A Libertarian Case Against Abortion

In celebration of the overturning of Roe v. Wade, I thought I would share an (unpublished) essay I wrote against the moral permissibility of abortion a few years ago. At the time, I was somewhat of a libertarian (this is no longer the case). Consequently, I approached the issue through a libertarian lens. If there is an apologetic advantage to this, it is that pro-choice arguments are, I think, strongest when evaluated against a libertarian backdrop. Thus, the essay seeks to refute the pro-choice position on its home turf, so to speak. Anyway, without further ado, the essay can be accessed HERE.

The Catholic Doctrine of Merit: The Proverbial Bus and the Good Thief

Objection: It seems highly implausible that good works are necessary for salvation. Suppose, for instance, that someone is baptized and therefore brought into a state of salvation. Further, suppose that this person is then immediately hit by a bus and killed, without having had the opportunity to do any good works. If good works are necessary for salvation, then this person would be damned, which is absurd. After all, he was just saved through being baptized. Or what about an infant who is baptized and then dies due to health complications? The infant in such a case has not performed any good works. But surely that infant will be in Heaven. Finally, we can take an example from Sacred Scripture. The Good Thief on the cross next to Christ repented, and Jesus told him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise” (Luke 23:43). The Good Thief, therefore, was brought into a state of salvation, and Jesus assured him that he would be in Heaven. And clearly, he had not performed any (supernatural) good works at that point, and he would not have the opportunity to do so since he would soon die on the cross. For all of these reasons, therefore, it must not be the case that good works are necessary for salvation.

A Brief Argument on Infant Baptism

Some Protestants reject the legitimacy of infant baptism by holding that baptism, being an outward sign of salvation, must be received with full, conscious consent, and this is because salvation itself can only be received by making an explicit act of faith (which requires full, conscious consent), no exceptions. This view is referred to in certain Protestant circles as "believer's baptism." Since, therefore, infants are neither capable of giving full, conscious consent nor, a fortiori, making an explicit act of faith, it follows that infant baptism is invalid. The trouble with this reasoning, aside from the fact that baptism is not merely an outward sign but rather also the instrumental cause of salvation, is that it entails that infants cannot be saved, which is in utter contradiction to the teaching of Jesus (cf. Luke 18:15-16). The Protestant is here making two claims which logically entail the conclusion that salvation is impossible for infants:

1. An explicit act of faith is necessary for salvation.
2. Infants are not capable of making an explicit act of faith.
3. Therefore, infants cannot be saved.

Kant's First Antinomy: The Beginning of the Universe

The philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) famously argued that reason is not capable of answering the question of whether the universe began to exist. Kant sought to show this by demonstrating that both the proposition that the universe began to exist and its negation (i.e., the universe did not begin to exist) admit of incontrovertible arguments in their favor, thus implying that reason leads to the conclusion that a proposition (what Kant calls the “thesis”) and its negation (what Kant calls the “antithesis”) are both true. But by the principle of non-contradiction, a proposition and its negation cannot both be true. Kant refers to such paradoxes as antinomies of pure reason. In his Critique of Pure Reason, Kant identifies four such antinomies, the first of which is the one presently under discussion. In trying to answer such cosmological questions by way of pure reason, reason itself, as Kant puts it, “soon falls into such contradictions that it is constrained, in this cosmological field, to desist from any such pretensions” (Critique of Pure Reason, Bk. II, Ch. II, pg. 385). Given the present antinomy, we must conclude that reason itself is bankrupt with respect to answering the question of whether the universe began to exist, even though the question must of logical necessity have an objective answer. As Kant writes,

Quitting the Quintilemma: Eternal Security and Warnings of Falling Away: A Response to William Lane Craig

In a previous post (HERE), I presented an argument against the doctrine of eternal security in which I argued that, in order to avoid antinomianism while maintaining eternal security, a proponent of the doctrine of eternal security has four possible moves, none of which is ultimately acceptable: (i) Antinomianism; (ii) No true Christian (i.e., no person in the state of justification) has ever committed the sins listed in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21, and Revelation 21:8; (iii) Antinomianism minus apostacy; (iv) Sacred Scripture contains numerous completely pointless warnings. This set up a quintilemma in which it was concluded that the doctrine of eternal security is false. Focusing on (iv), if the doctrine of eternal security is true, then it would seem that Scripture contains pointless warnings. For if a Christian cannot lose his salvation, then warnings about Christians losing their salvation are pointless.

The Ethics of Mockery

Two fundamental questions:

1. Is mockery ever morally permissible?
2. If yes, under what conditions?

In answer to the first question, we must answer with yes. For our Lord Himself engaged in mockery (cf. Matthew 23:24). Since, therefore, our Lord is utterly without sin (cf. Hebrews 4:15), it follows that mockery is not intrinsically sinful and therefore can be morally permissible.

Answering the second question is more difficult, but if we follow the example of our Lord, we can identify various conditions under which mockery is morally permissible. When Christ engaged in mockery, the chief reasons for doing so were to combat error and to teach truth. Christ engages in mockery in order to repudiate the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees, and to teach the truth that the interior life is more important than the exterior (cf. Matthew 23:27-28). So, using mockery for these purposes is morally legitimate. Purposes for engaging in mockery that are obviously not morally legitimate would include, for example, wanting to calumniate someone or wanting to simply manifest cruelty by inflicting emotional pain on someone.

The Biblical Case for the Doctrine of Eternal Security: Arguments and Rebuttals

The doctrine of eternal security can be defined, according to the Westminster Confession, as follows:

They whom God hath accepted in his Beloved, effectually called and sanctified by his Spirit, can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace; but shall certainly persevere therein to the end, and be eternally saved (Westminster Confession, XVII.I).

The basic thesis is that a Christian cannot lose his salvation. Once a person is justified, he is always justified. In my last post (HERE), I presented an argument against eternal security. In this post, I want to consider the biblical arguments for eternal security and to offer rebuttals to those arguments. In what follows, I will present passages of Sacred Scripture accompanied by arguments from the passages to the doctrine of eternal security as well as corresponding rebuttals to those arguments. I have attempted to be simultaneously comprehensive and concise. The scriptural passages are taken from the NIV translation. I have opted to use this translation because it is an Evangelical translation, which allows me to avoid the lame objection that I am using a translation with "Catholic bias."

An Anti-Antinomian Quintilemma Against the Doctrine of Eternal Security

A neuralgic point of contention between various traditions of Christianity is whether a Christian can lose his salvation. Among Protestants, Calvinists are especially associated with the doctrine of eternal security (alternatively, perseverance of the saints), which holds that no true Christian can lose his salvation, and this is because God will always preserve every Christian in a state of grace and continually and unconditionally forgive their sins. As the Westminster Confession states:

Thomism, Molinism, and God's Universal Salvific Will

One of the central disputes between Thomists and Molinists is over whether actual grace is intrinsically efficacious (Thomism) or extrinsically efficacious (Molinism). The late, great Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange explains this difference as follows:

According to Molinism, grace is efficacious only because God foresees that man will consent, whereas, for St. Thomas, “God indeed moves the will immutably, because of the efficacy of the moving power which cannot fail; but because of the nature of the will that is moved, which is indifferently disposed toward various things, it is not necessitated but remains free” (God, His Existence and His Nature, Vol. II pg. 516).

The Catholic Doctrine of Merit: The "Legalism" Objection

Objection: The idea that good works contribute to justification can’t be right. The Gospel is a message of grace, not works-righteousness. We are “justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as an expiation by his blood, to be received by faith” (Romans 3:24-25). Our entrance into Heaven is secured by God’s mercy, not by our good deeds outweighing our bad deeds. Such a notion constitutes a cold and servile legalism that falsifies the Gospel and causes us to pridefully look in on ourselves. As Martin Luther put it, “Turning to myself and looking into myself, into what I am and ought to be and do, I lose sight of Christ, who alone is my righteousness and my life…[W]orks…only compel us to look to ourselves again, and turn our eyes from that brazen serpent, Christ crucified” (Commentary on Galatians, 1535; quoted in A Lutheran’s Case for Roman Catholicism, pg. 15-16).