Transcript

What are we going to talk about today?

Does anybody know?

I think I might have mentioned it last time I was here.

What are we talking about today?

Marian dogmas.

Marian dogmas.

Okay, who here can tell me?

What is a dogma?

What is a dogma?

It's a teaching that is held infallibly by the Church, a teaching that is held infallibly by the Church, and?

And is necessary to be believed if and where.

Okay, very good.

Would anybody else like to add to that as to what a dogma is?

Anybody else?

Jackie gave me the approval.

Very good, very good, perfect.

So, dogmas are simple.

A dogma is this: a dogma is anything that is divinely revealed by God, any truth about the faith that God revealed to mankind.

Anything, whatever it is, if it is divinely revealed, it is a dogma.

A dogma is an article of faith that must be believed in order to follow God, because if God actually went out of His way to reveal it to mankind, that means that He intends for you to believe it.

And if God intends for you to believe it and you want to follow God, then you must believe whatever He revealed.

If God reveals it, you believe it.

And if you reject it, if you reject it, you are actually rejecting God.

So that's why dogma is so important.

That's why it's so important to believe the teachings of the Church, because the teachings of the Church are teachings that were revealed by God in His Son, Jesus Christ, that were given to the Apostles, and the Apostles gave it to the entire world.

So if you reject any dogma, any revealed truth, any divinely revealed truth, you are actually rejecting God.

So that's why dogmas must be believed, because if God said it to you, if God revealed it to you, and you say, Nope, I don't believe that, you are now calling God a liar.

And we don't want to call God a liar, because God is the God of truth; God is truth itself.

So if God revealed it, you know that we have an obligation to believe it.

That's what a dogma is.

Now, there are many dogmas that God has revealed to the Church, and there are particular dogmas that have been defined—definitively.

That's redundant, right?

Definitively defined—that have been formally defined by God's Church, which is the Catholic Church.

There are particular dogmas that have been defined over the last 2,000 years of Church history.

Now, how does the Church formally define dogmas?

And when I say define a dogma, what I mean by that is that there are things that God divinely revealed to us, and the Church, when it gives definitions to these revelations, right?

The Church defines these revelations; it is setting the parameters as to exactly what you have to believe in order to know that you actually do believe these dogmas.

So how does the Church do that?

Well, the Church does it in two ways: in an ordinary way and in an extraordinary way.

Ordinarily, all of the bishops of the world teach their local churches.

The bishops teach all of the teachings of bishops that they have in common all throughout the entire world, meaning that they are universal teachings.

Those universal teachings that are held in common by all of the bishops in their ordinary teaching capacity, those teachings are infallible, definitive teachings that you cannot reject.

These are the teachings of the universal Magisterium in the ordinary form.

Now, in the extraordinary form, these bishops will actually come together; they will convene in what we call ecumenical councils.

And when these bishops come together, and it's bishops from all over the world, they come together to formally teach and make pronouncements about what is in the deposit of faith.

Now, we need to get something very, very clear: everything that God revealed to mankind, everything that God revealed to His Church, He revealed it all at one time in His Son, Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ revealed it to the Apostles.

So everything that is dogmatic about the Christian religion, Jesus gave to the Apostles, and the Apostles handed it down.

The successors of the Apostles, who are the bishops, handed it down from generation to generation.

And whenever the Church has to formally define these dogmas, it is usually in response to movements within the Church that are heterodox.

What does heterodox mean?

Go ahead.

Wrong teaching, wrong thinking, or wrong belief.

If there is ever a heterodox belief within the Church, that's usually when the Church has to spring into action and say, Okay, you guys got some things that are incorrect?

Let us help you.

We are going to define this dogma, that way you guys don't fall into error.

Once a dogma is defined and the definition is given, you are bound to hold to that definition.

And if you don't hold to that definition, and if you believe anything that contradicts that definition or is an explicit rejection of that definition, you are now a what?

A heretic.

A heretic is anyone that explicitly and formally denies, rejects, or contradicts the definitive teachings of Christ's Church.

That's what a heretic is.

So if you just mistakenly believe something, you are heterodox.

But if you know that this is an error and you know that the Catholic Church has already defined this, and you still are obstinate in your rejection of it, now you're a heretic.

And if you're a heretic, you are not in full communion with Christ's Church because you are now calling God a liar.

And if you call God a liar, you're not in full communion with Him.

So this is why it's very, very important that we believe what God revealed.

And today we are going to talk about what God has revealed about His Mother.

That's right, His Mother.

Here's something that is dogmatic that every single one of us has to believe: Jesus Christ is God.

He is eternally God.

Jesus Christ has always existed for all of eternity because He is God, and God is existence itself.

So Jesus Christ has always existed.

Here's another dogma: two thousand years ago, Jesus Christ, who is God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity—and by the way, the Holy Trinity is another dogma—Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, two thousand years ago became incarnate.

He took on human flesh.

The eternal God, the Son of the Father, became man.

He took on flesh, and He came into this world.

How did He do that?

How did He do it?

How did God take flesh?

How did God take flesh?

What did He do?

I want to hear from Alonzo.

You talk a lot!

Just kidding, bro.

I want to hear from Alonzo.

Alonzo, talk to me, baby.

Through the Blessed Mother, Our Lady, God chose to become incarnate by taking flesh from a woman.

He said, My flesh is going to come from a woman.

A woman gave God His flesh.

God the Father, through His Son, Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, created Mary.

What this means is that God the Son, Jesus Christ, got to create His own mom.

He created her, and He said, This is the woman from whom I will take my flesh when I become incarnate to come into the world to save mankind.

Jesus took flesh from Mary, and He was born of Mary 2,000 years ago.

And what is it that God has revealed to us, to the Church, about His Mother, His Mother that He created?

What has God revealed about us?

Mary.

There are four Marian dogmas—four—that have been defined formally by the Catholic Church.

Can anybody tell me what those four Marian dogmas are?

Jackie?

I got one.

What's one?

The Immaculate Conception.

The Immaculate Conception, that's one.

Who else?

The perpetual virginity.

The perpetual virginity, that's another one.

We got two down.

What other ones do we have?

Go again.

The Assumption of Mary.

The bodily Assumption of Mary.

What else?

What's the other one?

One more, and it's actually the first one.

It was the first one to be defined.

Does anybody know?

I actually did talk about this when we did the class on the Rosary.

I mentioned this.

What is it?

The divine motherhood of Mary.

So we're going to start with that.

The first Marian dogma that was defined by Christ's Church is the divine motherhood of Mary.

What does that mean?

The divine motherhood of Mary.

What does this mean?

What it means is that Mary is the Mother of God, and that if you reject that title, if you reject Mary being the Mother of God, not only are you in heresy, but you've actually messed up your understanding of Jesus.

Why is this?

You have to say that Mary is the Mother of God because if you deny that, you are now denying the divinity of Jesus.

It's very simple.

In the year 431, at the Ecumenical Council of Ephesus, the Church came together and defined that Mary is indeed the Mother of God, and Mary should be called the Mother of God in the year 431. Why?

Because it's simple: Mary is the Mother of Jesus, Jesus is God, therefore Mary is the Mother of God.

And let's say that you reject that, because there are people still to this day that reject this.

As a matter of fact, the reason that the Council of Ephesus had to be held in the year 431 is because there was a heresy that was running rampant called the heresy—who knows what this heresy is called?

Go ahead.

The Nestorian heresy.

The heresy of Nestorianism says that Mary is only the Mother of the humanity of Jesus Christ, but she is not the Mother of His divinity.

Why is this an error?

Because if you say that Mary is only the Mother of Jesus' humanity but not His divinity, what you have now done is that you have split Jesus in half.

You now have two Jesuses: one who is divine and one who is human.

What you have done is you have undone the Incarnation.

When the Incarnation happens, there is still only one Jesus.

There is only one person that is Jesus, and He is fully divine and He is fully human.

You can never separate the two again because He is only one person, one person with two natures.

But if you want to say, Oh, Mary is only the Mother of Jesus' human nature, you have now separated; you have now undone the Incarnation.

And now you have two Jesuses.

You can't do that.

What you are saying is that Jesus was two persons.

Jesus was not two persons; Jesus is one person with two natures.

Because He's one person, you have to say Mary is the Mother of God because Jesus, the one person who is Jesus, is God, and there is no way around it whatsoever.

If you get this wrong about Mary, you're going to believe in a false Jesus.

So you have to believe that Mary is the Mother of God if you want to hold to the Incarnation, which is another dogma, another revealed truth from God.

Any questions so far?

Has everyone followed that okay?

So that happened in the year 431. So that one is easy: Jesus is God, Mary is the Mother of Jesus, therefore Mary is the Mother of God.

So that's the first one.

What is the second Marian dogma that was defined by the Church?

That wasn't the second one.

No. What is the next one to be defined by the Church?

Who knows?

Go ahead.

Yes, the perpetual virginity of Mary.

Who can explain that to me?

Who here knows what the perpetual virginity of Mary is?

And this one is so fun to discuss.

I'm about to blow your mind.

Someone tell me.

Go ahead, brother.

Amen.

So Mary, who is the Mother of God, the Mother of Jesus, who gave birth to the incarnate Lord, she was a virgin before, during, and after the birth of Jesus Christ.

She was a virgin perpetually, meaning her entire life she was a virgin.

Okay?

This is a divinely revealed truth from God to the Church.

How do we know this?

Whenever we want to figure out what God revealed to the Church and to mankind, where do we go?

What's the primary place to go to figure out what God revealed?

To Scripture.

So where do we go in Scripture to know that Mary was a perpetual virgin?

Where do we go?

Go ahead.

Okay, right.

So the brothers of Jesus are mentioned in Matthew 13, and we're going to get to that because right away, people that are going to be watching this on YouTube, as soon as I say that Mary was a perpetual virgin, there's somebody right now on YouTube, some non-Catholic, that's losing his mind, pulling out his hair, saying, Jesus had brothers!

Oh, we're going to get to that.

But right now, I want to know positively in the Bible where we go to know that Mary was a perpetual virgin.

If you go to the Gospel of Luke, chapter 1, and you read when the angel appeared to Mary and he told her that she was going to be the Mother of the Messiah, what did Mary say to the angel?

She said something very, very interesting to the angel when he told her this.

What did she say?

What did Mary tell him?

Well, ask the angel.

Mary said, How can this be since I know not man?

You know what's really interesting about this response that Mary gave the angel?

When Mary said this to the angel, Mary was already married.

Mary was already married to Joseph; they were already married.

She was already a married woman.

So when the angel appears to Mary and he says, You're going to be the Mother of the Messiah, she said, How?

Because I know not man.

Now, when you realize, wait a second, what do you mean you know not man?

You're a married woman.

What does that mean?

Well, that term—oh, and by the way, also when Mary said this, she had just been married to Joseph.

It was during the betrothal period.

Now, a lot of people get this wrong; they think that the betrothal is like the engagement period.

Betrothal does not mean that you're engaged to be married.

Betrothal means that you are already married, but in Jewish culture—and even a lot of Jews to this day—they do this where a man and a woman will get married, but they do not move in together; they do not live together right away.

They get married first, and then after getting married is when the husband goes and he builds a home for the woman.

Then, once the home is built or once they find the home, pay for the home, and the home is ready, then he will go and he'll get his bride and he will bring her into their new home where they live together.

That period in between that happening, that's called the betrothal period.

They are betrothed, meaning they are married; they just don't live together yet.

So Mary says, How can this be since I know not man?

That phrase know not man, that is a euphemism in the Bible that means what?

Mary literally tells the angel—she's saying, How is this going to happen?

Because I don't do that.

She's saying, I don't do that.

I don't have relations with that.

What this means is that Mary, as a married woman, was telling the angel—she's like, Hold on.

She's basically telling the angel, I am a vowed virgin, which we know was a thing with the Jews in that time, where there would be women who would consecrate themselves and they would vow to be virgins for their entire life.

Mary was one of these, according to the evidence that we have from Scripture and according to other writings that we have from the early Church.

They all tell us that Mary was a perpetually vowed virgin.

So Mary, who's a married woman, right?

She's married to Joseph, but they're not planning on engaging in the marital act when she tells the angel, How can this be since I know not man?

The way that it's written in Greek, too, it's literally like saying, I don't smoke, I don't drink.

It's like saying that—she's saying, I don't engage in that activity.

But she was married.

The only way to make sense of what she said is if she had already made up her mind that she was going to be a perpetually vowed virgin.

What's interesting is that in Luke chapter 1, when you read those words of Mary to the angel, those were the exact same words that were uttered by the son of Jephthah in the Book of Judges.

In the Book of Judges, the daughter of Jephthah said the same thing; she said the exact words about her perpetual virginity.

It was actually her father who said those words about her, saying, My daughter will not know man; she will be a virgin for the Lord.

So it's the same words—the exact same words from Judges 11, right?

So Mary is a perpetual virgin.

Now, non-Catholics who read the Bible, and they know the Bible, they'll say, Wait a second, no, this is false!

How can Mary be a perpetual virgin when Matthew 13 says that Jesus had siblings?

Jesus had brothers!

So take that, Catholics; you're wrong!

Mary was not a perpetual virgin because Jesus had siblings.

In fact, his brothers are named for us in the Bible.

His brothers were Simon, Judas, James, and Joseph.

He had four brothers, and the Bible also mentions that he had sisters too.

So how are you Catholics really going to say that Mary was a virgin her entire life?

And by the way, it's not just Catholics that believe this; it's also the Orthodox that believe this as well, too.

Eastern, Oriental, and the Assyrian Church of the East—they all believe that Mary was a perpetual virgin.

This was defined dogmatically at the Council of Constantinople II in the year 553, which was the fifth ecumenical council.

It was actually mentioned in Ephesus, where Mary was made Theotokos.

It was mentioned there, and it was mentioned at the next ecumenical council, 20 years later, which is Chalcedon in 451. Pope Leo mentioned that Mary was a perpetual virgin, but it was defined solemnly and formally at the Council of Constantinople II in the year 553. That's where it was defined.

So Catholics—and this is before the split between the Catholics and the Orthodox—we're all on board on this, right?

But again, people that are not Catholic or Orthodox, you know, they'll say, How are you going to say that Mary was a perpetual virgin when the Bible clearly says that Jesus had brothers?

Well, here's the part that they won't tell you, and here's why it's really, really important to be very careful when you read Scripture.

Because do you know what Scripture actually tells us about those brothers?

Scripture tells us that those brothers of Jesus were not the sons of Mary.

Matthew 13 gives us the names of the four brothers of Jesus, but then if you go 14 chapters later to Matthew chapter 27, this is when Jesus is getting crucified.

It actually gives us the names of the parents of two of the brothers of Jesus.

And guess who their parents are?

It's not Mary and Joseph; it's another woman named Mary and her husband, Clopas.

Clopas and Mary, according to Matthew 27 and John 19, were the parents of two of Jesus' brothers, James and Joseph.

James and Joseph's parents were not Mary and Joseph, not the parents of Jesus.

They were another Mary and another guy named Clopas.

Now, right away you might be thinking, Wait a second, I'm a little confused.

If Matthew 13 tells us that Jesus has four brothers, and then Matthew 27 gives us the names of the parents of those brothers, but it only says two of them—James and Joseph—then why are they called the brothers of Jesus, and what about the other two brothers?

What's going on?

Well, this is why we need to be really careful when we read the Bible, and we need to know what we're reading.

You see, Semitic people—Jewish people, people that spoke the Hebrew language, people that spoke Aramaic like in the time of Jesus—those languages do not have words for uncle, cousins, nephews, stepbrother, stepcousin, stepnephew, or anything like that.

The word in Greek in the Bible for brethren is adelphoi.

That's the Greek word, adelphoi.

Adelphoi means close relative.

It's translated into English as brethren, kinsmen, kinswoman, or just brother.

But it actually, when it's used by ancient Jews—because they didn't have those words in Hebrew or in Aramaic—so even when they would speak Greek, they would use the word for brother to refer to just close relatives.

But now you might be asking, Well, okay, so the Greek word could mean close relative, but how do we know for sure that these were close relatives and that they weren't actually the children of Mary?

Well, again, Matthew 27 and John 19 give us the names of the parents of two of them, and it's not Mary and Joseph; it's Mary and Clopas.

And you say, Okay, well then what about the other two brothers?

This doesn't make sense.

What about the other two brothers?

Well, it turns out that there were other historians in the early Church—early Church Fathers, early Church writers—that mentioned that the other two brothers, Simon and Judas, were sons of Clopas, but only James and Joseph were sons of Clopas' wife, Mary.

What this means is that Clopas had a wife and he had two sons, and then his wife died.

He then remarried, and with his new wife, Mary, he had two more sons.

So all four of them are sons of Clopas; two of them are sons of his second wife, Mary, but none of them are the children of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and her spouse, Joseph.

So then the question is, Well, why do they call these four guys the brothers of Jesus?

Why?

Well, it just so happens to turn out that this Clopas guy, the father of these four brothers of Jesus, he was a relative of Joseph, Jesus' father—Jesus' adoptive father.

So what that means is that these four brothers of Jesus were his close relatives; they were his adoptive relatives.

So we know explicitly from the Bible that two of them are definitely not the sons of Mary.

And somebody can raise an objection and say, Okay, I'll grant you that James and Joseph, they weren't sons of Mary, but what about the other two?

What about Simon and Judas?

There's a good chance that they were the sons of Mary, right?

Or at least the sons of Joseph?

No. Do you want to know how we know?

Do you guys want to know how we know definitively that none of these guys were the sons of either Mary or Joseph?

Because when Jesus was dying on the cross, what was the last thing that Jesus did before he died on the cross?

What did he do?

Jesus gave Our Lady, his mom, to the Apostle John.

That's how you know that Mary did not have other children, and that's how you know for sure that also Joseph, Mary's spouse, did not have any other sons either.

Because if there were other sons in the picture, one of them would have been the oldest and would have been the one to take Mary in and take care of her, especially since Joseph, Jesus' adoptive father, had already passed away.

So one of the other kids would have had to take Mary in.

But Jesus didn't leave her to Simon, or Judas, or James, or Joseph; he left her to John the Apostle, who was not a relative of Jesus.

If Jesus did have other relatives, even if they were adoptive relatives, even if they were sons of Joseph, he would have had the legal obligation—legally, according to Jewish law and according to natural law as well—to leave Mary to one of them.

But he didn't; he left Mary to John the Apostle.

That is how we know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Mary did not have any other children, nor did Joseph have any other children that could have taken care of Mary.

So the four brothers that are mentioned—the four brothers of Jesus that are mentioned in the Gospel—are not the children of Mary.

They are actually not biological brothers of Jesus; they are close relatives.

According to Church history, we know from the early centuries of the Church that Clopas was the brother of Mary Joseph.

And when we say brother, it's the same thing; adelphoi means that Clopas could have either been Joseph's brother, uncle, cousin, or nephew—any close relative of Joseph—which means that all these four brothers of Jesus were actually cousins.

And by the way, if you read the Greek version of the Hebrew Scriptures, that same word for brethren, adelphoi, is used in places where we know for sure that two people are not actual brothers of the same parents.

For example, in the Old Testament Scriptures, in the Greek version of it, which was written even before Jesus was born, it says that Abraham and Lot were brothers, adelphoi.

But we know that Abraham and Lot were not brothers; we know that Lot was Abraham's nephew because Lot was the son of Abraham's brother.

So we know Lot was Abraham's nephew.

But again, because Jews and Hebrews do not have a word for nephew or cousin, they just use the word for brother because to them that word just means close relative.

So these were close relatives of Jesus; they were not children of Mary or even children of Joseph.

Now, another objection is that non-Catholics and non-Orthodox will say, Oh, but wait!

If you read Matthew 1, verse 25, it says that Joseph did not know his wife, meaning he did not have relations with his wife until after Jesus was born.

So what that means is that after Jesus was born, Joseph and Mary would have had a normal, regular marriage.

You're saying because of that word until means that, no, Mary did have relations with Joseph.

They can say, You know what?

Fine, we'll grant it to you; Mary didn't have other children, but that doesn't mean that she was a virgin her whole life.

They could have still had relations, and Mary just never had any more kids.

And they'll say, because Matthew 1:25 uses that word until.

Here's the problem with that, though: the word until does not mean a change in circumstances.

We know this because we have all of these examples in the Bible of the word until being used in a way that does not imply a change in circumstances.

For example, in 1 Corinthians 15, where it says Jesus will reign over His enemies until the end of the age, meaning until the Second Coming.

Does that mean that after Jesus returns, He will no longer reign over His enemies?

Here's my favorite one: if you read 2 Samuel 6, it says Michal did not have children until she died.

Does that mean that after she died, she started having children?

No. Until does not imply a change in the Bible at all.

So there is no evidence whatsoever from the Bible that Mary had other children, and we have positive evidence that Mary, according to her own words recorded in Luke chapter 1, was a perpetually vowed virgin.

Because those are the same words that are used for perpetually vowed virgins in the Old Testament, in particular Judges 11 with the daughter of Jephthah.

So Mary was a perpetual virgin, and all of the early Christians, all of the early Church Fathers—every single one of them, without fail—they all said that Mary was a perpetual virgin.

As a matter of fact, the very first person in history to ever reject the perpetual virginity of Mary was an Arian heretic named Helvidius.

Helvidius was a heretic who rejected the Council of Nicaea; he didn't believe that Jesus was God.

And this guy, who didn't even believe in the divinity of Jesus, was the first one to say Mary didn't have other children.

St. Jerome, a great Church Father, you should read his work.

He has a letter that he wrote called Contra Helvidius (Against Helvidius). He roasts him so hard; he makes fun of him.

He really goes after him.

It kind of reminds me of me when I respond to some of the comments on my videos where I make fun of people.

Lord, forgive me.

But hey, St. Jerome gives me great hope that I could be a saint too!

He roasts him and says, Helvidius, don't you know that not a single person has ever believed this?

You're like the first one!

You're such a heretic, and you're really dumb.

He tells him, You're dumb!

You're not even worth the response, bro!

That's what he says in the letter.

He's like, Helvidius isn't even worth it.

I feel kind of weird just responding to this guy because people are going to think he's worth a response.

He's not; he's a dumb—what did he call him?

A bore!

He's a dumb bore!

So St. Jerome was like—he didn't hold back.

St. Jerome was buck wild like me!

Anyway, so the perpetual virginity of Mary was the second Marian dogma to be defined again in the year 553 at the Fifth Ecumenical Council, Constantinople II. What is the third Marian dogma?

We're halfway there now, guys; we've got two more.

What is the third one to have been defined?

What is the third one to have been defined?

Go ahead, whoever would like to say it.

No? So there's only one more: the Immaculate Conception.

What is the Immaculate Conception?

Mary was born without the stain of original sin.

The Immaculate Conception is the dogma that Mary was created by God without sin and that she was preserved by God from ever falling into sin.

The Immaculate Conception was defined—does anybody know when it was defined?

In 1854, the year 1854, by Pope Pius IX. He defined the Immaculate Conception and gave the definition of Mary's sinlessness, calling it the Immaculate Conception in a papal bull called Ineffabilis Deus, meaning the Ineffable God.

Ineffabilis Deus is the name of the document.

So if you guys want to read about the Immaculate Conception, go to that document from 1854 by Pope Pius IX, where he gives the definition.

So Mary was created without sin.

Is that possible?

Can God create anybody without sin?

Can God do that?

Because, by the way, again, the Orthodox believe this too; they believe that Mary was sinless.

Non-Catholics and non-Orthodox will object, and they'll say, No, where does the Bible say that Mary was without sin?

They'll say, The Bible doesn't say that.

Are you sure?

Where does the Bible say that Mary is without sin?

And before we get into it, let me just say: can God do that?

Can God create people without sin?

Do we know of any examples of God doing that?

Let me ask you this: were Adam and Eve created without sin?

God created Adam and Eve.

Did He create them in sin?

No! Adam and Eve were created perfectly righteous.

Adam and Eve had what the early Church Fathers called the fruit of original justice, meaning they were created without sin.

They lost that when they disobeyed God, and because of that, we all have the consequences now of what they did.

We all have a privation; we lack original justice.

The original sin lost original justice for all of us, but originally, Adam and Eve were created without sin.

I would point out that in the New Testament, in the Epistle of St. Jude the Apostle, chapter 1, verse 24, I believe, is where it says that God is capable of keeping anyone from falling into sin.

God can do that!

So we already know that it's a possibility because the Bible says so.

We already know that God can create somebody without sin because He did it with Adam and Eve, and we know that God can keep anyone from falling into sin because the New Testament says so in Jude 1:24. So now the question is this: how do we know that He did this for Mary?

Well, guess what?

Mary's sinlessness was actually prophesied in Scripture—in the Bible—in Genesis 3:15. Genesis 3:15 is what we call the proto-evangelium, or the first Gospel.

This is the first time in the Bible where you see God mention the Gospel.

In Genesis 3:15, where He says that He's going to save us, what does it say?

God says this: I will put enmity, and He's talking to the snake, to the serpent, to Satan, who caused Adam and Eve to fall into sin.

He said, I am going to put enmity between you and the woman.

He said, I'm going to put enmity between you and the woman and her seed, and between you and the woman's seed.

You will strike at his heel, and he will crush your head with his foot.

The seed—this is the plural evangelium.

Who is the seed of the woman?

Jesus.

You know something interesting?

Do women create seed?

No! Where does the seed come from?

The woman does not provide the seed in the life-creating act; the woman doesn't provide the seed—the man provides the seed.

But God said her seed.

So who is He talking about?

Who is the her that God is referring to?

Mary!

He's referring to Mary because Mary is the one that gave birth to a son, and it was not the seed of her husband; it was the seed, so to speak, of God.

It was the woman's seed, which is, again, very unnatural.

The woman doesn't provide the seed.

So right there, Genesis 3:15 is the very first time that our salvation is mentioned—Jesus coming into the world as a man.

And in Genesis 3:15, who is coupled with Jesus?

It's not just the seed by Himself; it's also the woman, the Mother of the Messiah.

And by the way, all Jews, even before the time of Jesus, believed that Genesis 3:15 was about the Messiah and the Mother of the Messiah.

So Genesis 3:15 says both.

What did God say?

I will put enmity between you and the woman.

What does enmity mean?

It means that's where we get the word enemy from.

It means you and the woman will be enemies.

I will put this enmity between you and the woman.

Because the enmity is between them, what that means is that they cannot touch each other; one cannot touch the other.

What that means is that the serpent, the snake, Satan, the devil, could not touch the woman because God put enmity between them.

Satan cannot touch Mary; he could not touch Mary, never did touch Mary—not because of herself, not by her own human power.

Because Mary is just a creature; Mary is not God.

Mary isn't divine; Mary is a human being, a human creature.

But God said, I'm putting enmity between you and her, between you and the woman.

You cannot touch her because her seed is going to crush your head.

So when we read the first time the Gospel is mentioned in the Bible, it's not just Jesus that's mentioned; it's His mom.

It's His mom that's mentioned.

She plays a role in our salvation as well.

Why?

Because what did she do?

She gave God the flesh that was crucified on the cross to pay for the sins of all mankind.

That flesh that was hung on the cross to die came from a woman—from a woman, came from Mary.

And that's how He crushed the serpent's head through His death on the cross and then His resurrection.

You guys want to know something really cool?

What was Eve's name?

We have Adam and Eve.

What was Eve's name before she was called Eve?

Did you guys know that Eve didn't get her name until after Adam and Eve fell into sin?

It wasn't—if you go and you read Genesis, you know, chapter 2, read Genesis chapter 3—it wasn't until after they fell that Eve got her name.

What was she called before?

Before she sinned, what was Mary called?

I'm sorry, Lord, forgive me.

What was Eve called before she sinned?

What was she called?

She was indeed called the helper, but there's actually another title that she had before she got the name Eve.

What was it?

Woman!

God said she will be called woman, and that's what Adam called her.

Adam called her woman until after they fell into sin; then she was called Eve.

You want to know something really interesting?

What did Jesus call His mom?

Woman!

A lot of non-Catholics will say, See, you guys elevate Mary so much, but not even Jesus has such a high view of Mary as you guys.

He just called her a woman.

They don't realize why Jesus called her woman.

Why did Jesus call Mary woman?

Because Jesus identified His own mother with Eve before she fell into sin, when her name was woman.

Jesus identifies Mary with the pre-fallen Eve.

And all of the early Church Fathers—what did they call Mary?

Starting with St. Irenaeus of Lyon in the 2nd century, they called her Eve, the New Eve.

Mary was the New Eve.

How do we know that?

Because Jesus called her woman.

And by the way, and I think I might have mentioned this last time—I don't remember if I mentioned it—what does Eve mean?

So we have Adam and Eve.

What does Adam mean?

Adam just means man.

What does Eve mean?

Eve means mother of man, mother of mankind.

Eve literally means mother of Adam; that's what Eve means.

And 1 Corinthians 15 tells us that Jesus is the New Adam, the second Adam, and Jesus tells us that Mary is the New Woman or the New Eve, meaning that she is the mother of the New Adam.

Mary was literally the mother of the New Adam, which makes her the New Eve—or even better than the New Eve, the New Woman according to her Son, Jesus Christ.

So if you read the Bible like a Jew, if you read the New Testament like a Jew, when you read John chapter 2, you see that the Apostle John is literally retelling the Genesis creation story, but he's giving the new creation story.

Go home tonight and read Genesis 1 and 2, and then go and read John 1 and 2. You'll see that John clearly was retelling Genesis, but now he's telling the new creation story.

In the new creation story, Jesus is the New Adam, and Mary, the mother of the New Adam, is the New Eve.

In fact, she is Eve before she fell into sin.

Somebody have a question?

For which one, though?

Jude 1:24 is what says that God can keep you from falling into sin.

And when the Immaculate Conception of Mary was defined in 1854 by Pope Pius IX, the definition of the Immaculate Conception is that God preserved Mary from the stain of original sin and kept her from falling into sin.

So it was completely by God's grace that Mary was kept from sin; she didn't do it by her own power because she's just a human.

It was because she had special favor from God, because God wanted a woman to participate in the salvation of man.

Because it was a woman who lost us our salvation, right?

There are a lot of people—there are a lot of, like, dumb liberals that think that the Bible says, Oh, the Bible says that woman is the reason that we all fell into sin, and now you needed a man to come and save us.

No, no!

Read Genesis 3:15. It was a woman who lost her salvation, right?

But guess what?

It was a woman!

It was a woman who obeyed God and who said, I get to give God something that He doesn't have: flesh to become man.

God saved us through a woman because Jesus is our salvation, and He came through a woman.

Mary is the New Eve.

This is how you study the Bible; this is how you read the Bible.

You have to read it like a Jew, and when you read the New Testament in light of the Old Testament and you see all of the parallels, guess what you get?

You get Catholicism.

You get Catholic beliefs.

You get Catholic doctrine.

You get the Marian dogmas.

This is why Mary is so important.

And when you think about this—everything that I've presented to you guys tonight, going to the Old Testament, going to the New Testament—you read the Scriptures, and now you see why the Catholic Church says if you reject these things, guys, if you reject these things, you're rejecting the Bible.

You are rejecting what God revealed to mankind.

This is why these Marian dogmas—you are bound to believe them because it is in the deposit of faith that God revealed to mankind, that God revealed to the Church.

You can reject these things, and then after everything that I've explained, you're like, Okay, I kind of get it now.

This is important.

So what objections do people have to Mary's sinlessness?

Oh, and by the way, when the angel—again, go to Luke 1—you get so much of what the Catholic Church teaches about Mary from Luke chapter 1. When the angel appeared to Mary, what did he tell her?

What did the angel, the archangel Gabriel, say to Mary when he appeared to her?

What did he say?

Hail, full of grace!

When we read that, we kind of just brush over that—like full of grace.

Okay, no!

Go and read it again.

First of all, he says, Hail.

That greeting, Hail, is reserved only for who?

For royalty!

The archangel is acknowledging that Mary is royalty.

How do we know Mary is royalty?

Because Jesus Christ is the King, right?

Jesus Christ is the King of the universe, and Jesus Christ is a Jew, right?

And the Bible tells us that Jesus came to take King David's throne.

Well, in the Davidic kingdom, who was the queen of the kingdom?

The mother of the king!

The mother of the king was the queen.

Well, Jesus is our new King, our King for all eternity, and His mother is the queen.

And you know who acknowledged that?

The archangel Gabriel!

Mary is the queen.

But then that's why the angel says Hail.

But then he says full of grace.

What does that mean, full of grace?

First of all, grace can only come from who?

God!

Only God can give grace.

Divine grace can only come from God—only from God.

Well, the angel is saying that Mary is full of grace; she is completely full of grace.

And in the Greek, if you read it in the Greek, the Greek phrase is kekaritomene.

That's a really interesting Greek phrase because if you were to literally translate kekaritomene into English, it would literally be the angel saying to Mary, Hail, Mary!

Having been perfectly graced is a past perfect participle, meaning that when the angel said this greeting to Mary, she was already in possession of this fullness of grace.

It was already a reality, and it was something that was indefinite—something that she would always have.

That's how the conjugation of the Greek works.

She was perfectly graced once and for all, always and forever: Hail, full of grace!

And whenever we read that, we kind of just skip over it, but that phrase means everything—full of grace.

And if you're full of grace, is there room for sin?

Because the Bible tells us that divine grace and sin cannot coexist; the Bible tells us this.

Well, Mary was completely full of divine grace, and if she's full of divine grace, she cannot have sin.

She was always full of this divine grace from the very beginning because it's a past perfect participle.

And because Genesis 3:15 says, I will put enmity between you and the woman, if Mary was born with original sin, what does that mean?

It means that God lied.

And remember, you do not want to say that God lied.

We never, ever want to say that God lied.

If Mary had original sin, what that means is that she was under the dominion of Satan.

And so whatever time Mary's original sin was removed from her, we know again from Genesis 3:15 that Mary was never under the dominion of Satan.

Mary always had divine grace from the first moment of her conception.

That is what the definition from Ineffabilis Deus in 1854 states: that from the first moment of her existence, Mary had original justice, which is what the early Church Fathers said.

She was the fruit of original justice—what Adam and Eve had that they lost.

God gave that to Mary for the purpose of our salvation.

So remember, God created Adam and Eve sinless.

The Bible says that God can keep any of us sinless, that He can keep any of us from falling into sin.

And it's prophesied that Mary would be kept sinless and kept from falling into sin because of the special role that she plays in the salvation of mankind.

Because it is through her that Jesus comes to save us.

God wanted a woman to participate.

An objection that some non-Catholics will have is they'll say, Well, don't you know that the Bible says that all have sinned?

Don't you know that Romans 3 says there is none righteous, no, not one?

Would you want to say that Mary is righteous?

But the Bible says there is none righteous, no, not one.

Read Romans 3. Well, you know what's really interesting?

When St. Paul, who wrote Romans, said that there is none righteous, no, not one, he's quoting the Old Testament.

He's quoting Psalm 14. And if you go and you read Psalm 14, what's interesting is that the verse he quoted is from verse 3 of Psalm 14. If you go two verses later, I think it's in verse 5, God says, I am with the righteous.

So Paul is quoting a psalm that says there is none righteous, no, not one, which is God speaking, and then two verses later, He says, But I'm with the righteous.

So when people say, Oh, look, Romans 3 disproves the idea of Mary's sinlessness, it's like, no, no, it doesn't. When Protestants will say, Oh, Romans 3 disproves the idea of Mary always being perpetually righteous, no, no, it doesn't. Because here's the thing: if we take that literally—like absolutely literally—that all have sinned, there is none righteous, not even one—what do you do with Jesus?

Jesus didn't sin, right?

Jesus was without sin, right?

Oh, so there's an exception to Romans 3. There's already one exception: Jesus, right?

Are there any more?

According to the Bible, yes—Mary!

And actually, later on in Romans, Paul goes on to talk about more exceptions, like babies that don't commit personal sin.

They're still born into sin; they have original sin.

But he goes on to make exceptions when he talks about—it's in Romans.

Why can't I think of the two twins that were born?

Isaac—and not Isaac!

What am I talking about?

Just go and read Romans where he talks about exceptions to Romans 3. But again, he's quoting Psalm 14, and Psalm 14, two verses later, says, Oh, actually, there are righteous here.

And actually, in the New Testament, there are many people that the New Testament calls righteous, even before Jesus Christ died on the cross for us.

The Bible talks about righteous people in the New Testament.

So yes, there are righteous people; Mary was one of them.

And again, if you're righteous, you're not righteous because of yourself—because you're so cool, you're so good, you're so talented, you're so well-behaved.

No! If you're righteous, it's because God made you that way.

And that's what the Marian dogma of the Immaculate Conception says: God made her righteous and kept her perfectly righteous for the role that she plays.

We're almost done, guys; we've got one more.

This will be fast.

There's a lot more I can say, but we've been here for a while.

We've got one more.

What's the last one?

My man kept saying it over and over and over again.

Now he's gone, so he missed his chance to shine.

What's the last one?

What's the only one that we've got left?

The Assumption!

Check this out: so what is the Assumption of Mary?

What is that dogma?

What is the Assumption of Mary?

The dogma of the Assumption of Mary, which was defined in the year 1950—recently, in the year 1950—it was Pope Pius XII in a document called Munificentissimus Deus.

Say that!

Try and say that one: Munificentissimus Deus.

In 1950, Pope Pius XII defined one of the Marian dogmas, which is that Mary, at the end of her natural life, was bodily assumed into heaven.

Now check this out: we just talked about the Immaculate Conception, right?

Which is that Mary was sinless; sin never touched Mary.

Well, if we do theology now—and what is theology?

It's using your logic and reason to think about what God has revealed to us—we can actually think about this logically.

The Bible tells us that death comes through sin.

We only die because of sin.

We die because of Adam and Eve's sin, original sin, because we're born into sin, and sin is what allows death to be in the world.

If sin was not in the world, we would not die; we would live forever.

Well, here's something very interesting: again, the Immaculate Conception says what?

That Mary is sinless.

If Mary is sinless, what does that mean?

If you reason this out logically, Mary is sinless; sin never touched Mary.

By an act of God, by God's divine grace, He preserved her from sin.

So let's think about this logically.

What does this mean?

Because the Bible says that we only die because of sin.

What does this mean?

If we're being logical, what is the logical conclusion here?

That Mary is immortal, right?

So that Mary doesn't die.

The logical conclusion here is that Mary, being sinless, would not experience death in the same way that we do.

Therefore, she was assumed into heaven, body and soul, because she was preserved from sin.

And I'm going to tweak this just a little bit.

The logical conclusion is that Mary didn't die because she was without sin; she's sinless.

So Mary, because she's sinless, didn't die.

I'm going to tweak this just a little bit, okay?

This is why we have to be—we're all theologians; we've got to be very careful.

Did Jesus have to die?

Did He have to die?

No! Jesus didn't have to die.

Jesus didn't have to become incarnate; He didn't have to die on the cross to rise from the dead and save us.

He didn't have to do that because Jesus was without sin, right?

Jesus was without sin, but He still died because He chose to die.

So let's tweak this and say if Mary is immaculately conceived, if Mary is sinless, what this means is that Mary does not have to die.

Mary didn't have to die.

Jesus didn't have to die either, but He still did.

And this is the genius of the Catholic Church.

The definition of the Assumption is that at the end of Mary's natural life, she was bodily taken up into heaven.

Now, I have a question for you guys: did Mary die?

Did she die?

Did she die?

Actually, we do—here's the interesting thing: the definition says at the end of her natural life.

But if you keep reading the document, later on in the document, it mentions that Mary died.

So what it means is that Mary died, but that's not part of the definition because the definition just says at the end of her natural life.

At the end of her natural life, after she died, her body was taken up into heaven.

And we know that Mary died because we have her gravesite, where her body would have been.

We can go and see where she died, and we have the tradition of Mary dying, that the Apostles were all present for Mary's death—that she died.

So it's very beautiful; it's so beautiful, the tradition that comes to us from the early Church Fathers that talk about the end of Mary's life.

The tradition says that Jesus came to His mom and said, Okay.

Oh, and before I get to this, I’ve got to tell you guys something—actually, no, I'll say it first, and then I'll go to this.

This will blow your mind!

Jesus came to His mom and said, Your natural life here on earth is about to come to an end.

You get to decide how your life here on earth is going to end.

Think about this!

Remember, Jesus was a good Jew, right?

What is the Fourth Commandment?

Honor your father and mother.

And by the way, this is another really good argument for the Immaculate Conception.

Jesus perfectly followed the law, right?

Jesus perfectly followed the law; He perfectly honored His father and His mother.

Well, Jesus created His mother, right?

Jesus created His own mom.

What's the best way to honor your mother?

Create her without sin!

Jesus honored His mom even to the point where He came to her and said—and this is obviously after Jesus ascended into heaven—He appeared to her and said, Your time here on earth is about to end.

You get to decide how you want your life to end here on earth.

Do you want me to take you now?

And what did Mary say?

She said, You know what?

I want to be conformed in all things to my Son, so if You died, let me die.

I want to be just like You because You're my God; You're my Lord.

So she said, If You died, let me die too so I could be just like You.

This is why Mary is so important—because Mary teaches us how to be like her Son.

Mary is that shining example of how to be like Christ.

So she died, and on the third day, her body was taken up into heaven.

Why?

Because she was sinless, and because she was sinless, her body was taken up and reunited with her soul, and she is in heaven now, bodily.

Now, anti-Catholics might say, Oh, beautiful story!

Voice of reason!

Beautiful story; that's so nice!

But where does the Bible say any of that?

Here's what's interesting: here's something about Mary that I want you guys to always remember, and if you guys have this, everything else will follow.

Everything else will follow.

Mary had God inside of her body for nine months.

Mary had God inside of her body, right?

When Mary was pregnant with Jesus and she went to visit her kinswoman Elizabeth—this is one of the mysteries of the Holy Rosary, one of the Joyful Mysteries—Elizabeth, her kinswoman, meaning that it could have been her sister, it could have been her cousin, it could have been her aunt.

Because remember what I explained about the word kinswoman.

You know, Elizabeth, when Mary was already pregnant and she went to go share the Gospel—Mary was the first evangelist!

When the angel appeared to her and said, You're going to be the Mother of the Messiah; the Messiah is here, and the Messiah is going to be born of you, she went to Elizabeth, her kinswoman.

And what did Elizabeth, her kinswoman, say?

She said, How could it be that the mother of my Lord has come to me?

Now, you read that, and you're like, Okay, that's cool.

But if you're a Jew and you really know your Old Testament and you read that, you're going to be like, Oh my goodness, this is a really big deal!

Why is it a big deal?

Because when Elizabeth said that, How is it that the mother of my Lord came to me?

those are the exact same words that King David said when the Ark of the Covenant came to him.

When God brought the Ark of the Covenant to him, King David said, How is it that the Ark of my Lord has come to me?

And then King David started worshiping God, and he started dancing.

And then in the New Testament, Elizabeth, who was pregnant with John the Baptist, said that the infant in her womb started leaping, worshiping God in the womb of Mary.

And then in the Old Testament, this is in Samuel, it says that the Ark of the Covenant stayed in the home of King David for three months.

And when you go back to Luke chapter 1, what does it say?

That Mary stayed in the house of Elizabeth for three months—or was it six months?

One of those two.

So when you read Luke chapter 1, if you know your Old Testament, you go, Oh, I get it!

Because what was the Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament?

What did the Ark have inside of it?

The Ark of the Covenant had the presence of God inside of it.

It had the manna from heaven; it had the Word of God; it had the Ten Commandments, the law, the stones inside of it.

And it also had the staff of the priesthood, Aaron's staff, who was the first priest, right?

That was all inside of the Ark of the Covenant, and these things were artifacts of God.

Well, in the New Covenant, what Mary had inside of her wasn't an artifact of God; it was God—God inside of her.

What that means is that Mary is the Ark of the New Covenant.

And if you remember Mary being the Ark of the New Covenant, all of these Marian dogmas are always going to stick with you.

Because when you read about the Ark of the New Covenant in the Old Testament, it had to be made perfectly.

It was made of incorruptible wood overlaid with gold.

Nobody could touch it; it could not be touched.

Nothing else could ever be put inside of it—again, only God inside of the Ark.

Nothing else!

Nothing else could ever be put inside of it, and nobody could even touch it.

Only a priest was able to touch the Ark of the Covenant; that was in the Old Testament.

Well, now in the New Testament, in the New Covenant, we have an Ark of the New Covenant, which is much greater because what was inside of Mary isn't an artifact of God; it was God Himself in the flesh in her womb.

And look at that!

Just like the old Ark, which was made with incorruptible wood—wood that would not die—overlaid with gold, Mary was conceived immaculately, never touched by sin, according to the prophecy of Genesis 3:15. And you know what else is prophesied in the Old Testament?

In Psalm 132:6, it prophesies that the Lord, the Messiah, would be taken up into heaven with His Ark.

The Messiah would be taken up into heaven with His Ark.

Who is the Ark of the New Covenant?

Mary!

And this isn't just me making this up; this isn't just me saying, Oh, look, this is very nice and poetic.

No, this is in the Bible!

This is in the New Testament.

Do you know who says it?

The Apostle John in the Book of Revelation.

In Revelation chapter 11, the very last verse of Revelation 11, John is describing a vision that he is getting of heaven, and he says, Oh, look!

The heavens opened up for me.

Look at what I see!

I see the Ark of the Covenant!

The same Ark of the Covenant that had been lost.

Can you believe that?

God gave the Ark of the Covenant to the Jews, and they lost it!

They lost it!

They managed to lose it; it was actually taken from them in war.

God was punishing the Israelites; God was punishing His own people because they had fallen into sin; they had fallen into idolatry.

So they lost the Ark.

But when He redeemed us, He gave us the Ark back!

He gave us a new Ark, and who was the new Ark?

John says that he sees it in Revelation 11. And then keep reading forward into the next verse, which is Revelation 12, verse 1. What do we read?

When he says, Hey guys, look!

I just found the Ark, what does he begin to describe?

He says, I see a woman in heaven who is clothed with the sun.

She is standing on the moon; she has a crown of twelve stars on her head, and she is the mother of the Messiah.

That's the Ark!

So who is he talking about?

Mary, in heaven, bodily—the Ark of the New Covenant.

The same Ark that was prophesied in Psalm 132, verse 8, that that Ark with the Lord would be taken up into heaven.

That's the bodily Assumption of Mary.

It is a logical conclusion to the Immaculate Conception.

Of course, her body would be taken up into heaven as well because she was always without sin.

And of course, it was prophesied in the Old Covenant and confirmed by the Apostle John in Revelation 11 and 12. So all of these Marian dogmas that have been defined over the last 2,000 years, with the first one being in 431 at the Council of Ephesus—that is the divine motherhood of Mary, why we call it the Theotokos—the second one being her perpetual virginity at the Council of Chalcedon, the fifth ecumenical council in 553, and then the third one being defined by Pope Pius IX in 1854 in that document Ineffabilis Deus, and then the fourth one being defined by Pope Pius XII in 1950 in Munificentissimus Deus.

It all comes from the Bible; it's all there.

And the reason that, again, the Church has to define certain dogmas is just to make sure that people know, like, Here are the guardrails.

You can't go outside of these guardrails because if you do, you are now rejecting something that God revealed.

And here's the cool thing with the bodily Assumption of Mary: because the actual dogmatic definition says that at the end of Mary's life, she was taken up into heaven, what that means is that you can be an Orthodox Catholic and you can believe that Mary didn't die, and you can be an Orthodox Catholic and you can believe Mary did die.

You can take either position because neither position is actually in the dogmatic definition.

However, if you want to say Mary didn't die, you're kind of ignoring what the document would later go on to say about how Mary died, and it's in the tradition about how Mary died.

But are there any questions about anything that we've discussed tonight?

What time is it?

Go ahead!

You talked about the natural law prohibiting Jesus from getting married to anyone else, correct?

Can you maybe explain that a little bit?

Yes, absolutely!

And by the way, that word for brethren, adelphoi, is also used for brothers in the Lord, brothers in Christ, that are not biologically related.

So that's another strike against people who want to say that those four brothers were biological brothers of Jesus.

I just remembered that now when you asked that question.

So according to natural law, you have the obligation to take care of your parents.

You have an obligation according to natural law that if someone is going to take care of your parents, you have the obligation to do it above anyone that isn't their child.

That's just part of natural law.

If I go and take care of some other woman that isn't my mother when my mother has nowhere to go and she's a widow, that violates natural law.

That violates natural law and that violates God's law because natural law would incline us to believe that we have obligations to our immediate family.

Are there any parents here?

Anybody here that has kids?

Jonathan has kids; James, no kids yet, right?

So if you're a parent and you have kids and you ignore your kids and you go and take care of other people's kids, and you feed them and you give them what they need, but you ignore your own kids, you are in grave sin.

You have violated natural law and God's divine law as well.

And it also goes the other way around because the Fourth Commandment is you have to honor your father and mother.

The Ten Commandments are divinely revealed by God; they're dogmatic.

You have to believe the Ten Commandments because God revealed them.

The Ten Commandments actually reaffirm natural law, and they illuminate natural law.

Anything that God reveals that is of a moral character illuminates natural law and allows us to understand natural law even better.

So when you look at natural law in light of the Ten Commandments, you will come to the conclusion that any person has the obligation to take care of a parent if that parent is destitute, sick, or dying.

You have the obligation to do such a thing.

So natural law is very, very important, and St. Thomas Aquinas talked a lot about natural law.

A lot of the great thinkers of the Church talk a lot about natural law, and God's divine law just illuminates natural law for us.

If you know nothing about natural law, you're good if you have God's law because all of natural law is included within God's law as well.

And St. Paul the Apostle talks about it in Romans.

In Romans 1, he says that anybody in the world that has the natural law will know that God exists.

They'll know that God exists and that God is personal because we have natural law; we have morals; we have right and wrong; we have good and bad.

Anybody can come to the conclusion of the existence of God and that God is personal just because of natural law.

The conclusion of that is that that is the case.

Really good question!

Did I answer that okay?

Is that good?

Okay, good!

Any other questions you guys might have?

Anything else?

Any questions?

So now you guys know about the defined Marian dogmas—what they are, when they were defined, what those definitions mean, and where to find it in Scripture and how to answer the objections.

I know it's a lot, and I don't see anybody taking notes, but it's okay because when this comes out on my YouTube channel, you'll be able to listen to it over and over again until you get it.

So Voice of Reason on YouTube—that's me!

Has anybody gone back to watch the Rosary video?

Oh, so you guys just aren't fans?

I'm just kidding!

I'm just kidding!

You guys are not; it's okay.

It's all right.

Thank you guys so much!

You guys are a great audience!

I'm sorry for putting some of you to sleep.

I could tell you guys were like, I'm over here super excited because I'm a nerd, and you guys are like, Oh, this guy's such a nerd!

But anyway, so are we good?

Anything else?

Anything I can clarify?

No other questions?

Everything good?

Perfect!

All right, thank you very much, Jackie.

I'll let you take it away if there are any announcements that you need to make.