SPEAKER_03 0:01

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and never shall be. World without end. Amen. Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us in the name of the Father and of the Son of the Holy Spirit. Thank you very much. So if you want to grab a textbook, you can do it without, but if you wanted to be able to follow along certain pages on the back table there, there's four or five there if you want to grab one. So I want to follow up from last week's class and continue into this week's class. So the handout you have at your tables there. Some highlights from last week leading into this week. So I also want to read from there a little bit and comment. The loss of original justice and holiness, right? Yeah, I can't.

unknown 0:53

You're recording.

SPEAKER_03 0:53

I am, yeah. Thank you for asking. Thank you. The loss of original justice and holiness, or another nice word, it'd be original harmony, right? Because it's harmony with God, others, the world, self, right? Is like the loss of an inheritance, right? Because you think, well, gosh, wait, why am I being blamed for what Adam and Eve did, right? Well, it's the sense of receiving, we all receive from the generation before us, right? So if you have the sense on a supernatural level that God created man and woman in a perfect state and through original sin, disobedience, they lost a permanent gift. They couldn't hand it on, right? So if you waste an inheritance, you can't pass it on to your kids, right? Simple like that. So to use that analogy. Um, so and also, by the way, if you were Adam and Eve, you would have done the same thing. Okay, so blaming Adam and Eve is not a good strategy, okay? We would just be blaming somebody else, it'd be you. So, and then the relationship between the teaching on original sin and the teaching on who Jesus is, that really you can't understand one without the other, right? And I forget where it was, it was in the textbook or somewhere else. That original sin, oh, it was the catechism, right?

unknown 2:11

Right.

SPEAKER_03 2:12

That original sin is the reverse side of the good news, right? In other words, the Old Testament proclaims the bad news that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We try and we try and we fail, the people of God. We need a savior. So who Jesus is, good news, who we are without him, bad news, right? The Old Testament. So original sin is the reverse side of the good news that Jesus is our Redeemer. And then continue with that, right? What is it that original sin has done or caused, or what are the consequences? Sin, suffering, death, right? That's the teaching, our faith. Sin, suffering, and death would not be, were it not for original sin, right? So that's exactly what Jesus overcomes, right? Forgiveness of sin, resurrection from the grave, redeems the value of suffering, right? So sin, suffering, and death. You could almost call it like the unholy trinity, right? That three sin, suffering, and death. Sin, suffering, and death. And in other words, also I would add this: what is heaven? Heaven is this world free of sin, free of suffering, and free of death, right? So that's another way to understand what Jesus has done is precisely overcome those three consequences of original sin: sin, suffering, and death. That's what the fullness of redemption will look like. Um that's want to keep that. Um you can't understand who Jesus is without original sin, and you can't really believe, shall we say, in the article of faith of original sin without knowing who Jesus is as well. Um and then Jerry's great phrase Jerry not here. No, yeah, Jerry Jerry's. So, and Jerry's great phrase for the difference between Catholic theology and others, not every process theology, but many, right, would have a lower estimation of our condition after original sin. The phrase, we're deprived of perfection, we're not depraved, right? Original sin puts us in a deprived state, not in a depraved state, right? Or as I offered last week, you know, we are not snow-covered dung as a result of Jesus. Jesus is not just snow on top of the dung that we are, okay? Um, that we are actually transformed, capable of holiness. And the very proclamation year after year, month after month, of a new saint, oh, this person is a saint, this person is a saint, that's not so subtly saying, you know, we can be transformed. We can be holy. God's grace can really make us godly, right? That we're so we know we're made in the image and likeness of God, and we don't completely lose that because of our sinful nature, right? And then I want to get to that term, which is in our in our textbook today. The term for our being deprived, not depraved, is concupiscence, right? That's a technical term the church uses for our inclination to sin. Concupiscence. So that inclination towards sin which we all have. So as a result of original sin, we have an inclination towards sin. But we're still also drawn towards the good, right? There's that internal tension, that um battle within us. So I added this to our sheet to remind us of that part. So from the Catech CCC, right? Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 27. The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God, and God never ceases to draw man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for. So that's pretty much the first paragraph of the catechism proper after it does some introductory material. So the catechism of Catholic Church just professes that almost like at the outset. Let's just say who we are. We are drawn towards God. It's in us to want to know and to love and have oneness with God. The great quote of St. Augustine, right? You have made us for yourselves, and we are restless until we rest in thee. So we are not, we don't deny our sinfulness, we don't deny our inclination towards sin, but we also profess very confidently and happily that the desire for God is real. The desire for God is written into the human heart. I was thinking about this today when I was hearing confessions that, so let's talk about what I heard today. No, I'm just kidding. I don't remember, honestly. So many confessions we hear. But speaking categorically, you might think, gosh, Father, the stuff you hear, you know? Well, of course, right? That's where you can be totally honest. So, on the one hand, we hear about how real the inclination towards sin is, right, as priests. But I can tell you, there'll be confessions, you know, it's been this many months. And after I hear, I'm like, wow, doing better than me. That's all you got for three months. Wow, that's impressive. I mean, that's sincerely. Like some people, they're just really living very virtuous, grace-filled lives. They confess on a regular basis, venial sins. And in fact, just on a technicality, if you didn't know this, you can come into a confession, just say, uh, bless your father, for I've sinned. It's been one month, two months, whatever. I ask forgiveness for my venial sins. Amen. Just you know you're allowed to do that. Because it's only serious sins that you're required to confess by name and number, right? Just that's a technical confession thing. But my point being that um some people, I want you to know this: that some people are, God's grace is really, really working, and they are only struggling with venial sins, right? Wouldn't you like to hear that too, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:24

You can also confess defects because they're inclinations to sin. Just not sufficient uh matter for absolution. So you have to have at least one venial sin, or like you say, generally, venial sins are sufficient matter.

SPEAKER_03 8:35

Yeah, so let's be clear, you can't come in and say I don't have any sins. No, you're not allowed to. I mean, you might not have any. It's true, you might not have any children sometimes. They really don't have any sometimes. Um, so I say, well, I have to come back later, you know. Um, but yes, you can, of course, the habit or the custom of confessing venial sins, naming them, describing them, is for getting good advice and growth and holiness. That's all good. And yes, you can also say, I'm struggling with this temptation. Like I feel drawn towards this sin. That's also just uncovering the movements of your heart, right? So, but what I want to say, just categorically speaking, that when I read this teaching of the church, I'm like, yeah, I see that in confession. On the one hand, people are really struggling with sins. Well, that's why confession is there. But also on the other hand, sometimes I hear people actually not struggling too bad. I remember this is a while ago. I don't I mean, I couldn't, you know, I couldn't name it or think of it very specifically, but I remember a person who's very, very advanced in years, and she says something like, Yeah, I'm still working on that. I'm thinking to myself, okay, well, you're, I think you're in your 90s, so that's very humble of you to say I'm still working on trying to change, you know. Okay. Well, keep up the good effort there, you know. Uh I think we say when in our 50s we're kind of stuck, right? But um, so point being that that I hear this teaching of the church how real it is. That's what I want to just share with you today. I hear and through confession how real it is that we are struggling with sin and falling and need mercy. That's why confession is error. But I also hear, actually, in confession, how God's grace really does make us holy, you know? And we know that the saints, John Paul II, Mother Teresa, they went to confession regularly, right? They were probably describing the movements of their heart. I'm drawn towards this and opening their heart to God, asking for encouragement. You're gonna say something.

unknown 10:36

Is it a female sin or is it a one sin?

SPEAKER_03 10:42

Well, we want to be clear, this is I'm glad for the question. Feelings are not sins in themselves, right? I'm feeling a lack of motivation. That's not a sin. That's that's just the human body has you know a chemical reality which makes you feel emotions of all different kinds, right? So sin has to be, you know, something contrary to God's will, and then you have to not just feel it, but then actually have some thinking about it and choosing, right? So I think what you're trying to say is, for an example, right? I know I should do these duties today, I don't feel the desire to do them, and I choose not to do them. So, but it I think in general, it also is a matter, you know, um, venial and mortal sins relate to what is the um the uh the the matter, as we say. So I don't feel like doing what I should do today, like washing the car. I really should, but I don't want to. Washing the car, probably not a serious matter. Um I don't feel energy to um help my son with his homework. Well, that's a little more serious. He really needs help, right? He might feel discouraged if I don't help him. Again, is that mortal? I mean, you would know when things get to be a really more serious matter. So it depends what the topic is, right? But but just generally, just remember that feelings in themselves are not, they're neutral, morally neutral. Hope that helps a little bit. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:11

Well that yeah, that's like the distinction between matter. You're just inclining.

SPEAKER_03 12:20

And now you can name it like, ah, there's that concupiscence again. Yeah, so you're giving me an example. Concupiscence is the category of the inclination, the feeling, literally, the the feeling, the attraction to um sin. And something else we always keep in mind, right, is that sin is always a deception. It's a twisting of the good, like, oh, I think I'll feel better if I slack off and don't do what I should do. But then later, yeah, no, it that did not bring happiness, right? It was it was deceptive, yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, sure. Thank you for the question. Yeah, so again, it's really important to always distinguish the role of the emotions, right? So being sorry for a sin doesn't mean there wasn't pleasure in some element of it, right? Something was pleasurable. I stole a candy bar, it tasted good. Confessing it won't make it not taste good. Like you it did taste good when I ate it, right? This yeah, like like Eve, something we ate, right? So yeah, being sorry for something is is being contrite. I recognize it's wrong, and I do I choose, I make the resolution, I don't want to do that again, whatever, whatever it is, right? But it's tempting precisely because there is a pleasure involved, right? But we have we are deeper than our emotions, and so the lack of peace because of the guilt is actually the greater the greater good, right? And you and your contrition recognizes that greater good. Yeah, so we're not denying pleasure as part of some sinful experience, right? But your conscience gets you to a deeper level of the soul, right? Yeah, I hope that kind of that's how that's how we look at it, yeah. So you can be sorry for something even though you can still remember the pleasure of something, whatever it is, right? Um yeah. My first sin was stealing um can uh it was gum at the supermarket. I remember I was like four years old, I can still remember. And then I remember because I specifically, you know, you're you're you know, you know, you're at the supermarket and you're short and small and nobody sees you. Your mom's paying. It's at my eye level, right? So I took it and I'm I can still remember, took it home. We're living in New York, I can still remember the house, and then I remember I went out to sit on the edge of, I wanted to, I went out in the front lawn to the curb to eat it. I guess I had I was I knew my guilt, and so I wanted to bring this sin as far away from my house as possible. But I still felt guilty. My first sin I can remember. So I had to wait three years, right, till first confession to confess that, right? So, um, so but the larger topic again, that the desire for God is written in the human heart, and I just want to share with you categorically that I hear that in confession, right? And I'll tell people too, like, you know why you're here today? It's because you're good. If you are good, you wouldn't have contrition, you wouldn't have guilt or sorrow for these things. You would just want them for your selfishness and not have a contrite heart, right? So the goodness of the human heart, I see that in a life of priesthood. And then scripturally, so this is on page uh 91 in the textbook there, Romans 2, 14 to 16. This gets us to the topic of what we call natural law. So I want to read that um two verses there. This is St. Paul's letter to the Romans. When Gentiles who have not the law, meaning the Jewish law, the Ten Commandments, things like that, so they don't have that revelation. When Gentiles who have not the law do by nature what the law requires, let me just stop right there. When Gentiles who have not the law, when he when St. Paul reports the law, he's referring to the revealed instructions of God in the Old Testament, right? Most especially the Ten Commandments, right? How to treat God, your relationship, God and neighbor. When Gentiles who have not the law do by nature what the law requires, what he's talking about is when a non-Jewish person respects God, when a non-Jewish person honors father and mother, when a non-Jewish person tells the truth and doesn't want to lie, all the commandments, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. And we term that in philosophy natural law. Natural meaning this. I want to explain that because that word natural and law could mean different, you could define them so different in different ways. Like the law of gravity, okay? It's describing something the way it is. So the natural law describes the way human nature is. We're not talking about nature like outside. Your nature as a human person, the natural law about who you are by nature. Again, inclined towards the good, but also tempted by sin or concubusin'. So St. Paul says, look at these non-Jewish people. Some of them are very righteous, some of them are honest and hardworking and faithful and all these virtues that God reveals that we should be through the Ten Commandments. They are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. We'll continue. They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, right? This is the belief of St. Paul, the teaching of the church. The law is written on their hearts. We are not depraved. Look at that. By nature, the human person, as he or she is, has the law, meaning the inclination towards the good. The Ten Commandments, or you might put it this way, the Ten Commandments are written on everyone's hearts already. Without reading them. The Ten Commandments are written on everyone's hearts already. We'll get back to why they're revealed, though. While their conscience also bears witness, right? The human being has a conscience, right? Now, not everyone's works so well in every moment, right? But it's there, right? While their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or perhaps excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus. A little parenthetical. One of the things that Vatican II articulated is who is saved, right? And the theological sort of development and nuances of all that. Obviously, there's one true church, and that's the that's the easiest way is to have the fullness of revelation share with you. It's the map of life. But are only card-carrying Catholics saved? No. That would be a very unmerciful God, right? Because that's one, what is it, 1.7 billion now? Whatever the numbers. One and a half billion people, only one and a half billion people have a chance that if you're not a card-carrying Catholic, you have a chance. And also it's not that, I mean, there's certainly Catholics who are not, you know, very holy, right? But point being that the the phrase from Vatican II, very beautiful, is those who through no fault of their own have never known the gospel of Christ can be saved. Those who through no fault of their own have never known the gospel of Christ can be saved. And what does it mean to not know it? It doesn't mean that you lived in a you live in a country where there's no Christianity. You cannot know it because your life experience would make it hard for you to believe that God is what Christianity professes, right? So that's for another day, but just to just to point it out that it relates to a lot of things to get this right about the human person. This is really fundamental teaching that has a lot of implications, right? That's why this is early in the book. We're only on page 91. We're still laying out some of the most fundamental truths, right? That we are deprived, not depraved, and that those who never get the experience of being evangelized or taught the Christian faith, here St. Paul says, they have a law written in their hearts, right? The knowledge of what is right and wrong, because um it's written there. Um and then the term is natural law. And again, we're not talking about nature and trees and animals. Nature, meaning the nature of the reality of the human person. Um that makes us very optimistic people, right? We believe people can change because they can. We really believe that God's grace can really transform the human heart despite what life has thrown their way, right? God is a healing God, God's grace can really um transform people.

unknown 21:59

So

SPEAKER_03 22:00

Again on the on the handout here. In philosophy, we call this the natural law, like the law of gravity, right? The law of gravity is not, I don't mean law like a lawgiver decides, okay, this is the law. Like it's just the will. It's a law because it describes what what how things actually are, you know. So I think in science we understand law in that sense. So this is the law, meaning the nature of the human person, most especially knowing good and evil. Now, I want to clarify, and this is here, um uh where is this? Yeah. So one, two, three, four. Well, the last paragraph under the section natural law, I'm gonna read that here. The last paragraph on the on page 91 after of the natural law section. After the fall, human reason and intellect became clouded and less reliable in discerning the fullness of God's truth. Therefore, in order for man to know God and to enter into a relationship with him, God chose to reveal himself to us and to bestow the grace necessary to aid human reason. So human reason is capable of very of great things, right? We can understand and grasp important things, but we understand that because of the fall, as it says here, human reason and intellect became clouded. So go back to the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments, like St. Paul's saying, is like written on the human heart. Everyone knows, and you can reason, by the way, to the existence of God, right? You can even do that. Like Aristotle, Plato, they knew there was a one God. They believed that there was, by reason, not by religion, by reason they taught there is a divine being outside of you know the creative world, right? So that's something, of course, they're really smart, Aristotle and Plato, right? So but it shows that by mere human reason you can figure out there is a God. Uh one God. You can figure that out. You cannot figure out the Trinity, right? That that's not accessible to human reason, but that there is one God, reason can get there. Reason can also get to the reason uh the rightness of obedience, the rightness of honesty, the rightness of fidelity, right? The rightness of chastity, all these, so the rightness of gratitude instead of jealousy, things like that. So by natural human reason, everything, I want to say this if you haven't heard this before, it's really important. By natural human reason, you could have you could figure out the Ten Commandments, however you might list them. But you can you can realize by reason that that's the right way to live. You can understand right and wrong. But we have something we know, we call it rationalization, right? That's using reason in a fallen way, right? We know what that's all about, right? So we can twist our skill with reason to a selfish person, a selfish purpose, right? So that's the clouding, right? So it says that after the fall, human reason intellect became clouded and less reliable. So God has looked at the human race, the fall, he sees cloudy intellects, human reason not so reliable. I better reveal some commandments to them. Moses, please come up the mountain. Please write this down, right? Yes. I think I would limit it just to that pretty much. You know what I mean? As far as these kind of topics, yeah. Yes. Well, well, when I said what you said believing in God. Um because again, by human reason you could know God exists. So that's by natural reason, right?

unknown 27:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:13

The answer is yes. Yeah, and and the reason is that precisely because of the cloudy intellect, right? God is looking at the heart, and some people have a sharper intellect than others, right? So some people are going to be able to reason the cloudy intellect, people are not in the same situation, life experience, culture, education, and intellect for coming to faith, even on these um matters that you could figure out by reason? It's a great question, right? So again, good. Yeah. Great example. Yeah, those are all mitigating circumstances, right? Yeah, yeah. I want to offer another uh analogy for this conversation. Many of you are parents. You could choose to just let your kids figure stuff out. We could do that. Like, they'll figure it out. Or you might want to reveal a few things to them, right? In a similar way, God the Father could just provide no revelation, no Old Testament, no New Testament, just that cloudy intellect. Let's see how they do. So kind of a similar fashion. Um now some are getting more or less access to that, how should we say, parental guidance and instruction. But in the end, and I guess the point is this, that if if God were to leave us without revelation, it would put us in a tougher spot to get through life wisely, right? Um, but nevertheless, God's providence, why is it that we get more exposure to a revelation than others? Like, you know, mystery of God's ways, right? But yeah, that the point being that God's looking at the heart and each one's um life situation is is the the scenario upon which a person is judged, to use that word. But wouldn't wouldn't everyone be happier with the gift of guidance and revelation? Absolutely. You can live life to the full, like last Sunday. I came that they might have life and have it to the full, have it more abundantly. Life is better with Jesus. Very simple, right? Life is better. We know how to forgive, we know how to pray, we know how to interpret life, right? But we don't lose hope precisely because of our um um inclination towards the good, our um are still being in the likeness of because of natural law. Yeah, so people in the former Soviet Union, all they had was natural law, right? All they had was the law written on their hearts to deal with in a very difficult society that rejected the the existence of God. Yeah. What do you think? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:05

Mary, uh Mary is you know, syllabus, and uh they still don't believe.

SPEAKER_03 32:11

Yeah. Yes, I'll offer this. Today's topic wouldn't go there, so I'm not gonna treat it too much, because that goes to the topic called ecclesiology, which is like how does salvation work with relationship to the church? And that's a rich topic with lots of nuances, and and it's a great question though, because it's relevant to our lives. Like, how do I understand the perspective of my Muslim coworker and et cetera, right? So I'll just say that today what we're what what today is laying the foundations for is how we approach those topics based on the nature of the human person and what revelation does for us. So I want you to mostly grasp today, as this textbook is saying in the catechism too, is that because of the fall we have a cloudy intellect, revelation is a great gift for cloudy intellects, right? And then, but how that applies to people in different scenarios is gonna be what we call ecclesiology, which is the study of the church and salvation. Um 1038, so let me quickly, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:12

Yeah, I was just gonna say that's uh it seems like it's a a good reflection of God's charity that he would reveal to us when he didn't necessarily have to, because he knew there would be a lot of people that would end up in hell if he did not do that.

SPEAKER_03 33:23

Yeah, because we're we're just more lost without the revelation, right? But at the same time, at the same time, he's more merciful. So to those who are you know not given all the privileges and blessings, yeah. Very good. Well, let's try to get through the rest of the sheet. And so we did there, uh, after the fall. So again, I'm just gonna keep reading. Um on the handout there. So after the fall, human reason and intellect become clouded. Therefore, God chose to reveal himself, e.g., for example, the Ten Commandments. Even though you could figure it out by reason, just like a parent could say, well, he'll figure it out. Let's let him figure it out by himself. Well, you could, but you could also say, listen, son, when you go to college, let me give you some advice about how to do well. My my advice to kids, go to mass, go to class. Don't skip those two. That's all I give. Okay. Um next, um, from the catechism here. Because we because part of this um um understanding is, well, what about evil, right? You see that on page 90. So quoting from the catechism, 309. So this page quotes 310, but I thought 309 would be helpful together with 310. So um the fall happens, therefore, suffering has now made its appearance, and well, why would God permit suffering evil, right? So on the handout there, paragraph 309. If God the Father Almighty, the creator of the ordered and good world, cares for all his creatures, why does evil exist? To this question, as pressing as it is, unavoidable, and as painful as it is, mysterious, here is the answer. No, it's not what it says, right? No quick answer will suffice. So I want you to just stop with that right now. The teaching of the church is suffering, that's a hard one. Right? The church doesn't say, well, we got we got that figured out for you, right? Because think about that in Jesus' time. Why do people suffer? Oh, because they sinned or their parents did. The teaching of the Catholic Church that Jesus founded is that's a hard question. Why is my good friend suffering? Why am I suffering? So let's continue. So no quick answer will suffice. Get ready for the next sentence. Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question. So please be wary of anybody who's got a quick explanation for any evil. Right? Just be wary of that. That's categorically, okay, the fall, sin and suffering and death enter the world. Why this one? Why that one? Only Christian faith as a whole constitutes the answer to this question. When I was in college, I was having a reversion, trying to look at questions. I remember really struggling with the question of suffering. So I, for one of my classes, I was able to do a paper on why suffering exists, even though it was a secular philosophy class. And I remember reading a book, Rabbi Harold Kushner. You may have read this book, you know, why do bad things happen to good people? The beautiful analogy in that book, which has always stayed with me, and that is the analogy of a tapestry. So on the front of a tapestry, it's all beautiful, but turn that tapestry around and it's just not, and it doesn't have a lot of logic to it, just looks kind of messy, right? The way things are stitched, etc. I think it's a great analogy for this question of, well, why does evil exist if God is so good, right? Well, because we don't quite see the whole during our short lives on earth. And we profess by faith, you know, that if Jesus suffered and suffering has redemptive value, we join our suffering to Jesus. St. Paul's a lot to say about we complete in our own bodies the sufferings of Christ, right? In our own lives. So my suffering joined to the suffering of Jesus is redemptive, it has meaning. Um so just to say this, that the analogy of a tapestry, I think, is the sh the quickest, if you're looking for just something to pray with, again, it's not the answer, but that that response to that whole larger question of why does evil exist? Um then lastly, it's on the bottom of page 91. It's an important term, which leads us to part of this larger answer, which is that yes, there's a consequence for original sin, the fall, sin, suffering, and death, and now enter the world. There's a consequence for rejecting God and not trusting in him, not obeying him. But from the very beginning, God has the will to save. So if you look at the bottom of page 91, this is Genesis 3.15, God says, I will put enmity, like hatred or conflict, between you, the serpent, and the woman, and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise your head, meaning the seed of Eve, and you shall bruise his heel. The sense of conflict between the progeny, shall we say, of evil, and then the progeny of Eve, which is ultimately Jesus, right? He is a son of the human family. So we call that, there's a fancy term for that, proto, meaning early or prototype, right? Proto-evangelium. Evangelium means the good news, right? So the earliest hint of the good news is Genesis 3.15. We see that as the earliest prophecy of Jesus. That he is the one who will bruise the head of the serpent. Remember in Mount Gibson's The Passion? Jesus is in the Garden, it starts with Jesus in the uh the Garden of Gethsemane praying. And do you remember the snake appears? Remember what Jesus does? With his heel, steps on the head of the snake. Do you remember that? Kind of fitting, right? We see Eve is also kind of part of that, right? Her fidelity. That's why you see in our sanctuary, the statue of Mary has the serpent around her feet, because we understand by her yes, she makes possible, you know, Jesus who does conquer the serpent. So this earliest prophecy of a Savior has a very fancy name, Proto-Evangelium. That I will put enmity between you, the serpent, and the woman, between your seed, all evil, and her seed, he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. You shall bruise his heel, he will suffer, right? He will die. He will take upon himself the suffering of the world, the evil of the world. But just, and I always remember this, I use this to remind myself of like what what chapter and verse is that? School gets out of 3.15. Don't all the kids feel like, well, that's good news, right? So Genesis 3.15, we get out of school. Well, Genesis 3.15 was the first announcement of that there will be a savior in response to the fall and all the consequences of the fall. Another minute or two for comments or questions. This is such an important topic. We covered it last week and then took a deeper today. It's just so important because it remember the term last week I offered what we call Christian anthropology. The anthropology, the study of the human, the human being, the nature of the human person. Understanding that by way of faith, the Christian perspective on the nature of the human person.

unknown 41:18

I don't know if that that Greek things talk about Mary because it's so.

SPEAKER_03 41:24

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Well, Eve and Mary is the new Eve, right? But the sense that Jesus is a member of the human family by way of his human nature, therefore he is the seed, right? That's gonna crush the head of the circumstances. Yeah, that's listening. Or do you need to confess, like I didn't evangelize someone when I had the chance? Yeah, so categorically we know that there are sins of omission, right? So we I confess to Almighty God that I have sinned for my thoughts, my words, what I have done, what I have done, and what I have failed to do. Now we shouldn't be overly anxious or scrupulous about what we have failed to do. Um, but what you're sounds like what you're saying is as I reflect and I had the opportunity and I didn't, did you not do it because you were thinking, oh wait, wait, what's the way? I'm not sure how, or was it I don't care about this person enough to do, or am I afraid, I lack courage? Like there's all sorts of like reasons that would be behind any kind of omission. Like I know I should have done any any kind of good thing. This is an example, right? Of sharing faith with somebody, but it could, there's all sorts of things that were all sorts of acts of virtue and goodness that we we recognize later. Oh, I didn't do that. I just I should have, you know. So I would only say that if there's again, for something to be sinful, it requires deliberation. It might be like later, like, oh man, I've that was a good opportunity. I I don't think I realized in the moment what a great opportunity that was. So it's one thing, again, any any any act, any good act that you rate it you you are um omitting. Did I omit it because I was just exhausted? Did I omit it because I was afraid? Did I omit it because I didn't have enough love for that person that moment? That kind of um motivation is really the that's actually the heart of the matter. Yeah, it's a great question. But again, this is not something we're supposed to be beating ourselves up about either, right? But that's a sign your conscience is working, right? That's that that's that inclination to the good. It's it's there, right? Yeah.

unknown 43:58

I heard the other day that it's a sin and the Catholics agree with other religious evil.

SPEAKER_03 44:07

No, not at all. There might be, you know, decades ago that might have been the understanding that you know you you can't go into this kind of a building or that kind of building. No, I wouldn't say that at all. I mean, was it not not long ago that um the Holy Father was in, was it Turkey? And he prayed with uh a Muslim leader there, right? So no, we there's not um an anxiety about doing things. Now you don't want to do things that would cause scandal or confuse someone or be not healthy for you, you know. So just like praying for someone that's sick or for the country or for with other people, other than that. Yeah, I'll even get requests like Father, my my friend is Baptist, could you come and pray with her? She's sick. Sure. Yeah, I'm not saying no, I won't pray with you because you're not Catholic yet, you know. But maybe praying with will help that person. God, sorry. You were saying, sorry. You meant I just meant with the case. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Unless it would be something that would confuse you or be stressful for you. No, there I think there's something we we live in a pluralistic society which accepts a lot of this mutual respect, you know. Yeah. Last question for the day.

SPEAKER_02 45:22

Well, if you could comment on that, like in that sense, like we uh they can pray with us, but it's like, especially if they're like non-Christian. I mean, you're not praying their prayer.

SPEAKER_03 45:31

Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, mutual respect is what I would say. You're never denying who you are or hiding your faith in.

SPEAKER_02 45:39

In aligning with what the Holy Father is doing, is going to different places and inviting others to pray with them effectively, right?

SPEAKER_03 45:44

Yeah, yeah. Well, great question. So I hope, again, we're gonna stay up this phrase that Jerry Shared last week. Deprived, not depraved. And then have in mind as you go about your week, everyone's got the Ten Commandments written on their hearts. Now, our cloudy intellect means maybe we don't live it so well sometimes, but everyone's got it. Everyone's got it. Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and never shall be. World without end. Amen. May God bless you all, the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit. Next Sunday is Mother's Day, so there's no class. The following Sunday, there is class. Then the next Sunday there's not because it's um Memorial Day weekend. So we have one more class in May, not next Sunday, but the following. And then we'll but we do continue through the summer, right? So this continues because we got this is a three year program. We're gonna chip away at this. We're gonna get to this book. We're gonna get there. Cool. All right, have a good one.