Transcript

Yeah, we can

Sorry, I, I don't have look on it.

Oh, here.

Yeah, why- scooch in a little bit this wa- there we go.

Think they caught the, the tail end of that.

There we go.

All right, let me just make sure the audio's working.

Oh, you're live right now.

Yeah.

We're doing it.

Okay.

Let me Ah, there we go.

All right.

Welcome, everybody.

Um, Eric, I'm gonna have you introduce yourself, but for those who don't know, this is Eric from The Catholic Christian, uh, and I am making sure we are good to go on YouTube and I'll let you introduce yourself.

Yeah, I know some of you guys are on my channel, not all of you guys.

But, uh, I just wanna extend my thanks to Joe Heschmeyer, Shameless Potpourri, for welcoming, uh, me onto his channel.

This is wonderful.

I, I think I'm the first person in your studio to be live with you, so that, that is an honor.

Pray for Joe and his channel and, uh, yeah, this is great.

Thank you, Joe, for having me.

Yeah, absolutely.

So, um, we're gonna do This is a little bit of a modified version.

For those of you who are patrons, I usually do a Monday morning, uh, Patreon.

Wait, am I frozen?

Oh, okay.

It was showing frozen on this end.

Wait, oh, okay.

Should I

do it?

Oh, yeah, that's, uh, that's ideal.

We're both just like looking down.

We've never done anything with cameras before, either of us.

Uh, I don't know why it's so hard.

It, it's like having somebody in your home, but in like a very small office, an office that I think looks deceptively large but, but Eric can tell you is, is much smaller than it appears.

Um, oh, yeah.

Anyways, so, so for those who are patrons, I normally do a members only Monday, but yesterday I was at the dentist and so I was gonna do it today.

And since I have a special guest today, I thought, Why don't we do a public one?

So I'm gonna answer some, uh, patron questions and then some public chat questions.

So, uh, with no further ado All right.

Um, Nathaniel said, I've been saying for a while that Protestantism can't give a coherent definition of heresy.

Catholics self- separate error, a simple intellectual mistake, from heresy, the same error held while refusing to submit to the church's judgment.

Sin is in the will, not the intellect, a fact I keep coming back to with these Protestant/Catholic divides.

Believing something later condemned isn't sinful until you knowingly resist correction.

Someone believing something that wouldn't be anathematized for hundreds of years is not culpable.

The difference for someone believing it after that point is in the rejection of the church, not error in truth.

But Protestants, by definition, must trust their own private judgment over any ecclesial authority.

If there's no binding church to submit to, what would the sinful act of heresy even be?

Where's the culpable choice of the will?

So I think it's like It I like the way he's framed that question.

And for those of you who are, um, Protestant, I'd be curious how you would respond to that.

Like, what is the difference between someone just being wrong about the Bible and someone actually being a heretic?

It seems like intuitively there's some level of There's some parts of scripture we're able to agree to disagree on, and there are some parts of scripture that everyone is bound to interpret the same way, but I don't know how one would, uh, parse that out other than I'm really convinced, uh, of, I don't know, this, this big issue.

I don't know.

Anything to add to that, Eric?

Oh, sorry.

I, I was, uh-

I hear you reading the questions.

I caught, I caught a little bit of that.

All, all my, all my friends and subscribers and stuff that are coming on here, uh, that threw me off, but, uh So as far as, as far as the heresy goes, to In my humble opinion, uh, it really has to do with culpability and obstinacy.

So post-baptismal, uh, obstinate refusal of a, you know, dogma that has been revealed that is binding on your conscience, or I'm sorry, your intellect and your will.

Now, when most Protestants these days won't have that, at least in my humble opinion, because they're not bound to that which the Catholic Church promulgates as binding.

So in a formal sense, it's hard to, you know, say if that is if they're culpable of heresy or not.

But, um, the culpability, I think, comes probably with when they do know whether it's through vince- or they do or don't know through vincible ignorance or culpable ignorance, um, and they, and they choose to reject that or just stick their fingers in their ears, Ah, nah, nah, I don't want to hear any of that, but, ah, that's all I got.

Yeah.

I, I, I'm sorry.

I was-

No, no, it's-

I was not paying attention to that.

I'm sorry.

I'm, uh, I'm told if I need help blink twice.

Uh, no, this is just the sensory overload of modern live streaming.

I've got like my laptop and then I've got it plugged into like a, another laptop screen, and then I got the camera here, and I'm following the chat and trying to read questions and keep track of people sending in super chats.

So maybe we'll take a few, uh, chats here.

For those of you who are patrons and Uh, I'll make sure your questions get answered.

Uh, so if I have to do an extra hour this week, I'd be happy to do it.

Um, let's see.

Somebody asked, it wasn't even a Oh yeah, Catechuman just goes You wanna, you Why- why don't you, you read that one?

You gotta do all the oh's though.

Oh, okay.

Let's go.

Truth nuke, Catechuman.

You're way better at the live streaming part of this than I am.

So, yeah.

Uh, there's a question about whether you are AI or animatronic, but I think that's a compliment.

You know?

They wouldn't say that if, uh, if it, if it weren't true.

And, uh, the allegation is that you kidnapped me, but you're clearly in my space.

Yeah.

It was definitely some elements of coercion and manipulation going on, but And yeah- Jo- Joel couldn't resist though.

The charisma and the charm.

Um, Javier Perdomo, who I think I Javier, is it fair to say we have a debate to announce soon?

I, I think that the details of that are- in the very final stages.

Uh, the thing is, i- it's looking really good.

I don't, I don't wanna prematurely announce it, but hopefully get people interested.

I'm looking forward to that.

But he asked about my epistemology, if I'm a Thomist.

Uh, I feel unworthy to claim the title of Thomist, but I That's certainly been very influential in my thinking.

Uh, I went to, uh, the Pontifical University of Santa Croce, uh, s- St. Thomas, excuse me, the Angelicum.

I actually did a year at Santa Croce before that.

But it's less Thomistic.

It's more Opus Dei.

So I did, um, yeah, I, I, Thomism theology degree, and then my philosophy was at a pretty heavily Thomistic seminary as well.

So, that's very much kind of the frame in which I was, uh, uh, taught, and I think is, is very much simpatico with, like, the way I view the world.

So, yeah.

Timu Thomist, that's a great term, Father.

So, all right.

Um, Where's purgatory in the Bible, Joe?

That's like I don't know if that's a serious question or a joke.

That's like the most common, uh, Catholic Answers question of just like, show me purgatory, but do it in accordance with the sola scriptura framework in the way that I Like, why haven't I found it yet without challenging my own paradigm?

So, um, all right.

I'm gonna do a couple other questions.

If you see any questions, jump in.

O- o- you watch that side, I'll watch this side.

We'll, we'll tackle this together.

Sound good?

Uh, Michael said, Joe, I was cold-called a few months ago by a very sweet Jehovah's Witness lady, and we had a short conversation in which I affirmed a lot of things she was saving- saying about the goodness of God and how it's important to know Jesus, all compatible with the truth.

She's now called back and left a message seeing if I'd like to have an in-person meeting.

I'm considering using this as an opportunity to perhaps try to explain the fullness of truth in the Catholic faith.

I don't really have any apologetic experience.

Well, seeing you and Counsel in Trent videos for a few years doesn't count, right?

Oh, yeah, that's totally the same thing.

Uh, Is meeting with her a good idea?

If so, what are some, some of the best questions I can ask in order to lead her to the truth?

So, I have found, in my own experience, Jehovah's Witnesses can be a tricky crowd, because they, they're trained in kind of a certain way of handling questions and all that.

Uh, but I would I, I would guess at a few things.

My aunt used to have this Jehovah's Witness lady come over, like, on a pretty regular basis, for like more than a year.

And they, you know, they would just try to convert one another, but in, in a good, charitable spirit.

And I think this is one of the things to the Jehovah's Witnesses' kind of credit, is they're willing to have those conversation.

They don't immediately just like think, Oh, no, you're trying to convert me, and then run away.

So I, I have respect for that.

Their Christology is really bad.

I mean, their Christology, where they just don't think Jesus is fully God, uh, is sub-Christian.

I mean, it I don't mean that in a pejorative sense.

I mean, we can't call them brothers and sisters in Christ given how bad their theology on Christ is.

And we try to extend that honor to as many people as we can.

Um, so just know that that is a major thing.

A second thing that can be really helpful is, um, like answering the questions of apostasy and restoration, because they're one of these restorationist movements that Jehovah's Witnesses are coming out of the same basic current that you get the Seventh Day Adventists and the Mormons.

And it's coming from this 19th century, um, kind of frontier theology.

And as a result, it's, it often, uh, pretty unchurched.

It's not really in sync even with something like traditional Protestantism, as much as you can speak of such a thing.

And it's often got these heavy kind of restorationist overtones.

And, uh, as a result, a good place to go with this is the apostasy, to say, Okay, can we agree the only reason to have your church is if you can show that our church failed?

And then put the conversation on those terms.

The other advantage that has is you don't need to be an expert on Jehovah's Witness theology.

You just need to know your own theology, your own history.

So, yeah, there you go.

Vanessa, I'm super glad you're here.

I almost texted you to see if you could, uh, pull questions behind the scenes, but I didn't want to bug you at the last minute.

But now that I see you're already in the chat, I'm totally gonna open up that doc if you wanna grab, uh, super chats.

Um, Vanessa is amazing, for those of you who don't know, and is one of the reasons I'm not always this chaotic and, uh, confused.

Uh, okay.

There were some previous question live streams, too, but, uh, okay.

Uh, Dionysius said, How much can we follow philosophy like Neoplatonism?

Uh, i- uh, on any of these, if you wanna jump in, okay.

So the whole Platonic thing is, is very good in some ways.

It's o- all, with all philosophies, it's just gonna be a matter of taking the roses and not the thorns.

And here I would be, um, heavily indebted to St. Thomas Aquinas, who was great at taking pagan philosophies and saying, What do they get right?

And what are the limitations in, in kind of their, uh, their vision of the world?

And then kind of working from that.

So, uh, Plato is, is good at seeing that there is more to the world than what meets the eye.

Um, there's, you know, like the whole allegory of the cave is getting to something real, where the world that is beyond what we see is actually more real than the world that we see, the world of the senses.

And I think there's something very healthy about that.

The problem in some forms of Platonism is that it leads to what's called Platonic dualism, where the body and the world of the senses are just treated as evil.

Those can't be harmonized neatly with Christianity without doing a real violence to it, because God treats the material world as good in the sense of being worth saving and, um, you know, worth, worth redeeming.

And so he works through matter.

He does, he does all of those things.

So-Yeah.

I, I think with any particular philosophical tenet, the question should be just on a- almost, like, case-by-case basis.

Does this match up with what we get from Revelation, from Christianity?

And if so, and you think it describes reality well, then, then by all means, take it.

But if, if not, then, uh, then let it go.

Uh, who's taller, me or you?

I don't know.

I- I'm not sure.

Yeah.

Well, with I've strategically given him the shorter chair.

So

I need a booster.

Uh, this office is extremely not set up for two people.

I hope you can hear okay, by the way.

I feel like we're, uh, leaning in with, like, a doo-wop mic, you know?

Like, just crooning together.

All right.

Um, how was my time at the Angelicum?

I need to stop doing this thing where I answer people's free chats.

No.

Uh, the, my time at the Angelicum was amazing.

I was actually joking about this over lunch, that I've told my wife before, if I could just be a seminarian for life, I would just have done that.

Um, that I I loved seminary, and I really highly recommend it to anyone, especially people who are nerdy in the way that I think a lot of the people who like this show are, where it's like you Okay, so here's the day.

You pray, you, uh And, and so I'm at the North American College, right?

So I pray, I eat breakfast, walk to school, get great Thomistic theology, come home, have amazing Italian food for lunch, uh, often will have, like, a little nap, and then talk theology over coffee with my bros.

And then, like, one weekend a month, uh, we would travel around, uh, some part of Europe with, with some guys I was friends with.

And, you know, we'd do more prayers in the evening and all that.

I mean, it just, it was incredible.

A life of prayer and theology, absolutely beautiful.

Wow.

Uh, Retro-cop-ylith.

I still can't pronounce your name.

Retroapocalypse, I'm just gonna say.

It said, Dinner's on me, guys.

Thanks for all that you both do.

That was incredibly generous.

That, uh, that more than paid for the lunch we just had.

So, wow, that's, uh I'm astonished.

I'm gonna start stealing all of your big fish.

Like-

That's fine.

No, I'm so-

That's, that's fine.

Redistribution of wealth.

There you go.

That's a social doctrine, guys.

The common good.

Yes.

Right?

Solidarity.

Um, yeah.

And so, any questions for either me or Erik, this is a great time, uh, for it.

But for those who don't know who you are, Erik, why don't you maybe give a little bit about your channel, and just explain kind of I know, I know you're the very basics of your background-

Mm-hmm.

but maybe if you wanna share, like, you converted, you got, you got this channel, and, and-

Sure.

Yeah, yeah.

So, uh, I'm a convert from confessional Lutheranism.

I've been a Catholic for almost 11 years now.

My wife pretty much forced me into making my own, uh, YouTube channel to create content and be a digital artist, as Trent would say.

And really, the focus, the goal of my channel is to be as loving and as ecumenical as possible for the salvation of souls.

And I'm still trying to figure it out.

I'm getting great advice from Joe, among others at Elle.

And yeah, I just, I just wanna populate the Kingdom of God, and And on the livestreams, we have a lot of fun.

You can just ask a lot of these people in here.

We, we don't like to take things too seriously, but at the same time, we wanna, we wanna save souls.

So, it's all, it's all good.

Thanks, Joe, for having me on.

This is great.

Such a blessing.

I love you guys.

Wonderful.

Um, yeah.

Uh, so, okay.

Ike has a question.

At what point is it sinful to entertain conspiracies?

Uh, I would say this, and I think this is something you'd love your, your input on if you want to.

Um, number one, anything that's a sin against charity.

So, think about when the Catechism talks about, like, sins of the tongue.

If you are spreading false information about somebody In fact, even if you're spreading true information that's negative without a legitimate reason to do so, you're sinning against them.

And believing uncharitable things about your neighbor without a sufficient foundation is also sinful.

Now, that's easy to miss with a, a big conspiracy, because the, the people you're believing uncharitable things about don't have, like, individual names and faces and all that.

Um, uh, so as a result, like, we can maybe under-appreciate that.

But if you say, like, Oh, I think, you know, uh, this group did this horrible thing, you're ultimately still saying uncharitable things about your neighbor.

It's not as bad as naming individuals, but it is still It falls short of what we're called to as Christians.

Now, I wanna be, be clear there.

That doesn't mean you can never have, uh, a belief that, you know, something was a plot or was an inside job or whatever.

Like, those things can happen.

They should be rooted in something more than, I have negative feelings about this group.

It needs to have more of a, a foundation, in fact.

And you should err on the side of a more generous interpretation.

Like, it is better that at the moment of your death and judgment, God tells you, like, Oh, people were actually way worse than you thought they were, rather than the alternative.

Because the alternative, you've actually sinned against them.

And the other, you've just been a victim of, of other people's, uh, wickedness being worse than you thought.

So, I think it's something to take very seriously.

The, um, the desire to make sense of the world is a strong one.

And I think it's something that we naturally can fall into.

We wanna put the pieces together.

And that can be very helpful, 'cause sometimes you put the pieces together, and you have, like, a theory of the world that actually has some explanatory value.

But it can easily go wrong.

Where very smart people are actually prone to this at higher rates than, than regular people, because you're used to drawing different data sets together.

But if you do that when the data is actually uncorrelated, then you, you draw these false conclusions, and you have to be very cautious about that.

Because these are not just false ideas in your head.

They You can have, um- uncharitable thoughts th- that seep into your heart.

And your conspiracy theory is probably not going to make the world better, but it might make you worse.

All right.

Um, Gabe says, Go Midwest.

Amen.

Go Midwest, indeed.

Yeah, I- I had thought that you were further away.

I thought you were, like, a six-hour drive from here, and you're actually a three-hour drive.

I won't say where, because I don't want There's some, there's some weirdos in here, so.

Um, all right Manito says, Should we, as Catholics, avoid media that takes the Lord's name in vain?

And helpfully includes some examples of what it would look like to take the Lord's name in vain.

Um, I think it is good to.

I think there's a difference, actually, between songs and movies.

And the reason I think that is because songs get in your head more at, like, a word-by-word sort of level.

I'm much less careful about movies that have, uh, periodic blasphemy or taking the Lord's name in vain if the rest of the movie is good.

You know, like, they're And, and particularly if it's something in context where it's not presented as a good thing, but you have, like, uh, a wicked per- So, I'll give you an example.

The movie, uh, uh, Calvary, is fantastic, and begins with this very hard-to-watch scene where someone who is a victim of clerical abuse, uh, threatens to kill a priest in the confessional.

And, uh, it's, it is graphic and vulgar, but in a way that, that feels very appropriate for what's being described.

Like, it, it is shocking, and it's meant to be shocking, and it doesn't, like, revel in evil.

It depicts it.

And I think that is an important distinction.

Are you depicting evil, or are you glamorizing or reveling in evil?

Um, but with songs, because songs get in your head in kind of a word-by-word sort of level, I will Like, if there's a song that I know has, has something in there that I don't want in my head, I will just selectively mute it, or I will just not listen to the song at all, um, because that's, that's not good.

Uh, so I- I'm more cautious about that than I am about film.

Did you watch the movie Father Stu?

Uh, no, I didn't watch the movie Father Stu, but this is, this is one of the things that I saw, uh, in the kind of feedback about it, that there was, like, the original version that was maybe more realistic, and then there was a more, like, tamed version.

Did you see the movie Father Stu?

Yeah, and I'm just I know there was a lot of cussing.

I'm just trying to remember how much was taking the Lord's name in vain.

'Cause me, personally, I'm not a big fan, even if it's depicting and not reveling.

Right.

I get that point and distinction.

That's a good distinction.

I just, personally, me, I don't care for it, so.

I mean, if they're, you know, constantly taking the Lord's name in vain, I- I- I just can't watch it.

That's just But that's just me, you know?

Say a Hail Mary every time they do.

Yeah, actually, you know, I'm very glad you mentioned that.

So, like, in conversation, when people will use If as long they just use the name of Jesus lightly, I, um, I will just, like, make a little sign of the cross or, like, make a little prayer.

I don't make a big deal of it with them, in that they notice it or they don't, but I just try to take those moments and turn them into prayers.

Whatever the person meant by invoking the name of Jesus, let's turn this into a good thing.

Like, yes, it's, it's beautiful that he is here.

It's beautiful that, uh, we have this access to him.

And, and that can be a very powerful thing, and also makes you more aware of it.

Like, people are very casual about, uh, like, OMG-ing about things, where it's just like, Okay, well, I- I want to honor our Lord.

Um, UCBSBenedictum's question seems like something that's an inside chat.

Yeah, it is.

It's all inside stuff.

Okay.

Should men be familiar with foreign women?

Uh, I think that he's I'm getting a no.

I'm getting a no on that.

Uh, Frank says that your review of the Need God debate was legendary.

Oh, thank you.

I, I'm trying to remember.

I don't, I didn't think it was that great, but thank you.

I'm not trying to downplay.

Thank you for the compliment.

Uh, Joe, Joe did amazing.

It was easy to do a review or a good review because of Joe.

So, it really goes back to Joe.

W- Well, thank you.

I, I was really Like, I will say, as someone who's just getting into the world of debate, I was pretty good about trying to watch the stuff after.

Y- y- it's such a weird thing when you're actually the one debating where you're like, Is this narcissistic to watch this?

Especially if people are saying I did well.

But I actually got I found it very helpful.

Um, I watched several Protestant streamers and they agreed with the position, you know, that baptism saves.

They disagreed with some aspects.

I thought it was, I thought it was super helpful.

Even people who maybe aren't the biggest fans of the Catholic Church in some ways.

I benefited from that, so, yeah, I'm thankful for yours and, and Javier, I know you did one.

And anyone else who, who, uh, reacted, I'm grateful for it.

And I think it also It points people to the debate if they, if they missed it.

Uh, speaking of, James wants to know where your review is, 'cause he said he missed it.

Um, where?

Yeah.

Oh, yeah, it's on my channel on a livestream.

Uh, so go, I don't know, a week back.

Yeah, but

Yeah.

Um, oh, KWood says, Can you clarify exactly what a graven image is?

Yeah, that's, uh, not a great translation in the KJV of the Hebrew pechal, um, or pechel, which is like an idol.

And it can be It can literally mean, like, a carved image, but that's not a very good translation for a couple reasons.

One, it's overinclusive, and two, it's underinclusive.

So, why is it overinclusive?

Well, God orders the creation of the cherubim, and you wouldn't say that he's ordering the violation of the Ten Commandments, because he can't order people to violate the Ten Commandments.

Like, you can't have a, a God who contradicts God.

So, whatever is meant by the word, it clearly doesn't include all engraved images, because the cherubim were engraved images.

The temple was covered with engraved images.

Uh, pomegranates and the like.

Those are all images.

They were made with engraving.On the flip side, if you have, like, a painting of the goddess, uh, that's an idol, whether it's made with engraving or painting or, you know, drawing, or whatever else.

So, uh, idol is the better term.

Engraved image is not what it says in Hebrew, that's what it says in, uh, 17th century English.

And, and, n- not a great translation, f- for that reason, 'cause it would include things that aren't idols, and it wouldn't include things that are idols.

All right.

Um.

Ike says, Is it true that the TLM was invented in the 1500s?

No.

Uh, the liturgy has changed over time.

And so, even, like, what we call the Tridentine Mass, there are different moments in time where, uh, there are bigger and smaller changes.

So like the 1955 Holy Week, uh, changes.

There are clear changes with different prayers, the second Confiteor is removed in the '50s as well.

Uh, you have, like, sometimes these small changes.

But if, if what you mean by the TLM is the exact form of that prayer, then that's gonna often be a snapshot of a very particular kinda moment in history.

The core structure of it, though, goes way back.

So, even if you read something like Justin Martyr's First Apology, uh, where he describes the elements of the Mass, they're recognizably the elements of a Mass today, either a Novus Ordo or, or a TLM.

Uh, the, the core, like, Eucharistic Prayer I, the Roman Canon, uh, is, I believe, 5th century or so, and many of the saints referenced would have been people that were known to the, to the Roman Christians in, like, the 300s and 400s.

So you have a kind of nucleus that, that then has these often minor changes, and then sometimes more substantial ones.

So in the aftermath of the Council of Trent, you get some bigger liturgical reforms, and then in the aftermath of Vatican II, you get bigger and, and more controversial liturgical reforms as well.

Um.

All right.

Cade says, Joe and Erik, where's the best barbecue in Kansas City?

I'm gonna g- uh, take this one, 'cause I-

I'll chime in first.

I live here.

There, yeah.

You, you might have some thoughts on it, so I'd, I'd love to hear your Okay.

You got your, you got your list upstairs?

I have two, yeah.

Okay.

I'll give two.

We'll see if they match up.

I would say for sit-down barbecue, 'cause sit-down barbecue and, like, gas station barbecue are two different things.

Best sit-down barbecue place is Q39.

Best gas station barbecue is Joe's Kansas City.

Uh, yeah.

So I'm going to Q39 tonight with my brother.

Uh, and the only other one I've been to is Slaps.

Oh, nice.

Okay.

But I hear Joe's

I w- I will take Joe's over Slaps any day.

'Cause it's Notre Dame.

Yeah.

And, uh, it's, it's great.

Um.

Oh, yeah.

I, uh So someone's 30 minutes from Kansas City.

Well, there you go.

I Uh, Techno Squirrel?

Is that what it says?

Or

Yeah.

Yeah?

Okay.

Fair enough.

I, I'm gonna just keep you 30 minutes away.

That sounds creepy.

No, I'm just kidding.

Uh.

It says, KC barbecue's pretty good, but I live in the South?

Oh, okay.

It's

Oh.

If, if the part of the South you live in doesn't end with X's, you don't have any reason to talk-

Right.

uh, in comparison.

Um.

Gabe says, Do you receive the Eucharist on the hand or tongue?

Explain why.

Well, my parish receives kneeling on the tongue, uh, and that's the, the way that the whole parish receives, unless you have, like, a, a special reason not to.

So it's pretty uncontroversial.

Uh.

When I'm at another parish, I'll receive standing on, on the tongue.

There's not a sinful way, uh, as long as you're doing it reverently.

Like, I, I don't think we want to impose the things that we find Like, I do it 'cause I think it's, it's respectful to God, and there's an active radical receptivity with it that I really like.

Uh.

Honestly, when I was in my 20s I made the switch, and one of the things that persuaded me was a Mother Theresa quote that turned out to be fake.

So, like, my reasons for starting it were, were, uh, mixed, in terms of good and bad.

But yeah.

So I've, I've been receiving on the tongue, I think, ever since then, unless it's been a situation where literally, like, I think there were a couple times where, like, it was so controversial I had a priest in Texas who, like, refused to commune me on the tongue.

Uh.

And so there I think I received on the hand.

That was, I don't know, 15 years ago.

Um.

So yeah.

It, and so I try not to be distracting.

I think if you receive standing on the tongue, it's, it's not intrusive.

If you're kneeling, I usually do that only if I get some other clue that someone else in the congregation is doing so, just so I don't make it needlessly about myself or distract anyone else from the fact that they're about to receive our Lord.

Um.

And, do some priests get mad?

I, I have had one priest get mad in, in, you know, almost 20 years of doing it.

Really?

On the mouth?

Mm-hmm.

Getting mad?

It was, it was like 15 years ago, down in Texas, in Austin.

There was a parish down there.

SSPX?

No.

He, he was, uh Uh, I think, you know what?

I think, I think that time I actually went to, to kneel, and then he told me I wasn't allowed to.

And so that was, well, that was a really weird, uh, sort of experience.

Um.

Okay.

You also were asked that, but th- also, there was a question about the TLM.

I was asked once.

Uh, you were also asked how you received communion.

You don't have to answer if you don't want to, but

Oh.

Yeah.

No.

I've always received on the tongue.

I don't kneel unless maybe there's an altar rail and everyone else is kneeling, like Joe was saying, prudently.

You don't, I mean You don't wanna stick out for various ostentatious reasons.

But I mean, really what it comes down to, guys, again, I'm not trying to tell you what to do or not do, the interior disposition is what matters.

And Joe was alluding to that when he said, A reverent communion.

You know what I mean?

Like, the Lord says he doesn't take delight in bulls and sacrificed sacrifices.

It's a contrite heart.

Right?

So if I'm sick, I'll take on the hand.

Right?

If I'm not sick, I'll usually take on the tongue standing-

and just try to be as reverent as possible, but mostly interiorly, yeah.

Yeah.

Well said.

Um, okay.

Um, oh, there was a question about the Angelic Warfare confraternity.

I don't know enough about it.

Do you know?

Okay.

I'm sorry, um, Eusebius Benedictum.

I had a friend who was part of that confraternity, but I don't know much about it.

So I, I have to plead ignorance there, other than, you know, my sample size of one, that guy was He was solid.

Uh, so yeah, other than that, sorry, I, I can't be more help.

Uh, Rokxxi, is that how we're going?

R-O-K-X-X-I, or maybe Rok21.

Oh.

Um, could be.

Uh, Finished The Eucharist Is Really Jesus a few days ago.

Awesome book, great info, and easy read.

Highly recommend it to anyone who hasn't read it yet.

Yeah, I've heard that book's really good.

You should Everyone should buy a copy, whoever wrote that book.

I was gonna say, Did you read that?

I did.

I'm just jo-

Yeah.

I'm just messing around, so So yeah.

It's I think the Actually, a quick story about that book.

I was a seminarian in Estonia for, like, four weeks, and was having a lot of trouble doing anything besides serving mass, because people in Estonia are not native English speakers.

And many of them speak perfectly fine English, but, uh, former Soviet countries tend to be really good at not talking to strangers.

And so, like, me being, like, the extroverted American wanting to, like, Hey, I wanna, uh, talk to everybody about Jesus, they would just kind of be polite, but terse.

And so it was hard to even know, like, Are you literally even understanding what I'm saying?

And I, I just felt like I was, uh, not being a good, uh, minister.

It was a great experience of failure.

It was a great experience of failure.

But there is a Missionaries of Charity community there, and they, uh, they are English-speaking is their official language of their community.

This is Mother Theresa's order.

So any- anywhere you see the white and the blue striped habits, uh, they probably speak English.

If you're ever abroad, there's a little pro tip for you.

Might be, you know, Indian-accented English or something, but you can, you can communicate.

So, um, I had asked the director of the cathedral, Well, could I go and, you know, present for this community?

You know, give a talk or something.

And he, you know, he didn't get back to me right away.

And finally, uh, one day he comes back.

Uh, it's a Monday, and he tells me, Okay, yeah, they, they want you to give three hour-long talks on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday to their community.

I'm like, Okay, three talks.

That's a different ask than, than one.

Uh, What are they on?

And he's like, I don't know.

You'll have to, you'll have to ask Sister, 'cause there, there was an English-speaking mass on Monday evenings.

So Monday evening comes.

I'm, I'm serving mass.

I, I see, uh, the, I guess the Mother Superior of the community.

And I'm like, So I hear I'm giving talks on Thursday, Friday, Saturday.

And she goes, Oh, no, no, no.

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.

I was like, Tomorrow?

I'm giving a talk tomorrow and I don't know what the topic is yet.

And it's an hour, and it's, it's to these really holy Missionaries of Charity.

What in the world?

And so, it ended up being two talks on the Eucharist and a talk on Mary.

But that night, I had some very good prayer.

Uh, whatever the prayer version of cramming is, to be like, Lord, I need you to give me something to share with these very holy women whose life is the Eucharist.

Like, I can't just be, You should believe in the Eucharist, 'cause that's gonna be a waste of all of our time.

Uh, so what, what I came away with there was the, the nucleus of, of what became the book The Eucharist Is Really Jesus.

So then when the, the Year for the Eucharist was announced, it was like, Well, why don't we turn this into a book?

And, and off to the races.

That's great.

Um

How many books have you written?

Uh, that was book number five, so

Wow.

Wow.

All right.

Batman Incorporated.

Love.

People's names are so endlessly delightful.

It says, Happy Month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Amen.

Uh, also, Happy Feast Day of Saint Charles Lwanga and companions, the, uh, Anglican and Catholic martyrs.

The Catholic ones are the only ones canonized, but we believe the Anglicans are probably in heaven as well.

Who were martyred for not going along with, uh, homosexual deviants in Uganda, and stood up to the king, and he, he murdered them for it.

So, um, yeah, happy Feast Day of Saint Charles.

I was baptized on the 11th of June in the parish patron by Saint Therese of Lisieux and love this season.

Amen, Batman Incorporated.

Um

Amen, Batman Incorporated.

I love it, I love it.

Um, yeah, Charlie Lucy says, Do you have any more debates planned soon?

Yes.

Um, as I sort of hinted earlier, uh, Cameron Bertuzzi of Capturing Christianity is organizing a debate, hopefully with, uh, Javier Perdomo and myself, on, uh, which books are in the Bible.

We're trying to set a date in, in July.

So I think we should have details soon.

He's been really easy to work with so far, and I'm really looking forward to it.

So

Nice.

Yeah.

Um, do you have any more debate covers you're gonna do?

Any more, uh-

Oh.

joys you're gonna watch?

Well, yeah.

That one, that one I'll watch.

Okay, perfect.

Javier came onto my channel and informally debated me on the canon.

But I didn't do as well as you would do, but

I, um, I'll, I'll watch it just for research purposes.

Yeah.

Um, bit Drake?

Uh, well, I don't know if this is a good time to bit Drake, because he's, he's going through a hard time, Drake.

Is he?

What, I-

Oh, yeah.

He's just been a- attacked in very popular media by Kendrick Lamar.

Uh, it, it Yeah, rap.

Uh, never mind.

Ah.

Okay.

Yeah.

How do you know about this, Joe?

It was, it was on the Super Bowl.

It's just not a small thing.

Oh.

Oh, okay, okay.

Okay.

Super Bowl.

Uh, says, You two have both given me solid advice regarding joining the Church.

Thank you all so much and God bless.

Thank you and God bless you.

This is I gotta share.

Like, I don't I'm sure you get stories like this, like people who it's like, Oh, okay.

I'm in a room and I'm looking at a camera .

and I'm, like, hoping and praying that it does something.

Yes.

And I don't know who's at the other end.

And sometimes it's, like, nobody, and, like, it just is, like, the channel's a, a dud.

Other times, it, you know, it's a lot of people.

And you just don't know before you do it, um, who's going to receive it and who needs to receive it.

Right.

And so it's always so beautiful when, when, like, someone, uh, get a name or a name and a face and a story where they say, like, This is, I was going through this and then, uh, this piece happened.

And it's, it's there's something so really beautifully, uh, gratifying about that.

So people were surprised by the Kendrick reference.

Got it.

I had to explain the whole Kendrick-Drake beef to my wife which was, uh, yeah but my wife is a Thomas Aquinas College grad, and so, like, you know, if it was something out of Shakespeare or, you know, Plutarch, she would have been fine.

But she has to explain, like, Midsummer Night's, uh, references to me.

And so this, I just, I brought the conversation down for her.

Um, Marty says, Is Carolina barbecue actual heresy?

I'm gonna say yes, but oh, look-

Oh, oh.

I'll let Christian Wagner hear that.

Oh, I will, I will go on his stream to debate him on this.

Like if you need that much vinegar And the real thing is, pulled pork is, like, the low end of barbecue to begin with.

Like, I like pulled pork, but let's be serious.

Like, pulled pork is like saying, Oh, yeah, I'm really into, you know, fine dining, and it's like, you eat hotdogs.

Like, come on.

Pulled pork is children's barbecue.

And it, it tastes fine, but this is why they need, uh, vinegar-based barbecue, 'cause it's so fatty that you need to cut it with, with vinegar.

So that-

End of debate.

End of debate, yeah.

That's fine.

Uh, Kay Wood says, Can you address R.C.

Sproul in a future episode?

I've addressed R.C.

Sproul so much that I've had people tell me I do it too often.

So I've been cutting back on going after Sproul and John MacArthur.

But I've got, if you go back through the catalog, I've got a bunch of stuff on, like, his theology of the cross and all sorts of things.

If you've got a particular thing that you've seen Sproul say, I, I might be, uh, able to and willing to do that.

Um, wait, Christian Wagner's a griper?

Uh, I don't know any of this, no.

That plus Carolina barbecue?

Over.

Um, all right, Ike says, Is Freemasonry an upgrade from atheism?

Yeah, but that's a weird way to think about it.

Meaning, like, uh, okay.

There's so many layers in that question.

What do we mean by Freemasonry?

Because, like, old school Freemasonry where it actually was much more like an intentional attack on the church, is different from just, like, uh, 'cause you'll, like, I've known Christians who were Freemasons and they just wanted a group of guys to hang out with.

That's clearly better than atheism.

It's smart, uh, not to become a Freemason as a Catholic, partly 'cause it's condemned by the Church.

But also because if you really understand Freemasonry, it is at odds with Catholicism.

But yeah, I mean, it's a step up from atheism, for sure.

Um, oh, someone asked about R.C.

Sproul on penal substitution.

I have an episode called, I think it's called How Does the Cross Work?

Sorry, I'm gonna Google my own No, no, you're good.

Does the Crucifixion Do Anything?

It's an hour and a half long episode, and it deals with why penal substitution is wrong, looking at Sproul.

And I have one a month ago that looks at Sproul, he's even in the thumbnail, called Did God Abandon Jesus on the Cross?

So if that's the thing you want, I've got, uh, like, a couple hours worth of content on that.

Um, Ike says, Joe, we need you to debate Matt Dillahunty, please.

Why?

Like, what, what particular topic?

Okay, so I'll, I'll tell you my own thinking with debates.

And I don't know, I'm open to whatever people have to say about this.

Um, I want someone who has a following.

Like, I don't wanna just choose some person 'cause I either think they're really smart or really crazy, if, if I'm, like, the only person that, like, knows who they are.

That, uh, I mean, that's an exaggeration.

But I want them to actually have something of a following.

I'm happy to engage with the kind of, there, there's, like, a new wave of Protestants who are kind of up and coming, and I think they're going to be, uh, bigger names at the, in the nearish future.

But I, I want to engage with people who I think are popular enough that they're kind of representative of something b- beyond themselves.

'Cause with a debate, I don't just wanna, like, convert that person.

That would be amazing.

I've never seen that happen in a debate.

But rather, I want the people who are inclined to their position to hear a different take, and maybe reconsider.

Um, that's more of who I'm doing it for.

And then second, I think it has to be an interesting topic.

I think the person has to be, uh, either of goodwill or at least have, like, a certain baseline that you can work with them.

Because there are times where people just w- refuse to do the basic thing that a debate is, and that, I think, goes very badly.

So, I don't know, I'm, that's kind of roughly what I'm looking for in my head.

And then, um, they need to be smart enough to Like, you don't want it to be one where you win and everyone on their side is like, Yeah, but that's just 'cause you chose the dumbest person on our side.

So, I want someone who, you know, like I say, is kind of a representative position.

Um, Malachi says, Have you ever responded to Anglican Aesthetics?

He loves to make videos refuting.

No, I, I think there's some people who I don't wanna speak to him personally.

I, I've had- um, multiple encounters with him early on where he, uh, gratuitously accused me of bad faith.

Like, not just we disagreed, but, like, he was acting like I was lying.

And it was like, Ah, it doesn't seem like it's I'm not helped and his channel was small enough that I'm like, I don't think people who are watching this are open to what I have to say.

And I don't think people who are, like, on the fence are particularly, um, gonna be helped by me making a response.

And I'm just gonna get frustrated by, like, the gratuitous assumption of bad faith.

Uh, that was kind of my experience with him of, like, Well, this is a small channel making uncharitable assumptions.

He might have gotten a lot better since then.

I have not really followed him since some, some early negative encounters.

Um, The Holy One says, When does admonishing the sinner become judging?

You can With the admonition of a sinner, that's a, that's actually a really good question because I think it, it can.

You want to distinguish between the action and the conduct.

And a good way to do that is just to assume that the person didn't knowingly and willfully do the thing that they did, that they didn't understand what they did.

And then you can kind of quietly bring them aside and, and correct the issue.

Um, if you're judging motives and knowledge, particularly in an uncharitable light, I think you, you are, if not over the line, at least so dangerously close to the line that you should watch out.

So yeah, I'd say separate the behavior from the, the individual.

All right.

Um, bum, bum, bum.

Uh, let's see.

Frank C. said I was beyond legendary in the debate, praise God.

Always weird, like, reading comments where people are very complimentary of me.

But I, I'm thankful.

Um, let me see.

Uh, K Wood, can you clarify the grave images?

I think I already did that one.

If I didn't, uh, let me know.

All right.

Um, absolute primacy of Christ within the Thomistic first Scthesian, do you have any thoughts about this?

Oh gosh.

That's my boy.

Um, yeah.

So, I don't know the SCOTUS position on absolute primacy, but Chri- Christ has absolute primacy, and it's delegated out to the Pope and the bishops.

So I don't know what there is, where the discussion or the debate is, 'cause I don't know the SCOTUS position.

But the manualist tradition, it's not inherently bad, okay?

But there's a reason why our seminarians aren't inculcated with it, okay?

So just make sure you go easy on it.

Read it.

But really what's kind of more important in a sense for seminarians is pastoral formation.

Not to the , not to, uh, undermine like, theology, manualists, and all that stuff, but it can get in the way, and it did get in the way of a lot of seminarians and priests back in like the '20s and the '30s.

But yeah, I don't know the SCOTUS thing.

I don't know about that.

Um, yeah, I can speak a little bit to the Uh, so Duns Scotus's position was if Adam and Eve had not sinned, Christ would still have become man.

And Thomas' position is Christ becomes man in response to sin.

And the arguments on Thomas's side are twofold.

One, Christ saying he came into the world to save sinners.

So if he's saying that's his reason for being here, well, if there weren't sinners, then he wouldn't be here.

That was kind of the argument.

And two, um, you get things like the liturgical evidence from the exultant.

Oh, happy fault, the necessary sin of Adam.

So he would say Christ would not have become man.

So that's, that's Thomas's argument.

Duns Scotus's argument is that th- the plan of God for all time, if I'm re- if I'm remembering Duns Scotus's position well enough, the plan of God for all time was for the kind of union with Christ that goes beyond what Adam and Eve had.

And the most fitting way to do that would be in the incarnation of Christ.

So even though he comes in, in a, a concrete way, uh, in response to the problem of sin, that he would have still become incarnate, maybe in some other manner, uh, in some other time and place, um, had Adam and Eve not fallen.

So the, the problem with adjudicating it is we don't have access to a counterfactual, like what would happen if Adam and Eve hadn't sinned.

Like we're, it's, everybody's guessing.

So it's, it's one of those areas where there isn't an official Catholic position, and it seems like there couldn't be an official Catholic position.

All right, you see anything you want to add?

Uh-

Nope.

Okay.

Uh, Pete says, When apologists talk about Peter being the rock, I rarely see them mention that every time God changed someone's name, it was always for a reason.

Is there a reason this argument isn't used more?

It- I think there is a reason.

I agree with you it's, it's a good one, and I actually think it's very persuasive.

I've talked to Protestants who, uh, that was kind of a light bulb moment for them, that just the fact he's going from Simon to Peter is really helpful.

And I think the reason it doesn't happen more is we often get like a deluge of examples.

It's like, well, Jacob becomes Israel, Abraham becomes Abraham, and so on.

And it would actually be more rhetorically powerful if you chose one example and then tried to explain what the connection is.

But the other thing that makes it complicated is the way Peter works is a little more complicated than just a proper name, meaning that it seems to have something between a proper name and a title.

And, and honestly, a papal name is, is a good, um, parallel to this .

where you could say, y- y- well, the official, like Europeans w- would say, like, Pope Prevost or Pope Bergoglio, uh, Pope Wojtyła, a- and then, like, use the surname of the pope, and then other times would use, like, the papal name.

And so similarly, like, sometimes it's Simon and sometimes it's Peter in Scripture, and there doesn't appear to be, like, a clear method to when and how where sometimes it's Simon Peter.

So, as a result, it looks slightly different than Abram to Abraham, although it looks actually, frankly, a lot like Jacob to Israel, because he's still known by both names after that.

So, it's, it's more than, you know, saying Sons of Thunder for, you know, two disciples, where it's clearly a nickname.

But it, it seems to have something between a title and a proper name.

Um, but yeah, I think that's, it's, uh, a very good, uh, expl- ver- very good question.

And f- following up on that, I saw people going back and forth on, Oh, who's the rock in Matthew 16?

And I think there's The argument that there's, like, a, a pun where Petros means pebble and Jesus means rock, or r- ex- excuse me, Petra means rock, is just false.

So, y- I wanna say one thing about that.

If you find someone saying that, you should, number one, uh, ask them to show you any time in the New Testament where pebble or rock in any form is translated as Petros.

It's not.

The word for a small rock is lithos.

The word for a large rock is petra.

Uh, but also in, in older Greek, you will find Petros used not just for pebbles, but also for enormous boulders.

So, uh, in The Story of Jason and the Argonauts, there's, a, a boulder so large five men can't carry it, and the word for it is Petros.

So, the pebble thing was always a myth.

But then the ultimate, I think the nail in the coffin, uh, mixing, uh, materials in the metaphor there, is, uh, John 1:42, where Simon has his name changed to Kepha.

That's what we're told.

And then that's translated as Petros.

So, we know that there's no Petros, Petra, uh, wordplay when Jesus gives him the name, because the name Kepha just means rock in Aramaic.

So, it's, You are Kepha, and on this Kepha, I will build my church.

So, uh, we can get into the deeper question of why then do we see Petros and Petra?

Well, because Peter was already known as Petros, uh, before the Gospel of Matthew was written.

And petra is the word for rock.

So, there's no way you can Like, Matthew's, uh, hand was forced.

Like, he couldn't use Petros, 'cause that's no longer the term used for rock.

Uh, lithos is too small.

Petra is the word that he uses that's the right word.

And, uh, people sometimes say, Oh, well, he couldn't give him the name Petra, 'cause that's a girl's name.

That is strictly true, but more fundamentally, he didn't give the Greek name to Peter at all.

He was known by that name before Matthew wrote his Gospel.

Uh, you can read, like, Paul's letters, for instance, where he's known as both Kephas or Petros.

And so, uh, as a result, like, the, the die had been cast.

And so people reading back into this like Jesus is making a Greek wordplay, that doesn't make sense.

Um, okay.

I'm gonna give you, Sergeant Adhesive's question.

Uh, Sergeant Adhesive.

Which Star Wars character would make the best Catholic, and why does, why is it Jar Jar Binks?

Uh, I'm not a big Star Wars fan.

I'm gonna go, uh, Luke Skywalker?

Because he, uh, he was like the prodigal son who came back to his father, Darth Vader, at the end of the I don't know.

I have no idea.

I don't know.

This isn't my wheelhouse.

I- I'm not a Star Wars guy, but.

Let me, let me throw this out there.

Han Solo, because Scott Hahn loves puns, and the fact that there would now be two Hans mean that it would no longer be Han Solo.

So, I mean, there you go.

Uh

That's good.

That's good.

Gage says, Brisket, wet or dry?

Wet.

Yeah.

I'm gonna go wet.

There's, there's no bad way to do brisket.

My, my dad always taught us growing up that, like, if your barbecue needs sauce, you haven't made good barbecue.

Which, you know, no pressure, kids.

But there you go.

Um, Vale Mevine says, Thoughts on Rachel/Jude's intercession argument.

Is this a question about Rachel interceding for the life of her husband No.

One No, that's, uh, David's wife.

Vale Mevine, I'm gonna have to ask for a follow-up as to what you're talking about there.

I'm sorry.

Oh,

Sorry.

Yeah, yeah.

No.

I, I was thinking of David's wife.

Uh, what's his favorite wife's name?

Totally blanking right now.

Who?

David, King David's favorite wife.

Beshert.

Uh, well.

No, before, before that.

So yeah.

Fair, fair point, fair point.

Sorry, sorry.

Um, okay.

Christopher s- w- we'll get back to that question.

Christopher says, What do you think the future of apologetics looks like for Catholicism over the next five years?

Have scripted videos taken over books?

They have kinda for me.

I, I find one of the reasons I don't have as much time to write books is that I'm doing, uh, content for YouTube.

But I'm doing content for YouTube that is, like, scripted in, in some of cases.

Like, I script half of my episodes and don't script the other half.

So it's not, like, as much just brain rot as it might sound like to be like, I just watch YouTube now rather than writing books.

Uh, so I don't know.

It would It's hard to say, but I, I do think people are getting a lot of information, uh, through YouTube now.

I think the danger with it, even with good content, is the way we absorb information can be negatively impacted when you're used to, like, high-speed information.

Yes, Michael, David's first wife.

Thank you, Gage.

Um, that was what I was blanking on.

Um-So, yeah, if, if you want a good convicting book on this, Amusing Ourselves to Death from Neil Postman.

It's from, like, 1985, warning about the changes in technology destroying attention span, and he was totally right.

And, and it The book is much better than what I just described it as.

But he gives this example.

Like, the Lincoln-Douglas debates were, like, seven or eight hours long, and ordinary people would go to them at the Illinois State Fair, and then, like, go home for dinner and come back for the rest.

And they would follow these massively long debates.

Now we have, like, 30-second sound bites.

And there's something really depressing about how that shift in culture has happened, and z- A lot of the reason for that shift is a media shift, where you've moved to things that, um, are no longer They no longer reward attentiveness like reading does.

They now reward, like, fast-paced interaction, uh, like video does.

So, there you go.

Uh, oh, good morning in the future, you in New Zealand.

Uh, any thoughts on future of Catholicism the next five years?

Not really, no.

No.

Finn Pope, um I said it like you're maybe the pope of Scandinavia, said, Did either of you guys hear N.T.

Wright say that abortion is sometimes permissible?

Yeah, I was super depressed about it.

I couldn't actually watch the video.

I saw it and thought, Nah, it's too dark.

I, I don't, I don't have space for that right now.

I read his comments.

N.T.

Wright is someone I've had a tremendous amount of respect for.

When he is wrong, he is so wrong.

Like, his stuff on purgatory and the Assumption of Mary is just It's, it's crazy, 'cause on the areas that are his area of expertise, like Paul, he's brilliant.

And even if you think he's wrong, he's making smart arguments and knows how to engage with this stuff.

But there are other times where, like, he's just completely clueless.

And so, like, he had this part in one of his books about how the Catholic Church teaches that Mary never died and she was assumed into heaven, and the Eastern Orthodox believe in the Dormition of Mary, but that she wasn't assumed into heaven.

And this is all just wrong.

The Catholic Church does not take an official position on whether or not Mary died.

But in the document declaring her assumed into heaven, numerous church fathers are quoted who describe her as having died.

So, it's, it's just not true that the Catholic position is she didn't die.

Uh, and second, it took, like, 30 seconds of research to find a gazillion Orthodox Churches named The Assumption of Mary, uh, and the OCA's website talking about how they believe in the Assumption of Mary and celebrate it on the Feast of her Dormition on August 15th.

And so you just get something like that, and you're like, well, he This is someone who's, like, a scholar who made this, like, really 101 kind of error.

I don't know what's going on.

But I think there are these areas where I mean, he has kind of a chip on his shoulder about Catholicism.

You can see it when he talks about, like, John Henry Newman.

And I wonder if it's just not a blind spot for him, and a blind spot that comes up even in his promotion of abortion.

Because he was attacking the Catholic Church for not letting women have abortions, uh, in cases I think of, like, fetal deformity.

And it's like, no, we don't think deformed kids should be killed for that.

Like, that's not something they chose, and that's not a capital crime.

Um, so yeah.

I don't know.

Did you have a chance to see it?

I, no, I, I'm like, stay in your lane with when it comes to justification-

Yeah.

with Saint Paul with N.T.

Wright, 'cause he's got some good stuff on that.

But other than that, yeah, I don't know.

Yeah.

When he's on the New Testament, I guess I would say he often gets the N.T.

right, but- I co- I couldn't, I couldn't help myself.

Oh.

Um, Frank says, Why do debates on the canon never seem to happen much?

I've seen some.

The canon is something that is, um It's pretty historically research heavy, if you're gonna go deep into what do different church fathers believe and all that.

But it's really important.

I think, you know, there was just this issue with, um, Mark 16.

It's the longer ending of Mark 16, uh, part of the Bible.

And Wes Huff says no, uh, Ryan from Need God says no, and a lot of Protestants say, I don't know.

And it seems like an area where having an infallible church to set the canon is actually really helpful.

Like, if every individual Christian has to figure out the weight of modern scholarship on the, uh, Mark and authorship of Mark 16, we're toast.

Like, that Are we gonna have to figure out if all of Paul's epistles were personally written by Paul?

Like, what, what kind of measure is that?

Um, James Brown says, Is there an authoritative list of infallible doctrines?

How do we find out the authority level behind particular teachings?

E- Okay.

The- There's a couple things going on there.

This question comes up a lot, and, uh, because oftentimes with sort of a misunderstanding of the Catholic position on it.

There's different tiers of authority.

Uh, there's not an authoritative list of everything at every level.

You can find different, uh, authors who've done that, like Ludwig Ott.

Um, and, you know, Denzinger, uh, or Denzinger has, like, a big collection of church documents.

But Ott actually labels different criteria and kind of the level of ascent that they're owed.

But here's the tricky part of trying to get a teaching-by-teaching list.

Like, if I said, I want you to name every teaching Jesus has, you couldn't do it.

Well, let me give you a more specific case.

Give me every implication of the parable of the prodigal son.

What are all of the things we are being taught through that one parable?

I don't think you could give that as a definitive list that says, These and only these things.

Um, so a- as a result, like, I think if you wanna know the weight of a particular teaching, you look at how the church has spoken about it, at what level.

But if you just want, like, a list of everything, I think that's a lot trickier.Uh, da-doo-doo.

Oh.

Vale on the Vine has a follow-up.

The argument in Brant Pitre's Jesus and the Jewish Roots book about Jews asking Rachel for intercession.

I don't ever hear apologists talk about it.

I don't know this argument.

Do you know this argument?

I've read that book and I don't know, I, I don't remember that.

I've read Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist.

He has several books that have, uh, that naming format, so maybe I just don't remember this particular one.

It's probably The Jewish Roots of Mary.

Wait.

Okay, so is, is this going back to when Rachel was intercede- interceding for the, was it the children of Re- Ramah?

Uh, might have, I don't know.

I'm, I'm at a-

And that-

I'm at a total loss.

It's a ty- it's a type for Mary's intercession for her children, her spiritual children, is that That, that prophecy and what, what was it?

Oh, gosh, which gospel at the beginning with Rachel and, and Ramah?

Um, oh, uh, Matthew 1 mentions-

Mm-hmm.

uh, that like, with the holy innocents.

Or Matthew 2, sorry.

Uh, yes, in Jeremiah.

Okay.

This You've caught me completely off guard, so I will So apparently, it's in Jeremiah.

It's quoted in Matthew, but it's from Jeremiah.

All right, we're narrowing this down.

I, I don't think I've heard this argument.

Okay, 31:15.

Thus says the Lord, 'A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping.

Rachel is weeping for her children.

She refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.' So I think, if I'm guessing what an argument would be there and what the response argument would be, it's that, well, Rachel is, is literally dead, so if she's weeping, she's obviously interceding.

Um, I think the answer would be this is poetic language, in that Rachel there probably doesn't literally mean the historic person of Rachel.

So I don't know.

Beyond that, I, I haven't read, uh, Brant Pitre's argument.

I have found other positions I've held where, after reading him take, uh, on that position, I've had to change my mind on things.

So he's, like, he's someone I take very seriously.

So I don't know.

Uh, I'd be interested in seeing more.

All right.

To both men, we'll start you off.

Favorite religious order?

Uh, Carmelite.

Uh, Saint Therese of Lisieux, Saint Teresa of Avila, Saint John of the Cross, Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity, Saint Teresa Benedict of the Cross, all day every day, not even close.

Sorry.

No , that's great.

That's fantastic.

Um, in big religious orders, I was thinking the Dominicans, partly 'cause I studied with the Dominicans.

And th- the problem is, like, there's some amazing Dominicans.

They're, you know, a little bit like a box of chocolates.

You don't know what you're gonna get sometimes.

But there are enough really amazing Dominicans in the world right now that are doing incredible things.

But I like your answer maybe better, because the priority of spirituality, and that made me think of, uh, there's actually a community here in Kansas City called The Community of the Lamb, uh, Little Brothers and Little Sisters of the Lamb.

They're in France and in Italy, and I don't know where else.

They live in, uh, pretty radical poverty and, uh, spend a ton of time in prayer and, like, serving, uh, people around them, and, uh, live a life of, like, pretty strict penance, so like, they had a fight with the city because the city code, or like, I guess state code, whatever it was, required them to have hot water, and they're like, We don't use hot water.

We're not gonna use this.

And so they forced them to put hot water in their monastery, and they turned that shower into, like, a closet, just like in protest, where like they use a cold bucket of water to, to shower when they shower.

And I mean, just they, they radically wanna live in solidarity.

They move into, like, poor neighborhoods and, uh, then transform the neighborhood through love.

And so there's something so beautiful about that, the combination of, like, the prayer and the service and everything else, and-

.

Yes.

Yes, very much so.

Um No questions shown up to Saint Mark's Bible Study?

Is this someone you're in Bible study with?

Uh, no, I don't know what that is.

No.

Oh, okay.

Nope, no, no idea.

Okay.

I don't know what that is.

Nice.

Well, congrats to Saint Mark's Bible Study.

That's really good advertising.

If you have an event coming up, just put a couple dollars in the livestream and be like, We had this event.

Uh, Nicholas says, Do you think unorthodox interpretations come more from presuppositions that are quote mined, or more so genuine misunderstandings of read scripture?

I don't think it's an either/or, meaning I'll give you an example.

So I, I've had Mark 16 on the mind.

I've been watching Wes Huff, I'm gonna do a response video soon on Wes Huff's stuff about why, um, he doesn't accept the longer ending of Mark.

But I see very smart people making really basic mistakes on areas like this, and I'll give you an example.

Um, one of the arguments Wes Huff gives of why he doesn't think the ending of Mark is authentic is that it looks like it's just stories from the Gospel of Luke told in, in abbreviated form.

So you have So just thinking about the evidence, you've got a short version of things like the ****** story in Mark and then a long version in Luke that's a lot more detailed.

And so he concludes, Therefore we know Luke must be earlier than the longer ending of Mark.

But then if you ask, Well, why do you think the Gospel of Mark came before Luke?

It's, well, because he has these all really short stories, and then when Luke has the same story, it's bigger, and so it must have come later.

So I don't know if you noticed that.

But in both cases, Mark has a brief version, Luke has a long one, and for Mark 1 through 15, that's proof Mark must be first.

For Mark 16, that's proof Luke must be first.

And there's no rhyme or re- like, no one, if they actually thought about that, I think, would, um, would actually fall into that because it's, like, such an obvious error.

But because, in the back of one's mind, they have an idea of when each one was written, then when they see, like, the Road to Emmaus and they see this short little thing at the end of Mark, they're like, Well, he must be getting that from Luke, rather than, Luke must be getting it from Mark, or they most, m- both must be getting it from an actual historical event or something like that.

Like, there's other ways of reading the same evidence, and people can easily slip into that totally unconsciously.

Uh, and as I was preparing this, I nearly made the exact same mistake-

Hmm.

because I was gonna say, well, look, you get quotations of the longer ending of Mark as early as Irenaeus, and there's an apparent reference to the ending of Mark, uh, in the First Letter of Clement in the year 96.

But the problem is what's actually going on is the verbiage in First Clement and the ending of Mark sound very similar.

That could mean First Clement is alluding to Mark, or it could mean the ending of Mark is alluding to First Clement, or that both of them are alluding to something unrelated, or, you know, whatever else.

So in other words, like, even having just seen that error, I nearly fell into it myself, and then had to be like, wait, that doesn't logically hold up.

Like, I got, I can't use that argument 'cause it doesn't work.

So, all that's to say, I think people don't have much of an ability to just read scripture clean without a, a hermeneutic or a framework, and I'm not really sure that they're meant to read it without a hermeneutic.

I think it's just an important thing of getting the right lens for it.

Um, why did Pope Benedict XVI reject the longer ending?

To my knowledge, he rejects the Marcan authorship of the ending of the Gospel of Mark.

He doesn't think Mark wrote it, which is fine to believe.

Yeah.

The question of Marcan authorship is different than the question of canonicity.

Yeah.

Uh, do-do-do-do.

Uh, any, any of these, do you wanna jump in on, please?

Esther says, Why can't I have Eucharist without catechism?

You wanna take a stab?

You mean without catechesis?

Is that what she's saying?

I don't know.

Esther, without catechesis?

Are you baptized?

Are you confirmed?

I, what, what You'd have to be more specific and more detailed.

Um, but there, there, there's a reason why, uh, you know, if you're an adult, proper catechesis and OCIA is really to dispose us for a proper reception of the Eucharist, knowing what it is and how we need to prepare for it.

But, um, yeah, I don't know.

I Don't know.

Um, all right.

Yeah, I, I think It's like this.

The Eucharist is this bodily exchange with our Lord, where we come into an intimate encounter with him.

And the closest analog we have on it in terms of earthly realities is the union of a husband and wife.

And so you think about how much preparation ought to go into, like, preparing for your marriage.

Uh, and you don't want to just be like, Oh, yeah, uh, hey, whatever, whenever, you know, without any kind of preparation or meaning or, uh, you know, context.

So, from the very beginning, you find And so you can read Justin Martyr talking about this in the 100s.

The Church was looking for three things.

You had to be baptized, you had to believe what the Church believed, and you had to be living in accordance with that.

And if you, if those three things were true, then you were welcome to receive the Eucharist.

And if not, then you weren't.

This fulfills, by the way, even older rites, like Passover, where you could eat of the Passover meal, but there were certain prayers tied to it.

Uh, and, uh, the Like, you had to be circumcised if you were a man.

Eric says Eric, if you get too close to the camera, you're blurry.

All right.

Well, I'll, I'll sit back then.

Uh, Nicholas says, Have you seen the debate titled, Is the Roman Catholic Church a Gospel-denying church?

I have not.

Have you?

No.

I think I saw it promoted, um, but I didn't I, I've not had a chance to see it.

Ashish asks, Are canonizations of saints infallible?

That is the second time that question has come up for me today, which is an unusual amount of times.

And there is a dispute on this.

The Church has not definitively spoken.

But the formula reads like the formula for infallibility, and the content in question of raising someone to the altar touches on faith and morals in an obvious way.

Uh, and it's required.

Like, it's particularly for non-optional memorials, so anything above that, a memorial or, uh, a feast or solemnity.

Uh, if you couldn't force a priest to celebrate someone in hell without doing a real violation to w- the Church's duties.

So, I think for all of those reasons, that they are infallible.

Uh, but there i- And that is, by the way, far and away the majority position.

But there is a minority position that they're not, and there are people I respect who, who take that side.

Um, and I think that's, that's a mistake, but a mistake with some basis.

Uh, someone is saying, Can- Kennedy Hill, excuse me, Kennedy Hall, uh, denies Vatican II, uh, canonizations and says they're not infallible.

I don't know what reason there would be for that.

I imagine because it's, like, gotten too easy or something.

But that doesn't really make sense if you understand the reasons for infallibility.

Like, the Infallibility doesn't attach 'cause we tried really hard to find out if the person was a saint or not.

We do try really hard before the declaration.

There's a, a number of steps you go through.

There still are.

Uh, so saying that, like, they're not infallible 'cause we didn't try hard enough misunderstands where infallibility comes from.Happy Hermits says, Uh, I recently attended mass out of town.

I'm not Catholic yet.

The woman administrating the host just scowled at me.

Should I have stayed seated?

Oh.

Well, yeah, so based on the thing we were just talking about, um, until you are fully in the Church, you should make a spiritual communion rather than receiving it.

I mean, very obviously you, you didn't do anything, uh, consciously that you weren't supposed to do, and I'm glad you're asking this question.

That you Once you are fully in the Church, or G- God forbid, if you're on your death bed before that, uh, those would be the times when, when you would receive.

But until then, just make a, a spiritual act of communion.

You can look up, like, uh, spiritual communions where you just pray to be united with our Lord, but you, you wait to receive him in that most intimate of ways 'til you are fully united with him in his Church.

Um, Joe, would you debate Tovia Singer?

Uh, yes, I would love to.

All right, who is Tovia Singer?

He's this anti-Christian Jewish apologist who, uh, regularly says just insane things.

But he's popular enough Tovia Winger, someone says?

That's, that's so unfair to Mike Winger.

It's a very funny joke, but Mike Winger is, like, 1,000 times m- more sane and reasonable.

Tovia Singer is, uh, unhinged, and I think fairly dishonest.

Or maybe, maybe not dishonest.

Maybe just, like, doesn't know Christians very well.

But like, when you quote Psalm 22, uh, which the Dead Sea Scrolls points to, is, is authentically saying what Christians have always said it says, that they pierced my hands and my feet, he claims that, like, Origen added this line well after the Dead Sea Scrolls, and, and accuses Christians of raping the Bible with the Septuagint.

I mean, it's just totally unhinged.

Totally unhinged.

Would, would you be up for debating him?

He, he reaches enough people.

Oh.

I think he, he Like, there's, there's people you debate 'cause you can have, like, a really smart conversation, and there's people you debate because they have a platform that they're spreading lies, and it's worth addressing-

Yes.

like, let, let someone stand up and just call them out on the shenanigans, because the people watching don't know enough about the textual history of this stuff to be able to say, like, None of what he's saying is true here.

Right.

Right.

And so, yeah, I I'm, I'd be happy to.

Uh, I don't know if you saw-

Yeah.

someone said they're happy to see I have Dan Aykroyd on the podcast.

I look like Dan Aykroyd?

Really?

I like that it's a joke that, like, tops 20 people are gonna get.

Yeah, like our old, uh, millennials and-

Mm-hmm.

boomers.

Um, and then I think this might be the last question unless I'm missing one.

Those were previous ones.

Um, Any thoughts on Introduction to the Devout Life by Saint Francis de Sales?

It's maybe my favorite book.

Wow, okay.

Um, I have that as my go-to spiritual, like, retreat read if I don't have something else that I'm, I'm working with.

Uh, it's fantastic.

Oh, here we go.

Here, you take this one.

I've, I've been talking a long time.

Which one?

Uh, Charlie.

Uh, Do you have any daily prayer routines or recommendations?

Honestly, I would recommend the first thing you do when you get up, literally, like, when you reach consciousness, is make some sort of act of giving yourself over to God and his will for the entire day.

Consecrate your day to God.

No matter what you do, don't do, whatever, give yourself to God.

Um, but me personally, you know, I go to daily mass.

I pray the rosary and some other prayers, you know.

There are liturgical prayers.

You can pray the divine office or at least do morning and, and, and evening prayer.

But you really gotta ma- Choose your prayers that are gonna dispose your heart to increase in love of God and neighbor.

That's it.

Don't just say prayers just to say 'em.

If they are disposing you to love God more and to love neighbor more, choose those prayers.

But prayer is the most important thing in this life.

I mean, literally.

So yeah.

Yeah, I think that's very well said.

Uh, are you familiar with the miraculous minute Opus Dei talks about?

No.

Okay, they just, they talk about setting aside your first minute of the day for God, um, and just immediately turning to prayer rather than hitting snooze.

And that is a great way to set the day on a good trajectory.

That's, uh Like, I'm often woken up by my children, so that's sometimes tricky.

But you then, I, you know, try to corral them together, and then we'll, you know, offer up some intentions, and then we'll just, like, pray an Our Father.

Something to, you know, set the day on a more prayerful tone, uh, right away.

So you don't get up and check your Twitter feed straightaway?

I, not with Not if I've got my act together.

And on days when I do, I, I Not Twitter but, like, Facebook.

I'm too old for Twitter.

But, like- on days when I have been like, Oh, let's see.

I've got 1,000 missed messages, that's, like, such a worse way to begin the day.

Right.

Like, I'm not saying I've never been guilty of that, but it is a night and day, uh, pardon the bad unintentional pun there, uh, kind of difference.

Um, and then, you know, also, like, when you're taking a shower, get in, like, a certain prayer routine.

That's a great time if you have a chaotic life with small children where you know you're gonna have, hopefully, a little bit of peace and quiet to yourself, and it's a very good time to set aside for prayer.

Liturgy of the Hours, um, it's probably not feasible to do all of it.

No.

But if you can do Uh, my goal every day is to do, uh, the second reading of Office of Readings, because it's, like, y- often the saint reading for the day or some good spiritual reading, plus either morning or evening prayer.

Got it.

And sometimes it's one of those things where I have to do it while I'm driving to something.

But you can still Um, Lila Rose's brother actually has a very good Liturgy of the Hours podcast.

Uh, I think it's just called Liturgy of the Hours.

And he sings a lot of the hours, and so it's, it's easy to follow along, uh, which can be nice.

'Cause, you know, I, I was used to doing them in community, and there's something about that, where I'll, I'll pray with my wife, or we'll, we'll put that on and pray it along with the podcast.

Uh, and then a good prayer in the evening is what's called, like, a three-two-one examen.

I got this from my pastor, where at the beginning you go to God the Father and you thank him for three things from your day.

Then you go to Jesus and you ask forgiveness for two things from your day.

And then I often will make a, a little act of contrition there.

And then you go to the Holy Spirit and you make one concrete resolution for the next day.

And it should be concrete, specific, measurable.

So, you're not just saying, I should be nicer tomorrow, you're like, I'm, you know, seeing this guy, Eric.

I'm gonna try not to make Dan Ackroyd jokes.

Or whatever, you know- like, wha- whatever, whatever that is.

And then at the end of the day, you either have something to thank God for or something to ask forgiveness for.

And if you do that, it makes a, a huge difference.

Um, so yeah.

And then, okay, there was at least one question that or two, two quick ones that, that got through.

Oh, also, Spotify only has the last 100 episodes of Shameless Popery.

Some of my favorite episodes are getting removed.

I'm just gonna start re-recording old episodes and see if anyone notices.

Um, yeah, sorry, I don't know actually I don't know what to do there.

I'll, I'll ask someone who understands technology better than I do.

Uh, Matt says, Why do you think the Reformation succeeded unlike numerous previous heresies?

I would suggest two or three major factors were the difference.

Yes, say it.

Oh.

No, you go for it.

No.

Oh, the printing press.

Yeah.

For sure.

Um, and the Catholic Church is, in my humble opinion, I don't know what Joe thinks, not the Church herself but the individual members, like, the corrupt per- prelates is more to blame than Luther et al.

But yeah, the printing press.

Yeah, they, those were two of my three reasons, that Church corruption was bad enough and there was enough institutional inertia.

Like, the, the Church was saying, We need to do things to clean this up.

It's a myth that that wasn't the case, that there was enough frustration with clear abuses, coupled with the press, and you're gonna have a sea change.

And that's a powerful combination.

I mean, think about in our own lifetimes.

Well, some of you maybe are too young.

Uh, when The Boston Globe broke the sex abuse scandals, that, uh, that combination of wickedness from clergy and, uh, the light of the printing press can be very powerful.

So, the presence of a printing press in a European city in 1500, if a city had a printing press and a comparatively sized city didn't, city A was about 50% more likely, uh, to become Protestant.

And, but one of the problems with the printing press is it is a one-way flow of information.

So, someone like Luther can write a tract, and if you know he's wrong, you can't just be like, Uh, excuse me, that's You can't, like, raise your hand.

You have to then, like, I guess write your own, uh, tract in response.

And at the time, there was enough of a culture of clericalism that, uh, clerics felt like they should be the ones.

So the- there was this slowness on the Church's part to get on board.

And so, uh, Luther had, uh, like, 100 to 120,000 copies of his works made in his lifetime.

Which now is not that big, but at the time was unthinkable.

Like, nobody was putting out numbers like that.

And so his ideas spread massively, widely.

Yes, yes.

And it was really about another generation, uh, before Catholics like Saint Francis de Sales made really good use of the printing press.

Before that, Catholics would use the printing press for things like translating the Vulgate, or copying the Vulgate, and, like, papal encyclicals.

But it was not, like, widespread, um, in terms of just reaching the masses.

Um

That's a great question for you, for you.

Oh.

Joe, who is the GOAT of Catholic YouTube?

Okay, I think the GOAT of Catholic apologetics right now is Scott Hahn.

Um, I think he's somebody who every other Catholic apologist on some level has to look at, at him and be like, This guy knows what he's doing.

He's got it figured out.

In terms of Catholic YouTube, Matt Fradd or Trent Horn seem like the, the two people I would, uh, think of.

They're, they're doing very different things.

Trent is, like, online Catholic apologist par excellence.

He's like the platonic form of the thing.

Mm.

But Matt Fradd is the way a lot of us find out about anybody new.

He's like Um, oh, there's a tornado siren?

Awesome.

Uh, so yeah, I think those two guys would be If, if you don't watch Pints and, uh, Council of Trent, you're missing out.

Thanks, Vanessa.

Also, can you guys hear the tornado siren?

Oh.

Oh, hang on.

I just got another one.

Uh, my wife just called.

Hang on.

I think-

Do you want me to take that or are you good?

Oh, no.

We're Oh, yeah, we're good.

Okay.

Uh, she's probably letting me know there's a tornado.

Okay, well, we should let you go 'cause there is a tornado.

Um Oh, Happy Hermit said, I didn't go up to receive the Eucharist.

I went up to receive a blessing from the deacon or priest.

The person might've been thrown off, so I'm sorry that they, they had an awkward reaction or scowled towards you.

All right, yeah, we should go find out if there's anything we should be worried about.

God bless you.

Have a good day, and hopefully we'll see you again.

Praise be Jesus and Mary.

Now and forever.

Thank you, that was great.

Dude, that was fun, man.