Sunday Night Live - Growing in Faith - Fr. Groeschel CFR with Msgr Joseph Giandurco - 10-10-2010

good evening this evening good evening and for Sunday night alive or live one or the other and I have a very excellent visitor this evening a dear friend of mine but before I do that I wanted to mention two books I just recently came out I may have mentioned this to you already this is after this life what Catholics believe about what happens next after this life and this is published by our Sunday visitor and it is a very helpful book it's $13 and this is a brand new one just came out praying constantly also published by our Cindy visitor and this is $15 and you can order them through the network or you can write a letter to me a note 9 1 box 55 Larchmont New York 105 3 8 50 books box 55 Larchmont New York 105 3 8 the other reason does a day I got a letter in the mail said father Benedict Groeschel New York City and it came to me somebody in the works of the post office must know me now you must be very aware that in the papers and somewhat in television and in magazines there are attacks right now on faith of the church and particularly on the Pope and especially with the Holy Fathers visit to England these attacks by militant atheists really attacking the whole idea of religion of faith of the church and of Christ and so tonight we're going to talk about faith and the attacks on faith now our best visitor this evening is a very esteemed man Monsignor Joseph's gender co professor at Saint Joseph's Seminary for a number of years his doctorate in canon law and now pas pastor also in Suffern New York so welcome thank you back with you I mean I even used to teach him in college so I go way back right and welcome to you thank you my very warmly happy to have you thank you it's great to be here what about this attack on faith and on God well there's no question that that the the attacks are getting more frequent and and louder in some sense and when when the Holy Father was preparing to go to Great Britain and Scotland the the fever pitch rose really and there were all kinds of predictions that there would be major protests because there's no place for religion any longer in modern society there was there was even a hope on the part of some militant atheists that the Pope would be arrested because he is a proponent of so many things that are harmful to humanity and whatnot but fortunately we've seen that the the Pope's trip to Great Britain was quite the opposite it was it was a rousing success really and I think it goes to show that in the hearts of many well there is a longing for God there is a sense of religion in in the best sense of the word and there there is also this kind of clash between those who would wish that religion would disappear and the ordinary people who feel that God is with them it's an interesting thing there are atheists or agnostics around who are not hostile to religion but and I've known some and some of them are reluctant reluctant atheists they wish they weren't one person the one very intelligent woman said to me I wish you could say something to me to help me believe but that's one group of people those are the a thing as I don't mind at all but what we're getting is kind of bitter angry fundamentalist atheist one of them is around they're famous this book it God is not great how religion poisons everything by Christopher Hitchens yes and pathetic I mean how religion poisons everything wanna want to project projecting the statement what right graduate is right it is it is really when you when you read some of these books now because there are so many of them when you read some of them you first you hear them saying that religion has this this mindset that wants to wants to wipe out all opposition to religion but these people now these militant atheists sound as if they're doing the same thing they they don't want to hear anything about religion any longer you know it's and you know I I love to read about Einstein Hitchens here mentions Einstein but he doesn't get very clear about it and here's Einstein's book out of my later ears and he says I cannot conceive of a genuine scientist without profound faith the situation may be expressed by this image science without religion is lame and religion without science is blind Albert Einstein right and in the back of the book there are beautiful paper pages and Achaia chapters on Einstein's own religious belief as a Jew and defecting the defending the Jewish faith and mentioning the persecution of the Jews by the Nazis and others it's quite interesting you know in modern time we had a whole big war against religion in Russia you know was absolutely atheistic and it's quite Russia Russia right now quite religious all other life that's right and did China the so-called Chinese Communists are a bit pragmatic man is doing very nicely in China that's right the Catholic Church it's the weak very nicely in China that's right I think they I think there is still oppression of the Catholics and Christians but it's it's becoming more tolerated I think they're becoming in a sense more open to the the West but their churches and cathedrals and Archbishop's appointed in publicly right right and at times it Rana when Archbishop's are appointed government representatives come to the occasion yes well there as we know there there's there's a patriotic Church and an underground Church but they're they're coming closer together right yes there's still tension there I think because of the suffering of the underground church for so many years but now it's changing though it's changing him well now tell us everybody's listening what are our arguments for the existence of God we're not going to take up the whole Christian faith that's these several program right but simply that God exists as a person that he knows us and we may know him which is what we call theism right there are a small number of people who are deists they believe in God as the Creator but he's not involved with us some of the early American people like Jefferson were deists but the vast majority I think in recent studies the last couple of years of the few studies that about 92 or 93 percent of Americans claim to believe in a personal God and about 86 or 87 percent believe that at the end of this life we have to give an account to God right I that the the church has always said that we can we can know of God even by our own reason it needs to be completed by revelation itself to know that there as we Christians believe that God exists in three persons etc but but in our in our hearts in our in our being really is the the truth that that there is a personal God and many many theologians throughout the centuries have tried to give one or more explanations of that and I think what what we're seeing now by these the modern atheists is trying to trying to erase that there they're trying to to say that there's no reason to even think of God there's no reason to say that that God created everything or started everything it's like the the book that has recently been on the New York Times bestseller list was number one last week it's number two this week called the grand design but the the point of the book is that because of the laws of physics we can we can say this is the the authors way of thinking because of the laws of physics we can say that there's no God and it it's it's actually quite absurd when you when you think of it that that would be a proof against the existence of God well you know it goes way way back to the Greek the Greek philosophers and Aristotle great philosopher got to the five proofs of the existence of God and he struggled with what God has to do with us but Plato his disciple was very clear that you could pray to God that God could know you and that he could do things for you by Providence and for that reason the early Christians had very profound influence from Plato right the in fact the gospel of Saint John uses some of the phrases of Plato at the beginning was the word the Word was with God that's very platonic right right and in a sense Christianized what was what was before them because of again the revelation from Christ himself really now about revelation reason and revelation comes together and the Jewish faith and then growing from that is the Christian faith and probably I should say the Muslim faith as well did you have reason and belief together and for instance we certainly accept the arguments for the existence of God but that Christ is the son of God that is a matter of faith you can use some reason from the miracles of Christ from the in fact a fact effect on the whole world historically with the teachings of Christ and the numbers of Christianity but it takes faith it does it does and as we were saying before before the show faith is a gift and therefore we are grateful for that and we pray that by our actions and by our reasoning others will come to to receive that gift as well through through God's action of course and that's part of the job of believers they need to give good example and give an account of their faith and I will be back in a couple of minutes this is a very very important and interesting subject so we'll be back in two minutes now one of the great obstacles to many people who try to believe who would like to believe is evil that evil comes into the world you have a quotation there I do I have a quotation because I I thought of st. Thomas Aquinas when we were preparing the show and I found this quote by Peter Kreeft a Catholic theologian a Catholic commentator and he says when st. Thomas Aquinas wrote his great Summa Theologica his great work of theology he could only he could find only two objections to the existence of God even though he tried to list at least three objections to every one of the thousands of theses he tried to prove in that great work one of the two objections is the apparent ability of natural science to explain everything in our experience without God and the other is the problem of evil and father and I were mentioning before the show when we were speaking that for most people if they have some kind of objection or doubt as to the existence of God it probably comes from the problem of evil more so than the scientific way of trying to negate God but it is certainly something that goes back centuries saying Thomas Aquinas died in the year 12 74 so these objections that they mention here are not new but they are still you know they are still with us and naturally in modern times we've had some terrible examples of evil you think of the rise of the Nazis Hitler responsible for the death of 40 million people's lives you have the rise of Bolshevik ISM again about 40 million people we're almost talking about a hundred million people violently killed we're innocent right right and those that's moral moral evil and there exists other kinds of evil like physical evil of people dying in different kinds of tragedies and all kinds of earthquakes and terrible things and there are people who suffer because of that people who then question because of those things but as you say perhaps some of the the most horrible are the ones the evils caused by other humans and I think even a person who's had faith all of his life has been faded of both of us the Christian Catholic faith in the center of all that the Sun six or seven years old when I read of the terrible earthquake that took place in Haiti that's the poor Island poor already what in the world does this happen to these people and you have to go away and pray for a while right in front of the crucifix because we see that God Himself the son of God took upon himself terrible evil visited upon this is the meaning of Christ crucified of the cross so true okay I convinced the Christianity without a cross is a meaningless religion exactly often time does priests the the only thing we can do is point to the cross for people who are suffering or who've endured terrible tragedies you know it's if we if we couldn't point to the cross how how could we begin to explain suffering as Christian's really and it and even looks back to the Jewish faith which is the foundation of the Christian faith there were many the proverb prophets many antara Bowl things visited against the Jews even until modern times you know and that's part of Jewish humor outside of the Warsaw Ghetto all this is going on did I gonna kill everybody and one rabbi said to another it happens because we chosen the other was as could they choose please come buddy else yeah that's very Jewish you were right I grew up with that kind of the right right but it's it's something that we have to think about and you listening to our program some of you are listening that are very ill there are people writing to me who have terminal illness or someone very dear to them who has terminal illness yes there are other catastrophes that happen in life accidents in Harrisons failures all sorts of things that's part of life and Christ Himself takes part of life definitely definitely those these are these are some of the crises that that can come into everyone's live for anyone's life and I think nowadays it's it's it's pretty common to speak of different crises crises of faith actually just just the other day Pope Benedict was speaking to Catholic journalists from around the world and he he was saying to them I think I lost my page but he was saying to them that if we if we don't stay focused on on Jesus himself then the crises can become all the more problematic I guess we could say or if I if I had the quote here I'd lost it but we have to remain focused on Jesus in in facing the difficulties in life and this is why Christianity is the religion of the cross this design of the cross back in the 80s and 90s that strange passage in human history I've lived through it and I thought it was a wacky time to begin with I'm so happy and it's over you would actually sometime find a modern church that didn't have a cross and I was appalled what is Christianity about but right the cross and the resurrection but you have a resurrection without Christ crucified it's kind of a silly thing isn't it that's right ridiculous that's right you know we did we went through different phases like that and fortunately I think we're we've refocused in many ways you know you may have noticed that I will always speak respectfully of the other great religions of the world because God in His Holy Spirit gives people to find their way to God there may be he brings them to the true church but maybe he gets them where they are and some of them are very holy people Jews Muslims Hindus Buddhists but in each one of them they have the problem of evil and their hope is that God will overcome evil but that they have to encourage it in and endure it but in Christianity it is the religion of the cross the religion of the suffering God and I think in the Holy Gospels and in the words of Christ Himself whose holy life was filled with suffering and ended in gigantic suffering exactly I there is no other religion that that shows us how God Himself takes on our suffering and it's through through him through Christ that we overcome suffering although many people would say you know we're still enduring suffering even though Christ is risen from the dead but our hope is in the final hour our final resurrection it's in Christ's conquering sin and death forever it's perfectly obvious in the guy in the New Testament in the Acts of the Apostles the Apostles astonished almost incapable of dealing with the idea the Christ had come back from the dead after such a horrible death they did they didn't what they didn't know what to make of it they saw him that's right they did what what to call about that's right and then everybody's just so happy Christ is risen but as the Acts of the Apostles go on they're arrested they're imprisoned they're murdered they're still tortured it did not mean that the resurrection meant that everything is going to be just wonderful Oh exactly exactly and even in a sense just before the Apostles were able to to go forward with their their newfound conviction it seems like they were ready to scatter and they saw the risen Christ than that that changed everything for them in the Holy Spirit descended upon them and from that day until this day that the church has continued to make Christ present and it is it's it's a miracle it's it's a blessing but it doesn't mean that that we don't have our work to do even though Christ conquered sin and death already we have we have to keep doing our part to make the message heard and to to bring Christ to the world who's who's waiting and looking for him and interesting to look at the different forms of Christian belief you have Catholicism orthodoxy which is very very close very close and then the different client forms of Protestantism but very varied some of them very similar to Catholicism like the Anglican Church some very different like the Quakers you know that have no sacraments or anything but they believe in Christ in every one of those the cross is there you cannot you cannot have Christianity without a cross at times in church history including among Catholics there were attempts to get out of the cross and it falls apart right it's an absolute disaster that's right the message it's not it's not the whole message without the cross and that's on the eve of the Reformation when Luther and Calvin were preaching that others the Catholics were falling apart they were not so much that the Protestant reformers succeeded the Catholics fell apart and in Germany practically nobody was practicing the Catholic faith that was showing it but and Luther began to preach and he originally preached as a Catholic yes you know we wanted to be remain a Catholic and then finally the great Jesuit saying to Calais st. the great Jesuit come on Oh in Canisius thank Canisius he went all over spread in Germany preaching and Peter Canisius oh yes and brought half of Germany back to Catholicism well there there have been many many points when the the Catholic Church hit a low a low point and in the sense it took a kind of shaking up for the church to come back you know to rebound in a sense and it always does yes it does and no do not not because of us no you know that's right several times modern times pope some said to say that's right big especially I think our president Holy Father would be the first one to admit that without the Holy Spirit the Catholics are really a mess that's not a big thing about well now we're going to be coming back with questions about faith and I want you to feel tonight you can call in any question about faith what it means to you you may not be a Catholic you may not be a Christian but what you may be an agnostic the budget but about faith and we're gonna drop it on your handle okay Joseph to see what you can do so we'll be back in a few cup seconds now next week we have dr. Nancy Coppola is going to be speaking about us abstinence education teaching people how to avoid forbidden sexual acts now obviously we're not talking about people within marriage but there some of our people who called in that during the week have asked me why don't you say some things about sexuality and chastity so dr. Coppola is a both a theologian and a psychologist so well be listening to Nancy next week now our first question this evening is from Mary Ann Mary Ann where are you from and what's your question I'm calling from New York City okay how are you father krischell and Monsignor only as old as you feel and you're as young as as you always were my question is for the two of you and I was wondering if you would think it was a fair observation to think that the writer such as clips for Hitchens and a number of these you know extremely vehement atheist comes from either their on refusal to accept the gift of faith or rejecting the gift of faith and they're operating under the auspices of well if I can't have it you can't have it that kind of misery loves company so I'm gonna make it bad for you - I feel bad so I'm gonna make you feel bad and Judith affair albeit simple analysis would you think that's a fair assessment I of course we don't know I don't know them personally so we I really can't say what's going on with them but I think it may be a possible explanation there as you have it in the sense that these people may not be open to the the gift of faith and be looking for ways to explain their their their lack of of understanding their lack of openness who knows what their their background is although it's interesting because their names are our kind of Christian names like Christopher Hitchens you know Christ bearer is what the name means but we don't know I don't know if if his family was Christian or he was Christian but apparently something something did happen where they started questioning and now obviously say that there is no God there there's no need to talk about God so it could be that they're they're just angry or or looking for answers but we really don't don't know their situation Hitchens in his book mentions that he was married by a clergyman I'm not sure whether I was a priest or a Protestant minister and he complains about he had to make offering for the occasion he was that bothered him now that's not very impressive right but I want to say this a person with no faith should move our hearts to sadness for them we should pray to them and as I mentioned I've known friends who did not have faith and they wanted to have faith what you're getting here is a very small group of writers like Hitchens whose book is how religion poisons everything now did you ever hear a prejudice statement in your life maybe that's a great example of prejudice and what I think we should be praying for this man and I understand that he's run into some serious illnesses I'm praying that maybe this will be an opportunity who knows that for grace who knows right now that's right I must say that if you look around people who leave as being fervent believers to atheists doesn't happen very often but furthered atheists do become believers quite often you know the when I was a student at Columbia where I was treated by the faculty with great respect I no complaints at all about the faculty were went out of their way to be respectful and deferential and Here I am walking into Columbia looking like a friar one or two of the students would be disrespectful or hostile but you waited through it and you know by the end of the year they make sure that they said hello and something and I don't know what they got hurt in their lives I don't know but if in the name of God I could accept a certain amount of abuse I'm delighted I mean look at the gospel yeah you know look at the Saints yeah look at the martyrs a little bit of a little bit of hard detail in dealing is nothing but at all hey we have a call from bill bill where you're from and was your question hi father good had talked again I'm from Pennsylvania I'm from Saint Cyril and Methodius Ukrainian Catholic Church in Berwick Pennsylvania yeah we were on before yes Father now tell us what's our question well I actually have a comment what made my faith grow father was I was in a Eastern Bloc country which happened to be Berlin and of course as you know the Russians unfortunately were shooting people or letting the dogs Mahlum or whatever one who tried to escape and I was quite surprised how no matter what happened the Russians could not keep down or oppress Catholicism and even though there was an underground Church I guess most of the Ukrainian Catholic Church that they still flourished even though there was complete convent and of course there was a priests taken to the prison camps in Siberia and I really impressed me and that they would still hold true to their Catholic beliefs and when I got older I felt compelled fathers who basically joined the Ukrainian Catholic Church the local one and around where I live because I was very impressed and also made my faith grow that they still held true to the Catholic faith well your some of you our voice our audience may not know the Ukrainian Catholic Church the there is the big Catholic Church and most Catholics belong to the Roman Catholic Church or the Latin Church but there are a number of other churches under the big church and one of them is Ukrainian which Catholic Church there's also the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and they have many symbolic similarities the Ukrainian Catholic Church has endured at times great persecution and one of its great bishops Andrew JEP Tatsuki Archbishop of Lilith suffered under communism and under Nancy and who is this proposed for beatification Archbishop Satsuki who was a great big tall I think six foot seven inches tall it was kind of a a giant in every particular way and he was great representative of the Ukrainian Catholic Church and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church suffered a great deal of turn together they kind of suffered together and in it I understand in recent years they're getting along very well we have a call from another bill how are you from what where are you from bill greetings father I'm from Dothan Alabama and I'm one of your Jewish viewers okay and the question that I have for you concerns people who are so strongly believe in their own faith that they expect everyone to work according to the rules of their faith regardless of what faith tradition they come from them themselves hopefully that's not too confusing and I was wondering if you have any thoughts on that well I'm father I'm gonna ask father at my senior speak first and then I'll speak soon well I think people of every religion feel that that their faith is the correct one it's the one that that people should believe but as father Benedict was saying before we have to respect the beliefs of other people and hold fast to our own and perhaps help people to understand our beliefs but there are times when we will not be able to and perhaps even should not try to to convince someone to leave their their own beliefs although I think part of your your question bill or your observation is that it may it may often come down to people feeling as a strong believer is trying to convince others and in essence there are times when that is what people do people try to make others understand the truth of of their own belief there's also the question of the people that you're talking to rather uninformed simple people who know little or nothing about Christianity or the church to inform them certainly not to cold call them or push them in but give them information but we have many people in this country more sophisticated they have their own belief and they're at home in it and it would be offensive to them to anything else in my life I've had many wonderful friendships with Protestants and Jewish people and with people who are struggling with unbelief they're struggling along and it would seem to me to be a following of Christ that this was to do you know in the New Testament there's some very interesting people who were not members of the Jewish faith which Christ belonged to all of his life until the navs Last Supper when he started the Christian world or the Apostles but think of the Magi they were so relaxed Rian's the the man who brought the gifts we think of the Roman soldier called Longinus that truly this man is the Son of God and our Lord would not have had much to do with non Jew because he said that that was he had been sent to the house of Israel but various Jewish people and non-jewish people come through the center of the the man whose Centurion was little girl or a little boy or servant has been ill and Christ comes to save him but restore him and he says lord I am not worthy that you should come into my my roof and speak only what we need this was a member of the Roman religion so give God a chance and I personally believe give God a chance we have a call from Rose rose where you from aren't you gonna tell us from Ohio father uh-huh beautiful my question is yes I believe in God's presence I have difficulty feeling his presence I wonder if other people share the need and the desire to feel his presence rather than just know about it that's rose I would I would say that people do want to feel God's presence in recent years we we've heard of blessed Teresa of Calcutta z-- struggles with feeling God's presence she was faithful to the end living her faith and serving God by serving others but she couldn't couldn't feel God's presence to her in in one way or another I mean she she did believe and she rejoiced when she participated in Mass I saw that personally and I father Benedict has seen that in mother Teresa but of course people want to feel and to to know that God is with them so we keep we keep praying for that and and if someone is not feeling that they have to keep trusting that God is with them and will show them his presence show them the way you know after mother Teresa died her spiritual director was ordered by the Holy See to make her private letters available as part of the cause of her beatification and eventually the father Joseph who was the one of the first priests may be the first friar priest of the missionaries of charity he published those and they're amazing mother Teresa says I feel neither faith nor hope nor charity and yet all through her life she showed faith hope and charity and I was very privileged to know mother and to talk to her often on a kind of deep level and I never knew that but I knew that about her face was a sadness I would say a somberness it wasn't about herself and then about six weeks before her death she was transformed father Andrew and I went to visit her she was a different person and she was laughing and telling us stories about and I said to father Andrew she's going we'll never see her again she's on her way home to God and those last few weeks after that long long time now you say why would that happen to mother Teresa for the world it's called the dark a sign of the Dark Soul work the dark night the dollars of the soul and I'm sure that her great faith and hope came in in that darkness and apparently what I've been able to read that that darkness came down upon him just when she started the new community that she didn't have it before but all those near 35 years right in darkness how great was her faith in God we have a last call probably from Matt Matt way you're from the mud you gonna tell us yeah hi father and I am from California uh-huh and my question is I noticed that when I attempt to get closer to God and to grow in my faith that I'm confronted by greater temptations and obstacles easily get frustrated and it seems like there's just a lot more adversity to deal with there is something to be expected when a person tries to repent and grow in their faith or am i imagining this or I'm not really sure well first of all if you read the lives of the saints that's a very common experience it's called the dark night and temptation and you may perhaps guess what the only way we could that this may also be attack of the evil one a person coming toward God it may be attacked by the evil one and the evil one comes upon a person to try to stop them particularly a person who is going to do a good deal of goodness and if you read the lives of the saints I don't want to start mentioning names I don't have time that many of them st. John of the Cross did walked through dark dark times and God was waiting there for them thank you all for listening tonight and we'll be next week with dr. Coppola an abstinence a serious important question and father would you give us a question quiet laughing yes may Almighty God keep all of you in his love and protection that you may know of the goodness of God and the love of God through Christ Father Son and Holy Spirit amen and as always I passed the basket this part of the program is only in this United States because in other countries you can't do this but in this country you can say can you send in some help so please don't forget eat wtn and keep us on the air god bless you talk to you next week

Channel: EWTN

Views: 12,632

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Keywords: Sunday, Night, Live, Growing, in, Faith, Fr, Groeschel, CFR, with, Msgr, Joseph, Giandurco, 10, 2010, Catholic

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Length: 54min 2sec (3242 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 11 2010