Transcript

Greetings, everyone, from the Catholic Answers Conference here in San Diego.

So, I'm here in San Diego, California with Jimmy Akin, Karlo Broussard, Joe Heschmeyer, Tim Staples, Catholic Answers crew, and the crew that is responsible for Council of Trent.

And I wanted to talk to you all about, uh, next steps where we wanna go with the channel.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, so the news where we wanna go with that.

Uh, one person in the comments said, Is the big news that Trent is starting a, a praise and worship band?

I was thinking about The Trent Horn Praise and Worship Project, but I'm still gonna I'm gonna put that on hold for a while.

No, what we wanna do is we really want to expand the Council of Trent.

And everybody who watches and supports, especially the people who support us at trendhornpodcast.com, at our Patreon, uh, you all have been really instrumental to help us grow.

Uh, not that long ago, I was recording this out of the closet of our master bedroom.

Uh, then later had a very dreary white background.

Uh, but because of your support, we have now a wonderful background for the set for us to be able to create content that really edifies people.

And the goal of the Council of Trent is I want to share the faith.

I wanna edify people.

I wanna show here's good reasons to believe Catholicism is true, good, and beautiful.

Christianity is true.

God exists.

The basic moral truths of the Catholic faith are true and they're good for us.

And I wanna create really good content that lifts people up.

And even people, if you're not Catholic, even if you're not Christian, you still find it to be very worthwhile and helpful in the world that we live in.

So, we expanded and built our new studio.

You guys are helpful for that.

The next step is that I want to expand the studio more, add about three more cameras, lights, and equipment to do interviews.

Uh, and also, by the way, your guys' support has allowed us to grow so we have two new people to help with the channel.

We have Thomas, who is our editor.

How's it going, everybody?

I, I was the one who had to edit everything before.

Yeah.

I was spending about 10 hours a week editing.

I used to be in a I used to be an editor at a community college TV station.

Mm-hmm.

That was about 20 years ago.

So I have editing background, but I, I have only enough just to get by, and-

Well, you do an incredible job considering that you got your channel to where it was doing all of that yourself.

It's very impressive.

But it was I was bursting at the seams.

It was just-

Yeah.

like, No, I cannot.

And I wanted to I want a professional, someone who knows how to do this.

Mm-hmm.

And so I can focus on research, writing scripts, because when I do the episodes, I script them because I wanna be, uh, judicious with your time.

I wanna respect your time as a viewer.

There's a lot of content out there.

Yeah.

And so I script the episodes to know, hey, I'm gonna give you the most information in the most efficient way possible.

I don't wanna take more of your time than I have to 'cause you, everyone who watches you lead busy lives.

If you don't, well, there's other good things you could be doing.

I, you don't need to be on the computer all day.

So Tom has been a big help editing.

Totally.

And the new brand design.

Um-

Yeah, absolutely.

done with the cartoon.

Yeah.

The, um, the production value has had a huge impact just on our reach.

We're so grateful to all of our new, um, followers on YouTube.

Um, just a, a fun stat for you guys since, um, I was I came on and Vanessa came on, we've actually doubled our reach on YouTube.

So-

Mm-hmm.

prior to, to this kind of new investment in the Council of Trent, um, Trent was reaching approximately 250,000 people every single month on YouTube, and now it's over half a million.

And so that, uh, uh, a lot of it-

That's just, that's just in a few months.

Yeah, just in under six months.

Yeah.

A huge part of that has been the production value that we've been able to add.

Mm-hmm.

And Vanessa has done an incredible job with us-

Mm-hmm.

repurposing our content both for YouTube Shorts and also putting it out on TikTok and Instagram.

Uh, Facebook as well, so

Mm-hmm.

And so, Vanessa, you wanna explain that you've been doing some of that and you've been getting a lot of views with some of that work.

Yeah, most definitely.

So what I'm doing is I'm expanding our audience from just YouTube alone.

So we're on TikTok, we're on X, we're on Instagram, Facebook.

We're even on Reddit.

Um, we're trying to do like iFunny too.

And so we're, um, putting the content out there and reaching like mass audiences.

We're getting millions of views on some of, like our more popular videos from YouTube just by slicing them down and putting them into one-minute segments.

And I have We have received such a positive, um, response to it.

So we're so glad that you guys like it, and you see it reflected in our YouTube Shorts as well.

So we're so happy to have you guys.

Totally.

So now we want to expand.

And I think you'll notice when you listen to Council of Trent, I care about your time.

I just want to give everyone content.

You've probably noticed I don't, I don't run ads.

Nobody sponsors the show .

uh, I don't really ask for support.

I usually forget even to ask people to subscribe, because I just wanna give people really good content.

Uh, but now I am asking for your support, that if you really like the channel, this is your opportunity to make a one-time gift to help us grow.

There's gonna be a, a donation link in the description below this video.

Mm-hmm.

And Trent, do you wanna share a little bit about what those donations will go to?

Yes.

So, what we're gonna do now is, we've expan- phase one was getting the studio to look better for just the regular Council of Trent episodes.

Mm-hmm.

Phase two is, I wanna do more dialogues.

Yeah.

And specifically, the area I wanna move into are dialogues with non-Catholics.

So there are Catholic channels, like think of Pints with Aquinas, for example, or other Catholic channels where Catholics get together and talk about stuff, which is great.

It's good to have that.

But we don't have a lot of channels, we don't have a lot of opportunities where Catholics and non-Catholics sit down to discuss, or Catholics and non-Christians, for example, to discuss, well, where do we disagree and where can we have search for the truth together?

And avoiding the extremes of being uncharitable, being aggressive with one another.

We don't want that, but we also don't want Kumbaya, just sit around talking about our feelings, what we agree about.

Mm-hmm.

We can have honest dialogue between people who disagree.

I mean, we had great conversations already on the channel with Redeemed Zoomer.

Uh, we've brought on other people to have talks with.

I've been on other channels and have had wonderful conversations.

I want to bring that here more.

Mm-hmm.

And I want to build up the studio-

Yes.

so that And what's great is, we're in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

Mm-hmm.

I brought out Austin from Gospel Simplicity.

I was able to fly him from Washington to Dallas.

We recorded our interview-

Mm-hmm.

and sent him back the same day.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So it's very feasible for us to bring people from all over the country out to Dallas, record a great dialogue, and then even send them home the same day.

We just need-

Absolutely.

we just need to invest in more cameras, more lights.

We have a wonderful set.

And just to have that presence.

And I think that's great for people to share the Catholic faith, to say, Look, I'll sit down with non-Catholics of all stripes-

Mm-hmm.

and this will move the channel into those audiences who will say, 'Yeah, I want to, to see that.' So I want that to be more professional and to, uh, and shoot for the stars, have people.

Like-

Absolutely.

I would love for like Ray Comfort, I know has-

Ooh.

commented on me here or there.

Ray, if you wanna come down, we'll build up a whole new studio.

I'd love to sit down to talk to you.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, you know, Richard Dawkins is doing his farewell tour.

If he wants to stop by the studio.

That would be amazing.

Just whoever you can think of.

I want to find the biggest names out there who want to talk about the faith, talk about important moral issues.

Totally.

And that can reach a lot of people.

Yeah.

And, uh, just to be clear, you guys, there is a link in the description for you guys to make a one-time gift to support, uh, this new initiative at the Council of Trent.

And what that will be going to is both to be bringing out, um, high-level, um, speakers and commentators to en- engage in conversation with Trent.

But also, for us to be able to travel to certain locations-

Yes.

if people are, are not able to come to Trent's studio in Dallas.

And then additionally, it'll go to investing in building out a studio locally in Dallas for Trent, where some of those guests will be able to come in person.

And that's why we're doing this livestream this way, because we kinda wanna demonstrate a little sample of what this channel could be like, where we would have a multi-camera interview-

Yeah.

in person.

And it really is, it makes such a big difference, uh, both to have multiple angles on a, on a dialogue and to have it well-lit, to make it cinematic and visually appealing.

That's huge.

And it's also huge to not just have people kind of zooming in.

Yeah.

Because when you, when you have that in-person encounter, there's something kind of, uh, especially when you're talking about issues like this-

Yeah.

about the disagreements between faith.

It's, I think it just, it makes it so much more human and authentic-

Yeah.

in a way that, that people feel on the other end consuming the content.

Yeah.

So, that's what we wanna do.

Our goal is to raise $20,000.

So, any kind of gift will be helpful.

We have hundreds of thousands of people who view this channel.

So you might think, Well, how can I help?

Five or ten dollars.

Yeah.

It's just enough.

And remember, we don't run, we don't run ads.

Uh, you know, we, and we don't have sponsorships.

YouTube might be running ads, but no one is sponsoring the channel.

We don't run sponsored ads in, in here anything.

Mm-hmm.

And I really don't ask for appeals during the shows, 'cause I just wanna get to that con- 'cause I'm excited about the content.

I forget to ask for subscribers and for donations, 'cause I'm so excited about the content.

I just wanna get it out to you.

So now is the opportunity where I'm saying five, 10, $20.

Maybe you can give more.

Maybe you want to become a patron, but you don't wanna make a monthly gift.

This is your opportunity just to give a one-time gift.

Maybe $100 or $1,000, that I don't know if I can commit monthly, but here, I've got some extra money.

Here's a one-time thing, and it will go towards that in-person studio and then the remote kit.

Mm-hmm.

And I think when we start doing these conversations, my goal is to do conversations that get hundreds of They already do get hundreds of thousands of views, uh, with not a great background.

Mm-hmm.

But to have these conversations, that's where people can really see the faith and be exposed to it.

I'm, I'm really excited.

And just in general-

Yeah.

I want to show people we can have disagreement.

Yeah.

But it, it can be humane, civil, good disagreement.

Yeah.

That, that is especially pertinent in light of what you were just sharing with our patrons at, um, our lunch here at the Catholic Answers Conference, that in light of just the recent kind of scandalous comments from Pope Francis, it, it's important to stress that it is possible to actually have charitable conversations-

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

affirming the similarities that we have with others, the, the common ground, but also venturing into the territory of disagreements and why, as Catholics, we do believe that the Catholic faith is the one and true faith.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And if I could add something, so I monitor the comments section.

And I see you guys conversing with one another, teaching others about the faith.

And we see, like a growth of our viewers, not just Catholic, but people with all different denominations, or people who are not even Christian who want to learn from Trent or learn about the Catholic faith.

Mm-hmm.

And so, we see that from you guys.

So we wanna reflect that also-

Yeah.

in our production.

We wanna invite people in who may feel like they can't talk to a Catholic or learn about the Catholic faith.

Yeah.

We wanna reach as many hearts as we can to spread the truth about God.

And so, this is truly because the encouragement that you guys do in the comments section.

So I wanna thank you guys-

Yeah.

so much for being so charitable to those who are coming in, 'cause I'm sure you guys see it.

You see comments from people who wouldn't be regularly watching these videos.

We see it in the numbers.

So we're just so, um-

Yeah.

thankful for you guys and we're hoping to grow that.

Totally.

There was a comment I saw once.

Uh, I f- it really struck me.

The comment said, I'm seeing a lot of comments here from non-Catholics.

Yeah.

I'm not sure what to think about that.

Mm-hmm.

I saw that one.

Yeah.

And it, it was so funny just to be startled by it 'cause people are so used to if you have a channel, that's just your tribe.

Yeah.

And it's there for you to be entertained and just root for your tribe.

Mm-hmm.

Whereas here, we're an unabashedly Catholic channel, but I want this to be a place for people who are not Catholic-

Mm-hmm.

to come and watch.

And if it is a topic you disagree with, I wanna share it with you knowing you disagree, and we can move the conversation forward.

And the best way for me to move forward is I might make a video, somebody might respond to me on another channel with a rebuttal or whatever it may be.

Okay, well the next step is let's sit down together and talk about it.

Right.

Like, I think that's the best way to share our faith and to move forward with different disagreements, so click the description, click the link in the description below.

Mm-hmm.

One-time gift, five, $10, $20.

If enough people who watch this just give small gifts, we'll get to that goal really fast, and if you aren't comfortable becoming a monthly patron, this is your great opportunity to give a, a larger one-time gift to really support the channel and help it grow.

So before we take questions, is there anything else you guys wanna share?

Well, I was actually just gonna share on your point about making this channel into a place where there are, uh, where there's opportunity for people of different faiths to come together, we just got a, a super chat from Jordan, who says that, um, she had some extra money and that you, Trent, helped her a lot in her journey from Mormonism into Eastern Orthodoxy.

She says she loves her Catholic friends and hopes to see this channel improve, so I think that's just a great example-

Wow.

of kind of what we wanna do here.

And, and that's the goal, so see what's-

Thank you.

interesting there is that if I can help people find the truth and move them closer to the truth, that's God working in that person's life.

Here's someone who maybe they're not Catholic, and they're not as interested in the channel, but they see, oh, actually, maybe they're not convinced of Catholicism, but in watching the channel, they're convinced that God exists or they become convinced that Jesus Christ is God and God is a trinity and I want to be a Trinitarian Christian or I wanna be an Apostolic Christian.

I wanna be rooted in the Apostolic faith.

So moving, so that's part of that journey, and that, it gets me so excited that I wanna make the videos, the comments, a place where anyone feels comfortable coming and discussing.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

I find that's the best way to m- to move, people move towards the truth one step at a time really.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And we're not trying to gatekeep it.

Like, we're trying to make this available to them, so that's why we do it on YouTube so that they can come across a YouTube channel.

They don't have to pay for some special course to learn about the Catholic faith.

Yeah.

We wanna make it accessible because the truth behind this channel is spreading the truth about God and spreading our love for God-

Yeah.

with, and spreading love and charity to everyone around, so we would really, we really appreciate that super chat, and it's so great to hear the impact that this channel has made for you.

Yeah.

Yeah, obviously I want, I want everyone to be Catholic.

I want everyone to belong to the Church Jesus Christ established.

Mm-hmm.

But I think to move towards that goal, people tend to move incrementally, and you work with people where they're at.

Mm-hmm.

And that's why I'm, yeah, I want, that's why I wanna bring in more guests in the big studio to have those dialogues 'cause I know people that their journey to being Catholic-

Mm-hmm.

it often started with, Well, I was a Baptist, but I checked out things at Catholic Answers, and you know what?

That kind of Protestantism doesn't make sense to me.

Sure.

Now I'm Anglican or I'm Eastern Orthodox.

Mm-hmm.

And I thought about it more, and you know what?

Actually, Catholicism is the fullness-

Yeah.

of the faith.

And so, I'm excited to walk people through that journey.

And having the dialogues, I think is an important part of that.

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm curious if you guys have any, um, specific guests in mind that you would-

Yeah.

Yeah.

be really excited.

Definitely drop that in the comment, and also if you, if you send us a super chat, we'd be happy to, um, to give you a shout-out and answer any of your questions.

Yeah, so yeah, definitely leave us a super chat, and we would, uh, love to engage, uh, any questions you guys have.

We got, we got one comment here from MTG Collegian, Not Catholic but Trent look the time to send, took the time to send me his book, Why We're Catholic, and that's been a motivator for me to consider RCIA along with people like John Buck.

Thanks Trent and Catholic Answers.

Yeah.

Yeah, I, I get a lot of people who will reach out to me and they'll say, Oh, you know, I'm, I'm thinking of becoming Catholic, and I love just sending them, I love having written a book so I can send them the book for free just to say, Hey, here you go.

Like, I'm not, like, the idea that, like, I would demand everyone to buy everything.

I can't just give away everything for free because, you know, Catholic Answers still has to make money as a press, but for people who show that interest, I love sending it to them even though I know, it's sad, some people have taken, like, I've sent copies of books, and I know some of them end up on the, like, the digital black market or wherever it may be.

Mm-hmm.

But you know, at the end of the day, if, if the truth can get out there and we can still have a functioning, profitable press-

Totally.

I want it to reach lots of people, and so I always wanna, yeah, I always wanna give that out to y'all.

And that's why I try to put everything on YouTube.

Mm-hmm.

And put it out there and not have a lot, uh, just on Patreon.

Yeah.

But just more to reach people, and that's why we just need more support so everything we're trying to bless people with can be just given to the most people as possible.

We just got a message from Cole Landon saying, uh, You guys should make some more videos on Eastern Orthodoxy.

It's becoming more prevalent on the internet, and we need Trent's expertise.

Well, I wanna, there's so many other topics I want to address.

Eastern Orthodoxy is one.

I have an idea for a video related to sedevacantism.

Mm-hmm.

There's so many different subjects.

Yeah.

That's why what I'm excited about with Council of Trent, I try to cover a lot of different subjects.

Yes.

And not just get stuck on one thing 'cause there's people who need the truth all over-

Right.

in so many different areas, but in order, and what's helped me to reach out in other areas 'cause before I felt like I was carrying the weight of the channel on my shoulders.

Mm-hmm.

I'd have to spend 10 hours, 15 hours a week editing-

Yeah.

or I'd have to, like, do social media myself and Vanessa can now actually-

Mm-hmm.

cut it up and do that.

Mm-hmm.

But now that more people are supporting, and if you, by the way, if you wanna support and help us to reach more people, go to trenthornpodcast.com.

Just for $5 a month-

Mm-hmm.

you get access to bonus content.

You're supporting the channel, and that frees me up so that, okay, instead of focusing on the technical stuff-

Right.

I can do research on Orthodoxy-

Sure.

or on, uh, what, whatev, all the different things that are out there, but there's just-I could do this forever 'cause there's an unending amount of, of distortions of the truth that are out there to correct.

Yes.

That's so true.

But that's another one I would l- absolutely would love to address more.

Yeah.

I would just highlight from what Trent just said that, um, your, uh, all of you who are patrons and who are supporting this podcast on Patreon, um, those donations are, are what enables Catholic Answers to, uh, hire, en- enable them to hire me and to hire Vanessa.

Mm-hmm.

And as Trent said, Vanessa has been managing, um, the, the, all of the social media.

And I wonder if you'd like to highlight just some of the growth that you've seen since you've taken that over just in July, a few months ago?

So we launched, um, uh, w- we've had TikTok for a year now, but we started launching the Twitter page and the Instagram page, and we have reached thousands of people.

We have a lot of u- new unique viewers that are coming to the channel just from the shorts alone.

Mm-hmm.

So, um, we see YouTube and these social media pages actually pushing out the content because it's engaging and people wanna talk about it.

Totally.

So we really see this, like, highlighted on, on Instagram because in the comments section there, there's people having full-on conversations about the faith.

And so I'm really happy that Thomas highlighted that, that w- because of your guys' support, just being viewers or the patrons' support, it has allowed for us to come onto the team so that we can allow Trent to do what Trent does best-

Yeah.

which is learn about the faith and talk about the faith.

Um, so we are super supportive of you guys.

And so we wanna continue growing so that we could reach as many people as possible-

Mm-hmm.

and o- on all the platforms that come to be.

But we're so thankful for you guys.

Yeah, and I'll just add to that.

Uh, and this is a little bit more on the kind of nerdy tech side.

But one of the things that, um, kind of expanding what the Council of Trent is in terms of being able to bring people in for interviews, uh, one, one of the effects that that'll have is that when, when you have a high-level individual come and sit down for a conversation, oftentimes, they, they have a whole audience who hasn't been exposed to your work.

Mm-hmm.

But then since they're engaged in that conversation, their, that person's audience then gets exposed to you.

And with what-

Yeah.

Vanessa is doing in chopping up all these kind of long form, uh, pieces of content that we're already creating and pushing them out onto social media, once we are able to bring in other guests, that reach will just grow because people will recognize these guests and be interested now to, to hear what is this conversation, who is this Trent Horn guy?

Mm-hmm.

And our hope is just that, that in and of itself, kind of in a, in that organic, human way, will really broaden, um, the sphere of people who are engaging in, in these types of conversations a- and encountering transferable expertise in kind of the history of our faith and why we believe what we believe as Catholics.

Uh, I think there's always a challenge for Catholic channels on YouTube is just to wanna stay in your bubble.

And just for Catholics in general.

Like, I wanna stay in my bubble.

I wanna talk to this Catholic.

I wanna just focus on this thing in the Church.

I wanna talk about this thing.

And there's roles in the Church to talk about what's going on in the Church.

But for Council of Trent, I do not wanna stay in the Catholic bubble.

Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

I want people to become Catholic.

So to do that, we need to go out.

Either I might go on another show and engage people.

But I also think to really bring people in, I want to bring the best representatives of non-Catholic religions, ecclesial communities, churches.

Mm-hmm.

I want to bring them to our studio and meet with them.

But the biggest thing is I wanna get If we're gonna go, Jesus said, Go and make disciples of all nations.

You can't make disciples of all nations if you stay in your bubble-

Yeah.

and only focus what's going on in your bubble.

That's true.

But if you guys click the dona- donation link, help us to expand, I want to go out and really do that.

And I want you guys to partner with us to help us do that.

On that point, we have a Super Chat from All About A Catholic Family.

Um, the question is, will you collaborate with Ferris?

How To Be Christian and Council of Trent are two of the best chan- channels.

I app- I love, uh, Ferris' work.

I, I know he sometimes refers to me as his nemesis.

I would like to be his, his friend.

Yeah.

I think maybe we got off on the wrong foot.

But, uh, I, I certainly appreciate that.

He's made some good content related to me lately.

And that's the other thing that I wanna do very soon.

What I want I'd love to do, like, a conference.

Hm.

And just bring together Catholic YouTubers.

And your donations will also go to support efforts like that.

Yeah.

Like, I wanna bring in people like How To Be Christian.

And down here in the Catholic Answers conference, we've invited a ton of Catholic YouTubers to come.

Content creators have come, and they're in- interviewing the apologists.

But I wanna really lift up other people.

I mean, there's so many people to reach.

We all have to work together to do this.

So that's why I'm, I'm super excited to always have friends in the vineyard.

Mm-hmm.

Totally.

Yeah, I think that would be a cool collab.

Yeah.

There it is.

And, and I know Ferris, the nemesis, put a, uh, a funny asterisk next to that.

I, I thought you said at first, I love Ferris.

And so I was just like, That's a huge statement.

I think he's, he's, he's a, he's a funny guy.

And he's, uh, he's, he's putting Anybody, it doesn't matter the size of your channel either, if you're Catholic and you wanna, you're putting your faith out there-

Hm.

you have three subscribers, it's good that you're willing to, you're taking a risk.

Yeah.

Like most Catholics won't talk about their faith to anybody.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

So that's why I wanna really encourage people to go and do this, what, whatever the forum- format may be.

And what's beautiful about you wanting to talk to people outside of our faith is that it encourages people like myself who may not know how to talk to a non-Catholic about the faith.

Right.

So it encourages me and I'm like, oh, Trent talks about this, so it encourages me to study more about the faith so then I could go talk to people who are not Catholic or who disagree with the faith.

So it-

Yeah.

is great that we're reaching wider audiences.

Like, for instance, you did a video recently about, um, Mormonism, which is something I'm not versed in.

So, um, watching you have the discussion, um, was great in just my own studies.

So-

Yeah.

I see that reflected in my own thing.

Yeah.

Yeah, guys, uh, definitely click that link in our description if you would like to make, um, a one-time donation or a monthly gift, uh, to the Council of Trent podcast.

We would be so honored to have your support.

Um, and, uh, you know, as we've been saying, we're really hopeful that, uh, your gift to us will enable us to give back to the Church at large and really grow the Council of Trent into something that is reaching far beyond just the Catholic bubble, um, but into both atheist, Protestant, Orthodox spheres, and really kind of stoking the conversation to bring unity into Christ's Church.

Um-Maybe we can take a couple more-

Take a couple more, yeah.

SuperChats, yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah, so we got a few more, few more SuperChats too.

All right, so we got one here from Sandra, she says, I pray that God continues to open Protestants' eyes about apostolic traditions through your channel as it has for me.

Praise be to God.

Thank you for that.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, and that's, that's just the goal.

We wanna reach people and that's why we're just doing this special webinar today, because what I wanna focus on is, is reaching people.

But we have to invest to be able to do that.

That's why I, I, I would love to do it so that you guys are now, you know, just supporting the channel and our episodes can just focus on, here's the truth, presented in a winsome way, not interrupted with sponsorships or with, always calls to subscription, and you know.

But I, but I know that you all are out there and want, want to support us and part- I think of it more like you're partnering with us.

Right.

Like we're working together to do this.

And I hope that as you watch episodes and maybe watch one of the interviews that we do, like, you know, doing a dialogue with a Protestant scholar or with a Jewish scholar, whoever it may be, I always wanna try to model, here's how you can have 'Cause what I try to do, I know sometimes people on the internet, when Catholics will talk to non-Catholics, it might take a very aggressive stance, and, and there's times for that if a person's being aggressive with you.

But what I try to do in my conversations, I really wanna model the way I would talk to someone, you can do the same thing when you're talking with your, your non-Catholic coworker, non-Catholic family member, non-Catholic friend at school.

Just to have these more informal conversations that still graciously go to the matters we disagree about and, and engage that, so.

We've had a lot of, um, discussion of Eastern Orthodoxy in the chat here.

Um, London says that he's read a number of your books and would appreciate, um, you addressing, in book form, the rise of Eastern Orthodoxy and how Catholics can engage with it.

Well, we do have a book at Catholic Answers, Michael Lofton just released a book called Answering Orthodoxy.

Okay.

So we do have one book on that.

I'm gonna put a link to that-

Uh, so put, yeah, you can put a link to that-

in the description.

Um, uh, Erik Ibarra, well, I mean, there's, there's different doctrinal issues that arise.

There's a recent book that was put out on the Filioque that is helpful.

And then maybe, maybe a book that, at a popular level, brings down a lot of these disagreements.

I know, I know Michaels does that to a great extent.

Mm-hmm.

Um, I wanna say his name's Brian Duong, I think, is his name.

He did a whole book on the Filioque.

Mm-hmm.

Erik Ibarra has an excellent book.

Like, you think about the Catholics and the Orthodox, uh, the biggest differences there tend to be things like the Filioque, the nature and authority of the papacy.

Uh, so Ibarra's book, The Papacy, uh, I think it's the discussion between Catholics and Orthodox revisited, just Erik Ibarra, The Papacy a book I'd recommend.

It's something that I might When I choose to write a book, I wanna, I usually pick something where I wanna, I have a passion for it, I find it interesting, and it hasn't been addressed too much by other people.

So maybe a book that synthesizes a lot of that.

Right.

Yeah.

That might be, um, something in the future to address.

I do think, also, when it comes to Eastern Orthodox, it's a little bit different as Catholics when we're addressing that versus, let's say, like, Protestants.

Mm-hmm.

Because we recognize the Eastern Orthodox, they have valid churches, they have valid sacraments, they have valid holy orders.

Mm-hmm.

So we would consider them separated brethren.

Yes.

And so I think the conversation that I think we're, we need to have when it comes to Orthodoxy is more so, what, what can be done so that we can reunite?

And it doesn't have to be a pipe dream.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

So I think one of the biggest things there is, I want to help people, uh, maybe the Eastern Orthodox, they have a misunderstanding of Catholicism, just like some Catholics have misunderstandings of Orthodoxy.

Mm-hmm.

Uh, I want to explore more the idea that, um, the, I don't think the end goal has to be I think if, if any non-Catholic group, when we think about, like, return to the Catholic faith-

Mm-hmm.

the or- the Orthodox, Eastern or Oriental, they're going to have the best chance because they're closest to us theologically.

Right.

Yeah.

So I would love to And that's why I would love if we, if you donate, click on the description link below, uh, and donate to build up our studio, I would love to invite people, um Like examples I can think of off the top of my head who are really thoughtful Orthodox, Father, uh, Laurent Kleeneberg, I believe, is his name.

Mm-hmm.

He has a book on, uh, differences between Catholics and Orthodox.

He has a wonderful book on the doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary written from an Eastern Orthodox perspective.

It's a very good book on that.

I find him to be very charitable, a very good thinker.

And I'd love to bring people like him, uh, maybe Father Josiah Trenham, for example-

Mm-hmm.

just to be able to come and sit down, uh, whoever maybe, and have just these kinds of conversations, whether it's separated brethren, people like the Orthodox seeking what, what are the real paths to reunion?

What are misunderstandings people have?

Mm-hmm.

And then moving out from there to Protestants, to non-Christians, to people who don't believe in God, all that.

Would you, um, would you consider discussing, uh, Orthodoxy and Catholicism with Jonathan Pageau?

Yeah, I, I've seen him have He had a great conversation recently with Bishop Barron.

Yes, uh-huh.

So that would be-

Mm-hmm.

another one with Jonathan Pageau.

I would love to have a, a chat with him about that, icons, artwork, beauty.

Mm-hmm, totally.

We could have Especially if it's someone that is just a cool person that I could chat with, that's, that's an extra bonus.

James Strong says, I'm a non-denominational Christian fan of yours.

I love how you and other Catholics draw on a rich tradition of moral philosophy when answering faith questions.

My Protestant brethren often fall short in this.

Well, I think that that is, to me, a very compelling reason for a Protestant to look at Catholicism, because if you's operating from the principle of sola scriptura to say, Well, uh, the Bible is the only infallible rule of faith for the, the Church's life and practice, especially if you reference that to say, Moral norms for a Christian must be explicitly found in scripture, I think that becomes really problematic.

Because 100 years ago every Protestant agreed that contraception was immoral.

Right.

Every Protestant believed it was sinful 100, 100 years ago-Yeah.

It was just obvious.

Yes, contraception is sinful.

You had people like Anthony Comstock, who was a Protestant who promoted the Comstock obscenity laws to outlaw contraception.

That was 100 years ago.

The Anglican Lambeth Conference opened the door of- for contraception for married people.

Mm-hmm.

And now, since then, it's very, very rare to find Protestants who will say, No, it's sinful to use contraception.

They'll say, Well, the Bible, it's not explicit that contraception is- is wrong- Mm-hmm.

so we can't say that a Christian is bound by that.

Right.

But if you follow that route, what do you do about gestational surrogacy?

Yeah.

Yes.

In vitro fertilization?

Totally.

It's a slippery slope.

Well, and then, there are- or I- I mean, I have- I've did an episode on my show, I know people get a little- some Protestants give me grief about it, but they didn't show anything wrong.

I have shown that there are prominent Protestant pastors, and I know Protestant put in quotation marks, we'll say Evangelical-

Sure.

Mm-hmm.

who have said that, Well, I can't say mutual masturbation between spouses, or non-lustful masturbation, whatever that is.

But creating this like carve out-

Right.

for saying, Well, I can't say that that's sinful, because they can't- without sola scriptura, you get a really, um, you get a really impoverished, um, uh, moral anthropology where you don't have the authority, whereas in the Catholic faith, we have magisterial teaching on these recent-

Mm-hmm.

moral developments.

Yeah.

And so, that's why I have approached those And I think a lot of Protestants have found my commentary on these pressing moral issues, um, to- to be helpful-

Yeah.

to argue that like IVF, for example, even if you use IVF and you don't kill human embryos-

Yeah.

it's wrong, because children have a right to be conceived out of the marital act and not in the laboratory.

Tha- yeah.

That's such an interesting point and it's so validating, like when you say that, I feel it, like that makes sense.

And the church is firm on that-

Yeah, mm-hmm.

that no, this is wrong, you can't do this.

Totally.

We have, uh, time for just one last-

Yeah, let's do it.

Let's do it.

Super Chat here before we gotta wrap up.

Um, this is from 33rdLegion.

He says, Trent, post some Christ-centered jujitsu training videos.

I could post videos, uh, showing what not to do in jujitsu.

Well, I mean, I did a episode recently on mixed martial arts- Mm-hmm.

uh, reflecting on Father Mike Schmitz' comments, and I- and I showed some behind the scenes footage of my coach who was a black belt absolutely working me.

So you could probably watch that and see what not to do.

But, um, you know what was funny?

Here at the conference, I have met actually a ton of people who enjoy Catholic apologetics and they also do jujitsu.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Now that my knee's healed, I wanna get back into Muay Thai and, uh, just combine all that together.

But, uh, hopefully maybe we can show on the channel some more hobbies.

Actually, no.

Here's a funny thing about jujitsu.

That has been a way for me to engage other Protestants.

I bet.

So I'm going to be going- there's a guy who had a- he has a small- a Protestant channel, and he does commentary on some of my work-

Mm-hmm.

and agrees with- like he agreed with my video about the- the Protestant creed problem, and he's a Protestant.

Okay.

Mm-hmm.

And he agreed with it.

Mm-hmm.

And I found out he does jujitsu at my friend's gym.

Oh, no way?

So he and I are gonna-

Did you roll with him?

No, he and I, we're gonna go roll together at the gym-

Okay.

and then I'm gonna go on a show.

Cool, cool, cool.

Nice.

S- and- and one night- I got back late from a talk.

I got back at like 11:00 PM at the airport.

Mm-hmm.

And so, I'm driving home, super hungry, stop at In-N-Out Burger.

Always a good decision late at night.

I go in, I'm dressed like this.

I got done with the talk.

Yeah.

And I sit down, and I see these like three big, like, big guys.

Yeah.

Mus- muscle guys, like they're- they're in shape.

And I notice they have hats on their- they're wearing hats that say Jesus and Jujitsu.

Okay.

And so, I sat down with them and I was talking with them, I was like, Oh, yeah.

'Cause they were- they said, We just got out of Fight2Win.

Fight2Win is a local tournament.

Okay.

And one of the coaches from our gym was the headliner at that fight.

Oh, gotcha.

And so, I told them like, Yeah, he- he coaches at our gym.

He's like, Oh, Coach Clark coaches at your gym?

That's awesome.

Mm-hmm.

And I was like, Yeah, and I do and I'm- they're like, We do a YouTube video channel, Jesus and Jujitsu, we talk about this.

That's kind of cool.

And I was like, Yeah, I do a video, a channel too.

And one of the guys is like, Oh, wait, you're Council of Trent.

That's amazing.

We recognize you.

And I was like- I'm like, Yeah, and like, I'd love to come on your show and just talk about

I love that.

Like, We can talk about jujitsu and we can talk about if you have any questions about Catholicism- Mm-hmm.

let's do it.

So that's why Jesus says in the Gospels, he says, Where your treasure is, there also your heart will be.

So like a lot of times you're re- when you wanna share the faith with someone, it's so helpful, like if you and that other person share a common interest and passion, just to bond over that and say, Yeah, and I'm Catholic and I do this and it's fun.

It- I mean, it could be anything.

It doesn't have to be combat sports.

It could be, you know, it could be hunting, it could be crocheting.

I- you never know what-

That's right.

you know, whatever it might be.

That's right.

But that's why it was just so funny.

It's something I love.

God providentially has like put all these little appointments, like this Protestant guy likes jujitsu, so I go and he'll just smash the heck out of me and then I'll be like, Hey, you know what?

Let's, um I would much ra- yeah, you can do that or whatever ma- ends up happening.

Mm-hmm.

And then, um, we have a good chat about, um, about the faith.

Good.

Yeah.

So- so maybe- so maybe for a future one for dialogue, I will invite a Protestant, Orthodox, maybe there's an actual Jew who does jujitsu- and I could roll with him, and then we could have a conversation on the channel.

That- Those could also be- I'm- I'm open to that as well.

I'm open to that as well.

All right.

And before Trent gets canceled, let's go ahead and end this live stream.

Thank you guys so much for coming on.

Please definitely click that link in the description below to make a one-time gift for us-

Yeah.

to help expand the Council of Trent.

We love you guys.

Thank you guys so much.

Thank you.