As you can see, the Practical Christian Mysticism blog has been refitted with a new look!  I want to give a big thanks to Tekeme Studios for hooking me up with the great new blog design!  If you want your site to look as cool as mine, take a look at http://tekemestudios.blogspot.com/ and get yourself a new look too!

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Growing up in the evangelical community, I was inundated with end-times and prophecy related media.  Even before the infamous “Left Behind” series, there was plenty of activity around the deciphering and prediction of future and end-time events.  Even before I joined the Catholic Church I realized there was kind of madness behind the end-times culture, so I decided to leave IT behind.  While I firmly believe in the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, I have no interest in trying to guess when it will be.  More importantly, obsessing over trying to understand prophecy often leads us to miss the point of the prophecy all together… hope. Continue Reading »

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Scientists have finally discovered the four winds talked about in Scripture. I mentioned this briefly in my Twitter feed last week, but didn’t have time to write a post about it.  Throughout many passages in Scripture, which I will list at the end of this article, it refers to the “four winds” of the earth.  Since scientists have, so far, acknowledged only 2 major sources of wind (called “air cells”) on the globe, many theologians have interpreted the “four winds” as the four cardinal directions.  However, I have long thought and recording in my own journals that I believed the “four winds” to represent four major sources of wind.  Part of the reason I believed this is because of the passage in Revelations 7:1 that says:

“After this I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding back the four winds of the earth so no wind could blow on the earth, on the sea, or on any tree.”

Continue Reading »

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I have had several discussions as of late concerning the relationship between religion and philosophy (like here). Chiefly, the topic of debate is whether or not philosophy and religion can be separate. Here is a post on the Catholic Answers Forum that caught my attention:

It seems to me that studying the connection between philosophy and theology is a philosophy itself.

Here’s one.

A logical contradiction implies nonexistence. For example, an apple that is not an apple is nothing at all (or, A + (-A) = 0).

Therefore,

If true philosophy seeks to be logical,
And that which is logical seeks existence,
And, as St. Thomas argues, existence is God himself,
Then, true philosophy indirectly seeks God.

So, a philosopher indirectly seeks God, his natural end, as much as he rejects logical contradiction and accepts God as the principle of his logic. (i.e. faith and reason are inseparable).

As Pope John Paul the Great said, “faith without reason is superstition.” However, reason without faith is rationalism. Superstition and rationalism allow us to create our own truth and accept error.

After reading this I realized that what really shapes the argument, that philosophy and religion are inseparable, is considering what the two would be without one another. It is hard to think of any serious philosopher going out of his way to avoid all theories of God, he would be left with only a handful of shallow remnants to ponder. Likewise, any serious religious pursuant, who avoids all philosophy, would have no context for his faith or spirituality whatsoever.

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While I realize that joining the Catholic Church means I pretty much have to turn in my “spiritual maverick” club card, I still carry a heavy bit of cynicism against much of Christian culture.  I role my eyes at the “American-Idol-Wannabe” CCM (Contemporary Christian Music) music industry, groan when I see a little fish on the back of someone’s car as they cut me off in traffic, and have a strong urge to light the “Inspirational” book section at Wal-Mart on fire.  Because of this, Chick-fil-A, the overtly Christian fast food chain, found itself in my sceptic pile very quickly.  However, I am here to say that Chick-fil-A has both won me over, and given me a renewed positive attitude toward old-fashioned religious sensibilities. Continue Reading »

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