Called to Communion with Dr. David Anders - 2020-06-20 - Called to Communion with Dr. David Anders

what's stopping you from becoming a Catholic why can't women become priests why do Catholics worship Mary why do I need to confess my sins to a priest where is purgatory in the Bible I think the Pope has too much authority what's stopping you you are called to communion with dr. David Anders on the EWTN global Catholic radio network hey everybody welcome again to call to Communion the program for our non Catholic brothers and sisters I know it's going to be a great show because you're gonna contact us with those questions that you have about the Catholic faith here's our phone number eight three three two eight eight EWTN that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six if you're listening outside of North America please dial the u.s. country code and then two oh five two seven one two nine eight five you can also text the letters EWTN to five five zero zero zero wait for our response and then text us your first name and your brief question message and data rates may apply those of you watching us today on TV you can participate as well our email address CTC at ewtn.com CTC at ewtn.com all right Charles berry is our producer we also have Ryan Penney ready to answer your phone calls and Jeff person on social media he can pass on any questions you might want to pose if you're watching us right now on YouTube or Facebook live we're streaming there right now along with all of our other great platforms I'm Tom price at least twelve feet away from dr. David Anders Tom how are you today doing great how are you my friend thanks a very interesting question here that came in from Jordan on YouTube Jordan says what is the Catholic view of Protestants taking holy communion is it considered valid at all while it wouldn't be considered as valid as the Eucharist in the Catholic Church is it at least better than not doing anything at all thanks Jordan okay Jordan thanks appreciate the question so when you ask about Protestants taking holy communion I presume you mean taking their right of communion communion in the Protestant Church as opposed to the Catholic Church what does the Catholic Church think about that so this is not Holy Communion that's the first thing it's not it's not the communion that was given to us by Christ because it's not it's not infected by an ordained priests they don't have the real presence of Christ nor is it the symbol of the church's unity because in fact it's it's they're not in unity with the one holy cow absolutely so so there are some objective deficiencies there does that mean that I would advise Protestants in Protestant churches not to do their rights not to do what they do and no I would not advise them not to do what they do mean ultimately I'd like them to become Catholic of course allure but you know there's a passage in Pope Francis's apostolic exhortation I think it's paragraph 350 for memory serves me correct okay that are 154 I can't remember which where he talks about San analogous issues not the rights of Protestants but he really talks about the religious rights of non-christian religions and and and the way in which human religiosity naturally expresses itself in rites and ceremonies that can kind of become a focal point for the community and and sort of a point of transcendence for those that celebrate those rights and they may not have the efficacy of the sacraments of the Catholic Church but they might be that might still be occasions for people in those communions to come to a to it to a less egocentric and more more transcendent view of themself in relationship to their community so I won't say that there's no possible way would not say that that that somebody could derive some benefit even spiritual benefit and being called this sort of a higher conception of themselves into a life of faith and hope and so forth through those rites but really this falls outside the purview of the Catholic Church the Catholic teaching you know when when when the Pope and the councils teach authoritative ly they're really teaching about the Catholic faith of course this is what this is what Christ has told us to do this is how it ought to be done we don't really concern ourselves too much in an authoritative way with what other people are doing right we're gonna present the truth of Christ and invite everybody to participate sure and then we trust that God can reach everybody in an unseen way and ultimately perhaps these rights perhaps not maybe an occasion for God to draw them closer and closer to the unity of the Catholic faith and many Protestants I know of course have have come up in their communions and they've been very sincere in their faith and then they've explored the the roots and depths of their own tradition they wake up one day and go this what happened to me oh I'm in the wrong church the whole thing what you know I want the full the full picture I better go join the Catholic Church and that happens to a lot of us Jordan thanks so much for checking us out on YouTube here's another view tube viewer and that would be Clement who says dr. Anders could you please explain the seventh-day adventists claim that quote the Catholic Church changing the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday and Sunday worship is a mark of the beast yeah thanks so first of all the Catholic Church did not change worship from Saturday to Sunday because and this is the this is what's false in the seventh-day Adventist claim there's nothing in the Old Covenant nothing in the Old Testament nothing in the law of Moses that specifies Saturday as a day of worship nothing in there whatsoever at all I challenge you go back and read the Ten Commandments go back and read the Sabbath commandment what does it say six days you work on the seventh day rest that's right doesn't say anything about worship that's exactly I actually go read what the Old Testament says about the worship of the Hebrews the worship of the Israelites was it limited to one day a week no no not at all seven days a week yeah the temple was going all the time the priests were making sacrifices all the time so the whole premise of the question is just faulty the idea that Jews worshipped on Saturday as opposed to Sunday they worshipped every day they worshipped every day they set aside one day as a day of rest and why the seventh day well because the Genesis account God creates the world in six days on the seventh day he rusts and then the Hebrews are called to imitate that after the creation order but the whole point of the incarnation death and resurrection of Christ is this the end of the end of the world in the creation of a new one Christ is the new Adam second Adam right and we're in here we're in a new heavens and a new earth or at least sort of incipient Lee that the seed has been planted right for the full culmination at the end of days Paul talks about the church being we on whom the end of the ages has come right it was a new thing and that's why the New Testament church celebrated the day of the Lord's resurrection the Lord's Day with special solemnity we find that in scripture and passage like Acts chapter 20 we read about the first day of the week being the day that the church would gather together to celebrate the Lord say the day of as a resurrection the day of the new creation okay appreciate that and a real quick question as we're going to break here Julio no wants to know about sacraments having two aspects do all sacraments have two aspects formal and material oh yeah sure sure sure sure so I mean that's that's how we specify a sacrament is the matter of the sacrament is the form of the sacrament absolutely all of them have that characteristic we can define them all in those terms okay very good and we thank everybody for checking us out on all the various platforms whether it's YouTube or Facebook anywhere we're glad to be with you here on EWTN is called communion in a moment we'll be talking with rod Robb in Rochester New York checking us out there on pucks at bonum radio we've got a line open for you as well if you have a question for dr. David Anders eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six on this edition of call to communion here on EWTN it's called a communion here on EWTN if you're ready now let's go to the phones at eight three three two eight eight EWTN we're gonna begin this time with Rob in Rochester New York listening on Hawks at bonum radio a first-time caller hey Rob what's on your mind today hey dr. Anders it's a pleasure to speak with you Utah I've more than once are you there yeah I'm right here okay good impressed with your clear thinking I forgive me I'm a little nervous now my question one of my questions is does receiving Communion make an actual difference in people's lives yeah I appreciate the question well it depends it depends it could make a difference for the good it could make a difference for the for harm could be harmful and it could be and it could be a very mild or moderate difference so it really depends on the charity of the communicant so the the mass is valid mass is valid regardless of whether or not the communicant is in a state of grace or mortal sin if the priest is a valid II ordained priests ii use proper form and intent then it's a valid eucharist but our ability subjectively to appropriate the Grace's that are made available are really dependent on our subjective condition first of all whether or not we're in the state of grace and secondly the the order of our charity and in fact I was it's kind of ironic that this question would come up I was reading an article in Saint Thomas last night on the question of whether or not every act of charity increases charity because you know you can grow in a virtue if you practice the acts of that virtue you can increase that virtue and Thomas was actually asking the question does every single concrete act of virtue necessarily cause you to grow in the habit of charity in his answer to the question was no no no and the reason why is it's kind of like lifting a weight you know I can go to the gym and pump iron and grow my muscles but if I go lift a feather weight I'm not gonna do anything right you know you actually kind of have to strain the muscle right to get some progressive loading going on there and in st. Thomas says it's kind of the same in the spiritual life you know you could you could make an act of charity think was quite tepid and didn't really stretch you in the spiritual life and the same thing would go you know it would be with any act of charity and of course you're taking holy communion presumes the the act of charity you know for it to be beneficial so it could be very it could be very profitable might be weakly profitable it might be unprofitable for communicant were to go forward in the state of mortal sin is that a helpful for you rod it was leading to it I'm sorry was that helpful for you I was kind of leading up to a scientific question which is a little off-base if you have any more time at all forms you will see what you got it seems this is a perfect opportunity for a replicable blinded randomized study like a drug study to prove the effects of receiving a blessed host versus placebo a consenting congregation could participate no one in the building would know which host blessed or placebo was received until the end of the study perhaps perhaps six months and then any significant differences between the two groups blessed versus placebo would prove the effect of transubstantiation hmm yes I understand the question oddly enough I actually wrote an article on this one time because you could you construct a double-blind placebo experiment with a control group and a test group to test for the efficacy of a valid sacraments versus placebo sacraments Wow and I'll give you my conclusion I wish I had the article in front of me I'd read it off to you but but I said you couldn't set up the experiment right because because you'd have to know more that there's more than one thing that you would need to know not just the question of validity and invalidity of the sacrament but you'd also have to be able to separate the test group in the control group into those that were in the state of grace and those that were not and those that had that had an ardor of charity and those that had tepid charity hmm and those are things you could never test for or control for right so so here's another model that I proposed all right and this is not going to give us sort of statistical certainty but but a sufficient kind of certainty for the credibility of the faith and it really is the it's the kind of certainty that comes from the narrative of a human life we can look to the lives of the Saints those who are imminent in charity and we can we can know because of the evident extraordinary character of their life and we can listen to their own testament their own testimony about their subjective psychological condition and the role that the sacraments played in their moral improvement and then we can test that against our own individual experience right we can we can apply what we know about the teaching of the faith and we can gauge whether or not whether or not we have been able to purge ourselves from some of our past faults and and and then better yet ask the people we live with am i makin progress am i am i moving along they'll tell you and you know a lot of times in life we will have periods of excitement and enthusiasm followed by discouragement maybe disillusionment and it's tempting sometimes when you fall into those darker periods that they go maybe I've lost it maybe I'm off track maybe I'm just deceiving myself and yet there's another perspective we can bring to bear which is that the process of disillusionment can itself be sanctifying we can't have you running around with a bunch of illusions now can we right you know the this continual growth and self-knowledge and passing through phases and appealing away of the artificiality that so often blinds us to ourselves and our own faults and the real needs of others and and if we keep maybe the way to you know if we keep becoming conscious of of greater and greater depths of our own self-deception right and less and less confident and our ability to act charitably or hopefully and we you know we begin to recognize how fake we are and how false and inauthentic we are that itself is a form of growth in charities or growth and humility and and usually is accompanied by deeper and deeper compassion hey we really appreciate your call Rob thank you so much for it and that opens up a line for you right now if you have a question for dr. David Anders eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six it's called a communion here on EWTN let's go to Suzanne now in Philadelphia listening on Sirius XM 130 a first-time caller hey Suzanne what's on your mind today hello Doctor a longtime listener first-time caller enjoy the program very much I have a question concerning marriage between a Catholic man never married and a Jewish woman who has one who was once married and divorced could this marriage be performed in a Catholic Church depends depends so Catholic Church recognizes two kinds of marriage there's what we call natural marriage and sacramental marriage and natural marriage is what everybody across the world recognizes as the normal kind of marriage it's the lifelong and two syllable union of a man and a woman for the sake of raising a family and and Jewish people do it and Moslems do it Hindus do it and Buddhists do it and atheists do it and and you know Paleolithic animists do it right I mean it's just it's just it's just the way of the world we find some form of that relationship in every culture and and we read the account of God's institution of this in the book of Genesis with Adam and Eve now Christ indicates to us that the intent that the the natural good at human person his lifelong indissoluble fidelity but in without the grace of God the natural marriage it's very difficult to do it's very difficult to do that's why in chapter 19 in Matthew chapter 19 when the Pharisees asked Christ about the Mosaic law and divorce he says well God permitted this because of the hardness of your hearts but it wasn't that way from the beginning and you know what God has joined man must separate so the so the idea is that even the natural marriage would be would be a lifelong indissoluble union but that's hard to accomplish then there's sacramental marriage and that's when two baptized people marry it takes the natural marriage elevates it to the level of a sacrament and because it's the sacrament it comes with grace and grace strengthens us to meet those arduous demands of the marital life and so it should be easier in theory for the sacramental marriage to endure and not only to endure but ginger with charity and as a sign of Christ's love for the church but in either case natural marriage or sacramental marriage can be valid and if valid then we have a natural obligation to the person to whom we made those those vows and promises so anytime that someone presents themself as married whether naturally or sacramentally the church takes that representation very clearly very seriously and prior to performing another marriage on one of those partners has to investigate the case and determine if the valid if there really was a valid marriage with a natural or sacramental so in the present situation that you mentioned potentially potentially but you need to you need to take it to the attention of the church let the marriage tribunal examine the case and determine what what the what the situation is alright Susanna thank you so much for your call it's called a communion here on EWTN if you have a question for dr. David Anders we're ready to ready to get that question at eight three three two eight eight EWTN that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six here's an email that just came in from Jack were Catholic missionaries threats to kill Native Americans who refuse to convert to Christianity not a violation of the faiths commitment to preserving the sanctity of human life from birth until the moment of death okay thanks so I don't know all these people these Catholics who were threatening to kill people on pain of conversion right that's not the way the Catholic Church generally operates and and in fact some of the more interesting stories from the colonial era are the Catholic martyrs that were killed at the hands of the people that they were evangelizing go read about the Jesuit martyrs in in Michigan in Canada in these kinds of places and the horrible tortures that they underwent willingly knowing that they were going to go to the death yeah to go share the gospel with Native Americans and that's not to say that that that European colonialists never performed atrocities against Native Americans of course they did absolutely and that's deeply regrettable in them cause of great sorrow and repentance on the part of the church but it's not the church's policy to attempt to force conversions because they wouldn't be conversions that's true right I mean faith is a human act and it proceeds from our own interior arity and freedom and if it doesn't proceed in that way that it's not the virtue of faith and it's kind of like you know holding a gun to somebody's head and saying love me it's contradiction in terms formative contradiction you can't do it it's not possible yeah the nature of love is that it's the free gift of self the willing surrender of yourself you know in charity and benevolence and the desire for union with another human being you can't possibly want to be in union with somebody who's repelling you with violence and so it wouldn't be it's it's it's against canon law it's against the teaching doctrine in law of the church and the thing would be a complete travesty and then an utter absurdity now you know have there ever been have there ever been individual Catholics and others for them the traditions as well who out of their own neuroticism and insecurity have attempted to force people into their own ideological straightjacket we'll see it all the time sure what's going on today all over the place right and left right and left ness a great cause of suffering and the Catholic Church says no absolutely John thanks so much for your email another John this one watching on YouTube wants to know could dr. Anders please explain Psalm 82 verse 1 I'll quote that for you God stands in the divine Assembly he administers judgment in the midst of the gods well who is God referring to who are the gods right okay so there's more than one way to read this text okay there's more than one way to read this text so one way to read it and this would be the way that the Church Fathers generally do would be that these small G gods are the angelic hosts oh that's one way of reading it all right now there's another way of reading it and Matthew ramage of Benedictine college catholic biblical scholar has written a book called the dark passages of the Bible based on the work of Pope Benedict and Benedict's exegesis and he deals with these kinds of passages at length and and raises the question well you know where were their polytheistic Israelites and at one level we know the answer is yes right because the prophets were always kept castigating this Israelites for being polybius they're like give up your other gods guys and come back to come back to the one god right that was the that was the constant refrain throughout the prophetic literature so we know that there were polytheistic Israelites who didn't quite get it in their thick skulls that the God of Israel was the only gone and and so there's this constant dialectic right in the Bible between the claims of the one God and then and then exalting Yahweh is the only God and and so you could also read this in that light that that hey all you people out there that believe in many gods whatever it is you think is God God our God is beaten stew out of those guys you know he is the only God that that you need to concern yourself with and so it could be kind of a nod to the challenge of polytheism that the psalmist is confronting right and he's rejecting that in in teaching the doctrine of the one god or it could be as the father said just a reference to the angelic hosts sure all right very good and we thank you so much for your question via youtube it's called a communion here on EWTN what's going out to a Sally in Baton Rouge and Sally's the first time caller hey Sally what's on your mind today I would like to the doctors view on the Catholic Church's belief in purgatory yeah thanks appreciate the question my view is that it is a Catholic belief therefore I believe it those churches defined it in Scripture and sacred tradition have revealed it and theologians have written about it so it's definitely part of the part of Revelation as part of the church's teaching and traditional and it's a wonderful teaching so here's what we know about purgatory number one it exists that's the most important thing to know about purgatory it exists beyond that we don't know a whole lot we know a few things one of the things we know about purgatory is it exists for the sake of purgation right so psalmist says who can ascend the Lord's Mountain or stand on its holy hill only he who has clean hands and a pure heart Christ our Lord says blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God well if you're like me and you struggle sometimes the purity of heart you know you got to get that fixed alright if not in this life didn't and then the next and that's one of the purposes of purgatory remember in Isaiah chapter 6 when Isaiah sees this theophany sees the Lord High and lifts it up on the throne he goes oops I'm toast and God says that's right you're toast but it's okay I'm going to take an angel and send him to you with this burning coal from the altar and purify you with fire and then you can be worthy you can go out and do what you're supposed to do that's a beautiful picture of the kind of probation that would take place in purgatory the other thing we know that can happen in purgatory is we can do penance for sentence Fourche we haven't done adequate penance in this life and we see that again in passages like second Maccabees chapter 12 or it's indicated that the souls of the dead can benefit from the prayers and sacrifices of the church on their behalf as they make reparation for the sins I committed in this life salary thanks so much for your call there's a line open for you right now it's eight three three eight two eight eight EWTN for call - communion [Music] it's called a communion here on EWTN we do have a line open for you if you have a question for dr. David Anders 8 3 3 2 8 8 EWTN that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six let's go to Daniel right now in Espanola New Mexico listening to us on Facebook live hey there Daniel what's on your mind today god bless you guys one of the question was as I were walking on EWN and I'm the priest had mentioned God was 33 when he died I just wanted to verify it that's true yeah thank you so the Gospel of Luke chapter 3 tells us that Christ was about thirty years old when he began his public ministry and then you you do the chronology with the gospel narratives and you come up with about three years of public ministry so you know about 30 years old is how I'll do is was what he started to give or take whatever we have to give or take and that's more or less how we how we can do it we have some other benchmarks in scripture when we're told that you know Christ John Baptist ministry coincided with the reign of Tiberius Caesar and you know the Pilate was the governor of Judea and we can kind of triangulate a little bit that's pretty good estimation okay there you go Daniel thank you so much for your call here's an email now from Felix who says dr. Anders what was or were the rationale as to why the Catholic Church instituted the sacrament of penance or confession several hundred years after the establishment of the church what did the early Christians do before that and if God is all hearing and knowing why does anybody need a priest to tell someone that they're forgiven okay thanks well I'm afraid you're misinformed my friend the church did not institute the Sacrament of Penance several hundred years after the Gospels on the contrary the sacrament was instituted by Christ our Lord and we can read about it John chapter 20 where he breathes on the Apostles and says received the Holy Spirit whoever sins you forgive are forgiven whoever sins you are you retain and retained and we can actually see it in action in the Saint Paul's ministry in Corinth when he acts communicates a fellow for for immorality and then readmits him and says I forgive him in the presence of Christ and readmits him to the fellowship of the church so we can see it in the Ministry of Christ we could see the Ministry of the Apostles now the church changed the mode of reception okay of this Accra but of course the church can do that right so it used to be that that confession was public and penance was public and absolution was public and you can you can read about this in texts like Tertullian an ancient Christian writer from North Africa in the second century has a text on penance and he discusses this and and Saint Agustin and sermon to the catechumens written in the fourth century talks about the order of penitence in the church and so penances used to be very long they could be you know days weeks or months long even and and people who were doing penance in the church would be actually in a public state and kind of they'd sit off to the side in their own little area and the church and they would dress a certain way and there's pretty bad regime to be honest with you and and if you read the canons of the Council of Trent excuse me not Kansas got shot cans the Council of Nicaea actually give special instructions on on the reconciliation of those in the order of penitence if they're in danger of death and so there's there's a lot of documentation about this in Christian antiquity and and and it was by and large it was a public celebration st. James kind of intimates in James chapter 5 when he says you know confess your sins to one another and you'll be healed anybody's sinned he should call for the elders of the church and he's sick they can call him they'll pray on him and I know I'm with old prayer offered in faith to make the sick person well and anybody who sinned will be forgiven right so the context here is a sort of public celebration of this confession and there was an early Christian excuse me an early critic of Christianity also in the 2nd century named Celsus he was a pagan he hated Christians and and we know about Celsus because the church early church writer Origen wrote a refutation of celsus called against Celsus contra Selim and and it's quite funny right because one of the things that Celsus hated about Christians he said Christians are like frogs sitting around a pond croaking at one another about how sinful they are I just love that image right so that was how it was that's how it was but while that's going on all right there is a discipline that is emerging especially in the fourth century in in Egyptian monasticism and it's the it's the tradition of spiritual direction and private confession to a spiritual mentor or director not necessarily connected to the Sacrament of Penance but in the context of discernment and discretion and trying to grow the spiritual life and that became part and parcel of the monastic discipline and people caught on pretty quick this is good stuff this is good stuff you know today people pay $150 an hour to do that right it's called going to your therapist and and it has been shown even scientifically that that is one of the most effective ways to bring about personal change is accountability to another human being all right it's very very effective and because we're not good judges of ourselves we and we don't we don't do a good job with that we need other people to kind of keep us accountable and tell us what's what and and so then in the Middle Ages we still had the Sacrament of Penance going strong but people began to go to the monasteries for spiritual direction and they would make private confession in that context and there was a great reform of the church that began in the 11th century under the authority of Pope Gregory the 7th Hildebrand and he had been a monastic right he'd come out of the cluniac reform movement and a big thing that Gregory wanted to do was to bring some of the renewal and the discipline of the monastic communities to the Christian population at large and it in it that had been going on for a while but he really institutionalized it okay and it led to this sort of great fervor this I really believe that's wouldn't the Reformation it was a Catholic idea wouldn't a Protestant idea Reformation really begins with Gregory the seventh who said let's bring the energy and the impetus and the spiritual renewal of Cluny Act monasticism to the church at large and it kind of culminates in the fourth Lateran Council which is in the year 1215 and that's when the church said you know what we're gonna institutionalize this connect it to the Sacrament of Penance and require that every Catholic make private confession to a priest at least once a year so that's the history of the thing now as to why we need the sacrament whether you do it publicly or privately first of all Christ instituted and he Institute's this I call the sacraments for a reason sacraments are visible signs of graces that he wishes to give us why do i establish a visible sign like why why baptism why eucharist why penance why warden he could just zap us into like invisibly with these Grace's yeah he could but then we wouldn't know right we wouldn't know we would just surmise right but if you have a visible sign you have objective certainty sure well I know I've received this grace of forgiveness and this strength to live a moral life because I've got the objective sign to which Christ is attached I stabbed lished the promise whoever sins you forgive or forgiven and so there's a there's a psychological kick that comes along the certainty the certainty of the thing and then the virtue of hope that's why he gives us sacraments could he send it all invisibly yeah but then we wouldn't know thank you so much for your question that is called a communion here on EWTN our phone number eight three three two eight eight EWTN if you have a question for dr. David Anders eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six here is Barbara now in Show Low Arizona listening on Sirius XM 130 hey Barbara what's on your mind today hi I know that when Christ was on the cross he said to John behold Your Mother and mother behold your son and the Catholic Church teaches that he was also giving his mother to us but I just wondered what evidence they have of that teacher yeah thanks appreciate the question so here's this text in the book of Revelation that speaks about the woman who gives birth to the child who rules the nations with a rod of iron that's Christ of course is also the mother of all those who believe in Jesus well that'd be us that'd be the church right and and there's a beautiful parallelism to Eve who's our mother after the flesh right human race descended from our first parents Adam and Eve according to the flesh well you know there's some good that came out of that but not all good we that didn't always go so well we inherited original sin and the wounds of original sin from our first parents but scripture tells us that Christ is a second Adam or reborn in him so what we lost in Adam we regained in Christ that's how st. here has put it and even as Christ as the second Adam so Mary is the second Eve right she is our maternity is not physical in the way that Eve's was not of us at any rate but it's a spiritual partition and she participates in that spiritual rebirth of the church right but through her and Fiat through her own be it done to me according to thy word she gives her consent and therefore she is the first instrument human instrument of the Incarnation and the salvation of the world without her consent we would all be sunk you know she had to say yes and she did thank thanks be to God for that that's why she prophesied all generations will call me blessed she's blessed hallelujah right she said yes and we are all the beneficiaries and so her yes really was the instrument a very singular instrument to bring the Incarnation and to bring that spiritual rebirth to all people who receive Christ that's why Scripture calls her the mother of all those who believe in Jesus Barbara thank you so much for your call it is called a communion here on EWTN or phone number eight three three two eight eight EWTN that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six Deborah's checking in on Facebook this is regarding an earlier question David regarding of forced conversions she says David you just lost me you know this occurred all over the Americas this is one example of the flaws of Catholicism what say you well I don't really know that it occurred all over the Americas I mean I know that there have been instances of violence that were portrayed against indigenous peoples but I mean I don't really think that this is a like a standard policy of the Catholic Church I mean I granted there were conquistadors who did atrocious things but you know I mean I'm not condoning that I certainly think that's rather horrible and and it's not it's not why I became a Catholic right and in fact if somebody came to me and put a gun to my head and said become Catholic or else I couldn't do it I couldn't do it because that's that's not what faith means sure and but alongside egregiously immoral people who attempted to exploit indigenous people for their own selfish purposes there are also examples of tremendous heroism and self-sacrifice on the part of genuine Catholic saints who wanted to give themselves in love to the whole world in imitation of Christ those are the guys I'm would like I would like to identify with not the others absolutely Debra thank is for watching thank you for watching us on Facebook we do appreciate that it is called a communion here on EWTN want to say a few words about our wonderful Catholic news agency anything that you read that is you know presented to be as news please know that that has been checked and double-checked and triple-checked to make sure of its accuracy this is one thing the Catholic news agency is very much a stickler about and and if it's an opinion piece it's going to be labeled as an opinion piece do check it out it's the only fast reliable and free Catholic news source that brings everyday blogs stories opinions and more to your fingertips for the latest Catholic news news that you can trust visit catholic news agency comm it's an online service from EWTN news back to the phones right now at eight three three two eight eight EWTN here is Bruce in Cedar Rapids listening on K mmk 88.7 FM hey Bruce what's on your mind today penance penance penance the need for restitution okay thanks appreciate the question so in other words like let's say that that someone had say you stole something from your brother mm-hmm and you wouldn't took his record his favorite Beatles record you took Abbey Road you know and and then you went to the priest and went to confession said I stole my brother's record collection and he said well here's your penance would you also be required to to restore his copy of Abbey Road all right well it means it kinda depends on what you mean by required mm-hmm would you be required to do that as a condition of priestly absolution and the answer to that question is no right and here's why right because the no no absolution is conditioned antecedently on the penitence agreement to perform a certain penance right so so if I go to confession the priest cannot say I'll absolve you but only on condition that you promise to do X that's not how it works no that's not how it works the only the only thing that the priest can condition is your contrition you have to actually be sorry like you really wish you didn't do it and you really don't want to do it again if you're contrite the priest cannot refuse you absolution then when he imposes the penance it's not as a condition of your absolution it's so that you can make reparation to God and the church for the offense that you've committed and and look there's not necessarily a strict mathematical proportionality between the temporal penance imposed by the priest and the gravity of your offense I mean this is in the order of love and and and sometimes it can be just kind of a token you know I mean we see that in human relationships I remember one time when I was a kid I trashed my parents house you know a bad guy that I was and they weren't very happy about it and they imposed a penance called a punishment on me and I remember they really won that big a deal like it didn't it didn't go anywhere close to making up for the offense that I caused but it was token you know and I kind of half-heartedly and they accepted that and we were reconciled and that his penances can be that way right in our relationship with God they can not really be proportionately mathematical to the offense that we cause now here comes another question like should you and human justice restore what you took answer the questions yes yeah yeah you should I mean the natural virtue of justice does indeed require restitution so you would you would give your brother Abbey Road and sergeant pepper's back right Wow you're hurting me now Tom now we're getting into it all right thank you so much if not for the record steal my brother's copyright I'm very glad to hear that Bruce thank you so much for your call it's called a communion here on EWTN let's go to Elizabeth now and Dwight Nebraska listing on the Great Spirit Catholic radio hey Elizabeth what's on your mind today well I have an interesting question and this I mean I'm completely Catholic and I completely believe that Jesus is the Son of God but he sometimes says things that are a little bit confusing for example on the cross he said my God my God why have you forsaken me this and there's other examples like this in the Gospels it makes it sound like he isn't God but he's calling on God so why would why wouldn't he just say father why have you forsaken me yeah thanks because he's quoting a psalm that's why he's quoting Psalm 22 which is a messianic Psalm and this cry of dereliction and and in doing so he is identifying with Israel in her state of alienation and exile and in fact the moment the the moment of Christ's physical death on the cross was in fact the hour of liturgical prayer in the temple when Jews would recite the Psalms and so in the moment that Jesus dies on the cross he in a profound way identifies with Israel in her liturgical prayer and her state of exile and alienation accepting in his own person the the the the wounds as the representative of Israel that that she suffered right and in fully entering into solidarity with wayward humanity and all of this is signaled right by his decision to quote that particular Psalm at that particular time it's a highly symbolic act and has to be read in light of Israel's liturgical history very good Elizabeth thank you so much for your call we do appreciate that here's a question from Joanne watching us right now on YouTube Joanne says when does the age of dinosaurs and the caveman enter into the timeline of life yeah thanks so so I'm not a paleontologist right and I get if I start if I start naming paleontological arrows I'm gonna get them wrong and embarrass myself but whenever the paleontologists say that it does I'll put it that way okay and you know really the reason a question like this would come on to a Catholic call-in show I mean you don't think I'm a scientist or an anthropologist I hope not right so why ask me well I think it's because folks may get a little bit nervous about does this impinge in any way on the biblical account of creation or the Catholic doctrine of creation and the answer to that question is I don't think so right and of course that's the church doesn't think so Pope doesn't think so Catholic theologians don't think so even the Church Fathers didn't think so because they understand the book of Genesis is really not about those kinds of questions it's really a book it's a book of theological anthropology it's a book about the origin of the human person in his relationship to God and about our being created in his likeness and image with rationality and freedom and the choice for or against God and in our in our and our loss of grace and our need for salvation that's really what the text is about it's not about dinosaurs very good appreciate your question Joanne thanks for watching us today on YouTube also watching on YouTube is Ryan who says how is it that Catholics assume that the penance that the priest gives satisfies the temporal punishment due to the sins committed yeah thanks so again I sort of talked about this a minute ago right and we're not suggesting that there's a kind of mathematical exactitude you know and as if the priest somehow had a little manual and he go as many sounds rad it all up in the ledger and this is why much pettish you have together doesn't work that way right this is a condition that the priest sets for you to perform to come back into communion with the church that's what it is right it's not it's not it's not offered is a kind of mathematically perfect proportionality directly weighted against the gravity of your sentence and and you know our whole life is supposed to be a life of Penant of penance of potential life and in fact it's interesting saint francis of assisi 'he's great saint of the catholic church many people have part of him of course and a lot of people have him in the front yard in the form of a statue what people don't realize when Francis started his public ministry what he did was not as unusual as you might think he went off and put on sackcloth and ashes and wore clothes and he goes off and starts rebuilding this church you know stone by stone and and in fact there was more of that going on in his era than you would have imagined and there were there were bands of laypeople who wanted to live a more deeply pious and committed life and they bound themselves together as what were called brothers of penance right Jesus says repent right and believe the gospel st. John the Baptist does two works of penance of prayer fasting almsgiving and and these are these are characteristic forms of piety that should that really should characterize qualifies the whole of the Christian life that were people of Prayer people of fasting people of of charity and and in living that way cooperating with the grace of God we can really attain eternal life and so it's not like the penance that the priests imposed in the sacrament is the only penance you should do in life you know I remember a long time ago before I was even Catholic I had a non Catholic friend that drove around the campus at EWTN and he remarked that you know what I'm talking about Tom there's a sign on one of the walls that says as a penance please don't smoke that's right you know you can you can do penance all the time in a lot of ways or definitely all right thank you so much for that question here's a question we received via email from Henry Henry says I was talking with my Protestant parent about the real presence and they jumped to John 6:63 before I even got around to mentioning the larger context it just surprised me how confident they were that Jesus is not speaking literally in the bread of life discourse how do you deal with folks that take an exclusively metaphorical approach in interpreting the bread of life discourse in John 6 for example getting entirely focused on verse 63 quote it is the spirit that gives life the flesh is of no avail the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life and then quote unquote saying therefore Jesus is speaking of something spiritual not something we can ever touch as in with our flesh thanks Henry yeah well a couple things we should we should we should attend to here one of them is that the context of the remark is why did so many people turn away at the teaching of Jesus because when he gave the bread of life discourse said you eat my flesh and drink my blood folks said I'm out of here I'm not going in for that flesh and blood stuff huh and then Christ turns to the apostles and he says that you guys gonna leave I say you've got words of eternal life we're not gonna go anywhere and Christ says no one can come to me unless the father draw him it's the spirit that gives life you're not talking about the the spirituality of the Eucharist he's talking about the spirituality of the act of faith hmm that faith is a gift that God gives and not everyone and and that's how you can explain why some people followed Christ and others turned away that's the context of his remark but you know the point that she raised is important because texts are by their very nature ambiguous they admit of divergent interpretations mm-hmm and so if you take the position that the text is all we have to go on that Christ somehow intended the Bible is our sole rule of faith then you have to conclude that Jesus wanted the church to be confused right because it's evident there are thousands of different groups that read scripture in very divergent ways well is that what he intended that he I intend for us not to have any certainty on the meaning of the faith I don't think so because Christ is the one said you have to believe and be baptized to be saved he wouldn't specify belief as the mode of salvation and not tell us how to believe that's why he didn't give us the Bible as our own faith he didn't leave us that way right in fact he gave us the teaching church said to the Apostles go therefore teach everything I've commanded you I'll be with you to the end of the age whatever you bind on earth is bound in heaven and whatever you loose on earth is loosed in heaven Christ gave us a teaching church as our rule of faith to actually define the contours of of the Christian faith so we can have certainty and so we pick up a text like whether it's John 6 John 3 so how is the church understood this for 2,000 years that's the only that's the only rule of faith we need all right and we thank you so much for your question as well man a fast moving hour I can't believe it dr. David Andrews thank you my friend thank you Tom we did the program here on EWTN at least on the radio side Monday through Friday at 2:00 p.m. Eastern we also bring you an encore of that same show at 11:00 p.m. Eastern with a special best of program on Sunday at 2:00 p.m. Eastern a lot of people can't catch us during the week they love that best of show on Sunday afternoons and don't forget you can check out the podcast any tie of the day or night at EWTN radio dotnet on behalf of our great team behind the glass I'm Tom price along with dr. David Andrews thank you so much for joining us see you next time right here on EWTN Skol to communion god bless [Music]

Channel: EWTN

Views: 2,514

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Id: Wn1RZOIkbqs

Length: 50min 32sec (3032 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 20 2020