Stephen K. Ray's Blog, page 15

Pope Leo XIII was the earliest born person to ever be filmed – fascinating!

This is an incredible glimpse back into the past. Pope Leo XIII was filmed and it was preserved and now colorized a bit.

According to Bobbie on X (@bo66ie29):

Pope Leo XIII was born on this day 2nd March 1810. He is the earliest born person ever filmed. Born in the same year as Chopin, he was a year younger than Lincoln and two years old when the War of 1812 started. He is seen here in this incredible film from 1896.

He is famous as the author of the St. Michael Prayer, eleven encyclicals on the Rosary and his Catholic social teaching.

The post Pope Leo XIII was the earliest born person to ever be filmed – fascinating! appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Why do bad things happen to good people? What is God anyway?

I recently received a heartfelt email from a woman who is about to lose her faith and is trying to understand why God allows bad things to happen.

I am not sure whether you’ll respond to this email or even read it, but I am writing because I’m at the edge of losing faith. I have been watching you on YouTube, and I must admit that I like your energy. I am not necessarily interested in defending the Catholic Church because a lot of Catholics have done terrible things, even though I would still never leave.Bad things happen to good people. How can I still believe? There’s so much evidence God exists, but it’s so hard to believe in a God who lets all those bad things happen. I know a lot regarding theology. It’s not what I am searching for, but to know it is worth it all—it is worth keeping faith.I am not angry because my grandma has cancer, nor my best friend having cancer and close to losing her life, but at those who are hypocrites, and God lets them do bad to innocent people…the stories would be so long…just want to know it is still worth it. How can I know?

I tried to give her a simple response to consider, at least as a start:Why bad things happen to good people has always been a mystery and one of the major questions of philosophy and morality.At the core, I believe, is the issue of us being free moral agents able to make choices for good or bad. Many people choose bad. The consequences of this are rampant.It all started in the garden of Eden with the fall. God made a perfect universe, which was full of joy and peace and goodness. Adam and Eve, who were given charge of this new earth, disobeyed God, and brought evil and bad choices into the world, which culminated in bad things happening.First, they were kicked out of the garden. Second, their son Cain killed his brother Abel. Sin became rampant in mankind because of Adam’s choice, but the “virus” of sin was passed on to his children and they to turned away from God.God did not create the world with evil or suffering. We brought that on ourselves, and his “free moral agents” continue to choose what is wrong. He could have made us all robots with no ability to sin, but he wanted us to choose to love him with our free will.Knowing his creation has been infected with this disease of sin and and he’s begun a great restoration program by sending his own Son to become one of us to start a new creation.The first Adam brought sin into the world, and therefore suffering and death. The second Adam Jesus came as founder of a new reality or a new kingdom which he is implementing in the Church and when he comes back again, it will be fully implemented.Unhappily, even the Church is made up of free moral agents that also make bad choices. They will pay penalty in the end.Hope that helps. Maybe we can continue with the conversation.

The post Why do bad things happen to good people? What is God anyway? appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

The Apostolic Fathers (who knew the Apostles or those who did) – A Dialog with Steve Ray and William Albrecht

These are the guys who made me Catholic!

Enjoy the YouTube discussion and also consider my 90-minute documentary “Apostolic Fathers: Handing on the Faith” filmed all on location following the lives (and deaths) of Ignatius of Antioch, Clement of Rome, Justin Martyr, Polycarp of Smyrna and Irenaeus of Lyon.

The post The Apostolic Fathers (who knew the Apostles or those who did) – A Dialog with Steve Ray and William Albrecht appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Fun to Join Bear on EWTN!

Always fun doing a show with champion surfer and Catholic Adventure Manly Convert. This airs at 6 PM Saturday on EWTN.Steve Ray’s Journey: From Baptist Roots to Catholic Faith.

The post Fun to Join Bear on EWTN! appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Should Catholics Go to Protestant or Ecumenical Bible Studies?

With Lent upon us, many Catholics will be making new resolutions, starting new studies and getting serious about the truth. With a plethora of new Catholic Bibles abounding, it is a great idea to dive into the Scriptures.

There are many good Catholic Bible studies available. Consider one that I myself have written a good number of the studies for at Catholic Scripture Study Int.

But one caution is regarding joining one of the popular Protestant or Ecumenical Bible studies.

You may find my Catholic Answers Magazine article helpful. It not only surveys the situation but gives a chart to compare the differences in the way Catholic and Protestant approach the Bible.

https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/should-catholics-go-to-non-denominational-bible-studies

The post Should Catholics Go to Protestant or Ecumenical Bible Studies? appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Does the Catholic Church Promote Coerced Conversions?

Today I received a letter from a husband sadly telling how he was coerced by his wife and the OCIA team to become Catholic. He says he was “lied to” by the team and threatened with divorce by his wife — or at least that is his side of the story.

It was a lengthy email, so I will not relay the whole message here since I do not want to betray a letter written privately to me or waste your time with all the details. The summary above is really all that needs to be shared.

Here is my response:

Dear Anonymous

First, I usually don’t respond to anonymous letters because I expect serious people to sign them if they expect me to take them seriously. However, I’ll make an exception in this case.Second, the Catholic Church’s position has always been that conversion should not be forced by threat or sword (as is done in Islam) but done through convincing someone of the truth and allowing them to choose.However, in early days, when fathers were “the head of the house,” as it was in the early Church, the whole family converted at the father’s direction. You can see this in Acts 16 with the Philippian jailer.The Catechism of the Catholic Church addresses conversion by force:

Paragraph 160 To be human, “man’s response to God by faith must be free, and … therefore nobody is to be forced to embrace the faith against his will. The act of faith is of its very nature a free act.” “God calls men to serve him in spirit and in truth. Consequently they are bound to him in conscience, but not coerced.… This fact received its fullest manifestation in Christ Jesus.” Indeed, Christ invited people to faith and conversion, but never coerced them. “For he bore witness to the truth but refused to use force to impose it on those who spoke against it. His kingdom … grows by the love with which Christ, lifted up on the cross, draws men to himself.”

Third, I do not know the whole story of the relationship between you, your wife, and the OCIA team, but from your side of the story, it appears the OCIA team did not fulfill its role properly. However, I have learned in life that there is always another side to the story. In any case, I am sorry that you were put into that position.

Fourth, I do not address anything like this in my conversion story since it is my own personal testimony and I never had coercion, nor do I know of any other situations where it has happened. I have a family member who is not Catholic, married to my very Catholic spouse, and none of us has ever coerced or pushed a conversion. We hope our example will eventually be sufficient, but not through pressure or arm-twisting.

Fifth, I hope you can join us some day for my conversion story, or watch it on-line and learn the true story of why a guy like me, raised in a very anti-Catholic Protestant world decided freely and without duress to embrace the fullness of the faith in the Catholic Church.

God bless you, and you have my prayers.

Steve Ray

The post Does the Catholic Church Promote Coerced Conversions? appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Today is Feast Day of St. Damian – He wrote a Book: Clerical Sodomy Past and Present and Confronting the Clergy

There seems to be homosexuality and approval for sodomy in the ranks of prelates in Rome. It is not mentioned, not rebuked.  Unhappily it seems to be ignored and condoned.

Very few bishops have mentioned or addressed it. Laicized pervert McCarrick and his collaborators and protectors are good examples. He advanced all the way to the top and those at the top knew it and did nothing.

For those who consider homosexual practice acceptable, it would be good to study Scripture and the ancient and continual tradition of the Church (Rom 1:25-27; CCC 2357).

Now I know a lot of priests and — all good and holy men! The vast majority of the clergy are good men, faithful, celibate and true. I feel sorry for these great clerics because the few reprobates among them cause a cloud to overshadow them all. We need to support and encourage those who are faithful to their vows.

The same thing was happening a thousand years ago. But a courageous cardinal spoke out against homosexuality and sexual perversion in the ranks of the clergy, pointing to bishops, priests and deacons.

His name was Peter Damian. He was raised to Cardinal and Doctor of the Church. He was charged by the papacy with fighting against this scourge of sexual perversion and sodomy. I wish our Pope would do the same.

St. Damian wrote a document entitled The Book of Gomorrah which was completed in 1054. It exposed the sodomy and perversion in the ranks. I suggest people get this book and read it today and pass it around. Pope Leo IX responded to this extensive letter with unreserved praise.

He said, “everything that this book contains has been pleasing to our judgment, being as opposed to diabolical fire as is water.”

For an excellent review of the book and interview with the translator in Catholic World Report, click here.

Here are quotes from his book. The first is describing the sins (and is a bit graphic)

“So that the whole matter might be presented to you in an orderly way, I distinguish four types of this nefarious sin. Some pollute themselves, others are soiled by fondling each other’s male parts, others fornicate between the thighs or in the rear, and these ascend by grades, such that each one is worse than the previous.

Accordingly, the penance that is imposed on those who fall into sin with others is greater than those who dirty themselves alone by the discharged contagion of semen, and those who contaminate others in the rear are more strictly judged than those who copulate between the thighs. The skilled machination of the devil thus contrives these grades of corruption, so that the more it ascends them, the more deeply the unhappy soul may be plunged into the depths of hell” (pg. 83).

The second is an overview of what needs to be done. And needs to be done again today.

“Alas, it is shameful to speak of it! It is shameful to relate such a disgusting scandal to sacred ears! But if the doctor fears the virus of the plague, who will apply the cauterization? If he is nauseated by those whom he is to cure, who will lead sick souls back to the state of health?

The cancer of sodomitic impurity is thus creeping through the clerical order, and indeed is raging like a cruel beast within the sheepfold of Christ with the audacity of such liberty, that for many it would have been much more salutary to be oppressed by the yoke of worldly duties than to be surrendered so freely to the iron rule of diabolical tyranny under the pretense of religion.

It would have been better to perish alone in secular dress than, having changed one’s clothes but not one’s heart, to also drag others to destruction, as the Truth testifies, saying, “He that shall scandalize one of these little ones that believe in me, it is expedient for him’ that a millstone be hanged about his neck, and that he be drowned in the depth of the sea.” And unless the force of the Apostolic See opposes it as quickly as possible, there is no doubt that when it finally wishes for the unbridled evil to be restrained, it may not be able to halt the fury of its advance.”

There is a lot more to this book. I have only provided two short passages. But St. Damian goes through it all and confronts it head on — with both mercy and judgment in the proper balance.

Another document from an even earlier period in Spain.

In A History of the Councils of the Church the author details many of the laws promulgated in the Church at the time. I found this law concerning sodomy among bishops, priests and deacons interesting. The Intro to the actual laws states, “In Spain, so rich in Synods, on May 2, 693, was opened the sixteenth Synod of Toledo, in the Church of SS. Peter and Paul. There were present fifty-nine bishops out of all the ecclesiastical provinces of Spain, besides five abbots, three representatives of bishops, and sixteen secular counts. King Egiza appeared personally…”

Law 3, “The prevalence of sodomy makes severe punishments necessary. If a bishop, priest, or deacon commits this sin, he shall be deposed and banished for life. Moreover, the old law remains in force, according to which every such sinner is excluded from all communion with Christians, scourged with rods, deprived of his hair in disgrace, and banished. If they have not sufficiently done penance, the communion is not to be administered to them even on their deathbed.”
(Charles Joseph Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church, trans. William R. Clark, vol. 5 (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1896), 245.)

What we are facing is nothing new. What is new is that it is being accepted and even approved. We have priests going around promoting tolerance for the LGBTQ lifestyle even within the Church. We have a papacy and magisterium that is silent about the problem. We must pray for our Church and defend her.

When cancer invades a human body it is unloving to ignore it. What if the doctor says, “We don’t want to operate since that is invasive and painful.” The best thing for the patient is to deal with the cancer and do what is best for the patient. Lovingly remove the cancer for the health of the whole body.

St. Peter (Cardinal) Damian, Doctor of the Church, pray for us!

The post Today is Feast Day of St. Damian – He wrote a Book: Clerical Sodomy Past and Present and Confronting the Clergy appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

What Number Replaces the ?

The post What Number Replaces the ? appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Vance delivers a historic defense of free speech in Europe

If you haven’t listened to JD Vance’s blistering 19 minute talk to the European Union, it is certainly worth a listen. See the YouTube of his talk below.

Jonathan Turley, one of the most respected reporters and commentators today, wrote a brilliant review of Vance’s lecture. His review is a must-read as well. He explains how Vance hit the EU right where they needed it. Turley wrote,

“In perhaps the greatest single declaration uttered by an American leader since John F. Kennedy in Germany declared “Ich bin ein Berliner,” he added: “If you are running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you. Nor, for that matter, is there anything that you can do for the American people that elected me and elected President Trump.”

You can read Turley’s brilliant article here:

The post Vance delivers a historic defense of free speech in Europe appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.

Please order my Genesis book if you use Logos or Verbum Software, thanks!

When enough people pre-order they will send my book “Genesis: A Bible Study Guide & Commentary” to publication for Logos and Verbum software.

Please do so if you have these software packages so we can get the book on these platforms. Thanks!

The post Please order my Genesis book if you use Logos or Verbum Software, thanks! appeared first on Defenders of the Catholic Faith.