Send CathInfo's owner Matthew a gift from his Amazon wish list:
https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/25M2B8RERL1UO

Author Topic: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney  (Read 6752 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline Nishant Xavier

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 2873
  • Reputation: +1893/-1750
  • Gender: Male
  • Immaculate Heart of Mary, May Your Triumph Come!
Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
« Reply #105 on: May 07, 2019, 07:46:13 AM »
  • Thanks!0
  • No Thanks!0
  • Quote from: Stanley
    Hello Xavier. My post was specific to the paper about AMS and diamonds, and you respond with a shotgun approach about "7 different dinosaur bones", wood, coal, and even collagen!

    Well, Stanley, we can always come to them one by one if you wish, but if you recall, C14 in Diamonds was only the 3rd point in the summary in my earlier post, and only the 51st of 101 in Creation.com's list of evidences. Thanks for the article by Kirk Bertsche. Bertsche says: "The ICR (Institute for Creation Research) recently spent eight years on a project known as RATE (Radioisotopes and the Age of The Earth). The RATE team claims the results have yielded convincing and irrefutable scientific evidence of a young earth. John Baumgardner, a geophysicist with expertise in tectonic modeling, presents experimental data claiming to show that all biological material contains intrinsic radiocarbon, no matter how old that material may be thought to be [1, 2]. He makes additional claims that even non-biological carbonaceous material contains intrinsic radiocarbon. He suggests that this radiocarbon is residual from the material’s creation. If true, his claims would have far-reaching implications for the ages of these materials. Baumgardner presents two classes of data. The first is a set of 90 previously published radiocarbon AMS dates of old samples (most >100k years) that he has re-analyzed. The second is a set of new samples that the RATE team collected and sent to a leading radiocarbon AMS laboratory to be dated. In both cases, I am convinced that the “intrinsic radiocarbon” is nothing more than contamination and instrument background." I'm aware that Taylor and Southon list 7 possible sources, 6 claiming the radiocarbon is somehow extrinsic to the sample itself, but it seems that most of them can be eliminated.

    Dr. Baumgardner has responded: "Regardless of the actual cause, the glaring fact remains that Taylor and Southon detected levels of 14C in the diamonds they analyzed that were all well above the intrinsic sensitivity of their AMS hardware. That intrinsic sensitivity, typically observed with a blank aluminum sample holder (with no sample or silver powder present) is on the order of 0.00056 pMC, corresponding to about 100,000 years under the standard assumption of a constant past atmospheric 14C level. Note that the level measured for samples 12674 and 12675 are more than 25 times greater than this normal instrument background. [that is to say, instrument background is insufficient to account for the observations. Therefore, one of the other 6 sources listed by Taylor and Southon must have contributed]

    It is important to emphasize that placing the diamonds directly in holes bored in the instrument's cathode sample holder eliminates all of the potential sources of 14C contamination listed in Table 1 of Taylor and Southon's paper except for items (1), 14C intrinsic to the sample itself, and (7) instrument background.

     The authors argue that most potential sources of instrument background can be excluded for their system. They show from their investigations that contamination from CO2 and other carbon-containing species adhering to the diamond surface can now be effectively ruled out as well. This means that contamination from ion source memory is largely removed from the table. [Does this answer your objection, listing ion source memory as a possible source for extrinsic radiocarbon, Stanley?]

    What then is left? It is item (1), namely, 14C intrinsic to the sample itself! [when all has been eliminated, whatever remains, however improbable it is deemed a priori, must be the truth?] ... Despite the conflict it raises for Bertsche’s worldview, the Taylor and Southon paper tangibly strengthens the case that AMS instrument background can be eliminated, to a high degree of certainty, even as a remotely possible explanation for the substantial 14C levels measured so routinely in carbon-bearing samples from deep within the geological record. 

    Furthermore, despite Bertsche’s emphasis on the diamond measurements, to me whether or not there is 14C in diamonds is a relatively minor issue. The dramatically more important issue, as emphasized in our RATE report, is the consistent presence of even higher levels of 14C in all fossilized living things which still retain some carbon. That fact is powerful and indisputable support that the earth is young and that the Genesis Flood really did occur not so long ago.John Baumgardner
    November 2014". For more, https://answersingenesis.org/geology/radiometric-dating/are-the-rate-results-caused-by-contamination/

    Do you think all the results of the RATE Project (Radioisotopes and the Age of The Earth) are incorrectly interpreted? For the diamonds, it seems to me we can eliminate instrument background as the only source when the portion of percent per modern carbon is relatively high, therefore not exclusively caused by "instrument background", item 7. Would you disagree? And if Dr. Baumgardner is right that placing the diamonds directly in holes of the instrument's cathode sample holder eliminates all other sources for the results than item 1 and item 7, it seems we could reasonably infer, to a fair degree of certainty, that item 1 also contributes.

    I am only a student of Creation Science, I freely admit that. My professional training and work experience is Investment Analysis. I have an MBA, I'm not a scientist and have never claimed to be. I am a pre-seminarian due to enter priory in July, and my only interest in evolution is because it seems to harm the Faith.

    For me, it was the study of the Liturgy and of Tradition, even more than Sacred Scripture and the holy Fathers, and also of the Lord's Words to His Saints, that convinced me that Special Creation less than 10000 years is the true history of man and creation. Recall also (1) After the original sin, the world changed dramatically, as our Faith teaches. (2) There was also a global flood, which we have independent evidence for, and which many researchers don't take into account.

    What do you think of the Divine Office on Christmas Eve, Stanley? In the Traditional Office, it says the world was created some 7220 years ago. In the modern one, they changed it to "unknown periods of time" or something like that. As Traditional Catholics, we should at least be skeptically cautious of evolutionism and its kindred relationship with atheism. Perhaps not every evolutionist is an atheist, but virtually every atheist is an evolutionist. I believe young earth, though the Church has not yet dogmatically condemnd old earth. I believe further study in the next few decades will show more clearly that young earth creation is right. God bless.

    Ladislaus, would you like to start a thread in the BoD sub-forum to discuss what are the fruits of Baptism of Desire? God bless.
    "We wish also to make amends for the insults to which Your Vicar on earth and Your Priests are everywhere subjected [above all by schismatic sedevacantists - Nishant Xavier], for the profanation, by conscious neglect or Terrible Acts of Sacrilege, of the very Sacrament of Your Divine Love; and lastly for the Public Crimes of Nations who resist the Rights and The Teaching Authority of the Church which You have founded." - Act of Reparation to the Sacred Heart of Lord Jesus.


    Offline King Wenceslas

    • Jr. Member
    • **
    • Posts: 344
    • Reputation: +100/-136
    • Gender: Male
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #106 on: May 07, 2019, 12:48:36 PM »
  • Thanks!1
  • No Thanks!1
  • Anne Catherine Emmerich:


    Quote
    2. Creation of the Earth

    Immediately after the prayer of the faithful choirs and that movement in the Godhead, I saw below me, not far from and to the right of the world of shad­ows, another dark globe arise.

    I fixed my eyes steadily upon it. I beheld it as if in movement, growing larger and larger, as it were, bright spots breaking out upon it and encircling it like luminous bands. Here and there, they stretched out into brighter, broader plains, and at that moment I saw the form of the land setting boundaries to the water. In the bright places I saw a movement as of life, and on the land I beheld vegetation springing forth and myriads of living things arising. Child that I was, I fancied the plants were moving about.

    Up to this moment, there was only a gray light like the sunrise, like early morn breaking over the earth, like nature awakening from sleep.
    And now all other parts of the picture faded. The sky became blue, the sun burst forth, but I saw only one part of the earth lighted up and shining. That spot was charming, glorious, and I thought: There's Paradise!

    While these changes were going on upon the dark globe, I saw, as it were, a streaming forth of light out of that highest of all the spheres, the God-sphere, that sphere in which God dwelt.

    It was as if the sun rose higher in the heavens, as if bright morning were awakening. It was the first morning. No created being had any knowledge of it, and it seemed as if all those created things had been there forever in their unsullied innocence. As the sun rose higher, I saw the plants and trees growing larger and larger. The waters became clearer and holier, colors grew purer and brighter—all was unspeakably charming. Creation was not then as it is now. Plants and flowers and trees had other forms. They are wild and misshapen now compared with what they were, for all things are now thoroughly degenerate.

    Before the sun appeared, earthly things were puny; but in his beams they gradually increased in size, until they attained full growth.
    The trees did not stand close together. Of all plants, at least of the largest, I saw only one of each kind, and they stood apart like seedlings set out in a gar­den bed. Vegetation was luxuriant, perfectly green, of a species pure, sound, and exempt from decay.

    Nothing appeared to receive or to need the atten­tion of an earthly gardener. I thought: How is it that all is so beautiful, since as yet there are no human beings! Ah! Sin has not yet entered. There has been no destruction, no rending asunder. All is sound, all is holy. As yet there has been no healing, no repair­ing. All is pure, nothing has needed purification.

    The plain that I beheld was gently undulating and covered with vegetation. In its center rose a foun­tain, from all sides of which flowed streams, cross­ing one another and mingling their waters. I saw in them first a slight movement as of life, and then I saw living things. After that I saw, here and there among the shrubs and bushes, animals peeping forth, as if just roused from sleep. They were very differ­ent from those of a later day, not at all timorous. Compared with those of our own time, they were almost as far their superior as men are superior to beasts. They were pure and noble, nimble, and joy­ous. Words cannot describe them. I was not familiar with many of them, for I saw very few like those we have now. I saw the elephant, the stag, the camel, and even the unicorn. This last I saw also in the ark. It is remarkably gentle and affectionate, not so tall as a horse, its head more rounded in shape. I saw no asses, no insects, no wretched, loathsome crea­tures. These last I have always looked upon as a punishment of sin. But I saw myriads of birds and heard the sweetest notes as in the early morning. There were no birds of prey that I could see, nor did I hear any animals bellowing. (Aw, so the mosquito, cockroaches, scorpians, etc. were never meant to be. Sin caused them)


    Quote
    3. Adam and Eve

    I saw Adam created, not in Paradise, but in the region in which Jerusalem was subsequently situ­ated. I saw him come forth glittering and white from a mound of yellow earth, as if out of a mold. The sun was shining and I thought (I was only a child when I saw it) that the sunbeams drew Adam out of the hillock. He was, as it were, born of the virgin earth. God blessed the earth, and it became his mother. He did not instantly step forth from the earth. Some time elapsed before his appearance. He lay in the hillock on his left side, his arm thrown over his head, a light vapor covering him as with a veil. I saw a figure in his right side, and I became conscious that it was Eve, and that she would be drawn from him in Paradise by God. God called him. The hillock opened, and Adam stepped gently forth. There were no trees around, only little flowers. I had seen the animals also, coming forth from the earth in pure singleness, the females separate from the males.

    And now I saw Adam borne up on high to a gar­den, to Paradise.

    God led all the animals before him in Paradise, and he named them. They followed him and gam­boled around him, for all things served him before he sinned. All that he named, afterward followed him to earth. Eve had not yet been formed from him.

    I saw Adam in Paradise among the plants and flowers, and not far from the fountain that played in its center. He was awaking, as if from sleep. Although his person was more like to flesh than to spirit, yet he was dazzlingly white. He wondered at nothing, nor was he astonished at his own existence. He went around among the trees and the animals, as if he were used to them all, like a man inspecting his fields.

    Near the tree by the water arose a hill. On it I saw Adam reclining on his left side, his left hand under his cheek. God sent a deep sleep on him and he was rapt in vision. Then from his right side, from the same place in which the side of Jesus was opened by the lance, God drew Eve. I saw her small and del­icate. But she quickly increased in size until full grown. She was exquisitely beautiful. Were it not for the Fall, all would be born in the same way, in tran­quil slumber. (Reproduction without lust and possibly without the physical act but a supernatural act of will between man and woman.)

    Man that sounds really beautiful compared to all of the scientific gobbly gook spit out every where. I am satisfied. The discussion so far leaves me cold. Anne Catherine's description raises my spirit to the heavens. Thank you Anne.

    As for science, if it doesn't help man survive here on earth so that he can reach heaven it is worth nothing in the eyes of God. Praised be Jesus Christ!


    Offline cassini

    • Sr. Member
    • ****
    • Posts: 3288
    • Reputation: +2070/-236
    • Gender: Male
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #107 on: May 07, 2019, 01:20:57 PM »
  • Thanks!1
  • No Thanks!1
  • Anne Catherine Emmerich:

    Man that sounds really beautiful compared to all of the scientific gobbly gook spit out every where. I am satisfied. The discussion so far leaves me cold. Anne Catherine's description raises my spirit to the heavens. Thank you Anne.

    As for science, if it doesn't help man survive here on earth so that he can reach heaven it is worth nothing in the eyes of God. Praised be Jesus Christ!

    My choice of reading for this purpose comes from the private revelations to Sister Mary of Jesus, known as Mary of Agreda (1602-1665). The following insights, dictated to her, she said, by the Virgin Mary herself in 1637, a mere four years after Galileo’s trial wherein the formal heresy of a fixed sun was condemned by popes of the Holy Roman Catholic Church. Her three volume work was entitled; ‘The Mystical City of God’ also known as ‘The Divine History and Life of the Virgin Mother of God.’ These revelations to Sr Mary, whose body now lies incorrupt in the Franciscan Monastery in Spain, have withstood many years of investigation, bans and then approvals, receiving approbations from popes throughout history as a mode of greater understanding of the Catholic faith completely in line with traditional Church teaching. We chose the passages most relevant to our synthesis.


    29. ‘I learnt also to understand the quality of these perfections of the highest Lord: that He is beautiful without a blemish, great without quantity, good without need of qualification, eternal without the duration of time, strong without any weakness, living without touch of decay, true without deceit, present in all places, filling them without occupying them, existing in all things without occupying any space [no Pantheism here]….Although, this divine knowledge is one, most simple and indivisible, nevertheless since the things which I see are many, and since there is a certain order, by which some are first and some come after, it is necessary to divide the knowledge of God’s intelligence and the knowledge of his will into many instants, or into many different acts, according as they correspond to the diverse orders of created things. For as some of the creatures hold their existence because of others, there is a dependence of one upon the other. Accordingly we say that God intended and decreed this before that, the one on account of the other; and that if He had not desired or included in the science of vision the one He would not have desired the other. But by this way of speaking, we must not try to convey the meaning that God placed many acts of intelligence, or of the will; rather we must intend merely to indicate, that the creatures are dependent on each other and that they succeed one another. In order to be able to comprehend the manner of creation more easily, we apply the order of things as we see them objectively, to the acts of the divine intelligence and will in creating them….I understood that this order comprises the following instants. The first is: God recognizing his infinite attributes and perfections together with the propensity and the ineffable inclination to communicate Himself outwardly… The second instant was to confirm and determine the object and intention of this communication of the Divinity ad extra, namely… to set in motion his Omnipotence in order that He might be known, praised and glorified…The third instant consisted in selecting and determining the order and arrangement, or the mode of this communication, so as to realize in an adequate manner the most exalted ends….The fourth instant was to determine the gifts and graces, which were to be conferred upon the humanity of Christ, our Lord, in union with the Divinity….In this fifth decree the creation of the angelic nature which is more excellent and more like unto the spiritual being of the Divinity was determined upon, and at the same time the division or arrangement of the angelic hosts into nine choirs and three hierarchies was provided and decreed.…To this instant also belong the predestination of the good, and the reprobation of the bad angels. God saw in it, by means of his infinite science, all the works of the former and of the latter and the propriety of predestination by his free will and by his merciful liberality, those that would obey and give honour, and of reprobating by his justice those who would rise up against his Majesty in pride and disobedience on account of their disordered self-love. In the same instant also was decreed the creation of the empyrean heaven, for the manifestation of his glory and the reward of the good; also the Earth and the heavenly bodies for the other creatures; also in the centre or depth of the Earth, hell, for the punishment of the bad angels….In the sixth instant was decreed the creation of a people and the congregation of men for Christ, who was already formed in the divine mind and will, and according to his image and likeness man was to be made, in order, that the incarnate Word might find brethren, similar but inferior to Himself and a people of his own nature, of whom He might be the Head. In this instant was determined the order of creation of the whole human race, which was to begin from one man and woman and propagate itself, until the Virgin and her Son should be born in the predestined order….In the same instant, and as it were in the third and last place, God determined to create a locality and an abode, where the incarnate Word and his Mother should converse and dwell. For them primarily did He create the heaven and Earth with its stars and elements and all that is contained in them. Secondarily the intention and decree included the creation of the members, of which Jesus was to be the Head, and of whom He would be the King; in order that with kingly providence, all the necessary and befitting arrangements might be made beforehand….Of the first day Moses says that “In the beginning God created heaven and Earth.” And before creating intellectual and rational creatures, desiring also the order of executing these works to be most perfect, He created heaven for angels and men; and the Earth as a place of pilgrimage for mortals. These places are so adapted to their end and so perfect that as David says of them, the heavens publish the glory of the Lord, the firmament and the Earth announce the glory of the work of his hands (Ps.18:2). The heavens in their beauty manifest His magnificence and glory, because in them is deposited the predestined reward of the just. And the earthly firmament announced that there would be creatures and man to inhabit the Earth and that man should journey upon it to their Creator. Of the Earth Moses says that it was void, which he does not say of the heavens, for God had created the angels at the instant indicated by the word of Moses: “God said: Let there be light, and light was made.” He speaks here not only of material light, but also of the intellectual or angelic lights….God created the Earth co-jointly with the heavens in order to call into existence hell in its centre; for, at the instant of its creation, there were left in the interior of that globe, spacious and wide cavities, suitable for hell, purgatory and limbo. And in hell was created at the same time material fire and other requisites, which now serve for the punishment of the damned. The Lord was presently to divide the light from the darkness and to call the light day and the darkness night. And this did happen not only in regard to the natural night and day, but in regard to the good and bad angels; for to the good He gave the eternal light of his vision and called it day, the eternal day, and to the bad, the night of sin, casting them into the eternal darkness of hell. The angels were created in the empyrean heavens and in the state of grace by which they might be first to merit the reward of glory. For although they were in the midst of glory, the Divinity itself was not to be made manifest to them face to face and unveiled, until they should have merited such a favour by obeying the divine will. The holy angels, as well as the bad ones, remained only a very short time in the state of probation; for their creation and probation with its result were three distinct instants or moments, separated by short intermissions. In the first instant they were all created and endowed with graces and gifts, coming into existence as most beautiful and perfect creatures. Then followed a short pause, during which the will of the Creator was propounded and intimated, and the law and command was given to them, to acknowledge Him as their Maker and supreme Lord, and to fulfil the end for which they have been created. During this pause, instant or interval, Saint Michael and his angels fought that great battle with the dragon and his followers, which is described by the apostle Saint John in the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse. The good angels, persevering in grace, merited eternal happiness. The disobedient angels, rebelling against God, merited the punishment, which they now suffer….During the whole first week of the creation of the world and its contents Lucifer and the demons were occupied in machinations and projects of wickedness against the Word, who was to become incarnate, and against the Woman of whom He was to be born and made man. On the first day, which corresponds to Sunday, were created the angels. Laws and precepts were given to them, for the guidance of their actions. The bad ones disobeyed and transgressed the mandates of the Lord. By divine providence and disposition then succeeded all the other events, which have been recorded above, up to the morning of the second day, corresponding to Monday, on which Lucifer and his hosts were driven and hurdled into hell. The duration of these days corresponds in the small periods, or delays, which intervened between their creation, activity, conquest and fall or glorification…. The most High looked upon His Son, and upon His most holy Mother as models, produced in the culmination of his wisdom and power, in order that They serve as prototypes according to which He was to copy the whole human race. He created also the necessary material beings required for human life, but with such wisdom that some of them act as symbols, to represent, in a certain way these two Beings. On this account He made the luminaries of heaven, the sun and the moon so that in dividing the day and the night, they might symbolise the Sun of Justice, Christ, and His holy mother, who is beautiful as the moon (Cant: 6, 9) for these two divide the day of grace and the night of sin.     

    The sun illuminates the moon; and both, together with the stars of the firmament, illume all other creatures within the confines of the universe…. He created the rest of the beings and added to their perfection, because they were to be submissive to Christ and the most holy Mary and through them to the rest of men. Before the universe proceeded from its nothingness, He set it as a banquet abundant and unfailing, for he was to create man for his delight and to draw him to the enjoyment of his knowledge and love. Like a most courteous and bounteous Lord He did not wish that the invited guests should wait, but that both the creation and the invitation to the banquet and love by one and the same act. Man was not to lose any time in that which concerned him so much; namely, to know and to praise his almighty Maker….
    ‘On the sixth day he formed and created Adam, as it were of the age of thirty-three years. This was the age in which Christ was to suffer death and Adam with regard to his body was so like unto Christ, that scarcely any difference existed. Also according to the soul Adam was similar to Christ. From Adam God formed Eve so similar to the Blessed Virgin that she was like unto her in personal appearance and in figure. God looked upon these two images of the great Originals with the highest pleasure and benevolence, and on account of the Originals He heaped many blessings upon them, as if He wanted to entertain Himself with them and their descendants until the time should arrive for forming Christ and Mary. But the happy state in which God had created the parents of the human race lasted only a very short while. The envy of the serpent was immediately aroused against them, for Satan was patiently awaiting their creation, and no sooner were they created, than his hatred became active against them. However, he was not permitted to witness the formation of Adam and Eve, as he had witnessed the creation of all other things: for the Lord did not choose to manifest to him the creation of man, nor the formation of Eve from a rib; all these things were concealed from him for a space of time until both of them were joined. But when the demon saw the admirable composition of the human nature, perfect beyond that of any creature, the beauty of the souls and also of the bodies of Adam and Eve; when he saw the paternal love with which the Lord regarded them, and how He made them the lords of all creation, and that He gave them hope of eternal life: the wrath of the dragon was lashed to fury, and no tongue can describe the rage with which that beast was filled, nor how great was his envy and his desire to take the life of these two beings. Like an enraged lion he certainly would have done so, if he had not known that a superior force would prevent him. Nevertheless he studied and plotted out some means, which would suffice to deprive them of the grace of the Most High and make them God’s enemies….’ --- Mary of Agreda: The Mystical City of God.


    Offline Incredulous

    • Hero Member
    • *****
    • Posts: 8901
    • Reputation: +8675/-849
    • Gender: Male
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #108 on: May 07, 2019, 02:09:41 PM »
  • Thanks!0
  • No Thanks!1


  • Here's some true American history: Link



    Mary of Agreda in America - Part I

     A ‘Lady in Blue’ Instructs Indians
    in the Southwest


     Margaret C. Galitzin

    The Spanish soldiers and missionaries had been exploring our vast Southwest for almost one century when the Pilgrims, members of a radical Protestant sect, established their first stable colony at Plymouth Rock in 1620. Unlike those Puritans, who aimed only to find a safe place for their sect to prosper, the Spaniards had a dual mission. They definnitely aimed to explore and settle the West, but another mission of equal import to the Crown was to convert the native Indians to the Catholic Faith.

     By 1598 the Franciscan friars who accompanied the Spanish explorers and settlers had established a chain of missions to work with the Pueblo Indians and other tribes in the unsettled Colony of New Mexico. In 1623, Fray Alonso de Benavides arrived from Mexico to the Santa Fe Mission as the first Superior of the Franciscan Missions of New Mexico and the first commissioner of the Inquisition for the Colony. He was known not only for his capacity and energy, but also for his great missionary zeal.

     He arrived with a small reinforcement of other Franciscan friars who would embark on the dangerous missionary labor in the expansive, unsettled territory of New Mexico. As in so many epic works in History, a few men, moved by supernatural zeal for the cause of God, undertook a work much larger than their human forces.

     One of the most fascinating episodes of this time involves the missionary efforts of a Spanish Abbess who worked in New Mexico, Arizona and Texas from 1620 to 1631. She instructed various Indian tribes in the Catholic Faith and told them how to find the Franciscan Mission to ask for priests to come to baptize their people. Her name was Mother Mary of Jesus of Agreda, a Conceptionist nun who, nonetheless, never left her Convent in Spain.

     An Abbess living in Spain bilocates to America


    Without leaving her convent in Spain Mother Mary of Agreda instructed Indians in the U.S.
    Her extraordinary bilocations to the New World were a source of wonder to the Spanish Church and Crown. The authenticity of the miracle of her more than 500 visits to America was carefully examined and docuмented by the proper authorities to ensure that there was no fraud or error. She was also carefully examined twice by the Inquisition in the years 1635 and 1650.

     In his Memorial of 1630, a report on the state of the missions and colony, Fr. Benavides made a precise account of the Indians who had been instructed by the “Lady in Blue.” His Memorial of 1634, written after he had met and visited with Mother Mary of Agreda in 1631, also describes that meeting and his favorable impressions of the Conceptionist Abbess (see Part Two). When he left Agreda, Fr. Benavides asked Mary of Agreda to write a letter addressed to the missionaries of the New World. Her words inspired religious to labor in the American missionary fields for many years to come.

     That Mary of Agreda played an influential role in our country is undeniable. Some years later Fr. Eusebio Kino found old Indians in New Mexico and Arizona who told stories about how a beautiful white woman dressed in blue had spoken to them about the Catholic Faith. Fr. Junipero Serra wrote that it was the “Seraphic Mother Mary of Jesus” who had inspired him to work in the vineyard of the Lord in California. (1)

     Today Mother Mary of Agreda is better known for her momentous work on the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, The Mystical City of God. Perhaps one reason that American Catholics know so little about her well-docuмented bilocations to America is because for centuries Friar Benavides' Memorials were concealed in the Archives of the Propaganda Fide in Rome and unknown to the English speaking world. His expanded 1634 Memorial was only translated into English and made available to the public in 1945. (2) Many of the details from this article were taken from that docuмent, as well as from several scholarly articles on the topic. (3)

     A command for an inquiry

     In 1627, Fr. Sebastian Marcilla, the confessor of Mother Mary of Agreda in Spain, sent a report about her work among the American Indians to the Archbishop of Mexico, Francisco de Manso. He told the Prelate that the young Abbess – age 25 - said that she was visiting Indian villages in New Mexico in some supernatural manner and was teaching the natives the Catholic Faith. Even though she spoke Spanish, the Indians understood her, and she understood them when they replied in their native dialect. The confessor had a favorable impression of the Conceptionist nun and was inclined to believe her words.

     The Archbishop ordered Fr. Benavides, who was being transferred from New Spain to New Mexico, to make a careful inquiry to be carried out “with the exactness, faithfulness and devotion that such a grave matter requires.” It is noteworthy that Fr. Benavides had been invested with two offices in New Mexico – that of Superior and that of Inquisitor – and had all the resources available to make a serious inquiry.

     The Archbishop asked that he should find out whether new tribes - the Tejas [Texans], Chillescas, Jumanos and Caburcos - already had “some knowledge of the Faith” and “in what manner and by what means Our Lord has manifested it.”

     Indians requesting Baptism

     In the summer of 1629, a delegation of 50 Jumanos arrived at Isleta, a Pueblo mission near present day Albuquerque, requesting priests to return with them and baptize their people. The Jumanos were an as yet uncatechized tribe who hunted and traded over a wide area in the Plains east of New Mexico – today the Panhandle or South Plains region of Texas.


    Mary of Agreda teaching the Indians
    For the past six years, smaller delegations of Jumanos had come at about the same time to Isleta to speak to Fr. Juan de Salas, a much respected missionary who had established the church in Isleta in 1613. Each year, the Indians made the same plea and spoke about a woman who had sent them. They were the first to report the visits of the “Lady in Blue.” But the story was disregarded as impossible.

     To travel from Isleta to the eastern Plains was a long and dangerous trek – over 300 miles through the hostile lands of the Apache. At that time, the missionaries lacked both the priests and the necessary soldiers to make the trip and establish a new outpost, so the mission to the Jumanos was delayed.

     This year, when the Jumanos party arrived, Fr. De Salas was at the chapter meeting at the Franciscan headquarters in Santo Domingo. A messenger was sent to him with the news about the delegation, and he informed the new Superior about the strange story of a lady who was supposedly teaching the Catholic faith to the Indians.

     Fr. Benavides, who had received specific instructions from the Franciscan general regarding this very topic, was very interested to know more. He decided to return with Fr. De Salas to Isleta in order to question the Indian party and ask how they had come to have knowledge of the Faith.

     In his Memorial to Pope Urban VIII, he reported the results of his inquiry:

     “We called the Jumanos to the monastery and asked them their reason for coming every year to ask for baptism with such insistence. Seeing a portrait of Mother Luisa [another Spanish Franciscan sister in Spain with a reputation for holiness] in the monastery, they said, ‘A woman in similar garb wanders among us there, always preaching, but her face is not old like this, but young and beautiful.’

     “Asked why they had not told us this before, they answered, ‘Because you did not ask, and we thought she was here also.’”

     The Indians called the woman the “Lady in Blue” because of the blue mantle she wore. She would appear among them, the Jumanos representatives said, and instruct them about the true God and His holy law. The party, which included 12 chiefs, included representatives of other tribes, allies of the Jumanos. In Fr. Benavides’s 1630 Memorial, he notes that they told him “a woman used to preach to each one of them in his own tongue” [emphasis added].

     It was this woman who had insisted they should ask the missionaries to be baptized and told them how to find them. At times, they said, the 'Lady in Blue' was hidden from them, and they did not know where she went or how to find her.

     Missionaries find a field ready for harvest

     Fr. Benavides sent two missionaries, Fr. Juan de Salas and Fr. Diego López, accompanied by three soldiers, on the apostolic mission to the Jumanos. After traveling several hundred miles east through the dangerous Apache territory, the weary expedition was met by a dozen Indians from the Jumanos tribe. They had been sent to greet them and accompany them on the last few days journey, they affirmed, by the 'Lady in Blue' who had alerted them of their proximity.


    The Church of Corpus Christi at the Isleta Mission, the oldest operating church in the U.S.
    As the friars drew near the tribe, they saw in amazement a procession of men, women and children coming to meet them. At its head were Indians carrying two crosses decorated with garlands of flowers. With great respect the Indians kissed the crucifixes the Franciscans wore around their necks.

     “They learned from the Indians that the same nun had instructed them as to how they should come out in procession to receive them, and she had helped them to decorate the crosses," Fr. Benavides wrote in his Memorial. Many of the Indians immediately began to clamor to be baptized.

     The missionaries found that the Indians were already instructed in the Faith and eager to learn more. Their astonishment increased as messengers arrived from neighboring Indian tribes who pleaded for the priests to come to them also. They said that the same lady in blue had catechized them and told them to seek out the missionaries for baptism.

     After a while the missionaries had to return to the San Antonio Mission to report to Fr. Benavides the astounding things they had found before he traveled to New Spain, where he would report to the Archbishop and Viceroy on the missionary work and potential in New Mexico.

     A great miracle

     Before they left, Fr. Juan de Salas told them that, until new missionaries arrived, “they should flock every day, as they were wont, to pray before a Cross which they had set up on a pedestal.”

     But this did not satisfy the Jumanos Chief, who entreated the priests to cure the sick, “for you are priests of God and can do much with that holy cross.”

     The infirm, numbering about 200, were brought together in one place. The priests made the Sign of the Cross over them, read the Gospel according to St. Luke and invoked Our Lady and St. Francis. To reward their faith and prepare the way for great conversions, God worked a miracle. All the sick arose healed. Amid great rejoicing, the missionaries left the village to begin the long and risky return journey to New Mexico.

     Along the way, they were met by “ambassadors” from other tribes, the Quiviras and Aixaos. These Indians also asked for the priests to come to baptize their people and told them the 'Lady in Blue' had told them where to find the missionaries. These ambassadors accompanied the priests to New Mexico.

     Report to the Viceroy and Archbishop

     The missionaries returned shortly before Fr. Benavides departure for Mexico. When he heard the extraordinary account of what the missionaries had found, he included the story of the “Lady in Blue” and her miraculous work to convert the Jumanos in his report.


    Mary of Agreda is better known for her work The Mystical City of God
    His Memorial of 1630 gives a careful description of the missionary work that had been accomplished in the New Mexico Colony. The 111-page docuмent described over 60,000 Christianized natives residing in 90 pueblos, divided into 25 districts.

     The Viceroy and Archbishop Francisco de Manso were very impressed with his account and dispatched him to Madrid "to inform his Majesty, as the head of all, of the notable and unusual things that were happening.”

     There were many pressing matters pertaining to the Mission Colonies that Fr. Benavides needed to address with the authorities in Spain. He also hoped to meet Mother Mary of Agreda in order to question her and learn for certain if she were the 'Lady in Blue' who had brought the Gospel of Christ over the oceans to the Indians of New Mexico.

    Quote
    1. Francisco Palou, Evangelista de la Mar Pacífico, ed. by M. Aguilar, Madrid, 1944. p. 25.
     2. The Benavides Memorial of 1634, trans with notes by F. W. Hodge, G. P. Hammond and Agapito Rey, Albuquerque, 1945.
     3. Donahue, William H., “Mary of Agreda and the Southwest United States,” The Americas, Vol. 9, No. 3 (Jan., 1953), pp. 291-314; Nancy P Hickerson, “The Visits of the “Lady in Blue’: An Episode in the History of the South Plains, 1629,” Journal of Anthropological Research 46.1 (Spring 1990), pp. 67-90
    Continued


     
    Facebook Twitter google_plus LinkedIn Pinterest Email
    Print
    Posted January 20, 2010




    "Some preachers will keep silence about the truth, and others will trample it underfoot and deny it. Sanctity of life will be held in derision even by those who outwardly profess it, for in those days Our Lord Jesus Christ will send them not a true Pastor but a destroyer."  St. Francis of Assisi

    Offline Stanley N

    • Full Member
    • ***
    • Posts: 1208
    • Reputation: +530/-484
    • Gender: Male
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #109 on: May 08, 2019, 09:34:07 PM »
  • Thanks!1
  • No Thanks!0
  • Do you think all the results of the RATE Project (Radioisotopes and the Age of The Earth) are incorrectly interpreted?
    Again, I started replying specifically about AMS and diamonds. But if RATE is not subtracting background (or not subtracting enough), then yes, they are probably treating instrument background readings as intrinsic when they aren't. On the things I know about, I find the ICR science rather bad, and that doesn't help their credibility on other things.

    You quote Dr. Baumgardner as giving 0.00056 pMC for instrument sensitivity and seem to think that's background. AMS is sensitive to well below background values. If that is actually "background" then it is much lower than I would expect, and would likely have earned Dr. Baumgardner some grant money.

    Quote
    They show from their investigations that contamination from CO2 and other carbon-containing species adhering to the diamond surface can now be effectively ruled out as well. This means that contamination from ion source memory is largely removed from the table. [Does this answer your objection, listing ion source memory as a possible source for extrinsic radiocarbon, Stanley?]
    No, not really.


    Offline Nadir

    • Hero Member
    • *****
    • Posts: 11659
    • Reputation: +6988/-498
    • Gender: Female
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #110 on: May 08, 2019, 10:19:02 PM »
  • Thanks!1
  • No Thanks!0

  • Here's some true American history: Link



    Mary of Agreda in America - Part I
    Wow, just WOW, Incred! Very impressive!

    [7] And seeing many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them: Ye brood of vipers, who hath shewed you to flee from the wrath to come? [8] Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of penance. [9] And think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham for our father. For I tell you that God is able of these stones to raise up children to Abraham. 
    Help of Christians, guard our land from assault or inward stain,
    Let it be what God has planned, His new Eden where You reign.

    Offline Stanley N

    • Full Member
    • ***
    • Posts: 1208
    • Reputation: +530/-484
    • Gender: Male
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #111 on: May 19, 2019, 10:07:25 PM »
  • Thanks!1
  • No Thanks!0
  • Thanks for your reply Stanley.  I think that if you compared them you would certainly agree that it does matter.  Big improvement in the laler TAN edition!
    I got Keane’s Creation Rediscovered (1999). Unfortunately, I found it makes substantially the same claims about radiometric dating that I mentioned from his 1991 edition.

    He claims decay rates may have changed. That would have consequences. Experimentally, extreme temperature and pressure have produced at most perhaps a couple percent change in some decay rates. (And these were with a sort of "decay" that isn't used in radiometric dating.) To make 4 billion-year dates become 4 thousand-year dates would require decay rates changed not by a couple percent, but by a factor of a million - or even more, if the decay rates were different only during a brief time. Changes that huge would mean a corresponding huge difference in fundamental material properties, which would produce effects we could still observe. For just one example, if the light from a star is 4 thousand years old, it reveals details of physics from 4 thousand years ago, which would show up in radiation, light spectra, and even orbital motions.

    He also claims that radiometric dating methods assumes starting ratios, with the same quote from Gish as in the 1991 edition. No, in general, they don’t. Isochron methods definitely do not assume a specific starting isotope ratio. Even C-14 dating does not assume that historical atmospheric isotope ratios were the same as today. Its developers were aware above-ground nuclear testing affected atmospheric C-14! C-14 dates were calibrated by reference to various “clocks” such as tree rings and corals.

    He has a similar short bit that the speed of light might have changed. The 1999 edition has added some counterpoint, but the intent of this section appears to be to suggest again that radioactive decay rates may have changed.

    Finally, the 1999 edition still has a section on “polonium halos”, discolorations allegedly caused by polonium decay. However, other explanations have been proposed for these phenomena (even before 1999). There is some expansion including a new paragraph of counterpoint noting that Gentry’s samples came from intrusions that imply age, but this section still looks out-of-date.

    Offline klasG4e

    • Sr. Member
    • ****
    • Posts: 2307
    • Reputation: +1344/-235
    • Gender: Male
    Re: BIG BANG Defended by Fr. Laisney
    « Reply #112 on: May 20, 2019, 08:39:19 AM »
  • Thanks!0
  • No Thanks!0
  • Thanks for your follow-up comment Stan.  Presumably, it shows good faith on your part .