Isn’t it unfair that God cursed Adam and Eve simply for eating a fruit that gave them knowledge?
The tree did not give knowledge Adam and Eve mere knowledge, which is something they already had by virtue of being rational animals. Rather, Adam and Eve thought it gave them legal authority to determine what is good and evil, or to be “like God.” John Paul II writes in Dominum et Vivificantum:
According to the Book of Genesis, “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil” was to express and constantly remind man of the “limit” impassable for a created being. God’s prohibition is to be understood in this sense: the Creator forbids man and woman to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The words of the enticement, that is to say the temptation, as formulated in the sacred text, are an inducement to transgress this prohibition-that is to say, to go beyond that “limit”: “When you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God [like gods], knowing good and evil.” “Disobedience” means precisely going beyond that limit, which remains impassable to the will and the freedom of man as a created being. For God the Creator is the one definitive source of the moral order in the world created by him. Man cannot decide by himself what is good and what is evil-cannot “know good and evil, like God” (36).
— Trent Horn
A friend of mine uses the “ensoulment” argument to defend early abortion. She said St. Thomas Aquinas taught an unborn baby doesn’t receive a soul until forty days after conception and that the Church still teaches this. Does the Church say anything about when a person receives a soul?
While St. Thomas did subscribe to the Aristotelian 40-to-80-day “ensoulment” hypothesis that a spiritual soul was present 40 or 80 days after conception (40 days for boys and 80 days for girls), he never wavered in his belief that abortion was always gravely wrong.
Concerning the Church’s teaching on the issue of ensoulment, Pope St. John Paul’s encyclical Evangelium Vitae states:
Even if the presence of a spiritual soul cannot be ascertained by empirical data, the results themselves of scientific research on the human embryo provide a valuable indication for discerning by the use of reason a personal presence at the moment of the first appearance of a human life: How could a human individual not be a human person? (EV 60).
What is at stake is so important that, from the standpoint of moral obligation, the mere probability that a human person is involved would suffice to justify an absolutely clear prohibition of any intervention aimed at killing a human embryo. Precisely for this reason, over and above all scientific debates and those philosophical affirmations to which the magisterium has not expressly committed itself, the Church has always taught and continues to teach that the result of human procreation, from the first moment of its existence, must be guaranteed that unconditional respect that is morally due to the human being in his or her totality and unity as body and spirit:
The human being is to be respected and treated as a person from the moment of conception; and therefore from that same moment his rights as a person must be recognized, among which in the first place is the inviolable right of every innocent human being to life. (EV 60)
— Peggy Frye
Why can’t we seek out a priest at any time we feel desperate to confess and ask forgiveness? Why do we have to wait for Saturday only, and then at a particular time only? If a person should die before then, would God forgive him if he repented in his heart?
Look at it from the priest’s point of view: Without some parameters guiding the process, he would constantly be receiving calls from people feeling “desperate to confess and ask forgiveness.” He would likely burn out quickly and be of no use in the confessional to anyone.
That said, practically every parish allows Catholics to call and make an appointment for confession outside of the scheduled confession times. If the person is gravely ill or in immediate danger of death, a priest will visit him any time, day or night, for the last rites (which includes confession).
Finally, yes, a person who is impeded from confession through no fault of his own but dies repentant can be forgiven.
— Michelle Arnold
Did Saul actually fall off his horse on the road to Damascus?
Nowhere does the New Testament make mention of Saul being thrown from his horse. In fact, it doesn’t even make mention of Saul traveling by horse. Each of the three accounts of Saul’s miraculous conversion (Acts 9:3-4, 22:6-7, 26:12-14) asserts that Saul, upon seeing the light from heaven, fell to the ground.
Most people assume that because Saul was en route to Damascus, he must have been traveling by horse at the very moment when the heavenly light appeared. This blinding light caused him and those accompanying him to fall from their horses to the ground. This is highly improbable. St. Luke, the author of Acts, in two of his three accounts of the conversion of Saul, furnishes us with a clue that sheds light on what Saul was more than likely doing when he fell to the ground. See if you can pick it out.
“As I made my journey and drew near to Damascus, about noon a great light from heaven suddenly shone about me. And I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’” (Acts 22:6-7).
“Thus I journeyed to Damascus with the authority and commission of the chief priests. At midday, O king, I saw on the way a light from heaven, brighter than the sun, shining round me and those who journeyed with me. And when we had all fallen to the ground, I heard a voice saying to me in the Hebrew language, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’” (Acts 26:12-14).
Each of these passages establishes the exact time of day when the heavenly light appeared that caused him to fall to the ground. It was midday. An important detail to be sure. We know that Saul was more than likely not riding his horse at noon because that was an established time of prayer. Every day at noon, pious Jewish men recited these prayers while standing facing Jerusalem. It is highly probable that Saul, being a zealous Pharisee, observed midday prayer as he traveled along the road to Damascus. He was likely standing erect and facing south to Jerusalem when he was blinded by the light of Christ and fell to the ground. Quite an appropriate time to have an encounter with God!
— Hector Molina
I have been viewing a number of atheist-based videos online recently and amid the standard arguments I hear all the time, one question is rather good; “If God is all powerful and we ask for ‘his will to be done,’ then why do we pray with intentions at all? How can we influence an all-powerful deity to change its mind when its will shall be done anyway?” So, besides praying for clarity and closeness with God, why pray at all?
If God is of little consequence, then one might ask why pray at all. But even if we aren’t interested in him, still any and every good thing is the result of his generosity. Since he has given us everything, don’t you think we owe him the acknowledgement of that fact?
St. Thomas Aquinas puts the worship of God under the virtue of justice. We owe him the acknowledgement of the truth of who he is—which is what worship (latria) is. It’s the highest form of prayer we have. Then we also owe him our gratitude. He told us to ask him for what we need—not because he needs to know, but because we need to be grounded in reality, acknowledging our complete dependence on him.
By asking for what we need, we don’t change his mind. But we do change ourselves—from assuming that we are independent and self-sufficient. If God wanted to end our existence, he wouldn’t have to do something; he’d have to stop doing something. He keeps us in existence at every moment.
Asking that his will be done does not at all mean that his will is always done. He has given us free will so that we can counter his will and often do. When we ask that his will be done, we are praying that we, his creatures, will act in accord with what he wants of us. In short: God has no need of changing, but we do.
— Fr. Vincent Serpa
My daughter’s seventh-grade Catholic school religion teacher recently told the class that because no one can know for sure if the plagues of Egypt really occurred, they are really myths, and Catholics are not required to believe these events were miraculous. Is this true?
No. The Catholic Encyclopedia explains:
As the plagues of Egypt find parallels in natural phenomena of the country, many consider them as merely natural occurrences. The last evidently does not admit of a natural explanation, since a pestilence does not select its victims according to method. The others, howsoever natural they may be at times, must in this instance be considered miraculous by reason of the manner in which they were produced. They belong to the class of miracles which the theologians call preternatural. For not to mention that they were of extraordinary intensity, and that the first occurred at an unusual time and place and with unusual effects, they happened at the exact time and in the exact manner predicted. Most of them were produced at Moses’ command, and ceased at his prayer, in one case at the time set by Pharaoh himself. Purely natural phenomena, it is clear, do not occur under such conditions. Moreover, the ordinary phenomena, which were well known to the Egyptians, would not have produced such a deep impression on Pharaoh and his court.
The First Vatican Council said:
If anyone says that all miracles are impossible, and that therefore all reports of them, even those contained in Sacred Scripture, are to be set aside as fables or myths; or that miracles can never be known with certainty, nor can the divine origin of the Christian religion be proved from them: let him be anathema (Vatican Council I, Dei Filius, no. 3).
— Peggy Frye
I love to pray the rosary, but when I get to the decade of the Assumption, I find it hard to picture anything as a visual image to meditate on, as I have no idea how it looked in reality.
Most artistic renditions of the Assumption show the Blessed Mother being lifted up into the sky. But the early Christian stories of the Assumption merely state that the apostles found her tomb empty (just as they had found her Son’s tomb empty). Either image might be helpful for meditation purposes.
— Michelle Arnold
Should we obey human or divine law? Acts 5:29 says we should obey God, but 1 Peter 2:13 and Romans 13:1-2 say we should obey the laws of man.
In Acts 5:29 Peter is saying we should not disobey God in order to obey civil authorities. In Peter’s case, obeying the authorities would have meant not preaching the gospel, something the Lord had commanded them to do, so this was a law they could not follow. But Peter and Paul also taught that human laws should be followed in general so that Christians and non-Christians can live in peace. 1 Peter 2:12 says, “Maintain good conduct among the Gentiles, so that in case they speak against you as wrongdoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.”
In regards to Romans 13:1-2, Paul is saying that all legitimate civil authority is established by God, and so just as Christians obey the bishop, they must also obey civil authorities. Those in power can rightfully punish those who “commit evil” and defy the state. However, Paul did not mean we must unconditionally follow the state because only God deserves that kind of allegiance. Instead, Paul tells us to give “respect to whom respect is due, honor to whom honor is due” (Rom. 13:7).
The Catechism echoes these points and says, “The duty of obedience requires all to give due honor to authority and to treat those who are charged to exercise it with respect, and, insofar as it is deserved, with gratitude and goodwill. If authority belongs to the order established by God, ‘the choice of the political regime and the appointment of rulers are left to the free decision of the citizens’” (CCC 1900-1901).
But the Catechism goes on to say, “The citizen is obliged in conscience not to follow the directives of civil authorities when they are contrary to the demands of the moral order, to the fundamental rights of persons or the teachings of the Gospel. Refusing obedience to civil authorities, when their demands are contrary to those of an upright conscience, finds its justification in the distinction between serving God and serving the political community” (CCC 2242).
— Trent Horn
Why is Holy Communion offered on the hand as well as the tongue? No matter how well one cleans one’s hands before Mass, they still aren’t clean enough to handle the sacred host.
Our hands are a lot easier on the host than the acids in our stomachs. Our Lord was quite willing to get dirty when he joined us in our human journey. Dirt does not keep him away from us. Sin is actually far filthier than dirt. But even sin did not keep him away from us. But it does keep us away from him. We tend to sin with our tongues more than with our hands. It is sin that we need to be cleansed of before receiving him in the Eucharist.
— Fr. Vincent Serpa
Several months ago we got a new pastor. I receive our Lord on my tongue. After the Easter Vigil, the priest asked me why I receive on the tongue and not in the hand. He said we are allowed to touch it. He recently came to me again and told me it is time to change, meaning to receive Communion in the hands. I am at a loss as to what to do.
Show your pastor the Norms for the Distribution and Reception of Holy Communion by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (usccb.org), especially number 41, which says: “The communicant may choose whether to receive the body of Christ in the hand or on the tongue.”
Politely inform your pastor that your choice is to receive Communion on the tongue. If he refuses to give you Communion on the tongue, contact your bishop, who should inform your pastor that he has no right to deny you Communion merely because you choose to receive it on the tongue.
— Michelle Arnold
Is missing Sunday Mass always a mortal sin? What can I do if I have to miss Mass?
Missing Mass is not always a mortal sin, or even a venial sin for that matter. Sometimes there are circumstances beyond our control, such as illness or an unavoidable work obligation, that occasionally prevent us from attending Mass on days of obligation. In cases like this where there’s a serious reason for missing Mass, then the obligation to attend Mass ceases. Thus, there is no sin to confess.
Canon 1248 of the Code of Canon Law states:
If it is impossible to assist at a eucharistic celebration, either because no sacred minister is available or for some other grave reason, the faithful are strongly recommended to take part in a Liturgy of the Word, if there be such in the parish church or some other sacred place, which is celebrated in accordance with the provisions laid down by the diocesan bishop; or to spend an appropriate time in prayer, whether personally or as a family or, as occasion presents, in a group of families (CIC 1248, § 2).
— Peggy Frye
Is the Bible correct when it says that God will not forgive those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit (Matthew 12:31-32)?
There is no sin that, when sincerely repented of, God will not forgive. The Catechism says, “[T]he gates of forgiveness should always be open to anyone who turns away from sin.”
John Paul II says of the references to blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, “According to such an exegesis, ’blasphemy’ does not properly consist in offending against the Holy Spirit in words; it consists rather in the refusal to accept the salvation which God offers to man through the Holy Spirit, working through the power of the Cross. . . . If Jesus says that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit cannot be forgiven either in this life or in the next, it is because this ‘non-forgiveness’ is linked, as to its cause, to ‘non-repentance,’ in other words to the radical refusal to be converted. This means the refusal to come to the sources of Redemption, which nevertheless remain ‘always’ open in the economy of salvation in which the mission of the Holy Spirit is accomplished” (Dominum Vivificantum 46).
— Trent Horn
I was commissioned to illustrate a coloring book of St. Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Native American saint of North America. One of the pages is to show her baptism. Can you tell me what adult baptism looked like in the seventeenth century?
Since this is an art project and not a historical document, you are allowed to take creative license in your interpretation of events. You can also create drawings intended to inculcate catechetical lessons. Since St. Kateri was baptized in the American wilderness by a Jesuit missionary, you could draw her being baptized in a river, patterning the image after well-known images of St. John the Baptist baptizing Jesus in the Jordan River.
— Michelle Arnold
In Theology of the Body for Beginners, Christopher West says, “[E]very time a husband and wife have intercourse they are meant to renew their wedding vows with the ‘language of their bodies.’” So would they receive sanctifying grace from that act, or just from the initial ceremony?
With the sacraments that we receive only once such as baptism, confirmation, holy orders and matrimony, so long as one is in the state of grace, one can receive sanctifying grace from those sacraments in an ongoing way. Certainly, the renewal of wedding vows whether verbally or otherwise would be an occasion for receiving such grace.
— Fr. Vincent Serpa
Is praying the rosary a form of idolizing Mary? Could you give me some advice on how to explain this to my Protestant family in the simplest terms? They also believe praying the rosary is condemned by Christ as vain repetition.
Praying the rosary is not a form of idolizing Mary. The rosary is a prayerful meditation on the life of Christ through the eyes and heart of Mary. The Church calls the rosary the “epitome of the whole gospel” (CCC 971).
Perhaps the simplest way to explain the purpose of praying the rosary to a Protestant is to explain it as a scriptural prayer. Begin with the gospel of Luke. Show them how the foundation of the rosary prayer is taken from the Annunciation and the Visitation in Luke 1:28-43: “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”
Pope Paul VI said the following on the rosary:
There has also been felt with greater urgency the need to point out once more the importance of a further essential element in the rosary, in addition to the value of the elements of praise and petition, namely the element of contemplation. Without this the rosary is a body without a soul, and its recitation is in danger of becoming a mechanical repetition of formulas and of going counter to the warning of Christ: “And in praying do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do; for they think that they will be heard for their many words” (Matt. 6:7). By its nature the recitation of the rosary calls for a quiet rhythm and a lingering pace, helping the individual to meditate on the mysteries of the Lord’s life as seen through the eyes of her who was closest to the Lord. In this way the unfathomable riches of these mysteries are unfolded (Marialis Cultus 47).
— Peggy Frye
My husband and I were divorced one year ago. The marriage was never annulled and I have remained chaste since then. We have recently begun talking about the possibility of getting back together. If that happens, I know we need to be remarried civilly, but do we need to be remarried in a church? Can we still behave as husband and wife with or without a civil remarriage?
If your marriage in the Church was presumptively valid, then you cannot be “remarried” in the Church. I recommend talking to your pastor, though, to ensure that there were no irregularities at the time of the marriage that must be resolved. Assuming all was in order, then you would only need to be remarried civilly—for civil benefits and to avoid scandal—but you may ask your pastor for a nuptial blessing if you wish.
As for conjugal relations: In theory, you could “behave as husband and wife,” as you put it. But to do so while civilly divorced, especially if the two of you have not publicly announced a reunion, could be scandalous. It could also be spiritually beneficial to wait for your marriage to be fully regularized, before both God and neighbor (i.e., the state), before engaging again in conjugal relations. If nothing else, waiting could be considered a penance for any harm the two of you may have caused each other or others by your marital breakdown.
— Michelle Arnold
During a recent Sunday homily, our pastor made mention of the precepts of the Church. I had never heard of these before. What are they?
The precepts or commandments of the Church are the basic minimum duties that the Catholic Church requires of her members. They are positive commands that set us on the course to growing in Christian holiness and are binding on the consciences of the faithful. Any deliberate failure to adhere to them constitutes a grave or mortal sin.
As the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, the binding or obligatory character of these precepts “is meant to guarantee to the faithful the indispensable minimum in the spirit of prayer and moral effort, in the growth of love of God and neighbor” (CCC 2041). The Catechism describes the precepts as follows:
The first precept (“You shall attend Mass on Sundays and on holy days of obligation and rest from servile labor”) requires the faithful to sanctify the day commemorating the Resurrection of the Lord as well as the principal liturgical feasts honoring the mysteries of the Lord, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the saints; in the first place, by participating in the eucharistic celebration, in which the Christian community is gathered, and by resting from those works and activities which could impede such a sanctification of these days.
The second precept (“You shall confess your sins at least once a year”) ensures preparation for the Eucharist by the reception of the sacrament of reconciliation, which continues baptism’s work of conversion and forgiveness.
The third precept (“You shall receive the sacrament of the Eucharist at least during the Easter season”) guarantees as a minimum the reception of the Lord’s Body and Blood in connection with the Paschal feasts, the origin and center of the Christian liturgy.
The fourth precept (“You shall observe the days of fasting and abstinence established by the Church”) ensures the times of penance that prepare us for the liturgical feasts and help us acquire mastery over our instincts and freedom of heart.
The fifth precept (“You shall help to provide for the needs of the Church”) means that the faithful are obliged to assist with the material needs of the Church, each according to his own ability (CCC 2042-2043).
— Hector Molina
I am in a celibate relationship with another woman. I am very devout, and we are older women. There is no sexual intimacy or temptation for either of us. I am wondering if we can get a civil marriage because of financial reasons and still receive the sacraments. Also, just curious about if the Church is going to start granting annulments to same sex couples if one of them reverted and wanted to marry someone of the opposite sex.
To begin with your last question: the Church can’t ever grant annulments to so called same-sex marriages, because they aren’t real marriages to begin with. There would be no need for an annulment. The state does not have the ability to change natural law. Calling it marriage simply does not make it so. The human body is not designed for it. To attempt “same-sex” marriage for whatever reason is a statement affirming what is not true. So to answer your first question: to do so would constitute a serious public sin.
— Fr. Vincent Serpa
Since confessions are sealed, how is it that so many biographies of saints have information that comes from their confessor? Is the priest not breaking the seal of confession?
The seal applies only to what is said during the celebration of the sacrament of confession. Presumably the confessors to the saints know the saints outside of the confessional and are relating information that they obtain outside of confession.
— Michelle Arnold
I’m 20 years old and I’m not Catholic, but I’m planning to convert. I’m guilty of mortal sin. If I die before I convert and can’t confess, will I go to hell? To be honest, I had no idea what I was doing was a sin until a few years ago. And I had no idea it was a mortal sin until a few moments ago. Does this mean I’m going to hell?
If you didn’t know it was a sin, you were not guilty of sinning. But if you did know it was a sin and actually sinned, your desire to ask for forgiveness and follow the Lord into the Church would suffice if you died before actually joining the Church. By the way, welcome home!
— Fr. Vincent Serpa