Rhology is the not-particularly-anonymous proprietor of the blog Rhoblogy, and is feeling a little strange as he composes this autobiographical post in 3rd-person.
Raised in a mainline, fairly liberal Methodist church and family in the Midwestern USA, which "faith" did little to prepare him for modernist and skeptical questionings related to science and Darwinian evolution, Rhology became an atheist at the age of 13. Jesus used a deep depression and a sharp sense of meaninglessness à la Ecclesiastes to show him that, no matter what he achieved, he'd lose it all to death at the end. Jesus then intervened and saved him just before his 16th birthday. For years charismatic, he eventually became "de-charismaticised" and a just-plain-Baptist. Only recently did the Lord use John 6:45 to turn Rho into an evil baby-eating Calvinist (a redundant term, to be sure).
During his university studies, Rhology studied in France for a year, and to prepare himself did some initial reading about Romanism, thinking that he would meet many challenges from that worldview while there. Oops - little did he realise that most everyone in France is a functional atheist. First lesson learned about Romanism in the real world.
Not long after, a worldview challenge came into view through longtime close friend David Bryan, who completed his journey from Bapticostal to Eastern Orthodoxy and in the course of numerous conversations, several of them the stereotypical "long talk late into the night", defeated many of Rho's arguments and forced him to do some serious rethinking. In the course of time, Rho consumed a great deal of, for example, James White's debates against Romanist opponents and also read through the Holy Scripture: The Ground and Pillar of Our Faith series and digested what could be applied to Eastern Orthodoxy, figuring that the truth would prevail. Long email discussions with David B later, Rho realised that the grass was not in reality greener on the Sola Ecclesia side of the hill, and he remained a Sola Scripturist. Honestly, in his internal dissension during this time, as he felt Sola Scriptura wobbling, he knew that if SS were to fall completely, conversion to EOC would be the logical conclusion, and was mentally prepared to go there if that were where the truth lay. Let's just say life would have been quite a bit different!
Not long after, Rhology's first forays into Internet apologetics and polemics on the topic of Romanism and such took place at Steve Ray's Catholic Convert forums. Then known as "Rho", he spent several months as a very active member, learning which arguments were good and sharpening them, and discarding others. (Unfortunately, very near the end of his stay there and a little before the death of John Paul II, their forums were hacked and all public archives were either lost or privatised, so these records are not accessible.) "Rho" also spent significant time on the orthodoxchristianity.net message boards, working on his understanding of EOC doctrine and finding more chinks in EO argumentation.
Rhology and his wife became tentmaker missionaries/ESL teachers in Japan for a year, starting in the summer of 2005, and Rhoblogy was begun as an online journal of that adventure. Slowly, the blog began to become less of a journal and more of what it is today. Since Jesus saved Rhology out of atheism when he was 16 and he (as should be obvious) tends toward the cynical and sarcastic, he gravitates toward rationalistic, concrete, and big-picture topics, which is why a great deal of the material at Rhoblogy deals with atheism, skepticism, Darwinian evolution, and liberalism. When you think about it, it's pretty cool how the Lord has brought such a diverse group together on the Beggars All team.
Rho's personal top 10 in dealing with Romanism and Eastern Orthodoxy:
10) On how the challenge "Where's your infallible Canon of Scripture?"is ludicrous since Romanists don't even have a fallible canon of their own infallible teachings, let alone an infallible one
9) Series on the glorious biblical teaching of Jesus' Preservation of the Saints
8) Compendium of resources on Eastern Orthodoxy
7) Irony in Patristics, exploring the question-begging nature of labeling some ancient writers "Church Fathers" and others "not-Church-Fathers"
6) Pro-Catholic and Enjoying It!
5) Because Rho loves the Gospel - Tim Staples keeps the commandments! and Taking sin seriously, or, The Gospel
4) Jesus' prayer for unity in John 17 (dispelling the "33,000 denominations" 'argument')
3) The special pleading of Sola Ecclesia-ists' claims to "unity" (burying the "33,000 denominations" 'argument')
2) Matrix of argumentation regarding how the Roman dogma of the Eucharist is monophysite
1) Formal debate with EO blogger DavidW on Sola Scriptura
Rho's personal top 10 in dealing with other topics on Rhoblogy and as a guest-blogger elsewhere:
10) The wire coat hanger and Darwin
9) Salvaging the Darwinian wreckage
8) A question for Dan Barker
7) Here lies an unwanted late-term fœtus, rest in peace (in which Rhology 'eulogises' George Tiller, the baby killer)
6) Series discussing Hymenæanism (aka Hyper-Preterism)
5) A moral quandary for atheistic morality
4) Empathy as Basis for Morality
3) Empiricism refuted
2) Guest post on Atheism Is Dead - "Evidence" for evolution is actually evidence for Intelligent Design
1) Guest post on Triablogue - On the Flying Spaghetti Monster
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