Pints With Aquinas - 145: 5 Lessons from the passion of Christ

Starting point is 00:00:00 G'day, g'day. Welcome to Pints with Aquinas. My name is Matt Fradd. If you could sit down with Thomas Aquinas over a pint of beer and ask him any one question, what would it be? In today's episode, we're going to ask Aquinas to share with us five things we can learn from the Passion of Christ. Hey, thanks for being back here at Pints with Aquinas, the show where you and I pull up a barstool next to the angelic doctor to discuss theology and philosophy. Today, we're going to look at a section of Aquinas' commentary on the Creed. He shares five things

Starting point is 00:00:45 we can learn from the passion of Christ on the cross. It's really powerful, awesome stuff. After that, I'm going to take some of your questions. And I actually, so one of the questions is going to be, I know this because I've just recorded the episode and I came back now to record the intro. One of the questions was, would I rather fight a hundred Cameron Fradd, that's my wife, 100 Cameron Fradd sized Bishop Robert Barons, or one Bishop Robert Barron sized Cameron Fradd? So be sure to stick around, you know, if you want that kind of magic. Hey, if you haven't already, be sure to go and subscribe to The Matt Fradd Show. Really excited about this. I think the video show is

Starting point is 00:01:31 getting better and better. We're doing one a month right now because it's super expensive, but hopefully we'll do more in the future if y'all want them. Here's some of the guests we have coming up who are almost certain to be on the show. There's a chance a couple of them may not be able to do it, but almost certainly, uh, Matt Walsh from The Daily Wire, uh, Father Mike Schmitz, um, Trent Horn, Father Gregory Pine, who we've had on the podcast before, Stephanie Gray, uh, who speaks out against abortion. We're going to have Catching Foxes, what, this week or very soon. It'll be releasing. And yeah, yeah. So just lots of great interviews coming up. And it's been really fun. And I just want to say thanks. But if you don't want to watch the whole three-hour

Starting point is 00:02:16 interview, which, you know, fair enough, go and subscribe to The Matt Fradd Show right now. Also, a big thanks to all of you who are supporting me and who are making The Matt Fradd Show and Pints with Aquinas and the Bible History Podcast and all the other things that I'm doing work. So, one of the things I'm doing right now is I'm going through the Summa Theologiae and I'm taking the article titles and the main responses of Thomas Aquinas and I'm editing it all into a three volume set for Amazon. So this is something that people have recommended in the past. They're like, if you're going to read the Summa, don't read the objections and the said contra and the reply to the objections, just read the article and then Aquinas' main response.

Starting point is 00:02:59 That way you won't get bogged down in the weeds and you'll actually be able to read through the bulk of the Summa Theologiae. So I thought, well, why not do that? Why not put it together? So that's what I'm doing right now. We're thinking of calling it Summa Succincta. See what I did there? Anyway, obviously that all costs a lot of money, but we should be rolling out the first volume in the next couple of months. Also, I'm going to Uganda in September, oh, gosh. Sometime towards the end of this year. I don't get the month wrong. But I'm not charging them to do it. I'm flying over for free.

Starting point is 00:03:29 I'm bringing over apologetics materials for free to share. They're paying for my flight. I want to get that right. But I'm not charging them anything else. And I'm bringing over free stuff to share with all the people that I speak to. All of this stuff is made possible because of awesome people like you who support me on patreon and now you can also support me at pints with aquinas um so if you go to pints with aquinas dot com slash donate some people have said to me they would rather donate to me directly and they

Starting point is 00:03:56 don't like patreon and they don't want to direct they want to they don't want to support me through patreon that's cool so that's why i've come up with this alternative. If you go to pintswithaquinas.com slash donate right now, you can give just like you could give on Patreon. I give you rewards just like I gave you on Patreon. So you get signed book, you get the Pints with Aquinas beer stein, you get all these audio things for free, these audio books that we're constantly recording. So you still get the gifts, but you can give directly to me at Pints with Aquinas. So you still get the gifts, but you can give directly to me at Pints with Aquinas. So a huge thank you to everybody who does that. You have no idea how much it means to me. Just a couple of months ago, when there was a bit of a scandal

Starting point is 00:04:33 around Patreon, I had 400 people drop their pledges. So I lost a lot of money. And it's a little difficult, honestly, when you're trying to book all these speakers, flying them in from all around the country, booking the, the, the space and stuff like that. So just, if you're out there and you're a supporter, big thanks to you. You really do make this show possible. And if you want to help and you don't yet go to pintswithaquinas.com slash donate, and that would be awesome. All right. So I want to share five things Aquinas says that we can learn from the crucifixion of Christ. Before I delve into the text from Aquinas today, I wanted to share an email I got recently from an evangelical pastor who listens to the show. And he listened to that show we did a few weeks back called The Glories of the Blessed Virgin Mary, or something to that effect. And you'll remember within that podcast, I tried to say, okay, even if you're an evangelical Protestant, here's what you should be able to say about Mary, right?

Starting point is 00:05:34 In other words, I'm not trying to convince you all at once because that rarely happens, right? But hey, like here's something we can maybe agree on. And what do you think about this? So I was so surprised to get this email. I'm not going to say the man's name. Let's see. Oh, he says I can use his name. His name is Brian. And I just want to share, he gave me permission to share this with you. So here it is. He says, thank you for this podcast. God has used you in a special way in my life to critically, spiritually explore aspects of the Catholic faith that before I would have written off and written off without any investigation. I'm now an evangelical Protestant that does crazy, scare quotes, things like invoking the name of saints. What? LOL.

Starting point is 00:06:19 He says, I feel like this podcast provided a mere Mary as Lewis provided a mere Christianity. I always like when I'm compared to Lewis, I have to say. He says, meaning you have laid out a picture of Mary for the most part that a Protestant and Catholic can agree upon if the Protestant is open to being intellectually and spiritually honest. I now hold a much higher view of Mary. It certainly relaxes my ears to hear you explain who she is and that Mary is great only because Christ makes her great, not the other way around. So thanks again for all you do, and I am happy to keep supporting you. I don't know if I will ever step over into Catholicism, but my love and respect for it have grown exponentially,

Starting point is 00:06:59 and you are the instrument he has chosen to use. Thank you for your faithfulness, Brian. So that's awesome. Thank you soness, Brian. So that's awesome. Thank you so much, Brian. So I just want to say a little bit about that. You know, I used to work for a group called Catholic Answers where my official title was apologist. You know, so if you'd be filling out a form, they're like job, you know, you're like apologist. That's what I would write. And I feel like back then I would get into conversations with evangelicals with my elbows up a little, you know, like ready to fight. And that's just because, you know, I was listening to really intelligent Protestants make their position and trying to see why I thought they were wrong. I was arguing a lot in the good sense with evangelical Protestants and others about the faith.

Starting point is 00:07:42 And so whenever I get into a conversation with a Protestant, I'd always be kind of like, here we go. I'm going to intellectually arm wrestle you. And I'm not trying to disparage intellectual back and forth. Obviously, that's what we have to do. And no one would ask Brian to become a Catholic if he didn't believe what the Catholic church taught. And part of him believing or coming to believe what the church teaches is that it be explained to him. And maybe there's some things that he believes that we don't believe, and we have to therefore explain why we think he's wrong. Like all of that, of course, is necessary. But the point I want to make is I think that my posture has changed as I engage with people who are either atheist or Protestant or some other religion. And I think for the better, I think my posture is a lot more relaxed. I'm not trying to hoodwink anyone. I'm not trying

Starting point is 00:08:33 to trick them. Because I think I've given it a lot of thought about what it would take for me to change faiths. I mean, have you ever thought about that? Like, suppose you're a Catholic. change faiths? I mean, have you ever thought about that? Like, suppose you're a Catholic. Maybe you're quite a staunch Catholic. Like, think about what it would look like if you began to realize that some other faith or no faith at all was the way to go. Imagine telling your friends that. You know, wouldn't it be excruciating? And so, as I've begun to realize that, I've begun to have a lot more kind of gentleness with my interlocutors as I discuss these things, because I know how difficult it would be for me just emotionally to begin to make that switch. And honestly, I think it's just the soft sell approach, if you want, I think is often a better tactic when it comes to evangelization than the hard sell anyway. I remember going for a job interview and needing a watch and I wanted to look good,

Starting point is 00:09:34 I guess, and I wanted a nice watch or something. And the man there didn't just try to sell me a watch. He tried to sell me a belt and shoes. And I think I'm remembering that story correctly, but he was really intense about it. You know, it was kind of slimy. It was kind of like, oh, for goodness sake, you know. And I remember leaving the store altogether and trying to find a watch somewhere else. Whereas if he had said to me, hey, yeah, this is a great watch. You know, you might also want to consider we got half price on belts or whatever, you know, some nice shoes over here. That all makes an appearance when you're having an interview, but no pressure. Feel free to look at

Starting point is 00:10:08 other stores too. I think we've got the best deals you're going to find right here. All right, suppose he took that approach. I definitely would have bought the watch and I probably would have ended up buying the shoes and the belt. I think when we're gentle with people, it frees them. They don't feel constrained. And I think that this is a much better approach to take with people, just an open and honest approach where it's like, yeah, here's what the Catholic Church teaches. And I totally get that some of that might seem crazy to you. And yeah, fair enough. I'm happy to chat about any of it or none of it if you want, you know, like I really do think that that's a more helpful, helpful approach. And I think I've

Starting point is 00:10:44 begun to see more success in helping people see the truth of the Catholic faith as I've taken that approach. So I just wanted to share that. And I wanted to say to Brian too, who obviously listens to the show, if you ever wanted to come to a divine liturgy with me, my family goes to Roswell 10 a.m. on Sundays. That's the service. You can come. No one's going to be weird. People will recognize that you're new, but no one's going to be weird. And I'll see to it that that wouldn't happen anyway.

Starting point is 00:11:15 And you're welcome just to join us. And then never join us again if you don't want to. Two things can be true at once. It can be true that I think the Catholic Church is the true church and want Brian, who I know is listening, to be Catholic. That can be true. But it can also be true that I think the Catholic Church is the true church and want Brian, who's I know listening, to be Catholic. That can be true. But it can also be true that I respect your decision. And just like you respect mine. And I think when we do kind of respect each other's autonomy like that and we talk to each other like adults and not people who need to receive a lesson from us, that we're obviously a lot more open to hearing what the other person says. Fair enough. All right. Let's dive into what Aquinas has to say. Oh, by the way,

Starting point is 00:11:51 I should have told Brian the name of the church. It's called Epiphany Byzantine Catholic Church in Roswell, 10 a.m. on Sundays. Show up if you want. Stand in the back. Again, it won't be weird. Show up if you want. Stand in the back. Again, it won't be weird. Okay, so moving on. So Aquinas has an amazing commentary on the creed. And when it comes to the part talking about Christ suffering under Pontius Pilate, being crucified, died, and was buried, he says this. He says, from all of this, we see that the effect of the passion of Christ is a remedy for sin.

Starting point is 00:12:29 But no less does it profit us as an example. Now, there were some early heretics who said that Christ was only an example, right? And that the way in which Christ saved us was by setting us an example. We look at him, we do what he did, by which we will now be saved. The church rejected this heresy and said, no, Christ's death and resurrection did save us and make possible heaven for us. That said, it seems like Aquinas is saying here, there's still an example, you know, there's still an example that can be had, right? So he says, but no less does it profit us as an example. St. Augustine says that the passion of Christ can bring about a complete reformation of our lives. Whoever wishes to live perfectly need do nothing other than despise what Christ despised on the cross and desire what Christ desired. There is no virtue that did not have

Starting point is 00:13:34 its example on the cross. Isn't that powerful? If you want to live perfectly, here's what you're going to do. Despise what Christ despised, love what Christ loved, desire what Christ loved, and especially on the cross. Here's another thing I think that evangelicals and Catholics can agree upon. I mentioned a few weeks back that we tend to be skeptical of what groups we define ourselves against do. And the example I gave was Protestants know, Protestants might look at Catholics and say, well, they're really into Mary, therefore I won't be. And I thought of one for Catholics as well. I think Catholics look at the culture who right now are talking a bunch about mindfulness and meditation and breathing. And we're like, oh, that's weird. Now, of course,

Starting point is 00:14:19 new age practices aren't to be allowed at all. I'm not suggesting that. But certainly mindfulness and breathing, how's that a bad thing? But very often we're like, oh, nope, nope, nope, uh, aren't to be allowed at all. I'm not suggesting that, but certainly mindfulness and breathing. How's that a bad thing? But very often we're like, Oh, nope, nope, nope, nope. Can't do that. You know? And so I think Catholics can fall into that trap as well. Like instead of just seeing what's good and listening to it, we just want to reject it all because we feel the society around us encroaching. Okay. Um, so we're kind of defensive and maybe in a good way, but maybe also in a negative way. And so, I think Protestants also, they don't need to oppose us when it comes to our sacramentals so much. So, I remember Carl Keating a while back wrote a book called Catholicism and Fundamentalism, right? And on Catholicism, for the T in Catholicism,

Starting point is 00:15:07 there was a crucifix, right? Christ's corpus on the cross. And then for fundamentalism, for the T there, it was a cross without a crucified Christ. So, I would just want to say, like, if you're a Christian who's not a Catholic, you shouldn't be opposed to crucifixes, nor should you think that you have to buy everything the Catholic Church teaches to be cool with crucifixes. I think crucifixes are beautiful, and it's a way in which we can meditate upon the passion of Christ. Now, sometimes you might say, well, statues, you know, can't do statues. That's a bad thing. And you think, well, it's just a depiction of something that happened. I mean,

Starting point is 00:15:44 many evangelicals I know aren't against, say, paintings of the crucifixion or coloring in books for their kids of the crucifixion. Well, one's two-dimensional, one's three-dimensional. There's really not a difference. So if you're an evangelical Protestant listening to me, you might consider buying a crucifix and putting it in your room. Because what we're about to do here with Thomas Aquinas is look at five things we can learn from the crucifix, right? Five things we can learn from Christ specifically. And a great place to begin thinking about these things is by actually physically looking upon a crucifix. Okay. So, let's see what aquinas says he says so if you seek an example of charity and here's the five virtues he's going to he's going to talk about by the way charity patience humility obedience

Starting point is 00:16:34 and contempt for earthly things these are the things that christ's example in his passion and death um show us and and should should encourage us towards, right? Charity, patience, humility, obedience, and contempt of earthly things. So let's look at them. He says, if you seek an example of charity, then, and he quotes John 15, 13, greater love than this no one has than to lay down his life for his friends. And this Christ did upon the cross. If therefore he gave his life for us, we ought to endure any and all evils for him. And then he quotes Psalm 15, what shall I render to the Lord for all the things that he has done for me? So there you go. You need more charity. You need to be a more charitable

Starting point is 00:17:26 person. I do. I look at the ways in which I hold grudges. I look at the ways in which I sometimes punish my wife by my silence. You know, like we'll get into a fight and I'm like, okay, fine. I just won't answer you. And I'm just, I'm going to go over here and I'm just not really going to engage with you so much because I need you to know that I'm angry with you. All right. Now, this is not okay, but this is things that I have done in the past. And I'm sure, unless you're already a saint, that you can think of a number of examples in your own life where you haven't been charitable and you need to be. Well, when you look upon the cross, St. Thomas is saying you you see here an example of charity

Starting point is 00:18:08 greater love than this no man has and you know he didn't feel warm and fuzzy as he was he was bleeding and choking and and asphyxiating death so that's the first thing the second thing is patience i need to grow in patience what about you you? Yep, I thought so. Aquinas says, if you seek an example of patience, you will find it in its highest degree upon the cross. Great patience is exemplified in two ways, either when one suffers intensely in all patience, or when one suffers that which he could avoid if he so wished. Christ suffered greatly upon the cross, first of all, we read in Lamentations, O you who pass by the way, look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow. Aquinas continues, and with all patience, because, 1 Peter, when he suffered, he did not threaten. And again, here's a quote from

Starting point is 00:19:08 Isaiah, he shall be led as a sheep to the slaughter and shall be dumb before his shearer and shall not open his mouth. He could have avoided this suffering, but did not. And then Matthew's gospel says, do you think that I cannot ask my father and he will give me presently more than 12 legions of angels? The patience of Christ upon the cross, therefore, was of the highest degree. Let us run by patience to the fight proposed to us, looking on Jesus, the author and finisher of faith, who having joy set before him, endured the cross, despising its shame. Hebrews 12.2. It's always amazing to me how much Aquinas uses sacred scripture. Like that was a very short paragraph. One, two, three, four, five quotes from scripture in a very short paragraph.

Starting point is 00:19:58 And this guy didn't have Bible hub to quickly look up, right? He memorized so much of the sacred scriptures, which is a great example to us. But yeah, patience. And I like this too. Great patience is exemplified in two ways, right? Either if somebody suffers intensely in all patience, right? So something happens to you, it's very difficult for you, and yet you don't kind of complain a lot and you're charitable in your dealings with other people. But it's also exemplified when somebody suffers something, but they could have avoided it. So it's one thing if you get into a car accident and you break your leg and you're in a tremendous

Starting point is 00:20:37 amount of pain and yet you show this virtue of patience. That's one thing. But it's another thing, it's a different type of patience to be the friend that sits in the hospital room with your friend with the broken leg, you know, for a significant amount of time. You know, like that is in a sense a suffering. It's easy to walk into somebody's hospital room and stay there for 20 minutes and leave. But what if you're there all day? What if you fall asleep in the couch, you know, throughout the night? And like, this is a suffering you're bringing upon yourself. And of course, St. Thomas's point is we see both of these at work in the passion of Christ.

Starting point is 00:21:17 I think one of the causes of conflict between family members and perhaps co-workers is this sort of excessive self-will, where I feel like I have a great idea and I need to tell you about it and convince you about it, you know? And so everybody has a great idea about how something should go and no one's willing to sort of be patient enough to sort of endure what someone else might think, which probably leads us to our next thing here too, which has to do with humility. So here's what Aquinas says. If you seek an example of humility, look upon him who is crucified. Although he was God, he chose to be judged by Pontius Pilate and to be put to death.

Starting point is 00:21:59 Your cause has been judged as that of the wicked. Job 36, 17. Truly that of the wicked because let us condemn him. Truly that of the wicked, because let us condemn him to a most shameful death, Wisdom 220. The Lord chose to die for his servant. The life of the angels suffered death for man. He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even to death on a cross. I mean, it is pretty astonishing when you think that the creator of the universe condescended to his creation and allowed his creation to kill him. Like it would be less of a stretch if I had a sort of fish tank and I became a fish and allowed the other fish to put me to death so I could save the fish. That's at least a finite gap between fish and me,

Starting point is 00:22:46 but we're talking about an infinite gap between God and me. This is a powerful display of humility. How can we not be humble? I think there's three kind of things we struggle with. One would perhaps be the stuff we own. So we can kind of be prideful in how much money we make or what cool fancy toys we have and whether they're better than yours or not. We can be prideful perhaps in what we know, you know? So I'm more intelligent than you. I've read more things than you. Wow, you've never heard of that. How could you never have heard of that? So like kind of intellectual stuff. And then I guess just our looks and our body, you know, I don't know, there's more, there's more to be sure. But how do you need to grow in humility? You know, because there is a lot of arrogance

Starting point is 00:23:33 kind of online, where people kind of display their intelligence, which is kind of funny. It's kind of like no one today that I, well, it's not really that cool, right? If I was to say I had a lot of money to show off my wealth, you'd be like, whoa, settle down there, dude. That's just not classy. And yet we kind of throw around our knowledge online or in conversations the way that we might be analogous to somebody sort of showing their all the money in their wallet or something. Let me drop this philosopher's name, or let me reference this obscure book by this poet or this author or something. And not cool, really. And often we don't even realize that we're being arrogant. So of course, looking upon the

Starting point is 00:24:17 cross should show us that we just have to be humble. And being holy is a much cooler thing than being clever. Being clever is great, but if it's an obstacle to holiness, gentleness and simplicity, it's not actually a good thing anymore. What else we can learn is obedience. So here's what Aquinas says, if you seek an example of obedience, imitate him who was obedient to the father unto death. For by the disobedience of one You know, obedience is a funny thing because we're all willing to be obedient when we agree with the kind of directions given by a superior. Right? And it can be tempting to think that therefore we are kind of very kind of compliant and obedient people. But of course, we'll never really understand whether

Starting point is 00:25:11 we're obedient or not until we're given a direction that we disagree with. I used to work for Net Ministries as a recruiter and as a supervisor. Net Ministries up in Canada. If you want to travel Canada for a year, Net Ministries of Canada. Look them up. Changed my life. But you know, we would recruit a lot of people and we'd make all this talk about obedience and suffering and listening and putting our self-will to the side. And we would all nod sagely and agree upon this, you know. But then it would be the stupidest little things. And some of the missionaries would just abandon that, you know, just abandon their teammates

Starting point is 00:25:51 because they didn't like a particular decision. And you're like, oh, wow, that's that you're really prideful. Like that was really an arrogant thing of you to do, you know? So I think, yeah, I think obedience is one of those things that can only be tested when we're given some sort of direction or an opinion by a supervisor, right, or someone above us, and we don't necessarily agree with it, you know, and we act the martyr, you know, and that's just not good. I mean, look at Christ who submitted to death on a cross, right? Because of our disobedience, he was obedient and therefore made us just. Finally, he says, we learn the contempt of earthly things. I'm not sure we talk about this enough, you know, in our churches. When's the last time you heard a sermon on why you ought to have contempt for this world? Worldly things, not the created world, of course, there's a distinction

Starting point is 00:26:47 there to be made. Aquinas says, if you seek an example of contempt of earthly things, imitate him who is the king of kings, the lord of rulers, in whom are all the treasures of wisdom. But on the cross, he was stripped naked, ridiculed, spat upon, bruised, crowned with thorns, gave to drink vinegar and gall, and finally put to death. How falsely, therefore, is one attached to riches and raiment, for they divided my garments among them, and upon my robe they cast lots. Psalm 21. How falsely to honors, since I was covered with lashes and insults? How falsely to positions of power because taking a crown of thorns, they placed it upon my brow. How falsely to delicacies of the table for in my thirst, they gave me vinegar to drink. Thus St. Augustine in commenting on these words, in commenting on these words, who having joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame,

Starting point is 00:27:54 says, the man Christ despised all earthly things in order to teach us to despise them. This is a difficult one, and it's one that I need to learn a lot more about, despising worldly things and loving Christ. I've been reading a lot of John of the Cross lately. He's a saint of Mount Carmel and some of his poetry. He's got this beautiful line in one of his poems. Let's see if I can remember it. He says, he who is sick with love whom God himself has touched finds his taste so changed that they all fall away like a fevered man who loathes any food he sees and desires I know not what, which is his name for God, by the way, which is beautiful. And he concludes, which is so gladly found. You know, I love that. I love that. Isn't that beautiful? He who is sick with love whom God

Starting point is 00:28:39 himself has touched finds his taste so changed that they all fall away like a fevered man. You know, when you get sick, you don't even want coffee in the morning. You're like, wow, what is wrong with me? And he says, this intimate union of Christ and the soul leads us to have a sort of apathy to worldly goods. And he says, we can actually burn out our appetite on them if we're not careful. And that's why we should forsake all for the sake of God. And that's why the path to God, he says, is nada, nada, right? No say nada. I know nothing, nothing, nothingness, nothingness, nothingness. It's fascinating stuff.

Starting point is 00:29:20 But yeah, I think you and I are too kind of obsessed with how many YouTube videos we can put up and how many people like our podcasts and how many retweets we're getting and how many Facebook shares we're getting. And this is really a contemptible thing, I think. Like we need to be falling more in love with Christ. How do you do that? Other than listening, I think, to very good podcasts occasionally, not all the time. I think we can binge on podcasts because we hate ourselves and don't like being with ourselves. Don't do that. I think we need good spiritual books, good spiritual directors, prayer, you know, spending our time maybe before the blessed sacrament, receiving the Eucharist, praying, spending time with good people who show us that

Starting point is 00:30:00 the Christian walk is much more joyful than the worldly walk. So there are five things that we can learn from Christ on the crucifix. So the next time you find yourself in front of a crucifix, think about those things, about how Christ was an example of charity, patience, humility, obedience, and contempt of earthly things, and how we ought to imitate him in those things. All right, now it's time to get to some of your questions. All right, a big thank you to everybody who is supporting me, either at pintsofthequinnis.com slash donate or on Patreon. Can't tell you how much it means to me and how much it enables me to get a lot of work done.

Starting point is 00:30:41 So thank you for making this show possible and for the Matt Fradd show possible. You rock, you rock, you rock. All right, let's take some of your questions here. I just threw out a question on Patreon asking for you to send them in. All right, so I haven't read these ahead of time, so hopefully none of them are too difficult to answer. All right, so let's check it out here. The first question comes from, well, let's just not necessarily go through them in order. The first question here comes from, oh my gosh, there's so many of them. Desiree, let me see if I can see your last name. Sifuentes says, pineapple on pizza, yes or no? If you say no, you're wrong. Well, it would depend on what's on the rest of the pizza. So like I like ham and pineapple pizza,

Starting point is 00:31:32 but I wouldn't necessarily want pineapples next to say capsicum and anchovies. You don't say capsicum if you're American, peppers and anchovies and things like that. I actually love anchovies. I like salami, black olives, anchovies. I like that sort of stuff. But yeah, I'll have pineapple on my pizza, but it's got to be with the right stuff. Seth Coutinho says, what are your thoughts on the Catholic charismatic renewal? Okay, so my first thought is that the church is universal, and therefore, there may be things and expressions among the faithful that we don't necessarily gravitate towards or do not necessarily understand right away. But that's okay. My classic example is the infant of Prague, right? The infant of Prague strikes me as one of the weirdest devotions ever. And sometimes I'm tempted to be like, that's just too weird. Like, it's just, I don't know where that came from, but it's weird. But

Starting point is 00:32:21 I should have a little more humility than that and just understand that the church is universal and different cultures gravitate to different devotions and that's okay. Likewise, if I were to sit here and criticize the charismatic renewal, I think I would equally be, I think that would perhaps be somewhat arrogant for me in particular, because I know very little about it. But two, I know many people who the charismatic renewal has really blessed. Is the Holy Spirit capable of waking people up from a deep slumber? Yes. Did he do that with me in a sort of charismatic environment? Yeah. So glory to God. Let me give you one example of a friend of mine whose life was

Starting point is 00:33:03 completely changed by the charismatic movement. This woman, one of my dear friends now, I would consider a dear friend. As a kid, I would have thought of her like a second mother. Loved her dearly. But she was very much engrossed in secular thought, sort of feminism type errors. And, yeah, not into cool stuff. And she was a very unhappy woman at one point in her life. She was in her late forties, very intelligent woman, okay? Worked in sort of mental health area, very intelligent woman. And she just happened to be at mass one day.

Starting point is 00:33:39 And after mass, the priest said, hey, there's a few couples down here that have invited anyone to come. And if you want to be prayed for, they'll come and pray with you. And this woman, she won't mind me saying her name, Evie, felt, well, what bloody harm can it do? She felt stressed, overworked. She couldn't stay on top of her diet. She was pretty miserable, actually. So she walks down the aisle, and they lay hands on her, you know, and before they can even ask her, you know, what exactly would you like us to pray for,

Starting point is 00:34:13 she starts bawling and has this radical conversion to Jesus Christ on the spot. Now, you might be tempted to dismiss a radical conversion like that, say, in a 15-year-old, you know, you might say, well, 15-year-olds are very emotional and maybe they're just attributed. No, but this is a woman in her late 40s, I believe, who was very intelligent and very cerebral. Everything was – she was very analytical and very critical about things. Her whole life was changed in an instant. She went home that very night and she took the many new age things that she had laying around the house like tarot cards and other things and burnt them

Starting point is 00:34:50 she had statues of buddha which she smashed and she threw holy water up the hallways of her room of her passageway not long after she went to a Bible study and was sharing this with some friends. And her friend said to her, well, gee, don't you think that's a little bit narrow-minded? And she said, well, it's a narrow path, so I hope it's narrow-minded, which I thought was a great answer. So there's an example of someone who's had their life completely changed by the charismatic renewal. And so I think for anyone, especially most of us who know very little about these things, we're not studied in them, to dismiss them wholesale would be erroneous. Are there criticisms that one could make of different expressions of the charismatic renewal? Yeah. But there are also legitimate criticisms one could make of any movement within the church, right? Life teen, Latin mass, Byzantine spirituality, name what you

Starting point is 00:35:47 want. They all involve people and people are broken and therefore criticisms can be made. But that would be my first shot at that answer. So thank you for that, Seth. Let's see here. Kasper Olowski, sorryowski sorry says if you were a kitchen utensil what would you be and why um i don't know that's weird i want to say rolling pin but only because i saw a rolling pin last night and that's kind of bubbling up in my consciousness. I don't know why, and I'm sorry, but I'm going to abandon the question. Okay. Michael Caggiano says, if the apostles had celebrated mass on Holy Saturday, would there have been any difference in the product of transubstantiation than there is now post-resurrection?

Starting point is 00:36:42 Presumably no, since the first mass was celebrated before the death of Christ, right, on Holy Thursday. So there you are. Garen Gray says, is it okay to pray in an accent that is not your native accent, such as a Midwestern praying in an Aussie accent? No. In fact, praying with an Australian accent makes it three times more likely for God to hear and answer your prayers. I'm not sure if you knew that, but you've learned it right here at Pints with Aquinas. Michael Moore says, Matt, how do I maintain friendships with persons that live against Catholic teachings, such as sexual libertines? How can a Catholic in friendship draw them closer to a better life? I think the first thing, Michael, that's important

Starting point is 00:37:25 is that you surround yourself with good people and that your primary source of community are not people who glorify sort of sexual licentiousness. That ought to be the first thing. And if you can't find them, you either need to look harder or you need to move. Secondly, you say, how can you draw them into a closer, a better life? Because clearly I'm not saying we need to cut out all relationships with people who are not further along the Christian walk than we are. Well, I think one of the ways that we can draw our non-Christian friends along into a better life is to be serious about living a better life ourselves, number one. And then number two, taking a holistic interest in our friend's life. We all know what it's like for somebody to notice

Starting point is 00:38:05 a problem within us or a perceived problem and to get to work on that. You know, they batter us to death with different books that show us why we're wrong and need to change our mind. And you know how quickly you stop listening to that person because you felt like a project, not a person. So you ought to treat your friends like people. That means taking an interest in their life, not just the areas in which you think they need to grow in. So what are your dreams? What are your fears? What are you doing next year? What Netflix shows are you watching right now? What things do you love? What do you hope to do? You know, what's on your bucket list? I think that could be a good start. Ryan Robbins says, for someone looking to casually evangelize to their friends, what do you find the most effective

Starting point is 00:38:43 or what suggestions do you have? Ryan, I think I sort of got to this a bit at the start of the show, you know, when I talked about just this gentle, honest, and open approach. Like we don't need to trick anybody. We don't need to emotionally manipulate anybody. We just need to be ourselves and pray for an opportunity to talk about Christ and our faith and to witness to them simply. Because of course, it's the Holy Spirit that does the converting anyway. So it's not a matter of you having to just get better at convincing people. I mean, you might have to get better at that. You might have to get better at logic, you might have to get better at

Starting point is 00:39:21 rhetoric and all those sorts of things. But also just speaking openly and honestly, I think is really compelling. Joseph Petrick says, what would Aquinas say about charismatic movement and speaking in tongues? Aquinas does address the speaking in tongues in the Summa Theologiae, but he doesn't address it in the same way in which it's often used today, as a sort of charismatic gift that isn't necessarily communicating meaning. It's just a means by which we pray. So I will have to do a whole other episode on that. Gabe Ogawa says, I'm discerning net. What would you say about net Ireland versus net Australia? Well, I would say if you hate the sun, then you should definitely go to Ireland. If you love

Starting point is 00:40:06 rain and dreary days, you should definitely do Ireland. But if you like sunshine and beaches and beautiful people, I guess Australia, whatever. I personally like rain and miserableness. So you could, I mean, you choose really, what do you want? That was definitely sarcastic. But yeah, I mean, you choose really, what do you want? That was definitely sarcastic, but yeah. I mean, whatever you feel called to, like when I serve with net ministries, I remember I didn't want to do Australia cause I was from Australia and I wanted an adventure and I wanted to go to Canada. So I think just be honest, like just do something fun. Like what do you want to do? Maybe Australia appeals to you. Maybe Ireland. Well, maybe call them both and begin a conversation with both. And you'll feel more inclined to one other than the other. All right. Joshua Wendell

Starting point is 00:40:50 says, is there no cussing policy on Pines for the Kindness? I was at Sikh and noticed that a couple of words were edited out of your live podcast. Yeah, cussing. Thanks, Joshua. It's a weird thing. I did cuss a couple of times in the podcast at Seek. I tend not to want to cuss on my episodes, primarily because I know that there are some parents who let their children listen to this and I don't want to be a bad example to them. I think cussing can be used appropriately from time to time and in the right circumstances, but it's just difficult to know if that circumstance is now, if you're driving around with your seven-year-old in a car somewhere. And so that's kind of one of the reasons I try not to swear on this show. By the way,

Starting point is 00:41:34 when I talk about swearing, it wasn't anything massive. It was just S-H-I-T kind of word. All right. Blake says, do you prefer the Tridentine Mass or the Divine Liturgy? Why? I prefer both. Both are absolutely glorious and, you know, beautiful. I certainly prefer both to a banal Novus Ordo. That said, of course, the Novus Ordo can be celebrated beautifully also, but Tridentine Mass or Divine Liturgy would be my preference, even over a beautifully done Novus Ordo. Anthony Bedoy says, do you think our Catholic nerdery can sometimes go too far by rejecting some of the natural goods of the world like sports, game, and art? If so, why do you think this happens? Can we remedy it? So I've never been a big fan of sports. Last night we

Starting point is 00:42:19 had the Super Bowl and everyone told me that I needed to watch it and I really didn't want to. And so I tried because my son wanted to watch it. And I got so bored after about seven minutes that I went upstairs and just started hanging out in the kitchen, cleaning up and thinking. And then the fourth quarter came about. And so I went down and I watched that. And I think like for many people who like to think, like who are more intellectually inclined, I don't mean that I'm an intellectual. I just mean for those of us who are more intellectually inclined, we tend to think about how sports is beneficial to the culture. Like that's what I think about, you know, I'm like, this is good for tribe mentality. This is a good thing for human, you know, I think from that angle, like people getting together and shouting at the top of their lungs with a bunch of other people, like in what other circumstance does that ever happen? Maybe the charismatic renewal, I don't know. Like when do you ever get to do that? So I think of it that way. So in that sense, I guess I'm a bit of a nerd, but no, I think sport is a very good thing. And I think art is a beautiful thing and I actually like games. So yeah, I guess I can't

Starting point is 00:43:28 speak for you, but I love art. I like games. I don't really like sport, but yeah. Okay. Hoss Hammond says, is death natural to the human person? And could you give your view? So we actually addressed this a couple of weeks ago in the podcast, What is Life? I think that death, I don't know. I don't know. I think death is probably natural to the human person, and that is why it was the tree of life that needed to supernat about original sin and these sorts of things and so I would recommend for a perhaps a more fleshed out view go listen to What Is Life. Christopher Beckett says, what do you do when you struggle with your faith and praying? So when I struggle with my faith I talk to people who are much smarter than me, not difficult. I read books on that particular area that I'm struggling with. And then I try to be very consistent to daily prayer, morning and night prayer, especially. So often when I wake up, I'll get up and I'll pray, you know,

Starting point is 00:44:37 in my icon or corner. And I don't necessarily have a lot of heart to heart sort of conversations with the Lord. It's just very kind of ritualistic, but at six in the morning, that's kind of all I can do, and I'm okay with that. Okay. Guys, there are so many questions here, and I'm so grateful for all of them. I think I've got over 50 questions here in under like 10 minutes of asking my patrons for them. So I'm not going to be able to answer all of them. Let me just try and answer like four more really quickly. Okay. going to be able to answer all of them. Let me just try and answer like four more really quickly. Okay. Mark Adkins says, did Jesus have a favorite food? Yes, he did. It was sushi. Okay. Maybe not,

Starting point is 00:45:14 but that is my favorite food. Joe Pass says, would you rather fight a hundred Cameron Fradd sized Bishop Barons or one Bishop Barron sized Cameron Fradd? bishop baron sized Cameron Fradd that is such a weird question I think I would rather fight a hundred Cameron Fradd sized bishop barons because nobody, nobody

Starting point is 00:45:38 is feistier than my wife so thank you for that weird question all right um michael pennerfield says what would saint domus aquinas say about binge watching netflix um i think he'd say it's a sin and slothful and stop it um but okay so but i think there's a difference between occasionally watching an hour or two of entertainment in order to relax or even more. And then just like this being a constant thing. I think to the constant thing, he'd say you're an idiot and this is even making you more of an idiot and so stop it.

Starting point is 00:46:14 But I think that's different to just taking leisure time to watch it every now and again. I think that's different. again. I think that's different. That said, I'm not sure how many of you have ever kind of laid down in front of a TV and watched several episodes and went, I feel really refreshed. Maybe you have, I don't know. But if you don't, then stop doing it and start doing something cooler. Julia Janowski, what's up, Julia? Came to our Pines for the Aquinas meetup at Seek. It's great to see you on here. You say, is it bad to pray the rosary every day and not always to be meditating on the same mysteries? Sometimes I will say the rosary while walking because I want to pray, but actually meditating on the mysteries is very difficult to

Starting point is 00:46:53 do all the time. No, it's absolutely not bad. I think we have to realize the distinction between, say, the Holy Mass and then private devot. Like private devotions are called private because there's no real set way of doing them, by which I mean, if you venture from it, you will be sinning. It's just not the case. I think we tend to struggle with scrupulosity when it comes to these things. I remember Benedict Grishel said that he would sometimes pray the rosary in the subway and he wouldn't meditate upon the mysteries because it was too loud and crazy, or maybe he just didn't want to. And he would just look around the subway and look at a person and say,

Starting point is 00:47:31 okay, I'll offer this Hail Mary for them. And he'd just pray a Hail Mary for them, and he'd look at another person and pray a Hail Mary for that. And so I think that's a beautiful thing. Incidentally, this is why I like praying the Jesus prayer. When I pray the rosary, I've got to be very attentive to what I'm doing, or I try to be. But when I pray the Jesus prayer, I can more or less just place myself in the presence of Christ and not be too concerned about my mind drifting.

Starting point is 00:47:54 Okay, I think I'm past the four that I said I would do, but let's just do a couple more because these seem rather quick. John Paul Master says, is there a prequel to Does God Exist still in the works? Thanks, John. I know I started that and then I kind of backed away a little bit. I think what I need is some significant headspace to be able to write that. I'm currently writing several other books right now, and that did just get pushed to the side, primarily because it's not what I'm versed in, and I'd need to kind of do a lot more kind of research to be able to make that a good book. I'm currently doing a book on Consecration of Mary through the teachings of Thomas Aquinas.

Starting point is 00:48:25 I'm also doing a book, hopefully, which will be called The Angelic Doctor is In. I'm not sure what it'll be called yet or not, but it'll be with Ignatius. So that's going to be pretty exciting too. That should be next year. And I'm doing a couple of other things too. So hopefully I'll get to that. Will Herman says, would Thomas Aquinas recommend I get an iOS or an Android phone? He'd probably recommend that you get neither and read books.

Starting point is 00:48:47 Luke Crossman says, I have an Orthodox friend that keeps going on about the energies and essence distinctions in the Trinity and how that's a major distinction between Orthodox and Catholic. I have a hard time following him when he goes on about this. Have you heard about this distinction and could you explain it? So I have heard about the distinction and I don't know enough about it to explain it competently and so I'm not going to. But let me just say this, there is a difference between theology and doctrine. Doctrine is what we're bound to believe, theology is the expression of that doctrine. Suppose there were a couple of communities that were raised in the Christian faith. One only had the Gospel of Mark, one only

Starting point is 00:49:24 had the Gospel of John. Knowing what we know now, we would know that the two do not conflict, but rather harmonize. That said, if you'd never read the gospel of John and all you'd ever read was the gospel of Mark or vice versa, it'd be pretty hard to see how they would harmonize right away, because it's the same doctrine, it's being expressed in a different way. And so when it comes to any sort of orthodox, not in the church, but in the sense of right teaching, when it comes to sort of orthodox teachings, they have to harmonize, even if at first they don't. So I don't know enough about to speak about it, so I won't, but I would like to have somebody on in the future to discuss that at greater length, because obviously there are many Eastern Catholics that would be fine

Starting point is 00:50:07 with this language. And then, you know, would be able to explain it a bit more. Because I think sometimes we can have a cursory reading of something and it seems to contradict what we believe. But then upon further reflection or upon further study, you realize that it can't actually contradict it. So one example would be some of the Eastern Church fathers talk a lot about the passions. And some Eastern fathers spoke about the passions as if they were alien to man's original nature, that they're kind of more like diseases than they are anything else. And then other Eastern fathers talked about it, not that they're alien entirely, but that they've just been kind of corrupted. And I thought to myself, well, that doesn't seem right,

Starting point is 00:50:50 you know, to talk about passions like that. Obviously we have passions for different reasons, but then within the same sentence of them kind of, well, the same paragraph of them saying why passions are bad, they would say something like, you know, pray for the gift of tears. Well, then I thought, well, okay, that's a passion. You know, like I'm passionately praying. I'm trying to be moved by the passion to repent, let's say. And so, as soon as I read that, I'm like, okay, so I don't know enough about this. Like someone would be able to explain this to me, but I don't know enough to be able to figure this out and put this together. So, humility is a good thing. I'm not saying you lack that. I'm saying I lack that.

Starting point is 00:51:35 And so, yeah, good for you for looking for further reaching out for further clarification, but I just don't have the knowledge to give it to you. You might want to check out with Father Michael O'Loughlin from Catholic Stuff You Should Know. Get in touch with them somehow, maybe on their Facebook page and ask them that question and they might be able to respond to it. Final questions comes from Bart Upart. What's up, Bart? Thanks for being a patron, brother. You say, when it comes to fasting, he's using a product that kills appetite, sort of cheating. For example, Padre Pio used snuff, chewing tobacco, on days where he'd fast because it killed his appetite. Fasting from what I understand should be painful to a certain extent because you teach yourself that you mustn't live by bread alone, but by every mouth or every word of the Lord. Yeah, well, I can't speak to the Padre Pio

Starting point is 00:52:15 situation because I don't know enough about it. Yeah, I think we're all at different stages and we're all called to fast at different levels. And I think one of the first things that we ought to do before we engage in fasting is be really super honest about how weak and pathetic we are. You might be a lot less pathetic than me, Bart. You probably definitely are a lot less pathetic. But suppose you and I were going to fast and you're like, okay, well, I'm going to give up everything but bread today. And I might say to myself, gee, I know myself enough that if I was to give up everything about bread and water, that I would end up kind of binging at 5 p.m. at night. So you know what? I'm going to take into account my weakness and I'm going to eat bread,

Starting point is 00:52:56 but I'm also going to allow cream in my coffee. And that's what I'm going to do. You know what I mean? And you might say, well, aren't you cheating? And I'm like, well, I'm kind of doing what I think I can do well. I actually like one of the rules for life that Jordan Peterson has. He says, you know, what's something you could do that you would do that would begin to make your life better? I like how he put that. Because it's not just what can you do? Because of course we can theoretically do a lot of things. You know, what we can do and what we would do can be very different. Well, I can fast tomorrow. Will you? No. Okay. Well, what will you do? And so sometimes it's about asking, okay, what can I do? And what would I do to kind of,

Starting point is 00:53:37 in this context, grow in relationship with Christ or something like that? All right. Thank you so much to everybody who was sending their questions. I apologize if I didn't get to yours. I want to say a big thanks to everybody who supports me on patreon and now as i said in the beginning of the show you can support me at pints with aquinas.com by going to pints with aquinas.com click donate or just go slash donate um give me five bucks a month 10 bucks a month 20 bucks a month i give you free things in return that i ship to your door you also get access to these awesome online audio books of Thomas Aquinas that you're not going to find anywhere else because Audible doesn't find it

Starting point is 00:54:09 profitable enough. So I'll just, I pay people to do them and then I give them to you for free. Thank you so much for making Pints with Aquinas possible. Thank you for making the Matt Frad show possible. This traveling that I'm doing to Uganda, this Bible history podcast. I really try to work my butt off for you guys. But if the money isn't there, then, you know, no money, no honey. Is that a line? By honey, I don't mean girlfriend. That was weird. I feel like that's probably what it means. I didn't mean to say that. If I don't have the money, I can't keep doing this. So a big thank you to all of you who are doing that and who will do that. Again, go to pintswithaquinas.com, click Donate.

Starting point is 00:54:45 There you'll get to see all the free stuff I can give you in return. And a massive thanks to all y'all. All right, God bless. Have a good week and enjoy the rest of my sister's song. Here it is. Ha-ha! I took you with too many grains of salt and juice Lest we be frauds or worse, accused Hollow me to deepen in you Whose wolves am I feeding myself to?

Starting point is 00:55:24 Who's gonna survive who's gonna survive who's gonna survive and I would give my whole life to carry you, to carry you. And I would give my whole life to carry you, to carry you. you and I would give my whole life to carry you, to carry you, to carry you, to carry you, to carry you. There were birds in your tears falling from the sky Into a dry riverbed that began to flow down to

Starting point is 00:56:37 A cross towering high up above the water And maple trees surrounded it leaves caught flame With golden embers Um, why, why are you still here? The show is done, there's nothing left to say So you can, I don't, why would you even It's beyond me that you would There's nothing left to say, so you can... I don't... Why would you even... It's beyond me that you would...

Starting point is 00:57:09 So... I should do a whole Aquinas thing in ASMR. What do you think? Oh, that's so gross.

Pints With Aquinas - 145: 5 Lessons from the passion of Christ

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.