Called to Communion with Dr. David Anders - 2020-12-12 - 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 here on ewtn this is the program for our non-catholic brothers and sisters if you've got a question about the catholic faith and you don't know where else to turn let us be of assistance here's our phone number 83328 ewtn that's 833-288-3986 if you are listening to us or watching us outside of the u.s please dial the u.s country code and then 205-270 that's a special phone number just for folks like you 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 if you're watching us on tv today you can participate as well our email address ctc at ewtn.com ctc at ewtn.com charles berry is our producer ryan penny is uh handling phone screening jeff berson's on social media he'll be glad to uh pass along any questions you might want to pose via youtube or facebook live because we're streaming there right now i'm tom price along with dr david anders tom how are you today very well how are you my friend oh i'm pretty reasonable thank you glad to hear that we're going to lead off today with a text from luis luis says how do i explain to my methodist friend why only catholics can take communion at a catholic church is there a biblical reference to support this yes i really appreciate the question thank you so much so so uh there are a number of reasons why only catholics should partake of holy communion in the catholic church one of them is that it is not safe it's not safe to take holy communion if you're not properly disposed to receive holy communion saint paul tells us in the book of first corinthians that if we eat or drink the lord's body in an unworthy manner then we are guilty of the body and blood of the lord and instead of bringing us any spiritual benefits it will actually it'll actually work against our spiritual best interests and if you think about it like you can understand why because in the catholic understanding of salvation we can be saved only if we're reconciled to god in charity and jesus himself talks about when you don't don't go make your gift at the altar unless you can go be reconciled with your brother first and then you go make your gift and not every not every christian tradition teaches this truth about union with god there are many communities that teach that all you need to be reconciled to god is faith alone that you don't actually need contrition or charity or forgiveness of your neighbor and so if you go forward presuming that you are in communion with christ when in fact you have enmity in your heart with your neighbor or unconfessed sin or whatnot then then you're just you're just deadening your conscience and you're worsening your situation well the catholic church has a way of verifying that people are properly disposed to receive holy communion and it's called it's called the sacrament of reconciliation or penance uh it's actually the tribunal there's a judicial metaphor here of god's mercy where the priest not only acts in a in a sacramental fashion to represent the forgiving christ but in a juridical fashion he acts as a judge to determine that you are in fact sorry for your sins and that you want to make amends into penance and on that basis he can forgive you and authorize you to go to holy communion but if the church doesn't have jurisdiction over non-catholics so the priest is in no position to verify well this person is penitent they reconciled to god and so forth and so just admitting people willy-nilly to holy communion it's like you wouldn't give chemotherapy to everybody willy-nilly some people it might cure them other people's going to kill them yeah you know you don't you don't give holy communion to people willy-nilly like that the other reason is that communion is the sacrament of the church's unity also in saint paul's letter first letter to the corinthians he says that that we who partake of the one loaf are one body in christ this is the sign of our communion with one another and the communion that we have with the body of christ is a total unanimity in in our in our profession of faith saint paul says first corinthians 1 10 that we have to agree on everything well he doesn't mean we have to agree on whether vanilla ice cream is better than grapefruit sherbet but we have to agree on the elements of the faith the dogmas of the faith and the elements of the moral life the essentials of catholic faith and uh and and so we shouldn't partake of the sign of the church's unity if in fact we're not at union now your methodist friend look i'm not we're not saying anything bad about methodists we love methodists we want them to go to heaven we think well of them but it is evident that we don't agree with them on the elements of the faith the many things in which we disagree and so to profess unity where there's disunity is actually to testify falsely about ourselves and our neighbor so i mean there are a few exceptions to this rule on holy communion for non-catholics orthodox christians the eastern orthodox christians because they are so close to catholics in faith and practice and sacramentally are actually permitted to receive holy communion in catholic churches with you know in in most circumstances and protestants who are in danger of death protestants who are in danger of death and how otherwise have catholic faith in the sacraments can also be admitted in these cases of urgency to holy communion so it's not it's not an absolute bound but the principles are there and i've explained them very good luis thank you so much for your text here's a question from phil via email who says do you have to be a catholic to consecrate yourself to mary um that's a good question i would say no no uh it would be i mean i would be very happy for people to consecrate themselves to marry uh whether they're catholic or not it's a you know it's a little bit odd honestly right yeah i mean because mary's mother of the church mary consecration mary is a very very very catholic thing to do and i'd say you know someone who is disposed to consecrate themselves to mary understanding what that means mary is a mother of the church you know mary is the immaculate ever virgin all pure and all holy one and our chief intercessor uh you know in the church before the throne of christ and our heavenly father all this that's entailed by consecration i'd say if if you're ready to do that well what on earth is stopping you from becoming a catholic i mean please call me and tell me i'd like to know what's the hang up you know and uh and you better watch out you better watch out because if you consecrate yourself to the blessed virgin i mean she might actually really pay attention to you and the next thing you know you might be catholic uh-oh game over check please appreciate that uh thank you so much uh for your question phil in a moment we'll be answering a question from joe who sent us a text also an anonymous text looks like we just heard from leanne on youtube teresa on youtube and we're waiting for your phone call right now at 833 288 ewtn that's 833 288 3986 for call to communion stay with us [Music] it's called a communion here on ewtn our phone number 833 288 ewtn if you have a question for dr david anders 833-288-3986 let's get to a question here from teresa watching us on youtube today teresa says i'm talking to someone who is stuck between being christian and catholic i think what she means to say is between protestant and catholic but to go on teresa says how do you explain to them why we have catholic doctrine yeah thanks really appreciate the question and to clarify all catholics are christians yes not all christians are catholic right okay uh so so here's here's the way i like to present it when when christ made provision for handing on the faith when christ made provision for handing on the faith what provision did he make how in fact did he intend for us to hand on the christian faith what did he say well here's what jesus did not say all right so i'm going to write this book you know with 66 books in it and i'm just going to leave it sitting here on this bookshelf and you guys go discover it and pass it out do whatever you want with it come up with your own system he didn't do that right right in fact jesus never mentioned the book what christ said was well in his own person he said the kingdom of god is here and he gave a lot of teaching about how we should live to be reconciled to god and our neighbors and a lot of that teaching included structures and organizations and rituals that he wanted to be perpetuated in his memory do this in memory of me he said of the holy eucharist and then he he took all that and he he announced his intention to found a society a visible society he said to saint peter in matthew 16 you are peter peter means rock you're the rock and on this rock i will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it i give to you the keys of the kingdom of heaven whatever you bind on earth will be on heaven whatever you loose on earth is loose in heaven and uh so christ there tells us he says i will build my church church means ecclesia it's a it's a it's a body of people who've been called out and and distinguished as a society i'm gonna build a society he put peter at the head he gave the church the power of binding and losing he gave instructions about how people could be included within or excluded from this visible society in matthew chapter 18 he says you know hear people that are unrepentant they don't change their way of life they don't listen to authority you kick them out of the church he says so you see the church there is something that you can be visibly in or visibly out it's not an invisible society you can't get kicked out of an invisible society right but it's got visible lines of authority and there's a clear way to delineate who's in and who's out that's what jesus said he was gonna found and then into the leaders of that society the apostles he says in matthew chapter 28 go into all nations make disciples teach them everything i've commanded you and i'll be with you to the end of the age so promise of divine assistance forever whoever hears you hears me whoever rejects you rejects me christ founded a visible society gave that society promises of his divine assistance and authority and established it as the authoritative means for handing on the christian faith down through the centuries now that's what christ set up no why do you want to do something different why not stick to the society that christ founded now what is that society that christ founded with a promise of divine assistance that the gates of hell would not prevail against it till the end of the age was very simple you go back and look at the first century go back and look at the new testament church all right what happened in the next generation can we identify that yeah we can what happened in the third generation the fourth generation can we trace in a line of historic continuity from the new testament to the present a visible society in direct continuity with that founded by jesus yes we can that's the catholic church it's not the baptist church that was founded in 1609 by john smith it's not the lutheran church i was founded by martin luther uh you know he started working 1517 you know by the 1530s he had an organization going it's not the calvinists founded by john calvin not the reformed church founded by exwingly it's not the anglican church founded by henry viii it's not the mormon church founded by joseph smith it's not the jehovah's witnesses founded by russell it's not it's not the restorationist church founded by alexander campbell all these had human founders lay after the fact why only the catholic church founded directly by jesus catholic dogma is just the church's authoritative pronouncement on what it is that all christians have to hold in common now if you dispense with catholic dogma if you say well i don't hold catholic dogma well then you have no objective means to determine what all christians should hold in common well you say well what about the bible okay well what about the bible so how's that working for you throw the bible out there and say everybody agree on the bible well they might agree on the bible but they don't get anything else they don't believe how they don't agree on what it says witness the you know tens of thousands of protestant denominations that continue to splinter every day unable to agree on the meaning of the text and their differences from one another are profound they don't it's not like they have some little core of doctrines that no they they disagree profoundly with one another on the basis of the bible alone and the reason they can't agree is because jesus did not give us the bible as our rule of faith he gave us the teaching church so let's keep to the system that christ set up if we want to be christians that is i.e followers of christ let's follow the system that he established and not one invented by you know saxon monk in the 16th century martin luther sounds like a plan all right teresa thank you so much for checking us out today on youtube it's called a 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 uh interesting question here an anonymous question just came in from youtube this person says there is a guy in kansas named pope michael who claims to be the pope how do i know that he is not the true pope i love this question i love this question so let's let's try a thought experiment what if i said i'm the pope i'm the pope how would you prove me wrong how would you prove me wrong and that's all pope so-called false pope michael did a guy in kansas who popped up one day put on a bunch of white gathered a group of people in a room with him i think included his mother and some of his cousins and relatives and they all said we're cardinals you're pope all right it's like children playing a game it's like children playing a game all right so the way we know who the pope is is the pope is elected by the cardinals and recognized by all the catholic bishops in the world and they in turn stand in direct succession to their immediate predecessors the popes and bishops of previous generations all the way back to jesus all the way back to the first generation and you know this guy and this guy who calls himself michael is not the first person to claim that that he is the real catholic church and everybody else is is a pretender he's not the first to do that i mean there's actually been a lot of these people down through history and saint augustine of hippo gave at least one very helpful criteria way back in the fourth century to to distinguish these people from the genuine article there was a group in north africa called the donatists and they said we're the real catholic church all these other people are fakes we're the real guys and to be honest with you they didn't have a strong claim but their claim was better than michael okay they at least had bishops and priests who had apostolic succession right this guy doesn't they said we're the real church and uh augustine who lived in north africa at the time looked at him and he said um guys i hate to i hate to to burst your balloon but you're only in north africa doesn't catholic mean universal you know he had this he wonderful phrase he said the verdict of the whole world is conclusive so you know there's also the taxi cab driver test all right go to ankara go to amman jordan i don't care go to jerusalem go to tokyo go to beijing go to moscow go to go to caracas go to new york ask a taxi cab driver who's the pope they're gonna be like the guy in rome yeah that's right the whole world knows who the pope is sure the verdict of the whole world now those guys aren't authoritative right i'm saying this just to be funny but the bishops are the bishops are authoritative yes every catholic bishop in the world knows who the pope is is francis that's who the pope is there you go thanks so much for checking in on youtube it's called a communion here on ewtn our phone number two eight 833 ewtn if you have a question for dr david anders 833-288-3986 june is watching us on youtube right now she says would you be able to explain the age limits for fasting i am not a very knowledgeable catholic and i'm unable to explain this to my protestant sister thanks june um yeah sure so when the church imposes a fast by law like the fast that we do uh in during lent you know um it it it's it has attention to the care of souls and the and the care of persons right there's a attention to the person and the church recognizes that the very young and the very old and the sick and the infirm it might not be medically indicated for them to fast and so the church says okay we're calling a fast we want everybody to fast prepare for the coming of the lord prepare for the feast of easter or what not you know prepare your own souls for penance um uh you know but you do so in a manner that's proportionate that's reasonable given your state of life and health so that's that's the rationale for not making you know a one-size-fits-all program and uh and look you know if you're if you're 65 70 75 years old and you're in good health and strong and you feel like it would be spiritually beneficial for you to fast and your your doctors don't tell you to do otherwise look the church is not saying you can't fast it's just not mandating that you're right right you know but if you're a strapping 25 year old you know bodybuilding man you're like you know don't plead that you're feeling faint that's right that's right you don't wimp out on us okay june thanks so much for your question if you're ready now let's go to the phones at 833 288 ewtn we begin here with karen in wilmington north carolina listening to us on siriusxm channel 130. hey karen what's on your mind today hi um i'm a member of the ukrainian catholic church so we're eastern right our liturgy as you know is very similar to the orthodox and my husband and i have been having a discussion we are i'm unclear as to i think he he's of the impression that the orthodox churches are part of apostolic succession which we we know that the catholic church uh is and so maybe i you could explain what apostolic succession really entails yes thank you i really appreciate the question so your husband is correct uh the orthodox do possess apostolic succession and and for that reason they are considered by the catholic church to be a real church to be a valid church and they have real bishops and they have real priests and they have real efficacious sacraments and and there is a hairs breath of difference between catholic and orthodox and and for your own for your own ecclesial community your own church community of the ukrainian catholics i mean it really is a hare's breath right and it boils down to the question of obedience to the pope that's really what it boils down to that that the catholic faith teaches that christ established a petrin office as integral to the church's constitution and he he gave the pope universal jurisdiction over the entire church the pope really is the vicar of christ on earth and and the visible sign of the church's unity on earth and the orthodox that have left the catholic fold will generally acknowledge the that the pope has a kind of primacy of honor but they're not willing to surrender to the pope's universal jurisdiction so they they they plead an autonomy from the pope in terms of their own affairs uh that would that would contradict the catholic faith so that's really what it boils down to is the question of the extent of the pope's jurisdiction over the christian world all right uh thanks so much for your call karen that opens up a line for you right now at 833 288 ewtn that's 833 833-288-3986 it's called a communion here on ewtn radio let's go to a text now uh this is from joe joe says catholics often say prompted by genesis 3 15 that mary will crush the head of the serpent well how do we respond to the protestant claim that this doctrine contradicts the truth that jesus defeated satan by his death on the cross okay thanks so uh yeah i have absolutely no problem whatsoever at all translating genesis 3 15 as he will crush your head and you will strike his heel all right and that seems to be what the hebrew manuscripts indicate right so the the the translation that renders this with the feminine pronoun the she shall crush the head it comes from the latin vulgate translation of the hebrew text and it's an idiosyncrasy of the latin text uh that renders this with with the female pronoun uh but doesn't seem to actually be indicated by the hebrew text and so catholic faith is is that it christ is the one who defeats uh who defeats satan by his death on the cross i mean that's that's the catholic understanding of things now um you know in in christian iconography catholic iconography especially from the middle ages because of this translation of the vulgate it's very often very common to see iconographic depictions of our lady with her foot on top of the serpent's head now i i do think there are other biblical images that also support that in particular revelation chapter 12 depicts the woman who gives birth to the child who rules the nation with a rod of iron now that rod of iron business that comes from psalm 2 that's a messianic psalm so that's a reference to christ now who gives birth to the child who was that after all that was blessed virgin mary of course yes and revelation chapter 12 depicts her in confrontation with that ancient serpent the devil so so it's not like this identification rests exclusively on genesis 3 15. there's also that other biblical reference um but i i like i'm not offended by that either like the idea that mary is in confrontation with the devil well of course she is of course she's in confrontation with the devil devil hates the blessed virgin mary even as he hates us the whole church the whole church is in a spiritual war with the powers and principalities in the heavenly realms a war that we will only win because of the unique mediation of jesus okay very good and a quick question as we're heading to break here from leanne watching on youtube leanne says if god is a supreme god why does god need our praise god absolutely does not need our praise and he tells us repeatedly in sacred scripture i don't need your praise i miss a very common theme in the old testament psalm 50 you know in particular i don't need your praise i don't need your sacrifices i don't need your offerings in fact i really don't like them when you offer them with wrong motives so go away i mean that's that's really what he says okay and come back when you have a right attitude god wants us to praise him because it's good for us because it's good for us not because he's some megalomaniac or something all right thanks so much for your question in a moment we'll be talking with rommel in orlando also laura in mansfield ohio looks like we have two lines open right now at 833 288 ewtn that's 833-288-3986 for call to communion do stay with us [Music] it's called a communion here on ewtn if you're listening to us today on radio or perhaps watching online call now 833 288 ewtn if you're watching us on tv today you can participate by uh sending us an email ctc at ewtn.com all right let's go to uh rommel in orlando right now listening to us on youtube hey rama what's on your mind today hey good afternoon dr anders and tom i have a quick question it's regarding ephesians 2 chapter 10 it's preceding this is the 8 and 9. it was it's very popular that the protestants are always um quoting but the chapter 10 says for we are his handiwork created in christ jesus for the good works that god has prepared in advance that we should live in them my question would be that good work this is pertaining in this chapter would that be um the good works part of the salvation army yes thanks i really appreciate the question so you know you allude to verses 8 and 9 that immediately precede this and i'd like to go ahead and read that whole section for it is by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not from yourselves it is the gift of god not by works so that no one can boast for we are god's handiwork created in christ jesus to good to do good works which god prepared in advance for us to do okay so uh the larger context of saint paul's teaching on the relationship of faith and grace and good works we really find it elaborated in the books of romans and galatians and when paul teaches that we're justified by faith and not by works he specifies in this way he says not by works of the law not by works of the law and he he goes on to enumerate what those are they're things preeminently circumcision and the other elements of the mosaic cultic and ritual code and the reason he says that is because in the judaism of paul's day uh there were many people in the jewish faith that had a sort of tribal identity and they thought that that you know they were they were beloved by god on account of their identity in the tribe and that the way you marked out members of the tribe from those outside was by these external markings like circumcision or the laws of kashrut and so forth and and so this is one of the reasons that saint paul before he was converted was so adamant to put christians to death because he saw the christian faith as really destroying this distinction between jew and gentile that he thought was essential to identifying who would be saved on the last day you had to belong to the household of abraham marked out by these tribal identifiers like circumcision and dietary laws and so forth and and then when he's converted he has a completely opposite point of view which is that these things were mere signs and tokens and pointers a pedagogue to lead us to christ and now the family of god who will be saved are all those who are saved through faith in christ whether they be jew or gentile and the dividing wall the barrier of hostility and this he comes earlier in ephesians 2 namely the law with its commandments has now been done away with it says faith in christ that makes us a member of the body of christ the church that community of the elect that will be saved now how are in fact are you accounted righteous on that last day if it is not on the basis of circumcision and dietary laws then on what basis is it now our protestant friends tells us that we'll be accounted righteous simply on the basis of faith alone that's what the protestants say that's not what jesus said it's not what saint paul says jesus says in a number of places that on the last day when he separates the sheep from the goats it won't be based on circumcision and dietary laws but it will be based on things like did you clothe the naked or feed the hungry or give drink to the thirsty or visit the sick and the imprisoned matthew 25 he enumerates this specifically these kinds of elements paul does as well in romans chapter 2 he says that to those who buy perseverance in doing good seek glory honor and immortality to those god will give eternal life but to those who are disobedient there will be wrath and punishment revelation chapter 20 is another passage that speaks about the last judgment and jesus says that in the last day the book of life will be opened and the dead will be judged according to their deeds whether they were good or bad and those who do good will enter into eternal life and those who do evil into eternal punishment so over and over and over again in sacred scripture we see that the saved and the lost will be differentiated by by their good works not by circumcision dietary laws and other cultic purity codes of the old testament but but specifically those works done in charity and that's we bring that background to bear in understanding ephesians 2 8 to 10. the good works that god prepared for us to do in advance are precisely those kinds of things feeding the hungry clothing the naked forgiving our enemies loving our enemies being patient being kind being pure in heart hungering and thirsting for righteousness meekness those who mourn and so on and so forth those are the things that god prepared for the elect to do that we might be saved all right rama thank you so much for your call it's called a communion here on ewtn let's go to laura laura is in mansfield ohio listing on the blow torch there saint gabriel radio hey laura what's on your mind today well i know that christ founded the universal church at what point did they begin calling it the catholic church yeah thanks appreciate it so let me distinguish between the concept the catholic church and the word the catholic church okay all right the concept of the catholic church is simply a visible society that potentially incorporates the whole world jew gentile male female slave free you know all the elect throughout the entire world from the beginning of time to the end of time that will be saved on the last day that's the concept of the catholic church and that concept is taught in the new testament and by jesus himself the word catholic the greek word catholicos which means universal was first used by ignatius of antioch who was the third bishop of antioch after you had saint peter and then you had somebody and then you had then you forget who the immediate success repeater was and then you had uh ignatius he lived around 100 a.d and he was the first person to use the greek word catholicus to destruct to describe that entity okay but the entity was created by jesus i mean he could have called it like you know the best church or the green church or my church or you know whatever i mean the word is not as important as the reality right the reality that christ founded a visible society that that potentially incorporates everyone and that had a given structure a definite structure a an authority structure and a body of doctrine that's a biblical idea jesus articulates that ideal st paul articulates that idea ignatius of antioch applied the word catholic to that ideal okay very good and laura thank you so much for your call it's called a communion here on ewtn uh miguel just jumped in via youtube today miguel says do catholics keep sacrificing jesus even though he has already risen this troubles me okay thanks really appreciate the question answer to the question is absolutely yes in a lot of ways all right and but one above all so st paul tells us that we are members of christ's body that's what he says jesus said it in fact when jesus when saint paul was persecuting christians putting them to death jesus shows up on the road to damascus and he says saul saul why are you persecuting me why are you persecuting me all right and uh you remember when in john chapter 4 when jesus says uh the truth the father seeks worshipers who will worship him in spirit and in truth not on this mountain or that but in spirit and in truth well what is that worship and spirit industry what are we talking about well paul elaborates that in romans chapter 12 he says offer your bodies as living sacrifices offer your bodies as living sacrifice this is your spiritual act of worship so as we give ourselves to god this is our supreme act of worship our worship in spirit and in truth the one that christ told us the father desired now in offering ourselves if we are members of christ's body which jesus and paul both say we are we are in fact offering to christ christ's own members and that is exactly what saint paul says in romans chapter 15 the one time in sacred scripture where paul refers to himself explicitly as a priest and what is the office of a priest a priest offers sacrifice that's what a priest does that's what book of hebrews says that in romans chapter 15 paul says that his priestly sacrifice is in fact the gentiles that he's gathering up a pure offering to give to god namely the gentiles us believers in christ will be sacrificed will be offered up as we offer ourselves now as we offer ourselves again if we're members of christ's body we're offering christ to christ and you know that him christ has no body now but yours no hands no eyes no feet but yours you know and and as we go if this was this was mother teresa's spirituality to a t right you know she goes out as the body of christ to minister to the body of christ she saw christ in the poor the lame the hungry the broken the wounded and the dying and then she was christ to them now this is true worship this is the worship in spirit and in truth this is the offering of christ's body to christ's body so yes there's a there's a way in which we do this every single day simply in virtue of our christian identity but then there is an even more sublime way in which catholics continue to offer the body and blood of christ even though he died once for all and only once on calvary where we can continually renew and recapitulate that offering in a profound and liturgical way and that is in the holy eucharist because in the holy eucharist christ comes down to the altar body blood soul and divinity truly present in the holy eucharist now his his his death is not uh he's not killed again he dies only once on calvary right but he is truly and substantially present on the altar and the entire church offers that sacrament to god in reparation for the sins of the world paul teaches this explicitly jesus teaches this explicitly when jesus instituted the eucharist he used the language the sacrificial language of the old testament the language of offering given for broken for poured out for this is the language of old testament ritual and paul precisely analogizes the eucharist to sacrifices and he's he says you know the eucharist is the sacrifice of the church these other things are the sacrifices of demons you can't have any any any uh coordination between the two you just stick to the sacrifice of the altar which is the sacrifice of the church this is in first corinthians so the church has always understood the eucharist as a sacrifice something that we offer to god and in doing so we bring our own body we bring our own sacrifices our joys our sufferings our sorrows our prayers our good works our merits and we join those to the sacrifice of christ now in doing this are we killing jesus again that's the that's the charge that our protestant brothers and sisters make against us the catholic faith says absolutely not we are not killing jesus again he died once for all on calvary two thousand years ago and yet because he is substantially present in the altar it is the same victim the same victim who died on calvary in a bloody manner is now present on the altar in an unbloody manner and the same priest the priest who offered the sacrifice two thousand years ago namely jesus himself is now also present in the person of his minister the ministerial priest of the catholic church who stands in persona christi in the person of christ renews that offering and he offers it for the same intent for the salvation of the world for reparation for sense for honoring god same victim same priest same intent the manner of offering however is different a bloody offering two thousand years ago an unbloody offering today and you say to me well can you have an offering if it's not bloody yes you can okay you sure can all right miguel thanks so much for your question we do appreciate hearing from you today it's called a communion here on ewtn if you want to know what's going on here at ewtn whether it's radio or television internet the register all of our various apostolates all rolled up into one my recommendation is that you subscribe to wings that is the weekly e-newsletter that will appear in your in your inbox every thursday morning generally you can find out about ewtn radio and tv shows items from our very own religious catalog and so much more i always look forward to receiving it on thursday mornings i think you will as well sign up for wings by going to ewtn.com and look for that subscribe button click that you're good to go and you'll start receiving wings almost immediately back to the phones right now here on call to communion here is john in philadelphia listening on youtube a first-time caller hey john what's on your mind today hi so um why why should one believe that god is omnipotent given the existence of evil are there any reasons from philosophy or natural theology oh yes conclude yeah yeah thanks okay appreciate it so first of all let's get clear on evil and the the the catholic philosophical position on this uh really is at one with the neo-platonic doctrine on evil and so uh you'll you'll find this teaching enumerated in platinus in the aeneids and uh you know which is a late antique greek philosophical text with without without christian influence or antecedence is we've developed independently of christianity from plato and aristotle brought together in a kind of a mystical treatise by platinus and and platinus starts with he he takes two ideas he takes one from plato and one from aristotle he takes from plato the idea of the good you know that sort of the form of forms the the principle of the ultimate intelligibility of of all things intelligible is this indefinable reality called the good and he combines that with this aristotelian notion so aristotle was trying to figure out what matter was and uh and what he found out and modern physicists would agree with him on this is that you can kind of infinitely subdivide matter you know you can take an apple and cut it into you have two half apples and you have two quarter apples and two eighth apples you can get it down to a level of granularity where you're down just to the atom well we know that you can you don't have to stop there you break the atom apart and after you've cleaned up the universe you can then go get into the subatomic particles and then the farther down you go you know when you get into the quantum level uh you know the with the quantum physicists if you say well what is that you know david murman the quantum physicist his response is shut up and calculate no we don't know basically like it sort of vanishes into the realm of pure potentiality there's no more thingness left there's just possibility okay there's just potential and and that's what aristotle said you know you can sort of infinitely subdivide matter uh to down to the purely abstract where you arrive at just it just sheer potentiality no thingness to it at all no substance to it at all in order to have substance you have to have form but now notice what we have there pure potentiality is nothing like there is no such thing as pure potentiality that's just an abstraction for something to actually have being to actually have existence it has to have some formality it has to have some some some principle of structural functional organization and and the more structure or formality you give to it the more realness there is to the thing and uh and and so he takes this idea from plato of of the good and he combines it with aristotle's notion that you can sort of subdivide reality into pure potentiality at one end and pure actuality at the other and then any sort of mixture of the two and he comes up with the idea that there's a sort of gradation in the levels of being and so the farther you go up towards the good the more realness there is and the farther away from it you get towards you know towards sort of breaking down into pure potential the less realness until you sort of vanish off into just nothingness and and and so evil in this scheme like the closer you get to the good the the realer you are the farther away from integrity and wholeness and unity you fall the less real you become until you vanish off into nothing and so platinus looks at this and then saint augustine the catholic theologian looks it after him and he goes aha so really evil is just uh is really nothing it's a privation it's a falling away from it's a turning away from the good and that is actually the catholic doctrine on evil when you when so evil is not a thing evil is not a substance evil is is can be accounted for by the freedom of rational agents to deflect from desiring or pursuing the good to some lesser good and the more they deflect the less realness or being or substance they have i think that's a very compelling account of evil it does it takes evil very seriously i mean there really is evil right um but but it but the explanation for evil lies in the freedom of the will to turn away from goodness that's how we account from evil now the question then becomes with god uh why would god permit that now he doesn't create evil because again evil is not a substance it's not a thing god creates substances he created the universe he creates plants and animals and people and you know and and and catholic radio hosts and facilitators and you know and these kinds of things stuff and everything is good but among the good things that god has created he's also created rational agents that have freedom and this capacity to deflect from the good and why would he do that why would he create rational agents with that capacity well you know jesus says in one place that there's more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner that repents than over 99 righteous people that have no need of repentance there is something intrinsically worthwhile in having a rational agent that has the capacity to send and also the capacity to repent and to come back and to grow in virtue so that our lives actually have meaning right there's a path for us to try there's something to be done there's a thing to be done there's growth in virtue there's there's the there's the ascent up that ladder of realness right to the place i love this phrase from c.s lewis from where all the beauty comes you know i want to go back to where all the beauty comes from right that's the goal of our existence what a beautiful what a worthwhile goal right but it's only intelligible in light of a universe where where the opposite possibility is is realizable where i might where i might turn away i might fall back down the staircase right god made a world where i can go up the staircase beautiful appreciate that john a great question thank you so much for it it is called communion here on ewtn let's go to marie now marie is in toms river new jersey listing on siriusxm channel 130. hello marie what's on your mind today hi um i'm thinking about the woman that you spoke with earlier her and her husband i believe she was ukrainian from ukrainian church and um uh john was saying that there's a hair's breadth of difference between the churches the priests are priests i'm assuming the eucharist is consecrated and truly christ present is that correct yes yes okay my question is the only difference it sounds like is they're not obedient to this po to the pope okay if a catholic isn't obedient to this pope as far as they feel he's they're not happy with this pope and they change to the ukrainian or that church okay baby excommunication okay okay thank you so so i i think we need to specify what it means to be obedient to the pope all right because it may be i think the premise of your question may contain a misunderstanding of the nature of of papal authority okay it is not necessary for any catholic to to like their priest their bishop or their pope in the sense that like you know they like their personality or they like their choice of shoes or you know they you know they like their dietary regime or they like their political preferences or anything like that okay you don't even have to think that the pope has good morals many popes haven't have good morals sometimes popes have bad judgment they've made bad calls about the governance of the church or even you know political interventions or whatnot and and uh acknowledging the pope does not mean that we think that everything that any pope does is beyond question that's just not what it means no catholic has ever thought that all right saint paul didn't think that a good example when peter who was absolutely the pope was in antioch uh peter had stood up at the council of jerusalem and said gentiles absolutely do not have to follow jewish law that's what he said and so the council of jerusalem said all right pope off we go gentiles don't have to follow jewish law then peter turned around and went to antioch and he refused to eat with gentiles for not following jewish law and he only did it because he was afraid of peer pressure and so saint paul you know like that the uncomfortable dinner guest stands up in the room and says what are you doing you are the pope and you're the guy that said they didn't have to follow jewish law and now you're doing this you are embarrassing all of us and you're scandalizing the gentiles would you please get with your own program and peter was like oh all right then he got back in line and catholics have done that over the centuries when popes have done things that were foolish or stupid or immoral or in poor taste or in poor judgment you know or just just or ridiculous uh catholic theologians catholic bishops sometimes catholic lay people have stood up and said pope you are way out in left field come on let's get but program and a lot of times popes have said you know you're right i'm sorry i'm coming back in line that's all consistent with catholic faith believing the pope or or being obedient to pope simply means this that we believe in the office of the papacy as established by christ that christ constituted the papacy as an integral part of the church's constitution so the pope does operate with a lawful jurisdiction right and and we recognize that that's an authority so like if he says this guy's the bishop well he really is the bishop if pope promulgates a code of canon law that's really the code of canon law if the pope teaches a dogma to be held infallibly or he infallibly teaches a dogma to be held in faith by all the christian people something that he rarely does by the way well that really is the teaching of the catholic church but but everything else he does like you know catholics aren't obligated to think that everything he does is prudent or wise are the best course of action and so one should never become catholic because they are enamored of a particular pope's personality and they should never leave the catholic church because they are repulsed by a particular pope's personality that's just the wrong reason to be catholic you should become catholic because you are persuaded that this is the church founded by christ that has the papacy as an integral part of its constitution that's the reason you become catholic not because of the the personality or particular policies of any particular pope okay very good glad we could clear that up marie thank you so much for your question we do appreciate hearing from you there were a couple of questions uh via youtube that we wanted to get to but we just kind of ran out of time you know once you hear the music only so much we can do hey dr david anders thank you sir thank you tom don't forget we do the program monday through friday at 2 p.m eastern right here on ewtn radio with an encore at 11 pm eastern we also bring you on the radio side the best of call to communion you can hear that on sunday afternoons at 2 pm eastern as well and of course check out the podcast anytime by going to ewtnradio.net ewtnradio.net on behalf of our fantastic team here and that would be uh charles and ryan and jeff i'm tom price along with dr david andrews thanks for joining us we'll see you next time right here on ewtn's call to communion god bless

Channel: EWTN

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Id: jfSxPjVnVV0

Length: 50min 31sec (3031 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 12 2020