Author: Lily Marie
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Faith or Obedience? The Passive Catholic and the Crisis of Discernment
Why do so many educated, faithful Catholics defer their discernment to clergy? A reflection on systemic passivity in the Church and the call to active faith. A Faithful Friend and a Strange Image Catholicism is often accused of being rigid or overly hierarchical, but perhaps one of its deeper, more insidious issues is not rigidity,…
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Corpus Christi: Where is the Body of Christ?
Introduction Corpus Christi, the solemn feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, is celebrated with majesty: a golden monstrance carried under a regal canopy, incense rising in thick plumes, and the faithful kneeling in adoration. It is a day to honour the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. But it should be a…
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Joseph of Arimathea: The Silent Disciple Who Spoke Loudest Through Action
Introduction Among the many figures who appear briefly in the Gospels yet leave an outsized legacy, Joseph of Arimathea stands apart. He is not a preacher, not a martyr, and not a miracle-worker. He speaks no recorded words. And yet, his silent courage in the final hours of Jesus’ earthly life leaves a lasting imprint…
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Eucharistic Miracles: Faith and the Search for Signs
Introduction Eucharistic miracles are often cited as divine endorsements of Catholic teaching: bleeding hosts, cardiac tissue woven into bread, scientific findings that seem to defy natural explanation. Many Catholics regard these events as powerful affirmations of the Real Presence. But a deeper question lurks behind the awe: if we truly believe that every Eucharist is…
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The Marian Dogmas
The Catholic Church upholds four Marian dogmas: These teachings are not presented as devotional preferences or theological opinions; they are declared binding truths, revealed by God and proclaimed by the Magisterium as necessary for belief. This reflection does not dispute that Mary holds a special place in salvation history. She is, after all, the woman…
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This Is Not What You Think
What This Is The Catholic Doctrine is not a devotional pamphlet. It is not an apologetics ministry. It is not curated by a committee. This is a project of fierce love and brutal honesty, a work by a Catholic who believes that Christ is eternally true, but the Church is not always honest. Who believes…
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What is Ecumenical Theology?
Ecumenical theology explores one of Christianity’s most difficult but urgent questions: whether centuries of division among churches can give way to some form of shared life, shared faith, or shared mission. It begins not with an idealised vision of unity, but with the reality of fracture. Historically, Christian unity has not been a given. The…
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What is Pastoral Theology?
Pastoral theology is the branch of Catholic theology that deals with the Church’s ministry in its most concrete form: when doctrine collides with lived experience. It does not ask what should be believed in the abstract. It asks how faith is sustained in grief, in doubt, in illness, and in conflict. Where dogmatic theology defines…
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What is Spiritual Theology?
Spiritual theology concerns itself not with rules, but with the terrain of the soul. It studies the movement of grace within human interiority and how the divine encounter shapes a person over time. Unlike systematic theology, which formulates doctrine, or moral theology, which defines duty, spiritual theology deals with what it means to be transformed,…
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What is Historical Theology?
Historical theology is the study of how Christian belief has developed, shifted, and been contested over time. It does not assume that doctrine emerged fully formed; nor does it treat the past as a fixed catalogue of theological certainties. Rather, it examines how teachings, creeds, and interpretations of faith were shaped in real historical contexts:…