Apologetics for the Masses - Issue #191b

General Comments

Hey folks, for those of you who have been readers of this newsletter for a while, you know that I really don’t like it when an organization sends out lots of fundraising letters – one every two or three weeks or so – or now they email you once or twice a week, or more, and some even call your house. That sort of thing drives me nuts. Which is why the Bible Christian Society does not do any of that – never has, never will. Nor do we sell anyone’s information to folks – never have, never will.

I decided a long time ago to try and send out a modest fundraising appeal via email just twice a year, and I have held to that. No hysterics, no crying wolf week in and week out, just a simple request that if you’ve benefitted from our materials, would you prayerfully consider supporting our work? My philosophy is simple: If I am doing my job right, and giving you something of value in these newsletters and in my CD’s – something that is helping you better understand your faith and to be better equipped to share your faith – then you will hopefully be willing to support what I do.

So, I simply ask that you take a few minutes to read some of the testimonials below, and if, after reading these comments, you think we are doing something that needs to continue being done, then prayerfully consider making a donation. Thanks!

(Oh, one other thing this time around – the “surprise” I mentioned in the last issue. For everyone who makes a donation by June 25, I will send you a bonus – a bonus from Dr. Scott Hahn that I think you will enjoy immensely. For details, see below.)

Challenge/Response/Strategy

     "I enjoy your radio program and apologetics issues. I have utilized several of your audio CDs and shared them with other people. One success story is that a whole family at my work came home to the Catholic faith (from being away and not having baptized their kids) after spending just a few minutes discussing differences of Baptists and Catholics. Praise be to God! I was able to give my coworker several of your CDs and THAT WAS IT."
                              Johanna Bonnell
                              Gilbert, AZ

          “Thank you very much for the CDs you have sent to Samoa for my Dad…He is speechless and emotional to hear and listen to your CDs…And he already mentioned it to our Bishop in town and other priests…Well, now they all want to hear and listen to it.”
                            Fetu Alaiasa
                            Tahiti

     "Thank you so much for your newsletters, recordings and all the material you have made available on the world wide web. I do not have any questions for you, I just want to let you know that you have helped me so much to grow in my faith and to seek to understand more about the Catholic Church. I have been a Catholic for 20 years and I never thought about 95% of the information I have gained through your media. But I am now thinking about and practicing my faith more devoutly. I am also always prepared (and equipped) to give an account for the hope that is in me, when required."
                           Stella
                           United Kingdom

     "I cannot begin to tell you what an incredible difference your CD’s have made in my life. I have never ‘fallen away’ from the Church but since studying your CD’s, I have become much more active in my prayer life, in apologetics and even evangelization.”
                            Chris Fowler
                            Mountain View, CA

     “I just wanna thank Our Father for the work and information that you spread via the internet. I am born and raised Catholic, but have always questioned my religion’s practices, and yet the answers that I get from people that I feel I can turn to just never seems to satisfy my logic. I want to be so close to God. This site has helped answer many of my doubts and I know that this site will help me also with answering some of my Catholic friends and family’s questions who doubt the Catholic traditions.”
                            Lia Ineleo
                            New Zealand

     “I just wanted to say I have listened to your mp3 downloads over and over again and as a raised catholic but not as a current practicing one, I can honestly say that the more I listen to you the more ‘The truth’ makes sense. I have been truly praying for truth and looking for an authority to follow. For the last month or so I have been being counseled by a Bible pastor and my girlfriend who are trying to teach their version of what ‘truth’ is and it just isn’t adding up in my mind. The reason I’m writing is because I do believe I have planted a seed in this pastor. I got him to listen to your ‘truth’ cd [One Church]…After he listened to you, his attitude changed dramatically.   I look forward to more of your words to come to help in my journey of finding truth.”
                        Jeff Y.

That, in a nutshell, is what we do. We answer questions for people – Catholic and non-Catholic alike. We teach Catholics how to better understand their faith and how to better explain it to those who question and/or attack it. We give Catholics more confidence, we give non-Catholics more truth. We reach people in all 50 states and all over the world – Japan, Poland, Nigeria, New Zealand, Qatar, Germany, Tahiti, Singapore, Russia, Thailand, Costa Rica, Brazil, and many more. Our materials have helped people in more than 50 countries that I know of. This newsletter has almost 30,000 subscribers, and we’re close to one million copies of our audio materials (CD’s and mp3 downloads) that have been distributed.

The quotes above present just a few examples out of hundreds we receive each year. A family brought back to the faith. Children baptized. Catholics having doubts about their faith removed, questions about their faith answered. Non-practicing Catholics on their way back to the faith, and planting seeds of the faith with "Bible pastors" in the process. Your support has helped bring about all of these things and many more. We help good Catholics, become better Catholics. We help bring fallen-away Catholics back to the Faith. We help non-Catholics come closer to, and quite often into, the Faith.

And, we do it all for free. No one else does what we do. No charge for the newsletter. I have seen other Catholic apologists offer online courses for hundreds of dollars…not here. Most apologetics CD’s out there cost at least five or six dollars each, or more…not here. You can get our CD’s for just a $1.00/CD shipping and handling charge when you order online or, if you mail in your order, you can avoid even that cost. And we have mailed tens of thousands of CD’s out for absolutely no charge to places like Ghana, India, the Philippines, Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. And, you usually have to pay for mp3 downloads…but not here.

So, I’m hoping that you will help us continue doing what we do. I always ask for just $0.10 a day. That’s it…just a dime a day…that’s $3.00 per month, or just $36.00 per year. If you can’t afford $36.00 right now, maybe $18.00 today and another $18.00 in six months? Or, maybe you can afford a bit more…we could really use a little extra right now…but, whatever you can do, is greatly appreciated.

So, can I count on you to help keep this work going and growing? Will you please prayerfully consider taking a moment to make a donation right now? There are 3 different ways you can make a 100% tax-deductible donation:

1) By clicking on this link and donating online: www.biblechristiansociety.com/donations

2) Through PayPal: the email address for our account is: admin@biblechristiansociety.com

3) By check – mail to: Bible Christian Society, PO Box 424, Pleasant Grove, AL 35127

Because of your support, a lot of seeds are being planted that the Holy Spirit can then nurture and bring to fruition. Non-Catholics are finding out about the truths of the Catholic Faith…and becoming Catholic. Fallen-away Catholics are learning, really for the first time, what it is they left behind…and coming back. Catholics are deepening their knowledge and understanding of the Faith…and reaching out to share it with others. And none of that can happen without you.

Your support does make a difference!

God bless!

John Martignoni

P.S. For those of you who are currently regular donors, we are already starting the process of sending the "Bonus" materials mentioned below to you. If you don’t have them within a couple of weeks, let me know.

P.P.S. Whatever you can do financially will be greatly appreciated and will help us to get even more materials out to even more people. But, most importantly, please remember that whatever prayers you can send our way would also be greatly appreciated. I keep all of you in my prayers.

BONUS

For everyone who makes a donation by this Monday – June 25th – in addition to knowing that you will be helping us here at the Bible Christian Society continue our work of reaching tens of thousands of people around the world with the truths of the Catholic Faith (not to mention helping me feed my kids), I will send you two free Scott Hahn CDs that, as far as I know, are not available anywhere else.

The titles of the CDs are: “The Eucharist IS the New Testament,” and “Covenant and Communion: Reading the Bible From the Heart of the Church.” You will absolutely love these CD’s! And, if you get these into the hands of your non-Catholic friends, they will be blown away by what they hear! The CD’s cover a lot of the same material, but from slightly different perspectives, so that’s why I want to send you both of them. I’ve recently received permission to offer them to folks for free – the same as we do with all of our other CD’s – but it’s going to be about 2-3 weeks before they’re available through the website. I wanted, however, to make them available to you sooner rather than later because they are so good.