Mark:

I really liked your books, but must complain about the cheap binding for "By What Authority?". The glue the publishers used is so ineffective that most of the pages are falling out of my copy. Now I know that buying a new one will solve this problem (temporarily), but I really hate to have to re-purchase books again and again because the publishers are cheapskates!

John Betts | Homepage | 11.29.02 - 4:52 pm | #

I already own "Making Senses..." and "By What Authority...", but I've been unable to justify risking the eye-cauterizing cover of "This is my body". And not just for me, after all, I have children at home.
Bubbs | Homepage | 11.29.02 - 5:11 pm | #

John:

There are some things I have no control over.

Bubbs:

Just buy the "Evangelical Discovers" tape set. It includes a talk based on This Is My Body. And nobody will ever accuse Catholic Answers of making an eye-cauterizing cover for it.
Mark Shea | Homepage | 11.29.02 - 5:45 pm | #

[whine]But Marrrrrrk, some of us don't like tapes. How are we supposed to find out how you got this way?[/whine]


Geoff Horton | 11.29.02 - 8:28 pm | #

It will be in print soon.
Mark Shea | Homepage | 11.29.02 - 10:16 pm | #

Bubbs: If St. Francis of Assisi could take it, you can.
Joe Marier | 11.29.02 - 11:38 pm | #

Hey Mark,

Capitalist and enjoying it, too?

Which book should I read that will best prepare me for your visit to Kalamazoo next year?


Fr. Brian Stanley | Homepage | 11.30.02 - 8:32 am | #

I'm coming to Kalamazoo next week (Dec 7), not next year (unless you know something I don't).

You should get Making Senses Out of Scripture (since that's what this series of talks will be about). Or, if you'd rather not go over the same materials twice, try another of the books or tapes. Your call.
Mark Shea | Homepage | 11.30.02 - 2:56 pm | #

Mark: I'm sorry, didn't mean to put you on the spot. I know you don't have control over the covers. I'm just frustrated since your books are some of my favorites. So you have tapes now, eh? Interesting...
John Betts | Homepage | 11.30.02 - 7:02 pm | #

Some interesting excerpts on there. Of course, the Reformed have always believed in multiple fulfillments of OT prophecy and the Christological focus, so that's not an exclusively Catholic thing. And I think your attempt to play Devil's advocate on anti-abortion, anti-polygamy, and the Trinity, showing how those beliefs are not supportable by Scripture alone doesn't work. I think the argument against abortion drawn from the Gospel is sufficiently convincing to anyone who doesn't have a hidden agenda in favor of abortion. People will always try to reinterpret Scripture to make it pro-choice, pro-homosexual, and pro-feminist but they'll have to do some really tortured hermeneutics to get it there. And I think Jesus' words in the Gospel at one point show that polygamy was allowed for a time, but from the beginning it was not so - "the two shall become one flesh." And the Deity of Christ is essential to Christian faith, since only God Himself could redeem humanity. No mere creature could die in our place, and that was why Athanasius spoke out so boldly against the Arians, though it seemed to be him against the world.
evan donovan | 11.30.02 - 7:27 pm | #

My favorite example of tortured hermenuetics was when a non-denominational chaplain was having some ecumenical dialogue with myself and another Catholic firefighter and he was reinterpreting John 6 and explaining how Jesus Christ didn't really mean what he said he meant.
Steve | 11.30.02 - 9:29 pm | #