It's tempting for me to dismiss Russell Kelly's last outburst in our back and forth on tithing. But I can't quite bring myself to do so. The whole encounter has been rather bizzare, given that we both agree on the most important premise: that tithing is an Old Testament concept, not a New Testament one. …
The Society for a Moratorium on the Music of Marty Haugen and David Haas Has Finally Won
One of the more hilarious sites on the Web relating to Roman Catholicism is the Society for a Moratorium on the Music of Marty Haugen and David Haas, or SMMMHDH for short. When it started, the Society made the following claim: The Society is awaiting pontifical approval from the Holy See as a pious sodality. …
Going Back to the Ones That I Know…
Pope Benedict XVI is certainly shaking things up in his "new" approaches to the Mass, Anglicans and Orthodox. It has more profound implications that many people realise. To start with, he's being more proactive to Anglo-Catholicism than many anticipated. In Think Before You Convert, I figured that the Roman Catholic Church would simply pick up …
St. Jerome’s Idea of Bishops and Presbyters
One of the reasons why people join churches like Anglican, Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches (especially the last one) is to have a church which can have continuity with the "Fathers of the Church." For Roman Catholics, one of the four "Doctors of the Church" (the most important of the Fathers) is St. Jerome, the …
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Anglican parishes to ordain own clergy. And on the flip side…
A couple of days ago I took the Anglo-Catholics to task for their ambiguous position relative to Roman Catholicism and how they needed to decide whether they are in or out of the "true church." It works both ways. Now we see that that magnificent island which filled two continents with those who wanted or …
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There’s Catholicism and Then There’s…
The announcement that the Traditional Anglican Communion seeks full union with Rome isn't really news. It's been their objective for a long time. The obvious dumb question here is, "why don't they just swim the Tiber and get it over with?" Part of the reason may lie in the fact that the Roman Catholic Church--wrongly, …
More on Communion as the Main Order of Worship
In his reply to my last post, Robert Easter makes the following comment on the Holy Communion: The earliest records show that weekly Communion was standard from the very first. John Wesley stressed it as still being important for the Methodists to take it weekly, and he took it several times during the week. That …
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From Pentecost to Liturgy and Back
My friend Robert Easter at Sanctifusion has thrown me some very deep questions in the course of a discussion: I was talking about you to a young man who is in the process of shifting form Church of God to Anglican. Something about the ancient ties and the Nicene writers. When we look at it, …
Vatican Representative Tones Down One True Church Statement. But Why?
Vatican Representative Tones Down One True Church Statement. But why should he? This issue is only complicated because we live in a world where statements of any kind which point out our differences are considered "politically incorrect." The Catholic Church's position on this matter is no different now than in 2000 when the current Pontiff, …
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Mother Teresa’s Crisis of Faith
The revelation of Mother Teresa's Crisis of Faith needs to be understood in light of her emphasis on the Passion in Roman Catholic spirituality. She wrote in 1951 that the Passion was the only aspect of Jesus' life that she was interested in sharing: "I want to ... drink ONLY [her emphasis] from His chalice …
Positive Infinity 