Just a bit of an introduction.
I was born anglican, and when young heard the Story of St Bernadette which I believed ever since, but i was assured it cannot have been true! And sadly most of the books I found were rabidly anti catholic. All the usual arguments.
Then by a long twisting journey , via school and later evangelical groups that didnt make sense to me, and sometimes long periods of no active involvement ,other than hunger , I began to read the writings of saints, and became increasingly convinced that Catholicism was the only true church.
But it also took the journeys of some authors, such as Scott Hahn, Tom Howard, journey home network, mother angelica and others to finally break down my resistance! And I came in by RCIA a decade ago.
I am in a process of continuous conversion, and still love reading early fathers, saints, and about others journeys into RCC , i discover more every day. Take Jesus descent after death, and teaching those he found, is an interesting defence of purgatory! I had never noticed till last week!
I do have a comment that cradle catholics should try to learn not just what they believe , but also why they believe in some doctrines, because outsiders (like me) ask, and not many can manage apologetic defences even to the "usual myths", and it would help if they could point outsiders to a few useful resources (take Surprised by truth series)
As a post grad scientist I have never found that conflicted with faith, and I think not there is not enough education about what science can tell us and what it cannot. Dawkinsians and sadly the atheist press tell us we believe in absurdities.
If only the public knew some of the absurdities that scientists believe in! The ultimate black crow paradox embodied in the copenhagen interpretation in quantum physics. That scientific method demands and so begins with the premise of a causal objective universe, yet concludes in quantum paradoxes that the universe is neither causal nor objective! So In simple english - starting with the assertion "all crows are black" it proves "all crows are white" A leading british quantum phyicists call this a disgrace and embarassment to science.
The reality easily provable by logic is that science is just an observation model. It has nothing to say on what anything really "is" or "why" only how it normally behaves, and because of the predictability of behaviour, we can get it to do a lot of useful things. But that is all it is, and that is why the paradoxes of the model do not represent the universe.
Hawking no longer believes in science as a fundamental underpinning- his concept of model dependent reality proves it. He just doesnt want to accept the philosophical earth shaker in what he concluded!
I am certainly not liberal in many ways. I love the constancy of the deposit of faith, and the constancy of moral teaching. The mark of the true church. I love the fullness of catholicism, hours spent in adoration,
But now here I do become liberal!
I know I am not obliged to believe in many miracles and apparitions. They are not the basis of my faith, but I certainly do believe in them! I love for example the story of Our lady of Kibeho, predicting the Rwanda genocide, "left to tell" and "led by faith" written by Immaculee
I have collected an extensive library of documents on many of the prodigies.
Far too many to list.
The favourites, fatima, lourdes , akita , betania for sure
And I have a library on the shroud!
But also.
Scientific evidence from such as Cochabamba.
Medically observed and prophesied Stigmata (and writings) of Katya RIvas. It isnt just that she had stigmata appear. How did they heal in 24 hours!
The medical reports of inedia of Alexandrina
The appartions of Zeitoun, Al Warraq and associated miracles.
etc
I am busily collecting the forensic evidence on not just such as Lanciano but also the recent eucharistic miracles.
Tixtla
Buenos Aires
Sokolka
Most recently Legnica
All the forensic reports are the same.
Human Blood - A/B
Human flesh..heart myocardium, evidence of beating because of...
White cells which also proof life. They should have dissolved after hours. Still there after years in some cases.
Catholicism has evidence.
It is not the basis of our faith.
But it helps arguing with Dawkinsians!
There is literally not a shred of evidence for abiogenesis - life as a cell from random accident chemistry.
Under the rules of science - abiogenesis does not qualify even as a hypothesis (there is no evidence for it, and the hypothesis is not testable)
And evolution does not qualify as a theory even! Not that dawkins would tell you that.
"Evolution" is a rag bag of unproven and part proven hypotheses (eg common descent)
some genetic theories, now proven (like mitosis etc) . And a lot of gaping holes. Like.. evidence of a new species appearing with different number of chromosomes. None.
Dawkins idea of "climbing mount improbable" is totally belied by real modelling. It isnt the "cliff face" that stops you climbing - , consider climing from here to mount everest, it is that for as long as you only move to higher ground, you will get stranded on the nearest litte hill just out of town. Unless you take jumps, and jumps have casualties.
His basic premise is that because you can walk across the surface of the earth and get a bit closer to the moon, given long enough you can walk to the moon! I only hope he tries it!
Most of what Dawkins says is a mixture of straw men, non sequiturs , his own bad understanding, and total B/S but he is stealing our kids by abusing science. The pied piper of illogic.