Choose a topic from Vol 1:

God

God's existence known by reason
Nature of God
Providence of God and Problem of Evil

Man

Nature of man
Existence and nature of the soul
Immortality of the soul
Destiny of the soul
Freewill of man

Religion

Nature of religion
Necessity of religion

The Religion of the Bible

Natural religion
Revealed religion
Mysteries of religion
Miracles
Value of the Gospels
Inspiration of the Bible
Old Testament difficulties
New Testament difficulties

The Christian Faith

The religion of the Jews
Truth of Christianity
Nature and necessity of faith

A Definite Christian Faith

Conflicting Churches
Are all one Church?
Is one religion as good as another?
The fallacy of indifference

The Failure of Protestantism

Protestantism erroneous
Luther
Anglicanism
Greek Orthodox Church
Wesley
Baptists
Adventists
Salvation Army
Witnesses of Jehovah
Christian Science
Theosophy
Spiritualism
Catholic intolerance

The Truth of Catholicism

Nature of the Church
The true Church
Hierarchy of the Church
The Pope
Temporal power
Infallibility
Unity
Holiness
Catholicity
Apostolicity
Indefectibility
Outside the Church no salvation

The Catholic Church and the Bible

Not opposed to the Bible
The reading of the Bible
Protestants and the Bible
Bible Only a false principle
The necessity of Tradition
The authority of the Catholic Church

The Church and Her Dogmas

Dogmatic truth
Development of dogma
Dogma and reason
Rationalism
The Holy Trinity
Creation
Angels
Devils
Man
Sin
Christ
Mary
Grace and salvation
The Sacraments
Baptism
Confirmation
Confession
Holy Eucharist
The Sacrifice of the Mass
Holy Communion
Priesthood
Matrimony
Divorce
Extreme Unction
Judgment
The Millenium
Hell
Purgatory
Prayer for the Dead
Indulgences
Heaven
The resurrection of the body
The general Judgment
The End of the World

The Church in Her Moral Teachings

Veracity
Mental restriction
Charity
Ecclesiastical censures
Liberty
Index of Prohibited Books
Persecution
The Inquisition
Jesuits
Catholic Intolerance
Protestant services
Freemasonry
Cremation
Gambling
Prohibition of drink
Sunday Observance
Fasting
Celibacy
Convent life
Mixed Marriages
Birth control

The Church in Her Worship

Holy Water
Genuflection
Sign of the Cross
Images
Liturgical ceremonial
Spiritual Healing
The use of Latin
Devotion to Mary
The Rosary
The Angelus
Devotion to the Saints
The worship of relics

The Church and Social Welfare

Poverty of Catholics
Catholic and Protestant countries
The Church and education
The Social Problem
The Church and Capitalism
The Church and the Worker
Socialism

Cremation

1134. Why does the Catholic Church forbid cremation?

It was a pagan practice which Christians avoided from the very beginning. In the third century we find Christian writers, such as Minucius Felix, warning Christians against imitating the practice, and bidding them retain the custom of earth burial. In comparatively recent times Atheists and irreligious materialists have reintroduced it in order to destroy Christian belief and to impress in an imaginative way the doctrine that all is over at death. This, in itself, would be enough to justify the Church in her refusal to accept a practice credited with such closely associated ideas opposed to the doctrine of immortality. But there are many other reasons. It is opposed to human instinct and the better sentiments of the human heart. Filial piety protests against such treatment of, say, a deceased mother. Christian reverence for the dead also protests. The body that has been anointed in baptism and that has been the temple of the Holy Spirit during life, should not be treated as so much offal or refuse, but should be allowed to disintegrate according to the ordinary laws of nature in God's earth. Again, the whole liturgy of the Catholic Church for Christian burial, from time immemorial, is adapted to earth-burial, and she cannot be expected to change her sacred liturgy with fads of the times. If a Catholic is cremated, he forfeits the privileges of such Catholic burial, a liturgy of great benefit to the soul which inhabited that body. The man who does not bother about such things, and holds that once one is dead that is the end of it, and that nothing else matters, is saying just what the advocates of Cremation hoped that he would say. It is good to be buried in the Catholic way, in consecrated ground. That is the proper place for a Christian. We can add to these reasons the medico-legal aspect of the case. Cremation destroys all signs of violence or of poison, and thus prevents exhumation and medical examination for the detection of crime. Many murders have been discovered by such examination after burial, and if Cremation became a general practice, it would be an easy way out for the poisoner and murderer.

1135. Is it a sin against the law of God to support Cremation?

The natural law of morality does not forbid it, nor has God directly given a positive law in the matter. It is a disciplinary law of the Catholic Church, and a very grave one. The Church could suspend the law, and permit Cremation in certain circumstances, as in the case of an epidemic or in war time. But normally she insists upon retaining the law, and all Catholics are obliged to observe it. The Church speaks with the authority of God, and it is God who forbids Cremation through His Church. Any Catholic who would violate the will of the Church in this matter would, by the very fact, be violating the will of God.

1136. Does not the Church oppose Cremation because she knows that it renders any idea of a resurrection impossible?

No. Cremation does not affect the question of the resurrection. Cremation means but a more rapid separation of the elements of the body, and even if the ashes be scattered to the winds, God can quite easily reassemble those elements. What is impossible to us is not impossible to God. Remember that there is no such thing as the absolute destruction of matter. There can be merely a transformation of matter. However many changes matter may go through, it is always there, still in existence. And the God, who created matter, can easily transform it back again into the bodies which it formed previously. No matter how men treat human bodies, or where they put them, some day they will all rise again.

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