Blog

“What you people do is child abuse! You should be ashamed of yourselves!” a woman screamed at me while I was engaged in evangelism at a college campus.  I was genuinely confused so I asked her, “What exactly should I be ashamed of?” She fired back, “Hell! Telling little children they might go to hell traumatizes them!”  I’ll admit this scares me! It’s almost too difficult to imagine the possibility of being in agony not just for a while, …

The Catholic Church teaches us what actions are gravely sinful and must be avoided so we do not forsake our salvation.Once, I was talking with a poised young Protestant woman who was adept at citing the Bible. The topic of James 2 and its insistence that a man is not justified by “faith alone” came up, to which she quickly responded,“Of course, we are saved by faith alone. But true faith is never alone. Saving faith in Christ is always accompanied by good works. The works aren …

The Christian response to sin is always necessary, but it need not be dire. For even before we turn back to God, he draws near to us, the sinner. And, if we allow him, God can use even our failings and faults to his glory and for our good. Romans 8:28 says that “all things work for good for those who love God,” and St. Thomas says this includes even our sins, for “God makes all things work together for their good to the extent that if they deviate and stray from …

It is an almost impossible question: What would you include or exclude if you were creating your own religion? What do you prefer to see in your Church unboxing, as you might prefer in a cosmetics or shoe unboxing? What would you click away from? The word religion necessarily conjures up the idea of a system of beliefs and practices that we do not, indeed cannot, make up. And with rare exceptions among genuine psychopaths or the most ardent ideologues, even people who explicitly eschew est …

Can you lose your salvation?Some Protestants believe in the doctrine of “Eternal Security” and would say no.Catholics take a different view.Apologist Karlo Broussard tells us Galatians 5:4 is a go-to text for Catholics when it comes to defending the belief that Christians can lose their salvation:You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.Notice that St. Paul says the Galatians were “severed from Christ” and that t …