Can We Know the Immortality of the Human Soul by Natural Reason?

For Lent, Larry and I are reading Bishop Schneider's Credo: Compendium of the Catholic Faith. Since Septuagesima Sunday is the beginning of Lenten preparation, we began last Sunday with the Preface, Introduction, and the beginning of Part I on Faith. Today we were discussing some of the questions and one presented a bit of a challenge. Part 1 #8 asks, "What are the truths of the natural order?" The answer: "Truths that human reason can discover and demonstrate without the help of 'grace, e.g., the existence of God, His providence, and the immortality of the soul."

What Are You Reading for Lent?

I always pick out a book for Lent to be my primary reading material. Since I read St. Francis de Sales Sermons for Advent, I decided to read his Sermons for Lent. He is, of course, addressing his sermons to religious, but they nevertheless are fruitful for the laity.

Since we arrived back from our Florida trip on Ash Wednesday and I had several days of catch up, I didn't read his Ash Wednesday sermon until this morning at adoration which is on fasting and how to do it properly and well. He firsts wants the reader to recognize how beneficial fasting is, so he describes four fruits of fasting well:

• fasting fortifies the spirit, mortifying the flesh and its sensuality
• it raises the spirit to God
• it fights cocupiscence and gives power to conquer and deaden its passions
• it disposes the heart to seek to please only God with great purity of heart