Recent content by HomeschoolDad

If it is so important to you, to think that Trump or Putin are atheists (as opposed merely to being sinners), go ahead and think that. They either are or they are not, and they profess to be believers. I've never heard Elon Musk say anything at all about religion. He could be an atheist, or...

The only Bibles to which I pay any attention for spiritual matters, are Bibles that have been approved by the Catholic Church. That said, some Protestant Bible translations are almost entirely unproblematical, such as the King James Version. I would be hard-pressed to think of a Bible...

Arguendo, they could also be lying about being atheists. Just saying.

There are no more Nazis in Germany, at least outside of small fringe groups. It is illegal in Germany even so much as to display Nazi symbols. Holocaust denial is likewise illegal...

In our culture and times, not saying that it is right, but people generally think of someone existing at the moment of birth and not before. That is why couples will say "we're going to have a baby", not "we have a baby" when they find out the mother is pregnant. When my (putative) wife fell...

That proclamation of Trump's on the IC was very inspiring. It's pretty obvious that someone wrote that for him, presumably a Catholic of a more traditional and orthodox orientation --- he wouldn't have had all that information at the top of his mind (not hardly) --- but it wouldn't have gone...

Some fora, both religious and secular, are death on anyone going off-topic, but I don't intend to moderate this forum that way. Very often, good discussions take on a life of their own, and veer away from the topic at hand. That's the time to break them out into their own threads, not to...

I have moved the posts regarding Trump's and Putin's alleged atheism to their own thread. Let's keep the discussion factual, and avoid making allegations about someone's internal forum that, in the end, only that person knows. Such allegations are mere speculation.

I am wondering at this point, if it would be possible for one to claim that the Catholic Church is not the one true Church to which one must adhere, if one realizes that they must adhere to it in order to be saved, because its priests could, theoretically, fool penitents by surreptitiously...

I don't think any of us would want to raise our children to view either Trump or Putin as paragons of Christian virtue, but Trump was raised as a Presbyterian (this presumably under the aegis of his Scottish-born mother), and Putin was baptized (and presumably chrismated as is Orthodox practice)...

If it is important to you, to think that a priest could, theoretically, withhold the intention to confer a sacrament, while remaining form and matter intact, and telling no one of his intent not to confer a sacrament, that is up to you. It's not something Catholics generally go around talking...

Regarding conditional administration of sacraments, this pertains to when a sacrament (such as baptism) is conferred when there is a doubt as to whether the sacrament was ever validly administered, or whether there is a doubt as to whether the penitent is disposed to receive the sacrament (as in...

All of this is just speculation, and to my knowledge, has no basis either in Jewish or Christian tradition. It would have been awfully hard for Adam and Eve to serve as advisors to the pharaoh. Ditto Noah, and in any case, after the flood, the pharaoh, if there was one reigning at that time in...

Trump was raised as a Presbyterian. Granted, his understanding of Christianity is superficial, but he does have at least some religious background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Trump_and_religion Putin was baptized as an Orthodox Christian and professes that religion.

Neither Trump nor Putin are atheists. They have both spoken publicly of their belief in God, and on top of that, Putin receives the valid sacraments of the Russian Orthodox Church and assists at their Divine Liturgy, which is one and the same thing as the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. They come...