His first one is from today, nothing major except his complete inability to understand how intelligent people can believe in both evolution and creation and see them as completely compatable.
His next post is a critique of the movie "Religuous" where he lumps Catholicism as a "manmade religion".
He then goes on to criticize the opinions of Athiests, with his "Athiest Starter Kit" he states number 9. Blame Christianity for the atrocities of the Roman Catholic church--when it tortured Christians through the Spanish Inquisition, imprisoned Galileo for his beliefs, or when it murdered Moslems in the Crusades.
The implication here, of course, is that everything evil done in the name of Christ, was ONLY done by the Catholic Church. Protestants are completely innocent of all of this and lead perfect exemplary lives. (Never mind that the Spanish Inquisition had nothing to do with Protestantism, many fundamentalists believe that Galileo was wrong, and Muslims have been killed by Protestants as well) Ray, if you are going to embrace the label "Protestant" you inherit all the baggage that goes with it.
The inquisition and Galelieo appears to be near-obsessions with Ray, he constantly brings them up to prove Catholics aren't Christian. But there were Protestant Inquisitions too Ray, and many fundamentalists believe Galileo is wrong.
Next, he writes an article calling Nostradamus a liar and a thief, and then hypocritically lies about the Catholic Church. He states that Nostradamus lifted his "predictions" from Scripture which he "read in secret". Why did he need to read it in secret? Because Ray claims that: "because in those days the Roman Catholic church forbade the reading of the Scriptures." Now, this is just a lie, there is no other explination for it. Because, if anyone does even a little research, they would see that at no time in its history has the Catholic Church forbid the reading of the Scriptures. They were then, as they are now, read in the churches every day. By Nostradamus' time there were any number of churches or libraries where an educated man like Nostradamus could read the scriptures.
He then creates and laments a percieved "double standard" between the way the FLDS child abuse was handled and the "sex scandal" was handled. He accuses the Pope of paying people off. Well Ray, the two cases were not remotely similiar, heres why. First, the FLDS abuse was occuring NOW, most of the abuse in the church happened 20 or more years ago. Yes, no Bishops were charged, but some did resign and others lost thier position (Cardinal Law). Of course no mention is made of the thousands of cases of abuse in Fundamentalist churches, but Ray needs to try to show that ONLY Catholics do these horrible things, all the better to scare people away from the Catholic Church.
In that same article he smugly asserts that Catholicsm is not Christian because its "official doctrine of justification by works flies in the face of the Bible" Never mind it is not the official doctrine of the Church that our justification is by works. The official doctrine of the Church is that we are justified by the Grace of Christ.
In his post "at the checkout" he repeats a common lie. That if you ask a Catholic if they are a Christian they will respond "No, I'm Catholic". He repeats this lie in "Our inventions", now, I'm Catholic, and if someone asked me if I am a Christian, my response would be "yes". Every Catholic I know would give this same answer, we KNOW we are Christians, it is fundamentalists like Ray who try to claim we are not. Here is a paragraph from this article:
Nator . . . please study your history. It was the Roman Catholic church (not the Christian Church) that arrested Galileo. I have spoken to hundreds of Roman Catholics, and when you ask them “Are you a Christian?” most say, “No. I’m a Roman Catholic.” They know the difference. One is steeped in tradition, and the other adheres to the Bible. And the Catholic church didn’t get their information “from the Bible” (it was a banned Book).First error, Catholic is Christian, I am a Catholic Ray, and I am telling you that there is no difference between Catholic and Christian. Catholicism is steeped in Tradition AND it adheres to the Bible. And, the Catholic Church has never banned the Bible, it celebrates it. He also includes a ridiculous cartoon showing a Bishop wearing a "Dagon mitre", this reveals alot about where he gets his info about the RCC, and it is not from Catholic sources.
He later gives his definition of a "Protestant" which is: That means he protests that the Roman Catholic church imprisoned Galileo (even though he admits in another post that Galileo was actually in a spacious apartment during his trial and served his sentence in a Villa in Florence, some imprisionment). He protests that they killed innocent Christians in the Spanish Inquisition. (few if any Protestants were brought before the inquisition in Spain) He protests that they embarked on the Crusades that slaughtered multitudes in the name of God. (what of the "witch trials" that raged across protestant Europe? What about Cromwells slaughter of Catholic women and children in Ireland?)
Does Comfort also embrace the sins of Protestantism just as he expects Catholics to accept the blame for past Catholic sins? Of course to listen to Ray, you would never know Protestants sinned at all.
Next comes a post directed at Catholics, and the ignorance flows, he states:
Joel, that’s a good question (I don't know if you're an atheist. Many people who are now high profile atheists are ex-Catholics--see my book Hollywood Be Thy Name for details). The Second of the Ten Commandments forbids paying homage (bowing down) to any graven image of any likeness, anywhere. The Roman Catholic church got around it by removing the Second Commandment and splitting the last one into two Commandments, to make up the ten. It sounds hard to believe, so check it out for yourself on the Vatican web site: www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/command.htm).First, there are quite a few high-profile athiests who were Protestants as well, so that means nothing. Next, he talks of the 2nd commandment as if it is specifically enumerated in the Bible, it isn't. As a matter of fact, there are three different divisions of the 10 commandments in use today. Also, he tries to make his point by linking to the Vatican website and going "see!". Nope Ray, first of all, look at the very Catechism you linked to, you would see that Catholics put that with the first commandment where it belongs, and we do not break up the last commandment. We refuse to equate a mans wife with his chattle.
Well, that is enough, I hope Ray repents of his deceptions. Things like this are the rotten fruit of OSAS. Ray himself admits that "If someone doesn’t fear God, they will lie to you (if they think that they can get away with it)" Well, obviously Ray, you thought you could get away with it.
11 comments:
"I used to have a pretty good opinion of Ray Comfort. I did not agree with everything he said, but I thought he was a genuine man of God. Today, my opinion changed."
My opinion too has recently changed. I even discussed with my brother in-law (whom works for Ray as his assistant) how rude and offensive Ray was in his statements towards the Vatican on evolution. Of course he was biased to Ray and did not see anything wrong with what he said. Sigh.
Couldn't agree more with your post! Great post! I will have to tag your blog as a 'blog of interest' as we have 2 things in common, we're both Catholics and both Texans. :)
Peace be with you.
Please I beg you turn away from your confused ways!
If Mary came back and saw she was an idle in many hearts today Im sure she would be filled with righteous anger. Ray can be a little judgmentalat times but this is no reason at all to change your beliefs!
God be with you
It was rather interesting for me to read the article. Thanks for it. I like such topics and anything that is connected to them. I definitely want to read a bit more soon.
Peter. Do you love your mother? Do you carry a picture of any of your family members? Do you allow your significant other to talk to the rest of your family? Do you ask anyone else to pray for you ever?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, according to your own standards, you have made those people idols in your heart.
You are just one more person who doesn't actually understand what we believe about Mary.
God Bless you "A Catholic Texan"
I also used to have a high regard for Ray Comfort. I am just now coming out of the fog of protestantism.
I am grateful to Our Loving Father ,Our Gracious Lord Jesus Christ and The guidance of the Merciful Holy Spirit that I have escaped the Theological Anarchy of the Evangelical Protestant Movement and been brought into the loving arms of the "...one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church;
Keep telling the truth
I recommend Fr. Mario Romero's book "Unabridged Christianity" as a good place to start learning Cathoic Apologetics. He states (what should be obvious) that when we pray to Mary or any saint, we are praying WITH or THROUGH them. We don't think Mary is the 4th figure of the Godhead! It takes nothing from Christ when we honor His mother or one of His friends; it is only BECAUSE of Christ's mediation between God and man, that WE CAN mediate for others. This is no different than asking a fellow Christian here on earth for their prayers. Would you say, "NO! Don't you know there's only one mediator between God & man, the man, Christ Jesus?" Of course, any Christian would be honored to offer prayers for someone else! It is an honorable thing to do and gives glory to GOD!
I find it very funnny and even more so very ignorant at how the noncatholics actually say that us Catholics don't follow the Bible, when in FACT the Bible is a Catholic book! It is so funny how they sit and meditate on a book that the Catholic Church put together day and night, and then have the audacity to say that we ourselves don't follow it.
For PETER HAWES: I'm sure that when Jesus Christ comes back and sees that His chosen MOTHTER was cast aside by many that picked and chose what they did and did not want to beleive from the religion that HE Himself created he will be full of much "righteous anger". If you don't love your own fleshly mother then thats on you and your soul, but not loving the mother that God Himself chose for the world to love and talk to, that's just plain unintelligent. I am a convert to the Catholic Church and I used to beleive these hurtful lies too. There is ONLY ONE Church that Jesus made, and it is NOT YOURS! Think about it.
I haven’t actually read Ray Comfort’s website and don’t really care to, so it is possible that the way in which he wrote his points was what caused offence, but most of what he wrote here I do not have a problem with. Don’t get me wrong, I have no issue with Catholics and see them as my Christian brothers and sisters who will see heaven, but I am a Protestant and have a Protestant view of history.
For example, it is true that for a period of history the Catholic Church fought very hard to prevent the Bible from being translated into the vernacular languages of countries like Britain and dispersed. The translation of the Bible into English was a Protestant phenomenon. Protestants like Wycliffe and Tyndale translated the Bible into English often at the cost of their lives. My ancestor John Rogers was burned at stake for translating the Bible. It was then dispersed by the Lollards at great personal risk.
The reason that the Catholic Church fought the translation of the Bible was that Catholics believe in the authority of the church. Originally the Bible was written in Latin, which only the priests could understand. This maintained the power of the priests to interpret Scripture. Unfortunately this led to many inaccuracies in translation, for example, prior to the Reformation it had been claimed that Jesus commanded us to ‘do penance’ when the actual term was ‘repent’.
Secondly, I think Ray is correct to say that Protestants should not bear responsibility for what the Catholic Church did (especially in the three or four centuries prior to the Reformation) because I think most of the atrocities which were committed were due to non-Biblical elements which entered into Roman Catholicism. Shortly prior to and during the Renaissance Catholicism became influenced by humanism (although during the Middle Ages humanism influenced the church to some degree.) This was what led to the doctrine of justification by works, because it was believed that humans were capable of being good people. The humanist elements of Aquinas’ thought were also reflected in his notion that the will was fallen but not the intellect, so therefore we could figure out things without the need for revelation. This led to a revival of Aristotle’s thought, which was entirely non-Christian. The Church then blended pagan Greek and Christian thought, culminating in literary works such as Dante’s Inferno where Judas, Cassius and Brutus (Caesar’s murderers) are in hell together. This confusion between Aristotle and the Bible is what led to the trial of Galileo, because Galileo questioned Aristotle’s ideas which were falsely confused with Biblical teaching.
Anyway, this post is getting long.
Big difference between "rePENTance" and "PENance" and "rePENTance".. no, it's the same.
Protestants ask in their heads or out loud in a very generic way and feel better about themselves. Catholics/Orthodox tell their priest specifically who prescribes medicine for the healing of the soul (as a doctor would for the body).
Ray Comfort lies about most things to make is opinion should like truth. I have debated Ray Comfort on Huntington Beach and when challenged with what Scripture's intent is he chokes. He has no formal education. Most of what Ray does is done for a profession that he made. Don not think for one minute that Ray Comfort is really a Christian concerned about humanity. He is an angry man who uses donated money to make stupid and ignorant movies. Ray has a secret desire to be a movie star and his followers help him fulfill that perverted dream. I closing one cannot believe anything that comes out of Ray Comfort's mouth. It is all spin just like his movies. He cuts things from his movies to benefit his thoughts and the truth is never revealed as spoken by the people he interviews. That places Ray Comfort in what I call the Christian Fraud league.
Kalasin: Protestants don't need to bear responsibility for the sins of Catholics prior to the "Reformation"; they have committed plenty of their own since.
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