Blog Day Off

Wasn’t able to blog last night.

Feel free to do your own guest blogging in the combox, though!

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."

44 thoughts on “Blog Day Off”

  4. At a Christmas party, a professor friend of mine mentioned reading The Spirit of the Rainforest. It sounded facinating so I ordered it and finished it in three days. Many anthropologists hate this book b/c it refutes their notion of the noble savage living in unadulterated joy as primitive man without the trappings and guilt of religion. However, the book is the story of Amazon Indians told from the perspective of village shamans. They tell another story of misery, murder, rape and fear. They saw and heard their many spirits who rejoiced at killing but got angry and fearful when their shaman came in contact with Christian missionaries. Their spirits taught them to fear the enemy Spirt who created the world and all of the spirits. But many of the indians received the gospel of freedom with joy, much to the irritation of the atheistic anthopologists.

  5. Go to Father Z’s site: What Does the Prayer Really Say
    http://www.wdtprs.com/blog
    As good or better than Whispers for Vatican inside info. It is also a great site to find out how badly the ICEL translated the Roman Missal.

  6. The perfect stocking stuffer.
    I’ve always wondered what it would be like to be a member of the AntiChrist’s Global Community Peacekeepers, and now I’ll know! 😉

  8. See what happens when Jimmy picks up a canon law book after supper? Next thing you know, the sun’s coming up, and it’s time to go to work again.

  9. Canon to right of them,
    Canon to left of them,
    Canon behind them
      Volley’d & thunder’d;
    Storm’d at with shot & shell,
    While horse & hero fell~

  11. Anyone heard about the monastic clashes at Mount Athos yet?
    On one hand, it’s very sad to see that happening in one of the holiest sites of Eastern Orthodoxy; on the other hand, that certain factions are this upset is a positive sign that the rapprochement between Patriarch Bartholemew I and the Holy Father is getting serious.

  12. Anyone heard about the monastic clashes at Mount Athos yet?
    On one hand, it’s very sad to see that happening in one of the holiest sites of Eastern Orthodoxy; on the other hand, that certain factions are this upset is a positive sign that the rapprochement between Patriarch Bartholemew I and the Holy Father is getting serious.
    Thus, it will actually take decades, unfortunately, if not, centuries for any actual reunification to occur between the Holy See and the Orthodox due to the long-standing history between the two.
    However, we cannot dismiss any effort in trying to achieve that aim. It is only by our constant efforts that we can ever hope to even accomplish this goal.

  13. There is a great article in the Advent/Christmas 2006 issue of Latin Mass Magazine,entitled,”Fulfilling the Council:Sacrosanctum Concilium and the Traditionalist Movement”
    It tells how the implementation of the Novus Ordo has strayed far from the document Sacrosanctum Concilium,and that traditional Catholic teaching and the Tridentine Mass is in keeping with this great document.
    The article begins on page 26.
    God bless you all,and merry Christmas.

  14. Canon to right of them,
    Canon to left of them,
    Canon behind them
      Volley’d & thunder’d;
    Storm’d at with shot & shell,
    While horse & hero fell~
    Into the depths of the law, read the six hundred!

  15. OK, so when you started with the ‘canons to the left of them…” I was expecting
    canon to the left of them
    canon to the right of them
    here I am,
    stuck in the middle with you…
    Guess I’m just not as cultured as y’all!

  16. “Anyone heard about the monastic clashes at Mount Athos yet?
    On one hand, it’s very sad to see that happening in one of the holiest sites of Eastern Orthodoxy; on the other hand, that certain factions are this upset is a positive sign that the rapprochement between Patriarch Bartholemew I and the Holy Father is getting serious.”
    — I know that this has happened from time to time over the centuries.
    Maybe most of you know this, but for those of you who don’t… there are dozens of monasteries on Mount Athos. So, not that it would be inevitable, but also not surprising when differences in beliefs and rites and personalities are in so close confines.
    peace to all of you

  17. Guess I’m just not as cultured as y’all!
    Actually, when I posted:
    Canon to right of them,
    Canon to left of them,
    Canon behind them
      Volley’d & thunder’d;
    Storm’d at with shot & shell,
    While horse & hero fell~
    (obviously, in the original, it’s really ‘cannon’ though, but I just wanted to play with ‘canon’ because of what Ed Peters said)
    It’s not at all that I’m cultured (especially in my case), it’s only because I used to watch The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and the butler used to often want to recite this in many of the episodes. ;^)

  18. let’s take a poll: how many think Jimmy should ban people who continuely call his Awesomeness, the late John Paul II, an Anti-Pope?
    here’s the first *aye*

  20. my reason is simple: there are a lot of “characters” posting here (starting with yours truly) but almost all of them are serious. anyone who calls jp2 an anti-pope cannot be serious, or if so, be taken seriously. …personally, i would ban a lot more from personal blogs, which, after all , are a species of personal property.

  21. let’s take a poll: how many think Jimmy should ban people who continuely call his Awesomeness, the late John Paul II, an Anti-Pope?
    Would our votes really count?

  22. “Guess I’m just not as cultured as y’all!”
    Hardly! I did a post about Gerry Rafferty last year. Good stuff. Baker Street is still one of my favorites.

  23. It’s not at all that I’m cultured (especially in my case), it’s only because I used to watch The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and the butler used to often want to recite this in many of the episodes. ;^)
    Did I happen to mention that he was, in fact, an English butler??? Now, if that happens to count me as someone cultured, then there goes the neighborhood! ;^)

  24. Touching a couple of bases.
    Favorite blogs: Jimmy’s fellow San Diegan’s “The Cafeteria is Closed”, “Argent by the Tibor”, and “Me Monk, Meander”.
    Can’t understand why anyone would be negative toward John Paul the Great. Even those cool toward him should remember it isn’t good to speak badly of the dead.
    Culture is most important only in yoghurt!

  26. Can’t understand why anyone would be negative toward John Paul the Great.
    Not speaking ill of John-Paul II, but why would anyone give him the moniker “the Great”?

  27. Not speaking ill of John-Paul II, but why would anyone give him the moniker “the Great”?
    Because he was?

  29. John Paul II will ALWAYS be “The Great” to me regardless of what fools either here on this blog or anywhere else on the planet, for that matter, may think of him!

  34. Brian is either a progressive Catholic, a non-Catholic, or has been living under a rock since 1978.

  35. Ooops, I forgot another possibility. He could be one of those radtrads who thinks he’s more Catholic than the Pope.

  36. Monica,
    I don’t know that I’m ‘cultured’. I know that poem because I had a really pretentious group of friends in high school…which means I was pretentious too. I sincerely hope I’ve outgrown it! 🙂
    Mary Kay,
    In fairness, he could just think that it’s something that the Vatican should decide, not the laity. I don’t know him and don’t want to put words into his mouth…it was just another possibility that occurred to me.

  37. Kasia, that’s entirely possible. Given the lack of context, it could be just about anything. That is, anything other than someone who had seen the ‘Santo Subito’ signs at his funeral.
    I wasn’t being entirely serious. In the days before a major weekend, sometimes I like to zip in a comment, then zip right back out again.

  39. For those interested in the Catholic Church in England, I recommend visiting Joanna Bogle’s blog entitled ‘Auntie Joanna writes…’. I find it warm–as she writes with English charm, and informative as to trends in English Catholicism–and the ‘culture wars’ that they are fighting. http://www.joannabogle.blogspot.com

  40. Wait, I thought it was:
    “Me and Davy Crockett,
    Cannon balls to the left of me,
    Cannon balls to the right of me,”
    Oh no, wait, that was Sgt. Duffy.
    So much for culture!
    TK

  41. re: the monastic clashes
    once you whack a rival monk with a fire extinguisher, you lose the moral argument, right?

  43. I’ve been reading (which means translating, in my case) some sermons on the Eucharist by St. Albert the Great. There’s a whole book of them up on books.google.com, so it’s pretty much a whole course on Communion.
    The interesting bit is that he gives three reasons for the Sacrament’s institution: 1st, remembrance of the Savior, 2nd, sacrifice of the altar, and 3rd, food/meal/rations for humans (cibus hominis).
    So clearly, you have to balance all these elements in the presentation of the Mass. And that’s what’s traditional.
    *grin*
    Btw, I think the “rations” meaning is hilarious. One more military metaphor buried in the Mass — Jesus’ Body and Blood is our MRE for the campaign against the world, the flesh and the devil. 🙂

  44. Brian is either a progressive Catholic, a non-Catholic, or has been living under a rock since 1978.
    Ooops, I forgot another possibility. He could be one of those radtrads who thinks he’s more Catholic than the Pope. (Mary Kay)
    😎
    Mary, I am what the RadTrads call a Neo-Cath: a conservative Novus Ordo Catholic.
    JP2 has a lot of things in his pontificate in his favor. His Theology of the Body will be especially remembered. But he has several things in the negative as well – IMHO the most important being his pontificate will be remembered that he did next to nothing about the priestly (and Episcopal) abuses during his reign.
    I would grant that JP2 was a good Pope. I don’t see anything that would warrant the moniker “the Great”, at least not yet.
    Thanks to the others who answered the question as “just because”. 🙂

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