Red Dirt Catholics
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Red Dirt Catholics
Religion of the Day (Part 4) - Ft. Father Joseph Irwin
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Exploring the intersection of modern secularism and ancient gnosticism with "The Religion of the Day" from the University of Mary, the follow-up publication to "From Christendom to Apostolic Mission."
In this episode, Jayce and James are joined by Fr. Joseph Irwin, pastor of St. Joseph Catholic Church in Norman.
This is part 4.
Register now for the 2025 Discipleship Conference for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City! This full-day, bilingual event will feature amazing speakers, breakout sessions, adoration, Mass, confessions, vendors and more at the Oklahoma City Convention Center on Saturday, August 9. Register now to get the early-bird price at OKDisciple.org.
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Links and other stuff from the show:
Pastoral Letter, "On the Unity of the Body and Soul:" archokc.org/pastoral-letters
Red Dirt Catholics Email Address: reddirtcatholics@archokc.org
The Book "From Christendom to Apostolic Mission" (Digital and Print): Amazon
The Social Dilemma: https://www.netflix.com/title/81254224
Daily Examen Prayer: https://bit.ly/309As8z
Lectio Divina How-To: https://bit.ly/3fp8UTa
So I was with Father Irwin, who's here with us right now, and we were at my sister-in-law Ashley's wedding, which was a beautiful wedding, beautiful bride, Doug was a great groom. It was awesome to watch and I was asked to do a reading. So I was fixing to do this delightful reading of Proverbs 31. You know, that's like the best woman ever. You know you read it and I had a whole plan. I was going to like, look at her while I read it and I was going to be emotional. I had it all planned out so I was really excited.
Speaker 3:We go through the rehearsal for this and you know I get up there and Father Owen's like, yeah, you know what you're doing, da-da-da. You know we kind of just get through it. But then the day of the wedding comes and we finish up the first part of the Mass, everybody is sitting down and as we sit down, peter asks me a question. He's like Dad, why do we sit down right now? And so everything that I was thinking about outside of my son vanished and I was like, oh my gosh, what a great moment to be a great dad and explain why in the mass and all this stuff. So I block everything out and I just start sitting and talking and telling Peter about all, about why, why we do these things in the mass and everything. Meanwhile, it's absolute dead air, absolute silence. Father.
Speaker 2:Irwin, what are you doing at this moment? I am looking right at Jace trying to subtly get his attention with my eyes and my head nod, and I'm like in every way trying to very, uh, nice, subtly get his attention. So he's so.
Speaker 3:He'll be like oh sorry, yes, um, nothing, nothing's working, sorry I'm, I'm just dialed in and I'm just enjoying this moment with my son and then, out of nowhere, I hear the voice of God. Go Jace, which is Father Irwin, who really, when he does that, really sounds like the voice of God. And I was like oh yeah, and so it was an embarrassingly long amount of time that it took for me to get up there, but that was a fun moment that Father Erwin and I had At least you just started with your name.
Speaker 1:It would have been embarrassing if you would have been like and now time for the reading or something, and then you would have not listened.
Speaker 3:Oh, I know, oh, I know. And Father Er Earth. It was funny he was mentioning he was like you get called out in mass Because we talked about it with Father Goins this episode not too long ago and I was like yeah. I'm just a bad boy, just bad to the bone.
Speaker 2:You're just a good father.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're always looking for those opportunities to be distracted sometimes I'm not, sometimes I'm explicitly not looking for those opportunities and just like hey, don't ask me, don't ask me, I'm I'm busy I don't want to talk later.
Speaker 2:This is a silent. This is our silent time, peter, it was a beautiful wedding it was.
Speaker 3:It was a good moment.
Speaker 2:It was like one of those moments you're like, okay, that's like the one hitch of the wedding, right there's always one thing that kind of always happens. There's no like perfect liturgical experience. So that's the. It was simple, but everyone remembers it and laughs.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was fun. I'm'm glad to be the comedic relief for everybody. James had your kid. We were on the phone earlier and he was playing a sport of some kind, some baseball. How did he do?
Speaker 1:He did all right. Yeah, I'd flown in from being at a conference and headed straight to the field so I could warm him up a little bit early. Usually we do that at home or in the batting cages. It was fun Warmed up early a little bit early. Usually we do that at home or in the batting cages, so it was fun Warmed up early.
Speaker 3:What did he hit for? Like three for four, two home runs.
Speaker 1:You know that game was kind of frustrating because we run, ruled them, losers. That's right and they like we had 24 minutes left in the game and we had most of our players there, so we got at bat once he was zero for one.
Speaker 3:It was kind of frustrating. Um, he, he has, a, he has. How do you run, rule somebody and only get to bat once? Were you just subbing?
Speaker 1:everybody in, or I don't understand little league rules, but we were up eight at some point in the game, at like third inning, and so they just we're up eight over ten. So I don't know how that works, I just don't know how you get eight runs and not get through the order.
Speaker 3:I mean we have like 16-some players, a large team.
Speaker 1:There it is. There it is.
Speaker 3:You're not playing with nine yeah.
Speaker 1:Really stupid. Why would you let everybody go? That doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 3:Like play by the rules. I'm just kidding. That's a good thing. Yeah, well, that's super awesome. School's out. Yesterday was Peter's first day of summer. He's very excited. We're going to the pool today, or some pool.
Speaker 1:Nice. Somehow we've got everyone excited and motivated about our summer routine, which is morning math right after breakfast and then reading in the afternoon after they've played for a while. So they have these. So school, yeah, these summer learning goals, nice. And basically there's different organizations that reward you for how many books you get read over the summer. So, like Dodgers, you can get a ticket Library, you can get some books. Barnes Dodgers, you can get a ticket Library, you can get some books. Barnes Noble, you can get a discount. There's a couple others. So we're making like a little chart on the whiteboard in their classroom that shows them what they get to, so it kind of can collect a lot of things. And I forget what we've invented in math. Like maybe if they both finish their books they get to go to Chuck of chuck E Cheese or something like that.
Speaker 3:Wow, but you have them excited about math. Yep, yeah, my house is fun and we're not starting the morning with math, but I bet your kids are going to be a lot smarter. We'll do that eventually. But I think Daniel has a whole summer plan and progress and we do have one of those book bingo things from somewhere that we're going through. We're reading Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe right now, so good For a little bit every week and whatnot. He'll give me a chapter, good, but then after that it's like Peter, sit down, peter, stop moving, peter, stop hitting your mom or whatever it is, you know, so it's a stretcher.
Speaker 3:Danielle's just so much better at patience in that area than me. I'm just like I just expect it.
Speaker 1:On good books like that too, it's particularly hard, like if we're reading like Winnie the Pooh, it's like, okay, we're done reading, but you're actually reading a good book, and you're like, hey, I kind of want to keep reading, son, but you're bouncing around.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I keep asking after. The two chapters is the minimum. I'm like, do you want to do another one? And he's like no.
Speaker 1:I want to go and read a book with you, it seems like every child I've ever known, like it's not very long before they're just like I'm done with this.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 3:I mean we would read two books before bed when he was two years old, but those were like shorter books, quick, quick kid books with pictures yeah, pictures is really big yeah, um, you know, every time we get to the start of the chapter of chronicles veneran, it has shows like the tiny picture, and he looks at that thing for like a good two minutes before he starts wiggling off everywhere yeah, you almost need a bookmark to accompany each chapter that they can keep holding on, that has the picture while you're reading it or something.
Speaker 1:But yeah, my, I think. For me I was kind of like with jace, like we'd read a handful every night and, depending on the mood and the child, some of them would read a lot of picture books non-stop and it'd be okay, um, but I found, like around six or so when they can they recognize more words themselves and they can do a little bit of reading that transitioning to a chapter book without many pictures, they're imagining the story and enjoying it. But like my four year old Theo, he won't stick out as long as Grayson will. He's more like where Peter's spot is, like he'll kind of listen to a chapter or two and then want a different book or want to go somewhere and play summer math sounds exciting.
Speaker 2:Summer math, how great. Want a different book or want to go somewhere and play Summer math. Sounds exciting.
Speaker 3:Summer math how Great Wow.
Speaker 2:If you walked in today. At the end of the day, I'm like Peter, we're going to do math, we're going to do summer math.
Speaker 1:I'm impressed by my wife's motivation skills because they're excited about whatever math journey we're on and they're cranking through it in the morning.
Speaker 2:It's pretty impressive my wife could get peter excited if you did like math problems where it's like you know you're giving them like the word problem sort of scenario like what's going on in the world. Let's figure out the math here. That might be kind of fun those are.
Speaker 1:Those are the ones that grayson he has back to back the six-year-oldold. And then Theo has more like it's like pre-K math, so it's like shapes and matching and things. So it's more like he's doing puzzles, he's doing word problems.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Kind of fun.
Speaker 3:Delightful. Yeah Well, we're super excited to have you, father Erwin, and we're still going through the sequel from Christendom to Apostolic Mission, the religion of the day from St Mary's Press. We're super excited to be going through some of this with you. Father, would you start us with a prayer?
Speaker 2:Yes, in the name of the Father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen. In faith and trust, we turn to you, heavenly father. Bless us in this conversation that we have today. Bless our work and our mission that we have to proclaim your truth, to bring your word to those who are in need.
Speaker 2:Lord, help us to be faithful to you in all things. Lord, we look to the world and the many challenges and struggles and sufferings that we see, and struggles and sufferings that we see, but in the same time we also look to your cross and to your love and mercy. So we ask for your Holy Spirit upon us, we ask for your love, we ask for your grace and we also ask for the prayers and intercession of our Blessed Mother. Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen, blessed Stanley Rother, pray for us In the name of the Father, son and the Holy Spirit, amen.
Speaker 3:You guys remember trying to pray together prayers like that over Zoom.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that was difficult.
Speaker 3:Four years ago. Yeah, because you're the worst Zoom tongues.
Speaker 2:The timing is always off. I always called it Zoom tongues.
Speaker 1:Zoom tongues. You almost have to do it kind of rosary style, like someone prays the first half and then you pray the next.
Speaker 2:Yeah, everybody. Go on mute and listen. That's what you have to do, yeah.
Speaker 3:And that's amazing. So we're going through this book, the Religion of the Day. This is episode four Right Of this series, even though we haven't recorded episode three yet, which is pretty impressive that we're getting to that. We're getting to that.
Speaker 1:Lucky to you listeners. I feel like George Lucas right now. Listeners will hear it in order, though, should you choose to.
Speaker 3:We just knew that we wanted the big gun for some of these spots, so we got Father Irwin to come in and talk to us about it. So we're talking about neo-gnosticism still is a huge piece of it but we're kind of going a little bit deeper. In our previous episodes we've gone through the 12 key tenets of Gnosticism and we're taking a few more key notes today, but then we're going to end up like starting to address some of the solutions for the parasite that Gnosticism is Right. So, James, like with some of these other notes, like we wanted to discuss like Gnosticism's kind of patterns and outlook throughout history. Was there anything that like hit you guys there?
Speaker 1:and outlook throughout history. Was there anything that hit you guys there? I really appreciated kind of how they outlined. We sometimes see polarities in Gnosticism there's this word we're using progressive here but take communism and fascism they seem so different but at the core of what their tenants are, um, they're, they're kind of coming from the same tree, and so I thought that was a really interesting thing. If you were to just look under a microscope at fascism and put it against the 12 tenants we just learned last two episodes, you'd see it there. Same with communism slightly different, like manifestations of of. You know how people might behave under that, but at the end of the day, same core outcome as far as pulling someone into pride, pulling them away from the Catholic understanding of the salvific plan, pointing at the problems over there, and we're going to squash those problems with our solution.
Speaker 3:You know what's interesting and we're going to squash those problems with our solution. You know what's interesting? When I was growing up and learning about Nazi Germany and fascism and Russia, I never thought of them as opposite ends of the spectrum, even though that was kind of what I was reading. I would hear about them and I was like they're just bad it was just like the kind of like what I was picking up from them.
Speaker 3:So it's really interesting. It was almost like a blind spot for me that they're theoretically on opposite ends of the political spectrum, or it's just your great astute nature of understanding? Yeah, it wasn't that.
Speaker 2:Also we don't think much about, like this book is doing an interesting thing of looking at sort of the roots, the deeper roots of these, many of these movements throughout history and so we have just a very black and white like Nazi bad, communism bad.
Speaker 2:But there's these deeper roots that come from sort of this Gnostic tendency that's been going on in the church since the beginning. He points out right away in chapter three that it's a threat that's been facing Christianity in the church since the pages of the New Testament and then since the church began even before that. So it's something that it's a philosophical as you mentioned before parasitic thing that infiltrates many things, especially the church's life and the culture.
Speaker 3:Yeah, there's a. What's your favorite, james? What's your favorite like Gnosticism, movement through history?
Speaker 1:What was your favorite one?
Speaker 3:You know, he was just going through all of them, like the one that I was thinking of. Like I've heard a lot about the Albigensians, like even so much so. Like there's some like when I was a Protestant and looking for reasons not to be a Catholic, like the way that we interacted with the Albigensians was used against the church in certain ways, so that one's like I just know a little bit more about that.
Speaker 3:What happened there? Oh, it's so long ago. There is a persecution of Albigensians because of their Gnostic tendencies. Do you remember, Father? It's not good enough for me to remember.
Speaker 2:I just have fondness because I've heard that word before and it's fun to say Albigensian there's so many heresies that are a part of, you know, sort of the movements of the day that have Gnosticism sort of infiltrated within, because it all kind of comes from this desire to sort of polarize our one, our desire to be saved, but to do it on our own, versus what the Christian ideal is, which is we turn fully to Christ. And so, especially if we're removing religion and we're removing Christ and we're removing those moral ideals from the culture and we're removing those moral ideals from the culture, so Albigensians, but also communism, but also any of these heretical or cultural or political movements, like the idea, is like, okay, we're going to remove this Christian thing because it's not fitting, it doesn't fit within this idea that I want to save myself, and so it takes on so many different modes of operation.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I 100% agree.
Speaker 3:One of the things that they mention here, as far as some of the key stuff, like we've been talking about it, but the depreciation of all things material and like the secret knowledge which we've we've touched on a little bit in a lot of these different ways, um are key things that are almost constantly present in all these movements.
Speaker 3:But, just like a lot of things, it isn't always present. And just because you don't necessarily think that you have hidden knowledge doesn't necessarily mean that you don't have a lot of Gnostic tendencies, which is really frustrating. It would be a lot easier if it was really simple. But my favorite thing that it talked about through the history and the patterns is that Gnosticism only exists when Christians become collectively proud that that. That that's uh, that in the rise of christianity, like when, as we are getting to the peak of a christendom moment and we're getting to look out over the course of something and like, and we feel actually proud of what's happened, just purely for our own benefit, not for the benefit of the lord in his kingdom, and and that's when, that's when it strikes yeah, that's when he gets you.
Speaker 1:That's very interesting. I I couldn't help but think, as we were going through this and reading through this and what you just said reminds me of it like how susceptible really any christian believer, any catholic believer, could be to gnostic, regardless of where they are in their formative reality or in their conversion. So let's take someone like with maybe a great love for the poor, a great, you know, kind of calling and and and uh, closeness to like the Catholic social teaching and and our and our and our, our works of mercy, um, but but perhaps that's been amplified with this Gnostic view of like hey, here's how we can save the world, you know, and so we're pointing out these actual, obvious evils and we're trying to get through it, like someone could get caught in some of these tenants there. But also let's take someone who's had a really great interior conversion loves the lord has found in their little pocket of friends, perhaps like great formation, great holiness, and it's growing and they're really proud of all of those things. They could start to think well, I have this special knowledge because I know all these particular catholic things and there's a spiritual pride that comes in I have my friends, yeah and so there, there, there could be and we're better
Speaker 1:yeah, like this group of catholics is better for whatever affiliation, special knowledge, techniques, formation, um, and that really wouldn't be a catholic thought. It's certainly a human thought, it's certainly easy to fall into, but it feels more gnostic and I'll go extreme for like a second. Like I don't know if anyone else has like enjoyed reading a conspiracy theory or something that points out like a right evil in the world, like oh, we found it like. I'll just think of one we were reading the other day like the world economic forum and like what happened, what sort of thoughts about how to handle COVID were done, were shared, even like way before COVID, or even one I've rabbit trailed in before is like the idea of the illuminati, you know, or like that.
Speaker 1:There's a group of corporate power, all you all kind of gathered against us and you know it could be easy to sort of want to fight against that and like really be obsessed with that and almost renounce anything that came from those places and that might be an okay decision.
Speaker 1:But we I think we get tempted to like prioritize that over God, prioritize that over our faith, or make it the main thing. But it's really kind of Satan taking someone who's really wanting to rebel from evil and run from evil and pulling them into a Gnostic trap of like if we just fix that problem, you know, the church and the world will be much better. When, in reality, it's like, yeah, there is a really organized group of persons coordinating all this evil, and like they have names and they're the demonic right. It's the battle of powers and principalities and we end up a good form Catholic or Christian might end up demonizing these people who are making mistakes, but it's like, yeah, this is the work of the evil one and those people that are, you know, caught up in it like they're the people that Jesus died for, just like you and me. And so I think we get caught in that as as believers on either spectrum, which is.
Speaker 2:I think Jason, I think you, what Jace, I think what you said there I think is really good. Like so, much of this is grounded in all kinds of pride problems too, like you just see that coming out so often and different forms of Gnostic or neo-Gnostic movements, or this progressive religion, which it's interesting. The book, like he says like this, or this progressive religion, which it's interesting, the book, like he says, like this is the progressive religion, but it's not really landing in one particular group or belief, or it's sort of a part of everything. But pride is a overarching issue, because if it's not coming from within me, if it's coming from within me and not from God, then sort of inherently pride is a part of it. Right, and so it's not a seeking, then, of anything that is ultimately good, it's a. It's a seeking of power. It's a seeking of influence good, it's a seeking of power, it's a seeking of influence, it's a seeking of sort of my own agenda.
Speaker 2:These kind of things are a part of a lot of these movements that you see, and the book also rightly points out that almost all of these things fail, almost all fail eventually. And so you know, sometimes I always kind of when we're looking at this, I'm thinking, well, we just need to really dive back into some of the fundamentals of our Christian life, and I think he kind of starts to do that in this book. But even just like learning about the virtues again, like having a more virtue-based sort of understanding of life, the moral life and its importance in the world, the importance of the you know obviously, the Christian ideal that it's not about self, it's about an offering and a service, as Christ taught us, and so that's interesting.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love that. One of the last things from this little piece that I still wanted to note is that and this episode is just a little bit more political than we probably ever have been, and it's just kind of the nature of what are some of the things that we're talking about, but that there's almost always with the parasitic nature, and we're going to talk about the derivative nature of Gnostics in a second, but there's almost always two. We were talking about the Nazis and Stalin and communism. They were fighting each other.
Speaker 3:That's ultimately what World War II kind of ended up becoming about, and you can see that, playing out of different forms of Gnosticism, deciding that there's different, which thing is going, is gonna save us. Like even right now, there's like the trans. There's a trans movement and then there's the radical feminism movement and they're both diametrically opposed to one another. Um, which is which is fascinating, like we don't, like the christian, wouldn't agree with either of those explicit things, but there's like a fight going on and there's a culture amongst it and we get caught up in the middle of all of that.
Speaker 2:There has to be a left and a right. It seems like with neo-gnostic movements, yeah, like it, almost like it can't really exist if there isn't an opposing diametric thing going on, like you just mentioned. But he kind of talks about that because even just leftists and rightists, just using those terms, both are going to have Gnosticism sort of as a part of it. And so, yeah, that's a good thing to point out.
Speaker 3:Well, there's something, and where this is moving into the next thing, there's always something that it has to attach to. It follows Christianity everywhere, and Christianity is the reason why Gnosticism can thrive, because it talks about, the author talks about and I think it makes sense, if you do this thought experiment, that Gnosticism on its own, with no other thing to rebel, rebel against, as it were, just is ultimately really unsatisfying. Like the satisfying part of gnosticism is, like the rebellion, the fight, the, the utopian thing. But once you get to a utopia, or said utopia, and it's the only thing it's, it becomes bland and very uninteresting yeah, if there's nothing to have vigilance and anger towards, then it's really not that exciting right right which is a, which is an interesting thing, so they need us there needs to be a revolution in
Speaker 3:a way, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's, that was part of that big name that we were talking about Ahead of time. Yeah, so it always just attaches itself to something like that. One thing that St Irenaeus said in the second century that I thought was important is they talk like us, though thinking very differently. So because they have our. They have our thought pattern, um, our, our pattern of language, but the the deep-rooted understanding of what they're discussing is broken, um, and so if you focused only on that, it would become uninteresting. So I really like that idea with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I found that one powerful and I feel like, if we're all honest, we've experienced that. Have you ever come across a thing? It kind of sort of sounded Christian but as you got deeper in peace sort of left you, or there now started to be little pieces that seemed a little different. In the first episode we talked about the guy I met on the plane. That was very interesting. I felt like some of the early things we were saying sounded the same. But since we were having kind of an intentional debate, I found that sometimes it sounded like we're saying the same thing and other times these were very different thoughts, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the progressive religion does that right.
Speaker 2:It happily brings in Christian thought ideas. I think you guys have talked about this, but there is that unsettling part of the conversation that's happened to me in lots of different ways. As a priest for sure I won't name any groups or things like this but recently I had a conversation with a group of people who are very intentionally Catholic but are part of a particular group, and I always kind of get this sense that there's some sort of disconnect, and I find that sometimes not only outside the church, but inside the church. What is it that is different from what is already happening, and why can't we all be on the same page? Like, what is there? Is there a peaceful revolution going on here, or is there a way for us to all come together? And yeah, you see it in politics all the time. So I don't know what we're going to bring up, but there's been a lot of things lately that we could talk about.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah. So, moving into the political and the more political side of it, the first thing that I want to touch on that I think is important is just like what is the Christian like? A basic run-through of what is the Christian understanding of? Like what politics is for, run through of what is the Christian understanding of? Like what politics is for? Um, and I think, like the, the classic scripture verse that we could talk about is like give to Caesar what is Caesar's and the God what is God's like. What does that actually mean for us? Like, what is the role of politics in a Christian's life?
Speaker 2:good question. I think he talks about sort of the at least in the founding of our country, the sort of the traditional idea that there was this that politics and religion were totally separate from each other. A political arena, and politics comes into that, or, excuse me, religion comes into that, by helping us to stay on sort of a correct moral path, um, to understand also that there's an ultimate goal for all of this, that it's not just here, there's something more, um, and also traditional values, maybe, like we're a family and we're a nation and we're gathered together here. So I think that's part of it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think Jesus is talking about here that there's a spiritual authority, right?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:In an area, in one sphere, and then there is a temporal authority and one trumps the other in specific ways. But it's good, jesus said it's good to give to Caesar what is Caesar's. So whatever makes sense to law enforcement or whatever, it is good to pay your taxes and be a citizen.
Speaker 1:Yeah, or to be obedient to the temporal authority. To the extent it doesn't compromise our obedience to the spiritual authority right.
Speaker 3:Exactly, yeah, so I think that that's like the simple thing with it.
Speaker 1:I liked the guideline. He went on later just about the reality of like a creative tension between those two right and so to your point, like there should, there should. Well, we think sometimes as americans we hear this whole separation of church and state, church and state like in its founding, that what this pure, total, separate, separate, gosh, I can't even talk separation as if they didn't even talk to each other or relate to each other. That really wasn't the intent and and, frankly, doesn't actually still exist. That way, if we're honest, like if we're honest, there's competing spiritual authorities that unfortunately, like this progressive religion, you know, gnostic thought and a Christian or even Judeo-Christian worldview to be a little bit bigger, and like people in the political sphere, are like using those beliefs to influence some of their behavior.
Speaker 1:Often Now we have examples of, like Kennedy, examples of Biden, like saying out loud, like, yeah, my personal faith doesn't influence my political decisions, but we see all over this the realm that happening. But I think, even in like a monarchy, it was kind of interesting to see, like you know, maybe the temporal order was clearly subject to the spiritual authority who the, the king would, typically their crown was god-given in many respects, like even the whole ceremonies of handing the crown, the coronation ceremonies are, would have been facilitated by the church. Often so kind of an interesting but in that space it's a creative tension because God doesn't say every day a specific way that we take care of our temporal things necessarily right, like there. Obviously we're looking through that backdrop but God will be very happy with me if I do a temporal good here because I'm obedient to the current state season and it looks different a few years later.
Speaker 2:Yeah state season and it looks different a few years later. Yeah, the struggle is the state. What happens with all of this is the state, because it's clear and it's tangible and we see it and we're creating laws and we're working together. The state begins to become sort of the thing that saves us because we can. We can manage it, and the eternal becomes sort of esoteric or philosophic or or it just kind of goes away like why do we need that, right? Yeah, that's the struggle.
Speaker 3:If we can solve homelessness or immigration or, you know, single motherhood or whatever it is, but just like riding it along, or riding it along some social programs or something along those lines. It's certainly. It's certainly something that can be, that is more uh. In line with that, that it's got, the government will save us. You know, I'm from the big government, I'm here to help, you know, kind of a thing and uh.
Speaker 3:But what's interesting is he was talking about like america specifically, um, where there's just a uh, a movement where we started, you know, you had your American left and American right, which is really very different than what we've we have today of, you know, american left being like, hey, we gotta gotta take care of our people, has a little bit of that stuff, and the American right wanting to limit it because it doesn't trust the, it doesn't trust the institution of the government, and going through it had that tension which I think would always be there, and both sides are looking to do a natural good in that way. But there was a commonality between the two that, the Ten Commandments and the generic Judeo-Christian worldview being where there was commonality in that, and I think that was a really healthy thing in why the US was really successful for a while, even though that there was a left and a right, there was just a lot more common ground between the two at that stage. Do you guys have any thoughts in that realm?
Speaker 3:I know we're not politicians or experts in this area.
Speaker 2:I know we're not politicians or experts in this area, no but he asks the good question In today's cultural setting of the left and right, do we notice these progressive religious tendencies on both sides? Because you can kind of be on either camp and say, oh no, we're fine over here.
Speaker 2:And then those on the right can be like, oh yeah, we're the christians, like we're the ones that got it all right, and um, but these these things, this, these tendencies come in on both sides, because we can, wherever you are, whether you go sort of radical, either way, you can very quickly sort of put your trust in that and not in what, what we really need to be trusting and which is our lord.
Speaker 2:So it when you're, when you were talking, what hit me was it's a battle of trusting properly in what god has given to us on earth so that we can live fruitfully together, right, so we can live in a way where human flourishing is actually happening and we're not just polarized but there's a common ground. I think you're right. I think, with maybe some exceptions in history, it tells lots of things to us, but it seemed like there was a time when it was easier to kind of come to that common ground. In our country, where it's not as easy anymore and you hear that in the media, even People are talking about that constantly like we can't find common ground, we can't seem to move forward, we don't know what we're doing. It's like we can't find common ground. We can't seem to move forward, we don't know what we're doing. It's like we're lost. Yeah, sometimes it's interesting.
Speaker 1:I think that if we think about the ruling, narrative, vision or worldview as like a series of lenses that are collapsed together, like back near its founding, maybe even pre you, maybe even early 1900s, you know the American world for the most part had pretty non-negotiable lens or a more common lens or common foundation of, like, you know, christian thought, you know, and so like.
Speaker 1:It was actually kind of helpful that that was the primary lens we looked through and then some of us would have had a more Market view, less invasive view of politics, and some of us would have collapsed with the Christian lens, had a more you know, caring for and using policy To, to help influence economics and such so like that would actually be a creative, good, creative tension, right. But then if you remove the lens of the, if you remove that lens, if if at first I was looking through, let's say I'm a libertarian, functionally pretty far right, but I've got a Catholic lens, firmly like it's not optional, I'm looking through it what's actually fairly good? Right, because they hold tension together and you sort of, and the only thing that you can see is good. But if I just take my libertarian lens, which is an example of a far right, I could start to make decisions that are only through that lens. So, like, through that lens, it's. It's okay if you want to sleep around.
Speaker 1:It's okay if you want to have an abortion, as long as it doesn't affect other people, it's okay if you want to, you know, get high and drunk or whatever, right like. These things start to start to just be like well, my main thing, my guiding moral vision, is just my political view, because I let the other one be optional or go away.
Speaker 2:Same on the other side, like good things in of itself, if you know, bound by the moral order but this is interesting, so I think this is a good way of maybe explaining again like how neo-gnostic thought infiltrates, because yeah, I think james is a neo-gnostic too.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, you're explaining it right because I think what happens too often is our starting point gets mixed up and if you use the lens sort of image, we prefer usually to start with a political lens.
Speaker 2:When it comes to cultural issues or problems or truth, or God even and religion, we start with our sort of neo-gnostic lens of what's gotta be this and then I'll bring God into it, maybe right, where that's clearly not good and also doesn't seem to work really well throughout history.
Speaker 2:So if we start with a libertarian lens or a Republican lens or a Democratic lens or liberal or conservative or right or left, then we are starting in a place that has, and it's starting with all kind of preconceived things and thoughts and ideas that we may not actually believe or understand or be able to even proclaim right, and so it's a tough thing. It's always interesting when you hear in the media, like in the news, where there's protests going on and this has happened, this happening more and more like massive protesting against things in our country and and that's a part of our history. But it's always interesting when you start hearing the commentary of people will go into those, those crowds and say, hey, what are you protesting? And how many people don't know what they're protesting, or they can't articulate it, and so it's a struggle. That's a struggle. We want to have the right starting place.
Speaker 3:And what we're protesting is a fascinating thing. I think that this brings up, naturally, something that's been really big in the media recently, which is this Harrison Butker stuff oh, here we go.
Speaker 2:And yeah, here we something that's been really big in the media recently, which is this Harrison Butker stuff.
Speaker 3:And yeah, here we go.
Speaker 2:You know, let's let's talk about that the way that everybody's reacting to.
Speaker 3:It is, you know, extremely polar. People are saying this guy hates women and is the worst, but at the same time number one in Jersey sales.
Speaker 1:Um, and it's just you, you know that's kind of crazy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I didn't realize that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, number one in jersey selling out a kicker. Who cares? He is probably the best kicker in the nfl. He was.
Speaker 3:He did help me win fantasy football this season, so he was my kicker, um but and I think that we watched that and it's like either you're the way that we're programmed is, we're either really into it or, oh my gosh, this guy's the worst human person and he's like attacking women and different things like that, and I think there's just so much more. There's so much more room there yeah, like to there to discuss and go line by line. I didn't love it. I think he said a lot of good stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think he said no, that is a really I've been thinking about that too. I know we kind of were talking about it before we started. That that's a really interesting. It's a really interesting thing happening in culture when you look at, look at the reactions so he gave this talk and almost immediately it blew up before anybody started commenting, especially in like the catholic, like the like, like the catholic catholic circles, right, I don't know how many people texted a link to me almost immediately but then the comments and reactions started happening and it blew up right in the culture and in the media and people are talking about it, everyone's talking about it.
Speaker 2:But I think it's a really interesting example of like. You have Harrison Bucker, who has a particular lens that he's coming at for a lot of different issues within the culture, the church, the world, everything. So he had something to say and he got a platform and he made his statement on a lot of things. But in the culture what we're seeing is the one of the 20 minutes is like a minute and a half what everyone's focusing on.
Speaker 2:So they're choosing their lens right to battle against this, and the battle and the attack or the response is coming primarily from those who are upset. The radical feminist side of things, or whatever it may be, and so it's a fascinating sort of display of how the culture responds to different things and kind of within what we're reading here in this book, like we're seeing neo-gnostic, progressive religious thought really prevail.
Speaker 1:What was interesting about that? I found interesting about that talk is like the, the cold, the, the radical feminist culture has grabbed the we're speaking to women at a commencement ceremony and made that like the worst thing. Now they've jumped on all the other things that would be opposing aligned agendas. But like, as the catholic, I actually did not feel like I felt like that was a climax in the speech. But I actually felt like the climax in his speech was where he's like pretty much gone through the early litany of all the things that are wrong and that have been really bad, and then he's kind of challenges the person there and that's not our job. Like our job is to live out our vocation fully and like be holy. So, like his most christian statement, yeah, I felt like was like at that point, because he's kind of most catholics listening they're kind of almost raw, raw like yes, I agree, like you're hitting on all the points you're touching what I'm feeling. And then he has kind of a convicting thing like it's not your role, though, your role is to go home and love your family. You know, and I'm paraphrasinghrasing him, but I thought that was such a good like.
Speaker 1:It's like he riled everyone up. He might align with some of those religious statements and primarily political statements, honestly, that were happening on the first part and we tend to mix them together because there are religious notes of why some of those things are wrong, but then I loved that point and so from that point he wasn't very gnostic at all. But if you think about, if we really want to be examining and not saying they don't agree with some of the things he said, but the way we could, if we're super polarized in some of those topics, we could be falling into kind of a neo-gnostic thought. Yeah, of like. Well, here's the problem if those, if this, just this is itself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, this is the problem, just fixed themselves right, you know it's something that he said you know or you know if politicians during covet would have. Just if the trans people just stopped being trans, or whatever it is that he said, you know? Or if the women just stayed home? Yeah, which is not what he said, but anyway.
Speaker 1:That's basically what he was being accused of saying. That's what he was being accused of saying.
Speaker 3:But that's just like the Gnostic lens through it all.
Speaker 2:So I just thought we like to cling to certain things. I don't know if this follows into all this whole book, but it's an interesting kind of thing to reflect on in the culture Because it happens to priests a lot If we're up there preaching and we say something and somebody doesn't like it, even if within the context of the whole homily or whole thing we're presenting, it's one little thing but someone will cling. This happens in the culture all the time. People will cling to one idea. It'll be twisted so that it can become a part of their now revolution. And that's the thing that's really difficult in the world today when it comes to what the church is trying to accomplish.
Speaker 2:I think Because I can only speak as a priest, but I think it happens too for those who are working in the church, those who are disciples, who are trying to evangelize and trying to proclaim the gospel we want to say things that we know are true and good and beautiful, but we're always a little bit hesitant or afraid because we know that someone can take that and twist it and make it something that we didn't actually say. But now it's a part of the attack and what's happening? Um, and it's a. It's a really difficult situation. So, um, I only say that because I think that what we want to be proclaiming ultimately is Jesus. I loved a lot of what Harrison Bucker said, and there's things I didn't like. There's things, and that's good, that's fine.
Speaker 1:Yeah great.
Speaker 2:We should be able to listen and criticize and take in what we like and don't like, and be able to say and for those of you who don't understand the context, Father Irwin went to Benedictine. I did go to Benedictine. Yeah, I'm a grad, so it's a bit Closer to home.
Speaker 3:It's a funny thing, Actually, when we were at Theology on Tap the other day, avery was trying to stir the pot. He was texting me saying during the Q&A he was like ask him about Harrison Bucker as a Benedictine alum you know, and just see what happens.
Speaker 2:And I was like I'm not doing that, but here I will. Well, one of the funny things I texted a couple of friends who were classmates or were there when I was there and I said the president of Benedictine College, his last name is Menace, and I said is President Menace like the biggest genius ever? A lot of pr, the pr, the free pr of benedictine college, has been unreal, right. So they're gonna be like I mean, how many people are not gonna be tapping at the door wanting to go to that college anyways, um, like right now, but anyways, I yeah, so it's a yeah.
Speaker 2:I just think that there's a lot going on. When I read this book and I think about the challenges that I face as a priest, it's kind to kind of give me a proper sort of diagnosis or understanding of what I, as a priest, am preaching to and how we're trying to bring Christ to the world and what we're really facing, like what is the, in a sense, the spiritual battle. And that's one of the things I appreciate about this book quite a bit is it's it's giving a more of a context to that battle and what we're facing and when we say something or do something or proclaim something in the church, what's going to happen to it and how's it going to be received? And yeah, what's interesting.
Speaker 1:I don't think I agree with you on that topic and I don't think the book said this. If not, I was just if it did. I'm a poor reader. But I think one challenge, one thing to be really on guard of, that I think neo-gnostic thought is doing to all of us and we can see it easier if we look at the part a neo-gnostic thought track we don't agree with. But the invitation is to look at the ones you might agree with.
Speaker 1:Um, I think it causes us to put our identity in places that it doesn't belong and so like even just the lens example, as I was pondering that like, or even like harrison's speech, like in some sense there there were things, if we're all honest, that he said in there in that speech, or things we hear kind of troped about in the media that we get kind of patriotic about and like proud or happy about and I'm not saying that's totally bad, like it's great, like, for example, pro-life, like good example, right, it's good to be like patriotically pro-life, right. But if blended in with that is some hatred towards the progressive and I'm letting that be a part of my identity.
Speaker 1:Like that's not good well, yeah, if any of it is your identity, right, any of it like, even if it's a good thing, like I'll pick something that I that like I would disagree with, or something like in the homosexual movement, the pride stuff. The thing, the worst part of that, in my opinion, is the lie that's being said, like that only this community will embrace me for who I am. And so there's something therapeutic and actually honestly beautiful if we want to take notes and good that someone can say like I'm gay, and be received and championed and loved, like okay, christians, if someone tells you they're gay, like receive them, love them as they are, who they are, for they are for their, all of their.
Speaker 3:You know all of their slay the fat and calf for them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right, um, and so I. But like all, if anything I guess this is just an examining thought I'm asking my own heart, like did I get excited and identify with that? And like want to be one of the crowd when that issue was brought up, or that thing or that thought? And it's like am I doing that when Christian thoughts are brought up, when the gospel is proclaimed, when the same note's getting hit on or something?
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's real.
Speaker 2:I think we're kind of alluding to one point that I really starred, which I thought was really because at the end of chapter, page 63, he's kind of talking about how this affects Christians in particular who are living the faith, but they're part of the political sphere and they're trying to figure out how to proclaim this. Well, but he says here they can't forget, they can forget this talking about Christians within this political ideal and they're having this neo-gnostic temptation. They can forget that our most significant battleground is not the political or the legislative landscape, but the individual human soul. I think that's a part or a point that was really important for me. He goes on there. He says that our ultimate enemy is not the political party but a powerful spiritual being, and that the only way to establish the kingdom of god is by weapons of warfare suited to a spiritual battle.
Speaker 1:Um, and so, yeah, to give harrison an attaboy, I do think he did that. Yeah, well, at one high point he was like the best thing you can do for our priests and bishops is to pray and fast to pray.
Speaker 1:And yeah, and I just I think a christian listener heard that loud and clear but might have, if we were too blended with neonostic thought, forgot that part and been really happy about everything he said about covid or yeah something you know what I mean and I think, if we're, like some of us probably did, get too excited about some of those pieces and not, as like you know, rallying right, for that part I can tell you that me as a priest, the first time I listened to it I was like why is he talking so bad about the priests and bishops? How dare he?
Speaker 2:Hey. So my tendency was like that's where I was focusing on. So my tendency was like that's where I was focusing on. I was like, hey, he's hey, because I'm like my you know my feels. Right, I'm one of those. I have this, like you know, gear where I want to protect priests and bishops, right.
Speaker 2:Well being the victim of a priest, probably, but you're right. You're right, though, I think, because you know, because you think more about it, and you're like well, clearly, priests and bishops and everybody needs prayers, and that point is very important, because he's like look, at the end of the day, we pray for them, we fast for them, and that's for the whole church and for every person.
Speaker 1:Those are the weapons of warfare, spiritual warfare right Prayer and fasting.
Speaker 2:Fasting prayer and what we do there with the Lord, I want to move it.
Speaker 3:We could talk about this forever and I, but I want to hit one more key thing before we wrap it up today, which is the rise of moral therapeutic deism. Have we ever discussed this before?
Speaker 1:I'd be shocked if we haven't avery's nodding his head yes, great, it's something back in the.
Speaker 2:I've listened to most of your podcasts. I feel like there was maybe a little bit.
Speaker 3:Cool.
Speaker 1:I remember I bet Chris got on a little teaching rant and told us about it. Maybe I'm just kidding.
Speaker 3:Speaking of Chris is going to be on soon, as a guest Yep, he's a loser.
Speaker 2:A return, a great return.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the great return he's going to fly in like an hour before we start the Chris Beck roast.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the greatest roast of all time With that. But moral therapeutic deism, which is something that I read a few years ago and I'm sure we talked about it on here, but I think it's just like a representative. At first I was like, oh yeah, yeah, that's what gnosticism leads to, but it but actually he says like, in a philosophical way, it's really not related to the gnosticism, but it's kind of the reason why gnosticism becomes. It's a good seedbed for it. Yeah, it's a seedbed for it. It's like it, though what the the words that he used for it represents and this is hard to hear a degenerate and flaccid state of Christianity being what that means.
Speaker 3:So, basically, for those of you who haven't understood what moral therapeutic deism, most young people who would check the box that say, yeah, I'm a Christian would fall into this category. Like when we look at the statistics of how many Catholics there are in the United States, but then we look at how many go to Mass. Father, do you know what? Is it like 20% that go to Mass, or is it even that?
Speaker 2:It's probably less than that it's probably less than that.
Speaker 3:So this great majority moral, therapeutic deism is like god is for when things that there is a god, he exists, he's ordered the world and has has absolute power. God wants us to be nice and good and make people happy and, as taught in the bible, the central goal of life is just to be happy and not hurt other people and feel good about it, and God has no need to be particularly involved in any of our lives as long as we're happy and good.
Speaker 3:But if we're ever not happy and good, then God becomes more necessary, which is where the therapy comes from. Father Irwin, when we were talking before, he used the analogy of like it's like God's like a pill. Oh, this wasn't working. Let me take a pill of God today.
Speaker 1:Or I'm really happy right now. I don't really need that, you know, right, yeah, I'm great, I'm great, I'm good.
Speaker 3:My health's fine. I do that with the doctor all the time. I don't feel bad, I'm not going.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one thing that might help also to continue to understand. This is like deism is an old heresy, right, it's an old heresy that we're basically. It's like the idea of a clockmaker, god right when God creates spins it up winds it up and then just steps back and doesn't have any other kind of personal contact or need to be a part of history or people's lives, and so that's the beginning of it, because that's kind of what it kind of is rounded in right, this idea that God isn't really a part of our lives.
Speaker 2:There's no personal God and there's really no need for it until I need it right. But um the moralistic, therapeutic part also weighs heavily in, because um everybody, you know, everyone's got a thing today, right, everyone's got something everyone's got a.
Speaker 3:Thing.
Speaker 2:And I think why this is such an important thing to be. I really appreciate. I remember when this came out, when I first heard this was not in 2005,. It was much later, so it's only it's been kind of circling around for a while.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I remember a lot of us Catholics probably first read of it in Sherry Waddell's book.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's been just a few years yeah.
Speaker 1:Forming Intentional Disciples.
Speaker 2:But I appreciate it because it's sort of speaking to this thing that we all struggle with sometimes is our ultimate need for God and what that really means. We have a tendency to see God more as a therapist and just go when I need that, instead of essential to everything. He's the one personal relationship with the Lord. Knowing Jesus Christ connection to our faith. It's the key. It's the key. It's the key to eternal and true holiness and happiness.
Speaker 3:So yeah, yeah, and the reason why this is really popular and a seedbed like neo-gnosticism is way more exciting than that One is. Unless something goes wrong, everything's great. It's just like beige uninteresting where, where neo-Nazism like sees evil in the world and wants to fight it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's like no excitement.
Speaker 3:It's almost more Christian in a way. Yeah, somehow Then then. Then MTD is but man like, but MTV is. So it's so nice because it allows you to blend and be unseen in the culture and not like well, as long as you're, as long as you're, a good person, you'll go to heaven, like there's just so much. It's just really easy to get along with everybody in that space and really easy to let yourself be God most of the time, which is what really gets us going as sinners. We're really excited about that.
Speaker 2:We want a religion. This is what.
Speaker 2:MTD, I think, kind of proclaims I want a religion that just makes me feel good about me. You hear that all the time in a modernian sort of idea like why are you doing this? Because I just want to feel good and I want, I want to make me happy. And sometimes you hear that about like missionary work too. That people will be like I went to this place and we did this and it made me feel amazing and I'm gonna. I'm gonna go do it again because I want to feel that. So Christianity becomes sort of this, just this way to feel a certain way, and that's all it is. It's not personal, it's not even really about Jesus after a while.
Speaker 1:Well, that's interesting because we all have a really deep longing for a purpose, right. And so if we're in that, if we're happy and feel good for a long time, like at a certain point we're just going to want to go grab the purpose, and if neo-gnosticism is giving it to us, then we can go exhaust ourselves in that and unfortunately we come full of pride and losing all sorts of love, of course. But we have to hear. I think this should give Christians conviction.
Speaker 1:People need to hear the gospel because daily we're bombarded with a counter gospel and it has to challenge, it has to have a high call and even if we look at the early tenets of Gnosticism, it has a high call. There's a great evil that we can combat against and that's attractive and we're losing people to it inside and outside, and so I think we need to. You know, woe to me if I don't preach. The gospel would be what saint paul says. I think we need to embody that again and realize the souls that hang in the balance I have a personal example of just encountering MTD in its greatest form.
Speaker 3:So every now and then, when I'm interested or when I need to help save up money for a family vacation or whatever, I'll do Uber driving. That's what I did when I was in college. So every now and then I'll hop in the car after the kid's asleep and go out and drive. So I meet all sorts of people and I have conversations that are like you know. Sometimes they'll say, is this what you mostly do? And um, and I'll say, no, I'm actually. I work for the church or something. If they press more, I'll be more, be, be more real with it. I want to, like some people want their uber driver to shut up and not talk, and some of them want me to tell them my life story and hear everything about me. So it's fascinating stuff. So when you get a ping in the app, you really don't know exactly where you're going. They just kind of give you a general area.
Speaker 3:So I was in Midwest City. I just dropped somebody off and someone was taking me to I-40 on the west side and she hops in the car and she immediately asks, which wasn't normally normal. It's like so what do you do? What do you do actually? Um, and I was like, oh, I, I work for the church and she like talked more and more and she like asked me why she's like, what were you before that? Because, I mentioned, I was a convert and so I got to like share some testimony and different things and then she kind of started getting into like why church for her and and what's wrong with the church and how they hurt her and how they're terrible to her when she was growing up. And now she, she really hated southern baptists, which you know.
Speaker 3:Her and I could both, in a sense, get onto that train, because that's what I was before, and discuss what was wrong there. And she talked about, yeah, I do love god and I know that he cares about me and I know that he wants me to be happy, and all of this therapeutic deism was just coming out within it, and so that's how she was described and she would describe herself as a Christian, but she doesn't go often because of the people, of the hypocritic-ness and all of that stuff. And so I like gently pushed I only have like 20 minutes and everything in that area, but then, like five minutes before we get to where we're going. She kind of just confesses and she was like, yeah, I can't believe we're having this discussion. I'm going to night trips, which is a gentleman's club in Oklahoma City, and I was like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 3:You know, like there's a as long as it's just it on display, like she's having all of these thoughts and wanting to be closer to God and all of these things, but didn't even come up. It didn't even come up to her of, like you know, the sin that was happening in their life. So it's a real blinder for everybody and I prayed for her and asked if I could pray for her. She was like no, I'm just going to hop inside, but that's like it on display in like real life, wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, but that's interesting because you're also beautifully pointing toward the reality that's probably happening in the, the souls of every person who who, in one sense, wants what what god gives us, wants what christ offers, but are trapped in, you know, sin, or bound by certain attachments to sin, or feel like this is the only thing I can do to be happy or to have fulfillment, or to have meaning or worth. And that's sometimes what sin does. It provides a sense of worthiness, but in the end it doesn't fulfill anything. So actually, that's a beautiful story, because you also um witnessed that person, right?
Speaker 3:yeah, yeah, it was great.
Speaker 2:Maybe the lord will maybe the lord will speak in a powerful way yeah, it was.
Speaker 3:It was awesome. It was the most open conversation about faith that I've really gotten to have with somebody. Cause you just kept asking questions and I was like you keep asking these questions. I'm going to tell you what's going on.
Speaker 1:I think that there's hope in that too. Like I think we need to all remember that, like you just kind of opened the door from what I mean, obviously you had the conviction to keep going, but planted in her heart was a desire to pursue this right, like she went into it, right, and so I think we need to be courageous enough to open the door, stay there, go there, as they've continued to give permission, because clearly she didn't have an agenda or want to talk about this and her right of going there, but she did. But she did and in her heart she needed to process this, she needed to talk about it, like it wasn't on her agenda, but she wanted to.
Speaker 2:It was fascinating.
Speaker 2:I just want to point one more thing out that I think is kind of interesting because he says when he's talking about how you can kind of fall into a kind of a Christian light but I think part of what moralistic, therapeutic deism does is makes Christianity accommodating to the person, and so that's sort of how we like, we want happiness, we want heaven, we want God. But I need this Christian religion or thought or whatever to accommodate how I want it to happen. And that's a tough thing to battle in the world as a priest but also as evangelists and disciples of the Lord so beautiful.
Speaker 3:I love that. Well, I think we're going to naturally end it there. We'll keep it moving. I don't know how many think we're going to naturally end it there. We'll keep it moving. I don't know how many episodes we're going to have on this book at least two more. I feel like there's quite a few more still in the hopper there. Father Erwin, it's awesome having you.
Speaker 2:Thank you for taking the time great to have the discussion with you guys and keep doing good work with Red Dirt Catholic. It's great and see what God keeps, keeps doing for us here.
Speaker 3:It's good, pray, pray. The Lord keeps the blessing. Um, but yeah, this has been Red Dirt Catholics. I'm Jace.
Speaker 1:I'm James. I'm Father Irwin.
Speaker 3:See you next time. Thank, you.