Month: June 2013

The Weekly Francis – 30 June 2013

PopeFrancis-fingerThis version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 30 May 2013 – 30 June 2013 (subscribe here; get as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Angelus

General Audiences

Homilies

Messages

Speeches

Daily Homilies (fervorinos)

Papal Tweets

  • “Are we ready to be Christians full-time, showing our commitment by word and deed?” @pontifex, 24 June 2013
  • “Charity, patience and tenderness are very beautiful gifts. If you have them, you want to share them with others.” @pontifex, 26 June 2013
  • “Jesus didn’t save us with an idea. He humbled himself and became a man. The Word became Flesh.” @pontifex, 28 June 2013
  • “Let’s learn to lose our lives for Christ, like a gift or a sacrifice. With Christ we lose nothing!” @pontifex, 29 June 2013
  • “A Christian is never bored or sad. Rather, the one who loves Christ is full of joy and radiates joy.” @pontifex, 30 June 2013

The eBook version of The Weekly Francis

Is Jesus Based on the Pagan Deity Horus?

Was Jesus based on the pagan deity Horus?

Some people claim that, a long time ago, there was a god.

This god was born of a virgin on December 25th.

He was baptized.

He had twelve disciples.

He healed the sick and raised the dead.

But he was betrayed and crucified, and on the third day he was raised from the dead.

And according to the people who claim this, this god was not Jesus Christ.

Instead, he was the god Horus.

And, since Horus was worshipped before Jesus Christ, they claim that Jesus Christ is just a rip off of the god Horus.

Are they right?

That’s what we look at in this episode of the Jimmy Akin Podcast.

If you’re reading the blog by email, click here to watch the video or listen to the audio-only version.

Use the links below to listen to or download the audio version.

What Now?

If you like the information I’ve presented here, you should join my Secret Information Club.

If you’re not familiar with it, the Secret Information Club is a free service that I operate by email.

I send out information on a variety of fascinating topics connected with the Catholic faith.

In fact, the very first thing you’ll get if you sign up is information about what Pope Benedict said about the book of Revelation.

He has a lot of interesting things to say!

If you’d like to find out what they are, just sign up at www.SecretInfoClub.com or use this handy sign-up form:

Just email me at jimmy@secretinfoclub.com if you have any difficulty.

In the meantime, what do you think?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

The Weekly Francis – 23 June 2013

Pope Francis is having his "Inaugural Mass"? What's happens in this Mass, and why is it important?This version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 12 June 2013 – 23 June 2013 (subscribe here; get as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Angelus

General Audiences

Letters

Speeches

Daily Homilies (fervorinos)

Papal Tweets

  • “Are you angry with someone? Pray for that person. That is what Christian love is.” @pontifex, 17 June 2013
  • “Christians are ready to proclaim the Gospel because they can’t hide the joy that comes from knowing Christ.” @pontifex, 19 June 2013
  • “Let us never forget that it is the Lord who guides the Church. He is the one who makes our apostolates fruitful.” @pontifex, 21 June 2013
  • “If we have found in Jesus meaning for our own lives, we cannot be indifferent to those who are suffering and sad.” @pontifex, 22 June 2013
  • “We are all sinners. But may the Lord not let us be hypocrites. Hypocrites don’t know the meaning of forgiveness, joy and the love of God.” @pontifex, 23 June 2013

Notes

  • (1) This version of The Weekly Francis includes the daily homilies of the Holy Father. These homilies are not published in full and summaries are provided by Vatican Radio.
    In a statement from Vatican spokesman Fr. Federico Lombardi:

After careful reflection, therefore, it was decided that the best way to make the richness of the Pope’s homilies accessible to a wider public, without altering their nature, is to publish an ample synthesis, rich also in original quoted phrases that reflect the genuine flavor of the Pope’s expressions. It is what L’Osservatore Romano is committed to doing every day, whereas Vatican Radio, on the basis of its characteristic nature, offers a briefer synthesis, but accompanied also with some passages of the original recorded audio, as well as CTV which offers a video-clip corresponding to one of the inserted audios published by Vatican Radio.

  • (2) The full English translation of the General Audience on 5 June 2013 has still not been released.

The eBook version of The Weekly Francis

Are most Catholics in America going to hell?

Are most American Catholics going to hell?
Are most American Catholics going to hell?

When you look around society today, it doesn’t look good.

Even in the Church, people are committing abortion and contraception.

They are sleeping together outside of marriage, using porn, and doing a host of other things that can endanger their souls.

It can be tempting to conclude that most Catholics in America today are going to go to hell.

Is the situation that bleak?

 

A Question from a Reader

A reader writes:

I belong to a great parish, full of wonderful people who love God and neighbor.

However, I can’t help but be aware that at least from an objective viewpoint, most of them seem to be in a state of mortal sin per the Church’s teaching.

The most common one is the use of contraception, but there are plenty of others, including cohabitation prior to marriage, remarriage outside the Church, etc.

The Church views all these things as mortal sins, although it’s clear these people don’t view them that way.

Our society at this moment makes it really difficult for people, especially young people, to do what the Church expects.

I also know that most of these people genuinely and sincerely do not believe they are sinning.  They continue to pray, to attend Mass, and have faith in Christ, which indicates to me that they don’t desire to cut themselves off from God.

Is it truly likely that the vast majority of American Catholics will end up in hell?

What can we say here?

KEEP READING.

Hidden Pyramids of the Bible!

There’s a very interesting thing that the authors of the Bible do.

It’s a technique they use, and it’s very subtle.

Most of the time, we readers miss it.

In fact, most people have never heard of it at all.

But it’s real, and it can give us important clues about the meaning of Bible passages.

Here’s the startling truth about . . . the hidden pyramids of the Bible!

 

It’s Called What?

Sometimes the Bible uses a little-known literary form that most people have never heard of.

It’s called chiasmus.

Whatever does that mean?

We begin to get a glimmer when we consider the origin of the name.

It’s from the Greek letter Chi, which looks like the English letter X.

In a Chi—or an X—there are two lines that cross each other. If you consider just the bottom half of the letter, they form a peak.

One line goes up to the peak and the other descends down.

Like a pyramid.

And that’s what a chiasmus is like, only with words or blocks of texts instead of lines.

A chiasmus is a sequence of elements that can be divided into two halves, with the second half being a mirror image of the first, like steps leading up one side of a pyramid and down the other.

A simple example of a chiasmus is Jesus statement that the “first will be last, and the last first” (Matt. 19:30), which has an A-B-B’-A’ structure.

What’s surprising is now a knowledge of chasmus can unlock the meaning of certain portions of the Bible.

Here's a video I did on the subject . . . 

What Now?

If you like the information I've presented here, you should join my Secret Information Club.

If you're not familiar with it, the Secret Information Club is a free service that I operate by email.

I send out information on a variety of fascinating topics connected with the Catholic faith.

In fact, the very first thing you’ll get if you sign up is information about what Pope Benedict said about the book of Revelation.

He has a lot of interesting things to say!

If you’d like to find out what they are, just sign up at www.SecretInfoClub.com or use this handy sign-up form:

Just email me at jimmy@secretinfoclub.com if you have any difficulty.

In the meantime, what do you think?

How can Jesus’ death save people who died before his time?

On the Cross, Jesus offered his life as a sacrifice to make it possible for us to be saved.
But what about the people who lived before he made that sacrifice?

How can they be saved? How did his death relate to them?

Let’s take a look at that . . .

 

An Outstanding Question

Recently, I blogged about the general question of how salvation works before and after the time of Christ, but we didn’t answer all the questions a person might have.

One outstanding question is how Jesus’ sacrifice could apply to people before it was even made.

Scripture gives us some interesting possibilities . . .

 

“From the Foundation of the World”?

One image that some have looked to is found in Revelation 13:8, where in some translations we read a description of Jesus as “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.”

If this is the way that the passage is to be understood, it would seem to teach that Jesus’ sacrifice is available to people no matter when they lived in history.

In other words, although Jesus was slain in A.D. 33, from God’s eternal perspective, that sacrifice has been available “from the foundation of the world” and thus able to save anyone in world history.

 

Is This the Right Interpretation?

Although it’s theologically true that Christ’s sacrifice can save anyone in world history, that doesn’t mean that this is what the passage intends to say.

There is another–better–way to look at the passage.

KEEP READING.

The Weekly Francis – 16 June 2013

PopeFrancis-fingerThis version of The Weekly Francis covers material released in the last week from 6 June 2013 – 16 June 2013 (subscribe here; get as an eBook version for your Kindle, iPod, iPad, Nook, or other eBook reader):

Angelus

Homilies

Speeches

Papal Tweets

  • “We must not be afraid of solidarity; rather let us make all we have and are available to God.” @pontifex, 11 June 2013
  • “How many kinds of moral and material poverty we face today as a result of denying God and putting so many idols in his place!” @pontifex, 12 June 2013
  • “Let the Church always be a place of mercy and hope, where everyone is welcomed, loved and forgiven.” @pontifex, 16 June 2013

The eBook version of The Weekly Francis

Is it okay to pray when you have doubts about God?

Is it okay to pray when you have doubts about God?
Is it okay to pray when you have doubts about God?

 

It’s great to have strong faith, to feel confident in what you believe.

That way you can “with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16).

But not everybody is at that point.

Some people are still coming to faith. Other people find their faith wavering at times.

So what about then? Is it okay to pray when you have doubts?

 

A Real Question

This is a real question. A reader writes:

I am going through a rough time and wanted to know whether it is okay to pray the rosary while being a bit skeptic about Jesus and Mary.

I find it a bit difficult to believe that Jesus is God, that Mary intercedes for me, that God exists, and that God has no evil in him.

Do you think, if God exists, it would be okay for doubting him while praying–or praying without hoping that somebody out there is listening?

Do you think its okay to pray to the Father than going through the Son and his Mother?

I’d like to say first that I am sorry that the reader is going through a rough time. I have been through rough times myself, and I will be praying for him.

I also invite other readers to pray for him and for everyone who is suffering. Whenever possible, I like to universalize my prayers that way.

Whenever I’m praying for someone in particular, I try also to pray for everyone else facing that difficulty. One of my favorite prayers is found in the Divine Mercy Chaplet:

“For the sake of His [Jesus’] sorrowful Passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.”

I’m also pleased to give the reader good news regarding his own prayers . . .

 

Why We Pray

KEEP READING.

Pope Francis and the Vatican “gay lobby”–10 things to know and share

Did Pope Francis just admit the existence of a "gay lobby" at the Vatican? If so, what will he do about it?
Did Pope Francis just admit the existence of a “gay lobby” at the Vatican? If so, what will he do about it?

 

Pope Francis recently made the news by, apparently, acknowledging the existence of a “gay lobby” at the Vatican.

What did he say? What did he mean? And what will he do in the future?

Here are 10 things to know and share . . .

 

1. What did Pope Francis say?

According to press reports, Pope Francis recently said:

“In the Curia there are holy people, truly, there are holy people. But there’s also a current of corruption – there’s that, too, it’s true…. The ‘gay lobby’ is spoken of, and it’s true, that’s there… we need to see what we can do.”

 

2. Where and when did he say this?

According to Rocco Palmo:

The comments were purportedly made during an hourlong audience the Pope held last Thursday with the Religious Confederation of Latin America and the Caribbean (CLAR).

An unsigned “exclusive, brief synthesis” of the encounter – featuring a series of pull-quotes, but not a full transcript – was apparently provided to and subsequently published on Sunday afternoon by Reflexión y Liberación, a church-focused Chilean website with sympathies toward liberation theology.

These thus were not public remarks, which raises a question about their authenticity.

 

3. Did he really say it?

KEEP READING.

What Is the Difference Between Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design?

cosmos
What’s the difference between creation, evolution, and intelligent design?

 
Creationism, Evolutionism, and Intelligent Design are three of the major positions on the question of how we got here.

What’s the difference between these positions?

That seemingly straightforward question proves surprisingly controversial.

Let’s take a look at it . . .

 

The Basic Question

The basic question at issue in the contemporary origins debate is whether or not the world was created.

It could be tempting to simply put participants in the discussion into two groups—creationists and evolutionists—and leave it at that.

Some on both sides of the issue would like to do exactly that.

In fact, some of the people who most readily identify themselves as creationists or evolutionists often speak as if these are the only two options.

 

Name Calling

Some creationists dismiss everyone who doesn’t hold their view as an “evolutionist” (using this term in a negative sense).

Some evolutionists dismiss everyone who thinks that the world was created as a “creationist” (using this term in a negative sense).

When this happens, the two camps are using prejudicial language. They’re calling each other names, and that doesn’t advance the discussion.

They’re also distorting the issue, because there are clearly middle positions on this question. In fact, there’s a spectrum of them.

 

The Spectrum

It’s possible to divide up that spectrum in different ways. In fact, it’s possible to divide it into a mind-numbing array of fine-tuned categories.

That gets unwieldy, though, and it seems that, today, most participants in the origins discussion would say that they advocate one of four major positions:

  • Creationism
  • Intelligent Design
  • Theistic Evolution
  • Atheistic Evolution

How can we describe these positions?

 

Creationism

KEEP READING.