On Brain Scans

Ok atheists, you think you've got the final nail for the coffin of Catholicism hidden in reading minds with brain scans. A core part of Catholic belief is the human soul, a metaphysical part of us that allows us to have intelligence past that of other animals. While watching an episode of Through the Wormhole, I realized there are a bunch of things that could be seen as arguments against the existence of the soul. Here, I'll address that.
I'll start in an unconventional way by conceding many things. First, you are correct. Your memories are hidden in the brain. They can be changed. Second, dreams are a pure part of us. The human brain controls and broadcasts images to our soul. Third, the soul does not see, hear, touch, taste, or smell. You're right. That's the brain.
So now let's show why these aren't sufficient disproofs of the soul.
On the memory statement. Memories can shape how we think and act. However, they do not change who we are. Memories on their own do not do anything. They are like pixels on a computer screen. They don't mean anything unless we assign meaning to them. That analogy applies perfectly to memories. Memories are like a storage of what we see and hear and detect with our senses. However, the soul is how we apply our identity to them. That's why some people would view one memory one way and another a different way. The soul is how we apply our knowledge and our experiences.
Now what if they were changed? When people suffer amnesia, they don't lose their identity. While a movie character probably isn't the best example, Jason Bourne is well known. Bourne wakes up with no knowledge of who he is or what he is. However, he still has a personality that exists separate from his memories. That example, and its real life counterparts, show why there is a metaphysical part of us that makes us intelligent. Our personality is not stored within the neurons in our brain. Our personality is a metaphysical part of our soul that is given to us by God.
On the dream statement. Dreams are an inherent part of us. Yes, that's true. By nobody knows what causes dreams. Why can we dream but not be conscious of how to change it? My theory is that the brain takes data from our everyday lives and from motor detection and creates a sort of movie with it. It's like a 4D movie. That's because the brain is the bond between the soul and the physical world. So when the brain takes stuff we've experienced and makes a dream out of it, the soul, our intelligence, still analyzes it via a separate part of us. That's why you can still think in your dreams. I had a dream once. I was on a date with someone I knew. I didn't like her when I was awake. As a result, I kept thinking, while trapped in the dream, that she wasn't my crush. You see, the dream shows us the disconnect between our brains and our soul. Our soul is what interprets and thinks and makes us different from others.
Now on the third statement. I'll define the soul here. The soul is a metaphysical part of each one of us that grants us intelligence and rationality. It also grants us an intuition. The brain is like a camera. it takes information and records it. However, it doesn't do anything to interpret it. Our soul, on the other hand, is like a computer processor. It lets us interpret what's going on. It lets us control our emotions. It lets us feel our emotions in a very vivid manner. The brain relays messages to the soul, and the soul analyzes it. The brain is what detects angry when someone wrongs us. The soul is what labels it as such. The soul is what puts things together to make sense of things.

Because the Bible Says So

This is a very, very common rationale behind many controversial subjects Christians support. However, while the Bible is true in a moral and allegorical sense, those who use it as their sole justification are just as wrong as those who don't believe.

I'll start the body of this article with a quote from Revelation 3:16: "But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth!" Those who simply quote the Bible epitomize this. While the Bible is correct, we are called as Catholics to transcend petty arguments about quoting the Bible as the whole justification for a doctrine. Rather, it is important for us to understand and analyze why the Bible says what it does. By saying "the Bible says so" as our go to backup against arguments by those who do not believe, we fail to recognize our obligation to understand the Bible. While it is true that the Bible is infallible, and moral truths expressed in it are consistent with the will of God, that doesn't make it suitable as an argument to make. I am not saying it is an insufficient argument. Rather, I am saying that those who use it as their first go to justification have insufficient knowledge of their own faith. Those who merely quote the Bible, not knowing why the Bible says what it says, and not knowing God's reasoning for his morals, are lukewarm in their faith because they refuse to invest their time into it.

So to sum this post up, don't automatically quote the Bible when confronted about the Church's controversial teachings. Rather, find a reason why it is true via reflection and personal reasoning. By reaching the objective truth of the BIble through your own efforts, you know what the Bible means and can analyze it much better than if you merely memorize a few words about it. So, to all of you that believe the Bible is sufficient as an argument for controversial teachings, you are correct in that regard. However, you are wrong to think it is okay under God to simply memorize words and not understand their meaning as a Catholic.

A Critique of Objective Theology

Mr. Cole, this isn't directed at you. This is directed at those who decided Theology should be the last final.
Theology is not objective. It just isn't. Making advanced theology objective seeks to make objective something that is inherently subjective. You can't just follow the Church because the Church says so. Christ himself condemned those who acted super religious but never truly understood why. In the same way, we shouldn't be forced to simply memorize facts about the Church. While it is important to know some events in Church history, testing us via multiple choice format isn't the right way to go. Rather, we have to be able to build on our knowledge. The only way we can get closer to God ourselves is to subjectively arrive there. Although Mr. Cole is a phenomenal teacher, he just can't teach us to existence with God. It's not possible. It's us who have to make the first and last steps. That means we have to have room to spread our wings. What use is a horse with no room to gallop? Think of theology like a convertible. Convertibles are great. Riding in a convertible freely is a great way to get around. You can feel free with the wind in your hair. That's what it's like writing an essay. You can be free in your thoughts. While some of them may be wrong, they'll mean more than just memorizing it. Objective exams due to a lack of time to grade are like a garage. Yea, you can still turn on your car. You can rev the engine. But if you stay in there too long, you'll suffocate from carbon monoxide poisoning. If the only theology anybody ever knows is objective theology, they'll know a ton of stuff but they won't know what to do with it. Nobody cares that you know that 2+2=4. They only care if you can use that knowledge to add 2 and 3 to get five. We need to apply our knowledge, not just blindly follow it. We can draw from one of Mr. Cole's multiple choice questions itself. The question is "how do we follow Christ." The answer is to follow him and understand why we follow him. It's not following him blindly. It's not about just saying "well Christ said so." That's why people who say homosexuality is a sin because "the Bible told me so" are the bane of Catholicism. We shouldn't just know facts, we need to understand them to apply them. So to anyone in administration who is unlucky enough to have nothing better to do than read this, heed the message and please give us an early theology final.

The other major drawback of memorizing theology questions is that it always makes the class too easy or too hard. Theology isn't something you're supposed to memorize. It's something you're supposed to understand and apply. Further, none of our classes have good critical thinking development. Yea, we write some in English. But that's just a psychology class of playing the game of guessing what the author meant. It's not critical thinking. We can't use that knowledge to adapt to situations. Theology one of those things were we can. By being able to understand abstract concepts and develop them into concrete ideas, we gain a rare skill that people need in todays world. We need it to analyze confusing things. We need it to be able to understand a justification for action. Most importantly, we need it to become closer to God. Critical thinking has to blossom in theology. So please, give our teachers time to grade essays.

What does it mean to be Man Fully Alive?

Saint Irenaeus, who created the saying

The first order of business is analyzing the sentence grammatically. The question that arises is whether Man Fully alive describes the Glory of God, or the other way around. Because this question can only be answered by personal opinion, we'll just show the meaning of both and say they're both true.

Let's begin with the original saying. The Glory of God is Man Fully Alive. This sentence is a simple sentence. No commas. Only one clause. Yet, it has an incredible amount of meaning. The surface of this quote seems to say that God's awesomeness is only when man is fully alive. That's false. Remember, God is perfect. Nothing can make him better. So let's draw a distinction between glory and awesomeness. Being awesome is when you're awesome. Glory is when you're awesome and people see it. Glory is when a pro baseball player hits a home run in the finals of the World Series. Awesomeness is when he does that same hit during practice. So God's glory is something we see. From here, I think the conclusion is that Man Fully Alive is what allows us to see God's glory. So let's discuss what God's glory is. God created mankind to be with him, meaning we are supposed to follow his calling. All that we do ought to be given up to God. Otherwise, we would be violating our purpose of existing. As such, we must do what we can to witness God. So that means we need to listen to that internal voice to be with God.
So what is God's message to us? Well, this comes in many forms. The first is pretty subjective. THe most obvious way God speaks to us is through some kind of vocation. While we can verify that God calls everyone to follow a career path or act in a certain way, there isn't some definite example of God's call to us, as everyone is called to do something different. The second way, the more important way, we are called by God is to love others. As Christ said, we should "Love others as I have loved You." What makes love such a central part of what it means to be Catholic? Well, we're all equal. God made us to be in union with him, meaning we all have an equal "dose" of humanity. This means we can't just arbitrarily assign what it means to be human. All people are different. That's what makes us similar. In that way, God calls us to love others as we lover ourselves, because others have the same human dignity and moral worth as we do.
So now let's go further and analyze why being fully alive means accepting the Glory of God. Man was created by God for one reason: to be in his presence. This means that in order to truly be happy, to be true to our essence, we've gotta be with God. This is where the saying really culminates in a simpler meaning. In order to be fully alive, in order to fulfill our purpose, in order to be happy, we have to be with God. God's glory is the only thing that makes us happy. That means we must do thigs for God's glory and not our own. We shouldn't have the idea that everything we do is for us. We should do things for God. That also means doing things for others. Since, again, God created us equal, we have to respect that and follow that. Honoring God and God's will means helping others, bringing glory to them and not ourselves. So, to sum it up, being man fully alive, acheiving the Glory of God, is treating others as God treats us in order to respect him as we respect ourselves.

What is Evil?

Artistic Depiction of Satan

If God exists, why is there evil? That's a common question asked by atheists and Christians alike. Whether you believe in God or not, it's hard to understand what evil is. That's because of the way our society deals with evil. As a society, we treat evil like a condition that people have, and like something that had to be created. But that's not what evil is. Evil is a corruption of good. Let's elaborate on that further.
When we discuss what evil is, we discuss something we perceive as negative. The human body is great, but it experiences sickness. Does that mean a sick body is bad? No. A sick body is merely a body corrupted by a virus or bacteria. Another analogy for evil is cold. Cold isn't something that actually exists. It's a lack of heat. To apply the analogy, good is like heat. Good is God. Anything that isn't close to God is therefore evil. That's where the corruption comes from.
The next question is why that corruption exists in the first place. If God created everything to be good, how did it get corrupted? This is a little long-winded, so get comfortable.
First, we start at where evil came first. God did not create evil. Rather, he created angels. At the time of their creation, he revealed parts of his plan to each one of them. Remember, God and the angels are metaphysical, so they aren't bound by time. At their creation, with the knowledge of God's plan, some of them "fell." The Fall refers to those who chose to take their own power. We can agree that this seek for power on their part is bad. So since we can agree that they did something evil, how did it come about? If everything was good, what made something have a bad thought? Well, the thought of being second to God served as a temptation for some. In the beginning, authority and power were good. They were corrupted during the Fall when some demons chose to take power and authority for themselves  Their autonomy allowed them to take what was good and turn it against God. If you have a screwdriver that you use to build, you can just spin it the other way to make it destroy. In the same way, power is a neutral object. It exists, but can be good or bad. In the Fall, some angles turned the screwdriver the wrong way. They simply turned it in a different direction and started the corruption.
Here's another analogy. Think again of the human body. It's pretty good. There are some sicknesses that are corruptions, however. So separate from these corruptions, lets see if the human body is perfect. It isn't. It has some corruptions that exist for no reason. People have wrong numbers of chromosomes, different DNA structures that become cancerous, and corruptions in the body that exist without outside influence. These exist because corruption is not an evil in itself. I've been wrong in this article calling it "corruption." It's actually change. You can change something for the better or for worse. Change itself, the action of change, is not swayed either way. Evil stems from change. People change and use free will to turn away from God. That caused the Fall, and it causes sin to this day.

Now, this concept does seem to fall to an infinite regression. While it would seem to suggest that evil is a corruption, that would also beg the question of what corrupted force corrupted it in the first place. If you thought that, I commend you, you seem intelligent. The answer to that is a clarification mod a corruption of good. Since God is infinitely good, anything away from god is the perception of evil. That means anything finite is subject to evil. Since God is also infinite, anything he creates is finite. Creating something infinite would clash with God's infinity itself, meaning he would never do it. Thus, everything God creates is finite and thus subject to error. You can't have two infinities. It's just not possible under the whole concept of infinity.