The Sean McDowell Show - Can Catholics and Protestants Agree?

Episode Date: October 17, 2025

In this conversation, Catholic apologist Trent Horn is here to discuss his video asking 50 Catholics their favorite argument for God. This was actually a response to my video where I asked 100 apologists their favorite arguments for God. However, today we're discussing why evangelicals and Catholics often approach apologetics differently. Whether you’re a skeptic or believer, this episode challenges how you think about the rational basis for faith. WATCH: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHDcd_44Jr8 WATCH Trent's Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24RlxhITBvE Full results: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NDeZ7gnSMK11e37cGoaJNV2ewCDavRbRtcM-wrAVFEo/edit?usp=sharing *Get a MASTERS IN APOLOGETICS or SCIENCE AND RELIGION at BIOLA (https://bit.ly/3LdNqKf) *USE Discount Code [smdcertdisc] for 25% off the BIOLA APOLOGETICS CERTIFICATE program (https://bit.ly/3AzfPFM) *See our fully online UNDERGRAD DEGREE in Bible, Theology, and Apologetics: (https://bit.ly/448STKK) FOLLOW ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Twitter: https://x.com/Sean_McDowell TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sean_mcdowell?lang=en Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmcdowell/ Website: https://seanmcdowell.org Discover more Christian podcasts at lifeaudio.com and inquire about advertising opportunities at lifeaudio.com/contact-us.

Want to keep God's word with you wherever you go? The King James Bible Study KJV app by Salem Media makes it easier to read, study, share, and pray daily with a timeless KJV translation. Enjoy features like offline access, audio Bible listening, smart search, and tools to highlight bookmark and take notes, all designed to keep your Bible studies simple and organize. Best of all, it's free to download in the Google Play Store. Grow in your faith every day. Search for King James Bible Study, KJV, and download the app today. I think most evangelicals through the filter of like what works to get people to Jesus. Hence, so many more Catholics cite the contingency argument and many Protestants don't.

Some who are more critical of Catholic theology and think that Catholics aren't even really Christians. They are nervous about people embracing Aquinas on natural theology and then following him into Catholicism. Science is great at doing a lot of things, but science can't answer every question we have. You're not going to find God with a telescope or a microscope. We would still ask the question, why is there a universe instead of nothing at all? Why is there something rather than nothing? Well, I want to get into some of what you found in your survey, but let me just pause right here. Given that you're the only one who said contingency and you're one of five Catholics that I interviewed for my survey,

I suspect that maybe a good chunk of my audience is not familiar with the contingency. argument. So maybe just kind of sum up what it is and maybe why you chose that one. Sure. So I think when many Christians think of the cosmological argument for the existence of God, now we should also preface here, cosmological means universe or creation. Really, we should say the cosmological arguments for the existence of God because there's a whole family of arguments that are focused on the universe as a whole as being evidence for God's existence. And I think many Christians, when they think of the cosmological argument, they think of the question, oh, okay, well, where did the universe come from? What explains the

beginning of the universe? And so that's a very common way for a layperson to approach the argument. And that's summarized well in the Kalam cosmological argument. But the contingency argument says, look, even if the universe had no beginning, even if it had always existed, we would still ask the question, why is there a universe instead of nothing? at all. Why is there something rather than nothing? And there are many different forms of the contingency argument, but I think one that works well, it just starts with saying, because some versions say, well, the universe could not have existed. So what explains it? And people might say, well, maybe the universe is necessary. Well, you know, I don't, I don't buy that, that it has to exist.

I agree. But you can start by saying, look, there are at least contingent objects. There are things around here that, you know, did not have to exist. We can, there are a few, a collection of contingent objects. Well, why do they exist? Well, you could go back to this other, you go back with a chain that goes back. And from there, you either get an infinite regress or you get a brute fact explanation. A good analogy would be a chandelier to understand the contingency argument. Like, what is holding a chandelier up above the room? You might say, oh, it's the chain, this chain, then that chain, then that chain, and they all hold it up saying, well, maybe it's just an infinite number of chains. Well, but that still doesn't explain why it's hanging there at all. Why is it there

instead of there being nothing above us? So the contingency argument seeks to explain the fact that the universe, however you arrive at that conclusion, did not have to exist. So there must be something a necessary being, that which cannot fail to exist, must exist by definition that explains why anything exists. And so I like this argument. It has some benefits from the Kalam argument in that it does not have to defend sometimes controversial premises about the past being finite. You could grant, yeah, maybe the universe were eternal. But why is there an eternal universe instead of just nothing at all? So if you're watching this and you're thinking, this is interesting.

I have questions and objections. Let me know if a full video, either myself or bring Trent back and we'd just spend an hour walking through the contingency argument would be helpful. Let us know in the comments. Let's take a step back, Trent. Maybe tell us what you found in your study. Sure. So I went through, I had 50 responses, and I decided to best compare it to your study.

I used the same categories that you used for your original survey. So I divided them up into five categories, existential arguments, the existence of God, the unique arguments, the moral argument, evidence related to Jesus. and then finally creation, which is a pretty big category. No one offered an existential argument, like a transformed life, for example, or saintly conduct. No one put that forward. We could discuss the reasons for that why in a little bit. Then we had the unique arguments, about 12% of respondents. So, you know, kind of a grab bag.

I had a few ontological arguments. I had common consent, which is an interesting one. I think that argument can actually be retrovited. Many people will scoff. That's the one that says, look, the vast, vast majority of people throughout history have believed in God. And the vast majority of people are more right than wrong about things. So that gives us good evidence that God exists. This argument is frowned upon a lot of people say, well, you know, can 50 million Elvis fans be wrong.

Yeah, they can. But actually, if you think about it, when you look at all, yeah, a large numbers of people, the majority have been wrong about some things, but they're usually right about most things. And so that should give us some credence there. So we had some of those unique arguments. The moral argument was lower. Yours was about 21%. Yeah.

And so mine was a bit lower about 12%. And I noticed it was more the popular level speakers and writers who opted for the moral argument. The philosophers that I interviewed and asked that surveyed did not pick the moral argument, actually. So that was a bit lower. The evidence for Jesus was about the same. That was about 12%. Though that would include other interesting things like fulfilled prophets. or things like Eucharistic miracles.

It's more of a distinctly Catholic idea. Sure. And then we had a much bigger creation block out of the pie chart. So I've tried to remember. I think yours was around, it was like half, I think. Yeah, it was like 47%, just shy of half. Yeah. So mine was 64%.

It was just shy of two thirds, picked creation. But then what gets interesting, if you just, instead of taking away the creation category, this last 64%, here's how I would break it. down. 26%, one-fourth of the respondents picked the contingency argument by name like I did. Another 24% said the arguments of St. Thomas Aquinas, either a particular one or all of them, but they picked some kind of argument of St. Thomas Aquinas. And then the last 14% were other arguments you might call creation arguments. Got it. Oh, I thought you're pausing to get a drink like like Marco Rubio did in that one.

response one time. The debate. Yeah, yeah. Sorry. No worries. Awkward silence. Part of the fun. Okay. So let me come back to what you said at the beginning tied to existential arguments. That so much surprised me that not any Catholic arguments, Catholic apologists responded this way. And there's only 5%. So I didn't really ask 100. I think it was 103 or 107. So it was like 5.5%. So probably five to seven Protestant said a changed life or an experience of God. And, you know, my father has done 250 debates in every single debate he would end by sharing his testimony. Yeah.

And so I think in some ways, it's an underrated, powerful argument to have a changed life. Why do you think not a single Catholic apologist pointed to that? I think that basically everyone that I asked, it depends on how. you take the question the best argument for God. And I'm sure you dealt with that as well in your survey. That can be answered in a lot of different ways, the best argument. I say the vast majority of people that I surveyed, they took that to mean, what is the most logically sound argument? What has the strongest premises? The best reasoning is immune to objections. So they were looking at it as the best argument, rather than saying, oh, what is the most effective to the widest number of people?

Because I agree with you. I think that many people, at least they are moved towards belief in God or belief in the Christian faith by holy and saintly conduct among professed Christians. I mean, especially when you look in the ancient world, how pagans were converted en masse to Christianity you had the pagan Roman emperors at the time saying, you know, we can't even feed our own people, but the Christians feed and take care of everyone.

And so it attracts people to them through their charity, their altruism, love of neighbor, love of enemy, willingness to be martyred. So I think that that still has, it's a very powerful testimony. Even today, we live in a very cynical age. You have a loneliness epidemic. You have a lot of people hungering for that which cannot satisfy you

in this life alone. So I do think it's something we should always focus on. But I think when we're looking at it more of an academic question of a particular argument to give reasons, I think that the transformed life is the best catalyst. But then it's good to have very solid arguments after that point. That's really interesting. This is something I wanted to ask you because I didn't qualify to people what I meant by best argument. Yeah. And it sounds like most of the respondents from what you think are asking what's the most logically

sound, reasonable, airtight, you know, rationally compelling proof for God, so to speak. I suspect that this might be a difference between evangelicals and Catholics. I think many evangelicals, I didn't say this, and I think somebody like Doug Grotice, who's such a careful systematic philosopher, who literally wouldn't answer the question because he's like, it's cumulative, like he just is such a careful thinker. I think he's the exception. I think most evangelicals through the filter of like what works to get people to Jesus. And whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, I think there's a very much, hence evangelicals, evangelistic, and a very pragmatic way of thinking about apologetic.

So I guess I'll give you an example. This is probably 10 years ago. I was speaking with some key leaders at Kru, Camps Crusade for Christ, about like the future of my dad's books. And what we're going to do with them. I just said, I'm curious, how are you, how committed are you to my dad's books? And their answer was, we're just committed to what works. That's all that matters. If your dad's book's great, if it's somebody else, it doesn't matter.

Advance the kingdom. So this might be a weakness in the survey that I didn't clarify. And if I had clarified, we might have got different responses. But I also think your contingency and my contingency probably processed this a little bit differently. Do you agree with that? What's your sense of that point? Yeah, I think that maybe Catholics look at, I think Catholics look at the process of conversion differently than Protestants, especially evangelicals do. So for example, my own conversion story, I was a, I believed in God, but was not Christian. I thought religion was just for simple-minded people. I was very pro-science

and thought religion was anti-science and bought into all those myths. That was in high school. And then I met Catholics in a youth group at my high school. And I started to go to church with them. From there, I hit the books and I downloaded as many debates as I could. And what really convinced me of Christianity were evangelical apologists, specifically J.P. Morrland and William Lane Craig and Gary Habermas. So I remember this was back in the year 2001, 2001, 2002, before YouTube.

So I just found some debate transcript. painfully downloading William Lane Craig debates, put them on floppy disks. But that was what really motivated and moved me. And then I started doing theology work to figure out, okay, well, what denomination do I want to be a part of? And then I chose Catholicism based on a historical investigation. But to become Catholic, to enter the Catholic Church, just like people today, there is a process. Back then was called RCIA, the right of Christian initiation for adults. now it's called OCIA, but it's a nine-month process. You start in September and you do weekly

catechetical sessions to learn about the Catholic faith and you go through various rights and things with the priests and the congregation, they pray over you. But it's a process that goes on for about nine months that culminates at the Easter vigil where you receive baptism, I receive baptism of the He'll receive confirmation, where I was baptized and then fully received into the church and became Christian receiving, you know, a valid baptism. But I think, so that's like a a nine-month process. Now, if someone's in danger of death or something like that, you can obviously speed it up. But I think for evangelicals, the process of conversion, you know, you could have an alter call and there you go. It's just very much, much quicker. So I think then for Catholics,

when we're laying the foundation for someone's faith, we might have sequential logical arguments and a systematic categorical framework will walk someone through, whereas maybe an evangelical will move with just like the biggest catalyst right there to move someone's heart to make that decision for Christ. That's that's really helpful. So give me an example. Like say you're on a flight, like classic example, start up a conversation with someone next to you.

I have this happen somewhat frequently. Yes. And I can recall, this is a number of years ago. There was a girl sent next to me college student. She was at Chapman University. And somehow we just struck up. She was studying philosophy and started talking about God. And she asked me, she goes, so you're a Christian, you actually believe there's scientific evidence that God exists.

Like she was stunned by the thought of that. Now, to me, I immediately went to the Kalam argument. I'm thinking I need something forceful. I need something simple that's memorable. I think if I said to her, well, let me tell you about the contingency argument. I think she would have like, I mean, they've not. No doubt. No doubt.

Like, that's the reality. So my thinking is, what's the most simple? two premises of conclusion, tell me what you think about it. And then, of course, I'd love to get it to Jesus, love to the moral argument, if we can. That's the thinking. So if you're sitting on the plane with somebody and they go, oh, my goodness, you're an apologist. You actually think there's scientific proof for God. Where do you go with it?

Well, I think sometimes what I might do there is I will question the assumption right off the bat. I will say, well, what do you mean by scientific proof? Because I agree with you, science is great at doing a lot of things. things, but science can't answer every question we have. You know, you're not going to find God with a telescope or a microscope, but science can't answer every question that we have. Science can't tell us what science is. Science can't tell us the laws of science are going to be the same today as they are tomorrow. Science can't tell us, why is there something to do science on anyways instead of nothing at all? So I always want to make sure that when I engage someone, get them to question their

assumptions right off the bat there. And then I might just try to figure out, okay, okay, what is the person I might put for a platter of reasons to say? There's things that science really cannot explain to us. Need a daily spark of hope and direction? Let the Daily Bible app from Salem Media be that spark. This free Android app delivers an uplifting verse each morning, plus reading plans, devotions, and trusted podcasts from leaders like Joyce Meyer and Rick Warren. Prefer to listen instead?

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Why do humans matter? Why do human collections of molecules matter more than other collections of molecules that have intrinsic rights and dignity, that we ought never to use humans as means. They should only be treated as ends, things like that. So I think that I might go down that road. I will say, though, that one thing Catholics can learn from Protestants, Protestants are just really good at giving their testimony as like an elevator pitch.

Like, here's my story. Here's what Christ has done in my life. And I think for Catholics, those who are converts like myself, have a better ability to do that. For many Catholics, though, they grew up in Catholic. And they're not converts, they're reverts. They maybe they grew up and maybe they had to come back to the faith and owner for themselves. Or it's just they had a solid faith and they always grew up that way.

And so to talk about what Christ did in your life, it's like, oh, I don't have a dramatic conversion story. But here's why I love the Lord and here's, you know, why I live my faith. But being able to succinctly give testimony to break the ice with someone, I think is very, very important to get them open-minded to it. And that's one thing Catholics can learn from Protestants. This is an important conversation because I think you're right. Protestants are good at that. It's the way that we think in terms of like elevator pitch, get somebody Jesus, share my story. But on the flip side, maybe not have some of the depth that we need philosophically speaking. Hence, so many more Catholics cite the contingency argument and many Protestants don't. And yet you can have that philosophical depth. But if you can't translate it well to people, that can get lost. I think maybe there's something. as a whole we could we could learn from one another i'd be curious from either my survey and maybe you

already answered this or from yours and again in my survey the top 47 percent was creation right number two was the moral argument and then number three was jesus and both of ours it was like less than a quarter was jesus which is just a whole interesting conversation we could have depending on what we mean by best argument but apart from you being the only one who's said contingency. Is there anything else that just surprised you from either my study or your study talking with Catholic philosophers and apologists? Well, and I'd be interested to hear how much this took up in your study, but I was very surprised in mine only 2%. It was only 2 respondents, so that would be 4%. So only two respondents mentioned the fine-tuning argument for the existence

of God. So that was a very small part of the creation element of my pie chart. Only two people mentioning it, which is very interesting because I did a video a while back called the argument for God atheists fear the most. And the argument I was discussing was the fine-tuning argument. And I had all of these clips from Dawkins and Hitchens and from other pro, sorry, atheistic philosophers and apologists saying that the fine-tuning argument is a difficult argument, one that kind of keeps them up at night. So it was interesting that the one that many atheists find disturbing to make them question their godlessness. It was very few, only two people mentioned it in my survey. And I find the fine-tuning argument to be absolutely fascinating. I think it is a very

powerful argument, at least for a designer of the universe. I think also for the question, the best argument for God, to get to God capital G, the infinite act of being, who is all powerful, all knowing, all good, has these divine attributes. A single argument to get there, you're going to have to have a lot packed into the premises to unfold that. And I think Aquinas' arguments or the contingency argument can do that. Whereas the Kalam argument, it gets us to a creator of the universe, but it's much more difficult to parse out the divine attributes from that. And much more so with the fine-tuning argument that, yeah, there's a designer, but is this

designer God, well, it's hard to get a lot, aside from intelligence, it's hard to get the other divine attributes out of that one single argument. So I think that also comes up, which argument can. gives you the most divine attributes. Yeah, that's a fair question from how you move from an argument to what we ascertained about God. And maybe this is an area where we would differ a little bit. William and Craig has put a lot of thought into arguing that it's intelligent and timeless

and changeless and even personal. But it does take some work to explain how those attributes come out of the cosmological arguments. You can get really powerful, but can you get all powerful from something out of nothing? I'm still not fully decided upon that. For the record, those people that are watching and tracking with this, the Klamma is not really technically a scientific argument. It's a philosophical argument in which science supports the second premise that the universe

had a beginning. So even with that girl, I just kind of skipped over whether it's scientific or not, and it was give the argument. And you're very carefully saying, let's walk through what science can prove and it can't prove. that's a very effective way to kind of challenge somebody's premises as well and assumptions that they have. So there's multiple ways to skin a cat. Now, I do want to ask you about this is you had a decent segment in your video. And by the way, those of you who are watching this, if you haven't seen Trent's video yet, hit pause and go watch it.

It's really well done. It's very thoughtful. And by the way, you got more views in your respond video than I did in my original one. So well done. You're doing a great job. Thank you. One of the things you talked about was Aquinas' Five Ways and how unfamiliar it seems that many Protestants are. You don't have to walk through all five, but maybe just tell us what are these, maybe what is just kind of one of them briefly and give me more of the evangelical than the Protestant explanation of what they are. And then let's talk about why maybe Protestants are not.

so familiar with them. Sure. So Thomas Aquinas, well, Thomas from the village of Aquino in Italy, Aquinas is not his last name, it's where he's from, was a, he was born in 1274, so a 13th century philosopher, Catholic, one of the greatest saints and doctors of the church. He was very notable in the Middle Ages for synthesizing the newly discovered works of Aristotle. So synthesizing the philosophy of Aristotle with Christian theology, to be able to answer all kinds of questions about the nature of God, the nature of man, the incarnation, to create a systematic theology. And he wrote several works, the most famous being the Summa Theologia and the Summa Contra Gentiles. In the Summa Theology at the beginning, he does kind of a brief review for his students.

Oh, by the way, here, you know, how do we show God exists? Here are five ways to do that. And many, and it's very short, brief run through he does. And many atheists try to knock that down, saying, these ways are, these are so silly, saying, no, he's just giving a brief review. He's not giving a knockdown case. And most atheists, like Richard Dawkins, when he tried to critique the five ways, it was absolutely embarrassing in the God motion. I fully agree with that, by the way. Absolutely embarrassing.

Because he says, oh, well, the Big Bang explains this. We don't need Aquinas's arguments. And people think that Aquinas is trying to argue for an infinite regress back in time and God must be the cause of the beginning in the universe. No, Aquinas did not believe you could prove the universe had a beginning. He thought, you know, faith teaches us through the book of Genesis, God created the universe in the finite past. But Aquinas did not think you could prove that by reason alone.

So his arguments say, look, even if the universe were eternal, there are things about the universe that show there must be a God. And he has five ways. The first three are cosmological arguments. The fourth one deals with grades of perfection, going to ultimate perfection. And the fifth one is a kind of design argument showing that. that everything is ordered towards a particular final cause. And so there's intelligence there. He said that the most manifest way is the first way. And that's the one that I really like a lot.

And it basically goes like this. It's the argument from motion, which also means change, really. When something changes, like let's say when water becomes ice, it has two elements with it. It has potential and actual. So liquid water is actually wet and liquid and moving. and it's potentially solid. Now, to actualize that potential, something else has to do that. Water doesn't just freeze itself. The air has to lower temperature.

Okay, but for the air to lower temperature, that's a potential. It has to be actualized by something else. And so we look in the universe, there's this whole network of chain of actualization. And so the question is, all right, well, is it just an infinite chain or does it terminate in that

which is pure actuality itself? A good analogy would be a train. You see a box car moving, on a train. What's pulling it? Well, the next car. Well, what's pulling that? Well, the next car. Is it just an infinite series of box cars? No, that would, it could still just be an infinite train that's sitting still. It needs a locomotive. It needs a car that gives motion without receiving motion. And so God gives actuality to all things without receiving it from anything else. So God is not a being with a lot of powers. God just is being. And so from this argument,

you can, like we mentioned earlier about the divine attributes, you can get a lot more divine attributes out. So if God is pure actuality or pure being, then that means God does not lack anything. And if he doesn't change. So God is pure actuality. Nothing about him is potential that is actualized. He doesn't undergo change. That means he must be timeless because to be in time is to change. He must be immaterial, because material things undergo change. He must be, he's not deficient. He's pure actuality without potential. So no potential knowledge. It has to be all knowing, must be, can't have any limit on power, and has to be all good because Aquinas' view of goodness, goodness and being are interchangeable. Like if you look at a bad squirrel, not squirrel steals your lunch, but like if he's missing a leg,

he's missing something he ought to have. So if God has all being, he's not missing anything, he's what we would say he is all good because he has the fullness of being itself. So from there, and that's why Aquinas goes through a very long discursus after the five ways about knowing the divine attributes from reason. So that would be that that would just be a brief overview. They've been explored at length by many other Catholic philosophers, but I find them to be utterly fascinating. No, that was great. And what's important for people to realize is this, these kind of cosmological arguments, at least you said the first three, are long before the discovery of, say, like DNA that could maybe point towards an intelligent agent or the beginning of the universe, at least scientifically. speaking, or the discovery of the fine-tuning the universe.

Right. So these are not dependent upon modern science in the arguments that they make, which I think can in some ways make them more powerful. Now, I know people listening are going, okay, wait a minute, potentiality, actuality, what do you mean by this? We don't have to go to that right now. Again, those of you tracking this channel, would it be helpful for you? If I bring Trent back and we just break this down a little bit because this is probably new to you,

my experience of these arguments, Trent, is at the beginning, they seem pretty intimidating, but there's moments where you go, oh my goodness, I get it. Like, wow, it really unlocks. But it takes a little more work to get there. So folks, comment below if you're like, bring Trent back and let's break these arguments down. If it's not helpful, we won't do it. But I love to know if that's helpful on my channel. Go ahead.

You're going to say something. Well, yeah, and I was going to say with these arguments, when you don't put in a lot metaphysically at the beginning, you don't get as much out. So the fine-tuning argument is very easy to understand and just tell people, but at most it gets you to a designer of the universe. The Kalam argument can get you to a creator and get you to more attributes, but there's less metaphysics involved. But when you put in more of that metaphysical foundation of essence, existence, potency, actuality, contingency, necessity, when you put that a lot in at the beginning and you see what flows from those truths, you can get a much more robust conclusion. So I think when you look at arguments

for God, like with any argument, look, the more you put in at the beginning, the more you're going to get back in the end in the conclusion. So some arguments, yes, it's for utility. If they're very simple arguments, people understand them, that's very helpful. But you just won't get as much out of the conclusion if you didn't put in as much in the premises in the beginning. That's really, really helpful distinction. So good stuff. Now, I do have just a couple more questions for you. Sure. You talked about in your video and suggested reasons why you think many Protestants are not familiar with Aquinas. So my son, he's a biola student and he helps him with social media. He's the one who emailed all the apologists and actually got the responses

and like categorized it for me. And so I was like, do you remember anybody mentioning Aquinas? And he's like, I don't recall it and neither do I. So I haven't gone back through all the emails that's possible. one or two, but I don't think there were any. Tell us why you think many Protestants don't engage Aquinas. Yeah, it was unmistakable in my survey. One out of four of the respondents mentioned St. Thomas Aquinas. And I think really right at the bat, I think it's about familiarity. I mean, St. Thomas Aquinas, among all the Catholic, the saints and the doctors who have built up the church over the past 2,000 years, he stands as premier one of the most important ones for creating a systematic theology, weaving all of the different elements of theology together with a robust

philosophy. So Catholics are just much more familiar with him, whereas for many Protestants, he just doesn't factor in, at least for Protestants nowadays. As I know in my own episode, where I also discussed with other Protestants like Jordan Cooper and Gavin Ortland, when you look at the early Protestant reformers, the first generation after Martin Luther, People like Francis Turritin, for example, or the Lutheran, Johann Gerhardt, they were very scholastic in their methods. Scholastic, meaning, you know, trying to create a synthesis between Aristotelian philosophy and Christian theology. They still followed all of that. But over time, it did start to change within Protestantism, and especially when Protestantism in America, turn more towards evangelicalism.

And then you had the influence of people like Carl Barth and others who said that, well, natural theology can't. really get us to God. You know, we have to just directly get there by an act of faith. And, you know, this kind of downplaying of apologetics in the early 20th century until we had that revival led by like Alvin Plantinga, William Lane Craig, your father, what you're doing here in the mid-20th century, late and in the 21st century. So there's just a lack of familiarity, I think, is just one element there. Why for more Protestant? Want to keep God's word with you wherever you go? The King James Bible study, KJV, by Salem Media, makes it easy to read, study, share, and pray daily with a timeless KJV translation.

Enjoy features like offline access, audio Bible listening, smart search, and tools to highlight bookmark and take notes, all designed to keep your Bible studies simple and organize. Best of all, it's free to download in the Google Play Store. Grow in your faith every day. Search for King James Bible study, KJV, and download the app today. Number two, what I had noticed was some who are more critical of Catholic theology and think that Catholics aren't even really Christians, they are nervous about people embracing Aquinas on natural theology

and then following him into Catholicism. So I've noticed not very common, but there are some notable voices who express a concern about Aquinas, kind of leading people into Catholicism. That makes sense. And I'm actually really curious how widespread that concern is. when I was watching a video, I thought, gosh, I've never, that's never crossed my mind to not read Aquinas because it might lead me to Catholicism. I've literally not even had that thought

in my life. I would love people here to comment if you've been to a Protestant seminary, if you've been to Catholic seminary, a Protestant university, a Catholic university, how much you read or didn't read Aquinas, especially at an evangelical or Protestant university or seminary. I would love to know, did you read Aquinas? If so, what classes, how much, why, why not? That would just be helpful for me. I reached out to a couple of key people at Biola and Talbot. So one of the leaders at Talbot, my co-ist, actually on our separate podcast, Scott Ray Philosopher, he said in our MA Phil program, which was started by Scott and JP and early on Bill Craig, they will distinctly read Aquinas and interact with it. And of

course, this is an MA philosophy program. If you don't, it's not a complete program. And he said he's not aware of anybody shifting into Catholicism, although some will become more liturgical. And I don't know if it's from reading Aquinas or not, but just through studying philosophy, some will. And then we have an honors program that I think is one of the best in the country. You're probably familiar with a Tory honors program. And Mill Reed, I was told I had, I actually texted this morning, like 6.30 in this morning, I texted one of the heads of it, and I was like, hey, do you guys read Thomas Aquinas? And he texted me, said, Tori students read a couple hundred pages of selections from the Summa Theologica, their sophomore year, and discuss it for six

hours, which I think is awesome. He said, I'm not aware of any students who convert to Roma Catholicism because of it. So I really don't know how widespread it is. Again, I love people to comment if you've seen this happen if you have that concern, how much you read, and this would be helpful to me. But tell me your reaction to that. Well, I think, yeah, and how it's widespread. Like, I wasn't making a claim in my original video that anybody who reads Aquinas is on their way to Catholicism. But the concerns over it, I think the people who are, who are, don't incorporate

Aquinas as much because of the concerns, I think you will find that more among Protestants, because really there are two kinds of Protestants when talking about relations of Catholicism. Protestants who believe Catholicism is a Christian denomination, though it has mistaken theology or it has theological errors, similar to how like an Armenian might view a Calvinist or a Calvinist might view an Armenian. We're both Christians. We just disagree on some elements of theology, but we're all Christians here. And I'm finding that that is the more common view among Protestants and evangelicals I engage

nowadays, that Catholics are Christians. They have the gospel, but, you know, there's elements there are theology that you just agree with. But for Protestants who believe that Catholics are not Christians, and so they're more like Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses or maybe Seventh-day Adventists for some of them, and believe that Catholicism has a false gospel, it is not a Christian denomination. And so it's beyond the point of just reasonable theological disagreement, which I believe is much more of a minority now within Protestantism than, say, 40 years ago. within that smaller group, I think they're more likely to not incorporate Aquinas out of the

concerns I mentioned earlier. Because I think many of the people that you've engaged at Biola and Talbot would probably hold what I might call the friendlier view of Catholicism. Friendlier view. I like that. I would, maybe this is nitpicking. Maybe you would agree with me. In my experience, I don't know that most would say Catholicism is just another denomination.

I don't know if they'd use that word. Maybe I'm wrong. Like there's Calvary Chapel. Presbyterianism, Baptist, and Catholicism, I think that more ecumenical group would say, yeah, it's a different branch of Christianity, but it's not heretical. And we differ over the Pope, we differ over purgatory, we differ over, you know, these are not insignificant differences. Sure. We even differ over how, you know, salvation by works and faith plays itself out.

But the gospel can be found in there, so I want to partner with them. that's probably how my experience, and if that's, it sounds like you agree with that. I think probably most evangelicals fall in that camp. Is that a fair to want? Absolutely. And I think 40 years ago, when Catholic apologetics had a resurgence in the United States through Carl Keating, Scott Hahn and others, what they were combating, there are many more evangelicals who would say Catholics have a false gospel.

They are on par with Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, they need to be saved, they are not Christian. that that view, I think, has dramatically decreased in the past 40 years. That I would agree with you, it's not just like when a Methodist becomes a Lutheran, it's not that big of a deal. But if a Protestant becomes a Catholic, it's sort of a big deal. However, though, I have noticed among those who are very skeptical of Catholicism or who consider it not Christian, they will even be concerned about a Baptist becoming Anglican. that they'll have a concern.

Like you notice here about studying Aquinas, that desire for that, that high liturgy, high church view, that's where they have a concern there. So yes, I agree that it's not Protestants today, the people that you engage with that I've engaged with, would not say it's not just another domination. It's a bigger divide, but we're all still united in the gospel, the life, death, the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Yeah, that's helpful. I don't, in, you played some clips about some evangelicals expressing concern going towards Anglicanism. I mean, I have some good, dear, close friends and people I work

with, you know, in the Protestant world who are Anglicans. And that really hasn't even crossed my mind about it being a level of concern. It's more like you appreciate the high church and the tradition and some of the practices, like some of the positive things you see within Catholicism without maybe some of the theological differences. But you're right. There's a segment of people that would have a concern about that direction. That's a separate. And their concern is that it is one step away from the cliff into a non-Christian false gospel church. And that's why, whereas you would say, oh, it's just one step away from another branch in Christianity,

but one that has significant issues, but another branch nonetheless. We're like teetering on a whole lot of conversations that you and I could have about this important ones. We'll have a part too, yeah. folks let us know what would be helpful to you on this channel i have a lot of debates with people i've debated pronouns i've debated whether we have toxic empathy or not uh c rt and other things i'm not super interested in catholic protestant debates that's just not my lane that doesn't interest me to spend my time on that but i am interested in saying what are things we can maybe learn from one another where we have common ground such as

in the evidence for the existence of God. And I think we found one of those here. So for those of you watching this, I would love to know what would be helpful if we did a follow-up? Would it be bringing Trent back and saying, okay, let's look at three or four of the best arguments that Catholics are more familiar with?

And let's explain them to our Protestant audience so we can even be better equipped to defend and make the case for God. What would be a good follow-up conversation I would love to know. Last question for you, Trent, and then we'll wrap it up. Sure. You might have answered this earlier.

But is there anything else that you think Catholics could learn from Protestant philosophers and apologists beside the point you made earlier about being able to share a testimony and break things down? Is there anything else to strike you? If not, that's fine. But I'd be curious if there is anything else. Sure. Well, I do think that there are definitely, just as I think, Protestants can learn a lot from Catholic philosophers, both in the past, like St. Thomas Aquinas,

and present philosophers. So Rob Coons, Alex Pruss, for example, are excellent Catholic philosophers, Frank Beckwith, writing on this subject. So I think it's important, you know, Protestants can learn from a lot of Catholic sources, and Catholics can learn from Protestants who have done a lot of great work in this area as well. I think about the work of Alvin Plantinga, for example. Or if you really want a great take on the contingency argument, I would recommend how reason leads to God by Josh Rasmussen. So he is a Protestant, but he is an ace philosopher. We had a wonderful time discussing issues at the Capturing Christianity Conference several years ago. So I do think that we can really learn from one another there. I also think, if this is something at my channel,

at Council of Trent, I have really been trying to focus on. I mean, I'm a Catholic apologist, but I did a survey recently, and I asked people, you know, what religious group do you you belong to. And we got 42,000 votes on that survey on YouTube. And it turns out 30% of my audience are non-Catholic Christians. So, you know, two-thirds are Catholic, about four percent are not Christian, atheist, Jew, Muslim, but 30 percent are Protestants or Eastern Orthodox. And so for me, I've noticed there are many Catholic apologists who will focus on defending distinct Catholic doctrine, which is important because I believe that it's true, and I want people to be united in the one church that Christ established. But at the same time, my heart is really towards,

I want to reach the most number of people who are the furthest away from the Lord. That is what I really want to do. So when I worked at Catholic Answers, the first books that I wrote, my very first book I wrote was called Answering Atheism. Then I wrote a book called Persuasive Pro-Life, because I had done pro-life work before this, and I wanted to help people to defend the unborn. And so my heart, I mean, I do episodes on Catholicism, but I have many Protestants to watch my channel because I want to refute atheism. I want to show the, you know, the resurrection is a, there's great historical evidence for that. I mean, I, I weep that there are Catholics who don't know about Gary Habermas's 1,000 page magnum opus, you know, or, or Justin Bass's really great

intro, the bedrock of Christianity. So many great things that are out there. And like, I want to, as a Catholic, though, I want to reach the furthest number, the most people who are the furthest away. And those tend to be secular people. So I want to really show them. There's good reasons to believe in God, good reasons to leave in Christ, and to believe in his church, and to believe in the moral teachings of the church that are, you know, abortion, transgenderism, so-called same-sex marriage that are often rejected today. So I get a little bit peeved when I see Catholics focusing just on engaging Protestantism. And then I feel like I'm just out here by myself trying to engage, trying to bring souls to Christ. And so I would love for them, hey, here's what Protestants have been doing really well on many of these issues. Let's work together. Let's reach those who are lost.

And then we can have a nice friendly chat about our differences about Christian systematic theology and go from there. But there's a lot of people that are lost out there. and we need to work together to help them through the Holy Spirit, working through all of us to be able to spread the gospel. So that's what I hope that they'll bring in. That's what I'm trying to. That's why I'm really excited to partner with you and other evangelicals on just some of these important foundational Christian apologetic issues.

I really enjoyed your conversation, I don't know, a year or two ago with Ali Beth Stucky, where you got into some of the differences between Protestantism and Catholicism. I watched that twice. So anybody who's like, hey, I want you to have that conversation. It's been done. And I thought that that was really a clarifying difference in the right spirit. So I would send people there. I said it was the last question.

But let me push back on one thing. I do. I really do sense that in you, which is one recent I reached out. But the very first time we ever talked, you didn't send me your book on pro-life. You didn't send me your book on evidence for God. You sent me your book when Protestants argue like atheists or something to that effect. And I thought, oh, that's cool. He's sending me a book.

And then my next thought was, oh, Trent's like evangelism. me to the Catholic Church. So I have a number of Catholics that reach out trying to evangelize me. And I'm not offended. Like, I love it because I'm an evangelist. But this is important to you to persuade Protestants, Catholicians as well, right? Yes, it is important because I want people to have the fullness. I don't believe that Jesus only gave us mere Christianity. And so I think that one of the things that has come from, you know, learning from William Lane Craig or J.P. Morrill and or out of Biola is to promote, you know, believing in God and the resurrection of Christ, this mere Christianity, which is a good thing, but God did not give us only mere Christianity.

We have, the Christianity is the fullness of the faith, and there are important doctrines beyond mere Christianity to defend. For example, can, you know, combating errors like universalism, for example, or acceptance of, even in the evangelical world of those who would accept the morality of same-sex relations, things like that. So there's things, mere Christian is good to start. But we have to go beyond that. And that will get to important theological and sacramental issues. Now, in sending you that book, Sean, I thought it would be an interesting way to go.

But in writing that, it wasn't purely just for, you know, sharing Catholicism of Protestants. In my engagement of Protestants, in seeing how Protestants would argue against Catholicism, I was genuinely worried that they were using a kind of skepticism that can easily be rerouted to undermine Christianity itself. And I would say, wait a minute, you don't want to do that. You don't want to try to refute Catholicism. You refute Christianity in the process. That's quite a price to pay you don't want to do. So I'll give you an example.

There are a Protestant apologists who will say, well, Catholics believe not just in sacred scripture, but sacred tradition. The unwritten word of God lived out through the liturgy of the church, that the word of God can be passed on in unwritten form through sacred tradition. And so one Protestant objection to that is, well, tradition is unreliable. It's like a telephone game. You say the apostles taught this. How do we know they did?

And it's an unreliable thing. And in reading this, I'm thinking, hey, wait a minute here. You don't want to go that route because how do we know the events in the Old Testament happened? The New Testament, the life and teachings of Jesus Christ existed as a tradition for decades before they were written in the Gospels. So I would say, wait a minute, don't argue against the ability to transmit things over time. So similar things like that, I noticed, wait a minute. It's okay to have disputes, but you don't want to use an argument that will end up undermining Christianity itself. Let's try a different argument and we'll discuss those differences.

Got it. So you're trying to help Protestants be better Protestants. Makes sense. Exactly. Exactly. All right. I feel like there's a million things we could talk about. Folks watching this, let us know what conversations would be helpful between the two of us.

And make sure you hit subscribe. We've got a lot of other topics coming up that you will not want to miss. And Trent, I enjoy your channel. Of course there's going to be issues that you and I differ on between Catholics and Protestants, but you engage YouTube really well. You have good content. Every time I've seen you out there, I've seen to be charitable with people who disagree with you and you're rocking it. So I look forward to having more conversations. And folks, if you want to study apologetics and even get some Aquinas, come study with us at Talos School of Theology. We've got an MA Phil program and apologetic program. distance fully online. And quick note, we have just finished updating our certificate program. We've been working on this for probably years. Going to announce it soon, but stay tuned. If you're not ready for a master's program, we have some of the best lecturers in the world giving talks. And I'll give more information on that as well as a discount code soon as well. Trent, I pushed the time here that I asked you to commit to, but this is really fun. It was worth it.

Thanks for coming on. I enjoyed it. Thank you. Hey friends, if you enjoyed this show, please hit that follow button on your podcast app. Most of you tuning in haven't done this yet. And it makes a huge difference in helping us reach and equip more people and build community. And please consider leaving a podcast review. Every review helps. Thanks for listening to the Sean McDowell Show, brought to you by Talbot School of Theology at Biola University, where we have on campus and online programs in apologetic, spiritual information, marriage and family, Bible, and so much more.

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