Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 30 | The Tragedy of the Catholic Sex Abuse Scandal

Episode Date: August 21, 2018

A grand jury report released last week reveals decades-long abuse in several Pennsylvania dioceses. I talk to my favorite Catholic, Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire, to hear his perspective on the travesty. I then dig a bit deeper into my analysis of the scandal. Then, in other religious news, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints no longer wants to be referred to as "Mormons." Copyright CRTV. All rights reserved.

Hey guys, it's Ali. Welcome to Relatable. I'm in this new space. That is not my normal space. If you're watching on CRTV.com, I'm having some work done on the room where I usually record this podcast. So we're in a new area. If you're new to Relatable, this is a podcast where we approach culture and politics from a Christian conservative perspective. Today we are going to talk about the sex scandal in the Catholic Church. And I wanted to get a Catholic's perspective on this, all of you know, I am very much a Protestant. So I am interviewing my favorite Catholic Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire. To watch this episode, you should go to CRTV.com slash Alley and subscribe using promo

code Alley 20 or you can stay right here and just listen to me. So first, I am going to summarize some of the details of this scandal for those of you who don't know about it. So last week, a jury report was released of a years-long investigation of Catholic Diocese. in Pennsylvania. The report says that more than a thousand children have been abused by 300 Catholic priests over the past 70 years. Unfortunately, this is not the first or the only scandal we've seen in the church. If you have seen the movie Spotlight with my favorite girl, Rachel McAdams, then you know about the abuse that was uncovered in Boston by journalists at the Boston Globe.

They found that church leaders in the archdiocese of Boston were guilty of perpetrating and then covering up abuse of minors in the church. And this was just one of the many investigations into the Catholic Diocese around the world. Australia, Ireland, Argentina, Canada, they all kind of had the same stuff, which really revealed a horrific pattern of abuse and especially pedophilia. This abuse started getting increasing publicity in the 80s, 90s, and 2000s. Adults started coming forward saying that they had been abused by priests and church leaders for decades of their life.

According to USA today, the majority of these victims in the church were between ages 11 and 14 years old. Some victims have been as young as 3 years old. So awful. Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict, both condemned all of these acts as evil. The Holy See, which is the governing body of the Catholic Church in between 2001 and 2010, looked into sex abuse allegations of 3,000 priests going back 50 years. So this is, I think it's safe to say, without a doubt, a widespread, an institutional, and a devastating problem within the Catholic Church.

And this particular case that we just heard about in Pennsylvania is, according to the Pennsylvania Attorney General, the biggest investigation into the Catholic Church by the government. A thousand kids, 300 predator priests, 70 years. This is according to a jury report released last week that's been in the works for two years now, reportedly. The details of this investigation, absolutely horrific. If you have kids with you listening, I would recommend stopping now and listening to this later or putting headphones in. Kids who were groomed by priests in the Catholic Church for abuse were given crucifixes to wear so that other priests would know that these kids were ready to be sexually abused. Boys and girls, teens and children

were raped. One priest forced a boy to perform oral sex. on him then washed his mouth out with holy water. Boys were forced to strip naked and then pose hanging on a cross while priest took pictures. They distributed these pictures to others at the church. Priest admitted to sadomasochistic sexual behavior with boys, a seven-year-old girl in the hospital recovering after getting her tonsils removed was raped by a priest. And like I said, this abuse has apparently been going on in Pennsylvania specifically for seven decades. I mean, an 83-year-old man who alleges abuse says that he is unable to show any

affection to his wife or his family because of that abuse. A woman who claims abuse says that it started when she was only 18 months old. 18 months old. There are other quotes from adults who were victimized when they were children that I can't even read. I don't even, I think it's even too far to say in this podcast. There are thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people walking around today who have been sexually abused, groomed, raped by people in the Catholic Church, and they are haunted. They are irreparably ruined, save for the redemption and healing of Jesus Christ. There is no telling how many people these victims have abused themselves, since we know that hurt people, typically hurt people as a way to deal with their trauma. The Vatican releases

statement after the report was released last week saying, I acknowledge once more the suffering endured by many minors due to sexual abuse, the abuse of power and the abuse of conscience perpetrated by a significant number of clerics and consecrated persons. Looking back to the past, no effort to beg pardon and to seek to repair the harm will ever be sufficient. Looking ahead to the future, no effort must be spared to create a culture able to prevent such situations from happening, but also to prevent the possibility of their being covered up and perpetuated. The Pope released a letter yesterday to the church calling for penance and for sorrow and restoration, which I think is very good. I agree with all of those statements. But you have to wonder if this

is truly going to be a turning point for the Catholic Church, and you have to hope that it is. I think the only way for there to be true change is obviously through the power of Christ via the Holy Spirit, but I think the question has to be asked why. Why is this so prevalent in the Catholic Church? Why is this kind of institutional abuse so rampant? Yes, sin, but sin exists everywhere. Not in every institution and every holy institution. Is it like this? Where someone is guilty of this kind of pervasive atrocity. I've seen a lot of Catholics understandably on the defense after this. I totally get that. I would be really defensive too.

But I don't see enough people asking why this is so rampant in the Catholic Church versus other churches. And look, Protestants, we have our issues. The former president of the Southern Baptist Convention was found guilty of covering up a rape allegation earlier this year, for example. But if I were Catholic, I would be wondering why this kind of particular evil has happened universally in the Catholic Church and for so long. So this is the question that I am going to discuss with Michael Nulls.

Michael, thank you so much for joining me. Thanks for having me. Yes, you are my favorite Catholic. I always say that. I think I've probably said that on this podcast before. I have a lot of Catholic listeners who also follow you and really like you. So I'm excited to talk to you. Thank you.

I always wonder if this is damning with faint praise, though. Am I your only Catholic friend? Because I can be your favorite Catholic, your least favorite. You're my token. So when I say all of these bad things about Catholics, I can be like, oh, but I'm actually, I'm friends with Michael Knowles. So it makes it better. No, you and Liz Wheeler in Matt Walsh, I just kind of put you all on a shelf and say,

no, these are my Catholic friends. So it's fine that I'm saying all this stuff. But really, I wish it was under better circumstances that we were talking. So I want to get your perspective about this Catholic sex scandal. I know that you're probably devastated as I am, as every Catholic that I've spoken to is. So can you tell me kind of your first reaction upon reading this? this investigation? Well, I'm not surprised by it.

And this is an aspect of the whole awful, this whole tragedy that people seem to miss is we've known that this happened. We've known this since the early 2000s. This investigation in Pennsylvania was really important because it cataloged cases from 1947 all the way up to the present. But it is worth pointing out that

the vast majority, virtually all of them, took place in the 19, 60s, 70s, and 80s. So if there is possible, if it's possible for there to be a silver lining in all of this, it's that most of these priests are already dead and many of them have been dead for decades. Unfortunately, the flip side of that is because this mostly happened a very long time ago, the priests who are not dead will probably not be prosecuted because of statutes of limitations. Right. The most jarring aspect of this, we know that a percentage of priests, abused children, and other seminarians and other priests over a number of decades.

We know all of that. The aspect that is so horrifying about this, which I know because I read that whole grand jury report, is the particular wickedness of it. You know, St. Paul writes about spiritual wickedness in high places. It's not just the fleshy aspect that some priests with disordered sexual desires, committed crimes. I actually can sort of understand that. What is much harder to understand is the level of evil and wickedness. You had these satanic rituals going on. You had some priests in the 1970s and 80s would have the little boys pose as Christ on the cross and take photos of it.

They had one priest washed out a boy's mouth after he had used him with holy water. You had another priest use a seven-inch-long crucifix to abuse children. I mean, this is a degree of evil that seems gratuitous until you realize the real culprit of all this. In our modern age, in our modern politics, what we really want is to say, okay, there's going to be some new policy, there's going to be a new reform, and we're going to reform the X, Y, and Z policy, and then this will stop. There isn't a policy for this. The cause of this is that evil exists and evil has a personality. Antonin and Scalia did a great interview in 2013 with this very flippant New York magazine reporter

and he said, you're looking at me like I'm weird because I believe in the devil. Many more intelligent people than you and I have believed in the devil. Most people throughout history have believed in the devil. And that, I think, is the essence here, is the devil exists. It's the only way to make sense of the particular evil of this crime. And if we deny that, the problem will not be fixed. Yes, I agree that that's at the core of every evil that we see. I mean, as conservatives, we kind of talk about this a lot.

There are liberals who continually want to slap on some kind of regulation in order to stop evil. We know that that's not going to happen because it exists in the heart of man. However, I do think that there are other aspects of this that can be discussed within the Catholic Church. I heard Father Jonathan Morris, who, as you know, he's on Fox News. He's from my old neighborhood that I would go grocery shopping in the Bronx. These are great things. There you go. He just seems like a great guy.

I don't know him personally. But I thought his analysis last week on this on Fox was really interesting. He said, you know, the crime isn't necessarily unique to the Catholic Church. This kind of abuse does happen everywhere. But he said the cover up is unique. The cover up does not happen. everywhere. And I don't hear a lot of Catholics saying that, that, hey, you know, we know that this sin exists because everyone is sinful everywhere. However, the cover-up like this doesn't happen in

every sector of society that it's this pervasive, this institutionalized. So why is that? Why is the Catholic Church so kind of unique in the cover-up of pedophilia and predation? Well, because it's the largest and longest living institution in the world. So I entirely agree with Father Morris's point and with your point on that. There is a unique bureaucracy to all of this, which seems to add to the evil. But this is because, of course, a 300 or 3,000 person church somewhere simply doesn't have the institutional bureaucratic decay that the Catholic Church does. And this bureaucratic element is really key here because we all know about the abuse of the children that took place over several, many decades. One aspect that's really going untalked about is the priests and the

cardinals and the bishops who are abusing seminarians and young priests and their subordinates, a sort of me-to moment for the Catholic Church. And what is so awful about that is we see this, I know a number of priests. And bizarrely, some of the people. the best priests I know, some of the best priests in the world never seem to get promoted. Why is that? Well, these sort of bland politician priests who turn a blind eye to wickedness and corruption, they do seem to get promoted. Now from everything we know about bureaucracy, this makes perfect sense, but it's a real problem.

And this might not be a popular opinion because it's not totally satisfying. But the way to fix that is this. Josh Shapiro, the Attorney General in Pennsylvania, is doing that. Just by shedding light on this, the problem is being fixed. You had Cardinal McCarrick, who resigned from the College of Cardinals just a couple of weeks ago. He's the first Cardinal to resign since 1927, and that was a political matter of a monarchist cardinal and some political issues then. This is massive, and I know firsthand from priests who say that Cardinal McCarrick was preying

on them and others. just shedding the light on it does help to solve the problem a little bit, but the problem won't go away. It's perfectly easy to say, oh, you know, all of the social science show that other denominations have the same rates of abuse. Another line is that public schools or school teachers in the United States abuse children at a much higher rate than priests do. Sure, that's all right. But that's not an excuse, is it? Yeah. give some context, but it's not an excuse. And what must happen in the church, the only real

practical matter of reform I could see is to uncover the bishops who have covered it up and who have moved priests around. But that said, the corruption in the bureaucracy is pretty deep, and I don't know how quickly that's going to be fixed. Yeah, and I appreciate you saying that because I think that's something that not a lot of people are saying. Like you said, this happens everywhere. a lot of Catholics saying that. I think that it's perfectly justifiable for Catholics like you and other people to feel a little bit defensive. There are a lot of people attacking the faith itself inherently that's saying, you know, Catholicism itself is corrupt and that's why this is happening and this is representative of all Catholics. Well, we know that's not true and I appreciate

the need or the feeling to be defensive over that. However, I do think that it's that it's good to acknowledge that it's not the same as the public school system. It's not the same as, you know, college football because we know that Christians are held to a higher standard. We're supposed to be above reproach. We have the Holy Spirit inside of us, which compels us to something else. And so we are to a higher standard than secular institutions who don't claim holiness. So my question is, I guess, is there something wrong with bureaucracy when it comes to religious institutions? Yes, we can say all we want to, sure, the bureaucracy is bad, but shouldn't you break up that bureaucracy if that is perpetuating this kind of institutionalized sin in an otherwise holy institution?

Well, because we see the same rates of abuse everywhere, this doesn't seem to me a good argument against the church itself. If we saw far lower rates of abuse among smaller denominations than perhaps we would. Another one of the reforms that people have proposed is we need to end priestly celibacy. And some people make what seem to me obviously mistaken theological arguments for that. And other people make practical common sense arguments. They say, well, they have to be celibate, so they have these deviant sexual desires and actions. But here it is important to look at the social scientific data. There's a very long study by John Jay, Criminal College, a five-year-long study, which showed no link between celibacy and child abuse. It actually showed no link between same-sex

attraction in child abuse as well. So I think some of those some of those easy fixes, you know, I don't know, to break up the Catholic Church, which isn't going to happen. Not break up the Catholic Church necessarily, but break up some of the bureaucracy. And obviously I'm a Protestant. We've had many conversations about Catholicism and Protestantism. And I know all of the wonderful things that the Catholic Church has accomplished. They've been spearheading justice and mercy for centuries.

So I don't, I know all of that. But I think that the thing that I have problem with is that when a priest is ordained as a priest, he is a priest forever, no matter what. I mean, Donald Whirl, the guy who oversaw all of this in Pittsburgh for 18 years, he spoke at the funeral of one of the abusers. And he said verbatim that a priest is a priest forever, no matter what. That, to me, is an inherent problem. Yeah, that's a very good point. I wouldn't be quoting Cardinal Whirl, though. I think Cardinal Whirl has a lot of problems.

But he's just quoting the catechism. He's just quoting the sacrament of orders. Well, he is in a certain sense, but in a practical sense he isn't because we know that recent Pope, certainly and the current Pope have laicized a number of priests, defrocked them, taken the collar off as they should be. And in a spiritual sense, I suppose they are still priests, but they're not in front of congregations or parishes. They're not working with people.

Pope Francis and Pope Benedict have sent priests. to live a life of seclusion and penance and prayer. So they maintain the spiritual order of priesthood, but no practical application of it. You know, all of this is an argument, it seems to me, for the Catholicity of the church, because when you look at the particular evil, even if the rates of abuse aren't higher,

you look at the particular evil of this. Men of God, like Cardinal Whirl says, you're a priest forever in a certain sense, men who are supposed to be representatives of Christ on earth and they're doing these horrific and satanic things. Father Gabriel A. Mourth, who was the Vatican exorcist for a quarter of a century, he said before he died that the devil resides in the Vatican, who resides in the Vatican.

And this makes a great deal of sense to me. One, because we had just had two of the greatest men of the century, John Paul II and Benedict the 16th, who were the pontiffs. but also because if you were the devil, where would you go? Where would you concentrate your efforts? It seems to me I would concentrate them on the church. And we see the horrific consequences of that, as Gabrielle Amorth pointed out. But this doesn't seem to me an argument against the church.

It seems to me an argument against the devil. So do you feel like lay people in the Catholic Church, and I truly don't know the answer to this, have the ability to hold their priests accountable, even though you guys believe that the priests are on another level of holiness? Well, certainly we're seeing them hold the priests accountable. What does it mean? Once the crimes are uncovered, then the priests can be held accountable.

Very fortunately, these incidents of abuse have waned substantially in recent decades. So we're not seeing much. Why do you think that is? Why do you think it's waned? What's changed? Well, in a very practical and criminal matter, the investigations in 2002, 2003 shed so much light on this. that there's simply more light and that gets rid of the corruption. But there is a question, why did it crop up during the 60s, 70s and 80s?

Because even before these investigations, the rates of incidents declined dramatically. Why is that? It seems that it has something to do with the sexual revolution of the 60s, 70s and 80s. It seems to have something to do with the cultural revolutions of the 60s, 70s and 80s. It perhaps has something to do with revolutions within the Catholic Church, which discarded so much of the traditional literature. so much of the traditional reverence for insipid saccharine, new age-leaning liturgies and practices.

And one wonders if those don't go hand in hand. Fortunately, right now we're in a period of reforming the reform. You're seeing a resurgence in the Latin Mass. Some of those acoustic guitars are disappearing. And you're seeing a return to seriousness. And then in the most serious matter, in this child abuse, you're seeing these priests defrocked, leicized, and dying. and dying. This is all cause for hope, but, you know, we're not out of the woods yet. And

it's easy to say there are a thousand victims over 70 years. Oh, you know, that isn't a thousand victims over one year. But the particular wickedness of it is something that one has to grapple with, even decades after the incidents. Well, do you think the Vatican has done a good job of responding? the pope sent out a letter today expressing his condolences and you know great regret and all of that when this when these sexual abuse stories came out pope john paul the second was still the pope and then pope benedict the 16th was the pope and because we have more time and it was so so much closer to the original incident in the early 2000s we can look at what they did and what they did was wonderful i mean they they handled it very openly

They leisized priests. They were pretty direct about it. They were very clear. There was a lot of moral clarity there. I'm hoping that we get some moral clarity from Pope Francis, but one of the aspects of his pontificate has been a little bit of confusion. He has, I know for Protestants,

you might not be as familiar with some of these apostolic exhortations and documents and statements that have come out of the Vatican. But there have been documents such as Amoris Laitizia and others that have bred a little bit of confusion, confusion with regard to sexual ethic, confusion with regard to Catholic doctrine.

The Pope recently changed the catechism of the church to say that the death penalty is an attack on the inviolability of the human person and on his dignity. This is in contradiction to 2,000 years of Catholic teaching. There's just been a lot of confusion. And I hope that Pope Francis can rise to the occasion and have moral clarity here.

He's been clear on sexual abuse so far. I just hope that the more confusing aspects of his pontificate don't overshadow that. Yeah. Okay. If there's one thing that you would say to people who maybe they are struggling with thinking that, you know, this is all Catholics or this is something inherent in the Catholic Church, what would you say to them? Well, I always go back to Chesterton when it comes to attacks on the Catholic Church

because he was so articulate and recent a Catholic apologist. He actually wrote orthodoxy, I think before he was a Catholic, and yet it sums it up very well. And in orthodoxy, he says, the way he knows the true faith is because Catholicism is attacked for opposite reasons. It's both too ascetic and it's too decadent. You know, there's too much celibacy and there's too much crazy sex for lack of clearer terms. all it takes is to look at the social scientific data on rates of abuse. That should dispel any notion that this is a particularly Catholic problem. The same goes for the 2000 years of history.

Well, I do you have a question about that. Why does? This was going to be my last question, but now I have a question. Why has the Catholic Church become a stereotype for pedophilia? Well, because the Catholic Church is the church. When people refer to the church, and I'm speaking broadly and ecumenically, they always picture the Catholic Church. Hollywood always pictures the Catholic Church. The mainstream media always picture the Catholic Church.

We know that these incidents are not happening at a larger scale in the Catholic Church, but the church has taken to be a representative of all Christians on Earth. And for myself, as a Catholic, this seems to make a lot of sense. But it's important to remind ourselves that one can appreciate the particular spiritual wickedness of these crimes without believing so much of the misleading information that this is all happening right now and that the rates are much higher than this. And because I think it was, who was it, Schlesinger? Arthur Schlesinger said that anti-Catholic bias is the most enduring bias in the history of the United States.

It's been around since the beginning. We were founded by my ancestors in Plymouth. Well, I could tell you why. I can tell you why it's because, well, so much of Protestantism and the Protestant Reformation, whether you like it or not, you know, helped with the founding of the United States. That's really neither here nor there. But a lot of it was determined by Protestantism. So I could see how there would be this undertone of not liking the hierarchy of the Catholic Church,

whether that's informed or not. But I could definitely see that. I could see that that could be the motivation behind some of this bias. It certainly seems like it's, more pervasive in the Catholic Church, but I don't know all of those social studies that you've cited. And if that's the case, then maybe it truly is just evil, and maybe that's the only common thread. Well, it is, but it doesn't mean we can't do anything about it.

You know, Christ in the Gospel of Matthew tells his disciples to fast and pray. These are things that we can do. I believe the Pope quoted this in his letter today. He said, we can fast and pray. And I think a lot of secular people, and even some Christians, scoff at this. They say, we need something else. Fasting and prayer is an important thing to begin. I totally agree.

Firing bad cardinals and bishops is another place to begin. These people aren't perfect. Even the Pope is not infallible, except when he is infallible, which is on very rare occasions. So there are practical things that we can do, but we won't root out the main problem until we reform the human person and the human people who are in these positions of power in the church. And that goes to attacking that old jerk the devil. Yeah, which can only be done through Christ, which, like you said, is accomplished through things like fast and praying. So I think that's a great word of advice.

Michael, thank you so much for your wisdom. I really appreciate it. Always good to see you, Allie. My favorite Catholic. Where can everyone find you? So you can find me on Twitter, Michael J. Knowles. and then you can see me on my show in I think about five minutes. Good.

On the Daily Wire. We go Monday through Thursday. So go to DailyWire.com or Facebook and YouTube until they completely censor us and kick us off of all of those. And then you can probably see me in the cardboard box on the street in Los Angeles. True. Another conversation for another day. Thank you so much.

See, Allie. So obviously Michael feels the weight of this like so many other Catholics do and even Protestant Christians do. I know Catholics who are absolutely grieve. by this. Like I've said, Catholics have done so much incredible good in the world, and I by no means condemn them for the sins of a few in the same way that I hope that my Catholic friends wouldn't condemn me for the sins of a few Protestants or Baptists. But if this were happening in the Baptist Church rampantly, I would want to get to the bottom of it. I would wonder maybe the

systems that we have set up are not working. I appreciate Michael acknowledging that bureaucracy within the Catholic Church is a problem. To me, bureaucracy is a problem anywhere. But it can pose a special danger in a holy institution in which the bureaucracy is seen as above reproach. And I know that this isn't going to be a popular stance to take, especially with my Catholic listeners whom, by the way, I really love. But to me, that is a fundamental flaw in Catholic doctrine. You guys know that I am a Protestant. So I have my disagreements with Catholicism is you guys who are Catholic have disagreements with my beliefs. And one of my disagreements is how Catholics view priests as holier than lay people, as you and me. So as you heard me say to

Michael, the sacrament of order states that once a priest is ordained, he is a priest forever, spiritually. They believe this model is after Christ, whom the Bible says is a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek. Cardinal Worrell, like I said, spoke with a funeral of one of the accused abusers and reiterated at his funeral that he is a priest forever, this guy who sexually abused kids. So my concern is that because Catholic doctrine views priests as inherently higher, inherently holier than lay people, as privy to the will and wisdom of God in a way that you and I aren't, that they are able to get away with things that they otherwise wouldn't be able to get away with,

that church members aren't able to hold their leadership accountable because who are they to hold their leadership accountable? Catholic priests are almost, almost, it seems like, impervious to real punishment, because they are protected by this hedge of holiness that they claim to have through ordination. Protestants just don't believe that. That's a difference in doctrine. I don't believe that my pastor or elders, my church are any holier than I am or are even closer to God than I am simply because of their

station. They don't have the power to forgive my sins. They are not my mediator. They are shepherds and they are teachers. These are their spiritual gifts. This is their calling. But they are not higher up than I am more than anyone else is. I just fear.

And maybe this is just my Protestant misunderstanding. But I just fear that it is the hierarchy of the Catholic Church coupled with this kind emphasis on external righteousness rather than internal repentance that creates this environment in which church bureaucracy can get away with anything. And let me say again, I know the amazing good that the Catholic Church has done. I know quite a few Catholic Christians that are amazing ministers for the kingdom. I also know that they are devastated by these reports and I am in no way condemning every single Catholic. Michael said that the rates of abuse in the Catholic Church are no higher than in other denominations. I'll have to research that. I personally haven't

seen that, but that doesn't mean it's not out there. It certainly seems like it's much more rampant in the Catholic Church and much more institutional and pervasive than in other places. But I will be more than happy to be proven wrong on that. So I will certainly look into it. I just wonder if it isn't worth taking a second look at the hierarchy of the Catholic Church at the sacrament of ordination, reconsideration of the pedestal that priests are placed on. That's my view. Okay, feel free to email me on that. I have gotten a lot of emails from my Catholic listeners about positions that I take

from a Protestant perspective. I love engaging with you guys. So feel free to push back and we can discuss our differences. Now, let's talk about something that Catholics and Protestants agree on. In other religious news, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a.k. the Mormons, said that they do not want to be called Mormons anymore. They don't want to be called LDS either. They want to just be referred to as the church or the Church of Jesus Christ. Russell Nelson is the church as president and he said, the Lord has impressed upon my mind

the importance of the name he has revealed for his church, even the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We have work before us to bring ourselves in harmony with his will and recent weeks, various church leaders and departments have initiated the necessary steps to do so. They feel, Mormons feel, basically, that it obscures the name Mormon, obscures the Christian nature of the religion. Okay, I totally understand that concern, but that's not going to happen. And the reason that's not going to happen is because Catholics and Protestant Christians don't believe that Mormonism is Christianity.

So they're just not going to call Mormons the church or the Church of Jesus Christ. we don't believe it as the Church of Jesus Christ. I appreciate the common ground that we have with Mormons, especially politically and morally, but the Mormon doctrine doesn't align with Christian doctrine at all. Mormons believe that you have to be Mormon to be saved. They believe that God is one of many gods, that we can become gods one day, among many other parts of the Mormon doctrine that is just antithetical to the Christian gospel. I know I have Mormon followers and listeners and I love you dearly, but I do not agree with you. People are going to to continue to call Mormons Mormons because to call them the church or the Church of Jesus

Christ would be to betray our own faith. Okay, now that I've made everyone sufficiently mad, I think that's all for today. Remember, we can love each other and still disagree. Feel free to reach out to me with your thoughts. You can also follow me on social media if you so desire. Love you guys. See you on Thursday.