Does God exist? (First Cause Argument)

This is the starting point of all apologetics. How can I help someone enter the church if they don’t believe a God even exist. If we can get people to see that God does exist then only from there can we start to work on the notion of Jesus and Christianity/Catholicism. 

 The book “Philosophy, the basics” explains this argument as something had to cause the existence of something else.  This author explains, if we go as far back as our mind shall allows us to we would find something or someone that had to start the first cause. The argument against this will be that we assume that there has to be a first cause and that first cause had to have a purpose. It also shows that God must have a first cause as well. The only thing about this was the existence of anything would have to depend on a creator and if God had a creator he wouldn’t be God.

 Before we get too much into the first cause, and if it could be God, we must paint a picture of what this God would need or be like. Can this notion of God really be possible. First we will create a list that would define this God, and see if it‘s possible for God to exist. As the book gives them to us, God must be, all loving, all knowing, all powerful and simply exist. Here is where it gets tricky. What does, all loving, all knowing, all powerful and exist mean? Can we even understand these fully sense we are bound to our human knowledge. We will try our best.

 I would like to bring to the table a couple other things God might not be able to do. As we believe, God can’t sin sense he is a pure being. That would make sin be stronger then he is, due to the fact that he couldn’t fight off the temptation, and due to the fact that sin weakens us and corrupts our soul. If he is perfect he could not be weakened or corrupted in anyway.
 God also cant change. If God could change then he would ether become stronger or weaker, smarter or dumber, or even bigger or smaller. If any of these were true then he wouldn’t be God. Why, because for him to become stronger, smarter or bigger he would had to be at one point weaker, dumber or smaller. Sense God is already perfect and pure he wouldn’t be able to “upgrade” himself to become better sense he is already the strongest, smartest and biggest there can be. As for the other side, if he can become weaker, dumber or smaller then that would mean he was once a stronger, smarter and bigger. Which would make God now imperfect.

 Then we must put some basic rules down. This God we are talking about can not contradict himself. Basically this means that God can’t go against what he is or who he is. For example, God can’t create a rock so big that he can’t move it. The argument here is, God can’t do everything. Just as we said before, he can’t contradict himself and these would make him contradictive. Other words, this would make him weak and not be all powerful because if God could create something bigger then himself, then he would not be God. As St. Anselm said, “God is that which nothing greater can be conceived.”
 I really enjoy this argument because no matter how far we can think back there has to be something that created something else. As far as our minds allow us to go back in time, we will end up with ether God or a single atom. Some say God created all things. Some say it started from an atom. I would like to say, what put that atom there to begin with? If there was something that created God then whatever that was, would be the true God because that would mean God has something more powerful then himself and would need or depend on something else. Which wouldn’t make him God.

 If science tells us, matter can not be created nor destroyed. Then that would bring up an interesting point. As we can see everything is around us today, matter must exist. If you can’t destroy it, then it must had always existed somewhere or within something. Going back to the atom, if matter can’t be created nor destroyed then that would mean, all the matter that is in the universe today would have been crammed into one little single atom at one point. Would this be possible? If it was, there must have been a strong being of some sort to put this together. If this did happened, then did God come first, or the atom? Could that atom put God here, or is it more likely God put the atom here?
 If science say as far as we can go back in time is to a single atom, then it would be saying that the atom always was and never had a beginning due to it’s matter cant be created nor destroyed. So in a sense would they be accepting that something or someone had to be without being created? If everything had to have a beginning then we wouldn’t be here, due to depending on something or someone else creating it.
 If everything that exist needed a creator including God, then we would be saying God doesn’t exist and nether do we. If God needed a creator then his creator would need a creator, and his creator would need a creator, and so on. Let me rephrase that, if it has a creator then it exist, if it doesn’t have a creator it couldn’t exist. If everything needs a creator then nothing would exist. This would be true only if God himself needed a creator as well. Sense God doesn’t need a creator because we believe he always was, then this would show that God could of created everything without needing a creator for himself.

 I say if we ever truly understood the mystery of God not having a beginning then that would only be revealed in heaven. We as humans want to have an answer for everything. We want to know everything. If we knew everything about God, and we understood everything about God. We would basically be putting God “in a box” of understanding him fully, if so then he wouldn’t be God. Cause that would mean our human minds just became equal to Gods mind. So to try and find out the first cause is in a way trying to know and understand creation as God knows it. God is beyond thinking, which we are limited to.

-AVM

The Church and my place in it.

The Church and my place in it.

Every person has a place in the church, these positions in the church change as life goes on.
Weather your taking classes or teaching the classes, that is your position. Baptism, Catechism, Confirmation, Marriage and so on. These being vocations or not, they are positions where people stand in the church.
The youth have their own place in the church as well. The youth can do many things for the church. The main thing we need to know is the youth is the future of the church. If our youth are not studying the church, strengthening their spiritual life or even as simple as being a practicing catholic, our church will suffer for it tomorrow.
From the babies to our Pope, everyone had a place in the church.

Jesus tells us in scripture that the church is looked at as a human body. The eye is not the noise and the arm is not the leg. But they are just as important as the other.
He also tells us that when the hand hurts, the whole body feels pain. When the eyes don’t work, they whole body suffers.
So if people start to slack off in the church, they are not knowing it but making the rest of the body of the church suffer as well.
Everyone has a vocation to live out, as you are on your way to fulfill that vocation, you are being active in your place in the church.

For example. A couple that is dating becomes engaged and about to get married. When they are in the process of engagement, that is their place in the church as of then.
      (Or) Seminarians, There job is to study to become priest. Studying for the priesthood is their temporary vocation, the priesthood is their final vocation. In order to reach that vocation they have to go through the process of their place in the church as seminarians first.
God doesn’t call us to just date our whole lives, or be seminarians our whole lives. God calls us to a vocation. But the process to reach that vocation may be dating or being a seminarian. So taking your place in the church is not as hard as you think.

It can be as easy as helping in catechism classes. Or helping father in mass or clean up the church. Don’t think that being a part of the church means you have to take on some big role or do overloaded things. If everyone does there little part in the church and take their place in the church then big things will happen.
Look at some of the gift’s God has given you, and apply those gifts for his church. If you can cook, help cook at events. If you can teach, help someone teach or teach a class yourself. If you can pick up a chair or make a sign to put on a wall, help with that.

 Everyone is a part of the body of the church, don’t let your body part be useless.

 So remember, everyone has a place in the church. Everyone has a job to do. God didn’t put you here to do nothing. He put each and everyone of us here for a unique and different reason.

-AVM

Angels

What do we as Catholics believe about angels? What does the word angel mean? Do angels really protect us from evil? Do angels really guide us? Are there different kinds of angels or different levels? Can we ever become angels? Are demons really angels who sinned against God? These are all great questions about angels. Let's look in scripture to find these answers.

What does the word "angel" mean?  The word angel means "messenger". A messenger of God to the humans. Angels were created by God and do not have physical bodies. They are pure spirits.

Do angels really protect us from evil?  Yes, St. Michael is the prince of heaven and is an Archangel. St. Michael fights for us against Satan. Jude: 9 = yet the archangel Michael, when he argued with the devil in a dispute over the body of Moses, did not venture to pronounce a reviling judgment upon him but said, "May the Lord rebuke you!" This shows that St. Michael an archangel fought for the body of Moses just as he will fight for us.
Psalms 91:10-12= No evil shall befall you, nor shall affliction come near your tent, (11) for to his angels he has given command about you, that they guard you in all your ways. (12) Upon their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone. This shows that the angels do protect us from evil.
Matthew 18:10= "See that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels in heaven always look upon the face of my heavenly Father. We have angels in heaven.

Do angels really guide us? Yes, as we see in Exodus 23:20-22= If you heed his voice and carry out all I tell you, I will be an enemy to your enemies and a foe to your foes. (23) "My angel will go before you and bring you to Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites and Jebusites; and I will wipe them out. Here we see that if we follow our angles voice, God will be an enemy to our enemies. They will also guide us as we seen in Psalms 91:10-12.

Are there different kinds of angels or different levels? Yes, as we seen in the previous verses, there are angels and archangels. All are angels but different levels of angels, or should we say they have different jobs. The different levels are called choirs. There are nine choirs of angels. They are Seraphim, Cherubim, Thrones, Dominions, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, Archangels, and angels. The archangels named in scripture are Michael, Raphael, and Gabriel. Michael means "Who is like God?" Gabriel means "God is my strength" and Raphael means "God is my healer".

Can we ever become angels? No, we can become a saint which means a person in heaven, or a person who followed God. Angels were made without bodies, humans were made with bodies.

Are demons really angels who sinned against God? Yes, every angel had a choice to follow God or rebel with Lucifer (Satan's angel name) One third of the angels rebelled and left God as we see in Revelation 12:4= Its tail swept away a third of the stars in the sky and hurled them down to the earth. We can see also see in 2 Peter 2:4= for if God did not spare the angels when they sinned, but condemned them to the chains of Tartarus and handed them over to be kept for judgment. We can see the angels sinned. We can also see in Psalms 103:20-21=Bless the Lord, all of his angels, you mighty in strength, who do bidding, obeying his spoken word. (21) Bless the Lord, all you his host, his ministers who do his works, everywhere in his domain. Bless the angels with strength who do bidding and obeying his spoken word.
We do not worship angels in any way, as we seen John fall to his knees in Revelation 22:8-9, and the angels tells him to get up and not worship him, but worship God alone.

Why did John fall to his knees and worship? Due to the fact the angels are with God, his glory is poured on them and they carry the glory of God with them wherever they go, demons can't stand the sight of angels cause of this glory poured on them. So as humans if we would see an angel with God's glory poured out on them, we might also think to worship due to God's glory surrounding us.

For more info on this topic you can also look in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, (CCC), 1352, 525, 559, 331, 336, 311, 391-93, 414, 328, 954.
-AVM

Faith and Works

Faith and works; what does this mean?

Well most Protestants say that you can be saved by faith alone, they also say, “You can’t work your way into heaven.” They will take you to Roman 3:28= for we consider that a person is justified by faith apart from works of the law.  They will also take you to Romans 4:1-12, where it talks about Abraham justified by faith and not works. This is true, but on the other hand what kind of works are they talking about here? Abraham was justified by his faith, his faith in God to trust in God fully. So what did Abraham do with this faith, he acted it out by taking his son to the alter to sacrifice him, as God told him too. Let’s look more into what the bible teaches about believing in faith and works.

 As I said Abraham was justified by his faith in trusting God and acting it out, we can clearly see it’s in, James 2:21-22= Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered his son Isaac upon the alter? (22) You see that faith was active along with his works, and his faith was completed by the works.

James 2:14-17= what good is it, my brothers, if someone says they have faith but does not have works? If a brother or sister has nothing to wear and has no food for the day, and one of them says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,” but you do not give them the necessities of the body, what good is it? So also faith of itself, if it does not have works, is dead. So here we see that if you have faith but don’t have works, your faith is dead.

James 2:24= See how a person is justified by works and not faith alone. Faith is a need, we must have faith, but we al so must have the work that goes with faith. Read all of James 2:14-26. It explains more of faith and works together as one.

Galatians 5:6 = For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. As we see here faith is working through love.

1 Corinthians 13:2= And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but not have love, I am nothing. We must have love with our faith, faith working through love. Love is what makes our faith act out.

1 Corinthians 13:13= So faith, hope and love remain, these three, but the greatest of these is love. We can clearly see here that love is the greatest of the three. Not putting faith or hope down, but what are the other two without love?

Matthew 7:21= “Not everyone who says to me,’ Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father in heaven”. Not everyone who calls to God will go to heaven, but the one who does the will of the Father. So here we can see you must do the will of God. Doing is working.

Philippians 2:12= Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
This is pretty straight forward, we must work out our salvation.

-AVM

Passover and Last Supper

How does the Passover and the Last Supper relate to each other and why would we relate them to each other? This is a good question; let's look into scripture to see what we can find.

Exodus 12:5 = the lamb must be a year old male and without blemish. The lamb must be unblemished. These types of sacrifices were for the cleansing of sins.

John 1:29= Behold, the lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. We see here Christ is the Lamb of God and takes away sins.

1 Peter 1:18-19= but with the precious blood of Christ as of spotless unblemished lamb. We see here he was the unblemished lamb.

Now let's look more into the celebration that took place.

Exodus 12:14= "This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate with pilgrimage to the Lord, as a perpetual institution." A feast is being done with this unblemished lamb, and it will be perpetual.

Luke 22:19= "This is my body, which will be given for you; do this in memory of me" Both were done in memory. This had to be actually preformed by the people.

1 Corinthians 5:8= Therefore, let us celebrate the feast, we can see here it was also called a feast.
Exodus 12:44 and 48, this gives the regulations of who can partake in this meal. It says no slave or alien can be a part of it unless they were circumcised. As we seen in the New Testament baptism replaced circumcision. We must be baptized in the Catholic Church to be able to receive at the celebration of mass.
Exodus 12:46, talks about how the lamb must be eaten inside and none of it taken out of the house. As Catholics we must receive the body of Christ in the church and not take it outside or save it for later. The only way the body of Christ can be taken out of the church is for the sick who couldn’t attend mass or special events as this. This is only one example of many.

Exodus 12:46 also says none of its bones could be broken. Numbers 9:12 also says no bones of the lamb must be broken.

As we see in John 19:31-36, they did not break any of his bones.

Exodus 12:22 says to take a brand of hyssop and dip it in the blood and put it over the door post so the angel of death would not be upon them.

John 19:29-30, says that they soaked in wine a sprig of hyssop and Christ drank it. When he did this he said "It is finished" just as the Jews would do.

-AVM

Confessing to a Priest

Confession, where did this practice come from? Is it in the bible? Confession is in the bible and it comes from Judaism, which is where Christianity came from.

Leviticus 5:5-6= than whoever is guilty in any of these cases shall confess the sin he has incurred, (6) and as his sin offering for the sin he has committed he shall bring to the Lord a female animal from the flock, a ewe lamb or a she goat. The priest shall then make atonement for his sin. Also continues through Leviticus 5:7-19.

As we can see here, Confession to a priest was practiced by the Jews. Now why don’t we have to offer a lamb, goat or a ram anymore?

In Exodus 12:5, they used a lamb for a sacrifice as well. As we see in 1 Peter 1:19, Christ is the Lamb, and in John 1:29, Christ is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. The lamb had to be unblemished as we see in Exodus 12:5 as well. Christ had no sin as we see in 1 John 3:5. So Christ is the sacrifice sent from God the Father, there is no need for any other sacrifice for the atonement of sins. Jesus was and will always be the ultimate sacrifice.

So the next question is, did Jesus carry this practice over to his Apostles and Disciples? Well let’s look into the New Testament to see.

James 5:16= therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. So here we can clearly see that we are supposed to confess our sins to one another. Does that mean anyone? Let’s look more into it.

John 20:22-23= and when he (Jesus) had said this, he breathed on them (Apostles) and said to them, “Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins your retain are retained.” Now, here we can see Jesus himself is giving the power to the apostles (the first priest of Christianity) the power to forgive sins. Notice the only times God breaths on people in scripture. Two times in the bible God breaths on the human body. First to Adam when he gave him a physical life with a soul, and second when Jesus breaths on the apostles. Giving them the spirit of new life, as we get when we are forgiven our sins.

So the next question is, can any follower of Christ (disciple) forgive someone their sins? Or does it have to be someone ordained into the church by the authority of the church. Notice Jesus didn’t give all his disciples the power to forgive sins. Just the first priest received this authority. There is a separation between the two. These were the leaders of the church and the faithful followers. Plus, in Judaism the people couldn’t just go to anyone to have there sins forgiven with a sacrifice. It had to be a priest.

Matthew 9:5-8= which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven, or to say, ‘rise and walk? But you may know the Son of man has the authority on earth to forgive sins….(7) He rose and went home. (8) When the crowds saw this they were struck with awe and glorified God who had given such authority to human beings. As we see here, at the end of verse (8) it says, God had given such authority to human beings, as in plural, more than one. Jesus is God and has the authority to give the power to human beings as he did in John 20:22-23.

Matthew 16:19= I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven”.  Jesus was talking to Peter, giving him the authority to bind and loose, such as rules of the church and binding and loosing sins on earth.

2 Corinthians 2:10= whoever you forgive anything, so do I (Paul). For indeed what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been in the presence of Christ. Paul is saying here that whatever and whoever he forgives, is in the place of Christ forgiving. Just as he stands in the place of Christ’s forgiveness, so do priest.

(CCC) 1457, 1532, 1401, 1415, 1467, 2490, 1851, 1480-84, 1455-58, 1448, 2040

-AVM



Questions about Mary

Here we will go over the main questions about Mary, “Mother of Jesus” and the Titles or Different names she has. What we as Catholics believe about her?

Who is Mary? Mary is the mother of Jesus as we see in Luke 1:43, Luke 1:35-37, Matthew 1:23 and Matthew 1:18-21.

Why do we believe Mary was a virgin even after she gave birth to Jesus? We can see that Mary was a virgin in Luke 1:27, Luke 1:34. Some might say, But in Matthew 1:25 it says, “He (Joseph) had no relations with her (Mary) until she bore a son, and he named him Jesus. Well let’s look at this word “until” and see how it’s used in other verses in scripture. As we see in Matthew 28:20, “And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.” Does this mean at the end of our life, or after judgment he will leave us? Of course not. Let’s also look at 1 Corinthians 15:25, “For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.” Does this mean once Jesus put all his enemies under his feet he will no longer reign? Of course not. Also look at 1 Timothy 4:13, 2 Peter 1:19, and see how they use this word until in those verses. The word until is not accurately translated from Greek to English as its best. It’s used as everlasting until.

Why do we call Mary blessed? Luke 1:42, “Most blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” She is clearly called blessed. Another verse we can also look at is Luke 1:48, for he has looked upon his handmaid’s lowliness; behold, from now on all generations shall call me blessed. All generations includes the people of today as well.

Why do we call Mary our mother? Let’s look in the book of Revelation. Revelation 12:17, then the dragon became angry with the woman, and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring, those who keep God’s commandments and bear witness to Jesus. We are the offspring, also known as children. Some might say this is talking about the “Church.” This would make a lot of sense as well and would be acceptable sense the church is spoken as a female. Neither one of these would be speaking against the Catholic Church. Let’s look into John19:26-27, “When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, “Woman, behold your son,” (27) than he said to his disciple, “Behold your mother.” Just as John accepted Mary as his mother, we do as well.

Did Mary only have one biological child? Or should we say, was Jesus her only child? Yes he was her only child; he had no biological brothers or sisters. Some people might take you to Acts 1:12-15, they will say it says right there in scripture that Jesus had brothers. Here we can see they all gathered to pray and Peter stands up to speak and it says, He stood up in the midst of the bothers and then it points out there was about 120 of his brothers there. Do you really think they were speaking about biological brothers, or maybe they were speaking of spiritual brothers? If we look back at John 19:26-27, we see Jesus give his mother to John his disciple. If Jesus had brothers or sisters, why would he give his mother to a friend? Wouldn’t that be wrong? If he did have any siblings, where were they during his crucifixion? Where were they in all the stories of Jesus as a child or his lifetime?

Why do we believe that Mary was sinless? Not even sinning once. If we go to Genesis 3:15, I will put enmity between you (Satan) and the woman (Mary), and between your offspring and hers (Jesus); He (Jesus) will strike at your head, while you strike at his heel. This would be why she was born without original sin. She carried Jesus in her womb. Jesus is God in the flesh. He couldn’t be brought into this world from a sinful person. If Mary was born with sin than her Original sin would have been handed down to Jesus, which can’t be. So God protected her from all sin so he could come into the world as God in the flesh, always and forever pure. The reason we sin is because we were born into it, sense she was not born into sin, she never knew sin. In this question as well you can also look at the section of “Theology” under the heading of “Mary is sinless.” You will see it goes a little deeper in this belief.

Is it okay to believe Mary was assumed body and soul into heaven? Well let’s see if it goes against scripture. We see in 2 Kings 2:11 and Hebrews 11:15, Enoch and Elijah were both assumed body and soul into heaven. Enoch walked with God and Elijah was taken by a chariot of fire. So it wouldn’t be going against scripture to believe God would do the same for the perfect, sinless mother of Jesus. Another thing that goes along with this is no one has ever found the tomb of Mary where her body was place, or found her body on earth. Just like Jesus, Enoch and Elijah, Mary was also taken to heaven.

-AVM