Radio Replies Vol 3 - Catholic Apologetics Online

That leads to an insoluble difficulty. For example, good Seventh Day Adventists are perfectly convinced that they are meeting and worshipping in the name of Christ. But we Catholics have the same conviction concerning our own religion. On your principles, both Churches would be the "true Church." But Seventh Day Adventists teach that the Pope is the "Beast" and "Antichrist," whilst Catholics believe him to be the Vicar of Christ on earth. If both are equally the true Church, Christ is teaching through His Church contradictory doctrines. The same thing applies all around. The Salvation Army says that baptism is not necessary; the Baptists say that it is necessary, but only for adults; the Anglican Church says that it is necessary, even for infants also. Are all these equally giving the truth to mankind in the name of Christ? It is impossible.

You have no need to believe either of them, taking them merely as educated men. There are educated atheists! Were someone to ask you whether he should believe an educated Protestant minister or an educated atheist, you would advise him to believe the Protestant minister. And you would be influenced by the thought, not of their education, but of the teaching they represented. Knowing Christianity to be true, you would prefer it to atheism. The same principle must be applied in the case you give. Apart from their relative education, you must consider the religions represented by the Protestant minister and the Catholic priest. But I must warn you that the Protestant minister really represents only his own views. No Protestant Church has any official body of doctrines which it can impose even upon its own ministers. But the Catholic priest does not give merely his own views. He speaks in the name of that vast international Catholic Church which alone can trace herself back to Christ, and which alone speaks as conscious of a divine commission to teach all mankind.

Your realization that the Catholic Church is the true Church is due to God's enlightening grace; and as a natural consequence any non-Catholic form of religion must seem inadequate and unable to satisfy the needs of your soul.

I admit that the Catholic Church imposes many obligations ignored by other Churches. But how can the true religion of a crucified Master be a comfortable one from a natural point of view? If human nature has to be sanctified, many of its natural inclinations must be mortified. So our Lord said, "If any man will come after Me, let him take up his cross and follow Me." You see, He does not deny that it means a cross. Yet, knowing the power of the grace He gives us, He says, "My yoke is sweet, and My burden light." It is a yoke, and it is a burden; but the one who courageously accepts the obligations of a Catholic will find such peace of soul and patience that it is more than worth while. Thus our Lord says, "My peace I give unto you - not as the world gives peace do I give peace." The world offers us the peace of earthly comfort. The peace of Christ is not that, but it is something far loftier and far more precious. You do not think that you have the courage to take up the cross of becoming a Catholic. Of yourself you have not. But God will supply for your lack of courage if you sincerely ask for additional strength. St. Paul says, "I can do all things in Him who strengthens me." That is true for all of us. So I advise prayer, earnest, fervent, confident, and persevering. And God will give you the graces you need.

You should go to the nearest Catholic rectory and ask the priest to instruct and prepare you for your reception into the Church, or at least to arrange for your instruction. He will do so gladly.

Yes, as the various Books left the hands of the original writers. Various texts in the Bible itself say that they are spoken or written with the authority and under the influence of God Himself. Moreover, the supernatural character of the Bible stands out in vivid contrast when compared with the teachings of other religious documents. The fact also that the Jews always accepted the Old Testament as the Word of God, and that Christians have also accepted both Old and New Testaments for so many centuries argues to the truth of their divine inspiration. For such a conviction cannot be due to any merely human influence. Nor must we appeal only to the fact of belief in the Bible by so many diverse peoples, including men of the greatest intelligence. The Bible has had the most extraordinary effect upon the lives of men, giving rise to spiritual experiences such as no other books have occasioned. It is not that the Bible has produced a fleeting condition of religious exaltation only. It has produced permanent transformations of character which are facts to be accounted for just as the facts of chemistry or geology or of any other science. That the Bible should have such an extraordinary effect as compared with other books is intelligible if it is the Word of God; not otherwise. Finally, the Catholic Church, with her infallible teaching authority, teaches that the Bible is inspired and that it is indeed the Word of God. And she also tells us what Books comprise the Bible.

It is true that Catholics are forbidden to read Protestant Versions of the Bible. Sacred Scripture is so important, and is entitled to such reverence that the Catholic Church permits to her subjects only such translations as she herself is able to guarantee to be substantially correct. English-speaking Catholics have their own Douay Version provided for their use. The Protestant scholar Scrivener said of the Douay Version, "Its scrupulous fidelity and exactness are its best recommendation. It is an act of justice to recognize that none of us has ever been able to reproach its translators with any willful alteration of the Scriptures." Catholics are obliged in conscience, therefore, to use the Catholic, and not the Protestant Version. This is a disciplinary law of the Church to which they owe obedience; and violation of that law is, of course, sinful.

That is not true. No Catholic can attend Mass on Sundays without hearing the appointed sections of Scripture. Private reading of Scripture is not of obligation with Catholics, though it is recommended as a devotional practice, and fulfilled by many.

How then did multitudes of Christians manage through so many centuries before the invention of the printing press, when it was impossible for them all to secure copies? They were not the worse Christians for that. They were taught by the Catholic Church. And the Catholic Church still teaches the Christian religion to her subjects with such success that Catholics have much clearer, more definite, and more accurate notions of Christianity than any of those who rely only on their own reading of the Bible.

We can know all that is necessary to believe and to do by being taught by that Catholic Church which Christ sent to teach all nations. It is not necessary to read Scripture in order to obtain this knowledge; and those who do read Scripture, making it the sole source of their knowledge, more often than not do not succeed in learning the essentials of Christianity. Those who maintain the necessity of reading the Bible limit the efficacy of Christianity in an impossible way. For thus millions and millions of Christians could not have known the essentials of Christianity before the invention of the printing press in the fifteenth century; and the illiterate could never have a chance of knowing the truths necessary for salvation, owing to their inability to read! The reading of Scripture is not, and never was intended by Christ to be man's guide in the great affair of salvation. He intended man's guide to be the teaching Church He founded and commissioned to teach all men in His name. And men have ever been able to turn to the Catholic Church for the necessary information in all ages.

That is an unsound principle. Many men fail to understand the true meaning of the Bible, and still more read wrong meanings into it. Thus St. Peter says that there are many things in Scripture hard to be understood which the unlearned and unstable wrest to their own destruction. The very fruits of such private interpretation should be sufficient proof that God could never have intended such a method. For men have made the Bible support the most opposite doctrines and have established hundreds of distinct and irreconcilable sects, each claiming to represent the true religion of Christ. God could never have intended a principle which would lead to such chaos.

The passage excludes the very conclusion you wish to draw from it. The Berean Jews are commended as opposed to the Thessalonian Jews because the Berean Jews at least listened to the Gospel and examined references to the Scriptures where the Thessalonians would not give any attention, but persecuted the preachers of the Gospel of Christ. But the passage you quote commends their eager interest, not their searching of the Scriptures as such. Nor can the passage possibly be interpreted as favoring private interpretation as a guide to truth. The Berean Jews turned to the Scriptures to see if what was said of Christ as the Messiah was true. Yet with what result? The very next verse after the one you quote tells us that "many indeed believed." Many, not all, of those who so eagerly scanned the Scriptures, discovered the truth and received the grace of the Christian faith. Those who failed to believe did not profit much by their reliance on private interpretation. Their decision for themselves was erroneous! No. Private interpretation is not a sure guide to the truth, and Christ wisely established an infallible Church to be the guide of men in matters of religion. The Jews of Berea who were converted accepted wholeheartedly and persevered in the teaching of the Apostles.

Neither they nor I have any right to adopt any interpretation of the Bible which is opposed to that officially taught by the Catholic Church. The Bible itself says that no Scripture is of private interpretation, and also that the Church is the "pillar and ground of truth." The idea that each man has a right to his own private interpretations of Scripture is anti-Scriptural.

The last words you quote do not qualify the preceding verse as you think. There is no doubt whatever that St. Peter warns against private interpretation in verse 20, giving the reason in verse 21. The sense is as follows: "Do not presume to think you may privately interpret Scripture for yourself. If Scripture were merely the result of natural human thought, it would be different. But it is not the result of merely human thought. The holy writers were inspired by God-and it is the Spirit of God, not your own reasoning, which can dictate the true sense." That Spirit of God operates through the Catholic Church, the appointed and authentic religious guide of men. In the same Epistle, III., 16, St. Peter obviously shows that he was opposed to private interpretation when he says that there are many things in Scripture hard to be understood, and which the unlearned and unstable wrest to their own destruction.

By what test do you decide that it is really the Holy Spirit leading you? How do you know that you do not just think what you want to think, and then persuade yourself that it must be right because you think it, and that your opinion must be the voice of the Holy Spirit? Other people, just as sincere, arrive at other conclusions. Why would it be wiser to accept your verdict rather than theirs? All kinds of strange religions have been given to the world by men who have declared with the utmost confidence that the Holy Spirit is responsible for their ideas. St. John warns us: "Believe not every spirit, but try the spirits, if they be of God: because many false prophets are gone out into this world." And he adds, "He that heareth not us, is not of God. By this we know the Spirit of Truth and the spirit of error." 1 Jn. IV., 6. St. John appeals to the teaching of the Apostles as constituting the teaching Church - that Catholic Church of which Christ said, "If a man will not hear the Church, let him be as the heathen." That Church we Catholics hear and obey.

In very many isolated passages of Scripture he could certainly do so. In a great many passages he would scarcely be able to do so. In many others he would have no chance at all. There is no doubt whatever that the Bible is one of the most difficult books to understand. One needs a vast knowledge of ancient languages, history, and customs; and must be quite at home with Hebrew and Greek allegorical, metaphorical, and typical expressions, quite apart from the spiritual insight required to penetrate the loftiest mysteries. How many individuals are thus qualified? The untrained lack the historical and philological formation necessary to appreciate the true sense of what is written, and therefore make isolated texts mean what they wish, without adverting to either context or parallel passages. In the "Merchant of Venice" Shakespeare puts upon the lips of Bassanio the famous words, "In religion, what damned error, but some sober brow will bless it, and approve it with a text."

That would not be possible, for Christian doctrine in its totality is not to be found in Scripture. Much of Christian doctrine is contained not in Scripture but in tradition; and a clear understanding of Christian doctrine requires in many cases the precise definitions of the Catholic Church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Not all Catholic doctrines are to be found in the Bible. But none of them is opposed to any teaching of Scripture. Some Catholic doctrines are found directly recorded in Scripture; others are logically derived from teachings recorded there; others are founded upon divine tradition. Scripture itself guarantees divine tradition to be a sound source of doctrine. Thus St. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians, "Brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which you have learned, whether by word or by our epistle." 2 Thess. II., 14. The traditions which the early Christians learned by word, and which were not included in the New Testament writings, have been preserved in the Catholic Church.

You cannot separate the two like that. It is true that Catholics are guided by what their Church teaches. It would not be true to say or imagine that they are not guided by the Bible; for all that is taught in the Bible is included in the teaching of the Catholic Church. Any notion that there is opposition between the teachings of the Catholic Church and the Bible is due to either a wrong idea of Catholic teaching, or of the meaning of Sacred Scripture.

You would not have the Bible save for the Catholic Church. Also, not all that God has revealed is contained in the Bible. And yet more, the Bible cannot be a sufficient guide when it requires another guide to explain its meaning. Remember that the first Christians owed their faith, not to the Gospels, but to the Church. The divine authority of the Church was the first fact as far as men were concerned in the order of proof. Before a line of the New Testament was written it was the Church that preached Christ to the first converts. Jesus commanded no writings, but told the Apostles to preach the truth, saying, "Teach all nations." And He promised them, "He who hears you, hears Me." The Apostles had to win belief in themselves and in their mission before they could win belief in their Master. It was on their testimony that the first converts believed in Christ. Had you lived then, and had you gone to one of the Apostles demanding proof from the written Word, he would have been quite unable to provide proof from Gospels which had not yet been written! He would have said to you, "Such is the unanimous teaching of the Apostles as we have received it from Christ." And either you would have accepted the teaching authority of the Church represented by the Apostles, or you would have been without the Christian faith.

Of course, granted our possession now of the New Testament, we must accept all that is written there in the sense intended by God, and nothing which contradicts that sense. But the New Testament contains only part of the Christian message to the world. There are doctrines over and above those contained in the written fragmentary Books of the New Testament. And for such doctrines we must rely upon the traditional teachings of the Catholic Church - traditions preserved from the very beginning.

No. We have no other records of the exact words of Christ save those contained in the New Testament.

Besides the Bible, the Catholic Church recognizes the divinely safeguarded tradition which has been preserved and transmitted in the Church. You must remember that Christ Himself established tradition as the main vehicle by which His teachings would be preserved in the Church and communicated to men. He did not expressly order any Gospels to be written. He demanded faith in His doctrines as they were preached by word of mouth. Before the New Testament was written, the only rule of faith was the oral teaching of the Apostles. Later on, part of the knowledge possessed by the Apostles was committed to writing, but part only. Not all revealed truth was written down. The divine teaching has been preserved and handed down completely in the Catholic Church, both by that section written in the New Testament, and by that section of revealed truth which was not committed to writing, but which is declared by the living voice of the Church. For example, which Books of Scripture are canonical, the very inspiration of those Books, the teachings on infant baptism, or on the matter and form of the Sacraments, and many other things, are known to us by the traditional and living voice of the Church only. But, asI have pointed out, Christ intended that, for He did not order anything to be written, but established His Church and sent it to teach all nations what He had revealed, and its applications in practice.

Because they were men of undoubted learning and holiness, and lived in times much nearer to the days of the Apostles than ourselves. Being men of learning, they knew the truly Christian outlook prevailing during the years immediately prior to their own age, and throughout the whole Church during their own lifetime. Being men of great holiness, their integrity in setting down the truth is above suspicion. And being in close proximity to the days of the Apostles themselves, they were ever so much better fitted than ourselves to judge the nature of Christianity as first given to humanity. Above all are the early Fathers worthy of credence when their independent writings are unanimous in declaring the teachings and practices of early Christianity. Any later teachings which will not harmonize with their verdict would obviously be a corruption of the Christian religion.

When I say that the New Testament is not the supreme authority, I am referring to it, not in itself, but as a source of doctrine to various individuals. As the Word of God, it possesses supreme authority in its right sense. But as individual readers are quite liable to get the wrong sense, they must be guided by the authority of the teaching Church if they desire certainty as to what the New Testament means. The authority of the Church is not; above that of Scripture; but it is above that of the individual judgment as to what Scripture means. Since the New Testament is of supreme authority in itself and in its right sense, I am justified in using it as proof. Then, too, when I am talking to people who profess to accept Scripture only, I am quite justified in showing that what they think to be in Scripture is not there; and also in showing them that many things are there to which they have never adverted. There is a difference between admitting that Scripture is the only authority; and making use of the only authority other people will accept.

No. We ask you to continue to believe in the Word of God, but completely; and therefore to believe in a Church that will not perish. For, according to the Word of God, Christ said, "I will build My Church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it." You must therefore believe in that imperishable Church; and the Catholic Church alone can be that Church.

That is not a correct presentation of the Catholic position. There is no question of the Catholic Church "arriving at" a true understanding of the Gospels. Before a line of them was written, Christ had established His Church, taught her His essential doctrines, sent the Spirit of Truth upon her at Pentecost, and commissioned her to go and to teach all nations orally and with authority, just as He had taught orally and with authority. Later on, under the inspiration of the same Holy Spirit, the Books of the New Testament were written. Now, as one and the same Holy Spirit could not contradict Himself, it is certain that nothing in the Gospels will contradict the official teachings of the Catholic Church. If independent people arrive at an interpretation of the Bible which conflicts with the official teaching of the Catholic Church, then they are mistaken, and have arrived at a wrong meaning.

They can be, and they are. But they are warned that their interpretation of what they read will be wrong unless it be in harmony with the teachings of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is the one safe guide as to what Scripture means.

No degree of merely natural mental fitness is a guarantee that one will be able to discern for himself the correct sense of all that is contained in the Bible. That should be evident from the conflicting conclusions at which even highly educated men arrive concerning its meaning. St. Paul says clearly, "We speak, not in the learned words of human wisdom, but in the doctrine of the Spirit, comparing spiritual things with spiritual. But the natural man perceiveth not these things which are of the Spirit of God; for it is foolishness to him, and he cannot understand, because it is spiritually examined." 1 Cor. II., 14. Natural intelligence is not capable of comprehending supernatural truth. And the teaching of the Catholic Church is the only real safeguard as to the meaning of Sacred Scripture. Ever we must come back to that in the end.

It is true that I can no more make you assimilate mentally and spiritually the true doctrine contained in Scripture thanI can make food nourish you when you yourself do not eat that food. But, as a qualified cook could prepare food for you better than you could prepare it for yourself, so I am able to put the truth of Scripture before you as you could never discover it for yourself. I at least have given years to the study of Scripture, both privately and under qualified professors, after a long training in cognate subjects. And I have the authentic decisions of the Catholic Church always at hand for constant reference. Would you say to a trained attorney, "You can no more interpret the law for me than eat my dinner for me"? Yet the interpretation of the revealed Law of God is more difficult than the interpretation of civil law. You must remember, too, that even though it is my duty to know the authoritative teachings of the Catholic Church, I am as subject to the authority of that Church as anyone else. I do not speak in my own name, but in that of the Catholic Church; nor do I ask others to do that which I am not obliged to do myself. It is not really a question of your being taught by me. We must both be taught by the Catholic Church.

You certainly cannot disprove it; and your own principles compel you to admit that you cannot. I can and do assert with absolute certainty that the Catholic Church teaches the truth.

I would not say because of superior intelligence or more accurate reasoning powers. Had you studied the same data, and had the same years of training as have been my lot, you might manifest much greater ability in dealing with the subject. Therefore, I base my assertion on better acquaintance with philosophy, history, Scripture, and theology-a knowledge I willingly restrict to the religious field. In addition to that, the light of faith, a faith justified by a solid rational groundwork, is of immense assistance. For it is a power of comprehension given by God, who can enlighten the mind interiorly to perceive the truth even as a human teacher can communicate intelligible light to his pupils.

It is difficult to follow your line of thought. Do you imagine that the moment a man makes a statement of his Christian Faith he must abandon a Christian way of life? Or that, if one attempts a Christian way of life, he is at once forbidden to make any statement of his Christian Faith? Christianity is a religion revealed by God to teach us the full truth about our eternal and supernatural destiny, and to give us the means of attaining that destiny through Christ who is the heart and soul of that religion. The effect of that religion, if we accept it, try to put its precepts into practice, and use its means of grace is a spiritual and Christian way of life midst our present circumstances and duties. And part of that way of life is our obligation to believe all that God has revealed because He has revealed it.

The Catholic Church agrees. We must not accept from fallible men what we are to believe; nor can the mere acceptance of any creed be essential Christianity. Yet, whilst essential Christianity is not the mere acceptance of a creed, the acceptance of a creed is essential to Christianity. For we must accept teachings essential to Christianity, and that means the acceptance of a creed. The creed to be accepted, of course, must not be one drawn up by fallible men. It must be presented to us by an infallible Church, acting in virtue of the power and protection of the Holy Ghost, as were the Apostles when they said of their decision, "It has seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us."

That is true. But the acceptance of a creed will not do that provided one lives up to the teachings of Christianity, fulfills its duties of worship, and obeys its laws. One who does this will find his religion full of vitality and dynamic. It is a mistake, however, to think that, because the mere acceptance of a creed is not enough, therefore, the acceptance of a creed is not necessary.

That is true; but it must remain Christianity. There are those who want to change its teachings who really want Christianity to be for a past age, and who desire to provide a new religion for this age. It is rather a mystery why they wish to retain the name of Christianity for their new set of teachings. Meantime, their very modernism robs Christianity of its vitality and dynamic. William Force Stead, a Protestant, has recently written in his book, "In the Shadow of Mt. Carmel," as follows: "While other Christian Communions have been sedulously bowing to the spirit of the age, with the studied politeness of a courtier, and with something of a courtier's eye to obtaining favors, the Roman Church stands erect and bows to no man." At its beginning Christianity was to the Jews a stumbling block, and to the Greeks foolishness. So it has remained. This modern world is full of Jews and Greeks. The modernist theologian turns to the Jew and says, "Look, we have removed the stumbling block"; and to the Greek, "Behold, we have removed the foolishness." But, somehow or other, in response to all this tampering with creeds and dogmas, Mr. Stead remarks that "the Jews and the Greeks are not very interested."

No one can object to any man thinking clearly, honestly, and comprehensively. But the one point you overlook is the propensity of men to think wrongly, either because they do not advert to all the relevant facts when they commence thinking, or because they wrongly imagine certain things to be facts which are not facts, or because they fail in logic during their process of thought. The real value of the creeds lies in their power to preserve men from falling into error through one or all of these causes.

They hinder one's progressing along wrong lines; and they exist precisely for that. But no sensible person wants to progress along wrong lines.

If one is free to believe the creeds mistaken, and does so, how could he be of any help in the approach to truth and reality? One does not help others towards the truth by giving them wrong explanations. And certainly Christ did not establish His Church for that perverse purpose. If the Catholic Creeds merely give what fallible men thought to be the truth about Jesus in other days, then they may not have represented the truth about Jesus at all. Such a statement is a denial of the infallible teaching authority of the Catholic Church; and no one who believes in the Church in the Catholic sense of the word could possibly accept such views.

Do you mean that we are to believe in a Christ about whom no definite statements can be made with any certainty at all? And why should we do even that much? Truly, modernism ends in a morass.

The Apostles' Creed is a summary statement of the main teachings of the Apostles. The Apostles themselves did not compose it. It was drawn up after their death, in order to embody in a brief rule of faith the substance of their teaching. The first and earliest forms of this Creed appear in the second century. But it went through various arrangements and reconstructions in order to exclude new errors and heresies, until it finally assumed the present form in the fifth century. There is no doubt as to its value and authority, nor as to the fact that its contents are derived from the preaching of the Apostles themselves.

I would not deny that human reason is capable of arriving at many natural aspects of eternal truth. Nor would I deny that the findings of previous generations provide a starting point for further discussions and discoveries by subsequent generations. But, in addition to aspects of eternal truth discoverable by reason, there are other aspects not discoverable by reason, and certainly not the fruit of natural mental development on the part of mankind. If they are known to men today, it is only because God Himself stepped in at a given moment in history and revealed them. Such, for example, is our knowledge of the Trinity of Persons in God, and of the fact that the Second Divine Person became man, appearing in our midst as Jesus Christ.

That is not surprising. I would be puzzled too. No sane and well-informed man could believe in dogmas or creeds opposed to what is really reasonable. But what is really reasonable is not to be identified with what ill-informed and unreasonable people may think to be reasonable.

The religion which is based upon the correct sense of the Bible is entirely compatible with sound reason. I hold no brief for the various forms of non-Catholic religion which men mistakenly believe to be in accordance with Scripture. Nor do I hold that even the right interpretation of the Bible will be in accord with what every man chooses to call the dictates of reason. Unreasonable propositions are often thought to be reasonable by the illogical and the untrained. Then, too, many people confuse the imagination with reason. But reason often demands the admission of things we cannot imagine. I have heard many a man commence a sentence with the words, "It stands to reason," and then go on to talk utter nonsense in the name of the reason he first invoked. The revelation of the Bible rightly understood will never conflict with reason rightly used.

Whoever put the idea into your head that Catholics are not allowed to think for themselves? Of course, they are allowed to think for themselves! God expects them to use the intelligence He gave them, and the Catholic Church expects it also. We priests are constantly urging our own people, "For the love of God, think!" On religious matters, however, when people begin to think wrongly, the Catholic Church says, "You must not think that, for what I teach on such subjects is the truth." Whilst people are free to think for themselves, they are not always free to think whatever they like. Christ certainly did not leave people free to think whatever they liked. He spoke with authority, saying, "You have heard it said . . . but I say unto you." He demanded that His listeners accept His teachings, whatever their own ideas might otherwise be. Christian faith is not faith in what one thinks out for oneself, but faith in what God has revealed through Christ and what is taught in the name of Christ by the Catholic Church.

Every man, who has not ceased to be human, "delights" in fairy tales, if they do credit to a creative imagination, and are well told. But to delight in fairy tales is not necessarily to believe them to be real descriptions of actual events. Nor have fairy tales anything to do with Catholicism as such. If ever a religion fitted in with common sense, it is Catholicism; and it is the only religion which does fit in with common sense. At the same time, it surpasses common sense insofar as the God with whom it is concerned surpasses finite and created man. A God on our own level, and able to do no more than we could do, would be no God at all. Meantime, unbelief is a domain reserved for people who think wrongly, or for those who, if they do think rightly, select unimportant affairs which have little bearing on religion and on the graver issues of life. The domain of unbelief is also reserved for people who do not think at all, as well as for minerals, vegetables, and animals. It includes all who cannot believe, and all who will not believe.

I do not know that these talks indicate a man who has ceased to think. But if you wish to speak of a fairy-tale mentality, what is the mentality of one who takes it for granted that a man who became a Catholic some twenty-five years ago ceased to think from that moment? You have no evidence whatever for that judgment. You believe it because you want to believe it, just as a child believes a toad to be a princess in disguise. Your interest in trying to explain away my becoming a Catholic, and your method of doing so, I quite understand. If the Catholic Church be true, it is most uncomfortable for those who do not accept it. Therefore, converts to that Church must be explained away. The easiest way to do this is to accuse them of utter brainlessness. And it is a consoling idea, because it contains an implicit compliment to your own superior powers of thought. But it doesn't work with the impartial, even though they themselves do not subscribe to Catholicism.

No man could study theology so well as to be led to abandon the Catholic Church. He would have studied it very badly, did he arrive at such a decision. But we can ask whether a Catholic has ever studied theology so deeply as to doubt and finally abandon the Catholic Church. As the question stands I say no. Deep study of theology as such could never lead from the Catholic Church. But other factors could enter into the case. A man could plunge into the deep study of theology, yet fail in piety and prayer, thus depriving himself of the influence of grace. That could be followed by a failure in humility and a tendency to isolated thinking with no allowance for the guidance of the Church. More and more such a man could consciously abandon himself to the dangers of self-sufficiency, until his eccentric subjectivism sapped his clear appreciation of essential obligations. It is easy to see that it would be possible for him to arrive at the wrong conviction that he should abandon the Catholic Church. And I believe that some men have been led by a badly regulated study of theology, coupled with neglect of grace and a failure in humility, to abandon the Catholic Church. They have got themselves into such a mental tangle that they no longer discern the true sense of Scripture, the verdict of history, and the demands of logic. But, even for them, the ultimate cause of their defection would lie, not in the intellectual, but in the moral sphere. And their loss of faith would not be free from sin.

By using his hands to throttle his victim the murderer is merely using a power given him by God. Reason can be used badly just as any other power. Human reason is not infallible. Every thought that comes into a man's head is not necessarily correct. It is absurd to believe that just because a man thinks a thing, it must necessarily be so. Though reason is a gift of God, it is no more exempt from submission to God's law than any other gift of God. And it is God's law that the human mind must accept what He declares to be true on the simple ground that He who is Truth itself has made the declaration. Man guiltily forgets his place, and proudly denies the obvious limitations of his finite intelligence, if he tells God that he doesn't think it true, and, therefore, will not believe it.

Not for thinking men. And if we restrict "all that one is told" to matters of religion, it is much easier to drop one's religious beliefs than to keep them; and having dropped them for want of thought, it is much easier to stay without them than to get them back. There is a mental laziness as well as bodily fatigue. And it takes no effort to take stones, vegetables, and animals for granted, and see nothing at all beyond them. You have but to hold your eyes open in order to see chalk-marks, but you have to be mentally alert to discern the sense of the writing on the wall. Again, it is easier to follow the lines of least resistance, obeying strong but blind instincts, than to adopt the Catholic program of self-control. Flippant and soft views of life are easier than serious and severer estimates.

I know the difficulties urged by all and sundry as motives for the refusal of submission to the Catholic Church. For the most part they are not proposed by reasonable and scientific men. The majority of the difficulties urged are based on guesswork, gratuitous assertions, contradictions in terms, errors in fact, and absurdities by the score. In nearly every case the objector has not even bothered to get right notions of the doctrine he wishes to assail. When he does get right notions, his objection falls to pieces.

Reason is the intellectual power possessed by men enabling them to distinguish between the true and the false, the good and the bad. But man can use his reason to good or bad purpose. So we have a sane use of reason, or a warped use of reason. Sane reason makes sure of its facts and the validity of its logic in its deductions from those facts. Warped reason jumps at conclusions that are convenient, without bothering to make sure of things taken for granted, or that it is observing the laws of logic. That concerns the true and the false. But reason also enables a man to distinguish between the good and the bad; and it can therefore be used on behalf of the good or the bad. For example, the doctor uses his reason to discover what will benefit his patient. That is a good use of reason. A murderer uses his reason to plan his crime, and to discover means of avoiding detection. That is a diabolical use of reason. Now the Pope applied the term "diabolical reasoning" to that use of the intelligence which is calculated to destroy faith and love of God, to destroy man's hope of eternal happiness, to set itself up as the supreme and self-sufficient guide, to offer men a materialistic destiny on this earth only, to deny the right of man to possess property sanctioned by God's commandment. "Thou shalt not steal." This use of reason to repudiate dependence on God and the obligation of His law is diabolical; for it is based on the very cry of Satan, "I will not serve."

Multitudes of scientific men are firmly convinced of the existence of the soul. They may not accept the fact as having been demonstrated by experimental science, though some do. But no really scientific men hold that "experimental science" is the only available means of discovering the truth. Sir Oliver Lodge claims to have experimental proof of the existence of the soul, not only in the living human body, but in a stateof separation from it. Yet even if you do not accept his verdict, "experimental science" can give not a vestige of proof that there is no soul. True scientists accept as proved all that experimental science has demonstrated. But they accept also many other things as certain both on the grounds of history and of reason. It is scientific to demand a proportionate cause in order to account for effects already known. And both physiologically and psychologically we have abundant evidence proving the existence of the soul.

Science has interested itself in psychical research based upon the sensibly manifested phenomena of spiritism in its various phases. Of these phenomena Lord Rayleigh, President of the British Association, said: "I find it difficult to believe the folly and fraud theory of these occurrences; but failing that one must admit the possibility of much that contrasts strongly with ordinary experience." Having a truly scientific temperament, he is a little more modest than those who know so much less.

The "other" world is not necessarily the "better" world. But we can let that go. It is certainly true that we do seriously accept different states in the next life, despite your inability to comprehend our doing so. You admit the fact that we do so, and also that it is beyond your comprehension. That is something. And as there is at least one thing certain despite your not being able to comprehend it, you will find, if you progress, that there are yet other things beyond your comprehension which are similarly true.

In order to prove by science that these subdivisions are myths, it is not enough to say that science has not established them. There was a time when science had not established the existence of Neptune. But that planet was not a myth. To gain your point you must show that science has positively proved that there is no other world, and no different phases of it. Until that is done you act in a very unscientific way when you deny them. At most you could say that they may or may not be.

But it is most unscientific to restrict all evidence to evidence of a particular kind, and to entertain a blind and credulous faith that nothing exists unless it can be discovered with a telescope or by chemical analysis. Speaking of this subject, Lord Rayleigh said, "Surely it is a proposition which I need not pause to refute that the lifelong beliefs of Newton, Faraday, and of Maxwell are inconsistent with the scientific habit of mind." Lord Kelvin said, "Science positively affirms creative power, which it compels us to accept as an article of faith."

It does not. And it cannot really deal with the question. Do you know what the Immaculate Conception means? It means that Mary the Mother of Christ was never contaminated by the stigma of original sin inherited from our first parents. You don't believe in original sin at all, nor in its derivation to mankind. Whilst, therefore, I believe in the Immaculate Conception of Mary, you believe in the immaculate conception of everybody; for you believe that nobody is contaminated by original sin.

Not always. But very often it is so. Reason has both extensive and intensive limits. It is limited as to the number of things it can know, and in the power of penetration it can bring to bear upon them. The specialist is a man who has had to abandon many avenues of knowledge in order to concentrate on a few things. And on his death-bed he himself would gladly admit that he does not know all about even the few things in which he specialized. Still the average man would not dispute the findings of the specialist. He would be indignant if any other average man disputed the views of the specialist. But in the field of religion he himself would feel free to air his views to all and sundry, though never had he specialized in either philosophy or theology. Instinctively he mistrusts his own knowledge and reasoning capacity in other matters, but not in religion. It is a peculiar phenomenon of the human being.

In what way?

If he repents at last there is one possible crime that he has not committed. For he has not died unrepentant. However we can let that go. It is a fact that, no matter what his crimes, a Catholic who dies repentant, and with the Sacraments of the Church, will save his soul. He will, of course, expiate his multiplied sins in purgatory; and will thus find that, though he has attained salvation, the multiplication of his sins was not a thing that did not matter. You may say, "But all the same, he is saved." But remember the conditions. I have said, "If he repents, and receives the Sacraments." That little "if" forbids presumption, and checks any tendency to throw oneself into a life of continued sin. For what man can say that he will have time to repent; or that he will suddenly develop the good dispositions necessary to correspond with such graces as God does offer him; or that his plan to receive the Sacraments at the last will be realized? All these considerations tend to make a man think. However if all the conditions are realized, a man will save his soul through God's mercy, no matter how many or great his crimes.

Apart from other factors his fate would depend on his degree of responsibility before God for his unbelief. If he had had no opportunity for sufficient study to discern the truth of the Catholic religion, or was so dense that through no fault of his own he could not perceive its truth despite an effort at impartial consideration, then he would not be held responsible for his unbelief by God. He would be judged on other factors.

It is difficult to believe that an intelligent man could regard himself as honest because he acknowledges his debts to his fellow men whilst he refuses to acknowledge any debt to God. However you suppose that he has led what he really believes to be an honest life. If by that you mean that he has never violated his conscience during the whole of his life in any serious matter, there is no need to believe that he is condemned to eternal torment. And, even if he has violated his conscience in such a way, he would be saved did he repent sincerely before death with the help of such graces as God would offer him. Where he would undoubtedly lose his soul would be in the case where he would persist in rejecting the Christian religion despite a conviction that it was indeed from God.

We do not for a moment believe that a believing bad Catholic can be saved. All we maintain is that a believing Catholic who has been bad can be saved provided he becomes good by repentance of his wickedness, and by reception of the grace of Christ before he dies. And that is a very different proposition. Nor do we say that an unbelieving good rationalist is lost. For if he is indeed good, then his unbelief is not his own fault; and we hold that God will not blame him for what is not really his own fault. Your conclusion that belief is more important than conduct is really meaningless. Belief is conduct. Belief and unbelief are merely ways of conducting oneself in the presence of a proposition offered for our consideration. If God declares a thing to be true, then it is most improper conduct to refuse to believe it. On the other hand, belief is correct conduct in such a case. This foolish division between belief and conduct seems to be based on the idea that kind conduct towards our fellow men in other matters justifies the outrageous conduct towards God of not caring in the least whether He has revealed any doctrines, or whether they are true or not.

Thomas Paine cannot strictly be called an infidel. He professed always a firm belief in God, and in the immortality of the human soul. On the very first page of his book attacking all revealed religion he declares that he believes in God, and hopes for eternal happiness. An infidel does not talk like that. His very writings, however, show that he never had any real understanding of the Christian religion, and that he never attained to the gift of faith in that religion as revealed by God. And he died without doing so, insofar as men can judge. He certainly expressed no recantation of his writings against Christianity, and probably died still under the delusion that he had good grounds both in fact and in reason for rejecting that form of religion. Men who mistake fallacies for sound reasoning are little likely to detect their own fallacies. But the chief trouble with Thomas Paine was his colossal ignorance of subjects upon which he took it for granted that he was well-informed. How responsible he was for this attitude before God must be left to God; as also the question of his ultimate fate.

There is no need to bring in the screams. Shortly before his death he asked for a priest, and sought reconciliation with the Catholic Church. The interpretation of his action is very difficult. Much exaggerated nonsense has been given out about Voltaire's dying dispositions by both supporters and opponents of the Christian religion. In one thing certainly Voltaire was sincere. He did not want to be refused Christian burial. But whether he was sincere in complying with the conditions required by the Church is hotly disputed. He never made a full and clear retraction of his blasphemous attacks on Christianity. And it is hard to believe that he really meant such professions of faith as he did make. A man who has indulged for years the habit of malicious mockery of religion does not change his mentality in a moment, unless by a miracle such as Voltaire certainly did not deserve. And it is quite possible that the fruit of a lifetime of deceptions was a last grim and tragic self-deception. But none of these cases proves opposition between reason and revelation, or that there is any conflict between science and the Catholic Faith.

It was given to man explicitly when God sent His Eternal and Only-begotten Son in human form as the Christ in order to give that more perfect revelation of Himself and of His plans for which the Old Testament manifestations were but a preparation.

There is no vicious circle. The proof of Christ's Divinity is drawn from quite other sources, independent of the doctrine of the Trinity.

God had no intention of revealing the doctrine of the Trinity in its fullness to the Jews generally prior to the coming of Christ. However, in the Old Testament, there are many veiled references to the Word of God and to the Spirit of God which could serve as a preparation to men of good will for the full teaching of the New Testament. But actually, although the possibility of the full truth could be inferred, nothing approaching proof could be adduced from the Old Testament without the additional light of the New Testament and Catholic teaching. The Jews, therefore, could not have attained to the knowledge of the Trinity we possess prior to the coming of Christ.

It would be a great mistake to imagine that to be the explanation of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. Men are, of course, incurably religious. And those without the true religion revealed by God almost of necessity invented religious theories which could not really transcend the human level. So we find male gods, female gods, and their progeny as part of the ancient pagan mythologies. I deny that this introduction of sex-life into the divinity was reasonable. But still it is intelligible. Yet these notions have nothing whatever in common with the Christian Trinity which is purely spiritual, and abstracts from sexual elements altogether. The notions of masculine and feminine cannot be applied to the First and Second Persons; and the Holy Spirit who proceeds from them both is not generated as a result of any "marital" union between them. The ideas you suggest have nothing in common with the Christian doctrine except the number three, and that certainly does not warrant the conclusion that the Trinity is nothing but a variant of the man, woman, and child principle.

I must reject your implication that, whilst the unitarian view is consistent, the trinitarian concept is inconsistent. Again, I must point out that there is no question here of pitting the personal thoughts of unitarians against the personal thoughts of trinitarians. The whole question must be one of objective fact. Did God reveal His trinitarian character to mankind? If so, then the Christian doctrine of the Trinity is right, to whatever other conclusions men's own thoughts may lead them.

The idea that the Trinity is a development of the male, female, and offspring principle is false. Nor can you contrast believers in the Trinity with those who think of God as one. Trinitarians believe absolutely in God as one. The three Divine Persons possess but one Divine Nature, and our doctrine of the Trinity insists most emphatically on the unity of the Godhead. Here precisely it differs from the pagan myths which, whatever their triad might be, absolutely denied the unity of God. If, however, you wish to contrast the trinitarian belief in three Divine Personalities in the one God with the unitarian denial of those three Personalities, then the trinitarians can surely claim to be right and that unitarianism is wrong.

That cannot be admitted. According to Egyptian mythology, Osiris is treacherously slain by a rival god, Set, and descends to the netherworld to become god of the dead. Isis, his sister-wife, posthumously gives birth to a child, Horus, who is the triumphant sun in the heavens avenging his father. Possibly the Egyptians used the male, female, and offspring idea in a primitive dramatization of the sun being slain at night by darkness and rising triumphantly to a new life in the morning. But again there is no resemblance to the Trinity save in the number three. The Christian doctrine was not the slow fruit of speculations based on existing Jewish or pagan ideas. It was the direct revelation of Christ. And to depict Him as a theorizer with other people's opinions is not to write history, but to indulge in fancies opposed to all available evidence.

The Christian doctrine of the Trinity means that there are three Divine Personalities possessing the one Divine Nature. The word itself, of course, is but the blending of the two words, "tri-unity." The idea of a unity containing within itself a multiplicity is not very difficult. A single human being is very complex if you begin to analyze him. New just as you have a human nature, God has a Divine Nature. But, where there are many men, there is but one God; and there can be only one Divine Nature. Yet God is the living God. There is a life in Him who is the Author of life; and life means activity. As you, for example, though silent and still, can be intensely active within yourself, able to be thinking of yourself, and forming an estimate of yourself, so God must be able to know Himself within Himself, and must be capable of a great love following His knowledge of the infinitely Beautiful and Good and True. But this knowledge and love within God must be identified with Him, yet in some way distinct from the source from which they proceed. His knowledge must be the child of Infinite Intelligence, and it must give rise to a Spirit of Infinite Love. And we are told by Christ that in the one God there is a Fatherhood, a Sonship, and a Holy Spirit of Love. And these make three personal relationships within the one Divine Nature.So we are bidden to baptize in the one name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.

Neither of your ideas can be applied to God. You are thinking in human terms which have only analogical application to God, and according to notions of successive priority which are excluded by the eternal simultaneity of God. Also you are attributing to the Divine Persons notions of will and of rights which are proper to one and the same Divine Nature possessed equally by all three Divine Persons, and which cannot be unequally distributed amongst those Persons. You must keep in mind that, if the Son is begotten by the Father, it is not by subsequent communication of being, but by an immanent eternal relationship of Nature. The successive idea that the Father exercised a Primal Will which led to the later origin of the Son is impossible in relation to God. So, too, is any talk of primordial rights in the Son to account for His derivation. The only reason for the Holy Trinity as revealed to us is to be found in the fact that the Divine Nature is what it is. God is the reason for His own existence and for all the conditions of that existence.

The idea that the Eternal Son could possibly be less perfect than the Eternal Father is absolutely opposed to Christian doctrine. Gradations of perfection are possible only amongst created natures in which limitations are possible. God is not a finite, limited, created Being. He is uncreated, and uniformly perfect in an infinite degree. There is no room for gradation of perfection amongst the uncreated Persons subsisting in the one uncreated Divine Nature.

You are right in calling it an age-old charge. And you can be quite sure that all the great minds of the ages have met the charge, and have discovered that there was nothing in it. Unity and multiplicity under the same aspects of comparison would, of course, involve contradiction. But not when they are not under the same aspects of comparison. I do not undertake to explain fully the mystery of the Trinity. Could I do so, it would no longer be a mystery. But the absence of contradiction can be shown. For the doctrine does not say that there are three Gods and yet one God; nor does it say that there are three Persons yet one only Person. It says that there is but one God and three Persons. Unity in plurality is not a contradiction. One tree with three branches makes but one tree. But we do not say that the one and the multiple in God are even equally absolute, as is the case with the tree and its branches. The Divine Nature is Absolute; the multiplicity is constituted by pure relations. The absolute exists in itself; the relative does not, but only in dependence upon the absolute. The charge of contradiction does not allow for these divergent aspects, and is, therefore, invalid. A man may or may not believe in the Trinity. But he speaks foolishly when he accuses those who do believe of an absurdity.

The Catholic Church does not exclude belief in a moderate and restricted material evolution. Things do evolve. But they have to "be" in order to evolve, and they secured their being by creation. We cannot, therefore, admit any form of the evolutionary theory which excludes God, or which denies dependence on God. In a well-understood system of evolution nature has two means by which it fulfills its work. It can use its initial resources received from the Creator, employing its own innate powers. And again, where its acquired capital does not suffice, it can have recourse to the ever-present God who interferes with His creative power for great changes only, as in the production of life, or of intelligence, and of individual souls. But these questions do not affect religion in practice. Even though a man did know how all things have come into existence, the why of all things would still remain; and God's rights would still have to be maintained. Reason cannot get away from the fact that all is the execution of a plan traced by God's Will; nor can reason get away from the fact that God has intervened in a special way to reveal to mankind its religious obligations.

Catholics are quite free to accept that opinion as an opinion.

No difficulty arises in this matter. For whilst Genesis teaches that God created all things out of nothing, it does not say that He created every individual thing in the universe like that. Even if God created a vast original nebula which gradually contracted at certain centers-such as the sun-from which smaller fragments separated, God would still be the Creator of all things, the evolution taking millions of years. The account in Genesis of the origin of all things in no way hinders an explanation allowing for an indefinite expansion of time.

You raise a problem which really does not exist. Three elements enter into the account of creation given by Genesis-the revelation of facts given by God; the expression of those facts in human terms intelligible to the people of the time for whom they were intended; and the arrangement of the matter according to a plan based upon religious motives, i. e., in order to inculcate religious obligations. The sequence is logical, not chronological. The Mosaic account does not pretend to give the exact scientific and objective order.

Greater difficulties occur when it is a question of the formation of man. That the earth as such took millions of years for its gradual formation can be regarded as scientifically certain. But that man evolved from lower forms of life is pure hypothesis or conjecture, without any real evidence in its favor. Even for man's body, intermediate forms are missing, and strict proof is entirely wanting. The Catholic Church teaches that each man's soul, which is spiritual, is immediately created by God. No Catholic, therefore, can hold that the soul of man is evolved from lower beings. What about man's body? The Catholic Church has not defined as an article of faith that we must believe that God immediately formed the body of the first man. But she says that the whole tenor of Biblical teaching is against its evolution and in favor of immediate creation. It would be rash, therefore, to assert as a fact that man's body evolved until fit for the reception of a rational soul. If, however, the hypothetical guess concerning man's body having evolved were ever proved true-as it probably never will be-such a doctrine, restricted to the body of the first man only, would not necessarily conflict with the Bible. For even then it would have been formed out of the slime of the earth through successive intermediate forms. However, there are weightier reasons against this theory than for it; and the Catholic Church, without defining the question, has given an interim decision of a disciplinary character forbidding Catholics to deny the actual creation of the first man, even bodily. Until the Church gives a further decision in the matter Catholics should hold that both the body and the soul of the first man were due to the special creative activity of God.

Belief in man's bodily evolution would not be incompatible with Catholic dogma. But it would be incompatible with science. It is because the really scientific men do not know what to believe as regards man's origin that they propose the theory of evolution as a probable guess which seems to fit in with the few very isolated fragments of apparent evidence they have perceived. More and more, these really scientific men are tending to regard what is termed major evolution as less and less probable, and to confine themselves to a very minor or mitigated evolution.

I am afraid you have not read widely and deeply enough. No first-class scientist will admit the derivation of all forms of life from simpler earlier forms to be a fact. They insist that it is no more than a probable guess. Wassmann rightly says, "The doctrine of evolution is not experimental. Man is too late on the scene for that. But there is a probability of a restricted evolution or of a mitigated transformism. To assert, however, that all vegetable forms are from one primitive type, or that all animals are from one primitive type is a delightful dream." Sir Bertram Windle says, "Transformism, however probable, is not proved. Perhaps it never will nor can be."

If so, you must be very easily satisfied. But firstly, you have not quite understood even Darwin. Darwin maintains lineal, not collateral descent. He would not say that man and anthropomorphous apes had a common ancestor, but rather that man is a direct descendant from anthropomorphous apes. In his book he writes, "The Simiadae then branched off into two great stems, the New World and the Old World monkeys; and from the latter, at a remote period of time, man, the wonder and the glory of the universe, proceeded." Secondly, whilst Darwin's theory appeals to many people as a theory, his attempts to justify it, attempts which have impressed you, have been utterly discredited. That statement is bound to seem extravagant to you, so let me justify it. Professor Bateson, of the British Association, recorded in 1914, "We biologists have come to the conviction that the principle of natural selection cannot have been the chief factor in determining species." Driesch, one of the greatest of German biologists, says, "For men of clear intellect, Darwinism has long been dead." Dwight, Professor of Comparative Anatomy at Harvard University, writes, "We have now the remarkable spectacle that just when many scientific men are all agreed that there is no part of the Darwinian system that is of any great influence, and that as a whole the theory is not only unproved, but impossible, the ignorant, half-educated masses have acquired the idea that it is to be accepted as a fundamental fact." Bumuller, the German scientist, writes, "The testimony of comparative anatomy is decidedly against the theory of man's descent from an ape." In addition to the names I have mentioned, the following men, all first-class scientists, and subsequent to Darwin, reject not only his methods of argument, but also his theory: Ranke, Wundt, Kohlbrugge, Vogt, Caullery, Carazzi, Du Bois-Reymond, Clark-Wissler, Branco, Karl von Zittel, Joseph le Conte, Virchow, Sir William Dawson, Vialleton, T. H. Morgan. Admitting more or less the theory, but rejecting Darwin's proofs, are: Le Dantec, Delage, Cope, Korchinsky, Von Baer, Hartmann, Packard, Jeckel, Haberlandt, Goette, Von Sachs, Kassowitz, Eimer, most of these being Professors of Zoology, Botany, Biology, Palaeontology, Pathology, etc., at their respective Universities of Berlin, Paris, Vienna, Strasbourg, Tubingen, Amsterdam, Stanford, etc.

Are you aware that Dr. de Beer, in his great work, "Embryology and Evolution," published from Oxford University, has declared that a study of the human embryo, far from showing anything about our ancestry, is really useless for the purpose? Dr. de Beer is not a Catholic. That should be one credential in his favor for you. Also he is an ardent supporter of the evolutionary hypothesis. But he is too scientific to rank a plausible guess as a demonstrated fact. Listen to his words, "There is no logical justification," he writes, "in regarding any embryological stage as evidence of the former existence of such a stage representing an adult ancestor. Equally well might a present adult stage represent an embryological stage of an ancestor. Embryology, therefore, is no guide to philosophy."

I am quite aware of vestigial resemblances to features discernible in other animals. But resemblances and similarities are not proof of derivation. To regard them as traces proving undoubted animal origin is simply fantastic. It is interesting to contrast the dogmatism of the man in the street with the tentative caution of the real scientist. Professor J. B. S. Haldane, a quite irreligious man, at least refuses to outstrip the available evidence. And he says that he regards the evolution of man from lower animals as rather more probable than the existence of Cedric the Saxon, but less probable than the existence of Queen Anne." The really great scientist, Reincke, speaks even more strongly. "The only statement consistent with her dignity that science can make," he writes, "is that she knows nothing about the origin of man."

I would have none, were my animal ancestry a proven fact, as is the origin of the human body in a germ cell. But it is not; and I object to fancies being represented as facts.

I speak scathingly of those who want to make such evolution appear to be more than a mere theory. Many people who pretend to a scientific outlook, have built up a mythology equal to any that has ever been foisted on a credulous humanity. And they get worried when one refuses to profess belief in their dreams. But organic evolution, involving the transformation of species, does not warrant belief. The well-known scientist, Yves Delage, made it his opinion that such evolution probably occurred. Yet he wrote as follows: "If there existed some other scientific hypothesis besides that of descent to explain the origin of species, many transformists would abandon their present opinion as not being sufficiently demonstrated. If one takes one's stand upon the exclusive ground of the facts, it must be acknowledged that the formation of one species from another species has not been demonstrated at all."

Thought itself indicates the probability of angelic creatures. God has manifested in creation a most extraordinary gradation of perfections. We see a mineral world; a vegetable world; a sensitive world. Then we find man, who sums up all three worlds, and surpasses them by his possession of a spiritual and intelligent soul. But why should intelligence stop at the feeble triumphs of man? Is it not natural that there should be higher created spiritual beings, intermediary between the Supreme Spirit and the created spirits immersed in the material bodies of men? There is a purely material world. There is a blend of the material and spiritual worlds in man. It is quite reasonable to expect a created and purely spiritual world. Our human intelligence stammers in speech and discourse, arriving slowly and with difficulty at its conclusions, and often making grave mistakes. The natural act of our intelligence is intuition, the vision or sight of truth, even as the natural act of bodily eyes is the sight of material objects. Yet we fail so often to attain truth. God could be better represented in His creation. Where is perfect intelligence acting according to laws proper to itself and unfettered by matter? Is it absent from the universe? No one who really believes in God would think so. Spiritual being is normal being. It is much nearer to the Author of all being than matter. And it is not unreasonable to believe in a class of created beings more perfect than men.

That cannot be maintained. For that would be to deny them personality. But both Old and New Testaments insist upon the spiritual and personal character of angels. Isaiah VI., 3, declares that the angels worship God crying, "Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Hosts." Christ said, "Despise not one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father who is in heaven." Matt. XVIII., 10. Messages and influences don't see! Again, Christ said that there is joy amongst the angels in heaven when a sinner repents. Can one attribute rejoicing to messages and influences? When Christ said that in the resurrection men shall be as the angels who neither marry nor are given in marriage, did He mean that men would be like messages and influences? St. Peter says that God spared not the angels who sinned. Did impersonal messages and influences sin?

Yes. I have already quoted Christ's reference to the guardian angels of children. We must remember that all phases of being are in communication. There is a mutual penetration of the various kingdoms, and mutual service. All less than man contributes to the welfare of man. And if I can plead with God for you in prayer there is no reason why angels could not plead for us all in a similar way. If I can communicate ideas to you, there is no reason why God should not employ angels for that same purpose; although angels would act in a way proper to themselves, and not subject to our limitations.

Neither is out of date. People are more ignorant of revelation and of the truth. And as they are more prone to deny the things they don't like rather than things they do like, they deny devils a little more vehemently than they deny angels. They deny both, of course. But this also results from the fact that men dislike being taught by anybody, even by God; and because they do not like to think that there are any beings higher than themselves. So you find unbelievers asserting that man is the highest and culminating point of evolution so far, and that he must push on to still greater perfection. But human pride has never permitted the suggestion that man will so evolve that he will cease to be man, and become another creature altogether. All is ordained to the glorification of man; and that leaves no room for angels. Therefore, angels do not exist. And if not angels, then no devils. For devils are simply angels who fell into sin, rejecting good and choosing evil in the inevitable trial given to all created beings endowed with free will.

The fallen angels may be called devils collectively. At the same time, their leader is a single personality, and is at times called the devil as the chief representative of the class of beings to which he belongs.

Lucifer, meaning "Light-bearer," was the name of the leader of the rebellious angels before their fall into sin. After the fall he received the name of Satan, or Adversary. Scripture also refers to him as the "Beast" and the "Dragon." Thus St. John says that Michael the Archangel fought with the Dragon and his angels, and the great Dragon was cast out of heaven. (Apoc. or Rev. XII., 7-9.) Christ referred to this when He said, "I saw Satan like lightning falling from heaven." Lk. X., 18. And He depicted the fate of Satan when He described the sentence of the wicked, "Depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels." Matt. XXV., 41.

It is. But the rebellious angels never thought to destroy or dethrone God. They simply abstracted from the consideration of God, and sought to enthrone themselves in their own proud estimation as sufficient for themselves without due relationship to God and submission to Him.

That is almost the only vice found in human beings which could be associated with angelic natures. Pride is the inordinate love of one's own excellence, and is a sin which can be common to human beings and to purely spiritual beings. Proper to men are those sins which arise through the association of the soul with a material body of a sensitive and passionate nature. And these are the very human failings, not pride. St. Bernard expressed this idea when he said, "Sin by sensuality, and you sin as a beast; sin by dishonesty, and you sin as a man; sin by pride, and you sin as the angels."

Not quite. Even the angels had not the beatific vision of God in all His glory and infinitely beautiful reality. Had they had that vision they could not have sinned. It must be remembered that God is in the order of infinite being and perfection. But the angels, as finite creatures with necessarily limited intelligences were in a lower order altogether. The vision of God as He is in Himself would be impossible to them by their own natural powers. They, as well as human souls, would need a supernatural elevation by grace, and by the intensification of their powers before they could have an immediate sight of God. Just as we know of God's existence without possessing that vision, so was it also with the angels. The fallen angels, therefore, never have seen God as He really is. Those angels who did not sin received the supernatural vision of God as their inheritance; and for them, therefore, sin is no longer possible.

No. Such human souls as are saved are elevated by grace to the supernatural order, and received on their entrance into heaven an additional capacity to see God in all His beauty and splendor as Lucifer never saw Him. Once any creature, angelic or human, has received that vision, sin becomes an impossibility; and heaven is, therefore, eternal.

You are not certain of that at all. You have no experimental proof that no devil tempts you. How do you know that the devil has not tempted you to adopt that conclusion? How do you know that he is not confusing his activities with your own mental processes in such a way that you cannot distinguish his activity from your own? I am not saying that he is doing so. I merely say that you do not know for certain that he is not doing so. And I maintain that he could do so, and that he is never so well served as by those who deny him. The devil is not likely to inform you just when he is at work, and how many of your inclinations are due to his influence.

God

Man

Religion

The Religion of the Bible

The Christian Religion

A Definite Christian Faith

The Problem of Reunion

The Truth of Catholicism

The Church and the Bible

The Dogmas of the Catholic Church

Moral Teachings of the Catholic Church

The Church in Her Worship

The Church and Social Welfare

Catholic Apologetics in Question & Answer Form

God

Man

Religion

The Religion of the Bible

The Christian Religion

A Definite Christian Faith

The Problem of Reunion

The Truth of Catholicism

The Church and the Bible

The Dogmas of the Catholic Church

Moral Teachings of the Catholic Church

The Church in Her Worship

The Church and Social Welfare

QUESTIONS IN VOLUME 3

501. To my mind, any Church worshipping in the name of Christ is the true Church.

502. Whom am I to believe, an educated Protestant minister, or an educated Catholic priest?

503. For some time I have realised the truth of the Catholic Church, and I have become dissatisfied with my own religion.

504. The Catholic Church, however, seems such a hard one to live up to, and I don't think I have the courage required.

505. Should I decide to become a Catholic, what must I do?

506. Does the Catholic Church accept the Bible absolutely as the very Word of God?

507. Is it true that Catholics must not read Protestant translations of the Bible?

508. Many good Roman Catholics have confessed to me that they have never read or heard a line of Scripture.

509. I think it is appalling that people should not read the Word of God for themselves.

510. How can one know all that is necessary if one does not read Scripture day by day?

511. We Protestants believe that each man should read the Bible for himself and accept the truth he discovers in its pages.

512. In Acts XVII, 11, St. Paul commends the Bereans because they eagerly searched the Scriptures to see whether the things preached to them were so.

513. If other students of the Bible differ from you in their interpretations, they have a right to their own views.

514. Peter says that "no prophecy of Scripture is made by private interpretation," but he adds, "for the holy men of God spoke, inspired by the Holy Ghost." 2 Pet. I., 20-21. You leave out those last words which show that he refers to the prophets, not to ordinary readers.

515. When we read Scripture we have only to be led by the Holy Spirit.

516. Has the ordinary reader no chance whatever of arriving at the correct sense of Scripture?

517. Even though he were to fail here and there, could not the average reader gain a knowledge from the Bible of the whole body of Christian doctrine in general?

518. Tell me this. Are all Roman Catholic doctrines founded upon the Scriptures?

519. It seems to me that Catholics are guided by their Church, and not by the Bible.

520. To my mind the Bible is a sufficient guide, without the need of anything else.

521. But we do possess the Gospels now, and we cannot go against them.

522. Are words of Christ extant other than found in the New Testament?

523. Does the Catholic Church recognize any instruments not found within its Bible, with the degree of solemnity as if they were?

524. Why do you rely so much on the testimony of those whom you call the "Early Fathers"?

525. If the New Testament is not the supreme authority for Catholics, why do you use it alone on many occasions to prove your contentions?

526. Do you ask us to believe in a Church which will perish rather than in the Word of God which will endure forever?

527. Do you imagine that the Catholic Church only has arrived at a true understanding of the Gospels?

528. Why can't Catholics he trusted to read the Bible for themselves?

529. Are not Catholics mentally intelligent enough to decide for themselves?

530. You can no more interpret Scripture for me than you can eat my dinner for me.

531. Can you dogmatically assert that the Catholic Church teaches truth any more than I can disprove it?

532. Do you assert this because of superior intelligence, better reasoning powers, or faith?

533. Christianity is a way of life, not a dogmatic statement of faith.

534. Essential Christianity cannot be the acceptance of a creed drawn up by fallible men.

535. We must not rob Christianity of its vitality and dynamic.

536. Christianity is for all times.

537. Creeds are of value only insofar as they help men to think clearly, honestly, and comprehensively.

538. Creeds are a drag on progress when they become tests of orthodoxy.

539. They may help a man in his approach to reality; but they set out the truth about Jesus as it was seen by fallible men of other days.

540. We must believe in Christ, not in any statement about Him.

541. What is the origin of the Apostles' Creed?

542. Are not many eternal truths the fruit of development of human thinking from the dawn of recorded history?

543. What puzzles me is how anyone can believe at all in creeds and dogmas which are against reason.

544. Do you consider the religion of the Bible to be compatible with reason?

545. To Catholics who are not allowed to think for themselves your doctrines may seem all right.

546. It strikes me that unbelief is the domain reserved for thinking people, whilst Catholicism is for people who delight in fairy tales.

547. If you analyze yourself correctly, you will find that you ceased to think from the day you became a Catholic!

548. Leaving out factors of ignorance and worldly advantages, could a Catholic study theology so well as to prefer another faith to his own?

549. By using his reason he is merely using a power given him by God.

550. Will you not admit that it is much easier to believe all that one is told?

551. Do you even know the difficulties which reasoning and scientific men have proposed against the Catholic Church?

552. You have spoken of "sane reasons." Pope Pius XI. spoke of the "diabolical reasoning" of Communists. What is the difference between reason, sane reason, and diabolical reason?