Father Spitzer’s Universe - 2018-06-27 - Near Death Experiences Pt. 2

[Music] [Music] hello and welcome to father Spitzer's universe where no man has gone before we go there every week though and we bring you with us I'm Doug Keck your host coming to you live from our EWTN studios in the heart of the mothership Irondale Alabama Mother Angelica way where it all began back in 1981 and continues thanks to your donations and support we need your support for this show too so check us out on Facebook send us a tweet on Twitter and for all things father Spitzer 2 places to go now there's the of course Maja's Center website that's Maja's Center one word.com and of course remember father's newest website which is the basis of the series we're doing right now credible Catholic one word.com and we want you to know that everything about Catholicism is totally credible today we're talking about near-death experiences part two always a very interesting topic and I wanted to mention also we're very proud here about a film that we produce called called and chosen it's the father Vincent our capodanno story that's what it's about it's a Gabriel Award winner and we were decided to re-air at popular demand on July 4th a perfect time to air 10:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time if you missed it watch it it's a great story about a wonderful Catholic chaplain and it's an award-winning film and speaking of award winners we turn once more to the west coast with the one and only father Robert Spitzer our beautiful Studios in Orange County California on the campus of Christ Cathedral as well and welcome father great to see you again great the V Beckwith you dug so it's we're gonna be talking about near-death experiences but if we could let's start off as we always do with a prayer from you and then he may the father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit amen Heavenly Father we ask you to send your Holy Spirit down upon us to inspire us and guide us and protect us this day so that we might truly understand the wonderful life you have prepared for us throughout all eternity with you a life of love a life of joy a life of holiness a life of salvation together with all the Blessed and especially in your triune law we ask this through Jesus Christ our Lord amen a Mary seat of wisdom pray for us in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit amen amen very good and so let's get started and let's deal with some questions came out of our recent programs including the one from last week dear father Spitzer last week you said that God does not send us to hell but rather we choose hell I'm very disturbed by this comment to me it seems to contradict both the Catechism and the Bible Matthew 13 where God's angels will weed the earth of the unfaithful if we send ourselves to hell then what's the point of Judgment Day thank you it's Dan from Illinois hmm no it's a really good question Dan and you know obviously you know judgment does entail you know a rendering of what we have lived our lives and how we have lived our lives and the choice that we have made throughout our lives to go the way of the Lord or to go the way of perdition and so in a way judgment is a reflection of the choices we have made and the choice that we have back to ourselves obviously God in that judgment can be incredibly merciful especially if we have asked for that mercy and that compassion in our lives and so yes there is a certainly a factor of that but it is really about our free choices that's what it's about God is you know yes you know you can say that God you know instrumentally allows us to go where we have actually chosen throughout our lives to go no question about that and so he would have a ascending dimension in that sense you know when you're looking at the Catechism which you you brought up the main thing you want to remember ever and always is that there is that word self.x exclusion from the Blessed and from God and and the idea of self exclusion the reason that the church defines hell in that way is because it is really our choice our we are the ones who are excluding ourselves from the kingdom of heaven and and in a way it gets that that sense you know that's why Jesus is so so you know emphasizing with with real rhetoric of urgency that you know we kind of get our act together that we try to you know you know manifest our desire to serve the Lord in our lives so that our choices really reflect right that the desire to go to his kingdom rather than the desire to exclude ourselves from that Kingdom and that's what the word self exclusion means the third era part of your question deals with the the Matthew passage you know or Jesus's is clearly using that parable now you have to be really careful when you're interpreting a parable in kind of a literalistic sense right you you don't want to be taking something which obviously you know is used as an image to convey something and in trying to make it a literal eyes it into an actual thing so I mean is Jesus here trying to say that they're really angels that are sending people to hell well to be honest with you exegetes have puzzled over this you know for an awful long time you know whether or not this is to be taken literally or taken as as a metaphor to indicate you know that you know the judgment is definitive right and so you know it's it's a very difficult question to answer but if you know if it you know helps to think of you know angels dispatching as it were the choices that we have made then go ahead and interpret it in that way you're free to do so and the Catholic Church certainly doesn't say you can't there are other interpretations which are also allowed from the same passage by the Catholic Church's doctrine of self exclusion from the kingdom of God and the Blessed and so again you could look at it that you know in in in in the way that the angels are you know not just dispatching our choices but that we dispatch our choices and they are the agents through which our own choice is dispatched so you can look at it that way and certainly you know apply it as you wish but you know the key thing to notice be kind of careful about that and also in the parables right when Jesus is saying the kingdom of God is like you know you have to be careful because that word like indicates like an analogy or something like that or the kingdom of God may be likened to right you have to be very very careful you know about trying to give a definitive interpretation once again what I would recommend if you want to get you know a really good sense of what what's the exegetical community thinking about this the catholic church has a its own commentary on scripture it's called the jerome biblical commentary it's a very good scholarly exegetical commentary it really does reflect the mainstream of exegetical thinking on things and that's probably or you would want to go there's a brand new one that well it's not brand new anymore I mean there's there's two of them but the the one that came out in 1998 is the one you want that's called the new Jerome biblical commentary and that might help you to do interpretations of these passages to get a sense of where the catholic scholarly community is and and by the way the most most of these people are are you know priests and laity and good standing or very very flying scholars of sure okay very good let's move on to a second question that ties into last week as well last week father Spitzer you discussed reasons that most adults who flatline don't have a near-death experience I've heard that one is often given a choice to stay or go given that God is omniscient could it be that he usually wants us to go back knowing we've likely choose to stay perhaps children would more likely choose to go back to alleviate their families I guess to in the sensitive of not wanting their families to suffer god bless this is from Mary yeah Mary that's a great question here's the the main thing children oftentimes well not often times children sometimes are given a choice you know whether they want to go back or not but normally after their meaning you know with Jesus or their meeting with sometimes the white light or with a deceased relative right after that meeting they're kind of told you know well it's not your time yet you know and in its time you're gonna have to go back for a while and and so forth so that's generally the case with children rarely is there a choice involved much more frequently adults are given a choice and and and that happens you know maybe about 20% of the time you know you know there's a relative or a friend or even you know this this very loving white light will will basically give a choice of whether or not to go back the vestments one that we know brought that was also to come back right otherwise we do know that that's about 20% of the people are given that of the adults are given that choice much fewer percentage a much lower percentage of children but in any case yeah it just seems like that choice is there but the majority of the time you know the decision is kind of made already most adults of course you know I would suppose who have family members etc you know who they're worried about will come back they don't want to leave things undone and that's out of a sense of love and they're given that choice so that that's pretty much the answer there and I'm assuming we really wouldn't know but is there any reason why we would suspect some people have that experience and some people don't is it possible that some people might have that experience but don't remember that experience oh that that's possible too you know I think you know really it's up to God's wisdom and and judgment and and at this particular point I I don't know why he yeah I can't get into God's mind and I couldn't tell you why he would do that but I know one thing that the relatives the deceased relatives and friends who come to meet these individuals and frequently you know give them that choice right or even if it's the white light you know himself who gives the choice well whatever the case may be you know they're these relatives are really doing the will of God they're presenting somehow the judgment of God for sure and so you know and why some people are not you know why this other 80 percent doesn't even remember you know the choice is you know it's it's hard to say okay and but but clearly they they are sometimes given a choice okay here's another question in the same vein dear father Spitzer can we actually meet the people we love in heaven after we die assuming that we get to heaven please answer god bless you always with love from Ursula from merry old England Thank You Ursula Ursula from merry old England great question and the answer is yes you know we're we know this from you know from the fact if you know our relatives are in heaven and we're going to heaven we are definitely going to be allowed to meet those relatives in heaven and be with them heaven you know is that community right of people right in love through the Trinity and of course why in the world would the Lord ever deprive us of the capacity to connect with our loved ones or beloved ones in that state of perfect communal love with the Blessed absolutely you're going to be able to see your deceased relatives and friends in heaven and by the way that's validated in the kind of experiences we were just talking about an answer to the last question and a lot of the time deceased relatives and friends will come to meet a person strangely enough though a lot of the time so the relatives are either unknown or were not the relatives people expected this evening I mean it's like yeah okay aunt so-and-so was a nice person and I thought I'd see so-and-so but I'm seeing this person but you can't make any any judgment about why that occurs that's again God's will he dispatches right the person who will greet people frequently and we don't know why it's those particular relatives but we do know this about 95 percent of the time it is relatives only five percent of the time it's friends so interestingly you know it's it's really relative you think that way they're very unpredictable at that they're the family connection is so strong even over above maybe a friend connection you know that's what I think I just think blood is just thicker than anything you know and I do think those family connections even if it's an aunt to me I've died even before the child got you know you know to heaven you know III think you know that Laden relationship somehow is is is strong from the side of the aunt who may have been deceased and and so that's the one scent and you know I always say why did I get the guardian angel I got I don't know you know I but I'm sure it was as they say right for me so uh and God is the best judge of that but boy it's yes you will meet your relatives there's one just like your cross is the one that was designed for you right exactly so yeah and it kind of fits into the whole teaching for the church of the whole communion of saints and the fact of our ability to pray to people in heaven and the Saints that they are alive yeah oh yeah absolutely absolutely and you know I mean they're you know God has his orchestrates all these things perfectly but I I do know this I mean they went when he talks about the heavenly banquet he means that you know I mean we're going to be seated with all these people and cluding all of our deceased relatives and friends I I think I talked about on the show once before you know I had a dream once you know where I you know it was like I was I had a thousand hands almost and all the people that I had somehow touched in my life you know in this dream and it was like these hands were coming out of me and they were touching all these people who I had touched who in turn were touching these other people who they had touched and so forth and it kind of turned into this huge Irish lace of people touching people you know hands you know all the way you know extended out for all this sort of you know a huge dimension and I sort of woke up from that and went well I guess in a way that's heaven so yeah I think that that that's absolutely the truth I think we get that communion of saints is of course you know the you know particularly the people we've touched but also we'll get to see all these other people and we have an eternity to enjoy them perfectly along with the infinite love of the Trinity and like you said we might find out that green and Edna's the one who's been praying you into heaven exact exactly why my time I was showing up there and you're not doing exactly exactly okay exactly here's another question that dovetails into what you were just talking about talking about dreams my non-catholic daughter-in-law has had dreams of dead people who she knew I suggested her that these people may be in purgatory and requesting prayers for their soul was I correct in suggesting this I'm not even sure if she believes in purgatory and this is from dick yeah I think I think again a good question I think that it's absolutely possible I think when I sometimes I get a premonition you know or I'll wake up in the at night or something and I will remotely as as if I was with them 20 years ago and I haven't had any contact with them or suddenly a name will pop into my mind and you know I don't even know where they are they could be living they might be deceased I don't even know some of them are in fact deceased but the one thing I do when I get that popin of a person or a name pops into my mind I do pray for them and I do pray for their salvation and I pray especially that if they're in some kind of trouble or difficulty or challenge then I you know double up the prayers and you know offer my own you know prayers works joys and sufferings for them so yes I do I think it's a great piece of advice and do it myself okay again father here's another question in the same vein what do you think about Internet postings of people claiming to go to hell and come back my personal opinion is that it's possible that these people are experiencing purgatory what do you think Joanne so do we have any records of people experiencing Hell and coming back well Joanne I think that what they might be experiencing and there are these negative near-death experiences there's there's no doubt about it they're much rarer than the beautiful ones but they are there and you know the way I would look at it is it's kind of a like a image you know almost like a pre-image they they think they're going to hell but they're really kind of experiencing and in some sense what hell would be like they're almost on the periphery of hell if I can put it that way and they all of a sudden get this experience of this is highly unpleasant time to get my act together time to turn around and and start pursuing another kind of life so I think you know it's it's really I would look at it as more you know the periphery of Hell you know and you might remember you know you know Virgil and I'm you know in Dante's Inferno you know as as you know you know the the encounter you know with the the guide Virgil at the gate you know that you get this little pre taste if I can put it that way at the periphery and you go hmm not so sure I like this I think I better get my act together so I think it's really a call to reform more than purgatory yes purgatory can definitely have its you know a painful dimension right because it is progression we do have to give up something that we're attached to you know we've left this earth not having freely detached from things but but by we've left this earth you know freely desiring to be with God for the rest of our lives definitively and so we've got some work to do and those detachments they come hard I mean I can tell you right now detaching myself from from my attachments is very very difficult indeed I don't like doing it and so frankly I tend not to like the cross and most of its forms but I I know that the Lord uses that cross to really affect me in a very good purgative way okay in that sense it's good right so we're striving to be better than the noble pagans at least in that sense but let me ask you a question too because there's a question coming up about Protestants and does it affect maybe if they have a near-death experience think about becoming Catholic or something like that but a broader question to say has there been a longitudinal study done on people with near-death experiences indicating whether these people necessarily let's say they had this hell-like experience that they really changed their lives or the people who had the heaven like experience really altered their lives or we could see it had an impact on their lives or has there been any Studies on that yeah I think this person dr. Janice Atchison I think is what her name is and I mean I might be wrong but I think that that she tried to do some follow-up work on that I have to say though that the vast majority of the good peer-reviewed medical studies of near-death experiences like the van Lommel study or the Parr Nia study those studies really emphasize the experience themselves you know and validating you know that what what the patients are reporting and cataloging what the patients are reporting and not a lot of longitudinal study has been done however they do have some longitudinal data on when children have had a near-death experience several scientists have tried to measure does their death anxiety progress into their I mean their their absence of death anxiety progress into their adulthood they have done that and that very much is the case okay they they don't have any subconscious death anxiety anymore so it never comes back okay which is really strange because when you think about it right I mean how do you change a subconscious response answer you can't voluntarily that is consciously change a subconscious reaction to something like death right so you know we have a normal death anxiety and so if you are to measure the subconscious death anxiety by showing images like death symbols and things like that say in ink blots or whatever it might be and you show that to a person right they are going to feel a death anxiety whether they're deeply religious or not now can you say it was a deeply religious person have a conscious you know worry maybe a lot less than a non-religious person but that's a conscious worry a subconscious worry is very difficult to change because of course it is really subterranean in there and it's exceedingly symbolic but I can connect with your subconscious through symbols through ink blots and things like that and I can sort of show you death images and really if you're religious or non-religious you're still gonna have what we call you know you're gonna probably score within you know the the range of death anxiety is modified by you know I mean as measured by a modified polygraph so you're gonna see that now what's interesting about near-death experiences is once a person has had that their subconscious response changes it literally changes their whole subconscious view their whole image of death changes you can show a child a gazillion death images and there's no response and of course there's there's like no anxiety about it and of course as they progressed into their adulthood it never returns so that is some longitudinal data it's really interesting and it validates that there's something exceedingly real that is going on in this you know it's not just the reports of accurate data that's taking place in the operating room or outside the hospital it's and it's not just the reports of blind people who have been blind from birth suddenly seeing for the first time when they're clinically dead right but it really is I think these longitudinal studies of death anxieties death anxiety and so I think again some of that's been done but not a lot of follow-up work and certainly not in peer-reviewed medical studies okay so we were kind of alluded to the next question and had to with Protestants again do Protestants typically see anything that would incline into Catholics when they return from a near-death experience how are we to reconcile near-death experience with God's immediate judgment after death which you kind of touched on earlier that was Tim in Sarasota there's also a follow-up to that there's another question okay we have it ready to come up which has to do aren't their near-death experiences that happen to non-christians like Buddhists experiences if so how are we to view those experience thanks for your wisdom and ministry and our those experiences what they seem different yeah I mean some of the images in the Buddhist experience well first of all yes there have been catalogs of those let's say near-death experiences of Buddhists yes the images initially are different you know what is the same is of course congruent with Jesus Christ's teaching in the scripture namely the love that is intrinsic to that experience so when like the experience of the white light the experience of love intrinsic to the white light is very much the same similarly you know there are other kinds of things that happen before they go to that other domain but yes sometimes though the images that they get upfront correspond to the images that that are part of their own religion so I forget again that there was a researcher who did some you know studies across the board and religions and but there are a lot of similarities but some of the images that they will see up front are the same but when they meet deceased relatives and friends or they see the white light there of course that the whole experience is dominated by love do they see beauty yes they see beauty and of course you know I'm not sure whether there have been any studies that have been negative with respect to Buddhist and I'm sure there have been or you know with other religions but I just aware of them I know there are some handbooks of near-death experiences that go into some of the these areas but again be careful with those because a lot of those things are you know anecdotal that means they're like one-off stories and you have to be a little careful with those what you really want to do is get real studies that have thousands of patients that have been interviewed that where you have double-blind studies or you have validation of data that took place you know while they were clinically dead you know what they're reporting happened in the operating room etc you have validation that this really did in fact occur as they've reported it and then you know you have a you know some kind of a scale a large scale of measurement of these occurrences over a fairly good period of time like about six seven years that would be the kind of study you want be very very careful about hearing one-off stories right because those things could be just downright false they could be very manipulative they could be they're trying to play to an agenda or something in that nature you really need a good social science special yeah if you're reading on the Internet be careful okay we're going to take all right yeah absolutely Spitzer here once more and stay with us father Spitzer's universe continues going to be talking all about things that happen with near-death experiences and there's a lot of interesting things just hear about so stay with us right here in the heart a father Spitzer's universe where we learned something new each week stay with us [Music] [Applause] you [Music] [Applause] well you found us we're still here in the heart of father Spitzer's universe happy to have you joining us as we talk about near-death experiences Park - part of a credible Catholic calm review and once more we join father Spitzer as always we've been talking about you death experiences in questions that people have sent to us let me ask you one question that might somebody out there might be thinking about they're thinking well okay so you have this near-death experience and as Christians we would think certainly Jesus Christ is God and our Savior and so wouldn't someone who maybe wasn't Christian be encouraged by the light or in their experience to be come Christian and if they're not do we have any idea why they wouldn't be yeah here is the difficulty with you know you know near-death experiences what you get is a really small glimpse of what you might call that peripheral experience that experience of you know paradise or that experience of being with the white light etc and I could reconfigure your question is into something like this well why wouldn't the white light just say well I'm the father of Jesus Christ or I'm Jesus Christ a lot of Christians say I know the white light is Jesus right and and they just say I know it you know it is that is the case when kids see Jesus of course it's it's a different deal they really see a Jesus that looks like you know the Jesus that that one little girl made that drawing up kids almost universally agree that's him you know they're shown twenty eight different pictures of Jesus you know from the you know the whole history of the Sacred Heart pictures and of course what do they pick they picked the one by this little girl who just happened to have a you know be a artistic talent but you know saw Jesus and and really was able to put it down and describe it to a very good artist and she had it you sort of to fine-tune to perfection and kids always choose it but what my point is is you you get a peripheral view and and you might think well here's the Lord's opportunity to get these people you know maybe to consider you know that I am Jesus Christ you know almost a pawn line experience we haven't done any major major studies of this or whether such things have happened before but whatever seems to occur it seems not to interfere with the free choice of the people there oh and as far as we can see that the the key thing that's going on you know is that there's some kind of reassurance you know from the white light or some reassurance from God or even what you might call Jesus as the white light that what they're doing is okay you know they're they're okay and there seems to be a deliberate attempt not to you know up end their freedom or their free choices in in some form of continuity now you might say well well why not why not just get them you know moving toward Christianity right away and again I don't know the answer to that for two reasons number one we really don't have a good so social scientific study of that phenomenon and it's really hard when you have about two or three anecdotal accounts it's really hard to draw any conclusive judgment from that and I would refrain from doing that and the second thing is it's really hard to penetrate you know what's going on in the total experience of those people when they come back because you you know there's they remember things they don't remember things etc it's very difficult plus they're going to put their own interpretation right and one other item is the Lord generally doesn't do anything to upset the continuity of their free choices and so essentially you know if you put all three of these things together probably an answer you know to your question but right now we do not have anywhere near a good study of that phenomenon well it kind of maybe in fact the Lord does say something you know the Lord does manifest you know his identity as Jesus right and we just don't know you know it could be like a st. Paul type of experience right and we know from sears fatima or lourdes and things like that though they may have been encouraged in some ways they certainly weren't forced to do anything as well that's right that's right and and and that's exactly right and so you know it's it's the same thing with you know people who witness a miracle you know in the name of Jesus you know that's Collier miracle you know and and you look at that and you go well why didn't that person just instantly go you know like Peter you know who Lord you know please you know I'm a sinful man you don't have to hang around the likes of me you know I mean why didn't they just get on their knees you know when they see this and and again God tends not to to to put to do something that's going to you know interfere with their with their freedom and really I'll tell you we can't imagine how immense our human freedom is and you know and God's going to respect that that freedom into the into our final days right and so so my one thought is I'll bet the answer lies somewhere in this whole area free choice in God's judgement of it for us which is why we have so much of a responsibility since we do have the freedom to make those choices right exactly okay actly you know so let's talk about near-death experiences in the final 16 17 minutes part two we talked about it there's something called a terminal lucidity you wanted to talk about what's that oh yeah well that's another interesting validation of the fact that we have a trans physical soul now the difference between terminal lucidity and you know near-death experiences is near-death experiences there is a transition from this world right so the person is looking at their body for example his or her body and in an operating room and reporting what's going on or going into the waiting room next door and reporting what his relatives are saying or whatever so there's that part but there's also part two where they go to a heavenly domain now these terminal these experiences of terminal lucidity are not that they don't have an experience of that otherworldly domain beautiful domain that heavenly domain alternatively though it does actually show that probably our consciousness is not residing in our brain or at least in our brain alone we have a trans physical that is to say some kind of a beyond physics beyond physical processes source of our consciousness and this is a really interesting set of studies and it's been done on people principally who have been severely mentally challenged throughout their lives and people who had hydrocephalus which is a considerable amount of water on the brain but it's really spinal fluid that seeped into their cranial cavity and then has been pressurizing and and while destroying their cerebral cortex which is their capacity to think with their organic brain or people who have severe Alzheimer's or dementia and have had it for seven or eight years and so you can give these people an MRI and you can see that their brain you know their cerebral cortex particularly and sometimes your frontal cortex has appreciably decreased in size and in other words it's atrophied considerably and in addition to that you see you know a different sort of you know problem as well as is that there are all these entanglements and Alzheimer's and things that are easily detectable that are also causing nerve atrophy in the brain so technically these people according to the MRI are not able to think with their physical brain yet one hour two even sometimes even a week before death they wake up almost suddenly and and their relatives are startled right because these people will come out of this almost comatose state or this vegetative state and they'll just start talking and say well you know I I gotta be arranging my funeral arrangements here and and by the way you know my will has to be taken care of in this particular way and I got to tell you about all these things have been happening and Joe I've heard you when you came to my hospital visits I know you were here and and so forth and so on and you know but of course they didn't know what their physical brain now they're talking but how they're talking it's not with their physical brain we have no idea how they are coming to these lucid thoughts and the idea of lucidity right terminal acidity as all of a sudden they have this mental acuity and clarity that they never had before and so you're thinking to yourself hey wait a minute how could this happen the MRI says this person is almost brain-dead and you're telling me that that they're there they're speaking articulately and not only that the religious parts of these things you know sometimes these people come out and they're talking about religious poetry and all these other kinds of things and experiences of God and you're going no way you know but the answer is way I mean it's really happening and so again how is it happening is the question and we've run out of answers from what we call an organic physical explanation or an organic physical cause like the brain and we're kind of left with well maybe there really is as near-death experiences a strongly suggest or even prove I would say that there really is a trans physical soul and that trans physical soul works through the brain but it is not coming from the brain itself and that trans physical soul is going to survive bodily death that trans physical soul is in contact with God that trans physical soul is also very capable of lucidity on its own and when it's freed from the body it is freed from what we call the laws of physics right it's freed from gravity it's read from solidity of matter and walls etc etc so this is another really interesting study and you know my one thought is boy if you know all of the things that Pope Francis has been saying about treat people with mental disorders with the utmost respect and you know and in all my books I have these you know where I talk about the soul you know I really you know emphasize this because you know what you see is not what you get that is what the physicalist and the empiricist would like you to believe but I'm telling you right now that person who seems severely mentally challenged or that person who seems to be in a vegetative state you better presume that they have a trans physical consciousness which is operative and that they're somehow aware through that consciousness of your presence your love your respect my one thought is every human being is made with the unique trans physical soul we have to assume it there's just mounting evidence for this and that's why I think the Catholic Church's teaching on this is so important it's so true truthful it is so civil and it so corresponds to who the person is and they're godlike eternal dignity made in the image and likeness of God you know it's interesting too because in bringing that up thinking in terms of especially Alzheimers patients and I know people over the years including family members who had to deal with some of this and and sometimes you get a situation where somebody would say well I don't really go and visit them because they're not really there anymore and and your point is they are still there oh yes and you know they may be in communion with God but do not think for a moment that they cannot appropriate and appreciate the love that you're bringing even by your presence in the room even if you just come in and say I love you very much I think you're here present with me I think you're also connected with the Lord right now but I'm going to say a decade of the Rosary here with you or I'm gonna say you know your favorite five prayers with you or I'm gonna read you a scripture passage don't think for a moment there isn't some sort of awareness appropriation appreciation of the love and the faith that you're bringing into that room it's there you should assume it I think the Catholic Church is being vindicated by these studies at every single second of all this that they've taught and the Catholic Church honestly there are some really other good Protestant churches who have taught this as well you know been so countercultural against the physicalist position against all these positions who say all these positions on human dignity that say oh no intrinsic dignity is is you know that's just a fallacy extrinsic dignity is the only thing that counts all those easily displayed capabilities for articulation and intelligence and the physical you know ambulatory ability that's what really counts the extrinsic dignity and of course the Catholic Church and some of these other churches have been screaming now its intrinsic dignity they have a soul their beloved by God they're made in the image and likeness of God treat them with respect God made them for eternity we've been the countercultural ones all this time upholding the dignity of these other human beings and and and it's so perfect because at the end of the day you know I think we're not only being vindicated but I think we have protected the culture of life by our countercultural preaching against physicalism and materialism I had a story I don't want to just go on and on but there's this story happened just yesterday where there's very brave young lady who was a friend of a former you know VP at the magis Center this daughter gave birth to a little baby last night and what happened was that the doctors have been telling her just abort her because you know she's gonna live you know probably be stillborn and live only for a few minutes well she gave birth to that little baby last night that baby only lasted for 36 minutes they baptized that baby they expressed their love for that baby and of course this is going to make all the difference in the world to that baby in the you know in his soul or in her soul and of course at the same time to all the people who are there present who maintain that faith but what a testimony to intrinsic dignity from the vantage point of extrinsic dignity in the world and this is just you know this is just crazy stuff you know why are you bothering but from the eyes of faith and the viewpoint of intrinsic dignity which should be the only thing that we think about day and night right you know is and and that really testifies that's real courage and that's a real example and the Lord will repay them a billion times told lovely or for this and that my one thought is keep it up everybody this is the kind of heroic witness to intrinsic dignity through the eyes of the faith that's gonna rescue our culture so if you you cast out intrinsic dignity it becomes utilitarianism and then you end up in a situation like the Nazis of the economy where you get rid of that Shaniqua and get rid of anybody who's not supporting the good of this state so to speak basically oh yeah we've got this assisted suicide movement going on full-blast right now and it's all about extrinsic dignity I mean you know people look at the Catholic Church you know when they're thinking to themselves well what do you what are you trying to tell me you know you know about you know people's lives you know who're I mean they've lost their ambulatory ability I mean surely you can't think that that's dignified well from the vantage point of a next sternal Dignity maybe it's not maybe maybe that person is has Alzheimer's disease and is really having difficulty maybe from the vantage point of extrinsic dignity they don't have you know much either in the comparative mode of this materialistic culture however in the vantage point of Jesus and in the vantage point of you know the trans physical soul that we're getting all kinds of validation of that person has the same intrinsic dignity as you and me which is immense because we're made in the image and likeness of God we're uniquely made uniquely made in the image of God as uniquely good and loveable and transcendent and and if you look at that and you look at that teaching then that person deserves to be treated with respect and and of course it's not just the whole thing of you know manipulating people into committing suicide which nobody you know bothers to talk about but when you give people this option you know what you're doing is you're opening the door to crass manipulation and implicit manipulation toward assisted suicide but it's all based on extrinsic materialistic dignity instead of intrinsic dignity a Catholic Church is the one real defender of this well and other churches as I said who have are also on board but but we have been so countercultural and we're being vindicated at every moment and God bless the courageous testimony of the people who constantly bring this out it'll save us from the culture of death if we can be validated and if we keep up courageously giving testimony well one of the things too that struck me in listening your discussion about the terminal lucida etc is is maybe the comfort it gives to so many caregivers and family members who may be in the final days did what they could and always felt like well maybe mom or dad didn't realize or I wish they knew how much I was I was trying to do for them and and and the idea that they do mm-hmm oh yeah I mean there are so many great testimonies to about people you know there was a fellow professor at Georgetown University you know who is teaching will while back but he gave a testimony about how he was working in a an Alzheimer's home you know and you know this one fellow who was a former professor a very esteemed economics professor I believe that at Georgetown University this fellow didn't want to play pin the tail on the donkey you know he and so the nurses came and said well this one is a very stubborn one and he's angry and he doesn't want to play pin the tail on the donkey so of course this fellow who was a really great psychiatrist he basically started probing the guy who had very little verbal capacity right took the guy five minutes just to say yes or no but the main thing was is he finally got out of him that he still had that sense of dignity of being a professor so he said you know I'm gonna put together 20 questions on a study about Alzheimer's I want to know what's going on inside of you and so he waited patiently for the patient you know five minutes later yes five minutes later no right he waited patiently for the answer these 20 questions and then he had the Dean of this of the College of Arts and Sciences at Georgetown put together a little plaque for this guy saying you know dr. so-and-so you've made so much difference to the study of Alzheimer's that said or assigned you know the Dean of the school at Georgetown University and so he read this plaque to this fellow who had almost no verbal capacity to express his thoughts the minute he finished that he said signed by you know dah dah dah dah this guy broke out in tears oh he understood immediately what was going on so we even have this kind of testimony as well that there is something clearly going on with people who are in an Alzheimer's position and they still remember their prayers they still remember so many emotive conditions they're tuned into the emotive conditions of other people even though they may not have a lot of memory or intellectual capacity they are tuned into religion tuned into the emotional you know dimensions of people etc and of course this guy just crying it meant so much to him you know he hugged the thing you know the the plaque right so you know you know this this is not killing the soul yes there is this severe atrophying going on in the body in the brain but no we we are made in the image and likeness of God in our soul is present and so yes you know the Catholic Church is teaching once again vindicated a countercultural that it though it may be let me ask you as we're wrapping out here every year you have an event that the Napa Institute puts on that your central do you want to give us a quick pitch on it's coming up in a couple of days oh that's right this is going to be in Napa California I believe it's starting on the 13th of July and it's at a place called the Meritage Resort anyway there's going to be a cardinal Muller is going to be there I mean very big fellow you know and of course you know Catherine Pacala cos is going to be there a variety of other really excellent theologians are going to be there as as well Mary Hassan will be there and of course yours truly will be there of course among many many speakers and if you just go to I believe it's a Napa Institute dot org if you just go to that website you can see the entire group of speakers but it's not just the speakers it's meeting all these very good folks right there's about 600 people there there's just every kind of liturgy imaginable that is being offered their Eucharistic processions retreats that go on as well during the day and and before that that the Institute actually begins so it is really a compounded you know Catholic religious experience that I think might be very very worthwhile to those who are many who have the time - okay - to go there that's terrific and with that being said let's have a quick blessing as we head out of the shofar and bow your heads and pray for God's blessing and may Almighty God sent His Holy Spirit down upon you to inspire you and guide you that you might truly know the beautiful destiny for which he has prepared for you from the beginning of time in your unique goodness love ability and transcendence with him and may you be faithful an attempt to stay on the road calling upon His mercy so that at the end of your life you may be with him in paradise and with the blessed in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit amen amen excellent thank you so much father we shall see you next week we have a replay next week but two weeks we'll be talking more about the Bible and the science and evolution and wrap things up as always thank you Father Spitzer and thank you all for joining us here don't forget about the Napa Institute conference father mentioned of course and don't forget all about the wonderful program we we have here on EWTN each week again next time evolution the Bible and science we can deal with it all right here in the heart of father Spitzer's universe where faith and reason meet and understand each other we'll see you next time [Music] you

Channel: EWTN

Views: 45,223

Keywords: ytsync-en, fsu, fsu15107

Id: NrcV6pj1-Io

Length: 57min 1sec (3421 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 28 2018