CHT to the reader who sent in the following church sign debate. It's currently being circulated around the Internet in the form of an e-mail that suggests it's real, but it's not (note that the leaves of the plants don't move from one picture to another). That doesn't stop it from being hilarious–if you don't take it (or its theology) too seriously.
Author: Jimmy Akin
Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."
View all posts by Jimmy Akin
This made my day. Thanks, Jimmy, I love your sense of humor.
You can make your own electronic version of these church signs by going here: http://www.says-it.com/
The Church Sign Generator is the link at the top left of choices.
Very great and funny war and I’m with the Catholic parish yet
Aquinas is with the Protestants herein….but heck, he thought any interest on a personal loan was against nature and that a child born to a slave mother was a slave and that the stars were eternal (below).
I’m wondering whether the Protestant comment on “rocks” was random or was in reference to St. Peter as “this rock” or to Aquinas who thought stars etc. to be immortal…Summa Theologica question 91 art. 5 in the Supplement “Therefore plants and animals will altogether cease after the renewal of the world…. Therefore it will be impossible for anything to be the subject of that renewal, unless it be a subject of incorruption. Now such are the heavenly bodies, the elements, and man. For the heavenly bodies are by their very nature incorruptible both as to their whole and as to their part…” He did not know that some of the stars we see are defunct for thousands of years but we still see their light.
And Aquinas never dealt with Isaiah 65:25 and whether it should only be taken iconically or both iconically and literally: Isaiah 65:25 “The wolf and the lamb will graze together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox; and dust will be the serpent’s food. They will do no evil or harm in all My holy mountain,” says the LORD.”
“…in the form of an e-mail that suggests it’s real, but it’s not (note that the leaves of the plants don’t move from one picture to another).”
Not only that, but shadows or the position of the parked car in the background don’t change at all.
Still, it’s very funny. I think I visit that website and try my hand at this.
Thanks to the internet, whenever I see a picture of anything remotely questionable, I assume it’s photoshopped.
I think eventually I’ll get to the point where I’m like this guy:
http://xkcd.com/331/
The images were created via this link.
http://www.says-it.com/churchsigns/
While I’m not sure what Aquinas thought about dogs going to heaven, I’m quite sure he thought that dogs had souls (contrary to some of the Protestant signs). Maybe not *immortal* souls, but souls nevertheless. Animals are called “animals” because they possess an “animus”, i.e. a soul. (As an aside, he also thought that plants had souls — vegetative souls, but still souls.)
He would quite agree, however, that rocks do not have souls. 🙂
But rock-and-rollers do.
The Chicken
But does rock and roll have soul?
Some would say that when Elvis did it, it did.
Well, when Louis Jordan released his, “Saturday Night Fish Fry,” in 1949, at least rock-and-roll had sole…
The Chicken
Oh, by the way, that’s not Louis Jourdan, the actor, but Louis Jordan, the sax player.
The Chicken