Called to Communion with Dr. David Anders - September 7, 2021

tnnews.com i'm theresa tomio and call to communion with dr david anders starts now what's stopping you from becoming a catholic why can't women become priests 1-833-288 ewtn i don't understand why i have to earn salvation why do i need to 1-833-288-3986 my sins to a priest what's stopping you this is call to communion with dr david anders on the ewtn global catholic radio network well we hope everybody had a wonderful labor day weekend here in 2021 welcome to a tuesday edition of ewtn's call to communion i'm jack williams sitting in today for tom price who is traveling home from his labor day festivities out and about so he'll be back with you again tomorrow we are asking the question however even in tom's absence what's stopping you from becoming a catholic if you'd like to answer that question for us the number to call is eight three three two eight eight e w t n that's eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six it's a free phone call anywhere in north america if you're outside the united states and canada your number is one two zero five two seven one two nine eight five and if you are indeed outside of north america we will put you to the front of the line at one two zero five two seven one 2985 you can always send us an email ctc at ewtn.com or you can text your question to dr anders text the letters ewtn to 5500 wait for a response text your first name in your question message and data rates may apply charles berry producing the program your call screener is matt gubinsky and jeff burson handling our social media efforts so if you're watching on youtube or facebook live you can type a question into the chat window and it may find its way to us by the end of the program and your host to see us every day the aforementioned dr david anders how are you i'm feeling pretty aforementioned today jack well that's good because you were got an email here from diane and she said recently i was moved to pray for those afflicted and was immediately struck by the thought of christ's passion and suffering and the sense that this was all connected that therein was the answer to seemingly senseless suffering i realize that as catholics we unite are suffering with that of christ giving it meaning and rendering it value and merit yet most of those for whom i prayed were not catholic or even christian can you speak to the connection between the passion and suffering of christ and human suffering in the world at large yeah thanks what a great question and this is of course one of the deepest existential spiritual needs that we have as a way to make sense of our own suffering and and to know how to endure it how to bear it uh virtuously and make something valuable out of it uh so you're correct that the pattern of christ's life is in fact the pattern not just for catholics but for humanity he reveals to us and and creates the possibility for us of a truly human life and uh and that's true for everybody not just for catholic people now obviously the more you are consciously and sacramentally connected to the death of christ to the passion of christ through the ministry of the catholic church the easier it's going to be for you to realize these spiritual ends and goals and purposes um i have heard non-catholic people from other religious traditions say that you know suffering isn't redemptive it doesn't have value it has no meaning and just because they say so that doesn't make it meaningless but it certainly would make it harder for somebody who had that idea to find meaning in their suffering now i think that almost every religious tradition every people group every culture has found that the suffering of some come can be redemptive it can be uh sanctifying it can be virtue building even if they don't manifest that in their religious imagery or symbols or doctrines everybody has the experience of growing through experience growing through hardship developing virtue however they conceive of the meaning of life now we know that through the mystery of god god is capable of making grace available to everyone in fact it is a dogma of the catholic faith that cri that god offers sufficient grace to every individual person that they might be saved now that grace is more manifest in uh the fullness of the catholic faith but in some hidden way known only to god it is in fact manifest in some fashion to everyone and that's why we're all morally responsible before god we have the opportunity to respond to his grace and and since the the form of our sanctity is cruciform and that's not just true for catholics anyone who's coming into a sanctified relationship with god is going to have to manifest at some level even implicitly faith hope and charity and and that's going to look like the passion of christ jesus says if you want to be to my disciple you have to take up your cross and follow me so everyone must at some point come to the realization i have to bear this up and i have to accept what the province has handed out to me as an as a good that escapes that transcends my reason and i'm going to find my own sanctity my own charity my own path in life not by just trying to avoid every form of suffering but by living through it meaningfully for the glory of god and the good of my neighbor 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number 833-288-3986 mrs e from the united kingdom says uh i have a question regarding in vitro fertilization we were trying for a baby for a long time had fertility drugs but they did not work i refused if i ivf before due to my catholic beliefs i am in my late 40s now and it's too risky to try again sometimes it comes to my mind was i wrong for not choosing ivf before i'm not sure on what the real standard the catholic church is is on ivf can you help me yeah thank you i appreciate the question well you are not wrong to obey the teaching of the church of course you're not wrong you are absolutely correct to do that um this however is a hardship for you to be childless and my heart goes out to you and our prayers go out to you and we recognize that this is a profound difficulty this is a great wound and and it's something that you're gonna suffer right um i will add it doesn't mean that your marriage is ultimately fruitless or that you you can't realize in some way the the goods of maternity and paternity and the participation in that ecclesial state of marriage which is naturally feckened and it's for uh the propagation of the faith uh through uh childbearing and manifesting christ left the world many of those aspects of that vocation that are maybe ordered towards the procreation of children can nevertheless be realized in other ways and oftentimes childless couples have a tremendous ministry in the catholic faith and in the world so you know we can we can take some of that pain and suffering and that loss and and turn that direct that into uh pastoral activity into apostolic activity that's very fruitful um but uh but we would we'd be lying if we said that it didn't come with with suffering and pain and loss and maybe times regret and self-doubt i mean those are natural responses but you know just because you want an outcome doesn't justify any means and ivf is an immoral means to what is otherwise a desirable outcome namely bearing children it's ewtn's call to communion with dr david [Music] anders my wife and i are former protestants who are considering converting to the catholic church and we wanted to ask you about what the catholic view of purgatory would be i have a religious teacher who tells us women should be priests how long do you have to be and that's cool mother angelica answering the call sunday 2 and 8 p.m eastern exclusively on ewtn radio living the beatitudes with father bjorn blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of god saint jose maria escriva says that we are called to light up the pathways of this earth by being sowers of peace and joy this comes from being aware that we are sons and daughters of god on the road of life though we find dangers but god walks with us every step of our life pouring out the gifts of his holy spirit upon us our lady is our companion like gps in our car connected to the cloud and bringing the latest updates to help us navigate our journey and get out of traffic on the way to the eternal kingdom we don't want to get into family fights on our way to god's vacation destination but we should be the sowers of peace and joy we shouldn't accept substitutes except only the authentic identity of being his children his sons and daughters let's grow in happiness and bring peace to those around us blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of god for more about the beatitudes visit ewtnrc.com [Music] 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number it's a free phone call anywhere in north america a couple of lines open for you at 833-288-3986 keep up with everything going on here at ewtn uh with wings it's our weekly e newsletter and you can find out everything that's going on right here on ewtn radio our tv shows items from religious catalog and a whole lot more you can sign up for wings at ewtn.com look for the subscribe button um again 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number first up today is jb in columbus georgia listening to us on siriusxm channel 130. jb you are on with dr david anders good afternoon guys thanks for taking my call um i have a question i'll just question though it's in response to what's keeping me from becoming a catholic and and i wanted to throw this out there because i i have recently sat down and kind of i found this website that had a list of like the 255 or so dogmas of the catholic church and then there was a couple maybe a hundred or so other things that weren't necessarily dogmatic and i read through the whole list and and i tell you the reason why i'm doing this research is because i really become convinced i'm a methodist but i'm real i've really become convinced that christ's body really is present in in the sacrament of the eucharist or communion and and i'm i don't want to miss out on that and so um so i went and i have been looking through and i really am i'm like 99 catholic i realize and my question is when if i mean do i have to profess to believe what happens if i have a problem with a dogma of the church you know for instance like papillion people infallibility i just i'm not there yeah and or the immaculate or the like the immaculate conception of mary i'm not there and so i'm not i'm not asking you to convince me that those dogmas are right what i'm what i'm at i'm with you i'm with you how do you how do you approach the question of the act of faith when some of the dogmas of the faith seem seem incoherent or incredible to you i i get that i understand i've been in the same place i think most people have um so first of all let me ask you a question if i might you said you're persuaded of the doctrine of the real presence of christ in the eucharist but you have some difficulties with the with the marian dogmas um metaphysically in terms of what is possible either either to god or in nature do you think it's more difficult for god to make the body and blood of christ present in the eucharist or to preserve the blessed virgin from original sin like which one poses a and this is an absurd question i know and you see the point of it which one is a greater difficulty for god or metaphysically i mean i mean yeah i don't think he breaks the sweat either way no he's not breaking a sweat either way so this has nothing to do with uh it's not just about the intelligibility of the dogma to us because i don't think anybody could claim that transubstantiation is fully intelligible to us it's intelligible to god but we don't understand how it happens we believe in transubstantiation on the authority of christ i would never come to this conclusion on my own if jesus hadn't revealed it to me so the reason i make an act of faith in the doctrine of transubstantiation is at least it at least primarily that that christ has taught the thing and if he says it he's the authority and so i'm going to believe him right uh if if in john chapter 6 right after jesus taught the real presence of christ in the eucharist if he had said and oh by the way here's a list of marion dogmas you have to believe would that would that resolve the problem for you well yeah probably okay so this this has to do not so much then with the question of the truth about the blessed virgin mary is about that the nature of religious authority within the christian faith this is really a scruple on your part about how do i how am i to form my dogmatic opinions and there is kind of this implicit belief that you seem to manifest and i'm not trying to put words in your mouth so i mean if i get it wrong you let me know but this is kind of what i'm inferring that if i can find in the bible yeah i'm okay with that but this stuff that's not in the bible i'm not so sure about right and that's the question we really need to address we r because like if you found some doctrine in scripture that you found otherwise difficult to swallow you would swallow it with ease because you're very comfortable with the idea of biblical authority right but that's that's embedded into sort of the grammar of your theological logic and here's what i want to do with that um is that grammar that you're bringing to the interpretation of the christian faith this sort of assumption that if it's in scripture it's clear outside of that and got some problems is that a scriptural disposition like does the bible itself suggest to us that we should approach the christian faith in that way and i would i would hold that that's not actually the case that when we look to the witness of the bible itself the bible's own testimony points us to a different set of religious authorities jesus of course never mentions the completed canon of the bible in any fashion and least of all does he mention it as a rule of faith for the church as kind of the you know the highest go-to place for the for the faith when jesus makes provision for handing on the faith he never points us to the bible certainly doesn't point us to the documents of the new testament he actually points us to his own oral tradition and to the teaching authority of the apostles and their successors so consider for example the christ words in the gospel of matthew he says go into all nations make disciples teach them everything i have commanded you now that of course was his entire oral tradition including the rituals that he instituted baptize them in the name of the father son and holy spirit command to celebrate the sacraments and the promise of divine assistance i will be with you to the end of the age and whoever hears you hears me that's from the gospel of luke whoever hears you hears me whoever rejects you rejects me whatever you bind on earth is bound in heaven whoever sends you forgive forgiven and so forth so when we actually look to the provision that christ makes for handing on the faith it's not the bible it is in fact the teaching authority of the apostles and their successors to the end of the age conveying his oral tradition and the and the liturgical practice of the church now i mean if you if you're 99 catholic i think you've you've probably already got that you understand that christ established the church that this was in fact what he gave the world to perpetuate his ministry that he promised that the church would not defect the gates of hell would not prevail against it he would be with the church till the end of the age and precisely the thing they were supposed to hand on were unwritten traditions about jesus because he never says go into all nations and you know hand out this tract that i wrote no he says teach them everything i've commanded you now the gospel of john tells us a lot of things jesus said and dead not in the bible a lot of them not in the bible the witness of scripture why was it in that he says well these things have been written so that you can have faith in jesus as the son of god not these things have been written so you can have a comprehensive account of everything you need to believe as a christian just sufficient that you might have faith that jesus is the son of god right so to make an act of faith in the catholic church like as an article of faith i believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church is to believe christ's testimony about the church now we began this conversation by you're admitting to me look if jesus just gave me a list of marian dogmas i'd have no trouble believing it but he's done one better because this jesus is not going to give us it's not the form his ministry took he's not going to give us a completely comprehensive list of every proposition that any christian could ever have to believe under any circumstance in fact when he was asked for such things he usually demured the rich young ruler comes and says what can i do to be saved he goes ah you already know what to do you already know what to do oh you want something else come follow me right he's always kind of dodging that way he didn't intend to give us a comprehensive list so when he made provisions for what it is in fact you have to believe he directs us to the authority of the church so if you're really going to believe the testimony of christ about the blessed virgin you have to believe the testimony of christ about the church itself namely that it possesses this charism of infallibility and it will teach the church he'll teach the truth with authority and without error now you know how do you handle this emotionally well i was kind of like you when i came into the church what drew me to the catholic church initially was a doctrine of salvation justification because i saw that the catholics had the better side of the argument and uh you know i wasn't comfortable with a lot of the other pieces of the puzzle that didn't quite all fit together for me but just like as a protestant when i picked up the bible the bible didn't all fit together for me i mean i had trouble making some of the parts cohere they were they cohere a lot better for me now that i'm catholic but at the time they didn't seem to fit i couldn't squeeze paul and the gospels together very well luther couldn't either but i accepted him on authority all right and uh and then when i became catholic it was like okay i'm the same sort of intellectual exercise is being asked of me just like i couldn't necessarily fit all the bible together logically but i did because i was exceeding to authority at this point in my christian formation i can't yet give a comprehensive account account of how all of this stuff fits together but because christ revealed it i'm gonna accept it and trust that his providence over time work of his spirit my life if i need to work these things out they will come and there is a logic that i'm not seeing but i am not the judge i'm not the final authority like my ability to conceptualize the logical coherence of the faith is not is not the final authority here it's instrumental the final authority is jesus and his words about the church there's enough believability to the catholic tradition there's enough motives of credibility that yes i can believe christ founded the church and gave her authority i'm going to accept that because god has revealed it over time these details will work out for me and they did what's stopping you from becoming a catholic 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number 833-288-3986 next up is rob in shoreline washington listening on sacred heart radio rob thanks for holding welcome to the program thank you so my question is uh we're called to love others and give to those who are in need but where's that line drawn like if we're being taken advantage of or someone's just using us for our money um yeah maybe they are yeah how do i yeah sure okay so i think uh first of all we need to get clear on the definition of love all right and that's very important now saint thomas aquinas who is kind of the the chief catholic theologian of all time defines love this way he says love is benevolence towards another person desiring their genuine good like i really want the good for this person and that may or may not mean you know like i don't have the habit of giving money to people that are asking for it on street corners when i'm you know parked at an intersection because i i strongly suspect that many of them are looking for money because they want to fund a heroin addiction and uh you know i'd be much more interested in helping them find their way you know to to legitimate work or maybe to treatment for addiction that would be desiring that person's genuine good uh i don't necessarily think that handing them a you know five dollar bill is really advancing them towards their own integral good so the first thing about love is that i i want this person's genuine integral good the good of them in in totality as a human being spiritual good emotional good psychological good uh economic well-being is part of that you know physical health relational stability all of those things that go into a life of flourishing and meaning i want for this person all right secondly i would like to be in union with them you know kind of friendship with that person but not on their terms i i want to be in union with them in some good right like in other words if one of these guys comes and says hey let's uh i'd like to be your friend and we want to go over here and out of this bridge and shoot up together i'm not interested in that kind of a friendship that's not what i mean i'm talking about a genuine friendship based in some virtue that's the kind of that's the kind of union that love demands genuine benevolence wanting their the integral good of the person and a willingness to befriend them but in some virtue in something that is genuinely good not on their terms and so when you get a relationship with a manipulative person who who's probably got you know personality disorder and some kind of dysfunction in their life and they use guilt to manipulate you they are neither bidding for genuine friendship nor asking you to advance their own integral good all right so right there that's problematic now here's another aspect of the teaching st thomas also tells us that in order to have one virtue you have to have them all and so much harm and i agree with that i mean so he's totally right so much harm happens in the world because of people trying to break the life of charity apart from justice and prudence now prudence is the virtue of good decision making right considering all the options what there may be many there's a good i want to accomplish here there are a lot of different ways to accomplish it one of them is prudent most of them aren't justice means giving somebody what they really need what they really deserve what is really suited to their condition and if you you can't break charity apart from prudence and justice so if i'm presented with another human being who makes a demand on me uh it may be or may not be a reasonable demand but what charity demands is that i bring justice and prudence consideration counsel wisdom to bear on the question of how can i advance that person's integral good and i may come up dry it may be that there is nothing i can do right now to advance that person's integral good the best i can do is maintain a willingness to forgive perhaps if they've manipulated me or tried to take advantage of me or hurt me in some way a willingness to forgive and a desire to move forward towards some inner girl good at whatever time that becomes possible 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number it's a free phone call anywhere in north america 833-288-3986 straight ahead we'll talk to michael in portland oregon tom in topeka kansas patrick in bay city michigan and we've got plenty of time for your phone calls here on a tuesday edition of ewtn's call to communion that number again 833 288 ewtn it's a free telephone call anywhere in north america eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six you can always send us an email it's ctc at ewtn.com that's ctc at ewtn.com it's ewtn's call to communion with dr david anders [Music] mother angelica scott hahn father wade menezes you'll hear the leading catholic voices on the largest catholic media network in the world this is the ewtn global catholic radio network [Music] this is a messy family minute with mike and alicia hernan when it comes to prudential matters like rules or discipline you and your spouse need to act as a team when it comes to discipline it's better to be wrong together than write alone you might think you have the perfect discipline but wait there is no perfect discipline plan but the most essential part of any plan is that you and your spouse agree on it sure it's simpler to parent alone but as a long-term strategy it's a disaster the key is communication you and your spouse need to talk decide and act together maybe it's the wrong decision but it's incredibly crucial that you agree to be wrong together spend more time talking with your spouse than listening to experts because being in unity with your spouse unlocks the grace that comes from the sacrament of marriage remember it's better to be wrong together than write alone for more on this topic listen to our podcast on parenting as a team at messyfamilyminute.org here's today's quote from mother angelica's perpetual calendar say to yourself hey wake up what are you here for you must have joy and freedom but we have to have the determination and courage to say what is wrong with me lord how do i overcome it 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.com hi this is psy kellett the host of catholic answers live and father hugh barber joins us for two hours of open forum today catholic answers live 6 p.m eastern on ewtn radio now back to called the communion with dr david anders [Music] one open line for you at eight three three two eight eight e wtn it's a free phone call eight three three two eight eight three nine eight six next up is michael in portland oregon listening to modern day e radio michael thanks so much for holding welcome to the program you're on with dr anders thank you very much glad to be here well i'm having a tough time calling myself a catholic here in portland okay and why is that well the archdiocese has decided to terminate its relationship with the boy scouts of america because of the sexual abuse effort going on with that okay i guess the extra bishop never read matthew 18 verse 22. i suspect he has read it but why do you say why doesn't he apply that doctrine of jesus to this situation okay and how would you have that be applauded so i'm make sure i'm following you well it's quite simple forgiveness is forgiveness it's black or white either you forgive or you don't forgive okay and so you think there's a lack of forgiveness on the part of the archbishop because he's decided to terminate the relation the diocese relationship with the boy scouts of america that's correct okay thank you i appreciate that i think i can respond to that so i i haven't read the bishop's decision and i don't know precisely what motivated him but i mean i can tell you as someone who works for a bishop in a diocese uh that a bishop has to make decisions about the temporal welfare of the church all the time that are based in you know kind of a prudential consideration about what is the best means to use to accomplish some particular uh uh pastoral or maybe it's even uh you know kind of a physical plant sort of need i mean am i going to contract with this electrical firm or that electrical firm to come you know fix the electricity in the chancery offices for example um and uh uh the question of matthew 18 really has to do with the inclusion of sinners within the household of faith you know or else we're in the same text jesus deals with what do you do if somebody sins against you and they they don't repent well ultimately you take it to the church and they're subject to the disciplinary structures of the church so this the context here has to do with uh how does the church receive somebody within her own family and let them have access to the sacraments and things like that and i i don't think the archbishop has said you can correct me if i'm wrong i don't think he said anybody affiliated with the boy scouts can't receive the sacraments in the church i don't think he said that at all i think probably what he's advocated is we're you know we're not going to promote scouting as a ministry within the diocese but he's not excluding members of the boy scouts organization from the sacramental life of the church or the fellowship of the christian faithful he's just making a prudential choice about which agency to engage in in ministry to youth and so i don't see that the question of forgiveness really has really comes into it at all i mean presumably if a member of the boy scouts organization send they could go to confession and be and be forgiven just like anybody else could so i don't think forgiveness is really the issue this is his own prudential decision about what kind of agencies do i want to work with in promoting the work of the diocese and uh you know he may have considerations about national politics and and the ideological uh tone of the national boy scout organization and whether there'd be some conflict of messaging with the catholic diocese because the boy scouts internationally have taken some nationally have taken some public stances that run contrary or are seen to run contrary to catholic teaching and he may think that that's kind of conflict of interest or sending a wrong message again that wouldn't have anything to do with uh you know with the question of forgiveness it would just be a prudential decision about again what's the best way to do youth ministry in my diocese now uh here's here's kind of an out for you also as catholics we are not obligated to believe that all of our leaders always act prudently and clearly they don't i'm not making a judgment in this particular case right because i don't know the situation but but you know christ never guaranteed that every bishop and every priest or every pope in the world would always and only act wisely and uh and and so it's not a burden on me right i'm not i'm very free as a catholic to think that you know some pastoral decision that a bishop or a priest or a pope makes may be a bad one that's an okay opinion for a catholic to hold in fact the code of canon law this section of the code on the rights of the catholic faithful states explicitly that the catholic faithful have a right and at times a duty uh to manifest their opinions to the sacred pastors and bishops about the the wealth the temporal welfare of the church or the spiritual welfare of the church and i think they think something's being done badly or in in the wrong way they they have a right to let that be known and uh you know so i would encourage you you know rather than seeing this as a reason to to reject the church you know you could be involved in the question perhaps of how should youth ministry be done in the diocese and get yourself on a committee uh get involved in a parish go out there and do youth ministry get involved in some other scouting organization let your voice be heard you have you have that right as a catholic person eight three three two eight eight ewtn is our toll-free number one line open and plenty of time for your calls at 833-288-3986 tom is in topeka kansas he's listening on sirius xm channel 130 tom you're on with dr david anders hello hi hi um so my question well yeah i'm a catholic but so my question comes from it's about the amazonian senate and the uh the pakamama incident but then there's that i'm also hearing that there's a statue of ball in front of b-a-a-l right the ancient hebrews would sacrifice their children sure i'm just like i'm trying to uh control all of this okay sure i think i can probably help you thank you appreciate the question so uh first of all i'm not going to pass any judgment positive or negative on the quality or how appropriate a given piece of artwork is or or you know what motivated some particular vatican official to include some artwork in the in the collection i'm just not going to address those issues at all and and again just like i told the last fellow on on the on the show individual catholics are free to think that church officials can make bad decisions like you're not obligated to believe that everybody always does what's prudent and best in the interest of the church so people clearly make mistakes about stuff you're allowed to think that nevertheless i will address a theological issue um is it absolutely wrong always and everywhere forever for any catholic agency to ever display uh artwork or imagery uh from non-catholic cultures or non-catholic religions or worship and i would say the answer to that question is no it's not always and everywhere wrong and there are situations in which would be very appropriate so it's a deeply catholic principle that uh christ came not for the jews only but for the whole whole world and that the religious history of peoples outside of israel are not irrelevant to the divine plan so you know god superintends history for the fullness of time and the coming of the messiah not just the history of israel but the history of all nations and it is a common patristic doctrine that uh the the religious and philosophical history of greece specifically which was a pagan nation was guided by the holy spirit to and i quote saint irenaeus of leon here to habituate men to the logos so specifically the development of greek letters and greek philosophy prepared the pagan world for the coming of christ the incarnate logos that is explicitly the teaching of the fathers of the church and so the mindset of ancient patristic apologists was not to always contrast catholic faith with with her non-catholic contemporaries but to sometime look for bridges that could be built between cultures to find in non-catholic places not not the fulfillment of the faith but its anticipation and to see in the imagery and the artwork and especially the philosophy and letters of these cultures some kind of intimations of the truth that would ultimately point towards towards the truth of christianity the anglican he's not catholic but the anglican writer c.s lewis once said about nature that nature writes with a cribbed hand what the gospel writes in capital bold letters right that there's a kind of i think it's an apt metaphor there's a kind of intimation a kind of hint it may be imperfect uh anticipations of the coming of christ now uh catholic missionaries throughout the centuries have really sort of doubled down on that sense of appropriation of non-catholic cultures and found points of commonality that they could work into a catholic expression of the faith and culturation at times refuting at times rejecting and at times accepting so it's not uncommon when you travel in italy for example to find churches all over the landscape named santa maria sopra minerva st mary on top of minerva meaning you would take some temple some hillside some consecrated place that had been dedicated to a pagan deity you acknowledge that and then you you know place a shrine blessed virgin on top of it showing that the christian faith the catholic faith fulfills and supersedes the religious aspirations of the pagans that they came to evangelize um and uh and that's clearly true in the way they handled pagan philosophy this even gets translated into into catholic art and so you can look in the sistine chapel for example and in some of the imagery of christ and the father and the last judgment and other other paintings of the frescoes you will also find that uh michelangelo put in some of the pagan oracles who are represented in the artwork not because he's embracing pagan prophecy as such but to show that even these aspects of pagan culture were understood by the fathers as a kind of anticipation of the gospel and uh and so that's that's part of the catholic mindset now obviously we're going to stop short of engaging in the rights and ceremonies of pagan peoples and we're not going to offer sacrifice to their gods and so forth but the act of sacrifice as such saint thomas says is of the natural law it's part of natural religion and insofar as mankind has an innate desire to offer sacrifice to some deity that is preparatory for the gospel now what's the right way to take these catholic truths and then implement them either in missionary activity or ecumenical dialogue now that's a whole different question and if you want to hold this was done imprudently because of the risk of scandal and and they they shouldn't have done it because you know it's raising questions in people's minds about syncretism that's that's a perfectly legitimate discussion to have uh but i'm just addressing the larger theological question is it always in everywhere wrong to engage you know pagan literature or artwork or mythology in a discussion of catholic faith the answer to that question would be no sometimes it's prudent 833 288 ewtn is our toll-free number that's the number uh rosalinda used in san antonio texas listening on guadalupe radio russell linda you are on with dr david anders thank you hi hi um i have a question on how to approach somebody who believes in god that does not believe in organized religion yes certainly thank you i appreciate the question so someone who believes in god but does not believe in organized religion believes instead in disorganized religion or self-organized religion there are no other options right because religion just means uh the the virtue the act of offering proper worship to god that's what that means and i'm going to offer worship to god according to some understanding of god in god's nature and what my moral duty is and that that worship can be organized by divine authority or can be organized by my personal authority or by no authority in so far as is very disorganized religion is nothing other than a revealed religion i should say it's nothing other than the right ordering of our innate religious impulse and uh so so we we need some order some virtue to our religious life um because we're not infallible we're limited uh we need we need the goods of tradition of scripture of teaching of community to guide and direct our religious impulses virtuously and and none of us are equipped to do that on our own now fortunately god has actually revealed supernaturally revealed a divine order to our religious life and that is the catholic faith now how do you bring someone else to see that to see their need for things like community and tradition and ritual and sacrifice and law well that's pretty tough when somebody has made themselves or their own their own preferences the center of the universe if they think they're wholly adequate unto themselves to direct their own religious life apart from the benefits of a community guiding them it's hard to make them see to see reason i think the best way is to manifest in your own life and in your conversation with them the very virtues that catholic faith is meant to build within you and as you show yourself to be more wise more prudent more just more charitable more faithful more hopeful more loving more kind more patient uh and and those things flow from your practice of the catholic faith the more interesting and more compelling that will be to your non-catholic friend now in my own life i have individuals that i've been in relationship you know sometimes four years who are aware of my catholic faith and uninterested in it but i have seen sometimes even sometimes after years of conversation and friendship an interest developed in another individual in the catholic faith not because i you know found that perfect apologetical tool to manipulate them um but you know because they began to see that it made sense and to be patient understand that god wants this person to be saved uh your life of charity and holy friendship and an informed faithful participation in the church and allowing that to be manifest in everything that you do is the best possible witness to this individual when they're ready to talk to you about the faith they will eight three three two eight eight e wtn is our toll-free number what's stopping you from becoming a catholic we'd love to hear your answer to that question at 833-288-3986 you know many of the mystics of the catholic church and a lot of the visionaries in recent uh decades and centuries have really stressed the importance of the rosary that's the message that our lady has been bringing to us over and over again and you can join us twice every day for the rosary here on ewtn radio 5 30 a.m eastern time with mother angelica and the poor claires of perpetual adoration and then at 9 30 pm eastern time with father benedict groschell and simonetta that's the holy rosary right here on ewtn radio next up is miriam in the great state of new mexico she's listening on siriusxm channel 130. miriam you are on with dr anders thank you thank you dr anders for excellent explanations for lots of these questions my question is is there a more welcoming version of this rcia that makes catechumens feel like they are very welcome and they are accepted and they are supported i had that experience i was a catechumen i was a candidate i very happily stood with my group in front of our young wonderful priest uh got his blessings got through the you know that uh made it through the first line of uh being a catholic so what i left about was not church doctrine any of the things catechism was teaching what i left was because of people acting as snobby saying things like i'm a cradle catholic i've been married 40 years i've been married 30 years i've been met it's just like well you haven't been married you know 30 years like you know they've come across as snobs i've heard this from other people as well my daughter herself left because they came across as knobs i mean i know they're not but they really come across as like where cradle catholics and we've been married this many years and you on the other hand so you know what i mean yeah yeah so i'm first of all i'm just profoundly sympathetic to your complaint and there is a lot of truth in what you say now uh in point of fact there's somebody a lot more important than me who has also put his finger on this problem and that would be pope francis and the the the culture the internal culture of catholicism of catholic parishes and diocese in the world today the extent to which many of them are driven by concern for maintenance of the status quo existing authority structures people in offices you know ministries that may be in place for 30 years as opposed to the needs of apostolate and mission and and the wounds of hurting people on what he calls the peripheries those that are currently outside the pastoral reach of the faith that is something that is really really sailing it to pope francis and he's tried to make that an issue in the international church because the problem that you've identified is a real one and i have experienced it i know what you're talking about um and you know your your initial question is there a kindler and gentler expression of rca than the one i went through well um i have had the blessing of traveling around the country and i've been in a lot of different parishes a lot of different diocese and one thing i've learned is they're not all the same i mean they're the same in terms of their doctrine and liturgical practice but the the sort of pastoral philosophy and the culture of different diocese can change dramatically from diocese to diocese and it's not always just because of the particular bishop they have at the moment it may be long-standing practice that's been in place for decades changes put in place a long time ago or failed to be put in place that have led to these outcomes and so yeah there are you will if you go from one parish to another you're gonna have very different experiences of rcaa unfortunately there is no uh or fortunately there's no standardized model that guarantees you know this is not a this is not a mcdonald's franchise where you know a big mac is going to be the same wherever you get it you know you're going to have differences in approach and sometimes it's going to make it easier or harder to swallow i hate that that's the case there are a lot of voices in catholic ministry today that are that are trying to raise awareness uh you know to bring some of these more human concerns i mean we may have a good formation in the doctrine of the faith how are we doing with the people thing um there are a lot of people who want to work on that but it is a problem and i i think historically in the united states this is a function of demography sociology and history going back 100 years and the way catholicism grew up on the ground of the united states how is largely to begin with an insular self-focused immigrant community of people that experienced kind of persecution and outsider status and so they didn't develop good habits of welcoming newcomers because they didn't have that need and they didn't have that opportunity the world has changed uh catholic pastoral ministry has not always has not always kept pace with those changes and that's a conversation that needs to happen now so what do you do if you're a catholic person and you're trying to you know live a healthy catholic life and that's not the culture of your parish well you know i this is this is a small consolation right now but you know my in my own catholic life my circle of catholic friends has always transcended my parish and uh because i want to be catholic and i want to live a sacramental life and i want to follow christ in the catholic church i've worked to make a catholic community for myself out of like-minded people that i find all over the place and i've never felt i mean i love my parish but i've never felt like i was totally bound by the contours of my geographical parish in order to form my catholic identity or live my life and and i hope this doesn't sound like a cop-out because it's not it really is the truth my catholic community encompasses the saints of 2000 years and they're every bit as much present to my moral imagination um as uh as the catholic friends i have in the pew i mean i i really mean that i'm not just whistling dixie here i mean it's true and uh and so my conception of myself as a catholic is broad it encompasses both my parish and my diocese and the church of 2000 years and friends that i've made across you know across cities and states um and uh and meanwhile i'm engaged in the work of trying to you know bring more of that up awareness of the integral human needs uh to the work of catechesis that you have so rightly identified as as very important uh very quickly we'll head to noaa he is in the great state of texas listening on guadalupe radio noah what's your question today for dr anders why does the protestant bible have seven missing books that we have thank you appreciate the question noah i'm going to give you the short answer the short answer is the seven books that protestants don't have those books teach things like prayers to the saints offering prayers for the dead and the doctrine of purgatory uh the protestant reformation in the 16th century leading protestant theologians did not like those things they did not like prayers for the dead they didn't like the prayers of the saints they didn't like the doctrine of purgatory and they found these seven books to be very inconvenient because they can they conflicted with protestant doctrine now they offer different reasons they have different arguments about why they took them out but at root the protestants didn't like what they said and so they took them out and quickly we'll head to jimmy in the great state of new jersey a first-time caller listening on domestic church media jimmy just a couple minutes left with dr anders what's your question today yes sir hi dr anders um my question would be um as a i've been a lifelong catholic um and i know you've been had a time in your in a protestant denomination for a long time how do you or did your denomination square with the fact that from the end of the apostolic age to the reformation time that gap in between like where did it all go yep i got you this about three different answers that protestants historically give one of them is the primitivist doctrine and that it would be associated with people like the like the the christian church alexander campbell they would just hold that the gospel was more or less just kind of destroyed after the the apostles and then recovered by reformers that's one version of it there's another view this was held by calvin into a certain extent luther that thought that their version of christianity existed for 1500 years kind of implicitly sort of like you know smoldering ashes on a fire and that their job was just to kind of blow that back into flame or you could take the kind of high church anglican view that would stress continuities between their tradition and catholicism so really multiple different answers to that question from within the protestant camp sort of depending on their ecclesiology david thanks so much for letting me sit in with you thanks jax always a blessed your security blanket will be back tomorrow thanks so much for listening on behalf of our host dr david anders our producer charles berry our call screener matt gubinski and our social media maven mr jeff person i'm jack williams again sitting in today for tom price thanks so much for tuning in to ewtn's call to communion we'll be back at it again tomorrow where we will once again ask that question what's stopping you from becoming a catholic it's uh call to communion with dr david andrews until tomorrow god bless on the next catholic connection with teresa tamio coming up on a new day in a new month starting the month of september with a look at the memorial for the aborted babies it happens every year and our friends from citizens are a pro-life society including dr monica miller will join us on a wednesday to tell us all about these events coming up in september all of that

Channel: EWTN

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Keywords: Catholic, EWTN, Christian, television

Id: nMYH4zlBog8

Length: 54min 30sec (3270 seconds)

Published: Tue Sep 07 2021