Mandeville, LA - This week's show is a cultural-apologetical romp through the Catholic doctrine of Purgatory. This greatly confused and misunderstood dogma of our religion makes sense only in the context of an economy of salvation wherein our acts (our merits and demerits, our sins and our good works) actually have a bearing on our salvation. The Scriptural evidence for Purgatory is considered, mostly in the New Testament, but also in […]
The topic of this show is is Queen Isabella’s Holy Rule, and it is a sequel to last week’s show. My guest is once more the gracious and erudite Dr. Alexandra Wilhelmsen, Professor of Spanish and Adjunct Professor of History at the University of Dallas. Subjects included in this show are the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, and the complex social and religious situation in Spain leading to it. […]
In the second segment of this episode I interview Charles Coulombe, historian and author, on the subject of holy relics. The first segment is a brief apologetic for the custom of venerating relics as it is practiced in the Catholic Church (and the Eastern Orthodox communions, too). For links to articles on the subject, as well as the website of an organization that promotes relics, please go to the the show […]
In this show, I go through four different arguments to answer these questions: "Why the Church? Why Not Just Jesus?" The topic results from common objections from modern non-denominational "Bible Christians," who claim that "the church" (or "religion") is a mere sideline (or worse) in Christianity, while it is the personal relationship with "Jesus only" that is front and center. What is wrong with the objections implied in these questions? How do we […]
There is a schedule change for this Episode of Reconquest. It will premiere at 7 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (6 p.m. Central) on Wednesday, July 20. My guest once more in Mr. Ryan Grant. As the name I’ve given the show suggests, the topics covered — from Saint Robert Bellarmine’s book, On the Church Militant — are heretics, apostates, and schismatics. Ryan and I discuss what these words mean and why, according […]
Mr. Ryan Grant, of Mediatrix Press, is my guest. The subject is the book by Saint Robert Bellarmine, On the Church Militant, which Ryan translated and published. We discuss the first three chapters of the book, which explain the origin of the word Church, its precise and accurate definition (against false definitions on the sectarians), and a summary of who are considered members of the Church. Saint Robert Bellarmine was […]
The price of our salvation is the Most Precious Blood of Jesus. In the nineteenth century, there was a real flowering of devotion to the Precious Blood, thanks to such notables as Saint Gaspar del Bufalo, Father Frederick Faber, and, of course, Blessed Pope Pius IX, who instituted the Feast of the Precious Blood (later moved by Saint Pius X to July 1), in thanksgiving for the ending of his exile in […]
For this show, I am joined by Dr. Alexandra Wilhelmsen (with whom I previously discussed the Spanish Carlists). Our subject is Saint Ferdinand III, the Crusader and liberator of Catholic Spain, who united the two Iberian Kingdoms of Leon and Castile, ruling — after his successful Reconquista — a territory roughly two-thirds the size of present-day Spain. Included in our discussion are the Saint's Marian piety, his chivalrous rule, his amazing […]
On this show, I consider a standard objection to Catholic devotion: the charge of idolatrous worship of the Blessed Virgin, the saints, and the angels. I call the show Giving God His Due. The question boils down to this: What is it that Catholics offer to the Virgin Mary, the other saints, or the angels that is due to God alone? What is God's due that we are rendering to a […]
