Have you hugged your Protestant friend today?

My friend Ben (of Mustard Revolution) and I have often had some great discussions about the differences in our beliefs. Ben is a protestant minister and I ... well, if you read this, you know who I am. Anyway, it's always been very beneficial (if sometimes frustrating) for us to go over what we really believe and how our beliefs are different or only apparently different.

Ben thinks I am wrong (along with the whole Catholic Church) about some things and I think that he is wrong (along with protestantism) about some things. However, we don't let that get in the way of being brothers in Christ and try to honestly discuss all of this.

So, when Ben posted this invitation to a blog dialogue, I was all for it:

So I am going to start something new to the mustard sphere today. I have a really good friend named Mike who has a blog as well. Mike is in his final year studying to be a Catholic Priest. Prior to meeting him and his roommate I had a conviction that Catholics were heretical heathens. I hadn't met anyone in my short time as a Christian who was anything more than Catholic by name association only. However, Mike and Josh showed me that there is indeed a love for Christ in the Catholic Church and their devotion to Jesus has convinced me that they are not heretical heathens...at least not the heathen part. (I kid)

So Mike or I will from time to time bring up issues or discrepancies in beliefs between Protestants and Catholics and suggest why I am troubled by a Catholic belief and then Mike will post his reponse on his blog as a sort of bridging dialogue (or vise versa). We are not being malicious or intolerant. We are trying to create discussion and hopefully by the end either we are able to agree to disagree and have a better appreciation for why each side believes what they believe...or Mike and all his Catholic blog followers will be persuaded to Protestantism. (I kid)

The issue that Ben brings up in his post is the perpetual virginity of Mary. I'm going to respond to it here and hopefully we can keep up a discussion on other things as well.

Feel free to chime in but please remember to be charitable. Ben and I are able to kid each other about our disagreements because we're good friends, but on the Internet, it's easy to be pretty harsh.

Stay tuned for my response.