Recovering the Art of Christian Polemics
UNCHARITABLE? DIVISIVE? STRIDENT?
Most well-read Christians know the two most famous stories of the early Church’s approach to dialogue. St. Polycarp tells us that the apostle John once went to the public bath in Ephesus and found inside a Gnostic teacher named Cerinthus. John ran out crying, “Let us fly, lest even the bath-house fall down, because Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, is within.”
Polycarp himself once met the heretic Marcion walking down the street. Marcion hated the creator-God of the Hebrews, and to get rid of Him had tossed out the Old Testament and much of the New and rewrote the bits he kept. Marcion asked Polycarp, “Do you know me?” and Polycarp answered, “I do know you. You are the firstborn of Satan.”
You May Also Enjoy
"For Fear of the Jews" (If Only)... It Ain't Broke, But Let's Fix it Anyhow... An Ex-Lutheran Still in Recovery... A Morally Squalid Man Besotted with Ideology?
"Oh God," Says the Atheist... Ashes to Go... Spring Break's Last Resort... Facebook'em, Danno... An Actual Wake... Epic Unions... Pulling the Wool Over Our Eyes... That's Why It's Called Dope
In most daily newspapers prolifers are called "anti-abortion" and pro-aborts are called "pro-choice." But these are euphemisms.