Sunday 12 August 2007

Lucha Con Dios


I was at a BBQ this weekend and at this event I happened to have the opportunity to speak with a "Lapsed" Catholic, at least that's what he called himself. Jim and I had quite the debate. It centred mostly around his assertion that the Church should be ordaining women to the priesthood (which I will write more about in an upcoming post) , but the argument came down to this; he said "wasn't the whole point of Jesus life, death and resurrection to demonstrate that humans who live moral existences can rise from the dead also?"
Wow.
I replied that he'd missed the whole point and starting from the Jewish practice of substitutional sacrifice and citing the book of Hebrews (which if you ever wanted a good bridge between Old and New Covenants this is it) explained how Jesus death and resurrection is the only way to reunite humanity with God. No sacrifice, no fellowship with God.
Jim replied that he liked this God even less after this realization than he did before. Before this explanation he figured that God's plan and thus God is flawed or there is no God, his reason being the presence of suffering in the world. If God allows suffering, then he is flawed.... whatever.
He left me in a ponderous state, obviously wrestling with this concept. Thinking back on it the story of Jacob came to mind. At Peniel Jacob wrestled with God. The scriptures don't say how it started, but it says that he wrestled with God until daybreak. I imagine that God approached Jacob and Jacob's response was to wrestle. In this case, God wrestled with Jacob to strengthen him and encourage him because his older brother Esau was after him with a few hundred men. Jacob was petrified of Esau from whom he had fleeced a blessing. God gave him hope that if he was given the strength to prevail against God, surely he would prevail against Esau, but so that he could not boast, God popped his hip out of joint and gave him a limp. Jacob's name was changed to Israel at this point which means to wrestle with God and his hip was never the same.
We are never the same after wrestling with God. Many times though God is not wrestling with us to build us up but to take us down a peg. In the case of Jim, he was wrestling with God's ways. He doesn't understand them and believes his own are better. He was just cruising for a bruising.
I have wrestled with God and I lost, no surprise there. I don't recommend it.

The next time you wrestle with God, think of Israel. He got a blessing out of his fight, maybe God has one in store for you. An attitude adjustment is a blessing too when you think about it.

Thursday 9 August 2007

The Agony of Discernment



So I'm moving now. The place I'm in is small, but it is cheap and nice and my wife and I like it. However there is another unit in our row-house which is big and beautiful but we would be pressed to afford it. I was asking God for his will in the matter and my wife and I took a while to think about it, and let me tell you, I agonized over this decision. My big reason for moving was that if my wife became pregnant we would need a bigger place anyway and she wouldn't want to move after becoming pregnant, but I was worried about my job. The lease for the Auto Shop I work in is up at the end of the month and our new owner hasn't said anything about renewal and my boss says we couldn't afford to move the business.
After a whole day of agonizing over the decision, I was leaning towards "no" for practical reasons when the building owner walks in 10 minutes before I am to go home (and his office is in a town 1 1/2 hours drive away) and announces that some repairs to the building are forthcoming and that we will be renewed in our lease. Well that put me over to the "yes" camp pretty quick. It's funny how God waits until the last minute to answer your prayers sometimes.
So I'm moving now and I can't wait.

Tuesday 7 August 2007

Spiritual Excellence



I've been thinking of a lot of things pertaining to Christian Spirituality (and by Christian I mean Catholic) and I had one of those light-bulb-over-the-head *Eureka* moments. They come few and far between but are always a pleasant surprise.

The moment came in one of the most unsuspecting places. I was watching the movie "The Last Samurai" starring the Scientology poster boy Tom Cruise. For those of you who have not seen the movie (which I highly recommend as it is the most brilliant performance of Tom Cruise's less than stellar reperatoire), Tom's character, Cpt. Nathan Algren, has been hired by Japanese businessmen in the mid 1870's to train an army due to his bravery in the American Indian Wars. The purpose of this army is to squash a rebellion of Samurai who are fighting the increasing westernization of Japan, the westernization that these businessmen are proliferating and becoming wealthy from.
During the battle for which the peasant army was woefully unprepared, Cpt. Algren is captured by the Samurai led by their Lord Katsumoto after he defends himself admirably enough to avoid slaughter. He is then brought to a mountain village very remote and breathtaking and informed that since the winter snows have now blocked all the passes, there is no conceivable escape. During his time in the village he starts to notice the people and culture. In what seems like a cross between Stockholm Syndrome and plain curiosity he starts to understand the Samurai a little better. Then he drops what was like a bombshell to me. Presented here in paraphrase he says "From the time these people rise to the time they sleep, they devote themselves to the perfection of whatever it is they do. Everything is an artform when done perfectly." The movie shows clips of the swordmaker making swords, the Samurai doing excercises in the fields, a woman making tea and it makes it look like everyone is trying to perfect what they do and to do it perfect every time.

I then thought "That is a very admirable goal. What is it that I do that I may strive to perfect?" I have a job apprenticing to be an Automotive Service Technician and perfecting that is a lifelong process requiring constant training. I have lost some weight and could use a little more training for my body to bring myself into good physical shape and tone. However, since this is a Catholic blog, the answer I'm really driving at is the need to perfect oneself spiritually, after all Scripture says that we must be perfect as the Father is perfect. But just how does one go about that? What does it mean to attain Spiritual Excellence?

This is where I remember that I am a Catholic now and I wipe away the sweat already beading on my forehead. We have the Saints! That is what they are for, to look to as an example of Spiritual Excellence. The one however that came to mind first was St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order. Alcoholics Anonymous and all the Anonymous groups have programs based on his teachings designed to break addictions and problem behaviour and this is good because let's face it, I'm addicted to sin sometimes and it is definitely problem behaviour. So I have found a copy of St. Ignatius' Spiritual Exercises online in PDF format here. (You must be a member to get it but membership is free. The site also has a long litany of other works by authors and Early Church Fathers and whatnot.)
I figured that if you want to be physically in shape you exercise and discipline your body, so if you want to be in good spiritual shape, you must exercise and discipline your spirit.

So I will read the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola and make a valiant attempt to employ them in the pursuit of Spiritual Excellence. Pray for me in this endeavour as we don't ever perfect ourselves so much as we allow Christ to perfect us. This will be interesting. To be continued...

Wednesday 1 August 2007

Value Added

I've been thinking about what we value in our society and why it is we value it. It all started like this...
My dad's sister married a guy from France, moved there and had 5 beautiful kids and they all come to visit every few years. My cousin Jérémie who is 13 and the only boy with 4 sisters seems to lack a good mentor in the faith and is starting to think like his friends, who are atheists as so many in France are now. His father is a faithful man, but what 13 year old wants to be like his dad? He is struggling with the concept of God in general as he is finding it hard to defend to his friends.
I raised the question of the value of a human being to him; "are you valuable as a human being"? He of course responded yes and I asked him why, which he could not answer.
The thing is that we as humans have absolutely no value. We are finite and the universe is infinite. Even if the universe was finite, the empty space surrounding it has no conceivable boundary. Things that are finite in comparison to that which is infinite are relative to zero. This is a mathematical principle, in fact calculus is based on the assumption that as X approaches infinity the relation 1/X becomes 0. Since the universe is infinite and we are finite, in comparison to the whole universe, we are meaningless organisms who have no value of our own.
Funny enough, if I killed someone just because I wanted to, that would be tragic and unjust. Why is that? Even if I were to kill a homeless person it would be a tragedy, and society who was so quick to forget the person in life would be as quick to convict and punish me for the murder. Why? Simply put because that person has value because they are a person and so does every other person. However how can this be since we have shown human life to be insignificant?
Just at the same time that finite things are meaningless, infinite things are meaningful since ∞/∞ is 1. It is only because finite things mean nothing that the infinite means what it does. The only source of value that exists is the infinite, which we as humans call God.
As Catholics we know that God is infinite and that God is the source of life, but in this perspective we know that God is the source of our value as well. The catechism proclaims this very truth clearly. We mean anything because we mean everything to God. He created us that way. It is easy to forget sometimes that we are valuable only because we mean something to God.
So this was the explaination I gave my cousin about the existence of God. I think it made a difference to him, but one can only hope and pray. However it opened another interesting train of though as well. If we are valuable only because God gives us this value, what else is valuable? Are the things we find valuable really valuable? In fact, if we don't have any value in and of ourselves we don't even have the authority or ability to define what is valuable. This means that we must look to God, the source of our value, to tell us what is valuable. We have all sorts of ideas about what is valuable, but without divine blessing, they aren't really valuable at all.
St. Paul writes to the Corinthians in his first letter:
3:11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one that has been laid; that foundation is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw 13 the work of each builder will become visible, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each has done. 14 If what has been built on the foundation survives, the builder will receive a reward. 15 If the work is burned up, the builder will suffer loss; the builder will be saved, but only as through fire
Whatever survives will earn the builder a reward. Whatever survives the testing fire is valuable
if it rewards the builder. What will survive the fire? Works of faith, love and charity done for the Lord in his work in accordance with his will.
It is a sobering thought for me because my priorities just don't line up with that sometimes. I think we all need a wake up call sometimes.

Friday 13 April 2007

Reversion 2.0


Evangelization is something we are all called to do. The opportunity can arise when you least expect it. For example, I was doing my laundry the other day at the Laundromat in my neighbourhood when I started talking to a lady there, I will call her Sheila to avoid actual names. The conversation turned to religion, which most people avoid like the plague. It came out that this woman, “used to be” a Catholic, but due to some issues that she had, decided that she could worship, pray and read her Bible at home. Her belief was that she could be “Spiritual” without being a part of a large organized religion.

To avoid a long and drawn out story, she asked me 3 questions regarding the faith:

  1. How do you explain and justify the evil and hatred in the world?
  2. If Jesus is inside my heart and I can find truth and beauty at home, how can you say that he is only in the Church?
  3. Can you explain the difference between Catholicism and the other traditions of Christianity?

I had to start in Genesis 3 for this one, and explained that although baptism removes the stain of Original Sin, it still leaves “concupiscence” behind, which is the tendency towards sin, and that there is no justification for the presence of sin. I asked “can you admit that the evil in the world is mankind’s fault?” and she said yes. I replied that if God fixed the problems in the world outright, it would negate free will, and that would negate salvation by choice. She acquiesced to this.

Next I explained the differences between the Church and Protestants, starting with Papal authority. I quoted from Matt 16 where Jesus renames Simon to Peter and asked her if she believed that Jesus was giving special authority to Peter and she said she did. I explained how in John 20 Jesus instructs the Disciples/Apostles to forgive the sins of others in his name and to baptize in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. I asked her if she believed that the Apostles were given the ability to forgive sins and asked her if our priests could do the same through Apostolic Succession and she said she did. So far so good.

Lastly, I explained how she does find truth at home and I also explained that a lot of Protestants do have truth, my parents for instance display a great faith and love for Jesus outside of the Church. I then asked her if Jesus is in the Eucharist and she said yes. I then said that if Jesus said he was the Truth, and he is present in the Church in His fullness of body, blood, soul and divinity, then the Truth in its fullness is resting in the Church alone, not just as a physical reality, but as a theological reality also. How could the fullness of Truth exist in a Church that did not teach it? Apart from this, outside the Church there are no Sacraments, and if the Truth in its fullness rests in the Church, then the Sacraments of the Church are true and vital also.

Here’s the bottom line. Sheila asked me what she should do then. I was blown away. I don’t think anyone has responded like that to a conversation about the Catholic Church with me before. I had evangelized as a Protestant before but this was entirely new to me as a Catholic. Don’t get me wrong, I talk about the Church, but usually it upsets people and they start talking about gay rights or abortion or some other thing they think the Church is wrong about and I end up defending the faith. This woman was different. Sheila asked me what to do.

I asked her if she was baptized and confirmed and she said she was. I told her to go to Confession and make it a good one and receive the Eucharist after and she was back on track. Sheila looked at me and said that she would go to Confession and receive the Eucharist for the first time in MANY years! We have a Catholic Revert!!

PRAISE THE LORD!!!!!!!!

I cannot contain my excitement!!! What a wonderful work that Jesus did in this woman! She was hurting and empty and searching for the truth, and all she needed was for someone to answer some nagging questions she had in a patient manner. That Jesus would choose me for this work is amazing for me. I am so glad that I was able to be a part of this.

So pray for Sheila that she makes a good Confession and receives the Eucharist without obstacle and that she grows in faith, love and charity in Christ.

Lesson: NEVER give up on anyone. Maybe they say they don’t believe, but you never know. I thought I was going to end up making apologies (in the true sense of the word) for the Church, but Jesus had something so much better in mind. Imagine not receiving Sacraments for years! No thanks!!

Pray for someone you know right now that they find the fullness of truth in the Church. Write their names (real or not, God knows who they are even if I don’t) in the comments section so everyone who reads it can pray for them too.

In Christ Jesus,
Joel

P.S. PRAISE THE LORD!!!!!!!!

Tuesday 10 April 2007

Mary Was a Perpetual Virgin Or My Name Isn't...


The Perpetual Virginity of Mary was always a hard sell for me. It wasn't until the last 6 months or so I started to get a handle on it. There are a few reasons why I feel that Mary needed to be a Perpetual Virgin and I will share them to the best of my knowledge and ability, however if I am off track or I contradict the Magisterium, please let me know and I will conform my opinions to those of the Church. Without further ado, the reasons are as follows.

1) Mary was the Ark of the New Covenant.

If you remember the Ark of the Old Covenant, it contained the 10 commandments (Word of God), the manna from the desert (Bread of Life) and Aaron's budding staff (Pastoral Symbolism). We also know that the foreshadowing of the Old Testament always takes a new form: the Word become flesh (John 1), the Passover Lamb becoming human, circumcision becoming baptism (Col 2:9-12). Following this vein, we can see that Mary was foreshadowed by the Ark of the Old Covenant having in her womb the Word of God, the Bread of Life and the Good Shepherd. What other reason for the Old Ark was there? It went before the Israelites through the wilderness and was the first into the waters of the Jordan, thereby allowing the Jews of the second generation to go through the waters as if in Baptism into the Promised Land. Please note the allegory of the Christian life found in the Exodus story. First in slavery to sin (Egypt), set free by the blood of the Lamb (passover), through the waters of Baptism (Red Sea) into the wilderness of the world where we are aliens on our pilgrimage to Heaven (wandering), fed with the Bread of Life and quenched with water from the Rock, given spiritual formation and training in holiness (Sinai and the 10 commandments), fighting against evil forces (defending against tribes in the area), and finally coming to the Promised Land, again through Baptism. The Ark led the way the whole time. So how does Perpetual Virginity work into this? Well, if you touched the Old Ark, you died. It was holy and set apart for God and God alone. It was a beacon, an object of adoration and a declaration of God's favour and provision. Mary likewise then was holy, set apart for God and God alone and is a beacon, object of adoration and a declaration of God's favour and provision. There is a strict "look but don't touch" rule in effect.

2)This was explained to me by my RCIA leader when I was but on my way to becoming a Catechumen because the Perpetual Virginity was high on my list of grievances with the Church.
The Jewish concept of marriage was a little different than what we have today. Anyone who has seen "The Nativity Story" has seen that when a couple became engaged, they were actually married at that point, but until the ceremony they were to refrain from what led to family so the marriage would be pure and there would be no doubt about the bride's virginity. We can see this in the Church today as the Church is the Bride of Christ, but the Marriage feast of the Lamb is spoken of as a future event. However, if the woman became pregnant, the Groom would marry her anyhow (if he knew the baby was his of course).
When it was announced to Mary that she was to conceive God's Son, she was under no illusions as to what that meant. To have someone's child was to be married to them. In her 'yes' Mary agreed to become God's 'spouse'. This makes sense also if Mary is to be the foreshadowing of the Church itself who is to be Christ's Spouse. Joseph therefore was told to take her into his house anyhow so that the baby would have a father and so God's Spouse would not be put to shame. Having said this, Joseph was a devout man the Gospels say and as a devout man, how could he in good consience have sexual relations with someone else's spouse? Mary had no other Children and remained a Virgin Perpetually because she became God's Spouse, prefiguring the marriage of Christ to the Church.

The question of Matt 1:25 came up to me also. It says:
"but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus."
What about the word "until"? I asked my Priest this question and he answered me thusly: In modern English the word until is used conditionally, that is to imply that whatever condition existed before no longer existed after. The original use of the word did not have this connotation of condition to it. Simply understood, when the author says 'until she bore a Son', he is trying to emphasize that she did not have relations with anyone, not even her own (earthly) husband so there would be no disputing that the child was of divine origin, not to imply this situation changed afterwards. I am quite satisfied with that explaination.

3) In the Garden of Eden, the Man was given the job of heading up the human family (which is more of a curse than a blessing if you are reading this as a feminist). If you will read Gen 3, you will find that Eve cursed herself and the relationships she will have as a result of being tricked, but since Adam chose sin over God, the whole of creation was damned. Sin entered into the world through the man only. This is one of the reasons that the Jewish faith is passed through the Mother only, because Original Sin is passed through the man. This is also the reason why Christ did not have an earthly father in a biological sense. He could not be scarred by sin in order to be our spotless sacrifice. Having said all this, Mary was the new Eve. In Gen 3 Adam named the woman Eve because she was the mother of all living. Likewise as the mother of all living in Christ, she is the new Eve. Therefore she is subject to Christ alone as he is the new Adam (1 Cor 15:35-50). To have sexual relations with anyone else would be to submit to or to put herself into subjection to the body of sin.
I was reading D.G.D. Davidson's conversion story at www.scificatholic.com yesterday, and I noted specifically his ponderings on birth control. My wife asked why we don't allow barrier methods as they do not abort or cause medical complications. I referred to Gen 38 and the story of Tamar, the wife of Judah's son. Judah's son Er was struck down by God for being evil, so his brother Onan was told to go and 'raise up offspring for his brother' by making Tamar his wife. It is said then that Onan practiced the 'withdrawal method' and spilled his seed on the ground (every time it says). God struck him dead for this also. Why? because he refused to give of himself to the woman, he only took. It was the ultimate way to use and mistreat the woman in his day and age. Likewise, barrier methods of birth control have in fact perfected this feat of using, abusing and demeaning by now allowing the man to 'complete the act' without in fact giving of himself at all. Barrier methods allow men to steal more effectively from women. What does this have to do with the Perpetual Virginity of Mary? Well, if denying the gift of himself is evil, then a man does good by giving of himself, by giving of his flesh to his wife if you will for the purpose of creating a new life within her. Since the sacrament of marriage is a foreshadowing of our marriage (in the Church) to Christ, and Christ always does what is good, he gives of his flesh to his bride, the Church, for the purpose of creating a new life within her, both collectively and individually speaking. Finally, as previously mentioned, as the foreshadow of the Church, Mary accepts "the Flesh of God" as the creation of a new life within her. To accept another flesh less than that of God after this is unthinkable and unnacceptable.

4)Like Divine Revelation, the doctrines about Mary are trinitarian to a certain degree. They are Immaculate Conception, Perpetual Virginity and Assumption into Heaven. Mary was Immaculately conceived as I understand as a singular grace given in advance for what Christ was about to do (and had in fact accomplished as he is Divine, outside of the bounds of time and therefore everything is now to Him) so redeeming her also. If she did not receive this grace, Perpetual Virginity and Assumption would be impossible. To be without stain of Original Sin meant that she committed no actual or personal sins. This meant that she was without concupicence or tendency towards sin, and therefore capable of remaining pure in every sense. This also means, since the wages of sin is death (Rom 3:23), then she was free to be assumed into Heaven because she had no sin to be paid for.
What this all means is that if you attack or deny Perpetual Virginity, you then also deny the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption. By saying she did not remain a Virgin is to say that she was capable of sinning, and that means she was not born free of concupicence, and therefore not born free of Original Sin. What this also implies is that she had sinned and therefore was capable of dying. Even farther, if Mary sinned, Christ was also marked by sin and could not be our sacrifice for sin, and this would make his death useless and deny also the resurrection due to the fact the resurrection relies on the assertion that Christ was in fact sinless.
There is a good reason that the Church declares these things Dogmas of the Church; because if you deny one of them the whole of the faith unravels and is left a sham.

1 Cor 15:17-19
17 If Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have died in Christ have perished. 19 If for this life only we have hoped in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.

I hope this has helped you out! I had a lot of fun writing it, and putting it all together on 'paper' helps me solidify my own view.

In Christ Jesus the Risen Lord
Joel

Protestantism Is A Lifeboat On Stormy Seas


In my Protestant experience, compared with my faith deconstruction of my young adult years, Christianity was a Lifeboat. It preserved me from drowning in the stormy seas of life, and kept my soul afloat even when I couldn't see bottom. The great thing about a lifeboat is that it is the feeling of security and hope, knowing you're safe for now and hoping that you will be rescued from the terrible perdicament surrounding you.
However, the drawbacks are large.

The lifeboat analogy reminds me of an author named Don Miller. He is not a Catholic himself, but he has some brilliant insights on conversion and Christianity in general. In his book "Searching for God Knows What" he details in some length his own conversion story. This book is so frank and honest, it literally blew my mind and totally changed my life. No exaggeration. Anyhow I digress.
In the book he uses an analogy called the Lifeboat theory. It says that the world is behaving as if it is in a lifeboat and that all our selfish behaviours stem from the desire to impress others so as to raise our status in the lifeboat, so if the time comes to throw someone out of the lifeboat for some reason, it won't be us. The Pharisees of Jesus' day are a good example of Lifeboat theory in action: "Thank you God for not making me like other men.", walking around with sad faces so you know they are fasting and are therefore more holy than thou, etc. The analogy explains that Jesus is the ultimate anti-Lifeboat. He didn't care what others thought, only what the Father willed. He didn't need status, only holiness and he didn't need validation from others, only the Father's favour (which was given). He stands outside of the Lifeboat beckoning us to abandon our vain attempts to jockey for position inside the Lifeboat, abandon the sense of fear and pride that keeps us in the Lifeboat. Once we step outside the Lifeboat, suddenly nothing else but Jesus matters anymore and we have nothing to be ashamed of except for what went on in the Lifeboat.

What does any of this have to do with being a Protestant you ask? Well, although Mr. Miller does not take the analogy this far, I would assert that Protestants are in their own Lifeboat of sorts, we'll call it the S.S. Luther for the sake of humour (S.S. standing for sola scriptura of course). They sail along in it thankful they are not swimming in vain for their lives as they did without their Saviour, they ration their available provisions as frugally as possible to make what they have go further, and they throw overboard everything that isn't necessary for survival to lighten the load. This is simply prudent action in a storm tossed sea, but to my amazement, they do all this in plain sight of a lush tropical island with plenty of food, shelter and fresh water. The island of course is the Catholic Church. It is a bastion of truth and graces, with more than we could possibly need to survive and best of all, it is where the Creator of the universe is actually present. The Island is frequently buffeted by hurricanes of anger from the harsh environment and is subject to frequent earthquakes, but we know that we will not drown in the rain, nor since our Saviour is present, will we sink into the oceans around us. We are truly safe on the island.

At some point in the past, I guess Luther figured that the Island was being overrun with dogs and built a Lifeboat (named after himself of course) and put out to sea until the dog problem was taken care of, but after spending so much time at sea, I guess he couldn't find his way back. Protestants born in the boat or who swim to it are told of all the horror stories about how the Island is an inhospitable place that isn't what it started out as or was intended to be and unfortunately the Catholics who continue to quit the island are all to ready to confirm these misconceptions either by ignorance or vehemence.

I bring this story up at all because of the wonderful responses I received about my previous post Salvation Ave. where I was in a bit of a theological pickle. Everybody was helpful to the best of their ability and gave extra resources where they could and I was truly touched. We in the Catholic Church, and fellow converts especially, know that we are all on the same island, for better or worse and are in unity under the Eucharist and the Magisterium. We are happy to help out a Christian sibling without condecension, arrogance or fear that somehow even having the conversation is a temptation from the Evil One, and I appreciate it very much.
On the other hand, I unfortunately did not find this trait in the "S.S. Luther". I found that if you struggled with something, people were sometimes 'surprised' you didn't know something, prepared to duke it out with you theologically with one finger pointed at you and the other stuck in Romans 8 (you former Calvinists know exactly what this passage is), or ready to give you the textbook answers to demonstrate how much they knew and how together their life is and how if you were a really strong Christian and knew your Bible better you wouldn't be having this quandry. The textbook answers include but are not limited to:
  • 'well pray about it'
  • 'read your Bible'
  • 'don't give in to Satan and his lies, trust in Jesus'
  • and the overused and abused 'I guess we'll find out when we get to Heaven'
All this crap is just a game, just something they use to feel like they are ahead in the Lifeboat so if the Arminians are actually right they aren't the first in line to cry "Lord, Lord" before being tossed into the Lake of Fire. I know this because I did it. So did my friends. So did the people at Church. It's all done in the name of 'Christian Unity' and 'Edification of the Body of Christ' which is why it stings so bad when you get pricked by their thorns.

When I bailed on the S.S. Luther (I was in the Baptist row, which was obviously in the front because it would be impossible to be thrown out of the Lifeboat unless you were never in the Lifeboat to begin with) I tried to make a swim for it. When I tired of swimming against the current, I lay on my back and rested and the storm washed me ashore on the Island of the Church. Thankfully I didn't have to get back in the boat, looking like something the cat dragged in. Jesus gave me another option. The option was complete surrender to the Lord and the Laws of the Island in exchange for perfect peace and safety, and Communion with my Lord. Obviously, the island isn't without it's dangers or pitfalls, but when I am struggling to make my way, I know that I have the help and support of all my siblings on the island and all the siblings past who are still present on the Island even if not physically.
As Father John Corapi, S.O.L.T. said once "1000 struggles still does not equal one single doubt. I struggle with things all the time, and boy do I struggle. That does not mean however that I have doubted". I hope to be able to help you all when you struggle, as you helped me.

In Christ Jesus
Joel