September 7, 2003
by F. Mascariņa
Dear member of INC,
After spending a few hours reading some Godīs Messenger magazines I have come to the realization that you were sincere when you converted to the INC (or if you were born into it, that you strive to fulfill its teachings). Has there really been a time when I have not thanked God for your showing your great faith in Him?
But I want you to understand that, though I am eternally thankful for your striving to find the Lord, nevertheless, I am saddened by the fact that you are not in the Catholic Church, the True Church of Christ.
Ah, yes-- the ministers have told you that we "worship idols." If that were true, then why did the pagan Romans persecute us? Should they not have accepted us if we were of their idolatrous kind?
What else were you told about us? That we violated many Biblical teachings? Then you should not read the Bible because we created it. You do not believe me? Research the canonization of the Bible itself; tell me which Pope settled the fight between St. Augustine and St. Jerome concerning which books belonged in the Bible.
And what else did your ministers say about us? From what I have read in your magazines, they tell you a lot of the rumors going around about the Catholic Church. Why concern yourselves with such tall tales? You would be surprised at how inaccurate and superficial are the understanding of your ministers when they tell you about such-and-such Catholic doctrine. I dare you to open a Catholic catechism. If you dare, then pick up a Catechism of the Council of Trent, or one by Aquinas if you like philosophy; if you are yet a child, or want simpler, less technical explanations, then pick up the Baltimore Catechism. Don't have money? Don't know where to buy them? Just look for some free ones on the Internet.
Having read the supposed "refuations" of Catholic doctrines in your magazines, I would like to know if you ever studied Catholic doctrine in detail? I mean, if a Catholic theologian went up to you and started to talk to you about "Pelagianism" or "Nestorianism" would you know what he/she meant? Or maybe he/she should start off with an easier topic, like the difference between Dulia, Hyperdulia, and Latria? And are you sure that your ministers have explained to you thoroughly the doctrine of the Hypostatic Union? I have caught myself smiling at the "explanations" of the Hypostatic Union in R. V. San Pedro's article The fallacy of the hypostatic union (March 2002 issue); there were so many errors in that article that there were errors in the errors.
No...no, if you have read these magazines and are still in INC, then I can safely say that you have not studied Catholic doctrine in detail. I have heard some INC (and ADD) tell me that they used to be catechists when they were still Catholic. I am a catechist (a very, very young catechist) and I am not impressed; when I ask them about even the simplest of Catholic doctrines (ex: "How can Mary be called 'Mother of God' if she is human?" ) they cannot answer.
It is because you did not bother to have a deeper understanding of Catholicism that you allowed your brain to be filled with INC teachings, and because they "sounded" right to you, you followed them. You have let others think for you about what Catholicism is; if you do that, they can say anything about Catholicism and you would not know if it were right or wrong. Why? Because you do not know Catholicism as each Pope knows it, as each Saint knows it, ar at least as each informed Catholic layman/laywoman knows it. Just because these magazine articles have quotes from Catholic books does not immediately mean that the authors of those articles understood Catholic doctrine the way the informed Catholic layman/laywoman, Saints, and Popes understand it. As a rule, INC authors rarely do.
In a few days I will be sent to the Army; I am not sure when I will return to finish writing and uploading the rebuttals to the INC articles I have in my possession. For now I must leave you with Karl Keating's articles on your church's doctrines. Please click here to access this article. And since INC ridicules the Catholic Church for using miracles as an argument for Christ's divinity, and I noticed that the Godīs Messenger magazines constantly criticize what they do not understand, and that this miracle argument is no exception to that rule, I would like for you to give the miracle argument another look. This time, it is explained by one of the greatest Doctors of the Catholic Church: St. Thomas Aquinas. It's one thing to read anti-Catholic INC fabrications of the miracle argument, it's another to actually read the Catholic explanation from a Catholic source of a rather Catholic argument. Here is the link to the article: The Probative Force of the Miracles of Christ.
Blessings,
F. Mascariņa