What People Believe About Jesus

welcome back to the word on fire show I'm Brandon watt the host and joining us as he does almost every single week for the podcast is Bishop Robert Barron Bishop Baron always a pleasure Brandon great to hear you and to see you we were just together a few days ago in the frigid snow-covered land of Minnesota we were up there for an honorary Doctorate in a keynote that you were receiving and giving at the University of st. Thomas tell us a little bit about that when you were there for the chesterton board meeting I just by chance we were in the same hotel you were there for the meeting and I was staying there for this event so we were able to spend some time together one of my memories Brandon a veteran is the I because I'm from Chicago so I know about Midwestern winters you're not you're from Florida so my image of you and in kind of a skimpy coat yeah because you were not properly accoutered it was my it was my one jacket that I was like one jacket your own and you looked pretty pretty uncomfortable I must say walking across that campus for me honestly it was even though MA I'm sick to death of Chicago winters but to sense that again it was a bit nostalgic it was like a homecoming you know to be in that for the cold weather um it was a joy it was a great event we had mass with Archbishop Hebdo I think one of the great churchmen in the country today and I preached that mass by the way during right before mass began he said I'm so glad that Bishop Baron is here to preach because that means I won't have to listen to his homily tonight to prepare my homily yeah exactly he's a good man and so I preached that then we had a cocktail hour with a lot of the donors to the Catholic Studies program there and then a dinner and then I gave a keynote address they were nice enough to give me an honorary doctorate to which I was indeed honored by um so it was a joy and what did I talk about I talked about oh the some of the research on the nuns you know the N o NES and why young people are coming away from the church and then what Catholic studies can do to address that so that was my topic so many of you of I've heard probably some of those themes before but it was a joy to talk about it up there I know you've praised the Basilica Cathedral Basilica I think that's yeah they could no the Cathedral both of st. Paul yeah and we did stop in there very briefly before the ceremony for my money the most beautiful ecclesial building in the United States built by the great Archbishop Ireland you know back in the early part of the 20th century and it's a splendid architectural gem because you look at it from the outside and you say oh you know it's it's really compact it's it's really it's small it's charming then you go inside and it's this cavernous building it's extraordinary feat of architecture and it's up there on this this very high point of the city of st. Paul in fact even looking down on the state capital that was Ireland's intention to show that the other primacy of of the faith so anyway it's a I enjoy Minneapolis I like I like that area and before we dive into the subject of conversation here maybe say just a quick word about the Catholic Studies program at the University which I know you really esteem yeah founded by the late great Don breel died just about a year ago Don was a real reformer in Catholic education because he professor there at st. Thomas but had the idea tenebra on the time of X Cordia ecclesia you know John Paul the second great statement on Catholic universities that they needed to revive a sense of the faith as animating all forms of intellectual life Don Brielle was very influenced by John Henry Newman and you can see the idea of a university very much behind of a Catholic studies proposal so it started there and then it's spread like seed all over the country indeed around the world so I think you know one of the great achievements I said that publicly one of the great achievements in post conciliar Catholicism is that Catholic studies movement so I was happy to you know pay tribute to bishop recently the big popular evangelical publication christian eebt today ran a big story and this was the title what do you believe probably a heresy about Jesus says survey and what they're referencing and what they explore and the rest the article is a recent survey conducted by LifeWay research a big religious research group sort of equivalent to the Pew Research Center or Cara for s Catholics they talked to 3,000 American adults from all different religious persuasions and they asked them just a short list of questions about Jesus and God and religion it looks like they do this every couple years and so they're able to sort of trace what the religious pulse of the of the country is I want to talk about some of those results with you now a couple quick caveats one it was commissioned by Ligonier ministries which is a pretty popular reformed evangelical ministry second some of the questions they asked are sort of loaded from an evangelical perspective so I think this survey might be of a special interest to evangelicals but we Catholics I think could still get some good things out of it okay so the big summary according to the Christianity Today article was that overall US adults appear to have a superficial attachment to well-known Christian beliefs after all a majority agreed that Jesus died on the cross for our sins and that he rose from the dead however Christianity today concludes they rejected the Bible's teaching on one the gravity of man's sin - the importance of the church is gathering together for worship and three the Holy Spirit now let's walk through some of these points one at a time so first of all survey found more than two-thirds of Americans 69 percent disagree that the smallest sin deserves eternal damnation what do you make of that well cause that's a different way to put it I'm because I would agree with that if if by small is sin you mean a venial sin sure it doesn't deserve eternal damnation but I wouldn't say that's equivalent to being like soft I'm sin I think what you first said though is probably right that I think a lot of people today would by the cultural consensus that you know I'm okay you're okay deep down were all nice people all of us are basically good I think that is largely held today and that's a very secular opinion and that indeed is not a biblical point of view because if that's true we don't need a savior and that's what's happened of course is because we believe that cultural consensus Jesus turns into not a savior but a teacher of vague spiritual principles and a self-help guru and you know etc so I think that's true I would agree with that we tend not to get sin right and therefore we get Jesus wrong doctrinally but in terms of the smallest sin deserving eternal damnation I mean as early as a Catholic I would deny that let's like questions like this to me highlight the need for much more subtlety and I think that Catholic theology provides it we've got this distinction between venial sin and mortal sin which kills the life of Grace in you yeah right yeah quite right and that's the you know so you to say we need a keen or a deeper sense of sin in our culture I think that's true everyone should agree with that but then within that perception there are important distinctions to be made okay here's an interesting one the survey found that a majority of US adults 58 percent said that worshiping alone or with one's family is a valid replacement for regularly attending church and only 30% of people disagreed so seventy percent of people did not disagree with that statement what do you make of that interesting that what I think is intriguing because that would also be in line with the cultural consensus in the direction of individualism and that you know the famous definition of religion by Alfred North Whitehead one of the great philosophers of the twentieth century but it's a remarkably bad definition where religion is what one does with one's privacy is what why has he as a Catholic I think that's just repugnant you know it's so interior rising and so privatizing like my deepest deep deep down conviction that's my religion where as a Catholic I mean I would say be as a Christian as a biblical person I would say Noah's religion has an awful lot to do with the mystical body of Christ it has to do with the church it's not what I do with my my individual privacy it's what it happens publicly religion and it happens in a community and that's why I see worship is much more than what I privately do in relation to the Lord it's it's something we do together I think Brandon like you know this morning I spent my typical hour in my Chapel in in my holy hour and in a way sure that's a very private singular sort of moment it's the Lord and I but what was I doing during that time I was praying the office of the church well the office links me to the church and it's a prayer on behalf of the church I was praying the rosary what was I doing I was I was asking the intercession of Blessed Mother for all kinds of people who would ask me to pray for them when I pray the rosary that's what I typically do is I'll say all right Lord I can't remember everyone that asked me to pray for them but you you remember you know so now I'm bringing through Mary's intercession all of these people to you my point is even though I'm alone in that room one on one with Jesus in a way but I'm also I'm not alone in that room I'm I'm linked to a very wide community with whom and for whom I'm praying and so I guess I'm I regret the fact that a lot of Americans feel it's just a very private matter it strikes me that you see it in both Protestant and Catholic circles that if worship is reduced to merely a good talk some good music and you know I feel sort of better about myself that all of that can be replicated pretty easily at home I can go my computer watch a TED talk I could turn on Spotify and listen to music I like you know yeah but for Catholics there's something that's a part of worship that we just can't get in our families or at home yeah and of course now speaking as a Catholic now we bring it to the mass what's the mass but the great act by which Christ worships the father so as son he doesn't worship the father because he's co-equal the father but in the measure the son is united to a human nature on our behalf in his humanity he worships the father now we join as brothers and sisters of Christ we join him in that great active of praise you can't get that from Spotify and you can't get that from a TED talk that happens at this great act that we call them and that happens in a communal way even if as a priest I'm saying Mass you know by myself yes in a way it's just maybe me alone in the chapel but it's never never by myself it's the mass is always with the angels and saints on behalf of the whole church so in a way I mean the whole church is mystically president every Mass and that can't be had on Spotify or through a TED talk that's why the mass is the source and summit of the Christian life do you remember Brandon is now about a year ago when I when I had the day with William Lane Craig the great evangelical philosopher evangelist and we talked about you know what's what would you do with someone you're trying to bring to the Lord and he talked about you know bringing them to the point of confessing that Jesus is their Lord etc and I said being a little provocative I said well I would try to get them to Mass you know and what I meant was that that's what it means fully to bring someone to Christ maybe as a preparation you do a lot of other things but the the goal is to bring them to mass where they have this experience of the right worship of the father which can't be had any other way all right let's move down the survey I think this one is probably gonna ruffle your feathers a little bit it says a majority of US adults fifty-nine percent say that the Holy Spirit is a force but not a personal being yeah and you know again that's the Star Wars gave us popular expression to it but that goes back to in our culture people like Emerson or Reed Walt Whitman in the 19th century and then Emerson is influenced by people like Friedrich Schleiermacher the founder of modern liberal Protestantism and that idea of you know the infinite or the all or Emerson's oversoul this kind of mystical language but today we probably identify with the New Age right that's and then in turn that goes back all the way to the Gnostics so that's a very old proposal when God is a force he becomes something that even oh boy the force and always bigger than I but I can finally manipulate it I can finally play with it or avoid it or look in Star Wars I mean if the force can be used for good or for ill none of that is in line with the biblical view that God is a person who addresses me and you personally who wants to be the Lord of our life you know a force can be set aside can be ignored can be manipulated but a person can't you know so it's extremely important that we recover even as we as we insist upon the essential mysteriousness of God God's not a person in the in the ordinary sense like you know you're a person I can see you and I can talk to you and you know ordinary ho-hum sort of relationship it's not like that but God's never less than a person he's he's hyper personal but see that's it's it's much more demanding and much more exciting at the same time isn't it because I the God is a force of the Holy Spirit of force finally it's a dull religion I think yeah that's a great force that runs through all things okay now let me get on with my life as opposed to no there's a as a person the Hound of heaven who's after you and wants you in relationship and wants to change you from within who wants to turn you into an image of his son that that's a much more dangerous but finally exciting business I think in common parlance the word human and the word person are sort of used synonymously but obviously we're talking bout the Holy Spirit the Holy Spirit is not a human so what do we mean when we say the Holy Spirit is a person well the classic definition is an instance of a rational nature is a person that's boethius's famous definition what I would say is a person is is someone endowed with mind will and freedom you know that there's so many the 20th century theologians stress on freedom the play of two freedoms so when I'm in relation to God it's not my freedom versus this vague force it's my freedom which is finite in relation to an infinite freedom a person of mind will Liberty who is now addressing me who has mind will and liberty and is trying to draw me into relationship it's much more exciting think of the angel addressing Mary at the Annunciation that's not coercion that's a gracious invitation right appealing to Mary's mind will and freedom and then she acquiesced she agrees she enters into this dynamic relationship but that's true across the board now watch the Lord Jesus as he engages people it's always an awakening of freedom it's an engagement of a person come come follow me but is that saying you know I will make you follow me I'm forcing you to follow me it's a come come you know if you can follow me that's more exciting even as it's more challenging well speaking of Jesus the surveyors asked 3000 American adults this question and then asked whether people agreed with it or not they said this statement Jesus was the first and greatest being created by God the Father 78% of people agreed with that I think that's probably where Christianity today got their headline Kristen what do you believe probably a heresy about Jesus arias rides again I see ancient Aryan heresy right areas who is a presbytery the Church of Alexandria in the 4th century by all accounts a very charismatic very intelligent a priest great preacher actually a songwriter and a singer and areas proposed this is a way past all this confusion about who Jesus is the you know at the time reasonable view that the law goes is the first of God's creatures so creature like you and me but at a very very high pitch and that logos now is joined to human flesh and become this this person that we call Jesus so he's a bit like Hercules or Achilles you know kind of a semi god demigod and arias proposes that as a you know more reasonable approach to Christology and man did he get a lot of supporters for a long time well long after his death he has a lot of supporters even among many bishops throughout the Christian world beginning in the East but spreading eventually to the West think of of Ambrose dealing with this problem in in Milan aryans going all the way up into into it president France and Germany and so that proposal was was very powerful a lot of traction and if the survey is right who and helping in with a name it a lot of people are Aryans today now we got to read Council of Nicaea 325 but then go forward from there Council of Constantinople 381 Council Kelsey 451 and what do we find not the Arian proposal but rather this is this strange deeply interesting proposal that Jesus is not semi-divine semi-human not simply human or simply divine but fully human and fully divine the Cree that we recite every Sunday as Catholics right that he's God from God light from light true God from True God see that's all holding off areas it's saying he's begotten not made see he's not a creature creatures are made but the law Gauss has begotten and we add consubstantial with the father one in being with the father of the same essence as the father right all of that is rehearsing the battle with arias in the fourth century this survey tells me you know it's among evangelicals largely but we still need to fight that battle we're still fighting the Aryan problem go back to the Nicene Creed say it with faith and you'll hold off this problem alright let's look at one more major finding from the survey they asked people whether they agree with this statement religious belief is a matter of personal opinion it is not about objective truth and 60% of Americans agreed with that gosh yeah we're a trouble but that's very reflective of our culture isn't I bet among younger people that number he goes even higher I'd be willing to bet see objective truth is is under assault everywhere in our culture not just in religion if I can say no I don't like being this gender I'm another gender I'll pretend I'm it I'm another age you know I you you have to agree with any of my subjective whims well then objective truth has gone out the window so a fortiori or when it comes to these ultimate claims about God about salvation about sin yeah it's just my opinion you know it's it's the big lebowski right it's just your opinion man that's the contemporary culture but Christianity from the beginning has been massively interested in objective truth because we claim Jesus is the incarnation of the logos which means the divine mind it means the truth of God you can't subjective eyes that without compromising the integrity of the Incarnation and then look at our tradition Brandon this is not just true Catholicism is truth of all the great Christian traditions have massively been interested in the objectivity of their truth claims but see the culture is very subjective izing very emotional izing and very individualizing and all those tendencies are problematic for the faith you know my problem with this claim that religious belief is just a matter of opinion is that it's so generalized fake religious belief to solve it you just need to get down to the particularity x' like okay how about this religious belief god exists either he does or he doesn't and we need to that that's an objective fact either he does exist or he doesn't Jesus rose from the dead either that's a historical fact or it's not these aren't personal opinions that we're exchanging it's you know again to be fair these are deep issues culturally there's been such a terrible history around violence and religion that people tend to associate objective truth claims with violence so yeah that's objectively true oh and if I don't hold it what are you gonna do to me are you gonna kill me you're gonna imprison me so that instinct is so great in us and that goes back to the dawn of modernity that it leads people to what you're right in characterizing is epistemological you a silly position but it's sort of psychologically and culturally credible the people associate objective truth in religion especially because it's ultimate stuff with violence so if you don't hold that as objectively true then that I'm going to imprison you or censor you or kill you at the limit and that so frightens people they'll say oh why don't we just say it's all the matter of opinion and then no one's in a position to do violence to anybody else so that's the trouble can we affirm objective truth in a non-violent way yes and I call that argument that's the whole point arguing about religion means honoring both objectivity and honoring non-violence at the same time I want to say a plague on both your houses either you subjective eyes the truth or you you are violent plague on both your houses let's argue that's better space to be in [Music] well it's time for a question from one of our listeners today we have a question from a young student named Mary at Buffalo Academy of Sacred Heart they are big big word on fire and Bishop Baron fans led by their teacher Megan Dandrea who is who runs a large class of a bunch of young students they've sent us videos they learned from them yes I remember them sure right right so I invited them to submit a question so Mary is sort of their representative and she's got a question for you about what it's like when you're celebrating the sacraments so here's Mary's question [Music] what is your experience as a priest and celebrating the sacraments when Christ acts through you to consecrate the bread and wine or to absolve sin what does that moment feel like for you huh it's a I hear your classmates behind you they're uh um it's a cool question interesting and and I'd make a couple distinctions in a way it doesn't feel like anything you know I'm saying there's something very objective about my operating in Persona Christi in the person of Christ meaning it's not tied to my subjectivity so if I don't feel something extraordinary happening in me it doesn't say one little thing against what's happening so as a priest I say the words of consecration and I'm utterly utterly convinced because the church teaches those that that change is affected whether I feel anything or not I can tell you this I mean like physically you don't feel anything there's nothing like I feel power coming out of me nor do you typically feel anything psychologically now now to be to be clear about this thing and kind of balanced about it there are times when and I love those moments when you feel the the the power and importance of what you're doing sometimes you know you're it's 6:30 daily Mass and and you're there you're saying Mass but maybe you're not really into it for whatever reason you're tired psychologically disconnected or whatever but there are other times when you aren't really in that moment and you are indeed feeling the the intimacy with the Lord and with his people and and the importance of what you're doing and and that's wonderful those are wonderful moments I think I'm glad you mentioned confession because there are times when that sacrament is especially powerful when you're the minister of God's grace and forgiveness maybe as someone that's been away from the church for decades and there's that moment of of welcome and return and and the flow of grace that's really powerful and I've indeed felt that and been very moved by it so that's the distinction I would make the main thing is it's not a question finally a feeling but of what the church is teaching and even if I don't feel one little thing the Eucharist is still present and the person sins are still forgiven but it's wonderful when you can feel the spiritual power of it well I want to thank everyone for listening to this episode I want to thank Bishop Aaron for joining us listen in the last episode we talked about bishops interview with Dave Rubin and Ben Shapiro if you haven't seen those videos yet go out and find them and more importantly please please share them we want to share these videos with as many people as possible so share them through social media either email them to your friends into your circles we want to get those out as widely as possible well thanks again for listening to this episode of the word on fire show and we'll see you next week right here on the word on fire show

Channel: Bishop Robert Barron

Views: 80,328

Rating: 4.8561854 out of 5

Keywords: Bishop Barron, Jesus, Christianity Today, Survey

Id: Tg6PdyuK2CQ

Length: 27min 27sec (1647 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 07 2019