Called to Communion with Doctor David Anders 02/19/21

team for more news from a catholic perspective visit ewtnnews.com call to communion with dr david anders starts now what's stopping you from becoming a catholic why can't women become priests 1-833-288 ewtn i don't understand why i have to earn salvation to a 1-833-288-3986 what's stopping you this is call to communion with dr david anders on the ewtn global catholic radio network hey everybody we made it to friday how about that welcome again to call to communion here on ewtn it's the program for our non-catholic brothers and sisters if that is you and you've got a question about the catholic faith we'd love to hear from you today and my personal recommendation is call early because uh on fridays the phones tend to fill up rather quickly and it would be a shame if you were to call late in the show and we couldn't get to you you'd have to hold on to that question all weekend long so here's our phone number 833 288 ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six are you listening outside of north america perhaps uh oh golly australia just as a guest or uh the uk somewhere love to hear from you as well here's a special phone number just for you dial the us country code in normally most cases that's going to be the number one and then 205 271-2985 you can also text the letters ewtn to 5500 wait for our response and then text us your first name and your brief question message and data rates may apply and you can always send us an email ctc at ewtn.com is the address charles berry is our producer ryan penny is handling the phones and jeff person is on social media jeff will pass on any question that you might want to pose via youtube or facebook live just put that question of yours in the comments section jeff will shoot that to us here in studio one i'm tom price along with dr david anderson tom how are you today very well how are you my friend oh you know i'm doing decent thanks how's that weekend of yours uh shaping up you got something in mind hmm read write play exercise sleep eat go to mouse all good stations of the cross you could uh true could prevail you know you could uh what what is the word i'm thinking you you could uh avail yourself i was thinking prevail but here it is available and you know my my wife has a a great version of the stations that hang in the main hall of my house yeah they're quite beautiful all right we're going to lead off today with a question from colleen via youtube what would disqualify somebody from being a quote sister or brother in christ i have a fallen away catholic friend who claims we are not sisters in christ so is there any time a christian would not be a brother or sister in christ i understand that any baptized christian is a brother and sister in christ no matter the denomination any thoughts there david yeah thanks so you know i mean this is a this is just a colloquial expression that we use you know it is kind of a term of endearment and i don't know that i would want to attach too much significance to the idea of like formal rules of validity for identification is okay you know fraternity in christ but if you really want me to get like hard theological about it what i would say is that we're we're members of christ's body through baptism and that actually creates an indelible mark on the soul and so a person who's baptized is you can't get unbaptized and they're they're a member of christ's body and that's true even if they are immortal sin right i mean you can still go to hell right it doesn't it doesn't keep you from going to hell but it you cannot become detached from that indelible mark of baptism and it's in virtue of that that we can recognize our commonality with all baptized people as a as members of christ's body and so you know i i you know i would be very comfortable referring to any baptized person as a brother in the lord or a sister lord unless they had lost the faith and and and didn't want to be referred to that way you know man i know baptized people who no longer profess the christian faith and they would say i'm not a christian and please don't refer to me as one and that would be offensive to me i would respect that if they didn't want me to call them that i wouldn't call them that but uh but unless they tell me otherwise i'd be very comfortable using that language about anybody very good colleen thanks so much for watching us on youtube interesting question here from dean uh this is uh this might be a little uh on the geeky side david you might enjoy this that dean wants to know what are your thoughts on jungian psychology in relation to catholic teaching yeah thanks so uh i i think that it's it's interesting and and you know came up with an idea obviously his idea was the archetype and he thought that religious and cultural forms were uh expressive of of perennial modes of consciousness that because of our biology the way our brains are put together the way we think that people across cultures are are likely to uh to express some of their perennial philosophical and religious needs in similar ways and that the psychologist could could do a kind of comparative analysis of culture and try to identify those types and uh and see them as representative of sort of universal psychological traits or characteristics and uh you know on the face of it i find that theory to be plausible and and and in fact i see while the fathers of the church were not union psychologists they did a lot of comparative religion the fathers did and comparative philosophy and they were very big on looking for these points of commonality of christ across cultures and then seeing jesus as the fulfillment of these they didn't use the word archetypes that's the union word but basically seeing christ as the fulfillment of these sort of universal archetypes i mean uh you know i remember one sort of trivial example that comes to mind clement of alexandria pointed to the myth of the phoenix you know the bird that immolates itself and rises again from the ashes as a kind of uh you know kind of um archetype of the christian idea of resurrection and that that you find that sort of thing that sort of engagement with pagan literature in the in the works of the fathers now when when they got to the philosophers especially plato and platinus oh man then they just really went to town and they i mean so some of them just got intoxicated by it and justin martyr even augustine would speak of plato as being uh like a a christian before christ you know they use that kind of language clement thought that it was so similar to christian revelation he imagined that plato must have spent time running around um you know with hebrew people i mean he does that's the fault it's not what happened you know but they they they love to find those sorts of things so you know as long as your place you're starting from is the christian faith biblical revelation uh you know i'm a fan of reading all kinds of literature whether it's religious literature psychological literature comparative myth comparative ritual and and getting insights about the human condition as long as it's the catholic faith that norms those insights dean thanks so much for your question via youtube in a moment we're going to get to ron and rapid city look at this so we have one line open what did i tell you calls fill up quickly on fridays 833 288 ewtn if you want to snag that last line 833 288 3986 here on call to communion stay with us [Music] prayer doesn't have to be anything rigid or formal of course we have countless ones we can turn to when words don't come to mind so wrote prayers are fantastic but i also like to pray by listening to praise music reading the psalms and just listening to god's voice keep in mind that prayer is a two-way endeavor sometimes we think it's just us talking and god listening if that's what your prayer life has mainly consisted of try getting used to listening to god speak to you you'll hear beautiful and amazing things lent a season of grace with father cedric pesagna the same holy spirit that drove jesus into the desert has to drive us to lead us to control us to push us motivate us and empower us to change and to be illumined and i pray that this lent the spirit will touch you in powerful ways lent a season of grace with father cedric passana sunday 8 p.m eastern on ewtn radio the wisdom of mother angelica don't you feel some time like there's so many people in the world how does he hear your prayer never think of that huh everybody thinks i'm only a little grain of sand on the seashore oh but that's not true see god is god and you and i have to let god be god i don't know how he does it he's god for more information on mother angelica visit religious catalogue at ewtnrc.com [Music] now what is an what is an ewtn media missionary we hear about this all the time well let me tell you ewtn media missionaries are wonderful people who prayerfully take ewtn to parishes and the community through the print and electronic media that we provide if you want to know more visit ewtnmissionaries.com today ewtnmissionaries.com join us in sharing the eternal word with the world it's the friday edition of call to communion here on ewtn we'll get to the phones in just a moment first a real quick question from vicki watching us on facebook vicki says dr anders you recommended a book yesterday the confessions of saint augustine can you tell me which translation might be easier to understand yeah so there are many translations of augustine out there um you know penguin the penguin classics edition has has a few has a couple different ones and i usually think that they're pretty good uh chadwick's oxford classics edition is also not bad former professor of mine at the university of iowa thomas williams who's a medievalist specialist in medieval philosophy and i studied with guy he's just a fantastic translator um also has a recent edition out of augustine's confessions pretty good by thomas williams yeah um i hate to say it uh i really do hate to say it but i don't love frank sheeds oh and i should right because he's a company man right yeah yeah that's not my favorite so i i prefer these sort of university press type titles penguin is the one that i went with and uh i found it quite accessible sure all right and if you're ready now let's go to the phones at 833 288 ewtn we begin with ron in rapid city listening on alexa hey ron happy friday what's on your mind today sir well thank you for all you do and uh i do have a question and it has to do with what god's will is for widows and widowers in matthew 13 8 uh uh they described those as fruit from the seeds that were planted in that ground that was fertile and he refers to saint thomas uh acquaintance refers to those three types of fruit as continents namely those of virgins those of widowed people and those that marry people and i just wanted your opinion on what as a widow or what what what's god's will for me now yeah thanks well chastity of course chastity of course and that's god's will for all of us because chastity is the good of the human person that's that according to our state of life being virtuous and our sexual faculties of course is his virtue is what is good for us um but in so as far as whether or not you should bury again perhaps i think the the rule of saint augustine is very helpful here love and do what you will right love and do what you will and i mean this is a vocational question about how you're going to serve god in your present circumstances and that's of course highly particular to your circumstances and different from mine i mean a lot of conditions to weigh one would be you know you have children you have grandchildren you have other family obligations or family relationships maybe help mitigate to certain extent the loss of your spouse um you know what good would you seek you know to marry again you know obviously companionship and uh you know somebody growled with and not be lonely i mean these are great goods to be realized sure uh and uh uh you know but other people might find i had i got enough to do i got enough on my plate you know i did that once it was it was a blast but it you know it's kind of difficult at this state of life that that's also okay and you know i'd pray about it and uh uh but you know don't be guided by by guilt um you know there's uh there's there's no definitive answer it's it's where you are in your subjective situation with respect to your relationships as long as you live a chaste life seek god's will and virtuous and and seek to do good to others uh for god's sake you're okay ron thanks so much for checking in with us in rapid city that opens up a line for you right now at eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six uh one more recommendation here call early because the phones really do fill up and they are pretty full right now but there is one line open for you right now here is jennifer now jennifer is in fremont michigan listing on holy family radio jennifer what's on your mind today good afternoon dr anders thanks for taking my call i have a quick question i wanted some clarification over something i thought i heard you say at the tail end of your show yesterday you were talking about marriage and i thought i heard you say that in order to have a catholic marriage valid in the church a valid catholic marriage that the couple had to intend to have children want to have children and so i thought well what about an older couple for instance my my boyfriend and i were older he's 53 i'm 43 we're discerning marriage we are both of course open to god's will open to life but it's not something that we would be actively pursuing and it's something that we would be actively preventing through natural means should god call us further into that vocation um and so i wondered if you could just clarify if that if i heard you correctly yes yes yes thank you i really appreciate the question so so the the the church is more nuanced than i was all right and the code of canon law and i'm reading from the code right now it talks about what what is matrimonial consent what am i agreeing to right when i enter into matrimony what am i agreeing to for matrimonial consent to exist the contracting parties must be at least not ignorant that marriage is a permanent partnership between a man and a woman ordered to the procreation of offspring by means of some sexual cooperation okay now ordered two is the language of canon law now obviously if if uh that that's all you have to intend i'm entering into the kind of relationship that uh would naturally be fulfilled in the procreation of children now if it's not in fact uh fecund right if children are not produced and look age is one of the principal reasons why that wouldn't happen that itself does not nullify the marriage doesn't make it an illegitimate marriage because i'm still entering into the kind of relationship that would be if circumstances permit fulfilled in the bearing and raising of children it is a bit nuanced isn't it yeah so they're better than i am right that's why they're the code of canon law and i'm not right um and all i meant to convey in that earlier call was that you know a couple let's say not somebody who's elder or older and maybe not children are not on the horizon um a younger couple maybe in their 20s or 30s that say well we'd like to get married but we're not going to have any kids like we've just made up our mind no kids no kids for us you know we're not going there and i've i've known people in that situation who said oh we swore off children never gonna do it right the church would say well that's not a valid marriage because that's not what marriage is marriage is a relationship that is naturally fulfilled in the bearing of children i'm at least at least open to that and i'm not gonna you know take steps artificially to try to prevent that right um but but obviously we don't have any control over you know immediate control over you know whether or not that's gonna be successful and even even young couples sometimes enter into marriage they don't know if they're going to have kids and some people is great suffering end up not having children because the bodies don't cooperate and sometimes older couples go in and they're like it'll never happen and then you know here comes the the the the fifth sibling who's like 15 years behind the last one that happens too sure it does is that helpful for you jennifer yes thank you so much for the clarification that's what i thought um yeah i was surprised to hear that i thought wait did i hear that correctly well thank you you've done me a great favor thanks for making me clarify there you go jennifer appreciate your call it's called a communion here on ewtn our phone number 833288 ewtn here is barbara now in philadelphia listening on siriusxm channel 130. hey barbara what's on your mind today hi dr anders a quick question about prayer and how to understand the terms of our relationship with god when we pray so i've been feeling a little lost in a dark space and people say pray pray pray talk to god about this and and i very much want to do that and i want a relationship with god but i feel like i talk to god and i don't see anybody listening to me and i don't like there's no eye contact there's no touch there's no voice coming back to me and sometimes while the voice in the back of my head going there's nobody here i'm taking my most important thoughts and wishes to do a a god that i can't see here feel touched doesn't respond to me so i'm just gonna get your feedback when those thoughts pop into my head there's nobody here okay yes yes so first of all barbara you're in great company you're just a fantastic company because that's the experience of all the saints and if you read the great treatises on prayer in the catholic tradition they they they face this reality head-on and one of the things the doctors of the church i'm thinking particularly if somebody like theresa of avila if you read her readings read her writings on prayer a lot of it is her kind of bringing a real critical attention to all of the false answers that people give to that dilemma now here's here's one that's very common today right and i would really guard people against there are some non-catholic churches and maybe a few catholics who sneak in the door too that do this that that that imagine that you know prayer is like a ham radio and uh and it's just a matter of getting the tuning right and then if you get the tuning right you can learn how to hear god and they'll talk about well i heard god okay which is if you think about it's really an amazing claim yeah it's an astonishing claim when people say that and uh and well how do you know well you know when i whenever god talks to me well you know i get this funny feeling or it's not like my other thoughts or you know it seems to be confirmed by people around me or they have they come up with all these sort of arbitrary rules that they use to say well that's how i know god is talking to me but if you if you kind of poke and prod at those rules you realize that well they don't really they only deliver what they promised so this is a this is a sort of sophisticated way of trying to convince myself that i'm having a supernatural experience or some sort of miraculous experience by setting up these sort of tokens or signs but they're not tokens or signs that scripture gives us or that god himself has revealed this is just an attempt to to people to anthrop anthropomorphize god so that they can imagine him more like a like an imaginary friend who has a conversation with me over a coke you know rather than the the transcendent unchanging god of the universe and when you read catholic uh tradition on prayer they warn about this kind of thing and you know teresa of avila spends a lot of time dealing with these sort of emotional responses in prayer and saying well that's really not god who's talking to you you know and and god prayer in the the catholic sense a lot of times is the process of learning to identify all the things that are not god right and then you end up ultimately in what can feel like a very dark place and and in fact when you've when you sort of shed yourself of every kind of artifice and artificiality and false conception or false idea about god you can you can enter into what john of the cross calls the dark knight of the soul now why people think dark knight of the soul means depression it does not mean depression it means that that place in the spiritual life where you have literally detached from everything even your own conceptions about god and to where you you've you list this utter deprivation of sense in spirit and john of the cross says that's the best place to be that is the best place to because that's when god really can kind of break down and rebuild your personality in his own image wow so the the sense of like alienation and aloneness all of those things that you're taking as signs that i'm doing something wrong well catholic tradition says well actually that's the sign that you're doing something right and it's precisely in that sense of loneliness and alienation and and and and dryness that you that now god can really begin to work on us and produce in us the conformity to his will that is the ultimate christian prayers the prayer of christ not my will but thine be done or the prayer of our lady be it done to me according to thy word a wise priest of my own diocese said to me one time he said prayer is learning to accept reality and that's just that is just a tremendous insight i think it is and let me offer you another contrast between two ways of praying there's a kind of praying and it's it's the one i sort of characterized as the ham radio approach which is uh you know prayer is sort of drawing god down into my world bring him down into my experience so he answers my needs and speaks to my situation and i've seen this trivially to the extent of people asking god to find them a parking spot you know and then if they find it they take that some token of a miracle right here's another way of praying which i think is the catholic way it's not drawing god down into my experience so much as it is elevating my mind into god's experience not making him a part of my story but making myself a part of his story saint bonaventure in the beginning of his treatise the mind's journey into god says that that true beatitude is when i rise when i transcend myself right rise above my present circumstances and enter into the experience of the transcendent god through the crucified which happens by grace and so that's the that's the point to keep in mind like the the catechism says that prayer is the raising of the mind to god and that can happen in a lot of different ways you know uh it can happen in conversation you know colloquial uh i vow interchange with god but can also happen through consideration of the divine attributes consideration of god's mercy and justice uh examination of my own conscience right meditation on the sacraments and if you we we do need tokens and signs of god's presence in our life but they don't have to come just through our imaginative life they can also come visibly in the sacraments of the church i i to me the most potent and and palpable sign of god's active presence in my life is the words i absolve you in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit it's and it's not just a sign it's the reality or how about the sign that is this is my body given for you right it's a sign but it's also the reality these are the the tokens and signs of god's presence to which we need to pay the greatest attention barbara we hope that is very helpful for you and thank you so much for your call in a moment we'll be talking with joe in milwaukee amanda in ohio mark in grand rapids and look at this miracle of miracles two lines open at 833 288 ewtn on the friday edition of call to communion mother angelica scott hahn father wade menezes you'll hear the leading catholic voices on the largest catholic media network in the world this is the ewtn global catholic radio network he is honored by the church as a saint with the title of the seraphic doctor matthew bunson and the doctors of the church one of the greatest theologians and franciscan mystics in church history bonaventure also wrote a biography of saint francis that was commissioned by the franciscans themselves it took a saint and true mystic to understand a true saint and mystic he died in 1274. for more about the doctors of the church visit doctorsofthechurch.com [Music] hi i'm doug keck and this is an ewtn bookmark brief speaking with dr scott hahn about his latest book it is right and just why the future of civilization depends on true religion written along with brandon mcginley published by emmaus road publishing available through our ewtn religious catalog well tell us dr scott hahn it is right and just why the future of civilization depends on true religion why does it and why do we need to understand that this book came in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election where i would say catholics not only in america but throughout the whole world facing a pandemic and political chaos need to be reminded not only that they are a part of a kingdom that is in heaven but they're also called to make the disciples of all nations here on earth starting with ourselves speaking with dr scott hahn about his latest book it is right and just why the future of civilization depends on true religion written along with brandon mcginley available through our religious catalogue thanks for stopping by we'll see you next time hi this is sci kellett later today on catholic answers live we tackle some tough subjects eugenics and chastity catholic answers live 6 p.m eastern on ewtn radio now back to call the communion dr david anders [Music] delighted you could join us for the friday edition of call to communion here on ewtn uh our phone number is 833 288 ewtn that's well you've 833-288-3986 four lines that's probably going to fill us out for the rest of the hour but we are going to do this question here from marie watching us on youtube marie says in your recent shows you mentioned that god has no senses no feelings like us so why do we occasionally read about his anger in the old testament yeah for the same reason we read about his feet right sometimes scripture ascribes feet to god yes god walks in the garden right uh or the speaks of god sitting on a throne all these anthropomorphisms in scripture convey the same thing they're figures of speech and language they're images that evoke uh you know god's glory or power uh or these divine attributes under you know under the figure of some sensible object uh but they are not literal descriptions of god's nature okay and that's that's the way catholic tradition always treats this so you know when we talk about god's wrath or god's anger what that means is that we experience our alienation from god because of our own sin as wrath but we don't predict literal wrath of god marie thanks for checking us out today on youtube call to communion here on ewtn here is joe joe is in milwaukee listening on the ewtn app hey joe what's on your mind today hello i'm taking a course in the sacrament of marriage and i have an assignment where i need to argue why marriage is between one man and one woman and furthermore argue this without using theology um yes so uh my mind has just gone blank but the new natural law theologian um i mean a philosopher i'll come up with in a minute i think the title of the book is i'm just going to look it up on case for marriage i think is that the title is that the title um no i'll come up with it i'll come up with it okay okay yeah i've got it i've got the book for you give me a couple minutes to research it i just it's in my head and i just can't i can't get the title but in the meanwhile while i'm thinking of the book title here's the answer to the question i'll give you the the thesis and then we can research it in the book later uh why is there an institution called marriage socially around the world through history why why does it exist all right well for the blindingly obvious reason that when men and women get together in intimate uh union that babies tend to happen i mean that's the fact so there's something about the nature of the male female procreative union that's different from every other kind of union when tennis players get together and hit a ball over the tennis net babies don't tend to happen right they're not not is something that's intrinsic to the activity of of uh robert george right robert george all right i'll get the book later good job um bays don't don't pop out of the tennis court right as a result of playing tennis uh you know when um when i'm engaged in an economic transaction you know to draw money out of my bank account babies don't happen right all kinds of social interactions uh in which babies don't naturally they're not naturally a product of that activity and that that's this true of some kind of sexual activity as well there's only only one specific kind of sexual activity uh that is that where babies are the natural result and if there's a reason why uh we have not uh in law and culture hallowed these other sorts of social interactions in precisely the same way that we hallow the male female procreative union because they're not they're not socially productive and precisely the same way so when we talk about marriage being the foundation of civil society and we mean that quite literally no babies no civil society you know i mean you know government's always about infrastructure spending but i could build more bridge bridges and more roads to keep the thing going mm-hmm well you better build more people i mean before you not gonna have any people not gonna need any roads if you haven't had people to drive on them right and and uh and then when babies come into the world they have needs they have needs yeah they need education they need love they need no emotional stability and who who who's going to do that who's going to take care of those kids and love them and bring them up well who should who ought to well it doesn't take a phd in ethics to figure out that the people most suited to care for the kids that have come into the world are the people who brought them in of course under most circumstances now you might need a phd in ethics to unlearn that fact right but you don't need one to know it everybody knows that and uh and everybody knows miss common knowledge if i bring a kid into the world then dump it in the river i'm a bad guy right if i bring a kid in the world and you know dump my mom and baby and run off i'm a bad guy all right and so the the the law and culture that surrounds marriage throughout history not just catholic world right just recognizes these biological and social facts about our nature and you'll find that marriage of some kind exists in almost every society throughout history there are one or two very very outlier exceptions but in almost every place that you can find people you'll find something like uh the christian understanding of marriage and it'll have permutations and differences right and uh here's what's changed in the modern world all right after the protestant reformation and especially puritanism in the advent of romanticism you get this idea uh that that purpose of marriage is somehow my personal fulfillment through you know through through erotic pleasure or something well that's just crazy idea that's just nuts right and uh and it becomes detached from what everybody else in the world knows which is it's about having kids bringing them into the world you know laws of inheritance and kinship bonds and you know responsibility to others and this sort of an economic institution it's there for the raising up of these kids making sure they have a place to be and now suddenly it becomes about my own my own erotic fulfillment and romantic passion and and most cultures throughout the world have no such idea like that at all that's just not the way they see it and uh and of course once you think that that's what marriage is for right which has no basis in history or biology all right well that's when you get no fault divorce yeah right and then that's when you have people just chasing whatever passion of the moment moves them and then and then why why call those things marriage like why grant all this other kind of activity the dignity of marriage why would i call you know a certain kind of sexual union that's not intrinsically procreative uh uh why would i want to dignify that with marriage or why what a philandering husband he wants to just run around and do whatever why would i want to dignify that activity with the title marriage well to to to remove the social stigma of course right it's a psychological thing and and when you read the court decisions on say gay marriage or bergefell decision justice kennedy it says as much he says look we need to change the legal definition of marriage so that these people won't feel bad about themselves it's got nothing to do with the good of the children or families nothing intrinsic to the activity he just recognizes that look when you have a moral imperative here that people don't live up to it are gonna feel bad well we can't have that wow anyway robert george i think is the book and it's the case i've got the book yeah and the book is called conjugal union that's the one what marriage is and why it matters it's a 2014 book again the title conjugal union thank you all right and joe thank you so much for your call it's called to communion here on ewtn let's go to amanda now amanda is in ohio listening on annunciation radio hey there amanda what's on your mind today well thank you for taking my call but my question is um i've been offered a position at the church to teach first graders and i'm having trouble with self-worth and self-doubt i just i don't find worthy of it okay thanks yes i really appreciate the question well i have a question for you if you hadn't it's fine but did you ever read the cs lewis's chronicles of narnia by any chance yeah okay do you remember the novel prince caspian it's the second book in the series okay and in prince casper caspian is the rightful heir to the throne of narnia and uh and his his evil usurping uncle miraz has taken the throne and caspian had to run for his life and he goes out in the woods and he meets the fawns and the satires and the dryads and the dwarves and so forth and eventually peter susan edmund and lucy come back and aslan comes back and they restore caspian to his throne and right before the coronation aslan says to him caspian do you feel qualified for the throne of narnia and he says i really don't think i am and nazim says good that will proceed to the coronation because if you said otherwise it wouldn't be the job for you right and uh and i i think it's don't take this the wrong way it's kind of delightful right that that you you have this sense of the profound dignity of this job right they hear kids and and they really deserve the faith and they deserve a you know a competent presentation of the faith and and that's i really had to take that seriously am i really the person for the job well that's wonderful what a virtuous attitude you've got i mean i commend you for that for that introspection and circumspection right but here's the answer to your question vocation like at the most basic level is when god calls you how does he call you he calls you through the church you know and if the church has said we need you well then god's called you and my own bishop i said that to him he hired me to do a job several years ago and i was like i don't know if i'm up to this he says god doesn't call the qualified he qualifies the call you know i asked my bishop i said this is bishop baker before bishop i said bishop when did you know you were called to be a priest he said when my own bishop ordained me wow and that's the best possible answer i mean that's such it gives me goosebumps it's so good like how do you know you're called to do this because god called you yeah there you go amanda thank you so much for your call i hope that's helpful for you it's called a communion here on ewtn be sure to join us for the journey home coming up monday night 8 p.m eastern this week's guest dr leroy uh hope i get this right huizenga a former lutheran a former presbyterian and a former anglican he shares how he found his true home in catholicism the journey home with marcus grodi monday night at 8 pm eastern right here on ewtn radio it'll also be on ewtn television let's go to mark now in grand rapids listening on holy family radio a first time caller hello mark what's on your mind today hey love the show so let's say thanks for putting it together every day um my question is why does pontius pilate warrant such a prominent place in our profession of faith great question so something that all religions have in common is um see how can i put this a kind of invisible narrative right or world that one can call up in the imagination uh and one seeks through one's religious practice to sort of enter into that world and participate in it somehow and you know the greeks imagined that the gods lived on olympus you know you know homer imagines a mythical past populated with you know gods and demigods and gorgons and beasts right and one could call that up in the imagination and um and you know we could sort of characterize that in a lot of cases is in the language of once upon a time you know and we know that once upon a time doesn't really happen now it's it's back then mercia eliade the historian of religion referred to this quality of religious faith as in illo tempore in that time they did it this way okay one of the distinctions of the christian faith is inelo tempore happens to be today right that that the that time that space in which god was active happens to be real human history and by naming pontius pilate it's like saying when when kirinius was the governor of syria the gospel writers and the writers of acts locate these events not in some mythical past but in in contemporary well from their point of view in contemporary history these are you know saint paul says you're not ignorant of these things when he's before fastest and agrippa they happened under your very nose right you can find this in secular history jesus the nazarene the jew who was crucified by pontius pilate this is something known to all right and just as objectively evident is the fact that there ain't nobody in the tomb you know this is not in illow temporary this is not once upon a time go to jerusalem look at the tomb i've been there there ain't nobody there it's empty when i was a graduate student at the university of iowa i i was a i was a a graduate assistant and i was a a ta a teaching assistant and we would have all the teaching assistants would get together and we would write the exams um collectively and then we'd give them out the same exam to everybody and uh one of the tas who was a friend of mine jewish woman we had a sort of common theme in our biblical study of all these famous people from scripture whose whose burial plots were not known you know like we didn't know where moses was buried god buried him elijah goes to heaven and uh and she kind of wasn't thinking and she said well all these people in scripture and we don't really know where they are you know the bodies we don't know what they're buried and we have moses and got a lot you got jesus and i said um so and so um there's a reason we don't know where jesus's body is and all of a sudden she kind of like it was like i should have had a v8 you know popped the forehead and goes oh yeah cause he walked out of it yeah there's that mark thank you so much for your call it's called a communion here on ewtn larry's in philadelphia listing on the iheartradio app larry what's on your mind today hi dr anders uh thank you for taking my call i have a question about first peter one three to nine sure to me it's easy to to read that as a guarantee that our salvation uh and our faith are being shielded it says being our faith being shielded by god's power until the coming of the salvation uh ready to be revealed the last time so it to me it's easy to take that as a guarantee of our salvation yet i know uh in catholic teaching it it shouldn't be taken that way can you explain to me why yeah sure absolutely well so first of all you all there's a lot of passages like this in the new testament you know neither height nor depth nor powers nor principalities nothing in all of creation can separate us from the love of god in christ jesus saint paul talks about that um there's a lot of that kind of language and i really think that the the emphasis is over against the persecution that the church was facing at the time and and you know a lot of things coming against us in the faith sometimes you know whole churches being decimated and the apostles say hey you know what they can kill the body they can't kill the soul nothing can separate you from the love of god i mean he has got his hand on you you're one of his elect you're one of his beloved you're safe but you can take yourself out of that relationship and that's why saint peter says in his next epistle in second peter he says it is better never to enter the way of righteousness than to enter and then fall away that's an astonishing thing to say so it's we certainly don't live that way right i mean our own pastoral ministry is not oriented that way but peter says better not to become a christian than to become a christian and fall away the book of hebrews is all about this you know about those having tasted the heavenly gift who turned their back cannot be brought again to repentance it's a bad situation and so the possibility of apostasy of mortal sin of abandoning the faith is also warned against in the new testament over and over and over again and what it boils down to is that we have st peter says one of my favorite verses of scripture in him through the promises of him who called us all we need for life and godliness and nothing can separate us from the love of god if we hold fast to all those things that we need for life and godliness nothing can snatch us out of god's hand jesus put it this way he said if you love me this is john chapter 14 if you love me and keep my commandments then my father and i will come to you and make our dwelling with you and i will and and i will come back again and bring you to where i am so let's do that let's love god keep his commandments and hold fast the faith we once received and nobody can snatch us out of god's hand but we can jump out of his hand if we want to yeah let's not let's not jump let's not do that larry thank you so much for your call on this friday afternoon edition of call to communion here on ewtn marguerite is in granite falls minnesota listening on the great real presence radio hi marguerite what's on your mind today oh thank you dr anders i so appreciate this i was just wondering about older people who are seeking a male relationship and they decide to um they decide to live together and in my mind i keep turning thinking um that that i don't i don't know how that what the church feels how the church feels about that but i think it would be bad example for the younger people so many doing that before they get married and um i wondered what your answer is to that i think it's a i agree with you marguerite i think it's a bad idea bad idea and uh for exactly the reason that you stated that this is a serious occasion of scandal uh obviously an occasion of fornication for the elderly themselves uh but but then an occasion of scandal for the young and uh uh you know i mentioned my father often on this show and for some reason my dad was an upstanding chaste moral man who was very faithful to his marriage and i think that's why guys who felt a little weak in the knees about marriage would sometimes come to him for advice and occasionally they would come and say i'm thinking of divorcing my wife and he would say well you're thinking of going to hell then i would advise against it you know and tell them don't leave your wife and so he had this this this similar question would come well you know i'm getting up there in years and you know i don't really want to deal with prenuptial which catholics can't have anyway uh you know and uh it's kind of a headache and what if we just live together and my dad would just look at him and say you gonna do that in front of your granddaughter really that's what you're gonna do that's a horrible idea yeah there it is margarite thank you so much for your call rudy is in indianapolis first time caller hi rudy what's on your mind today good afternoon uh dr anderson thank you so much for taking my call um i want to give you just some quick background and then i'll get to my question uh quickly i promise i was raised an evangelical and i think i think i've heard you mentioned that you were too um and i've been faithful to the evangelical church all my life and and i'd be no offense at all when i share with you that they have taken a very hard line against the catholic church and to share with church members that the catholic church is most immoral and occult and stay away from it it's dangerous but in more recent times i've given very serious consideration to joining the catholic church for reasons i am not sure i understand totally but just a lot i think because i've been listening to this station i have reached out to a lady who lives near me um a a priest or a uh maybe not a priest but a clergy member she may even be listening now and i'm thinking of just asking some questions one particular question that i have one thing i was taught in the evangelical church is to rest heavily upon the authority of the scriptures that they are true and they're reliable and i think i believe that a great deal and i wonder how the catholic church comes down on that question and then the second thing is on the issue of baptism does the catholic church believe that baptism is required for salvation okay thanks uh so first of all the terms in which you've raised the question i know are are drawn from your protestant background and i'm going to answer the questions but i also want to draw attention to the terms to the premise that's built into it because the catholic church conceives of these things in a way that's very different from the way protestants do and so a simple sort of binary yes no is is really not enough to to get at the major differences on the question of sacred scripture the reason that there is a sacred scripture for protestants to venerate the reason the bible as you know it exists is because it is a product of catholic tradition the catholic bishops especially in the 4th century formally defined the canon of the bible as the word of god promulgated it handed it on by sacred tradition down through the centuries and it was received by the reformers luther and calvin and zwingli and cranmer in that form because they received it as a product of catholic tradition they learned that the bible was the word of god from catholic tradition the bible itself does not come with an introduction written by god right you know a lot of books have an introduction by the author or a preface the bible does not come with a preface saying by the way this is my word god right the way the reason we receive these books as the word of god is because the catholic church said this is the word of god so does the catholic church regard the bible as authoritative absolutely and that's the only reason protestants do is because the catholics taught them to do it right now but here is the difference the bible is absolutely authoritative but it is not authoritative in the way in which protestants think it's authoritative it is not authoritative as a rule of faith rule of faith is where do you go if you want a definitive answer on what to believe or think or do as a christian right kind of where the buck stops that's not what the bible is for and how do i know that well jesus never told us that jesus when jesus gave instructions for handing on the faith he didn't say hey if you want you and i answer a question about the faith go to the bible he never said that on the contrary jesus established the teaching church he said to the disciples go and make disciples of all nations and teach them everything i've commanded you i'll be with you to the end of the age and whatever you bind on earth is bound in heaven christ gave us the teaching of the apostles the teaching church and his promise of divine assistance forever the gates of hell will not prevail that's the rule of faith for the church if you want to know what the christian faith is you go to the teaching of the catholic church that he founded now within the church the bible is our authoritative liturgical text it's it's what we pray and reflect on and read and meditate to enter into the mind of christ in the apostles it's a spiritual text that works on us in our interior life to change us and make us like jesus but it's not a kind of constitution of the church all right rudy thanks for your call paula in michigan couldn't get to you please call us on monday dr david andrews have a great weekend thanks tom hope you have a great weekend as well god bless this is colin donovan open line friday is next on ewtn radio

Channel: EWTN

Views: 3,746

Rating: 4.9672132 out of 5

Keywords: Catholic, EWTN, Christian, television

Id: LU_Cz3MNK-I

Length: 54min 20sec (3260 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 19 2021