Dear Johan:

Well, I will first answer your direct question, "How correct is the Church and the Bible?"

The Bible and the Catholic Church are infallible in the teaching of Faith and Morals.

The Bible is not a book of science, history, archeology, or sociology. In those subjects the Bible may not have the right answer and the Church may not be accurate either on those subjects.

But, on the subject of Faith and Morals neither the Bible or the Church can be wrong. It would be cruel indeed if God left us to the imaginations and interpretations of people without some definitive way to know for sure what God intends. Without this "Magisterium", as it is called, we end up with 30,000 denominations all thinking they are right even when they contradict one another. God has never operated that way.

God has always had a teaching authority (Magisterium) on this planet to guard and protect His teachings. In Old Testament times Moses, for example, was a Pope. Jesus Himself speaks of the Chair of Moses in Matt 23:2. Reference to a "chair" means a "seat of authority. When Christ came, he appointed Simon Peter as the first Pope of the New Covenant. This is called the "Chair of Peter".

The Bible and the Magisterium of the Church are infallible, but only under certain conditions dealing with only the topics of Faith and Morals.

If the Pope were to say that 1 + 1 = 5, he would be wrong.

The Bible is a religious book. It is infallible in its religious message. While it is remarkable how many times the Bible is correct in its science, history, archeology, or sociology, since it is not about those subjects, all that matter is the Bible's religious message.

For example, some people believe that God created the world in six twenty-four hour days. This is not likely, but if God wanted to do it in six days He is certainly capable to do it. If He wanted to do it over 10 billion years, He can do that too. Who are we to tell God how to create the universe?

God even mentioned this arrogance of man to think they can tell Him how things work in Job 38:1-11:

Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind:  "Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?  Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me. "Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.  Who determined its measurements--surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it?

On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? "Or who shut in the sea with doors, when it burst forth from the womb; when I made clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, and said, 'Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed'?

We have to accept what God says whether we like it or not. The interesting thing about Truth is that truth is not dependent upon our agreement or with our opinion. Truth is Truth.

The Bible and the Church are in the business of religious Truth, the Truth about Faith and Morals. God guarantees that the Bible and the Church can never be wrong on Faith and Morals because the Holy Spirit will see to it that the writers of the Bible, and the Magisterium of the Church will not be wrong on Faith and Morals. If this were not so we could never know what is true since we certainly cannot trust man's opinions.

And, by the way, there is historical evidence that proves that God protects His Magisterium. In the 6th century a man named Vigilius murdered the Pope and got himself elected pope with the specific goal of bringing the Church into heresy at the behest of Empress Theodora. But, when he sat in that Chair of Peter something happened to him. The Holy Spirit came over him and he could not go through with it. Theodora was angry at this and sent him into exile. Pope Vigilius died before making it back to Rome.

There are other similar historical events like with the Primate of England, Thomas Beckett, who was appointed to the Archbishop of Canterberry in the 12th century to support King Henry II against the Church. But, he too, after sitting in the Cathedral Chair could not go through with it. The King had him killed.

God protects His Church from error on faith and morals.

Now as to your other comments:

Your remarks fall into four categories:

1) lack of reason and logic
2) ignorance of the Bible
3) judgmentalism and hypocrisy
4) Ignorance of the Church and Church history

Let me deal with these one by one:

1) lack of reason and logic: You say, "I am a homosexual man. I like my life alot and no one in my family or friendship circle has any problems with that. I am as I was meant to be. As God intended me to be."

It does not follow that because you like your life and your family and friends have no problems with it, that God intended you to be a homosexual.

This is the same illogical notion to suggest that because you were "born this way" that God intended you to be homosexual.

Some people may have been born with a proclivity to violence and when they grow up like killing people as a mafia hit man. Does that means God made them that way? Of course not. I could say that I was born fat. Does that excuse me from the sin of gluttony. Genetic fatness can't be helped. Opening my mouth and shovelling in food is a choice.

The Church's official teaching on homosexuality is published in the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, (Cf. Gen 19:1-29; Rom 1:24-27; 1 Cor 6:10; 1 Tim 1:10) They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved. tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered."

2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.

2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.

Homosexuality cannot in the wildest imagination be considered "normal". In evolution, any creatures who were homosexual died without passing on his or her gene pool. The whole point to the evolutionary process is to pass on one's gene to the next generation. That is impossible with homosexuality in the natural sense.

God told man to go out and multiply. Homosexuals cannot do that. God created marriage specifically for procreation and said all sex outside of marriage is sin. That idea was so important that it is included in the Ten Commandments. Homosexuals cannot procreate.

As for being born homosexual there is no scientific evidence to prove that. There was a study a number years ago where a scientist thought he found a gene responsible for homosexually. The homosexual community nearly tarred and feathered him for this. They would not accept this study.

But, for the sake of argument let us say that homosexuals are born that way. That does not give them the excuse to fornicate any more than my being born fat gives me the excuse to eat 25 eggs for breakfast.

Whatever defects or proclivities we are born with does not give us an excuse to sin. Gluttony is a sin regardless of my genetics. Fornication is a sin regardless of one's genetics. All non-married persons (marriage defined as between a man and a woman married to each other), is committing the sin of fornication/adultery if they have sex with anyone other than their spouse.

All other practices of sex, outside of valid marriage, is perversion.

The other illogic is that "God made me like this." Exactly where do people get that idea? God did not make me fat, God did not make my grandson born with defects that caused him to die at five days old.

Defects and proclivities at birth are not God's fault. Those aberrations are caused by all sorts of things. God does not cause them.

God never commits material evil. Babies born with defects, born with the genetics that leads me to be fat, or you to be homosexual is not God's fault as these aberrations are material evil. It is not as God intended. God does not intend any genetic abnormalities that cause us to be something other than the perfect creature God created us to be. He does not intend a cleft foot, a baby to be born with one arm, or to be born with a congenital disease. Genetically, I carry a recessive gene of Cystic Fibrosis. I do not have the disease, but I carry the gene for it. When I was married we had to have our children checked to see if the genetic lottery went against our children.

Because of the sin of man, not following God's plan, the gene pool is no longer perfect, but deeply flawed. Thus, we inherent the tendencies of all sorts of personality traits and physical traits. This is the result of genetics, not God's intention.

2) ignorance of the Bible

Your statements about what the Bible says or does not say has little semblance to what the Bible actually says.

a) In Sodom, the men of the town wanted to have sex with the two male strangers. They did not know or recognize them as angels. Lot knew they were angels, which why he was so upset at the idea of them being raped by the men of the city. The men of the city had no knowledge that they were angels, thus, they were lusting after males, as far as they knew.

b) The New Testament has a lot to say about homosexuality. See Romans 1:18-36:

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of men who by their wickedness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.

 Ever since the creation of the world his invisible nature, namely, his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse; for although they knew God they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their senseless minds were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man or birds or animals or reptiles.

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever! Amen.

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. Their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in their own persons the due penalty for their error.

And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a base mind and to improper conduct. They were filled with all manner of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malignity, they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's decree that those who do such things deserve to die, they not only do them but approve those who practice them.

To suggest that the New Testament does not speak about the sin of homosexual sex one has to be utterly ignorant of the Bible, or delusional.

There is NO question as to God's view of homosexual sex, which God calls an abomination, a word reserved only to a few sins.

At the same time no where in the Bible that God say he hates homosexuals. He hates the sin, not the person. God loves all people -- even the people who are hell (who are there by their own choice).

3) Judgmentalism and Hypocrisy: You accuse the Church of making judgments and say we are not to judge people, yet you make judgments all over the place in your post. You judge the Church, and you judge me. Is this not hypocrisy?

I am amused by the people who preach tolerance and no judging. So far, of the 1000s of people who preach this that I have met, 100% of them are the most intolerant and most judgmental people I have ever met.

Jesus never preached that we are not to make judgments. He said that we are not condemn people or judge with double-standard or judge hypocritically. Of course, we are to judge people's behavior and ideas. Everyone does. If they say they don't then they are lying or need a psychiatrist. For those who do not believe in judging, I expect them to lobby their state legislature and Congress to abolish all criminal law and criminal courts, as those laws and courts judge people. But, that deals with crime, some will say!

Well sins are crimes against God and are far worse than the crimes against man. The third definition of crime in the American Heritage Dictionary is: "A serious offense, especially one in violation of morality."

If you wish to pretend that all judging is wrong, then you might want to start by looking in the mirror and chastise for judging that person you see.

4) Ignorance of the Church and Church history: Finally, your comments about the Church and her history is patently ignorant.

 a) In similar manner as with what God has said in the Bible, the Catholic Church loves the homosexual person, and welcomes that homosexual person, but cannot support the sin of homosexual sex or the sin of anyone. The Church did not invent this moral imperative. The Church is merely following the Biblical teaching.

You are correct in saying that a sin is a sin. The Church agrees. The Church, and the rest of us are mandated to support moral correctness and to admonish the sinner. We have no choice because it is what God commands us to do.

b) You state, "you burnt innocent women at the stake for crying out loud!"

The Catholic Church never burnt anyone. The State is the one who burned heretics because heretics were a threat to the State. The penalty for heretics in the Church is excommunication, not death.

It is true that some clerics participated in seeing that a few were burned, but those priests and bishops were violating Church teaching and sinning themselves and will be held accountable by God for their sins.

Nearly all witches and similar people were burned by the Protestant Calvinists in Germany and Puritans in the America. It has never been true that the Church taught or had any policies to put anyone to death.

You state, The Pagan religion was there first!" what is this a elementary school playground. I did it first! No I did. No I did.

Anyway, actually God was first. The pagans just tried to understand God as best they could without having any revelation or guidebook to go by. That is why some pagan practices are similar to Christian practices. They inherently knew God existed, occasionally stumbling over a correct notion, but got it wrong on the details. They did the best they could, and then went bad to worse from there because of personal interpretations of their faith. They lacked a Magisterium to guide them properly.

Then when God revealed Himself to the Jews through the prophets, and particularly through Moses and the Ten Commandments, mankind had for the first time a guide to understand God more accurately. The ultimate revelation of God was in Jesus, and through the Apostles a New Testament was written, and a Church formed, to provide the best guide possible until we come into perfect knowledge in heaven.

You call yourself "somewhat anti-Catholic". By definition, that means bigotry. You can disagree with doctrines of the Catholic Church and not be "anti".

If you wish to disagree with the Church then have the integrity to disagree accurately. An anti-Catholic never does that but protects himself through disagreeing with myths about Catholic teaching that do not exist. They tend to be scared to learn the real teaching of the Church.

Apologist like me usually have to spend hours and hours refuting nonsense, like, for example, the canard and strawman argument of "Catholics worship Mary". No, Catholics do not worship Mary and any person who does worship Mary is sinning against the 1st Commandment and risking their soul to hell.

By the time I refute all these false arguments there is no time left to talk about the real teachings of the Church. I think that is by design by anti-Catholics. If we were to discuss the real teachings of the Church, then the Church would not be the boogie-man anti-Catholics think we are. God forbid that we are Christians with a reason for our faith.  But, anti-Catholics want to protect their prejudice and their hatred so we usually cannot talk about anything real.

Thus, perhaps you really do not mean that you are anti-Catholic. Perhaps you mean that you disagree with the Church on some things.

In any event, we will pray for you.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary

"Lord, those are your best servants who wish to shape their life on Your answers rather than to shape your answers on their wishes." --St. Augustine