Pints With Aquinas - The Dalai Lama, Jordan Peterson on Confession, Pope Francis on Hulu, & Whatever Else

Episode Date: April 13, 2023

Pope Francis Article: https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/254049/6-hot-button-issues-pope-francis-and-gen-z-confront-in-new-disney-doc Jordan Peterson Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuzcqA7LXLQ Dalai Lama Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRZMR9Ovmwk  

G'day everybody, thanks for tuning in to today's episode. I wanted to invite you to consider becoming an annual supporter of us over at matfrad.locals.com. When you become an annual supporter, we send you our pints with Aquinas Beerstein for free. We just ask that you pay shipping. And then you'll also get access to our quarterly newspapers, The Jill. You get a bunch of other free things in return as well, but you know, I'm not gonna go over them all now. Go check us out. MattFrad.locals.com. Thank you. What? And I clicked go live. And now we're live?

And now we're live. G'day everybody and welcome to Planes with Aquinas. Today on the show we will be looking at three things. Number one, we'll be looking at what Pope Francis said in a recent Hulu documentary. A couple of weeks ago I commented on what that documentary might be like. It's been released. I haven't actually watched it, but there's an article from Reuters, not Reuters, is it? Reuters. Reuters!

And I always say routers or Reuters or anyway. So we'll look at that. And then I want to look at something that Jordan Peterson had to say on confession, which is actually really cool. And I want to see some something that Jordan Peterson had to say on confession She's really cool And I want to see some of your responses in the comment section and then we want to take a look at something that Dalai Lama did So that's that. Thank you so much for being here. We had an excellent show with Laura Horn yesterday

We're really enjoying what we're doing here One of the things we're trying to do here at pines with Aquinas is just to kind of encourage people to Comment below and so Thursday And I have decided that when you comment under one of our videos for the first hour after the release of that video We will respond to you. Is that still accurate Thursday? I am trying to keep up I am trying really hard. There's a lot of comments that come through but like we don't pay to advertise pines with Aquinas on YouTube So we kind of rely on y'all to share the comment Right now live on stream. Yeah, read it to you. Yes, not show them our our back end sure I mean what sorry

I'm at the channel back different type of back end Somebody said well There's so many nice ones here. Okay. Oh, I see. Yeah. We just released a clip with me and the Laura Horn. So there's some nice ones here. The last time. So what we were talking about is how spouses can love each other. All right. So we're going to read a live comment. This one's called from live free or die. Probably not his real name, who says the last time I gave my wife flowers, she asked, what did you what did you do? Now I just do something for her. When she leaves. What is it? What is it? What does he mean? What did you do? Now I just do something for her. When she leases.

What is it? What does he mean? What did you do? Is she happy or sad? She's like, why did you do that? Cause the joke you made in the video that you just watched about like, you said, you know, if you were to give someone flowers,

they would be like, what the heck? Am I supposed to? You definitely said heck. Well, you know, when you're kids, you don't have kids and you know, you buy flowers for each other. It's very beautiful. It's still beautiful. and you know, you buy flowers for each other. It's very beautiful.

It's still beautiful. And husbands should certainly still do that for their wives. But I just kind of envisioned this like exhausted wife homeschooling her kids and I walk in with flowers. I love you. And she's like, what? What now? Look, I got to cut these and find a vase and untwist that weird rubber band thing.

Thank you. You want to twist it? I was just cutting through. Yeah, I was going to say, how do you cut flower stems? I don't. Okay. The last time, uh, what about to fit a vase though? So here's the thing. The last time I, we, we got flowers at my house, me and my roommate, both obviously a man. Um, we got it for our housewarming party and uh, my, uh,

my roommate's fiance actually bought them. Because her mother's a florist. And I was just going to throw them in a vase with water. And she was like, you can't do that Thursday. They will die tomorrow. And so she cut them how they're supposed to be cut. But here's the thing. I was hanging out at the party.

And so I did not pay attention to what she did. So I don't know how to do that I think the most important thing is tell me in the comments if I'm wrong I'm sure you will question of the day question of the day Flowers before putting them in a vase I think you just have to cut them so they're kind of wet and more absorbent to the water But don't you have to cut them in an angle? Ah see this is I'll tell you what I do and everyone can be super ashamed Of me. I take a long

Serrated knife. Okay, I lay the flowers on a bread cutting board and I just saw through the first three inches That is what I do Pretty manly But that's what I do. I don't know if I should do that I don't really care to do anything else. But yeah, okay So should we say so yeah reply to that guy and just say something Nice, but yeah, look look Joe. Thank you so much. Thank you for commenting. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for liking And let us know what you think about these kind of solo episodes that we've been doing lately

a Lot of good feedback good from them people seem to like them So I also want to let people know that I'm interviewing Dennis Prager next week and it's going to be at nine o'clock at night, but it's only going to be for my local supporters. So Matt Fradd dot locals dot com. Go over there, join up and you can watch the whole interview over there. We'll see how it goes. I need to challenge him on his views on pornography.

So I plan on actually giving him my book, The Porn Myth in the middle of that interview and telling him to read it. I really liked Dennis Prager, by the way. Don't get me wrong. I'm not trying to be snarky. I just thought what he had to say about pornography was pretty bad. So we'll see. He'll get a chance to explain himself and maybe it'll go, maybe it'll be better. MattFrad.locals.com. All right. So let's do this. We're first going to take a look at this article from Reuters about Pope Francis. Now let me just say this, as I mentioned a moment ago, a couple of weeks ago I heard that Hulu, which I guess is under Disney or part of Disney, was going to do a documentary

in which Pope Francis sat down with some 20 year olds to talk about big topics like LGBTQ and pornography and feminism and things like that. I was nervous and I haven't seen it so I'm still a little nervous. I was nervous for two reasons. Number one, I think it's fair to say that when Pope Francis does off the cuff interviews, things can sometimes get extraordinarily confusing, extraordinarily quickly. So that was the first reason I was nervous. The second reason I was nervous is even if he did offer excellent answers, what are the

chances that Hulu would be willing to not edit them and maybe have the Pope come off like some woke social justice warrior? So I was really nervous about that. Now I saw that Michael Lofton just recently released a video, I think it was a couple of days ago, and it sounds like from what I heard of him that he thought it was a really good interview. And it would seem that way too from this. So we're going to read through this together. Pope Francis has praised the virtues of sex in a documentary released on Wednesday describing it as one of the beautiful things that God has given to the human person. The 86 year old Pontiff

made the comment in the Disney Plus production The Pope Answers which captures a meeting he had last year in Rome with ten people in their early 20s. Francis was quizzed by them on a variety of topics including LGBT rights, abortion, the porn industry, sex, and faith and sex abuse within the Catholic Church. Sex is, and here's what he said, and I love it, sex is one of the beautiful things that God has given to the human person. And then he says, to express yourself sexually is a richness. So anything that detracts from real sexual expression lessens you and depletes this richness. And he said that in reference to

masturbation. Here's why I love that the Pope said that. Unless you know what something is for, you won't know whether or not you're using it correctly. If I didn't know, let's say, that this coffee cup was a coffee cup, I might use it to break door handles off of doors when they're locked. And that would be a misuse of this cup. Of course, it's a little bit more difficult to talk about the proper use of artificial things. It makes a lot more sense with natural things. But once I know it's a coffee cup, I can then see that that was a misuse of the coffee cup to slam it into a door handle.

If we don't know what sex is for, we're not going to know when we're abusing it. So I think it's important that we point out what sex is and that it's sacred and beautiful and holy. If something isn't beautiful, you can't make it ugly. I don't know, I think that's right. I think that sounds right. Like if you came to my house and I took the trash can in the kitchen and dumped all of the contents on the floor, I would say, is this beautiful? And you would say, that's a very weird first encounter with Matt Fratt at his house.

And I was, but is it beautiful? And you say, well, no, it's not beautiful. You think, well, how could I make it ugly? It's already ugly. What if I kicked it? Would it be uglier? You're like, not really. It's just really, it's ugly. You can't make ugly things ugly. You can't make moderately things, like moderately attractive things really ugly, like me, but you can make really attractive things really ugly. Like you can make Lucifer ugly. You can make sacred things ugly because you take what's beautiful and you desecrate it and you pervert it. The first commandment in the Bible from God to humanity comes from Genesis chapter 1 verse 28. God says be fruitful and

multiply. That's the first commandment. Have sex, have babies. Sex is the most sacred thing that two human beings can do to each to do with each other, to each other, for each other. It's not watching the office on the couch after a hard day, you know, at work. It's not walking on the beach with each other, to each other, for each other. It's not watching the office on the couch after a hard day at work. It's not walking on the beach with each other. It's not going out to dinner. All of these things can be lovely things. Sex is that most beautiful thing. And the reason you can make it ugly is because it's beautiful. So I love that he points that out, that when we abuse sex, it is a poverty. it detracts from real sexual expression Right that is to say it's artificial. It's a counterfeit. I really like that

Okay Francis was also asked whether he knew what a non-binary person is and he replied affirmatively he repeated that LGBT Why don't we say Q anymore? Why aren't they saying Q? Do you know? It's hard to keep up with all the different words. It's harder than the mystic metaphysical jargon. Or why they don't do that anymore. Maybe it's like a shorthand because it's getting way too long. It's a bit ridiculous. It's a bit unwieldy. It's the LGBTQAIP silent number two. Yes, exactly. Pope Francis said, by the way,

if you're wondering why sometimes I say Francis and sometimes I say Francis, it's because I've been living in America too long and now I'm schizophrenic. But he said that non-binary, a non-binary person has to be accepted, welcomed by the Catholic Church. Amen, 100%.

And I would say, I think this is the right approach. Like when you are addressing somebody who thinks that the church is just judgmental of persons and hateful of persons, which may be these 20 something year olds thought, it's important to kind of remind them what most Catholics know, namely we're all sinners and the church exists for sinners, right? The church militant exists for sinners. All persons, says Pope Francis, are the children of God. All persons. God does not reject anybody. God is Father. Right, we can think of 1 Timothy chapter 2, 4, I believe, 1 Timothy 2, 4. You can double check me if you like. God desires all men to be saved and to come

to a knowledge of the truth, right? So he wants all to be saved. And then he says, I have no right to expel anyone from the church. I'd want some qualification on that because obviously Pope Francis being a Catholic would recognize the legitimacy and even necessity of excommunication, which is an act of love towards the sinner. It's a medicinal act by which you show the person that you're going down the wrong road and eternal hell is a real possibility for you. But I'm going to take this as charitably as I can. Okay.

And maybe you don't want to do that and you can let me know in the comments section below. But if I take this as charitably as I can, because again, it's just an off the cuff conversation, it sounds like he's saying like, no, like God welcomes all and so does the church. Now by that, Pope Francis doesn't mean therefore grave sin is okay. He just means that people who are experiencing delusions or obsessions or addictions or who engage in sinful behaviors are still Catholics and are still... I mean if we weren't we'd all be buggered. I'd be gone by now. So would Thursday, especially Thursday. On abortion, Francis said priests should be merciful towards women who have terminated a

pregnancy but said the practice remains unacceptable. I hate the phrase terminates a pregnancy. Now I don't think Pope Francis used that because it's not within quotes so I think that's Reuters. Terminated a pregnancy. No, you've paid someone to kill your innocent child That's what abortion is you pay a hitman to kill your innocent child and I'm gratified to hear that Pope Francis even used that language Again, I haven't seen it but somebody told me he used that language in the documentary where he likened abortion to hiring a hitman This is exactly what happens you pay somebody to kill an innocent human being. Or you just pay somebody to kill a human being. It would be the idea of a hitman.

All the worse when you are targeting an innocent person. And even worse than that, when you're having someone target your innocent child. But he's right. We have to be merciful to everybody because Christ commands that we show mercy. What are you making that face for? Sorry, I just Googled Pope Francis Hulu to see if I could find the exact wording of his Spanish from that. All right, good luck. But when you Google Pope Francis Hulu, the third link is our

video. Not this one. Yeah, but do you think it's because it keeps your history of your this is on Chrome and we normally use barry. So cool. Will we be who do we or no? No. Who lose its Hulu's trailer. It's only fair that Hulu should beat us. Wtns video on it. Right. And then us. Okay. Well let's get this right then. Here's what I would say. I think, look, by the way, if you're a woman who has had an abortion, if you're a man who's faulted at your post, and maybe even paid for your girlfriend or wife to have an abortion, what you've done is terrifically evil, grievously atrocious. But you are a beautiful man and a beautiful woman, creating the image and lives of God, and He loves you, and His mercy is infinite. And

when your sin, as grave as it is, goes up against His mercy, that's like Matt Fradd going up against a UFC fighter. It doesn't stand a chance. So I just want you to know you're welcome here, and I love you. And I think we Christians have to recognize that we've been raised in this pornified sewer of a culture which justifies fornication, which even celebrates abortion. All of the sitcoms, all of the movies, the bloody powers that be here in the United States calling it healthcare, demonizing anybody who would question the morality of abortion. This is the culture in which these people have been raised. And so we have to recognize that when we speak to people.

The other thing I would say is mercy is the off ramp for people. I found one of the direct quotes from CNN's article. All right, go, go. Any embryology book shows us that a month after conception, the DNA is aligned and all the organs are drawn and it is therefore not just a bunch of cells put together, but a systemized human life. So the question that should be submitted when talking about the morality of this. When talking about the morality of the of this is, is it valid to eliminate a human life to solve a problem? Right.

He said, the answer is definitely no. A woman who has had an abortion cannot be left alone. We should stay with her. Yeah. Francis says we should stay by her side, but we should call a spade a spade. Staying by her side is one thing, but justifying the act is something else. Right. And that's what is stated here as well. And so I think, yeah, that's really important that we walk with people, we journey with them. But again, mercy only makes sense if you're a sinner. Like the world would all agree, mercy is a great thing, but in order to receive it,

you have to suck first. Like you have to actually sin. No one's offering mercy to people who don't sin because people who don't sin don't need mercy. And so mercy is the off-ramp. I mean, put yourself in the shoes of this person who has paid somebody to kill their child. If you've done something like that, it seems to me you've got two options. One, you double down and

you just, you know, come alongside those who want to celebrate this evil that you've committed because it's way too difficult to look at the reality of what you've done. That seems way easier, doesn't it? The other alternative is you admit what you've done and that is terribly awful to admit that I had this beautiful child and I paid someone to kill it. That is atrocious. In order to accept that second option, you need to know that mercy is available to you and it is available to you.

So let me just say this, if you're a woman who's had an abortion, God loves you and he wants to forgive you and that forgiveness is available to you. And we're going to be talking about confession later on the show. And so maybe stick around for that. Can we, yeah, we read some of the quotes from the CNA article. Yeah, if you can do it quick, the more full ones. Uh, there should be a distinction between the richness of social media and the morality. Of what you do.

The morality of social media depends on morality of what you do. The morality of social media depends on what you use it for, the Pope says. Quote, pornography diminishes. It does not help you grow. Those who use pornography are diminished in human terms. Exactly. I know by human we include the spiritual, but even if you forget about the spiritual, like you're becoming a soft person. You're becoming a weaker person, a less interesting person, kind of like a rat clicking at a lever to get a pellet. I mean, this is what porn does to people. It guts them from the inside out.

Wow. Yeah, sorry. So everybody should read the Reuters article, but you should definitely go read that link with you in the description? That's awesome. The CNA article has some of the more full quotes. That's beautiful. By an actual Catholic place. So they're not, you know.

Yeah. All right. Here is something else. You said he said on abortion, priest should be merciful towards women who've terminated a pregnancy. Again, terminated pregnancy doesn't seem to be Francis's words. Thank goodness. But said the practice remains unacceptable. Yes. He says, it's good to call things by their name. Could not agree more with you. Holy father. It is one thing to accompany the person who has had an abortion, quite another to justify the act. This is such a

great point because whenever we seek to justify an evil, have you noticed that we change the language around that thing? Think of the different sexually depraved acts that are now considered acceptable in today's society, which is to say pretty much all of them. We say, oh, he cheated on his wife. No, no, he didn't. No, because that implies that there's some inconsequential game taking place. Now, what he did was he committed adultery and he'll have to stand before God in judgment. Right. For that adultery, not cheating. Well, people say, Oh, you know, like he was sleeping around, she was sleeping

around. No, no, they were fornicating. Bring back that word. I remember I had a conversation with this teenager who loved Jesus and was converting fully to Christianity at the time, and she said, where in the Bible does it say that you can't have sex before marriage? And I think she asked that because she didn't know what the word fornication means, and she didn't know what the word fornication means because we stopped using it.

It's not gay love, it's sodomy. I wouldn't even say masturbation. I think self-abuse would be a more appropriate term. Because what does the culture now want to call masturbation? It wants to call it self-love. It's like, it's not a loving act to abuse yourself. This is what happens in masturbation. We could go on and on. It's not healthcare. We have to use the right words. Even if it offends people, then what they're being offended by is the truth. The truth is sometimes offensive to those who are always offensive to those who don't want to convert to it, don't want to accept it. And I know that because I'm a wretched sinner

and I know that experience. Okay, yeah. So I think that's good. I want to know what you thought of the Hulu documentary. If you watched it, let us know I think that's good. I want to know what you thought of the Hulu documentary if you watched it. Let us know in the comments section below. Alright, so now I think we want to take a look at something that Jordan Peterson recently said. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I need to put in my little earphone for this. Yeah, and I am gonna add a link to the description of this video. I'd like to think I'd like to think that we're getting better at this Thursday. We are getting more and more.

What do you say? Just, you know, really? It's more and more professional. You guys are going to be watching one day and like, wow, it's like daily wire quality. That may not need some new cameras for that and about eight more people work. All right, so let's let's. So, OK, here it is. They can they see this? They can.

Woke religion versus the Roman Catholic confession. We're going to start a couple of minutes in because this is where Jordan Peterson starts talking about Catholic Confession. I was going to like just a second. OK, you can. I'm going to need to pick it up. Go for it. All right. So we're playing with the proposition that there are clearly pathological forms of belief

or, and in a deep level, pathological forms of religion. Okay. So we'll start with that premise. And then the counter premise is that there is something that's the opposite of that. And you started to flesh that out in one dimension, which is that if it's a genuine religion, in quotes, then one of the things it offers is an actual pathway to atonement.

Which means that you have some means of dealing with your sinful inadequacy that doesn't crush you. Okay, so let me tell you something that Carl Jung said about the Catholics. This is very cool. He said he really regarded the Catholic confession as a form of, what would you say?

God's mercy manifested in the world, symbolically speaking. And here's why. Okay, you're gonna do Stu- The audit, oh yeah, there we go. I pause that for a second. Yeah, I mean, this is this is true, isn't it? I mean, even for those who would deny the moral law, the objective moral law, people still engage in things that they consider shameful, even if they don't think that those things should be considered shameful objectively. So all of us have this experience of sin. Yeah.

But you're definitely being guilty in relationship to your own conscience. And then you have to deal with the fact that you're not who you should be. And that can crush you. Certainly that crushes people who are depressed. It crushes people who are anxious and it definitely crushes people who have post- The music keeps going in and out the audio, I don't know if that's going out. Alright, so now there's an existential problem. Oh, I'm sorry. You've got to stumble forward with your inadequacy. Now, if you're Catholic, you can go to the church

and you can say once a week or however often you want to, here's a bunch of ways I'm really stupid. And they've hurt me. Yes, confession is so beautiful. I know we have a lot of Protestant viewers and I love you and you're so welcome to be here. We had a beautiful comment the other day too by an atheist who came across our video on transgenderism and subscribed and said she's

loving what she's seeing. So everyone's welcome here. Just like Pope Francis said, you're welcome in the church and you're welcome here on this YouTube channel. But I mean, gosh, we've all had that experience, haven't we? Where we just did something that we are so deeply ashamed about. Something that we feel that if our best friends knew they might abandon us like that kind of wretchedness God knows I've been there and what are you gonna do with that now? I've never been a Protestant and I have great respect for faithful Protestants But I was talking to my mate Jimmy Akin who was a Baptist at one point and he said becoming a Catholic and going to confession

Was one of the greatest blessings because as a Baptist he would say I would have to like repent of my sin and then do kind of like mental gymnastics until I felt God's mercy and that I was forgiven. There's something so objective in the sacrament of confession because I physically kneel before another human being right who represents Christ And I don't hide. I mean, most of the time when you meet people, you're putting your best self forward. That's why confession is so awkward. Or it can be. You know, like when you meet someone,

usually what you're meeting isn't them. You're meeting a very excellent, very intricate fig leaf. You know, things that have kind of got them through life, things that the world has applauded. I think real friendship, real intimacy begins when someone allows you behind the fig leaf to see that thing that they feel ashamed of, you know. But that is true. You meet someone the first time, you put your best self forward, you smile, you hope your breath doesn't stink,

you try not to be awkward and creepy. Like Thursday when he met Brett Cooper, that hasn't happened. I haven't met Brett Cooper. When that happens, for example. I'm just joking, she'll be the one who's awkward. She will, she'll sidle up to you and be like, I love pints with a quietness.

I don't know. You can respond, I feel like I can't just throw that at you. Okay, hold on, let's break this down real quick. Matt, Matt wants me to ask Brett Cooper out, but let's, let's all take guesses in the live chat as to whether or not I went on the Nashville trip. Oh, the answer was no. All right. I'll take you there. I'll take you there. She's a tall woman though. You're going to have to have to wear some, uh, some high heels. Listen, uh, but it's true.

Like you meet someone, you really want to impress them. What's awkward about confession is you kneel down before someone that you may know or may not know and just say all the worst things about you. As one spiritual father once said to me, go to war on your ego. And we all know the difference as Catholics, when you go to confession, you try to like hide your sins or even that's how wicked we are. We try to put lipstick on a pig like the language we use, like how harshly we accuse ourselves, we're even unwilling to do it there.

But when you do it right, as many Catholics do, you just kneel down and you just say it like here it is. And to hear the words of absolution. That's what Jimmy Akin was getting at. It's like, I just to know I'm this objective mirror, this objective indicator, like you've been forgiven. Doesn't actually matter how you feel. It's done. It's taken care of. Love it. I do love being Catholic. All right, keep going. ... them out completely. And in principle, I'm trying to rectify those faults, right? First, by their admission and second, by the determination not to propel them forward. And then the priest says, okay, as far as God's concerned, that's good enough.

And you have to go do these rituals of atonement and the slates wipe clean for the week. And you're gonna go out and be a fool again, but you get started again. So you're proposing that one out and be a fool again, but you get started. I got a couple of things to say. This proposing that one of the whole we can wrap up here. I think that's pretty much what he has to say. But yeah, obviously one of the requirements for confession is that we have sorrow for

our sin. But this is how merciful God and the church are. Even if you're only sorry because you're afraid of hell in the sacrament of confession, like that's enough You just have to confess very simply to the best of your memory Number and kind like he here's what I did. He is about how many times I did it or I did it This this one thing is very evil. I did it once That's all you got to do and and when he talks about these acts of atonement What's interesting is the church teaches that

when the priest absolves you of those sins, it's not as if you then have to do the penance for the confession to be valid. That's not what the church teaches. Once the priest forgives you, you've been absolved from your sins. Then as a priest, he gives you those penances, which you're obliged to do. If you were to say, refuse to do them, then that would be committing another sin. But you know what I mean? Like the sin that you've confessed has been forgiven. So being a Catholic is fantastic.

Do you remember your first confession Thursday or at least maybe not your first confession, but the one where it really meant something to you? I remember my first, yeah. Yeah, I remember my first. I was 13. It was when I converted yeah. What was that like? Very nerve-racking um and then it was you know it was uh it was kind of like getting a shot the first time honestly it's really terrifying the first time while you're

saying all the sins because it's it's it's not normalized when you're a convert, you know, like I think kids, it's kind of, they oftentimes they grow up in the same parish. So the first time they go to confession, it's like, a lot of times it's a priest that they've known for a long time, somebody they trust and they've known him since probably since they can like they can't probably can't remember not knowing this guy and having a trust in him and then they are also you know hopefully their parents go often and and so it's it's somewhat easy to just like confess because it feels like it's what you do. Yeah like my kids have been doing it ever since they were young. Yeah so it's just but they actually enjoy doing it, which is kind of weird. Very

good people. But as a, as a convert, I found it really hard. I mean, cause even though I really, I really do like, I like, I liked my priest. I think he was a great pastor. Father Brian Zdinski is a very holy man and he's a very holy priest, but it was just so weird because you never sit down and have to tell another human being All of the bad things you've done and and and when it's conversion when you're converting your first confession is supposed to be a general Confession, right? So you're supposed to say All of the things as you can remember your entire life. Yeah. And so, you know, it was very it was To be honest, it was really scary. How'd you feel as a as a as a 13 year old?

Was it still troubling when you left or was there a sense of relief? There was a there was a big sense of relief But but doing it for the first time as a 13 year old and like saying everything wrong I could ever remember doing first time as a 13 year old and like saying everything wrong I could ever remember doing. Yeah. What a beautiful thing. Like you think our Lord's first words in Genesis to Adam, well maybe not the first words, I forget, but where, no, where are you? That was the first words I'm pretty sure from God to Adam. Like where are you? Uh, and it's not as if God was asking for a lesson in geography or something like that. He knew where Adam was, but he wanted Adam to know where Adam was. And so he essentially was asking,

why are you hiding? Stop hiding. And in confession, you stop hiding. You come out and rather than trying to endear yourself for another person, you just lay it all out there. So I wanted to share with people though, some of these- The comments?

Yeah, now I don't know if you can throw them up on my screen, but I can look at them. I can't. I can look at them. I have the ones and I have them organized by the username. So if you just tell me which username you want. All right. So let's look at orange man bad. So I want to look at four comments that were under this video that I thought were really especially good. Let me know when it's up. It's up. He says I joined

the Catholic Church last year and I felt immediately at home. It filled my soul with hope and good news. I feel I finally met Jesus. 2000 years of tradition and history has distilled absolute beauty. Look at that. 232 views. Isn't that amazing? Next one from Jacob Sonati. He says, I left Protestantism and came home to the Catholic Church in 2021. Were you able to find that? Yeah, I got it. Yeah. left Protestantism and came home to the Catholic Church in 2021. We able to find that? Yeah, I got it. Yeah.

I thank God for his church and all seven sacraments that he gives us with his grace through the sacrament of reconciliation. So beautiful. It always overwhelms me when I leave the confessional. God's divine mercy is infinite. Amen. Two more here. This comes from Sandra Elder. She says, as a Catholic, I can attest to both the emotional healing and spiritual strengthening that comes from frequent confession. It not only helps you feel at peace with God and with yourself, but helps you grow in virtue so you find you're able to resist those sins easier. Amen. That's right

You're not just forgiven of the sins in confession. You're given the grace to help you stop Then it says read more and I forgot to click that so we can stop there this one comes from LRR I am a revert Catholic never before I felt so much love for God and his church I feel really loved and I want to be good, more a saint with the grace of God to be at mass in heaven on earth, to be loved by God is sanity. To want to please God is difficult, but as a little child we learn to trust God and let him take charge. Aura et labora, viva Christo rei.

Prayer and work, long live Christ the King. That is beautiful. I have so much hope for humanity. I think God is really raising up saints today. And there's a lot to be excited about. All right, so now what are we doing? We are looking at an unsettling moment. All right, so I've heard about this, but I haven't, I haven't, okay, so let's- So the Dalai Lama, we talked about who he is, but I haven't, I haven't. Okay.

So the Dalai Lama, we talked about who he is first. So the Dalai Lama is the religious leader, the top of the top of the specific wing of Buddhism. So this man has been the Dalai Lama since 1940. He was born in 1935. And the previous Dalai Lama died in 1933. He's the 14th. And so the way they pick it is they're like all supposed to be the same the reincarnation of the same dude.

Right. And so, so when one dies, there's like a long period where they find the child who was born that is the reincarnation of the guy. Yep. And yeah. I, I went through a phase when I was like an atheist and then I was done, I was ever an atheist,

but I was kind of agnostic with atheist leanings, but I really wanted more out of life, more than I knew atheism could give me. And so I started to be open to the spiritual side of life. And so I started listening to like new age tapes and meditation and buying books on the Dalai Lama and reading his wisdom. And I remember like really enjoying it,

whether I should or I shouldn't have, isn't the point. The point is that that I did Let's see what happens because again, I'll eat in the chat also just made a good point if you are watching with kids Yeah, if you're watching with kids don't Yeah, that's it says unsettling moment Dalai Lama asks boy to suck his tongue So if that didn't give it away, all right, let me put this up to my ear and then you go for it. Yeah So if that didn't give it away. All right, let me put this up to my ear and then you go for it. Yeah The Dalai Lama has apologized after an unsettling video appeared on social media in which

He kissed a young Indian boy on the lips before asking him to suck his tongue Okay, so he looks all joyful he holds the boys face's face and briefly kiss them, the pair, press their foreheads together. Uh huh, okay. Just as the boy goes to pull away, the Dalai Lama instructs him, and suck my tongue. Oh my gosh. Prompting him to slowly inch forward, and then what did it say? Did he do it? God have mercy. No, the boy the boy pulled away Something was the Dalai Lama sprang to his defense claiming the leader was simply joking around But the uncomfortable video was sparked widespread outrage. Yes, rightly so across social media Okay, still not letting him go like he's still holding on to the kid We're gonna try to go the Dalai Lama impart impart some wisdom is he I can't even see him speaking

Is he speaking maybe the boy is speaking to him to look to those good human beings to create peace and happiness and I'm not cool And you got dudes in masks behind him. There's still masking. Can you believe that? Yeah, but not only is the Dalai Lama not masking. He's asking you to suck his tongue my gosh All right. Well a couple of thoughts on this and you know, maybe I'm sure number one, I'm sure that's gross. I'm sure everybody on the internet has already kind of given their two cents and mine might not be any good, but a couple of thoughts would be, uh, if I was that boy's father and I knew what was going on, I think

I would have jumped the fence and punched him in his bald head. I know that's not very Buddhist and it's probably, I don't know. Is it very Christian of me? Maybe not But I would I don't know. I just would have done anyway, I was still at Milstone his bald face Anyone ever try to do anything like that with my child. I would like hurt them seriously Milstone, what are you saying? Milstone? Milstone. Yeah. Yeah Milstone. So I guess two thoughts Let me as hard as it is. Let me get, see if I can do it like a charitable take. And by charitable, what I mean is, what's the best case scenario?

And then what I think is the actual scenario. Best case scenario is he's just like a weird old dude. And maybe he's going loopy and... He's 87. He's 87. And maybe you could say well I mean the fact he's doing this so publicly shows that there's nothing deviant about it because usually deviant acts are done behind closed doors. The other way to look at this and this is the way I would look at it is if you're willing to do

this in public what are you willing to do behind closed doors? This is a pedophilic act and it's disgusting. And of course, I'm sure everybody's saying this, but could you imagine if Pope Francis did that? He should be condemned and I would be the first one to do it. But I wonder what mainstream media is doing about this. I'm not going to accuse mainstream media of not condemning it because I haven't actually seen it.

But I would say that they're falling over themselves to try to interpret this. The Catholic priest or bishop did this because, of course, the church has always slandered people say, well, if you are a celibate, you know, therefore there's something wrong with you. But my understanding is a Dalai Lama celibate. But I'm sure you're not seeing the kind of condemnation. Let me know below if you're seeing this. Like are we seeing full out condemnation of this or not?

Any final thoughts on that? Yeah, that's weird, dude. It's weird. Don't be weird. All right. So I want to if unless you have any. I mean, I just pulled up the live chat for you to see it. So what are people saying?

That's OK. A lot of people lose their filter in old age. I know I do, but I have not yet asked anybody to suck my tongue. Rat prophet, just hoping, hopping in now, would you say the mandatory confession negatively affected you would have been better if it was optional No, not at all No, I think because it depends on how you phrase it like if I look at my relationship We're getting back to confession. So we're moving away from the weird Dalai Lama thing to confession I'm gonna forget that happened. You just forget that happened. Just scrub your eyeballs

Just press a bunch of hand sanitizer into your hand and then rub it into your eye sockets Please don't do that That was do not do that. That was it for legal reasons. We can recommend that please run it by your doctor before not doing that No, I don't think so like, you know, I think of my wife right and If you think of let's say the Eucharist as the most intimate bond that you have with our Lord, which of course it is. You could equate that with the sexual act.

Before I give myself to my wife, before I receive her, I want to know that I haven't deeply offended her. If I have done something wrong that's offended her, I want to make up with her. I want to say, I'm so sorry. I don't want to put it off and then come together bodily. You see what I mean? You see how that would kind of hinder that coming together? So if we can understand that in the kind of like natural relationship realm, it's kind of like that with our Lord. Like if we've offended our Lord before we come together with him, we need to confess. And so when I take my kids to confession, it's never actually like a scary thing. I mean, I just told you, my kids love going to confession. And here at Franciscan University, there's confession all of the time. So what we'll

do is we'll go to confession, and the priests are always so lovely and kind and good and give them a penance and we pray. And I go take him out for cake or ice cream. And I say, isn't that beautiful? What a wonderful thing. How good is our Lord that he wants to forgive us? So I suppose it also kind of, it's all about how you kind of frame it as well. Dude, as if we've got a thousand people watching. Holy cow. That's nuts. We didn't even have that with Laura Horn. Wow. It's the Dalai Lama. It's yeah, that's what it is for both your and I's humility. It's the fact that we're doing the Dolly law. It's Thursday's red hat. It's my my climbing hat.

Well, look, a couple of things. What I want to do now as we wrap up is I want to look at an article from the Summa Theologiae from Thomas Aquinas on whether the church should excommunicate anyone. And the reason I want to read through that is because of what we mentioned earlier, where Pope Francis said, you know, that the pope, you know, I forget the exact wording was, but it was something to the effect of the Pope has no right to kick anybody out of the church. And what I said was, okay, I want to take this in a charitable frame. I don't think he's denying the reality of excommunication. But I, for those of you who are kind of confused about excommunication, we're going to look at that together. It's, I wouldn't even show the text because it's, if you zoom in it's so no

Yeah, I'll slack it to you and you can decide but but while we're pulling this up I want to let people know that next week. I'm gonna be interviewing Dennis Prager Yeah, and That's gonna be a locals only stream You want to just want to do a little pitch right now for locals if you go over to map frat dot locals calm and become an annual subscriber, we will send you a free pints with Aquinas beer stein. We just ask that you pay for shipping because these things are hefty. Um, we at the end of every month, right to our annual supporters and tell them

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Like a lot of people. And if you actually, if you're watching on YouTube right now and you like locals, let us know below in the comments section if you do like it and why you like it. Maybe you don't, you can say that as well. Of course, I won't block you. I promise. Um, but a lot of people are saying like, this is how social media was meant to be. Why are you laughing?

But now he said something funny, oh what'd you say that people from Brett Cooper show are filtering in to see your future To see her future boyfriend. I Love that it's gone from like making you feel uncomfortable to just a bit It's just a bit at this point. And if she found out about it, I would have to like talk to her about it. Yeah, to talk to her about like what how many kids she wants to have and where she wants to raise them. MattFrad.locals.com. We'll put a link in the description below. Thank you for supporting us. We really appreciate it. I'm pretty sure that soon YouTube will ban us. Maybe I'm wrong, right? Maybe I'm just like a conspiracy theorist, but given all the stuff we've been talking about I wouldn't be surprised

Which is why we're over on map frat dot locals calm and we're also posting all of these videos over on rumble Which you can subscribe to over there So I'm looking at article 2 whether the church should ex communicate anyone let's take a look at this now I've said it before Thomas Aquinas. It's like a pre-packaged debate, that's what we're looking at. What I want to do is look at the said contra and the respondio. So the said contra, that's Latin for on the contrary. He's going to appeal to tradition or scripture, this is what he always does, to show what the church teaches.

The respondio is where it says, I answer that, and that's when he gives his opinion on whether the church should be able to Excommunicate anyone so what's let's look at those two first and then we'll look at three arguments Against why the church should act communicate anybody and then see Aquinas responses. So should the church excommunicate anyone? Well Aquinas says that the Apostle whenever he says the Apostle he means st Paul. In 1 Corinthians 5, 5, ordered a man to be excommunicated. So if you want to say the church shouldn't excommunicate anybody that's wrong to do that, then your argument isn't with the Catholic Church. It's not with me.

It's not with Thomas Aquinas. It's with Saint Paul. And that is not a position that Christians ought to be in. He says, further, it is written in Matthew 18 17 about the man who refuses to hear the church, right? Let him be to thee as the heathen or publican. This comes from the words of our blessed Lord. And then Aquinas says, but heathens are outside the church. Therefore they also who refuse to hear the church should be banished from the church by excommunication." Right, here's Aquinas' main response. He says, the judgment of the church should be conformed

to the judgment of God. Now, God punishes the sinners in many ways. And you might think, well, why does he do that? Aquinas says in order to draw him to good, either by chastising him with stripes or by leaving him to himself so that being deprived of those helps whereby he has kept out of evil, he may acknowledge his weakness and humbly return to God, whom he had abandoned in his pride. That's why earlier I said that excommunication is this medicinal act, right? That it's written in the letter of Hebrews, you know, who of us didn't have a father that disciplined us? Like, we need discipline. And if God's disciplining you, it's

because he's treating you as sons. If he's not disciplining you, that means you're illegitimate. You don't want to be illegitimate. So the reason God punishes is to draw us back to himself. He says Aquinas continues, in both these respects, the church, by passing sentence on excommunication, imitates the judgment of God. For by severing a man from the communion of the faithful that he may blush with shame, she imitates the judgment whereby God chastises man with stripes and by depriving him of prayers and other spiritual things, she imitates the judgment of God in leaving man to himself in order that by humility he may learn to know himself and return to God." And so this is, I think, a really good argument as to why the church needs to be

employing this far more regularly than she currently is, especially with public sinners like Joe Biden, who is endorsing child mutilation through what he would call, you know, what trans affirming healthcare or some ridiculousness like that. By calling abortion the murder of innocent human beings, like that, by calling abortion the murder of innocent human beings like healthcare, women's healthcare, like this is abominable and he should be, in my opinion, is that he should be excommunicated because we want to draw him back to God, right? Not because we want to damn him to hell. That's not what we mean. That's certainly what we should mean as Catholics when we say this person should be excommunicated. What we mean is, look, for his own good, he needs to be excommunicated so that God can draw him back to himself, so that he can be deprived of these goods such as Holy Eucharist,

et cetera. The other reason is it causes tremendous scandal to the faithful. When you watch someone advocate for grave evils and they're not being disciplined, what message does that give to the faithful? So if you are, I know we have bishops who watch the show. I was so humbled to have one particular bishop. I won't say his name. Paul Mears cited a very large conference recently and said he watches pints and he was grateful for it. And that I was so humbled by that. But yeah, we need to, we need out of love. We need to be excommunicating people. All right, let's look at the three

arguments for why we shouldn't excommunicate people and let's have Thomas Aquinas destroy them. We'll go through these one at a time. Number one, it would seem that the church ought not to excommunicate anyone because excommunication is a kind of curse and we are forbidden to curse. Therefore, the church should not excommunicate. Do you see how even in his objections he writes syllogistically? We shouldn't excommunicate anyone because excommunication is a curse. We're not allowed to curse. Therefore, we can't excommunicate. I mean, that's logically airtight. Let's see what Aquinas' response is. He says, a curse may be pronounced in two ways. First, so that the intention of the one who curses is fixed on the evil which he invokes or pronounces,

and cursing in this sense is altogether forbidden. Secondly, so that the evil which a man invokes in cursing is intended for the good of the one who is cursed. And thus cursing is something lawful and salutary. Thus a physician alright so here we go right I talked about excommunication being medicinal. Here's Aquinas a physician makes a sick man undergo pain by cutting him for instance in order to deliver him from his sickness. I've had to undergo major surgery in my life. My wife has had to do that multiple times. The reason for the pain that's inflicted

by the physician in those instances isn't to cause us detriment. It's not to punish us so that we will be in pain in the end. It's so that we can be well. This is the point of excommunication. Here's the second objection that someone might have. Further, the church militant should imitate the church triumphant. Now we read in the epistle of Jude, verse 9, that when Michael the archangel, disputing with the devil, contended about the body of Moses, he durst not bring against him the judgment of railing speech but said the Lord command thee therefore the church militant ought not to judge any man by cursing or excommunicating him

Aquinas responds with one sentence He says the devil cannot be brought to repentance where for the pain of excommunication cannot do him any good All right, so the church isn't going to excommunicate people To whom excommunication wouldn't do any good such as the, so the church isn't going to excommunicate people to whom excommunication wouldn't do any good, such as the demons who are damned for all eternity. But it can do that for souls that can repent. The third objection, further, no man should be given into the hands of his enemies unless there be no hope for him. Now by excommunication a man is given into the hands of Satan as is clear from 1st Corinthians 5.5. Since then we should

never give up hope about anyone in this life. The church should not excommunicate anyone. So the argument there seems to be pretty straightforward. When you excommunicate someone you're giving them to Satan and you shouldn't be doing that. Therefore you shouldn't be excommunicating anybody. And Aquinas says from the very fact that a man is deprived of the prayers of the church, he incurs a triple loss corresponding to the three things which a man acquires through the church's prayers. For they bring an increase of grace to those who have it or merit grace for those who have

it not. And in this respect, the master of the sentences says the grace of God is taken away by excommunication. They also prove a safeguard of virtue. And in this respect, he says that protection is taken away, not that the excommunicated person is withdrawn altogether from God's providence. Right, so just real quick, to excommunicate somebody is not to damn them to hell. So if the church excommunicates Joe Biden and then Joe Biden dies,

the fact that he died excommunicated is not the same thing as to say the church has damned him to hell. Why? Because Joe Biden could repent in a way that was only known to God. So it's not a judgment on the eternal soul of an individual who's been excommunicated. It's not the same thing, right? He's excluded from that protection with which he watches over the children of the church in a more special way. Moreover, they are useful as

a defense against the enemy. And in in this respect he says that the devil receives greater power of assaulting the excommunicated person both spiritually and corporally. Hence in the early church when men had to be enticed to the faith by means of outward signs thus the gift of the Holy Ghost was shown openly by a visible sign, so too excommunication was evidenced by a person being troubled in his body by the devil. Nor is it unreasonable that one for whom there is still hope be given over to the enemy, for he is surrendered not unto damnation, but unto

correction, since the church has the power to rescue him from the hands of the enemy whenever he is willing. So it's a disciplinary action. It's a medicinal action. It's not a damning action. So just to kind of sum that up again, I really like that. I mean, if you want to say the church should next communicate, you have to say Paul was wrong in doing it.

And then you all have to have to take issue with Christ in Matthew 18, 17, who says, you know, if someone refuses to listen to the church, let him be to thee as the heathen or publican. I do think that sometimes we remember stories of Christ from our childhood that may or may not be grounded in sacred scripture. And then maybe we're inspired by the Holy Spirit to pick up the New Testament. And if you're like me, like I've been shocked at how violent Christ's words are, how harsh they can be. Certainly Christ is always merciful to sinners, but to those who are hypocrites and refuse to acknowledge their sin and those who make it more difficult for sinners

to repent. Whitewash tombs anybody? Brood of vipers? Not a good place to be in. Let us know below in the comment section what you think about excommunication. Do you think that the church is employing this as much as she should or is? Maybe you disagree with my take and let me know below. Thank you so much for watching. Before you go, do us a favour and like and subscribe to help grow this channel. God bless you and have a wonderful day. Thanks so much.