Response to Jeff

Hi all --

The blog is back!

Jeff, thank you for posing those questions. Maybe they are questions on other people's minds also, and I am happy to offer answers that are consistent with Church teaching and my personal understanding of the issues. In my study of Church teaching and theology since undergrad, I am continually comforted and impressed by the phenomenon that every moral value and doctrinal belief my parents instilled in me from my earliest memory has deep groundings in an abundantly rich and sophisticated intellectual tradition that has withstood 2000 years of challenges from philosophies and moralities that have emerged and disappeared and re-emerged in new forms.

In the course of "getting educated" I've found that it is not necessary to set aside my reason in contemplating or attempting to defend my beliefs. On the contrary, in recognizing God as my Creator, I acknowledge that God is the creator of my capacity to reason, and God is certainly not threatened by my reason. In fact the Church teaches that Faith and Reason together bring us to contemplation of Truth. So, it would in fact be misguided and do a disservice to our religion to check rationality at the door and preface all our religious beliefs, not to mention our political ones, on a claim that "The Bible says ..." or "The Magisterium says..."

With that preface, I am happy to respond to your individual questions this weekend, drawing upon my faith AND reason.

Thanks once again to Jeff for keeping the conversation going and for valuing other view points.


Monica