Called to Communion with Dr. David Anders - January 7 2022

8 ewtn i don't understand why i have to earn salvation to communion 1-833-288-3986 dr david anders on the ewtn global catholic radio network hey hey we made it to friday how about that 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 any question at all uh that would help you know aid your your own personal walk with the lord we are here for you we would also like to ask you the question which is what is stopping you from becoming a catholic yourself here's our phone number 833 288 ewtn that's 833-288-3986 listeners outside of north america should dial the u.s country code and then 205 271-2985 here's a little caveat m tour for you and that is uh phone lines tend to fill up very quickly on fridays so please call today if it's on your mind so you don't have to wait through the weekend again 833 288 ewtn is that phone number you can also text the letters ewtn to 5500 wait for our response and then text us your first name and your brief question message and data rates may apply and you can always send us an email ctc ewtn.com ctc at ewtn charles berry back from his time away we're very glad to have him back as our regular producer also matt gabinski handling the phones for us jeff burson on social media if you want to ask a question via youtube or facebook live either jeff or charles will send that to us here in the studio love to see what is on your mind i'm tom price along with dr david anders tom how are you today very well how are you my friend i'm doing decent thank you we've got weekend plans for you you know uh just enjoy time with my family uh it's probably the last weekend i have at home with my college-aged son before he goes back to school oh yeah we'll probably goof around with him a bit sounds like a lot of fun yeah this is sort of a liturgical lull here in the action between the christmas season uh and the uh you know season of lent but we're still in business guys we are doors are open sacrament's being offered absolutely and actually the christmas season continues through the baptism of our lord absolutely all right so here's a very interesting email we received actually uh just a couple of days ago this is from lisa hello dr anders thanks for sharing your knowledge and gifts with the world on your show it's such a blessing to me it enriches my day every time i listen i have a question i would greatly appreciate your insight on i have spent the better part of a decade trying every possible treatment option for painful cystic acne that consumes my whole face ultimately the only treatment that worked was birth control coupled with spiro no lactone i think i got that right which i've been on for five years i am now in my mid-20s i would like to get married someday so i stopped taking the pill for six months as a test unfortunately my acne is back and worse than ever so would the principle of double effect allow me to take birth control for acne treatment while married if i follow the nfp cadence of abstinence with my spouse i have heard a whole spectrum of beliefs from catholic priests and parishioners alike i am lost on what to do i'm very open to children but i feel confused with this predicament predicament and ultimately unprepared for marriage since i certainly don't want to start out married life in mortal sin or with the awful painful acne thank you in advance for your time and any insights you may be able to share god bless lisa thank you lisa i appreciate the question so let me review if i could the church is teaching on human sexuality as it relates to marriage because if we don't know what we're trying to accomplish we don't know whether we have succeeded and the church's teaching is that the purpose of human sexuality is the procreation of children that's why god has made us sexual beings so we can bear children and it obviously has many other effects but they're ordered towards the procreation and raising of children so to take one example many people experience in their sexual activity a great uh uh kind of emotional bonding with their with their spouse that's facilitated elicited by the sexual activity now why would that be why would that take place well because it serves the interests of children for their parents to be bonded to one another so it makes sense that when god gave us the gift of human sexuality he would append if you will to this procreative faculty this secondary effect that would tend to unite the couple more intimately together because that ultimately serves the end of the child so it's not wrong to take pleasure in the unitive aspects of human sexuality they're there for a reason but everything ultimately serves the good of the family the raising of children within the family okay and so we should order our sexual lives in such a way that we respect and honor the procreative end of human sexuality and that would include our use of the unitive aspects of sexuality that we also keep in mind that those are rightly ordered towards the good of the family the good of the spouse and not to be turned to my own private pleasure my own private good i so to to live in this kind of way means that i resist the temptation to instrumentalize my sexual life or to objectify my partner or myself or my own body and just seek to serve my own sort of wanton passions rather than the good of the common good of the family um now many people enter into marriage without the ability they may have a congenital problem maybe age where they're probably not going to bear children the church says it's not immoral to engage in sexual activity if you're not capable of bearing children provided that you live your sexual life where effectively dispositionally you're still ordered towards the same goods you're an openness to life such as it is possible to the good of the family the good of the spouse and away from your own sort of wanton you know sort of selfish pursuits and you leave the question of whether or not children happen to god you put it in his hands and that doesn't mean you can't take steps to time the birth of your kids you can natural family planning being a very appropriate way to do that um but ultimately like a sterile couple for example that's not their fault okay so they can still engage in sexual activity provided it's ordered in this proper fashion now when it comes to the intervention that you're talking about my understanding is that you would not be taking this to prevent children but to cure a medical condition right and you've already suggested you could also regulate your sexual life in a way that would be respectful of the ins and purposes of sex and not turn it to this sort of wanton selfish uh kind of use that would be intrinsically immoral and so that would be acceptable lisa thanks so much for your letter lots more stay tuned for call to communion this is a messy family minute with mike and alicia hernan we talk a lot on our program about the messiness of life but we thought we should take a moment to explain why it's important we live in a broken fallen world and we're constantly trying to repair relationships in situations that have become well messy why is it so important to recognize this because if we deny or ignore this reality or try to control our situation and make it neat and perfect we'll only end up frustrating ourselves and making the situation worse family life is never easy saint john paul recognized this when he wrote there is no family that does not know how selfishness discord and tension can wound the family but every family is called by the god of peace to have the joyous and renewing experience of reconciliation and unity restored families need to embrace the mess knowing that god is always calling us to reconciliation with him and our families and that he will give us the grace we need to get there for more inspiration visit us at messyfamilyminute.org divine intimacy radio the greatest joy in my life is helping others to come to know christ more fully and there's no better light on this path the path to deep union with god than the wisdom of the saints talking about this daily on ewtn radio is one of the great joys of my life divine intimacy radio sunday 6 30 a.m 1 30 p.m and 11 p.m eastern on ewtn radio [Music] call to communion in progress with dr david andrews on this friday afternoon here on ewtn radio our phone number 833-2888 that's 833-288-3986 again if you've got something weighing on your mind weighing on your heart and you want to get that question answered call now while the lines are still open because they will clog up if the past is any indicator here and so uh if you were to wait you know for another half hour so you might not be able to get in 833 288 ewtn i want to tell you about a wonderful product now available from ewtn's religious catalogue it's gorgeous it is a saint joseph and child jesus sterling silver medal on a 24 inch chain this beautiful and unique oval double-sided sterling silver silver metal features the saint joseph with the child jesus it's enhanced with beading added beaded edging and four floret tips this is all very precise language but you probably know what i'm talking about here it's been hand polished and engraved by new england silversmiths the metal is just over an inch in length it comes on a 24 inch stainless steel endless curb chain comes packaged in a deluxe velvet gift box it's an ewtn exclusive item and made right here in the usa it's available right now at ewtnrc.com and i think it's cool that it comes in that deluxe velvet gift box might be somebody on your mind or your heart that uh would be a wonderful recipient of something beautiful like this if you want to look at it go to ewtnrc.com in the search box you could put st joseph child jesus silver medal and you'll probably find it ewtn rc.com if you're ready now let's go to the phones at 833 288 ewtn we're going to begin today with michelle a first-time caller in saint helen michigan listening to us via podcasting hey there michelle what's on your mind today yeah i was i was more curious about this um um praying to those things and could you turn your radio down please that would be very helpful sure thank you okay um i was more interested in praying to the saints um and the mother mary that every that the catholics believe in and i was wondering how that could be biblically accepted when when even the uh even when everything points against it yeah thanks i really appreciate the question so i've read the bible covered cover many times and i've never found one page of scripture not one verse of scripture that ever points against uh cultivating friendship with the saints i've never seen a text that would suggest that so i i would have to beg to differ now you know there is a principle in the bible that we should call upon the lord for our help so psalm uh chapter 44 for example verse 26 rise up and come to our help o lord redeem us okay many appeals to god for help psalm 60 lord help us against our foe for human help is worthless helpless god human help is of no account now i don't think anybody would read psalm 60 and come to the conclusion you know i gotta move out of my apartment this weekend and uh i got all these buddies that are willing to you know help me run a u-haul and come over and move the couch but scripture says that human help is worthless so i better not ask him i'll just ask god to help me move the couch no of course not i'm gonna ask him to help me move the couch and uh you know jesus says in john chapter 15 i no longer call you servants but friends so jesus is my friend so i guess i better not i better not have anybody over from my birthday party no friends allowed jesus my only friend no of course not no of course not a good human life a virtuous human life a moral human life a spiritual human life is one in which we depend upon the help of the lord we know that everything ultimately comes from him but that doesn't mean that i can't have humans help me to jesus is my friend but that doesn't mean i can't have humans as my friends and in fact god wants us to live well in community with other people part of what our salvation consists in is that we are reconciled to other members of christ's body which is the church and i know you've read the new testament the book of first corinthians actually paul makes this point explicitly that god has given different people different gifts so that we can all serve one another and serve the common good of the church and that's that's what being a christian means if somebody has a gift of helping somebody else has the gift of teaching somebody else has the gift of administration we bring these to to one another we help one another we serve other members of the body of christ so that we all can be built up in the charity of christ and ultimately be united together to god so uh in the church we ask others to pray for us and we pray for them in turn st james says that we should pray for one another james chapter five and he says that some people's prayers are more powerful he says the prayer of a righteous man avails much unrighteous man not as much so so the whole catholic dynamic of our life with the saints is based in this biblical idea that yes our help is in the name of the lord who made heaven and earth and we understand that human health is in one sense of no value because everything comes from god and yet he wants us to live well with one another to try to help one another to pray for one another to depend upon one another in charity because that's what love means and it all comes from god but it not but not in such a way that it destroys human relationship now what about when a soul dies a christian dies and is admitted to the presence of god have they stopped being a part of the church when they die do they cease to care about the body of christ when they die well jesus cares for the church he's in heaven and he loves the church and desires it's good yeah are those who are united to jesus in heaven going to care less about the church no they're going to care more about the church even than they did in this life they're still members of the body of christ and they still pray for us and that is the explicit teaching of scripture and i would point your attention to a text like revelation chapter 5 verse 8 where the saints in heaven are praying for the church on earth and offering the prayers of the church on earth to god they're in an intercessory capacity and it's just and right and appropriate that they would do this because that's how we express our love for one another as christians we pray for one another and that relationship does not stop at death it continues after death because that's what salvation means that we become perfected in charity in union with god appreciate your call michelle hope that's helpful for you thank you so much for checking in with us today and that opens up a line for you right now we have one line open at 833 288 ewtn that's 833 288 3986 all right let's go to uh beards town illinois and we're going to talk with chris listing on the great covenant network hello chris what's on your mind today yeah thanks um does the catholic church believe that other denominations that they will be accepted into heaven or do we think that only catholics will go to heaven thank you i appreciate the question the catholic position is that god desires for everyone to be saved for every single person to be saved and you do not have to be a card carrying member of the catholic church to get to heaven in fact everybody that lived before the incarnation that made it to heaven made it to heaven without being baptized without being a catholic think about moses think about all the prophets think about abraham yeah think about noah think about adam none of these guys were baptized but they all knew god but they didn't know him as well as we do they knew less about him but they knew god they responded to his grace and love god forgave them their sins gave them the life of grace and after the ascension of christ they too were admitted to eternal glory none of them were baptized and there have been those even outside of israel i already mentioned to abraham he was you know everybody before abraham but even those like job for example who was described in the book of job was a righteous man in whom there was no fault but job wasn't in israelite right so it's never been the case that you have to be a baptized catholic in order to make it to heaven what you do have to have is you have to have the grace of god in your heart you know david prayed in psalm 51 and he said he said sacrifice and offerings you do not desire but a but a contrite heart o lord you will not despise therefore wash me cleanse me take not your holy spirit from me david understands that in order to have that proper disposition of justice in his soul has to come as a gift of grace so to be saved you need the grace of god in your heart now the easiest fastest most manifest and plentiful way an efficacious way to lay hold of that grace is to go to the source and summit to go to the font in apex that that ever resplendent fountain that never runs out the source of grace that that are the sacraments of the catholic church that god put in the world and so we call all people to the blessing to the feast to the riches of the catholic tradition to lay hold of that grace and that's the provision that god made for everyone to come to the catholic church and receive all that grace but if you're not in the catholic church it doesn't mean you're deprived of all grace it just means you don't have the fullness you don't have the most manifest articulate complete expression of that grace and so it's more difficult for you it's more difficult for you so you know let me give you an example catholic church teaches us the truth about the moral life if you're catholic it's a no-brainer good example don't kill babies don't do it don't kill babies that's very clear teaching of the catholic church if your catholic is falling off a log easy to know not to kill babies there's no effort about it at all i just church says it don't kill babies i'm not going to do it look outside the catholic church a lot of people outside the catholic church that refrain from killing babies well good for them but there are many that are confused about it and they're not sure should we kill babies or not they're not sure some of them say we should kill babies some say we shouldn't kill babies maybe they'll refrain from killing babies in uncertainty and still be saved but so maybe somebody else is you know sort of wantonly killing babies and justifying it because they're not sure whether they're humans or not well see how see how it's not that not being catholic isn't what cut them off from salvation right but because they refused the light of the catholic faith they were less clear in their moral lives they gave up an opportunity for clarity about their moral lives and that lack of clarity and that lack of access to the light made it objectively more difficult for them to be saved take another case let's say someone does something gravely wrong they know they've done grave wrong their conscience begins to gnaw and bite at them and they wish they could undo what they had done they're catholic they go to confession they receive absolution they have the certainty of forgiveness their conscience is clear now they have encouragement to go live the moral life with strength and encouragement and hope now take somebody who's not catholic they don't have access to the confessional it's not that it's not the absence of the confessional that will damn them you say but without that benefit maybe they go well i don't know what to do about my conscience my conscience is just going to bother me all day long i know what i'll do i'll just give up the struggle for the moral life yeah yeah that's it i'll get rid of all that those catholics they're all guilty i'll give up what they call catholic guilt and i'll harden my conscience as a way of dealing with this guilt complex a lot of people make that choice and so because they didn't take the opportunity to benefit from the sacrament of confession they maybe made another decision in their moral life to maybe to harden their conscience no i'm not saying that everybody who neglects confession will have a hardened conscience what i am saying is confession facilitates the softening of one's conscience it facilitates progress in the moral life and of course it does because christ instituted it for that purpose so and you could go through all the elements of catholicism like this and show how the catholic faith is divinely constituted to form us after the likeness and character of jesus to change our moral lives to make us more rational loving wise god-fearing people god put it in the world for that reason so it's a great good that we offer to the world but if you're outside the catholic faith for no fault of your own you're at an objective disadvantage but you're not thereby condemned okay glad that got clarified chris thanks so much for your call here's gail now in north dakota listening on the great real presence radio hello gail what's on your mind today hi um i want to tell you guys first salvage i love your show sometimes i'm out somewhere and people ask me if people are talking about catholic things and i know the answer and then i think how did i know that but it's because of you guys thank you you're welcome so here's the situation um i have a friend who is not catholic and she said when i told her that we went to church during a snowstorm he said i don't understand how come the catholic church doesn't shut down their storms like all the other churches and i honestly didn't know what to say yes thank you i appreciate the question it's because catholics and many non-catholics have very different ideas about the nature and purpose of worship and for catholics the celebration of the liturgy is vastly more important to our spirituality into our identity than it is to other traditions and that's what it boils down to that that it's easier to kind of make a utilitarian judgment and say ah too much of a risk don't want to get out of the roads let's just call off liturgy that's easy easier for a non-catholic to do because it's not understood to be the source and summit of their salvation but for catholics to celebrate the liturgy is to work out our redemption in fear and troubling it is to come into contact with the source and summit of our faith the holy sacrifice of the mass it's the place where we publicly acknowledge god and give him thanks and reverence and honor and these things are tremendously important to us so will a catholic forego mass if if some sort of catastrophe makes it objectively you know gravely dangerous to go of course a catholic would have to forgo mass but we would do so very unwillingly all right gail thanks uh that was a great question appreciate hearing from you today in north dakota all right in just a moment we're going to be talking with alice in cleveland terry in fairfax virginia jose in san diego gill in michigan very busy friday afternoon just like i said here on ewtn's call to communion with dr david andrews do stay with us [Music] why do we need to pray we don't pray because god needs our prayers we pray because we need god's grace and every day when i face the day i realize i have no idea what i'm doing and i need god to walk me through my day step by step giving me the grace the counsel the love the encouragement that enables me to glorify him in everything that i do and become the person he wants me to be prayer is my lifeline and now the ewtn family prayer with father joseph family a prayer that we pray together is a powerful prayer so please pray together with me our ewtn family prayer [Music] today we pray for young people heavenly father we worship you our creator you have brought each one of us into existence because of your loving generosity protect young people from the many snares of temptation that surround them shield them from drugs fornication self-indulgence and sin lead them in the path of life and of true love surround them with angels to guard defend and guide them let none of them be lost but grant that they may fulfill your plans and find lasting happiness amen this is dr david anders if you missed part of today's show catch the encore tonight at 11 eastern check out the podcast anytime at ewtnradio.net and click podcasts [Music] i'm jerry usher and i'm debbie giorgiani join us for take two with jerry and debbie at noon eastern with an encore at midnight eastern now back to more of call to communion [Music] hey what's stopping you from becoming a catholic let's talk about it here on ewtn's call to communion if you want to give it a try we have one line open right now at 833 288 ewtn that's 833-288-3986 let's go now to alice in cleveland listening on the rock hello alice what's on your mind today i have a friend who i i don't she don't i don't wait a minute this is my question okay does she this pain come from god or the devil thank you i appreciate the question i think it's a false dichotomy in other words i think there are other options as well if i hit my thumb with a hammer when i'm trying to hang up a picture in my house i would ascribe the pain to the hammer not to god or to the devil right yeah um and uh i i think a lot of times our pains are self-inflicted if uh if last night i had a child that had a muscle cramp in the middle of the night woke up in pain i think he probably was deficient maybe in some magnesium or something you know or some potassium i wouldn't describe that to either god or the devil directly now sacred scripture does tell us that the human experience of pain is ultimately the fault of sin in the world and and that it falls within the scope of god's providence so that god god permits but does not directly intend many of the evils that we suffer now sometimes god permits the devil directly to be the agent of our suffering but not every suffering is the result of the devil's direct agency we know the story of job in the book of job god permitted the devil to torment job in some specific ways but nothing in scripture suggests that every experience of suffering is the fault of the devil and it definitely asserts that god does not directly intend any evil so many times i think it's just more reasonable to assign a more proximate cause like say you know bacteria or the hammer on my thumb alice thanks so much for your call hope that's helpful for you call to communion with dr david anders here on ewtn radio going now to san diego let's talk with jose listening on facebook this afternoon hello jose what's on your mind today yeah i have a quick question um i just wanted to know what kind of suffering is it for a mom that has her uh child banished without a trait and then her dying without ever finding out what happened to her son oh thank you thank you i appreciate that question i must be like a very harsh uh suffering i i can hardly imagine anything worse yeah i'm a parent i've got five kids and and to have your children suffer and especially in this kind of way and to feel so powerless i think it must be one of the hardest things in the world and when we encounter sufferings like that sometimes we just want to cry out to god and say why lord why i can't see any sense in this i don't know why you would permit this and i take some comfort in the knowledge that when you read the psalms that many times the psalmists also cried out to god in this way and they said god we don't understand why you're letting these things happen to us they don't seem to make any sense we're suffering terribly and you seem absent where are you where are you god that's a very common complaint in many passages of scripture and i think that we have those texts of the bible not to answer the question why did god permit these things but to but to tell us that it's okay to ask the question and the sense of frustration that we have in the face of seemingly meanest meaningless suffering is part and parcel of the human condition now what we do have as catholics we don't have an answer to the why for every experience of suffering but we do have the person of christ who enters into that suffering with us and part of the purpose of the incarnation when jesus christ became a man born of the virgin mary was that he also would experience the waywardness and alienation and the suffering and the and the i shouldn't say waywardness but he wasn't wayward but he he he definitely was outcast and alienated and uh was lonely and experienced loss and disappointment as well as every kind of physical suffering he went through these things with us and uh and is therefore capable of being compassionate to us and so we don't necessarily have an answer personally for the why of every suffering we can find comfort in our fellowship with our lord who was a man of sorrows and familiar with suffering appreciate your call thank you so much jose it is called to communion here on ewtn radio going now to fairfax virginia here is terry listening on youtube this afternoon terry what's on your mind today yes um good afternoon and thank you for taking my call dr anders thanks for the great work you do i have a two-prong question but it's related to adam and eve the first one is if they were born sinless no concupiscence why would they even have a tendency to consider and then disobey god and my second question dr anders is if original sin wouldn't have come through adam and eve the likelihood is that it was going to come sooner or later um down the line would you agree with that what are your thoughts and thank you yeah thank you let me let me answer the second question first um and the the idea that you know original sin it was somehow almost inevitable because you know if adam and eve didn't sin their progeny would have and we could have picked it up someplace down the sort of congenital trail i think overlooks the the probability that god would have confirmed out of adam and eve in righteousness with a super added gift of grace in the way he confirmed the holy angels may not exactly the same way but in some way analogous and that adam was the head of the race in a representative fashion whereby he could have obeyed or disobeyed in a representative way on behalf of all of his progeny and so i i don't really think we can conclude that that original sin was inevitable because somebody would have would have fallen rather it's also possible that adam might have been confirmed in righteousness in a way that also could have could have been passed on to his progeny so i just i don't think scripture doesn't answer that question but it doesn't necessitate the conclusion that you drew now um when it comes to why did adam and eve sin even though they had infused knowledge and they had the gift of integrity so they weren't subject to concupiscence and this little bit related to the second question as well but in john paul ii wednesday audiences about the first uh two chapters of genesis in the theology of the body wednesday the 12th december 1979 i'm quoting the text uh the pope writes he says the important thing is not that these experiences belong to man's prehistory but that they are always at the root of every human experience and let me unpack that so i think what the pope is saying is that when we turn to these genesis stories that we're they're they're not there as historical oddities you know they're not they're not there to give us you know uh trivia show answers to you know what you know what's the name of the first man who fell into sin you know they're there to be illustrative about the nature of sin and our experience of sin and the moral life for everybody for perennially to inform us about our conditions now and uh and so the speculative questions i think about man's pre-history are to some extent unanswerable but i think we can look to the stories and find something of perennial value for us now i think most of us have had the experience in life of first of all knowing the good that we should do knowing why we should do it and being conscious that we can do it like knowing that it's not beyond us and not doing it who hasn't had that experience oh yeah i mean every time i go to confession i'm like i knew better i shouldn't have i knew i shouldn't have i i i coulda i coulda but it didn't so i'm hearing confession yeah right and that's sort of the shape of the moral life sin is to a certain extent a mystery and i think that but i do think part of the explicability is that we can choose what to pay attention to and and that's that is the secret i think one of the great secrets of the moral life we can choose what to pay attention to and if you give yourself to paying attention to things that are going to distract you from the greater good sooner or later you're going to choose the lesser good and so one of the reasons that we are to live a contemplative life a meditative life um is to constantly keep in mind the greater good you know i i quite recently i got a great piece of advice from a priest in the confessional i said you know i've got this thing this person i'm mad at and i'm fussing about this and i'm mad about that and he said would you care on your deathbed is it the kind of thing you'd care about on your deathbed answer that question was no nope and he said you know one of the good principles of spiritual life that all the doctors of the church have given us is reflect daily as if it were your last day and value your choices see us as reflecting on those higher goods as if it were your last day then see if you care yeah well that is sad isn't that something stuff that is wonderful thank you so much for your call terry hope that's helpful for you call to communion with dr david anders here on ewtn radio you know uh i was thinking this morning about uh mother angelica of happy memory and uh one of her great and dear friends also of happy memory is father benedict groeschel father groeschel no longer with us of course here but uh wow he left us some wonderful radio and television programs and we still carry him on ewtn radio check out the wisdom of father grow shell this is especially going to be great for our west coast listeners who can check it out every friday evening at 10 pm eastern a little bit tougher for those of us in the central and eastern time zones because that'll be midnight for us here in the central and 1am saturday morning for those uh on the east coast but golly what a great show the wisdom of father benedict groschell right here on ewtn radio quick question now from facebook ron wants to know why does the catholic church say we have to be assigned as an exorcist to be performing exorcisms when scripture says we all should be able to drive out demons yes thanks so i it's not clear to me that scripture says we should all be able to drive out demons there are a few places in scripture where christ specifically assigns the task of exorcism to apostles matthew 10 i think is one passage mark 9 or 10 that neighborhood when jesus sends out the 12 and then the 72 and tells them to preach the gospel and to heal the second cast out demons and we know from the book of acts that the fact that an exorcism might have been performed by someone that was not of the company of the apostles didn't mean that it was safe to do so and i think the clearest example what is it acts chapter 19 when uh some jewish fellows attempted to cast out a demon in the name of jesus whom paul preaches and the demon spoke to them and said jesus i know paul i've heard of but who are you guys i proceeded to beat them up you know yeah and and uh there is the passage in mark chapter 16 when christ says these signs will accompany those who who believe and one of the signs is that they will perform exorcisms but jesus never says that every christian will perform exorcisms merely that among those who follow him some will perform exorcisms and the position of the church is that you know the church has spiritual jurisdiction in the same way that a police officer has jurisdiction within his municipality right uh you know if you live in birmingham the the tuscaloosa cops are not going to arrest you right you know the birmingham cops have jurisdiction that that catholic priests have jurisdiction that it comes to them from through and from their bishops because it is to the bishop to the to the apostles basically that christ gave the power of binding and loosing he didn't give it to the whole church he gave it to the apostles and they in turn share their jurisdiction with their own priesthood and um and that power of jurisdiction makes a difference now in some cases in a sense every christian shares in in the church's power of judgment in a very remote way okay it to begin with we all have the task of being the judge of our conscience in the internal forum with our confessor and we are we can rightly accuse ourselves of our own sense we can discern the good in our state of life and our families and we have an obligation to call out evil when we see it to work for justice and things like that so we do manifest the judgment of christ even as laypeople but in a higher order the priesthood expressed it participates in that power of binding and losing it's one of the reasons why say a catholic values the priestly blessing as a sacramental and why if i try that i'm shooting blanks you know um and uh and so because exorcism is not a safe activity it's a very dangerous activity and acts chapter 19 shows us that and history shows that as well people people can be drawn to this activity because they are sensationalists and they're attracted to the esoteric or the occult and they want to see fireworks so to speak that's a very bad motivation and demons are oftentimes a lot smarter than you are and so it's hand you know like approach cautiously kind of thing the church says it's in the best interest of everybody that this ministry be reserved to to mature spiritually mature wise people who've undergone proper training and who possess the proper jurisdiction for the safety of all involved ron thanks so much for your question call to communion with dr david anders here on ewtn radio going now to gill in michigan listing on the great ave maria radio hello gil what's on your mind today yeah good afternoon um thanks for having me on your show and thanks for doing your show my question today is i have a lot of friends and family that i guess i would call fallen away catholics some of them have went to other religions and some of them just don't really practice at all anymore [Music] and i would like to know like what the official church teaching regarding their salvation and also what would be a kind way of convincing them or persuading them to try to come back to the catholic religion sure thank you appreciate the question so um we are saved uh by our union with god and neighbor in charity that's how we're saved when we love god and we love our neighbors and and that that love in our hearts is the motive force for developing a life of virtue so virtue and charity are how we're saved and the catholic faith is appointed by god to help us grow in virtue and in charity if someone leaves the catholic church understanding that it was appointed by god to help us grow in virtue and charity then their very leaving would be an act of great injustice because they would be leaving something they knew was appointed by god and that would just definitely not be a just thing to do many many people who leave the catholic church however do not understand that the catholic church was established by god to help us grow in grace and virtue and so they leave in a measure of ignorance and i don't care if they went to catholic school for 12 years that in to my way of thinking that does not necessarily solve the ignorance problem because what if they were badly informed in their 12 years of catholic education and unfortunately that can be the case and just having someone read you a list of propositions out of a textbook is not sufficient i think for someone to have internalized those and understood their reasonableness so just because you've been to catechism class or just because you've been to catholic school i don't think it's fair to conclude yeah they are operating with impunity i don't think we can draw that judgment but if someone left the church with impunity understanding that it was established by god then that would be a great injustice however i think that's often not the case sometimes people believe in ignorance because they didn't understand the faith and it didn't make sense to them and maybe their spiritual needs weren't their pastoral needs weren't being met properly and so they went someplace else maybe that's no fault of their own maybe it's the maybe it's a pastoral failure of the church that that is responsible and maybe some priests will have to answer to god one day because he turned them away from the confessional when they were seeking the sacraments and he told them to buzz off or something like that that would be his fault not theirs and he would blame the bear the brunt of that nevertheless when someone walks away from the church even when it's no fault of their own they've walked away from truth and grace and so it's going to be harder for them it's going to be objectively more difficult for them to be saved doesn't necessarily mean they'll be lost they may still be saved but they've they've walked away from the source and summit of the the truth and grace of the life of christ and so it's going to be that much harder for them to lay hold of the love of god and neighbor so it's appropriate to want those people to come back and to offer them the catholic faith in its fullness your question is how to do that effectively well it has to be done in charity which means you cannot make your love your loved one who's walked away from the church you can't make them into a project where you know you have a goal and and success means you've you've manipulated them back into the church and you've accomplished your goal right that is objectifying them that's what the church calls proselytism and most people resist being told that they're doing something wrong yeah and you walk up to hey you're doing wrong you got to do what i want you to do that's a surefire way to get them to do the opposite so i think both from a moral point of view right you're treating them as an as a as an end and not a means and from a pragmatic point of view you're actually going to have more success the best way to approach anybody is to love them now if you love somebody you want their inaugural good which means that you'd like to move them towards truth and grace and charity and virtue and all of it if possible but if it's genuine love that's motivating you you'll be satisfied with baby steps yeah and church embraces a principle called gradualism so let's say they're a cursing swearing anti-catholic heretic who spoke two packs a day and you get them down to a pack and a half progress you've made progress yeah you said i'm saying you just you do you take you do the job in front of you you take the steps you can take and you do it in love and friendship gail great question thanks so much for your call call to communion with dr david anders here on ewtn radio a delightful email here from ray ray says my three-year-old granddaughter three years old now asked me this question why is jesus hanging on the cross i don't know how to explain this to a three-year-old can you give me some pointers if a three-year-old asked me that question i would say mean people killed him mean people killed him but he loved them anyway oh that's good he loved them anyway and then you know as they got older i would i would pack in more theological content sure okay good well there you go ray thanks so much for your question here's an interesting one and i couldn't quite figure out where he's going with this he or she because this is an anonymous email the subject line says communion in secular food and here's the question if the priest blesses a passover meal like a lamb dinner is that valid and what about things like fast food okay thanks i appreciate the question so to consecrate the eucharist to confect the body of christ one can only do that with wheaton bread and grape wine okay using the form of the right given to us by christ and with the intent to perform the right so if a priest first of all no priest would ever attempt to consecrate a hamburger like it you it would be impossible all right yeah it's like marrying a watermelon i mean it's just it's just it just doesn't make it it's incoherent right yeah um but if uh but if a priest attempted to uh confect the body of christ in invalid matter say in a rice cake and a pepsi they would be invalid and nothing would happen if a priest said the words of consecration over bread and wine but without the intent to consecrate say for example if a priest and i hope this doesn't happen but if a priest were an actor playing the role of a priest in a play and they had a mock mass in the play the purpose would be theatrical not sacramental the priest could say the words in the context of the theater production but without the intent to consecrate and because he lacked the intent nothing would happen however i hope no priest ever does that yes it would strike me as very inappropriate okay definitely but this is a hypothetical nothing would happen the only way you have a valid mass where christ is truly present is when you have valid matter bread and wine you have the valid form of the right given to us by christ and the properly ordained person the validly ordained person has the intent to consecrate when all that happens then you have a valid eucharist okay all right thank you so much for that and we're going to go to elizabeth in minnesota uh listening on the ave maria radio app elizabeth we have about one minute what's your question please um okay i had just heard about this catholic um basketball coach in on the east coast who his team won like 90 to 4 or something like that and i heard another prominent catholic um saying that that was he thought that was justified and i basically just wanted and apparently also they um you know you got about five seconds uh i was wondering dr anders opinion on that that doesn't seem very appropriate to me you know i mean i'm not a coach i'm not a sports guy but i mean i played the bench on the b team when i was in high school but i think when you start getting up you know 50 to 4 that's time to let the b team play um you know that's when i got out on the court right that's what that's when the coach finally let me play and then you don't run up the score against the other guys because prince don't do unto others what you wouldn't have them do unto you you know i mean you can still win the game with charity and grace and sportsmanship without rubbing their noses in it there you go and hey you gotta let us be team guys have a chance to play once again that's right good for you elizabeth thanks so much for your call i think that's a great way to end the program and uh end a week of great live radio shows here on ewtn's call to communion dr david andrews have a great weekend thanks tom we hope everybody has a great weekend be sure to join us on monday at 2 p.m eastern we do the program live every weekday 2 p.m eastern with an encore at 11 pm eastern check out the podcast at ewtnradio.net on behalf of our fantastic team including our returning champion producer charles berry i'm tom price have a great weekend god bless [Music] the most original and exclusive catholic content is on ewtn radio each week on the catholic sphere we connect with ewtn contributors from different parts of the world each i think has a unique perspective on issues of concern for all of us as catholics it reminds

Channel: EWTN

Views: 3,802

Keywords: Catholic, EWTN, Christian, television

Id: rnJG8W7fQKE

Length: 54min 10sec (3250 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 07 2022