Pints With Aquinas - Calvin Robinson's PERFECT Speech on "Gay Marriage"

Episode Date: March 13, 2023

Rev'd Calvin Robinson's Full Speech: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymbTb2HS5Rc Join Matt for a stream reviewing and discussing an amazing speech recently given by Anglican Cleric Calvin Robinson and much more!

Music playing So The So so So And... And you're live. And we're live here on Pines with Aquinas. Hey, before I do anything else, I want to let you guys know that if you become an antivirus, you're going to be infected with a virus called the virus. And if you become an antivirus, you're going to be infected with a virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called the virus called And you're live. And we're live here on Pints with Aquinas. Hey, before I do anything else, I want to let you guys know that if you become an annual

supporter over at matfrad.locals.com, we send you a beer stein for free. You just have to pay for shipping. We're bringing that back. And then also you get access to our quarterly newspaper called The Jill. I'm really proud of how much we give people. I think you should be. This is an amazing beer, Stein actually was that you're drinking coffee out of. I am drinking coffee. Yeah.

You're calling it a beer, Stein at 11 a.m. And I worry what's about to happen. I appreciate that. This is actually the size of a pint. So you can drink beer out of it. But yeah, for a while, I was giving it to people who were giving an insane amount and so I was like, well, what can I give to people who are giving 10 bucks a month annually? And I was online looking at tumblers and I contacted my friend. I'm like, should I give him a tumbler? It's cheaper. He's like, dude, no one wants a tumbler. I'm throwing out tumblers. I've got so many tumblers.

I like the tumbler mug crossover that you have the locals one. Oh, yeah, it's sitting on our desk out there point is we decided We're gonna give people the expensive one. Very good Yeah So if you go to Matt Fred dot locals comm right now become an annual supporter for one of the two options that gives you We'll send will will contact you in the next coming weeks and we'll you just go pay shipping on that But the newspaper which we put out quarterly we pay shipping on that So I remember as an Australian always being annoyed with You just got to pay shipping on that. But the newspaper, which we put out quarterly, we pay shipping on that. So I remember as an Australian always being annoyed with, you know, we only do it within

America or, you know. So if you're in Australia, I'll pay shipping. If you're in Yemen, New Zealand, Namibia, Uganda. Not the moon. I might regret this at some point, but for now, that's what we're doing. But not the moon. Not the moon. So what we've decided to start doing here on Pines with Aquinas is in addition to our

interviews that usually come out once a week, we're going to start doing solo episodes like this where we look at different things and chat about them. So if you like that idea, let us know in the comments section below. We're going to do a couple of things today. We're going to, by the way, I've got Calvin Robinson. Did I say his name right? Reverend Calvin Robinson. There's a little interview I did with him this morning, which we're going to play for you shortly. We're also going to take a look at his speech at Oxford. It was a debate that he engaged in on why Christians should not accept so-called same sex marriage.

This is another reason you should sign up on Locals, because I'm not sure if I'm going to have an account after this episode. But I don't think we'll get. Well, I have to say for his speech, I don't think so. He said one thing during the interview that I'm a touch worried about, but I think at most we'll just get limited. I don't think they're going to delete the channel for it. Give us a thumbs up. Give us a comment. So YouTube thinks it's a popular video. Yeah. And that'll be good. So we're going to look at that debate. We're going to go through

it. Thursday, you've cut out six clips. Is that right? I've cut out six clips that I thought were the most substantive. They weren't the most entertaining parts or even the parts that were my personal favorite. They weren't the most entertaining parts or even the parts that were my personal favorite. I thought they were the most substantive to his argument. And so I wanted to give close the attention. So we'll go through them, comment on them. Now you said what was your favorite part? You pointed out recently, we had to cut this part out. My favorite part.

By the way, if you've got no idea who Calvin Robinson is, you don't know the speech we're referring to, don't worry, we're about to play it. You'll see it and you'll love it. Yeah. And you know what? As I talk about my favorite part, I'm going to just link the full thing in the description real quick. Nice, nice, nice. My favorite part was the, he says if we're open to homosexuality, even though it's against the Bible, why not be open to polygamy? And some-

What is going on with this thing keep talking I'm sorry I'm just trying some idiot in the audience goes whoo and the whole audience cheers cuz they're like oh, it's so funny Yeah, clap and Calvin yells shame degeneracy Really like this guy I was so in like, he just like says it with like the and he means it and he's right. Authority and like belief.

And it was the English accent helps. Frankly, I mean, one of the best things that's ever happened on the Internet. If you like the idea of me interviewing Calvin Robinson here in studio, I don't like doing Skype interviews, but I would be open to flying him from England to be here. If you would watch that, you think it's a good idea, please tell me in the comment section below because flights are a ton of money these days and I don't want to spend it if people aren't interested, but I think I'm going to do it. And like the video because Matt and I really

want to do it. Yeah. We like- He's really cool. He's so cool. cool yeah and not just because the afro that does help though it does help not gonna lie all right so hold on let me put these little blue things in before we click play on this video we should point out that everybody in the world is apparently moving to studentville Ohio and I've come to believe that it might be the primary purpose of Pines with Aquinas, because I keep meeting people who say, hey, I showed up here because I heard about Steubenville on Pines with Aquinas. And when I say showed up, I don't mean visited.

I mean, I got into a U-Haul and then my wife and children and dog moved here. So in several months, we're either going to have people who are really happy with Matt Fradd or are going to hate me because they're going to regret their move. So I just want to say this, if you are discerning a move to student, the Ohio, please come and visit it first. Spend some time here, get an Airbnb or a hotel, spend a week, get to know people. Cause, uh, it's definitely not heaven on earth. It's a very charming town.

But if you're not, there's it's got some rugged edges that takes some getting used to. If you're not, especially if you have a family, I think I think that that made it when I moved, it made it better for me. It was like the like charming, rugged edges made it a lot more fun for me as a single guy. But if you have a a family I could see that being a sticking point I mean my wife and I was sitting down having a lovely chat last night really like that woman And we were talking about the friends we have in this town and we've just got too many

There's too many people that we want to grow in relationship with so we're like alright Well, let's let's pick three and see if we can kind of go out to dinner with them. I have a drink with them and sometime next couple of weeks. It's a great problem to have this, this, this, like, I remember when I lived in Atlanta, if there was a young family at church, you'd be like, all right, let's see if, you know, they want to be in community with us and we'll get to know them. And you can't do that with everyone here. There's way too many amazing people.

It's a, it's a good problem, but it's also it's also difficult So I do want to point out that When I'm the comments are a little behind, uh-huh, but we're getting comments from should we fly Calvin Robinson out? Yeah, I Was just about to ask if that was an idea. It's all somebody else. It's a good idea somebody else I've wanted to do it for a while. I would love to see that. Yes, please. All right, good.

Yes, yes sir. Do it with like a hundred exclamation points. I am interested in that. This is why I'm grateful for our local supporters because we just had a debate. I had to pay the debaters, flew them out, put them up at hotels, paid camera, audio people,

renting spaces and things like that. So thanks a lot. If you become a supporter, this is definitely helping us dump a bunch of cash into there. Also, before we get into this video Thursday, in a recent interview with my wife, you were bemoaning that dating app Catholic Match. Catholic Match, yeah. And then you got scorched in the comment section and I think started a Catholic Match. So no, that's not the order of events. One, I may have gotten, I may have gotten disagreed

within the comment section. Um, but I've been told by people who use it, I was already signed up. Oh, okay. That's why I was complaining about it. I've been told by people who use it that I am correct about specifically the user interface is anyway. Point is Thursday still single. If anyone out there would like to start a family. All right. So should we start these clips? Did we? Yeah. So what's the first one? We just got a super chat before we started. God bless you. Was it for $3, dollars? Because if it was, I can fly out Calvin.

Yeah, if you want to guarantee we have Calvin Robinson on, make a three thousand dollar donation. What did he say? Or she? Robinson reminds me of an articulate version of Moss from the IT crowd.

Yes, yes. I love that show. Richard Iowati is really funny and that's totally off topic, but he is very funny. Okay. All right. So here we go. Ladies and gentlemen. So this first clip, this first clip is basically quoting Thomas and scripture on marriage. Thomas Thomas Aquinas Aquinas. See, we still talk about Thomas Aquinas and he ends with a great question to the bishops on scripture so does it and and these even though he's talking anglican bishops german bishops if you're watching you ready yep now i may have trained at the last remaining

sound anglican seminary up the road at st.'s house, but I am a newbie deacon. So perhaps I am wrong on this. Let's consult people wiser than myself. Good man. Starting with the Church Fathers. St Thomas Aquinas in his Summa Theologica. I wouldn't call Thomas Aquinas Church Father because he's not, but I love that he did, as an Anglican. Yeah, it's really good. We'll take it. Quite clearly identifies Matrimony as being between one man and one woman, did as an Anglican. Yeah, it's really good. We'll take it.

Quite clearly identifies matrimony as being between one man and one woman, beneficial for begetting of children and for the good of offspring for both educational and developmental purposes necessary for the perfection of the community and for the worship of God. St. Paul describes marriage as therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife and they become one flesh, in which he is mirroring the language of Genesis, where God tells man and woman to be fruitful and multiply. Both Aquinas and Paul refer to matrimony as a sacrament,

a holy mystery in which one man and one woman are joined together in conjugal union with the potential to be blessed by the grace of God with children. To start a family for the worship of God. People will often argue in this debate, we know more about homosexuality now than we did then. Maybe so. But are we really going to suggest that God knew less then than we know now? What a line. For either all of scripture is God-breathed or it isn't. Either we believe Christ or we don't. Oh, that is a real puzzle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That is a really powerful line.

Yeah, either all of scripture of God-breathed is God-breathed or? Well, I like his point that we might say that we know more about homosexuality today than we did back then. But are we really saying that God knew less back then? Either we're going to accept this as the inspired and errant word of God that we have to submit to or we take our desires and we reinterpret the scripture to fit them. Yeah, he is. It's a great speech.

Totally not super substantive, but his, the way the clerics are, the whole ensemble of the clerics is very well put together. You mean Calvin? Yeah, Calvin's like clerics. Oh, he looks awesome. Yeah, he looks very good. Yeah, there's something beautiful to be said about people who dress for the occasion. It's full collar with the jacket buttoned only at the top.

Yeah, I'm digging it. Yeah. All right. I don't know. I think I just messed something up there, but I'll click play. All of scripture is God breathed. That's right. Or it isn't.

Yes, it is. Either we believe Christ. Yes, we do. Or we don't. If we look wider abroad to the church Catholic, which defines in the catechism of the catholic church He is talking about the catechism of the catholic church. Okay, so this is the catechism Calvin the doors are open. We need you. I'm not pretending. It's all warm and cozy and lovely over here Please come please come and help us but like specifically

Please convert to catholicism join the american ordinaria and start us. But like specifically, Please come. Convert to Catholicism, join the American ordinary and start ordinary parish in student-ville, Ohio. We would like that. Matt and I will both join. Matrimony. The matrimonial covenant by which a man and a woman established between themselves,

a partnership of the whole life is by the nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring. This covenant between baptized persons has been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament. This is referred to as marriage in God's plan. So are we looking to alter the catechism of just the Anglican Church or the Catholic Church too? Should they all get with the times? Two thousand years of Christian doctrine cannot be altered at the whim of a few liberal bishops.

Yep. What is God ordained cannot be adjusted to suit our new liberal progressive views. Marriage is heterosexual and monogamous and should be open to the possibility of children. Mm, that is there's really excellent. Yeah And just so people know too I interview him and we talk about this in a moment So stick around so you can watch this because I asked him about the German bishops I even asked him his opinion on contraception. So you should stick around for that. What do you think about that? The quoting of the catechism the Catholic catechism as an Anglican. Well, I I love it

I mean, let's let's read what the catechism of the Catholic Church says here because it sums it up. Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the history and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on sacred scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,

tradition has always declared that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered. They are contrary to the natural law. They close a sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine, effective, and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved." But I think he does a good job, and we'll probably get to this, where he threads the needle between we condemn the act, but not the person necessarily.

I mean, we condemn people for committing sin, but... I took out that section just because we hear it so much. But he did phrase that particularly well in his speech. Yeah. People really should go and watch the whole thing. I've got about half of it here, but the links below watching will go and watch the whole thing. The link is below. Yeah, it's excellent. And then you've got you've got people who want to change this. But here's something I put out on YouTube the other day, and I stand by it even though it made some people upset. You know, the failure of bishops, and here we would include the Bishop of Rome, if there is such a failure, to proclaim truths necessary for the salvation of souls and or to condemn doctrinal errors and intrinsic evils that are perilous to souls, right? Their failure doesn't alleviate us, the laity, from proclaiming these truths, from condemning these errors.

So it's definitely sad and it definitely confuses the faithful. And maybe if the faithful are confused, they're going to not know what truths to proclaim, what errors to condemn. But for those of us who do know it, we are still under that obligation. And if these bishops fall at their post, they are going to have to stand before the judgment of God one day, as we all are. Yeah. So my question to the bishops would be, do we not believe in the authority of scriptures

anymore? Can we pick and choose which parts of the gospel we adhere to? The church, after all, is Christ's bride, as we heard earlier. Jesus is described as the bride groom, so that we may know how he relates to us. Two grooms would be pointless. Christ is already in union with the Father and the Holy Spirit. It's us he's inviting in. Two brides is what we're looking at here. The church is attempting to marry itself and to leave Christ out of the picture. Great point. Your thoughts? I picked that one specifically because I had never heard someone before point out, like we've heard, I've heard people in homosexuality say, you know, like the church is the bride of Christ and so you have to have, um, you have to, like, you can't have

Christ, Mary and Christ or the church, Mary and the church, or, or even using this argument for why we can't have female priests. Right. But his, um, his analysis specifically that I thought was most was why I picked this one specifically was because he said, well, obviously no one here is going to claim that Christ, like the, the groom is marrying itself, right? Because the groom is Christ and he's already in perfect relation. Yeah. So what you're doing is you're talking about a lesbian relationship where the bride marries the bride. Yes. And, and this is worse because then we cut Christ out of our, out of our church altogether. And I thought, I'd never heard somebody make that point before.

And I thought it was extremely, I think it's extremely important. So that's why I picked it specifically. Okay. Just like St. Paul says in Ephesians five that wives should submit to their husbands as the bride, as the church of the bride to Christ, the bridegroom, we're the ones who submit to him. We don't tell him to submit to us. Yeah. Yes often part the words God is love and we've heard that one tonight too again without any understanding yes God is love.

He sets the terms not us. Another one we've heard plenty of is inclusivity should the church be more inclusive. of is inclusivity. Should the church be more inclusive? Again, it's a play of words. It's virtue signaling. It's to appear good rather than to be good. The church should absolutely be inclusive. Christ spent time with tax collectors and prostitutes, but it is they who went away changed, not Christ. Oh, yes. We are fallen, therefore we are all sinners. The church is open to sinners, of course it is. That's the purpose of the church.

But it should not be to encourage people to continue to sin. Our duty as clerics is to help lead people to Christ, to lead them away from sin, not to embrace it, not to affirm it. I know many LGB people, I know many LGB people who live lives in Christ. They abstain from sexual gratification to be closer to God.

And it's not easy, it really isn't. It's perhaps not fair, but it is right and it is good. And these people are being let down. I've had people crying saying, I could have got married, but I did what the church taught me was right. And now the church is saying they were wrong all along. I've wasted my life. Ooh, so good. He does thread that needle there. Church is saying they were wrong all along. I've wasted my life.

So good. He does thread that needle there, like there he points out that it's not a sin to have same sex attractions, just like it's not a sin for me to be sexually attracted to someone, not my wife. And suppose I considered my current relationship with my wife to be loveless and oppressive, I might make the argument that surely God wants me to be free to experience love. You know, I've made a mistake here. And the church would say, well, what is love? You know, it's very easy to throw out the phrase for their sake, then that's something I can continue to do in a less than optimal marriage relationship. It's not something that I abandon for the sake of what

I'm calling love. Like if I abandon my duty in pursuit of what I'm calling love, it's not love that I'm finding. Yeah, I. I picked that one because I thought it was it was about the love thing. I think the love thing was particularly impressive because the point he made about how the church is actually harming people with same sex attraction who want

to be faithful. And that, I think, is. That one that upsets me more than just misleading because there are people who despite the confusion are following, which makes them very strong people. And then so you're taking the people who are already trying to live a good life and you're making it harder for them, which I find to be even more upsetting. I'm not trying to make a strict analogy between being tempted to look at pornography and having homosexual inclinations But imagine if the church came out and tried to lower the bar saying well pornography is okay You know just so long as it's this this and this I think it's like it's so condescending

It's like no, I know what the truth is. I know what's being proclaimed Especially when you're struggling with it Yeah, and then you get told that you're struck like he's making the point that it seems like your struggle may have been in vain Right these people and that's particularly heartbreaking. Yeah, so My message to the proposing side is do not lead us astray. Do not lead people astray Do not be the wolves in sheep's clothing. Do not be the false teachers that the Bible warns us about. Remember your obligation to defend the faith.

Stop teaching about diversity, inclusion, and equality, and get back to teaching about redemption and salvation. Yes! This is spiritual neglect. Yes, it is spiritual neglect. Help people by telling them the truth. And one of the people, so people know, one of the English bishops was a presenter

for the side that the church should accept it, and is sitting there. You can see him in the wide shot. He's the guy in the purple clerics. Okay. So the guy in the purple clerics is an Anglican bishop. So did you watch this whole thing? Cause I haven't. Oh yeah, of course. Yeah. I've seen, I've seen it like three times. So we chatted with Calvin right before this. And again, we're going to play that interview soon. But he was saying that it was a very tense situation where he palpably felt people's dislike of him. And I loved his honesty at some part during the speech. He points out, like, I felt rather anxious about this.

Like, I've lost sleep over this. Love that honesty. Like, this is a difficult thing to defend. And like it's been said before, courage doesn't mean not being afraid. If you didn't feel afraid, you wouldn't need courage. Courage is that virtue which enables us to act rightly even when we are afraid. And that's what he's doing here, and that's what our priests and bishops need to be doing. Yeah.

And reminding them that Christ suffers with them. And be compassionate by leading them to Christ when the world tries to lead them away from him Amen The church is imploding and the faithful masses have stopped turning up on Sundays And we are seeing the most rapid decline of Christianity in this country that we may have ever seen do not accelerate it with heresy. Amen You do not have the authority to bless sin When I hear the Bishop of London on record saying these new prayers will mean priests can bless same-sex relationships Some of which may be sexual in nature. I hear the devil at work

Bishops are promoting the idea of sacramental sodomy. Let them be anathema repent What a guy and you go back like two seconds to the wide shot. I will try Can you go back like two seconds to the wide shot? I will try. Yeah, I believe it's the guy, the row that is on the far left of the screen. Yeah. Second from the back there, the older guy. Okay. With the brown hair over one more to the left.

This guy. That guy. I believe it is that guy. I believe he is an Anglican bishop and presented for the side that the church should accept homosexuality. Sod me. Let them be anathema. Repent.

And to the rest of you, I have no doubt that some of you will consider me a bigot or a transphobe or a homophobe, but I am neither of those things. None of those things. I'm simply a follower of Christ, a Christian. Love it. Yeah. That's just so spot on. These ad hominem attacks are what keep people afraid.

Speaking of fear, right? Homophobia, it's like we're really, the phobia we have is to be disliked. We just want people to pat us on the back and tell us we're fantastic. I live in a house. I don't know why everybody thinks I'm scared of them. You live in a house?

Yeah, homophobia. Everybody thinks I'm scared of homes. I live in one.? Yeah. Homophobia. Everybody thinks I'm scared of homes. I've lived in one. It's got nothing to do with that. Yeah, but I like it. Yeah. No, these it's funny. Like these slurs are what has taken out many Christians. Yeah. It took me out for a while.

I remember when so-called homosexual marriage was passed in the United States. I didn't speak out about it. And I didn't intentionally think, oh, I'm afraid I'm not going to speak out about it. I didn't have a podcast or anything back then, but I could have tweeted about it. And I didn't. And that was due to my cowardice. I was just like, I don't know what to think. I know, I know this is wrong. And so it's good to see lines being drawn in the sand.

If anything, that's kind of what I think people like Father James Martin and the German bishops are forcing Orthodox faithful Christians to do. It's like, okay, everything's come to the surface and now we've got to talk openly about this. And so obeying Christ is not a homophobic thing to do. Yeah. This last is literate. This last one is like 20 seconds.

I think it's just his closing remark. All right, here we go Calling for the Quran to be updated to modern society But I am neither of those things none of those things I'm simply a follower of Christ a Christian He's calling for the Quran to be updated to modern societal norms It is the same Mind your language. It is the same, mind your language, it is the same patronising attitude of people of other, that treat other faiths, patronise other faiths while being intolerant towards

Christians at the same time. It's a shame. But in the words of St Athanasius of Alexandria, if the world is against the truth, then I am against the world. Thank you very much. Wow, that guy. That was world. Thank you very much. Wow, guy. That was amazing. Do you know why the fellas ringing the bell? I don't. Maybe somebody in the comment can tell it.

I'm sure it has something to do with the Oxford Debate Society's format. Maybe it's a maybe it's the time how much time he has. Maybe it's like one ring means you've used this much time. Two rings, maybe. I'm not sure I Mean we know that it says this Elsa in the catechism that unjust Discrimination towards those with same-sex attraction is to be shunned a men of course and yet of course We're supposed to discriminate you should discriminate

It's like every time you see like if you're here and you're watching this right now And you're like Matt Fradd's opinions are bigoted You're discriminating between what you think is the right teaching and what you think is the false teaching so we all discriminate but what's your litmus test for what's true and What we should be discriminating against is so-called same-sex marriage, which isn't a thing It would be like the state deciding that enemies mean friendships. Well, you can do that, but friendship actually precedes the state and you have no right to make that assertion.

Yeah. It was, I mean, the speech was amazing and I keep saying it, but people should go watch the full version. It's in the comments. All right. Um, well, let's, let's play the short interview I just did and we'll come back. And when we do, I want to take a look at what Thomas Aquinas has to say in the Summa Theologiae about loving the sinner and hating the sin. Reverend Calvin Robinson,

thank you so much for being on the show. It is my absolute pleasure. Thank you for the invitation. Robinson, thank you so much for being on the show. It is my absolute pleasure. Thank you for the invitation. So you just gave a speech, it was a debate at the Oxford Union, and it was entitled, well, at least the clip was entitled, Christianity Should Not Allow Gay Marriage. Oxford Union has 573,000 views, but you told me that someone else clipped it, and that's had how many views now? Over two million views on the last five minutes of my speech. Well, it was excellent.

Both my producer Thursday and I were just raving about how excellent, you did such a good job at threading the needle between here's the truth and here's what love is. And yeah, so it's so grateful for it. What has, what was the reaction like on the day and what has the reaction been like since? On the day, it was difficult, if I'm honest with you. The chamber was absolutely silent, but also electric. You could hear a pin drop and the vibe was negative. People did not want me there. It was made clear at the start of the debate actually that people had petitioned to have

the debate cancelled. But thankfully the chairman of the society said, no, we are a free speech society. We're a debating society. The whole purpose is to have these conversations. That's quite rare these days. But there and then I was not welcomed. And I felt the spiritual attack. I felt it was spiritual warfare that we're in. And it was difficult. But then a couple of weeks afterwards, the video goes online and it goes viral. And I'm hearing from people in Africa, in America, all over the world saying just thank you for standing firm in the faith and thank you for preaching the gospel and speaking the truth and not adding anything and not taking anything away. It's just really

simple and why is everyone else not doing this? Where are our priests, our bishops, our deacons, why are they not standing firm in the faith? Yeah, the top comment under the Oxford Union YouTube page says, I am a Muslim and hearing this man speak was a delight to my ears. Christians, you need to stay true to your religion. Don't change what you believe. God has sent you. Change yourself. Thoughts on that? Well, they tend to do it, don't they? They stand firm in their faith. They do not shift. What we're seeing with Christians right now is so many people want to shape the faith around

their worldview rather than shaping their worldview around the faith. And the same with their lifestyles. And because we're so weak, because we're diluting our faith, the secular world around us, the atheists and the agnostics are saying, well, the Christians can alter their faith. They can change their doctrine. They can change their teaching. Look, they've done it. So they can continue to do it. Why should they not do it? Because they're bigoted. Let's make sure they're progressive and liberal. And actually, if we stood firm like the Mohammedans do and say, no, this is what we believe and we're not going to alter it for you, then we'd be stronger for it. And I think we'd

be better off worshipping Christ in the way that he taught us rather than the way that people want us to. Mason- Yeah, I mean, as somebody who preaches at a church yourself, I'm sure you recognize that it helps when the laity come up to you and say, please keep doing that. Thank you for doing that. So what would your advice be for lay Catholics? You know, the Catholic Church, of course, has consistently denounced same-sex, well, so-called marriage and same-sex activity, while stressing the importance of charity towards those with same-sex attraction. But there is this small but growing contingent, as you know, within the Catholic Church that's trying to push this stuff as well. How can we laity encourage our priests to speak out

about this? I suppose just hold them to account. I hear from so many people that say, look, my priest is a wet liberal, he's preaching about climate change, he's on about the latest political agenda, he's being anti-Republican or anti-Conservative. How do I find a good church?

And I think, no, actually the answer is go to your parish church, stay with your parish church because that community is important. However, hold your priest to account. Remind them that you want to hear the gospel, you want to hear the truth unashamedly and that's what you're turning up for and if people keep doing that then the priest will be like oh okay maybe I can get, because they want to, of course they want to, they're faithful people. I honestly believe that people who are in ordained ministry are truly faithful and they want to do this

but they're afraid quite often and we have to remind them that it's not their job to be afraid, it's not their job to be worldly, it is their job to be set apart to preach. Yeah. And what's interesting is the parishes with the, as you say, wet liberals, I'm sure are dying out. It's, at least the people I know, they're flocking to parishes that are going to proclaim the gospel and not give in to woke doctrine. So it's almost like it would be a good idea just for your parish if you wanted to grow, that you would just proclaim the gospel, even from a strict pragmatic... Straightforward really, isn't it? That's quite obvious. But in the West, we don't tend to see that anymore. I don't know why. If we look at where the church is dying, Australia, Canada, America, and the United Kingdom, why is it dying in those countries? Because those countries happen

to be chasing worldly norms, chasing societal norms, and disregarding the gospel. Then we look where the church is growing. Most of the African continent, Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe, where they stick to the orthodoxy of the church as it has been revealed to us through Christ. And that's where it grows, that's where it thrives. So, I mean, it's quite obvious if you look at the data, but they don't want to because they want to be seen as good people rather than actually being good people. And that's what all this comes down to,

the work movement, the virtue signaling, it's appearing good rather than being good. You did an excellent job as I say threading the needle between condemning the sin while loving the sinner. It feels like we're becoming less and less tolerant for nuance whether you're on the left or the right you've just got to say what you mean as loudly and as aggressively as possible and if you offer any kind of nuance well that's a sign of weakness and people don't have an attention span to hear that anyway. But it is important that we have this nuance. So what would your

advice be to us on how to talk about this issue with nuance? I suppose what I would suggest is that we stop doing this and start doing this. And you know, quite often when I talk about sin, people think I'm lecturing them or preaching at them or even judging them. And actually I'm not, I'm talking, people think I'm lecturing them or preaching at them or even judging them. And actually I'm not, I'm talking about me. I'm talking about us as a collective, not you as an individual. I'm saying I am a sinner because we are all sinners. We are all fallen. And that's the issue. Because that word sin, when people can't get to the nuance, because they heard the word sin, they say, you can't call something a sin, it's

legal. Or you can't call it a sin. That's my life. And they feel judged and they say, you can't call something a sin, it's legal. Or you can't call it a sin, that's my life. And they feel judged and they can't go any further in the conversation. So we have to reflect inwards and say, look, I am a sinner, I sin all the time. I try not to sin. I pray hard to separate myself from sin and to head towards holiness, to head towards Christ and try and live a Christlike life.

I am fallen and I am sure you have struggles too. Like we've got to bring it back to ourselves, I think. Yeah, yeah, that's good. Now the German Catholic bishops have voted in favor of blessing same-sex unions. This is a terrible idea. Yeah, it looks like these guys are headed to schism and I hope that Pope Francis has the courage

to do something about it and soon. But why are these supposed halfway measures also a bad idea? Well, you can't compromise on the truth, right? If we believe in a universal truth, which even that's a stepping stone because so many people are relativists these days and they think they own their own individual truths.

But if we as Christians believe in a universal truth, there is one truth and he is a living God, then we cannot say that you can own part of the truth or you can submit to part of the truth. Like you either submit to him or you don't. And these so called Catholic bishops in Germany, I mean Germany is tainted with this stuff, isn't it? It's always been like this way. But they do not want to be Catholic. They do not want to be Christian. They want to be something else and they're trying to reinvent it. I think they're Protestants, to be honest with you, and they're looking at what we're doing in

the Anglican Church and thinking how can we have some of that apostasy. It's a great shame what they're doing and I just hope that the Pope is strong enough. He said he would excommunicate them if they continued and they have continued. So you know he has to follow through with his word. If this is, you know, you guys call him the Holy Father, he has to act like a father right now. If a father sets some ground rules and the child breaks those rules, you have to come through with the punishment. Otherwise, the child will keep pushing those boundaries further and further. Yeah. Final question. In your argument, you stated that this has been something universally taught

throughout the last 2000 years, right? The immorality of homosexual acts. And therefore, to change this, It's like, what is that? What does that say for Christianity? Not to mention the fact that it's explicitly condemned in scripture. And I don't know your position on this, and I don't mean to put you on the spot, but it wasn't, you know, in the 1930s that the Anglicans made an exception for contraception. But this had been universally condemned throughout church history. Is this something you've changed your mind on, or are open to changing your mind on? No, no, I accept the Catholic teaching on this issue.

I think the Anglican Church in the United Kingdom has made many mistakes, actually. And one of them is saying that contraception is down to the conscience of the parents. And note, they use the word parents, though. So they are acknowledging that we're talking about childbirth and we're talking about life at the point of conception.

So that is all acknowledged, but they put it down onto the conscience of the parents. I think that's a great mistake because it's divorcing the issue. That's what actually, that's what a lot of this is. Contraception is where a lot of this started because we're divorcing the sexual act from marriage. And we're making, we're going down the 1960s

liberal sexual revolution route of sex being about pleasure and it being about a personal commodity and it's nothing to do with two loving people united under God for the purposes of being blessed with a child. So yes, that was a mistake. But also, you know, the Church of England made many mistakes and one of them is the ordination of women. One of them is the stance on contraception and the other, of course, is divorce. But traditionalists, Orthodox Christians within the Church of England don't capitulate on those issues anyway. But this was an interesting point because in the debate at Oxford, one of the bishops said, yeah, you know, we already ignore the Bible on divorce. We already ignore the Bible on the ordination of women. so therefore what difference would it make if we ignore the Bible on the issues

of homosexual marriage? And I'm like, no, again, you're proving my point. We should not take more scripture or tradition on these reasons. Yeah. Look, thank you so much for being on the show. I would love to have you in studio and we could kind of get into this a little more. But thanks a lot. Let's make it happen. God bless. Thanks. One. Okay, we're back. So that was my interview with Reverend Calvin Robinson. I hope you appreciated it.

I really appreciate this fellow's courage. If you want him on the show, let us know in the comment section below, because I'd have to fly him out from England and yeah, it'd be quite the ordeal, but I think it'd be worth it. He just seems like a terrific fellow. He's also my age. I like talking to people my age. The older I get, the more.

Unintelligible people like you Thursday's language becomes to me. What do I say that you don't? Okay. That's fair. I did say that earlier today. I did say that. That's fair. I think a great scripture passage that highlights mercy and truth is in John chapter 8 where our Lord encounters the woman caught in the very act of adultery And after her accusers leave this is what he says Jesus stood up and said to her woman. Where are they has no one condemn you? She said no one Lord and Jesus said and notice this he leads with mercy But he closes with truth. He says, neither do I condemn you from now on sin no more. So it does seem to me that if we're going to go out and say sin no more, that that does

come off quite abrasive, especially to people who are hurting. I think it is important that we remember that everyone we're speaking to and speaking about right now are people who've grown up in a sexually broken culture. They've had pornography thrust upon them. They have Disney trying to brainwash them into thinking homosexual acts and transgenderism stuff is normal. And so, you know, like we do need to lead with compassion. These people have a story.

I have a story. You have a story. I too am sexually broken. I too am a hypocrite. And so I think that is important that we that we realize that like when we're condemning sin, we're condemning my sin, your sin, their sin. We're all in this together. It's not like we've got the pure people and the sinful people. All right. The pure people are Christ and the blessed mother. And then there's the rest of us. Like all of us struggle with our sexual passions.

I think it was Father Mike Schmitz who pointed that out. It's not us versus them, it's just us. Like all of us struggle with, how else to put it, brokenness, perversions in our sexual desires that we have to wrestle with. So recognizing that. But so like, I think the problem with a lot of these these bishops is all and when I say bishops, I'm talking about the Anglican bishops, but we can also say the German bishops and then perhaps other bishops. They say neither do I condemn you. And that's it. We need to say, look, I don't condemn you.

Like I want to invite you to be a Christian to repent of your sin, to get the help necessary, just like I need the help necessary, just like the bishops need the help that comes from the grace of God that's necessary. But you've got to say from now on, sin no more. So I just want to point that out because I think it's a good point. What I want to do now is take a look at an article from the Summa Theologiae. You let me know in the comments section if you like this idea because when Pines of the Quina started, all we did was review Summa articles and talk about them.

I don't know, some people wish that that would come back. And so we like the idea of maybe incorporating a Summa article into these little solo live streams that we're doing now. So this is, let's see, article six. This is from the Summa Theologiae, the Secundae Secundae, which is just a fancy Latin way of saying the second part of the second part. Question 25, Article 6. And he's asking whether we ought to love sinners out of charity. I'm not sure if we'll read this whole thing because it is quite long. But if you're not familiar with the Summa, Thomas

always sets up objections to the position he wants to make and then responds to those objections. So the sumer is like a pre package debate. It's actually quite cool. So let's just look at the first objection that someone might have. They might say it would seem that we ought not to love sinners out of charity, for it is written in Psalm 118, I have hated the unjust, but David had perfect charity. Therefore, sinners should be hated rather than loved out of charity. Thing is, whenever you read Aquinas' objections, they always seem... I mean, he writes in syllogisms and it's like, wow, that's a good point. That's a good argument. If David had perfect charity and he hated the unjust, therefore we ought to hate the unjust, what would Aquinas have to say to that?

Here's what he says, and this comes from the reply to objection one. The prophet hated the unjust as such, and the object of his hate was their injustice, which was their evil. Such hatred is perfect, of which he himself says, I have hated them with a perfect hatred." Now, hatred of a person's evil, listen to this, this is very good. Hatred of a person's evil is equivalent to love of his good. Hence also, this perfect hatred belongs to charity. So if I love you and you're destroying yourself, it's because I love you that I hate the thing

that you're doing that's destroying you. Like if you, a random stranger, wrote in the comments section that you're addicted to meth, I'd be sorry for you, I would reply to you, I would maybe point you to a link that could help you, but it really wouldn't ruin my day because I don't know who you are and I don't love you because I don't know you. I mean, I love humanity in a general sense, but I don't love you particularly because I don't know who you are. If Thursday told me he was addicted to meth because of my love for him, I would seek to

help him in a more intentional way. Now, if my wife tells me that, then my life falls apart, right? And I do everything that I can to help her. In other words, to the degree that I love a person is the thing that they're doing that's destroying them is going to affect me. It's going to impact me. So it's precisely because of my charity that I hate your sin. Let's look at his said contra and main response.

So Augustine says that when it is said, thou shalt love thy neighbor, it is evident that we ought to look upon every man as our neighbor. Now, sinners do not cease to be men for sin does not destroy their nature. Therefore, we ought to love sinners out of charity. And it should be said, we're to love sinners out of charity. And it should be said, we're not just talking about sexual sin here. We're not just talking about those who practice the sin of sodomy in either heterosexual or homosexual relationships. We're talking about all serious sin here. And here's Aquinas' main response. He says there are two things

that have to be considered in the sinner. So when we talk about the sinner, what are we talking about? His nature and his guilt. Those are the two things. Now, according to his nature, which he has from God, he has a capacity for happiness, right? He has the, and we could just say the beatific vision, salvation. That is something he is capable of. On the fellowship of which charity is based as stated above, where for we ought to love sinners out of charity in respect for their nature. On the other hand, we can talk about their guilt, right? And their guilt is opposed to God and is an obstacle to happiness. We don't often think about it like that.

But the reason you should hate my serious sin that I'm engaged in and that I might love is precisely because that stuff is an obstacle to my happiness. Wherefore, in respect to their guilt, whereby they are opposed to God, all sinners are to be hated. So we have to hate the sinners. But when we're talking about the sinners, we're not talking about their nature. We're talking about, what does he say here? Their guilt, their serious sin. That's what we're talking about when we talk about hating sinners. We ought to hate, by the way, not just the sins of others that are obstacles to their happiness.

We also ought to hate the sin in our own life, which is an obstacle to our own happiness. Let's see. Okay. All sinners are to be hated, even one's father or mother or kindred, according to Luke 12 26, for it is our duty to hate in the sinner, his being a sinner, and to love in him, his being a man capable of bliss. And this is to love him truly. Think about my analogy with my wife again. If I said to her, you know what, babe, I love you, you know, and if your meth addiction is you think it's going to make you happy, then who am I to stand in your way?

This reminds me of that classic example I had with a sex worker, quote unquote, at Baltimore, um, the Baltimore Basilica. I think she got up. I don't know if you know this story, but she got up. You've told it before. And she just said, look, I'm happy. And you're, you're painting people in the industry as being helpless victims. I'm not a helpless victim. It makes me happy. And my response, it may have been unhelpful to her, but I think it was accurate, was you're wrong to be happy. Like you're actually not. You can think yourself subjectively at peace, but that

isn't happiness. Like the blessed Virgin Mary at the foot of the cross was happier then than someone who's, let's just keep using the analogy, on a meth binge right now, even if they think it's making them happy. Because happiness has to do with our objective good and the fulfilment of our nature. I'm certainly not saying that the Blessed Mother was smiling while her son was being tortured or that she felt peace or she probably felt peace in in the sense that she had submitted this to God's providence. But that's what that's what we should mean by happiness.

All right, let's look at look at another objection here. Let's look at. Let's go the second one further. And again, this is what Aquinas is going to respond to. Love is proved by deeds, as Gregory says in a homily for Pentecost. But good men do not do no works of the unjust. On the contrary, they do such as would appear to be works of hate, according to Psalm 108. In the morning I put to death all the wicked of the land, and God commanded wizards, love

it, thou shalt not suffer to live. Therefore, sinners should not be loved out of charity. What's Aquinas's response to this? He's going to begin by quoting Aristotle, who observes that when our friends fall into sin, we ought to deny them the amenities of friendship so long as there is hope of them mending their ways. And we ought to help them more readily to re, listen to this, this is us,

if we treated our friends like this, we would be much better friends than we may currently be. We ought to help our friends more readily to regain virtue than to recover money had they lost it. For as much as virtue is more akin than money to friendship. When, however, they fall into very great wickedness and become incurable, we ought no longer to show them friendliness. It is for this reason that both divine and human laws command such like sinners to be put to death, because there is greater likelihood of their harming others than of their mending their ways. Now,

Guiness is definitely not, for those who are confused, not talking about you becoming a vigilante killing those involved in mortal sin. So this has to be understood correctly, of course. Nevertheless, the judge puts this into effect. So you think of the state, you know, inflicting capital punishment on a serious sinner, for example. So the reason the state may do this isn't out of hatred for sinners, but out of the love of charity, by reason of which he prefers the public good to the life of the individual. Moreover, the death inflicted by the judge profits the sinner if he be converted unto the expiation of his crime and if he be not converted, it profits so as to put an end to the sin because the sinner is just

deprived of the power to sin anymore and that's a loving thing. All right, so table the question of capital punishment for a moment, but this idea that if I came on here today and started saying that I'm doing something, I don't know, like I started a porn company or something like that, you know, and people in town who love me would try to rebuke me. And suppose I was completely uninterested in their rebukes, then they should not show friendliness to me in a way that would lead me to believe that they're okay with the serious evil that I'm committing.

And I love this idea of, you know, if your friend lost $10,000 and he said, can you help me? I had it in a suitcase for some reason. This doesn't sound like it's legit, but he lost it and you want to help him find it. All right. Well, if you know your friend is caught in serious sin, and here I don't mean venial sin necessarily, here I don't mean sin that was committed once and then repented of, but someone who's involved in serious sin and who doesn't think he has to repent,

you should be more interested in this person regaining his virtue than him regaining his $10,000 because it's the virtue Which is conducive to his happiness in the way that the money isn't necessarily All right, so that's what Thomas Aquinas has to say. So this adage or this Axiom that people sometimes throw out love the sinner Hate the sin it's it's based in scripture and it's based in Thomas Aquinas All right So that does it for today Let us know in the comments section what you thought if you haven't yet subscribed to the channel

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Could we? I'm muted. Hold on. Oh, yeah, sure. Could we say a prayer real quick for the German bishops and those struggling with same-sex attraction or the care of poorly catechizing clerics? Yeah. Yeah, it's beautiful. Like I think think we should just before we do that, I think it is important that we that we do realize, like, if you're not somebody like you out there, you're like, I don't struggle with same sex attraction. You really do need to put yourself in the shoes of somebody who does, because it's very easy to just like condemn a sin. to just like condemn a sin.

It's very easy. And maybe that's in part what we've done today. But it takes great charity to empathize with where somebody's at. Because again, we made that distinction earlier, just like it's not a sin for me to experience sexual attraction to someone, not my wife. Right. It's not a sin if you have same sex attraction. Obviously, if I was to then entertain that sexual attraction somehow with someone not my wife, I would begin to sin.

Just like somebody with same sex attraction would also sin if they began to entertain that in a lustful way, let's say. But we really do have to be compassionate. Like I know several people who are living celibate lives because they have same sex attraction and these are some of the most courageous and interesting individuals that I've come across. So let's say a prayer. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, amen. O heavenly King, Comforter, Spirit of truth, you are everywhere present and fill all things. You are the Treasury of blessing and the Giver of life. Come and dwell within us. Cleanse us of every stain and save our souls, O gracious one. Father, we ask your

blessing upon those who might be watching who are experiencing same-sex attraction or any kind of sexual temptation or sin that you would give us the grace to repent of these sins and to rely on your grace in order to live a more beautiful, pure life. We also ask that you would give Pope Francis the courage that he needs to correct these bad bishops in Germany who are now blessing sin. And we also pray for the conversion of those German bishops and we entrust all of these people and ourselves and our loved ones to the intercession of the Most Holy Mother of God. 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. In the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Amen. Thanks guys.