Christianity

Morality Is Not Hate

February 26, 2011February 26, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Fr. Mark Hodges –
This week, U.S. Attorney General Holder announced Obama’s decision not to uphold the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which was passed by a bipartisan overwhelming majority and signed by Bill Clinton in 1996. Significantly, the Attorney General described anti-sodomy beliefs as “animus,” which means “vehement emnity,” “hatred” or “ill will.”

This echoes Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s anti-Christian view, stated in a Supreme Court decision upholding the ejection a Christian legal group for not allowing open homosexuals in leadership positions, that “Condemnation of same-sex intimacy is, in fact, a condemnation of gay people,” and “Our (Supreme Court) decisions decline to distinguish between status and conduct.” (By this reasoning, if you don’t support gluttony, you “condemn” overweight people.)

The ACLU has hailed the Obama Administration’s decision as “the tipping point in the gay rights movement.” Indeed, it may be. It is certainly yet another turn toward moral insanity, as the Fathers and Mothers of the Church predicted, when the world calls evil “good” and good “evil.” [Read more…]

The Catholic Church and the Left

February 20, 2011February 21, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Jack Kerwick –
My pastor’s homily was but the latest confirmation of that what many an astute observer has long observed: the “progressivism” of secular leftism has made sizable inroads into the Catholic Church. This is no mean feat. In fact, the significance of the left’s infiltration into this institution has gone largely unnoticed.

Whatever one may think of its theology and ecclesiology, the cold heart fact of the matter is that the Catholic Church is not just one more institution among others. Structurally and doctrinally, it is the emblem par excellence of the ancient world, a continual reminder to our generation that its life did not begin yesterday, and that Western civilization would be unrecognizable, and probably nonexistent, without it, the Catholic Church reminds us as well that we are living off of a cultural capital that was millennia in the making. Its unabashed affirmation of the centrality of tradition to right conduct, its hierarchical conception of authority, its exclusion of females and homosexuals from the priesthood, and its demand that its clergy take a vow of celibacy are some of the more salient respects in which the Catholic Church has not only distinguished itself from the leveling impulses of our age, but resisted them. [Read more…]

The Art of Living: Patience and Perseverance

February 8, 2011February 9, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Edward P. Sri –

How do you respond when “bad things” happen to you? When you experience disappointment or setbacks? When you are hurt by something someone said?

When experiencing sorrow, we might be tempted to close in on ourselves. We might allow negative emotions to gnaw at us. We might fail to be attentive to others’ needs because we are so preoccupied with our troubles. We might also become sluggish in our responsibilities, not giving the best of ourselves at work and with our family.

Some people simply are not pleasant to be around when they experience sorrow. They become gloomy and grumpy, and might even let their frustrations out on others.

Human beings cannot escape suffering in this world. However, the way we face life’s sorrows is a question of moral character. Do we allow sorrow to dominate our existence? [Read more…]

Debunking the Galileo Myth

January 30, 2011January 31, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Dinesh D’Souza – (Townhall)
Many people have uncritically accepted the idea that there is a longstanding war between science and religion. We find this war advertised in many of the leading atheist tracts such as those by Richard Dawkins, Victor Stenger, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens. Every few months one of the leading newsweeklies does a story on this subject. Little do the peddlers of this paradigm realize that they are victims of nineteenth-century atheist propaganda.

About a hundred years ago, two anti-religious bigots named John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White wrote books promoting the idea of an irreconcilable conflict between science and God. The books were full of facts that have now been totally discredited by scholars. But the myths produced by Draper and Dickson continue to be recycled. They are believed by many who consider themselves educated, and they even find their way into the textbooks. In this article I expose several of these myths, focusing especially on the Galileo case, since Galileo is routinely portrayed as a victim of religious persecution and a martyr to the cause of science. [Read more…]

The Sheep and the Goats: Work and Service to Others

January 29, 2011January 31, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Jordan Ballor –
In the parable of the sheep and the goats (Matt. 25:31–46), Jesus differentiates between those who have done good to others and those who have not. The king, taking the place of Christ in the parable, says that “whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” Whatever good was done was counted as being done to the king, and whatever bad was done was counted the same way. And on this basis the king separates the righteous sheep and the unrighteous goats. The goats “go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” It is natural to think that the good the sheep do to others (“I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink…”) refers to special acts of kindness, things that are only done occasionally and usually within a charitable context.

Lester DeKoster, in his book Work: The Meaning of Your Life—A Christian Perspective, provides a refreshing understanding of this parable. He writes that the good Jesus refers to includes these special acts of charity, but also refers to the service we do every day within the context of work. [Read more…]

A culture exposed

January 27, 2011January 29, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Mike Aquilina –
We’ve come a long way, baby. And we’ve ended up back where we started before the rise of Christianity. In the Church’s infancy, the age of the Fathers, abortion and infanticide were commonplace events, requiring little deliberation. Archeology has yielded us a rare glimpse at the inner life of ordinary people in this time. We have a letter from a pagan businessman in which he wrote home to his pregnant wife, amid the usual endearments: “If you are delivered of a child [before I come home], if it is a boy, keep it, if a girl discard it.”

Indeed, most pagan cultures considered it a duty to place “defective” newborns on the dunghills at the edge of town, where birds of prey could pick them apart. Most families interpreted the word “defective” broadly, to include female children as well as those with disabilities or disfigurement. Plato and Aristotle commended the practice, and the Roman historian Tacitus said it was “sinister and revolting” for Jews to forbid infanticide.

Yet these practices created a crisis for pagans. Abortion and infanticide led to low fertility rates, high maternal mortality, a shortage of marriageable women, and an absence of familial care for the elderly. [Read more…]

Why a Christian Anthropology Makes a Difference

January 18, 2011January 20, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Peter Kreeft –
It is simply impossible to agree on ethics, on how to act, on what is good and what is not, if you disagree about metaphysics or anthropology. And since ethics is unavoidable, so is anthropology.

Of the two words in the term “Christian anthropology,” I assume that I don’t need to define the word Christian because the Church has been doing that for two thousand years – they’re called creeds. But what about anthropology?

By anthropology I mean simply a logos about anthropos, a theory or philosophy about mankind or human nature. I don’t mean the empirical science of anthropology. Everyone, absolutely everyone, needs a philosophical anthropology, especially everyone in the medical profession. But not everyone needs to be a scientific anthropologist, or to have an anthropologist, as everyone does need to have a physician. Everyone needs a physician, but not everyone needs a physicist. [Read more…]

Neutering God

January 14, 2011January 16, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Mark Tooley – It’s a wonderful mercy that much of the more extreme elements of radical feminist theology in the churches peaked in the 1990s and have since faded. The high tide of radical feminist theology was the 1993 ecumenical Re-Imagining Conference, endorsed by nearly all the Mainline Protestant denominations or their women’s agencies, where speakers condemned traditional Christianity as patriarchal and instead acclaimed ancient feminine deities like Astarte, Isis, and Athena. God was also commonly called “Sophia,” based on the Greek word for wisdom. There was a special altar call for lesbians, not for repentance, but for acclamation. A milk and honey ritual replaced the traditional Eucharist. [Read more…]

Bill O’Reilly Needs No-Spin Truth: Child in the Womb is Fully Human!

January 14, 2011January 16, 2011 by Orthodox Editors

by Jennifer Hartline – The No-Spin Zone is once again in need of some actual truth. I tuned in on Friday night to hear Bill O’Reilly read a letter from a viewer in New York who asked him why he keeps referring to the fetus as a “potential human being.” This viewer reminded Bill that as a Roman Catholic, he should know better! How absolutely correct. O’Reilly, however, responded this way:

“I’m absolutely factually correct when I say a fetus is a potential human being and no one can deny that. I respect your opinion but until you become a Supreme Court Justice, it remains your opinion, your belief. I can’t run this program based upon my religious beliefs, so I try to put up arguments based on facts and I believe we are successful in doing that.”

Bill, in that one small paragraph you have gone so very, very wrong in so many ways.

It is not “factually correct” to say that a fetus is a “potential human being.” For starters, it isn’t scientifically correct. The fetus is an unrepeatable, unique human child, created from the joining of a woman’s egg and a man’s sperm, possessing a brand new DNA never before seen in the world. [Read more…]

What Would You Do With Your Life If You Knew You Could Not Fail?

January 13, 2011November 15, 2018 by Orthodox Editors

by Anthony Davar –

What thoughts and fears are keeping you from starting or achieving your goal, and moving forward? Those who succeed and those who fail in life have the same fears, but the successful go forward with action despite their fears. Courage is not the absence of fear, but doing what is right despite one’s fears. […]

Talking with some dear friends recently, I asked “What one thing would you do with your life if you knew you could not fail?” The answers were inspiring. See if you find your life’s desire among them: [Read more…]