Archive for category: Roman Catholicism

   Yesterday I reviewed some clips from an interview done by Dave Armstrong. I noted some of his amazing statements, and in particular, I found quite humorous his very inflated sense of importance in basically vanquishing the entire Protestant world from the field of battle. No one can respond to Dave Armstrong! Well, I knew Dave would respond, and respond he

   Roman Catholics believe Peter established the church at Rome, served as its first pope, and was eventually martyred there. This faith claim is not based on Biblical evidence. It is elusive “tradition” which posits Peter (and Paul) established the Roman Church in the early 40’s. Peter is said to have remained in Rome for twenty-five years, preaching the Gospel, and

   Gary Michuta’s recent book is entitled, Why Catholic Bibles Are Bigger. Michuta and I have at least one thing in common in regard to the canon. He states, “Any bible-loving Christian will want to make such an examination , surely, rather than run the risk of spurning a set of books which may, in fact, contain God’s

   I continue with my examination of Steve Ray’s claims concerning Ignatius of Antioch (second in a series).

   After listening to countless hours of Catholic Answers Live, I’ve noticed many of the questions can often be difficult, odd, unanswerable, or simply confusing. For instance, a caller recently asked Patrick Madrid something like, what happens to guardian angels after those they are “guarding” die? Do they get reassigned to a new a person, or do they retire? I admit,

   A caller asked Steve Ray about the Protevangelium of James, one of the early “infancy gospels” from the end of the second century that became the basis for later Marian dogmas (such as the concept of the perpetual virginity of Mary). Here’s a review of his comments.

   This is the third in my series of refutations of Gary Michuta’s failed attempt to defend Steve Ray’s comments on Catholic Answers Live. Enjoy!

   Four years ago I addressed the abuse of the words of Ignatius of Antioch by Roman Catholic apologists, at that time quoting from an article by Tim Staples as my example. I then took the time to work through the text of Ignatius’ epistle to the Smyrneans, demonstrating that a fair and contextual reading does not support the abuse of

A review of Catholic Apologist Gary Michuta’s examination of Luther and the Apocrypha (Part 2)        A few days ago, I posted Part 1 of my review of Catholic apologist Gary Michuta’s presentation of Martin Luther from his new book, Why Catholic Bibles Are Bigger (Michigan: Grotto Press, 2007). Mr. Michuta presented around twenty pages of argumentation on Luther’s involvment

   Though it only shows the bankruptcy of the argumentation, many have criticized me for not turning this blog into an IIA (Internet Ignorance Aggregator) by having comments. “See, he can’t respond to refutation!” is the cry. Of course, given that I have a toll-free phone number that folks can call twice a week to ask questions or challenge me, the

A review of Catholic Apologist Gary Michuta’s examination of Luther and the Apocrypha        For many Roman Catholics, no discussion on the canon of Scripture is complete without at least some reference to Martin Luther. In the case of Gary Michuta’s book, Why Catholic Bible Are Bigger (Michigan: Grotto Press, 2007), Luther’s position on the Apocrypha is discussed for twelve

   Here are some of the comments left by Roman Catholics on Michuta’s video. They are…educational. This topic was brillantly debated by Gary Michuta. Gary proved every point and Mr. White was stuck with restating his platitudes. BTW, Steve Ray and Dave Armstrong were in the audience. Instead of there being a debate, why doesn’t Mr. White just stop misrepresenting the

   Our main internet access is down today (I’m using my BlackBerry as a tethered modem to write this) so I will have to wait till Monday to provide a video blog, but Steve Ray just noted on his blog the posting of a video response to my documentation of his errors regarding Jerome being alone and unique in his rejection

   Did you know you can watch the late John Paul II’s tomb via webcam? Yeah, here’s the link. The other webcam links are to outside monuments, which makes at least some sense (you can tell what the weather is, time of day, etc.), but putting a webcam on JPII’s tomb is just…creepy. I suppose you could watch the flowers wilt…

   Here is a tremendous example of the kind of scholarship put forward by Ignatius Press and Catholic Answers in the person of one of their “experts,” Steve Ray. This kind of gross misrepresentation is simply too easy to refute, yet it is so very popular amongst Rome’s adherents.

   It’s all too easy to get caught up in rhetoric and ad hominem with someone presenting a counter position. Paul instructs Christians to slander no one, and to be peaceable and considerate as we strive to show true humility toward all men (Titus 3:2). This goal can be easily forgotten. Particularly in written dialog, things we write not intended as

   If you ever engage those who advocate Catholic apologetics, you’re probably familiar with the argument that Catholics are unified in their beliefs, while Protestants are not. A Roman Catholic apologist recently stated this common caricature in a blog entry against me: “The same thing happens with Protestants, in their internal squabbles. This is one of the ongoing tragedies of Protestantism.

   I’ve spent a lot of time chasing Luther quotes, particularly those put forth by Catholic apologists. Back in November, I posted a brief review of a Martin Luther quote used by Steve Ray in his book Crossing the Tiber: Evangelical Protestants Discover the Historical Church. The quote suggested Luther wrote a letter to Zwingli telling him only a Church Council

“Just when I thought that James Swan has forgotten me, my book, and the issue of the Old Testament canon, he reappears on the Alpha & Omega website with a canon article.I really respect James Swan even though I have never had the pleasure of meeting him. He seems to try to base his position on research and I’m glad

   I was catching up, as best I can before heading back out on the road soon, with my RSS feeds, and I couldn’t help but notice Dave Armstrong, who has decided recently to try his hand at church history, taking a shot at the Athanasius Problem. You see, the great bishop of Alexandria is a constant problem for Roman Catholics

   For Roman Catholics, the Council of Trent made the official pronouncement on the canon of Scripture, and in that pronouncement determined the apocrypha was sacred Scripture. What criteria did Trent use to determine which books of the Bible were canonical? Some of the answers I’ve been given are, “Trent did not determine the canon, they simply reaffirmed the canon,” and

   I have been teaching through the Gospels at PRBC for a number of years now, mainly focusing on the Synoptics. But I covered John 5 recently, so I felt it appropriate to cover chapter six as well. In the process of teaching exegetically through the text, I happened to notice that Stephen K. Ray has a book out titled, St.

   In glancing through various sources relevant to the woman of Revelation 12 (historically taken as the people of God in the Old and New Testaments, but becoming Mary as Marian piety developed, especially in the middle ages) in response to Steve Ray’s words in his pdf from a few months ago seeking to defend the idea of the idea of

   As I have looked over my archives I see that almost three months have passed since my last installment in response to Steve Ray’s attempt to defend the concept of the Bodily Assumption of Mary from Scripture. Of course, this 30 page pdf, cobbled together from various sources, is only partly on the subject of the Assumption. A large portion

“Swan struck me as a real lightweight, and the above seems to verify my suspicion. He is a ‘wanna-be’ and it seems like he tries to puff out his chest to look bigger than he actually is.”     “It seems he is a James White wanna-be, though he’s no where near as clever.”    These are recent comments directed towards me