Called to Communion with Doctor David Anders - May 7, 2021

charles louisiana for more news with a catholic perspective visit ewtnnews.com i'm theresa tomio and 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 why do i need to 1-833-288-3986 my sins to a priest what's stopping you this is called to communion with dr david anders on the ewtn global catholic radio network hey everybody welcome again to call to communion here on ewtn i'm so glad that we made it to friday and i'm glad that you are with us if you've never heard our program it is a program for non-catholics those of you who are not catholic this is your kind of a show because we will answer any question regarding the catholic faith and we would also like to know what is keeping you from becoming a catholic here's our phone number and i recommend that you call soon because the phones really tie up quickly on fridays here's that number eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six if you're listening to us outside of north america please dial the u.s country code 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 of course you can always send us an email ctc at ewtn.com is the address ctc ewtn.com all right charles berry is our producer michael birchfield is our phone screener and jeff person is on social media if you want to post a question via facebook or youtube by golly we are streaming there right now so you can put your question in the comments box jeff will shoot that to us here in studio one i'm tom price along with dr david anderson tom how are you today great looking forward to the weekend how about you same same anything going on anything big well i'm just going to do battle with the grass it is a battle yep we say out where we live it is not a a fancy um you know subdivision or anything like that so it's like we're we're mowing the weeds that's just what we're doing we're mowing you know your place you're kind of mowing the trees i mean like you're surrounded by trees there is there very beautiful yeah well we love it we we're very blessed here's uh our lead-off question here this is uh from carroll carol says my son is a follower of n.t wright reads them all the time he is not open to the catholic church at all my son that is please what is your opinion of n.t right i've tried to listen to him but i get very confused is he anti-catholic thanks carol okay anti-right is really an enigma and i love the guy personally okay uh but what the reason i say he is an enigma is that it really really bothers nt right it bothers him a lot how many people become catholic by reading him right i mean he he's not catholic and he has some some issue with the catholic faith but the the result of his work of his exegetical work on the new testament which is really stellar stuff i mean he is a top flight uh uh magisterial scholar um and he'll he's one of the few late like second half of the 20th century type people who will be remembered for 200 years for his work on the new testament just really outstanding scholar is that that people read him and they become catholic and he's part of a larger movement called the new it's been called the new perspectives on poll and uh and the reason is called the new perspectives on paul is it's sort of broken away from the catholic protestant uh traditional sort of dogmatic paradigms in which paul has been read for 500 years since the reformation and anti-rights project as many other scholars as well people like christopher stendahl james don ep sanders some of the names in this movement are trying to go back and reread saint paul in light of what has come to light about second temple judaism judaism around the time of christ and what that would have meant for the intellectual cultural social world of early christianity and the the net result of all of that is that the sort of traditional categories of pauline interpretation really are don't work they don't work with saint paul and and for in t wright a lot of paul's thinking is has to be read in a much more sort of corporate and ecclesial context and he takes very seriously paul's doctrine of the church and and he radically reinterprets what paul means by grace and faith and justification around this idea of of sort of inclusion into the covenant people of god rather than reading it as traditional theology would have done just sort of strictly in terms of the individual salvation uh into right reads it more in terms of you know by faith one is incorporated into god's people uh at whereupon one is expected to live accordingly that there's a ethical demand placed on one who becomes a christian and uh and it really tends in heavily catholic directions it tends toward the way catholics understand the relationship between church and salvation the personal ethical life now where ente wright falls short of catholicism is for some odd reason that i can't figure out he seems to presume the doctrine of soul of scripture nt wright does i mean he doesn't talk dogmatically that way but his whole understanding of christianity is based on his analysis of the new testament documents which seems to me to be kind of myopic because that's not what the new testament itself tells us to do and so he's not really open to other sources of revelation like sacred tradition and he tends to be kind of down on aspects of catholicism that he doesn't find in the new testament documents so at least as far as the way he reads the new testament i'm a big fan of nt wright but i wish he would broaden his data set a little bit in early christianity to incorporate elements of catholic faith and practice that he kind of dismisses you ever met him no but he's been to our hometown birmingham on a few occasions i mean he's a he's a bit of a lightning rod especially in the protestant communion um because uh you know there are a lot of protestants that get very uncomfortable with nt wright because they know that people read him and become catholic i mean i did i mean yeah of the many influences that led me to the catholic church i was going back to re-examine the new testament um try to get fresh eyes on it and i stumbled across the new perspectives on paul and i read in t wright and i read christerson doll and uh and i was pretty much done at that point just just put a fork in me turned me over and i was i was like okay you know my presbyterianism is gone check please so you mentioned that a term uh as you were explaining this a second temple what do you mean by that right so in 586 the babylonians came and came into judea and they destroyed the temple that had been built by solomon and uh and it stayed destroyed until the return from the exile roughly 70 years later and the jews in jerusalem rebuilt the temple but the the rebuilt version was a scaled down you know it was the it was the lego version of the original temple okay and those who saw it at the time lamented if they had remembered the first temple they said this doesn't compare but that temple remained until uh 70 a.d when the romans destroyed it that second time so that period of time from the rebuilt temple to 70 ads called second temple period got it all right thank you so much for that and in a moment we're going to be talking with robert in lancaster pennsylvania we have a line open for you on this beautiful friday afternoon 833 288 ewtn is our number 833 288 ewtn don't miss the good fight on saturday would you like to know what the heart of spiritual conversion is i'll tell you the catholic church father robert spitzer will return to the good fight to reveal his second of the called out of darkness trilogy called escape from evil's darkness such wisdom and grace on ewtn global catholic radio network the world over with riemann arroyo coverage as seen through a catholic lens all people of faith and sincerity need to awaken to this and protect this fundamental right of religious looking expert analysis does revelation judge history or does history judge revelation stories vital to people of faith it's part of our faith that comedy and tragedy naturally go hand in hand delivered to your inbox every week sign up today go to ewtn.com slash world over why do we need to pray we don't pray because god needs our prayers we pray because we need god's grace and every day when i face the day i realize i have no idea what i'm doing and i need god to walk me through my day step by step giving me the grace the counsel the love the encouragement that enables me to glorify him in everything that i do and become the person he wants me to be prayer [Music] it's called communion here on ewtn our phone number eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six what's keeping you from becoming a catholic let's talk about that hey i wanna tell you about the sunrise morning show coming up on monday morning 6 a.m eastern matt and anna will be welcoming dr matthew bunsen who actually grew up in hawaii he'll be along to talk about saint damian of malachi on his feast day wonderful program sunrise morning show monday morning at 6 a.m eastern right here on ewtn radio if you're ready now let's go to the phones at 833 288 ewtn let's begin today with robert in lancaster pennsylvania listening on the ewtn app a first-time caller hello robert happy friday to you what's on your mind today sir thank you so much i have a question concerning matthew 1 28 so much of mary's identity as i understand it rests on her being uh full of grace but all the newer translations and of course the protestant translations are referring to her as you know hell favorite gabrielle refers to his hell favored one where he addresses her as hell favored one not hail mary full of grace and i can't find uh anything that seems to kind of clarify this to me i was hoping that you could do that yeah sure absolutely so the um uh the text of course is uh is a gospel of luke not saint matthew and the word the greek word that luke uses is which is a middle or or passive voice and uh and it literally means one having been graced right one having been graced to the full now it's it is it's evident why many bible translations don't render it that way for exactly the reason that you suggested well we can't put anything catholic in this translation that might suggest catholic devotionalism that might that might point in the direction of the catholic veneration of mary and we need to sort of disentangle this translation from all that you know devotionally loaded language people might actually get the idea of praying the hail mary if they wrote if they read full of grace you know and have that uh and uh and i really i mean i say that kind of tongue-in-cheek but i really do think that's probably the reason right because uh because of its devotional overtones there are those translators who who want to try to present the meaning of a text uh but but disentangle it from what you know theological assumptions so let the the text speak for itself but you really can't do that in this case because the word only occurs once in the new testament only in this passage now in some translations of the bible you'll read that stephen was full of grace in the book of acts but it's a different greek phrase this being translated when it says jesus jesus stephen is full of grace the only place this word is used is of the blessed virgin mary hail full of grace hail one having been graced to the full um and uh and so you know the translation itself the questions about how you translate that is going to be a polemical and theologically loaded question there's just no getting away from that right um now more interesting is how shall we interpret the significance of the text what does that mean okay and i think the larger context of saint luke's gospel and other gospels is informative because mary however you understand the language charatamine the greek word is clearly presented in the text as a paradigmatic figure i mean she's she is the daughter of zion she is one who seems to embody in herself the summation the culmination of all these old testament archetypes of holy women who have experienced surprising and miraculous births and gone through hardship in their vocation to serve the lord and there's numerous ones right but mary's situation is all the more imminent not only because of the one to whom she gives birth but the parallelism that's set up between her and eve uh christ in the new testament is clearly presented as the second adam the new man and of course the reason for the reason we need a new man is the first man sort of made a mess of things and eve was part of the occasion for that and she said no to god in his grace here mary is presented as the one who says yes now other texts in the new testament like second chapter the gospel of john that identification with that first woman seems all the more explicit for example when she goes to christ and says they have no wine and he says woman not mom woman what to the into me then she responds do whatever he tells you now the ceremonial water jars are the ones that are used for the transformation of water into wine that seems quite evidently and typologically significant that christ has taken the elements of the old covenant that were inert spiritually inert he miraculously transforms them into a vessel of grace at the word of this woman right this woman the first woman who brought our wreck in ruin and the second one who is this instrument of the transformation of of the presentation of grace to the human person the book of revelation chapter 12 indicates the woman who gives birth to the child that will rule the nations with a rod of iron that's of course a reference to psalm 2 it's a messianic psalm she's identified as the mother of all those who believe in jesus the mother of all those who believe in jesus and is presented in confrontation with that ancient serpent the devil that's the exact language of the text well if that's not like knocking on the front door of your head obvious i don't know what is that mary in all of these texts is presented as the the spiritual progenitor of of the human race right her partial issue i should say of this spiritual race of new men recreated in christ i mean it's a it's a powerfully symbolic image of what her identity is um so if she is a sort of icon or representative of what what recreated humanity looks like what's the what's the sort of the engine that gets that done well it's grace and so this language about her being a sharer in that divine grace is all the more significant because she has this to an imminent degree you know the promise of all believers is that we'll be participants in the divine nature that's what second peter 1 4 says well she has that all the all the more one having been graced to the full therefore full of grace there you go robert appreciate your call hope that is uh helpful for you that opens up a line for you right now at 833 288 ewtn if you have a question for dr david anders on this friday afternoon or if you'd like to tell us what is stopping you from becoming a catholic 833-288-3986 uh todd's checking in with us on youtube todd says i am a protestant but i want to learn more about the catholic church but now there are some things i just don't understand for example why catholics pray to mary where should i start yeah thanks i appreciate the question so well let me answer why alex created mary and then gave you some more resources to go to in a nutshell the new testament and the old teach that god extends his grace to us through instruments now god can reach down to touch you directly of course you can't and he does all the time but he also likes to work through instruments work through agents through intermediaries think about very end of the book of job god says to job's companions i'm pretty irritated at you guys but ask my servant job to pray for you ask my servant job to pray for and i'll listen to him on your behalf he's explicitly instructing i'm going to take care of you guys but i really want to do it through the mediation of job old testament genesis 18 abraham says to god will you wipe away the righteous with the wicked god says no i'll spare the wicked for the sake of the righteous so the righteousness of the few availing for the many exodus 32 moses says god don't wipe out israel remember your promise to abraham isaac and jacob god says okay for your sake and theirs i'll spare everybody else saint paul colossians chapter 1 i fill up on my own flesh what's lacking in the promise and the sufferings of christ for the sake of his body the church so all through the bible we have this dynamic of one person stands in the gap on behalf of another god is merciful to the unrighteous because of the intercession of the righteous that's a powerfully biblical principle question does that perjure after death answer yes evidence revelation chapter 5 verse 8 the saints in heaven we are shown offer our prayers to god they don't just pray for us they actually present our prayers to god that's the explicit teaching of the bible revelation 5 8 revelation 8 3 says the same thing tobit chapter 12 says the same thing second maccabees chapter 15 says the same thing second kings chapter 13 strongly suggests it so we've got a powerful biblical picture of this great cloud of witnesses that hebrews 12 talks about is it 12 or 11. my mind went black oh you know the faith chapter hebrews we'll just say hebrews okay i'm gonna look it up can't read if it's 11 or 12. um this powerful cloud of witnesses in heaven offering our prayers to god interceding on our behalf and god hearing and being clement and merciful to the church because of the prayers of the saints in heaven that's all in sacred scripture right st james tells us chapter 5 that the prayer of a righteous man avails much forever righteous man avails much he says us 11 just looked it up oh thank you he says you guys your prayers are not very powerful in case you're not very righteous but the prayer of a righteous man avails much right so uh if the saints are more righteous than we their prayers are more powerful among the saints one is more righteous than another it's just a fact well who's the most righteous of all the saints blessed virgin mary got to be so like it is perfectly okay to pray and ask the intercession of everybody's favorite curmudgeon saint jerome the crotchety saint right you can ask saint jerome to pray for you and i suggest you do but like why beat around the bush go straight to mother mary yeah she'll pray for you now that doesn't mean you don't also pray to jesus of course you do right doesn't mean you don't pray to the lord lord our god of course you do but god wants for us to be saved in through and with the intercession of the church jeff points out our jeff uh handling social media points out that todd who is a protestant he actually comes from a general baptist background is there anything else that we should be talking about there to help out todd well yeah sure so you know i did a lot of scripture quotation just now which talking to general baptist is generally a good idea but i ask all protestants inquiring about the catholic faith to consider first this question how does jesus want us to come to know about him what provision did christ make for us to understand the christian faith and hand it on down through the centuries did jesus in fact tell us when you have a question about the christian faith go consult the bible no he never said that and you know the new testament 27 books of the new testament were not even written until after christ ascended to heaven and christ makes no explicit mention of them so whenever you appeal to the new testament you're doing a very unbiblical thing i'll say that paradox again whenever you appeal to the new testament particularly if you appeal to it as a kind of definitive rule of faith you're doing a very unbiblical thing because the bible never mentions the new testament as a collection of books the only time new testament or new covenant is ever used in sacred scripture is with reference to the eucharist jesus says this is the cup of the new covenant the new testament in my blood all right never mentions the collection of books called the new testament the only way we have a collection of books called the new testament is because it's a product of catholic tradition so if you say well i don't believe catholic tradition oh you better throw out your new testament then just throw it right on out because that's the premier prince product of catholic tradition but once you admit the authority of catholic tradition you got to admit the whole thing you can't you can't pick and choose no any more than a baptist would say well i like john but i'm not too big on matthew so i'll throw it out of my bible you can't do that okay you can't say i like this part of catholic tradition but i don't like that part because the same guys that defined the the canon of the new testament they're the same guys that are defining the dogma of the trinity they're the same guys that are that are articulating the church's teaching about the sacraments about baptism about transubstantiation and the mass about the intercession of saints all that catholic stuff okay hey todd thank you so much for your question glad that you're watching us today on youtube our phone number eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six we have a line open for you right now on call to communion bill is listening in vienna virginia on guadalupe radio a first time caller hey bill what's on your mind today hi the concept of uh purgatory is uh i i understand it perfectly you can't go before god unless you're perfect and clean and you've perfected yourself and this is what the function of of a purgatory is i understand that concept the one what i don't understand however is uh since purgatory is so good for you it's i i consider it like a boot camp you know you go in sort of a mess and uh you go through this uh six weeks or months or whatever it is of of all kinds of troubles and tribulations and you come out strong and you stand straight and you're you're a marine or whatever you are and uh and you're ready to to continue you know as you know as as having perfected yourself or having gotten really strong and whatever so it's a good thing for yourself for you so catholics should rejoice that there is a place called purgatory so my question to you is if purgatory is so good for you and that it perfects you why do catholics go to the nth degree to try to get out of purgatory why are there indulgences why do you have to pray for people so they'll get out of purgatory when the most important thing is to go through purgatory so you can perfect yourself yeah great question so uh you know i've got about 30 seconds before the break and i'll do what i can if i have to carry it over i'll carry it over yeah the best analogy i like the boot camp business i like that all right but i but the best analogy is just the the undesired suffering that we experience in this life and and if you've if you've been through the ringer of personal suffering and tragedy and loss and trauma you don't wish that on anybody but once you are confronted with it you have to make a choice about what you're going to do with it am i going to become bitter and cynical or am i going to try to open my heart to compassion and love and forgiveness and humility and when you're in the throes of that existential dilemma it ain't easy and you need all the help you can get absolutely sit tight bill we'll continue this call in just a moment here we'll also talk with carolina in rockville maryland line with your name on it available right now at 833 288 ewtn for the friday edition of call to communion [Music] the words of blessed carlo accutis the virgin mary is the only woman in my life and this i offer all the suffering i have to suffer for the lord for the pope and the church this is life issues with brad mattis president of life issues institute more horrific details are coming out of china regarding their barbaric treatment of the minority uyghur population women have come forward talking about their kidnappings forced abortions multiple rapes tortured by electric shocks and forced sterilizations one woman returning to china after visiting another country was forced to take a pregnancy test when it showed positive she was forced to have an abortion after all that she was sent to a detention camp and didn't make it back home for months the trump administration called these crimes against humanity but president joe biden dismisses them as mere cultural norms should we be surprised a president who funds abortion in america and around the world would ignore such atrocities for more information visit our website at lifeissues.org and stay informed more informed than you've ever been [Music] ewtn helping people grow in their love and understanding of god i just wanted to thank you for your show it's made such a huge difference in my faith life because if you don't know why you're doing things and you're just going through the motions it's totally pointless but if you know why it's infinitely meaningful so you really helped me make a 180. ewtn live truth live catholic [Music] monday on take two with jerry and debbie we'll ask you to weigh in on something of interest to you in the news be sure to join us on most of these ewtn stations now we return to call to communion it's called communion here on ewtn glad you could join us on this beautiful friday afternoon our phone number eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six so before the break we were talking to bill in virginia who asked a very good question why do catholics want to skip purgatory yeah so first of all i have i have known catholics who have told me they're looking forward to purgatory well mother angelica mother angelica father benedict grishall i seem to remember talking about this you know he was wanting to get all cleaned up um uh and john henry cardinal newman saint john henry carl newman has a poem famous poem about a soul eager for purgatory it's called the dream of gerontius and uh in the story it's a narrative you know sort of epic poem soul basically is carried to the ant chamber of heaven and realizes that he ain't ready he's not dressed right for the party and more or less dives into purgatory to get himself all fixed up so the idea of wanting to avoid purgatory is with qualifications right it may be the appropriate thing but we are given an opportunity to do penance in this life and and whether or not we go to purgatory really depends on what we do with the opportunity for penance now and penance can of course mean the penance assigned by a priest in the confessional but penance can also mean all the suffering that comes our way in this life and and it's it's a there's a lot of it plenty and if you hadn't had any yet it's coming buddy it's coming no it is coming and uh and it is profoundly tempting faced with suffering in this life to become bitter narcissistic selfish self-absorbed avoidant rigid uh you know get angry people around us i mean um there's a there's a line in a popular rock song that goes blame is easier to give than receive you know got that right that is man you were right about that you know and um uh and and that's that's the challenge that we face now if you're able to weather that storm in this life and it ain't easy right and and not blame others and not be bitter and accept the suffering that comes your way is something good from the hand of god's providence even though you don't understand it and turn that into compassion and wisdom well then no purgatory for you yeah pretty wonderful bill thank you so much for your call call to communion here on ewtn our phone number eight three three two eight eight ewtn here is carolina now in rockville maryland listing on her alexa device a first time caller hey there carolina uh what's on your mind today hi thanks for taking my call my question is regarding the annunciation when the angel gabriel answers to mary that she was going to be the mother of jesus she says how can this be if i no not man yes and but she was betrothed so yes like the natural assumption would be that that joseph would be the father and so then i've heard that some people say that she'd already already decided that she was going to devote her life to god and if that was the case why would she be betrothed like why would her parents make her get married and why would joseph want to marry somebody who's already devoted or wanted to devote her life and virginity to god yes great question wonderful question and you're correct that one of the insights the church fathers had into this text was mary knew where babies came from and she was betrothed and the natural response if an angel comes to you and says you're going to have a kid you would think okay great you know the wedding's next month and i know how that's going to happen her surprise is is indicative it's that's highly emblematic stuff the father saw it read into that her promise of perpetual virginity now your question well why then be betrothed at all and why would joseph agree to that well um there's an early church text that's not in the bible and it's not canonical and you don't have to believe it right it's just part of an ancient legend about joseph and mary but it's our earliest extra biblical source of insight called the proto-evangelium of james and in that text joseph joseph is depicted as a much older man someone who's already widowed who was married before it had children and his wife has died and he's an older fellow and so he's really not interested in bearing any more children but he's in a position to provide care and protection and solicitude for this young virgin who is going to have a very difficult time in life a very difficult vocation and so he agrees out of pastoral concern out of holiness of life out of compassion to be the protector of the holy family um that's a possible answer now the proto-evangelium of james is like it's not canonical scripture and there's other ways to construe the the history but i think that that that joseph's attitude is the same whatever we think about his origins and his age at the time it would have been out of care and compassion and and uh and pastoral solicitude i can think of a weakly analogous situation in in human life the christian writer c.s lewis formed a correspondence with a woman by the name of joy davidman and uh she was kind of down on her luck and she had children already from a previous relationship and she'd moved to the uk was living in england and she was pretty big on lewis's writing and they would correspond back and forth and she she needed to get whatever the british equivalent of a green card is she wanted to establish residency in the uk and lewis agreed to legally marry her and protect her and her kids even though he never really intended to cohabitate with her at all and so they did they got legally married now the end of the story was very different from joseph and mary because they ended up falling in love yeah and then you know they resumed sort of normal conjugal living sure right and when she died he was grief struck losing his his dear his dear love but his initial impulse was you know was not that it was more of a and i'm going to try to take care of this woman and her kids who have need of some beautiful things and and that impulse could motivate saint joseph as well now as as he got into it he began to realize that he had taken on something much uh more noble and grand than he could ever have imagined and he also needed an angelic visitation to get things cleared up for him right and then uh and then he didn't he didn't know he was becoming i don't imagine he knew uh the patron of the universal church and the model for christian fathers forever beautiful carolina thank you so much for your call appreciate hearing from you in rockville it's called a communion here on ewtn a couple lines open at the moment 833 288 ewtn that's 833-288-3986 miguel is in el centro california listening on youtube a first time caller hey miguel what's on your mind today hey guys uh good morning guys are wondering uh just why is it problems always say are you saved or i accepted jesus christ and there's that one i mean when when we uh we catholics we say no you know every day we're looking for god's grace but how do we respond and say have you accepted jesus christ your lord and savior yeah how do you address that and you know why do they say that thank you guys um yeah i appreciate the question so first of all if any protestant ever asks you are you saved and have you accepted jesus christ you just say yes i accepted jesus christ as my lord and savior you say that now in fact you you actually do say that every time you go to mass when when we recite the creed we confess that we believe in one lord jesus christ who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven and became man yeah right we say that every week i believe in one lord jesus christ who for my salvation came down and was incarnate of the blessed virgin mary you confess that every single time you go to mass you confess it every time you renew your baptismal promises priest says do you believe in god the father and jesus christ is only son our lord do you believe in the holy spirit the holy catholic church i do i do i do i do i do right you confess this every time you go to confession you know lord i'm heartless sorry i've offended you whom i should love above all things and i firmly intend with the help of your grace to dependence to sin or avoid whatever leads me to sin right you renew that conversion every time you go to the sacrament of confession every time you receive christ in holy communion you're confessing his lordship and salvific power in your life who said whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has life and i abide in you right and we're confessing that with our words and our actions every time we go to holy communion in the creed in the sacraments in our prayers in our daily walk we're confessing christ's lordship and his saving power over our lives so you answer that question yes now just the part of your question why do they do that okay i'm going to use a technical word here christian initiation initiation you know you join a fraternity you get initiated right it's the ceremony for getting you in okay what is christian initiation how do you get in the club how do you get in the club it's not really a club but you know what i mean well the bible's very clear on this when the people ask saint peter at pentecost in acts chapter 2 what must we do to get in the club peter says it's very simple repent and be baptized for the remission of your sins the promise is for you and for your children saint paul said in galatians chapter 3 whoever is baptized has clothed himself with christ in romans chapter 6 saint paul says we die with christ in baptism and are raised again with his new life first peter chapter 3 saint peter says baptism now saves you jesus christ in mark chapter 16 says whoever believes and is baptized will be saved baptism is the right of christian initiation you get in the door you join the club you become a member of christ's body through baptism that's how it happens that's that's what scripture says that's what sacred tradition has been doing handing on the words of christ for 2000 years now early protestants in the 16th century understood that they understood that baptism was the right of christian initiation luther understood it john calvin understood it right they all understood it but the protestant theologian john calvin while he believed in baptismal regeneration that you're saved in baptism and he believed that this was the door into christian life he introduced a doubt that was novel is a new thing in the history of the christian religion john calvin 16th century french swiss reformer introduced a doubt and this is what he said you find it in a number of places in his works but in particular i think his commentary on titus 3. calvin says well baptism does this but not in everyone wow like it has that effect it actually does initiate some people into the life of grace but it only works on you if you were one of god's predestined or elect and so two different but this was calvin's you not protestant right right two for two different babies go for baptism one gets born again and one doesn't because one's elect and one's not wow and so in the history of protestantism especially the calvinist variety a spirituality emerges of how do i know i'm one of those people in whom baptism worked what signs can i detect in my own life to find out if i was one of the elect and what you've heard of puritanism puritanism was all about trying to answer that question trying to prove my election to myself now what happened is over time over about 300 years within the history of protestantism the emphasis on on those signs of election overshadowed the significance of baptism until baptism as the rite of christian initiation sort of faded from protestant consciousness and it became all about this question of my own personal assurance so eventually by the time you get to the late 19th century within protestantism the idea of beginning the christian life has evolved into when i have asserted my own assurance then i begin my christian life and so beginning of christian life in evangelical protestantism is associated not with baptism but with that internal sense of assurance that might happen in like a crisis conversion experience where one is conscious of giving one's life to jesus in a conscious mode right that is interpreted now by many evangelical protestants as the point of christian initiation to be followed by baptism as just a sort of outward sign of an inward grace that's already taken place so that's why that's how protestants came to that point of view and it is a it is an idiosyncratic development from their own bizarre doctrine of baptism that was introduced into the christian faith by john calvin now the history that i just gave you 99.9 of evangelical protestants have never heard that story they don't they don't know that about their own history i know this for a fact because i myself grew up evangelical protestant yeah and i was told we have to pray to invite jesus into your heart you have to have a conversion experience and do you know for sure you're going to heaven have you been saved i grew up that way and i was just so well that's just biblical that's just what bible teaches then i read the bible and i was like no it doesn't where did this stuff come from and i embarked myself on a multi-year study of the history of protestantism trying to figure out where did my beliefs come from and i eventually found the story i pieced it together and i figured out the religion that i think is christianity is something that emerged in early 20th century american protestant evangelicalism it's not biblical at all it's not even old it's just brand new and we've erased our own historical consciousness i'd better become catholic so i did so you did and we're glad of it miguel thank you so much for your call today here on ewtn's called communion i want to tell you about a new book now available from ewtn publishing and if you're watching us on youtube or facebook right now you can see it right here on the set it's called web of faith a curious catholic's answers to theological questions by our friends father ken bregenti and father john tragillo one of the hosts of ewtn's open line well this great book draws on father john and father ken's years of pastoral experience to compile a comprehensive list of the best questions ever asked of them on their great tv show including something like uh psychics what are psychics what are their abilities what are what are what are their non-abilities how canon law applies to lay people you'd be surprised and how to avoid the dangers of the internet which as we all know are pretty much everywhere anyway it's a great book do check it out web of faith a curious catholic's answers to theological questions it's available right now at ewtnrc.com catholic by catholic at ewtn rc.com all right back to the phones now on call to communion rob is listening in quincy illinois and that's on siriusxm channel 130 a first time caller hey rob what's on your mind today hey guys thanks for taking my call sure okay i grew up i grew up catholic and uh when i early twenties i got married not in the catholic church um that marriage didn't that marriage didn't last i ended up getting divorced i've remarried and not in the catholic church again but i was wondering is there a path for me back in the catholic church yeah easy path very simple okay so uh because you were catholic growing up and by the way thank you for your question because you were catholic growing up the church regards both of those relationships as invalid marriages right they don't regard them as valid marriages um and it's a pretty easy decision i mean because a catholic is obligated by law to marry in the church and so neither one of them was valid so you don't have to worry about figuring out which one's valid neither one is um and all you have to do to to come back to full communion with the catholic church is just have your present relationship convalidated in the church now this is a very simple it's very simple the reason i say you're you're lucky is because what happens to a lot of folks like you is like let's say they marry the first lady in the catholic church all right then they leave and get divorced well the church says well that's actually a valid marriage that first one was valid because it happened in the church now you got now you got to figure out well is it valid or not and it's a lot more complicated more complicated but because both of them took place out of the church there's really no question about it all you got to do is you know if you want to be married to the woman you're you're with you just have the marriage con validated in the church and then even you go to confession and you're i mean there you are you're good to go you're catholic it's simple apply i mean you can honestly get this done like in an afternoon i mean i had my marriage convalidated because my wife was a catholic who left the church and married me out of the church when i came back to the church that said well you know you gotta have a marriage kind of validated so we went like i think on a thursday afternoon set our vows in front of a priest we were good to go there you go rob is that helpful for you very much so thank you a lot so just call your parish talk to your priest tell them hey i want to come back i got an invalid marriage need to be convalidated you know and uh and you might have to tell him about the first relationship and he'll fill out the paperwork for you and off you're off to the races rob thanks so much for your call let's go to ed in des moines right now listening on i heart radio a first time caller ed what's on your mind today uh hello thanks for taking my call i had a question is it accurate to support our belief that the virgin mary is our mother by stating that because we are adopted brothers and sisters of jesus through baptism that we in turn can make that claim i know i've heard it explained that you know jesus from the cross telling john this is your mother um you know supports that yeah i just was yeah yeah absolutely so there there's a couple different ways you can conceive this you've articulated one very clearly that's correct right and that we are called jesus's brothers in sacred scripture by adoption that's absolutely true that's absolutely true so that's one that's one avenue into this there's another avenue that's a little bit more let's say mystical we are jesus we are we're his brothers and we're him uh the scripture says that christians become members of his body and you say well maybe that's just a metaphor well it is a metaphor it's more than a metaphor because there is a real organism a spiritual organism called the mystical body of christ and the identity with christ is so close that paul says that we died with him that when christ died on the cross we did too hmm and and he doesn't just mean psychologically he doesn't just mean in figure or symbol he means there's some inner principle of our life some animating force of our personality that was corrupted by sin that is destroyed in the death of christ and that we are reborn with him in baptism so so the identification with christ is yes by adoption legally but also mystically by incorporation jesus is called in the new testament the second adam the progenitor of a whole new race of human beings and we are the the fruit of that of that uh of that generation right by our inclusion into him and so mary is our mother by adoption but she's also spiritually our mother by this spiritual parturition whereby she brings forth the church okay appreciate your call ed thank you so much for it and we're going to go to a question now from ann who says i wish to understand why the catholic magisterium favors the present calendar that uses days and months named after pagan gods don't god's calendars use the sun moon and stars to mark time yeah absolutely so uh i don't know what the problem is i mean honestly i don't i'm perplexed by why this would be problematic i mean the the sacred scripture itself presents the the people of god as in a kind of um how should i put this they're in a relationship with the paganism around them that both incorporates and transcends it right so i mean the plagues in egypt are a good example right these aren't random events these are these are emblematic of different gods of the ancient egyptians whom yahweh is shown to triumph over right and we find throughout the old and new testament these elements of paganism that are sort of incorporated and then transformed into something radically different in in a in a new testament or or christian idiom if you've ever traveled in italy for example you find you'll find all over the place you'll find churches named santa maria sopra minerva st mary on top of minerva because there'll be a shrine some pagan shrine to the roman goddess minerva and you know some early catholics said we're going we're going to show minerva who's boss we're going to trump that card you know and we're going to climb up on top of minerva's shrine and we're going to build a shrine of the blessed virgin mary how you like that kaboom you know and uh and that's always been the way of the catholic church and we don't say that paganism is holy and entirely evil it's not right i mean paganism is is replete with natural religious sentiment that is that's highly suggestive of catholic fulfillment and that's the way the catholic church has always understood it so we take these elements of our culture if we live in the west you know these are these are the traditional gods of western paganism and and they're incorporate i mean that's part of our identity as westerners just like if you lived in the east the eastern patrimony is part of who you are and the catholic faith shows by all its rights and signs and rituals including its calendar that these things are not so much repudiated as purified transformed and received their fulfillment and culmination in jesus okay well we do appreciate that thank you so much for your question here's a a quick one one more here this is from anthony watching us on youtube uh anthony says can the sacrament of anointing be administered remotely by a priest uh for example covet patience uh cases here in india where the priest has no access to the patient no it can't be i'm so sorry to report you can't you can't do that however you shouldn't despair in the absence of a the absence of a sacrament does not mean the absence of grace right the presence of a sacrament guarantees the presence of grace it's a it's a visible audible tangible sign that god's grace is present and that's why we have the sacrament so we have that assurance but in the absence of a sacrament it's not like you know god's like oh my gosh i can't help that guy there's no sacrament and god can god can work immediately in the soul of anybody and does all the time so we presume on god's mercy and there are other ways you know to instrumentally bring grace to a person who is not able for some reason to receive the sacraments when the prayers of the church preeminently you pray for them yeah you know and and that's it's not the same thing as a sacrament but it's not nothing okay very good uh i do want to give out a personal shout out to one of our listeners who was just calling in his name is steve and steve as you can hear the music is coming up we didn't have time to get to your call on today's show but please call us back on monday because i was looking at what our screener wrote down your call is very important and we would love to tackle it on monday's program so do call us back hey dr david anders hope you have a great weekend thanks tom don't forget we do the program monday through friday here on ewtn 2 p.m eastern is when we do it with an encore at 11 pm eastern there's also the podcast of the program which is available 24 7 at ewtnradio.net ewtnradio.net on behalf of our fantastic team here charles berry michael birchfield and jeff burson plus all the other people who work behind the scenes i'm tom price along with dr david anders thanks for joining us see you monday right here on call to communion we hope that you have a great weekend as well god bless i'm kimberly hahn and my new show

Channel: EWTN

Views: 2,717

Rating: 4.9506173 out of 5

Keywords: Catholic, EWTN, Christian, television

Id: rSpYbgKwDpY

Length: 54min 15sec (3255 seconds)

Published: Fri May 07 2021