A lot of people have misconceptions about the Catholic Church. Catholic Answers is a media ministry that answers questions about what the Church really teaches. We are the largest organization of our kind. Learn more about Catholic Answers, our beginnings 40 years ago, and where we’re headed.
Our Mission
Catholic Answers is a media ministry that serves Christ by explaining and defending the Catholic faith. We help Catholics grow in their faith, we bring former Catholics home, and we lead non-Catholics into the fullness of the truth.
Our Vision
Our goal is to be the most trusted and accessible source for sharing, explaining, and defending the Catholic faith through as many media as possible: from personal contact to the most innovative means of mass communication.
A Resource You Can Trust
Catholic Answers works each day to ensure our content is faithful to the Magisterium. Our staff apologists have decades of practice in apologetics, and several hold advanced degrees in theology and philosophy. We maintain a broad list of associates (clergy and laymen) who are experts in the fields of liturgy, history, bioethics, theology, philosophy, canon law, and more. We have close friendships with members of the Church hierarchy across the United States and in Rome. An independent registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, Catholic Answers is listed in the Official Catholic Directory and is recognized as an apostolate in good standing by the Diocese of San Diego, where our main office is located.
Our Story
Catholic Answers started in 1979 when our founder, San Diego attorney Karl Keating, came out of Mass one day and found a flyer on his windshield that attacked the Eucharist. A local Fundamentalist church had put it on every car in the parking lot, and predictably, the flyer was full of misinformation. Karl was so annoyed that he drove home with a humble goal: to draft a letter that would introduce basic Catholic beliefs and refute anti-Catholic charges. He wrote the rebuttal, signed it “Catholic Answers,” opened a post office box in that name, and proceeded to place his response on the windshields of cars in the same Fundamentalist church’s parking lot.
That modest effort was Catholic Answers’ first publication (tract). Surprisingly, Keating soon found the post office box bulging with letters—some unquotable, others cheering him on and asking for more tracts. He obliged, writing 24 additional tracts that comprised Catholic Answers’ entire line of publications for several years.
Keating also wrote articles for the Catholic press about the clash between Fundamentalists and Catholics, drawing responses that convinced him there was a real need for information on Catholic apologetics—the study of how to explain and defend the faith. In 1986, he launched a monthly newsletter to help people keep abreast of what Catholic Answers was doing and learn more about the exciting field of apologetics.
In 1988, growing demand and his own burgeoning desire to commit himself to serving the faith led Keating to close his law practice and turn Catholic Answers into a full-time apostolate with its first office and staff members. That same year, Keating published the book, Catholicism and Fundamentalism, a compilation of apologetics newspaper articles that he had written during a 30-week stretch which became one of the best-selling Catholic apologetics books of all time.
The apostolate grew quickly, and in 1990, its original newsletter was replaced with This Rock, a 10-issue-a-year magazine that became the nation’s premier journal of Catholic apologetics and evangelization. More than 30 years later, that publication—still in printed form and published six times per year—is known as Catholic Answers Magazine and is available to anyone who requests it.
Our Core Values
These principles inform all that we do. They are the foundation of our organization.