Pints With Aquinas - Non-Catholics Can Pray the Rosary, Too!

Episode Date: September 10, 2021

Have you or a Non-Catholic Friend wanted to learn more about the rosary? Can Protestants pray the rosary? Of Course! Matt explains the basics of the rosary, answers common objections to the prayer. ** Best rosaries and home altars: https://catholicwoodworker.com/ 🔴 FREE E-book "You Can Understand Aquinas": https://pintswithaquinas.com/understa... 🔴 SPONSORS Hallow: http://hallow.app/mattfradd Ethos Logos Investments: https://www.elinvestments.net/pints Homeschool Connections: https://homeschoolconnections.com/matt/ 🔴 GIVING Patreon or Directly: https://pintswithaquinas.com/support/ 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 co-producer of the show. 🔴 LINKS Website: https://pintswithaquinas.com/ Merch: https://www.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 Gab: https://gab.com/mattfradd 

G'day, g'day, and welcome to Pints with Aquinas. My name is Matt Fradd, and today I want to discuss why Protestants, or evangelicals, depending on how you identify or refer to yourself as, could pray the Rosary without this necessarily being a threat to their Protestantism. So obviously, as a Catholic, I want Protestants to become Catholic, to embrace what I consider to be the fullness of the truth that God wants for Christians. But in this video, I'm going to set myself a more modest task. I just want to suggest that as a Protestant, if you've been attracted to the rosary, maybe you've just sort of seen some rosary beads on television or something, and you've thought to yourself, gosh, that kind of looks cool. How would I get into that, and is it even okay?

I want to respond to that and maybe help you see why you could pray the rosary without having to become a full-fledged Catholic. So if you are a Protestant here, I am so glad to have you here. Thank you so much for being here. I know it always sounds slightly patronizing when people say what I'm about to say, but let me say it anyway, because I mean it. I have Protestant friends, obviously, who I love and who teach me to love Jesus Christ. I'm thinking of a couple of friends in Portland, Oregon. They just love our Lord. They love the scriptures, and they encourage me to be more devoted to them. And then of course, I learned from academic Protestant theologians

and philosophers like Dr. William Lane Craig and people like Gary Habermas and others. So I'm a friend. Now, if you're here today and you're watching this and you're a Protestant and you're just like in no way open to the rosary being an okay thing, maybe this won't convince you. But if you are open, then, well, we'll see. Maybe it will. I also want to let everybody know that I'm going to be giving away 50 rosaries today, 50 free rosaries today at the end of this episode. That is what it looks like.

This is the Pints with Aquinas rosary. That is what it looks like. This is the Pints with Aquinas Rosary. So stick around to the end to make sure you kind of learn more about that. Okay, lovely. Well, g'day. Let me just take a breath here and say, if you're new to the channel and you want to subscribe, click subscribe.

Click the bell button. If you want to see that this video gets out to more people, please consider sharing it on Facebook because that really helps us out as I sip from my espresso. Glory to God. Okay, so let's see here. I put out a comment on YouTube on my community page, asking for Protestants to let me know what objections they have to the Holy Rosary. And if I could condense them, it would seem that they would be either, it's somehow idolatrous. A lot of people said things like, there's 50 Hail Marys and five Our Fathers. Don't you see the imbalance? This just seems wrong. So it was this idea that we shouldn't be giving prayerful attention to Mary. We certainly shouldn't be praying to Mary, that this is essentially idolatry or akin to worship.

And the second thing I think people said a lot of is, you know, this is vain repetition and vain repetition is condemned in Scripture. If I could boil it down, those would be the two things. So I want to kind of address those and then see if in the YouTube live chat, y'all have some more objections that I could think about on the spot. So the first thing I actually want to do is actually agree where I can with those concerns. So I am going to respond to them in a Catholic way, but I want to first agree to those two concerns to a point, okay? First, yeah, it's possible that people have an unhealthy devotion to Mary, a false devotion to Mary. That's possible, but the abuse of a devotion doesn't negate the proper use of it.

There was a heresy in the 4th and 5th century, let's see if I can pronounce this, Collyridianism, which sought to deify the Blessed Virgin Mary, all right? This is back in the 300s and 400s, and this was condemned by the church. But it's true, you know, I could think of an example, say, where a Catholic might choose to, say, read alleged apparition messages, say, coming from the Blessed Virgin Mary appearing somewhere in the world, praying her or his rosary instead of, say, going to Holy Mass. That would be an inappropriate devotion to Mary. You know, I think in that situation, a good Catholic would say, like, you ought not do this, you know. So it is true that there are abuses, just like there might be abuses in Protestantism. You know, I mean, you might find a Protestant who says, well, I have

the Word of God and I don't need a community. And I can give you some scriptures as to why I don't need to attend a church, say, or even listen to elders. You see, you might say, OK, but like there's an it's not but that it can be and that is true and that this is something that Pope Paul VI and John Paul II have referred to so let me just kind of give two quotations that might help you out as a protest, okay? Think of it this way. If you were talking to a Muslim as a Protestant and you wanted to say to them, we believe that God is three persons, it would be helpful for you to begin maybe by expressing

what it is you are not saying before you say what you do mean. So you might say, okay, there is only one God. Absolutely. Christians, we do not believe in three gods, right? So you state what you don't mean right up front so that they don't accidentally misunderstand you. So what I want to do is share a quotation from somebody who has written a lot on the Blessed Virgin Mary, and has even written kind of in a way that often strikes against our modern sensibilities. He's very kind of French and floral, St. Louis de Montfort, in his book, True Devotion to Mary. Listen to what he says. I don't have my glasses today, so let's see if I can...

Listen to this. If you're a Protestant and you're worried about what the Catholics think of Mary, if they think too much. OK, here's what Louis de Montfort says. With the whole church, I acknowledge that Mary, being a mere creature fashioned by the hands of God, is, compared to his infinite majesty, less than atom, or rather is simply nothing, since he alone, that is God, can say, I am he who is. Consequently, this great Lord who is ever independent and self-sufficient never had and does not now have any absolute need of the Blessed Virgin for the accomplishment of his will and the manifestation of his glory. To do all things, he has only to will them. So whatever you hear Catholics saying about Mary, whatever might make you uncomfortable in how they express their devotion to Mary,

recognize that's one of the rails we can't go over. So you might think of, if you're like me and you're terrible at bowling, you might go bumper bowling. And so there's some leeway here and there, but you can't, you won't be able to get into the gutter. So recognize that. Okay. Now, the second thing, just really quickly, is to recognize that the rosary can be vain repetition. Okay. The church acknowledges this. And John Paul II, St. John Paul II, in his apostolic letter on the rosary says this, and he's quoting Pope Paul VI, the rosary is an exquisitely contemplative prayer. Without this contemplative dimension, it would lose its meaning. As Pope Paul VI clearly pointed out, without contemplation, says Pope Paul VI,

the rosary is a body without a soul, and its recitation runs the risk of becoming a mechanical repetition of formulas in violation of the admonition of Christ in praying to not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think they will be heard for their many words. Matthew 6, 7. By its nature, the recitation of the rosary calls for a quiet rhythm and a lingering pace, helping the individual to meditate on the mysteries of the Lord's life as seen through the eyes of her who was closest to the Lord. In this way, the unfathomable riches of these mysteries are disclosed. And then John Paul II follows up by saying,

is worth pausing to consider this profound insight of Pope Paul VI in order to bring out certain aspects of the rosary which show that it is really a form of Christocentric contemplation. All right. So that was the first thing I just wanted to do is to acknowledge, yes, there are abuses at times to devotion to Mary, but that does not negate the use, does not negate true devotion to Mary. And secondly, it's true that the rosary is vain. It can be sort of a vain repetition, fall into that. Okay. But it doesn't need to at all. And I would encourage Protestants to consider praying the rosary. What sort of hurdles would they have to get over before praying the rosary? I think the first thing that they would have to get over

is the idea that we're not allowed to pray to the saints in heaven. I think that's the first thing. I think if a Protestant can see that it's consistent with scripture and tradition to pray to the saints in heaven, then he's almost all the way there. He might realize, okay, now I can pray the Holy Rosary. Okay, so here's just a few things. Now, this could be an entire video on prayers to the saints. I actually did a debate with Cameron Bertuzzi for my patrons. We might be releasing that publicly soon. This is not going to be an exhaustive rebuttal to those who say we can't pray to the saints in heaven. But I just want to kind of go over some points here. Okay. First thing to

realize is that Catholics and Protestants often use the word pray differently. Okay. So when a Protestant says pray, he often means it to be synonymous with worship. When a Catholic uses the word pray, he sometimes uses it and often uses it in that old English sense of the word, often uses it in that old English sense of the word, which means to ask. I was recently at a Macbeth play here in Steubenville, and privy was said, and privy being a contraction for I pray thee. I pray thee, you know, open the door, this sort of thing. So when a Catholic says, I want to pray to Mary, he's not saying, I want to worship Mary. He's saying, I want to request something of Mary. Okay. So how might we come to understand this? Okay. The first thing is to realize that all of us, all Christians are members of the body of Christ. And so I'm mystically united

to one another. All right. And we could give scriptures for that, of course. Second thing to realize is that death doesn't separate the body of Christ. All right. So I'm still mystically united as a Christian to those who are in heaven. Third thing to realize is that the saints in heaven are aware of the saints on earth. And we could give numerous examples of this. of the saints on earth. And we could give numerous examples of this. For example, Hebrews 12 uses that imagery of us running the race and our forefathers in the faith, Old Testament and by extension, New Testament, are sort of cheering us on. Another way we can see that the saints in heaven are aware of the prayers of the saints on earth is to look at Revelation chapter six, verse nine. St. John says, quote, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the witness they had born. Here's another one from Revelation 5, verses 8 through 10. Listen to this. Which are the prayers of the saints? elders fell down before the lamb, each holding a harp and golden bowls full of incense,

which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song saying, worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals for you were slain and by your blood, you ransom people, et cetera, et cetera. So you have these elders offering the prayers of the saints on earth okay um and these saints are perfected in charity and if the prayers of a righteous man availeth much then the prayers of the saints in heaven um ought to prevail if perhaps more than mine would yours and yet you have no problem asking me to pray, so why not ask a Christian in heaven to pray, since they're perfected in love and are more concerned about you, not less.

Look, much we could say here, but I just want to respond to kind of one objection. Someone might say, okay, but the Bible, okay, maybe the Bible doesn't forbid prayers to the saints. I mean, sometimes people try to point to the Old Testament to say that this is necromancy. Okay, let's just address that. This is not at all the case. The forbidding of necromancy, well, first of all, it's interesting. That's actually a proof of against soul sleep. So if your objection is the saints are totally unaware, they're unconscious until the final judgment, well, then why are we forbidding necromancy? Okay. But second,

notice that praying to the saints is actually the exact opposite of necromancy. Why? Necromancy is a form of divination whereby one summons the spirits of the dead in order to obtain information from them. But when a Christian prays to the saints, he's not summoning them from the dead by some sort of black art ritual in order to obtain information from them. Rather, he's giving information to them, as it were, asking them to pray for his needs. needs. But suppose you say, okay, but there's no explicit example in the New Testament or the old of someone actually praying to a saint. Like there's no injunction to pray to the saints. So what about that? So here's what I would say. First of all, the Bible doesn't state or give examples of many things. And it doesn't mean those things aren't in some way necessary to the Christian life or appropriate to the Christian life. Number one, the sinner's prayer. There was an article on the

Protestant site, thegospelofchrist.com, and it says this, a person can search his Bible from Genesis 1-1 through Revelation 22 verse 21 and never find this prayer or any variation of it mentioned in scripture, right? The I repent of my sins and I come to you and I ask you to save me. Well, that isn't to say that we shouldn't be doing that. Here's another example. Nowhere in scripture does it say we should pray to the Holy Spirit, nor does it give examples of anyone praying directly to the Holy Spirit. Well, does that that mean we shouldn't pray to the Holy Spirit? No. Here's a quote from Trent Horn which I really like.

Protestants recognize that the absence of these prayers in Scripture does not prove that they are illicit, because a fundamental point of law, including moral law, is that people have liberty unless something is expressly or implicitly forbidden. The New Testament describes how Christians have freedom in Christ and they should live as free people provided they don't use their freedom for evil. Therefore, to show that we must not pray to the saints, a Protestant must demonstrate that scripture expressly or implicitly prohibits the practice. The other thing to point out to anybody who's serious about, say, church history is to recognize that, yes, it is true that there

was some development in how the church understood prayers to the saints, but that very quickly, we see this being endorsed expressly through scriptures, through the writings of the early church fathers. Augustine in his homily on John, this is in the 400s, says, quote, at the Lord's table, we do not commemorate martyrs in the same way that we do others who rest in peace, so as to pray for them, right? That's what we should be doing.

We should pray for the dead. But rather that they, that is the martyrs, may pray for us, that we may follow in their footsteps. There's just, I mean, there's so much. Let me just kind of give you one more from Origen. He says, but not the high priest, Christ alone, prays for those who pray sincerely, but also the angels as also the souls of the saints who have already fallen asleep. Now, we could go through and give a much longer list of the early church.

But I just wanted to kind of throw that out there because if you're a Protestant, look, it makes sense. If you're a Protestant and you encounter Catholics, it makes sense that you're like, this is kind of weird. But it's the same thing with Catholics. Catholics can go to a church service, a Protestant church service and go, this is kind of weird. But just because something strikes us as weird, it doesn't mean it's illegitimate. I think it was C.S. Lewis who said, when a Protestant looks at the Catholic church, he sees an overrun jungle. Like, why do you need all these things? When a Catholic looks at a Protestant, he sees like a barren desert. Like, where is everything? Okay. So yeah, we have an initial reaction to the way each other perhaps worships, but that's okay. I mean, there are obviously several hundred years that separates Catholics

and Protestants, and this is something we should expect. So we shouldn't just allow a kind of gut reaction, this is weird, to prevent us from seriously asking questions and arguing. Okay. All right. So I'll leave that there as far as I think praying to the saints is legitimate. Now, if you see that, Now, if you see that, you know, I mean, suppose you're a Protestant and you are at, maybe, okay, let me try to think of an analogy on the spot. Your friend's husband dies. You go to the funeral. As the casket is being lowered into the ground, your friend says something like, John, just help me, pray for me. Give me the strength to be a good woman and a good widow and to live my life according to Christ's commands. So what's she doing?

She's praying to her deceased husband. And by praying, what I mean is she knows he's before the Lord maybe. And so she says, please help me, pray for me. I don't know if you'd correct your friend. And not only because it was an intimate situation, her husband just died. I just think you kind of go, well, yeah, that's understandable, you know. Anyway, so Catholics, Orthodox, other Christians have really prayed to the saints ever since the earliest times within the church in heaven, right? Asking their intercession so we can pray the Hail Mary.

The Hail Mary is half scripture and then half a sort of request of the mother of God to pray for us. We say something like, well, not something like, we say exactly, Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. And then the prayer to Mary to pray for us, Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. So I think you should be okay asking her to pray for you. Well, okay, but maybe you say, but I'm not okay calling her the mother of God. Well, why? And you might say, well, because it seems to indicate that she existed prior to God. She's the mother of Jesus, not the mother of God. So when you say she's the mother of God,

it gives the impression that she existed before God. Okay, but just because something gives an impression, it doesn't mean we should throw the whole thing out. Saying that we believe in a God who is three persons gives the impression to Muslims that we worship three gods. But it doesn't mean we should just say, okay, well, let's not talk about the Trinity. Let's not make that an important part of our faith. All it means is we've got to do a better job explaining it. So when we say Mary is the mother of God, we're not saying she's divine.

We're not saying she preceded God or is co-eternal with him. All we're saying is, look, it's a very clear syllogism. Mary is the mother of Jesus. Jesus is God. Therefore, Mary is the mother of God. I don't see how you could get out of that syllogism or why you would even want to. She is the mother of God. And if she's not the mother of God, to whom did she give birth?

Jesus. Uh-huh. And who might that be? You see the problem? Okay. Let's see. What else can we talk about? Let's talk about vain repetition. I'm going to have a swig of my lovely sparkling liquid death water. I just said that out loud so you knew that I wasn't drinking beer this early in the morning. Glory to Jesus Christ. All right, let's see here.

All right, so someone talks about vain repetition, okay? And this comes from Matthew 6, 7. And let me just read the King James. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do. Now, this word is a little difficult to translate. In Greek, it's mei battlegeseta. The mei just means not. Battlegeseta is a little more difficult to translate because it's the only time the word is used in the New Testament, and there doesn't seem to be any, maybe there's some, I couldn't find any, contemporary uses of that word, but it seems to refer to stammering. Okay. So how might we understand this? Well, I think what we need to

do is understand this in light of what comes next, what Christ says immediately after him saying, but when you pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do. And then he says, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. So I think that's how we have to interpret when you pray, use not vain repetitions. So in other words, Jesus is saying saying you have a loving father. He's concerned about you. He knows your anxieties. He knows the problems you have before you even announce them. In fact, before a word is on your tongue, he knows it already. You have a loving father. So you don't need to sort of rattle off a bunch of prayers in order for him to hear you as the pagans do.

All right. This isn't the idea of the rosary. We're not praying something long in order to make God listen to us. And we can give examples in scripture where we see repetition encouraged and even used. For example, two parables of our Lord show that we should be insistent in prayer. That is to say, we should repeat our petition if it isn't first answered. The parable of the unjust judge and the parable of the friend who comes in the middle of the night, you know, and he says, I got a friend who came for a trip. Can I can I have some bread or something? And he says, well, he doesn't get responded to right away. He's going to keep knocking and saying the same thing. All right. So we have examples right there from our Lord's parable saying that, you know, repeating prayers is not the problem. Secondly, Psalm 136 has a lot

of repetition actually. Okay. Listen to it. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord. Give thanks to the God of gods for his steadfast love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of the thanks to the God of gods for his steadfast love and Jewish forever. Give thanks to the Lord of the Lords of Lords. Again, no glasses. I apologize for his steadfast love and Jewish forever to him whom alone does great wonders for his steadfast love and Jewish forever for his steadfast love. And I mean, this goes on and on and on throughout the scripture, but I don't think anyone would say, yeah, that's, that's vain repetition. Okay. Well, you need to say, you need to ask the question, why? Okay.

Also, we can think of the angels in heaven saying, holy, holy, holy, right? This is repetitive, but it's not vain repetition. You might also think of somebody who might struggle with anxiety, and they're a Christian. And whenever they feel afraid, they might pray Psalm 23. You know, the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. And maybe they're undergoing a rather stressful period. And this is something they just continually pray to themselves, repeat to themselves. Would you honestly say this is vain repetition? I mean, I don't think so. And if you're going to say it's vain, it's got to be for another reason than you're

repeating something, since scripture encourages it and gives examples of it. Also, we have to understand this, when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, in light of the Sermon on the Mount, because the Our Father is taught immediately after the Sermon on the Mount. And the Our Father is taught immediately after the Sermon on the Mount. And the Our Father is taught by Christ to the apostles and by extension us as a model of prayer intended to be repeated. I don't think there's any Christian out there who thinks you ought to only say that once or once a year. But any more than that, you know, once a day might be cutting a little. No Protestant would say that. Okay.

What does the church fathers have to say on this vain repetition? Well, in the, I always say cantina aurea, but I keep messing that up. Cantina. No, I am saying it right. I always mess this up. It's Cantina. Cantina. That's right.

It's not Cantina. It's Cantina Aurea. Sorry. So this is a commentary on the four gospels by Thomas Aquinas in which he only uses the writings of the early church. And I looked at this verse and here's just what Chrysostom has to say about this line. He says, quote, again, this is Chrysostom talking about the words of our Lord. Hereby, he, that's Christ, dissuades from empty speaking in prayer. As for example, when we ask God things improper as dominion, fame, overcoming our enemies, or abundance of wealth, like, yeah, that would be vain repetition. If you keep praying for things that wealth. Like, yeah, that would be vain repetition.

If you keep praying for things that are worldly, you know, that aren't for your spiritual good, that may even be sinful, that would be an example of vain repetition. He says, he commands then that our prayer should not be long. Long, that is, not in time, but in multitude of words. For it is right that those who ask should persevere in their asking, Okay, so this is more what we're talking about. Okay. Now I want to respond to one other thing and then I'm happy to, what we'll do after that is I'm going to tell you how you can get these 50 free rosaries and then we'll take questions

in the live chat. Okay. So a lot of people in the comments yesterday were saying things like the rosary focuses too much on Mary or the rosary has like 50 Hail Marys and five Our Fathers. How do you not see the imbalance? Well, I want to thank my friend Jimmy Akin at Catholic Answers who helped me think about this. And he gave three points. Number one, the rosary is a Marian devotion. So, of course, it's going to focus on Mary. So, again, I think if you can get past what I would call that Protestant hang up, that we cannot seek the intercession of Christians in heaven.

If you get past that, which I think is unbiblical, right, and certainly isn't expressed in the early church, then I think you can be okay with a prayer that's Marian in character. So that's the first thing to say. Secondly, who a devotion focuses on doesn't tell you anything about the rest of your devotional life. Like if you see me offering a prayer to St. Joseph, there's other things I do. And it's not as if you can take from that. He has this emphasis on his prayer, on praying to St. Joseph. For example, and this is an example that Jimmy Akin gave me, the Lord's Prayer doesn't mention Jesus at all. But it would be fallacious to say that people who pray the Lord's Prayer must have an imbalanced

devotion towards the Father, and they're ignoring the Son, Jesus, somehow. The third thing to point out is the Rosary is optional. It's encouraged by many saints and popes and by the church, but it's not mandated. The mass, the holy sacrifice of the mass is mandated. So think of it this way, this might help. The mass is addressed almost exclusively to God. It also takes longer, typically, than the rosary. the church thus insists that the core of the faithful's spiritual life be devoted to God the mass being mandatory and longer rather than Mary which what is the rosary well it's first optional and it's also shorter so I don't know if that's been a help I don't even know, my goal is not even to fully persuade people,

but just to kind of reason together. As a Catholic Christian, maybe you're watching as a Protestant Christian, or maybe you're a Catholic Christian who wants to better help explain things to your friends. I think it's right to sort of first understand where they're coming from and then to show why they should be open to praying the rosary. If this is something you've wanted to do, it consists primarily of the Our Father and the Hail Mary. And when we pray the Hail Marys,

we're meditating upon different biblical scenes. So there are, of course, a couple of biblical scenes that you may not agree with, such as the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin from Revelation 12. But that's okay. I guess you don't have to pray that one. Again, my point here is not to make you a Catholic in this video. My point is just to say, as a Protestant, you can think highly of Mary and pray to Mary and essentially pray the rosary

without even having to become a Catholic, I think. Now, again, as a Catholic who thinks that the fullness of Christianity resides in the Catholic Church, I want you to be a Catholic, but I'm just like, this is something you could do without a threat, I think, to your Protestantism, especially when you see the way Martin Luther and Calvin spoke about the Blessed Virgin Mary. Okay, I want to give away 50 rosaries right now. And I want to say thank you to the Catholic woodworker for allowing me to do this. This guy is amazing. He's a solid Christian man, catholicwoodworker.com. Click the link in the description below to check out all of his amazing things. He has beautiful rosaries, beautiful home altars. Let me say something about this rosary first, because I don't know, There are two types of rosaries. See, this is

what you'll learn as a Protestant if you agree with me and start praying it. You either have the really dinky ones that break apart in your pocket, and then you have some that are just like so thick they barely fit in your pocket. And that's why I personally love Catholic woodworker. Check this rosary out he did for me. I just think this is very beautiful. Notice the Our Father beads are larger than the Hail Mary beads. I just think it's beautiful. This is something I came up with. I developed this middle piece from scratch that doesn't exist anywhere else. So if you want to get a free rosary, and these are valued at about $70 because they're made in the United States. Those are brass bits on the rosary. And, you know, look, you can get cheaper rosaries from other parts of the world, but this is done in a way I think that we would agree is ethical.

And it's also, I think the quality is often better. Anyway, if you wanna get a free copy of this rosary, here's how to do it. You ready? The next 50 people who become a patron for $10 or more a month, I will send you a rosary. You just have to pay shipping. I'll also send you a book that I've wrote recently. You'll get stickers of Pints with Aquinas.

The reason I'm trying to get more patrons is I just hired a Catholic Jamie, also known as Video Guy. I just did it. I don't really have the money reason I'm trying to get more patrons is I just hired a Catholic Jamie, also known as Video Guy. I just did it. I don't really have the money yet. I'm going to be paying him, but it's like, it's more, it's a full-time job. And I need more patrons in order to pay his salary. Now, again, I'm going to pay his salary, but I just, it's very difficult right now because it, you know, bringing on someone full-time is not something I've really done before. So that would be beautiful. If you could support the work of Pints with Aquinas, you know, bring on someone full-time is not something I've really done before. So that would be beautiful. If you could support the work of Pints with Aquinas, you know, we pay people to fly in for these interviews. We pay for the debates that we host. We give each

guest at least $500 each. You know, we need a new camera. That's going to cost me two grand. There's a lot of expense that goes into this. I really believe in it. I really love it. I want to pay my full-time video guy. So the next 50 people who become patrons, in addition to all the things you get on Patreon, you'll also get this rosary, which is valued like 70 bucks for free. It would be amazing if you didn't become a patron for a month and then quit because then I'll be in the hole. That'd be great. But yeah, that's how you get it. But for the rest of y'all who may not want to do that or, you know, may, I don't know, may already have it or something, check out catholicwoodworker.com. He also has little home altars here with beautiful crucifixes.

And check out this. I love this. One of the things I've decided to do in my prayer life is to put something like this, something like a home altar on my bedside table. Isn't that beautiful? And then you can buy these beautiful prayer cards that go along with it. And then what I do is when I wake up in the morning, the first thing I do is kiss the crucifix and offer a prayer of entrustment to our Lord. So you might check them out because one, I can vouch for this guy. He's not just a dude in it for money. He's legit, solid Catholic guy. And yeah, he's, let me see if I can find this other thing. Look at his daily, his prayer cards. I love these prayer cards. Yes, he's a Catholic dad and he also just does the best rosaries I've

personally seen. So you can kind of like buy these beautiful prayer cards and put them in your home altar and the more you buy. So check it out. Link in the top of the description below, catholicwoodworker.com. Let's just, I want to have a look at one of his rosaries here. Let's see. I'll go to his main site.

Rosaries. So he's a bunch of different types. So, you know, if you're a Protestant, you've been listening to this, like, okay, I'm willing to give it a shot. Maybe check this out. Like those are really beautifully made rosaries. Catholicwoodworker.com, catholicwoodworker.com.

And again, the first 50 people from the moment I said that, we're going to be going through our patrons and we're going to see who those 50 patrons were. And then we'll reach out to you over Patreon by message to tell you how to get your free rosary. So thank you so much for supporting the show. Yeah, it means a ton. All right, so what I want to do now maybe is just to take some questions

here in the live chat. You are more than welcome to disagree with me, to say that I'm wrong. It'd be cool if we didn't get gross and belligerent as YouTube comm boxes often become. But let's see here. Oh, look at that. Thank you so much. Evan just became a patron. All right. Like unless 50 people just signed up before you, which is highly unlikely, we'll send you a message. We may not even get 50 people sign up, let's be honest. But yeah, thanks a lot. All right, let's see. Oh, by the way, someone suggested recently that I start printing beautiful newsletters and posting them. So that's something we're going to start doing.

So thank you so much. Someone sent a message in about that. Maybe you're here today. So we're going to actually start doing that for our patrons who give 10 bucks or more a month. We're going to start mailing these beautiful letters with like an article from a Dominican priest, a bit of the Summa, a reflection from me and things like this. So I'm looking forward to that as well. All right. If you have any objections or any things you'd like to add, please feel free. And also if you're a Catholic and you want to share this with a Protestant friend, please, please feel free to do that. Share it on Facebook.

That really helps. Or just tell them to check it out. The Silent Knight says, God bless the Catholic Church. Yeah, indeed. Jesus' Girl says, please support this channel. I get all notifications and love all the content we need to support channels like this thank you matt that's super kind of you thank you very much um jonah says i'm a protestant but adore your ministry and i'm excited to begin praying the

rosary thank you so much sorry jonah i beg your pardon but like here's an example right catholics and protestants have been separated for hundreds of years, and it's only natural that we're going to be using terms differently. For example, Jonah just said to me that he adores my ministry. If someone were to look at that and be like, oh, see, he gives adoration to Pints with Aquinas. He is an idolater. You'd be like, dude, no, try to understand what he means. Please try. And it's the same thing. Just as a Protestant, you would say to me, try to understand where I'm coming from. And I really want to do that. I don't want to be a

dismissive, triumphalist Catholic. And if I am, I repent of that. And the ways I have been in the past, I repent of that. Triumphalist in the sense of looking down my nose and not giving any credit where credit's due. All right. Thank you, Jonah. That's super cool. Catherine says, I know Jesus is God and the spirit, but I just can't pray to Mary. It feels like it would be evil. I mean, I'm not upset. And then she might have said something else here. But okay, fair enough.

It's understandable that praying the rosary would be a sort of awkward thing, especially if you've been told in the past that praying the rosary or praying to Mary is somehow evil. But listen, I have in front of me the very first prayer that we have to Mary, and it comes from the third or fourth centuries. Listen to what it says. And that's like, that's 200. It's like in the 200, 300, we already have this prayer, which is just illustrative of, you know, I'm sure a much broader

and typical devotion to Mary that Christians had. Here's what it says. Beneath your compassion, we take refuge, Theotokos, which is a Greek word meaning meaning god bearer our petitions do not despise in time of trouble but from dangers ransom us only holy only blessed uh virgin mary so okay so first thing i would say is it's understandable that you would have some hesitation there especially if you've been told that this is wrong but you might consider the arguments i offered for why we can ask the prayers of the saints in heaven, just like we can ask the prayers of the saints on earth. You know, it's true, Christ is the only mediator, right? The only unique mediator between God and man. But when you ask me

to pray for you, in a sense, you're asking for my mediation because I'm going in between God and you as it were, asking God to bless you. But you're not in doing that and asking me to pray for you. You're not usurping the unique mediatorship of Christ. Are you? No, of course not. I mean, Paul in that same chapter, I think he's beseeching people to pray for him and to pray for those in authority. I think he's beseeching people to pray for him and to pray for those in authority. So we can pray for each other on earth. We can also, so just like I can ask you, Catherine, to pray for me, and I do, if you would, I'd be honored. I can also ask the saints in heaven to pray for me.

I can ask the saints on earth. I can ask saints in heaven. So think about the arguments I offered and then consider the fact that the early church, again, there was a development in the early kind of hundred years or something. Obviously, there's a development. But some of the earliest Christians aren't talking against praying to the saints. And there's a lot of early Christians showing examples of it. So consider that. Maybe that'll help. Oh, awesome. Logan just became a patron yesterday.

I'm exploring Catholicism and joining RCIA soon. Congrats, man. Awesome. I really think that people who become Catholic in this day and age, like, let's just be honest, it's a messy world. And we have a Pope who I don't agree with on everything. And we have like bishops and priests and leadership in the church who have not been transparent and sometimes have been downright wicked. The end. I'm upset about it too. So when I see people being like, yeah, I understand the church is sinful. I understand that there are weeds amidst the wheat, but this is the church of Christ. I just think that's incredible. So welcome.

There are weeds amidst the wheat, but this is the church of Christ. I just think that's incredible. So welcome. Joshua says, this Protestant just became a patron, been watching for a long time. So might as well. Thanks so much, man. That's really cool. Stephen says, convert here.

Praying to the saints and Mary is my biggest obstacle. I can say that the rosary has brought so much rest and peace to my life. I now try to pray it every day. That's beautiful. I would also just kind of add this, right? And this is maybe a little more sentimental, a little more sort of superficial, but maybe not. I don't know. Praying the rosary is just a lovely thing to do. You know, we all want to be spontaneous in our prayer, just like we always want to be spontaneous in how we speak of our bride or our husband. I want to say, I love you. You're beautiful.

But the feelings aren't always there. And just in marriage, when the feelings aren't there, you still go on your standard date night. And there's a bit of a routine to that. You get in the car. You drive to a place. You have a meal. You drive somewhere else. You do this thing.

You drive home. You make love, things like that. There's a ritual, in drive home, you make love, things like that. Like there's a ritual in a sense to it, you know. And you do it even if you don't like have a great deal of feeling. That's something nice about the rosary. You can pray the rosary if you feel a great deal of love and intimacy with our Lord. But if you don't, you can still pray the rosary. It's kind of nice to have that. And it is sort of rhythmic and you can sort of sit and pray and just sort of just meditate on those different gospel scenes. So good for you. Chad said, just became a patron. I had been on the fence for a while. I'm also a Protestant and your first channel I've supported. Man, super kind of you.

I'm really grateful. Thank you very much. You helped me do all this work. So thanks. Okay. Evan says, why do so many Catholics seem to leave the church because they realize how the church idolizes Mary? Seems to be a trend. Could it be that the church needs to clarify more than Marian doctrines?

Yeah, without kind of talking to anyone in particular, I'd hesitate to comment. I think people leave the Catholic Church for different reasons. And put it this way. If someone would leave the Catholic Church and still maintain their faith in Christ, basically, if someone would leave the Catholic Church and still maintain their faith in Christ, basically, then I think they will naturally begin to criticize those elements of Catholicism that they no longer hold, such as the Eucharist, the Holy Father, Pope of Rome, things like that. So, I personally don't see the trend, but to your point, could it be the church needs to clarify more the Marian doctrines? I don't think so, actually. I think the church is very explicit about what we think

about Mary, but it may be the case that in particular parishes and communities, this needs to be expressed. Because I think the church universal has done a marvelous job at making it very, very, very clear that, well, what I read earlier, if you haven't, if you're just joining the live stream, go back and listen. I won't repeat it. But, yeah, it might be the case that in particular communities where Marian devotion is very strong, especially for outsiders or people new to the faith, this might need to be, yeah, clarified. We got a super chat. Thanks so much, Mr. Green. He says, Protestant here, my 16-year-old son and I benefited greatly from your Forged book. Awesome.

I'm so happy to hear that. Yeah, for those who aren't familiar, myself and a friend, Jason Everett, wrote a book called Forged, which is a 33-day walkthrough to help you overcome pornography. It's very beautifully written, I think. It's not scandalous at all. This is really something I think you could read with a 15-year-old son, 14-year-old son. Yeah, that's lovely. Oh, look at this. This is really cool. Nojo says, I started my path to the church praying the rosary and I omitted the assumption and the crowning of Mary mysteries. Okay. That's awesome. Yeah. So,

by the way, the rosary was originally thought of as Mary's Psalter. The Psalter refers to the Psalms. The monks used to pray all 150 Psalms in a day or over the course of a week. Lay people who maybe couldn't read or couldn't afford a Bible or simply didn't have the time, prayed 150 Hail Marys to imitate the monks. So that's how it sort of originally arose. There are different mysteries associated now with each decade, like each group of 10 Hail Marys. I should have probably said that at the start. Two of those are the Assumption of Mary and the Crowning of Mary. Now, the rest are taken straight out of Scripture. I agree that these two are a little more mysterious. Like, I can understand why a Protestant might read

Revelation chapter 12 and not see Mary. I've discussed this at length on the show before. If you type in, if you go to pintswithaquinas.com and type in Mary into the search bar, you'll find episodes where we've responded to these sort of Protestant objections. But I like what Nojo is doing here because he's doing what I'm kind of suggesting you do. Like, again, I'm a Catholic. I want you to be a Catholic. But I also don't want to be super abrasive and expect you to do something that you're just not willing to do right now. What I'm saying, the whole point of this video is just to say, as a Protestant, like, you can pray the rosary and still be a Protestant.

It seems to me that all you have to accept is this isn't vain repetition, which I think I've argued for. This isn't idolatry. And we can pray to Christians in heaven by asking for their intercession. And Mary is clearly the mother of God. And if you want to omit certain mysteries because you don't agree that Mary is the queen of heaven, okay, you could omit that. You could pray the other mysteries. You know, there are other ways around it for now, you know?

So there you go. Man, my throat is hurting talking this much. That's why I keep drinking. Oh, I got more espresso left. Let's pound that. Council of Florence says, Matt, I would love to be a patron. Is the rosary thing still going? I mean, I just don't know.

I haven't gone over to Patreon and seen if we've got 50 people. I doubt it. I'm not even confident that we'll get 50 people signing up. It was just something I chose to do. But I will say, even if you don't get the rosary, you get a ton of other things in return. We do regular courses, video courses, say on the papacy. We did one on the great books of Western civilization. You get access to our community forum. I do videos just for my patrons. You get my book sent to your door. You get stickers. You even get the beer stein if you give more. So there's all sorts of things you get in return,

not just that rosary. So consider doing it if you want, but no worries if you don't want to. I fully understand that people have to decide where to tithe, and that's fine with me. Oh, this is a great, great comment by Russ Cassidy. Would it perhaps be easier for a Protestant to pray, for example, the Divine Mercy Chaplet using the rosary beads, but minus the heavy emphasis on Mary? I think that's a great point, Russ. I would recommend that people look up the Divine Mercy Chaplet. Within the Divine Mercy Chaplet, it uses rosary beads and you just pray one Hail Mary. Like there's one prayer to Mary. The primary prayer in the Divine Mercy Chaplet is, oh, goodness gracious. What is it?

Eternal Father, I offer to you the body and blood, soul and divinity of your dearly beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, in atonement for our sin and those of the whole world. And then you say, for the sake of his sorrowfulful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world so you could do that you you mean look as a protestant you don't want to pray that the the the rosary okay like you don't have to do that right now but you could still buy a rosary if you wanted to get one from a friend or something there's a link in the top of the description below go buy a rosary and then you could pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, which is very Christocentric. That's an option too. There is something lovely about having a physical instrument, which you are fingering as you pray. You know, as I sit in church, something that kind of reminds me of prayer. I think this is a lovely thing.

I don't think it's that different to say a Protestant who would like a beautiful Bible. You recognize that you don't need a beautiful Bible for the Bible to work, but it's also nice to have something that's befitting to the experience of reading God's word. This is something physical that gives you comfort, and we're human beings. We're not angels, so it's okay that we get comfort from physical things. All right, let's see. This is fun, hey? Saint Maximilian Mary Colby says,

never be afraid of loving the blessed version too much. You can never love her more than Jesus did. Amen. Very true. Let's see here. Dawn, who is a Lutheran. It's so good to have you, Dawn. She says, I'm a Lutheran, love the Divine Mercy Chaplet. Jonathan Rumi taught it to us last year in his prayer hours. I also pray the rosary. I find Catholic prayers very rich and very meditative. That's so beautiful. Thank you. Samuel says, I pray the rosary every day. And yes, I'm a Protestant.

Awesome. Let's see this fellow. I can't pronounce his name. Printempt. Forgive me. He says, or she, I try to do the rosary as a Protestant, but I get thinking it's sacrilege when they claim Mary is the spouse of the Holy Spirit. Okay. Fair enough.

Okay, well, first of all, I mean, as a Protestant, you wouldn't necessarily have to think that Mary is a spouse of the Holy Spirit in order to pray the rosary. That's not part of the rosary. But let me share this with you, okay? The difference between Mary and you and me is that Mary has a unique relationship with each person of the Blessed Trinity, right? So you and I are, I am, I don't know if you're a man or a woman, I am a son of God. Okay. But if you look at each person of the Blessed Trinity, Mary has a unique relationship with each in a way that other people don't. It's true, she's a daughter of God, so she has that in common with me and with you.

But she's also the mother of God the Son, right? So she's daughter and mother. So why do we say spouse? Because it was by the Holy Spirit she conceived. Obviously, when we talk about her as spouse, we're not saying in a carnal sense. We don't believe Catholics are in agreement with the Protestant reformers that Mary never actually engaged in sexual relations with Joseph. But if anyone could be said to be the spouse of the Holy Spirit in a mystical way, who might that be? I mean, it clearly would be Mary. It was by her union with the Holy Spirit that she brought forth the fruit, which is the second person of the Blessed Trinity. So that's why we refer to her as the spouse of the Holy Spirit.

But again, if that's a hang up, you can still pray the rosary right now, you know. Let's see here. Irene says, may I know how you would explain to a Protestant that we can ask saints to pray for us and that it works? So I would recommend that you go back and listen to this entire video because I actually made an argument. I didn't go into depth because we just didn't have time for that based on Scripture as to why we can pray to the saints in heaven. So you might want to check that out. Christina, love you, Matt, dear brother in Christ. Thank you so much for your love and please pray for me.

Let's see. Alina says, I started praying the rosary this summer with the rosary crew on YouTube. I'm Lutheran. Cool. Thank you so much. It's lovely to have you here. Dan says, why are Catholic funerals often preceded by a communal rosary session?

Where does this tradition come from? So, again, I think it's important to realize that the rosary is a private devotion, which a Catholic is not mandated to pray. You can be a saint, you can be a holy Catholic and not pray the rosary. The Catholic Church, I think I would say it's encouraged and it's a devotion that has arisen in the West. And for that reason, it's, I'd say the most popular devotion, private devotion within the Western church. And this is why you'll see it being prayed, you know, before funerals or something. In the East, I mean, just the other day, I interviewed Sister Natalia.

She doesn't pray the rosary. She has other prayers to Mary. The beads she uses are called a chotki, which means not in Russian, I think. And actually, I have one on my arm. I pray the chotki regularly. And it's a different prayer. That's okay. So I would just say it is a tradition that has come up in the West. And that's why it's the most popular, and that's why you see it at preceding funerals. Let's see here. Frederick says, I'm still a Pentecostal Christian, but I love how you have helped me to find the Catholic Church. Thanks.

I know become a Patreon, or I'm going to.entecostal Christian, but I love how you have helped me to find the Catholic Church. Thanks. I know become a Patreon or I'm going to. I don't know. But either way, thank you so much. That's beautiful. Again, dude, look, we live in a day and age in which paganism is strongly on the rise. Right. Demon worship. Satanism is on the rise.

We have a, at least in the United States, there's this sort of death cult that treats abortion as a sacrament, as a sacred thing that ought not to be touched. I mean, Protestants and Catholics have differences, but we need to band together. But we need to band together. As Peter Kreeft once said, when a maniac is at the door, feuding brothers reconcile. And so I think it's so important that we learn from each other, that we pray with each other, that we pray for each other, not dismissing our differences, not pretending they don't exist, not actively working to seek reconciliation, but that we love each other. And we try to give each other the benefit of the doubt, and we try to give each other the benefit of the doubt and we try to understand each other. Sorry. Ah, this is nice. Unknown Player says,

The best thing is the Orthodox also have a rosary to Mary called the Rule of the Theotokos. 150 Hail Marys. Meditating on her, that's exactly right. They do indeed. Wild Man wants a rosary. Click the link in the description below and you'll go to Catholic Woodworker. Buy a rosary from them. In my estimation, they're the best rosary people out there. Austin says, Matt, thoughts on the book, The Secret of the Rosary? How much weight should we take? St. Louis de Montfort words about the rosary throughout the book. Okay, so I'm a big proponent of this.

I have this pinned on Twitter and on Facebook. A faithful Catholic should submit, should not only submit to what the church teaches authoritatively, but should also not demand uniformity where the church allows diversity of opinion or custom. And sometimes what happens is, this happens in Catholicism and Protestantism and in Orthodoxy and just, I think, in people. Whenever we experience something as life-giving and we cherish that thing, we naturally want to tell other people about it and welcome them into this thing. But I think we've got to be careful not to say what the church hasn't. So if you're a Catholic who says to not pray the rosary makes

you a bad Catholic, okay, well, that's not what the church teaches. And so you shouldn't be demanding something, namely pray the rosary, when the church doesn't. But I think you can say the church strongly encourages it. So by extension, I think we could read Louis de Montfort and be like, eh, I kind of like him. Some things are a bit weird. I don't really get it. And that's okay. I'm not a big fan of Louis de Montfort. When I read him, I just, his flowery French kind of way of speaking, it used to bother me way more than it does today. It doesn't bother me so much today. I think he's brilliant. And I actually would encourage people to read Louis de Montfort. I'm just saying personally, he's not somebody I go to for spiritual reading. And that's okay. There are many treasuries, sorry, there are many devotions within the church's

treasury. We should choose a few of them and then be faithful to them, not bouncing around from one devotion to the other. But given that the rosary is so strongly encouraged by saints and popes, and that it's essentially like a Bible study on string, I think that's a good reason for us to read it. As far as Louis de Montfort, yeah, I mean, again, I think something similar there. You might love him. You might not. I think he's great. I just don't read him personally. Maybe I will.

But I don't think you have to be afraid if you read a saint and they don't strike you as compelling. You know, just because your friend really likes St. Thomas Aquinas doesn't mean you have to love reading Thomas Aquinas. You know. Excuse me. All right. And I understand that some people will probably take issue with what I've said, but that's, that's what I think. Matthew Keaton says, new patron, please pray for me and my wife as we

go through RCIA in the full. That's beautiful. Your ministry is a big part of what brought us to the church. Glory to Jesus Christ. Thank you, Matthew. Dan says, Amen. Christians have so much in common, even our diversity, and we need to recognize this more whilst maintaining good-hearted argument. Amen, brother Dan. Trina says, I prayed the rosary for a week as a lukewarm Catholic, and it single-handedly dragged me back to the church.

I agree. It is a powerful devotion. And there are certain apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary, for example, at Fatima, which I think are actually like pretty strongly attested to. This isn't just like Catholics seeing Mary in a bit of toast or something. These seem to be strongly backed by other, you know, non-Christian eyewitnesses who saw certain things. If you're interested, check out Our Lady of Fatima. And she there recommends we pray the Holy Rosary.

It is a powerful prayer. Theophania. Glory to Jesus Christ. I see your patron is still offering Marco Polos. Yes, you're right. Shouldn't you remove this? Yes. I think I'm going to. And what I'm going to do in its place for my patrons at that level

is to do like a monthly Zoom call where we all get together and just chat with each other, as well as some other things. So stay tuned to that. I'll change that soon. Thank you. D says the rosary has helped me come out of porn addiction. Beautiful. Glory to Jesus Christ. Unknown player says the luminous mystery should, in my opinion, be called the chaplet of light instead of calling it a rosary because 150 hail marriage was supposed to parallel the Psalms. Okay. Yep. All right. I think that's a fair comment. When John Paul II added, or he didn't add

five mysteries to the rosary. He suggested five mysteries that could be prayed, but it was merely a suggestion. That's right. And I tend to agree with you that it does sort of break the symbolism, doesn't it, a little? excuse me i'm trying to uh i'm trying to find some other devotion oh some other things i pray the angelus thrice a day beautiful uh atmos says have you ever thought about having Anthony Esselin on the show?

Oh, have I ever? We actually had a scheduled time, but he got sick and couldn't come. Thank you for the reminder. I'm going to reach out to my assistant and see if we can schedule him soon. Evan says, Matt ordered a dumb phone. Let's go. Hey, good for you. That's what I use now.

Esmeralda, wonderful name, says, please talk more about how to meditate and about the mysteries themselves. I have trouble like trying to walk and chew gum at the same time. This isn't a sales pitch for my book, but I did write a little devotional on the rosary which you could check out and that might help you let me show you what it looks like so here it is on amazon let me just kind of get rid of this here all right so this is a book i wrote called pocket guide to the Rosary. It's kind of like a leather type, leatherette sort of book. Oh, what's happening? And it's like a pocket-sized book. I think it's quite beautiful.

I'm pretty proud of it. And in it, I kind of, yeah, I have different kind of ways of helping you meditate on the mysteries. So you might check that out if you want. Barbara says, I started praying the rosary daily after I found out I was pregnant. It helped me with all my anxieties and my prayer was answered. It was, it is one of the most beautiful ways of bringing me closer to God. That's awesome. Benjamin, hi Benjamin, says, what are you drinking? it is one of the most beautiful ways of bringing me closer to God. It's awesome.

Benjamin. Hi, Benjamin says, what are you drinking? I'm drinking a thing called liquid death, just sparkling water. I've already had a few people complain about that. I didn't know there was anything wrong about it, but if there is,

I guess, inform me and I'll, I'll cancel drinking it. All right. Golly, we've been going for over an hour now massive thanks to all of you who decided to become patrons uh again i don't suspect we'll get 50 people at least not today but maybe we will and those first 50 people who become patrons will get this gorgeous i think rosary all right that's what it looks like you You just have to pay shipping. And then we also send you other things and you get all sorts of other stuff by being a patron.

Now, and again, I hope you'll become a patron for more than a month because if you don't, I'll be in the hole financially because that rosary is about 70 bucks. And then like the book I'll send you and things like that. So the other thing is like, if you become a patron and you don't get the rosary, I understand if you'll quit after that, but you know, consider sticking around because it really does help fund this apostolate. And we have a lot of expenses. One of the reasons for those who were just joining us, I was, I was doing this is because we have a video guy who I just hired full time and I need to pay his salary. And in typical Matt Fradd fashion, I shoot before I am. So I could have waited until I had the funds typical Matt Fradd fashion, I shoot before I aim.

So I could have waited until I had the funds, but I've never done that in my life. I just think God will answer that prayer. So big thanks to those of you who will do it. Okay. Oh, look at this. Dan says, patron, much overdue. Cheers from Australia.

That's super kind of you. I honestly think the primary reason people don't become patrons is not because they don't want to give $10 a month or $5 a month. I think the primary reason if you haven't become a patron yet is probably because you don't want to get out your credit card. And I totally get that. I fully see it. It's annoying. But for those of you who do, thank you.

And for those of you who don't want to or just can't, that's also totally fine. So massive thanks and honestly, no pressure. All right, my friends. Oh, this is so nice. Jonas has just became a patron. We'll stay for way longer than a month. Your ministry is worth it. Just so you know, you get all sorts of things

by becoming a patron. Like the other day, I interviewed Sister Natalia. And after that interview, I had Mother Gabriella and Sister Natalia chat for like 15 minutes about her entering the convent. And that's like a special bonus episode. So we put up bonus videos and all sorts of things. So massive, massive thank you guys. All right, I'm going to go. But I think it would be nice if we prayed the Hail Mary together. And sorry, before I make the sign of the cross, I'd love to know what you think, especially if you're a Protestant, like again,

feel free to like, tell me why I'm wrong or why I should reconsider things. And I will. I will reconsider things. Look at your arguments. I want to take them seriously. And thank you for taking this seriously. If you've watched to this point, I guess it's a sign that you have. Let's pray.

In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, I'm in. Blessed Mother, you are the daughter of God, the Father, the Mother of God, the Son, and in a mystical way, the spouse of God, the Holy Ghost. We ask your intercession. Pray for us, please. Pray to us that we might be obedient to God's will and love Jesus more. Pray to us that we might be obedient to God's will and love Jesus more. 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, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. God bless you all. Thank you very much.