Purify Your Bride

I am going our camping with the family for a while. Please feel free to comment on anything but I won’t reply for a while.

We have seen Europe become post-Christian. Why did it happen? There are a number of theories. People have noted a series of steps from sentimentalism to relativism to secularism to atheism. But why? Why did Europe go down that road? It is important because America seems like it is headed the same way. Sure it [...]

I noticed that some guy called Catholic Champion has written a response to TurretinFan’s post. He does an OK job. A bit to much of matching insult for insult but he makes good points. Most of the quotes are just ECF’s saying nice things about scripture. It is a classic straw man. Mark was not [...]

This reply became long so I made it a post.
I am enjoying your blog, I assume that I am welcome as a protestant, and a reformed one at that! ;)
Of course you are welcome. I am glad when anyone enjoys what I write.
First- the authority would not be the ‘rookie’, but the Bible to [...]

Found an interesting article linked in the comments of this thread. It talks about the nature of knowledge and specifically the ideas of a guy named Polanyi.
One of the central elements of the early modern attempt to reformulate knowledge and thereby extricate it from the tyranny of tradition was the attempt to reduce all [...]

Mark Shea has a great post on the perspicuity of Scripture. He makes some very good points. Sometimes he writes so well it makes me wonder why I bother trying. But that is another issue.
I did feel he was being a little harsh on protestants. He makes it sound like the idea is just silly. [...]

How do we get saved? It is an important question. When people ask it we need to give them the right answer. But how central should that question be to our evangelical activity? For many protestants it means everything. They teach that you are saved by making a one-time commitment to Jesus. Then they focus [...]

Mark Shea posts a long quote from Chesterton about monotheism and polytheism. He essentially argues that it is most reasonable to believe that most religion started out as believing in one God. These beliefs tended to get corrupted over time into polytheism as people tended to assume different images of God were actually different gods. [...]

I was reading a book called the Power of the Powerless. It is about a man who grew up with a severely disabled brother. One thing I found interesting was when he connected the 12 step program in AA to the mentally handicapped. Step one of the program is to admit you are powerless over [...]

Dave Armstrong has a post on conscience. It is a topic that has interested me for a long time. When I came into the church I knew I had to change my thinking. had to accept the Catholic position on a number of doctrinal points. That was hard. But what I didn’t realize is [...]

The news about the pope’s broken wrist is sad. Broken bones take so long to heal at his age so I am sure he will suffer. The thing I wonder about is the process he uses for writing. My understanding is he used to write all his stuff out by hand in German. Then some [...]

When thinking about Pope Benedict’s’ encyclical it becomes very difficult to put your finger on just what he is saying. What seems to confuse things is he does what everyone should do. He puts God at the center of his thinking on politics and social justice. It is confusing because we live in a nominally [...]

I made a long reply to Ken on David Waltz’ blog. It didn’t seem to post so I copied it here. Ken’s words are purple. Mine are in black:
We have sufficient knowledge without claiming infallible knowledge or living under the burden that RCC apologetic Newman style seeks to create, “how do you know you have [...]

A question for any Sola Scriptura believer. How can you teach you children and grandchildren to follow to discern true teachers from false ones? What can you tell them. Just follow the bible and pray? How many people end up in false churches that way. You can warn them about error you know. Don’t become [...]

One thing that gets lost in this whole creation debate is just how beautiful the science of evolution is. Really, the way genetic reproduction has built into it the ability to diversify a species and the effect it has of actually improving the species over time. It is an awesome system. When you look at [...]