| Jimmy Akin | |
|---|---|
 Akin providing a rebuttal during his 2022 debate with Bart Ehrman. | |
| YouTube information | |
| Channel | |
| Years active | 2009-Present |
| Subscribers | 83k [1] |
| Total views | 8,800,000+ [1] |
Last updated: October 24, 2024 | |
Jimmy Akin (born in 1965) is an American Catholic apologist, author, speaker, and podcast host. He has been working for Catholic Answers [2] since 1993, their longest-serving staff member.
Born in 1965 in Corpus Christi, Texas, Jimmy Akin grew up nominally Protestant in Fayetteville, Arkansas. As a child, he attended services at the local Church of Christ with his parents but became interested in the New Age movement as a teenager. During his time in college, Akin encountered the preaching of the televangelist Eugene "Gene" Scott and became a Christian, finding a denominational home in the conservative Presbyterian Church in America, and wanted to be a pastor or seminary professor. [3] [4]
Soon after becoming a Christian, Akin met his future wife, Renee Humphrey, who had been baptized a Catholic but held many New Age beliefs. Over the course of their relationship, Renee reverted to Catholicism and resumed practicing the faith. They were married in 1988 and Akin soon after converted to Catholicism in 1992. Later that year, Humphrey died of colon cancer. [5] [4] [6]
He is the senior apologist for Catholic Answers. [7] While his academic training is in philosophy, he is also an autodidact, who has managed to acquire an extensive background in apologetics, biblical studies, theology, liturgy, canon law, and related disciplines. [8]
Akin is a weekly guest on the national radio program Catholic Answers Live, a regular contributor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a popular blogger and podcaster. His personal web site is JimmyAkin.com. [9]
He defended charges that Pope John Paul II engaged in self-flagellation, writing, "Self-mortification teaches humility by making us recognize that there are things more important than our own pleasure." [10] Akin said that while Chick tracts were inaccurate, he thought they brought some people to God. [11]
Since 2018, Akin has been the co-host (alongside Dom Bettinelli) of Jimmy Akin's Mysterious World, a podcast examining mysteries in the areas of the paranormal and true crime. [12] [13]
To be born again, or to experience the new birth, is a phrase, particularly in evangelical Christianity, that refers to a "spiritual rebirth", or a regeneration of the human spirit. In contrast to one's physical birth, being "born again" is distinctly and separately caused by the operation of the Holy Spirit, and it occurs when one surrenders their life to Christ. While all Christians are familiar with the concept from the Bible, it is a core doctrine of the denominations of the Anabaptist, Moravian, Methodist, Baptist, Plymouth Brethren and Pentecostal churches along with evangelical Christian denominations. These Churches stress Jesus's words in the Gospels: "Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’". Their doctrines also hold that to be "born again" and thus "saved", one must have a personal and intimate relationship with Jesus Christ.
Christianity began as a movement within Second Temple Judaism, but the two religions gradually diverged over the first few centuries of the Christian era. Today, differences of opinion vary between denominations in both religions, but the most important distinction is Christian acceptance and Jewish non-acceptance of Jesus as the Messiah prophesied in the Hebrew Bible and Jewish tradition. Early Christianity distinguished itself by determining that observance of halakha was not necessary for non-Jewish converts to Christianity. Another major difference is the two religions' conceptions of God. Depending on the denomination followed, the Christian God is either believed to consist of three persons of one essence, with the doctrine of the incarnation of the Son in Jesus being of special importance, or like Judaism, believes in and emphasizes the Oneness of God. Judaism, however, rejects the Christian concept of God in human form. While Christianity recognizes the Hebrew Bible as part of its scriptural canon, Judaism does not recognize the Christian New Testament.
Predestination, in theology, is the doctrine that all events have been willed by God, usually with reference to the eventual fate of the individual soul. Explanations of predestination often seek to address the paradox of free will, whereby God's omniscience seems incompatible with human free will. In this usage, predestination can be regarded as a form of religious determinism; and usually predeterminism, also known as theological determinism.
Lumen gentium, the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, is one of the principal documents of the Second Vatican Council. This dogmatic constitution was promulgated by Pope Paul VI on 21 November 1964, following approval by the assembled bishops by a vote of 2,151 to 5. As is customary with significant Roman Catholic Church documents, it is known by its incipit, "Lumen gentium", Latin for "Light of the Nations".
Sola scriptura is a Christian theological doctrine held by most Protestant Christian denominations, in particular the Lutheran and Reformed traditions, that posits the Bible as the sole infallible source of authority for Christian faith and practice. The Catholic Church considers it heresy and generally the Orthodox churches consider it to be contrary to the phronema of the Church.
Jack Thomas Chick was an American cartoonist and publisher, best known for his fundamentalist Christian "Chick tracts". He expressed his perspective on a variety of issues through sequential-art morality plays.
Apologetics is the religious discipline of defending religious doctrines through systematic argumentation and discourse. Early Christian writers who defended their beliefs against critics and recommended their faith to outsiders were called Christian apologists. In 21st-century usage, apologetics is often identified with debates over religion and theology.
A number of religious groups, particularly Christians and Muslims, are involved in proselytization of Jews: attempts to recruit or "missionize" Jews. In response, some Jewish groups have formed counter-missionary organizations to discourage missionary and messianic groups such as Jews for Jesus from using practices that they say are deceptive.
The Anglican Use, also known as Divine Worship, is a use of the Roman Rite celebrated by the personal ordinariates, originally created for former Anglicans who converted to Catholicism while wishing to maintain "aspects of the Anglican patrimony that are of particular value" and includes former Methodist converts to Catholicism who wish to retain aspects of Anglican and Methodist heritage, liturgy, and tradition. Its most common occurrence is within parishes of the personal ordinariates which were erected in 2009. Upon the promulgation of Divine Worship: The Missal, the term "Anglican Use" was replaced by "Divine Worship" in the liturgical books and complementary norms, though "Anglican Use" is still used to describe these liturgies as they existed from the papacy of John Paul II to present.
Catholic Answers is a Catholic advocacy group based in El Cajon, California. It describes itself as the largest lay-run apostolate of Catholic apologetics and evangelization in the United States. It publishes Catholic Answers Magazine, a bimonthly magazine focusing on Catholic outreach, religious formation and apologetics, as well as the website catholic.com. It also produces Catholic Answers Live, a radio show answering callers' questions on a variety of topics related to the doctrines and practices of the Catholic Church. Catholic Answers Live is syndicated on the EWTN radio network.
Scott Walker Hahn is an American Catholic theologian and Christian apologist. A former Protestant, Hahn was a Presbyterian minister who converted to Catholicism. Hahn's popular works include Rome Sweet Home and The Lamb's Supper: The Mass as Heaven on Earth. His lectures have been featured in multiple audio distributions through Lighthouse Catholic Media. Hahn is known for his research on Early Christianity during the Apostolic Age and various theoretical works concerning the early Church Fathers.
Biblical inspiration is the doctrine in Christian theology that the human writers and canonizers of the Bible were led by God with the result that their writings may be designated in some sense the word of God. This belief is traditionally associated with concepts of the biblical infallibility and the internal consistency of the Bible.
Robert A. Sungenis is an American Catholic apologist and advocate of the pseudoscientific belief that the Earth is the center of the universe. He has made statements about Jews and Judaism which have been criticized as being antisemitic, which he denies. Sungenis is a member of the Kolbe Center for the Study of Creation, a Catholic Young Earth creationist group.
This is a sub-page for the Justification (theology) page.
Chick tracts are short evangelical gospel tracts in a comic book format, originally created by American cartoonist Jack Chick in the 1960s. His company Chick Publications has continued to print Chick's work, as well as tracts in a similar style by other writers. Several tracts have expressed controversial viewpoints including strong anti-Catholic views and criticisms of other faiths.
Bart Denton Ehrman is an agnostic New Testament scholar focusing on textual criticism of the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the origins and development of early Christianity. He has written and edited 30 books, including three college textbooks. He has also authored six New York Times bestsellers. He is the James A. Gray Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
The Catholic Church has been criticised in fiction, such as literature, film and television. Polemics have also been written on the Church and its practices. Some examples are the anti-Catholic stereotypes that filled Gothic fiction of Anglican England, the films of Luis Buñuel who took issue with the Church in Spain, the humor of some US television pundits like Rosie O'Donnell, and the rhetoric of some fundamentalist preachers.
John Bergsma is an American Catholic scholar.
Dave Armstrong is an American Catholic apologist, author, and blogger.
Tim Staples is a Catholic author, apologist, and lecturer. He is the Director of Apologetics and Evangelization at Catholic Answers.