More toils of ecumenism

Tom Pink’s post of September 8, The toils of ecumenism – a new doctrine or an old policy?, is now getting some attention from British Catholics in the blogosphere since Damian Thompston, editor of The Catholic Herald and columnist for The Daily Telegraph, discussed it favorably in a post at his own Torygraph blog this morning. [...]

More Scattered Thoughts On Obedience

God does not ask of us virtue, moralism, blind obedience but a cry of assurance and of love from the depth of our hell–Paul Evdokimov
It is very easy to simply let the Magisterium tell you what to believe. I have a couple of friends who keep insisting that Rome should take care of many things, [...]

Development of Doctrine III

John of Fides Quaerens Intellectum has replied to my post Development of Doctrine II, primarily with a 1,700-word comment thatis longer than the post itself.  As supporting material, he has posted two entries at his own blog: one consisting chiefly of quotations from the late Prof. JND Kelly and Fr. John Behr on St. Irenaeus; [...]

Development of doctrine II

[As I had hoped, my post "Development of doctrine: it's that time again" elicited some very interesting discussion. The purpose of this sequel is to reply to the last comment that John of Fides Quarens Intellectum addressed to me. That's the comment that got my mental juices flowing well. As I wrote my reply to [...]

Are universes clickable?

Over at the conservative blog What’s Wrong with the World (‘W4′ for short), Lydia McGrew critiques what she calls The Fallacy of the Clickable Universe. Here’s how she starts:
When philosophers talk about the Problem of Evil (aka “the POE”), they sometimes cast the question like this: “Why did God create a universe in which Adam [...]

Primary, secondary… but who’s really counting?

Kind of a random post, this. Sort of a methodological reflection on the intellectual life.
On his blog, Fr. Hogg (of whom I learned via Dr. Carson’s post on “essence and energies”), mentioned that he, as a 51-year-old, is interested only in reading primary sources, since he has no desire to waste his remaining time on [...]

Obedience and Development

Last night my friends and I were discussing about how obedience is never mechanical. It is not simply being told what to do and doing what we are told. Sometimes we want to be told what to do because we are having a hard time understanding what we should do, what we should believe. But [...]

Development of doctrine: it’s that time again

It has often been remarked, starting with C.S. Lewis I believe, that traditional Christians of differing ecclesial affiliations have much more in common with each other than with liberal Christians of the same ecclesial affiliations as they. That is not only true but offers the firmest basis for the sort of “ecumenism” enabling traditional Christians [...]

The letter of the law…

I want this post to piggyback on the discussion taking place about sola Scriptura. To be honest, I tend to avoid that debate, partially because it seems to devolve more quickly than others into pedantic, hairsplitting, pulpit-pounding backbiting; it’s a credit to this blog and its readers that that has not happened thus far.
All I [...]

Edward Feser: Catholic, philosopher, conservative

I’ve recently stumbled across the website of Ed Feser, who has been commenting for years over at Maverick Philosopher. He’s just published a book, blurbed by J. Budziszewski and Francis Beckwith, refuting the “New Atheism”:

By all means get it; unlike most academic books, it isn’t even that expensive.
His most recent blog entry is on Pre-Socratic [...]

Essence and Energy

In a post at Pillar and Ground of the Truth, Fr. Gregory Hogg has compared the statement of St. Augustine in De Trinitate 1.1.3, that it is “difficult” to contemplate and have full knowledge of God’s substance, with the statement of Gregory the Theologian in Theological Orations 28.4 that is is “impossible” to express God [...]

A fallible canon?

I have always been puzzled by a claim I’ve often heard from sola-scripturists: that the canon of Scripture, though constituting the sole infallible rule of faith, was only fallibly established as a canon. The latest instance of an argument for that claim, to be found at the ever-reliable Reformed site Parchment and Pen, only reinforces [...]

Take a long slip of paper…

How can we (pardon the pun!) wrap our minds around the immateriality of the intellect, the non-materiality of the mind, and, thus, the human soul of which it is the chief power?
If I were to write one vertical hash mark, on an infinitely long slip of paper, for every number in the set of natural [...]

Looking for God in All the Wrong Places

In the spring of 1974 I was in a tenth grade chemistry class that involved a little more math than I was comfortable with (i.e., an amount greater than zero). As I was browsing in the bookstore of the local university one day I saw that they had hand-held calculators for sale, and I decided [...]

The Eucharist as the Church’s only ordo theologiae…

The proper and ineluctable ordo of Roman Catholic theology is the Eucharistic covenant as it thrives in the Church. All theological principles and categories must submit to and be subsumed under this one triune matrix of actual, substantial, concrete, and free––because historical––communion in and through the μια σαρχ (One Flesh).

Book news…

Recently, Apolonio opined in a combox here that Catholic philosophy can and ought take a step forward by using the tools of analytic philosophy more consciously. His words were ringing in my ears just as I googled upon the following publishing announcement:

Thought and World: The Hidden Necessities
James Ross

FORTHCOMING IN NOVEMBER 2008 Available for pre-ordering
James F. [...]

9/11: In Memoriam

The best I could think to do on this anniversary is offer this podcast by The Anchoress. It is drawn chiefly from the Liturgy of the Hours’ Office for the Dead.
Pray well. And remember.
[This entry is cross-posted at Sacramentum Vitae.]

Why Kant is wrong…

[The following is something I've been tinkering with for a little while as I continue to delve into critical realism. It's rough, I know, so I am just looking for constructive criticisms/suggestions or questions for developing it.]
Four reasons I think Kant is wrong about categories and noumena.
1. Humans spontaneously and naturally develop their cognitive [...]

Questionis disputanda: Is freedom the capacity to choose rightly?

Obj. 1. It would seem that freedom is not the capacity to choose rightly, but the capacity to choose rightly or wrongly. For if one can only choose rightly, then one is not free to choose wrongly; hence one is predetermined to do right, which is incompatible with the capacity to choose.
Obj. 2. Moreover, the [...]

You can’t parody this

From The Boston Globe: “Kerry Kennedy talks about her new book, in which she strives to reconcile her Catholic faith with the teachings of the church.”
Read that quote again. Then watch the video.
She even says at one point that certain “words and symbols” of the Church are “anathema” to her. If you know the [...]