Called to Communion with Dr. David Anders - September 3, 2021

1-833-288-3986 why do i need to confess my sins to a priest what's stopping you this is called to communion with dr david anders on the ewtn global catholic radio network welcome to call to communion the show where we ask you what's stopping you from becoming a catholic i'm your host dr david anders i'll be joined shortly by jack williams a facilitator who is experiencing technical difficulties at the moment if you would like to be on the show please call 1-833-288 ewtn two zero 1-833-288-3986 two seven one two nine eight five the main line again is one eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six the show is called the communion all people are called to communion with christ in the church that he founded and that is the catholic church uh you know i myself was not raised in the catholic faith i kind of grew up thinking catholics were a bit nuts and i never met a catholic to be honest with you until i went to college and even then wasn't you know overly impressed with catholicism as such uh and uh but around about my late 20s early 30s i had a rude awakening and thought that found out that the church that i had spent most of my life contending against was in fact the church founded by jesus christ and became catholic in 2003 my life has never been the same since and it's a it's a journey worth taking and a conversation worth having so if you're like me you've grown up or maybe you left the church and thought this is not at all a viable option for me spiritually and here's why we'd like to know why what your objection is what your problem maybe you're just ignorant of catholicism so call me and tell me about it at now while i'm 1-833-288-3986 on the phone calls to come in i do have some email questions that people have sent uh let's see here's one from matt matt asks dr anders how can we be responsible for sin if we're tempted by the devil doesn't scripture say that if you lead one of these little ones to sin a millstone is to be tied around your neck and thrown into the sea isn't satan responsible for our sins since he has led us there yeah thanks matt i really appreciate the question well the catholic position on temptation and sin is that to be tempted is not in itself a sin i mean to tempt somebody else to sin would be sinful because you're intending and evil but but the fact that some immoral choice is presented to me as an option and even that i might find it attractive at some point uh that's not itself uh culpable action there's nothing there's nothing i haven't done anything wrong if i'm attracted to something that might be uh inadvisable or or bad for me or harmful to somebody else the it becomes morally relevant when i in fact choose it and then do act in accordance with that choice that's what we call sin now why would god permit the devil or another human agent or some object to tempt me well according to catholic theology there's a couple reasons why god might allow that one of them would be to give me an occasion of merit provide me with an opportunity to do something meritorious now jesus himself exemplified this he was he was tempted by the devil of course he did not sin and his whole life of obedience was in fact meritorious st paul teaches us in philippians chapter 2 that because of his humble obedience unto death god exalted christ to the right hand so we also can do meritorious good works by being exposed to temptation and and defeating it so another reason that god might allow us to be tempted by the devil or some other agent or some other object is so that we can grow in virtue you remember the old solar flex ad no pain no gain right well you know virtue is a habit a disposition that we develop through practice and you're never actually going to grow those virtue muscles if you're not exposed to occasions when you have to exercise those virtues against arduous difficulties so another reason we might be exposed to temptation so that we could actually grow in virtue finally god might permit us to to be exposed to temptation as a scourge for our own previous immoral activity you know when i when i get any kind of a virtuous spiral of good leading to good it becomes easier and easier to do the good but you can get into a vicious spiral as well where one sin kind of leads to another and uh and the consequences of the activity become the punishment for the activity right you you do you pick yourself up hit yourself in the head with a hammer and it hurts right god will allow you sometimes to be led into temptation so that you can learn from your bad mistakes and do better next time now i think i might hear do i hear the sound of jack you do how about that i am so glad to have you jack thank you for joining us technology is a funny thing isn't it yeah good to have you live radio is a funny thing you've got some emails there that i think i had a i had one of uh one of our messenger angels bring down to you i do indeed we might have to get a messenger angel to come back and carry him up to you [Laughter] well how about i read another one before the break sounds like a plan all right this one's from anonymous anonymous says i have a protestant friend who says that they don't need a priest to confess uh to because they can go straight to god and they don't need a man interceding what is your response okay thanks i appreciate the question well actually i agree with your protestant friend they don't absolutely necessarily have to have a priest to intercede for them in order to ask god to forgive their sins and in fact the catholic church has never said otherwise when you look at sacred scripture all of the old testament saints were deprived of a benefit of the catholic sacraments king david psalm 51 is probably the perfect example of this perfect contrition this cry immediately to god for forgiveness and he does so with an expectation that god will forgive him and in fact the catholic church teaches to this day that if you're conscious of grave sin by all means you know don't wait till saturday afternoon at three get right with god right now by repenting of your sin make that act of perfect contrition oh god against you and you only have i sinned and done what is evil in your sight therefore wash me cleanse me forgive me renew within me a right spirit i mean do that right away do that right away get right with god as soon as you're conscious of being of having departed from him in the state of grave sin so why then would you add to that the sacrament of confession well the same reason that jesus instituted all of the sacraments so that we could have an objective tangible visible auditory sign of god's presence with us guaranteeing the outcome that we're asking for in prayer so say with baptism for example we all know that we need inward renewal and regeneration we need to become new people in christ well wouldn't it be neat if god gave us a tool that would that would infallibly do that in our lives and we could be certain that we had received the gift same with confession god has appointed a sacrament so that we can have that objective tangible sign with his promise of assistance whoever sins you forgive our forgiven and know that we're forgiven so it's a blessing not a curse it's a help not an impediment in the spiritual life 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number it's ewtn's call to communion with dr david anders here's today's quote from mother angelica's perpetual calendar wisdom gives me the ability to be at peace in the midst of turmoil because it enables me to see the plan of god in every detail and to accept it all with love mother spiral bound perpetual calendar features an inspirational message for each day of the year it's available from the ewtn religious catalogue at ewtn rc that's ewtnrc.com [Music] i am father thomas loyola and this week on light of the east on ewtn both in and outside of the church hope self-sacrifice and courage much needed in our world seem to be so scarce our two guests cameron traxler and renjucione serve as signs of hope for the church and for the world on ewtn sunday is at 11 30 a.m eastern he was a scholar a preacher a capuchin franciscan and a defender of christendom matthew bunson and the doctors of the church saint lawrence of brindisi was one of the most respected preachers in the 17th century but he also helped raise an army against the ottoman turks when they invaded hungary in 1601. he led the troops to victory against the turks carrying only a crucifix he was declared a doctor of the church in 1959. for more about the doctors of the church visit doctorsofthechurch.com [Music] you know we've got two great new offerings from ewtn publishing uh mother angelica's guide to the spiritual life from the nun who made it her life's work to instruct millions this volume assembles her most profound and timeless advice on how you can grow in holiness and achieve your ultimate purpose to spend eternity in heaven with jesus and blue collar apologetics by our own john martin former host of open line monday and he explains uh it helps you to explain the catholic faith in a very common sense scriptural way both these volumes available at ewtn's religious catalog that's ewtn r c dot com eight 833 288 e wtn is our toll-free number it's a free phone call anywhere in north america 833-288-3986 donnie you're on with dr anders hi donna what's your question today uh my question is if i believe in god and i believe jesus died for my sins why do i still have doubt sometimes oh yeah thank you i appreciate the question so are you asking doubts about god in christ or doubts about other things i i guess it's depth about other things and i think one big doubt for me is god's plan for my life because i guess sometimes i just don't know what it is oh that's a great question i love this question thank you so much for asking it and i think we're all very sympathetic i think we all feel this way many times and in part i think the problem is not anything about the catholic faith but i think it's a fault of our culture uh not about catholicism not about scripture but about our culture because it's very common in the world around us uh you know in something like the movies you know the romantic comedies for example uh to imagine that that reality has this sort of shining luminescent path in front of me and that that destiny is going to converge for me to find my true self or my true path or the one way to happiness or true love or something like that and everything's just got to converge to make that clear to me make that known to me and once i know it i'll walk that path and everything will be wonderful and that's how all the romantic comedies always work out you know the guy finds the girl or he finds the ideal job or he finds the you know the uh uh you know the the celebrity career that he wants and everything seems to converge to make that stand out to him and then he's happy forever and and then you know we look at our own lives and our own lives don't function like romantic comedies we don't have that maybe that promise of true love that we're we've always wanted or that perfect job or that that absolutely correct thing that's so evident we should do to make sense of our lives and uh but i think that if you go to the scriptures and you go to the teaching of the saints you'll find that um that's not promised to us that way of thinking out our about our lives is not promised to us in fact many of the great heroes of the bible had the opposite experience well they thought they knew what they were doing and then reality unfolded very very differently and of course nowhere is this clearer than in the the people of judea when they were exiled to babylon they thought they really understood what it meant to follow god and and what that would mean in their lives and then the next thing you know they're ripped away from the temple they're ripped away from their institutions they're transplanted to a completely different part of the world and they've got no idea how how can you be israel apart from israel they didn't know they had no idea and then when they finally come back they're still oppressed they're still occupied by the romans and they're dying for somebody to come and put it all to rights and so when jesus the messiah shows up they say okay great if he's the messiah he's going to kick out the romans and he's going to make that shining luminescent path for us to follow and it'll all be wonderful and christ's response to that was to say the kingdom of god does not come with your careful observation nor can men say here it is or there it is for the kingdom of god is within you and the path that christ calls us to is not to some particular historical form of of you know politics or government or a career or a love life but rather to manifest the fruits of the spirit blessed are the poor in spirit blessed are the pure in heart blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness these kinds of attitudes that jesus gives us or the the works of penance that he wants us to do to pray in secret to give alms to fast in secret now father in heaven will will reward us to love our enemies to deny ourselves to take up our cross and follow him now these attitudes these virtues these dispositions they're useful for anything that we do in life now the specific circumstances of our lives and of the saints vary enormously so you know maybe one person is a doctor one person is a sanitation worker one person is a stay-at-home mom one person is a stay-at-home dad somebody else is an invalid and maybe they're grossly disappointed in the circumstances of their life and yet we can always identify with christ and try to live according to the virtues and the beatitudes and to grow in the life of holiness because our ultimate vocation is not to this or that that career or this or that relationship our ultimate vocation is to holiness in the life of heaven and in the modern world people have so many choices ahead of them have so many opportunities that we never would have had in the past that we get confused and think that the meaning of our life is to make the right choice about career or family or marriage but really that's kind of a feature of just the modern world and technology and the economy when the real choice we have to make is not you know what career what marriage or what family or what hobbies to be involved in but the choice for goodness for truth for beauty for virtue for god and that's the true path of our life you know i love david that you over you kind of over emphasized the the the just the general idea of it because you know sacred scripture tells us to walk by faith and not by sight which tells us that god's work in our life is not always going to be perceptive by our senses huh oh yeah i mean i i think that's the message of christ the kingdom of god doesn't come with your careful observation and uh and we often think it does oh if i just build this ministry or erect this church or you know i uh get this career or you know then then i'll realize god's purpose is for my life but god's purpose for our life is that we just be conformed to christ was that helpful donna for you extremely helpful nice thank you very much well god bless you we appreciate the phone call 833 288 e wtn that's our toll-free number 833-288-3986 next up is tracy in lafayette louisiana listening on christ our king radio tracy thanks for holding welcome to the program thank you so much my question is sorry go right ahead okay um i'm calling to see if you can help me better explain the catholic stance on salvation so that i can explain it better to my elderly mother-in-law who was posed the question by her protestant son because she went directly to purgatory and it hasn't sat well with me okay sure yeah did was there more to the question or i can i can respond to that unless you have something else you want to ask no that's it okay yeah fantastic so the catholic position on salvation is that if we believe christ and are joined to him in the sacraments that god will give us the holy spirit and the life of grace in our souls and this will enable us to love god and love neighbor the gift of god's grace brings with it the forgiveness of sins and the power to live a holy life now what do we do with that power it is up to us to cooperate with it it becomes possible for us to live the life of holiness by being joined to christ through faith in the sacraments it becomes possible to us to live the life of holiness we must therefore live a holy life and at the end of our life jesus says that we will be judged according to our deeds and every single passage of the bible that addresses the future life establishes that we will be judged according to our deeds you could look at say matthew chapter 25 or romans chapter 2 or romans chapter 1 for that matter you can look at revelation chapter 20. every single passage that looks to the end of time and an eternity says that christ will divide the sheep from the goats based not on their faith alone not on their verbal profession of jesus but on their deeds did they feed the hungry clothe the naked give drink to the thirsty visit the sick and the imprisoned and so forth and in fact christ says many people will come to him and profess that they had faith in him and he'll say doesn't matter you didn't do these things and therefore you can't come in now faith and grace are very important because they're what actually give us the strength and the ability through god's help to live that way we can only imitate christ in the life of holiness if we're joined to him through faith in the sacraments by god's grace but we have to thereby cooperate in grace so that god will judge us to take us to heaven now you know when i say that we have to cooperate our cooperation is also a work of god's grace god really does want us to be saved he really wants to come and dwell within us jesus says in john chapter 14 if you love me and keep my commandments the father and i will come and make our dwelling within you we can have a deep personal relationship with god an interior relationship of god by faith and holiness that radically transforms our life and takes us out of ourselves and infuses the supernatural principle into us so it's not just mere nature at work here i mean god is at work in us and yet it is still we who are doing the cooperating and therefore it's on that basis that god will judge us so no one knows they may claim to know no one knows in this life what their ultimate destiny is i cannot tell you with certainty yes i'm going to go to heaven or i'm going to go to hell or i'm going to go to purgatory i don't know god knows and god will reveal that to me at the end of time saint paul didn't know first corinthians chapter 9 he says i buffet my body and make it my slave he practiced asceticism so that having preached to others i myself might not be disqualified the apostle paul himself looked at his own disqualification for eternity as a real possibility now he was hopeful and confident in god's grace at work in his life he was conscious of god's grace at work in his life and hopefully in eternity and aiming for heaven but recognize the ongoing responsibility of cooperating now jesus also says whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has life he gives us the sacraments as a real point of contact with his divine life so don't walk away continue to receive christ in the sacraments i know where grace is to be found i have a rational objective basis for hope but i still have to engage and cooperate until the end of my life eight three three two eight eight ewtn that's our toll free number it's a free phone call anywhere in north america a couple of open lines and plenty of time for your calls at 833-288-3986 next up is steve in spokane washington listening on sacred heart radio steve you are on with dr david anders yes thank you for taking my call so last week and this week both two people called in that had serious reservations about taking the vaccine yes i do too okay dr anders ended by saying on last week he said take the vaccine this week they basically said take the vaccine and follow what the chur what the church says um i wonder how um you never said anything about following your conscience so i wonder how how do we square not following your conscience on this one but on so many other occasions that dr anders talks about he says we must follow our conscience yeah thank you i really appreciate the question so first of all i have absolutely no memory uh and and would not if i had given the opportunity demand categorically that anybody either take the vaccine or engage in any other sort of medically therapeutic behavior i would this is not that kind of show i don't claim to be a physician or an epidemiologist and i don't generally get in the habit of commanding other people's consciences to do anything other than to listen to them right so that's that's not consistent with my approach my style or my philosophy if i said that it would i would have misspoken because it's not the sort of thing i would want to do on air so i have no memory of saying to this fellow just take the vaccine right now um but every time i have addressed this question i have always insisted that people have a moral a moral obligation to follow their conscience the reason i teach that is because that is the teaching of the catholic church the church says we must follow our consciences now having said that i must add some qualifications following conscience is not all there is to a good moral life it is an important aspect it is a cine qua known meaning you have to follow your conscience but just following your conscience does not make you a good moral decision maker because you can follow your conscience off a cliff if your conscience is badly formed i imagine that were there were a lot of ideologues in the wars of the early 20th century on on both sides of the ideological divide left and right who followed their consciences they did what they thought was the ideologically correct thing to do into horrific human rights abuses if you're badly informed your conscience can lead you off a cliff you do have to follow it but that by itself doesn't make you a good moral decision maker you also need to conjoin your conscience to developing the virtue of prudence you're not a good moral decision maker if you don't have the virtue of prudence prudence involves among other things docility the willingness to be corrected to listen to authority whether that be ecclesiastical authority or rational authority circumspection contemplating multiple possibilities recognizing that my own narrow viewpoint is not the only one and i'm not omniscient so i have to bring the virtue of prudence circumspection docility obedience and a in a genuine openness to truth and a need for discovery recognizing that i'm not infallible bring all of that to the process of moral decision making inform my conscience from the best authorities and reason and then follow my conscience that's how you become a good moral decision maker about vaccines or anything else eight three three two eight eight e wtn is our toll-free number eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six it's ewtn's called a call to communion with dr david anders [Music] the words of blessed carlo ogutis our soul is like a hot air balloon if by chance there's mortal sin the soul falls to the ground confession is like the fire underneath the balloon enabling the soul to rise again that's why it's important to go to confession often the catechism of the catholic church has a great quote from saint john chrysostom on prayer in paragraph 2744 it reads quote nothing is equal to prayer for what is impossible it makes possible what is difficult easy for it's impossible for the man who prays eagerly and invokes god ceaselessly ever to sin close quote that's the power of prayer so what are we waiting for let's get to praying [Music] 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 those who have suffered abuse [Music] lord jesus christ innocent lamb who suffered unjustly for our sake look with mercy on those who have suffered abuse as children the wounds they carry are deep and yet are not beyond your reach heal them console them free them from the burden they carry and bring a swift end to these terrible acts cleanse our churches our schools and our homes of all abuse and grant that children everywhere will be welcomed loved and cherished amen hi this is sci kellet we're talking addiction and healing today on catholic answers live with our guest scott wieman catholic cancer is live 6 pm eastern on ewtn radio now back to call to communion with dr david anderson [Music] it's ewtn's call to communion with dr david andrews if you'd like to be part of the program the number is 833 288 e wtn that's 833-288-3986 that's the number nicki used in south texas watching us on facebook live nikki you are on with dr david anders hello um um oh okay my question is that my husband isn't catholic yet and i am and i'm trying to help him to become catholic but uh he's told me before that i've that i'm pushing a little too hard and so i step back a bit because i'm trying to be respectful but i had never thought of this before that is it my responsibility as a catholic person in the house that i guide him better towards becoming catholic already because i've been waiting for him since he's the man of the house since he's the head of the household um i've been waiting for him to jump in by himself but but he's never really had a good path towards god until very recently that he's seen that god exist and um so i'm just i'm a bit uh i just need some advice on how can i help better and still cooperate with god's will thanks i really appreciate the question so saint paul actually discusses this dilemma in his first letter to the corinthians chapter 7 and he says how do you know husband if you will save your wife how do you know wife if you will save your husband you don't you you each one is responsible to the lord that's the teaching of the apostle and so you have an obligation to god to follow the catholic faith to live a sacramental life to seek practice of virtues and to grow in holiness and the more you exemplify the virtues that the faith extols the more powerful your influence over your husband will be you know christ calls us to be lights not fish hooks right we're we are to lead others into the faith by example by our own luminous holiness not by our coercive power and jesus himself lived this way christ invited everyone to come well actually invited people i should say he invited the crowds to come follow him to come live with him to take up uh repentance and faith in the gospel but when people said i'm not so sure about that he'd say well off you go off you go and then he turned to his disciples so you guys want to split two off you go they were like no no jesus we're with you he's like okay all right then but know that it's going to cost you you know he was not he wasn't about the numbers he was about living living in intimate communion with his father and making that communion available to us and inviting our participation but whether we took up the call or not that's on us and that's true in marriage as well now catholic faith teaches that in saint paul teaches that your sanctity sanctifies your home right so you're bringing the presence of christ into your home by virtue of your own discipleship considering that you're walking with christ that's powerful now uh you know you can offer occasionally if you if prudence suggests it a gentle admonition or a kind push or an invitation but i think that if you if you attempt to force him into the faith if you try to manipulate him into the faith then you're actually not going to get what you want and most people resent being coerced into doing anything and it don't matter what it is i mean it could be something for your own good and you might even know it's for your own good but if somebody else is telling you to do it we have a tendency to put the brakes on we like to be the master of our own ship all of us do right and uh and so you might actually find paradoxically that you have more success uh the the less you seem directly interested in coercing him into coming you know the more you just make the faith salient to him through your own joy and and virtuous living in your own consistent practice and you can always you know hey you want to come to mass with me oh you know you're not going to well all right maybe next time you know um and uh you know maybe once once every blue moon you could say hey you know we've got a i've got a birthday coming up i would love it if you came to mass with me or something like that but um ultimately ultimately his conscience has to persuade him of the necessity of becoming a catholic and and you're not responsible if he doesn't do that does that help you nikki yes thank you you're very welcome we appreciate the call today 833 288 ewtn that's our toll-free number 833-288-3986 [Music] next stop greenville south carolina barbara is listening on the ewtn app barbara you're on with dr anders hello and thank you very much i love this show and i just appreciate all the knowledge that you share my question is this i'm trying to understand the best way to understand passages in the old testament like in ezekiel chapter 5 this starts at verse 13. thus my anger will send itself i will vent my wrath against them until i am satisfied it's just those words in particular i understand what the situation is they were doing things they weren't supposed to but when we look at jesus in what he did for us out of pure mercy these words seem like they would never come out of his mouth in the way he approached things so does that make sense yeah sure thank you so much i really appreciate uh the question and it's a common one now i would like to make one qualification about jesus versus the old testament if you look through the synoptic gospels of matthew mark and luke and i've done this exercise and i would encourage you to i don't think there's any instance in matthew mark or luke where jesus says directly that god loves us i think he exemplifies it but he doesn't teach it explicitly rather than when christ talks about love which he does all the time it's by way of admonition to tell us that we have a moral obligation to love one another if we want to be sons of the father so jesus's overwhelming emphasis is on our moral obligation to love rather than god sort of disinterested or benevolence towards us and uh and it by loving we will participate in the love of god but it's really the emphasis is more on our our our obligation to love rather than than god offering us some sort of you know just uh just kindness without without consequences by contrast the old testament is replete with teaching explicit teaching about god's loving kindness and so my point is the god of the old testament is presented consistently as a loving spouse to wayward israel whose desire is to reconcile his faithless spouse bring them back to himself so that he can show our blessings on them so you know there's a kind of a stereotype old testament god mean new testament god good i don't really think the stereotype fits the data john jesus does say john 3 16 god so loved the world but uh but this idea that you know jesus only presents this sort of loving non-judgmental face of god i don't think that's really true and christ does in fact use imprecatory language about sinners he says woe to you corazon and bethsaida if if the gospel that had been preached in your city had been preached in sodom and gomorrah they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes and you didn't therefore it will go worse for you on the day of judgment so there's a you know there is a prophetic condemnatory strain in the teaching of jesus very much in the same vein as the hebrew prophets and he identifies with the ministry of the hebrew prophets through and through as he does with the ministry of john the baptist who also talked this way really kind of hellfire and brimstone kind of guy john the baptist from time to time so i don't think the dichotomy between the old and new testaments is as strong as as some people want to suggest that it is now that being said it's still a problem for us when we encounter these descriptions of god that seem to uh it'd be easy to think of him as was he just some sort of petty middle eastern tyrant you know who just demands absolute obedience on pain of punishment and i might find that a very difficult god to relate to so i i still have the problem even when i recognize the continuity of old and new testament now the way sacred scripture and sacred tradition handle this is that first of all anthropomorphic language about god in the bible whether in the old or new testament language that would seem to ascribe the attributes of human personality to god are a condescension to our sort of cognitive limitations and that the catholic doctrine of god is that god is not a man god is not a human person and therefore god does not have biological human emotions because these are a function of our embodied humanity our our uh in doctrine system you know the the hormonal system um these are uh you know these are sensorial responses to stimuli god does not have those because he is an infinite absolutely some simple eternal omnipresent spirit who never changes is no hint of change in god god does not have passing emotional states he doesn't go from from happiness to sadness or you know anger to love or you know jealousy or he doesn't have any of those states he is eternal beatitude uh eternally happy in himself and the source of all beatitude and goodness and truth and uh and so when we encounter what would seem to be anthropomorphic descriptions of god in sacred scripture we recognize that those are given for a purpose basically to motivate us in our own moral activity and obviously ezekiel's purpose and scripture's purpose is to warn us about the consequences of sin because if we sin grievously we will experience alienation from god not because god changes and suddenly flares up with an emotional fit no that's not why we'll experience alienation from god we'll experience alienation from god because we will be cutting ourselves off from the source of all benevolence and goodness and beauty now i like to draw this analogy if you imagine the sun like you know the sun is shining and beaming its light in warmth down on planet earth all the time if you go take a a black umbrella and open it over your head you will block the light of the sun out now the sun hasn't changed it's still sitting there beaming and shining on you but you're impeding the flow of sunlight so to speak by by putting up a barrier between you and the sun that's kind of an analogy for a catholic faith understands uh the love of god the love of god is unchanging and eternal and always available but we can interpose creatures our own passions uh you know our idols uh the things of this world we can turn away from that light and truth and goodness and experience the loss of that of that light of god's countenance but it's because of our actions it's because we've drawn ourselves away from it turned our thoughts and our eyes on other things that we experience that loss and that alienation not because god you know suddenly gets flared up in a heat of anger even if the prophets sometimes use that language they use it to be provocative really to evoke in us a sense of seriousness about it uh but we see this evolution throughout the old testament and into the new this uh deepening appreciation of the nature of god as unchanging now i myself find that a very attractive way of understanding doesn't take anything away from the seriousness of these texts yes they're serious admonitions to the life of holiness but i don't have to approach them as literal descriptions of god's character that's the overwhelming tradition of catholic biblical interpretation is that helpful for you barbara is wonderful that's excellent thank you very much thank you thank you 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number grab this open phone line at oh what an 833-288-3986 hi uh my question is on the um communion some churches are doing communion as a memorial so the participants each have a snack version of a little wafer which is wrapped as a to-go snack and uh attached to a little grape and it is done as a memorial repeating what jesus said this is my body which is given up for you and do this in remembrance of me so there's a uh practice of this specifically a church near me covenant church it's called covenant church uh which describes itself as evangelical church catholic church however they took out the word catholic last week and replaced it with historic historic church since the apostles that they followed the church so this is as a practice as a memorial i should say uh is that good enough is that communion yes thank you i understand the question i really appreciate it so uh the sacred scripture teaches us that that the eucharist this is what we're talking about when christ took bread and wine and he said this is my body which is given for you this is my blood of the new covenant which is shed for you the eucharist is the language the church uses to describe that that the eucharist is first and foremost a participation in christ's death on calvary on in christ's self-offering and if you look in saint paul's letter to the corinthians first letter chapter 10 verse 18 and following he lets us know explicitly that catholics that participate in the eucharist are sharing in the altar of sacrifice and you know sacrifice is is the way in which israel worships god we bring to the lord something of value in the old testament it would be goats and bulls all right but in the new testament it is the body and blood of christ that the church brings to god in an offering of sacrifice and that's really the key to christian worship saint paul says offer your bodies as living sacrifices this is your spiritual act of worship saint peter teaches in his epistle that god has made us into a spiritual house to offer spiritual offerings offerings of ourselves and we exemplify this and experience most deeply when we join them to the sacrifice of christ made present to us through the eucharist now it is it is while it is a sacrifice that we offer to god it is a memorial of his death and resurrection and the catholic church understands that there is a memorial aspect we do in fact remember what he did on calvary but we don't only remember it we recapitulate it we we participate in it and in in doing this we don't just memorialize we actually share in the real the the real body and blood of christ jesus says my flesh is real food my blood is real drink and if you eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood you will have life that's what jesus teaches us in john chapter six and so there is a profound although mysterious spiritual reality at the heart of the eucharist and your question well you know does it you know can i wrap it up in a cloth and send you away with some grape juice is that just as good no it is not just as good it is not just as good st paul teaches us also that a participation in the eucharist in the body of christ is a participation by which we are all made into one ecclesial body into one group into one loaf the the eucharist is intimately connected to the identity of the church that jesus founded it's not just a private celebration that i can carry off into a closet it's something that i receive in and through the church that christ instituted that's why when christ gave us the eucharist he ordained his apostles as priests and said to them not to me not to you not to charles or jack but to the apostles do this offer this in memory of me he established the sacred priesthood to perpetuate his presence down through the centuries and gave them a command to do likewise and to make disciples and to baptize them and to forgive their sins and that he would be with them until the end of the age and so for these reasons the catholic church teaches that if i want to experience the eucharist that christ gave i must it must be consecrated by an ordained priest who stands in direct succession to the apostles to whom christ gave the institution of the mass the holy sacrifice of the eucharist the real body and blood of christ and the true sacrifice of calvary are made present to me only in that church founded by christ in apostolic continuity down through the centuries that's the teaching of the catholic faith so i get all of jesus i get his sacrifice i get his body and blood and i participate in that membership in his body which is the catholic church i don't have any of that if i just wrap up some you know some ritz crackers and some grape juice and then go think nice thoughts in my hotel room none of those things are present to me now you know the the protestant church down the street that that does this you know that has the crackers and the juice and you take it out the door is there anything of value there well it's never a bad thing to think about jesus it's always good to think about jesus and the catholic church would say you know these other groups that are out there they have some good things they have some good things and we rejoice in that we rejoice in those elements of truth and sanctification we have in common we're not we're not condemning them we don't hate them we love them but we would be lying if they said if we said it made no difference it does make a difference stay in the church that jesus founded stay in the catholic church thanks so much mel we really appreciate that phone call today be sure to check out the catholic cafe this sunday morning at 10 30 a.m eastern time join uh deacon jeff drazemski in that corner booth in the catholic cafe again sunday 10 30 eastern right here on ewtn radio next up is deborah in santa fe new mexico you're number one in new mexico today dr anders um deborah you are on with dr anders hello dr anders it's so good to speak with you again thank you um yes um my question today is um so with the new um uh thing from the pope you know talking about the availability of the latin mass and um you know we're all still kind of working through that and what what's going to happen in santa fe with the latin mass and where is it going to be or is it going to be um i always like to think kind of like 10 steps ahead and i'm wondering you know if it's if it's not available here is it possible to go to the sspx church down in albuquerque in order to go to the latin mass i can't sometimes i hear that it's a valid math and sometimes i hear you can go to the math but don't receive and i just don't know where that part of the catholic church is standing right sure yeah i appreciate the question so the question of validity is easy it is actually a valid mass and that's that's the position the church has taken so they have validly ordained priests and bishops and so they have a valid eucharist um but validity is not your only consideration you you really need to consider prudence as well and so you you could go and it would be a valid mass but i would advise against it i would strongly advise against it and the reason why is that unity with the sea of rome and with your your diocesan bishop is a higher value than whatever conception of liturgical propriety that you might have saint ignatius of antioch made this principle known long long long ago third bishop of antioch after saint peter said celebrate the eucharist with your bishop and that's that's the position of the church that the eucharist is not uh you know it isn't my own personal possession that i can go carry off and celebrate according to my tastes with my ideological compatriots apart from the mind and the body of the catholic faithful that is contrary to the meaning of the eucharist the eucharist is is irreducibly the sacrament of the church is unity and the the bishop is the established source of the church's ecclesial unity within the diocese by christ's institution so the fact that i can see a valid mass in the sspx does not nullify the fact that i'm doing so with a kind of profound contradiction to the meaning of ecclesial unity that the eucharist is supposed to exemplify and look i've got nothing against the catholic mass and i hope that all the people that want to receive the eucharist in that form of the mass have an opportunity to do so the latin man the latin mass exactly that's yeah thank you for that i mean if you if you have a devotion to the latin mass i hope you have that opportunity but not at the expense of ecclesial unity and that that's precisely the issue that pope francis raised in tradiciona's custody that he was concerned that devotion to the latin mass had become divisive and that would yeah you have good intuition jack i'll follow your lead here very quickly we'll head to bill in north texas listening on guadalupe radio uh bill just a couple minutes left with dr anders what's your question dr anders i have a question about the sacrament of reconciliation and communion um if i am not in the state of grace and therefore in my mind should not be receiving communion do i need to confess my sin to a priest and be absolved with that than by a priest yes sort of answer yes so you can god can forgive your sin immediately and directly without the intervention of a priest but according to the law of the church you should not go to communion until you have had the benefit of sacramental reconciliation unless it is a case of urgency like you're in danger of death every every every law of the catholic church can be sort of hedged and qualified when there's a question of danger of death but if you're not in danger of death if it's not a matter of urgency like that then the church insists if you're conscious of grave sound do not receive holy communion until you have been absolved sacramentally in this agreement of confession now you know don't wait for confession to get right with god go ahead and make an act of contrition immediately but then make that appointment to go to confession then go to communion david have a great weekend you too jack on behalf of our host dr david anders our producer charles berry call screener matt gabinski uh i'm jack williams thanks so much for tuning in to ewtn's call to communion back at it again on monday until then god bless i'm continually amazed and humbled at the way mast appeal with colleen

Channel: EWTN

Views: 3,562

Rating: 4.8909092 out of 5

Keywords: Catholic, EWTN, Christian, television

Id: IliFlzoZJJA

Length: 53min 52sec (3232 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 03 2021