Nathaniel Turner's Blog, page 4

February 13, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 16: The Sacraments: The Eucharist (Part One)

Tell me the story again
Tell me the story again
A Child in a manger bed
See the Virgin smile, for she understood

Now grow up and break your bread
Pour your cup of wine
On a cross of wood
A cross of wood
A cross of wood

– Chris Rice, “Tell Me the Story Again”

The faithful, incorporated in the Church through baptism, are destined toward the cultivation of the Christian religion by its character and, regenerated into sons of God, they are bound to profess, in the presence of men, the faith that...

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Published on February 13, 2017 10:00

February 9, 2017

Romans 10

This is a literal translation of an ancient Greek text. It has also been cross-posted on 31Prayers.com. For more information on how to read this post and what everything means, see the relevant page on that site.

 
1Brothers, the good will of my heart and the petition of God over them [is]some manuscripts: over them is; others: over Israel is until salvation. 2For [I] witness to them that [they] have jealousy(zeal) of God,a but not according to(in accordance with) knowledge; 3for, not perceiv...

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Published on February 09, 2017 10:24

February 6, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 15: The Sacraments: Confirmation

To be honest, I don’t have a lot to say about confirmation. It’s one of the three rites of Christian initiation (the other two being baptism and the Eucharist), which means it’s integral to unity with the universal Church, but I can’t recall thinking of any particular controversy around it. Perhaps I just didn’t run in the right circles.

To that end, this week’s post is pretty short. (No, I’m not done with it quite yet; calm down.) I’ll just do a quick run-down of confirmation–how it looks an...

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Published on February 06, 2017 10:00

January 30, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 14: The Sacraments: Baptism (Part Two)

Last week, I talked about how the purpose and effect of baptism is to forgive sins and unite the believer to the Body of Christ (as opposed to merely signifying a declaration of faith on the part of a person old enough to make such a decision).

This week, I’m going to tackle the second point of contention: when to baptize somebody.

As a Baptist, I always had a ready answer to the question of infant baptism: “It’s not Scriptural!” Indeed, infant baptism is never mentioned explicitly in Scriptu...

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Published on January 30, 2017 10:00

January 23, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 13: The Sacraments: Baptism (Part One)

There are, generally speaking, two primary points of contention regarding baptism: (1) when to do it, and (2) what it’s for. That may sound like just about everything, but at least I don’t have to argue that we should do it–that much should be obvious (Matthew 28:19-20).

I grew up in the Baptist tradition, which means that my answers to the above issues were (1) upon or beyond the age of accountability (or age of reason), usually five to eight years old (depending on the child), and when the...

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Published on January 23, 2017 10:00

January 16, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 12: That Death May Die

My original plan for this series had me moving directly into a discussion of the sacraments. I assumed everyone would be on the same page as me by this point, but it occurred to me more recently that views on original sin are inconsistent. Personally, my view did not change between the first time I learned of the topic, when I was Protestant, and now; thus, as a chronicle of my own journey, this series did not need a post dealing directly with the question of original sin.

But, I decided, as...

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Published on January 16, 2017 10:00

January 14, 2017

A War’s Beginning

Terms of Enlistment (Frontlines #1)Terms of Enlistment by Marko Kloos
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed this, which I think is the point. But I also spent a lot of time not sure how to feel about it.

First, the most jarring thing for the average reader: present-tense storytelling. Mr. Kloos uses the method effectively, I think, because the story keeps you engaged, even when it’s not an action sequence, and you aren’t dragged in and out of the story’s pacing when we do enter an action sequence. But when you flip open the book a...

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Published on January 14, 2017 21:34

January 9, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 11: The Virtus in Virginity

The English word “virtue” comes from Latin virtus, literally “manliness.” Of course, in ancient philosophy, there was a transition from simple “manliness” to real virtue (like those I discussed a couple of weeks ago), and then deeper, more complex transitions over time to arrive at the wide range of modern views on virtue and ethics.

But as George Orwell and anyone who has sought to change terms (gender-neutral nouns and pronouns especially, such as “chairperson” or the intentional abandonmen...

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Published on January 09, 2017 10:00

January 2, 2017

Swimming the Tiber 10: Judging Your Sins

Happy new year! I’m not going to talk about New Year’s resolutions, I promise. (Well, at least not outside that sentence.)

Last week, I talked about virtue and vice from the perspective of Catholic philosophy; the week before, I talked about how we are justified and, more crucially related to this topic, how sin and salvation interact. Please keep both topics in mind going forward.

When I was younger, I had a particularly egalitarian view of sin. Basically, I told myself that all sins are com...

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Published on January 02, 2017 10:00

December 26, 2016

Swimming the Tiber 9: Virtue and Vice in Catholic Philosophy

Merry Christmas! I hope this Christmas season is a joyous one. Now, on to your regularly scheduled program.

But now, if, in all this talk, we both inquired and were speaking beautifully, excellence would be neither by nature nor taught, but coming to [men] by divine lot, without sense [for those] to whom it comes.

– Socrates in Plato’s Meno (my translation)

And if [things are] thus, the human good comes about as an activity of a soul according to excellence–and if, rather, [there are] excelle...

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Published on December 26, 2016 10:00