Apologetics for the Masses - Issue #63

I’m going to do something a little different this week. The head of a Catholic radio group sent me the exchange below that he had with a non-Catholic listener, and asked me to respond to him. The listener’s emails are the first and third ones listed below (in italics). The first one he sent after hearing something on a particular program that he objected to, and the second one he sent after getting a response from the head of the station.

I’m sharing all of this with you because I want to use it to give you a little homework. The assignment is: How would you respond to the listener’s 2nd email…the one that starts off with, “Sorry for the VERY late reply…”?

Now, I’m not asking you to actually write out something, but if you want to do so then feel free. But I am asking that you think about how you would respond, in general, to that email. What approach would you take? Would you answer all of his objections, or just pick out a few? If only a few, which ones would you try to answer and which would you ignore? And so on. Think about it. And, if you want to put something in writing to me, I’ll read it and possibly make some general comments about what you write in next week’s newsletter.

I decided to do this because this guy’s emails are typical of a lot of emails or letters and such that Catholics get from non-Catholics. Kind of all over the place and not really making an argument as much as simply “preaching” and telling us that Romanism is evil, etc., etc., etc.

So, think about it. Ponder it a bit. And, next week, I’ll give you my response and the reasons behind why I responded as I did. I’m not going to claim that my response is the best possible response or anything of that sort, but I am going to claim that my response – or rather the approach that I take in my response – could possibly save some of you time and heartache and maybe a few hair follicles in responding to folks who write these kinds of things.

Enjoy.

Challenge/Response/Strategy

Subject: spiritual warfare, 2006-09-16

From: Russ D.

To: undisclosed-recipients

I listened to St. Joseph Radio Presents 2006-09-16 and was sad to hear John ? [by the way, this was not me he is talking about – I’ve never been on St. Joseph Radio] talking about spiritual warfare without any reference to God’s Word at all, merely his own speculations, largely unhelpful, and wanted to warn about the danger he’s setting people up for by his false assumptions and assertions especially in his third point that when Satan or his demons attack us we’re to do the opposite of what THEY would have us to do. This is sadly the very approach “conservatives” have taken in the past several decades and still today and only result in an ungodly “reactionary” approach in which the enemy sets the terms of the war or debate and gradually and imperceptibly leads people in their direction, versus God’s requirement in Romans 12 and 2 Timothy 2:15 telling us that in such times, we rather, by memorization and meditation on God’s Word, are, by His Holy Spirit (1 John 2:27) to ACT (not REact) as those who by His Grace are conformed to His Word, not contrary to Satan’s, for despite arrogant spiritual “masters” who would usurp God’s role versus Jesus’s Mark 10:45 example of a faithful shepherd servant leader, God tells that though He graciously gives us Ephesians 4:11 pastors and teachers for
the equipping of the saints for works of service to build up The Body of Christ, we nevertheless at the same time don’t need any man to teach us (1 John 2:27), as the writer to the Hebrews made very clear in his loving rebuke in 5:12 that most professing Christians today disregard at their peril, as is seen in John’s having to address the subject of spiritual warfare.

Does John really think that Satan is really so stupid and powerless that he couldn’t easily use reverse psychology to counter John’s unbiblical notions because John won’t use God’s Word to instruct the people versus his own notions, sadly common among most professing Christians who refuse to be conformed by the renewing of their minds with God’s Word as Romans 12 commands, preferring the wisdom of men and saints. When all the talk about Church or God’s Word being finally authoritative, at the end of the day what Romanism results in is both Biblical illiteracy and ignorance of Church teaching idolatrously to make the people subservient, rather than teaching them godly, for what possible chance do any have, including clergy, of learning the impossible uncountable millions of pages of church teaching over the millennia if they won’t even learn the possible hundreds of pages of God’s Word He gave us for our instruction? This is simply idolatry and rebellion (Prov 16:18) Protestants are very happy to copy, requiring assent to their statements of faith like Rome does Church teaching rather than to God’s Word, as they falsely claim to do, being usually no different in this regard.

There’s also the typical Biblical error of calling for intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints which directly contradicts the commands of God Himself in Hebrews 7:25 that it is Jesus we are to have intercede for us, not creatures, since as is usual, much if not most “worship” today and historically has followed a pattern of selfishness and idolatry by which we would keep God at a distance and try to get Him to do our bidding by intermediaries since bottom line we are really practicing atheists, Jesus having made it very clear that “many are called and few are chosen” and “strait is the gate and narrow the way, and few there be that find it.” (Matthew 20:16; 22:14 & 7:14). For a helpful curative in pursuing God-centeredness and abandoning creature-centeredness Romans 1 condemns, see www.desiringGod.org.

John’s sad immaturity in giving Satan too much credit for technical interference with the radio broadcast is not the appropriate message to be giving to his ignorant and immature impressionable audiences so sadly typical for today’s talk radio, as if there’s a devil hiding under every bush which removes the mature scriptural approach of circumspection and especially Ephesians 6’s description of “the whole armor of God” we’re told to employ that requires: 6:14 “Stand therefore, having your loins girded about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; 15 And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; 16 Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. 17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God: 18 Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching there unto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints.”

It is of course interesting to note that in the Biblical description of Christian worship and duty that we are the ones who are to “watch therefore with all perseverance and supplication for all saints” not the other way around as the Romanist creature-exalting, God-belittling superstition has it. I regularly look for ways to pursue reconciliation with Roman Catholics as 2 Corinthians 5 requires, but so long as most people today (not just Romanists) follow in exalting man and belittling God, exalt the worthless “broken reeds” (Isaiah 36:6) of such worthlessness as human reason and so-called “free will” Thomas Aquinas regrettably exalted but Augustine and God’s Word contradicts (e.g. Romans 9:16, “it is not of him that runs or him that wills, but of God that shows mercy” and Philippians 2:13 “for it is GOD that works in you to will and to do of HIS good pleasure.” there is little ground for that reconciliation that pursues salvation based on works, not evidenced by them as a s is usually falsely asserted and claimed, which is not according to James as is usually presumed, but rather in flagrant and direct violation of both him and Paul. There will be many in the Judgment Day that will be condemned by The Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints for asking for their intercession (see Matthew 12:39-42), which as saints devoting true worship to God their Creator they could not cease for mere creatures, and perpetuate the idolatrous system withholding that glory and honor from the true Intercessor
of Hebrews 7:25. Isaiah 42:8.

May God help us all in our pursuit of the 2 Corinthians 5 reconciliation He requires to the glory of God, Romans 11:36.

God bless you,

Russ D.

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From: Doug S.

To: Russ D.

Subject: FW: [Fwd: spiritual warfare, 2006-09-16]

Dear Mr. D.,

Thank you for your email. I have forwarded it on to the producer of that show, so hopefully you will receive answers directly for the host of that show. I did not hear that show.

I am not following your arguments very well, but it seems that you are confused or misinformed on what Catholics believe and what the Catholic Church teaches.

For an accurate account of many of the issues you mention, I suggest that you visit www.catholic.com On the left side of the home page, you will see a list of topics.

One of the topics that you mentioned is praying to Mary or the saints. That is well answered at
http://www.catholic.com/library/Praying_to_the_Saints.asp

May God bless your journey to Truth-

Doug S.

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From: Russell D.

To: Doug S.

Subject: Re: [Fwd: spiritual warfare, 2006-09-16]

Dear Doug:

Sorry for the VERY late reply, almost a year later, and thank you for it, but as to not knowing what Catholics believe, having God’s Word that the Vatican has replaced with its own teaching like the Pharaisees did and for which Jesus condemned them, by the grace of God, I know far more about the TRUTH, that is Jesus, than Vaticanism and its adherants (since Rome is now
officially secular one can no longer call it Romanism), also having John Paul II’s official Catechism and various other websites intelligently exposing the various errors of Vaticanism comparable and successor to the similarly erroneous Pharaisees and their sacerdotal system of Jesus’s day that the apostles abolished in the power of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, understanding what Jesus meant in John 19:30 when He said “It is finished!” meaning, as Hebrews makes clear the total fulfillment and termination of the Old Covenant in Himself upon the tree, as the butterfly terminates the caterpillar, one of the earliest Christian symbols of the resurrection, including the Ten Commandments that no longer apply to the Christian as far too lacking compared to the infinitely higher standard demanded by the abiding resurrected Christ (e.g. Matthew 5, especially 21-44 and His replacing the Old Covenant with His own:

1. enlarging/replacing commandment 6 (don’t murder) with love, 5:21-26,

2. enlarging/replacing no committing adultery with no looking/thinking about it, 5:27-30,

3. enlarging/replacing unlimited divorce with its qualified abolition, 5:31-32,

4. enlarging/replacing permitting oaths with their abolition, 5:33-37,

5. enlarging/replacing revenge with grace, 5:38-42 and

6. enlarging/replacing love of neighbor to love of enemy, 5:43-44).

Since Jesus wrote the Decalog and gave them to Moses as preIncarnate Christ, He has every right to rewrite them according to His perfect understanding of man’s further development in obeying Him more fully than previously. Those who still would hearken to the Ten Commandments are like the Judaizers Paul constantly fought who rejected His Lord Jesus and whom he finally anathemized in order to protect his converts from the Pharaisees’ evil ungodly religious sacerdotal system exalting man above God via cleverly disguised salvation by works, like the Reformers anathemized various doctrines of Rome to protect their converts to Christ from a similar evil ungodly religious sacerdotal system exalting man above God via cleverly disguised salvation by works.

As antidotes to this poison I recommend you visit www.aomin.org and www.monergism.com and especially www.desiringGod.org to see the true Christian faith presented versus Vaticanism’s illiterate sacerdotal system that depends on ignorance to sustain it, sadly including even the ignorance of its clergy, as the above websites prove.

You prayed God would bless my journey to “Truth,” but His Word in John, both 8:32 and 14:6, says that that is Jesus Himself versus an abstraction of modern philosophy, and the book of Hebrews further rejects the toleration of any other mediator than Christ, like Mary or the saints who, knowing both Hebrews and its divine author would condemn Vaticanism for the corrupt
antiChrist system, even though there are many godly Catholics justified by faith alone as God and His Word require, though in their ignorance they fail to understand, like Sam Brownback, that in the eyes of Vaticanism, bound by Trent, they are anathema. Everyone who asks a saint for help has turned his back on Jesus and turned his back on and violated Hebrews, the very Word of God they claim to worship. 1 Timothy 2:5 “For [there is] one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus” and Hebrews, chapters 8, 9 & 12.

That anyone would turn to a mere saint for help, according to popular error and Vatican false teaching, instead of Jesus, as God commands in the Scriptures above, even if the saints could hear and act (which Abraham declares by the chasm fixed in Luke16 they cannot (meaning Catholics use Church teaching to reject God’s Word and Abraham’s, making them no children
of Abraham, like it was with the Pharisees). One can only wonder how Satan has led the Vatican astray with his various Marian apparitions the gullible who reject Christ accept without discernment: 2 Corinthians 11:14-15 And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into
an angel of light. 15 Therefore [it is] no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.

John 7:24 Judge not according to the appearance but judge righteous judgment. 1 Corinthians 2:14-16 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know, because they are spiritually discerned . 15 But he that is spiritual discerns all things, yet he himself is discerned by no man. 16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he shall instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.

God bless you and may He move you to a blessed journey to Jesus Who is The Way, The Truth and The Life.

Russ D.

In Conclusion

I’m going to do my best to get the newsletter out next week, but the travel schedule may preclude me from doing so. So, if you don’t receive an issue next week, that’s the reason why.

Have a great weekend!

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