I'm excited to share with you that today my first fiction novel, Chasing the Seeds, has been published! I wrote this book, and the series that it begins, to be entertaining and suitable for adults as well as teens (probably late teens; parents you should read the book before deciding whether your teen child should). It is "clean" meaning: zero profanity, zero blasphemies, zero sexual stuff.  What's the book about? When Edmund, a young software engineer from Austin, discovers a clue in his deceased father's book, the contents launch him on a worldwide scavenger hunt for a mysterious prize ..read more

Dear friend, In my previous letter, I discussed ideas from philosophy about the existence of God. What does it mean to be a Christian? I’m going to “jump ahead” in this letter and address a question that will come up if you continue down the path of becoming a Christian. You may have already reached the point where you think you want to become a Christian, or you may reach it in a month or a year, but when you do, you will want to read and think about this letter. What does it mean for you to be a Christian? Do you need to say a prayer, or one prayer per day, or multiple prayers per day? If yo ..read more

Dear friend, We’re going to get a little philosophical in this letter. When I was an agnostic, I distrusted philosophy and lent it no credence. This was due to simply not having learned what philosophy was but also because in practice I heard about many different, contradictory philosophies, so I concluded that one could make “philosophy” into whatever one wanted. But just because something can be abused and twisted doesn’t mean that it’s bad, just that it is misused. One of the greatest thinkers to ever live was St. Thomas Aquinas. He lived during the 1200s and was a priest of the Dominican O ..read more

Dear friend, In my previous letter, I shared how I personally became a Christian from atheism. As I write these letters to you, I also encourage you to take action to seek for yourself the truth of God’s existence and of Christianity in particular. Here is how I recommend you do that: Say a prayer each day for God to make Himself known to you so that you can believe. Start reading St. Matthew’s Gospel. Here’s a bit more on the prayer part of that recommendation. God is omniscient, so He knows everything. He knows that you currently don’t believe in Him (or maybe are unsure if you do), and He ..read more

Bitcoin and the Catholic Church: could two things be any more different and at odds with one another? In fact, after reading this article, I hope to convince you that Bitcoin is not only compatible with the Catholic Church, but also that Bitcoiners should become Catholics themselves. Why Bitcoin and the Catholic Church Seem to Be at Odds Centralization vs. Decentralization Bitcoin runs as a peer-to-peer network of computers (let's call them nodes, though special nodes exist, for example, mining nodes). This network is decentralized, meaning that these nodes are being run all over the world by ..read more

I first heard about Bitcoin when the Mt. Gox implosion happened around early 2014. I saw the Bitcoin price chart and gasped when it went up parabolically to almost $1,200, then collapsed down into the $200s. At the time, I didn't know anything about sound money, fiat currency, or the Federal Reserve, so the idea of Bitcoin seemed crazy to me, even though I was a software developer who could understand the technology behind it. From No-coiner to Bitcoiner Not long after, a friend of mine kept encouraging me to get into cryptocurrency, specifically Ethereum, but intuition told me that Bitcoin wa ..read more

Introduction This is the first in a series of real letters I am writing to my agnostic friend. It is intended to provoke thought and discussion between him and I, and hopefully ultimately result in his conversion to Christianity and the Catholic Faith. I printed this first letter and mailed it to him via snail mail. It is not intended to be a proof-text against a hostile atheist (of which I was one), but rather someone who doesn't believe in God but is open to discussing it and considering it for themselves. Hello my old friend, I write to you in what I hope will become a set of letters to sha ..read more

Catholic Answers recently published a new book by well-known apologist Joe Heschmeyer, titled The Eucharist Really Is Jesus: How Christ's Body and Blood Are the Key to Everything We Believe. When I first saw the title of the book, I thought, "I already believe this, so what can this book really add to that?" Turns out, it added a lot! Before I dive into it, be sure to check out Joe's blog Shameless Popery, both in its original site: https://shamelesspopery.com/ and also the newer articles he is writing for Catholic Answers Magazine: https://www.catholic.com/profile/joe-heschmeyer Do ..read more

(Note: I update this post periodically with changes to the investments and the rationale for adding or removing any specific stocks.) Goal: Invest in companies that do not violate Catholic moral teaching We can take a few different approaches: 1. Invest in a Catholic Mutual Fund We could invest only in mutual funds whose ostensible goals are to invest from a moral Catholic perspective (e.g. Ave Maria funds, Aquinas funds). This route outsources our investment decisions to others and comes with the risk that these people or organizations will make poor decisions, either from a Catholic moral po ..read more

I remember when I became Catholic. I thought: “How wonderful this is. I now have access to the full truth and all the graces that God wants to give to me, through the sacraments, sacramentals, and devotions. What more can I ever need?” In the first Lionheart Catholic book, I share my experiences with the tremendous graces that you can avail yourself of as a Catholic. By applying the "recipe of the saints" from this first book, you can prepare yourself spiritually for these dark times, laying a supernatural foundation that comes only from God’s grace. That supernatural foundation of sancti ..read more