Episode Transcript
[00:00:09] Okay. Yeah. Let's take our Bibles and turn to the very end of the Gospel of St. Matthew. It's chapter 28, verses 18 to 20. It's a passage that's often referred to as a great commission. And in this passage we can see our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, solemnly commissioning the apostles. And that means? It's just a Greek word that signifies a man who's been commissioned, in other words, a man who's been set out on a mission.
[00:00:37] So Matthew and Jesus coming spoke to them, saying, all power is given to me in heaven and earth, going, therefore teach ye all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you all days, even to the consummation of the world.
[00:01:01] So our Lord commissioned eleven apostles, one sent out with a commission. What exactly is their commission? Well, he just gave it to him to go to all nations, teach them all truths, to observe all things whatsoever he's commanded them for all time, even to the end of the world. So our Lord sent out these men to teach all nations all truths for all time. That, of course, is a perfect description of the Catholic Church.
[00:01:28] The Catholic Church is simply Christ himself living in and working through his mystical body, teaching all nations all the things he has commanded for all time.
[00:01:38] So it's obvious what our Lord means when he sends out his apostles to the nations for all time. But when he commands the apostles to observe all things whatsoever I've commanded you, what exactly is he talking about there?
[00:01:52] What our Lord is speaking of and what he gave his apostles is what we call binding revelation.
[00:01:57] It's important to keep in mind that all binding revelation ceased with the death of the last apostle, St. John the Beloved.
[00:02:05] And that means that nothing can or will ever be added to or taken away from that and that none of it can change. Since obviously God didn't forget anything and obviously he's not going to remember anything, suddenly he's God. It's all a done deal. Right now, theologians break down binding revelation, what God has revealed to mankind, into five basic categories.
[00:02:27] Number one, the dogmas of the faith. That's the teachings of the Church, and they can't change. Number two, sacred Scripture, and that can't change. Number three, Christian morals. That's what's right and wrong, and these can't change. Number four, the seven sacraments, and they can't change. Number five, the hierarchical constitution of the Church, and that can't change. Okay, so again, the contents of binding revelation, that body of teachings and practices, the complete body of teachings and practices which was delivered to the proselyt, are the dogmas of the faith, holy Scripture, Christian morals, the seven Sacraments, and the hierarchical constitution of the Church.
[00:03:07] And they can't change. Christ our Lord gave the Church the deposit of faith, but he did not give the Church the power to change it, alter it, leave parts out, add parts in. It's his, and it's all a done deal. Our Lord didn't give his Church the power to grant suicide.
[00:03:27] Simple fact is that the Catholic Church is actually the mystical body of Christ. It's actually Christ continuing his work throughout time in his mystical body. And so all this can, will, and must remain intact until the end of time.
[00:03:44] Now, that might seem like a strange claim, giving the chaos and insanity loose in the Church today, but it's true. So let's talk a little bit more about that.
[00:03:52] Saying that all those things, the dogs of faith, holy Scripture, Christian morals, the seven Sacraments, and the hierarchical constitution of Church, that this can, will, and must reign intact until the end of time does not mean that any particular teaching or practice will be clearly taught or defended by any particular successor of the apostles, be it the pulp or the bishops, or even by a lot of them.
[00:04:13] That's super important to understand.
[00:04:16] Saying the dogsmith of the faith, holy Scripture, Christian morals, seven sacraments, and the hierarchical Constitutional Church can, will, and must remain intact at the end of time does not mean that any particular teaching or practice will be clearly taught or defended by any particular successor apostles, be it the pope or the bishops, or even by a lot of them. Okay, so obviously, all five of these categories are under full blown attack in our day.
[00:04:49] Yes, that's correct. To give only one example, just think about how unpararently, just think how apparently incapable the vast majority of the hierarchy has been over the past 60 years in regards to actually clearly laying out the teaching of the Church on contraception.
[00:05:09] But we've actually seen this kind of chaos before and during one particularly horrific time, even at levels which approached that, that we're seeing today.
[00:05:19] During the Aryan heresy, something like 90% to 98% of the bishops became heretics. So obviously they weren't teaching the true doctrine. St. John Henry Newman called this a suspense of the function of the teaching Church. And the teaching Church refers to the Pope and the bishops that are in union with him.
[00:05:38] And he pointed out that during the Aryan heresy, most of the bishops, quote, including Pope Liberius, stopped using their teaching authority. But he was not suggesting that the pope or bishops had lost their teaching authority, but pointing out that, a matter of historical fact, that for 40 or more years they had chosen not to exercise it. Close quote.
[00:06:01] What are we saying here?
[00:06:04] We're saying that we've already seen a lengthy period in the Church in which the vast majority of the official teachers of the faith, that's the bishops, in union with the Pope, failed to teach and defend the true faith.
[00:06:17] And notice that during this horrific period, they had not lost their teaching authority. The bishops and the Pope had not lost their teaching authority. They had chosen to not use it.
[00:06:29] They had chosen to not use their teaching authority. And this is why St. John Henry Newman referred to this as a suspense of the function of the teaching Church, because the bishops and the Pope had chosen to not use their teaching authority.
[00:06:43] And I don't think you need me to tell you that we seem to be right smack dab in the middle of another one of these episodes when the bishops and the Pope have not lost their teaching authority, but they sure do seem to have chosen to not use it.
[00:06:59] So again, even if some or many of the teachings are obscured and not clearly taught in any particular age, these things that were delivered to the apostles, the dogmas of the faith, Holy Scripture, Christian morals, the seven sacraments, the hierarchical constitution of Church, these things can, must, and will remain intact by divine assistance until the end of time. In other words, on the human side of things, the Pope and the bishops in union with him may or may not teach, preach, or proclaim those things delivered to the apostles, but that will have no effect on them whatsoever. They remain unchanged, proclaimed, defended, or not.
[00:07:34] Now there's a three dollar word that theologians use to describe this unchangeableness of the Church. That word is indefectability.
[00:07:42] So we're talking about indefectibility here. And all that indefectability means is that until the end of time, by the assistance of the Holy Spirit, those things delivered to the apostles. And again, that's the dogmas of the faith. Holy Scripture, Christian morals, the seven Sacraments, the hierarchical constitution of the Church can, must, and will remain intact. Okay, does that mean the Pope and the bishop, or each bishop in union with him, or even most of the bishops in union, will actually teach preacher to proclaim those things delivered to the apostles? No, it doesn't. And all we have to do is look around.
[00:08:16] But if they do not or are not exercising their office of teaching, defend these things, they don't lose their teaching authority. It still resides in them. They're just failing to do their duty and yet that's what they specifically promised to do when they were consecrated bishops.
[00:08:33] Yeah, think about that.
[00:08:36] It's a very, very dangerous office to have in the best of times.
[00:08:40] These aren't the best of times.
[00:08:42] Put that mildly. And on that note, we know that as history draws to a close, the mystical body of our Lord. The mystical body of our Lord, again, is the Catholic Church. We know that our Lord and his mystical body will suffer the Passion.
[00:08:56] Actually, the new Catechism has about three or four paragraphs on this very thing. It's a very, very brief summary, but it's still good. And it tells us at the end of the world, the Church's final trial will be following the Lord in his death.
[00:09:09] I'm of the considered opinion that we're there, that we're deep in the passion of the mystical body. We're certainly not to the crucifixion yet that'll take place during the three and a half year reign of the Antichrist, but that we are deep in the Passion of the mystical body.
[00:09:24] And of course, we saw in the very beginning, during the Passion of our Lord, the Pope denied that he even know Christ. Three times he denied it and he, along with almost all the bishops in the world, ran away.
[00:09:38] Only one bishop remained faithful to foot across only one. That's because he stayed close to Our Lady.
[00:09:45] There's a very important lesson for each and every one of us right there, because the point I want to make here is that if it's true we're deep in the passion of the mystical body, then why should we be surprised if we see striking similarities?
[00:10:01] We need to pray, really pray and sacrifice for the Pope and the bishops.
[00:10:10] So another point I want you to really hang on to is be calm. Even though it may seem, or does seem, that the vast majority of the official teachers of the faith, the bishops in union with the Pope, are, for the most part, and in a fairly spectacular way, not clearly teaching and defending the true faith, even though it seems we're currently in the midst of a very serious suspension of the function of the teaching Church. Don't worry.
[00:10:36] Yeah, don't worry.
[00:10:41] Yeah, I'm actually as serious as a heart attack. Don't worry. You already know the dogmas of the faith, and even if you don't, they're easy enough to look up in any decent Catechism. You already have the scriptures and hopefully you read them. You already know our Christian morals, and if you don't know if something's right, or wrong, you can look it up. In a decent catechism, you still have access to the Seven sacraments. And we've talked before about what to do when there's no priest. And you already know what the hierarchical Constitution of the Church is, right? So don't worry.
[00:11:10] I consider it personally that it's a very great privilege to live in these times, but we have to make dang sure that we're doing our part. We got to stay in the state of grace. You're still seriously sinning away. Stop now.
[00:11:24] Stay in the state of grace. Strive to grow in charity, and it's absolutely essential. And by that, I mean absolutely essential in letters that I would put up 500 foot tall. That what you need to do, what every one of us needs to do if we want to get through all this, is to copy St. John, the beloved apostle, and stay right next to Our Lady. If you haven't done the consecration by St. Louis de Montfort, get the book to devotion to Mary, read it, and then do the consecration. Consecrate yourself to Our lady and stay right next to her.
[00:11:56] It's only going to get worse. Okay, let's be realistic.
[00:12:05] Yeah.
[00:12:06] Okay. We can talk a little bit more about the hierarchical constitution of the Church and explain what that means a little better. You already know it. It's actually really easy to understand. You just know this, but you probably aren't familiar with the terms. So here's what we're talking about when we're talking about the hierarchical constitution of the Church. So you have the guy in the pew. Over him is the priest, over the priest is the bishop, and over the bishop is the Pope. And that's what it looks like for all of us. Since we're Roman Catholics, we're from the Latin side of the Church. It's almost the same for the Eastern Catholics. And by that mean, we mean, like, the Ukrainian Catholics or the Maronites or Melchizede Catholics or Selmarbach Catholics or Chaldean CaTholics and so forth. The CatholicS who are from the Eastern Rites in the east, you have the same idea. Just one more step. You have the Guy in the Pew. Over him is the priest, over the priest is a bishop, over that Bishop is another bishop who is a patriarch of that. Right? Or the Equivalent. He's the head bishop of that particular Rite of Catholics, and over that bishop is the Pope. That's what the hierarchical nature of the Church looks like for the Eastern Rites. Okay? So basically, you have the Faithful under the priest, under the bishop, under the Pope. That can never change. It's just the way it is. Again, it's possible to have another bishop in the lineup if you're from the Eastern Rites, right? But you still have the same ordering. In that case, you have the Faithful under the priest, under the bishop under another bishop, under the Pope. So that's it.
[00:13:30] Any more questions?
[00:13:35] Yeah. Okay.
[00:13:37] That's actually a misunderstanding. Eastern Catholics are Catholic, just exactly the same as you and I. But the Eastern Orthodox are not Catholic. They're schismatics. They're in schism. They have some real problems in regards to their understanding of certain dogmas and their understanding of certain aspects of Christian morality. But that's to be expected, since once a group goes into schism, over time, other areas start to slip.
[00:14:06] Okay, yeah, sure. We can talk about what schism is. The way some people act. You'd think you need to have two or three doctorates in theology and be able to speak, read and write ancient Ugaritic to understand what scissor is. It's actually easier than Pi.
[00:14:20] Let's take the Russian Orthodox for an example. So here's how that looks. The Guy in the Pew, under the priest, under the bishop, under Patriarch Krill, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church.
[00:14:34] Now, what's missing?
[00:14:40] That's right, there's no pope. There's no connection to the Pope, therefore no connection to the Church. It's a branch that's been broken off. And to be fair, there are actually a number of Russian Orthodox Churches over here. I think we have OCA and Rokar, the same exact structure, but different bishops. I think right now they're all in communion with each other. But if that's true, it's relatively new development. That wasn't true when I was in seminary. At any rate, they all suffer from the same problem. There's no connection to the Pope and therefore no connection to the Church. They're all branches that have been broken off.
[00:15:12] That's what sin looks like. Objectively speaking, it's a very, very grave sin against charity.
[00:15:23] That's a very good question. Wasn't the excommunication of the Eastern Orthodox lifted, and so all this is basically a moat point?
[00:15:30] Yeah, it's true that the excommunication against Eastern Orthodox was lifted by Pope Paul years ago, but that has absolutely no effect on schism. The whole point of schism is there's no union with the Church. And that hasn't changed a bit. They still aren't in union forth Orthodox. It's still the guy in the pew, under the priest, under the bishop under whatever Orthodox patriarch they recognize lifting excommunication didn't suddenly produce a connection to the Pope. And so they still don't have a connection to the Church. They're still all branches that have been broken off. Okay.
[00:16:03] Yeah. We just can't be thankful enough to be in the one true church, and we really need to pray for these people that are outside.
[00:16:14] Okay, that's a fair enough question. But first, I want you all to do something. In the first place, take stock right now of whether anything we've talked about bothered you or not, whether any of these points made you uncomfortable, angry or not. Okay.
[00:16:28] All right.
[00:16:30] Now I want you to pay attention to how you react, to. What am I going to say? Whether this disturbs your peace or makes you uncomfortable, even angry. Okay, so what about the SSPX?
[00:16:40] Well, the only hard thing about answering that question is the emotional response it produces in so many folks.
[00:16:48] So the SSPX, let's see how that looks. You have the guy in the pew, over him is a priest. Over that priest is the district superior, who is also priest. And over the district superior, you have another priest, Father David Pagliari, the SSPX Superior General. So guy in the pew under a priest, under a priest, under a priest, there's no connection to any bishop in union with the Pope. There's no connection to the Pope and therefore there's no connection to the Church, period.
[00:17:21] The SSPX is a branch that's been broken off.
[00:17:28] Yeah, of course. It's systematic. Who exactly is Father David Pogliar under?
[00:17:34] Or better yet, who is he not under?
[00:17:38] We just went through the hierarchical nature of the Church. You have the faithful under the priest, under the bishop, under the Pope, and that can never change. It's just the way it is. Again, it's possible to have another bishop in the lineup if you're in the Eastern Rites, okay? But you still have the same ordering faithful under the priest, under the bishop, if you're Eastern under another bishop, and then under the Pope. But with ISSPX, there's no connection to any bishop and union with the Pope. There's no connection to the Pope, and therefore there's no connection to the Church. This is not complicated. Putting a picture of the Pope in your chapel or commemorating or the local bishop in your Mass do not produce union with the Church. It just doesn't work like that.
[00:18:18] Of course, they put out a whole stream of legal arguments why they aren't in sism. But all those arguments piled up together aren't worth a pale or warm spit.
[00:18:31] So it's just like the Eastern Orthodox? No, not exactly at all. The SSPX has a worse understanding of absolutely unchangeable, hierarchical nature of the Church. A Russian Orthodox friend asked me a couple months ago about the SSPX, and during the course of our conversation, when I happened to mention that there was a priest in charge, he couldn't believe it. I thought you said they had bishops.
[00:18:53] I did say they have bishops. They now have three of them.
[00:18:58] But didn't you just say that there was a priest in charge? Yeah, the superior SSPX is a priest over bishops. A priest over bishops? That's impossiblE. You can't have a priest in charge of bishops. These people aren't traditional. That's nowhere in tradition. That's completely upside down. These people aren't traditional.
[00:19:18] This is a Russian Orthodox guy, and he was, of course, completely correct.
[00:19:26] The SSPX is a branch that's been broken off.
[00:19:31] That's making you uncomfortable, isn't it?
[00:19:35] But nothing we talked about before we touched on the SSPX bothered you at all, did it?
[00:19:40] All right, we're going to come back to that. Okay, but first let me answer these questions.
[00:19:48] No lifting excommunication. The Bishops SSPX had exactly the same effect on healingism as when Pope Paul lifted excommunication on the Eastern Orthodox, which is to say nothing.
[00:20:00] How could it?
[00:20:02] There's still no connection to any bishop in union with the Pope. There's still no connection to the Pope, and therefore there's still no connection to the Church.
[00:20:09] I don't like it either. That's just the way it is.
[00:20:16] Okay, now that's an interesting objection, but let me answer by asking you a question.
[00:20:23] Even if all the bishops in the world said that SSPX was not schism, how would that affect the reality?
[00:20:31] I'm serious. I'm serious. Think about it. If everyone in the world said that Bud light guy who pretends to be a girl is really a girl, does that make him a girl?
[00:20:40] I mean, seriously, who is Father David Pagliari under?
[00:20:49] Would it be fair if I summarize that objection by saying it's a state of emergency, and so the SSPX is justified in what it does and how it does it?
[00:21:03] Okay, then let's focus on that for a minute.
[00:21:07] We got to start by reminding ourselves that the hierarchical nature of the Church is not something optional that we get to play with. It comes to us from God himself. Well, with dealing with questions like this, we need to keep that front and center.
[00:21:21] The hierarchical nature of the church is not for men to change or rearrange any more than it's for men to change the contents of sacred Scripture, to change the dogmas of the Church, or to change the morality of sinful behaviors into something that's more pleasing to their desires. This is not a relatively good idea until a state of emergency arrives.
[00:21:41] But just for the sake of the argument, let's take that idea of a state of emergency seriously for a minute.
[00:21:49] Okay, so it's possible to think of a more extreme state of emergency than the Crucifixion.
[00:21:56] That was the ultimate state of emergency. There's never been anything like it, and there never will be. Even the passion of the mystical body is Christ suffering as members. But the crucifixion was the deliberate murder of God the Son, right?
[00:22:11] So it's impossible to think of a more extreme state of emergency than the crucifixion.
[00:22:16] Everybody agree? Okay, so should we praise the apostles and disciples for running away?
[00:22:29] That's a serious question. Should we praise the apostles and disciples who ran away from our Lord's Crucifixion?
[00:22:36] Yes or no?
[00:22:45] No. Okay. That's right.
[00:22:49] As we just said a couple of minutes ago, the mystical body of our Lord is also going to go through a mystical passion, crucifixion, and death. Right?
[00:22:58] So given that reality, the fact that the mystical body of our Lord is also going to go through mystical passion, crucifixion, and death, should we praise those who run away from the passion and crucifixion of his mystical body?
[00:23:13] Yes or no?
[00:23:22] I think the SBX really has something to offer.
[00:23:25] I really do.
[00:23:28] But they've run away from the fight.
[00:23:31] They've run away from the battle.
[00:23:34] They've run away from the cross.
[00:23:39] We need to pray, really pray that they repent, turn back and come in union with the Church, and get into this fight before it's too late.
[00:23:51] Before it's too late.
[00:23:54] Okay. I hope you don't mind if we briefly return to the fact that what we said initially about the SSPX really bothered you. Okay, good. So let's walk back to the conversation really quickly. We started, we were talking about the Great commission, what exactly our Lord commissioned his apostles to do. Then we considered the idea of a temporary suspension of the teaching office as one way of understanding what's going on right now.
[00:24:27] And that led to some discussion of the Eastern Orthodox and schism. And yet none of that bothered any of y'all, did it?
[00:24:34] But then, once SSPX came in, the conversation, it started bothering you, right? I don't think that's random.
[00:24:41] See, over the years, I've known something really interesting virtually every time, with almost no exceptions, that I make even the mildest critique of SSPX or answer a question like this. People get disturbed, complain, write me letters. They're just spraying verbal bullets everywhere in some of these letters.
[00:25:00] Seems to me that if I were to summarize what those objections have in common, the ones I've seen over the years, what principle they're appealing to, it'd be something like this. And I want to be emphasized. I'm not trying to be sarcastic at all.
[00:25:13] My heart goes out to these people, even though I can't agree with them, but I understand where they're coming from, and my sympathies are with them, but I can't agree with them, if that makes sense.
[00:25:25] Okay, so this is my two sentence summary of the principle that seems to lie under their objections. And again, I'm trying to be fair. Father, you can criticize the persons and policies of any deacon, priest, or bishop in the world, including the Bishop of Rome, that's fine.
[00:25:40] But you cannot criticize the persons or policies of any deacon, priest, or bishop of the SSPX, and especially not Archbishop Lefev.
[00:25:53] Yeah, I can repeat that, Father. You can criticize the persons and policies of any deacon, priest, or bishop in the world, including the Bishop of Rome. That's fine. But you cannot criticize the persons or policies of any deacon, priest, or bishop of the SSBX, and especially not the archbishop.
[00:26:12] But maybe this has nothing to do with why our conversation bothered you. We end up talking about society, and I don't want to put you on the spot here, okay? So I'd like to suggest that later on today, you take some time and really enter into yourself and look in your heart and ask yourself, why exactly did that bother you?
[00:26:30] That's important. Really important. Not for me. I'm at peace. But for you. So take some time and get to the bottom of it.
[00:26:37] Okay? So that's it. Any more questions?
[00:26:45] Yes, actually. The SSPX has a lot more problems than schism and their completely novel approach to the hierarchical nation of the church. If you're really interested in the truth of the matter, probably the best one stop thing. There's a three hour long conversation between John Salza and Ozzy named Matt Fradd. That would be a good place to start. It's on a YouTube program called Pints With Aquinas. Yeah, John Salza and Matt Fradd. It's long, but he'll cover a lot of different things. There's other things I could say too, but you can turn there.
[00:27:16] Okay, well, yeah, I need to get going, but let's wrap this up with two things I'd like you all to ponder till the next time we get together. And they're actually related to what we wound up talking about today. So, first is, what is God looking for in the hearts of men?
[00:27:36] What is God looking for in the hearts of men?
[00:27:41] Make sure you know the answer to that question. Not just know it, but believe it and live it.
[00:27:48] What is God looking for in hearts of men? And secondly, there's a saying I'd like you to ponder. And while you're doing that, really take a brutally honest look at yourself. No flinching. Okay? I mean it.
[00:28:00] Wise men once said, when an honest man discovers he's mistaken, he it'll either cease to be mistaken or cease to be honest.
[00:28:16] Look around at the world. Look at your own heart.
[00:28:19] When a wise man aught discovers he's mistaken, he will cease to be mistaken or cease to be honest.
[00:28:29] All right, talk to you all later. Bye.
