Aleteia: How a radical atheist became a Catholic priest

Source: Aleteia by Philip Kosloski | Aug 14, 2017

He hated the Church until one event changed his life forever ... and his story would later impress Maximilian Kolbe.

Born into a wealthy Jewish family in France in 1814, Alphonse Ratisbonne was set to become part of his uncle’s large banking firm. At first Ratisbonne was a nominal Jew, but when his older brother converted to the Catholic faith and became a priest, a hidden rage woke within him.

Ratisbonne wrote, “When my brother became a Catholic, and a priest, I persecuted him with a more unrelenting fury than any other member of my family. We were completely sundered; I hated him with a virulent hatred, though he had fully pardoned me.”

Furthermore this hatred for his brother was broadened to include all Catholics, and Ratisbonne explained how it “made me believe all I heard of the fanaticism of the Catholics, and I held them accordingly in great horror.”

This also affected his personal beliefs and he came to no longer believe in God. Ratisbonne was too busy following worldly pursuits to worry about his Jewish faith and his deep hatred for Catholicism only pushed him further away from any type of religion.

He eventually began to feel the void in his heart, but at first sought to cure it through marriage. Ratisbonne was betrothed to his niece, but because of her young age the wedding was postponed. During this time of waiting Ratisbonne decided to travel without any singular purpose.

His trip started out by traveling to Naples, where he stayed for about a month. After that Ratisbonne wanted to go to Malta, but took the wrong boat and arrived in Rome. He stayed there, making the best of it, and ran into an old friend.

One day when visiting his friend Ratisbonne encountered a Catholic convert, Theodore de Bussieres, who knew Ratisbonne’s priest-brother. While this made Ratisbonne hate the man, he enjoyed conversing with him because of his knowledge.

Later Ratisbonne visited de Bussieres again. They had a heated discussion about Catholicism and de Bussieres made a wager with Ratisbonne.

Have you the courage to submit yourself to a very simple and innocent test? Only to wear a little something I will give you; look, it is a medal of the Blessed Virgin. It seems very ridiculous, does it not? But, I assure you, I attach great value and efficacy to this little medal. [Also] you must say every night and morning the Memorare, a very short and very efficacious prayer which St. Bernard addressed to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

While at first Ratisbonne protested at wearing the medal (which was the Miraculous Medal), he decided to put it around his neck and say the prayer each day. He figured that it couldn’t do any harm and would prove to all the ridiculous nature of Catholicism.

Ratisbonne lived up to his side of the bargain, finding it easy to recite the Memorare. Then one day he was traveling in the city with de Bussieres and they stopped at the church Saint Andrea delle Fratte. When Ratisbonne entered the church it appeared to be engulfed in a marvelous light. He looked to an altar from where the light was coming and saw the Virgin Mary, appearing as she did on the Miraculous Medal.

He left the church in tears, clutching his Miraculous Medal. Several days later he was received into the Catholic Church. After returning to Paris his betrothed was shocked and rejected him and his new religion. Ratisbonne then entered the Jesuits and was ordained a priest.

This amazing story of conversion would later influence Saint Maximilian Kolbe to found the Militia Immaculatae and convinced him of the power of the Miraculous Medal. He firmly believed in Mary’s role in bringing the world to Christ.

CNS News: Acclaimed Atheist Poet Becomes Catholic: 'My Tears Just Stopped'

By Mark Judge | November 30, 2016
For CNS News

Poet Sally Read (Ignatius Press/
Used with permission)

“If you’re there, you have to help me.”

Those are the words that poet Sally Read said to an icon of Jesus in 2010. Read, a British poet and atheist, had stopped into a church in Santa Marinella, Italy. She felt burdened. Her young daughter was having health issues. Her husband Fabio was enduring some stress at work.

“There was this incredible experience where this presence almost came down, and my tears just stopped, just dried,” Read tells CNSNews.com. “I felt almost physically carried up. It was as if someone walked into the room. I knew this person. I knew that I was a Christian.”

Up to that point Read, now 46, had been an atheist. “I was brought up an atheist,” Read notes in her just-published memoir, “Night’s Bright Darkness: A Modern Conversion Story.” “At ten I could tell you that religion was the opiate of the masses; it was [driven] into me to never kneel before anyone or anything…As a young woman I could quote Christopher Hitchens and enough of the Bible to scoff at.”

Read was born in 1971 and raised in Suffolk, England. As a young woman she worked as a nurse in a psychiatric hospital and became a critically acclaimed poet, winning the Eric Gregory Award in 2001. A few years later Read married an Italian man, Fabio, and the couple, along with new daughter Florenzia, moved to Santa Marinella, a town 30 miles from Rome.

In her 30s and raising her daughter, Read began working on a book on women’s health and sexuality. Wanting to interview a wide swath of women for the book, Read contacted orthodox Catholic women. When the women declined to be interviewed, largely due to the graphic nature of Read’s subject matter, Read approached a Byzantine-Catholic priest, Fr. Gregory Hrynkiw, for advice. Fr. Gregory and Read became friends, with the priest answering questions the author had about faith.

Christian Post: Atheist Journalist Sohrab Ahmari Announces Conversion to Catholicism After Jihadis Kill French Priest

BY SAMUEL SMITH , CP REPORTER
August 1, 2016|4:38 pm

(PHOTO: SCREENGRAB/YOUTUBE/FOREIGN POLICY RESEARCH INSTITUTE)
Sohrab Ahmari.

Last week's killing of a French priest by radicals associated with the Islamic State has inspired atheist Wall Street Journal writer Sohrab Ahmari to come out publicly about his plans to convert to Catholicism.

After the news broke that Father Jacques Hamel had been killed by radicals who raided the Church of the Gambetta in the Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray district of Normandy last Tuesday, the Iranian-born Ahmari announced in a tweet:

"#IAmJacquesHamel: In fact, this is the right moment to announce that I'm converting to Roman Catholicism."

Ahmari later deleted the tweet and pinned another tweet the following day.

"To new followers: I deleted my tweet professing my conversion, to avoid drawing internet-crazies' attention to my church," the tweet explained.

In response to published reports and tweets that incorrectly claimed he was converting to Christianity from Islam, Ahmari clarified in another tweet that he is actually converting from Atheism.

Although Ahmari publicly announced his conversion only after Hamel was killed, his decision to convert was not inspired by Hamel's martyrdom.

A source close to Ahmari told The Christian Post that Ahmari has been under instruction with a Roman Catholic priest for some time now but Hamel's death was what prompted him to announce his conversion plans.

Ahmari was born in Tehran and moved to the United States when he was 13 years old. He earned a law degree from Northeastern University and was inspired to become a journalist because of the disputed 2009 Iranian elections.

Ahmari has been published in The Boston Globe, The New Republic, The Chronicle of Higher Education and works as an editorial writer for The Wall Street Journal's European edition.

In response to the attack in Normandy last Tuesday, Ahmari praised French President François Hollande for declaring that France is "at war" with the Islamic State.

"I support that sentiment because it's still ahead of where many other European governments are in terms of recognizing that what's happening is a low-grade jihadist insurgency targeting all of Europe, and many governments are in denial," Ahmari said in a video interview on WSJ.com. "As far as the Hollande government goes, at least it's a first step to recognizing the adversary and to say there is a war. That is more than can be honestly said of President Obama."

Ahmari added that he thinks European governments are being too reactionary and are not mobilizing to defeat the extremist threats.

"What you see is governments lurching from attack to attack and being very reactive," he said. "If something like [the Normandy church attack] happens, France ramps up sales of artillery to the Iraqi government. ... But you don't see that full-scale mobilization that really needs to happen."

Another area of concern that Ahmari warned about is the Islamic State's growth in Libya.

"No one is paying attention to this vast stretch of territory becoming an 'ISISistan,' if you will," Ahmari stressed.

NCR: Jesus Christ is God, and He Alone Can Bring Peace to Our Nation

POSTED BY REBECCA HAMILTON 07/08/2016 FOR NATIONAL CATHOLIC REGISTER

Fernando Gallego, “Cristo Bendiciendo” (c. 1495)

Evangelical atheists and moral nihilists of all stripes would lead us to believe that when we remove God from a society, what we get is reason and rationality.

Despite their own irrational hate talk and irrationality, they posit that the only evil is God—that faith, and faith alone, is responsible for every evil human beings have ever committed or will commit.

Reality puts this fantastical delusion to the lie at the first and every test.

What do we get when we remove God from a society? We get evil. Pure, unadulterated and unapologetic evil. We get an implosion of the civic order and a societal return to the beast.

The steady pounding of politically correct censorship of speech and thought is nothing more than an attempt to coerce silence about reality by imposing Orwellian double speak on the populace. The use of slander, vitriol and personal vendettas to silence public debate on important issues has all but stopped our ability as a nation to deal with the problems facing us.

Simply put, if we can’t talk honestly about it, we can’t deal with it, and “it” will roll right over us and ultimately destroy us. We become like a person with a compromised immune system who dies from a relatively minor infection because their normal defenses against it are blunted.

If you want to see what happens to a society that turns its back on Christ, look around you. Watch the news. Listen to the self-serving double-speak and lying, the manipulations and prevarications from our leaders in government, education and commerce. See the implosion of peace and sanity.

Look, listen and think for yourself. Think. What you get when you remove God from a society is evil unchained and without apology.

Original sin infects all societies, including Christian societies. The evil that people do to themselves and one another is ubiquitous. But Western society’s development of the rights and value of the individual is a direct result of following the Gospels of Christ to their logical conclusion.

Western society has also committed evil. We are never free in this life from our fallen natures. But the ideal that human beings have certain unalienable rights that are inherent in the fact that they are human beings, is the flowering of the Gospel teaching that every hair on our heads is numbered, that we are, each and every one of us, made in the Likeness and Image of God.

God vs. Atheism: Which is More Rational?

How to Respond to the "New Atheism" By Trent Horn, A Catholic Convert, Apologist and Speaker

Photo source: Huffingtonpost

Ridicule of religion is the ethos of many modern unbelievers

By: Trent Horn

Source: Catholic Answers

In C. S. Lewis’s novel That Hideous Strength there is a scene where the non-religious protagonist, Mark, is instructed as “part of an exercise” to trample an image of a large crucifix. Because Mark is not a Christian, he is puzzled as to why he should bother with this exercise and not just leave this silly superstition alone. The professor who is leading the exercise tells Mark, “Of course it is a superstition: but it is that particular superstition which has pressed upon our society for many centuries. . . . An explicit action in the reverse direction is therefore a necessary step towards complete objectivity” (ch. 15). In other words, if religion is to be purged from society it cannot simply be ignored; it has to be ridiculed.

Lewis’s novel, published in 1945, was set in the future. Nearly seventy years later, that future is our present, and the author’s descriptions of religious ridicule pale in comparison to the current mockeries of Christianity found on the Internet. Yet while the vileness of the ridicule has increased, the attitude embodied by the professor remains the same. The best way to see how Lewis’s fiction has become prophecy is to contrast the “Old Atheism” with what some have called the “New Atheism.”

The “Old Atheism”

Throughout most of the twentieth century, public profession of atheism was synonymous with communism or the endorsement of totalitarianism. In a 1961 episode of The Twilight Zone titled “The Obsolete Man,” a librarian in a police state is executed for the crime of believing in God. Ultimately the librarian (portrayed wonderfully by the late Burgess Meredith) turns the tables on his executioner, but the image of a believer being crushed under the jackboot of totalitarian atheism was, at the time, not mere fiction. In his 1967 memoir, Tortured for Christ, Richard Wurmbrand describes how Soviet guards would tell prisoners, “I thank God in whom I don’t believe. Now I may indulge the evil in my heart” (p. 34).

These horror stories may have something to do with atheism’s low approval ratings. Gallup compared two polls conducted in 1958 and 2012 about people’s unwillingness to elect certain minorities to the U.S. presidency. In 1958, 38 percent were willing to elect an African-American and 18 percent were willing to elect an atheist. In 2012, while 96 percent were willing to elect an African-American, only 54 percent were willing to elect an atheist (Jeffrey Jones, “Atheists, Muslims See Most Bias as Presidential Candidates,” Gallup Polling, June 21, 2012).

Faced with such dismal levels of public approval, atheists felt the need to show believers that they were good people and not amoral communists. Beginning in the 1970s, the philosopher Paul Kurtz promoted what he called “secular humanism,” which focused on promoting human well-being without religion rather than converting people to atheism. Secular humanists even praised religion for its beneficial effects on society.

The Second Humanist Manifesto affirmed, “In the best sense, religion may inspire dedication to the highest ethical ideals.” The Manifesto went on to point out that while religion can hinder society, so can many nonreligious ideologies that are not based on humanism (Paul Kurtz and Edwin H. Wilson, “Humanist Manifesto II,” 1973). But this attitude of congenial disagreement changed for many people on September 11, 2001.

The “New Atheism”

I remember getting ready for school on that fateful day when my dad ran into my bedroom and turned on the television. Because I went to high school in Arizona, the attacks were in progress by the time I woke up. I stared in disbelief as the news replayed over and over again the surreal sight of the World Trade Center collapsing into a pile of dust. How could 19 human beings (the 9/11 hijackers) do something so terrible? The answer from the New Atheists was simple: Religion alone has the power to cause people to do such terrible things.

In 2004 American atheist Sam Harris, after reflecting on the September 11 terrorist attacks, published The End of Faith. In the book, Harris argued that religion is a form of mental illness and not part of a rational worldview. He writes, “[I]t is difficult to imagine a set of beliefs more suggestive of mental illness than those that lie at the heart of many of our religious traditions.” (p. 70). In 2006 British biologist Richard Dawkins went so far as to claim that religious education for children is child abuse: “Even without physical abduction, isn’t it always a form of child abuse to label a child a possessor of beliefs that they are too young to have thought about?” (The God Delusion, p. 354). These books were followed by others, such as Christopher Hitchens’ God Is Not Great and philosopher Daniel Dennett’s Breaking the Spell: Religion as Natural Phenomenon. Before Hitchens died in 2011, these authors were known as the “four horsemen” of the “New Atheism.”

What made these atheists “new” weren’t their arguments against religion but their attitude that religion should be reviled. At the 2012 “Reason Rally,” about 10,000 atheists gathered on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., where Dawkins instructed them regarding Christians: “Mock them, ridicule them in public. . . . Don't fall for the convention that we’re all too polite to talk about religion” (Lillian Kwon, “Atheists Rally for Reason; Urged to Mock the Religious,” The Christian Post, March 24, 2012).

Ridiculing religion

To be fair, there are atheists who do not see religion as a bad thing and don’t support ridicule as a way to combat it. Atheistic philosopher Walter Sinnott-Armstrong writes, “Like law, science, art, and guns, religion is a powerful tool that can be used for great good as well as for great evil. I have no desire to obstruct the benefits of religion” (William Lane Craig and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, God? A Debate Between a Christian and an Atheist, 82).But other atheists think this “accommodation” is dangerous. Harris writes, “I hope to show that the very ideal of religious tolerance—born of the notion that every human being should be free to believe whatever he wants about God—is one of the principal forces driving us toward the abyss” (The End of Faith, 15).

Formerly atheist blogger Leah Libresco converted to the Catholic Faith

Her online announcement shocked the secular community. Atheist blogger Leah Libresco has announced on her Patheos blog that she has converted to Christianity. In her latest online post, "This is my last post for the Patheos Atheist Portal," she explained her conversion to Catholicism. Libresco said her conversion came from her struggles with the roots of the moral law. Libresco said she inevitably arrived at an understanding that aligns with a Christ-centered world-view.

Source: MySecretAtheist blog

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Libresco said her conversion came from her struggles with the roots of the moral law. Libresco said she inevitably arrived at an understanding that aligns with a Christ-centered world-view.

Libresco found herself constantly exploring this paradigm until she finally accepted the notion that truth and moral goodness come from God. "I believed that the Moral Law wasn't just a Platonic truth, abstract and distant. It turns out I actually believed it was some kind of Person, as well as Truth. And there was one religion that seemed like the most promising way to reach back to that living Truth.

"I asked my friend what he suggests we do now, and we prayed the night office of the Liturgy of the Hours together (I've kept up with that since). Then I suggested hugs and playing Mumford and Sons really, really loudly," she wrote.

"After I changed my mind, I decided to take a little time to make sure I really believed what I thought I believed, before telling my friends, family, and, now, all of you. That left me with the question of what to do about my atheism blog. My solution was to just not write anything I disagreed with. Enough of my friends had accused me of writing in a crypto-Catholic style that I figured no one would notice if I were actually crypto-Catholic for a month and a half (i.e. everything from "Upon this ROC." on).

Libresco admits she struggles with aspects of her newfound Catholic faith. Among them, the church's teaching about homosexuality, but she seems set on a path to explore these specified issues as diligently as she has the overarching existence of a higher power.

Libresco promises to further discuss her ongoing spiritual path in future blog posts.

"This post isn't the final word on my conversion. I'm sure there's a lot more explaining and arguing to do, so be a little charitable in your read of this post and try to give me a little time to expand my ideas over the next few weeks," she writes.

Many people in the secular community question Libresco's massive transition, but at least one prominent atheist has shown his support. On his "Friendly Atheist" blog, Hemant Mehta wrote the following about the conversion:

"It happens. Far less frequently than the other way around, but it happens . I won't pretend to understand whatever she's going through. But whenever you make a big announcement like that, it's like a huge weight has been lifted off your shoulders. It's even harder to do that when you talk about religion so publicly. Anyway, I wish Leah the best."

For the glory of God and His Church!

DR. ALBERT EINSTEIN EXTOLLED THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AS THE LONE VOICE AGAINST HITLER

By The Splendor of the Church

Albert Einstein, addressing the Catholic Church’s role during the Holocaust, said the following:

“Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks… “Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.” DR. ALBERT EINSTEIN [December 23, 1940 issue of Time magazine on page 38.]

Einstein: The Church alone stood for intellectual truth and moral freedom
By: Mary Meets Dolly

The Church today still stands for intellectual truth and moral freedom. Although the propaganda that surrounds us says otherwise. But it is the Church that speaks for the human embryo that is frozen, sold, discarded or torn apart for harvestable biological material. It is the Church that reminds us that we all began our lives as small as the period at the end of this sentence and our size does not diminish our worth. It is the Church that stands firm against the creation and manipulation of human life in the laboratory. It is the Church that speaks out against the seek-and-destroy mission going on in the womb against those that are not deemed "genetically fit." The truth is that when the Church stands for the embryo and fetus, it stands for the inherent dignity in every human life regardless of DNA or point of development.

The Nazi's dehumanized the Jews and other "undesirables" and the Church stood for them, however imperfectly. Now the Church is nearly alone in standing for the youngest and most voiceless members of our species. Those that many have gone to great lengths to insist are not human. We know better. I pray that those who despise the Church today will see in the future what the Church has done to protect the most vulnerable and innocent of lives and will praise it unreservedly as Einstein did.

The Iglesia Ni Cristo® (INC-1914) is following Pope only to Demonize him!

One Pope! Many journalists!  One guy tells something, the media will say something. One good seed sown, weeds grew and choke them. So that what's picked up by harvesters are fruits of weeds.

That's what happened to Pope Francis' comments on possible salvation of Atheists... his words were picked up wrongly and circulated misinformation which the Pope DIDN'T SAY!

What's their agenda? Well... they hated the Catholic Church.  Much  more the Pope. So even though they aren't directly interested on the Papacy and what the Pope is saying, they are very much interested on how they can distort his message and circulate misinformation.   But the TRUTH never will be heard.

The Iglesia Ni Cristo® (INC-1914) didn't spare that temptation.  The headlines in HuffPost "Pope Francis Says Atheists Who Do Good Are Redeemed, Not Just Catholics" went viral like a bushfire and was immediately picked up by anti-Catholics awaiting for an ambush to the Pope!

It wasn't surprising for the Iglesia Ni Cristo® to pick up such a juicy news because for the past 100 years of Manalo's cult, it was FOUNDED in BIGOTRY and ANTI-CATHOLIC rhetoric.  All their might, they had attacked the Church of Jesus Christ-- the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church of Christ accusing her of apostasy to accommodate FELIX MANALO's claim as "GOD'S LAST MESSENGER" which a contradiction to Christ claim to be final and climax of all prophesies.

Here is "What Pope Francis really said about atheists" from CatholicVote, let me quote the first few paragraphs by Stephen Kokx

Pope Francis raised a lot of eyebrows Wednesday after saying all people who do good works, including atheists, are going to heaven.

At least, that’s how the Huffington Post interpreted Pope Francis’ Wednesday morning homily.

Here’s what Pope Francis really said about atheists:

The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! ‘Father, the atheists?’ Even the atheists. Everyone! And this Blood makes us children of God of the first class! We are created children in the likeness of God and the Blood of Christ has redeemed us all! And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. If we, each doing our own part, do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter that so much. We must meet one another doing good. ‘But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!’ But do good: we will meet one another there. [Read more here]

Apparently, HuffPo doesn’t understand the difference between redemption and salvation because here’s how they reported on the pope’s remarks:

Pope Francis rocked some religious and atheist minds today when he declared that everyone was redeemed through Jesus, including atheists…

Of course, not all Christians believe that those who don’t believe will be redeemed, and the Pope’s words may spark memories of the deep divisions from the Protestant reformation over the belief in redemption through grace versus redemption through works.

Reuters interpreted the pope’s comments in a similar way:

Atheists should be seen as good people if they do good, Pope Francis said on Wednesday in his latest urging that people of all religions – or no religion – work together…

He told the story of a Catholic who asked a priest if even atheists had been redeemed by Jesus.

“Even them, everyone,” the pope answered, according to Vatican Radio. “We all have the duty to do good,” he said.

“Just do good and we’ll find a meeting point,” the pope said in a hypothetical conversation in which someone told a priest…

Francis’ reaching out to atheists and people who belong to no religion is a marked contrast to the attitude of former Pope Benedict, who sometimes left non-Catholics feeling that he saw them as second-class believers.

No more than an hour went by and an inquisitive Presbyterian friend of mine emailed me with a link to the HuffPo story. “So doing good on its own is enough for salvation in Catholicism?” he asked. In response, I sent him two links that clarified the pope’s words.. continue reading...

The Iglesia Ni Cristo® isn't after the truth. They LIED in order to win converts. And the Father of Lies, the Deceiver is very satisfied with them. His reign resides in them for their FOUNDER FELIX MANALO is the Anti-Christ according to 2 John 1:7.

Praise God, we are Catholics! Even the Iglesia Ni Cristo® of Manalo is following him!

Dr. Stephen Bullivant: An Atheist Philosopher Became Catholic

Shared from BrandonVogt Blog

NOTE: This interview originally ran at StrangeNotions.com, the website I created to bring Catholics and atheists into dialogue.

Dr. Stephen Bullivant has long been one of the most popular contributors at Strange Notions. Atheists appreciate his respectful, fair-minded articles while Catholics value his careful articulation of what Catholicism actually teaches about atheism.

Part of the reason he’s beloved by both groups is because he’s seen both side of the divide. After adopting atheism for many years, and devoting his doctoral research to the topic, he converted to Catholicism in 2008.

Since then, Stephen has authored two books, The Salvation of Atheists and Catholic Dogmatic Theology (Oxford University Press, 2012) and Faith and Unbelief (Canterbury Press, 2013; Paulist Press, 2014). He also just released a massive tome that he co-edited with the philosopher Michael Ruse, titled The Oxford Handbook of Atheism (Oxford University Press, 2013).

I recently sat down with Stephen to discuss his conversion from atheism to Catholicism, the role of Christianity in the rise of atheism, and what Catholicism teaches about the salvation of atheists. Enjoy!

Topics Discussed:

1:32 – How did you, as an atheist, become interested in researching Catholicism?
3:16 – What role have Christians played in the rise of atheism?
6:10 – What does the Catholic Church teach about the salvation of non-believers?
10:19 – What can Christians and atheists learn from each other?

Full Text of Benedict XVI's Letter to Atheist

I doubt if Eduardo Manalo, grandson of the Iglesia ni Cristo's founder FELIX MANALO can comprehend this very intelligent response of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI to an Atheist.  I will not be surprised if Eduardo wouldn't and couldn't write a letter to the Pope with his objection to Catholic doctrines, practices and teachings. Surely Eduardo Manalo or any of his paid and incompetent Bible preachers would be left begging for understanding for having such an unmatched knowledge in Christian history, theology, practices, tradition-- much with reason and faith! -CD2000

Piergiorgio Odifreddi and Benedict XVI.

[Source: National Catholic Register] Exclusive to the Register, we publish below the first English translation of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s letter to the militant Italian atheist, Piergiorgio Odifreddi.

In September, the Italian newspaper La Repubblica printed extracts of the letter whose full contents were published in Italian on Nov. 23 by the German-language agency Kath.net.

The Pope Emeritus sent the letter in response to a book Odifreddi wrote in 2011 entitled Dear Pope, I’m Writing to You. The work was a critique of certain arguments and lines of thought found in Benedict’s theological writings, beginning with his 1967 volume Introduction to Christianity, and including his book Jesus of Nazareth, which he wrote as pope.

---

Distinguished Professor Odifreddi,

First, I must apologize for the fact that I am only thanking you today for sending me your book, Caro Papa, ti scrivo, and for the kind words which you addressed to me at the time through Archbishop Gänswein. However I did not wish to write before having read your book, and since various tasks still weigh upon me, I have finished reading it only now.

Today, therefore, I would at last like to thank you for having sought in great detail to confront my book, and thus also my faith. This in large part was precisely what I intended in my address to the Roman Curia at Christmas 2009. I must also thank you for the faithful manner in which you dealt with my text, earnestly seeking to do it justice.

My opinion of your book as a whole, however, is rather mixed. I read some parts of it with enjoyment and profit. In other parts, however, I was surprised by a certain aggressiveness and rashness of argumentation.

I would like to respond chapter by chapter, but unfortunately I do not have sufficient strength for this. I shall therefore choose a few points that I think are particularly important.

Turning the Tables on Atheists (Part 1)

Author Patrick Madrid Discusses "The Godless Delusion"

By Karna Swanson

GRANVILLE, Ohio, MAY 12, 2011 (EWTN/Zenit.org).- What would happen if Christians turned the tables on atheists and challenged them on their belief that God doesn't exist?

This is the premise of the book "The Godless Delusion: A Catholic Challenge to Modern Atheism," written by Patrick Madrid and Kenneth Hensley (Our Sunday Visitor), in which the internal contradictions of a non-belief in God, as well as the various incoherencies in the atheistic worldview, are exposed.

According to Madrid, "atheists are not accustomed to Christians subjecting atheism to a rigorous critique on its own merits. This is why our primary goal was to take a different approach by providing a philosophical critique of atheism itself."

Madrid is the author or editor of 16 books, the director of the Envoy Institute of Belmont Abbey College, the publisher of Envoy Magazine, and host of the Thursday edition of EWTN Radio's "Open Line" broadcast (3-5 p.m. ET).