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Contraception, NFP and Sex: A Refutation of Salzman and Lawler
Recently, Todd Salzman and Michael Lawler published an article over at National Catholic Reporter arguing in favor of abandoning the Church’s traditional teaching on contraception. In their article, Salzman and Lawler note correctly that if the Church were to change her teaching on contraception, “the entire edifice of official Catholic sexual teaching crumbles”. As a…
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Three Ways Knowing Greek Supports Catholicism
St. John Henry Newman is famous for saying “To know history is to cease to be Protestant”. Needless to say many Protestants take offense to it and many often reply with the retort, “To know the Bible is to cease to be Catholic”. I want to offer a bit of pushback to the Protestant rejoinder…
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God’s Knowledge of Future Contingents: A Molinist Account
Recently, Alsdair MacIntyre, one of the most prominent Catholic philosophers of the past century, delivered his annual lecture at the Notre Dame fall conference. The lecture is available here. During the lecture, MacIntyre claimed that certain spontaneous acts (“singularities”) of free creatures could not be foreknown even by God. MacIntyre claimed that this was not…
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AI, Language and Idolatry
Can computers understand us? Humans use language in order to communicate which classically was thought to be a uniquely human ability. With the rise of computers and more recently of advanced artificial intelligence systems, some have asked whether computers too can use and understand language. This question has come to the forefront recently after OpenAI…
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Apologetics Isn’t Dead: A Reflection on Cameron Bertuzzi’s Conversion to Catholicism
Earlier today, Cameron Bertuzzi, the man who runs a ministry call Capturing Christianity, announced that he recently entered RCIA at a Catholic Church and will formally enter the Church this Easter. Besides for being an occasion of joy, Bertuzzi’s conversion offers an opportunity to reflect on a somewhat controversial topic: the role of apologetics in…
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Calvinism, Catholicism and Androids: How Detroit Become Human Presents Free Will and Salvation.
Quantic Dream’s 2018 Playstation 4 game Detroit: Become Human is a beautifully made decision based story that attempts to ask questions about the nature of man, intelligence, choice, and other important topics. One of the most important themes covered in the game is that of freedom. Detroit touches upon both freedom of the will taken…
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Some Great Resources on Molinism
Below are links to some great articles, books, and videos on Molinism by Molinist and non Molinist scholars alike. Articles Banez’s Big Problem: The Ground of FreedomJames Dominic Rooney OP Rooney argues that while Molinism has to deal with the grounding objection, the main Catholic alternative to Molinism, Banezianism, has itself a problem in regards…
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Molinism Defended: A refutation of Steven Colborne
Steven Colborne has published an article over at his blog perfectchaos.org offering three very brief critiques of Molinism. In this brief rebuttal I will respond to all three. The Critiques 1. Freedom is Impossible Colborne writes: God, by His very nature, is omnipresent, which means that there are no boundaries to God’s being. If God…
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The real contingency of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom: a response to Ron Digiacomo
Ron Digiacomo published an article over at philosophical-theology.com critiquing Molinism for failing to preserve the real contingency of the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom. Digiacomo argues that because Molinism holds that God cannot actualize certain worlds based on the counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, that these words are not as contingent as Molinists want to think. Molinism…
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Luis Molina’s Theory of Middle Knowledge as a Catholic Response to the Reformation
This paper was presented at the undergraduate Medieval and Early Modernists of North Texas and Oklahoma 2019 Conference in February of 2019 at the University of Dallas The Protestant Reformation was undoubtedly the most important theological event of the 16th century and perhaps the most important historical event of that time outright. Since the Reformation,…