EWTN Live - 2018-12-05 - Fr. Robert Altier

[Music] thank you thank you very much and welcome I'm father Mitch Pacwa welcome to EWTN live where we bring you guests from around the world I've got a great show for you tonight we're talking about the beauty truth and goodness of the Catholic faith with father Robert Altair but before he joins us want to welcome the education and outreach director for the Knights of Columbus Museum mr. Peter sanski and he's here to tell us about Catholic saints specifically the patron saint of priests the cure $1 son Jean Veon Marie V&E Peter welcome good good and you not just here to talk about st. John Vianney but you brought a relic of the relic of his heart this is his entire incorrupt heart from the shrine at ARS France mm-hmm and it's interesting because I remember we've we had a show just on that and the heart indicates that he'd had a heart attack at an earlier point in his life that it the scar tissue had healed up but yeah this is the entire heart and hasn't decayed no and he is now the patron saint of priests he is he was named so I at his canonization and the Knights of Columbus have asked the shrine ours if this incorrupt heart of st. John Vianney could come to the United States so they will lead it on pilgrimage throughout the country to pray for priests to pray for bishops to pray for renewal and holiness you know it's this is extremely important we and really one invite all of our viewers to go to these different exhibitions of this relic of the heart of the patron saint of priests of all priests it'll be in the United States from now through early June of 20 19 correct that's correct and they can get more information about the journey of this relic they have a website which is K of c.org so it stands for Knights of Columbus of course but K of c.org / V&A and Viennese Belle VI a and n ey there's also an email they can email - which is V&E at KFC org that's a great thing and we're obviously you know at a time where people are very very hurt very angry and dealing with all sorts of other emotions about the crisis we've got regarding priests and the bishops we need to help to turn to Jesus and that's exactly what st. John Vianney did and he was a great the greatest confessor and in our history so we need him to help pray for us so that priests and bishops repent of bad and turn to good and become shares of good he's an excellent exemplar you know this heart was full of love for the people of God yeah and as you say he would spend 14 hours a day or more in the confessional helping people to root out sin from their life and to live holy lives and we want to pray that he helped to do that for all of the clergy today that we can be as good as he was well thank you Peter for bringing this with us I know you're going to be taking this over to the cathedral here in Birmingham yes and it'll be on pilgrimage there as well all the cities so check that out and we are going to be back in just a couple of minutes with tonight's guest father Robert all here so please stay with us [Applause] [Music] - thank you very much welcome back so we have a guest tonight and he is a priest of the Archdiocese of st. Paul Minneapolis Minnesota he is serving at the Church of Saint Raphael in Crystal Minnesota and he also presents an expansive video series on either began called Beauty truth goodness the fundamentals of Catholicism now this series was designed to help Catholics better understand and live and defend the faith so tell us more about it please welcome father Robert Altair I apologize that you know you're here in the sunny south and it is sunny today but it's kind of cold maybe not as cold as Minnesota but it's not the warm he might have been expecting well actually I'm one of those weirdos that likes it cold and so I was happy last night when I came in it was 40 degrees yes good felt like spring to me yeah well it's winter here so it's supposed to be - when I get home so that's cold well well to warm our hearts up with God's truth you have this new series and how is it that you got involved in doing this series in the first place well actually started out 29 years ago when I was was first ordained the pastor had asked me to teach a series of classes in in the parish and so I put those together as a series that would be 12 weeks but two hours at a time and and then eventually as things go you know you just keep adding more and more and more and over time they became quite popular we had I taught them twice a year so we had about a hundred and fifty people a year who were taking the classes and about two people have been converted to the faith through taking those classes so the people at Catholic parents online eventually asked if they could could videotape it and make it available to more people because it's it's pretty comprehensive and it presents the faith in a way that's a little different you know that that's same truth but just coming at it from a little different angle and when you say that you take it from a different angle what is this angle that you are trying to take well first of all my philosophy was that you know you could no longer tell people this is just what the Church teaches because you had to people want to know they want to understand and so so part of it is it's part of having a rational mind examine understand exactly but for many years people were okay saying this is what the Church teaches there they accepted that that was fine but now we live in this time where people doubt and they question and and so on so my thought was let's explain it you know so here's what the Church teaches here's why and more importantly where it were it can here's how it applies to you and so so it's coming at it from a very practical perspective one of the things I guess I'm not particularly smart so I can talk to average people at an average person's level and so it's presenting things add to two people on on their day to day level and and I think that's what makes it accessible to people that's probably what's made it as popular as it is well so how is it that you approach what what are the ways that make this so distinctive in how you approach presenting the content of our faith because our faith is not just a vague believing it has specific content correct and especially how does this relate to Beauty truth and goodness what do you got going here well the way that I approach it some of it is is asking questions you know to have and I don't have people think for a minute then I'll give them the answer and you know some of it I have to say I do one on purpose it's a little bit I asked them for instance when we talk about Jesus and and okay how many would say that Jesus is for instance a human person with the human nature the vast majority people raise their hand and I say congratulations you're all a bunch of heretics and then I say don't say that's the Arian heresy and here's the problem with that and here's why so he's not that so how many of you would say that he is God with a divine nature and of course then they raised their hand they said well you're still a bunch of heretics and here's why this is monotheism trickster well but that we all eventually come to the truth unfortunately by the time I get to the truth after going through nestorianism as well nobody will raise their hand when I say okay is Jesus a divine person with two natures human and divine nobody will raise their hand because I've called him here it takes three times by then but it's it's trying to present in a way that they can remember it yeah and and so but then and and it's it's a lot of information somebody once said to me you should cover half the information in twice as much time and I said but then we're only gonna cover one quarter of the information you know the idea is especially if it's tape people can come back and listen to it they can look at it again and and they can get more out of it because over the years people have told me well I'm thinking about the point you made by the time I couldn't come back in your two points ahead and I missed all that and and so they you know they would either come back take the class again or they get the tapes or whatever and guess I'm dating myself talking about tapes but now it's whatever yes you want DVDs or whatever they are but but it's been a time of rapid chase who will accept that I still talk about records we're getting to be old yes so so anyway it's but it's it's trying to present the beauty so it's it's the truth obviously we want the fullness of the truth and that's that's the comprehensive part I mean right now it's presented in 60 30 minute programs that's what what EWTN is playing and and so it goes from starting with with God in creation and of course with eschatology or the end times things and then everything in between so it's trying to get the basics it doesn't go you know obviously real real deep and I am but but it's to try and say here's what we believe what I always told the people that are converting I said look I want to make sure that you know what you're converting to I don't want anybody to say if I would have known that I wouldn't have become Catholic and so I said you know we won't get into the fine details about everything but he said we're gonna cover everything that's necessary that you can on to know and so it's it's comprehensive but it is clear and that's that's the thing that I think is is it's it's clear but it's accessible and this is an important quality because we've certainly been in a period of time where lack of clarity was even presented as a virtue you and I are old enough to remember that in the 60s and 70s where being unsure of what the church really believes and unsure about what you believe was considered a way to keep you uncomfortable and struggling with personal freedom and choice and instead of saying you know let's get some clarity about what we do believe and why that's what you're trying to sort I'm trying to do jesus said the truth will set you free yeah and the confusion which comes from the the vagueness basically says I can make my own truth yeah every you know I have a different truth than you do it's like no the truth is objective it's not my own opinion and that was part of the problem is that people don't know what the truth is they're they're made for the truth but they didn't know what it was because it wasn't being taught and so so that was part of what I was was setting out to do well there's a very important line in the first letter to the Corinthians chapter 14 where it says say Paul wrote God is not a God of confusion but of peace and that's where he set the contrast between confusion and peace and he was warning the Christians in Corinth not to live in a confused way about their doctrine on a variety of ways because they were dividing into little factions in the use of the spiritual gifts you know don't cause confusion confusion is from the enemy of our soul in peace is what God gives us and the peace will come from having the truth if you're clear you can be at peace and the beautiful thing about being Catholic is that it's not my opinion because somebody can challenge my opinion and then maybe I'm not sure its objective it's the same for everybody in every country every culture every age the truth doesn't change and when I can conform myself to the truth even if somebody's going to try to deny it or challenge it I know it's not just my opinion and so therefore it's not a personal attack and it's not causing me to doubt the truth then because the truth is objective in again that's another element of what we've seen in our own lifetimes that sometimes theologians are so emphasizing their opinion as a way for them to be creative and come up with something new and that's not what we want like in a math class you don't want creative new answers that are wrong perhaps creative but I don't consider it creative I when I go to a store I want my change to be given to me correctly I don't want too little or too much I want the exact correct chain and I don't want creative well I think that you should take only two dollars out of the five dollars we owe you and change no that's that's not good I want the correct in the same in my face because much more is at stake in the face absolutely so eternal salvation is at stake well and you know that the point is that we can be creative in the way that we present it but it has to be the truth mm-hm you know you think the the Trinity st. Patrick used the the Shamrock when he went to Ireland it was what was there that hadn't been used before and so fine it's the same truth it's a different way of presenting it and it made sense to the people but you can't come up with a new truth right and that's the problem and and that's with all the different things you know the people were trying to make a name for themselves more than you know if they came up with a new theory you especially see that in the scripture world you know all these people that that were just coming up with something new so that they might be the the the shining star and so no be a servant of the word there's also an element they're coming up with something new so they have a dissertation topic they can get their PhD and tenure yeah so in this it's just simple yeah yeah the here's here's what the Church teaches here's why the church teaches it here's how it can apply to your life that's what we try to do and well in in terms of the element how does beauty III like the point that Bishop Robert Barron makes that today much of our politics needs to include the element of beauty in the church and this is very important because oftentimes many of our churches are not particularly beautiful you know they again they might have some clever architecture but not necessarily beautiful architecture or art what how does beauty come into play in because it's part of what you're doing how does it a factor in well in in two ways in these videos that one of course the truth is beautiful and and when we can see being made in the image and likeness of God and that the truth will set us free that that's that's the greatest beauty of it all but in the videos there's a lot of what they would call b-roll that's put in their pictures and art and other things to be able again to highlight the the point artistically and beautifully and and so so it's in that way again it's bringing it very practically to people and of course with some of the the art and the church and the beauty in the church remember for instance with stained glass that that was originally for people who couldn't read and so it told the stories they could come and they can see it and and they it would remind them of what they were hearing in the scriptures and because they couldn't read them so we can do that same thing you know picture you know as they say speaks a thousand words and so if we can be speaking the word and have the picture there for people's minds it's it's approaching them in two different senses that the sight and the and the hearing and so it can it can go deeper into their hearts raymond royal last week had a wonderful guest on his program that was addressing the need for more beautiful art as a way to teach the truths of the faith to illustrate the truths of the faith that that she had a book that was talking about how that was very important at the time of the Reformation when the reformers were destroying art in the churches they were a con clastic especially in Holland and Belgium you had Catholic artists coming up with baroque and other beautiful pieces of art that taught and the the the art illustrates but also elevates us to beauty along with the truth right that's that's how that works together and and that really began because the truth itself is so beautiful the expression of it really if it's the expression of truth can only be beautiful if there's something that's twisted it suggests that what it's expressing is twisted yeah and so the truth is clear it's it's there there's no there's no confusion there's no twisting and so that's the way they are taught to be and ought to reflect the Creator who is the truth mm-hmm this is I think a very important component it's one of the reasons why we also want to encourage Catholics to become involved in the art whether it's music or literature or painting works glass or no all you know all the different theater movies the media that bring beauty to the Internet there's a lot of ugliness mm that's promoted on the internet we want to promote virtue beauty and goodness that's that's part of our role in elevating the culture from its downward and that's the thing as Catholics we have something that not only just as the Lord would use in his parables like the the yeast and the dodo and such that's what we're to be in the society to lift it up to you know and we have something that can do that but again if we don't know what the truth is if we're confused about the truth if we're vague about the truth if we're rationalizing our way around the truth then we can't present it yeah so so is somebody who's looking at art has to know the truth first when you come across people who as you described are rationalizing themselves away from the truth in other words they're using a number of arguments and propositions and ideas to move themselves away from the truth which is an odd you use of reason but why would they do that what motivates people to use their reason to deny truth oftentimes it's it's an attempt to justify sin or to justify why they shouldn't have to do or accept whatever to conform themselves to the truth if they've accepted something that's not true and the other you look at what the devil does you know right from the garden it's taking what God says and twisting it again and and and so if we look in our society which is very not only rationalistic but but but it's it's it's the relativism that's there and so now to say that look this is the truth that we have to conform ourselves to people take that almost as an insult or something that's a violation of their dignity I can make up my own mind about what's true and well okay we have our mind that we can make up but let's at least explore the truth but it's that point of conforming to something else they all want to be unique independent whatever which God made us all unique but he made us in His image and likeness and God is truth God is love and so the truth and the love is what he wants for us and when we use our reason when we use our free will against that that's what violates our own dignity and so again what the devil is doing is say this is what will make you free and in fact it's what enslaves us yeah the the evil one in the garden had said that God really say that you shouldn't eat from into the fruit everything except one and lest we die and then you know that and that that the brilliance of the temptation is this that why you won't die now there's another part of that sentence you won't die right away you know just like someone who picks up habit like using drugs you don't die the usually the first time you use them first time you smoke first time you drink usually you don't die from that but when you develop into a conclusion so the he there's this deception and a lot of people helped them they don't even need the devil to come up with bad reasons they work on their own and I'm writing in a society like ours there plenty of mouths there for people to choose from which is again why we have to get the truth out there yeah there there's so many competing voices and and all the talking heads on TV and and or the internet or whatever these days if we don't get the truth out there people aren't going to hear it well we also know I mentioned it when we had the relics of Saint John Vianney here again he needed to take it over to the cathedral um and we're having a service tomorrow with the priest of the diocese at the Cathedral at the heart of San Giovanni but a lot of people also think wait a minute what about all these priests have been doing all these abusive things they're not living this stuff they don't even believe it why should I well again most of that once again that the truth is objective and even if somebody else isn't living it doesn't give me the the right to not live it or the excuse to not live it if I know what the truth is I have to embrace that I have to conform myself to it and what we have to be careful when we see this all the time especially with some of the troubles that the bishops have run into it's the Catholic Church it's like no those are individuals in the church who are not living the Catholic faith correct and you know because they fail to live the truth of the faith doesn't make it any less true exactly and it doesn't give me in the excuse to not live it matter of fact I usually say that if these folks these bishops and priests commit these sins and then because they are scandalous then I say well then I'm not gonna live it either at that point the devil gets a two-for-one sandwich he tempts the one group of people to commit their sins and then I get caught up in a - so then he gets a two-for-one exactly and being the son of a used car salesman I know I understand - first you don't want to go with that no and I it out to people I said if the devil if you put yourself in the devil's position why go after thousands of people when you can just go after one yeah get the priest or get the bishop and if he's going to not preach the truth if he's going to give bad example of remise is because he's compromised his own morals and then he's going to teach the people the wrong stuff but and then he leads and all the devil had to do was go after one that's it and he got hundreds or thousands so our turn is to do what's right accept the truth and live it all right so this is series is called beauty truth goodness the fundamentals of Catholicism with father Robert all Tyrion will be a 12db set with 60 programs all Tolls X 235 shows on each DVD so this is a good thing that'll be item 28 24 D at our catalog ewtnrc.com right we're gonna take a break right now we're going to come back in a couple of minutes and get your questions and our studio audience as well so please stay with us [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] right you have some questions we're ready for questions yup let's turn over the phone call Oh John hello father how are you oh good today you saw full spit and vinegar a good way well you know we can regard our religion with a lot of beauty and truth and heretics were mentioned before and we just simply have to know that Jesus is God and it's fully powerful able to do anything I wanted to ask our guest if he could tell us some of the ways that we can get drawn to Jesus personally so as to be very far from being heir Attucks and I'll hang up thank you John so how do we you know get closer to Christ and thereby avoid becoming part of heresy well first of all of course read the Gospels yeah that's where we would come to know Jesus personally in that way but it's primarily a new prayer life that's what I was gonna say especially in prayer mm-hmm because we can read the Catechism we can even read the scriptures we can know about Jesus but we want to know Jesus and that is only gonna happen in prayer it's to know somebody requires a relationship not just reading about them and and so we want to make sure that we're conformed to the truth but if we're praying truly praying we will ultimately be conformed to the truth because if there's something in the way God will let us know that if we're humble enough to be willing to say that I might not have the truth or I might be mistaken on this let me look it up let me ask somebody and and so that we can make sure that we are conformed to the truth so again right now there are lots of opinions about who Jesus is and so as he said yes Jesus is God but we own Jesus is a nice guy Jesus is a teacher Jesus is whatever they've got you know the warm fuzzy Jesus as I call him and it's like it's not the truth we want the truth about the person of Jesus because he is truth and and so there there's no falsehood in him so again if we truly want to know Jesus we have to be willing to conform ourselves to the truth which is what the prayer life is about conformity to Christ yeah and you know it's good to use the scriptures in your prayer I especially recommend that people make or take time before the Blessed Sacrament if they possibly can so you're looking at the Word of God telling us about Jesus in front of Jesus and the Blessed Sacrament and engage him as a friend to a friend oh that would be a very important part of learn to pray exactly so were you from Colville Washington good to have you here welcome and your question regarding st. John Vianney and the practice of the sacrament of confession in our parish we've seen I believe a some increase in that sacrament partially may be due to the practice of Eucharistic Adoration being promoted however to think of the Saint John Dini doing this for 12 to 14 hours how can we partially how can we go back to to that tremendous participation in the sacrament today well first of all we have to remember that you know Saint John Vianney was obviously the extraordinary individual people would come from Paris to go to confession to him there were lots of priests in parish in Paris but they would go to ours because he was such an extraordinary confessor so so on one hand his situation is slightly different in that way because because of who he was but the question is a very valid one you know for a number of years we were dealing with problems with general absolution and confession was not being encouraged in some parishes you had to make appointments to go to confession which of course takes away the anonymity there were very limited there I know parishes where there are a couple of thousand people in the parish and confessions are for 15 minutes a week and and so if you know if we don't if we don't spend the time in the confessional nobody's going to come and and so we have to be generous we have to miss priests we have to make ourselves available we also have to preach it and we have to be going to confession ourselves and understand the beauty of it so that we can tell people how beautiful it is and the freedom that comes from confession and and once people can can can experience that themselves then they will start telling people about it as well and so so I think but it has to start at that point with the priests living it preaching it and helping people to understand it this is not a negative thing I always point out people think six sacraments are great but the seventh one they think just is a bad thing it's like no this is so beautiful if people would only understand it's not a condemnation this is this is God's Way of reconciling us with himself removing the sins from our soul destroying them making us pure drawing us closer to himself it's so beautiful and if people would know that they would be attracted to and I think it's important to remind ourselves that when Saint John Vianney was ordained people were not going to confession in his day either he was used by the Lord to revive confession and as you say they came from Paris they had to run a special train this is a dead-end town there was no train that had developed a train line to ours because so many people were coming to confession so that was important we have another caller hello Joan hi father how are you things and father back clear and you know what I'm just going to put the cards on the table here father matter with you we do a Eucharistic Virgie here for the holiness of priest in New York for a number of years and you know what surprises me is that we don't have enough exercise for you know because the devil is rampers and a lot of priests I I will I've spoken to a lot of priests here in New York and around the world to be honest with you I won't name names but they're very nonchalant and I don't know what it is but they're like likes it easy and think everything is okay don't worry about it but the devil is rampant and we need more exercise and more priests to do X and course number one and number two we need and the priests to be talking from the puppet how they can protect the lay people and and do helium deliverance okay well a couple of things thankfully the bishops of the United States back a few years ago started a course for priests to be trained as exorcists we can't just throw any priest out there and say just do this they're going to get hurt badly if they don't know what they're doing so it's a it's a two-year course each time that it's been taught now it's full so 60 priests from around the country each time taking this and and so we're getting more and more but we're still way behind we have to realize 25 years ago we had one Exorcist in the United States that was active now we have several hundred but we still have a long way to go we do need to tell people about what's going on obviously we don't want to give the devil more than what is is due but the main thing we have to help people to understand is really stay out of mortal sin that's where the devil is getting people to trip up all the time and people are you know again rationalizing why it's okay for them to do this and so on and so we have to teach them to keep them out of the way of the devil too you know and so again help them know things again I I get frustrated when priests are willing to tell people things like tarot cards and palm reading and and so on are okay no they're not they're noble sins and and so so we need to be clear that these occult things we need to stay away from their their children's games like magic 8-ball or you need your boards and you know light as a feather stiff as a board Bloody Mary those kinds of things that that school kids play they're evil they open their opening themselves up and they don't realize that they think it's funny or it's it's fun or whatever and witchcraft right now is running rampant in America and and so that again is a major problem because people are looking for power and and that's the devil is going to be willing to give them that if that's what they want but so we need to have priests that are making sure people are hearing that this is these are things are bad stay away from them but and I agree we need to have healing we need to have deliverance we need exorcisms for people who need them but we have to have priests that are properly trained to do that and and that's that's where we're lacking but it is picking up and not only properly trained but they also have to have the approval of the local ordinaire the local bishop they can't campus a shingle saying Exorcist here no this is something has to be done in good order because the the evil one uses disorder luckily for and I think one way for people to keep in mind that they should think about this when you start going into the realms of sin whether it be the occult like you were talking about pornography and a variety of other areas you are like a soldier who has gone over the enemy's lines and if you get behind the enemy's lines you are susceptible of all kinds of harm from the enemy that's correct you stay away from that which belongs to the enemy of our soul and stay on you know with the means of grace the means goodness beauty and and holiness and truth that's our defense so that's why we and again I urge people read Ephesians chapter six and see the the defense we need to have sir were you from Shorewood Illinois good to have you here welcome and your question looking to the future what can be done at the seminary level to help bring healing to this crisis no the the section of questions that we have yeah well it's a great question first of all I think we have to recognize that in the face of this crisis God is still raising up some wonderful vocations yes lots of young men entering the seminary they want to be good priests they want to be holy priests so again we need to we need to make sure that they're taught the truth but we need to form them in in their their humanists I I remember somebody that I was talking to go on to a seminary and they said well the rector said our task is to form you to be men so that you can be priests and and so that was I thought a beautiful thing because if we understand truly what it is to be a man in Christ then the morality part becomes not so much of an issue but if we don't know what it means to be men then we're susceptible again we need that formation in in the truth we need the formation in morality and and so that that's what we need to make sure and thankfully the seminaries have been improving over the last decade or two and and so things are moving the right direction and I think in terms of the present crisis what we what is coming out at this point is that a number of people who had positions of power and authority inside the church abused that a fork and that power either to remove people that disagreed with them in theology and not disagreed with the church necessarily but just disagreed with them and their interpretations and some of them use their authority to induce these young men to commit sin with them mm-hmm and at this point we also have to let any man no you do not have to ever give in to that and be a whistleblower against anybody who abuses their authority to try to abuse you in any way whether theologically the ideologically or in otherwise terms of the flesh so this is something we have to be very clear but also I think when you went to some minute they had a psychological test didn't they oh yeah you know say when I went but we may have to ask new sets of questions because this other crisis is right I'm up and try to address that on those terms as well and the other thing that needs to be there for the seminarians with what you're talking about is that they have to have a way that they know that they can bring that up and be safe exactly because most of them would say but if I say something they're gonna kick me out of the seminary if I want to be a priest I have to be silent and and so we have to have something in place that will protect them and that's not just a false you know the fear on their part oh no that happened it has and you know it's a grave evil grave evil but again that was the people in power that we're abusing their powers right that's when instead of good Shepherds they were thieves or hireling hmm Good Shepherd Jesus our Lord won't like that we have another caller hold Deb hello father thank you so much for taking my call where are you calling from I'm calling from Rhode Island great and what is your question well I have a question and a comment and I want to thank father for developing the series I think it's so much needed explanation of why the truth teaches what it teaches but also in addition to that I'm just wondering if in these series is that also emphasized that the church doesn't officially cannot officially teach anything other than what Jesus wants the church to teach when I was growing up in the 60s and I was told you know different things about what the Church teaches and some of it was not correct or was not explained and I thought well I can't imagine Jesus ever wanting you know nobody but Catholics can get into heaven I didn't make any sense to me and I thought well the church just makes up its own stuff or something and so I then you know many years many many years later I came to realize that you know the the the dots get connected by what Jesus wants the church to teach and and I just wondered I think sometimes a lot of people may have that um you know that block of the church is making up the rules as they go along and what does Jesus say about it so it is matter of fact that's what you're talking about that and we've all been talking about some people we're making it up as they went along they were and in those classes as as your bread she brings up what I tell the people right from the start is two things first we talked about the vagueness I said we are going to make distinctions and so all through the class we're making distinctions and I tell them the other thing is when there's something that's my opinion I'll tell you this is my opinion and you know so so for instance when it comes to how often to go to confession I'll give them my opinion I'll tell them what the Church teaches and and make that very clear so that they know that okay this is this is you know his opinion and it's just that but you're you're absolutely right we have to we have to teach the truth and and the truth is Jesus Christ and and so the church there are obviously man-made rules that that are their laws in the church that that that can change with time and so on but you know again those things are clear for everybody and so it's not just my opinion about what the the way ought to be there are official teachings in that regard as well and and so so that's what we have to be clear about in in the issue that she brought up that somebody had taught her that only Catholics go to heaven I remember back in 58 it actually been there's taught earlier than that but I remember hearing it from the pulpit back in 58 that there was a group saying that only Catholic school to heaven nobody else does and Pope Pius the 12th condemned that and excommunicated the teacher of that I was 19 49 49 when they when he was excommunicated let it reconcile but to the church but still you know there was a reminder of that that wasn't Catholic teaching they were making that up and so I'm making it up can be by people on the far left and people on the far right worse to go straight straight with the truth and not veer off as Moses warned people of Israel mm-hmm another question from our studio audience sir where are you from Wake Forest North Carolina oh thank you so and so what is your question my question tonight is maybe you could speaks a little bit more about this father last segment you brought up compromise it's a number of people not living the truth today being compromised what kind of impact does that have on society and the church well it has a huge impact actually you think again about what's going on in society right now and particularly the point that that Pope Benedict would bring up over and over and over again and and that is again the the the rationalization and everybody doing their own thing and and so on and and so that's where the problem is because you know if we if we have to understand that what I always tell people is look if you have the truth and somebody else doesn't if they compromise they still don't have the truth but if you compromise you no longer have the truth and so once we start compromising then everything starts spiraling downward because again if I don't have to believe this then what else don't I have to believe and then nothing is nothing is absolute then and so that's again the society that we're living in everybody can be their own little God everybody can make up their own rules everybody can make up their own truth that's all part of the fruit of the compromise in one way or the other so again we need to get back to the truth because the truth will set us free if you think of it this way going back to an earlier image somebody who compromises the truth about the way that they handle money at a bank is called an embezzler mm-hmm and do you want to be an embezzler you're gonna get caught they almost always do and you want to be the victim of an embezzler well when people compromise the truth of the cry of the of Christ's truth and his gospel these are embezzlers of our immortal souls and that's what we don't want and we want to make sure that it's the full truth and that we have a full accounting because you can't fool Christ on that thank you for being with us thank you for having me and want to remind people that it's called Beauty truth goodness the fundamentals of Catholicism with father Robert of teir it's a 12 DVD set available at EWTN RC dot-com and we'll be having this available on EWTN as well so would you join me in giving a blessing to our article on out of time Lord bless you all and keep you and especially tomorrow on the feast of Saint Nicholas give you great joy and blessing in generosity o mighty God bless you the Father Son and Holy Spirit amen and again we can bring father a tear and his series and all the other programs that we do only because this network is brought to you by you so mother was inspired to start it so please keep us in between your gas bill electric bill and cable bill and we'll pay our bills true thank you [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: EWTN

Views: 25,142

Rating: 4.8664045 out of 5

Keywords: eli, ytsync-en, eli03026

Id: w2NG7MI9psc

Length: 54min 30sec (3270 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 05 2018