Avoiding Babylon
Avoiding Babylon was started during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. During these difficult and dark days, when most of us were isolated from family, friends, our parishes, and even the Sacraments themselves, this channel was started as a statement of standing against the tyrannical mandates that many of us were living under. Since those early days, this channel has morphed into an amazing community of friends…no…more than friends…Christian brothers and sisters…who have grown in joy and charity.
As we see it, our job here at Avoiding Babylon is to remind ourselves and those who enjoy the channel that being Catholic is a joyful and exciting experience. We seek true Catholic fraternity and eutrapelia with other Catholics who, like us, are doing their best to live out their vocation with the help of God’s Grace. Above all, we try to bring humor and joy to the craziness of this fallen world, for as Hillaire Belloc has famously said:
“Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine,
There’s always laughter and good red wine.
At least I’ve always found it so.
Benedicamus Domino!”
Avoiding Babylon
Rome Has Spoken: The Most Contested Encyclical in the Modern Church | Immortale Dei (Full LOCALS Show)
This episode is only available to subscribers.
Avoiding Babylon +
Access to the FULL show on audio!If you’ve ever assumed “separation of church and state” is the safest way to keep the peace, Pope Leo XIII has a blunt counterargument: a state that acts like God is irrelevant eventually rewrites everything that holds a society together. We walk through Immortali Dei (1885), one of the strongest statements of Catholic teaching on church and state, natural law, and the public duties of rulers and citizens. Along the way, we touch the famous tradition behind the Saint Michael Prayer and why Leo thought the political storms of his day had a deeper spiritual dimension.
We lay out Leo’s core framework in plain terms: two powers, spiritual and temporal, both established by God, each supreme in its own realm. Then we unpack the thesis and hypothesis distinction, the “ideal versus concession” tool that shaped Catholic social teaching for decades. That sets up the unavoidable question modern Catholics keep tripping over: how does Immortali Dei square with Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae on religious freedom? We don’t pretend the tension is fake, but we do show why the debate persists and what’s at stake when words like “rights,” “coercion,” and “conscience” get sloppy.
We also read the lines that hit closest to home in modern America: the state redefining marriage, pushing the Church out of education, and treating truth as opinion. If you care about Catholic social teaching, the social kingship of Christ, and why modern liberalism keeps producing cultural whiplash, this conversation gives you the map and the vocabulary to think clearly. Subscribe for the next installment, share this with a friend who argues politics all day, and leave a review with the biggest point you disagreed with.
Get 10% off an amazing Black Monk Rosary by going to https://www.blackmonkrosaries.com/?ref=AVOIDINGBABYLON and using code AVOIDINGBABYLON at checkout!
Check out our sponsor, Nic Nac, at www.nicnac.com and use code "AB25%" for 25% off of your first order!
Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1
https://www.avoidingbabylon.com
Merchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.com
Locals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.com
Full Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribe
RSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rss
The Saint Michael Prayer Origin
SPEAKER_03If you have ever prayed the Saint Michael prayer, you have prayed words written by the Pope in this episode. And according to the tradition of the Church, he wrote them because of something he heard. On October the thirteenth, eighteen eighty-four, after offering Mass in the Vatican, Pope Leo XIII suddenly went pale. Witnesses say he collapsed at the foot of the altar, and he looked, for a moment, almost lifeless. When he recovered, he told them what he had heard a conversation between God and Satan, where Satan boasted that, given enough time and enough power, he could destroy the church. Then he heard our Lord grant the request and give Satan a sentry for the forces of hell to do their worst. Now this is of course private revelation, and no one is bound to believe it. But here's what is not in dispute. Shortly after this mystical experience, Leo, who was convinced that the crisis around him was not merely political but also demonic, did something more than write a prayer. He sat down and wrote a constitution. Not a constitution for the church, but instead for the state. He called it immortality day.
Leo XIII Writes For The State
SPEAKER_04I'm just look, I had a rough couple days, but um reading this encyclical was hard. Yeah. Uh well, first off, it was one of my favorites. Um by far, like one of my favorites. Like I was like, holy cow, because you think to like um Pope Paul the Six writing um uh Humani Vitae, and and you'll hear like modern Catholics be like, it was prophetic, it was prophetic. It was not a big thing. You go back and you read Humani Vita, and it's the weakest, like barely it's just I mean, it gets the point across, right? I guess. But when you read this encyclical, like almost everything uh Pope Leo the 13th wrote was prophetic, first off, like truly prophetic. And it's it's it makes me angry that he was never canonized. Um, I never had blessed like Pius the Ninth. If I ever have a dire situation in my life, I will be praying to Pope Leo the 14th, uh 13th, Pope Leo the 13th for his intercession because like the the holiness just drips through his writing, you know, and and his aching for the church and his aching for the world. And everything he wrote was so prophetic, and it's just every single warning he gives in this encyclical was ignored, not just by the state, but by the church, and it's just it was it's rough, man, because I mean not just ignored, you could say potentially like even turned on its head over Vatican II. Yeah, and it's like when you when you read this one, you're like, man, I would I would die a happy martyr for this pope. You know, like I would I would lay down my life for this pope because he's just he's just he's just amazing, man. I don't know. It's uh I don't know. The hard part of this episode is going to be not to read the entire encyclical because it's just banger after banger paragraph and the whole last four pages highlighted, I think. It's it's dude, it opens up talking about like Christian civilization or pagan civilization in the early church and how their punishment, you know, like and it's like, but if you if you if you if you believe that and you view that and say, yeah, God was giving the pagans their joke, because the the people had always said like the church was the cause of the fall of the Roman Empire, and he's like, Well, no, it the fall of the Roman Empire was a chastisement by God for their unfit, you know, for their for for their or persecuting the curve the church, persecuting the church and for just being wicked pagans. And when you if you really believe that, then you have to see what's happening now as like we're on we're on course for another chastisement because of what we're doing, you know. But um, yeah, and that that vision that Leo had, it's just it just like just even the even the fact that like where do you know where the lore comes from? Like where where the legend comes from? The actual source for yeah, like is it does anybody ever know the source, or is it when like did it was that like a post-consiliar uh trad thing, like where we invented it, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_03Well, I mean, uh, so I yeah, I don't know where the story itself comes from. Um, I mean, he did write the St. Michael prayers, right? And there's multiple, there's the shorter version for the laity and a couple longer versions for use in actual exorcism. So, like the pr the obviously the prayer exists, and he did write it and he mandated it being Sid Um after church. So, but uh as far as the reason we've been told for why the prayer was written, I I honestly don't know where that actual source directly comes from.
SPEAKER_04I I remember when um when uh Taylor wrote Infiltration, he said he couldn't find original sources for it. Right. He couldn't find original sources for that, and he couldn't find original sources for the quote about them uh uh Pope Pius XII saying, uh I you know they I have I I see them tearing down the altars and thing, you know, whatever quote that was. That was the yeah, that's another yeah, there's no he couldn't find sources for that one either. But um, yeah, it's just uh yeah, this is a tough one. Um all right, so tonight on locals, we have so much stuff to do on locals tonight. Like we have to, we have I think we should play Leo's clip of what he said about the SSPX. Um we have, I think during this episode, maybe we play the Vance clip. Vance being asked about Pope Leo because it's kind of pertinent to like relationships between church and state. But then we also have um there's so much drama going in the Ortho Bro world right now with like Jay Dyer stepping down and all that stuff. But there was an Orthodox priest who that's uh Stephen DeYoung. Yeah, he wrote about Father Stephen DeYoung, Father Josiah, whatever his name, Trenum, whatever his name is, uh Peugeot, and Jay Dyer. And he had some really interesting things to say, especially about Father Father Josiah's fake accent. It's kind of funny, it's kind of funny. Um, but yeah, so we're probably gonna all right. So we're gonna cover ortho controversy, um, Pope Pope Leo addressing the SSPX. Vance. What else? JD Vance. JD Vance, we'll maybe do here, but no, I have like a whole bunch of other like it's gonna be a packed local show tonight. So we'll try and get through this one in a in an hour if we can. We'll see how that goes because this uh this is I mean, all right, so and also we're doing rarum Navarum next, right, Rob?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, unless you wanted to do Libra uh Libratas, but I I think I think it's time to hit I think it's time to hit Rare Mavarum.
SPEAKER_04Now, Rob Rob had suggested maybe breaking that into two episodes because this one I feel like should have been two episodes, probably.
SPEAKER_03But rare, so this one is a little longer than the ones we've been doing, but not too bad. Rare em Navarum is about 20% longer than this one, but also like you know, to really get into rare Navarum, we're gonna have to talk about communism, socialism, capitalism, labor unions. You know, there's there's maybe not as much history, but there's a lot more context to talk about than what we've been doing. So we might have to do like a his history and context episode and then a whole separate episode on the actual encyclical.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's uh man. Well, either way, we're gonna do Rare Navarum next. So if you guys want to read up, that's where we're gonna go. Um, I have some news. I'm uh going to be bringing in Nick Knack to my company tomorrow because all of the guys I work with suck and they all need a little bit of a pick-me up. Uh, I lost my mind this morning on the job and screamed at everybody because they all suck. And tomorrow they're gonna have a little bit of nicotine to put a little pep in their step. So if you also would like to have a little nicotine and pep in your step, go to nicknack.com, use code AB25% for 25% off your first purchase, use code AB10 for 10% off all subsequent purchases. Nicknacks is a nicotine product, nicotine is an addictive substance, but that's going to be the point as I throw these at my men tomorrow if they piss me off.
SPEAKER_03Well, so it's a good then that they uh Nick Knack emailed me today and said if we wanted to have them send us more, they would. So they're they're going to have to can can we put uh flavor requests in? Because I'm you just tell them what you want, what you want.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, tell them. I mean, I I I'm out of um what was it, tangerine that we loved? Oh no, no, no, no, no. I just like all the citrus ones, man. I do like all the citrus ones, but is my favorite. I'm out of that one, and uh, I would really I would I would like to get some more of those. So um Bobby says, uh, oh yeah, so go to Nick now. And also, I may just beat all my men with my um Black Monk Rosary. So go to blackmonkrosary.com. Black Monk Rosary, first off, um, graduations are coming up. Great graduation presents, right?
SPEAKER_03I got to uh pray the rosary on a black monk rosary this weekend at uh at my uncle's bedside a couple hours before he died. So oof. Well, and it was the it was the um luminous mysteries, I assume. Absolutely not, no. Come on, I was gonna say it was on the uh uh Memento Mori rosary, so it was perfect.
SPEAKER_04Luminous mysteries for sure. No, all right, go to uh black book rosaries and uh use code Avoiding Babylon to get 10% off at checkout. Bobby, this is uh actually a pretty cool comment because we're the new Rome waiting to be chastised. We made peace with the Persians and had a gladiator fight at the Emperor's Palace on his birthday. Uh Pope Leo actually talks about us defeating the Mohammedans in this encyclical. It is just such a wildly good encyclical, man. So, all right, Rob, why don't you take us through the historical context and then let's dig into this thing?
Why Immortali Dei Matters Now
SPEAKER_03Okay. So if uh all of you who've been with us through the series so far, you already know a lot about Leo the 13th, and you probably are starting to see kind of what he's doing with his pontificate. But just to remind anyone or catch anyone up, uh, in episode four, we did Attorney Patras. That's when Leo the 13th rearmed the Catholic mind by bringing back Aquinas and rebuilding the church's intellectual foundation. That was kind of his first his first move. And the episode after that, episode five, we did Humanum Genus, where he names the enemy, the enemy, Freemasonry, and he pulls apart their whole philosophy and all the secret societies, and he shows the church how the city of man is being built around them. So that's his second move. And now, in this episode, and which uh in with Immortality Day comes out in 1885, comes his third move. And it wasn't just enough to rebuild the Catholic mind and to name the enemy. Um, at some point you have to answer the question that that enemy is forcing upon you. And the question is, what's the alternative? Um, if the liberal, secular, religiously neutral state is wrong, and Leo the 13th had spent his entire pontificate arguing that it was, then what's right? You know, what does a nation look like when when it's correct? And Immortality Day is Leo's answer. It is the most positive, most constructive document we've done in the entire series so far. You know, if episodes one and through one through three, um, you know, which was what Mirari Voss, uh, Quanticura in the syllabus, and then I forget what episode three was. But if those were the church getting knocked down, um, episodes four, five, and six here are the church getting back up. Um, and this is the one where the church, you know, basically says this is how how how it's supposed to be done, how states should be run. Um, but to understand why it had to be written, we have to kind of look back at the pressure Leo was under in 1885. By this point, he'd been a prisoner in the Vatican for 15 years. The Papal States were gone. Um, and across the you know, what was the Catholic world, the government after government were running the same Masonic playbook, basically, you know, the playbook Humanum Genus just exposed. In France, the Third Republic was secularizing the nation, stripping the Catholic orders out of the schools, secularizing education top to bottom, driving the faith out of public life by law. In Italy, obviously, the state had seized Rome, but it continued to treat the church as best as just a private club. Um, in Germany, Bismarck's uh Kulturkampf had only just started to wind down after years of arresting arresting bishops and seminar closing seminaries. And uh underneath all of it ran, of course, the philosophy we've been talking about liberalism, not in like the American political sense, but as the like the total theory of society.
SPEAKER_04And and and and essentially, like the the principles in which America was founded. Like, yeah, like all the things he's he's addressing are the principles in which America is founded. And the principles in which all of us who went to public school were taught were these amazing things, like freedom of religion, freedom of speech, all these, like all of these things, he sees that they will become the ruin of society.
SPEAKER_03And he's just and we're we're gonna talk a little bit about America uh prior to this encyclical. So, yeah, yeah, you're absolutely right. I also think one of the documents Michael, we're gonna do this on locals tonight.
SPEAKER_04We just said that. Sorry, go ahead, Rob.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, um, I think one of the documents, one of the non-encyclical documents we should do is his um is his letter against Americanism. Yeah. Um, eventually. But anyways. Um, so liberalism is of course the doctrine that the people, you know, are the only source of authority. Um, all religions are equal before the state. Church and state must be separated, you know, and that God is basically a private hobby with no claim on public life. We've already talked about all this. Um you know, and to us, as you just said, it it's it's what our world is is built on now. It's what it is just the world, but in a sense, it already was in 1885. In 1885, this was just simply progress, it was settled, it was obvious to them. It was the way they thought civilized modern nations were supposed to work. Um, and Leo looked at all that and called it, you know, what he believed it was, and he believed it was a lie about the nature of authority itself, and he set out to prove it in Immortality Day.
Two Powers Spiritual And Temporal
SPEAKER_03Um, and the core teaching of Immortality Day is that there's two powers. Um, of course, Immortality Day is last and for the immortal god. It was issued on the Feast of All Saints Day in 1885, November 1st. Um, so this is uh what about a year, a year after his vision that his vision happens on October 13th, 1884, which is 33 years to the day before the miracle of the son of Atomar. Oh wow, yeah, yeah, that's interesting. Um, so this is uh about a year after that, and he opens it not with a complaint, um, but with a vision of order. And his starting point is that all authority comes from God, not from the people, not from the consent of the governed, uh, from God alone. Um, and if all authority comes from God, then there's two authorities that God has established honor, two perfect society uh societies, as Leo calls them. One, of course, is the church, which God established to govern the things of the soul, of eternity, of salvation, and the other is the state, which God established to govern the things of the body uh and of the temporal common good. So two powers, the spiritual and the temporal, both from God, both real, both with genuine authority in their own sphere. And you know, it it wasn't a call for theocracy. Leo's not saying that the Pope should run the government or that priests should be magistrates or anything about that. He explicitly draws the line that the church governs souls and the state governs civil affairs, and that each is supreme in its own domain, basically. Um but Leo says the state is not free to be neutral about God because the state authority comes from God, so that the state then has a duty to God. So a nation, just like a man, owes worship to its creator, and therefore a rightly ordered state must publicly recognize the true religion, protects the rights of the church, and order its laws as far as it prudently can toward the eternal destiny of its citizens. You know, Leo argues that a Christian nation is not a nation that just happens to have Christians in it, it's a nation that publicly acknowledges Christ as King in its laws, in its institutions, and public.
SPEAKER_04So I don't mean to jump in, but just to just to add some context. Yeah, no, for sure. The um the in well it's it's a premonition that Leo's having where he's seeing the got the world governments around him no longer recognizing Christ as king. Right. And he's and he's he's anticipating what that means for for for the world, right? And then you end up with like Pius the 10th ends up writing an encyclical about Christ the king and instituting the 11th, okay, instituting the feast of Christ the king because it gets so much worse by his time. But these are it's just a prophecy that that Leo is seeing about to unfold.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. Um so so this, you know, the this ideal from Leo is is the thesis. Um and you know, but the moment you you say that, you know, what he believes out loud, whether now in 2026 or even back in 1885, every instinct that the modern world has trained into you screams that it's impossible, dangerous, or or even wrong. But Leo anticipated that reaction. And his answer to to that reaction is is potentially the most important and even controversial idea in the entire episode, even potentially more so than than what he lays out about the state. Um so so that you know, like like I said, Leo anticipated that that reaction that people were going to have. Um he was honest enough to face it. You know, he just he's describing the ideal state, ideal Catholic state. Um, but he's writing to a to a church that's scattered across um you know nations that are Protestant, pluralist, secular, or you know, openly hostile to the faith. You know, so he's writing to people in nations where the ideal isn't just unrealized, it's currently impossible.
SPEAKER_06Yeah.
SPEAKER_03You know, so so what is the Catholic supposed to do in a country that will never most likely never be a confessional Catholic state? Or are they supposed to pretend or they supposed to revolt? Are they supposed to just despair? And Leo's answer, and it's not just his answer, it had been worked on um for a couple decades prior to this, um, by uh what was the funny French name Josh Charles said last episode? Dupin Lu? Oh uh Bishop Dupe. No, it was uh It was Dupen Lu. Dupin Lu. Yeah, it was Dupin Lou. Um he he's one of the he's one of the uh the theologians that that were work was working on this, but um uh the the answer became known as the thesis hypothesis uh framework.
Thesis And Hypothesis Explained
SPEAKER_03And it's it's uh it's really one of the kind of the cleanest, uh slickest pieces of of social doctrine the church has produced. And um the the rest of this, um honestly, probably the rest of the whole. Series of encyclicals we're going to do really depends on on people understanding it. Um, and and it's pretty simple. So the the thesis is the ideal, right? So it's what should be the unchanging norm. And in this context, it's the you know, it's a confessional Catholic state that recognizes the true religion, gives the church her rightful place, and who may even limit the public spread of grave religious error for the good of souls. Um the principle underneath all that is the whole the phrase, you know, error has no rights. Yeah, truth has rights, people have rights, but error itself, falsehood, has no positive claim on the public square that the state exists to serve the truth. Um, now, so that's the thesis, in at least in this context. The hypothesis is kind of the concession to reality, it's the prudent application of when the ideal cannot be achieved without causing even greater harm, you know, harm like civil war, um, harsh persecution, you know, complete anarchy and chaos. So, you know, in this sense, the the hypothesis in a pluralistic or non-Catholic society is you know, the church tolerating religious liberty, you know, uh accepting a degree of separation between the church and state, not because it's ideal, but because it's the lesser evil at that point. You know, it's basically kind of the medicine for this the sixth situation.
SPEAKER_04I was thinking about this in light of the council, uh, the second vatican council.
SPEAKER_03Right, and this this will go right to it actually, but yeah.
SPEAKER_04Like I was thinking about this in light of the second Vatican Council, and I was thinking, like, what would happen if Leo the 14th came out talking like Leo the Thirteenth, right? Like, it might cause total and utter chaos, you know. And I and I was thinking, like, when Paul VI lays down his papal tiara, that concession. Like, is that what's going on here? Is it basically like this is the only way the church is going to be able to function in the post-World War II world, right? And but the the thing is, all it just kept coming back to was the men that are in the hierarchy today don't view the church the same way Leo XIII does. They don't see the church as the teacher of all humanity, they don't see the the church as the like the the the instructor of nations.
SPEAKER_03It's simply the privilege route to them, right?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's the privileged way, or it's a or they even like like they still teach the Catholic faith, right? Like you you still get the Catholic faith in that you're getting the sacraments and you're being taught about mortal sin and you're being taught about uh what holiness looks like, things like that. But they're no longer the the the modern hierarchy no longer sees the church with the same vision that Leo the 13th or any but any of the pre-conciliar popes saw the church and her role in society and the world. So it's it's kind of jarring when you're reading some of these things by Leo because you're just like, man, this that's just a different.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah, you're supposed to say elder brother before me, but I think I just said it first. That's all right. Let them talk. Well, I just ignore them now. Everybody comments, my face is freaking red, my studios, I don't even care. So the thesis in in this framework never changes, it's rooted in divine law, it's the permanent ideal. The hypothesis is a practical accommodation to messy, you know, reality. So toleration uh of other religions is not endorsement. Tolerating error isn't the same as saying error is good, it's saying that under these specific conditions, fighting it would cost more than just bearing it. Um, so what Leo does is he gives Catholics a way to live faithfully in a hostile secular world. What just happened to the comments?
SPEAKER_04I put ocean and timeout. Uh time out or forever? No, timeout. I gave him a timeout. No, I think you I think you oh, I banned them permanently again. I meant to just put them in timeout.
SPEAKER_03No, ocean, I ocean. I'll fix it after the video.
SPEAKER_04You go you go too far every episode, ocean. Eventually you get to me. I don't know. You're right, you got to me. See you later. You'll come back.
SPEAKER_03This is an interesting theory. The laying down of the tiara was possibly the beginning of the hundred years that Jesus said he would give sanctum.
SPEAKER_04It was it was either then or it's 1947. Those are my two theories. Like, I I either think it's at that moment when Paul the Sixth does that or 1947, because 1947, so many things are happening in 1947.
SPEAKER_03I mean, I've always I don't know. I guess I've always thought that it probably began right then and there, but the church in 1985 wasn't great, you know. Like, if that's when the hundred years ended, I mean, I are we better now than we were in 1985? No, that's why I thought I definitely the 80s were like the worst of the liturgy, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_04Like, well, okay, so we were talking about this a little bit earlier, too. Um, so like I you think um Leo, the uh Leo the 14th's writings are on par with like JP2, or you think they're even better than JP2's?
SPEAKER_03Uh that's I mean, I'm JP2 is a lot of uh um what was it, phenomenology, right? Yeah, and I I'm just that's it's it's always just like two wishy-washy feely, you know, feely wheelies sort of so like you you have a major you have a major drop-off at the council, right?
SPEAKER_04Like a major drop-off where I mean, at least you still do get Humani Vita after the council, which is like uh, you know, it's I mean it's it it it holds the line. Um JP2. I don't know, man. If if you read Veritat's Splendor, like he's at least like giving moral clarity in that, and he's like, you know, he's he's uh reaffirming moral principles in it. Um Benedict, I mean, got like these guys are all modernists, don't get me wrong, they're all modernists, all all of the post-conciliar popes are modernists, but Benedict at least like had a mind for theology, even if it was a little modernist, he at least was like a a theologian, so he knew how to how to write. But there is a severe drop off with Francis to the point where it's like scandalous, yeah. And then and then Leo comes, and Leo's not as scandalous as Francis, but it's the same thing, like it's no the same wishy-washy nonsense language that, like, yeah, right, he's not he's not making exceptions for gay blessings, but it's still that same Tuco Fernandez I was gonna say I think that's that's the common thread. Yeah, yeah, maybe, but I I do think there was another significant drop off once the Francis papacy started that I like I I don't see I don't know. Whatever. Well, let's let's I mean I I I'm not saying Leo the 14th's gonna suddenly start writing Leo the Thirtieth. It's hard it's hard to defend anything after the council after reading some of these encyclicals with you, man. It's like it's just so like I as much like I still don't think the settings are right, but I have a lot of empathy for their position because you're just like, what like man, this is such a drastic change.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it is. Um, where was I? Okay, yeah, so with the the the thesis hypothesis stuff, Leo gives Catholics a way to live faithfully in a really hostile world without ever conceding that the hostile secular world is right, you know. So he's he's he's telling Catholics you can obey the laws of a religiously neutral republic, you can be a good citizen of your nation. You and you can still hold, you know, that that this arrangement is is a wound, it's a concession to the fallen, you know, to a fallen age, and it's not the way God ultimately wants nations to be to to be ordered. And for like 80 years after this, that that whole framework is how Catholics understood the relationship between church and kin church and state, you know, it was the the standard framework.
Vatican II Religious Liberty Tension
SPEAKER_03But then came Vatican II and a document called Dignitatus Humanae. Um, and you know, that's that the the question that dignitatus humane raises, you know, has been kind of tearing at the church ever since. Um so you know, in 1965, the church promulgate promulgates dignitatus humane, which is the declaration on religious freedom. And it based I didn't pull up the actual document, I'm not gonna read from it, but to summarize, it says, at least in like the common reading of today, that every human person more or less has a right to religious liberty, that no one should be forced to act against his conscience in religious matters, um, and that no one should be prevented from publicly practicing their religion within due limits, and even that the right should be recognized in a constant, you know, in the constitutional law of society.
SPEAKER_04Or the Detroit Archbishop going to a mosque and praising Islam.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, to say the least. Um now compare that to Leo the Thirteenth. Immortali Dei says that the says that the ideal state may limit the public expression of religious error because error has no rights. Dignitas humane, many say, says the state should constitutionally protect the public expression of religion, including in practice false ones. So it's it's there's no small difference there. And you know, even to this day, to a lot of faithful, intelligent Catholics, it looks like the church said one thing in 1885 and then said the opposite thing in 1965. You know, and how you how you answer the question, did the did the teaching change, you know, has has really split the Catholic world since you know for the last 60 years. You know, you have the the traditionalist critique, you know, from men like uh Archbishop Lefebvre and Cardinal uh Ottaviani, um, you know, who who at least maybe not initially, but eventually came to say that the teachings seem to change. Um, Leo the Thirteenth taught the social kingship of Christ, uh, whereas dignitatus humani seems to contradict it. You know, and and if the since the church cannot reverse her own solemn teaching, it seems like something there has gone gravely wrong. Um, you know, and it that's kind of if not this specific subject, this kind of problem is the the doctrinal engine of the entire traditionalist movement, you know, and if you push it to its extreme, you know, you you do get kind of the sedative contism that we covered in the our Vatican I episode.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_03On the other hand, you have the the the content uh continuity reading, you know, from like Benedict, um, where he addresses it in his famous 2005 address on the human uh humanitarian continuity, you know, and they argue that the teaching kind of just it didn't reverse, that the principle didn't itself change. Air still has no rights, but what's changed was just the prudential application of the light of modern of the modern state. They say that uh dignitas humane is talking about immunity from coercion, basically a civil right not to be uh forced, you know, to to practice Catholicism. Which is a different question, they say, from whether error has a positive right to exist. Um, you know, they they in Leo Leo's own categories, some of them argue that the council just universalized the hypothesis that it recognized that in the modern world, almost always religious liberty as a civil arrangement is the prudent, potentially even permanent application for the modern world. Um you know, so it's it's uh it's obviously not a settled question, um, even to this day, and and there's a lot of unresolved tension in the church because of it.
SPEAKER_04Um but but what we do know is you can't really understand the crisis in the modern church without understanding this encyclical, because it's kind of like I I just bought the um the catechism on modernism, and it's it's it's all based on like basically Leo the Thirteenth and you know um the syllabus of errors and all this, like it's it's just a catechism on modernism, so that you have a better way to understand how subtle some of these things are, like some of them are so subtle, and they just kind of infected everybody and everything, and even American Catholics, even Cedivantists, are spewing modernism from like a modernist American point of view.
SPEAKER_03And you know, it's um whether right or wrong, you know, continuity or or departure, like it it we do have to look at the world as it existed, like at the time of the Second Vatican Council. And I'm sure we'll get there through the series, but like you know, when Leo's writing this in 1885, Europe, the Catholic Europe is crumbling. Yeah, and by the time of the 1960s, it's gone, you know, yeah, whereas the American Catholic Church is growing steadily, yeah. You know, in a wor in a in a country, in a secular country with freedom of religion, you have the Catholic Church growing and thriving, whereas in Catholic Europe, Catholic Europe had collapsed. So I could see where where they're saying, hey, in this day and age, it is prudent to just always have religious liberty, to just, you know, yeah, because at least Catholics weren't being persecuted here.
SPEAKER_04So they were they were viewing the revolution through the American lens instead of the French lens, right? That's I mean, we we've heard Benedict even say that. Like the French Revolution was all about persecuting the church and taking away the church's um privileges and trying to uh subdue the church, where the American uh revolution was kind of just like freedom of religion, everybody should do what they want, we won't bother you. The church, the state can't interfere with church matters, you know, that separation of church and state. Where Leo's lamenting the idea of the separation of church and state, but they're seeing the church flourish under these conditions of a separation of church and state. I get, I mean, I I I I can um like empathize with their perspective on it at that time, especially while the world is in total chaos in the 1960s. You have you know revolutions on the streets in America, JFK is assassinated. Like it's it's a wild time going on in in in the world. Well, that was years later, but still.
SPEAKER_03Um, yeah, and and it's important to realize like immortality day sets in motion a lot of things, it kind of starts a chain reaction that runs through the next hundred years. You know, three years after this, uh Leo Paul uh promulgates his encyclical uh libertas, which is kind of a deeper treatment of of human liberty, where he defines true fear freedom against like the false liberal version of freedom. And that encyclical with immortality day kind of becomes the the backbone of Catholic political philosophy for the next you know 80 to 100 years. Three years after that, in 1891, comes Rerum Navarum, which we'll talk about next time. You know, so that's his encyclical on capital labor, the rights of workers, and that launches modern Catholic social teaching as we know it. Um, and rerum Navarum stands on the foundation that Immortality lays the you know the conviction that a society owes its order to God, not just um you know, not just on economic markets or or political majorities. And then after that, you know, in 1899, he issues a letter called Testum uh Benevolentia, which addresses the church of the United States and the the uh heresy of uh Americanism, you know, and the question underneath that is exactly the the thesis hypothesis question we're talking about. You know, is the American model, the separation of church and state, religious liberty for all, is it merely a tolerable hypothesis? Or, you know, or at some as some American Catholics were starting to teach, it has the actual thesis, you know, the actual ideal better than what Leo describes in Immortality Day. Um, and in in that letter in 1899, he says more or less that the American arrangement may be a workable accommodation, um, but don't don't mistake that accommodation for the ideal, basically. Um so yeah, every thread, whether it's in libertas, rare novarum, the Americanism controversy, um, the social kingship of Christ, that Pius XI uh you know um later crowns with the feast of Christ the King in 1920, the collision of Vatican II, every single one of those comes back to to immortality here. Um yeah, so that's basically it.
SPEAKER_04Who laments like the fall of Christendom in it? It's interesting, especially when he's talking about the revolutions in the 16th century and stuff. Like he's lamenting the the revolutions that happened in Europe, like you could see his heart is broken over what happened in Europe.
SPEAKER_03So I think we're ready to get into the encyclical itself.
Reading The Encyclical On Authority
SPEAKER_04Yeah, let's do it because this one's a doozy. So, oh man, I gotta go all the way back to the beginning. Um, the first thing I that jumped out at me was um it's right right in the beginning in paragraph two, um, where he says, From the very beginning, Christians were harassed by slanderous accusations of this nature, and on that account were held up to hatred and execration for being, so they were called, enemies of the empire. The Christian religion was moreover commonly charged with being the cause of the calamities that so frequently befell the state. Whereas, in very truth, just punishment was being awarded to guilty nations by an avenging god, like you'd never hear a pope talk like just punishments were being avenged uh or being uh uh what did he actually say? He said uh the uh in very truth, just punishment was being awarded to guilty nations by an avenging god. And like I was saying earlier, like if you believe that is what is causing the empire to fall, the Roman Empire to fall, what does that imply for us? Because like that's that's that's where I get my apocalypticism from is not it's not a black pill, it's in that I believe the story, like I believe in God, and I believe God punishes us when we are are guilty of idol worship and we betray him. So I just I don't see how we uh how we could avoid it.
SPEAKER_03I mean, I I think it's I think you could very I think you could make a very good case that World War I and World War II, which in essence is is largely the same conflict, that those wars were a punishment for the for for the world failing to you know to to heed the warnings that in these encyclicals we've read.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I definitely don't disagree, but where where the problem comes in is that it doesn't lead to repentance and a return to God. No, it doesn't, which means that a deeper and harsher chastisement is on the horizon. It has to be one so harsh that we wear sackcloth and ash and beg God's mercy and repent for our sins. Um I I I I tried not to highlight too much until paragraph five. So if you have anything in between.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, just the end the end of two I have. Many indeed are they who have tried to work out a plan of civil society based on doctrines other than those approved by the Catholic Church. Nay, in these later days, a novel conception of law has begun here and there to gain increase in influence, the outcome, as it is maintained, of an age arrived at full stature, and the result of progressive liberty. But though endeavors of various kinds have been ventured on, it is clear that no better mode has been devised for the building up and ruling the state than that which is the necessary growth of the teachings of the gospel. We deem it therefore of the highest moment and a strict duty of our apostolic office to contrast with the lessons taught by Christ, the novel theories now advanced touching the state. By this means we cherish hope that the bright shining of the truth may scatter the mist of error and doubt, so that one and all may see clearly the imperious law of life, which they are bound to follow and obey.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Oh man. Um in uh go ahead. Well, d before you get to five, I had one more thing marked as as important. Um, as no society can hold together unless someone be overall. Directing all to strive earnestly for the common good, everybody politic must have a ruling authority. This authority, no less than society itself, has its source in nature, and has consequently God for its author. Hence it follows that all public power must proceed from God, for God alone is the true and supreme Lord of the world. Everything without exception must be subject to Him and must serve Him, so that whosoever holds the right to govern holds it from one soul and single source, namely God, the sovereign ruler of all.
SPEAKER_04You see, he's starting to see that they're not even following natural law, right? Yeah, like he's they're not even following natural law anymore. And it's just like like these are the seeds for the feast of Christ the King to be instituted down the road. Like it's just you just see it's already. I mean, bro, this is before abortion, this is before uh uh even even contraception. This is this is he just sees rampant immorality, and he sees these governments trying to make laws that are contrary to the natural law. And he's like, You you you all you leaders, like you need to recognize that God is the source and author of all of authority, and you're governing in his name, man. Like, because people like this idea of oh, we're a we're a government formed by the people for the people, you know, for the people and by the people, like he's saying that is wicked, like to have a government formed by the people for the people is wicked because then it just becomes mob rule and consent of the governed.
SPEAKER_03And he's not saying that things like republics are inherently bad. Matter of fact, the the very next sentence he says the right to rule is not necessarily, however, bound up with any special mode of government. It may take this or that form, provided only that it be of a nature of the government. Rulers must bear must ever bear in mind that God is the paramount ruler of the world and must set him before themselves as their exam. So he's saying, if you want a republic, so you know that's okay. If you want a monarchy, whatever, as long as whoever is ruling the nation understands that God is truly the ruler of the world.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. And and like I said, this is before 90% of the horrific things were put into law, like to actual, I mean, it's before gay marriage, before contraception, before abortion, before any of like the big, big doozies that come down the road. So, um, all right. So then in paragraph five, I saw I highlighted uh, but if those who are in author uh are in authority rule unjustly, if they govern overbearingly or arrogantly, and if their measures prove hurtful to the people, they must remember that Almighty God will one day bring them to account. Like this, this was so good. More strictly in proportion to the sacredness of their office and preeminence of their dignity, the mighty shall be mightily tormented. Then truly will the majesty of the law meet with the dutiful and willing homage of the people when they are convinced that their rulers hold authority from God and feel that it is a matter of justice and duty to obey them. Like this is and this goes to the church authorities too, but Leo can't see that yet. Like he doesn't see that this is going to end there, also. They are convinced that their rulers hold authority from God and feel that it is a matter of justice and duty to obey them and to show them reverence and fealty, united to a love not unlike that which children show their parents. Let every soul be subject to higher powers to despise legitimate authority in whomever whomsoever it is vested is unlawful as a rebellion against the divine will, and whoever resists that rushes willfully to destruction. This is this is why I'm hesitant to even really like all the stuff with our own hierarchy. So you have to tread so cautiously when when even criticizing them and calling this one out and calling that one out because it's well it's a rebellion against the divine will, and whoever resists that rushes willfully to destruction.
SPEAKER_03Well, and just two sentences later, he says to gat cast aside obedience and by popular violence to incite to revolt is therefore treason, not against man only, but against God. Yeah, it's a hard one, right? Like it's well, even even talking about our own, like obviously, yeah, the church, but even talking about like our own our own nations, you know, like like to despise legitimate authority, like is our current government, and I don't just mean like the Trump administration, I mean like our current form of government, does it hold legitimate authority?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, if so, you know, like so every four years we have a civil war essentially, right? Like we're in civil war every four years when an election comes around. But no, you're right. Like I had a um, I had a guy that watches our show uh reach out to me recently, and he was like, I'm I'm kind of struggling with all the Trump stuff because we're very critical of Trump. And he's like, like even King Henry, um even uh Thomas um what the heck is his name? Thomas Moore. Thomas More when when when he's going against King Henry VIII, it's like King Henry's doing these horrific things, and he still is like, No, my king, I love you. I would never, you know, and it's like we like we do even, you know, the you think about the way we talk about Biden and we talk about Trump, and it's like they're not we we talk that way because we know they actually don't get their authority from God, like they're just awful rulers that we have.
SPEAKER_03One one of the more difficult uh I guess threads running through my entire life um was coming to terms with my father. You know, the the the history he and I had together, our relationship, um, and stuff like that. Like I spent a a good portion of my life um despising him, you know. Yeah. And um and it took a lot to it took a lot to get over. I mean, it took him basically being, you know, on his deathbed the last few months to really start to get over that and come to terms with the fact that whatever he had or had not done throughout his life and throughout his role as my father, like he was still um my father. And there there is there is a heavy duty there, you know, on both on both ends, and whether or not he had lived up to his, um, it really had nothing to do with whether or not I was going to live up to that's a hard that's a hard one. My duty, and and it I'm starting to see that more and more with um with with others in authority in our society, you know. I it as the the the encyclical talks about, you know, uh united to a love, not unlike that which children show their parents. You know, that should be how we view um state and church authority.
SPEAKER_04It's hard, man. It's really hard when you get when you got when you got the rulers we have, but even just to flip on its head what you went through with your father, like one day you'll be in that position and you're gonna make a ton of mistakes as a father. Yeah, you know, like you and I are going to make a ton of mistakes as fathers. And and I I've started to realize that as a father, you know, starting starting to wonder what little things am I doing or not doing now that are my kids gonna hold against me until they become parents and realize and and like every little thing you do is imprinting something in them, you know, and and like when I was I remember having blowouts with my wife and the kids witnessed them, and you don't know what that does to them. But and and then especially because the conversation came up um recently about somebody in our comments had said uh there's this new thing where um kit kids are going no contact with their parents, right? And I like I've never been in that situation. I'm from a big Italian family. We have blowouts, we fight with each other, but we all make up after. But the thought of my kids going no contact with me because of some mistake I made is like it's really hard. But it's a it's something out of my realm. But I also know that there's some toxic relationships that you have to go no contact with because they're just poisonous, you know. So it's like, but but to your point about like being a father, like you'll one day be judged by the kind of father you are. Your father had to go face his judgment for the kind of father he was, but we still have the duty to honor and love our parents, regardless of what they did. Like, we have to, in the best of our ability, honor our mother and father because it's a commandment from God. So it's a hard one.
The State Duty Toward True Religion
SPEAKER_04Um, all right, the next one I have is in chapter six, or paragraph six.
SPEAKER_03You have anything before no, we basically read up to that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, uh, since then, no one is allowed to be remiss in the service due to God, and since the chief duty of all men is to cling to religion in both its reaching and practice, reaching and practice, not such religion as they may have preference for, but the religion which God enjoins and which certain and most clear marks show to be the only one true religion, it is a public crime to act as though there were no God. So too, it is a sin for the state not to have care for religion as a something beyond its scope, or as of no practical benefit, or as of many forms of religion to adopt that one which chimes in with the fancy. For we are all bound absolutely to worship God in that way which he has shown to be of his will. All who rule, therefore, would hold and honor the holy name of God, and one of their chief duties must be in the faith be to favor religion, to protect it, to shield it under the credit and sanction of the laws, and neither to organize nor enact any measure that may compromise its safety. This is uh this is the bounding duty of rulers to the people over whom they rule. For one and all, they for one and all are we destined by our birth and adoption to enjoy when this frail and fleeting life is ended, a supreme and final good in heaven, and to the attainment of this very endeavor should be directed. Like, I I I don't know. I I read that and I was thinking more of the church, like like they have a duty. The the the the willingness that the hierarchy had to just play loose and and free with this the the rites and the sacraments and the liturgies of the church during that council, it really is just just heartbreaking. We got the Australian watching us. I'm missing a couple guys. You want to know I was freaking me out? Me and Rob both got the same play button. Mine looks like the size of a credit card, and Rob's looks like it's gigantic. It's not right.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's just gotta be perspective.
SPEAKER_04It's gotta be perspective. Did you see I ordered the other one, right? Yeah, yeah. That's pretty cool. Yeah, yeah, I should, I should have ordered the second one. I kind of like the other one better. You can order as many as you want forever, but um, yeah, I still gotta figure out better light. Rob sent me a light, but the light's like 400 bucks or something. I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna just make you people see my red face for a little longer. I'll get it. Just not yet. We gotta build our savings back up. We kind of blew the savings on my new studio.
SPEAKER_03So yeah, it looks, I think it looks good. I think we'll think it's gonna be awesome.
SPEAKER_04The studio looks great. It's the lighting that I have to tweak and and figure out. Like, I have to, I just have to figure it out. Whatever. We've done this conversation 19 times. But um, where uh where do you have highlighted next? Because I tried not to highlight too much because the thing is so long, so I jumped pretty far down after that. I went to 20.
SPEAKER_03Um, oh, you went to 20. Yeah, let's see if I have anything that I marked as particularly important. I have a lot highlighted before 20, but let's see if I have anything. This is kind of funny.
SPEAKER_04The play button size is proportionable to how much each person does. Yes, Rob Rob does the majority of work, therefore, his play button is bigger.
SPEAKER_03Okay, so uh in 17, um, he actually talks about marriage, and I thought it was um he says domestic society acquires that firmness and solidity so needful to it from the holiness of marriage, one and indissoluble, wherein the rights and duty of a husband and wife are controlled with wise justice and equity. Due honor is assured to the woman, the authority of the husband is conformed to the pattern afforded by the authority of God, the power of the father is tempered by a due regard for the dignity of the mother and her offspring, and the best possible provision is made for the guardianship, welfare, and education of the children.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, the the the in chapter 20 is basically covering those same themes. Um and it's because like we take for granted that this is the the moral order we live under. That husbands are good to their wives, that wives are good to their husbands, that fathers are good to their children. Like we take that for granted. That was not the way of the Roman. Like the Roman citizen treated his wife like a piece of property. His slave was also his yeah, his children, he had the right to kill his children. They were his children, they were his property. He was if if a child disobeyed him, he was that he had the right to kill his own child. So, like, we take for granted this idea of what a family looks like and and the duties of a father and a husband to his wife and children, and the duties of a wife to her husband. Like, this is and it's starting to fall apart before our eyes right now because we're losing that perspective of what Christian family looks like because we live in a depraved world. But in in 20, it also says, Women, uh, women thou dost subject to their husbands in chaste and faithful obedience, not for the not for the gratifying of their lust. Talking about women and their lust.
SPEAKER_03Women, women thou dost if only because this is from St. Augustine. If only he had heard of book talk.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Uh yeah, so this is from Augustine. Women uh thou dost subject to their husbands in chaste and faithful obedience, not for the gratifying of their lust, but for bringing forth children and for having a share in the family concerns. Thou dost set husbands over their wives, not not that they may be that may they may oh man, not that they may play false to false to the weaker sex, but according to the requirements of sincere affection. Like sincere affection for your wife is a big thing, right? Like this would this your wife is not just your property. You should you should do this because you have a sincere affection for her. Thou dost subject children to their parents in a kind of free service, and dost establish parents over their children with a benign rule. Thou joinest together not in society only, but in the sort of brotherhood, citizen with citizen, nation with nation, and the whole race of men, by reminding them of their common parentage. Thou teachest kings to look to the interests of their people, and dost admonish the people to be submissive to their kings. With all care dost thou teach all to whom this honor is due, and affection and reverence, and fear, consolation, and admonition and exhortation, and discipline, and reproach and punishment. He's talking about the church. This is what the church has taught us. And you really don't like man, the the atheists of today and and the you know the people who think nothing of Christianity, they all get to live in the spoils of men who were subdued by the Christian faith. They take for granted that that the even even like the when you go back to the Me Too movement, right? Like the whole thing was based on debauchery and you know, but it came back to Christian principles where women were angry that men didn't act like Christian men. It was like it's like you guys, you guys had the sexual revolution, you wanted free love, you wanted to. But regardless, it wasn't just then though. It's the it's it was this backlash from women who were angry that they were taken advantage of. It's like you guys set this, you guys set this system up. You wanted free love, you wanted to just have sex without consequence, and then when men behave like barbarians, because that's what happens when you get rid of Christian morality, when men acted like pagans, now all of a sudden you want to cry about and you want to hold them to some morality that you told them not to uphold anymore. So now these women are mad that these men weren't gentlemen. Like, screw you, you chose these rules, you wanted to play in this in this mud. Um, all right, what do you have
Christendom Then Liberalism Now
SPEAKER_04next? Uh 21.
SPEAKER_03I violated the whole of 21, and yeah, yeah. So uh there was once a time when states were governed by the philosophy of the gospel. Then it was that the power and divine virtue of Christian wisdom had diffused itself throughout the laws, institutions, and morals of the people, permeating all ranks and relations of civil society. Then, too, the religion instituted by Jesus Christ, established firmly in befitting dignity, flourished everywhere by the favor of princes and the legitimate protection of magistrates. And church and state were happily united and conquered in friendly interchange of good offices. He's he's describing Christendom here, basically.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's why that's why I said earlier, like he was lamenting the fall of Christendom. Like he's like, when things like when when the church is is playing her proper role and the state is playing its proper role, they the the the state upholds the church because the church disciplines the children, and that makes the rule of government so much more peaceful because the church is keeping people. Oh my gosh, it happened again. Don't worry, somebody will turn it back on. Um, yeah, you see. I still hear you, it's just my my my lights went out.
SPEAKER_03The state constituted in this wise, uh constituted in this wise, bore fruits important beyond all expectation, whose remembrance is still is still and always will be in renown, witnessed to as they are by countless proofs which can never be blotted out or ever obscured by any craft of any enemies. Christian Europe has subdued barbarous nations and changed them from a savage to a civilized condition, from superstition to true worship. It victoriously rolled back the tide of Mohammedan conquest, retained the headship of civilization, stood forth in the front rank as the leader and teacher of all, in every branch of national culture, bestowed on the world the gift of true and many-sided liberty, and most wisely founded various numerous institutions for the solace of human suffering. And if we inquire how I was able to bring about so altered a condition of things, the answer is beyond all question, in large measure, through religion, under whose auspices so many great undertakings were set on foot, through whose aid they were brought to completion.
SPEAKER_04Alright, you're gonna have to hang on because I I I can't believe it.
SPEAKER_03Okay, I have a lot okay, I'll just keep reading because I have it all highlighted. A similar state of things would certainly have continued had the agreement of the two powers been lasting. More important results even might have been justly looked for. Had obedience waited upon the authority, teaching, and counsels of the church, had this submission been specially marked by greater and more unswerving loyalty, for that should be regarded in the light of an ever-changeless law which Noah of Chartres wrote to Pope Pascal Pascal II. When kingdom and priesthood are at one, in complete accord, the world is well ruled, and the church flourishes and brings forth abundant fruit. But when they are at variance, not only smaller interest not only smaller interests prosper not, but even things of greatest moment fall into deplorable decay. Can you can you not coming back up?
SPEAKER_04Alright, it might take a second for my uh thing to boot back up.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, sorry. Where where are you up to now?
SPEAKER_03Uh I I just finished 22.
SPEAKER_04Okay, because in 23, I had I have to f it's I have like nine things running on one outlet right now, and she must have turned on the vacuum or something. Um, but that harmful and deplorable passion for innovation, which was aroused in the 16th century, through first this is like he's getting into the the reformation, you know. But that harmful and deplorable passion for innovation, which was aroused in the 16th century, threw first of all into confusion the Christian religion, and next, by natural consequence, invaded the precincts of philosophy, whence it spread amongst all classes of society, from this source as from the fountainhead burst forth all those later tenets of unbridled license, which in the midst of the terrible upheavals of the last century were wildly conceived and boldly proclaimed as the principles and foundation of that new conception of. Law, which was not merely previously unknown, but was at variance on many points, not only with the Christian, not only the with not only the Christian, but even the natural law. Like he's talking about America, essentially. Like these are all the principles in which America is, not just America, obviously, but like the things that we hold as like sacrosanct in our country are the very things that he's saying are going to like lead to confusion in the Christian religion, um, and by natural consequence invade invade the precincts of philosophy, which then will lead us to no longer obey even the natural law, which is exactly what happened. Yep. Um, yeah, like I I even kept going. Like amongst these principles of the main one lays down that as all men are alike by race and nature, so in like manner all are equal in the control of their life, that each one is so far his own master as to be in no sense under the rule of any other individual, that each is free to think on every subject just as he may choose and do whatever he may like to do, that no man has any right to rule over other men in a society grounded upon such maxims, all government is nothing more nor less than the will of the people, and the people being under the power of itself alone is alone its own ruler. Like that's a government by the people for the people. It's crazy how these things you think as an American are good, and then you're reading the Pope trying to trying to show you where this stuff is going to lead. It's going to lead to chaos and and men no longer following the natural law. Yep.
Marriage Law And State Overreach
SPEAKER_04Um, what'd you have next? I'll just uh just a lot. It is, yeah. I tried to skip as much as I could because it's so good.
SPEAKER_03Um, like what what did you just uh Okay, you just did 24. Like I have 25, 26, 27, 27 is the next one I have. I'll highlight it. Okay, let's read 27 then. Um now when the state rests on foundations like those just named, and for the time being they are greatly in favor, it readily appears into what and how unrightful a position the church is driven. For when the management of public business is in harmony with doctrines of such a kind, the Catholic religion is allowed a standing in civil society equal only or inferior to societies alien from it. No regard is paid to the laws of the church, and she who, by the order and commission of Jesus Christ, has the duty of teaching all nations, finds herself forbidden to take any part in the instruction of the people. With reference to matters that are of twofold jurisdiction, they who administer the civil power lay down the law of at their own will, and in matters that appertain to religion defiantly put aside the most sacred decrees of the church. They claim jurisdiction over the marriages of Catholics, even over the bond as well as the unity and it the indissolu indissolubility of matrimony. They lay hands on the goods of the clergy.
SPEAKER_04I want to stop you there. Like our our man, there's so much there. Because we in America, like you never thought anything of like the state recognizing marriage, but the state also then takes this duty that they could go, oh well, we're just gonna give you a divorce. Where the church is the church is like, no, no, no, that's like the marriage is our realm. You don't you don't get to have a say over marriage, marriage is our realm. And the the government is basically like, well, you know, the church does what it does, but we're gonna give you a decree of divorce. And it the church sees that where this is where this is heading. And I I yeah, it just never I never thought about this stuff. Like, so do you think the church do you think the state should have any say in marriage, or do you think it should just be totally given back to the to this to the religious realm?
SPEAKER_03I don't think there should even be marriage licenses, to be honest. Like it should be yeah, it really should be the realm realm of the church.
SPEAKER_04I mean, but I suppose But like there is a good when the church when the state recognizes a marriage and gives tax benefits to a family and things like that. Like, I I I see a benefit in that. Like, you do want the state to recognize the benefits and goods of marriage, but what happens is then the state gets involved and they're like, Well, we'll call anything a marriage. So I like the average person looking 20 25 years ago would have never thought anything of this stuff. Maybe, maybe go back before no fault divorce or something, you know, like you know, before 1970 or whatever. And you're like, no, no, no, it's good that the state recognizes marriage, then all of a sudden they give no fault divorce, and then all of a sudden they're they're recognizing uh same-sex marriage. Next thing you know, they're punishing men for their wives filing for divorce when the wife is the one who cheated. Like, there's the you know, there's things that the state did to absolutely destroy marriage and the covenant, yeah. Um, yeah, wait, so I was saying ever had a good comment. So, like, like it's good to encourage marriage, but with how much the state has screwed up marriage, encouraging divorce and screwing over men, I'll pass on the tax breaks.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's yeah, well, the the thing uh so Joe Joe Diodotti says, could you imagine the state recognizing baptisms? Currently, no, that would right because it would be crazy to think that, but I mean, as as Joshua Charles talked about during the last episode, that was how you became a citizen of a Christian nation was through baptism. You know, you weren't really a citizen unless you were a baptized, you know, Catholic.
SPEAKER_04So in in France, you can't get married in a church until you have a government wedding, which is not a valid wedding. So, like the church wedding isn't licit or legal on its own. It's like, but that's in America, too. Like America, you could get married in a church, but you need a government witness there. Like, if you just went and got married in a church, it wouldn't be a legal marriage. Right. Appreciate you, man. Thank you. It you know what it is, it's a it's a it's a it's it's an in-depth series, it's an in-depth look at this stuff, and we're trying to do something that's of substance and still pertaining to the Catholic faith. And we're we're dealing with the current crisis by looking back at the things that were coming down the pike. These shows are never going to be huge. They're we just don't care. Like, I honestly, I'm at a point where I don't care if they're big, I just I'm I'm enjoying it.
SPEAKER_03Like, like five, ten years from now, like our our our usual episodes where we're talking about whatever was going on at the time won't matter, you know, they won't mean anything. But this series will always hopefully mean yeah, it's an evergreen series.
SPEAKER_04You could send us if you got a long car ride and you want to, you know, if you don't have time to sit and watch it live, it's like if you got a long car ride, it's a good one to throw on for a two-hour car ride or something. So um, the next one I had highlighter was like uh 31. So I don't know if you had anything in between there. Um it's just so it's just so dense and packed, like you could literally read the entire encyclical. It's like we're trying to give you guys the highlights and uh some of the things that like popped out to us because it we know it's hard to sit and read an encyclical, but the some of this stuff is just so good, and you're just like, man, like the the popes before the council saw this stuff coming, and then all of a sudden they had this council, and it's like uh John the 23rd's like, Oh, enough with the prophets of doom.
SPEAKER_03It's like, no, bring back the prophets of doom, man. Uh, this is there, there is a specific playlist for this already set up on the channel. Um, after the link is in the description, so just click on the playlist link and it will it should play them all.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, if you're checking this one out now and you didn't watch the last one, like Joshua Charles jumped on halfway through the last one, like after the historical section, Josh jumped on with us and we discussed Freemasonry and secret societies and stuff.
SPEAKER_03So um, so I have I have 31 highlighted as well, especially the last sentence. Um, I I the last sentence you could say is kind of like TLM versus novus or sort of thing. And 31.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so if you want to read it, literally highlighted the same thing, and I put it in a different color than the beginning of 31. You want to read the whole thing. So I I basically like the beginning of it, I highlighted in yellow, and then like I cut it in half, and then I skipped a couple sentences and I highlighted the rest in green. But um, the sovereignty of the people, however, uh, and this without any reference to God is held to reside in a multitude, which is doubtless a doctrine exceedingly well calculated to flatter and to inflame many passions. That's important, like the sovereignty of the people, and you know that it's meant to inflame passions.
SPEAKER_03Well, they're they're bribing you with your own vote, basically.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and and and that's that's yeah, and it also makes like selling offices of the state like you know, like a thing, but it it it inflames passions against each other, so you're no longer seeing it. You're like, think about the the you know, the division between Republicans and Democrats, you know? It's it's kind of crazy, and and uh um so you were drawing in your book like a prop girly. Yeah, with different colors. Well, no, so me and Rob have this app uh called Voice Voice Note, or is that what it's called?
SPEAKER_03I I I actually don't.
SPEAKER_04I I've been reading them, but I've been well, I listen to the audio of them on my way home from work, and then because I I want to listen to it first, and then I go back and I try and I reread it and it lets you highlight it and stuff. So all right, so where I went next is indeed from the prevalence of this teaching, which is you know the the sovereignty of the people, uh indeed, from the prevalence of this teaching, things have come to such a pass that may it hold as an axiom of civil jurisprudence that seditions may be rightfully fostered. For the opinion prevails that princes are nothing more than delegates chosen to carry out the will of the people, whence it necessarily follows that all things are as changeable as the will of the people, so that so that risk of public disturbance is ever hanging over our heads. I mean, we see this even with Trump when he didn't follow his campaign promises, how crazy everybody went, you know. Um to hold, therefore, that there is no difference in matters of religion between forms that are unlike each other and even contrary to each other, most clearly leads in leads in the end to the rejection of all religion in both theory and practice. So, like the idea that um you believe what you believe, I believe what I believe, what it it ends in the rejection of all religion. Yeah, and it ends in A. And this thing, and this is the same thing as atheism, however, it may differ it differ in it from name. Men who really believe in the okay, god this next part, as you were.
SPEAKER_03This is what I hadn't agreed. I I like this. Novosordo here.
SPEAKER_04Men who really believe in the existence of God must, in order to be consistent with themselves and to avoid absurd conclusions, understand that differing modes of divine worship involving dissimilarity and conflict, even on most important points, cannot all be equally probably or equally probable, equally good, and equally acceptable to God. That was like, which is why they are freaking not budging with the SSPX, which is why you they had to uh give us traditionus custodis, because you can't have those two things being upheld as two two two forms of the same right, right? Like like Benedict's is the extraordinary form and the ordinary form. Like you can't, because when you put them side by side, one is a is basically a mockery of the other, you know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. I mean, he he says differing modes of worship involving dissimilarity cannot be equally good. I mean, it's just logical. If they're not the same, they can't be equal. It's just how it works.
SPEAKER_04It's just it's like oh man, it was a that was uh so too. The liberty of thinking and of publishing, whatsoever each one likes without any hindrance, is not in itself an advantage over which society can wisely rejoice. So, like, freedom of the press is not something you should be praising. I mean, it can work good in some cases, but then in others, it's like book burnings should happen. There should be a list of banned books that Catholics should not read because they're poisonous, they destroy your soul. On the contrary, it is the fountainhead and origin of many evils. Liberty is a power perfecting man and hence should have truth and goodness for its object, but the character of goodness and truth cannot be changed, be changed at option. These remain ever one in this. Can you imagine like a can you imagine Pope Leo the 14 talking like this?
SPEAKER_03I I I can't, yeah, I can't imagine any Pope sets of council or any Pope.
SPEAKER_04Not in our lifetime, probably for the next 80 years talking like this. These remain ever one and the same and are no less unchangeable than nature itself. If the mind assents to false opinions and the will chooses and follows after what is wrong, neither can attain its native fullness, but both must fall from their native dignity into an abyss of corruption. Like this is it's this is a prophecy. It's a legitimate prophecy. Um whatever, therefore, is opposed to virtue and truth may not be rightly brought temptingly before the eye of man, much less sanctioned by the favor and protection of the law. A well-spent life is the only way to heaven, whither all are bound. And on this account, the state is acting against the laws and dictates of nature whenever it permits the license of opinion and of action to lead minds astray from truth and souls away from the practice of virtue. To exclude the church founded by God Himself from life, from laws, from the education of youth, from domestic society is a grave and fatal error. A state from which religion is banished can never well regulate, can never be well regulated. And already perhaps more than is desirable is known of the nature and tendency of the so-called civil philosophy of life and morals. Like he's just saying, like it can't, it, it can't, it's not gonna be well. Like our our fate in America is destruction because of the principles we're founded on. Like there, there's no way around that. It's it's it's not a it's not, you know, you can't put a can't put a timestamp on it, but it is bound for destruction because of the principles our country was founded on.
SPEAKER_03I think we have a crazy prod in the comments.
SPEAKER_04Please be smart, stop talking to demonic spirits, pretending to be the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, we I also for Thursday's show, I have I found a a Protestant podcast losing it over Father Ripperger.
SPEAKER_03Oh, that's gonna be good.
SPEAKER_04And we're gonna cut clips and we're gonna go over that on Thursday, I think, because it is just hilarious. These guys think that the intelligence agencies, the CIA, were all founded by the Knights of Malta.
SPEAKER_03I'm like, wait, which are the the Knights of Malta the Knights of uh the Knights Hospitaler from the Crusades?
SPEAKER_04They think the Roman Catholic Church is in charge of the American Intel agencies. It's like they think Rome is the Jews. It's amazing.
SPEAKER_03No, no, no. You guys got a backwards. The CIA is the boss of the of the of at least of Vatican II, probably.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, there's a lot going on there, but um
Voting Civic Duty And Prudence
SPEAKER_04uh all right. So, what do you got next? I got 34.
SPEAKER_03Um, that's funny.
SPEAKER_04You you and I highlighted almost the exact opposite paragraphs, which is good because that means you got an insight from something, and and I got an insight from I know, but it means we have the whole ding thing to talk about. I know it is it is going to make this difficult, but well, I got because I got 34 because he highlights Mirari Voss, and and I was just reading this paragraph to my wife earlier because um well, whatever, you read yours and I'll and I'll get it.
SPEAKER_03Well, no, I don't have anything till 36, so you go.
SPEAKER_04Okay, so 34 is doctrines such as these, which cannot be approved by human reason and most seriously affect the whole civil order. Our predecessor, the Roman pontiffs, uh, well aware of what their apostolic office required of them, have never allowed to pass uncondemned. Thus, Gregory the 16th and his encyclical Morari Voss, dated 1832, August 15th, invade with weighty words against the sophism of the sophisms, which sophisms, which even at this time were being publicly incul inculcated, namely, that no preference should be shown for any particular form of worship, that it is right for individuals to form their own personal judgments about religion, that each man's conscience is his sole and all-sufficing guide, and that it is lawful for every man to publish his own views, whatever they may be, and even conspire against the state. On the question of the separation of church and state, the same pontiff writes also nor can we hope for happier results either for religion or for the civil government from the wishes of those who desire that the church be separated from the state and the concord between the secular and ecclesiastical authority be dissolved. So I was explaining to my wife how these are such American principles, right? Yeah. That freedom of religion and everybody has a right to their own conscience, to the point where even our own hierarchy will say things about freedom of conscience, like, look, your conscience is the pro the primordial Christ, which you know is true, but the way they use it, it's like you know, somebody within with without a properly formed conscience can not be sinning, even though they're doing something horrific if they are following their conscience. And it's it's a vile thing to think. But the Leo's pointing out that this is actually going to lead to the destruction of your society.
SPEAKER_03Yes.
SPEAKER_04Oh man, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, hold on. It is clear that these men who yearn for a shameless liberty live in dread of an agreement which has always been fraught with good and advantageous alike to the sacred and civil interests, to the like effect, also as occasion presented itself to Pius IX brand publicly, many false opinions which were gaining ground. And like all of this stuff, this is this is before the the communist revolutions really take hold, right? So, like Rare Navarum is written in response to those communist revolutions, but he sees it on the horizon, not in response.
SPEAKER_03The first communist revolution is until you know 1917. Oh, okay. But he sees the idea.
SPEAKER_04But it's it's written in response to you know Marx and Engels Communist Manifesto, which have been so the revolutions haven't happened yet, but these ideas are popping up, and he's starting to see that like he sees this is just going to be calamity upon a calamity, and it's just going to just it's going to end in ash, all of it.
SPEAKER_03Um, did you have anything before 36? No. So on Twitter earlier today, I I made the the quip that Leo the 13th might convince me that I should actually vote again. Um, and that's because he says here, neither is it blameworthy in itself in any manner for the people to have a share greater or less in the government. For at certain times and under certain laws, um, such participation may not only be of benefit to the citizens, but may even be of obligation.
SPEAKER_04So, okay, so I think I think he's assuming that elections aren't rigged. Yeah, right. He's assuming that elections aren't rigged, right? But he's also looking back to how Christendom formed in the first place. Yeah, and the way Christendom forms in the first place is the church does her thing, converts souls, and those souls actually like rot, like you eventually get people of power who are in the Senate and they are in these positions of of civil authority who now have a formed Catholic conscience, and they get to start adjusting the way things go. So I think he's almost looking at it in respect to, yeah, look, if you're a Catholic and you can have a role in civil government, that's actually a good thing because it can bring about good fruits, just like it did in the early church, as Christendom is being formed in seed form, you know. Um this is probably a good time to play the clip of Vance when they asked him about his um disagreements with Pope Leo.
SPEAKER_03Right now, you think?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think this is a perfect time to do that. Okay, let me find
JD Vance Clip On Disagreement
SPEAKER_04it real quick. This is kind of what Leo the 13th is talking about, right? Like it, like um, neither is it blameworthy in itself in any manner for the people to have a share have a share greater or less in the government, right? So now we have a Catholic vice president, but he's in disagreement with the Pope to some degree. But the way Vance handles this goes to this encyclical, really. Like Vance is able to just kind of write off the Pope. Go, look, I you know, I think. The you know, the Pope does his thing, and you know, we do our thing, we have separate roles. And it's only that way because Vatican II made it thus. Like it's only that way because Vatican II made it that way. But there was a time where if you were a Catholic, I'm sorry, you were subject to the Roman pontiff.
SPEAKER_01How do you process Pope Leo's criticisms of the administration, you know, on war and, you know, have the treatment of migrants?
SPEAKER_02So the way that I think about it, first of all, you know, I do think that the media, not saying you, but the media often tries to treat the Pope as this sort of far-left guy, where he said it's reasonable for a nation to have borders, it's reasonable for a nation to enforce its borders. Yes, he has said some critical things, but the way that I take it is I try to listen and I try to understand, I try to understand the perspective, but fundamentally, the job that I have is to apply moral principles to the problems that exist. I certainly think the Pope is going to have interesting views on that. I certainly take those views under consideration, but it's not my job to sort of say, well, just because the Pope disagrees with me, I'm gonna do something different for the American people. I think he has his role, I have my role, the president has his role, and the Pope's role is as a preacher of the gospel, certainly an important moral voice, but I I think somebody where you've got to you gotta you gotta weigh everything. You gotta say, absolutely, we can treat people humanly, we can also have a border. Part of my job is to balance those things. I think part of the Pope's job is to remind us. I'm sorry, but like Vatican II, this is like he's just following Vatican II.
SPEAKER_03I don't think so. I think everything he said there is pretty much in line with this encyclical. I I really do. I he he because the the the the two the two power, you know, the the church, the church and the state are are have the authority in their spheres, right? And yeah, the church has the authority to teach on faith and morals, yeah. And yes, the state is is bound to to to follow that and and and believe in those faith and morals, but the state is the one that has the authority to apply those faith and morals.
SPEAKER_04When talking about an issue of morality, like like I'm not saying JD Vance should be just subject to the Roman pontiff and just do whatever he says. I'm just saying the the way he's like, well, the Pope is the preacher of the gospel. It's a little it's a little flippant of who the who the Pope is, who the Roman pontiff is. And he's like, oh, you know, he's kind of just like you know, he's a preacher of the gospel, you know. No, he's the Roman pontiff in reality, right? And his words should hold more weight, but they've made it where the Pope is kind of playing this political game and he's not, you know, it's it's just it the it's it's it's led to a degradation of the papacy in general.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04The council since the council. There's just a degradation in in the office of the papacy, and it's sad because I think JD Vance, like, I mean, I I can't I can't tell if he's genuine or if he's but I mean he's a smart guy, right? Like he gives good answers, and like, especially when talking about like the the the order of uh the order of charity and stuff like that. Like he he's a smart guy. He's not, you know, I don't know how much he believes the stuff or if he's using it as a skin skin shoot to get elected to stuff, but yeah, he it's um he's an interesting character. So I mean if they all right, so here's the thing, we're in an hour and a half, and I think we should I don't know if you have something like big highlighted, but look, you're not gonna get through this whole thing, and I I think it's almost brutal to do that to everybody.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I do uh I had one I had one thing that I I kind of tweeted earlier that um if you ever want to just destroy uh a left cast or or liberal Catholic uh position on anything, that this is what I would go with. Leo says it is unlawful to follow one line of conduct in private life and another in public, respecting privately the authority of the church, but publicly rejecting it. For this would amount to joining together good and evil, and to putting man in conflict with himself, whereas he ought always to be consistent, never in the least point nor in any condition of life to swerve from Christian virtue.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I mean look, I I'll say this. Um it's it's been hard to read these encyclicals in light of the current situation, but they're also really informative, and they've I I've I've learned a lot about some of my own um improper views. Like like I've had I've had many incorrect views by growing up in America and being raised in the public school system, and like because I I I love certain uh like even even learning the Catholic faith, like you learn certain apologetic arguments and you learn church history, but to actually understand like what our philosophical lens should be and understanding the the the modern errors, it it's I don't know, it's it's been pretty it's been pretty important for me.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you know, you're right where it's it's hard to read the sort of things we used to hear from the our popes. Um and compared to what we hear now, there is definitely a sense of uh discontinuity there. But on the other hand, like uh I wouldn't say it um it is somewhat in a weird way comforting to also realize like the our the the crisis of the modern age isn't as modern or new as we like to think it is, yeah. You know, like like yes, the what the the way the church has handled things since 1960 is way different than how they were handling it in 1860, but they were both fighting against this the same struggles in in a sense it's made me realize that at least for the vast majority of of of the churchmen at Vatican II, they probably really were doing what they thought they you know because they they saw us uh a century of how the the church had handled it, and it just didn't work for whatever reason, right? You know, Leo the 13th is as amazing as this encyclical was, it didn't stop the the march of liberalism.
SPEAKER_04What what I'll tell you what it's giving me an appreciation for is Marshall's thesis, infiltration, infiltration, infiltration. I mean, this stuff has you know, it's not it's not some drastic thing that happened at the council. No, it's it was a slow infiltration of the church, and it's just gotten so pervasive in the minds of men, and it it's less an infiltration of people.
Consistency In Public Catholic Life
SPEAKER_03I mean, sure, there are obviously bad actors, but it is definitely it's it's more of an infiltration of a worldview of an ideal.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, 100%. It's just this pervasive toxic poison that has infected the minds of all of us, all of us, like we're not exempt from it. We're learning this stuff as we're going, going, holy crap, I didn't even know this stuff was bad. And it's all because we didn't listen to the warnings of the popes who came before. So it it's it's been really good. We're gonna jump into uh uh rarum Navarum next. Um, we'll we'll see how that one goes because an hour and a half is a long time for these shows. So maybe we'll break that one into uh two hour-long episodes.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Um plus it will give us at a future date the ability to splice them together and release it when we don't want to do another actual episode. Make a super cut of it later.
SPEAKER_04All right. So here's what we got in locals. Um I I I would I would totally be up for debating this. Some woman said, Married women, have you ever said yes to sex because you didn't want to deal with his moodiness if you said no? And I thought that was an interesting one because married men, have you ever said yes to something because you didn't want to deal with your wife's moodiness if you said no? And I think that that could be an interesting conversation we could do. We have the ortho, we have the orthobro wars going on where we have this father uh Emmanuel Lamelson, uh, him going off on uh like Jay Dyer, Father Josiah, Father Stephen DeYoung. He's kind of mocking American Orthodoxy because American Orthodoxy is kind of absurd.
SPEAKER_03It is, it's so it's just kind of absurd.
SPEAKER_04It's just a it's just it's I don't know. Like I I would never be tempted to go that way.
SPEAKER_03It's American Protestants Protestantism with smells and bells. That's it. It's American liberalism and pretty vestments.
SPEAKER_04They have the same rejection of authority the Protestants have against their own heart, their own hierarchy. I'm sorry, I have the hiccups, guys. Um I got Zen hiccups right now. Or uh Zen, you traitor. Um, then we got I want to do Leo doing the SSPX thing.
SPEAKER_06Okay.
SPEAKER_04Um, all right, so we're going over to locals, guys. Jump over to locals.
SPEAKER_03Let me get the link for everyone. How would Ant know what it how Italy is doing in the World Cup? How are they doing in the World Cup? I don't know. I don't know how America's doing the World Cup.
unknownI have no idea.
SPEAKER_03All I've been watching is how the Scots love America.
SPEAKER_04Do they been watching those videos on Twitter? No, but I've been seeing like the Venezuelans fighting the Ecuadorians and all that crap.
SPEAKER_03Oh my World Cup and your Twitter's still about race wars.
SPEAKER_04That's all they want.
SPEAKER_03My World Cup is watching a Scottish guy going to a Buckey's.
SPEAKER_04The the South American wars are hilarious to me because I work with all guys from different South American countries and they all hate each other. And it's all racial. Like it's they like I'm telling you, the the Hondurans hate the Ecuadorians, and the they all just hate each other. Um all right, so yeah, we're gonna go over to the other side. We're gonna do SSPX, we're gonna do ortho bro drama, and um next episode we have Protestants going after Father Rippiger, and we're gonna mock them mercilessly.
SPEAKER_03Uh send them to uh Robert at avoidingbabylon.com and I'll read over them.
SPEAKER_04Robert, not Rob. Because I've given your I've given your email addresses Rob at avoiding Babylon. It's Robert at Avoiding Babylon.
SPEAKER_03Or team, team at avoidingbabylon.com. That'll work too. You got a taffy outro? No, he's he's making one for what what are we doing? What are we doing Thursday? Is Nancy Charles coming on this Thursday or next? Oh, she is!
SPEAKER_04Yes, we're getting Nancy on Thursday.
SPEAKER_03Okay, so Taffy, Taffy, careful, careful now. This careful, but you have to make a Nancy Charles intro somehow. Oh, careful, because we love Nancy. So it would be best just to do one making fun of her brother. I think. I think that's safest.
SPEAKER_04Oh, we're gonna get we're gonna get her to spill the tea on Josh. I'm gonna go Nancy. I know you think you wanted to talk about like what it's like to to be under the coverage. How was he as a 10-year-old Josh? We wanted to know what kind of what kind of an a-hole is he to work for.
SPEAKER_03That's right. She does work for him. Can you imagine how much of a perfectionist he is?
SPEAKER_04Oh, he is the bossiest perfectionist on earth. That poor girl. He's got to be a drama queen, right? Oh my gosh, you have no idea. Oh my goodness. I can't imagine what that poor girl goes through. All right, we'll see you guys on the other side. Uh, what am I gonna put? That's like oh, Jamie, you suck. I'm sorry. Like, hit the post, man. Like, that's like the out.
SPEAKER_03Uh man, I don't know. Just some Enoch on. We did the Asian one, right? We already did that one. That was funny. Uh we can't do Enoch because then he'll get part of the cut. We'll just do this.
Locals Transition And Extra Topics
SPEAKER_03Okay, we are on locals.
SPEAKER_04All right, so I think we should do Leo first, and then I want to do the theater of digital orthodoxy next.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, he was there. He was home.
SPEAKER_03Okay, here we go.
SSPX Tensions And Pastoral Fallout
SPEAKER_05I lesbian si va verso lo scisma. Ecco, come cosa prova di fronte a questa prospettiva? È un dolore per la Chiesa.
SPEAKER_00Certamente, noi abbiamo invitato, sto considerando ancora fare un altro appello a dire: non fate questo, cerchiamo di vivere da comunione nella Chiesa, ma è la loro scelta. Bisogna rendersi conto di ciò che significa per loro, per la Chiesa, certo, la divisione fra i cristiani è sempre un punto doloroso. Però rifiutano accettare certi elementi fondamentali of the Chiesa, cominciando con diversi punti del Concile Vaticano II.
SPEAKER_04All I could think was these men honor me with their lips, but I am far from their hearts. In vain do they worship me. Like all of this bullshit ecumenism that we see with all the oh, we have to heal these. He won't even sit down with them. Like, I don't, I don't know what he's not giving them hope, or it's not like he's saying, Hold off, you know, we'll set some meetings up and we'll discuss that. Like, he's not, he's just like, Well, you know, they disagree with certain points of Vatican II. And if they move, they if they go ahead, then we're gonna have to move forward. And we're basically we're just gonna move on. What are you gonna do? Like, there's no there's no genuine care for souls, there's no like actual concern for the people in their care. Because it's not just the society bishops or whatever, it's the countless people who are in the care of these priests in the society. I don't know it's uh it's just it's really is heartbreaking to me.
SPEAKER_03I I guess I just I don't see what could be lost or threatened by just sitting down with them, you know.
SPEAKER_04Consecrate the bishops, just give them permission to consecrate the bishops, leave the status quo. We're still you're still a regular, but like continue your mission and we'll work it out at a future point. Like, what's what's the harm in that?
SPEAKER_03I I yeah, I mean, I I I personally don't see see how it could be that harmful. But even if even I don't I wouldn't even be upset if they didn't go that far if if Leo were were to personally meet with uh what's his name, uh Pigley Arnie or whatever, yeah, and uh and have a legitimate meeting with them and they come out afterwards and still say no. I'm not saying I would agree with the decision, but I would have a lot more respect for it personally, you know.
SPEAKER_04They don't care for the objections the society is raising, like they just don't care.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_04These these men, like I said, like we're reading uh Pope Leo the Thirteenth, and he sees the church as the instructor of all humanity, like the instructor of nations, those who are you know the the church as this uh perfect society that is meant to instruct the nations and men. And the society still sees the church as that. And Leo and the modern hierarchy do not see that as the church's role. They they're just like, no, we're just meant to make people be nice to each other, right? That's literally they think that's what Catholicism is. Let's just all be nice to each other. This faux charity, this false, false understanding of what it means to be charitable, this this false mercy. They think God is like they downplay the severity of of man's just punishment that is due him for his sin. They deny all of that, and they just think, oh, God just wants us to be nice. It's it's enraging. Oh man, we're gonna just I don't know. Like, I I don't blame the society for doing what they're doing. I don't I don't know. It's happened before. I don't know if it's some people think this is gonna like low-key be like way bigger of a deal than than they think. I don't know. It's it's maybe maybe the society is there to be uh what does St. Paul say? Like like heresies must arise so that so that the truth can can come out, you know. I don't know. Right. I don't know what's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you know, I I've I've seen it I've seen seen it both ways. Some are saying this is gonna cause the society to grow more, others saying this is gonna cause it to collapse. And like, I mean, I'm with you. Like it it is just kind of a it's it's just what happened before, like yeah. Not not much is new here, guys.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I don't know it's just it's just sad. I mean, we're gonna we're going to see it get much worse, guys. Just you know, prepare for heartache. Like that's what that's what this whole series has been, is heartache, you know. But I do think it's going to get much worse. And the thing that scares me is that I like I do think anytime you see a group totally break off from the church, it it devolves. Like it just does. But the society I see is different. I don't know.
SPEAKER_03Like they're just I mean, they have had some breakaways, but not not many, nor all that large.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I mean, only time will tell. We'll see how it plays out. Pray for all involved.
SPEAKER_03I was gonna say, it just is a shit situation all the way around.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I feel bad for all I feel bad for the people who attend chapels and just want to be Catholic and like they're just doing what they can to survive the because their other option is what some horrific novus ordo that their children might lose their faith because the freaking priest is over there talking about how great Islam is. I mean, we have it, we have the Detroit Archbishop literally going into a mosque and talking about how this is where holiness and sanctity is.
SPEAKER_03I mean, look at look at Charlotte. You know, we we you and I were at the the SSPX chapel there. Beautiful, and now for for many people in that whole diocese, because they purposefully made the one diocesan TLM chapel purposefully made it like a quarter the size it needed to be. The SSPX is the only option. Many of those are the same. The only option these people have, yeah. It's not like they wanted it.
SPEAKER_04I've talked they have, you know. I've talked to a like a diocesan priest about this, and he was like, you know, he's like, I like what do you tell someone? Like, no, go sing table of plenty. Like, like, what do you like? That's the only option they have to be Catholic. Like, it's kind of a hard one to say, like, no, you should you should you should just go and do the boomer novasordo thing over that. I don't know. It's uh I don't I don't know.
SPEAKER_03If I had a a chapel, you know, 30 minutes from my home, I would be there every weekend. Yeah, you know, and and I'm not I don't think that would change with the these consecrations coming up, to be honest.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think we're just in a time where you just like wherever you have to go to be Catholic is what you gotta do. Like you just have to raise your children Catholic and be Catholic and not get poisoned with this modernist garbage that's being fed to so many people. Because it's like your soul is on the line, and like you really do have to put truth above everything. And like we see the errors of the council because we were warned about the errors that are in the council. Like, we were warned, we're reading all the warnings. Now and the and the Pope's telling us this is this is gonna lead to this, this is gonna lead to this, and then you get to the council and the church is just adopting all these things, and you're just you have to you you can't ask people to suspend their cognitive like it's just cognitive dissonance to to go along with some of this stuff, you know, and you'd have to like I'm telling what one of the frustrating things is watching some of the Catholic apologetics online and stuff, and you're just like you guys are you guys are arguing for a faith that the hierarchy no longer teaches. Like the stuff we're talking about in these encyclicals, the hierarchy no longer teaches. So, yes, and in in that conversation that the CETEs are having is like did the Novus Ordo bring about a new religion? No, I don't think it brought about a new religion. Not in, but in practice, it kind of did. And like I said, you it's still the path to salvation. You still have the sacraments there, you're still taught to if you go to a good parish, you're still going to be taught how to how to find eternal life. Yeah. And not and that doesn't mean just go to heaven. Like eternal life is not just about going to heaven, like eternal life is is about now, it's about how you live your life now.
SPEAKER_03Sanctification, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Sanctification now, it's about it's about your relationships now, it's about everything. Like you can have eternal life now. And if you're not in a place that brings you that life, you need to find a new place. Like that's just it's as simple as that. But you could still find that in in the church now. It's just the whole paradigm in which they view everything is off, you know. It's just so I like my biggest argument with like the set is and a lot of the trads is like what what what like where does that thesis that you guys have provide for like what like how are how are ordinations invalid now? And I like the church has the authority to change those things. It's just you just have godless men in the positions, it's just clearly they're godless men. I mean, for the Detroit Archbishop to go to a mosque and say the things he said, he clearly does not believe the Catholic faith. Like that's obvious. He does not believe the same Catholic faith you and I believe, right? So, but that doesn't mean he's not the bishop. He's still the bishop, he's just a garbage bishop, you know. And all of the people who like will go back and they'll bring up saints who said, uh, you know, you uh you don't have to obey uh a heretic, things like that. Like those are all opinions. The church is never like spoken they're in the minority, yeah. Yeah, so it's you know, still a complicated question, but you know, I'm empathetic to the the the I'm empathetic to the trad position, I'm empathetic to the sede position. It's just scary stuff, but let's get into orthodoxy because orthodoxy is a total shit show.
Digital Orthodoxy And Convert Branding
SPEAKER_04Because the answer is not there, I'll tell you that. So um, all right, so this is uh Father Emmanuel Lemelson. I have no idea who he is.
SPEAKER_03That's because he's Orthodox.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Uh the theater of digital orthodoxy, how convert apologist media commodifies an imperial old world aesthetic while eclipsing the organic liturgical reality of the local church.
SPEAKER_03Uh which which one is this?
SPEAKER_04It's you got to go right to a substack.
SPEAKER_03I know, but which article on it?
SPEAKER_04Uh it's it's called The Theater of Digital Orthodoxy. Okay, I see it now. So the digital public square is birthed the distinct paradox, the theatrical commodification of an old world faith for Western algorithms where the ancient mysteries of eternity are quietly adapted into curated screen aesthetic. A telling moment occurred on a recent widely viewed episode of the Girls Gone Bible podcast. The non-denominational host showered their guest, a Southern Southern California-born convert priest, with praise for the traditional masculinity of the Greek Orthodox Church. Canonically, his jurisdiction, the Patriarchate of Antioch, is part of the historic Room Orthodox family. So he's not even Greek Orthodox, but like these people say Greek Orthodox as if like that's just some umbrella term, but it's they're not. Like he's part of some very specific Room Orthodox family, meaning he was technically within his rights to accept the broader heritage, yet the speaker's choice to remain completely silent and leave this specific label uncorrected exposes the core opportunism of the digital format. Correcting his host would require introducing complex canonical realities that disrupt the smooth, emotive flow of a highly optimized online talk show. Instead, he allows the consumer-friendly brand of Greek Orthodoxity to stand unchallenged, willingly absorbing its cultural cachet to validate his authority before an outside audience.
SPEAKER_03Now, to be fair, if you had tried to explain something like that to women on a girls gone by, their heads would have literally exploded.
SPEAKER_04But the but no, but but him explaining it is important, right? Like this guy explaining it is important, like because we can fall prey to you know, you see these clips of orthodox debates against Catholics, and it's like there's no one Orthodox church. No, it is so disintegrant. Like they're you want to talk about ecclesiastical issues and like you know, their view on ecclesiology being psychotic, like you this is where you gotta go. This interaction exposes the contradiction of an American convert movement that has spent decades fiercely critiquing historic immigrant parishes, routinely lamenting what they view as excessive ethnic and linguistic isolation within localized jurisdictions. The explicit institutional goal of this movement has been to construct a streamlined, thoroughly Americanized church. Yet on the media set, this anti-ethnic ideology undergoes a striking operational inversion. The digital platform is instead leveraged to project an intensified, exoticized old world persona complete with a highly stylized, affected foreign accent and strict public visual. Like, like I don't know. For people that don't really, that accent is totally made up bullshit. Like he makes up a fake accent to sound like he's foreign. I love my holy orthodoxy because right, I love my holy orthodoxy in the paragraph above. From Southern California, you should be saying dude. Yeah, he's a so he should talk like Tim Gordon, asshole.
SPEAKER_03Plus, the Orthodox priests, they generally speaking don't wear you know any sort of vestment in public because in public, because what? Because they have day jobs, you know what I mean? Like, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Uh yet on the media set this anti-ethnic ideology undergoes a striking operational inversion. I we read all that. Okay, so uh completely the highland allies affected foreign accent.
SPEAKER_03What someone goes, uh Ocean wants to know if you make up your New York accent. I'll tell you guys a secret. It's the opposite. Yeah, you mean ant in person, you can't hardly understand him because of his damn accent.
SPEAKER_04I I don't think you guys I tone it down and like go out of my way to pronounce my Rs so much so that people don't take my accent shockingly, which is like you'll hear me. Like, if I'm just going talking fast, it'll come out a lot, but whatever. Um, so complete with a highly stylized, affected foreign accent and the strict public visual maximalism of traditional black cassock, long beard, and heavy pectoral cross. The historic prestige of an ancestral lineage is harvested as a marketing asset to capture Western algorithms, even as the platform's internal rhetoric actively works to decouple the domestic flock from the very cultural realities that kept those sacred symbols alive. It's just the the whole thing, it's like they're sativacontists. Ortho bros are sedevicantes, that's what they are.
SPEAKER_03Many of many of the converts, like Jay Dyer, was a Cedivacist.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. So like they're they're they just don't look, and I'll and I'll grant them that the modern church is a mess, right? So it's it we're in this conundrum where the modern church post-council is a mess, and even the Catholic apologists trying to defend Catholicism are defending a Catholicism no longer taught. So it's like I I'm I'm even empathetic to the people who go to orthodoxy because they see the problems in the Western church. They're like, man, what the hell is this? But the thing that keeps me in the Western church is this historical view of seeing the church as this continuous society and this continuous entity that was the teacher of all mankind, was the teacher of nations, was the church that had the mission to go and baptize all nations. It is the kingdom of heaven come to earth, and now it has been infiltrated. And you have, I mean, I every single thing that we go through puts me more and more into the Ticonious lens of this, where it's just the body of the devil is inside the body of Christ, and the body of the devil is growing more and more powerful within it. But inside that body, you still have the faithful, and it is still the only path to salvation, it is still the arc of salvation. We're just outnumbered, we're just outnumbered, and there's going to be a way where God corrects it. We just have to, we just have to be Catholic and live out our faith and pass our inheritance on to our offspring and try to talk to people about it as much as we can and build something that lasts beyond this catastrophe that's coming. Because there's a catastrophe coming to society, there's a catastrophe coming to the church.
Social Breakdown And Tribal Politics
SPEAKER_04We don't know when, but it's coming. You can feel it's coming, you see the way everything is just falling apart, right? Like I was listening to you you watch um that lawyer that's been uh it got pretty big during the uh Carmelo Anthony case that uh uh Bronck Bronca or something, I forget his name.
SPEAKER_03I I see his tweets, I don't watch him.
SPEAKER_04So he was talking about even even when you are trying to have a a trial where a person is judged by a jury of his peers, right? Now, in Minnesota, let's say, you wanna you wanna try somebody for fraud in Minnesota and he gets judged by a jury of his peers. If you get one Somalian on that jury, you're not getting a fair trial. Unless it's a white person being charged with fraud, right? But if you have a Somalian being convicted of fraud and there's one Somalian on that jury, you no longer have no matter what, no longer have a no longer have a system of law in place, right? Because you're gonna get a hung jury every time if you just get one person in there. It's the same thing with Carmelo Anthony. If there was one black person on that jury, that kid was getting a hung jury. It's just the reality of it. People are so tribal now, it's no longer an integration of our nation. Where, you know, even before when you had immigrants coming in, you had European immigrants coming in who had the same religion, essentially, they were Christians, they were coming in, but even they kind of changed the dynamic of the country and the makeup of the country. They started in ghettos, and then and then the freaking the the it's kind of hard because like part of me is like, should we integrate these people into the wider society or should we let them live in their little ghettos because I don't want them infecting larger society?
SPEAKER_03Oh it it's it's di that's hard because on one hand, like we'll we'll integrate all this stuff in eventually.
SPEAKER_04What you can take that off screen, I'm saying like we'll we'll we'll bring it back to that eventually or something.
SPEAKER_03Um you know, I I mean, living here in Minnesota, for instance, like there are you know, whole neighborhoods now that are more or less no-go zones, you know, small riverside in Minneapolis because of the smalllies. So I want to hit a sucks because you've lost what I my internet froze, wouldn't you? You've you've lost whole neighborhoods that have you know history and had a culture previously, but like you said, you don't want them necessarily to move out of that neighborhood.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's like keep them in that ghetto. At least they're not because because what happens if you disperse them throughout the country, now that's I mean that uh it's scary stuff, man. Like that was like forced forced integration when they got rid of segregation, right?
SPEAKER_03Like, but yeah, the the whole great migration that happened in the well in the 60s, um, from the south to all the northern cities, you know, it changed those cities um drastically. And Martermaid has a really good series on the great migration and just how how much things changed in cities like Chicago and in New York and you know, just all all the northern and and west coast cities that received these huge migrations of of blacks from the south.
SPEAKER_04Uh Rob, I have watched the I have watched in just the course of my 20 years of work in construction, I have watched entire Italian neighborhoods just completely disintegrated. And used to be like you, you if you went to Bensonhurst, it used to be all beautiful Italian restaurants and all Italian. It was a dude, it's all freaking Africans now. Yeah, they just ship them in, they freaking moved them all over there, and it just it pushed all those Italian neighborhoods out to the suburbs, and then you get you used to be able to like, oh, I'm gonna put my kid in a good school district. That's code for white. Like, like when you when you talking to Long Island, you're like, Oh, I want to make sure I'm in a good school district. That's code for a white school, yeah. They even have they even have those mixed in now. So now like the majority of people that send their kids to public school, like your daughter is going to go and meet some Puerto Rican kid or some Dominican kid or something, like that's just what's going to happen, and then you're gonna have to freaking deal with that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, like the the the city I grew up in, the suburb, uh suburb uh just a suburb of of St. Paul, Minnesota. You know, it wasn't even an outer ring suburb, it was an inner ring suburb that had streetcars connected to to St. Paul, even. But you know, it was a city that even when I was young, you know, there were maybe 10 common last names, you know, throughout the whole yeah of 20,000 people. You know, they were um, you know, we had a Croatian hall, uh the which was everyone rented about for events. There was the the Polish National Uh Um Alliance bar, which is in the basement of a house. You had, you know, so you had these these small uh European ethnic conclaves, you know, that made up my hometown. And now though, now it's you know, now now this the city, the the school did decided to do open enrollment where you no longer had to live in the school district. Oh that's a school there.
SPEAKER_04So now you were, you know, you're you were even started after I graduated, but people are you know, they're bussing in kids from in the inner city into the school in the school district, and now this the school is all it does is degrade the school, degrade the school and the quality of education that was in that school. So now shootings are common in the city, and it's to bring this back to orthodoxy to try to you know package this thing nicely, like orthodox and orthodoxy in America for forever was these European Christians, or not even European, it was like Greeks coming to America, Greek or people from the Balkans. Well, it'd be like a Russian ghetto, and people would form a community, and then they would have their their Orthodox parish, right? And it would just be made up of that ethnic makeup because they came here, and then there was never like this outreach um mission to convert anybody into those churches, it was really just made up in that area for the for the local community, and you would have your your Greek Orthodox parish in you know in Astoria Queens, or you'd have your Russian Orthodox parish over in uh Glendale, and that would be what it was. But now with this online digital missionary work that Jay Dyer's doing, Father Stephen DeYoung, Jonathan Peugeot, all of them, you're getting people inquiring about Orthodoxy, and what you wind up getting is somebody named Alex Jorado going to an Orthodox parish who has a Catholic Western upbringing trying to bring Mexican customs into a Greek Orthodox ethnic parish and it's disrupting things, like it's making people lose their identity, their cultural identity. So it's like it's not the same as if the Orthodox Church herself sent out a mission to somewhere and kind of brought the Orthodox culture to a place. It's this weird thing where it's 90% Protestant converts. Yeah, and they're gonna deal with a very similar thing to what the Catholics dealt with. Like our church is so heavily influenced by Protestant converts now, like this whole thing of this on like all of the online apologetics are Protestant-focused apologetics, and everything's about winning Protestants to Catholicism. And like it's just a weird, it's just a weird like culture that has been brought into the Catholic Church.
Online Apologetics And Authority Problems
SPEAKER_04It's a very odd, like we've talked about like the the testimony culture, and the it's just it's and it's it's brought in this idea of faith alone plus the sacraments, and not living a an integrated Catholic life. Like it's a it's a very you know, it's a very different thing where we I mean, we talked about it also when we were talking about um like almost all of the conversions now are intellectual conversions.
SPEAKER_03This this is especially true in the trad movement, yeah, 100%. And it's it's um it I think it I think it's something that could definitely be be dangerous, especially within the trad move trad movement, because there is a very um Protestant ethic to this idea that they just have to read all the traditional documents and encyclicals, and they can be the one to figure out what is real Catholicism. And I mean, as we both said, like like that there it obviously the church is in crisis, and you know that the church isn't teaching everything the way they should be, but in a sense, like like you you just became Catholic, bro.
SPEAKER_04Just yeah, man, just live your life as a Catholic for a few years before you you know you become Catholic, and within two years you become a side of actist, and then you try pulling Catholics to your new reformation, and you're trying to pull them into set of contentism. Like, those people really need to shut the F up, man. Yeah, like if you're a Protestant convert to Setivacontism, shut your face. Seriously, like I don't know what the hell you're doing. You went from one Protestant sect to another, like that that freaking Tommy went from a Mormon cult to come into set of acantism, and he's bringing his Mormon cult-like activities into the Setivacontist movement, and it's psychotic. It's like I don't, dude, I just want to live in an integrated Catholic parish and I just want to be Catholic. Like, that's it. Like, I don't want to, I don't, I don't know, man. This whole like resist the Pope thing, and I think it's just so heavily influenced by that Protestant mentality, even though like you have two different kinds of Protestants. So the ones who come in and they're just like the Pope, everything he says is gospel, and that's it, it's it's law. And the other ones who come in and they're like, Well, I'm just gonna have our own reformation in the church now, and there's nobody just coming in and just being like, I'm just gonna be Catholic, man.
SPEAKER_03Like in in like, yeah, yes, we we should resist the bad things that are happening in the church, but you do that internally and in your family and in your parish level, right? You you don't do who the who the hell are you to think you you know you have some right to to speak out and and like the arrogance of it, right? Yeah, it is like I'm going to correct this. It is so infuriating. That that arrogance is so infuriating.
SPEAKER_04Ah man, we all need to learn a little humility. Yes. It's we all need to learn a little humility, man.
SPEAKER_03Um, he does get into um still can't get over how Rob's play button, Mog's hands play button.
SPEAKER_04I'm gonna move, I can't move the wall further away. I don't know. It really does, though. I gotta figure something out. I gotta put a magnifying glass on it or something. Um, okay, so this drive to administratively sever the American flock. From its historic ancestral roots, marks the clear persistence of a latent individualistic mindset operating beneath a traditional orthodox exterior. The systemic breakdown explains the mechanics behind the guest digital following. He communicates in the consumerist vocabulary that modern Western individual individuals instinctively crave a paradigm that inherently privileges independent media platforms over hierarchical accountability and treats the visible episcopate as an administrative adversary rather than the literal focus, literal locus of Eucharistic and canonical unity. This is like um, you know who's one of the biggest offenders of this? Um what the hell's his name? And I and I I kind of like the guy, but um Cleve to antiquity. Like I like him on a personal level, I don't dislike him, but he's a Protestant convert. He's not even confirmed in the like he's he's a catechumen, and he's up here and he's like still roasting Catholics like a Protestant. Like there's not there's like an it's because his his his thing is just content, like that's all it is. It's like he's just doing content. It has nothing to do with his love for orthodoxy or his love for the faith. It's just content.
SPEAKER_03And he hasn't been Orthodox long enough to have a love for it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. He's got he's got he does content, right? He was a Protestant apologist making content, and he got to a place where he could no longer um he could no longer hold the the positions he held because he knew they were untenable. So instead of taking a step back from making content and working these things out in private, he comes out and announces his conversion to orthodoxy, and he's now like the now he's the orthodox streamer. And it's like, dude, take a step back. Yeah, take a step back, and like it's just still like roasting the Catholics, and this is why you everything's about like winning people to our side because our arguments are the best. It's like, dude, I that's why I'm so glad I never got into the into the debate world or the apologetics world like that. Like when they talk about like who are the best online apologists, like honestly, I think we do really good apologetics when discussing history. We'll never be considered apologists, though. No, nor do I really want to be. No, I don't want to be even in conversation with those guys. Yeah. But it is just it's this weird phenomenon where I'm always I'm always like, I don't want to do what anybody else is doing. I have this instinct, this instinct to never want to do what other guys are doing. Uh granted, I'm just contrarian, so that might just be me, but no, I think there's like something so cringe about watching like everybody putting the same freaking content out, you know, and like you see, like the church father that destroys Protestantism, and like it's like dude, five arguments that totally kill solo scriptura. It's like how many of those videos can you guys watch?
SPEAKER_03So, you know, going through like uh like Joe Eshmeyer's stuff, like so. He just said a hundred thousand too, just you know, a week or two after we did, but his videos have each of them 40,000 views.
SPEAKER_04I it's I mean, look, if you're gonna do that kind of Joe's good at it.
SPEAKER_03Well, he well, he is very good at it, and like like I I don't ever want to do that stuff, but I do value it because if someone like today, I actually had an had an old friend reach out, um, who is possibly considering Catholicism, you know, raised raised Protestant, but they're possibly considering it, you know, and and they had a they had a question about you know praying to the saints, and of course, you know, I I explained it from my perspective, but it was helpful to be able to go and you know find a video Joe, a 40-minute video Joe did on it, and send you know, send that. And like there is real value.
SPEAKER_04Well, there's a definite need for it, right? There's a there's a definite um, there's always new people inquiring. I'm just sick of it. Like I just like there's always an appetite for it, there's always a need for it, and especially coming from guys that work at Catholic Answers, like they're the Catholic Answers guys, of course, they're doing apologetics. And Joe has actually brought in some new arguments and stuff, you know, like some some new insights into it. It's just I can't like I I don't know, I just have no desire to watch videos like like about Protestant apologetics. I just don't care. Like, I don't Protestantism is irrelevant to me. Orthodoxy is irrelevant to me, like orthodoxy is so irrelevant to me. It's like when I see cat well when I see Catholics like fighting with the Orthodox, I'm just like, don't even raise their don't even raise attention to them. Like don't even they're irrelevant. It's the silliest idea ever, Orthodoxy. It's just silly to me. It's like if you're if you're not, it is so much an ethnic thing. Like you have to be from that part of the world to truly take it in, in my opinion. Like, I don't know. I I like we're all western, like you you're not going to Eastern Orthodoxy, and you don't fit.
SPEAKER_03When uh so I I grew up with a couple of my friends um were Coptic. Um, they you know, legitimately they were cops from the world. Yeah, but they're legitimately Coptic, yeah, right. And you know, and both their dads um were priests, so and you know, and they knew I was Catholic and and you know, strong in my faith as a as a teenager. So we would talk about our different faiths a lot. And you know, I I at one point I asked each of them, like, what you know, how um how how does someone become Coptic Orthodox? And they both kind of just looked at me and they're like, What what what why would any why would anyone who's not Coptic become Coptic? You know, they're like they're like you're if you're Coptic, you're already Coptic. So if you're not, why would you become Coptic?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's like it's like converting nationalities, not converting nationalities. It's like it's like I no longer want to be Italian, I want to be Coptic.
SPEAKER_06Like, what are you what are you talking about?
SPEAKER_03Like Yeah, Bobby. What the hell are you doing, Bobby?
SPEAKER_04Whatever, Bobby. He tries to explain it, and I'm I'm like, yeah, that makes sense, and it does, like it makes sense, but it at the same time, Bobby grew up in the novice ordo, and well, so you and I both did, right? So I still think the Latin mass is a better fit for Bobby, yeah. Like I just still think it's a better
Eastern Catholic Life And Identity
SPEAKER_04fit. Now, I do think he has adopted Eastern practices and and over the past couple of years, and he he was away from the faith for a while, and he was looking to come back in, and voice of reason convinced him to go to. I'm just kidding, I don't know why you really went. I'm just kidding, it wasn't voice of reason. No, like his reintroduction to the faith happened to be at a Byzantine parish and like he was coming from this ridiculous novus order world and he found something beautiful and ancient, and it's like so he had he adapted to that over the past couple of years, so now it feels like home to him, but it was not naturally a home to him, like it took a lot of change of orientation for him to adopt that, and but he still like he comes, he comes here and he comes to Latin Mass with me, and he fits in like that's a you know, he's he's easily at the Latin mass.
SPEAKER_03It's like you just have to make sure to slap him every time he does the sign of the cross backwards. I think he just does it to annoy me at this point. Um, I understand that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's I do. He uh yeah, like he's still more at home in the Latin mass. Like, I don't I he'll fight with me to no end on that point. And like he right now he's rolling his eyes and he's going, but like he's more at home in the traditional Latin mass than he is there. I don't care what he says. I don't believe him. So let him this will forever be a contention between us. Um this is false. It's just it's just a fight we'll always have. It's just what it is. I'm never going to agree to his to his whole proposition. It's just it's silly to me. But then again, I don't know how much like I don't know, because like I I have an Italian identity, you know what I mean? Like, I still have an Italian identity, so for me to go east, like I would feel like I'm betraying my Roman heritage, like my Roman heritage. I don't know. I would just I would I have never set it foot in an Eastern liturgy ever. My brother Joey has. My brother Joey goes to a Byzantine liturgy because it's more convenient than going to the Latin mass.
SPEAKER_03I mean, like to be completely honest and transparent, if I had a Byzantine pair of 30 minutes for me, you'd probably go there, you'd go there every time. I mean, it's better than the novice order.
SPEAKER_04Don't get me wrong, right?
SPEAKER_03It's like like I'm taking that over the novice order. But I in once again, I'm a contrarian, so this is just my personality. Maybe I would very well quietly but loudly make the sign of the cross the right way every time, dude.
SPEAKER_04I'm at if I go to a novice ordo, I'm I'm yelling dominionus. I'm pulling the I'm pulling the uh what's his name?
SPEAKER_03And I will I will say it three times, even when everyone said, Yeah, me too every time.
SPEAKER_04What's funny is when I started going to the Latin mass and I didn't know that prayer, I would just say three times, Lord, I'm not worthy to receive you, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed. Like I would say that three times until I learned the prayer. Now I'm saying that prayer at the Novus Ordo.
SPEAKER_03Yep. Um I would say Filioque.
SPEAKER_04But even that, like Bobby said, it's not like they like it's not like they like say something against the filioque at his eastern powers, they just say the creed without the filioque, and it's not like Bobby understands it. No.
SPEAKER_03But I will say, I think there is a rather large portion of Eastern Catholics who, if you press them, would probably deny the filioque.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think it depends. If they're a Catholic going to the Eastern parish, I don't think they would. But if they're right, yeah, if they're like ethnically Byzantine or whatever, whatever that means. I mean, I still I still hold that the only Greek prayer God hears is the Kyria Laison. He ignores all other Greek prayers.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I mean, you even the Jesus prayer you have to say at least in English for it has to be in English. Or Latin.
SPEAKER_04I just haven't learned that one in Latin yet. I'm sure it's not too hard. Yeah, that's probably an easy one. Um this is why almost Latinized. I love that I love that Majarian only pops in for the locals shows, actually. I think it's pretty awesome. He never watches YouTube, but he always pops at the locals. That's that's pretty good of you, Majari. We appreciate you. Um Yeah, Bobby could be a Byzantine priest and carry on without saying mass.
SPEAKER_03He'd he'd he'd have to canonically change rights first. I think he I think he has. Have you uh Bobby, have you can't?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I'm pretty sure he changed rights. Okay, I think he's canonically changed rights.
SPEAKER_03Like I think uh uh hypothetically, if him and my sister get married, uh I'm you could have you could have canonically Greek nephews, dude. That's not good.
SPEAKER_04You want to know what's funny is he goes to a Byzantine parish or he goes to a Maronite parish, right? Or Melkite parish, whatever he goes to. He goes to a Melkite parish. That's right. It's not a yeah, so he goes to a Melkite parish. Now, if he marries my sister on Long Island, it would be a Byzantine church, he'd have to do it if he wants to do it at Eastern liturgy, and he would need permission from the Melkite parish to do it in a Byzantine parish. Like at that point, just get married to a Latin mass asshole. The uh, because they're not canonically the same. They're different churches.
SPEAKER_03You're gonna have Melkite church are two different churches. You're gonna have a Greek priest, yeah, Melkite priest, looking at this pasty white guy. Seriously, like, what the hell are you doing here?
SPEAKER_04Just go freaking Irishman married a guinea broad at a freaking Byzantine liturgy. That is that sounds like a setup. Right now, he is so mad at me.
SPEAKER_03I'm gonna I'm gonna have a so a white Irish guy in uh in uh in a guinea broad walk into a Melkite parish. Uh Bobby, love you, man.
SPEAKER_04What is this? A YouTube black for ants? That was Rob's joke in the green room. What is this? A YouTube plaque for ants it's gonna be funny when the freaking when the jeets invade the freaking Byzantine parishes. I can't wait for that. Oh, the serum malabars are over there when you get all the Indians, all the Indians coming into your Melkite parish. I can't wait.
SPEAKER_03Except their tradition is versus populum, legitimately, so then they would start complaining against the ad orientum.
SPEAKER_04They're saying, bro, you're you're part Irish, stop the stop the Lark. I am part Irish, uh about I think I'm about a quarter Irish, just the part of him that loves to fight. Um I was uh I was out in the sun all weekend, and my wife is just going, Your face is going to be so red on that show on Tuesday. I'm just like I don't know, it is what it is at this point.
SPEAKER_03Uh we should send Taffy a play button. Okay. Taff, since uh since I sent you my address for you to send me something, how about you send me your address for me to send you a play button?
SPEAKER_04Dude, I have right now this kid Brock that watches our show making something for me. A secret heart icon? No. I gotta see if I can pull it up. Hang on.
SPEAKER_03Because I think he's making he asked if he could make something for me.
SPEAKER_04I want to see if I could if you guys can see this. He's he does like woodwork.
SPEAKER_03Dude, you are such a boomer. No, we cannot see that.
SPEAKER_04So it's it says, uh, have you accepted Mary as your personal mother and intercessor? That's awesome. Pretty awesome. Um, yeah, it's pretty it's uh it's pretty cool having uh people send us stuff. We gotta get like a PO box or something. I don't know, give them my address out. I was gonna yeah. Oh, the kid, listen to this. So uh last episode you weren't on, and um kid comes on. I I opened it up to people to pop on. I sent you the clip. The kid, the kid, so he uh he's marrying my neighbor, and like he didn't know it was my neighbor, and he's like just driving by and he sees me in my driveway having a cigarette, right? And the girl's last name is Avanzato, and I'm like, I know that freaking last name. It's my son's friend Brian's sister. Like my son's friend is Brian Avanzato, it's his sister that he's marrying. So I sent the clip to my son, he sent them to his friend Brian. He's like, Holy crap, that's so weird. Um, let's see.
Meetups Conferences And Audience Questions
SPEAKER_04Somebody asked if we would do a speaking gig at their parish. We're gonna have to come up with a price, Rob.
SPEAKER_03I mean, for for something like that, I mean, a conference is is something else. Like, I'm not gonna say the point of a conference is to make money. But for those of you who don't know, the point of most Catholic conferences is to make money. Make money, yeah.
SPEAKER_04So, like to get me and Rob to get me and Rob to fly out and miss our families for for a night or two, right? Like it would have to be fly out on Friday night and go home Sunday morning, right? Like, it's not that we're great, it's like you're asking me to give up my family time, right?
SPEAKER_03And and then like uh, whatever money beside you know, obviously travel lodging would have to be covered, but then anything above that I'm going to use to make it up to my family, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Seriously, like I gotta buy my wife off to pull something like that off, right?
SPEAKER_03So whatever it is, I'm gonna use the next weekend and do something fun with the family to say I'm sorry for so it's like how do you even put a price on that?
SPEAKER_04Like, I don't know, man. I would just I would just feel bad saying to you guys, like, me and Rob gotta make $1200 each or something to come and do something like that because I can't see doing it for less than that. Like you're talking about leaving on a Friday and going home on a Sunday. Like, that's I can't see doing that for less than that. Like, I could go to work and make you know 60 bucks an hour or something.
SPEAKER_03It would be different if this was our day jobs and we weren't already giving two or three nights a week. But my kids are precious. You might my kids already lose a few nights a week with me doing this, they then give up a weekend. Like I said, it would have it would have to be worthwhile.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. So we feel bad even putting something like that out. Uh, Majarian said, you pay for my travel, food, and lodging, and I'll come for free. Yeah, but you're just married and you don't have children yet.
SPEAKER_03Someone says I'd pay $1,200 each for like a birthday party. You want us at your birthday party? At your kid's birthday party?
SPEAKER_04And like, what would you want us to do? Would you want us to like give a talk, or do you want us to just come and like hang out and drink beers? Like, I don't know, I'm gonna charge you guys to come and hang out and drink beers. It's like what a weird thing.
SPEAKER_03I mean, I will say, if if we don't have to give a talk and we do just have to drink beer, it probably would be a less less of a fee.
SPEAKER_04Uh well, that's why I said like we really should just do an avoiding Babylon meetup and like make it way less than a conference would cost. Like, let's just do an avoiding Babylon meetup somewhere, somewhere like we did in that North Carolina hotel. And you just get a hundred guys together because I doubt you guys are coming to hear us give a. I mean, we'll give a talk, like, I don't mind, I'll put something together for you guys, but I don't think it's gonna be much different than you've heard on the show. Um, so I think the people that would want to come and hang with us would want to just like have some time hanging out with us and like you know, just like spending time shooting the shit just to get a boys' weekend. It would have to be a men's thing. And because you can't have women at something like that if we're all just hanging out and drinking, it would just be like uh cigars and scotch and so you know drinking and talking, sitting at a round table telling stories because we had a lot of fun doing that in North Carolina, like of that conference that we went to in the Carolinas, like the highlight was clearly the night hanging out with everybody. Like, I didn't I didn't I was falling asleep at the conference itself. I was like, get me out of here, man. This is boring. But then once we got back to like we all went out to dinner together, it was like 25 of us went to a buffet, and then we went back to the hotel, and there was like 35 or 40 of us at the hotel. They gave us a conference room. We all just went to the liquor store, brought beers back. One guy was drinking chocolate milk and freaking bourbon maniac. That was grew up. It was he got sick, he was throwing up.
SPEAKER_03It was a like if Leo the 13th is prophetic, we were all prophetic that night about what was gonna happen there.
SPEAKER_04Uh cigars and sash does sound fun, but hope you're not coming. You can't come, hope. You need to watch the children. Chocolate milk and bourbon. It really was. We watched them do it. We're like, dude, you're gonna get sick from that. He's like, no, I do it all the time. Like, you're gonna get sick from that. Two hours later, it was vomiting everywhere.
SPEAKER_03I respect Jameson.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was Jameson, chocolate milk and Jameson.
SPEAKER_03I respect the commitment.
SPEAKER_04It was chocolate milk and Jameson, not bourbon.
SPEAKER_03Do we do bar mitzvahs as well? I that could be good for the channel. Well, that could also be very bad for the channel.
SPEAKER_04We'll come and baptize your dog. How about that? Come and baptize your dog. Thoughts on the next. Uh, my son went to one of the watch parties without telling me. And he sent me some of the videos in the mayhem in the city. And I was like, why did you go to that? I personally don't give a flying crap about sports. But I was going, I was considering pretending to be like a fair weather Knicks fan to annoy Tim Gordon because he despises the Knicks. And I was going to pretend like now that I've been a Knicks fan for all these years, I finally like I've literally never watched a game of basketball.
SPEAKER_03You should start doing all the posts he does about like, you know, the the top the the who's the goat of all time.
SPEAKER_04And dude, I could not name a single basketball player that's playing now to save my life. Like I know some of the past players from like, you know, like I can name like the greats and stuff from like our era. I could not name a single active basketball player. Uh LeBron James. He doesn't play anymore. His son does. LeBron James doesn't play anymore. LeBron's 40 years old, bro. See, that's how much I'm how much I know LeBron's 40 years old. He doesn't play anymore, right? Steph Carey plays still. Like his son plays or some shit. Hold on. Is that legitimately the kid's name? Yeah, it might be. Yeah, it might be that is his son's name. The thing is, like, his son sucks. Everyone says he still plays. LeBron still plays? Oh, what the hell do I? He's 40 years old. He's still playing basketball. When did Shaq stop playing? How old was he? So LeBron's son is on the same team as him, I'm pretty sure, right? I don't know. His son is probably, I think his son's on the same team as him, and they were he was basically like, if you want me, you gotta take him.
SPEAKER_03That's what we call nepotism.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. All right. Dude, I'm telling you, I don't know anything about basketball.
SPEAKER_03Italy isn't in the World Cup. Was that because it's not a real country? Wait. Why is Italy not in the World Cup? Oh, Bronny James.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, that's it.
SPEAKER_03No, no, no, wait. Is it Bronny or Brony? Is he a Brony? Sports talk with Ant and Rob. You don't know what a Brony is, do you? It's not a clue. It's a male fan of My Little Pony. Is it really? Yeah. They love the Novus Ordo.
SPEAKER_04Jabroni James. No, it is Bronny James. Everybody's so mad at us. This is now a Tim Gordon episode. What the broader? We should do it as a goof. We should do it as a goof. Nick's talk with Ant and Rob. Yo, you want to know what's crazy? Because the the the um the freaking X algorithm is so freaking fidgety.
Sports Detour And Algorithm Complaints
SPEAKER_04I wanted to see the end of like that game four, I think it was, where they had the big comeback. Like they had a huge comeback, they were down 27 points and they came back and won. And I wanted to just see the comeback. So I like searched Nick's comeback, and I watched one one highlight reel of like the the you know them coming back, dude. Every freaking video now when I flip through, if I do like if I doom scroll, is like Nick's content, and I'm like, I don't give a flying crap about Nick's content, and all I'm seeing is Nick's content for days and days now. Infuriating.
SPEAKER_03Instagram's like that. You know, like Adrian will send me a post that could be construed racist, and then it's all racism.
SPEAKER_04It's just all my my whole my whole X feed is just racism, uh recovering drug addicts.
SPEAKER_03Uh and then hope sends Hope sends uh a reel about you know some cute parenting thing, and suddenly my racism app becomes my parenting app. And then Adrian sends me.
SPEAKER_04Let me tell you guys my X feed. If I flip through, I'll get um people blacks chimping out, I'll get cops arresting black women, I'll get cops arresting drunk women, I'll get uh drug addicts and recovery for some reason. Because I still like to hear drug addict recovery stories. Uh now I'm getting Nick's content and so much freaking Dave Ramsey. I feel like every other video is a Dave Ramsey clip. I don't know why. Like I I I must have like watched one or two of them, and now it's just every freaking video is Dave Dave Ramsey. He's got a lot of people clip farming him.
SPEAKER_03Why does why doesn't why do none of you clip farm us?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I was gonna like I seriously, why do none of you clip farm us? It's actually kind of annoying. Like every other creator has people clip farming them, and none I have to post my own clips. You guys suck as freaking. I'll tell you what, you guys could even post stuff from locals.
SPEAKER_03Even if we talk to you. Do you guys need like some fancy name like Groyper to make you want to post clips or something of us?
SPEAKER_04I'll tell you what, I have uh I have a Twitter account with 3,500 followers that I set up as an avoiding Babylon clips channel, and I barely post on it. But if anybody has low Twitter following and they want that account, I'll give it to them. I would give that account. Let me see how many how many people I got on that one.
SPEAKER_03Uh you do not want me to post your locals.
SPEAKER_04Go ahead. I don't care. We need the clips out there.
SPEAKER_03I guess we do never say anything all that crazy.
SPEAKER_04I mean, what do I yeah, what do we got? Let me see. Uh it's got 3,500 followers, avoiding Babylon clips. Yeah, you could grow that thing, man. Um Ann is an abusive cult cult leader, always degrading his acolytes. Yeah, but majorian, if nobody's listening, it doesn't matter if you say crazy shit. You can say crazy things to 18 people. It's it's when people see you say it that it gets bad.
SPEAKER_03There's nothing worse than seeing a clue seeing a part where you said something kind of crazy, start to gain traction. You're like, oh no, no, no, no, no. Oh no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_04Uh ocean listens to anybody in the avoiding babylon universe. The expanded, yeah. The expanded avoiding Babylon universe, ocean's in their in their in their chat. Everybody, everybody tells me like who is telling me the when Rob said the N-word. Oh no, yeah, do it, do it. If you guys can find that, post it, it'll go for it'll be hilarious. Guys, I do still have a day job to make one for the team, Rob. No, you can post me saying it, I don't care. Yeah, but it's not funny when you say it. It's not nearly as funny as when you, but you say it so like like you're gonna kill one of them. Like what you sound like you're you know, like you just because you pronounce the R so hard. No, I do not. Like when I when I say it sounds endearing, never pronounce the R. I say it sounds endearing. Not a dear, maybe people are looking like we gotta get these niggers out of here. Like, you I have never pronounced the R on stream. Stop it, stop it. You you say it's super racist, hard R Rob. No, like I get I get a bit of an end pass because I'm from New York, and like you know, I was a wigger when I was a teenager. Me and my friends all called each other that growing up, but you uh you say it rough. You guys can post that.
SPEAKER_03Oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_04I'm dying for a clip like that to make it to like my uncle or something. He'd laugh his ass off.
SPEAKER_03This is why I don't tell friends or family members about this channel.
SPEAKER_04I don't tell anybody about them either, but they find it nevertheless. If you guys, if you guys uh if you guys um uh tag me in the in the tweet where you clip that, I'll I'll repost it. It's crazy. It sounded exactly like Rob, though. It was that's the crazy perfect, perfect Rob impression is why you guys are freaking out right now. Actually, it it sounded like it sounded like Adrian more than anything. Yeah, definitely. Um good is posting it. All right, you can post it on Instagram. I don't know if it'll stay up. Oh man. Um, all right. Are we teetering out or what are we doing? I'm not sure what we're doing. You know, we I got some other stuff we could talk about. I got we'll we'll give you guys another.
SPEAKER_03We've been going for two hours and 43 minutes.
Closing And Thursday Preview
SPEAKER_04Oh my god, it's 10 o'clock. I thought it was nine o'clock. All right, yeah, yeah. I thought it was nine o'clock. It's 10 o'clock. We've got as long as a normal show. Yeah, yeah. We did a three-hour show tonight. We're gonna wrap this one up. All right. We will uh we'll do a Friday night show soon where we give you guys a long show. I mean, this was a long show. This is two hours and 45 minutes. All right, all right. Uh, we will see you guys on Thursday with Nancy Charles. This is a fun one. When the time goes like that and you don't even realize how long you've been on for, it was a good show. This is a good locals. Fun one today.
SPEAKER_03It was a good locals.
SPEAKER_04All right, we'll see you guys next time. Take us out, Rob. I'm just ending it.