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Light from the East

Light from the East

I want you to know how much I have come to admire This Rock and how much I enjoy reading it. You have created a journalistic treat while at the same time doing solid work for the faith. 

For my money, your top performance was last November’s treatment of contraception [“Apologetics and Birth Control,” by John F. Kippley]. That is the biggest subject in the land, and you treated it as baldly and as bravely as I’ve ever seen. 

L. Brent Bozell 
Washington, D.C.


 

Supercharged 

 

This Rock is the only magazine I’ve ever read in my life that gets me pumped up, psyched up, and intellectually charged and challenged just by looking at the cover of each new issue because I know what’s inside: more front-line action. I like the tone of authority in the publication and the boldness and confidence that comes with it–that’s a hallmark of apostolic ministry. When it comes to defending the faith, I appreciate the heavy witness from the early Church Fathers. 

If more people knew the wealth of information they contain, they would not send in letters to the editor like the one where a man wrote, “Church history certainly does not compel toward Catholicism.” 

Paul Berghout 
Springfield, Virginia 


 

Listening to the Fathers 

 

I’m very involved in the Evangelical community and am on a spiritual journey to the Catholic or Orthodox faith. As a Protestant I always have believed that the early Church was Protestant. Your articles on “The Fathers Know Best” have been very helpful in seeing the Catholic Church in a new light. 

John Strassmayer 
[No address given]


 

We Aim to Please 

 

When I called and asked why it was taking so long for my order, you said you were working on it. Within three minutes after my call it was delivered. Thank you for responding to my call. 

Philip Dupor 
Kenosha, Wisconsin 


 

Came to Argue, Converted

 

The area in which I had been serving as a priest had been inundated by an Assemblies of God congregation that sought to proselytize many of our people. 

We found most Catholics did not know how to respond to the barrage of questions from these people. I knew something had to be done. It was time to educate the Catholics in the area with some good apologetics–they wanted to meet the challenge! 

I felt it was most important and necessary that our people not feel intimidated when confronted. Very often this was all these evangelizers needed. 

I was delighted to find out about Catholic Answers. Patrick Madrid from your staff gave an excellent presentation, with many practical suggestions on how to defend and intelligently answer people who challenge the Catholic faith. Catholic Answers let our people know there are answers to their questions–and our answers make a lot of sense. It gave the people what they lacked–confidence! 

At this particular presentation something else happened. I noticed a young man walk into the seminar with a Bible under his arm and a confrontational look on his face. I said to myself, “This one is ready to take Pat on.” I observed him all through the talk. He was taking copious notes. 

At the end of the workshop I saw this young man make a beeline to Patrick Madrid. I thought, “Here it comes.” I cringed. To my surprise I heard him say, “I just want you to know I came here tonight ready to argue with you, but you answered a lot of my questions.” This young man has since been received into the Catholic Church. 

Anthony J. Manuppella 
Vineland, New Jersey 


 

Whew! Whew! Triple Whew!

 

I got your catalogue two days ago. You seemingly have the answers to everything. I would like to know what is your answer to the horrendous blasphemies of this apostate pope and his lieutenant, Ratzinger. 

“We defend,” you say [in the catalogue], the Church “in public and on radio and television.” You never imagined that you would have to defend it even against a pope and cardinals. 

I too am defending the truth, our faith. I wrote since 1981 more than 1,380 letters, from one to 77 pages, most six, eight, or ten pages, many over 20. I wrote this pope three times, Cardinals Ratzinger, Bernardin, O’Connor, Hickey, bishops, priests, nuns, editors of magazines, Time, LifeThe New York Times, priest professors, university professors, Jews, pagans. I got replies from the mentioned cardinals, bishops, and a few of the others, even from the mayor of Boston. 

[Unlike you,] I did not have to leave my occupation [to do this work]; I came home, slept a few hours, then after midnight I was writing until six in the morning, then slept two hours more. And I wrote on weekends, during my vacations. Now I am retired and have all the time I need. 

I am interested only in private revelations, lives of saints; the books you are advertising don’t teach me anything, cannot teach me anything. 

John Henry Newman, maybe he was a saint, but whatever I read from him–quotes in articles–I don’t like them. 

Stanley Jaki, in Hungarian his name is Jaki Szaniszlo, whatever he says even with the best faith about the creation is an error. He does not know the truth. 

[Edward J. Gratsch’s] Aquinas’s Summa: After a vision [Aquinas] wanted to burn his books; the other [monks] did not let him do so. When everything is said and done, a good vision is more worthy than a million books. 

[Mortimer Adler’s] Aristotle for Everybody: [Aristotle] was almost condemned, said Jesus Christ. 

Fr. Frank Sheedy: He says many errors and hates Bayside. 

Vatican II was partly the work of hell, says Akabor, a prince from hell; the Holy Ghost not even at its beginning was always present, says Beelzebub. It was manipulated by Satan; he sat among them and played them like a chessboard, says the Virgin Mary. Satan entered the Church, as [Christ’s] Mother said it at Fatima, at the Council. Satan changed the wording of the Bible. He said, “The Bibles translated after 1964 are diabolical translations.” So if you want to teach truth, you have to go back to the Douay Rheims Bible. 

To a Mexican nun Jesus Christ told around 1969 that in his second coming (at the end of the world he will come a third time) he will put to shame the reigning pope personally. Never such a good occasion. 

Istvan Varkonyi 
New York, New York 


 

Are True Christians Rich?

 

There is an argument I heard that you never addressed. Lester Sumerall (very anti-Catholic) said that all economically advanced countries are Protestant, therefore proving that God is only with the Protestants. 

Vanessa Alexander 
Anderson, Indiana 

Editor’s reply: Since those same wealthy countries lead the world in crime, suicides, and abortion, are we to conclude such things are the fruits of Protestantism and that God approves of them? 

Whenever Christ indicated a preference, it was for the poor, not for the rich. You therefore could make an argument that truly Christian countries would not be notedly wealthy, because they would not be dedicated to the sterile accumulation of cash but would be more concerned with higher things.

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