Pints With Aquinas - 231: Aquinas on Alcohol

Episode Date: November 10, 2020

Today we'll take a look at what Thomas Aquinas has to say about alcohol! We'll be looking in the second part of the Summa at three questions in particular: 1. Whether the use of wine is altogether unlawful? 2. Is Drunkenness a sin? 3. Is Drunkenness a mortal sin? And more! SPONSORS EL Investments: https://www.elinvestments.net/pints  Exodus 90: https://exodus90.com/mattfradd/  Hallow: http://hallow.app/mattfradd  STRIVE: https://www.strive21.com/    GIVING Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/mattfradd This show (and all the plans we have in store) wouldn't be possible without you. I can't thank those of you who support me enough. Seriously! Thanks for essentially being a co-producer coproducer of the show.   LINKS Website: https://pintswithaquinas.com/ Merch: https://teespring.com/stores/matt-fradd FREE 21 Day Detox From Porn Course: https://www.strive21.com/   SOCIAL Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mattfradd Twitter: https://twitter.com/mattfradd Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mattfradd   MY BOOKS Does God Exist: https://www.amazon.com/Does-God-Exist-Socratic-Dialogue-ebook/dp/B081ZGYJW3/ref=sr_1_9?dchild=1&keywords=fradd&qid=1586377974&sr=8-9 Marian Consecration With Aquinas: https://www.amazon.com/Marian-Consecration-Aquinas-Growing-Closer-ebook/dp/B083XRQMTF/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=fradd&qid=1586379026&sr=8-4 The Porn Myth: https://www.ignatius.com/The-Porn-Myth-P1985.aspx   CONTACT Book me to speak: https://www.mattfradd.com/speakerrequestform

G'day, g'day, g'day, and welcome to Pints with Aquinas. My name is Matt Fradd, and it's lovely to be with you. Today, I want to do three basic things with a lot of fun stuff sprinkled in between. I want to take a look at what Thomas Aquinas has to say about alcohol. Three things in particular we'll look at. Whether one can use alcohol legitimately. Second, whether drunkenness is a sin. And thirdly, whether or not it's a mortal sin. I then want to take five questions from my amazing patrons, including a question about Catholic mindfulness and my thoughts on it. And then just for fun, I want to create the super Catholic apologist. And what I mean by that is if I could take attributes of different Catholic apologists and biblical scholars and push them into one amazing package, what would it look like? So anyway, it should be fun.

I've had a great couple of weeks. I was just in South Carolina giving some talks on pornography. It's the first time I've actually really gone on a trip. I spoke at Franciscan University of Steubenville a couple of months ago, but first time I've spoken in a high school in like five months, thereabouts. Crazy stuff, but it was amazing. It was really a beautiful time. I just recorded a video about an amazing thing that happened during one of those talks on pornography that I gave. So I won't recap it here, but feel free to go check that out. Some exciting things have been happening. We just hit

90,000 subscribers, which is pretty amazing. I'm trying to think about what I'll do once we hit 100,000 subscribers to celebrate. I've got some ideas. Love to hear your thoughts below in the comments section. But yeah, pretty excited about that. If you haven't yet subscribed, you might want to think about that. Here's one reason to subscribe. Next week, we're hosting a debate between Protestant Steve Christie and Catholic apologist Trent Horn. And we're going to be debating the Deuterocanonical books. So if you're a Catholic and you're like, why do we have more books in the Old Testament than Protestants do? Or if you're a Protestant thinking, why do Catholics have more books?

Do they add to the Bible? How should I think about that? That's what we'll be debating. So that'll be pretty bloody fantastic, I reckon. Also, check this out. We just had an amazing conference. Maybe many of you attended. It was a virtual apologetics conference. We had about 26,000

people register for that, and that was really amazing. But we also had an offline conference just for patrons up in the North Georgia mountains. I want to show you a few photos because these are pretty great. So this is the group that came. It was a small, intimate group. It was an amazing, amazing time. That's Father Lewis, my parish priest in the front there. He celebrated divine liturgy one day up in the top left-hand corner. You can see Father Gregory Pine, who is actually 11 feet tall, I think. So we made him stand in the back. He celebrated the Dominican Rite. He celebrated the Dominican Rite. And man, we had a fun time. I basically wanted to create a retreat that I would actually want to go on. And that's definitely what this turned out to be. So yeah, big thanks to everybody who came.

I was trying to see if I can show you more photos. Let's see. Oh, yeah, there we go. So this was, we would have a pub night every night, and we'd just get together and have some drinks. Actually, if you can see on that TV, that's actually Dr. William Lane Craig. So he spoke at the Virtual Catholic Apologetics Conference, and that was really fun. We would just sit around and watch these incredible talks. We would have drinks. We would go on hikes, celebrate liturgy with adoration. It was really cool. Let's see.

Oh, this is a funny photo. Each night we had cigars and whiskey out by a bonfire. And as you can see, the land is really beautiful where we were. Choda Falls, it's called. But this is probably not the best photo because people already mistake Father Gregory Pine for being part of the KKK. So having him in front of a gigantic fire like that, maybe that wasn't the best thing. But man, we had fun. Anyway, just wanted to share that with you. So there you go. Okay, before we look at the text of Thomas Aquinas,

I want to say thank you to our sponsor, Halo. Are you familiar with Halo? Go to halo.com slash mattfrab below. If you've been wanting to grow in prayer, if you've wanted to pray more regularly, but you're having a difficult time doing it, Halo can help. It is 100% Catholic and incredibly well produced. And so you can download it right now.

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in the United States. Five-star reviews. Lots of people say good things about it. I's really good. I think it's the number one Catholic app in the United States. Five-star reviews. Lots of people say good things about it. I've really enjoyed it. So check it out. hallo.com slash Matt Fradd. Click that link below. hallo.com slash Matt Fradd. All right. Well, I'm drinking coffee today. Cheers. Partly because it's 1030 in the morning. But sometimes I'll get emails from people who say that they're really disappointed in the show, in Pints with Aquinas, because they think that we glorify alcohol, drinking alcohol, and that this is a bad thing. And so today I just wanted to take a look at what Thomas Aquinas himself has to say about alcohol,

because some people have different views on it. There are some Christians, believe it or not, who think that any use of alcohol is sinful. I had a friend who was a member of the Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Church, and I remember going to her church up in Virginia, I believe it was. They handed out those jack-chick tracks at the beginning of church, which was great. Always a good way to welcome a Catholic. I don't know if you're familiar with them, but he's incredibly anti-Catholic. Was. He's now dead. So I don't know if he still is. Anyway, yeah, and sat down, and this is the kind of like Protestants who don't think women should wear pants or drums. You shouldn't listen

to music with drums in it. I think I'm characterizing them well enough. But anyway, we got to know each other a bit, and I went to her church, and yeah, that was one of the things they believed, that drinking alcohol was sinful. So why don't we start there and actually look at what Thomas Aquinas has to say. We're going to read from the second part of the second part of the Summa Theologiae. Question 149, having to do with sobriety. Is the use of wine lawful? And by wine, we can supplement that with whiskey or beer or different types of alcohol. Now, before we see directly what Thomas has to say, let's look at one of the objections that he poses. He poses three objections here.

He poses three objections here. Let's see. It would seem that the use of wine is altogether unlawful. For without wisdom, a man cannot be in the state of salvation, since it is written in Wisdom 7, verse 28, God loveth none but him that dwelleth with wisdom. And further, in Wisdom 9 9 verses 19, it says, By wisdom they were healed, whosoever have pleased thee, O Lord, from the beginning. End quote. Now, the use of wine is a hindrance to wisdom. For it is written in Ecclesiastes

chapter 2 verse 3, I thought in my heart to withdraw my flesh from wine that I might turn my mind to wisdom. Therefore, wine drinking is altogether unlawful. I say it almost every episode, but I'm going to say it again. Thomas Aquinas steelmans his opponent's arguments. He doesn't set up a straw man. He doesn't set it up to be weaker than it actually is he makes it stronger i think than his opponents can here we have in this one objection and we have two more in which he cites three passages of scripture let's go ahead and read another objection just because i'm i want to objection to further the apostle when aquinas refers to the apostle, he's referring to St. Paul, says,

it is good not to eat flesh and not to drink wine nor anything whereby thy brother is offended or scandalized or made weak. Now it's sinful to forsake, by the way, that's from Romans chapter 14 verse 21. Now it is sinful to forsake the good of virtue as likewise to scandalize one's brethren. Therefore, it is unlawful to make use of wine. All right. You know, already I'm not terribly convinced by that, but therefore I don't think I'll be convinced by any of them. But again, you know, he cites St. Paul. And now here, here's the third objection.

Why not? Let's just do all of them. You have time, don't you? Jerome says, so he's quoting a church father here. don't you? Jerome says, so he's quoting a church father here. After the deluge, wine and flesh were sanctioned, but Christ came in the last of the ages and brought back the end into line with the beginning. Therefore, it seems unlawful to use wine under the Christian law. All right. So those are some objections to the use of wine. What Aquinas does before he responds to each objections is two things. Number one, he cites from authority,

that might be from scripture or a church father, and then, or perhaps someone after the 800s or a pope or something like that, who still has authority. And then he gives his own response. All right. So here is what's called the sed contra, that who still has authority. And then he gives his own response. All right. So here is what's called the said contra where he cites authority. The apostle, that is Paul, says in 1 Timothy 5.23, Do not still drink water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thy frequent infirmities. infirmities. And it is written in Sirach chapter 31 verses 36, wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart. Now, even though this is coffee, it still gives me joy. So here we go. All right. That's the argument from authority. Here's his main answer. Okay.

Here's his main answer. Okay. No meat or drink considered in itself is unlawful. According to, that would include moonshine. Sweet. That might be, okay, we'll get into that later. According to Matthew 15, 11, not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man, end quote. Wherefore, it is not unlawful to drink wine as such, yet it may become unlawful accidentally. So I guess if during the days of prohibition, moonshine may have been

unlawful in that sense, accidentally, not as such, because, okay. This is something owing to a circumstance on the part of the drinker, either because he is easily the worse for taking wine, I know people like that, or because he is bound by a vow not to drink wine. Sometimes it results from the mode of drinking because, to wit, he exceeds the measure in drinking, and sometimes it is on account of others who would be scandalized thereby. All right, that's really cool. He just kind of gave us three reasons there. Okay, so he's saying, like, when you think of drinking alcohol, like, just as such, it's not unlawful. But it can become unlawful, okay, for three reasons he lays out here. You

might be able to think of more, but these are good reasons. One, maybe you've made a vow not to drink wine. Maybe you've gone to confession and you confessed being drunk and the priest told you to abstain from alcohol for a week, let's say. Well, in that sense, drinking wine during that week would be unlawful, you know, accidentally, not in and of itself, but because you have taken a vow. Okay. Obviously, immoderate use. Okay. And then also, yeah, on account of others who would be scandalized thereby. So I mentioned this group of Christians who thought drinking was wrong. Suppose I was to go to her house and this person had children around and they all thought that alcohol was sinful.

You know, if I was to pull out a bottle of beer and drink it over dinner and say, well, look, you are incorrect in thinking that this is wrong as such, and therefore I'm going to drink it. Like that would cause scandal. I've also had friends whose one of the spouses has been an alcoholic and obviously a recovered, maybe not obviously, but a recovered alcoholic. And so I think it would have caused scandal if I was to say, hey, do you mind if I go down to the store and just get some whiskey? I know that your husband or wife or whoever is an alcoholic, but I'd very much like to drink. You could see that being a cause of scandal as well. So alcohol as such is not unlawful. Why don't we look at his

just first objection here? You remember the first objection where he cited three different pieces of scripture where he said, you know, like man should be wise and cannot be saved unless he is, and alcohol impedes that, right? That was the argument. Here's his response to that argument. A man may have wisdom in two ways. First, in a general way, according as it is sufficient for salvation, and in this way it is required in order to have wisdom. Not that a man abstain altogether from wine, but that he abstain from its immoderate use. Secondly, a man may have wisdom in some degree of perfection, and in this way, in order to receive wisdom perfectly, it is requisite for certain persons that they abstain altogether from wine. Excuse me. And this depends on circumstances of certain persons and places.

All right. So having a beer is not going to affect my wisdom. Having five might and therefore would be wrong. Okay. All right. Let's look at drunkenness is a sin. Oh, here's a really thing. Here's a really interesting thing he addresses, which I wasn't planning on getting at.

But hey, let's do it. He also asks whether drunkenness excuses a particular sin. So if I get drunk and then go do something really awful, am I culpable for that really awful thing? And I think what he'll say will surprise you. Whether drunkenness is a sin. Let's go right to the main response. Whether drunkenness is a sin. Let's go right to the main response. Drunkenness may be understood, says Thomas, in two ways. First, it may signify the defect itself of a man resulting from his drinking much wine,

the consequence being that he loses the use of reason. I think by this he means, suppose somebody drinks a great deal and they've just messed themselves up. So even when they're not drunk, they're suffering the effects of being drunk. I think that's what he means by this first thing. On this sense, drunkenness denotes not a sin, but a penal defect resulting from a fault. So I think that's what he means. So if I'm drinking, getting drunk, suppose I was getting drunk as a kid. Obviously that drunkenness would be a sin, which he's about to say. But suppose that's really kind of messed me up, and I'm not drunk now.

And what he would say, well, the effect that resulted from that drinking is not a sin. But the drunkenness itself was, and here's where he's going to get to the second way in which we can think of drunkenness. Okay, this act may cause drunkenness in two ways. On one way, through the wine being too strong, without the drinker being cold. Oh, here, let me back up a bit. I think I missed something. On this sense, drunkenness denotes not a sin, but a penal defect resulting from a fault. Secondly, drunkenness may denote the act by which a man incurs this defect. Okay. So when we think about drunkenness, this is what we're thinking about. Now, when someone gets drunk, this act may cause drunkenness in two ways. On one way, through the wine being too strong without the drinker being cognizant of this.

And in this way too, drunkenness may occur without sin, especially if it is not through his negligence. And thus, we believe that Noah was made drunk as related in Genesis chapter 9. All right, let's just pause there for a moment because this happened to me once and I want to tell you about it. I was living just outside of Ottawa in Ontario, Canada. And there was this fantastic little English pub. What was it? Ashton? Yeah, Ashton is the name of the little town. Lovely little pub they had up there. And I got to know people quite well. I would work in the day doing some carpentry work while I was there and I would go have a beer and just loved it. Lovely little pub, all right?

And then I would play music. I don't know if you know this, but I play music. And so I would sing on like a Friday night, bring my guitar, plug it all up and, you know, that kind of stuff. All right. So one day it was my birthday. And so we went there for drinks with some friends and I was also playing. And I guess the bartender, you know, because she liked me and thought that this was a good thing to do, really spiked my drinks. So I'm up there playing a song. I come back, and I don't know what I was drinking, but it was like double or triple the amount of alcohol that there should have been in it. And I'm drinking it, and I got absolutely hammered. And I suppose Thomas would say, well, this isn't necessarily a sin because this wasn't necessarily your fault. Now, I suppose if my intention was to get drunk and then I drank like three or four or five of these, that would be a sin and I would have got way drunker than I had even planned to because it was spiked.

But if I was just planning on having one or two drinks and they were spiked, then Aquinas is going to say, okay, well, in this sense, drunkenness isn't a sin because you didn't intend the outcome, all right? Okay, but on another way, drunkenness may result from inordinate concupiscence and use of wine. In this way, it is accounted a sin and is comprised under gluttony as a species under its genus. For gluttony is divided into rioting and drunkenness. Rioting and drunkenness, which are forbidden by the apostle. So if we just kind of go back to that first, in one of those first objections, oh sorry, in the respondio to the last thing we looked at, he quotes Sirach and it says, wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart. But see, what we do is we drink it immoderately and it becomes a cause of sorrow. So

drunkenness is a very serious sin and one that we Christians should flee from. And if we have been drunk, as Aquinas is going to say soon, we should go to the sacrament of confession and repent of that. So drunkenness is a serious sin. I think what's difficult is if I'm not allowed to use a substance because it's wrong, then I can just abstain from using that substance. But if I am allowed to use the substance but have to use it appropriately, it becomes a lot more difficult. Because then I have... Not only am I engaging with something that is okay in and of itself, but I can't overdo it, but I have to use it in and of itself without overdoing it. And the thing that I am using

is decreasing my inhibitions as I'm drinking it. So, but this is, this is, this is something that I have to be really careful about and that you have to be really careful about. And we might talk in a moment about some sort of resolutions that we might make that can help us. Because you've probably had the experience, I've had the experience where I'll have a drink and then I'll have another drink and I'm not intending to get drunk.

And this has happened to me in the past, right? I'm not intending to get drunk, but I don't think about it, right? Because my inhibitions have been lowered because of the alcohol. And so I'll have another one and then I'll have another one. and then I'll have another one, and then all of a sudden I realize I'm drunk.

So if you would have asked me at any point, are you planning on getting drunk? I would have said no, but I ended up being drunk. But I don't think that makes me free of sin because I think I still have to be vigilant and more intentional than I'm being. So we'll look at that in a minute. But Aquinas is going to say that getting drunk is a mortal sin. All right. Now, according to

the Catholic Church, if you die in a state of mortal sin, you are separated from God from all eternity. Now, the church distinguishes between grave matter and culpability, mortal sin, right? Sometimes the terminology is used interchangeably. Something can be grave and not mortal, right? So when he says, is drunkenness a mortal sin, maybe it would be more helpful to think of drunkenness as a grave sin, right? Here's why. Because in order for something to be a mortal sin, I have to do it intentionally.

It has to be like really bad. And I have to be in, you know, doing it freely. No one's kind of, you know, forcing me to do it. But in that instance that Thomas Aquinas just gave, like someone could be spiking your drinks and you don't realize it. Well, I'm not doing that intentionally. And so therefore we can still say that drunkenness is a grave sin, right? But if I'm not culpable for it in the sense that I didn't intend it and I wasn't really free to do it, then we wouldn't call that a mortal sin, but we would still say it's grave matter, you know? All right, so let's have a look at what he has to say about drunkenness being a mortal sin. The sin of drunkenness, as stated in the foregoing article, consists in the immoderate use of concupiscence and concupiscence of wine. When we talk about concupiscence, we're talking about disordered desires.

Using things inordinately due to those disordered desires. Aquinas says, now this may happen to a man in three ways. First, so that he knows not the drink to be immoderate and intoxicating. And then drunkenness may be without sin, right? We just said that as stated above. Secondly, so that he perceives the drink to be immoderate, but without knowing it to be intoxicating. And then drunkenness may involve a venial sin. Thirdly, it may happen that a man is well aware that the drink is immoderate and intoxicating. That is to say, he drinks more than he should. He knows what

it's going to do. And then Aquinas says, and yet he, that is the one getting drunk, would rather be drunk than abstain from drink. Such a man is a drunkard, properly speaking, because morals take their species not from things that occur accidentally and beside the intention, but from that which is directly intended. On this way, drunkenness is a mortal sin because then a man willingly and knowingly deprives himself of the use of reason, whereby he performs virtuous deeds, right? With his use of reason, that's how we do virtuous deeds, but I'm depriving myself of that. And I also use that to avoid sin. And thus, the man who chooses to get drunk sins mortally by running the risk of falling into sin as well as it being a sin in and of itself. For Ambrose says,

sin as well as it being a sin in and of itself. For Ambrose says, we learn that we should shun drunkenness, which prevents us from avoiding grievous sins. For the things we avoid when sober, we unknowingly commit through drunkenness. Therefore, drunkenness, properly speaking, is a mortal sin. You know what's interesting is I think in our society, if you say this person is a drunkard, what you mean is, you probably mean they're an alcoholic who gets drunk intentionally frequently. But here we have Thomas Aquinas saying, if you just choose to get drunk and then get drunk, you are a drunkard. So you and I have to repent of that. It's not okay to get drunk. And what's difficult is, you know, there is so much about alcohol that's really good. Like if I sit down, you know, on my back deck,

in a rocking chair with a friend, it's been a hard day, and the two of us like crack open a beer together and we have a lovely conversation. Alcohol helps facilitate that. We do drink in order to have like a biological effect. It's not like, Thomas isn't saying drink alcohol so long as you feel the effects. And if you feel the effects, it's simple.

No, of course you feel the effects when you drink. That is why you drink alcohol. I mean, if that weren't why you drink alcohol, then drink non-alcoholic beer or drink a kombucha or drink something else. I think it's pretty clear that the reason we drink is to have this physiological effect take place. And that can be conducive to a good conversation, right? It can lower our inhibitions so that we're not as tense and guarded and conversation can come a little easier. But Aquinas is saying here, if you intend to get drunk, this is a mortal sin, and so we cannot do it.

Now, of course, one of the things he says is the reason drunkenness is so problematic is, one, you deprive yourself of the use of reason. So it's a sin in and of itself. But also we tend to do stupid things when we're drunk that we wouldn't if we had our faculty of reason working correctly, you know? Cheers. If you've just joined me, this is coffee. I didn't just kind of make light of drinking. I mean, how many people have committed the sin of pornography or masturbation or fornication or theft or, you know, maybe breaking

or damaging another person's property when they were drunk or said things that was cruel or unkind or gossiped about other people when they got drunk. So serious bloody thing. I want to suggest a couple of things we can do, but I'll do that in a minute. First of all, I want to look at, does it excuse sin? Now, when I first read this, I thought Aquinas was going to say, absolutely not. You choose to get drunk, then you are culpable of whatever results from that drunkenness. And he surprised me by kind of saying, no, no, you're actually not culpable for what you do while you're drunk. Now, I'm not saying if I get drunk and then do something horrible, I can be like, can't blame me.

No, it's like I chose to get drunk. This resulted from that. So in that sense, like I am culpable. You know what I mean? But it's not an additional mortal sin, I think Aquinas is going to say. Let's have a look here. Let's read them together. Two things that will be observed in drunkenness, namely the resulting defect and the preceding act.

On the part of the resulting defect whereby the use of reason is fettered, drunkenness may be an excuse for sin insofar as it causes an act to be involuntary through ignorance. But on the part of the preceding act, a distinction would seem necessary. Because the drunkenness that results from the act be without sin. The subsequent sin is entirely excused from fault, as perhaps is the case of Lot. If, however, the preceding act was sinful, the person is not altogether excused from the subsequent sin because the latter is rendered voluntary through the voluntariness of the preceding act, namely drunkenness, inasmuch as it was through doing something unlawful that he fell into the subsequent sin. Nevertheless, the resulting sin is diminished even as the character of voluntariness is diminished. Wherefore, Augustine says that Lot's guilt is to be measured not by the incest, but by his drunkenness. Does that make sense?

So I am still culpable for what I do after I get drunk because it was through a free choice that I got drunk and therefore, you know, whatever I do is a result of that free choice of getting drunk. But if I no longer have the use of reason or to the degree in which I lack my reason, that sin is going to be diminished. So even if it were a mortal sin, it could be said to be a venial sin. Or if somebody I think was like blackout drunk, and again, this is not good. This is not an excuse to go get drunk so that we

can engage in sins and then say we're not culpable for them, of course. But then we could not be sinning. It's sort of like if I'm sleepwalking. If I sleepwalk and do something bad, like hit my wife in the face for some reason, I don't know, or wake up and I don't know what people do when they sleepwalk. I don't sleepwalk. But you wouldn't say, well, you have to get a confession for that. You know? But if I get drunk and I don't have the use of reason, like when I'm sleeping, something similar is happening there. Although I am responsible for the act of getting drunk and have to confess that. All right.

Before we take some questions from our patrons, let me just suggest a couple of things that you and I might do. Number one, we should perhaps think about abstaining from alcohol more than we currently do. I know some people who have decided just to abstain from it until the weekend. And I think that's a really cool idea, especially if you feel like you're using alcohol like a crutch, you know?

You come home, you're tired, and it's just that medication that you need to just sort of relax, you know? Maybe you feel like you're becoming too dependent on that. And so abstaining throughout the week and then just drinking Friday, Saturday, and Sunday could be a good thing. Maybe if you just Sunday, this is the day of celebration. I'm going to have a couple of glasses of wine or something like that. This could actually help us to appreciate alcohol more than if we were just to reach for it every time we wanted to.

to reach for it every time we wanted to. Another thing I would suggest, and I suggest this to myself as well, is what if I was to make a decision never to have more than one drink in a row ever? What if I made that kind of commitment? Or if you don't like that, two drinks. What if I did that? When I was a missionary with Net Ministries up in Canada, which is an awesome organization if you want to travel the country and evangelize teenagers. That's what we did. We had a one-drink rule. So you can have a drink, but you're going to have one a day. And I liked that because it was like, you want to drink now or are we going to go out later? We'll go out later.

Okay, well, I'm going to save my drink for then. And it kind of helped you appreciate it a little bit more. I would love to hear your opinions below. I've pinned the comment and I've asked you, like, what have been your – how have you enjoyed alcohol? How has it been a positive for you? How has it been a negative? And maybe suggest to us some ways that we can use alcohol more responsibly because, for goodness sake, I think we most certainly do need to use it more responsibly. Hey, this month is

November. We have Black Friday this November. So I'm doing an extra special thing for my patrons. We are, in addition to everything you already get when you become a patron, like you get access to courses taught by university professors on Dante's Divine Comedy, on St. Augustine's Confessions. We've done one on Flannery O'Connor. You get things sent to your house like beer steins and signed books. And I think we do a lot of good stuff for our patrons. But in addition to all of that, if you become a patron this month for $10 or more, we will send you a car magnet of Thomas Aquinas. It's about five inches, so it's big enough.

And you can put that on your car to represent the big man. Again, we're only doing this in November if you become a patron for $10 or more. So please consider doing that because we're trying to do a lot of good work. And your support over on Patreon helps us. Patreon.com slash Matt Fradd. Click the link below and go check it out. Patreon.com slash Matt Fradd. Patreon.com slash Matt Fradd.

Speaking of alcohol, I want to say one more thing before we get to questions from our patrons. You might really consider doing Exodus 90. If you're a man, because it's just for men. So that kind of helps. Maybe. Exodus 90 is a 90-day Catholic spiritual exercise for men. Basically, you get together with a group of men, and for 90 days, you read the book of Exodus. They've got a fantastic app that helps you with this. You spend time in prayer every day. You grow in self-mastery by saying no to things like sweets and eating between meals and alcohol. So 90 days without alcohol. And it really is a fraternal experience. It's not something you do in an isolated way. You meet weekly with your brothers. And yeah, it's really

cool. I've got a link below, exodus90.com slash Matt Fradd. Oh, let's see if Pints with Aquinas is here. No, no, no. Okay. Why is Taylor Marshall cool, but I'm not? Where is it? Where is it? Oh, there I am. Beautiful. All right. I forgive them. exodus90.com slash Matt Fradd. And then they're all starting during the new year. That's what's cool about it too, right? So Exodus 90 starts on January 4th and ends on Easter. What a cool thing to do. So it's like prolonging your Lent.

So it's in 62 days. You have time to get pumped up. Click that link below, Exodus90.com. Join my wait list right here, and you'll get some private videos from me as you begin your Exodus 90 preparation, and then into your journey, exodus90.com slash Matt Fradd. All righty, let's take some questions from our patrons. Massive thanks to you if you are a patron. This question comes from Rhiannon. Is there something you would like to have told your wife before you met her?

I'm thinking like the letters people write to you or their younger self, but in this case for your wife while she was waiting for you. Some encouragement for the single ladies out there would be appreciated, I'm sure. Oh man, life, I don't know. I mean, what was cool about my wife is I met her doing ministry up in Canada, and she gave me a CD of the chastity speaker, Jason Everett. And so it was her who actually evangelized me about chastity. So I had become a Christian in the year 2000. So three years later is when I met my wife and she gave me that CD. And I didn't know why the church taught what it taught about sexuality. I knew that I had to stop things of a sexual nature and to save sexual marriage. I didn't really know why. This talk by Jason Everett taught me the why behind the what. And it was then that I decided I was going to save sexual marriage. So it was pretty cool that my wife, in a roundabout way, is the reason I did that. Something that's really cool is that my wife was serving with this same ministry group in the year 2000. And in the year 2000, during this ministry thing, she was told to pray for her future husband.

And it had never occurred to her to do that before. thing, she was told to pray for her future husband. And it had never occurred to her to do that before. So it was August in the year 2000 that my wife started praying for her future husband. And in August in the year 2000, I came to Jesus Christ at World Youth Day in Rome. So I'm all about praying for a future spouse. So I'm not sure if that is exactly what you were asking me, but that's what I would say to that. This next question comes from Katie Hendricks. She says, hi, I just joined your Patreon today. I have been listening for about a year and a half and just joined the Catholic church. Hey, beautiful. Welcome home. You posted on Twitter a while back a quote from Aquinas. And here's that quote. The diligent would become negligent if he were told of his unfailing predestination.

She says, for me, coming from a Calvinist background, this is not at all how I felt. I felt moved to obey because of his unwarranted grace. The unwarranted grace I had been given. I think that's beautiful. And I think that is how we should respond. Like I love our Lord and I want to worship him and I want to pray and I want to be faithful, not because I'm afraid of hell, but because of his just tremendous love for me. I mean, you can imagine a relationship between a son and a father, you know, does the son want to do his father's will because

his father says, if you don't, you'll be punished? Maybe. But I think in an appropriate relationship, if the son loves his father and he knows of the father's love for him, he will seek to do what his father says because he knows that is ultimately what is best for him. But I think we have different stages in the spiritual life. Some of us have a sort of a mercenary relationship with God where we're really just in it for ourselves. And I think as we grow in our relationship with God and in the spiritual life, that mercenary part ceases

and we want to love God for God's sake. So I do think it's true for people, for some people at least, the diligent would become negligent. So if I just came to Christ and I had been living a life of sin and I was now told that now I'm a Christian, I cannot lose my salvation, I'll absolutely go to heaven. I'd like to say that it's because of my love of God that I'm fleeing from sin and seeking to grow in virtue. I don't think that's true though. I don't think that would have happened. I think I would have fallen back into a bunch of sins and become negligent. So in

that sense, I think Aquinas is right, but I don't think that you saying you want to love Jesus Christ because of his tremendous grace and goodness towards you is in any way in conflict with what Aquinas would have thought. Another question here comes from Liz Anderson. She says, what are your thoughts on Catholic mindfulness? Okay. So I think whenever we debate something, whenever we argue about something, the very first thing we have to do is define our terms. What is it that one means by Catholic mindfulness? Because I think when people think of Catholic mindfulness, all sorts of images and ideas and practices might arise in their mind. Maybe you're

thinking of yoga, right? And you're just equating yoga with Catholic mindfulness. And you say, therefore, Catholic mindfulness equals yoga. Therefore, it's wrong if you feel that way about yoga, right? Or maybe you think that mindfulness, Catholic mindfulness is essentially centering prayer, which would be kind of more maybe Buddhist in origin and effect. And so therefore you say, therefore it is wrong. Okay. But we would probably want to say, well, what are people who are using the term mean by the term? I think that's really important that we do that. What are people who use the term mean by the term? So if by Catholic mindfulness, one means, all right, I live in a busy day and age where my phone is blowing up with text messages and emails, and everybody's asking me to respond to them,

and I'm dealing with traffic, and I'm dealing with children crying, and I'm dealing with the demands of my spouse and my friends, and I am living in a constant state of agitation. spouse and my friends, and I am living in a constant state of agitation. And suppose someone said, but we ought not to do that. We ought to be at peace. We ought to be free of anxiety. We ought to be mindful of our desires, of our choices, of our interior life. Well, in that sense, yeah, Catholic mindfulness sounds bloody fantastic because it sounds like what we ought to be doing um i know for me if i start to get stressed out one of the things i'll do is i'll just be aware of my body i'll just be aware of it i just i just sort of pause take a few breaths and for me what i notice sometimes is i'm really tight up in my shoulders

and i'll just sort of consciously try to relax that and I'll breathe in and I'll breathe out and I'll offer a prayer. This goes something like, Father, I love you and I love that you love me and I thank you that you love me and you're so good. You're so good and I want your will to be done in my life and I want to be obedient to you. I thank you for my life and I thank you that you would never lead me to a place where I don't know what to do and would be completely helpless, because I always have you. So I know that you'll be with me even if I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, you know. Okay, all of a sudden Catholic mindfulness sounds really cool. So I think it depends on how

you're using the term. Another thing I see is people who do not understand what who wrote the Benedict option. Was it Rod Dreher? That's it. Rod Dreher. In my estimation, the people who think they know the most about that book are the people who have never read that book. last week, I've heard two or three people say, I'm not talking about the Benedict option. And I'm like, have you read the book? And he's like, no, what do you think it means? Well, you know, like retreating from the world. Okay. That's not what Rod Dreher said. So I think it's really important that if we're going to speak about something and come up with a hard and fast opinion about it, we need to define what we mean by it. So that would be my thought. Okay, another question here comes from Matt D. Matt D asks, my favorite cigar? My favorite cigar is probably The Banker by H. Upman. And a big thanks to one of my patrons, Nick, who bought me this once. And I thought, gee, this is great. For a cigar to be

good, it needs to smell good. I just love the smell of a good cigar. I mean, before it's lit. And I once heard somebody say that, you know, a cigar is as good as the circumstances or the experience of smoking it. You know, so like if I'm smoking, not that I would, I guess, but if I'm smoking in my car while I'm driving down not that I would, I guess, but if I'm smoking in my car while I'm driving down the highway in traffic, probably not a very pleasant smoke. But if I'm sitting with some friends on a deck and we're having a lovely conversation about philosophy or theology or whatever, even if it weren't a great cigar, it still would be perhaps because of the experience around it. Okay. Final question. This comes from Anne Wilber.

Anne, thank you kindly for being a patron of ours. She says, I watched a video by a woman who claims that the roots and the true mission of the pro-life movement are the overturning of Brown versus Board of Education. Now, for those of you who aren't aware, Brown versus Board of Education. Now, for those of you who aren't aware, Brown versus Board of Education was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court in which the court ruled that US state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional,

even if they segregated schools, even if the segregated schools are otherwise equal in quality. I didn't know that. I had to look it up. So I'm just reading what Wikipedia said. So there you go. So this person is saying she watched a video

where this person was saying that the real point of the mission of the pro-life movement is to overturn that. And continues that pro-life is really a front for white supremacy. Is there any truth to that? Or at least any truth with regards to the Catholic stand on abortion? No. No, no. People aren't against abortion because they hate races other than their own. People are against abortion because they think it's wrong

for big, strong people to kill, to dismember and kill little, weak, innocent people. I think when you get into an argument with somebody and they throw out something like this, this feels like a couple of fallacies to me. One of the fallacies, it seems to be, is an appeal to shame. You're like, I'm against abortion. And someone says, you're a racist. You're like, what? I sometimes like to ask, what's the most this argument proves? That's something I like to do. If I'm in an argument with somebody and they say something to try to rebut my point of view, one of the first things I naturally do is, okay, what's the most this suggests? And then I say, okay, I don't agree with that, but for the sake of argument even if that were true

right and so I think you could do I don't even know if it's worth going there with this because it's so ridiculous but you you could imagine someone saying like okay even if it were the case that people are pro-life because they're racist which again is ridiculous but and in fact you want to look at the numbers of black people versus white people that are slaughtered by Planned Parenthood. I think there's a good case to be made that the opposite is true, that the founder of Planned Parenthood was a very racist person herself. And you could look into that, but I think what you could say is even if it were the case that someone were pro-life because he were racist, it wouldn't follow that being pro-life was bad.

His being racist is bad. But if I'm pro-life because I'm against black people, well, I suck for being against black people, but I could still not suck for being pro-life. Does that make sense? So, just because somebody holds one bad opinion, it doesn't mean that all of his other opinions are false. I'm sure Hitler held true beliefs, even though he also held false beliefs. Like just because someone's immoral doesn't mean they can't be right about certain things. That's what I'd say, I think. All right. Now, just for fun, I was thinking about this. I want to share with you, what would the ultimate, the ultimate, what would the ultimate apologist look like?

If I could take bits and pieces of different apologists and stuff them into like a robot, not a robot, but like a, it's a weird thought experiment to be fair. What would look like the best apologist, the best Catholic apologist? And I've got five people that I'm going to draw from and I'm going to slam them together to make them the most formidable Catholic apologist in the existence of apologists. I'd say number one, they would have to have Jimmy Akin's brain. Jimmy Akin, I think he's like Thomas Aquinas.

The dude knows so much about so many issues that it's ridiculous. He's got a fantastic podcast called Jimmy Akin's Mysterious World. I would highly recommend it. He knows so much about so many things, and he's very good at being nuanced. My friend Trent Horn once said that Jimmy Akin, he thinks, may be a robot sent from the future by God to help save the church. I don't know what you think about that, but I would say Jimmy Akin's brain. And then speaking of Trent Horn, next, this person would have to have Trent Horn's debating skills. Trent Horn is a boss when it comes to debates.

He is so very gifted at thinking on his feet and arguing. So I would have to say Jimmy Akin's brain, Trent Horn's debating skills. Thirdly, this person would have Stephanie Gray's disarming delightfulness. I don't know if you saw the debate that I hosted recently on abortion. It was between my friend, Stephanie Gray Connors, I should say. She just got married. And Malcolm Potts, who is an abortionist or was, I'm not sure if he still does abortions or not, but Stephanie Gray is the most disarmingly delightful person. You encounter her, she's just a beautiful person. And you don't realize right away that she's like a pro-life logic ninja who will absolutely dismantle any argument you put forth

and just destroy it in front of you while smiling. So fourthly, this person would need to have Father Mike Schmitz's jawline. I think it's very important that our ideal Catholic apologists have Father Mike Schmitz's jawline. Now, if that feels a little wrong that I'm just focusing on his outward look, I would also say that he also is disarmingly delightful. I'm not sure if you've ever watched any of Father Mike Schmitz's videos on YouTube, but the man is just very delightful. And you just kind of want to listen to him. He in no way comes across as abrasive or jerky or anything like that. So I guess I would say Stephanie Gray and Father Mike Schmitz's disarming delightfulness, plus his jawline, Trent Horn's debating skills, Jimmy Akin's brain. And finally, I think we would need Brant Petrie's biblical knowledge.

So if we could put all of that into one package, I think we would have the ideal Catholic apologist. Fair enough? Massive thanks for being here today. Thank you. If you haven't subscribed yet to the channel, be sure to do that because as I say, next week we're hosting a debate between Protestant Steve Christie and Trent Horn on the deuterocanonical books of Scripture. Why do Protestants have smaller Bibles than Catholics? That's what we're going to be debating. It's going to be an amazing debate. It's going to be free for you to watch.

All you have to do is click subscribe and click that bell button so you will be alerted. Of course, if you become a patron, you will get to ask your questions in this debate. So go over to patreon.com slash Matt Fradd. You'll get a bunch of free things as soon as you become a patron. And as I say, if you give $10 or more, we will also throw into the package that we send all of our $10 patrons

a pints with Aquinas car magnet so you can represent the big man on the highway. God bless you, my friends. Thank you for being here. That'll do.