¶1you. Yes, you. You've probably got some objections to Catholicism. Now, maybe you worry about hell or about homosexuality or about the Bible or about divine simplicity. Or maybe you think you can explain Catholic miracles without becoming Catholic, either by appealing to divine accommodation or demons or aliens or something else entirely.
¶2If any of that applies to you, you're in the right place. If you're new here, my name is Joe Schmidt and I'm a philosophy PhD candidate at Princeton University and I just converted to Catholicism. This is the third video in my three-part video series making a comprehensive case for Catholicism. The first video comprised my philosophical case for theism and the second video extensively examined the evidence for miracles and in particular Catholic vindicatory miracles. That is miracles that seem to evine intent to vindicate or authenticate or legitimize Catholic doctrine.
¶3In this third and final installment, I'll first examine non-atholic explanations of the Catholic miracles, after which I'll address the biggest and best objections to Catholicism. I'll conclude with some broader comments about my conversion, as well as a challenge issued directly to you. Yeah, you again. You, I'm talking to you specifically. I give you a challenge later in the video.
¶4And that applies to all of you. Without further ado, though, let's dig in. the ghost. [music] Oh, hallelujah. [music] >> [music] >> Okay.
¶5So again, like learning about all the miracles caused insane cognitive dissonance in my mind together. They're truly overwhelming evidence for Catholicism. But the problem is that I had so many barriers to going all the way to Catholicism. You know, I had objections to theism and Catholic moral teachings and hell and the Bible. Like, you name it, I had an objection.
¶6And sometimes more than one. Uh, I even put together like a 200page document with all my objections to Catholicism. And you can see where that led me. Um, but anyway, in this part of the video, I will explain how I overcame my nine biggest barriers to becoming Catholic. So, let's get on to those.
¶7So barrier number one, non-atholic explanations of miracles. So listen, if I'm going to convert, at least in large part due to vindicatory miracles, I need to see why the various alternative explanations of the miracle data don't work. Okay? So let's just systematically comb through those. So one potential explanation of the Catholic vindicatory miracles is some sort of selection effect.
¶8Like even if Catholicism is false, perhaps it's not surprising that the miracle record would seem to favor Catholicism because of its highly institutionalized structures leading to better investigative procedures and documentation. You know, its history of deep interest in the miraculous and its, you know, strongly missionary commitments. And besides, you know, like how do we know that Catholicism has the monopoly on particular vindicatory miracles? Maybe there are similar vindicatory miracles in other traditions or religions and we just aren't aware of them. Okay, so this is a kind of like selection effect type explanation and I think that this is not a serious explanation of the miracle record for various reasons.
¶9Let's go through those. So for like starters, you know, Ethan Muse, hordes of Substackers have been scouring the internet and books and articles for other examples of putitive vindicatory miracles and I've also done my own digging. People have been desperately trying to find them for a long while. Credible public miracles invoked on behalf of puditive divine revelations inconsistent with Catholicism have thus far been sorely lacking. Puditive cases from other sects are either lacking entirely or relatively easily explainable in naturalistic terms or exhibit clear signs of human or demonic deception like being superintended by an abbot who is corrupt, a fraudster, a serial adulterer, an expert propagandist and Hitler acolyte and responsible for fabricating a bunch of miracle stories or truly miraculous but not vindicatory of doctrines incompatible with Catholicism.
¶10That is, they don't involve God putting his miraculous stamp of approval on a claimed divine leggate or divine message affirming doctrinal content inconsistent with Catholicism. The best candidate that anyone has found is of course our lady of Zetun which happened at top a Coptic Orthodox church. But even the best defenders of this miracle like Dr. Travis Dums Day admit that it's an ecumenical miracle in that it doesn't privilege Coptic Orthodoxy over other sects. Right?
¶11Mary was silent. She didn't reveal anything to a seer or visionary. In fact, the miracle is devoid of doctrinal content altogether except for the manifest intent by God to answer prayers to Mary for healing. All that gets us is like, you know, saintly intercession and something in the neighborhood of high marology. And you know, while the context of a Coptic church is suggestive, like it clearly it clearly doesn't like manifestly an intention by God to doctrally affirm distinctive Coptic Orthodox teachings.
¶12And we have totally plausible explanations for why God performed the miracle that don't cite any Coptic distinctives, namely stemming the tide of growing sociopolitical strife between the majority Muslims and the minority cops in Egypt at the time, as well as urging church unity around the time of ecumenical dialogues with Rome. Ethan Muse elaborates this point as follows. the miracles that are the most convincing from a non-atholic context. I mean, first, there's a really good case called Barbara Schneider, which is basically a healing um that took place where there's just very extensive medical documentation. It's totally inexplicable.
¶13It'll be reminiscent of some of these Padre Pio healings that we've talked about where but but really the most impressive I think that people everyone's going to hear about is Our Lady of Zon. >> Absolutely. which everyone is repeatedly hearing about that's happening basically in the context of Coptic Orthodox Church where our lady is appearing over this Coptic Orthodox church over a period of three years seen by somewhere between 250,000 and a million people including Muslims including atheists you know government does an investigation they can't figure out how it would be a fraud or a conspiracy you know >> and so there's lots of conversions there's lots of miraculous healings associated with Our Lady of Zune and this was actually one of the first miracles as I mentioned at the beginning that I personally had learned erned about and so um and it was the one I was familiar with even before converting to Catholicism. Now what's there's things to think about for Zon which is it's almost in many ways the exception that proves the rule. So there's absolutely nothing in Zun that's at all antithetical to Catholic doctrine.
¶14Let's think about that. So first our lady publicly manifesting her presence during a time of turmoil and war. you know to unite Christians and Muslims and you know the cops who have been so consistently persecuted throughout history and who are engaged in ecumenical dialogue with the Catholic Church around the time these things are h you know so basically there's nothing at all unfriendly or antithetical to a Catholic worldview about conceding the veracity of that phenomena >> now on the other hand if we pose the question can a cop concede Fatima can you concede all the revelations to the seers and say that all those were substantially true and nonetheless that Coptic Orthodoxy is the one true church and not the Roman Catholic Church. Can you concede all the private revelations to Padre Peio? Can you concede all those statements that he made and still remain Coptic Orthodox or Oriental Oral Orthodox?
¶15Can you concede a distribution of Eucharistic miracles where we are all believing that God uses miracles to confirm his word as is taught in Mark 16? We all believe that that's true. But nonetheless, why would all the best scientifically verified eucharistic miracles be occurring in Catholic contexts if you had the one true church? Why wouldn't you have comparable evidence for yours that was as good? And you can't say it's a selection bias because God is providentially in control of the universe.
¶16So if he's trying to get a message out there, he can't be thwarted by selection bias. He can get he can make the evidence appear. He can make it happen. He's a smart guy. So it's he's not limited by those sorts of human constraints.
¶17if he's trying to show to the world what the true religion is. So then I would say that asymmetry in itself for how difficult ours are for you versus how innocuous yours is for us is illustrative of the principle which is yes miracles even vindicatory miracles can happen in non-atholic context but when they occur they will not be an authentic miracle as opposed to a demonic deception and vindicate something inconsistent with Catholic doctrine those that will never occur. I'm committed to that never occurring. So if you think you have an example, me and you can have a discussion about it. You know, I can come and try to debunk it and I'll be your interlocutor.
¶18>> You heard of one in a Christian context? >> Well, yeah. I mean, there's lots and lots of claims, which is why there's something I want to get to, which is my actually my schema for dealing with claims because everybody's going to come out of the woodwork with a million claims, but there's a difference between having a claim, so having hearsay testimony, having reminiscences, having, you know, all this stuff, and giving a presentation like the one I just gave. and the present. So I want you to find in your religion.
¶19Don't just nebulously gesture for me towards there are lots of claims or blah blah blah blah blah. Give me your closest parallel to Fatima and then we can look at what your closest is and we can look at Fatima and then I can start scrutinizing your thing. But before we do even taking your thing at face value, we could ask which one of these religions does it seem like God is more excited about? And I want to make sure you can pass that test. And there's nobody in the world that can.
¶20And I think that's already telling. Nobody can. Nobody can give the presentation for one of their miracles that I can give for these except for the cops and our lady of Syon basically. And so then we can but we continue into three categories of miracle claims in other in non-atholic contexts and three responses that we're going to give. So one example of a response that we'll give is just to say that it's a spurious claim.
¶21>> Yeah. >> And the vast majority of miracle claims are false. So therefore, the mere fact of a claim without the additional substantiation and corroboration like we're talking about here, the fact that you have a claim is not good. Even sometimes testimony, lots of multiply attested testimony, even from people who are firsthand, you would not believe in researching the number of examples of that quality of testimony that I found that I can then show was spurious. It just turns out retrospective memory is unreliable, especially when people are giving testimony a lot later.
¶22There's a certain fraction of people that will tell lies that will seem implausible or surprising to us. There's a natural tendency for legendary embellishments to occur and for exaggerations to occur. There are misinterpretations that happen all the time. Sometimes there are coincidences. So all these things do happen and they happen with great frequency which is why you need to be as forensic and analytical about verifying each case as we've been here and not just super credulous and be like, "Well, everybody has claims therefore everybody's on a par." No.
¶23Claim is not the same as what we just did. So that's not a claim. So we want very concrete solid evidence and corroboration and then we can start talking seriously about the implications and how to harmonize it with the Fatima and the Lords and the launch and the Padre Peio and all this stuff. So then the the second category is going to be actually one last point on that which is even for someone like Padre Peio where he's a true miracle worker. >> Yeah, >> there's tons of miracles I can debunk that get claimed in in connection with Padre Peio.
¶24more than I can confirm. And so, and Padre Peio himself acknowledges this throughout his life that many people are claiming miracles from him that he just thinks couldn't have happened and claiming he said things that he didn't say, etc. >> So, also you could have people that did true miracles, but then the vindicatory implications of that get distorted over time because basically additional stuff gets added to the war. And so that's another thing that you have to be very careful about when you're basically examining these carefully, which is even if there's true miracles, that doesn't mean that whatever the tradition or devotional narrative is about the event is true in its substance. It could be just a there's a core that's real and then there's a narrative on top of that that's been >> like a superructure imposed on it.
¶25So then second is okay we can concede that it's a genuine miracle as I just did with Zitune but then point out that the vindicatory implications of it are consonant with or consistent with Catholicism and so if you maybe if you just looked at that one miracle in a vacuum maybe you would conclude that religion but then if you looked at the overall distribution of miracles you'd see they're all clearly favoring both qualitatively and quantitatively the Catholic Church and that we're by far the best and we can prove all of our distinctive core doctrines that way. And so it just establishes it beyond reasonable doubt. Then the third category is basically demonic deceptions. >> And we all have to believe that demonic deceptions occur if we're Christian. >> So if we for instance, if we're believing in Matthew 24 when our Lord is prophesying for us that there will be many false prophets that will come and will perform false signs and wonders that would deceive even the elect if that were possible.
¶26when he's saying that, well, it would be a it would be astonishing if we believe Christ and he's prophesying that if it weren't true. >> So then we can't have these Christians that are so reluctant and reticent to ever say that anything was demonic. They're so ashamed to claim that some of these things that happen in these contexts are demonic. But no, there there are demonic deceptions. They do occur.
¶27Sometimes they're not even deception. Sometimes our Lord is just making it plain that demons exist. and he's giving that to us almost as an extraordinary grace that he's forcing the demons to manifest themselves clearly and conspicuously. >> My second response to the selection effect explanation is that if there are any vindicatory miracles favoring Catholicism and that aren't performed by demons, we'll get to the demon explanation later, which is by the way something that the selection effect response doesn't challenge. Then if Catholicism is actually false, God is a deceiver.
¶28And once we start saying that God will perform signs and wonders in confirmation and furtherance of false revelations for pragmatic reasons and is thereby going to deceive hordes of people into giving their lives to a false sect and giving the ascent of faith to false revelations that has two extremely implausible consequences. First, we then can't trust any puditive revelations from God since any such putitive revelations might simply be lies. But this has the absurd consequence that even if you were an eyewitness to everything in Christ's ministry and even if it unfolded exactly as described in the gospels, you know, Christ is healing the blind. He's curing leprosy. He's raising Lazarus from the dead.
¶29He's crucified. He's interred in the tomb. You interact with his glorified body and poke his wounds. He eats fish. He hangs around for 40 days.
¶30He's like breathing on you like [laughter and gasps] even if you saw all of that, you still shouldn't believe that Christ is Lord and Christianity is true. Because after all, maybe God is just performing miracles in confirmation of a false divine legate and his false teachings in God's name. But that just strikes me as clearly wrong. You know, if you saw those things with your own eyes, of course, you should submit to Christ's lordship and become Christian. You know, we could call this like the awesome miraculous evidence response to objections to the the Catholic vindicatory miraculous case.
¶31Like if your objection implies that we shouldn't become Christian upon witnessing all of Christ's miracles transpire exactly as described in the Gospels, well then your objection fails since that's absurd. Here's the second extremely implausible consequence. The rational foundation for our belief system is then undermined, right? Like if we can't count on God to be truthful and not perform boatloads of deceptive signs, then we can't count on God to have placed us in an epistemically friendly environment conducive to the formation of generally true beliefs about the world and reliable cognitive faculties. And this point is especially forceful when we consider the particularities of the miracles themselves.
¶32Again, like return to Padre Pio, he was having complex multimodal experiences involving extensive interactions with Mary and Christ almost daily. If he wasn't actually interacting with Christ or Mary, or if he was and they were systematically deceiving him of in what they told him, then God is basically putting people, as Ethan puts it, in the Truman show where through no fault of their own, they using well functioning cognitive faculties are rationally obliged to believe in massive deceptions about extensive multimodal ordinary interactions on a daily basis. Oh, and you know, God's also doing this to like Amir Na Nazour and Adam Blly stigmatist and like St. Fina and St. Theresa of Aval and St.
¶33John of the Cross and St. Jeemical Ghanian and on and on and on and on. If God is willing to go to these lengths to actively deceive people about the world, or if God is even willing to allow lesser spirits to go to these lengths to deceive people about the world despite the absence of discernable signs of deception, then we can't count on God to place the rest of us in an epistemically friendly environment in day-to-day life. And that has implausibly skeptical consequences. As Ethan Muse puts it, unless St.
¶34PO's private revelations were substantially true. He was perpetually being deceived about who he was perceiving and communicating with, whether conduct was sinful and the nature, purpose, and effects of his actions. There was a world of difference between God adapting a message to the culture of its audience and putting somebody in the Truman Show. If you think that God has good reason to put St. Peio in a skeptical scenario, then why not think that he has good reason to put you in one?
¶35Ironically, if anyone could reasonably think himself epistemically privileged by God, it would be someone like St. Peio, whom God uniquely privileged in so many other extraordinary ways. And here's a final point about like the divine kind of deception or at least very significant divine misleading model. If you think God can actively deceive tons of people in a totally incernible way through extensive multimmodal regular interactions without somehow landing us in a skeptical scenario, well, so long as we just have a super high presumption in favor of non-deception on any given occasion of divine communication, as we should, then that alone suffices for me to make my case. Since then, we should simply have a super high presumption in favor of God's honesty with any given vindicatory miracle, let alone the entire pattern of vindicatory miracles.
¶36And also, it would just be like exceedingly strange and awfully convenient for the non-atholic if God basically goes out of his way to only do vindicatory seeming deceptions for Catholicism and to promote Catholicism. Like, that's just it's not credible. So, that's my second response to the selection effect. Basically, you know, if there are any vindicatory miracles in the sense of divine signs that are favoring Catholicism, then God's a deceiver and that has very implausible consequences. Third, the very nature of a vindicatory miracle involves God putting his stamp of approval on a divine legate or divine messenger who is promulgating a revelation on behalf of God.
¶37So, vindicatory miracles by their very nature are meant to be public signs that witness to and further some teacher or teaching. But God is not limited by selection effects. Right? If he wants to get the word out about a revelation, he will. He's omnipotent.
¶38He can't be thwarted by those pesky Catholics and their amazing recordkeeping. Right? So, the fact that he hasn't gotten the word out for non-atholic sects is therefore itself strong evidence that they don't have vindicatory miracles. Again, God is not limited by a selection effect. And the whole point of a vindicatory miracle is to promugate revelation.
¶39Fourth, here's something basically granted by the selection effect objection. Only Christian and Catholic vindicator miracles have been so public, so massive and extraordinary that many times, cultures, nations, etc. have heard about them. But this is itself super surprising if Christianity or Catholicism is false since massive public super extraordinary miracles are self-publicizing, right? Like one of the reasons Fatima is such a big deal is because every major Portuguese newspaper was present because of the advanced prediction and the large crowds with which gathered during the apparitions.
¶40One of the reasons Zetun is such a big deal is that between 250,000 and a million people saw the apparitions. It was reported in the New York Times. It made national and international news etc. Right? and ditto with Lords and I could, you know, I could go on and ditto with Lords and Ditto with Padre Peio where like tons of people, thousands of people would flock to see his masses and would flock to, you know, try to get a confessions with him, etc.
¶41Since extraordinary and massive public vindicatory miracles are self-publicizing, a selection effect won't explain why only Christianity or Catholicism seems to enjoy them. Here's my fifth response to the selection effect explanation. Let's distinguish local vindicatory miracles from broad vindicatory miracles. Local vindicatory miracles are miracles that vindicate puditive divine revelations and whose intended audience that is those who God intended to see or hear about the miracle is highly localized geographically, temporally or culturally. Broad vindicatory miracles by contrast are miracles that vindicate put divine revelations and whose intended audience is super broad temporally, geographically or culturally.
¶42In other words, the divinely intended audience is massive and spans [clears throat] many times, nations, and or cultures. The selection effect objection effectively grants that Catholicism or Christianity has a monopoly on broad vindicatory miracles. You know, like its whole point is that even though broad vindicatory miracles cluster in Christianity and Catholicism, you know, maybe there are these like local vindicatory miracles that that haven't reached us precisely because they're localized geographically or culturally or temporally. But crucially, if God wanted to, he could reach a broad audience under any constraints, whichever institutions existed or didn't exist. So if all the broad vindicatory miracles are Catholic or Christian, this raises the question of why he only performs broad vindicatory miracles for Christianity and Catholicism when he easily could do the same for any other sect given that he can reach a broad audience under any constraints.
¶43And if the response to this is that, you know, oh well God doesn't perform any broad vindicatory miracles, he doesn't have that intent. It's just that like narrow Catholic vindicatory miracles simply get inadvertently amplified due to a selection effect. And you know that's and that and that that's what explains this kind of distribution of broad vindicatory miracles. But that's extremely implausible for at least three reasons. First, it just seems like manifestly evident that say you know Fatima, Zetun, Lords, etc.
¶44are intended to reach a broad audience. Fatima was literally predicted months in advance so that people may believe to quote the apparition and the nature of the miracle itself was a spectacular public event in front of 30 to 100,000 people. And so the response at hand just doesn't even seem to get off the ground. Second of all, given theism, it seems highly unexpected that God would allow inadvertent amplification plus a strong selection bias to create a misleading evidential situation and make religious truth bordering on inaccessible. And third, if God exists but Catholicism is false, it seems especially unexpected that God would allow inadvertent amplification plus a strong selection bias to create the false impression that God favors Catholicism specifically.
¶45Since given non-atholicism, the Catholic Church is blaspheming God by claiming to be a divine legate and is binding consciences under pain of damnation to evil and false things, which is very bad. And also, you know, like Catholicism is committed to doctrines that are really bad if they're false. You know, like doctrines about hell and sin and homosexuality and the like. It would be super surprising under non-atholicism that God would go out of his way to perform signs in furtherance of this sect, including signs like eucharistic miracles that seemingly serve no other salutary purpose than vindicating transubstantiation, right? And then to like only do that in Catholic context.
¶46Like come on, man. So, I think the selection effect explanation just as poorly when we look at the the broader distribution of broad vindicatory miracles. That's my fifth response. My sixth response is that it's just like obviously false that Orthodox and Protestant churches and organizations and communities lack enough institutional structure to investigate and document miracles possibly vindicatory of their sects, right? Like for starters, lots of miracles don't require much institutional structure to be documented and propagated, right?
¶47Like it wouldn't take much for say like word to spread about Martin Luther publicly appearing to multiple people and joining them not to pray rosaries and to you know to protest the Catholic Church and for him to like tell seers to predict a massive public miracle months in advance and then for the miracle to occur in front of tens of thousands of people including skeptical and hostile witnesses. getting getting word out about that doesn't take much institutional structure. It also it it doesn't it also doesn't take much for an Orthodox priest or Protestant pastor to send a bloody wafer off to a laboratory and share the results. And again like Pentecostals already do this adnauseium with their nonindigatory healing miracles. That's why we hear about like Greg Spencer and Barbara Schneider and all the other miracles that you know for instance Craig Kenir and lots of others have publicized.
¶48So the selection effect explanation is just like clearly mistaken. Like no, there there is enough institutional structure to get the word out about miracles in other sects. You're just wrong. Oh, and we also saw with Zetune that the Coptic Orthodox Church does have a deal of institutional structure that was actually super effective in documenting and promulgating Zetune. So we've already seen like I don't know five reasons why this objection fails, but the sixth just comes and just like smacks it in the face.
¶49And there are more smacks still. So seventh, the very fact that God arranged history so that the Catholic Church mogs everyone else in its institutional functionality and diligence is itself not something we would expect if Catholicism is false. You know, since God would know that doing so would lead to a massively skewed perception of the quality of miraculous evidence for Catholicism. That's very surprising if Catholicism is false, but precisely what we'd expect if Catholicism is true. And then eighth of all, at some point, my friend, just snap out of it, right?
¶50Like we have Mary appearing to Catholic shepherd children, calling herself our lady of the rosary, constantly enjoining people to pray the rosary, asking the holy father to perform a formal consecratory act of a principally orthodox nation outside of his jurisdiction according to the Orthodox to her immaculate heart. She's explicitly granting requests to convert named people to Catholicism. She's appearing in France and saying, "I am the immaculate conception." Christ and Mary are appearing to me and affirming that like Peter is the rock in the context of a cult of unity in an orthodox country. The existence of purgatory participatory vicurious satisfaction for sin icon veneration the nine creed the rosary marry intercession Padre Peio is literally reduplicating Christ's passion wounds and being united to Christ's passion in an act of participatory redemptive suffering. He's able to tell in striking detail the unconfessed mortal sins of penitence.
¶51He's knowing exactly when they're being remitted in confession. souls in purgatory are constantly visiting him. He's he's visiting hell and experienced the suffering of the damned Catholic priests and it only seems to be Catholic priests are praying over bread and it's turning into suffering myioardial tissue and on and on and on. Like how do you not look at this evidence and just immediately see that Catholicism is true and that you know this alternative explanation is just like guzzling unconscionable amounts of copium straight from the fire hose. I mean, like, come on.
¶52Come on. Come on. And and you know, just like finally to my selection effect peeps, are you comfortable betting your soul on a selection effect in the face of this miraculous evidence? Are you comfortable? Are you comfortable risking seeing Christ at the end of your life and saying that?
¶53I'm not. Okay. So, that's what I'll say about the selection effect. Uh, let's go on to generic theist accommodationism. Okay.
¶54So this explanation of the miracle record says that in performing miracles, God is just accommodating to the socioultural conditions and beliefs and expectations of the societies in which he performs them. You know, he's essentially just like meeting people where they're at, right? So it's not surprising that say Portugal or France would get a Catholic vindicatory miracle, even if Protestantism is true since, you know, God's just trying to better connect people with the church most conducive to their spiritual growth given their times and places and upbringings and religious context. And you know in Portugal or France that's Catholicism. But you know this divine modus operandi is perfectly compatible with generic theism or pluralist theism where multiple religions are at least approximately true or where multiple religions are equally legitimate paths to God or something.
¶55So you know we can just go in for this kind of generic theist accommodationism like no no particular religion is true or maybe like they're all true or they're all like equally legitimate paths to God or something like that. Um and God's just like again like accommodating to people's particular socio cultural conditions and beliefs and whatnot. But this too is not a serious explanation of the miracle record. First, while God does perform miracles in a whole host of contexts, he doesn't perform specifically vindicatory miracles in a whole [clears throat] host of contexts. Those seem to cluster in Catholicism.
¶56So, the generic theist accommodationist strategy simply grants that God is an active deceiver. God's going out of his way to authenticate, legitimize, and promulgate false revelations through manifold miraculous signs. And he's willing to put people like St. Pio and Mazour and St. Fina and Adam Bligmatist basically in the Truman Show.
¶57But, you know, for reasons we've already seen, it's disastrous to make God out to be a deceiver. So, just return to the the points that I made in my first response to the selection effect explanation. Second of all, even ignoring the divine deception response, generic theist accommodationism does not predict in the slightest that the pattern of vindicatory miracles would uniquely privilege Catholicism specifically. Right? The generic theist god could have singled out with massive vindicatory miracles Sunni Islam or Shia Islam or Orthodox Judaism or liberal Judaism or liberal Christianity or mere Christianity or Lutheranism or Methodism or Seventh Day Adventism or Presbyterianism or Coptic Orthodoxy or Eastern Orthodoxy or the Assyrian Church of the East or Anglicanism or the Baptists or the Quakers or Evangelicalism or Pentecostalism or Hinduism or Buddhism or Janism or Dowoism or any of the thousands of other religions or sects.
¶58Right? Or God could have made vindicatory miracles a complete mix with some favoring one sect, others favoring another sect and so on for all the countless different patterns we could have gotten. It is extremely overwhelmingly surprising then that God singled out Catholicism specifically for repeated systematic unmistakable vindicatory miracles given the mere generic theist accommodationist view. By contrast, the vindicatory miraculous favoring of Catholicism isn't at all surprising under Catholicism. And so this is extremely powerful evidence for Catholicism over the generic or pluralist theism hypothesis.
¶59Third, generic or pluralist theist accommodationism is very strongly disisconfirmed by many facts about the particular miracles we covered. You know, St. Peio, for instance, is clearly poorly explained by accommodation. It's just like not at all plausible that God would accommodate someone's false and harmful religious beliefs by torturing him against his express wishes. So the first question I would have is why in the world is the way that the god of generic theism is accommodating Padre Pio's religious beliefs is by giving him excruciatingly painful and humiliating wounds that he's for 50 years begging for this god to take away and is basically torturing him based on a false theology of basically like vicarious participatory suffering as this guy is part of a religion which explicitly says that if it is not literally and exclusively true that this religion is true then everything about the religion is in vain.
¶60And so he does he decides it's not only that like he did this but it's like he doesn't do anything comparable for any other religion that would have way less morbid consequences if he did do it. >> Yeah. I mean this I know this is a point you've made in the past and I find it plausible like the generic theist is remaining a generic theist instead of a Christian or a Catholic in part because they think that you know oh you know it's got like a repressive sexual ethic. Oh, you know, um it it's got all these it's got a commitment to hell and these various other bad things. Um like it would seem much more plausible under that brand of generic theism that you know the religion that such a god would be most interested in vindicating would be something like some kind of you know universalist Hinduism or something.
¶61Like if you have a delusional belief um that it's good for you to be tortured, right? If you have a delusional belief that it's good for you to be tortured, then regardless of even the vindicatory implications, that's just the last thing that I would expect your like warm fuzzy hippie god to choose to be the most extraordinary religious accommodation that he does for anybody is to choose to do it in that way with that guy against his express wishes. And it's like if I was almost trying to come up with data that would be like the least expected on that worldview that they couldn't accommodate like this would be close like [laughter] I guess that's true. Oh and also like the exact same points apply to MNA too by the way and you know Adam Blly stigmatist etc. Um [laughter] you know St.
¶62Joseph of Certino it was super embarrassing for him he didn't want this to happen. Um, and you like still other miracles are not plausibly interpreted as society bound accommodations like you know launch. Ethan says like the miraculous conservation of the relics indicates that the author of the miracle intends for them to be transhistorical witnesses that evinc the authenticity of the Lanchiano tradition. In fact, their state of preservation suggests that the author of the miracle has been more concerned with preserving their evidential value for modern scientists than with preserving their visual appearance. You like on the one hand the heart tissue is ligignous and mold spotted.
¶63the blood clots are brittle and fissured and you know their services are dull and irregular. On the other hand, they have inexplicably retained enough structural integrity and immuno reactivity to confirm organ and species identity. So like it just it just seems that the author of that miracle is not just trying to like you know accommodate to the particular religious circumstances of the particular people and time and place or whatever uh of its original occurrence. Like instead it seems like it's intended to be promulgated widely and to be like known today uh through contemporary methods of science. So anyway, um that's the third point.
¶64It's just like there are like particular facts about the miracles that seem to very strongly disisconfirm generic or pluralist theistic combinationism. Even like setting aside the stuff about like the patterns uh and whatnot and gods being a deceiver on this model. Um okay, my fourth response, the generic theist accommodationist response to the Catholic indigatory miraculous case faces the awesome miraculous evidence response. If you were an eyewitness to everything in Christ's ministry and it unfolded exactly as depicted in the gospels, you should believe that Christ is Lord and Christianity is true. But the generic theist accommodationist severs that inference, right?
¶65Like after all, oh maybe God is just accommodating or condescending to the socioultural conditions and beliefs of certain second temple Jews at the time, right? Like no, that strikes me as clearly wrong. If we saw those things with our own eyes, of course we should submit to Christ's lordship and become Christian instead of taking seriously that, you know, oh, God's not intending to like authenticate Christ's message, you know, he he's just he's just meeting us where we're at, you know, like, no, stop. Fifth, God can connect people in Catholic societies with the Catholic Church without vindicating distinctively Catholic doctrines. And and you know, we would strongly expect this under generic theism given God's at least general honesty and the fact that religious truth being accessible is a good thing that would be compromised by the performance of deceptive vindicatory signs.
¶66And given that under generic theism, Catholicism teaches all these things, it would be very bad if true. And given that it's like blaspheming God, etc. For example, God easily could have made Christ appear to Catholic seers, not Mary, without vindicating any distinctively Catholic beliefs. you know, like Christ could just say like, "Yeah, pray, you know, like submit to my lordship." Like that those sorts of things. Uh well, even like the generic theist would would struggle with that, but this is more just like about non-atholic accommodationism in general.
¶67That that could have happened. And you know, a public miracle in connection with such a non-windigatory apparition would surely kindle faith in the members of the relevant Catholic societies, right? And then sixth and finally, once again, at some point, dude, just snap out of it like St. Pio and Mir Nazour are like supernaturally reduplicating Christ's passion wounds. They're literally living icons or representations of his glorious passion.
¶68How do you stare that in the face? These people like who are having like complex multimodal visions of Christ himself saying like I unite you to my passion for instance and then being an icon of Christ sharing his passion wounds. How do you stare that in the face and deny Christ? How do you see Mary reciting the nyine creed with Mna and Christ saying that he's the creator and Mary saying that Christ alone is the most high and good above all things and not become Christian? Oh, generic or pluralist theist accommodationist.
¶69Are you comfortable betting your soul on generic or pluralist theist accommodationism in the face of the miraculous evidence? Are you comfortable betting risking losing out on union with God, being separated from God and suffering eternally as a result of such a choice? Are you are you comfortable with that? I would not be. Okay, let's get to the next one.
¶70The spirits are running spirits or aliens are running a muck. Um [laughter] maybe there are just powerful spirits causing miracles in different sects and you know these rather than God are responsible for Catholic vindicatory miracles or you know maybe maybe like aliens are responsible for them. You know, maybe they also did like the the pyramids as well. Okay, so this at least has the advantage of you know not making God a deceiver. So that that's pretty good.
¶71But like basically [laughter] what does this amount to? There's like super powerful spirits running around deceiving people into believing Catholicism, performing boatloads of deceptive signs and wonders, putting tons of people like St. Padre Peio and Mir Nazour and Theresa Vabala and Joseph Gupertino and St. Pastina and St. John of the Cross and Ben Lucia dos Santos and the Truman Show like that is your hypothesis.
¶72Like like Daycart's evil demon is or evil extraterrestrial is basically real and has essentially boundless powers of deception and is like regularly actively deceiving people about basic facts about the world around them and like who they're interacting with on a daily basis. Like come on, this just has like intolerably skeptical implications. Second of all, this hypothesis just does not predict that the spirits or aliens would favor Catholicism specifically. Right? If there are spirits or aliens running a mock, the spirits or aliens could have singled out with massive vindicator miracles, Sunni Islam or Shia Islam or Orthodox Judaism or liberal Judaism or liberal Christianity or mere Christian or Lutheranism or Presbyterianism or Anglicanism or the Baptists, the Quakers, the Coptic Orthodox or the Eastern Orthodox or the Syrians or the Evangelicals or the Pentecostals, the Hindus or the Buddhists or the Janists or the Dowists or any other of the thousands of religious religions or sex or they could have done any mixture of vindicatory miracles, right?
¶73And so it's extremely surprising, even conditional, on this spirits or aliens running a muck hypothesis, that they singled out Catholicism specifically. And by contrast, the vindicatory miraculous favoring of Catholicism is not at all surprising under Catholicism. It's exactly what we'd expect. And so this ex this is extremely powerful evidence for Catholicism over and against these spirits or aliens are running a muck hypothesis. Third, this hypothesis can be used to just like explain away anything like like like, oh, there there never were dinosaurs, right?
¶74There's just like powerful spirits or aliens who happen to want to convince us that dinosaurs existed by planting fossils. We wouldn't take this seriously in any other context. Dragon has another one. How do you respond to people who say Yahweh and Jesus exist and do miracles, but he they are not God, but just a powerful deities? Some Buddhists and Hindus believe that.
¶75This this actually raises a good question I wanted to get into which is that Protestants like Mike Lacona, Gary Habermass, a lot of these guys working on the resurrection, a lot of the Protestants working on the resurrection will use the resurrection like event as proof of Christianity being true, right? And so what they're doing is essentially what we're doing with the Catholic miracles is they're saying, "Well, this this miracle, this event has this sort of vindicatory element to it which proves that Christianity is true." And then when they turn to discussing these Marian apparitions, it's like we just forget all of that. Like we we forget the fact that a miracle can be vindicatory in this sense. And so, um, I I would assume that's going to be your response here is that the vindigatory implications of the event themselves, >> what he's talking about here is different because what he's saying is basically imagine that we can see that there is a supernatural being that identifies itself as the Christian God, but the Christian God is not who it claims to be, right? So it's just some kind of powerful uh entity that isn't actually like the god of classical theism that it purports to be.
¶76And so basically this would leave us with two scenarios. Like either this being which is super powerful, super intelligent is like deceived about its own nature and identity in a way that's sort of hard to fathom. like how you could be wrong that like you're the self-existent ultimate ground of all being that's eternal that's outside of time and space upon which everything depends, you know, and you communicate existence to everything that exists outside of you and you have full knowledge and awareness of everything that's going on all the time. So it's it's not clear how you could be mistaken about that. It's a little bit of a baffling and confusing view.
¶77So but then or it's just lying, right? So it's like pretending to be that even though it's not, right? And all of this gets down to it starts to become equivalent to like brain in a vat skeptical scenarios because what you're saying is there's a super powerful agent that is either itself deceived or has an intent to deceive in such a way that has created within it a very strong motivation to basically deceive all of us about the fundamental nature of reality. And so he's super powerful. So he can work miracles, he can manipulate people's minds, you know, he can perform extraordinary public signs, etc., etc., etc.
¶78and he has a desire to basically deceive us about the fundamental nature of the world. Well, that's basically just like a cartisian skeptical scenario. And so for the same reasons we resist skepticism, for the same reason I think that Cameron exists, I think that I have a mom. I think 2 plus 2 equals 4. I think there's like a basic aptitude that my mind has to discover the truth outside of itself and that the environment that I'm in is friendly to me discovering the truth and that it's possible for me through diligent rational investigation to get closer to truth.
¶79I have to foreclose almost axiomatically that I'm in such a skeptical scenario where there are these super powerful beings that are completely unrestrained and that are trying to deceive us about the fundamental nature of reality. So that first type of response is like a transcendental response, right? Reasoning from the basically this violates the preconditions for knowledge about anything to posit the existence of such a being. Then the second type of response will just be like a more abductive type of response where I'm just going to say inference to best explanation. So there's a miracle record that appears to uniquely privilege these claims.
¶80A really logical explanation for that is that the being that's posited by the Christian worldview which is itself kind of like a sublime internally coherent you know somewhat anticedently plausible worldview makes this prediction that this being is going to try to communicate with us and reveal itself to us. And that prediction is also going to be that basically therefore the true religion is going to be uniquely privileged by the distribution of miracle evidence that it creates. And then there's a super ad hoc theory which is like no this being isn't who it claims to be and just randomly decides to claim to be this thing that it's not and then perform a bunch of miracles and then it turns out there are no similar beings that are like counteracting it with similarly credible miracles for other false claims. But just for some reason specifically, the Christian guy has decided that he's motivated to lie about being the Christian God and has is the only one that actually has taken an interest in actually producing false misleading miracles. So that just violates every principle of good reasoning about how to compare two theories for plausibility that like we subscribe to in every other context, you know?
¶81So you might as well be positing like there's a spirit that goes around fooling us at the Large Hadron Collider to create a misleading impression that the standard model of particle physics is true or that prefers to create a mass illusion that rain happens or always makes it to where thermometers are off by one degree. Like you can posit a bunch of ridiculous, ad hoc, not independently motivated theories when there's a very straightforward, natural, intuitively plausible theory to explain the same data to be a skeptic about anything. But it's just terrible reasoning. Fourth, this hypothesis succumbs to the awesome miraculous evidence response. If this alternative explanation undermined the case for Catholicism from Catholic vindicatory miracles, then it would also undermine the case for Christianity from the awesome miraculous evidence.
¶82But that's absurd, right? Like surely the awesome miraculous evidence argument for Christianity goes through. So if your objection to the case for Catholicism implies that it doesn't, then you've gone wrong somewhere. I mean, again, like imagine you witness firsthand everything reported in the Gospels about Jesus. That would clearly be overwhelming evidence for Christianity specifically to the point that anyone who did not become Christian upon seeing all of that would just be irrational.
¶83But if we thought that these spirits are aliens running a muck hypothesis undermines the case for Catholicism for miracles, then it would also sever your inference to Christianity after witnessing everything in the Gospels. After all, maybe there are just spirits or aliens out there and you know, one of them just happened to really like Jesus even though Jesus was a false prophet was blaspheing God the creator and so, you know, this spirit or alien just performed all these deceptive miracles on Jesus's behalf. I submit that this objection would not remove the force of the awesome miraculous evidence for Christianity if you had it. And yet it would if we accepted the objection as applied to the Catholic vindicatory miraculous argument. So we should not accept the objection as applied to the Catholic vindicatory miraculous argument.
¶84Fifth, some Buddhists might go in for the spirits running a monk hypothesis without God the creator in their metaphysical system. Instead, fundamentally or ultimately, there just is like a paniply of finite spirits with different powers and abilities and their own idiosyncratic ends. But we've already seen ample reason to reject this view on philosophical grounds. I mean, for starters, it struggles with contingency arguments which deliver a necessarily existent ultimate foundation of reality. And stage two of those arguments at least gives us reason to think that such an ultimate necessary reality would be the unlimited god of traditional theism.
¶85And also like if scientists had two theories of the ultimate nature of reality, one of which posits just one fundamental field or kind of particle which explains everything else about reality where the fundamental field lacks any arbitrary or inelegant or complex parameters and the other of which posits 337 fundamental fields each having lots of arbitrary and inelegant and complex parameters. The scientists are rightly going to massively favor the simpler, more elegant, less arbitrary hypothesis. And yet this is precisely the choice we face between theism and the fundamental finite spirits hypothesis where like under theism everything traces to a single fundamental being entirely devoid of arbitrary or inelegant or complex parameters. For example, only this much power or only that much knowledge or only sensitive to these reasons or only this much goodness or this exact mix of good and evil etc. Instead, God is purely perfect.
¶86He has every perfection to an unlimited extent. It's a highly simple, compactly describable, elegant, non-arbitrary, uniform hypothesis. Under the fundamental finite spirits hypothesis, ultimate reality consists of some arbitrary number of lesser spirits like, you know, like 337 or something, each enjoying an arbitrary concoction of highly complex features without being able to derive those from any simpler theoretical posits. It seems you like exactly this much limited power specific to the each of the 337 beings, exactly this much limited knowledge, exactly this mixture of good and evil specific to each of the 337 beings and so on. And plus there are going to be like additional rules and stipulations about how they each can and can't interact.
¶87[laughter] So, so there's no question that theism does far better than the fundamental finite spirits hypothesis on theoretical virtues of simplicity, non-arbitiness, uniformity, etc. Right. Antheism also does a much better job unifyingly explaining the philosophical data. So, for example, if these spirits are literally running around and performing massive public deceptions in favor of false revelations, then why on earth would we trust them to benevolently guide the evolutionary process to ensure that we have moral and operatory knowledge? Or if these beings are just like innocently mistaken about such basic facts about the world, which is itself like a pretty silly hypothesis, you know, like how do you not know whether you're the the creator of everything else as was said to MNA?
¶88Well, then why think they have the requisite knowledge of moral and oporary truths to ensure our access to them? And you know, for obvious reasons, these views do a much worse job unifyingly explaining the fact that humans generally systematically avoided every skeptical scenario. And also, you know, there are striking coincidences between the mental states of these beings and the physical world, which don't appear derable from simpler posits. I mean, listen, I could go on and on, but this view is just clearly inferior to theism. And again, like in this response, I'm just assuming that the people who are positing the spirits running a muck hypothesis don't have God within their metaphysical system.
¶89That that's specific only to this fifth response. And then sixth and finally, my friend, do you hear yourself? Do you hear yourself? Padre Peio and Mirina Nazour are being united to Christ's passion. The Blessed Virgin Mary is appearing to people and explicitly agreeing to convert named individuals to Catholicism.
¶90She's telling them to pray the rosary. She's saying, you know, she's calling herself, I am the immaculate conception. Catholic priests are praying over bread and it's turning into suffering myocardial tissue. Again, how do you look at all of that, all of that, all the miracles that I went through and say aliens? How do you do that?
¶91I don't know. First, and secondly, how do you not feel existential dread at the thought that you're betting your entire soul for all eternity on the hypothesis that aliens replicated exactly what we'd expect if God were just screaming that Catholicism is true? Are you seriously going to risk damnation for that? Are you willing to like Yeah. Like write down on a piece of paper like I think all these miracles were aliens and like sign it.
¶92Are you were you willing to sign that? I I again I certainly would not be. Okay. Onwards we march to Protestantism. Okay.
¶93So I will break this section into four chunks. First I'll consider the Protestant accommodationist denial approach to Catholic vindicatory miracles. Second I'll consider the Protestant accommodationist acceptance approach. Third I'll consider the Protestant demonism approach. And fourth, I'll defend some independent problems for Protestantism, even apart from its decisive, miraculous disisconfirmation.
¶94I'll explain what these views are momentarily. So, just listen up. Galma. Okay. First up, Protestant accommodationist denial.
¶95This is the first Protestant explanation of the Catholic vindicatory miraculous evidence that we will consider. This hypothesis is very similar to the generic or pluralist theist accommodationism. Uh the basic tenants of Protestant accommodationist denial are that Protestantism is true. The distinctive Catholic doctrines that are being vindicated by the Catholic vindicatory miracles are false. But God is performing those vindicatory miracles because he's accommodating or condescending to particular times and places and belief systems.
¶96Okay, so those are the three main tenants of Protestant accommodationist denial. But this is not a remotely serious explanation of the miracle record. First, it absurdly makes God out to be an act of deceiver. The hypothesis literally grants that God is going out of his way to authenticate and promulgate false revelations through manifold miraculous signs. He's also willing to put people like St.
¶97Peio and Mazour and St. Fina in the Truman Show. But it's disastrous especially for Protestants who accept the biblical data about God's truthfulness to make God out to be a deceiver. And that's entirely setting aside the skeptical implications that would also plague this explanation. Like you know like with Fatima, God's just making Mary like what?
¶98lied to the children about the pope being the holy father about him having the spiritual authority to make a formal consecratory act on Russia's behalf to the immaculate heart. God's making Mary lie to St. Bernardet Subaru that Mary is the immaculate conception. Christ is lying to me about saintly intercession and Mary being the mother of God and participatory redemptive suffering and like vicarious participatory satisfaction for sin. Christ is deceiving Padre Pio by like sending him fake souls from purgatory and implanting in his mind false revelations about others mortal sins.
¶99[laughter] Even though they get like even though like the penitence like oh man yeah that was 14 years ago and I didn't confess that and I suppressed that and that was a highly specific detail about my life. Uh I mean like dude this hypothesis is blasphemous. You are blaspheming God with this hypothesis. You're making God out to be an active deceiver with this hypothesis and that's not okay. And again just like just think about it, right?
¶100Like God can connect people in Catholic societies with the Catholic Church without vindicating distinctly Catholic doctrines. And you know, we'd strongly expect that under Protestantism given God's veracity and the fact that religious truth being accessible is a good thing that would be compromised by the performance of deceptive vindicatory signs. You know, for example, God easily could have made, as I've said before, Christ appear to Catholic seers without putting a stamp of approval on any distinctively Catholic beliefs. You know, he could have just said like, yeah, pray to God, you know, ask for mercy, all that stuff. And and a public miracle in connection with such non-indigatory apparitions would surely kindle faith in the members of the relevant Catholic societies, right?
¶101So that's my first response to the uh Protestant accommodationist denial. Second of all, even ignoring the divine deception response. Protestant accommodationist denial does not predict in the slightest that the pattern of vindigodory miracles would uniquely privilege Catholicism specifically because again God could have singled out with massive vineigatory miracles any of the Christian sects. liberal Christianity, mere Christianity, Lutheranism, Methodism, 7th Day Adventism, Presbyterianism, Coptic Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodoxy, you're in the Church of the East, Anglicanism, the Baptists, maybe the Quakers, I don't know that the Evangelicals, propentecostals, non-denominationalists, or any of the dozens or thousands, depending on how you count, Christian sects, or God could have made the vindicatory miracles a complete mix, you know, with some favoring one sect, others favoring another sect. But no, God favored, singled out Catholicism specifically for repeated, systematic, unmistakable vindicatory miracles.
¶102And by contrast, the vindicatory miraculous favoring of Catholicism is not at all surprising under Catholicism. And so this is extremely powerful evidence for Catholicism over Protestant accommodationist denial. Third, Protestant accommodationist denial is once again very strongly disconsc. St. Pio, for instance, is clearly poorly explained by accommodation.
¶103It's not at all plausible that God would accommodate someone's false and harmful religious beliefs by torturing him against his express wishes. And you know, the same points, as I've said before, apply to Mirina and lots of the other miracles that we've seen. Fourth, Protestant accommodationist denial simply undermines the very foundation of Christianity itself, namely the miraculous vindication of Christ. After all, if God is willing to go to such gargantuan lengths to vindicate false doctrines and false divine legates, including through kinds of miracles that Christ himself uses to accredit his authority to his listeners, then we can no longer be confident that Christ's prophethood and revelations are veritical as opposed to yet another of the hordes of false prophets and false doctrines that God goes out of his way to miraculously vindicate. So, the hypothesis here just completely undermines Christianity itself.
¶104Protestant denomination is denial is a self undermining hypothesis. >> And one thing that's great about the church and the model of um the model that we are working with and defending now is that the church remains as a divine wgate that can be accredited to every generation, right? As something that is just in the same way that when Moses has signs that accompany him that vindicates him, so too for the church, right? And so one thing can be that the church is prophesied in scripture. And so we can look to scripture as a motive.
¶105You know, once we have good reasons to accept the authority of scripture or good reasons to accept the authority of Christ and we think he's made reference to the church or good reason to accept the consent, you know, the organic development of a consensus within Christendom. All that's fine. Those can be ways of of identifying that the church has authority. But in addition to that, the church itself actually there are lots of for instance vindicatory miracles that are performed by God which we reviewed that point specifically to and confirm the Catholic Church's claim. >> You've had a few conversations about some of these, right?
¶106Yeah. [laughter] >> And so those are evidence signs that point to and refer to and vindicate the Catholic Church's claims. >> And in fact, those credentials that the church claims for itself, this is a big problem for Protestantism. And it gets back to actually what Augustine said in replying to the manaches which is remember what he said was the church's authority is inaugurated by miracles and it's only on the authority of the church that he's moved to accept the scriptures. Right.
¶107Right. And so what he's actually presupposing is that these sort of vindicatory miracles and these signs and the moral miracle of the church itself and all this stuff is actually convicting him that the church is what it claims to be which is then what convinces him that Christ is who scripture represents him as being. >> Yes. Right. That's the route.
¶108That's the route. Yeah. >> And so once we realize that the reason we accept the Old Testament, the reason we accept the New Testament is most fundamentally because Christ has the credentials of a divine legate and he affirms them, >> right? [clears throat] >> And so it's because of Christ's miracles that we accept Christ. And then we so then if we start to realize that if the foundation if the most superior credentials that are given to us are actually Christ's body, the church, its miracles that it claims for itself, you know, just as Christ prophesies, you'll do greater works than these, you know.
¶109So it turns out the superior credentials of the church, the same reason you had to trust Christ is your reason to trust the church. >> And so if those reasons don't work for the church, then they don't work for Christ. And so you've defeated your own Protestant religion. Right? >> So the credentials, every credential that the the divine legates in the Bible itself can claim for themselves.
¶110So too the Catholic Church can claim for itself and with much more um historical credibility, which is I think why God chooses to make it to where these are the more historically credible miracles. >> Yeah. That's not a coincidence, right? >> These are ones that we can have photographs for. These are the ones where we can actually have hundreds of eyewitness testimonies where there's no ambiguity about >> scientific investigations.
¶111Right. >> Right. These are the ones where we can send it to a lab. And so if you're willing to play Mr. Atheist skeptic for all the Catholic Church's miracles and then you're going to go based off of the historical value of ancient records with debated authorship, you know, it's just insane.
¶112It doesn't make sense. It's not it's not reasonable. And so actually, no, we don't we shouldn't assume the Protestant paradigm because even the clearest route to confirm the Catholic Church claims about itself involve looking at the the manner in which the church has been confirmed that is similar to the manner in which Christ himself was confirmed. And so it has the same credentials. >> Yeah.
¶113The motives of credibility. Yeah. Excellent. It it's something that I think has actually been conspicuously lacking in Catholic apologetics for the past few years, which is just that a lot of people are are taking an approach to Catholic apologetics that doesn't start out with saying, "What does the church and what does scripture teach about how I should go about doing this? What are the right arguments to be making?
¶114What is the approach I should be taking?" >> And so, you need to start there. just what does revelation say about how to approach going out and giving a rational defense of the faith and that starts with miracles and prophecies. That's the best place to start. That's the best rational foundation. And it's it's easy to see why.
¶115It's why God chooses to use them to as the basically external proofs of revelation, which is that they're just uniquely conducive to docsility if that's the basis. Right? And this is this is something that um St. Paul himself explains explicitly in first Corinthians when he says my message and preaching were not with wise and persuasive words but with the demonstration of the spirit's power so that your faith may not rest on human wisdom but on God's power. So what he's explicitly clarifying there is that when our faith is not based off of basically like discursive reasoning about the intrinsic plausibility of the theological propositions that are being asserted by the church but is instead just the church claims to speak on behalf of God.
¶116The way God signs his signature to such claims is through performing miracles. The church has an abundance of credible miracles and just a completely and is uniquely privileged by them in a unique way. So God is clearly attesting that he wants me to submit to this institution. So like regardless of whether it makes sense to me regardless if I can figure out the solution to all these objections. I can know that Catholicism is true for the same reason that if I was there during Christ's ministry and saw him walking on water and telling the paralytics to get up and walk and restoring sight to the blind and raising himself from the dead in a glorified body.
¶117If I saw all those things, I'd know he was who he said he was. even if I didn't know how to resolve all of the apparent contradictions between his doctrine and the Old Testament. >> Well, we've got all those types of healing miracles. If so that you may know the Son of Man has authority to forgive sins, get up and walk. If healing the paralytic is good enough, then we've got that for Fatima.
¶118You know, if restoring sight to the blind is good enough, we've got that for Fatima. You know, hearing to the deaf, we've got that for Fatima. We've got things that are almost tantamount to resurrections. Fifth, and relatedly, Protestant accommodationist denial undermines the function of miracles as signs to the faithful. If God's okay with doing the most colossal miracles in all of history in witness to and furtherance of false doctrines and false claims of divine leates, then miracles no longer serve as avenues by which the faithful can discern right from wrong doctrine.
¶119Like now in order to figure out religious truth, we have to become like mini popes who only settle on theological views after a diligent scientific examination of individual controversies and after learning like Hebrew and Greek to solve some of these centuries old debates between Catholics and Protestants and also among Protestants themselves. Like that's your model for how God intends for us to discern religious truth and that's your model for how religious truth should be promulgated and safeguarded? H how has that worked out since the advent of Protestantism? Has it led to the unity that Christ prayed for? Or has it led to the interminable doctrinal disputes and a schism fest?
¶120I'll let you answer that for yourself. Sixth, the model of divine activity proposed by Protestant accommodationist denial just flies in the face of the biblical witness. We learn from the New Testament that heresy and schism are extremely big deals. They're very bad. Paul lists dissensions and factions or hyesis, you know, the word from which heresies derives among the works of the flesh, warning that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
¶121And he repeatedly condemns divisions within the church. Like Paul is literally just saying that like, you know, dissensions and factions, these are damnable sins. Titus is instructed to warn a heretical person or hieros anthropos twice and then have nothing more to do with him since such a person is perverted and sinful. Likewise, second Peter warns of false teachers who introduce destructive heresies, thereby bringing swift destruction upon themselves. So, the New Testament treats doctrinal rupture and ecclesial division as sins that corrupt the church and when culpably persisted in, are damnable.
¶122And we know from all throughout scripture that God hates sin. And given this biblical witness, it would be extremely surprising for God to put his miraculous stamp of approval on false doctrines, especially when those are false doctrines distinctive to a church who is blaspheing God by claiming to be a divine legging consciousness to error on pain of damnation. Like the divine MO under Protestant accommodationist denial is almost maximally unexpected given the biblical witness. And you know like some people who accept Protestant accommodationist denial are going to be you know like these super liberal Protestants um who like yeah they don't accept that scripture is um inspired perhaps or that scriptures in errant or what have you. Um, but even those people, if we just take the historical witness of the New Testament on like historical grounds, we don't presuppose that it's inspired scripture, but just like as historical testimony, it is manifestally evident that like basically immediately after Christ all like all the apostles think that heresy and schism and false doctrine are a very big deal.
¶123So that's like very good even historical evidence that this is part of the apostolic deposit. is part of what uh Christ entrusted to the apostles. So even even if we take the scriptures as mere historical testimony, the liberal protestant who goes in for Protestant accommodationist denial is in significant trouble here. And seventh of all and seventh of all, once again, snap out of it, my friend. Snap out of it.
¶124Surely you can just see that a Protestant denominationist denial is like among the most overwhelmingly copefilled ad hoc desperate hypotheses that you're entertaining solely to avoid the most blindingly obvious interpretation of the data. And again, I ask, are you willing to print out on a sheet of paper, articulate this hypothesis and sign your name at the bottom saying, I, Joe, bet the eternal fate of my soul on Protestant denominationist denial. Are you willing to do that? Are you willing? Do you want to do it right now?
¶125Okay. So, that's Protestant accommodationist denial as a potential explanation of the of the miracle record. I think that's hopeless. Let's go on to Protestant accommodationist acceptance. So, you know, maybe the solution to all the preceding problems is is, you know, just to embrace the Catholic distinctive doctrines instead of rejecting them.
¶126But perhaps that's just like totally compatible with remaining Protestant. And that leads us to Protestant accommodationist acceptance, which is the hypothesis that Protestantism is true. The distinctive Catholic doctrines that are being vindicated by the Catholic miracles are actually true. Uh, and you know, they can just be assimilated within a Protestant paradigm. Okay, so the main problem with this hypothesis is that it's false.
¶127Let's just systematically walk through all the vindicated doctrines to see how absurd Protestant denominationist acceptance is. Okay? So like named individuals should convert to Catholicism. Purgatory is real and the mass is efficacious and getting people out of it. There's such a thing as mortal sin which is remitted through sacramental confession.
¶128Hell is real. Transubstantiation is true. There's participatory redemptive suffering by which we can unite our sufferings to Christ's passion and offer them up as sacrifices in reparation for sin and sinners. Even though this was like, you know, one of the central disagreements between the reformers and the Catholic Church. The pope is the holy father, meaning that his office is holy and he's the spiritual father to the church.
¶129The pope is spiritual authority to perform a formal consecratory act on behalf of a principally orthodox nation. Peter is the rock on which the church was built in the context of a call to unity. So somehow Peter being the rock is important for church unity. Everyone should pray the rosary and prayerfully meditate on the assumption and coronation of Mary. Mary was immaculately conceived.
¶130Mary is the mother of God. The nyine creed is true. So there's one holy, catholic, and apostolic church. Saintly intercession is good, appropriate, and spiritually efficacious. Relics and holy water are good, appropriate, and spiritually efficacious.
¶131Icon veneration is good and appropriate. Okay, I I could go on, but you get the point. How on earth are you going to accept all of that [laughter] and remain Protestant? Like, what are you doing, my friend? Do you not see the blatant and overwhelming tension?
¶132Like, if the Catholic Church just systematically got all these hot button issues right in debates between Catholics and Protestants, then Catholicism is basically certain. There's just no credible way to maintain all these doctrines and yet reject the church. Doing so just like reeks of desperation. You know, you're adding epicycles upon epicycles to salvage a massively disconfirmed theory. And there's an obviously superior unifying explanation of the data.
¶133You after all, there's something all these doctrines have in common. Hm. You know, I wonder what that is. I wonder I wonder what they could have in common. Again, just snap out of it, my friend.
¶134Submit to Rome. Okay. So, you know, Protestant accommodationist acceptance is not a serious hypothesis. Let's go on to Protestant demonism. This is what like I think a number of Protestants are going to want to go in for.
¶135Um so like since the Protestant accommodationist approaches are hopeless, all Protestants have left is the demonic explanation of Catholic vindicatory miracles. I mean of course they could try to give like these foiling naturalistic conspiracy theories going through systematically through all the Catholic miracles just conspiracy after conspiracy, massive coincidence after massive coincidence. But then of course like why on earth do you accept the resurrection? like if if you're willing to put on your atheist skeptic hat as Ethan said, like good luck. Good luck, my friend, trying to go out there and put forward a convincing case of the resurrection.
¶136Um, so like really all that Protestants have left to be even remotely consistent is the demonic explanation of Catholic vindicatory miracles. But that explanation too is hopeless. Don't mean tissues. What are tissues? How do you say tissues in Spanish?
¶137First, Protestant demonism does not predict in the slightest that the pattern of massive public vindicator seeming prednatural deceptions would uniquely favor Catholicism specifically. Like demons could have singled out with such deceptions, any of the bajillions of Protestant sects that you disagree with, dear Protestant demonist proponent. You know, like the demons could have could have could have chosen Lutheranism or liberal Christianity or Methodism or 7th Day Adventism or Presbyterianism or Anglicanism or Pentecostalism or evangelicalism or non-denominationalism or the Baptist. Or the demons could have singled out Coptic Orthodoxy or Eastern Orthodoxy or the Assyrian Church of the East or Mormonism or the Quakers. Or they could have singled out religions that literally deny Christ like Islam or Judaism or Hinduism or Buddhism or Taoism or Confucianism.
¶138Or the demons could have made their massive public vindicatory seeming deceptions a complete mix with some favoring one sect, others favoring another sect and so on for the countless different patterns we could have gotten. It is extremely surprising then that the demons systematically single out only Catholicism with repeated public vindicatory seeming deceptions. By contrast, repeated systematic vindicator seeming supernatural manifestations only favoring Catholicism is not at all surprising under Catholicism. And so this is extremely powerful evidence for Catholicism over Protestant demonism. Second, and again drawing from Ethan Muse, dismissing miracles as demonic deceptions simply because they conflict with your highly fallible private interpretation of scripture is plainly at odds with the New Testament epistemology of miracles.
¶139We see over and over again the Pharisees being rebuked for superimposing their personal interpretations of disputed theological points over and against manifest divine deeds performed in witness to revelation. And we see over and over again in the context of disputation with Pharisees, Christ appealing to miraculous confirmation of him and his messages. You know, in John 10, Christ commands the Jews, "Do not believe me unless I do the works of my father. But if I do them, even if you don't believe me, believe the works that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I in the Father." In John 14, Christ reiterates, "Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me." Or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. Those alone are sufficient.
¶140In Matthew 9, when Jews objected to Christ absolving the paralytic sins, Christ responded, "But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins." Then he said to the paralytic, "Rise, pick up your bed and go home." And he rose and went home. And when the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men. So Christ is literally saying, "So that you may know that this doctrine is true, get up and walk." Christ is here making it clear that Protestant demonism has things backwards. The vindicatory miracles of Christ settle the theological disputes with the Pharisees. The Pharisees should simply recognize that their private interpretation of prior revelation was mistaken, and the miracles are called forth to demonstrate as much.
¶141And as Ethan points out, scripture emphatically teaches that God works miracles to confirm revelation. You know, like St. Peter in Acts 2 declares that Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders, and signs which God did among you through him as you yourselves know. Hebrews 2 says, "This salvation which was first announced by the Lord was confirmed to us by those who heard him. God also testified to it by signs, wonders, and various miracles." Mark 16 says, "The disciples went out and preached everywhere, and the Lord worked with them and confirmed his word by the signs that accompanied it." St.
¶142And Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2 that my message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words but with the demonstration of the spirit's power so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom but on God's power. You know, I could go on, but you get the point. The third problem with Protestant demonism is that Catholic vindicatory miracles pass all the scriptural tests for discernment of true miracles from false demonic deceptions. Consider the fruits test. Christ says, "Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.
¶143You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. So, when we apply this fruits test to the Catholic claimed divine legates, what do we see?
¶144Well, the Fatimaers lived lives of extraordinary saintliness. Lucia lived in humble, prayerful, quiet seclusion, dedicating herself to God and obediently submitting to her religious superiors in a convent her whole life. The children fasted often by giving away meals to the poor. They voluntarily accepted suffering whenever the opportunity presented itself and they explicitly offered that suffering up to Jesus out of love for him. They refused to lie or succumb to intense pressure to divulge Mary's secrets.
¶145And you know, I could go on, but they were just like demonstrably saintly individuals. And you also can't undermine the appeal to good fruits by saying that well, you know, part of part of what the seers were inspired to do were various minor acts of reparatory penance. And that's just beyond the pale. Like, how dare anyone lightly hit themselves with some tingling leaves? [laughter] That's not how the fruits test works.
¶146I mean, like, for starters, voluntarily taking on not permanently damaging mortifications and offering them up in love for the reparation of sins seems obviously good to me. But even setting that aside, this response completely destroys Christ's own appeals to his own vindicatory miracles in response to the Pharisees. After all, if this charge worked against Fatima, the charge would also work against Christ since the Pharisees could equally charge Christ with the bad fruits of healing on the Sabbath and claiming authority to forgive sins. And and that's just beyond the pale, you know, like how dare a human claim that prerogative and how dare he perform such a work on the Sabbath day of rest. Like no, if you can appeal to your own tendentious prior theology that's in dispute in order to like assess the fruits, like that just like visiates Christ's own appeals to his fruits test in the context of the Pharisees because they could equally question beggingly just like reassert and and pound the table on their own prior theological understanding and trying to assess the fruits.
¶147So like the fruits test loses its force if that's like elicit appeal. And so I think like the Fatima children just like manifestly passed the fruits test as do lots of these others here. St. Bernardet Subaru was literally canonized because of her insane sanctity and she too lived a life of humble meek faithful prayerful obedience to religious superiors in quiet seclusion not seeking fame or notoriety praying like almost all the time. She also refused to lie or succumb to intense intimidation by religious and civil authorities.
¶148We already saw in part we already saw in part five of the video the heroic virtue of St. Padre Peio and the seeming holiness of Mirna Nazour, etc. You know, I could go on, but already one of the central scriptural tests for people claiming to speak on behalf of God is passed with flying colors for the legates in Catholic vindicatory miracles. So, the Catholic miracles pass scriptur's own tests for discerning demonic deceptions from true divine deeds. And there are other tests as well.
¶149So, let's go to the Deuteronomy 13:18 test. I think it's also prudent for me to clarify that I'm not saying that it is always unreasonable to conclude an apparent miracle is a demonic deception. Scripture plainly teaches that counterfeit miracle signs and wonders are poss possible. For instance, in Matthew 24, our Lord forewarns us, quote, "False messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect." Rather, what I am saying is that scripture provides us with criteria for distinguishing true miracles from false miracles that make sense of our Lord's reasoning in his disputes with skeptical Jews. A more prudent approach to spiritual discernment is to actually apply the biblical criteria to the case of Fatima rather than what my opponent just did.
¶150So, first let's look at the miracle of the sun. Deuteronomy draws a distinction between two kinds of false prophets. False prophets that speak in the name of pagan gods and false prophets that speak in the name of God the creator. In Deuteronomy 13, God admonishes the Israelites not to follow a prophet that speaks in the name of pagan gods under any circumstances, even if the prophet announces a sign or wonder and it comes to pass. By contrast, in Deuteronomy 18, we read, quote, "And if you say in your heart, how may we know the word that the Lord has not spoken?" When a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the word does not come to pass or come true, that is a word the Lord has not spoken.
¶151The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You need not be afraid of him. And this occurs in the context of how are we to know when the prophesied greater prophet than Moses is to come. Father Reginald Gary Gulrge explains the rationale for this distinction as follows. quote, "A miracle performed in the name of God the creator in confirmation of some revelation to be accepted by all cannot be false, especially if the wonderworker first denounces it." This is so because it stands in contradiction with the infinite good goodness, wisdom, and truthfulness of God, that he would permit his name to be alleged in order to substitute a false miracle for a true one, and that he would suffer his name to be brought forth as a witness to a lie through which man would necessarily and invincibly be led into error.
¶152End quote. Now, let's apply this principle to Fatima. It's clear from the content and context of the revelations to the Sears, the apparition purported to speak on behalf of God, the creator. Thus, we have to apply the criterion in Deuteronomy 18 rather than the one in Deuteronomy 13th. On July 13th, this year's announced that the apparition promised to perform a miracle so all may believe on October 13th.
¶153This was fulfilled when more than 100,000 people witnessed an extraordinary sign at the date, time, and location that were announced three months in advance. The testimony of the crowd is corroborated by distant witnesses spread out over more than 150 kilometers and a peer-reviewed analysis of certified photographs. >> It's also worth adding that Maur and Padre Pio both also, you know, predicted or revealed things that came to pass or turned out true on the basis of their private revelations. In November 1984, for example, Mirina successfully predicted on the basis of the apparition's words weeks in advance, a period of blindness, Padre Peio truly revealed the hidden unconfessed mortal sins in significant detail to large swaths of penitence. Padre Peio predicted Savino's injury, you know, and so on.
¶154We could we could go on. So, not only do Catholic vindicator miracles pass the fruits test for spiritual discernment, they also pass the Deuteronomy 13:18 test. And not only do they pass those two, they also pass the house divided against itself test. So let's hear from Ethan again. >> Next, let's consider the moral effects the apparitions had on others.
¶155If the principal intention behind Our Lady of Fatima was to deceive Protestants into accepting expedatory penences, then it was remarkably ineffective. However, if the principal intention was to convince lukewarm Catholics, Freemasons, and atheists to come to faith in Christ, then it was astoundingly successful. In Matthew 12, Christ rebutted accusations he was driving out demons by the power of demons by saying, quote, "If Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then will his kingdom stand?" End quote. If Fatima were demonic, then it is completely incomprehensible that Satan decided to perform his most colossal deception in history in an overwhelmingly Catholic country at a time when secularism was on the rise with the sole effect of converting atheists to Christianity.
¶156Can my opponent point to something comparable that Satan has done for any false sect in history? For my opponent's perspective, Catholic siology and marriology went off the rails long before Fatima. However, the apparition did change Mary and devotion in the church in one especially conspicuous way. All over the world, pious Catholics now recite the Fatima prayer at the end of every decade of the rosary. Let's read the prayer.
¶157Oh my Jesus, forgive us our sins. Save us from the fires of hell. Lead all souls to heaven, especially those in most need of thy mercy. End quote. So the biggest change that Fatima brought about to Catholic Marian piety was the incorporation of a christocentric prayer into a pre-existing Marian devotion.
¶158That's exactly the opposite of what I would expect a demon to do if my opponent were correct. Recall that one John 4 says, quote, "Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God." End quote. Three definite fornowledge. >> So Fatima clearly passes the house divided test. The same points apply to St.
¶159Bernardet Subaru at Lurards. It would be ridiculous. It it would be a ridiculous demonic MMO to appear to a Catholic girl in 1858 against the backdrop of a France that had been profoundly transformed by the Enlightenment and Revolution and in which rationalism, socialism, secularism, religious indifference, and anti-clericalism were increasingly powerful forces. Again, the obviously foreseeable effect of this apparition would be to enliven the faith of current and lapsed Catholics and stem the tide of secularism and anticclericalism, which is the exact opposite of what we would expect demons to do. Like Satan is literally going against Satan here.
¶160What are you talking about? Like like in case and again like in case you didn't know, demons don't want people to start following Christ and enliven their faith in Christ and abandon secularism. Similar points apply to MNA and Padre Peio as lots of documented conversions had come about as a result of their supernatural charrorisms. As Muse writes, did Satan really think it would be a good idea to manifest diabolical power in some of the most audacious and conspicuous ways he ever has in a predominantly Catholic country at a time when the world was becoming increasingly secular? This is with respect to Padre Peio.
¶161And did he really decide that the best way to do so was by vindicating a priest that spent almost all his time in the confessional bringing liars, adulterers, thieves, and blasphemers to repentance in Christ? Once again, once again, if this criterion that our Lord recommended has any utility at all, then it definitely applies to the case at hand. Zetun Zetun also plausibly passes this test. The apparition was seen bowing before the cross, blessing the crowd, holding olive branches, symbolizing peace in issuing in unity and peace among increasingly hostile relations between Muslims and cops, leading to conversions from Islam to Christianity, healing a bunch of people. Oh, yes.
¶162You know, like this sounds totally demonic, you know, because demons famously love bowing to the cross and blessings and unity and peace and healing people of things and bringing about conversions to Christ. Just sounds totally exactly like demons, doesn't it? Yeah, totally. Exorcists routinely testify how much demons absolutely despise the blessed sacrament. So, it's very surprising that they would be performing all these eucharistic miracles to promulgate devotion to something that they despise and which is sometimes used in exorcism sessions with success.
¶163Likewise, relics and saintly intercession and Marian invocation are used in exorcisms to drive out demons. Exorcists and those in deliverance ministry abundantly testify that Mary herself even shows up in exorcisms and casts out demons. So, like, okay, we've gone through three scriptural tests for discernment of spirits, whether they're from God or from demons. The fruits test, Catholic vindicatory miracles, pass those pass that with flying colors. The Deuteronomy 13:18 test, Catholic vindicator miracles pass that with flying colors.
¶164The house divided test, Catholic miracles pass that with flying colors. And there's yet another test that Catholic vindicatory miracles pass, and it is the Moses and Pharaoh's magicians test. In the spat in the Old Testament between Moses and Pharaoh's magicians, Pharaoh's magicians were allowed to do their cool magic tricks that simulated Moses's signs. And by the way, they weren't doing those in invocation of God the creator. So, this is totally compatible with the Deuteronomy 13:18 test.
¶165And we are to disregard them on the basis of the Deuteronomy 13:18 test because they're not speaking in the name of God the Creator. But even in that context, right, where like the Pharaoh's magicians are allowed to do their cool magic tricks that simulated Moses' signs, God manifests his superior power on behalf of the true divine leate by having Aaron's rod swallow up the snakes summoned by the magicians. And what this shows is that God will demonstrate the superior efficacy of his power to make religious truth accessible. But if the biggest and best evidence miracles throughout history like Fatima and Zetun and Lords and Padre Peio and Eucharistic miracles, etc. are demonic counterfeits, then God has been totally inept at demonstrating the superior efficacy of his power.
¶166And that just contravenes God's emmo in scripture. And here too, I will play some Ethan clips. Yeah. No, I think that's right. I mean, the And I mean, another problem that they face.
¶167So there's some questions we can get into about I mean often they they just completely pretend not to understand even though it's explained repeatedly the distinction between just an ordinary miracle and a vindicatory miracle and then they start repeatedly appealing to the fact that there's like miracles across a variety of different Christian denominations and even non-Christian sects that we could concede like healing miracles and the like, right? That are answers to prayers, right? or people doing exorcisms and all of that stuff. They they point to that and then they just completely neglect that there's a difference between that and like God coming and sending Mary to deliver a very specific message that like affirms the papacy and you know the dogma of the immaculate conception and that like presupposes a million ways to Sunday that like Catholicism is true and that everyone needs to be Catholic and like Mary is agreeing to personally convert people to Catholicism and then Mary is saying I'm agreeing to perform a giant public spectacle in order to convince everyone to believe this message. And then she does and a 100,000 people see it and then she does 15,000 healing miracles directly connected with it and further confirmation of it over the next few decades.
¶168And like looking at that and thinking that like the fact that there's like some charismatic, you know, Pentecostal who like prayed for a healing and then his prayer was answered is comparable when clearly what's happening in the one case is there's actually a revelation that has doctrinal content that's relevant to whether Catholicism is true. that God is going out of his way to create public verifiable evidence to convince everyone and persuade everyone that this message is authentic and to accept it. And clearly there's an implication that can be drawn from that. Clearly. >> Yeah.
¶169>> And so then and then they want to go so far as to start saying, "Oh, no, all that's demonic deception." >> And once you start going that route, it does even their hermeneutic. The hermeneutic was already bad for going back to scripture and treating miracles as merely probitative. Like for instance, our Lord is literally saying, "So that you may know that the son of man has authority to forgive sins, get up and walk." Right? Not so that you may suspect, you know, so that you may know, right? But so the probative hermeneutic already there's a million reasons why it doesn't work.
¶170But it's especially bad if you're saying that the most impressive miracles that have happened throughout history and the greatest quantity of them are actually demonic deceptions that are indistinguishable but for your theological conclusions. And then they then it doesn't even seem like they have probitative value, right? Or such negligible probitative value that we might as well set them aside rather than repeatedly invoking them and bearing them as like primary witnesses to the credibility of the message. But then finally, there's like a basically what in the um in the manuals they call like a reductive metaphysical certainty that you can argue for from miracles that is basically just like even if we thought that every individual miracle was doubtful, if we looked across the full range of vindicatory miracles and miracles that seem like they had doctrinal content and we looked at it throughout the course of salvation history, we should at least be able to say that there shouldn't be basically a completely misleading conclusion that is suggested by the totality of that evidence because God wouldn't allow that in his providence. Basically, God wouldn't allow the confluence of all the misleading massive deceptions to point in the same direction and confirm the Catholic Church so profoundly.
¶171And so that argument appealing to the whole record of miracles collectively rather than just each individual sign they have no compelling response to that which is to say like going back to drawing the analogy with Pharaoh's magicians right what God does for instance when they're allowed to convert you know to basically transmute the rods into snakes to mimic Moses what he does is he immediately opposes the sign by having by having Moses's I mean Aaron's staff swallow follow up the snakes that the that the magicians were able to summon. And then he goes on, Moses goes on to continue performing more and grander and grander signs to the points where eventually the magicians confess, oh, this is the fingerprint of God. And the Pharaoh even gets to the point of confessing um and then immediately goes back on that. but because God demonstrated the superiority of the efficacy of his power versus that of the demons. So it's he's creating comparative uh discernability through opposing their signs with grander signs.
¶172And so they at the very least should be able to look at the history of miracles and have a credible argument that that the deceptions that are happening on behalf of Catholicism at least as good genuine miracles are happening on behalf of reformed Protestantism. You know, so [gasps] the true religion should have at least one miracle that is at least as good as one of the many deceptions of the false sect. Like that seems like that's at least a reasonable ask. >> And so if they can't even muster that, that's very problematic. Yeah, I think what's um definitely bringing up the the reductive metaphysical certitude point is very important and in my experience it isn't as used as much as it should be because it's a very compelling argument because a lot of people they are already from their you know a lot of people listening to these sorts of debates they at least have like a lot of them have an evangelical background or basically might as well and it's sort of like you know the the old like CS Lewis thing that you know people are a lot of people in evangelical contexts or even in Catholic contexts are taught you know about how we consider Jesus and say like okay one needs to consider you know is he what do they call lunatic liar lord I think that's the thing you know like how are we going to consider Jesus and obviously you know the the two others are are just absurd so like he has to be lord so like considering the Catholic church kind of in the same way because the church is the body of Christ the church in history, you know, really uh as as Shaman puts it, you know, it is you have one of two decisions.
¶173either you can't do the redee [clears throat and cough] you can't do the redeem zoomer thing where you know he used to kind of say that there is some sort of you know Catholic church is kind of okay and there's some good things about it and you know I really appreciate it but ultimately you know that's not uh you know it's not the the true church and you know I respect it a lot etc etc like really the only two options one would be able to have is either the Catholic church is the true church or the Catholic Church is a demonic deception blaspheming our Lord and you know binding people's consciences uh to supposedly to eternal damnation but really in a sort of twist of events to an eternally damnable thing like those are the only two options and shaven he brings it out all in a beautiful way and I just wrote an article about it in case you know everybody should follow my substack anything's as well but um really those are the only two options you have for Catholicism. But then you consider it in light of like okay God he is provident you know God has providence over all of creation and he makes sure that his own gospel is spread you know abroad to all nations. So God has this providence over how his gospel is spread and he has attached certain promises to it and certain prophecies about how it will spread. And we consider the actual concrete way in which the gospel is spread. And this church that is either the true church or is it de demonic deception has been followed by an abundance of miracles by the conversion of not even to mention the moral miracles like the conversion of entire nations from paganism into Christianity.
¶174The purification of the most barbaric peoples, you know, the the spread of of such great uh you know arts and culture, whatever other things you want to bring up. And then also like the concrete miracles that follow all of her saints that are some of the most um and don't don't take this uh listen or don't take this badly but some of the most rabid adherence to the Catholic Church right some of the most devout strong and unflinching adherence to this group are the ones performing the most miracles like if if you take this into consideration there would be no real way in which you could speak of God uh through his providence preserving his gospel amongst the nation, fulfilling the promises that he gave to and through his son for the spread of his gospel. So that that uh Ethan, I love that you brought up that point because a lot of people they they kind of tell half the story by just bringing up the individual miracles without actually looking at it in the context of salvation history and the providence of God. >> Yeah. I mean, it's just it's and it's a simple question to ask people.
¶175If you concede that God uses miracles to confirm his word by the signs that accompany it as is attested in scripture, you know, if you concede that, then let's look at the overall history of the spread of the Christian religion, the propagation of the Christian religion and all the different Christian sects. And then let's say if we were just going based off of miracles alone, which sect does it seem like God is the most excited about >> that he's doing? he's putting the most energy and effort into promoting and then we might suspect that that one is the fullness of truth if we want to be like ecumenical. Um at least he's preferring this sect and that and so if if the person just begins with that question and they start then going examining the record of miracles and then looking to see if I was just going to make a conclusion based purely on miracles setting aside all my other considerations. Isn't it interesting that the Catholic Church isn't doesn't just like squeak out an edge where it's like a selection effect because we're better at record keeping?
¶176No, no, no. There's like certain kinds of signs that are only happening in the Catholic Church and where when it comes to certain types of verifiable evidence to support them. Really, the only credible examples that you can find are Catholic examples. And God himself, who's trying to do it for vindicatory reasons, he's not limited by a selection effect. If he wants to get the word out, he can.
¶177And like super extraordinary miracles are self-publicizing, right? >> Yeah. >> The reason why Fatima became very well known was because every single major Portuguese newspaper was present because of the advanced prediction. So God arranges for to get the word out, right? So the miracle will become known because God's none of God's plans can be thwarted.
¶178And if his intent is to publicize a message, then he won't be thwarted by the limitations of humans in doing so. And so the question is just that if your little sect, you know, is the fullness of truth, shouldn't you have like a super abundance of miracles? Shouldn't you be punching above your weight in miracles, especially at pivotal moments in the history? Like if you like I think a very key point in bringing up when we're disputing with Protestants specifically is the dynamics in the reformation counter-reformation with regards to miracles. >> Yeah.
¶179which is notice they start becoming cessationists because the it's so bad that the Catholics we're when we're opposing them we're the ones who actually have ongoing miracles and an abundance of credible miracles to support our claims and there's like a conspicuous lack of it on the Protestant side. So they literally start developing theological novelties to try to disparage miracles as a category of phenomena because that's how bad it is. If if if it was actually the going the other way, then you would expect during the Reformation, during this critical moment in church history where there was going to be an ambiguity for a sincere believer to decide which way to go >> and the and they didn't know whether they needed to keep submitting to their ecclesial superiors or whether they needed to break away >> that the way God would put his finger on the scale was by giving lots and lots of signs to support the Protestants, right? And I mean at the very like you would want Protestant reformers that were prominent leaders in the movement who had inspired sanctity and were prolific miracle workers. That's what you would expect.
¶180>> And instead you see the opposite. So, not only is it the Catholics that are getting things like right coincident with the reformation, you know, things like Our Lady of Guadalupe, one of the most extraordinary miracles that's going to cause millions of conversions to the Catholic faith, right? They're and they're getting they're having lots and lots of even like vigorous pmicists against Protestants during the early reformation period who are themselves have inspired sanctity clearly and are very prolific miracle workers. And then you're looking over at the Protestants and not only are they miracle poor during this critical period, but contrary to inspired sanctity, there's lots of evidence of even demonic influence on major reformers. Like for instance, like people don't know this, but like you can even get it from Protestant historians going back to people like Martin Luther.
¶181He was frequently conversing with the devil and having interactions with the devil by his own recounting. You know, he has a weird fascination with excrement. You know, there's it's tons of if God was trying just like he did when he was founding the church where he raises up men, he gives them inspired sanctity, he gives them the marks of a true apostle and miracles and he helps them propagate it. If you're thinking about his providence, his grand plan for history, is it going to be that the sect that you're opposing that has a very credible case that you have a duty to remain within it is the one where they're going to have all the miracles to the point that you're going to have to start denying miracles and all the people opposing you are going to be like the awesome super eminent sanctity people and then you're going to have the fascination with excrement like constantly talking with the devil guy as your main leader. >> Yeah.
¶182Do you think do you think that this miracle the miracle of the sun is a good enough reason for somebody to become Catholic? >> Oh, absolutely. And I mean I know lots of people who have become Catholic because of the evidence for it um for its authenticity. But I mean look the here are the questions that a person just needs to ask themselves. First is can you accept the authenticity of this miracle without being Catholic?
¶183And it seems almost impossible to think that like the most obvious colossal miracle is going to be a vindication of a message that includes like a request for the holy father which our lady is calling the holy father in communion with all the Catholic bishops of the world to consecrate an orthodox country to the immaculate heart of our lady. that that's going to be heaven's agenda for the world and the most spectacular colossal miracle, you know, of the 20th century. I mean, it's just it's impossible for me to fathom [laughter] uh in good conscience holding that to be authentic, right? While also rejecting the Catholic Church. I mean, our lady is agreeing to convert specific people by name to the Catholic faith, right, during these apparitions, you know, and it just the whole thing is suffused.
¶184I mean furthermore if if it just convinces you to say the rosary like you'll become Catholic our lady will convert you [laughter] right just piously recite the rosary right so I think if you accept the authenticity of this there's almost no way to resist the implication that you should become Catholic so then the question just becomes what are your options for resisting its authenticity and I mean either what you're going to do is going to be this like extremely desperate like naturalistic theories to try to explain away all the data by positing like a huge number of ginormous coincidences and ad hoc auxiliary hypotheses, right? So basically have to like and then if you're a Christian, you know, don't ever try to do apologetics about the evidence for the resurrection if this is the lengths that you're willing to go to to explain away, you know, Catholic miracles, right? Or you're going to say it's like demons, right? And I've had a debate with a guy named Sean Luke where I'm arguing against that. But basically, I think there's lots of criteria that we can use to exclude a demonic explanation for Fatima, you know, and if let's just say again talking to Christians primarily right now, though there's there's different remarks I would gear towards atheists or people coming from other faith traditions, but specifically talking to Christians that are not Catholic, >> I would just say I think it would be extremely bizarre if the largest, you know, most credible demonic deception in history were one more credible than the best most credible miracle favoring your true sect since God uses miracles to confirm who's right.
¶185>> Basically, [clears throat] miracles would almost lose all probitative value if this one can't be discerned from a demonic deception. It would be weird that they would decide to do it in an overwhelmingly Catholic country where the main thing you're doing is taking lukewarm Catholics and atheists and converting them to Catholicism rather than tailoring it to like lead Protestants to apostasy into apostasy from Protestantism, right? Or Orthodox into apostasy from orthodoxy. It would be really weird if the main change that they decided to make to the pre-existing Mary and devotion of the rosary was to introduce a christoentric prayer which is the Fatima prayer. Right?
¶186So almost all reference like most of the references to Jesus in the rosary come from Fatima. >> So that's also very strange if the if we're sort of taking a Protestant theory of the demonic deception here, you know. So and we can just keep layering on. It's extremely bizarre that we're supposed to recognize prophets by their fruits, right? And then all these children have inspired sanctity, you know, which they clearly do in the case of the Fatima seers.
¶187It's and so we keep going and going and going and it's very much almost all the discernment criteria we can use to tell true miracles from false miracles. For instance, one thing I didn't even mention is we've got like 15,000 healing miracles connected with the intercession of Our Lady of Fatima and going to the Fatima shrine and applying Fatima water afterwards and further confirmation of it, right? And so if Jesus is able to rebuke the Pharisees for rejecting the evidence of his miracles, right? If he hadn't done among them the works that no one else ever did, they would be without sin. But because he has, they've hated both him and his father, right?
¶188And so they're it's imputable to them as sin that they're willing to dismiss these miracles that they're witnessing with their own eyes as demonic deceptions in the face of that evidence. They should recognize that it does authenticate him. Right? Well, we've got all those types of healing miracles. If so that you may know the son of man has authority to forgive sins, get up and walk.
¶189If healing the paralytic is good enough, then we've got that for Fatima. You know, if restoring sight to the blind is good enough, we've got that for Fatima. You know, hearing to the deaf, we've got that for Fatima. We've got things that are almost tantamount to resurrections. [snorts] Well, and so and there's more depth we can go into here because it's actually I think this is going to be the key to the arguments internal to revelation.
¶190There are other arguments that we can advance as well. Um but the first thing is just going to be so let's just take the first example where this takes place within the narrative where we have basically escalating signs and wonders and chastisements that are occurring in Egypt. So the first time when we actually have Pharaoh's magicians come to challenge Moses and Aaron, they is when basically and this was the first sign that actually Moses was prepared with um he was told he was going to be prepared with back in Exodus 4, but basically it's the transforming of the rod into a snake and so a transmutation um and the basically the Egyptians are able to replicate that feat. But our exedites are going to point out two things that are significant here which are why they don't undermine because notice this very sign which is being replicated at least in appearance by the magicians is one of the signs where it's so that you may know and it's one of the signs with which God has decided it was fitting to accredit Moses to the Israelites and so the important thing is that first what matters and this is something that even you know St. Thomas is going to point out what matters first is so who is being invoked because God is going to impose restrictions on whether you can forge his signature whether you can forge his signature.
¶191If you're claiming a revelation in his name and then you're performing a sign in furtherance of or in confirmation of that counterfeit revelation, he's going to permit far less in the way of demonic deception than if a person is just out there performing trickery, but they're not purporting to do it on behalf of God. And so the first thing is the invocation of God the creator. And you can say it this needs to be something that's foundational because remember this is being done to accredit Moses prior to any substantive revelation um concerning the accreditation of prophets. So basically the invocation of God as he can be known through natural reason. So we're not going to presuppose other things about God but as he can be known through natural reason.
¶192So basically God the creator. Because if you're just doing like lowercase G gods, but really what you're describing is a spirit rather than like you know the necessary like all powerful ground of all being that made everything or something along those lines is like God as he can be known God quad deity the concept of deity that we all sort of possess innately. So once you invoke deity and you're saying deity is confirming the revelation that puts it in a qualitatively different category. So even if it's the same materially it's an identical sign the context of an invocation and bringing the sign forth as a witness to a revelation that's being attributed to God the creator already puts it in a different category where there's going to then there would need to be evident signs of deception. The second thing that distinguishes it is in that very narrative.
¶193So both in how the subsequent course of the narrative proceeds, but also in the immediate context of the transmutation, Aaron's rod swallows up the rods of I mean the serpents that were summoned by the magicians. And so what that does is it shows that even in the immediate context of the deception, God will demonstrate the superior efficacy of his power to per to show that there is a difference between basically when God works a sign and when the sorts of demonic signs that are going to be permitted to be worked. And so, and then this is true especially later on where they're continuing to try to go tit for tat and then they eventually run out of steam and God eventually wins and blows them out of the water. Now, you could go with some later Jewish exed and say that the problem is specifically that demons can't summon small animals even though they can summon snakes. That doesn't seem all that likely to me.
¶194But regardless, what it shows is God is going to make it clear from the overall evidence both in the immediate context and in the broader context that his his power is superior. And so therefore, the authentication of the true revelation will ultimately be more impressive than the deceptions. >> So that's my third response to the Protestant demonism explanation of the miracle record. Catholic vindicatory miracles pass all the scriptural tests, the tests, the tests explicitly laid out in scripture itself for discernment of true miracles from false demonic deceptions. The fruits test, the Deuteronomy 13:18 test, the house divided against itself test, and the Moses and Pharaoh's magicians test.
¶195The fourth problem is that Protestant demonism undermines the function of miracles as signs suited to the intelligence of all. If, as we know, God performs miraculous signs and expects the obedience of faith to follow upon them, then it needs to be relatively easy for people, including illiterate peasants, to recognize whether a miracle occurred. But that's completely destroyed. If, in order to determine whether, say, Fatima was demonic, we need to settle this arcane dispute about the precise interpretation of a passage of Hebrews, and where you guys have the novel interpretation devised by fallible men 500 years ago in contradiction to the 1500 year long perennial understanding of the church, no less. Like surely you can see that it's not reasonable to expect the illiterate peasant to solve these arcane theological and hermeneutical disputes about the meaning of certain terms in like coin Greek and whether St.
¶196Thomas's or others harmonizations is like are hermeneutically sound. And then fifth, and finally, again, are you willing to bet your soul on Protestant demonism? That God has essentially allowed demons complete free reign to perform the most dramatic string of apparent miracles and furtherance and confirmation of a false sect and false doctrines, leading hordes of atheists and secularists to Christ, and basically putting people like Padre Peio and Mirna Nazour in borderline skeptical scenarios with God refusing refusing to perform anything near as impressive to combat the deceptions. Oh, and these demons just like seem utterly fixated on performing vindicator seeming deceptions for Catholicism and only Catholicism. Like you're going to stake your soul on all of that.
¶197I at least am certainly not prepared to do that. So those are four in my view like overwhelmingly powerful problems with Protestant demonism together with a fifth kind of pragmatic point sprinkled in. And I think this explanation is hopeless on the basis of these considerations. And so the miraculous vindicatory case against Protestantism is just overwhelming. But the problems of Protestantism don't stop there.
¶198I think like the next biggest problem in my view with Protestantism is just like it's kind of meta narrative. So this is what we could call the meta narrative problem for Protestantism. And the problem here really just concerns the story that Protestantism has to tell about Christianity itself. like you know what sort of church Christ founded, how that church was supposed to preserve the Christian faith whole and in violet while retaining unity and you know what happened to it basically immediately after the apostles died. So let's just start with like bare common sense about governance.
¶199To take an Ethan Muse analogy, imagine founding a country and giving it laws but no court. That's a terrible idea, right? Like an obvious problem is that there wouldn't be any way to authoritatively resolve disputes about what the law meant or how it applied to particular cases, including new cases involving divergent interpretations of the law which threaten to cause division in the country. So on a purely common sensical level, we would expect that if Christ is going to establish a kingdom on earth as he explicitly says, then he would not just give it a law code like the Bible, but also a court system, that is a continuing body that can authoritatively resolve disputes about what the Bible means and how it applies to particular cases. And that's just again that's just on a purely common sensical level like like like who who starts a country with a law code but no court?
¶200It just it just sounds ridiculous. And already like you know this already kind of looks like a lot more and already you know that looks a lot more like Catholicism than Protestantism. Now of course you know like a proponent of a courtless system might reply by saying that well yeah but even in countries with courts it's not always clear what the court meant. But in practice courts are clear enough to perform their function adequately even if they aren't perfectly clear. Whereas law codes are not adequate substitutes for courts.
¶201This is what we've all recognized. This is why we have courts for our countries. And moreover, when courts are unclear, they have the necessary means at their disposal to fix that, even if they don't always do so immediately. Having a court also means that not everyone has to become a legal expert to arrive at judgments about particular issues. Without without a court, everyone has to wind up performing a jeritical function themselves.
¶202And that's way too ownorous even when the law is unambiguous. And of course, when the law is ambiguous, that would lead to a massive proliferation of divergent interpretations, massive confusion, massive division, etc. And we also of course need a way to communicate to people when they have error in interpreting the law. But that of course presupposes someone with the authority to clarify the law because otherwise you know errant interpretations will insulate themselves from correction. And so all that is just like with respect to a country, you know, it just it makes complete sense to not just have a law code but also a court.
¶203And the same goes for the church, right? Christ established a church, a kingdom that would fill the earth. It has a law code, the Bible. And just as it's a very bad idea to found a country with a law code but no court, it's also a very bad idea to found a kingdom with a law code, the Bible, but no court, the magisterium. Because otherwise, there isn't any way to authoritatively resolve disputes about what the Bible means and how to apply it to particular cases, including cases where divergent interpretations of the Bible threaten division in Christ's kingdom, which he prayed in.
¶204Of course, you know, Protestants have pastors and sometimes confessions and cinnids and denominational courts. But the problem is that all of these authorities remain in principle appealable to an individual's or another body's interpretation of scripture. If a Lutheran cinnid rules one way and a reformed sin at another, there's no higher ecclesial authority capable of finally setting the matter for the church, right? For the universal church. All they have is the law code which is manifestally inadequate to preserve both unity and truth without the universal court system that has the final say.
¶205But the the main things that are actually relevant for like making this system at all functional is first is that the the um people need to not be able to have issues where they're going to have to divide the church, >> right? >> And meanwhile, if I think we should baptize babies and you think it's a sin to baptize babies, we're probably might we're going to probably have to divide the church if both of us are peers and we're on a par, right? We're probably going to have to break up and do things differently because I'm not going to let you be pastors at my churches when you're going to sinfully baptize all these babies that I think then have to be rebaptized, right? >> Or like if you're a Calvinist, right, and I reject Tulip, you know, we're probably then going to have to divide the church. >> Yep.
¶206[laughter] And so we go through and so the good news here is that if ever a controversy arises where basically there's a doctrinal controversy that's threatening to divide the church, the fact that the means are there to adjudicate the controversy in a way where everyone has to submit on partisans of both sides have to submit. >> Yes. is something that's necessary for safeguarding unity regardless of whether at every time there is explicit teaching regarding what the true interpretation is which is that when the when the potentially rupturing uh disputes infectious disputes arise then that's when the magisterium is there to be able to step in and to adjudicate the controversy. >> Yeah. >> Another thing is just that like a big part of this is not that every person at every time has the correct teaching.
¶207They don't >> but that the true faith in substance um is there and is retained without an ad mixture of air. >> Right? >> And what we can tell it just happens inevitably is there's a level of entropy when you take anything. So if I give you a message and we play telephone, there's an entropy that inevitably occurs over time to where the that's like the famous result of playing the game telephone is that there's going to be all this entropy and then the the end result is going to be totally different. >> Yes.
¶208>> And so the accumulation on any individual issue, maybe the fact that somebody makes an error isn't important. Though with regard to a lot of issues, even that isn't true, right? But the accumulation of two centuries of air and then two centuries of linguistic and cultural distance between the original revelation and then the people at the end plus the accumulation of all these false presuppositions and ideologies etc. It results in a wholesale corruption of the faith over time to where the faith can't be preserved whole and violet. So it also becomes an issue about the perpetuity of the transmission of the faith in a way that just is recognizably the same as what it was at the outset which is just that there's going to be way too much entropy unless the institutional church is there to safeguard it.
¶209>> Yes. Yeah. Indeability, infallibility, right? That's that's the that and that was Newman. That was I mean that was Newman's sort of like master argument for it, right?
¶210And quite suspiciously, we see the manifest inadequacy of the Protestant paradigm almost immediately after the Reformation. Within barely a decade, the reformers themselves were divided over matters they regarded as enormously important. You know, Lutheran, and of course, they couldn't resolve the the dispute. Luther and Zwingley couldn't agree about Christ's presence in the Eucharist. Their 1529 meeting at Marberg ended with agreement on 14 articles, but division on the 15th.
¶211And then, totally unsurprisingly, given their defective courtless system for church governance, Protestantism turns into a schism fest. It's just not plausible pre theoretically. Just like on a meta narrative level, you know, it is not plausible pre- theoretically that this was the structure for church governance that Christ had in mind. You know, Christ wanted people to remain united while preserving the whole truth full and in violet. Any sensible guy, much less the omnisient creator of the universe could foresee that the Protestant system was not going to work for that.
¶212So just just on a common sensical level, again, like I'm sort of just establishing a kind of prior here before looking at the the biblical evidence and the historical evidence. Common sensically, if Christ intended to establish a unified worldwide church that would preserve one faith across nations and centuries, a continuing teaching office is exactly the sort of institution we should expect him to provide. And then when we turn to history, we discover that this is exactly what the earliest Christians adopted. So like suppose that the you know the predominant Protestant picture is basically correct. The apostles did not establish a continuing authoritative episcopal hierarchy whose occupants inherited apostolic teaching offices.
¶213Visible communion with bishops was not constitutive of membership in the church. Apostolic succession was not supposed to function as a public criterion of orthodoxy. And the Roman church possessed no distinctive authority deriving from Peter. If all that's right, then the generation immediately after the apostles should look recognizably Protestant. But the evidence is the polar opposite.
¶214I mean, even starting with scripture, you know, there are loads of scholars, including lots of Protestants, who grant that James, the brother of Jesus, was the first monoiscopal bishop of the mother church at Jerusalem around the 40s and 50s. James was the leader of that church at the top with the elders or presbytors below him and the deacons lower still. So, like the three-fold hierarchy is actually the most primitive form in scripture itself. You can see this article by uh Ecclesia Antiqua and this footnote here for more on that. But turn next to first Clement at the end of the first century, right?
¶215So, immediately after the apostles, right? So like immediately after you know the death of most of the apostles its ecclesiology is already striking right the church of Rome intervenes in a serious internal dispute at Corinth hundreds of miles away and insists that unjustly deposed ministers be restored. As Dr. Cesar Bernstein atles antiqua notes Clement twice wrote that the church of Rome spoke with the authority of God when it commanded a foreign church to end its internal schism. Clement warns rebels who should disobey what has been said by him through us and commends those who would obey what we have written through the Holy Spirit.
¶216Clement also gives an explicit account of apostolic succession saying that the apostles preached throughout cities and countryside and appointed their first fruits to be bishops and deacons. It then explains why the apostles made provision for these ministries to continue. They knew disputes would arise concerning ecclesiastical office and therefore arranged for approved men to succeed previous ministers. So already at the end of the first century we have apostolic succession and an extraordinarily authoritative Roman intervention in a foreign church that even the great Protestant historian JB Lightoot saw as the first step toward a papal domination. Then comes Ignatius of Antioch in the early 100s who just devastates any theory on which episcopal hierarchy is an early corruption of apostolic Christianity.
¶217For those who don't know, uh, Ignatius is writing pastoral letters to pre-existing Christian communities while being transported to martyrdom. And like across church after church, he simply takes for granted the three-fold structure of bishop, presitors, and deacons. So to the Ephesians, he speaks of bishops established everywhere to the utmost bounds by the will of Christ and commands submission to the bishop and presbytery. At Magnesia, he names Damis as bishop alongside presbbiters and a deacon and urges Christians to obey their bishop. At trails he names Palibius as bishop and says Christians should do nothing apart from the bishop.
¶218He then names bishops, presbyvers and deacons and concludes apart from these there is no church. Ignatius literally says you don't have a church if you don't have a bishop, presbytors and deacons at Philadelphia. He again takes for granted one bishop together with presbyvers and deacons whom he says have been appointed according to the mind of Christ. So he's literally saying like you know like this is what Christ had in mind. He's in the early 100s.
¶219Much better position than you by the way. Like this is this is according to the mind of Christ. This is what Christ intended. That's what he's saying. And at Smeir and at Smyrna he says that where the bishop appears there the people should gather and that baptism and the eucharistic assembly are not to be conducted independently of him.
¶220And yes before you whine that oh in writing to the Romans he doesn't name a bishop. Listen dude first Ignatius doesn't name anyone at Rome. And yet even by Protestant lights they must have had at least preserters right? So the silence should not lead us to conclude that Rome had no bishop. Unless you want to say that they didn't have presptors.
¶221Second, there's an obvious explanation for why Ignatius doesn't name anyone at Rome. He's literally being transported to Rome to get martyed. The Christians in Rome are under intense persecution in the very epicenter of the lion's den. So, it's utterly unsurprising that in sending a letter there, he wouldn't name anyone in order to protect them. Third, Ignatius literally calls the Roman church a church, and he bathes it with special praise for basically being a model church.
¶222And we already know that Ignatius said you literally cannot have a church without a bishop. So obviously he believed Rome had a bishop. And fourth, Ignatius also explicitly says that bishops were quote appointed throughout the whole world unquote. Okay, so like dude, Ignatius is writing extremely early and addressing lots of distinct churches across Asia Minor. Yet Ephesus, Magnesia, Trails, Philadelphia, and Smyrna already exhibit the same ecclesial structure with a single bishop as head.
¶223Ignatius isn't introducing the structure. He's he's literally appealing to it as something that all of his readers already know and take for granted. So, if this structure was not part of the apostolic deposit and instead of corruption, stare at what you have to say within an exceptionally narrow window immediately after the apostles, multiple geographically distinct Christian communities converged upon the same fundamental innovation of the church's constitution with scarcely a hint of opposition. The innovation would have to spread so quickly and successfully that by the early 100s, a bishop of Antioch could speak as though bishops were simply a normal feature of the Christian churches everywhere that was like according to Christ's intention, etc. And somehow this transformation would have left virtually no surviving memory of a great ecclesiastical revolution in which apostolic Christianity was replaced by something fundamentally different.
¶224I mean, come on, dude. This is not credible. And by the late 100s, the evidence is even more explicit. You know, like like Irenaeus and I think it's like 180 or something. I think it's either 170 or 180.
¶225It's like Irenaeus and either 170 or 180, I forget. Um he's combating Gnostic groups who claim access to authentic apostolic teaching. How does he answer them? Well, he brandishes that they don't have apostolic succession. He explicitly says the apostolic tradition has come down through the successions of the bishops and then literally gives the succession at Rome.
¶226He's like, "Yeah, the apostles commit the Episcopal office to Lionus. Anacletus succeeds him. Clement follows him. The chain continues down his own day." And he, you know, and he's also [clears throat] like, I could do this for any other church. [gasps] He also says, Polycarp had been appointed bishop of Smyrna by the apostles in Asia.
¶227So he's literally saying that apostles in Asia appointed a bishop of Smyrna. And Polycarp had personally transmitted what he learned from the apostles. And Aronyaeus even singles out Rome and writes that it is a matter of necessity that every church should agree with this church on account of its pre-minent authority. This is in the 100s, my guy. And then the mortorian fragment traditionally dated to the later 2nd century although its dating remains disputed casually refers to the period just casually refers just casually refers to the period where pas brother of Hermas was bishop and occupied the chair of the church of Rome.
¶228It's like once again an ongoing episcopal chair at Rome is simply taken for granted and like you know people at this time were just like casually dating events by appeal to who was occupying the chair of Rome. Turning to Cyprian of Carthage in the third century, he describes the Episcopet as fundamentally one and interprets Christ's commission to Peter as establishing a visible principle of ecclesial unity. Jerome later speaks openly of the chair of Peter. Writing to Pope Deis, he says that he follows no leader but Christ while nevertheless maintaining communion with Peter's chair, which he identifies with a rock upon which the church was built. H kind of sounds like what Mary said to me.
¶229H Elsewhere, Jerome matterof factly enumerates Clement among the bishops succeeding Peter at Rome. Optatus likewise argues against the donatists by appealing to the Roman Episcopal chair beginning with Peter and continuing through a succession of occupants. We've got like bishop lists in Africa. Like dude, Protestants who deny the bishop Rick. Like dude, Protestants who deny the bishop Rick have to maintain that there was basically a conspiratorial convergence all across Christendom almost immediately after the apostles died on a complete perversion of what they in fact instituted.
¶230Again, this is not credible. So not only did we anticedently expect Christ to institute an ecclesiology analogous to Catholicisms, but when we turn to the historical evidence, we find precisely that ecclesiology. And then finally, you know, we find that there are lots of passages that are naturally and then finally when we turn to scripture, we find that there are lots of passages that are naturally read as teaching that ecclesiology. So like start with the old covenant. Jesus himself recognizes an authoritative Jewish teaching office.
¶231As he says in Matthew 23, the scribes and the Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses. Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you. Jesus also talks about how they had, you know, the binding and loosing authority. They bind heavy consciences. And that was their and that was their authority to authentically exposit and interpret and bind consciences concerning revelation concerning the interpretation concerning the interpretation of Revelation.
¶232The old covenant even contained a jeritical mechanism for hard disputes, right? Like Deuteronomy 17 instructs Israelites faced with difficult cases to go to the appointed priestly and jeritical authorities, obey their determination, and not turn aside from the verdict. So the notion that God's covenant people possess not just scripture, but living authoritative interpreters thereof, is already biblical. It was part of the Old Testament. It was part of the Old Covenant.
¶233And the new covenant doesn't abolish the Old, but fulfills it. So, we'd expect something similar but more perfect to exist in the new covenant. And lo and behold, we find exactly that. In Matthew 16, Jesus says, "And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.
¶234Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." The imagery here hearkens back to Isaiah 22 where the Davidic king appoints Eliakim to an office that of steward or prime minister within the royal within the royal household as it says in Isaiah 22. I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David. What he opens no one can shut and what he shuts no one can open. And so there's like a pretty and so you know there's a pretty clear parallel between these passages and it sound pretty similar like I will give you the keys. What if you what have you bind on earth?
¶235Like and so what's the parallelism? Well, Christ is the Davidic. And so, what's the parallelism? What's the typology? Christ is the Davidic king.
¶236His church is his kingdom. And Peter receives the keys of that kingdom together with the authority to bind and loose. Eliakim's key signifies an office of delegated royal authority. He's the steward of the kingdom in the king'sstead, overseeing the kingdom in anticipation of the return of the king. And offices of course are by their very nature capable of being occupied successively.
¶237And moreover, the authority to bind and loose was precisely the kind of jeritical and interpretive authority required to determine what is permitted or forbidden and to settle questions of religious law. In Matthew 18, Christ extends binding and loosing authority to the apostolic body more generally. And this is this is starting to starting to sound suspiciously like a court h you know like like Christ is literally saying like like the apostles would have known what binding and loosing meant in that context. There was already there was already a court system for authoritatively interpreting the law that had precisely that authority. And Christ is now giving it to the new high priest of the new covenant.
¶238To them, they would have understood this. In fact, the authority again is to bind and loose heaven. And you can't bind heaven to error because God can't be wrong. So already in scripture, we see an infallible teaching office protected from error when it issues definitively binding judgments. Here you can see more about this from Dr.
¶239Cesar Bernstein in this post here that's linked in the resource document. And then after the resurrection, Jesus singles Peter out again in John 21. Feed my lambs, tend my sheep, feed my sheep. Shephering is a biblical metaphor for pastoral governance, one Peter himself later uses for ecclesiastical oversight. And of course, you know, which sheep belong to Christ?
¶240Well, earlier in John 10, Jesus describes his messianic mission as gathering his people into one flock, one shepherd. So when the risen Christ entrusts his sheep to Peter, the natural reading is that Peter receives a distinctive pastoral responsibility for Christ's flock, the universal church. And then after Judas dies, the apostles appoint Matias to take his office. That's in Acts 1, which shows that the apostolic ministry is already conceptualized in scripture as an office capable of being vacated and filled. And they saw the need to fill it once someone passed away.
¶241A doctrinal crisis then erupts in the primitive church. You know, like must gentile converts be circumcised and keep the mosaic. Oh, this is the Judaizer controversy. Well, what does the church do? It convenes a council and issues a binding decision on all Christians announced under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
¶242Again, this is almost exactly the institutional structure that Catholicism claims Christ gave the church. We see an authoritative body settling pressing doctrinal disputes, issuing a binding decision on the universal church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit right there in scripture. If your church does not look like if your church does not look like that, it's not holding these ecumenical councils which it issues binding decisions on the universal church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, then your church is not the New Testament church that Christ founded. And like just stepping back, the convergence of the common sense expectation, church history, and the biblical witness just makes Protestantism look exceedingly implausible. Our anticedent expectation for church governance strikingly matches exactly what we see almost immediately after the apostles die, which in turn strikingly matches the natural readings of a bunch of biblical passages.
¶243All of which in turn strikingly match the Catholic model of church governance over Protestant models. Ethan Muse makes this meta narrative argument more succinctly. >> It didn't. So, one thing I think about like I told you earlier is I think in terms of these like stories or the meta narratives and like if it seemed to me that what Christ was trying to do was to like perpetuate the sort of these three roles that he had taken on into the future past the apostolic age. Which of these made more sense to me?
¶244That one what he had done was so take prophecy, king, priest. Those are three roles of Christ there and there are three functions that I think the church has to carry out. And so then there are questions as to what design of the church, what structure of the church is going to equip it and to well dispose it to carry out those um functions without like extraordinary interventions from God. So what just going to what's going to give the church the ordinary means to successfully accomplish those functions? And so with regard to prophecy or his role as prophet basically there's a deposit of faith that he's entrusted to his apostles and what's going to be the best way to safeguard that deposit.
¶245So to make sure that you don't have like an ad mixture of air that's going to creep in and to have it to where just the faithful even the lay faithful including like illiterate peasants are going to be able to get all the teaching and instruction that they need in a way that they can count on that they can rely on and where it's actually going to be reasonable to expect them to hearken to basically sound doctrine. So like where theology and doctrine can actually matter and where they're actually going to be preserved. So there's like an enduring and faithful witness to what Christ's teaching ministry and the apostles teaching ministry. And what I realized was like it just seems extremely obvious to me if you're not like coping like crazy that like just me and my Bible is not going to work, you know? So it's not going to work for like illiterate shepherds, you know, it's not going to work for the vast major like just before the printing press, there was a reason like Protestantism didn't get started, you know, which is it didn't work.
¶246Like so if nobody can read the Bible, then this idea that Christ designed a system where everyone was supposed to be sitting in private judgment over a million competing sects that you wouldn't be able to recognize unless you had already created a systematic theology based on the exesus of Greek and Latin for all the all the illiterate people all over the world, you know. No, these these debates are too subtle. I mean, obviously there's the famous canon conundrum to begin with, but there's also just the issue that like private judgment as to arbitrating theological disputes just doesn't actually seem like a scalable or sensible way to ensure that all the faithful get the sound teaching that they need and to where it's like easily and immediately recognizable like even to PhDs, you know, like even the PhDs can't agree amongst themselves and can devise all these competing waring the theological schemes. And so if there if theology was going to matter and if there was going to be a reasonable expectation for people to have basically sound doctrine and to prevent not fall for heresy or not fall into sism then the standard needed to be like a visible structure of authority that was basically saying this guy's top dog this is the court like what he says goes you know Rome has decided the cause is finished you know so that type of structure is exactly what we needed what we And then I look to the Bible and I say, "Okay, well, what do they do in the Bible?" Like, "How do they actually organize the church in the Bible?" And then it's like, "Oh, Christ picks like a group of guys and says, "Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever despises you despises me." And those guys go around by both word and letter bossing people around and demanding faith and not having to justify themselves based on previous revelation.
¶247And then these guys are getting together and they're like holding councils and like we're being told like, "Okay, if you have a dispute like try to work it out amongst yourselves, you can't do it. Go to the church. If they won't listen to the church, cast them out like a pagan or a tax collector." [laughter] And I'm just like, how did this pro how did anyone ever think that was like a good idea? Like this whole Protestant thing, it doesn't make any it really didn't make much sense, especially if the New Testament church was like a prototype or a foundation. And then I look at the early church history and it's like, huh?
¶248And everybody in the world for hundreds of years has like these monoiscopal bishops that are meeting in council. [laughter] It's very interesting. And so just when I when I looked at that, I was just like, yeah, it just just for very like, you know, I'm idiot level theology at this point. Like I'm not a super wellressearched theologian. I'm just like, this doesn't the Protestant thing doesn't make sense.
¶249Now there are all sorts of other problems I could raise like the canon problem, powerful arguments against solafid like this excellent video here by distinguo um or you know arguments against solos scriptura the protestant dilemma that uh the client Dr. Cesar Bernstein has been pushing uh you know the Eucharist the papacy how the papacy served as a principle of unity amidst past schisms like the noation and donatist schisms you can see this video here by scholastic answers for more on that and you know so much more besides but you know I think the miracles and the meta narrative stuff are the most forceful for me so just going to move on to orthodoxy so again like take a step back remember we're trying to look at alternative explanations the miraculous data some some non-atholic way to make sense of it I was trying to like grope around for these these non-atholic explanations and I was just finding them all systematically wanting. So having gone through potential Protestant explanations and also just seeing the um impl the sheer implausibility of Protestantism itself then you know I we can turn then to orthodoxy and as it turns out the Orthodox are in the same situation as Protestants with respect to the miracles right they can either embrace well flailing naturalistic explanation you've seen why those are not going to be plausible or they can go in for accommodationism or demonism but we've already seen that both of those approaches are hopeless right so the miraculous case not only rules Protestantism, but also Orthodoxy. And again, the miracles are just like shot through with vindications that Orthodox cannot plausibly accept. Mary is agreeing to convert named individuals to Catholicism, even though you guys teach that there's no salvation outside of your church.
¶250She's calling the Pope the Holy Father, vindicating the holiness of his office and his spiritual fatherhood to the church. The Pope has spiritual authority to formally consecrate places well outside Rome. Mary is saying to MNA that Christ established his church on Peter in the context of a call to unity. and she chose a few Catholics in a massively orthodox majority nation to achieve the unity. Only Catholics, moreover, have dogmatized the immaculate conception which multiple Marian apparitions vindicate.
¶251Public empirically verifiable eucharistic miracles only seem to happen in Catholic contexts. Souls in purgatory, which you guys don't believe in, or at least most of you guys don't believe in, are visiting Padre Peio and are being released by Catholic mass. And he's claiming private revelations that these souls are being released by the propitiatory sacrifice of the Catholic mass. And and you know and of course that God's going out of his way to manifestly vindicate Padre Pio as a divine ligate and Mary seems to be asking MNA for prayer for souls in purgatory despite the Orthodox again generally disbelieving in purgatory and on and on and on and on and on. >> I mean obviously a lot of it I do think actually disting distinguishes between Catholicism and orthodoxy you know >> like with Fatima and miracles and all of that stuff.
¶252>> Yeah. And there's other stuff we could talk about there. But besides the fact that it distinguishes between Catholicism and Orthodoxy, there's also just a question that's like vindicatory and well evidence skews Catholic in a way where if God was privileging one church over the other to where he actually expected people to know one church was the true church, the one true church in a way where it's like people like you and me who were epistemically inquiring. Like I think you could very reasonably plead like I was getting like I was you gave me a lot of signals that were pointing [laughter] one way and not the other. Like >> like come on, bro.
¶253Like look at what you just did. Like >> Yeah. >> Like it was it was like like in terms of just the skew of stuff that's not like just miraculous occurrences, but stuff that has any specificity and that seems like it's vindicatory in its intent and where there's extensive objective documentation of it. Um, it does seem like basically what I would argue is that the motives of credibility for Catholicism are the ones exclusive among any church that make it have a claim to visibility in a unique way that makes Catholic exclusivism plausible in a way that orthodox exclusivism is not plausible given basically the comparative lack of visibility of the Orthodox Church especially like from this epistemic standpoint. >> Yeah.
¶254Yeah. And do you find it plausible that um >> like if God really cared that you exclusively be a part of the Orthodox church, he would not create a miracle record that was seemingly favoring another church? >> And as with Protestantism, I think Eastern Orthodoxy suffers from, you know, independent problems. I think it's meta narrative of church history just like doesn't look plausible, you know, like it seems unable to settle pressing doctrinal disputes and perform the essential ecclesial functions of the church. I mean, right?
¶255Like, you know, before the schism, the church is chugging along, convening ecumenical councils almost every 100 years, settling pressing doctrinal disputes. And this continues all the way up until a split. And then after the split, one of these churches continues holding ecumenical councils at around the same rate and continues settling pressing doctrinal disputes, while the other basically oifies and is unable to settle pressing doctrinal disputes and perform the essential ecclesial functions of a church. Like, hm, I wonder which one of these is the true continuation of the previous church. Here's what I'm going to pose to you as a question just as like a basic plausibility gut check, which I think there's a million of those against orthodoxy without getting into the weeds.
¶256Suppose that Christ instituted the papacy in the New Testament, right? And so Peter was the first pope as Joe Hishmire argues, right? Um and he's saying things to Peter like, you know, I pray for you so that you know that your faith will never fail. will strengthen your brethren. Right?
¶257And he's giving the keys to Peter and then giving him authority and then just giving the authority to all the other bishops, right? Um and we're doing all this stuff and there's all these teachings throughout the New Testament that are indicative of Petran primacy. So suppose he did all of that for knowing that the major rift in the church was going to be that the church that's really associated with the papacy and with Peter and with the succession of his office is going to break away from the true church and become a renegade church that basically is like the heretical you know sysmatic sect and then the popeless church is going to be the one true church and so like and that's when the vast majority of Christians are going to live is in that situation and that situation is going to persist for millennia. Does it make any sense providentially speaking that basically we instituted the papacy as like sort of like a symbolic honorific office [laughter] but then the arandisement of this office would then lead to the most massive heresy of all time. >> Maybe Catholicism is slightly more plausible to me but it's like they're both >> even though all the evidence is Catholic.
¶258Well, [laughter] >> like you guys are the true church and you have no miracles. >> Oh, well maybe. Okay. Do do you mean like no vindicator? >> What's the best thing you got?
¶259What's your Fatima? What's your wards? What's your Guadalupe? What's your >> I just like Coptic. The Coptic has zetun.
¶260But I guess it's not that's not particularly vindicatory. Um >> but it's also just I mean that's not Eastern Orthodoxy. You're going to go with you're going to be oriental orthodoxy. >> I No, I'm not. like your your one holy Catholic and apostolic church is the one where every time you're going to explain your conversion, they're going to ask what's that?
¶261>> Yeah, [laughter] I'm not going to Coptic Orthodoxy. Um, >> for miracles is better than Eastern Orthodoxy. >> The Orthodox also struggled to explain why Florence wasn't ecumenical. And here I would strongly recommend this video here by Katakis Vids. And then turning to other religions, I'll just, you know, I'll be very brief here because adherence of other religions are either going to have to explain away the Catholic vindicatory miracles naturalistically, which I think is hopeless, or explain them my appeal to lesser spirits, in which case, you know, my objection to the spirits running a muk hypothesis will, in which case my objections to the spirits running a muk hypothesis will apply.
¶262Or explain them my appeal to God, in which case my objections to the generic or pluralist theist accommodationism will apply. So I've already argued against alternative religions. Um, but you know, I'll briefly comment on a few. First, as regards Islam and Judaism, both suffer from a drought of impressive signs. I know like some Islamic apologists saying, "Ah, yes, but like look look at the the Quran itself.
¶263It's it's like it's a miracle or something because it's like it's so maleifluous or something." Like, dude, 1 Corinthians 13 like mogs the Quran any day of the week. But also, you know, suffering a drought of impressive signs is especially damaging to Judaism given its own scriptures. So, Ethan here has just finished explaining the Moses and Pharaoh's magicians thing that we talked about earlier. basically like God makes it clear he he demonstrates the superior efficacy of his power in the context when there are you know like opposing demonic counterfeit signs. So he was just talking about that and how that's God's mo even in scripture.
¶264Regardless what it shows is God is going to make it clear from the overall evidence both in the immediate context and in the broader context that his his power is superior. And so therefore the authentication of the true revelation will ultimately be more impressive than the deceptions. And this is something that Jewish modern Jews cannot concede or maintain because what obviously if you look at the history of miracles orthodox Judaism has a complete drought of impressive signs. Now meanwhile we have spectacularly impressive signs that have continued to occur since the inauguration of the new covenant with the coming of our Lord. And so when you're looking at like Fatima and Wards and Guadalupe and Padre Peio and all these Eucharistic miracles, when you're looking at extraordinary signs that are being performed all over the world in furtherance of and confirmation of the Catholic Church's claims to be a divine legate, if what we're learning from the Exodus narrative is that God is going to demonstrate the superior efficacy over his power in the face of demonic um basically imitation or conspiracy, then that overall distribution, even if you could plead skepticism with regard to each individual case the overall distribution is totally incompatible with God's approach to basically vindication of revelation.
¶265So those are two aspects that I think are completely neglected often in these discussions which is first the restrictions are most stringent when a person is claiming to be speaking on behalf of God as he can be known through reason and then second is that basically the overall record of miracles is going to be such that it's going to prevent the deception by comparison. So we're going to be able to see the superior efficacy of God's power through the miracles that he works. And I mean, well, and there's a whole set of arguments that we can make from prophecy, which we can treat sort of distinctly. It's related, but distinct from miracles as a motive of credibility. They're basically the main two when it comes to objective motives of credibility.
¶266And there's definitely a lot there to work with, too, when doing um apologetics with Jews. I mean, it's and that was one of the preferred arguments of early Christian authors, you know, writing against Jews. But yeah, there there is something interesting there. So the first point you raise is a good point to address which is basically saying well yeah but Christians are disqualified relative to this Deuteronomy 13 criteria even as you're construing it because he is telling us to go follow other gods right now. However, I think actually the wording of Deuteronomy 18 is helpful in clarifying this for us because the specifically the distinction that's drawn is between the people who speak in the name of other gods and then the people who presume to speak in the name of God.
¶267Right? presume to speak in the name of God is the is the designation that's used for then we use the fulfillment test as to whether or not we actually go and follow those people. Um so the the onus would actually be that Jesus didn't even presume to speak on the name of the Jewish God. So he may have said a lot of false things about the Jewish God. He may have done a bunch of idolatry too, right?
¶268But he was performing the signs that he was performing in the name of the Jewish God by praying to his father who he purports to be the Jewish god. And so he's working miracles through that consistently throughout. And he's never at any point in saying we there are other gods that we should also go and worship. He's making claims that you may dispute or find contestable that seem exactly within the range of the sort of claims where we would be expected to be docile to this new prophet and defer to them because it's like a tricky subtle theological matter where maybe we're right, maybe we're wrong. How should we settle it?
¶269Miracles. But he's at least purporting, he's presuming to speak in the name of the Jewish God, which is actually the criteria. So you could even disagree in substance based on your own the the prior theology as to whether he was or he wasn't. But he was purporting to he was clearly calling the Jewish God forward as a witness to his entire ministry. And he was directing all worship to that God.
¶270Even if you think ultimately he institutes false worship or deficient worship where it is actually materially idolatry, it's at least not formal idolatry because he's at least trying to make it to where the whole cultic system is in line with the prior revelation. >> Oh, and this, by the way, is why the chief priests thought that he was blaspheming, right? Because he was speaking in the name of the Jewish God. Okay? >> So he's putting himself forward as a Jewish Messiah, working signs in the name of the Jewish God.
¶271And I mean obviously this entire idea that he began as an authentic prophet or as a true prophet but then fell. I mean you point out okay well the divine audation of the church and then the moral miracle of the church and the conversion of the gentiles and then all the subsequent vindicatory miracles that have performed been performed in furtherance of the church's mission. All of that would count against it as well as just the foundational miracle of Christianity occurs at the culmination of Christ's ministry. Right? So after he's already said all the stuff and after he's already been put to death, that's when he's raised in his glorified body.
¶272So if that sign is a sufficient sign, if that's a uniquely divine prerogative and God is calling himself as a witness to Christ's ministry, then already that argument is starts out with no plausibility. I mean, it's also finally in on this point, there's an obligation that God would have to oppose basically a false messiah claimment that was going to present with such a false appearance of credibility. Um, so, and this is exactly what happens recalling what we talked about with the Egyptian magicians, right? So, when the false signs are performed, God opposes them in order to make it clear where the truth lies. And similarly, if so many Jews are going to be led into air and so many different other people are going to be led into air on a person who is forging the Jewish God's signature, God at the very least should be performing equally credible signs continually throughout history, pointing people back to rabbitical Judaism or Orthodox Judaism, at least on behalf of the Jewish people themselves to prevent them from being seduced.
¶273But instead, what he does is actually precisely the opposite. So what he does, so for instance, allowing coinciding exactly with this moment in time, then the destruction and unprophesied from the rabbitical Jewish standpoint, destruction of the second temple, cessation of the extraordinary role of prophet and anything recognizable as the Old Testament, succession of prophets unannounced and then going into the entire Jewish people being dispersed throughout the world and then all of the Old Testament prophecies rather than having prophesied like this ape of the Messiah. having a whole epoch where he basically rules the world. Instead of that being prophesied, he seems to be by superficial appearances at least in conformity with the prophecy of what the actual Jewish Messiah would do. So there's no prophetic forewarning.
¶274And rather than actually challenging this these this gigantic diabolical deception, rather than challenging it and giving motives, continual motives to the Jewish people to hold fast to the true revelation, he completely abandons them. The chain of prophets ceases, the entire simple system of temple worship is abolished and now the Jewish people are in eclipse. So it's just clearly not what you would expect. >> Yeah. And we see as well there's the fulfillment of all the prophecies in like Leviticus and Deuteronomy about what will happen to the people if they're unfaithful.
¶275And those are the ones that are consistently fulfilled throughout that time in exile. Um and so we do we do have a sign here being fulfilled, but it's not the one that is the positive sign. Mormonism I don't think we should find it remotely plausible. Its founding prophet is a serial adulterer, fornicator, liar, and polygamist who participated in occult practices, used occult sear stones to dictate the Book of Mormon, and sacrificed a black sheep to a demon. This is obviously not a credible foundational prophet.
¶276Uh, and its model of God is also philosophically inferior to traditional theism for various reasons already canvased. Anyway, if you want to learn more about all this stuff on Mormonism, definitely check out the Mormonism section of the resource document. And finally, as regards eastern religions, some of these are atheistic and so face form notable challenges uh from my philosophical case for theism and of course my miraculous case. And among the theistic eastern religions or sects, they'll face the challenges I've already raised towards either demonism or the spirits running a mock hypothesis or accommodationism depending on their favorite approach to Catholic vindicatory miracles. And then listen, just a final point on this first barrier, you know, like why I think that Catholicism has by far and away the best explanation of the of the miracle record.
¶277I just think you're safe in Catholicism, right? Like you can plead to God on judgment day. Richard of St. Victor's famous line, Lord, if this is error, we have been deceived by you yourself. For these things have been confirmed among us by such great signs and wonders and by such things as can only be done by you.
¶278Okay, onwards we march to the next barrier. So my second barrier to Catholicism was just various objections that I had to theism. I mean I already said a lot about the problem of evil and divine hiddenness and religious confusion in part four of the video. So I'll just say a bit more about the most challenging aspect of the problem of evil, namely the problem of evolutionary animal suffering. And I'll also cover puzzles about God that worried me just a little.
¶279But before getting into the details, let me make an important meta point. Even if these various theistic problems constitute powerful evidence against theism, the evidence for theism is just utterly overwhelming and massively outweighs even powerful evidence to the contrary. To me, the philosophical and empirical cases together just make atheism not a live option at all. Even if atheism is strongly evidentially supported by facts about evil, the philosophical and empirical cases together just make atheism not a live option at all. to me, even if atheism is strongly evidentially supported by facts about evil.
¶280Like, I I don't know what to tell you, man. But we we have photographs, we've got videos, we got laboratory reports, we've got X-rays, we've got millions of direct eyewitnesses. Like, I don't know. Like, your view has been empirically refuted despite your desire to cling to these abstract and highly controverted speculative philosophical arguments concerning which there's massive disagreement. Like, dude, I don't know, maybe you just made some philosophical mistake somewhere.
¶281It wouldn't be the first time, and we're in general not that good at speculative philosophical theorizing, right? like put a 100 philosophers in a room applying roughly the same methods to roughly the same intuitive data and you'll get 700 different views. And so in light of all of that, it's totally listenit to just conclude that these philosophical objections must go wrong somewhere, even if I can't pinpoint exactly where. But thankfully things aren't even as bleak as that. So let's turn to evolutionary animal suffering.
¶282So the basic problem here is that you know the brutality, horror, suffering and languishing pervading the evolutionary process is much better predicted by naturalism than theism. At least putting in our background all the theistic evidence that blows naturalism out the water like you know fine-tuning and psychophysical luck and non-skeepism and contingency and so forth. Thus at least against that background evolutionary animal suffering is very strong evidence for naturalism over theism. So how do I respond to this? Well, in addition to the meta points above, and in addition to the modest form of skeptical theism, which I think dense the force of the problem, there's once again a disjunction of non-silly responses to the problem that significantly mitigates its force.
¶283So, first up is the omission theodysy. And here I'm drawing on an excellent paper by uh Brian Cutter and Philip Swinson in the resource document. We want a theodysy that has the power to explain why there is so much evolutionary animal suffering, why that suffering looks roughly like it would happen if life was allowed to evolve uninterrupted in a universe like ours, and why the distribution of suffering looks kind of random. The omission theodysy delivers precisely that. According to the theodysy, God gave some group of non-human moral agents, perhaps angels, my favorite approach, or perhaps aliens, the power to intervene in the evolution of life on our planet and the foresight to know that if they didn't, things would go badly and evolution would be chalk full of suffering.
¶284Consequently, God tasked these beings with benevolently directing the evolutionary process. Unfortunately, this group freely omitted performing their divinely appointed role, resulting in what we see, namely a random-looking distribution of suffering right from the beginning of sensient life's evolution. And you might ask, well, why did God give the angels or aliens this freedom and role? Like, especially given that it risked so much evil. Well, because doing so enables lots of profound goods.
¶285Specifically, if the non-human moral agents did the right thing, then a slurry of intrinsic values would have been instantiated. Intrinsic values that could persist and add up over the course of an infinite afterlife. But these values, for example, the value of relationships forged by making a significant difference to the well-being of others, or the value of being responsible for good things and avoiding bad things, could only have been attained if were the agents to freely not help, things actually would have gone much worse. That's what makes exercising their high stakes freedom well facilitate better relationships for all eternity, right? Like either better relationships between those agents and those they help or better relationships between those agents and God.
¶286And it's just not at all implausible that for example my relationship with you could be better for all eternity because I say saved your life or made some other significant difference to your welfare such that had I not done so your life would have been much worse. And the added relational benefits here can aggregate for all eternity. either to an infinite total amount or to a very large finite amount that outweighs the relevant suffering that God risked in creating these agents with high stakes freedom and adopting a policy of non-intervention if they freely advocate their divinely appointed role. And to complete the theodysy unfortunately the moral agent or agents responsible for benevolently guiding the evolutionary process dropped the ball. And notice that God's policy of non-intervention, if the agents dropped the ball, is justified by the fact that this makes the agents real difference makers in the lives of other creatures.
¶287Such that had the agents not helped those creatures, the lives of those creatures would have been much worse. And that requires God not to swoop in and improve the lives of those creatures if the agents dropped the ball. And yeah, and yeah, while this policy does risk a lot of suffering if the agents drop the ball, that risk is justified by the overwhelmingly greater benefits attained if the agents do the right thing. So those are the broad contours of the omission theodysy. Of course, you might find it highly implausible as a naturalist or an atheist, but that's utterly irrelevant to the problem of evil.
¶288Since when evaluating the evidential force of facts about evil, we need to compare how likely those facts are conditional on theism with how likely they are conditional on naturalism. So long as the stories I've given aren't super unlikely, assuming that theism is true, that alone suffices to weaken the argument. And there are lots of reasons why this story is not super unlikely conditional on theism. First, as we saw in the demonic portion of part five of this video, it wouldn't be very surprising conditional ontheism that God would create angelic beings and give them a choice about whether to follow God's will for them or not. And it's likewise not terribly surprising that God might delegate to some of these beings particular responsibilities within creation, including responsibilities for helping other creatures spiritually and physically.
¶289Like, we already know that we have differencem responsibility over the lives of other humans and animals. And we already know that this can and does improve our relationships with each other and with animals. So, so it shouldn't be too surprising that God might give a similar differencemaking responsibility to higher beings than us. Second, we also saw in that portion of the video that there's very strong evidence for the existence of demons. And so, the theodysy here is just utterly non-ad hoc.
¶290Like, we have boatloads of independent, highly convergent, contemporaneous, multimodal, direct eyewitness testimonies to demonic manifestations across cultures and across the millennia. Even if you don't go all the way to believing in them, as you should, the abundant testimonies themselves make the probability of this theoretical positable. And once you've granted that, it's going to be very hard to regard the omission theodysy as a wild or silly or very improbable hypothesis, especially assuming theism. As a result, the theodysy seriously dense the force of the argument from evolutionary animal suffering. Third, and as I've intimated, we already know that God is in the business of giving us highstakes freedom and responsibility for how well the lives of other humans and non-human animals go, and that omitting to help others has pretty dire consequences for the well-being of others.
¶291It should not then be too surprising that God might bestow the same sort of high stakes freedom and adopt the same policy with non-human moral agents and for the same reasons that he does for us. Thus, still further pieces of our background knowledge make the omission theodysy not super surprising under theism. Fourth, nor is the omission theodysy ad hoc under Christianity. In fact, as Cutter and Swenson point out, it fits quite nicely with traditional Christian views about fallen angels. First, the theodysy's claim that angels were appointed to govern the earth would explain why they have the power to actively meddle in earthly affairs at all.
¶292Second, the theodysy nicely coheres with various New Testament descriptions of the devil and other evil spirits. The devil is said in John to be the prince of this world, in 2 Corinthians to be the lowercase G, god of this world, and in Ephesians to be the prince of the power of the air. the whole world lies under his power according to first John. And Mark says that he's related to the world as an owner to his house. Matthew and Luke say the kingdoms of the earth belong to him.
¶293Ephesians says that spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places are the rulers of this world. Third, the theodysy fits with commonly accepted ideas within historical theology such as the popular view that God initially left the cosmos to the care of the angels. Travis Dunay has documented historical support for this among Petristics and later church thinkers. In isuma theologia in Isuma theologia Aquinus maintains that all corporeal things are ruled by angels and quotes a host of earlier Christian authorities to the same effect including some that make reference to the devil's original responsibility over earth. Here he approvingly quotes John Damosine who says that the devil was one of the angelic powers who presided over the terrestrial order.
¶294Fourth these also explains why the human fall placed us under the devil's dominion rather than simply in a state of separation or alienation from God. This makes sense if the devil was already the appointed ruler of earth before humans came on the scene. By analogy, a child who runs away from home would by default find themsself under the rule of whoever already controls the surrounding territory. So for these four reasons, the omission theodysy actually coheres quite well with Christianity. And that's in addition to all the reasons I've given for why this story is not super unlikely conditional on theism, which again will alone suffice to weaken the argument from evolutionary animal suffering.
¶295And so just stepping back, I've given a number of reasons why this theodysy is neither ad hoc nor especially improbable under theism. So that's the first the odyssey that I'm going to build into my disjunctive approach to the problem of evolutionary animal suffering. The second one is just defeat in the animals afterlife. And here I'm drawing ideas from an excellent book by Trent Dherty called The Problem of Animal Pain, a theodysy for creatures great and small. Given theism, it would not be too surprising that there would be an afterlife.
¶296Like after all, that would enable like way more goods that would otherwise be unattainable. Indeed, if the afterlife is endless, it enables infinitely more good, at least in the created order. So it's hardly surprising under theism that God might give us an afterlife. But why stop at us? I mean, if he can give us an afterlife enabling lots of goods, why not do the same for other sensient animals?
¶297Like God omnipotent after all, you know, like plausibly then he could recreate or resurrect the sensient animals in the evolutionary process and give them good afterles. And for the reasons given, this shouldn't be too surprising under theism since it's literally a good thing. Indeed, potentially infinitely good. So, I've explained why this view isn't ad hoc conditional ontheism, but it's also not ad hoc on Christianity. In the escaton, the Bible says the lion will lay down with the lamb.
¶298And so there will plausibly be animals in the afterlife. So why not include those very animals in the evolutionary process, right? That doesn't seem that doesn't seem to me particularly far-fetched. Indeed, this meshes pretty well with God making all things new in the escaton or in the new heavens and the new earth. But if God secures an afterlife for animals, then animal suffering becomes easier to explain.
¶299For an afterlife allows animals suffering to be defeated, provided that God enhances the cognitive capacities of animals in the afterlife, so that animals can come to regard their earthly suffering as a meaningful and integral part of a valuable life story or a valuable cosmic story. Having recognized this, they would not wish away their suffering because of the goods their suffering enabled. Maybe goods for others on Earth, maybe goods for those animals in the afterlife relating to some kind of character development or fuller manifestation of their capacities or some improved minimal relationship with their creator. However we cash it out on the operative story, animal suffering is not just outweighed by goods in the afterlife, but also defeated by the animals own lights. Again, you might find the story highly implausible as a naturalist or an atheist.
¶300But again, that's but once more, that's totally irrelevant to the problem of evil as we saw in the omission the Odyssey because what matters is how likely the data is conditional on theism compared to how likely it is conditional on atheism. So even with like you know your atheist prior and your atheist mindset uh if you find this implausible that's not the relevant implausibility that would impugn this theodysy and by the way I haven't read Schneider's book animal suffering and the Darwinian problem of evil. Um but I haven't on good authority that he also defends a similar but subtly different model of animal afterlife and brings in both both aesthetic and christoologgical considerations. So that's another book that you could check out here. Schneider's book animal suffering and the Darwinian problem of evil.
¶301The a third these that I'll put into my disjunction is the theistic multiverse. It wouldn't be too surprising under theism. I don't think it wouldn't be like gargantuinly improbable, like hopelessly improbable under theism that God might create every universe worthy of creation. That would produce lots of good and maybe much more in the created order than a single creation worthy universe. But if God creates every creation worthy universe, it's totally unsurprising that he would create many universes with evolutionary processes rife with suffering since tons of those will be creationworthy.
¶302given that the evolutionary processes will also contain lots of pleasure, lots of good beings and lots of good in the afterlife for you know some or all of those creatures and may lead to moderately flourishing global communities of rational animals for millions of years too. Now you might object that only a very tiny fraction of creationworthy universes will contain a suffering filled evolutionary creative process. And so it's still very surprising under the theistic multiverse hypothesis that we would see a suffering filled evolutionary process. much more surprising than it is under naturalism, at least backgrounding again all those considerations like fine-tuning and non-skeepism and whatnot. And so there's still a big evidential hit to theism on our hands.
¶303But I say in response, that evidential hit is plausibly offset by the fact that the theistic multiverse hypothesis predicts that we would exist far better than naturalism, or at least far better than non-silly, non-skeepical versions of naturalism. And you know, for the philosophy nerds out there, if you object that my rejoiner here assumes the falsity of the self-sampling assumption, then I think you're probably right, but that's not a problem. Remember the dialectical context. I'm not trying to show that these theodysies are true or even plausible. I'm just trying to meet the low bar of not prohibitively improbable or non-negligibly likely or nonsilly.
¶304So long as I can meet that bar, and I think I clearly have, the problem of evolutionary animal suffering loses a lot of force. And so all I really need here is the claim that the negation of the self-sampling assumption is not super improbable given the theistic multiverse hypothesis. And that's surely right. I mean, you know, like none of us should be very confident about which theory of self-locating evidence is true. And also, you know, these two views are actually positively probabilistically correlated since if we learned that the self-sampling assumption is false, then we should significantly increase our confidence that there are lots of observers and hence increase our confidence in the theistic multiverse hypothesis.
¶305Okay, but I I've just gotten into the weeds and I know I've lost a lot of you. So like stepping back recall the dialectical function of these three theodysies that I've given you know the the omission theodysy the trendori animal afterlife theodysy with defeat and then the theistic multiverse theodysy recall the dialectical function right remember the dialectical context I'm not here in the business of saying that any one of these is true or especially probable I'm in accommodation mode here right like I'm recognizing that yes my theism is going to take a hit relative to appropriate background knowledge from facts about animal suffering. I'm granting that my sole aim is to significantly blunt the force of that evidential hit or to mitigate the level of evidence against my theory. And I think I've clearly succeeded in doing that, especially if we consider the disjunction of these and other theodysies for animal suffering in books like you know there's a palgrave handbook to um uh the problem of animal suffering and philosophy of religion that's very recent. There's, you know, Michael Murray's nature, red and tooth and claw.
¶306There are lots of other approaches and all that is in addition to my meta points about modest skeptical theism and the overwhelming evidence for theism and so on. So, all in all, yes, there's some evidence against theism here. In fact, this might even be the best the atheist can hope to muster, but the evidence is not extremely strong and theism is neither blown out of the water nor longer live option nor unable to be basically decisively confirmed through enormous theistic evidence. Here are two final points about the problem of evil more generally that I want to make. First, it just seems manifestly clear to me that the problem of evil cannot be treated as anything close to a silver bullet.
¶307As Alexander Puce writes, I think to myself here, during the blink of an eye, there are horrendous things happening. But there is an infinitely long life afterwards if God exists. For all we know, the horrendous things are just a blip in these infinitely long lives. And it just doesn't seem hard to think that over an infinite future that initial blip could be justified, redeemed, defeated, compensated for with moral adequacy, sublated, etc. And second, this is just like a high order consideration to temper your confidence in uh the problem of evil.
¶308We should expect to overrate the problem of evil given its emotional veilance. As Matthew Addin puts it, you should expect yourself to have some bias to overrate arguments that have more emotional force. Because the problem of evil is an emotional problem and not just an intellectual one, we are liable to overrate its intellectual force. Our emotions affect our perception of arguments more than we like to think. Now, I am not suggesting that the problem of evil is only an emotional problem and that it lacks intellectual force.
¶309I don't believe that. My claim is simply that we should expect ourselves to overrate the force of the problem of evil relative to other arguments that are similarly evidentially compelling but lack the same kind of emotional payload. End quote. Okay, so that's like the first theistic problem uh within this second barrier that I really had to work through. And um the various considerations that I've raised in this section helped me work through it.
¶310There were some puzzles about God that also worried me at least like a little bit. Now, okay, listen. The stone paradox was not one of these, but I mean I did come across this meme here. Maybe I should make this smaller so that it fits. There we [laughter] go.
¶311I I could not refuse to include this meme in the video. Um, so I didn't worry about the stone paradox, but hey, I know some people worry about it. So like, you know, the question is, can God create a stone so heavy that he can't lift? If yes, then there's something he can't do, so he isn't omnipotent. If no, then there's also something he can't do, so he isn't omnipotent.
¶312But, you know, that objection fails. For starters, omnipotence only requires the ability to do what's possible. And a stone too heavy for an unlimitedly powerful being to lift is not possible to begin with. So, it's no threat to omnipotence that God can't make such a stone any more than it's a threat to omnipotence that he can't make like 1 plus 1 equal 53 or a triangle that has 17 sides. And I know I hear some of you saying, well, you know, technically technically you might think that there could be a stone which is essentially earthbound and so couldn't be lifted by anyone, not even God.
¶313But then just like another premise of the objection to theism is false. Namely, the premise that God isn't omnipotent if he can't lift such a stone since again it's impossible for the stone to be lifted. and omnipotence only requires the ability to do what's possible. So, the stone paradox is a big nothing burger. Um, but hey, uh, covering it gave me a reason to include this meme here, and I know that some people worry about it.
¶314So, um, okay, what about omnipotence versus moral perfection? Again, this one didn't bother me, but I know it has bothered some people. Um, so the objection here is that God can't be omnipotent because he can't do evil. But first, uh, that just again misunderstands omnipotence. An omnipotent being is roughly, you know, a being who firstly enjoys an infallibly efficacious will.
¶315So that necessarily if the being wills that P, then P is true. And secondly, an omnipotent being has the ability to actualize any possible state of affairs. But a perfect being doing evil is not a possible state of affairs. So it's again no threat to a perfect being's omnipotence that it cannot do evil. We could alternatively, I mean, we could understand God's omnipotence as the possession of all abilities that don't entail any limitation or that don't detract from his value.
¶316And since the ability to do evil entails limitations and detracts from value, God's inability to do evil is no threat to omnipotence. So defined. So there's like two approaches to responding. And then the final theistic problem here is uh divine foreign knowledge versus human freedom. And this one did bother me a little bit more because I have kind of you know studied this one and thought about it.
¶317So a final puzzle. So suppose that God infallibly knew a thousand years ago that you'd watch this video. It might then seem that you must have watched this video. I mean, like, after all, you can't do anything that would make God's past belief false since God is infallible. And you can't now change the past.
¶318Like, as we say, there's no use crying over spilled milk. The past is over and done with. It's fixed. It's beyond our control. And so, it seems like you couldn't do otherwise, then watch this video.
¶319And just more generally, if God already infallibly knows every choice everyone will ever make, it can seem that no one ever has the genuine possibility of doing otherwise. But I don't but I don't think this is a very serious challenge. The fact that God knows what you or I or anyone else will do depends on what you freely do rather than your action depending on God's knowledge thereof. In other words, assuming it's listenit to talk about God's knowledge a thousand years ago given divine timelessness. God knew a thousand years ago that you will watch this video because you will in fact watch this video.
¶320Like that's what explains why God knew that a thousand years ago. And had you chosen otherwise, which you could have done, God simply would have fornown for all eternity that alternative fact instead. And although we ordinarily cannot act in such a way that some arbitrary fact about the past would have been different, like facts about the civil war, say, it is far less obvious that we cannot perform an act such that if we were to do it, a past fact which depends upon our actions would have been different. In fact, it seems obvious to me that in evaluating what you can do in a given choice scenario, we should not be holding fixed things which literally depend on what you'll end up choosing, right? Like those things are explanatorily downstream of what you end up choosing.
¶321So they shouldn't be serving as constraints that delimmit your abilities anticedent to your choice. So like to put it in slogan form like your actual choice determines the contents of God's infallible fornowledge, not the other way around. And so the latter does not render your choice inevitable. Oh, and yet another response to the freedom for knowledge problem that I don't favor, but which I'm at least like somewhat open to is that like yes, no one can ever do otherwise, but we still have free will because free will or the kind of control over our actions needed to be morally responsible for them and appropriately praised or blamed for them does not require the ability to do otherwise. Lots of philosophers defend that view.
¶322you can see like Frankfurt cases uh and the debate about Frankfurt cases um for like a defense of that sort of view that like we can still have free will at least in the sense of the control needed for moral responsibility in the absence of the uh you know the ability to do otherwise in the absence of alternative possibilities as philosophers put it and again I I don't I don't actually favor that view um but but like in full honesty I'm like open to it at least somewhat so okay so that's how I worked through some of my theistic barriers to Catholicism some of my objections to theism again like you can see the earlier part of the video, part four, where I went through like divine hiddenness and religious diversity and the problem of evil in more depth. But let's get on to my third barrier to Catholicism, moral problems. Okay, so this one was hard for me. One of my biggest barriers to Catholicism was the fact that many of its moral teachings just seemed so implausible to me on an on an intuitive level. To take just some representative examples, um, Catholicism is committed to absolute deontology.
¶323So certain things are absolutely categorically prohibited under any circumstances. They are intrinsically evil or evil regardless of circumstances or consequences. For example, masturbation is not just impermissible, but it's impermissible under any circumstances, even if doing so would save your own life or the lives of arbitrarily many other people. And that just seemed at the time deeply implausible to me. or take early stage abortion.
¶324Directly and intentionally killing a zygote or embryo or early stage fetus well before any capacity for consciousness exists is intrinsically evil under Catholicism and thus absolutely prohibited under any circumstances. And not only was that difficult for me to accept, but it was even more difficult to accept that early stage abortion is impermissible in circumstances like rape when carrying the baby to term would cause significant distress to the mother. cases where the mother's life is endangered, Catholics, Catholics can apply like the principle of double effect there such that like you can perform an operation which foreseeably leads to the death of the child even though you don't intend it and you don't use the child's death as a means to bringing about the the life-saving um procedure the the life-saving operation. Um so but anyway, we don't have to get into that. I didn't really worry about that too much just because Catholics can appeal to double effect there.
¶325But um but still this early stage abortion thing was was difficult. Sexual ethics very difficult for me. It seemed super implausible to me that for example, gay sex is intrinsically evil. So, so not just wrong, but wrong regardless of circumstances or consequences. It just didn't seem plausible to me at the time.
¶326I I I keep on having to say that because, you know, I'll get into this, but like moral intuitions are pretty malleable. Um, it seemed pretty difficult to me at the time to accept that. It just did not seem plausible to me that, for example, becoming transgender, say, was impermissible. Uh, or, you know, having gay sex was impermissible. Uh and the absolute prohibition here, these were pretty implausible to me as well, like you know, um no gay sex less the world would fall.
¶327You know, like um you can't do it to prevent yourself from dying, say, uh or a bunch of people from dying. Um and you know, the absolute prohibition on intentionally contraceptive sex that didn't seem plausible to me either. Um so I, you know, I could I could go through the list at the time of the various facets of Catholic sexual ethics that did not seem plausible to me. Um the Catholic teaching on suicide didn't seem plausible to me. So it seemed implausible that suicide is intrinsically evil.
¶328Um like you know when North Korean defectors try to escape North Korea, they bring with them cyanide pills to commit suicide in case they get caught since they know that you know they'll otherwise probably be brutally tortured. And that just it seemed permissible to my non-atholic mind at the time. It seemed permissible to me uh to you know take the cyanide pill and intentionally indirectly kill yourself um in those circumstances. But Catholicism says otherwise. Catholicism says that intentionally and directly um committing suicide is intrinsically evil.
¶329It's wrong regardless of circumstances cannot be justified in principle. Okay. So, how did I overcome this barrier? Because I I just I had so many just intuitive resistances to Catholicism. Okay.
¶330So, here's what I say. Uh I grant that moral intuitions generally carry some evidential weight, but their evidential weight isn't super strong. at least when they're not fixed points like it's you know it's pro tanto wrong to recreationally torture rape and dismember innocent children and there are tons of reasons to think that the evidential weight of moral intuitions is not very strong. First moral intuitions vary considerably both across persons and within the same person over time and especially with respect to the very moral questions mentioned earlier. Such variability does not show that moral intuition is wholly unreliable.
¶331But it does indicate that human moral intuittors are less reliable than my extremely high confidence in my non-atholic moral judgments had presupposed. More generally, substantial variation in the outputs of a puditive source of access to a certain domain of facts gives us reason to think that those outputs are significantly influenced by non-truth tracking factors. And that in turn should lead us to place correspondingly less trust in that source. Like interpersonally, there's significant intuitive disagreement about moral matters. Some intuitively find killing a fetus permissible, whereas others intuitively find it utterly heinous.
¶332There's lots of intuitive disagreement about white lying and lying when prudent. There's lots of intuitive disagreement about the permissibility of subjecting animals to painful experiments for the sake of drug development. There's lots of intuitive disagreement about corporal punishment of children. There's lots of intuitive disagreement about retributive versus non-retributive punishment. There's also lots of intuitive disagreement about the permissibility of various non-procreative sex acts like homosexual sex.
¶333There's even lots of moral disagreement among ordinary folk about absolute beontology. You'll probably get a sense of that if you talk to undergrads or like teach high school students. So that's interpersonally. So that's interpersonal disagreement among like first order moral intuitions that a lot of people feel super strongly and passionately about. In personally, people often find their own moral intuitions or seemings changing over time.
¶334I mean this happened to me with homosexuality when I learn when I learned about it as a Catholic youth. It seemed impermissible to me. But after years of being like a liberal skeptical agnostic or atheist, it came to strike me as intuitively permissible. And there are lots of other examples of this in my life which I will talk about shortly. But intrapersonally even the moral intuitions or seemings themselves change over time.
¶335Kind of suspicious. But but the very fact of significant variance interpersonally and intrapersonally again I'm not saying it totally visiates our moral intuitions. I'm not saying that this implies skepticism about moral intuitions. That's not what I'm saying. All I'm saying is that we should uh temper our confidence in the deliverances of these moral intuitions.
¶336We should place at least some less trust in the putitive source of relevant facts because it does seem to be influenced non-trivally by non-truth-tracking factors. Again, bear in mind in everything that I say, I grant that moral intuitions generally carry some evidential weight. They they do carry evidential force at least presumptively or defeasibly. My goal is ultimately that to temper the evidential force such that like the empirical considerations should win out. So that's my first response.
¶337Second of all, we have empirical evidence that moral and philosophical intuitions are influencable by non-truth-tracking factors. For example, studies have found effects associated with the wording and framing of cases, the order in which cases are presented, and exposure to the judgments of others. These effects provide reasons to think that intuitive judgments can be influenced by factors other than sensitivity to the relevant moral facts. And if that's true, then it wouldn't be too surprising that some of these or other non-truth tracking factors explain some, most, or all of non-atholic moral intuitions. Third, intuitions are highly susceptible to cognitive penetration and inculturation.
¶338A mental state is cognitively penetrated when it's influenced by the subject's prior beliefs, expectations, desires, or theories rather than being determined only by the truth. Like people's intuitive responses to cases and principles shift with political ideology, religious worldview, desire, exposure to a view, and endorsement or rejection of a view. I've noticed this in my own intuitions a lot. Like when I come to accept a theory, I often gradually lose intuitions that I previously thought told against those theories. And I often gradually gain intuitions favoring those theories that I previously didn't have.
¶339So for example, I used to think it was intuitively absurd that, you know, there exists something composed of exactly my left big toe, Donald Trump's right ear, the upper half of the Statue of Liberty, and a particle in the core of Jupiter. But after having leaned toward, you know, the disjunction of marological universalism and nihilism for some time, that didn't seem particularly unintuitive to me anymore. And and even now, it doesn't seem unintuitive to me. And this has happened to me with lots of philosophical theories, and others attest to the same thing. I I I recall some sort of video.
¶340Um I have a memory of it. I'm like, I wish I would have dug and found it. But um I think I've heard pans psychists report losing the intuition that there are no conscious particles simply because they become so familiar with seeing the world through a pansychist lens. I could be wrong about this, but I thought it might have been a conversation between Philip Goth and um Emerson Green at some point like that they just sort of just lost the intuitions because they became familiar with uh just kind of swimming in the mindset. But I could be wrong about that that that it was those two who talked about this.
¶341Heck, since my conversion to Catholicism, a number of my moral intuitions have changed or significantly dwindled in force, including intuitions about the permissibility of hell. And honestly, absolute deontology doesn't seem especially intuitively implausible to me anymore, either. So, these and many other experiences just make me think that moral intuitions are pretty feeble, dude. They're so prone to non-truth-tracking influences that I should not accord them significant weight in my theorizing. That's not to say that they have no weight.
¶342I am not saying that but I should not be according them or at least like the non-fixed points ones significant weight in my theorizing such that they can almost like screen off the best explanation of the miracle record. Fourth, moral intuitions are also significantly shaped by behavior and desire which don't tend to track moral truth. To give a particularly poignant example of this in my own life, I remember the first time I downloaded a free book from a certain website that certain legal codes prohibit. My moral intuition at the time was that I was doing something wrong and I felt guilty. I felt pretty guilty.
¶343But over time, I gradually did it more and then more and then more until eventually it just seemed like a totally normal thing that everyone does and that it's totally permissible and besides, you know, oh, the publishing companies are rich enough and things like that. So, I literally deadened my conscience through repeated violations of it to the point that I literally lost a moral intuition because I just desired to do something contrary to it. H isn't that interesting? Isn't that interesting? We can literally voluntarily cultivate and lose moral intuitions through our behaviors and desires.
¶344And this realization made me accord much less weight to my moral intuitions against Catholicism. They're flimsy, at least partially voluntary, and so susceptible to non-truth tracking forces. And it's not super implausible that there might be behavioral and desire related reasons why I had some or all of my anti-atholic moral intuitions. Oh, and you know, just by the way, to be absolutely clear, I am not saying that downloading free books from such websites is actually morally wrong. That's not what I'm saying.
¶345Um, there are very traditional confessors and experts in Catholic moral theology who deem it permissible. Scholastic answers has argued that it's permissible. Um, consult your own confessor. But my own confessor told me that, you know, custom has the force of law and that if it's custom in your discipline and the law is not enforced by the country, um, my own confessor told me that it'd be permissible for me. So, like, okay, I'm just making a point here about my intuitions, right?
¶346Regardless of whether or not my original intuitions were correct, my my broader point still stands that like my conscience was convicting me of something at the time that I just repeatedly ignored. and I had certain intuitions at the time that I just repeatedly flouted to the point that I eventually lost the intuition. So that's my fourth response. Fifth, my moral intuitions against Catholicism should not hold significant weight to my theorizing because Catholicism has an internally plausible debunking account of my anti-atholic intuitions. A debunking account of an intuition explains why you have that intuition independently of the truth of its content.
¶347So the point is not that the intuition has been shown false, but that its evidential force is undermined at least to an extent. I mean like pretty clearly once you see that you would likely have had the intuition regardless of whether its content were true, you have less reason to trust it. And Catholicism offers precisely such a debunking account of many non-atholic intuitions. If Catholicism is true, it makes sense that most of us would have many moral intuitions relating to hell and objectively sinful acts that are seriously mistaken. Like human under Catholicism, humans do have some natural moral knowledge afforded by our conscience.
¶348Right? This is the law written on our heart. But our ability to see and apply moral truth is deeply wounded intellectually and valitionally by both original and personal sin. Right? Where we are in a postfall world mired in the knowetic or intellectual effects of sin.
¶349We have disordered desires and darkened intellects. So if Catholicism is true, it wouldn't be surprising if most people including sincere, smart, and reflective people have distorted or unreliable moral intuitions at least in certain restricted domains. and moral intuitions and judgments are especially prone to these nuetic effects of sin since they're tightly tied to desire, self-interest, convenience, pride, tribal loyalty, and social belonging, resentment, and other such factors. These are exactly the kinds of intuitions where our fallen, broken, distorted desires and faulty background beliefs are liable to induce fallen, broken, distorted seemings. you know, like intuitions about morality not being super demanding or intuitions about the permissibility of various pleasurable things that aren't actually permissible, etc.
¶350in which our culture is just like saying these are okay, these are okay, these are okay. If a theory renders it not very surprising that a certain class of intuitions against it would not be particularly reliable, then those intuitions are plausibly not very strong evidence against that theory. And again, I'm not saying that they don't have any evidential weight. That's not what I'm saying. The point is that their evidential weight is tempered or mitigated.
¶351And connecting this back to the miraculous case, if Catholicism is true, we can readily explain non-atholic moral intuitions. By contrast, if Catholicism is false, it's far more difficult to give a satisfactory explanation of why the miracle record would uniquely and conspicuously privilege Catholicism in the way and extent we find. So, the miracle evidence, I think, clearly mogs moral intuition. Ethan Muse explains the appeal to knowetic effects of sin exceptionally well since there are actually two subtly different points here. Um both of which I think have force and he also shows um that it doesn't lead to skepticism.
¶352So let's play muse. >> He he seems to complete fundamentally misunderstand how knowetic effects of sin is being deployed in this context >> which is it's not saying we sin so therefore our moral reasoning is unreliable. This is a moral judgment so therefore we should undercut it and not have as much confidence in it. That was that was definitely not your argument, right? Yeah, >> that wasn't the argument I made.
¶353Now, even that argument could be a reasonable argument, more reasonable than he's saying if it was just interpreted this way. At the very least, put way less confidence in like morian judgments about morality just based off of like the phenomenological strength that the intuition has when you consider it, you know, because you have a defective equipment that could erroneously produce those sometimes. So you shouldn't treat the fact that you have this 100% conviction as corresponding to like 100% evidence, you know, but instead there should be some kind of mitigation to account for the f the the fallibility of the mechanism, right? The heightened foulability of the mechanism. >> And if if even if you just took it that way, then it just requires these people to be more modest in how they're drawing out implications.
¶354So it would cut both ways. Sure, it would require everybody to be more modest when reasoning morally, but that's all we need because all we're trying to do is say put less weight in this to overturn strong evidence otherwise. Right? That and so that gets back to the issue of the dialectical context. >> But but actually, as he mentions, as he anticipates, the argument that was being made is in fact more subtle, >> right?
¶355which is the argument that's being made is that there's a systemic bias that's introduced by the knowetic effects of sin that would make us likely to erroneously form the judgment that hell was unjust even if it were just. Right? >> And so one thing if given the ways that we expect these psychological mechanisms to work, one thing the phenoic effects of sin would probably make us do is have less of an intuitive appreciation for the badness and the severity of sin and therefore what punishment was due on account of it. It would also make us have an inflated inflated perception of our own worth and our own dignity and what we're entitled to and how much we debase it when we commit sins. Right.
¶356Right. >> It would also probably cloud our judgment and make it to where we could sublimate other biases more easily to rationalize actions that weren't okay or to rationalize conclusions that were unsound. Right? And so for instance, if we had a strong desire not to go to hell or if we had a strong desire to fornicate or to masturbate or whatever and we knew that having the beliefs, you know, in hell or all this stuff would be an obstacle to that or at least make it unpleasant for us to do that to consider that or cause kind of dissonance. It might make it to where the facility with which we rationalize is greater, right?
¶357And all of those things are biases that militate in favor of the intuitions. So they actually are selective debunkings rather than global debunkings, right? particular two and they were saying there's a direction to the bias and because there's a direction to the bias we therefore need to put much less weight in the con in the strength of those intuitions especially when there's diversity in those very same intuitions right so if a bunch of people are arriving at conflicting judgments about the same matter and we know there's a bias in one direction that's that's going to completely change the evidential picture right and it's going to be very forceful in discounting the weight that's applied to these first order intuitions in the evidential way. Um, and so saying there's a systemic bias in one direction is very different than just saying you can't trust moral faculties at all because they're corrupted by sin. We're saying specifically the fact that we're fallen man is something that's going to make it to where I would expect us to have a judgment that was more unfavorable to hell than was due.
¶358Right? Then finally, the last thing I'll say in this regard is notice the asymmetry. The non-atholic worldview doesn't predict that you'll have a bunch of misleading Catholic miracle evidence that uniquely favors Catholicism given their worldview. >> Right. >> Right.
¶359But meanwhile, the Catholic worldview does predict that you'd have misleading moral intuition evidence against Catholicism given Catholicism was true. >> Yeah. >> So if you have two really strong considerations that you don't know how to reconcile. So you've seen all the evidence for Lords and you've seen all the evidence for Padre Peio and St. Charbell and you've seen it for Fatima and for all the Eucharistic miracles and you're like, I don't know how to reconcile that.
¶360But it's also morian for me that hell can't be justified, right? Well, here's a good way to break the tie. A good way to break the tie is Catholicism predicts that you'd get misleading evidence like Morian intuitions that hell is not right. But meanwhile, non-atholicism doesn't predict that you'd get a consilience of a bunch of miracle evidence that gave the false appearance that Catholicism was true. >> Right.
¶361Spot on. >> So that selective debunking already is an evidentially relevant asymmetry, which is it's about the predictions made both by both models about what types of evidence you'd get. And so Catholicism predicts misleading moral evidence against Catholicism. Meanwhile, rival views don't predict misleading moral miracle evidence in favor of Catholicism. >> Excellent point.
¶362All right, let's uh let's keep going because I think they're going to try to turn the noet effect noetic effects of sin uh against your justification for Catholicism. Let's see if they succeed. Here we go. >> Every every human institution can make errors just like individuals can. And so ultimately, we all just have to reason about these things as best we can.
¶363and then again say here I stand again I can do no other it just seems to me that this and I'm just not compelled if somebody's gonna say yeah but your reasoning is following mine mine's okay but yours >> I was going to say the more I think about it the more I think that this will just be self undermining because the noetic effects of sin if such there be are not restricted just to moral reflection all of our cognitive faculties including the ones that brought us to the conclusion of conviction that the Catholic Church is authoritative and true and that God exists and so on and so forth And so if if the damaging effects of sin are so deep that we can't trust any of our basic moral reflections or the the fruits thereof, we can't trust any of our basic perceptions of the world's whether those be sensory or intellectual. And in which case, why do we think that the Catholic Church is true or that the teachings of the Catholic Church are true? It's not like God implanted that belief directly in our brain. We we've followed a a chain of discursive reasoning to get there. As I think Ethan would say, like in his miracle cases, these are really nuanced, sophisticated histo attempted historical demonstrations of the veracity of these various claims to have performed miracles in the 20th century.
¶364But the noetic effects of sin, they undercut. So I I think that this is not a line that you really want to pursue to its fullest extent. It's just going to undercut everything and therefore undercut nothing. Yeah. So, >> you already preempted this, but let's let's go over it again.
¶365We've already dealt with this, which is we're not making an argument. So, knowetic effects of sin first is not an argument that humans are now generally unreliable even in the domains that are directly affected by the knowetic effects of sin like moral reasoning, right? So, it certainly doesn't imply we're generally unreliable in perception, right? Or cognition or these other domains like drawing inferences about the probability of naturalistic explanations for puditive miracles, right? That >> right?
¶366>> That like those are very peripheral areas in which there would be no effects of sin. And God in his providence wants to preserve general reliability. So like he's our epistemic bodyguard as we said in the previous episode, >> just had that talk. Yes. Perfect.
¶367>> Right. He's not gonna he's not going to permit us to fall away into the point where like um we're in a skeptical scenario with the extent of the noetic effects even with regard to natural morality. Right. But however um it is going to especially in the areas that are directly affected like moral reasoning um at the very least cause us to be more circumspect in the confidence that we invest in the conclusions. So that's definitely true as a general point.
¶368But more specifically, the actual argument that's relevant here is that the nuetic effects of sin don't just increase air uniformly across all possible errors that you could make, but instead they do so in a way that is in conformity with basically the concupisible like disordered appetites that the sinner has. Right. Right. >> And so basically when a person lives a life of vice, they wind up having a malformed conscience. And so then they become less sensitive to and responsive to um moral reasons and they become and so and we take those types of examples, right?
¶369And that those are the examples that are cited in scripture too. And so those are the ones that are directly relevant. And so for instance, if you love sin and you hate God, then you're going to care less about offenses against God. You might even say like Randall does that, you don't even know what it means to offend against God, right? And you might not feel the weightiness of sin and its severity and how it cries out for punishment.
¶370Those things may not be as emotionally salient to you as me suffering is bad. That might become more emotionally salient to you. And then you may supplementate this through the noetic effects of sin into forming an a unshakable intuition. If I know anything, I know that bad things happening to me because of the bad stuff I've done is not fair. >> And so that clip of course also touches on some of the hell stuff that I'll get to in the next section.
¶371So keep this in mind. Sixth, and relatedly, these moral intuitions are not independent problems for Catholicism. That's because under Catholicism, the nomic effects of sin probabistically correlate the various anti-atholic moral intuitions. So, it's a mistake to treat each intuition against Catholic moral teachings as additional good pieces of evidence against Catholicism. And I suspect this mistake leads a lot of people to drastically overestimate the force of the punitive evidence against Catholicism from moral intuition.
¶372It's also just like totally common sensical that the problems here are heavily probabilistically correlated, right? Like if you found out that you were seriously mistaken about say contraception and the church was right, that it's intrinsically evil, if you just found that out, it would then become totally unsurprising that you may be getting some of these other moral intuition seriously wrong, too. Seventh, we know that somebody's moral sense is damaged enough to be seriously mistaken about the moral propositions at issue, right? Like my own at the time non-atholic moral sense implied, for example, that St. Padre Peio and St.
¶373Maximian Colby and St. Mother Teresa and St. Alphonsus Lori and St. Thomas Aquinus and St. Augustine and St.
¶374Bonaventure and St. Ambrose etc had moral senses that were badly damaged even though they were far more morally virtuous than me. And even though some of them receive well-evinced mystical gifts indicating a much greater closeness to God than me. Either they were seriously mistaken or I am seriously mistaken. So somebody here is seriously mistaken and in that case serious error about morality is possible.
¶375And so then the question becomes like when moral senses conflict, how do we arbitrate between them? Well, in reflecting on this question, it just seemed patently unjustified for me and you this is something that Ethan helped me with. It just seemed patently unjustified for me to be supremely confident that all the Catholic saints and billions of people in both Christian and non-Christian traditions like the Islamic tradition throughout history have been wrong instead of me. Like why think I won the epistemic lottery? What's so special about me?
¶376And all I really could do at this juncture was just table thumping and fist pounding. That's all I could do. And more generally, if my thermometer reads 92 degrees and your thermometer reads 104° and I don't have any reason to think that my thermometer is special or more reliable than yours, then I should consiliate to at least some degree. That is, I should decrease my confidence in the output of my thermometer. I'm not saying I should totally jettison the verdicts of my thermometer.
¶377That's not what I am saying. I'm not saying that I shouldn't trust my thermometer at all. That's not what I'm saying. I should at least though consilate to some degree, you know, temp decrease my confidence in the output of my thermometer. And the same is true with divergent moral intuitions as there's no good reason to think that I'm special or more reliable than everyone else.
¶378And again, while this doesn't by itself remove the evidential force of the intuitions, it blunts their force enough that I can't use them to screen off the best explanation for the miracle record. And of course, I'm putting this in terms of like me, but like I'm applying this to the objector as well. So that's my seventh response. Eighth, I came to appreciate that basically every moral view except for a hopelessly unsistatic moral particularism has highly unintuitive consequences. So it isn't a particularly strong mark against Catholic moral theology that it has the same.
¶379To take just one example, and I could do the same for other ethical theories, consider total act utilitarianism taken super seriously in philosophy. Um, which is the view that an action is permissible if and only if it maximizes total well-being. Here are some intuitively absurd implications of total act utilitarianism. First, child porn. Child lover Chuck is the last sensient organism alive after a virus wiped out all other sensient organisms.
¶380He knows where some child pornography is stored. And I know this is going to get totally unmonetized. So, um, you're going to have to support me on Patreon because I'm not going to make any money from this video. So, go down in the description, click that Patreon, give me tens of thousands of dollar. Okay.
¶381Um, okay. Okay, so child lover Chuck is in the last he's the last sensient organism alive after a virus wiped out all other sensient organisms. He knows where some child pornography is stored and he knows he would enjoy masturbating to it. If he doesn't masturbate to it, he'll still be happy, just a little bit less happy than if he does. He also plans to take a pill that will offset any objective list goods or bads that the action might cause.
¶382Total act utilitarianism implies that he is morally required to masturbate to child porn under these conditions, and that seems to me to be ridiculous. Next up, mom rape for a marginal picoscond of shrimp life. Okay, so a smart truthtelling oracle informs you that if you rape your mother, and only if you rape your mother, he'll create a single barely conscious shrimp and keep its welfare at a level barely worth living for an extremely long time. In fact, he has so precisely calculated the length of this shrimp's life that the rape's detraction from welfare is just ever so slightly smaller in magnitude than the total welfare produced by the shrimp's life. The margin is so small that the net positive marginal utility of raping your mother is equivalent to an extra picoscond of shrimp life barely worth living.
¶383According to total act utilitarianism, you're morally obligated to rape your mother for that extra pico of shrimp life. And that seems ridiculous to me. Like, like, dude, if you think it's basically a morian fact that Catholic teachings about morality or hell are false, and yet you think raping your mom is morally obligatory for the added marginal utility of a picoscond of barely worth living shrimp life, you've completely lost the plot. Heck, you've also lost the plot. If you think that the falsity of these Catholic teachings is Morian, while you don't think the falsity of total act utilitarianism is Morian, so if you're like one, you know, the one of these fancy pants uh grad students or something like that where it's like, oh yeah, this is a totally totally respectable view within academia, you know, like this total act utilitarianism, it has consequences that are on the on the exact level of implausibility.
¶384I mean, we might argue much more implausible on the level of implausibility as some of the most implausible by your lights Catholic moral teachings. And don't get me wrong, I'm not a shrimp hater. I have donated to shrimp charities. So, like I'm not saying that shrimp don't matter or that their interests don't matter in any way, shape, or form or that you that's not what I'm saying. Go back, rewind the clock, listen to what I said.
¶385I did not say anything that implies or suggests that. Okay. Necroilia. Corpse lover Carl really loves corpses. Specifically, he gets a significant kick out of sexually violating them in all sorts of creative ways.
¶386And this doesn't induce any significant harms to himself. Now he's the last person alive and he's contemplating whether to dig up a bunch of corpses, men, women, children, babies, dogs, to sexually violate them in all manner of grotesque and bloody ways. According to Actutilitarianism, it's permissible for him to do this, but that just seems absurd. Beastiality. Beastial Bob really likes animals.
¶387I mean, he really likes them. He's the last person alive, and only one animal, a dog, is alive with him. Thankfully, supercomputers exist, which calculate well-being levels of different actions. He wants to have sex with a dog. So, he brings himself and the dog to a supercomputer to calculate the well-being effects of the sex.
¶388As it turns out, the sex would make him pretty happy and increase his life's well-being quite a lot. And while it would decrease the dog's well-being, the magnitude of his increase just barely edges out the magnitude of the dog's decrease over the course of their lives. Total act utilitarianism implies that he is morally obligated to have sex with a dog. And that seems ridiculous. Incest.
¶389Bob and Sally are siblings and infallible secret keepers. Sally has had her uterus removed while Bob has had a vase of actomy. They decide to fly out to a remote island, have sex, and keep the secret. Beforehand, a reliable supercomput informed them that it wouldn't cause significant future harm to themselves or others. If act utilitarianism is true, it's permissible for them to have incestuous sex, but that seems ridiculous.
¶390Okay, next up is prolonged non-consentual torture of zillions of people for a negligible chance of a boring finite afterlife just for yourself. Okay, so this one's fun. Okay, so total expectableist act utilitarianism with expected utility theory implies that one would be morally obliged to torture oneself and tend to the power of Graham's number other humans against their will for 10 the power of Graham's number years in order for you alone to achieve a 1 in 10 the^ of grams number chance of living some exceptionally large but finite number of years at a welfare level just barely worth living like eating unbuttered unsalted stale popcorn and unseasoned raw cauliflower at every meal and like never doing anything especially fun. Again, that just seems utterly ridiculous. Like, if your view implies that you'd be morally required to non-consensually torture zillions of others and yourself for a basically 0% chance of a boring, finite afterlife just for yourself.
¶391You have an intuitively ridiculous view and you're on no grounds to brandish allegedly Morian intuitions against Catholicism. Even though those intuitions are not shared by like billions of people. Okay, so torturing babies by shoving broken glass up their anuses and brooms down their throats and plucking off their digits one by one with tweezers and then skinning them alive before slowly dismembering them and eating their corpses just for fun can be permissible so long as you have enough fun. that is a quantity of happiness in this activity that at least equals the quantity of suffering caused. And if we want we can factor in other objective list goods if you're like an objective list act utilitarian.
¶392And that just see and that just seems to me to be ridiculous. Like suppose we have a choice scenario where on the one hand you can choose recreational baby torture producing exactly as much happiness and suffering or you can just you know choose not to do that. act utilitarianism says it's permissible for you to do either of those options and that just seems ridiculous. Oh, and if we sweeten the recreational baby torture option by saying that you'll also get a quarter in addition, well then you're required to pick that option. Okay, so listen and like we could do this for lots of other ethical theories as well.
¶393And I mean we probably couldn't do it for particularism, but again that's just like a hopelessly unsistatic um moral theory, hopelessly ad hoc. And so like once you come to appreciate that basically that that basically every moral view uh has these like drastically unintuitive consequences, it shouldn't be a particularly strong mark against Catholicism and Catholic moral theology that it has some of the same. My ninth response to the uh the moral problems and moral objections that I had um was just that like I figured that there was often a huge disjunction of not hopelessly implausible accounts of what might metaphysically explain the relevant unintuitive moral judgments in Catholicism. And that significantly tempered the force of my contrary intuitions. Like the prohibitions no longer seemed like arbitrary ad hoc restrictions.
¶394Instead, like principled reasons could seemingly be given for them. And the disjunction of the various accounts didn't actually strike me as too implausible to take just accounts of the categorical prohibition on kinds of sexual activity that are non-procreative by nature. I came across John I came across Pope John Paul II's personalist or theology of the body account. Divine boundary setting accounts whereby God contingently delimits the precise bounds of permissible sexual activity through categorical bands laid down for good but non-necessitating reasons relating to moral risk. One flesh union accounts defended by Alexander Puce in his one body book, an essay in Christian sexual ethics.
¶395That's the book. That's the book's title. One body an essay in Christian sexual ethics. Check it out. Divine consecration accounts whereby God sets aside the sexual faculty for a sacred or holy function given its intimate connection to producing new divine image bears.
¶396Where that sacred function just is the natural function of reproduction and spousal unity. Stolen pleasure accounts whereby different kinds of pleasure are ordered towards the promotion of different objective goods. It's protanoto wrong to strongly dissociate a kind of pleasure from the objective good to which it's ordered. And divine and divine commands then strengthen proanto wrongs into absolute wrongs. Classical natural law accounts whereby it's intrinsically wrong to direct faculties away from their natural ends.
¶397new natural law accounts. Like I mean like I could go on and you know to in full honesty I'm still trying to figure out which of the many accounts here are within magisterial bounds and which is true. But like the very fact that I was coming across non-silly stories that do deliver the relevant Catholic verdicts justifiably decreased my confidence in my in my anti-atholic intuitions. So like that's the that's the reason why I bring this up. not actually positively claiming here and don't understand me as claiming that absolutely every single one of these accounts that I've mentioned here uh is within magisterial bounds.
¶398That's not what I'm claiming. But that's my ninth response to the uh the moral problems or moral objections to Catholicism. I was just coming across this huge disjunction of not hopelessly implausible accounts of um what could explain the relevant unintuitive verdicts. 10th of all, the worries about absolute deontology tend to overlook divine providence. Like very plausibly, God would never put someone in a situation where, say, you know, masturbating is required to prevent a million holocausts.
¶399[laughter] I mean, you might still press uh the objection as like a counter possible by saying that, well, hey, like if he did put someone in those circumstances per impossible, surely masturbation would be permissible, right, Joe? Um, but the rules for counter-possible reasoning aren't entirely clear, and lots of different moves seem open to the Catholic. So first like we might say that in this impossible world a different normative ethical theory would would have been true. Uh and that normative ethical theory would have delivered the verdict that yes masturbating is permissible in that impossible world. Second if Catholics are allowed to think that there is some element of contingency in the absolute prohibitions then we can simply maintain that God would have simply adopted different policies or altered the sacred purpose of the sexual faculty or made some other tweak to the normative domain such that masturbating in that world is permissible.
¶400In fact, this second response can also be given to objectors who insist that we're not dealing with counterpossles but simply counterfactuals with remotely possible anticedants. Third, it wouldn't be surprising if speculative counterpossible or even merely like highly remotely possible uh moral intuition, so moral intuitions about these cases that are like counter possible or cases that are like super far removed from ordinary experience. Uh, it wouldn't be too surprising if those like speculative moral intuitions are unreliable. And in any event, they're basically nothing compared to the miraculous case. 11th.
¶401So, yes, I'm really going hard on this. 11th. It just seems absurd to me to use moral intuitions about, for example, gay sex or hell to screen off, dismiss, or even merely counterbalance the miraculous evidence. Like on the one hand, you have a small handful of highly cognitively penetrated, socioulturally bound, quasi voluntary intuitions that aren't shared by billions of people. And on the other hand, I have photographs, videos, blinded laboratory analyses, x-rays, millions of contemporaneous direct eyewitnesses.
¶402Like we are not the same. And like a a thought experiment also reveals that moral intuitions against Catholicism certainly are not fixed points whose denial would lead us into skepticism or like morian facts that we know better than anything to the contrary. Like again imagine that you were a direct eyewitness to Christ's teaching and ministry and suppose that Christ repeatedly and unmistakably taught the contested moral claims of the Catholic Church that eternal hell lies in weight for unrepentant grave sinners and that he is God. But also imagine that you yourself saw everything Christ did exactly as it's depicted in the gospels. So, you know, like with your own eyes, you see him raise Lazarus, heal withered hands, these visibly obvious withered hands, cure the congenally blind and paralyzed, cast out demons, massively multiply loaves and fish right in front of your eyes, and literally walk on water.
¶403You then watch him get brutally crucified with your own eyes. You're there at the crucifixion. You accompany the woman who inter his cold, dead, lifeless, bloody body in the tomb. But then, as you're praying with the apostles in the upper room, the risen Christ appears to you all. You literally put your fingers in his side to feel his wound for yourself.
¶404You palpate his hands and his feet. He breathes on you and then he hangs around for literally 40 days as he eats fish with you and the apostles and extensively communes with all of you. Finally, you see him with your own eye ascend to heaven. If you saw all of that, it would be ridiculous to reject Christ and his teachings on hell and morality. You should simply conclude that you've gone wrong somewhere and that your conscience is just malformed and you know, you made some error about speculative morality, which wouldn't be the first time that's happened.
¶405You wouldn't like you wouldn't suddenly conclude that oh I guess I don't know that like recreationally torturing babies for fun is wrong. Like no no that's not what would happen. You would submit to Christ lordship and accept his moral teachings. And so what that shows is that the Catholic Church's teachings on hell and morality which we are by stipulation assuming that Christ is teaching in this hypothetical. These are not beyond the fixed point limit.
¶406Evidence for miracles can indeed overcome intuitions to the contrary. And our total body of miraculous evidence I think clearly does. So stepping back, you know, for all these 11 or so reasons, I don't think anyone should take moral intuitions against Catholicism to be particularly strong evidence against it. Of course, you know, other people have like moral problems with the church itself, but you know, I've never really found those convincing arguments against like the truth of Catholicism. Like yes, Catholics in the church, including members of the church hierarchy, have done very bad things in the past.
¶407Like, of course, you know, I want to note the church has been unfairly maligned in tons of ways. You know, you can see Stark's bearing false witness book on that. Um, but I also don't want to say that, you know, the church has been like morally impeccable. She definitely hasn't. But moral peeability isn't particularly strong evidence against Catholic teaching or the apostolic authority vested in the offices whose members sometimes behave immorally, right?
¶408Like compare what Christ says in Matthew 23. The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses's seat. So they have the relevant authority. So practice and observe what they tell you, but not what they do. For they preach, but they do not practice.
¶409So Christ is here very clearly distinguishing spiritual teaching authority from personal holiness and noting that personal wickedness does not negate said authority. He's recognizing the immorality of those who hold the relevant office of Moses's cathra while explicitly reaffirming the authority of their office to authentically exposit the contents of divine revelation to delimmit the bounds of orthodoxy and to bind and loose consciences with their interpretation of the law. And it's the same principle with Peter's cathedra which the early church fathers testify that Christ founded. The conduct of many holders of this office has sometimes been radically and gravely immoral. But this does not negate the authority of their office to authentically exposit the contents of divine revelation to delimmit the bounds of orthodoxy and to bind and loose consciences with their interpretation of the Bible.
¶410And just like more generally, Christ promised his church indeibility and infallibility, not moral impeccability. So the church was promised indeectability. It'll never lose the apostolic faith. It'll never be overcome by error in such a way that she becomes a false church. um it won't be the case that the universal church is bound to accept uh heresy.
¶411So shall faithfully preserve the apostolic deposit until the end of the world. Secondly, the church was promised infallibility. So the church is preserved from definitively teaching error in matters of faith and morals. The church will not bind the universal faithful to a false doctrine as something definitively to be held in faith and morals. But that's different from let's say like oh you know some disciplines some disciplinary decisions by the church were mistaken and had very bad consequences and should not have been implemented.
¶412And nowhere was the church promised moral impeccability you know like freedom from moral corruption and wrongdoing like that by Catholicism's own lights. That's simply not one of the charisms that Christ gifted his church. The church is run by fallen humans. Uh even though they have the help of the sacraments and the Holy Spirit's guidance in doctrinal matters they're still wicked like the rest of us. Right?
¶413And so it's to be expected under Catholicism that the church hierarchy would do some very bad things. It's to be expected and so it's not particularly good evidence against Catholicism. And I would also of course be remiss not to mention the utterly unparalleled goods that the church has given society. I mean the church like basically invented hospitals and universities as recognizable institutions. She was largely responsible for shaping western civilization as we know it.
¶414And as father Robert and as father Dr. Robert Spitzer puts it, "The combined effect of the Catholic Church on education, healthcare, social welfare, justice, and rights theory, science, and social egalitarianism has, to say the least, been utterly transformative." And finally, like, don't you think that the survival of the church like amidst punctuated corruption is astonishing? Like, no other human institution has lasted nearly this long with a corrupt hierarchy. I mean, empires have come and gone. Governments have come and gone.
¶415Whole civilizations have come and gone, but the church remains. I don't know. It's more than a bit suspicious. Okay, that's my third barrier and why I don't think it's particularly serious. Uh, moral problems.
¶416Onwards, we march to my fourth barrier, hell. So, Catholicism teaches that anyone who dies in a state of unrepentant mortal sin will suffer eternally in hell. But I of course had many objections to the doctrine of hell. Here we'll focus on three objections. The justifiability problem, the proportionality problem, and the problem of heavenly grief.
¶417Let's start with the justifiability problem, which just asks like why consign people to hell? Like what could possibly justify God in causing or allowing some creatures to suffer forever? Like doesn't that just seem like clearly beyond the pale? Like doesn't it just seem unjustifiable, Joe? Well, I came to see several plausible responses to this problem.
¶418First, there are models of hell on which it just seems to me clearly justified. So, uh here's just one example of a model of hell that I think is clearly justified. First, God gives all of us enough graces to be saved. So, if you end up suffering eternal punishment in hell, that's because you freely reject God's offer of salvation. You performed some gravely, seriously evil act that is fundamentally opposed to the love of God and you did it with full knowledge and deliberate consent.
¶419So you stared clearheadedly at what you knew or ought to have known was seriously evil and you chose it nonetheless. And not only that, but you persisted in this state of fundamental orientation away from God until the very end, never having adequately repented of it and spurning all the manifold graces God gave you to try to repent, to try to like just woo you back to the love of him. So like you're not damned on account of making an innocent intellectual mistake or making choices for which you aren't significantly culpable due to you know psychological or social conditioning or whatever. Instead you're damned on account of unrepentant grave sin that you deliberately choose in the absence of significant freedom mitigating factors and concerning which you had or are gravely culpable for lacking full knowledge of its serious wrongness. God gave you enough help to be saved.
¶420the ball was in your court and you were fully culpable for dropping it in a serious way. So that's the first plank of this model of hell that I think is clearly justified. Second of all, following Catholic philosopher Alexander Puce, the lives of the damned are on the whole worth living in the sense that it is better for them to have lived their whole lives, including their endless stay in hell, than to have never existed at all. Of course, hell involves everlasting suffering, and you definitely don't want to go there. But everyone should recognize that experiencing even even a significant amount of suffering is totally compatible with being on the whole better off than not existing.
¶421Precisely because one may still have lots of goods in one's life, even including pleasure. Third, the reason God permits people to definitively exclude themselves from him in hell is respect for autonomy. Free will is profoundly valuable. God did not want robots. God didn't want robots that he simply pre-programmed to love him.
¶422He wanted love to spring from us with the help of his grace. God therefore gave us valuable difference-making responsibility concerning our ultimate fate. We can either definitively resist his grace or omit resistance and let it transform our lives. By death, we can either fix our wills toward the good or fix them toward evil. But you ask, why doesn't God just violate people's autonomy and corral them into heaven?
¶423And you know, why does he let people definitively rather than temporarily or nonfinally exclude themselves from heaven? Well, not only is unmanipulated and uncoerced differencem responsibility for whether we definitively accept or reject God plausibly profoundly valuable in itself, but but it may also enable an infinitely better afterlife than would otherwise be available to us, or at the very least a much better afterlife to a large but finite extent. After all, it's not After all, it's not at all implausible that a world in which we enjoy this difference-making responsibility and exercise it well by freely repenting, loving God and others, and embracing God's offer of salvation would involve better relationships for all eternity than a world in which we lack this difference-making responsibility and instead are coerced or manipulated or basically guaranteed by the laws of probability to embrace God and and better relationships for all eternity can sum to an infinitely better life on the whole or again at least a better afterlife to a large but finite extent. So basically God endows us with a risky kind of freedom that enables an infinitely better heavenly afterlife by making for improved relationships between us and God as well as between us and each other. And it just seems to me manifestly permissible for God to risk eternal creaturely suffering if he ensures that every creature lives a good life on the whole.
¶424And if that risk enables an infinitely better afterlife for those creatures than would otherwise be attainable. Like we're already like we're already fine or at least most of us are already fine with a government or our parents risking our lives going seriously and definitively astray even though they could forcibly and paternalistically corral us into a better life. And like one plausible reason this is permissible for governments or parents is because risking your life going south is required for you to have real agency and autonomy which in turn enables a much better life for you than would otherwise be attainable. It's out of concern and love for you. And they're totally permitted to risk you choosing very serious wrongs and making yourself miserable.
¶425That is a patently and that that is a patently mundane common sensical anti-paternalist judgment that a lot of us have about you know the behavior of parents with respect to children or governments with respect to their citizens. And notice that it's just the same common sensical antipaternalism that justifies God's permission of damnation under the current model. So that's the first response to the justifiability problem. There are models of hell that seem to me clearly justifiable on which God gave all of us enough graces to be saved. The damned among us freely but definitively rejected those and persisted in that state of rejection until the very end despite God's manifold attempts to save you along the way.
¶426God permitted them to do so because the real possibility of misusing our freedom enables an infinitely better afterlife had we used it properly. And God ensures that even the lives of the damned are on the whole good or worth living. Like when I step back and I think of this picture, I think about it which is totally compatible with Catholicism. I literally don't have the intuition that this is impermissible in the slightest. In fact, it seems clearly permissible to me.
¶427And again, this is only one model. There are others too, but like one just one suffices to put the objection to bed. As an aside, I'll just mention like one other highly speculative model that helped me during my conversion. A model which at least Father Dr. James Dominick Rooney tells me is compatible with Catholicism.
¶428Uh it's Thomas philosopher Jacqu merit Jacqu meritain Jacqu meritane's revery model on which the damned experience only a finite period of sensory pains. So the pain of sense after which they attain a state of natural beatitude or natural happiness existing alongside an eternal sorrowful remorse for missing out on the supernatural happiness of the beatotific vision the end for which love destined them. But even their sorrow is intermixed with a contented grateful acceptance of their proper and deserved place within the divinely created order. In Maritan's poignant words, "To this very sorrow which crowns without diminishing it their happiness at seeing the order of nature fully accomplished in them. They give their full consent.
¶429They know it is just. It dignifies them and they thank God for it." That's a quote from Brian Cutter's paper. Now to be clear, to be absolutely clear, I am not saying that this revery model from Jacqu Maritan or Maritan or whatever is true. I am not saying that autobiographically though it was just yet another picture of everlasting suffering in hell because it does involve everlasting suffering. It's yet another picture of everlasting suffering in hell that I thought would be clearly permissible for God to actualize.
¶430There's a finite period of pains of sense after which there's an eternal state of natural beatitude or natural happiness accompanying which is the pain of loss at the beatotific vision. So it kind of again that's that sorrowful remorse of missing out on the supernatural happiness of the beatotific vision um that the damned themselves eventually come to kind of like endorse as just recompense um for their uh their crimes against God. They thank God for it and they recognize that it kind of dignifies them according to Maritan. So again, I'm not saying that that's true or that I even accept it, but I have it on at least good authority that this is consistent with Catholicism. It's yet another model of hell that just seems to be clearly permissible.
¶431So that's my first response to the justifiability problem. My second response to the justifiability problem is that it's based on a moral intuition that will face pretty much all the same problems that I raised in the last section. So if you just clicked on this section to hear how I respond to objections to hell, you absolutely need to go back and listen to the section on moral problems. But here's just a quick fire summary. The anti-hell intuition massively varies from person to person.
¶432It seems like truckloads of people don't share it. The intuition is highly susceptible to cognitive penetration. It's significantly affected by non-truth tracking factors. It seems at least indirectly voluntary, at least for me. Catholicism has an internally plausible debunking story for the intuition, according which you're just systematically and totally unsurprisingly downplaying the seriousness of sin.
¶433The objection is not independent from other anti-atholic moral intuitions that we've already conditionalized upon. There's no reason to think that you're the lucky one who hit the jackpot of correct moral intuitions about this matter over and against billions of Christians throughout history, including literal moral saints who utterly mu in holiness and whose theoretical morality issued in a manifestally superior practical morality compared with you and many of whom had a demonstrably well-eval indicating a much greater closeness to God than you. The intuition pales in comparison to the force of the miraculous case, of course, and your own worldview almost certainly has drastically morally unintuitive consequences to boot. So that so that's my second response. It's more like, you know, like, I don't know, 10 responses condensed into into a response.
¶434But anyway, um, in fact, arguably debunking explanations are going to be even more plausible in the hell case than in the case of the moral intuitions that we considered in the last section for the reasons Ethan Muse gives in the following 16-minute clip. And yes, I am unabashedly playing a 16-minute clip for you. amount of evidential force to assign to intuitions will not scale in a way that is directly proportionate with the strength of the intuition or how forceful the intuition is to the particular subject that possesses it. >> Peopleastic very quickly, right? Well, and part of the reason for that is that the presumptive difference that we give to intuitions is based off of just assuming across the range of typical intuitions where we're going to assign evidential weight um the factors that would debunk the intuitions or make them unreliable are not present.
¶435So that's part of it, right? But there's going to be a strong um basically thing where in the cases where intuitions are unreliable, many of the factors that will lead to unreliability are not any less likely to be present for strong intuitions. In fact, in some cases, the stronger the intuition, the more likely it is that the debunking thing that's driving a misleading intuition is present. So that's why the evidential force of them is basically like the absence of the basically the evidential force will be mitigated in proportion to how likely it is that these debunkers are present. Right?
¶436>> And strength is actually very um weakly correlated with the absence of debunkers. Right? >> Mhm. >> Now there's some weight that should be given to strength. I'm not saying strength is completely irrelevant.
¶437So the more strongly held the intuition is, there probably will be a greater evidential weight because it's the brain's sort of internal epistemic system saying assign more evidence to this and less evidence to this, you know, and and it's generally good at its job, right? But there's still going to be a cap on how much weight. So like the fact that you feel like 100% sure, table pounding sure doesn't mean that you need to start treating this exactly like it's an axiom of mathematics or something like that. you know, if there's other reasons for suspicion or the bar for having suspicion isn't going to be dramatically higher for really strong ones, >> right? >> Um, so then, okay, let's get deeper into it with these first order intuitions that hell um would just definitely be unjust.
¶438So, let's think about just in general how we would go about trying to show that the intuitions are unreliable. So, let's go back to my measuring instrument analogy. One of the ways we could show that a measuring instrument was unreliable if depending on who was using it um you got very different diametrically opposed results with the same instrument. Right? >> And so if there are certain people who use it who get very strong readings in favor of hell and others who get very strong readings against it and others who get moderate or lukewarm readings, right?
¶439That's going to tell us, oh something's up with a thermometer because it's all over the map depending on who's using it. So, it seems like idiosyncratic personal factors are driving this or potentially are driving this. >> Um, and so that's going to cause us to cast out on or to reduce our credence in those particular intuitions because it's depending on who's using it. It's all over the map. Then we we're going to want to look more for basically are there any reasons to think that particular people that are using it that we know what the errors are that are biasing them.
¶440Mhm. >> And then are there any ways to say that there are certain people that we feel like there's greater reason to put trust in their readings. So that's something that I further explored in the discussion. Mhm. >> And so when it comes to these sorts of very strong first order intuitions about hell, um, one thing I think we definitely need to put on the table is the one of the most common factors that's going to lead to unreliable intuition is when things are really really emotional um, for people where if I if it's going to basically I'm going to just oftent times believe what I want to believe, believe that the things I want to be true are true.
¶441Mhm. >> Right. That's a very strong, very common bias that I've seen in my own life in a million ways. Right? >> And so if it turns out that I really, really, really strongly believe I mean, I really, really strongly desire that I don't go to hell forever and that my friends and family don't go to hell forever.
¶442That's going to be one factor that I know is going to be a really strong bias in the direction of forming these unshakable intuitions. And there's sublimation that occurs where I may think that this is now purely epistmic or it's just my abstract reasoning. But there's not that much compartmentalizations. The effects of emotional bias are precisely so powerful because they can be subconscious and they can make they can create the false appearance that you're doing normal reasoning that's not influenced by bias. >> Yes.
¶443>> And so the presence of that factor is already something that's going to say I want to put less weight on this type of evidence. So like these just pure first order like visceral emotional gut reactions. Mhm. >> Um, another So, and that's just a type that type of because there's a desiraability to one answer, then I start convincing myself and soothing myself by saying that that answer is definitely true. >> Yeah.
¶444>> And like this is also true when it comes to preserving self-concepts. So, like social identity theory, right? Um, so it's not just that there's some really really bad catastrophic outcome that I really don't want to happen and it's going to have all these really sad implications. It's also something nobody wants to think of themselves as like a really bad awful person. >> This is well known in the literature on motivational reasoning, right?
¶445Yeah. Motivational reasoning, right? Yeah. Right. Yeah.
¶446>> And a lot of us the ways we resolve cognitive dissonance >> or they don't want to think badly of their friends either. That's another >> to preserve our belief that we're a good person >> um is by literally and we have studies of cognitive dissonance that show this. Um Jake Quilty Dunn has gone through these that are really good that basically the ways we'll resolve some of this stuff when there's when there's certain information or evidence that threatens our self-concept is just by losing the intuitions, right? And so if and if we don't want to be tormented by a guilty conscience, if we don't want to think less of ourselves, if we don't want to think we really are that bad, then the stronger the bias is going to be towards basically adopting these really strong intuitions that this thing couldn't possibly be true and that we definitely don't deserve it, >> right? >> So and then in addition to that um it's called basically so those two are already very strong really bad sad thing.
¶447So want it not to be true. So therefore convince ourselves it's not true. Things threatening to our self-concept. So therefore cognitive dissonance we suppress it. Right?
¶448And then third thing is rationalization. So there if there's something we want to do and I do this all the time. Right? There's something I want to do that I know I shouldn't do, I'm going to convince myself that it's okay for me to do it. >> Right?
¶449And so and if if we live in a world where we understand that there are certain things that are very costly that are being demanded of us, right? So don't masturbate, don't engage in certain types of sexual relationships that we want to engage in. Don't consent to impure thoughts, you know, don't steal, don't be really proud, you know, go to mass every Sunday early in the morning. You know, if there's lots of things that we don't want to do that are costly to us, rationalization, the brain is really good at giving us the intuitions that rationalize thing, the things that we basically want to do, right? >> And so it's those three things.
¶450It's we don't want to live believe that something catastrophically bad is likely to occur. We don't want to think of ourselves as bad people. And we want to keep doing bad things that we know we would have to stop doing if we accepted this belief. >> Right? Powerful factors at play there.
¶451Right? >> And so if you have the confluence of all the strongest cognitive biases that we know of >> for convincing us to manufacture certain types of intuitions, >> that's going to cast huge doubt on the particular intuition, first order intuition that we're appealing to, >> right? >> Okay. another way we could do it. And so to draw it to tie it back to the thermometer analogy, um >> let's say we know the thermometers are most likely to malfunction and they have a high rate of malfunctioning in extreme climates.
¶452Okay. So let's say the thermometer is most likely to give an unreliable reading if you're taking it to like the Sahara Desert or Antarctica. >> Yeah. And then the measurements that we want to do to figure out whether hell is real, we want to go to the like Gobi Desert and we want to go to, you know, um, like Greenland and Antarctica and those are where we're doing our measurements and we know those are precisely the conditions under which this thermometer is the least reliable. >> Right.
¶453Right. >> Mhm. >> Okay. So another another way that's like a personal factor that we know is going to create a systemic bias against hell in terms of first order intuitions. uh a personal factor is humans really suck about reasoning about things that are far removed from our experience, right?
¶454And so if in ordinary human experience, the thing that we're used to dealing with as far as practical ethics is concerned um are what are the just and appropriate penalties for humans to impose upon other humans for human faults in their dealings with other humans. Right? >> And that's what we're used to and then we become habituated to that. where then we say okay like a life sentence is good for a murderer 15 years is good for armed robbery and this stuff for just the functioning of society. >> So we're not considering this different form in this different context where it's the infinite god where infinity is already something that creates a bias because we can't wrap our heads around it or ever fully appreciate intuitively the force of just how big infinity is.
¶455Right? We only consider harm from the perspective of the finite creatures that we are and finite things we wrap our minds around. But if all our ordinary experience is associating Oh, these people are normal types of people that I don't have to worry about or perceive a threat from, right? And that I'm supposed to be amiable with and cordial with and personally merciful towards. >> And then these are the types of penalties that are being meed out appropriately in ordinary social contexts.
¶456If I start to see that and then I start saying now in this extreme limit case, ordinary guys who are the guys that I'm normally just cooperating with and expected to be nice and amable with and be friends with, ordinary guys are getting way more extreme punishments than the most extreme punishments we impose in this human context. >> Now, there's a principled reason to think it's an exceptional case, right? So, like notice how much weight should we put on human intuitions about folk physics when reasoning about quantum mechanics or special relativity or anything like that, right? So we're reasoning about the extreme limit >> based off of intuitions that are being formed almost exclusively from observations within a certain ordinary regime. Right.
¶457>> Right. >> And so that's another context where I expect us to be able to fail to appreciate the force which is we're taking a principle that applies within the general case >> and abstracting it to a extreme limit context. >> And that's precisely the case where we might get a counterintuitive result. But it turns out that those types of counterintuitive things like if you're betting on um if you're betting on uh what's going to work these like more abstract generalizing systematizing principles that apply in the ordinary case and that have counterintuitive results in the limit that's what tends to be true in other contexts like in physics for example right >> then finally the last example that I'll give to sort of illustrate this point is um basically when we start seeing that there's high between individual variability, right? That's going to tell us that, oh, probably these idiosyncratic factors are at play, right?
¶458>> And then one thing that would be really interesting to us is if we saw that people who um nonetheless really didn't want to go to hell, didn't want the doctrine of hell to be true, right? If we saw that when we had those types of people who had been willing to make all the reforms that were necessary in their life >> to where they made those costly sacrifices and all of that, right, and who spent lots of times contemplating the issue and scrutinizing their conscience consciences and trying to peel back between all the cognitive distortions that are self- flattering. If the people who do that tend to at a way above average rate arrive at this really strong considered judgment that they deserve hell, that's going to be really relevant. That's going to be highly relevant to the final analysis of whose intuition is to put more weight on. >> And I contend that that's precisely what we do observe which is basically when you look at Catholic mystics and saints and moral theologians, when you look at people like Padre Peio and St.
¶459Alfonsus Lagori and St. Katherine of Sienna and St. Terresa Vava and all these people, there's a consciousness of the enormity of sin and the debt of punishment that they've incurred through sin and the appreciation for the mercy of God and remitting the punishment for their sins that grows and grows as they grow in personal sanctity, right? >> And as they become people who we would tend to want to defer to in moral matters. So the people who are the most moral and the most virtuous and who have done the most to remove all of these cognitive biases and to try to peel them back that many many many of these people who are heroically virtuous who are willing to suffer martyrdom right who are obedient to the point of death you know who are willing to sacrifice all the sensual pleasures and delights of this world and live in voluntary poverty and chastity when we look at those people and there seems to be a positive correlation between them doing all that stuff and gaining a deeper and deeper appreciation for how bad hell is.
¶460I mean, I've had friends that have converted recently since my conversion >> and without fail every single time once they convert and once they start going to confession regularly, they start appreciating, wow, like I didn't realize how big of a deal sin was and I didn't realize how bad I was. >> Certainly. True. True of me in my experience for sure. >> It's true in my personal experience, too.
¶461Is that >> I can certainly attest to this on my end. And dude, I I just I think it's totally unsurprising even on independent grounds that we just like systematically underestimate how bad sin is. I mean, I remember um I was really struck by a line from St. Fina uh who speaking to God wrote that I would rather be in agony until the end of the world amidst the greatest sufferings than offend you God by the least sin. St.
¶462Dominic Savio had a kind of like motto of sorts which was death rather than sin. So death, death rather than sin, that's that's how bad sin is. And so, um, I think like it's just not at all surprising to me that a lot of these these intuitions would be, uh, would result when we really when we just like systematically underestimate how bad Zin is. But anyway, I'll continue playing. Once you just drop that, once you drop any pretense >> and then you just start saying you open yourself up to this possibility and then you start really start examining it from the perspective of oh this is true possibility.
¶463>> Mhm. >> It it starts to become more and more intuitive >> where you really feel like you deserve it and you start to feel like I saw what my cognitive defenses were that were preventing me from accepting this [snorts] >> and once those go down I start to realize this more and more and more. >> Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
¶464And certain I mean you know I before my um my general confession covering a decade of my life away from the faith I mean like whoa I was really like there was a lot of stuff under the hood there. Um I mean I spent like two or three hours on the examination of conscience and I I'm not trying to like I'm not doing a display here of false piety or anything like that. I am I mean we don't need to go into all the ways in which I was and still am a very bad sinner. So I'm I'm dropping all false pretenses. I am not holy.
¶465Um I want to get there though with God's grace and I you know I pray for that and I hope that God helps me along that path. But um I yeah I saw all the ways in which I was just I mean downplaying my sin kind of you know hiding it from from the light uh and and you know going through two or three hours of just combing through that that those 10 years of all the things that I did and then just really kind of staring at them and I was like whoa. Uh it was kind of unnerving. But anyway, >> and then and then finally, there's types of intuitions that I'm going to put really little stock on are ones that seem voluntary and very malleable. And this is something that really convinces me with moral intuitions.
¶466I've been able to talk myself into moral anti-realism, having a really strong intuition that moral anti-realism was true at past points in my life. I never got I never got that far. But >> I' i've been able to talk myself into really strong intuitions that God, even though I believe God exists, that it's just impossible. It's like 0% chance that eternal conscious torment is true. >> I've been able to talk myself in now, you know, or maybe not talk myself in.
¶467I've been able to have adopt the extremely strong intuition that there's, yeah, actually I do deserve to go to hell, you know, and so I can see and there's a certain level of voluntariness to it. And that makes me especially suspicious of it when it's very malleable and it seems like it's depending on sort of like choices like constructive choices that I'm deciding what attitude what sentiment I'm going to adopt. >> Like for me >> I can't help it doesn't matter what I do. >> I'm overwhelmingly convinced by the empirical evidence against a flat earth. you know, >> like people going to Antarctica and the way flights work and all this stuff that the massive conspiracy that would be required and you know we you know the footage from space and all all this stuff when I see that stuff there's almost no voluntariness in how compelling I find it >> right [laughter] >> it's it almost imposes itself upon the mind and so and the same thing is true I've said for a lot of the miracle evidence that I look at >> yes >> where it's like >> the forcefulness or the coency of this evidence doesn't feel voluntary to me.
¶468It doesn't feel malleable. Now, people may arrive at different judgments and it may seem different, strike different people as forceful to different degrees or whatever. >> Yeah. >> But to but for me, I can tell there's a difference, at least for me personally. >> Yes.
¶469>> And the extent to which it feels like when I'm making moral judgments, >> there's almost like a choice I'm making about what values to adopt >> versus the extent to which when I'm making empirical judgments, there's a certain extent to which they're kind of being foisted upon me. >> All right. So that's my second response to the justifiability problem. You know, together with Ethan's responses. And then third, as Matthew Adelstein points out with respect to the problem of evil, you should expect yourself to have some bias to overrate arguments that have more emotional force.
¶470And because the problems with hell are highly emotionally laden and not just intellectual problems, we are liable to overrate their intellectual force. Like our emotions, as Matthew Adelstein says, affect our perception of arguments more than we like to think. And again, to be very clear, I'm not suggesting that objections to hell are only emotional problems. Following Matthew Adeline, that's not what I'm saying. The point is just that we should expect ourselves to overrate their force because, you know, objections to hell relative to other arguments uh are far more saturated with emotion.
¶471And so you should diminish your confidence in your objections to hell to at least some extent given that they may very well be influenced by known distorting factors. Okay, so that is the justifiability problem. Let's turn now to the proportionality problem. Here's the argument as Brian Cutter articulates it with minor amendations. Premise one, if Catholicism is true, then God causes or allows some to experience everlasting suffering after death as a punishment.
¶472Premise two, if God causes or allows some to experience everlasting suffering after death as a punishment, then God deals out an infinite punishment to some after death. Premise three, no one does anything in his earthly life that merits infinite punishment. Like all our crimes seem finite in gravity, duration, intensity, and every other morally relevant metric. Premise four, if God deals out an infinite punishment after death to someone whose earthly deeds don't merit infinite punishment, then God punishes unjustly. But God doesn't punish unjustly, and so Catholicism is false.
¶473So the basic thought is that like if Catholicism is true then God punishes crimes that only merit finite punishment with an infinite punishment and that's unjust and disproportional. But of course God can't do something unjust or disproportional and so Catholicism is false. That is the objection. That's the proportionality problem. So what are we to make of this?
¶474Well first this is a fancy pants abstract philosophical argument concerning which there's lots of disagreement. And you know I already know that we're pretty bad at speculative philosophical theorizing as I've said before. Put a 100 philosophers in a room applying roughly the same methods to the same intuitive data roughly and you'll get like 700 different views. By contrast, the empirical evidence for miracles is overwhelming. And it's totally listenit to just conclude that this argument must go wrong somewhere, even if I can't pinpoint exactly where.
¶475Uh, and actually, as it turns out, there's just a huge disjunction of non-silly responses that significantly temper the force of the objection. So, let's proceed through some of those with my second and third responses. So second, it's not at all clear that premise three in this argument is true, according to which nothing we do on earth merits infinite punishment. It's a totally common sensical judgment that the gravity, severity, or seriousness of a crime scales in proportion to the dignity or worth of the one offended against. Wantingly stepping on the neck of a bee is bad, like you shouldn't do it.
¶476But it's clearly worse to wantingly step on the neck of a puppy and worse still to step on the neck of a baby or grandma. And that's precisely because the subsequent beings have more dignity than the earlier beings. They have more value. They have more worth. They're owed more honor given the kind of beings that they are.
¶477But with this common sensical principle in hand, the gravity of crimes against God himself due to who is infinite majesty, worth, dignity, and value will be infinite and thereby merit infinite punishment. And again, like I'm not here claiming that this story is true. The point is that it's a natural extension of a common sensical principle that's at least not extremely improbable. And so long as that bar is met, there's a cap on the evidential force of the objection at hand. A cap that makes it pale in comparison to the extreme force of the miraculous evidence.
¶478Of course, there are standard objections to this story. So, for instance, some allege that it collapses the distinction between venial and mortal sin, or that it makes all sins equally bad, but that's just demonstrabably false for reasons that Ethan Muse gives in these two videos here and here. I mean, you know, for starters, like Catholicism teaches that there are diverse punishments in hell. Like someone, you know, hell is not maximal suffering for everyone for all of eternity. That's not what we teach based on how many crimes and how culpability and the the gravity or the differential severity of the different crimes that you can commit on earth.
¶479uh that you know the the suffering involved in hell will kind of be tailored and different for different people depending on um like how bad they were and how culpable they were in this life. While holding fixed of course that you know like any of us could only go to hell because we commit a grave sin for which we had full knowledge and deliberate consent uh and concerning which we did not adequately repent until the very end. But you know Ethan Ethan gives other responses as well in these two videos. Others alleged that even if the objective gravity of a crime against God is infinite, we could never meet the subjective conditions for infinite culpability given that, you know, we often don't know that our sins are infinite offenses against God. And in any event, you know, we're limited and frail human beings.
¶480Ethan also addresses that extensively in both videos. So, check out those videos. They're linked in the resource document. But very briefly, you know, like imagine that Bob cheats on his wife. Even if we suppose that Bob didn't know that doing so would ruin his relationship with his wife.
¶481like, you know, maybe he thought that it wasn't so bad and, you know, he could get away with it that he thought and, you know, he's he has okay enough reason to do it, you know, because otherwise he'll just be deeply sexually frustrated. You know, he's got to get he's got to get these sexual tensions and energies out somehow. Um, and even if we suppose that he did it partly as a result of human weakness in the face of his attractive coworker, none of these are going to be good excuses when his wife finds out and confronts him about it, right? She'll point out that even if he didn't know, it would ruin their relationship. And even if he thought that he was probably doing something okay, or at least maybe doing something okay, he should have known better, right?
¶482He's culpable for his ignorance and his mistaken judgments here. So, it's no excuse that he didn't know that it would definitively ruin his relationship with his wife. And nor is it a legitimate excuse that like, oh, you know, he's just a limited, frail, weak human being, so it's not that bad. Like, no. So long as his human limitations did not remove his ability to make a fully free, deliberate choice, not under the influence of addiction or duress or coercion or other significant impediments to freedom, he's still on the hook.
¶483And his wife is totally justified in definitively ending the relationship, even knowing that this would result in long-lasting serious heartbreak on the part of her husband. He was the one who fundamentally violated the conditions of the relationship. He is the one who, in the words of the catechism, definitively excluded himself from his wife's presence. And if he tries to plead ignorance, he's just pleading culpable ignorance. And likewise, so likewise, even if you protest that you didn't know the the real gravity of your mortal sins and that they're fundamentally incompatible with relationship with God, you should have known better.
¶484And so long as your human limitations did not remove your ability to make a fully free, deliberate choice, not under the influence of significant impediments or freedom limit limiting factors, you're still on the hook for mortal sins. And again, if you want to see further discussion of the infinite gravity response to the proportionality objection, as well as replies to these and other objections to it, see the aforementioned videos linked in the resource document. So that is my second response to this argument is that I think Catholics can question premise three. Onto my third response to the proportionality objection. Suppose you think that the story that I just gave, the one about, you know, uh, meriting infinite punishment.
¶485Suppose that that is prohibitively improbable. Suppose you think it's not just like very improbable, very unlikely. You think it's just like extremely prohibitively only negligibly likely? No matter. No matter.
¶486No matter. The Catholic still has lots of responses up their sleeve. Which brings us to Brian Cutter's excellent paper, Hell and Proportionality. Therein cutter shows that even if you think that our earthly sins don't merit infinite punishment, there are lots of ways everlasting suffering in hell might only amount to a finite punishment. In other words, cutter shows that premise two of that argument is false.
¶487Here's premise two again. And if God causes or allows some people to experience everlasting suffering after death as a punishment, then God deals out an infinite punishment to some after death. Even if we assume that God causes or allows everlasting retributive suffering, it does not follow that God deals out an infinite punishment. And Cutter gives two broad ways that everlasting suffering in hell might only amount to a finite punishment. First, the total suffering in hell might be finite even though it's everlasting.
¶488And second, the total suffering may be infinite, but this infinite total suffering may only comprise a finite detraction from well-being. So let's take each of these in turn. Beginning with finite total suffering, which is nevertheless everlasting. There are a couple ways the total suffering in hell might be finite even though everlasting that as far as I can tell are within the bounds of orthodoxy. By by which I don't mean like you know capital O orthodoxy.
¶489I mean within like actual orthodoxy within the bounds of the magisterium. First the suffering in hell might decrease by a geometric proportion over regular periods of time. It's mathematically provable that an infinite series of finite numbers added together can equal a finite number so long as the numbers decrease by a geometric proportion as you go along the series. So if for example the damned experienced 1,000 units of suffering over the first decade in hell, 500 units over the second decade, 250 units over the third decade, 125 units over the fourth decade, and so on add infinitum throughout an endless future, the total amount of suffering in hell is only then 2,000 units. That's mathematically provable.
¶490And there are different metaphysical stories about the lives of the damned that could deliver this verdict. On one story, the damned grow ever less substantial, more shadowy, and ever approaching, but never quite reaching utter non-being. And as their degree of being dwindles, so too does their capacity for various modes of consciousness, including suffering. So that's one approach that takes like a degrees of being model. Another story dispenses with degrees of being and says that the damned progress toward more impoverished, thinner, more tenibous modes of consciousness in hell.
¶491Again, here I've been like quoting from Brian Cutter. A final a final metaphysical story just maintains that the pains of sense and pains of loss themselves just gradually diminish over time without ever ending entirely. For instance, the pangs of conscience grow dimmer. The sorrowful remorse gradually fades, gradually fades, but never entirely dissipates. And the bitterness toward God and others waines over time.
¶492Interestingly, even Aquinas suggested that the punishment of the damned might diminish over time. Uh, writing in his sumo that we may also reply that the words of the psalmist refer to mercy as granting a relaxation but not setting free altogether if it be referred also to the damned. Hence the psalm does not say will he from his anger shut up his mercies but in his anger because the punishment will not be done away entirely but his mercy will have effect by diminishing the punishment while it continues. And of course I'm not saying that Aquinus specifically adopted this geometric deep decrease model. Um but like it does seem to be a model um that a Catholic can accept and there are lots of metaphysical stories for how it might be implemented.
¶493So that's the first general way in which the total suffering in hell might be finite even though everlasting. And that's just like if the suffering in hell decreases by geometric proportion over regular periods of time. Here's a second way. There could be divergences between psychological time, that is how long something feels from the first person perspective, and objective time, that is how long it actually takes as an objective matter of fact. We already know that these sometimes come apart.
¶494So for instance, when when people on drugs feel like they've been tripping for many hours or days when in reality it's only been like minutes or a couple hours. But if there can be divergences between psychological time and objective time, perhaps psychologically the pain of the damned doesn't feel like it takes an eternity. Even though as an objective matter of fact, it is eternal. It is everlasting. It is everlasting suffering.
¶495Since suffering is a psychological quantity, when aggregating it, we should plausibly take into account its intensity and subjective duration. So if the subjective duration of the damned suffering is finite, then the damned only experience finite total suffering even though it's objectively everlasting. And also by the way like even if you think we should aggregate suffering over objective time, still the badness of pain is plausibly a function of its subjective character. If the pain is subjectively indistinguishable from pains lasting a finite duration in both subjective and objective time, then very plausibly it's only finitely bad. and the proportionality objection will once again fall by the wayside because that's not an infinitely bad kind of punishment that's being meed out on people.
¶496And as long as both of these views are at least possibilities, as they clearly seem to be, premise three of the proportionality argument is false. And consequently, the argument fails. I should also mention that I'm more confident that this first way of implementing finite total suffering is uh compatible with the magisterium than the second way. Um, I I'm more I'm more confident that the first is compatible with the magisterium than I am that the second is compatible with the magisterium. Um, I I haven't come across anything yet that indicates that the second is incompatible with the magisterium.
¶497Um, of course, if it is, then just like, you know, burn it, throw it out, you know. Um, I don't care about it. If it's uh, you know, inconsistent with the magisterium, do do away with it. Cast it into the flames for it contains nothing but sophistry and illusion. Um, but uh I haven't come across something yet which indicates that it's out of bounds for Catholics.
¶498But but of course I'm I'm always free to be corrected and I will absolutely 100% humbly submit to the magisterium the moment I learn that it's inconsistent with anything that I say. Okay. So let's go on. So remember there were two broad ways that everlasting suffering in hell might amount to a finite punishment. The first way that we've been exploring is that you know the total suffering in hell might be finite even though everlasting.
¶499And there were two subways you could accomplish that. One through um a geometric decrease in the suffering of the damned and the other through a divergence between psychological time and objective time. But there's a second broad way that the everlasting suffering in hell might only amount to a finite punishment. And so let's get on to that. This way grants that the total suffering in hell is infinite if we just aggregate the suffering.
¶500Even so, it doesn't follow that this constitutes an infinitely severe punishment since infinite total suffering is compatible with a finite detraction from well-being. And the severity of a punishment is a function of the degree to which the criminal's well-being is diminished by the punishment because suffering is not identical to well-being. Well-being is a matter of how well your life goes. Suffering may be one factor that affects how well your life goes. But it's an interesting and substantive philosophical question how the different factors that affect well-being kind of combine together to lead to um like well-being levels.
¶501And so it's and and it's entirely consistent to hold that you may very well have a merely finite detraction from your well-being even if you experience infinite total suffering over the course of your life. So to see how infinite total suffering is compatible with a finite detraction from well-being, cutter asks us to compare life one consisting of 10 billion years of the worst torture imaginable with life too, which is an infinitely long existence containing only slight hazy lizard-like discomfort without counterbalancing goods. And you know, we could substitute here an infinitely long life of boring music, bland potatoes, and infinitely many brief mild headaches that aren't counterbalanced by goods in the life. We might think that intuitively life one is worse despite life two's containing an infinite total quantity of uncounterbalanced suffering. Since life one contains only finite suffering, it's surely not infinitely bad.
¶502In which case, anything better than life one, such as life two, at least according to some people's intuitions, cannot be infinitely bad either. Thus, even a life of uncounterbalanced infinite suffering, need not constitute an infinite detraction from well-being. In which case, premise two of the proportionality argument is false. Premise 2 assumes that everlasting punishment must be infinite punishment. But that is not but that is not true.
¶503In order to get that verdict, you have to add additional auxiliary premises that are liable to objection. Of course, you know, this particular response here rests on an intrapersonal version of a contentious view in population ethics, but I would bet a good deal of money that there are serious defenders of that view in the literature. Moreover, population ethics is notoriously difficult and everyone should have a non-trivial degree of higher order uncertainty about the right answers here. But that just means that it's at least a a live possibility that the view which legitimizes the intrapersonal judgments and cutter's response is true. In which case, it's a live possibility that Cutter's response to premise 2 succeeds.
¶504And as a result, there's a live possibility that the proportionality argument fails. And that puts a cap on the evidential force of the argument. And honestly, that's all I need here. The evidence for Catholicism for miracles is overwhelming. And so long as it's not very improbable that the proportionality argument fails, the evidence it affords against Catholicism is just going to be utterly swamped by the evidence in favor of Catholicism.
¶505And again, you know, that's just like on the basis of this one response from Cutter. As we've seen, Cutter has other responses that straightforwardly refute the argument. And we've also seen that there are still yet further responses to the argument that Cutter doesn't even cover or defend rather. Okay, so that's my third response to the proportionality objection. And fourth and finally, the argument once again rests on moral intuitions about proportionality and the gravity of various crimes.
¶506So pretty much all the same responses to the moral problems from the last section will apply here too. Remember I gave like 11 different responses there. And Ethan Muse's points that I showed in response to the justifiability problem also apply here with full force. Okay, so those four responses I think suffice to satisfactorily address the proportionality objection. Let's turn at last to, you know, my final big objection that I had to hell, which was the problem of heavenly grief.
¶507Here is the argument as Noah McKay on his blog, How to Be Happy in Heaven, articulates the objection with a few minor amendations on my part. One, if Catholicism is true, then the elect in heaven will know that the damned are suffering. Two, if the elect will know that the damned are suffering, then the elect will pity the damned. After all, the elect in heaven are supposed to be perfected, and perfect people pity the suffering of others. That's a fitting or appropriate response to suffering.
¶508Number three, if the elect will pity the damned, then the elect won't be perfectly happy. So if Catholicism is true, then the elect won't be perfectly happy. But if Catholicism is true, then the elect will be perfectly happy. Like that's what heavenly bless is supposed to consist in. And so Catholicism is false.
¶509It implies both that the elect will be perfectly happy and that they won't be perfectly happy. So I have two responses to this. Uh first premise two here is false which says that you know if the elect know that the damned are suffering then the elect will pity the damned and it's false for the reason that McKay gives in his article. Suppose you're at a romantic dinner with your wife on your wedding night. In this setting your wife merits your full attention.
¶510Although you know for example that there are refugees suffering in Sudan and although you're rightly disposed to pity their suffering, it would be inappropriate for you to pity them while at dinner because it would be inappropriate for you to think about them while at dinner. You like under the circumstances your wife is more worthy of your attention than the Sudin refugees. Even though you know under different circumstances the Sudanese refugees would be more worthy. And this example illustrates that although there is some sense in which pity is a fitting response to the suffering of the damned, there are circumstances in which it would be unfitting all things considered to pity the suffering of the damned. And I, that is Noah McKay, suggest that the elect will be in this kind of situation in heaven.
¶511What is heaven after all? Well, it's intimacy with God. And God being absolutely perfect is supremely worthy of attention. And it would therefore just be inappropriate to And it would therefore be inappropriate to attend the damned while in heaven when you're at the great heavenly wedding feast, right? And experiencing the most intimate communion with God and his saints and angels.
¶512Pitting the damned while in heaven would be like, you know, pitting the Sudanese refugees while at dinner with one's life, except much worse, right? So premise two here is just false. You know, from the fact that the elect will know that the damned are suffering, it does not follow that they'll pity them. Second of all, Adam Peltzer argues that some amount of heavenly grief is compatible with perfect blessedness in heaven. And I'm currently unaware of any reason to think that his view or something in its vicinity is outside magestisterial bounds.
¶513And so this response targets premise three. Premise 3 says that if the elect will pity the damned, then they won't be perfectly happy. Adam Pelzer says no like perfect happiness, perfect blessedness is compatible with some kind of you know mitigated form of appropriate um negatively veilanced emotional responses. Specifically, maybe the elect do experience a limited temporary perfectly ordered sorrow contained within and vastly outweighed and transformed by their perfect joy in God. The object of this limited sorrow might be the fact that fellow creatures definitively rejected God and lost communion with him and the elect.
¶514Of course, you know, the elect will simultaneously recognize that God's judgment is perfectly just and they won't wish that justice to be overturned. But still, you know, like the fate of the damned, considered in its tragic and genuinely bad aspects might indeed result in a kind of temporary limited perfectly ordered sorrow that is compatible with perfect human blessedness and ultimate flourishing in heaven. But again, like you know, if that's compatible with the magisterium, then then so much the worse for that response. Burn it, dance on the ashes. Um, yeah.
¶515Okay. So, I've picked the three strongest objections to hell in my estimation, including ones that bothered me during my conversion process. I think most other objections are just like blatantly weak. You know, like for instance, Randall Rouser argues that choosing to decisively reject God is fundamentally irrational and it's wrong to punish people who are fundamentally irrational. But that, you know, that's a very poor argument.
¶516I mean, imagine saying like, "Oh, your honor, my client's decision to rape the victim was fundamentally irrational, and it's wrong to punish people who are fundamentally irrational. So, you know, let this man go." Like no, that's that's not plausible in the slightest. Choosing to perform an irrational action doesn't mean that you are irrational in a way that undermines responsibility, voluntariness, or culpability, as would be the case if you were, for example, psychotic or schizophrenic. You like Rouser's reasoning would exclude even finite earthly punishments, at least um doled out for retributive end. And in any case, like perfect rationality is clearly not required for voluntariness or moral responsibility or culpability.
¶517Um, people can evily and responsibly choose to embrace an irrational action and that evil choice legitimizes punishment. This happens all the time when we know we're doing something wrong and deliberately choose it nonetheless. But again, like the most fundamental point here is just that like choosing to perform an irrational action does not mean that you are irrational in a way that undermines culpability or voluntariness or responsibility. it it doesn't somehow make you like mentally it doesn't somehow make you like mentally ill or psychotic or you know schizophrenic or you know things like that. I'll con and and and so just like to close off this fourth barrier on hell.
¶518I will conclude by saying that I don't take the problem of hell lightly. Together with moral problems, this was one of my biggest barriers to Catholicism. I pray every day for the salvation of all souls. And I also pray that my responses here break down your barriers to the doctrine of hell. All right, so let's go on to barrier number five, biblical problems.
¶519So here I had two general problems for Catholicism. Objections to biblical inherency and moral difficulties with the Old Testament, specifically about genocide, slavery, and other forms of violence. Now, because I don't have the space or time here to comb through all the difficulties people raise for the biblical texts, I'm instead going to focus on giving you methodological tools and principles by which the general class of biblical difficulties can be addressed. And we should get clear on the dialectical context before digging in. I'm in accommodation mode here.
¶520So, I'm not trying to like prove to you here that the Bible is inspired or inherent, right? All I'm trying to do is significantly temper the force of biblical objections to Catholicism. I can grant that they have a deal of force. Indeed, I could grant that they're very forceful. All I need to do is show that there's one or more Catholic friendly accommodations for the data here that aren't hopelessly implausible, that aren't negligible in probability, which in turn will allow the staggering overwhelming evidence for Catholic miracles and all the other arguments for Catholicism to win the day.
¶521So let's start with inherency. Now Catholics are committed to what I call Catholic inherency. Whatever the sacred writers intended to assert given the parameters of their genre, audience, the literary devices available to them in their socioultural, historical and literary context is without error. Okay? So given all those different parameters, whatever the sacred writers intended to assert is without error.
¶522So yes, Catholic inherency is unrestricted in scope. It applies to everything in the Bible, not just those bits of the Bible relevant to salvation or morals or whatever. But it certainly does not force fundamentalist or highly conservative hermeneutics. And this is where my general approach to resolving difficulties kicks in. There is significant leeway in our biblical hermeneutics because Catholic inherency concerns authoral or maybe even redactor intent which is often difficult for us to access especially when the Bible spans 40 authors writing over 1500 years with genres that we sometimes only obscurely understand and with whole hordes of literary devices at their disposal many of which we may not fully understand either.
¶523But just to take some examples of the general moves that I'm inclined to apply in a variety of contexts consider the following. So like if the gospels are Gregor Roman biographies, the genre itself allows for intentionally changing the orders of events, who was present at things, etc. for a variety of purposes, for example, to convey a theological point or because it makes for a smoother story or whatever. These changes don't involve the sacred author intending to assert that P when P is false. Since the sacred authors are self-consciously using the built-in flexibility of the genre and various other literary devices, perhaps even ones we don't know about to perform some other non-assertoric or partially astoric expressive function.
¶524They could be intending to assert merely the general gist or they could be intending to evoke some practical effect in their audience rather than literally describe an event or you know just a bunch of options. Sacred writers might be using phenomenological description or intending only to describe the way things seem to them. They might be intentionally using approximation. Maybe they're intending to depict or represent something without endorsing or asserting it. Or again, maybe they're intending to evoke some practical effect in their readers.
¶525Maybe they merely omitted something instead of positively denying it. Maybe they're using narrative compression where they collapse a lengthy sequence into a short description. Maybe they're thematically rather than chronologically narrating events. Maybe different writers are foregrounding different causal levels or different aspects of something. Maybe a prophecy is a veiled conditional prophecy or is deploying telescoping or is a typological prophecy or is hyperbolic or symbolic or intentionally progressive in fulfillment.
¶526Or maybe in writing genealogies, sacred writers are omitting intermediate generations or following legal rather than purely biological descent or emphasizing dynastic succession or organizing names schematically or, you know, tracing different lines for different theological or practical effects or just trying to present things in a memorable way or using the words father and son for a more remote ancestor or descendant. Maybe for some passages, the communicative significance of them is determined by what the final redactor is doing with the inherited material. And maybe the final redactor's intent diverges from the intent of the original person behind the inherited material. Or maybe or maybe the spiritual senses of certain passages just are the intended meanings by the original authors or redactors in terms of authorship disputes like David. I I don't know like maybe the composers were wielding known ancient literary conventions or forms or genres whereby one attributes a book to someone they who didn't write it.
¶527This may have been done for a variety of reasons. Maybe it was written as an apocalyptic piece where a later writer speaks through an ancient prophet to make a theological point or to commentate on current events or to interpret current crises or to speak of the end times like a kind of apocalyptic character, you know, whatever. Or maybe they were doing this to lend credence to their book with a common understanding between them and their audience that this shouldn't be interpreted as a literalistic assertion that Daniel himself were the beast. Or maybe some of the themes or content originated from Daniel or a Danielic tradition. And maybe it was some established practices practice in Israel culture to attribute a work to a highly esteemed originator of a book's content or the tradition on which it's based.
¶528Or maybe whole hosts of other things could be happening whereby the authors or composers or redactors weren't intending to assert that Daniel wrote the book. For example, maybe inspiration in this case attaches to the redactors primarily. Uh and maybe they intended simply to showcase traditions about Daniel without asserting the verticality. Or maybe they wanted to showcase what their ancestors believed or whatever. Or maybe Daniel was in fact a substantial author of much of the book which was maybe then modified or added to over succeeding generations.
¶529Or maybe a strong historical core traces back to day. You know, I I don't know. I could go on. Again, all of this is intentionally schematic. Once we recognize all these manifold different things that the dozens of different sacred writers might be doing with the biblical text, and once we realize our highly fallible access to authoral intent and extremely limited understanding of context, audience, and literary devices, especially for the Old Testament, which deploys genres and conventions we can only speculate about, and from a period concerning which we have only fragmentaryary records, it wouldn't be at all surprising, even conditional on Catholic inherency, if there are lots of apparent errors in the text, including ones that aren't easily resolvable.
¶530or ones we don't yet know how to resolve. To put it differently, even if Catholic inherency were true, we would expect there to be apparent credible errors in the biblical text. Opponents of Catholic inherency tend to mistakenly treat biblical problems as if they're probabilistically independent. As if Catholic inherency just like requires this crazy string of massive coincidences whereby all the harmonizations wind up falling in favor of the biblical text. But that's just clearly mistaken for there are hypotheses that are entirely reasonable or plausible conditional on Catholicism and which together with Catholicism render it entirely unsurprising that there would be lots of difficult to resolve apparent problems with the biblical text.
¶531In other words, the various apparent errors are probabilistically correlated in such a way that they cannot be treated as independent problems that combine to a strong cumulative case. And this actually contrasts with miracles generally you know like explaining eucharistic miracles won't help you much in explaining padre peio or mirna nazour explaining which generally won't help you much in explaining marryian apparitions explaining which won't generally help you much in explaining healing miracles you etc. One such hypothesis that correlates apparent errors in the biblical text is the hiddenist model of divine activity which we examined when discussing demonic phenomena in part five. According to this model, in disclosing himself to humans through natural and supernatural revelation, God's general motus operandi is epistemically fine-tuned to provide enough objective evidence to make a belief rationally obliged and enough counter evidence and psychological barriers to preserve the psychological possibility of doubt. And notice if the Bible were prospicuously inherent that would start to compromise the obscurity posited in the hiddenist models mo like you know it would be pretty insane if there were like no even apparent tensions or difficulties with a book written over 1500 years by 40 different non- including authors across totally different cultures time periods genres etc.
¶532So it's not especially surprising under the hiddenness model that there would be quite a deal of apparent errors in scripture. And again given our fallible access to authoral intent and very limited knowledge of relevant genres, literary devices, audiences, and contexts. It also wouldn't be especially surprising if a lot of those apparent errors seemed recalcitrant to the modern mind. as Ethan Muse explains. >> So, Catholicism has an explanation, for instance, for why the Bible, even if it were inspired and inherent, it wouldn't be conspicuously so.
¶533And for it to not be conspicuously so, it has to have lots of apparent contradictions and historical discrepancies because otherwise it would be conspicuous, right? >> [clears throat] >> if you had, you know, 40 authors in like three different languages writing over 2,000 years, something that was perfectly consistent and where there were no apparent historical difficulties whatsoever, right? That would violate these sort of hiddenist constraints that were saying the epistemic fine-tuning. So basically, we have something which is correlating all of these difficulties relating to the Bible without actually saying that there's going to be a unified explanation for each of them, but it's correlating them because it's saying here's a reason we might expect the Bible to have the sorts of properties that cause you to doubt whether it is inherent, but yet for there to be a way to resolve all of them that is not obvious, even though you might actually have to particularize the facts to each, right? So that's something that's correlating the air.
¶534So that's something that's helpful, the epistemic fine-tuning. >> And the point here also shows, by the way, why appeals to parsimony by opponents of Catholic inherency should land on deaf ears since Catholic accommodations which seem on the surface to be more complicated actually flow from a deeper, more unifying simple hypothesis which is anticedently reasonable given Catholicism. And there are other relatively simple and non-silly hypotheses which also probabilistically correlate apparent errors in the Bible. For example, maybe ancient authors just tended to literalistically assert far less than modern readers think even when ostensibly doing history. And you know, all the more so when not.
¶535Now, before turning to my second class of biblical problems, I'll briefly address an objection or two. Specifically, you might object that my general approach to resolving biblical difficulties is ad hoc or unfalsifiable. But I think that's a that's a pretty weak objection. First, many of the harmonizations are indeed independently motivated when you attend to known linguistic usage literary conventions that are established on independent grounds. Second, even if my approach involves some ad hoc maneuvering, that's fine.
¶536Again, I'm in accommodation mode. If I take on some ad hoc posits, that will be some dent to my theory, sure, but not a huge one. Certainly no certainly nowhere are even approaching the utterly bizarre and hopelessly unprecedented conspiracy of conspiracies that non-atholics need to posit for the miracles. Indeed, like even for Patrick Peio alone, for instance, third, we've already seen why it's actually not very surprising by the lights of my own theory that some ad hoc moves may sometimes need to be appealed to. Fourth, it's just false that my response makes biblical hermeneutics unfalsifiable.
¶537There are various biblical texts for example parts of the New Testament whose genre is reasonably well understood and where we can imagine lots of ways of clearly falsifying Catholic inherency. I mean like just to take a particularly dramatic example you know if for example Paul were very explicit that he's flatly denying the historicity of Christ and makes it very clear that he's intending to speak literally not symbolically or metaphorically. fifth. To at least some extent, yes, my approach does make my view of the Bible less falsifiable than you might otherwise have thought. But while it's bad if an entire theory is wholly unfalsifiable, it's not so bad if a part of a theory is not easily falsified.
¶538As I explained in my B theorem video, the reason why unfalsifiable theories are bad is that if there's nothing that could disisconfirm or count as evidence against the hypothesis, then there's also nothing in principle that could confirm or count as evidence for that hypothesis. And that just follows from B theorem together with the probability raising conception of evidence. But this problem does not afflict theories which merely have parts that are relatively resistant to falsification since the theory may also have tons of other parts that are super liable to falsification. So the mere fact that my approach shields the Bible to maybe some extent to maybe a moderate extent from falsification does not mean in the slightest that Catholicism is unfalsifiable and so unable to be confirmed by evidence. And again like my model still makes the Bible clearly falsifiable.
¶539I I don't want that to get lost in the sauce. Finally, you might worry that my approach should make us less confident that we know what the Bible actually teaches since the authoral intent seems so obscure under my model. But once again, there are lots of cases where it clearly isn't obscure. And in any event, this is why the magisterium is so helpful. Since in the Catholic paradigm, it authoritatively exposits and interprets the Bible for us under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
¶540The whole point of Catholicism is that it's not just me and my Bible, right? Yeah, you're right. That is a hopeless model. And the schisming mess of Protestantism proves as much. But that's not the Catholic model, right?
¶541And under the Catholic model, my approach to biblical difficulties doesn't threaten undue skepticism about biblical teaching. All right, so we've covered my general strategy for dealing with objections to Catholic inherency. But what about my moral problems with the Old Testament? Well, very helpful here for me was uh Dr. Matthew Ramage's book, Dark Passages of the Bible, Engaging Scripture with Benedict the 16th and St.
¶542becomes Aquinus as well as Swan Sona's excellent work on these topics on his channel, Intellectual Catholicism, a channel which I very strongly recommend you guys all check out. I've also been playing a lot by the way. I should have said this earlier. I've been playing a lot from the Sumocontra everybody channel. So, you should definitely check that out too.
¶543Both of both those channels will be in the resource document. But like long story short, my approach to moral problems with the Old Testament is very similar to my approach to objections to Catholic inherency. There's lots of room for interpretive leeway. Take for instance the conquest narratives. One approach of course is to say that God does indeed have the right to deputize humanists to take life.
¶544And in so far as this is intuitively implausible, we can respond to the that intuition in much the way that we responded to moral objections to Catholicism back in barrier number three. That's not my favorite approach though. My favorite approach is to interpret the passages wholly or partially nonliterally in ways that pretty much dissolve the moral problems altogether. I mean Catholicism certainly isn't committed to a literal interpretation of the passages. Heck, the Pontipical Biblical Commission's 2014 document, The Inspiration and Truth of Sacred Scripture, goes so far as to say that these texts require a nonliteral interpretation.
¶545Here's from page 146. From the outset, it is necessary to note that these narratives do not have the characteristics of a historical count in a real war. In fact, the walls of a city do not come crashing down at the sound of trumpets, nor is it evident how a peaceful distribution of lands by lottery could really take place. On the other hand, the Norman Deuteronomy, which prescribes the extermination of the Canaanites, takes written form at a moment in history when these populations were no longer identifiable in the land of Israel. One must therefore reconsider carefully the literary genre of these narrative traditions.
¶546As the best interpreters of the petristic tradition had already suggested, the narration of the conquest epic should be seen as a sort of parable presenting characters of symbolic value. The law of extermination, for its part, requires a nonliteral interpretation, as in the case of the command of the Lord to cut off one's hand or pluck out one's eye if they are a cause of scandal. I mean, I I don't think I myself would go so far as to say that they absolutely require a non-literal interpretation, but like again, this is like a book put out by the Pontipical Biblical Commission in 2014. So it's totally consistent to read conquest narratives as something like parables or symbolic depictions or propagandistic communicative efforts or accounts with a historical core but allegorical embellishments of various kinds such that the sacred writers or potentially redactors were intending to communicate not that God literally commanded genocide but something else and we could speculate about that like you know maybe God fiercely hates sin especially idolatry and the wages of sin especially idolatry is death. God is infinitely more powerful than the regional deities worshiped by the Canaanites.
¶547The consequences of sin last for generations and we must totally eradicate sin from our lives. There's no compromising with it and you need to quash it down to every last bit including even the near occasions of sin based. It's also worth noting by the way that there are a number of indicators within the texts themselves that something nonliteral is going on, right? Like the Pontipical Biblical Commission gives reasons for that. And you know, it can also be seen when we read that entire people groups are said to have been wiped out, but then literally show up a few verses later.
¶548Sim similar points apply more broadly. For example, you know, like maybe Noah's flood was actually local, but the author or editor of Genesis self-consciously described it as global to emphasize the inescapability and finality of God's judgment. Uh, and that's even a moderate position that adopts a literal historical core. I mean, there are more liberal positions which allegorize the story entirely. So, turning finally to slavery, Swansona has just like excellent videos on this topic that helped me just completely remove this barrier.
¶549So, I will link those in the resource document. My current favorite approach, but there are others like watch Swan's content. This is not like among the most liberal proposals even that that Swan canvases. So, um, my current favorite approach, but you know, there are others, including ones that are, uh, much more liberal that that Swan canvases. So, so check out Swan's content.
¶550Um, he goes through a number of different proposals. My current favorite approach is that God regulating an institution through Mosaic law does not amount to God morally endorsing or even morally permitting the institution. like it's a law code for the governance of an ancient people group which is meant to circumscribe or put limits on their depravity, right? But that doesn't mean like that things within those limits are thereby divinely approved or even morally permissible by God's lights. So, you know, like laws regulating slavery are then accommodations to and restrictions upon an entrenched social institution, much as Jesus says the Mosaic permission of divorce was granted because of human hardness of heart.
¶551And you know, you might ask, well, hey, why didn't God just like give them a legal code that abolishes it? Um, but listen, there are lots of like non-silly reasons we can glimpse for why God might like I don't know, maybe if he totally banned it. The Israelites would completely reject any covenantal relationship with God. And God knowing this and knowing how overwhelmingly important such a relationship is for their salvation and the salvation of humanity, therefore wisely ordained not to completely ban slavery from the outset, but instead chose to gradually work within their moral weakness to gradually call humans to higher and higher moral heights culminating in Christ and his church. As an analogy, imagine a mother whose son is super addicted to a graphic and sometimes lewd video game.
¶552The mother wants her son to freely love her and remain in a relationship with her. But she knows that if she banned the video game altogether, her son would probably be violent toward her and the rest of the family and then run away from home, probably getting himself killed in the process. Since that would be disastrous for the son and the family, the mother begrudgingly lays down rules that permit playing the video game, but restrict it in various ways. Now, by permitting and regulating the video game, she's not there by endorsing it or saying it's morally permissible for her son to play it, right? She's simply accommodating herself to her son's present moral weakness while restraining some of the harm of the game and, you know, gradually trying to train her son towards something better.
¶553And I think we can see Old Testament slavery in a similar vein. But anyway, that that is not the only proposal. Like if you think that's a silly proposal or that that's false, um I mean of course I don't agree with you, but uh there are lots of other proposals besides. So check out the stuff in the resource document if you want to look into resolutions to this biblical problem and other biblical problems in more detail. A sixth barrier to me becoming Catholic were just like various magisterial texts that I came across.
¶554It seemed like the magisterium had contradicted itself at various points or said some seemingly false things. I mean, not only would this be a problem for the magisterium's trustworthiness, but it would also straightforwardly falsify Catholicism if the contradictions or falsehoods were infallibly proposed. Now, I won't proceed through all the alleged magisterial problems here. Instead, I've chosen like the three seemingly biggest most obvious problems uh in air quotes that I repeatedly see Protestants and sometimes Orthodox bring up. Um these concern our dogma that extra ecclesia nulis salus or outside the church there is no salvation our teaching on religious liberty and a papal condemnation in exserj do once you solve these which seem on their face to be like the most slam dunk obvious problems of all time uh you should be pretty confident that all the others can be solved too and I'll also briefly talk about marryian dogmas and other miscellaney at the end okay so let's get to no salvation outside the church the modern Catholic church teaches that non-atholics and even non-Christians can be saved Perluentium.
¶555Quote, "Those who through no fault of their own, do not know the gospel of Christ or his church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart and moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience, those too may achieve eternal salvation." So the modern church teaches that some people who die without visible membership in the church may nevertheless be saved. But doesn't this contradict the dogma that, you know, there's no salvation outside the church? In 1442 at the council of Florence, Pope Eugene IVth promulgated cane domino which solemnly declared that those existing outside the Catholic Church, including pagans, Jews, heretics, and schismatics, cannot attain eternal life unless they are joined to the Catholic Church before death. So, it seems like the church first excluded all non-atholics from salvation and then subsequently reversed herself. So, like what's going on?
¶556Isn't the church just blatantly contradicting itself? Well, no. The contradiction here is merely apparent. In short, it neglects that there are multiple ways to be united or joined to the church. Sure, one way to be united to the church is through visible incorporation into the Catholic Church.
¶557In other words, you're a formal member of the visible church. Like you're baptized and visibly joined to the church through the bonds, the profession of the Catholic faith, the Catholic sacraments, and ecclesiastical governance under the pope to whom you like explicitly and visibly submit and the bishops in communion with him. So you know this would include baptized and professing Catholics as well as people who were you know baptized Protestant but joined the jeritical externally visible bounds of the church through confirmation and now profess the Catholic faith. So that's one way to be united to the church visible incorporation into her. But there are other ways to be united or joined to the church and non-atholics who are not visibly joined to the church may nevertheless be united or joined to her in one of these other ways.
¶558So for instance, one can be united to the church through explicit desire as in catechumans who consciously desire and seek to become Catholic. Or one can be joined to the church through implicit desire as in people who desire to do God's will but non-culpably fail to know that Catholicism is true and that God therefore wills everyone to become Catholic. And notice that conteino only says that you need to be joined or united to the church to be saved. It does not say that you need to be an explicit formal member of the visible church to be saved. And so it therefore allows that some people who are not explicit formal members of the visible church may nevertheless be saved by their incorporation into the church through explicit or implicit desire.
¶559And it's clear from history that cane domino could not have meant that you absolutely need to be a formal member of the visible church in order to be saved. As Christian Wagner notes in these two excellent, excellent articles, the medieval theology of baptism, as expounded in, for example, Aquinas and Duncotus held that infants baptized in heretical or schismatic communities genuinely receive salvifically efficacious baptismal grace precisely because the infants lack the malicious will that would obstruct sacramental grace. If contate domino meant that mere location outside the church's visible jeritical bounds necessarily meant damnation, then even this universally recognized preflorence medieval teaching would just blatantly and obviously contradict Florence. But you know the council fathers aren't morons. Obviously they knew about this teaching and they were condemning heretics and schismatics and pagans and Jews in the moral sense.
¶560That is those who are not merely externally part of these communities but who are also culpable for their heresy or schism or Judaism or paganism. Here are some other here are some other reasons why it's clear from history that contino could not have meant that you absolutely need to be you know a formal member of the visible church to be saved. Cardinal, one of the most influential ecclesiologists associated with Florence, taught that someone who after due diligence mistakenly followed an antipope while sincerely intending to follow the true pope need not incur the guilt of schism and so could be innocent before God. But crucially, following an antipope places you outside the visible bounds of the church. You forfeit your explicit formal membership of the church.
¶561And yet following an antipope was recognized at the time as not necessarily being a barrier to salvation. Heck, Aquinus held that an unjustly excommunicated person who is therefore outside the jerit jeritical visible bounds of the church does not thereby lose God's grace even though as I said excommunication removes you from the visible bounds of the church such that you're no longer a formal member of the Catholic Church. Pope Innocent III over 200 years before Florence acknowledged that an ecclesiastical sentence can externally bind someone who remains innocent before God. In fact, the medieval church venerated numerous saints who died during first millennium schisms while outside jeritical communion with Rome. So it's clear, it's manifestly evident that external visible jeritical separation from the Catholic Church was not seen even at the time of the Council of Florence to necessarily incur damnation.
¶562It is manifestally clear that this is not just some kind of like, you know, centuries later post hot cope that we're just trying to cobble together to make these consistent. No, when you actually examine the historical evidence itself, it becomes clear that, you know, the Protestants are just wrong when they try to, you know, champion this and tout this as like, oh yes, Rome has contradicted itself. No, the C orthodox channel has a good overview of all this. Now, some apologists, as Redeem Zuma points out, for example, Trent Horn, try to reconcile this apparent contradiction by saying that those outside the church who are saved are joined spiritually to the church by faith or by desire. Therefore, there is no salvation outside the church strictly speaking because these individuals are in the church by desire.
¶563Redeem Zuma does admit that the solution by Trent Horn, namely that the phrase no salvation outside the church must be understood as no salvation for those who are not in the church either in fact or in desire does solve the difficulty. However, redeem Zuma does not believe that the church at the time of unam sanctum and Florence, namely in the late 13th century and onwards up until Vatican 2, believed that one could be saved without being a real member of the Catholic Church. That is to have visible communion i.e. baptism, sacraments and being communion with bishops in communion with the pope. We will first site an authoritative doctor of the church on this question to represent the postflorentine view.
¶564Then we will site a pre- Florence and pre-un pope that demonstrates the same view. First we will site St. Robert Bellamin on the church militant when he speaks of specifically catechumans. He deals with the following objection that if cateumans can be saved but they are not in the church factually and it is true that no one can be saved outside the church then catechumans consequently cannot be saved as they are not factually in the church. In the quote above, the objection is put forth and they appeal to the Latan council and also to the council of Florence.
¶565Take note that Pope Eugene is well aware of the papable bull conte domino because in his words he appeals to the decree of the Armenians in the council of Florence to prove the 73 book cannon of the Catholic Church and in the same decree is contained cane domining manner. Quote, Consequently, I respond that it is said outside the church, no man is saved, and this ought to be understood on those that are neither in fact nor in desire within the church, just as all the theologians commonly teach on baptism. Moreover, if the catechumans are not in the church de facto, at least they are in the church in desire, therefore they can be saved. Take note, this is not limited to catechumans. St.
¶566Robert Benamin writes also about the excommunicator. He says quote again some might be in the soul of the church and not in the body such as catechumans or the excommunicated if they might have faith and charity which can happen. St. Robert Bellamin later writes that an excommunicated person that was unjustly excommunicated and has faith and charity does still belong to the church by desire and this is sufficient for them to be saved although they do not belong to the body or the external communion. Now as we can already see the doctrines of the church clearly teach that one may be outside the church in fact yet in the church by desire.
¶567Consequently one can attain salvation who is in the church only by desire and not in fact. Now that this has been demonstrated to be believed post Florence that is after Florence we will go to the pre Florence and pre-unam sanctum church. For this we will go to the famous pope Pope Innocent III who lived before both of these decrees. Pope Innocent III writes in his work debitum pastorali on the question of baptismal errors. He writes the following quote.
¶568You have to be sure intimated that a certain Jew when at the point of death since he lived only among Jews immersed himself in water while saying I baptized myself in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen. We respond that since there should be a distinction between the one baptizing and the one baptized as is clearly gathered from the words of the Lord when he says to the apostles go baptize all nations in the name etc. The Jew mentioned must be baptized again by another. That it may be shown that he who is baptized is one person and he who baptizes another.
¶569If however such a one had died immediately, he would have rushed to his heavenly home without delay because of the faith of the sacrament, although not because of the sacrament of faith. End quote. To explain it simply, Pope Innocent III is asked what must be done if a Jew not able to find a Christian to baptize him since he lives only among Jews baptizes himself. Pope Innocent responds by saying that such a man must be baptized by a Christian when he has a chance since baptism is not validly conferred unless there are two people namely the one baptizing and the other the one being baptized. However, yet Innocent III is clear that if such a Jew was to die after baptizing himself, he would still be saved because of the faith of the sacrament, although not because of the sacrament of the faith.
¶570In essence, he is saying that he is saved by baptism of desire, not baptism in fact. Now, you may be asking, well, why is this important? This is very important because it demonstrates that one can be saved while not being visibly joined to the Catholic Church. Later theologians refer to this belief by stating that such a man can be perfectly joined to the soul of the church while not being a member of the body of the church. For example, as cited above, St.
¶571Robert Bellamine saying an excommunicated person can hypothetically be joined by desire to the soul of the church, which suffices to salvation, but he is still not in the body or external communion. Now, it must not be imagined that Florence disagrees with Pope Innocent III on no salvation outside the church. Pope Innocent himself clearly states that nobody can be saved outside the Roman Catholic Church. Pope Innocent III writes, quote, "By the heart we believe and by the mouth we confess that the one church, not of heretics, but the Holy Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church, outside which we believe that no one is saved." End quote. Now, from what has been gathered, we have two seemingly contrary statements.
¶572Firstly, that nobody can be saved outside the Roman Catholic Church. And secondly, that someone outside the visible structure of the Roman Catholic Church can be saved. This is solved as has been said by interpreting outside the church as outside the church in both fact or actual membership and desire or faith. Now since some may be outside the church in fact but not in desire for example cateumans or unjustly excommunicated individuals they are able to be joined to the soul of the church and be saved without changing the dogma of no salvation outside the church. In the case of Pope Innocent III, the Jew he mentions would be outside the church.
¶573In fact, since he does not have true baptism or participation in the sacraments or visible union with the bishop in union with the pope, but he would be inside the church by desire and consequently, if he died, he would enter heaven because of the faith of the sacrament. To quote Pope Innocent III again, "You have to be sure intimated that a certain Jew when at the point of death since he lived only among Jews immersed himself in water while saying, I baptize myself in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen." The Jew mentioned must be baptized again by another. That it may be shown that he who is baptized is one person, and he who baptizes another. If, however, such a one had died immediately, he would have rushed to his heavenly home without delay.
¶574because of the faith of the sacrament, although not because of the sacrament of the faith. This belief was explained in detail by the holy office in a letter approved by Pope Pius the 12th in 1949. After mentioning that the dogma that there is no salvation outside the church is infallible and also saying that the church has the right to explain this dogma herself since the deposit of faith is trusted to her to be explained. They go on to say, quote, "In his infinite mercy, God w that since it was a matter of the means of salvation ordained for man's ultimate end, not by intrinsic necessity, but only by divine institution, that salutary effects could also be obtained in certain circumstances when these means are only objects of desire or of hope. The same must be said of the church as a general means of salvation.
¶575That is why for a person to obtain his salvation, it is not always required that he be de facto incorporated into the church as a member, but he must at least be united to the church through desire or hope. The church before unam sanctum and Florence and also after unam sanctum and Florence has always taught that certain individuals may be saved who are not in the church by fact but only by desire. This is not a novel teaching of Vatican 2 and redeemed Zuma has no basis for asserting that it is a historical contradiction. The second ecumenical Vatican council itself also affirm the necessity of the church for salvation in its dogmatic constitution lumentium section 14. It states quote the sacred council wishes to turn its attention firstly to the Catholic faith basing itself upon sacred scripture and tradition.
¶576It teaches that the church now sojuring on earth as an exile is necessary for salvation. Christ present to us in his body which is the church is the one mediator and the unique way of salvation. In explicit terms he himself affirmed the necessity of faith and baptism and thereby he also affirmed the necessity of the church. For through baptism as through a door men enter the church. Whosoever therefore knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ would refuse to enter or to remain in it could not be saved.
¶577End quote. But but Joe, doesn't Kate doino like name drop pagans and Jews and heretics and schismatics as outside the church? Like if so, how could they be saved if there's no salvation outside the church? Well, here we need to distinguish between formal and material sin. A person commits a materially sinful act when what they do is objectively contrary to the moral law, whether they're culpable for that or not.
¶578A person commits a formally sinful act when they're actually guilty or culpable for doing something materially sinful. Suppose, for example, that a man sleeps with his wife's identical twin while reasonably and non-culpably believing that she is his wife. His act is materially adulterous since he has intercourse with someone who is not his spouse. But he is not formally guilty of adultery because he neither knows nor intends to violate the marital bond. Similarly, someone may materially sin by being separated from the Catholic Church.
¶579you know, being externally a heretic, schismatic Jew or pagan without being formally culpable for rejecting Christ or his church because through no fault of their own, they may not recognize that Catholicism is true. Crucially, Florence is speaking of heretics, schismatics, Jews, and pagans in the formal sense. That is, those who knowingly and culpably remain outside the church, not every person who happens to be externally or jeritically separated from her. And Christian Wagner has a fantastic video on the medieval roots of Vatican 2 where he explicates this in more depth. >> What about the text given from the Council of Florence that quote unless they are joined to the Catholic [music] Church before the end of their lives that the unity of the ecclesiastical body is of such importance that only for those who abide in it do the church's sacraments contribute to salvation.
¶580End quote. Did all of the theologians at Florence [music] somehow condemn the entire tradition before them? Did they condemn themselves in the sentences, commentaries that they wrote as bachelors of theology? Did they condemn those great masters that they wrote in allegiance to throughout their entire lives? Did they condemn the other doctors of the schools who they were loyal to as well?
¶581Clearly, this idea is absurd. So, what does this text mean? Well, what you have to remember is that schism is a type of sin. Schism is damnable because it is a mortal sin. is classified as one of those indispositions that the medieval theologians and magisterium speak of.
¶582Thus, it needs to be treated like any other moral act that is grave. It is perfectly normal for us to say that all schismatics go to hell without qualification. Why is this the case? It is quite simple. Ordinarily, when we name a sin, we are naming some moral act on the part of a person that the individual is culpable for.
¶583Thus, for example, St. Paul states that those of various different classes, drunkards, fornicators, adulterers, liars, etc., will not inherit the kingdom of God. To use a classic example, if someone happens to commit adultery in a non-culpable way, for example, if he is invincibly ignorant that the woman he is with is not his wife, then the individual is more properly said to be a non-adulterer than an adulterer. Although, in order to better explain this, we use the language of a material adulterer. But would these possible cases of material adultery stop me from saying without qualification that all adulterers go to hell?
¶584Of course not. It is assumed that when we name a certain moral act, we intend to name that act as culpably exercised. That is the act formally considered, not the act materially considered. This was my purpose behind my invocation of St. Augustine's words to the Donatists in an earlier discussion with Sha Luke where St.
¶585Augustine states that those are not obstinate in their heresy are rather called non-heretics than heretics. Thus, those who commit an act of schism in an inculpable way are rather called non-skismatics than schismatics. It is completely irresponsible and intellectually lazy, if not dishonest, to quote texts without having read and understood the teaching of those authors that surround those [music] texts and the categories that they are working with in their own works. Thus, the medievals have an entire system of general [music] moral theology about the culpability surrounding immoral acts that clearly show that they did not universally apply the condemnations of Florence to all those in schism, but only those culpable for their actions, as is most clearly shown in the case of infants who are the least culpable. The Cardinal Frans I mentioned earlier gives a quite good overview of this teaching.
¶586Although as mentioned there are thousands if not more teachings from other prevatican 2 authors who say the same exact thing. He says quote for the reason just stated the sacraments of the church wherever they are validly conferred produce all those effects that an obstacle in the recipient does not impede. Thus if we speak specifically of baptism conferred by a heretical or schismatic minister upon infants in whom there can be no obstacle. It has all the same essential effects as if it were conferred by a Catholic minister. Not only are they marked with the character of Christ, but they are also regenerated as children of God through grace and incorporated into the holy mother church whose members they remain at least in the internal form and before God until they adhere to schism or heresy by their own act which would be a mortal sin.
¶587This applies fully to those called material heretics or schismatics. That is in the external form alone. As St. Augustine teaches in many places about the sacrament by which the mother church generates children, not only through her own womb, but also through the wounds of handmmaids. End quote.
¶588The reason that the sacraments of those in heresy or schism do not benefit them to eternal life is because they are illisposed to receive such graces by their immoral acts. If they have acts of heresy or schism that they are not culpable for, clearly the reason for the ill disposition is removed and it would be absurd to give the same condemnation. And since they are lacking the form of their act that specifies it in being a sim, then they would only improperly or materially be referred to as schismatics or heretics. This is why, as Frangelin points out, St. Augustine sometimes qualifies his statement about the lacking fruit among schizmatics [music] with quote those who are proud and do not join the lawful mother end quote.
¶589Thus, Fransen goes on to say, quote, "Thus, those who are proud, that is, who out of any perverse desires or culpable negligence, do not seek the truth as they ought, or refuse to embrace it when sufficiently proposed, formally or equivalently adhere to error, and rebelling against God in his church, are torn from it as formal heretics or schismatics, not only in the external form, but also before God, and in the internal form, holy exile. But on the contrary, those who are only materially [music] heretics or schismatics, that is by external profession alone and not by culpable adherence of mind, should be considered even as adults to have that disposition of good faith. End quote. That disposition of good faith which renders a schismatic or heretic merely material is assumed by St. Augustine of some for example the affforementioned epistle where he writes quote though the doctrine which men hold be false and perverse if they do not maintain it with passionate obstinency especially when they have not devised it by the rashness of their own presumption but have accepted it from parents who have been misguided and had fallen into error and if they are with anxiety seeking the truth and are prepared to be set right when they have found it such men are not to be counted heretic heretics.
¶590End quote. In fact, interestingly enough, this inculpability for the moral act of schism is actually baked into the old right of the reception of heretics and schismatics. For, as Frangelin points out, for those received into the church from ages 7 to 14, which were above the age of reason, they were only required to give a profession of faith rather than an abjgeration of heresies. Thus, they were clearly assumed to not be culpable for their errors. So the questions I have for Sha Luke and others are if Florence teaches that no sacraments practiced outside of the church are salvific simply by virtue of not being within the jeritical bound of the church rather than by reason of moral culpability.
¶591Why do they believe that infants who are baptized were saved when baptized by these individuals? It can either be because of their lack of culpability or perhaps they're condemning their own views. The latter is absurd. So as to the former, then you admit that it has to do with the moral quality of the act of schism. If this is the case, then why would it not also apply to anyone else who in accordance with their [music] own teaching on general moral theology is not culpable for their schism?
¶592If not, why has the church assumed inculpability for heresy and schism among the young, that is under the age of 14? Would it not be a great crime for them to not require this ancient and necessary ceremony in the reception of heretics and schismatics? Now, many of you claim that this distinction between material and formal schism is something novel that the authors at Florence did not have in mind. But this is absurd and merely exposes the ignorance of many of you who presume to attack the Catholic Church while ignorant of the doctrine you speak of. One of the greatest theologians of Florence was Juande Tokamato who was an expert at ecclesiology and one of the biggest influences on the ecclesiology of Florence.
¶593If anyone is able to express the mind of the documents, it is him. Toramada was one of the most active legates and theologians at Florence going before kings to do the bidding of the pope. He was appointed by the pope to be present as a theologian at the earliest conferences of the council where the topics were discussed before the opening sessions. In fact, in the famous quote by Cardinal Biserian concerning the Latins destroying all their arguments against the filioquay in the beginning of the council, [music] it was Toramada who was the spokesman. In fact, it seems like he was the one who convinced Bacerion of the Catholic teaching on purgatory.
¶594In the debates that took place throughout the council, he was appointed as one of the six official orators of the Latins. Specifically, he represented the Dominican order at the council. Beside this, he wrote definitive chronicles on the council as well. His biggest contributions came down to debates over the sacraments and the role [music] of the Roman pontiff. Besides these discussions with the Greeks, he was also involved with the discussions with cops.
¶595Well, luckily for us, he wrote a work called Suma Ecclesia and the entire fourth book is about schism and heresy. Isn't that fantastic? Well, does he mention material schism and heresy anywhere in this work? He absolutely does. This is evident when he discusses the necessity of pertinentity for there to be true schism.
¶596Finally, what about Pope Bonafice VI's 1302 Bulum Sanctum? I mean therein he writes we declare say define and proclaim that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman pontiff. Wes Huff even cited this as one of his you know like main reasons for not being Catholic uh in his video which was very unfortunate. Um but Wes did not do his homework. The bull's immediate target is a Catholic king claiming independence from papal authority.
¶597It's therefore totally reasonable to understand Bonafice here as gravely obliging him and everyone else to submit to the pope's authority. Bonafice would therefore be saying that submission to the Roman pontiff is necessary for salvation by a necessity of precept. In other words, there is an objectively grave obligation that everyone has to submit to Rome. An obligation whose culpable violation dams you if you don't adequately repent. But non-culpable violations of mere necessities of precept for salvation do not incur damnation.
¶598To take an analogy, it is necessary for salvation that you not commit adultery. Adultery is an objectively grave act. It's a it's in the objective form. It's it's a mortal sin. Materially, it's a mortal sin, right?
¶599But that does not mean, returning to an earlier case that if you innocently sleep with someone other than your wife, you'll thereby be damned. Non-culpable violations of grave obligations are not damnable. So if Bonafice is defining a universally binding grave obligation to submit to the pope. In other words, if the necessity for salvation here is a necessity of precept as seems eminently reasonable given the context, then his claim is clearly compatible with the possibility of salvation for non-culpable non-atholics. So there's no tension here with what the modern church teaches.
¶600And moreover, as Christian Wagner points out in in that video that I just played, baptism makes one a subject of the church, which is clear from the condemnation of Arasmus at Trent and the common distinction of our theologians between members and subjects of the church. You're subject to the Roman pontiff if he has spiritual authority over you. And the pope has spiritual authority over every baptized person whether they recognize it or not. So another eminently reasonable reading of Pope Bonafice's definition is that it's absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature that they be among those over whom the pope has spiritual authority through the bond of baptism. And you know, of course, that's obviously compatible with the possibility that non-Christians be saved since non-Christians can be baptized.
¶601Indeed, Catholic theology has long recognized that even non-Christians could receive baptism by explicit or implicit desire. So the definition here is also compatible with the possibility of salvation for non-Christians. Okay. So, let's take a step back, my fellows, my fellow human beings. We've just resolved what otherwise looked to be an intractable contradiction concerning estra ecclesiadalis by carefully attending to distinctions that have been wellknown in the Catholic theological tradition, but which are generally entirely unknown to the contemporary mind.
¶602And when you think you have a slam dunk magestisterial contradiction on your hands just by reading a few quotes and using your Tik Tok masserated 21st century brain, but then realize that carefully attending to history, context, audience, textual interpretation, theology, and magisterialology completely decimates the seemingly slam dunk case, you should massively decrease your confidence in your ability to detect clear magisterial contradictions. You've just gotten decisive higher order evidence that this stuff is subtler than you thought. And there are probably lots of moves available and lots of historical or theological points that you're just missing. And that should significantly decrease your confidence in any other puditive magisterial contradictions that you think you found. Anyway, in case it's helpful, here's the clearest articulation I can muster for the dogma that outside the church there is no salvation.
¶603And that's the Catholic Church, by the way, which is, you know, the church. That is the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church is the church. The church is necessary for salvation in each of two senses. First, necessity of means by divine institution or what some people call a necessity means per accidents.
¶604This means that all salvation comes from Christ through his body, the church. Accordingly, anyone who is saved must be united to the church either a in reality, so that's through full visible incorporation into the Catholic Church involving baptism and the visible bonds of the Catholic profession of faith, the sacraments and ecclesiastical governance, or b in desire when full visible incorporation is nonculpably absent. This desire may be either explicit as in a catechuman who consciously intends to enter the church or implicit as in someone who through no fault of their own does not recognize the truth or necessity of the Catholic Church but who moved by grace sincerely seeks God and strives to do God's will as it's known through conscience. Such a person implicitly wills whatever God has established and would embrace the church were its truth sufficiently made known to him. So that's the first sense in which the church is necessary for salvation.
¶605The second sense in which the church is necessary for salvation is a necessity of precept. This means that there is an objective grave moral obligation to be Catholic. So anyone who fails to be Catholic and whose failure to be Catholic meets the conditions for culpably mortally sinning will be damned if they die without adequate repentance. No non-atholic is damned on account of failing to be Catholic if this failure does not meet the conditions for mortal sin. Those conditions are firstly the actor or omission is an objectively grave matter.
¶606In other words, it's a seriously wrong kind of act or omission. And and yes, the religious obligation to be Catholic is a grave matter. Second, the act or omission is imputable to your will as a deliberate and free choice whether directly whether directly or indirectly. And thirdly, you had full knowledge that the act was gravely wrong or else you are seriously culpable for lacking that knowledge. Okay, so that is you know you can screenshot this, share this with your friends, share this with everyone, share it with your dog.
¶607Um these are the senses in which uh the church is necessary for salvation. That's my clearest articulation of you know Catholic dogma. Okay. On to religious liberty. Some months back a Protestant Okay.
¶608On to religious liberty. This was like the second uh puditive slam dunk magisterial contradiction that uh I thought I had found. Uh so some months back a Protestant YouTuber for whom I have a profound deal of love and respect made a video called the biggest and best contradiction from Vatican 2. and he was talking about the issue of religious liberty. Uh I too worried about this puditive contradiction for a while but then I read a fantastic 600page book by Michael Dunigan in which he masterfully shows that there's no contradiction here.
¶609Uh and as always Joe Hishmire gives an excellent synopsis. Okay. So I want to turn to the third and final of the SSPX's doctrinal disagreements. And this is the one that I think they make the strongest case for. It's the doctrine of religious freedom.
¶610Because at a surface level, there certainly appears to be a contradiction between what popes said throughout the 19th and the early 20th century and what the second Vatican council and every subsequent pope has had to say. For example, Pope Gregory the 16th wrote an entire encyclical against liberalism and religious indifferentism, Marari Vos, in which he denounces as absurd the idea that liberty of conscience must be maintained for everyone. Gregory warned that this idea spreads ruin in sacred and civil affairs. Since when all restraints are removed by which men are kept on the narrow path of truth, their nature which is already inclined to evil propels them to ruin. And Pope Pius the 9th similarly warned in his 1864 encyclical Quantura against those who dared to teach that the best form of society is one in which the state made no distinction between true religion false religions or who contradicted scripture, the magisterium and the church fathers by teaching that the ideal civil society is one in which no duty is recognized as attached to the civil power of restraining by enacted penalties offenders against the Catholic religion except so far as public peace may require.
¶611Now alongside Quantura Pas also released his famous syllabus of errors and in the syllabus of errors one of the errors condemned is the idea that every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which guided by the light of reason he shall consider true. Now I want you to compare that language with the language of the Vatican 2 document Dignitus which teaches that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power in such ways that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs whether privately or publicly whether alone or in association with others within due limits. Now first glance that looks like just a blatant contradiction that appears to be the very kind of teaching that Gregory the 16th and Pius the 9th condemned. And if we interpret phrases like religious freedom to mean the way we use them in a secular context, then I think there really does seem to be a contradiction.
¶612But is that what the fathers of Vatican 2 actually meant? Because remember, the mere fact that two things sound contradictory doesn't mean that they are contradictory. Because the very fact that two things might sound the same doesn't mean they are the same. As I pointed out last week, 3 century bishops condemned Paul of Samosada's doctrine of Christ being homoius with the father. And then the bishops in the 4th century teach that Christ is homoius with the father.
¶613That looks like a blatant contradiction, but it's not a real contradiction because Paul had meant something different by the term than the nyine bishops did later. So even though critics accused him of contradiction and of the later council of contradicting the earlier teaching, the reality is that they're just using the same word to describe two things, a true thing and a false thing. So similarly, how do we distinguish the true version of religious liberty taught by Vatican 2 from the illegitimate version of religious liberty or freedom of conscience condemned by 19th century popes? Well, as professor Michael Dunigan points out, the so-called right that the 19th century popes had condemned was this false vision of religious liberty really proposed by enlightenment thinkers. And it was this idea of religious liberty as a positive right to error and a right that had no real limitations beyond perhaps public peace.
¶614And it was rooted in true indifferentism. the idea that one religion was as true and as good as another or at least that the truth of religion was too difficult to ascertain. >> To really understand what the popes are are kind of rejecting in the 19th century, you need to look at the French declaration of the rights of man and the citizen which came out in 1789, the same year as the revolution itself. And the key point there was that when they talked about rights and like the right to conscience or right to worship, their idea of those rights was as a positive authorization that you had you had a a positive right to worship or believe or pretty much say anything that anything that you wish to say or believe, etc. Gregory the 16th is actually explicit that the form of religious liberty that he's condemning is one which arises from that shameful font of indifferentism.
¶615And so the popes rightly reject this false right to religious freedom. And to their credit, the SSPX, I think, will acknowledge that what Vatican 2 affirms is not this indifferent version of religious freedom that Gregory and Pas condemned because what Vatican 2 affirms is something more nuanced. It's quite different. First, it's actually not a positive right at all. Instead, it is an immunity from coercion.
¶616And second, it's an immunity that is limited not only by public peace, but also by the good of society. >> The right to religious liberty is a right to immunity. It's a right not to be interfered with for the most part. Again, within due limits, >> we see these two distinctions in dignitus itself. The declaration rejects indifferentism.
¶617It reaffirms the traditional Catholic doctrine on the moral duty of men and societies toward the true religion and toward the one church of Christ. Instead, what it calls religious freedom is specifically immunity from coercion in civil society. Now, the distinction here between positive rights and immunities, what are some called negative rights is a critical one. In American law, for example, you have a legal immunity from unreasonable searches and seizures. That's a very different thing from saying that you have a positive right to carry drugs or illegal weapons or something.
¶618Even if some people will misuse their legal immunity in just that way, they don't actually have a positive right to it. There's an important distinction there. I hope it's clear. Similarly, the catechism is very clear that the church and parents would deny a child the priceless grace of becoming a child of God were they not to confer baptism shortly after birth. You have no positive right to refuse to baptize your baby.
¶619you're doing an an injustice to your child, but you do have a negative right. We can't force you to get your baby baptized. You have an immunity from coercion in this area. St. Thomas Aquinas actually taught this explicitly, that it'd be immoral for the state to baptize, for example, Jewish children against the will of their parents, arguing that to do so would be a danger to the faith and against natural justice.
¶620And he points out that even when the church had powerful princes on her side, it was never Christian practice to forcibly baptize. Well, use that as kind of a model for understanding this idea of religious liberty. Paragraph 21108 of the catechism is clear. The right to religious liberty is neither a moral license to adhere to error nor a supposed right to error. Error has no rights.
¶621Religious liberty instead is a negative right. It is an immunity within just limits from external constraints in religious matters by political authorities. And those just limits as I said are more limited than in the false enlightenment version of religious liberty. Dignitas human repeatedly stresses that this is a right within due limits. But the boundary there is not simply public order as the enlightenment thinkers thought in public order in a kind of secular sense.
¶622the higher standard of the objective moral order, recognizing the state has a legitimate role as a proper guardian of public morality. And as the catechism points out, those due limits have to be determined in a particular social situation by the virtue of political prudence with a view toward the common good. So this right, the Vatican 2 right, is formulated specifically as a limitation upon the coercive power of the state. Oh, and by the way, although I myself favor Dunigan's resolution of the puditive contradiction here, as Heshmire points out, there are several other resolutions to boot. So, I think it's actually fair to say there are several plausible ways of harmonizing dignitus human with 19th century papal teaching, even though they might look contradictory at the outset.
¶623I like the way that John do. Rosa of the classical theism podcast puts it, >> but I also don't think that it's necessarily a bad thing to have more than one solution. Just like certain Bible difficulties, we might be able to, you know, get to a set of options that, okay, maybe this is the solution, maybe that, maybe we have two or three different options on the table. Maybe we're not sure 100% um which one is correct. If you've ever dealt with alleged Bible difficulties, I think you'll know what John means.
¶624Sometimes there's a clear answer as to how to make sense of two seemingly contradictory passages. Other times, there are several possible solutions. Even if you're not sure which one is correct 100%. It can be enough to show well there are several plausible harmonizations so it doesn't seem like an obvious contradiction. Well, similarly here while there are plenty of examples of people promoting the false version of religious freedom in the name of the council when you look at the actual right to religious liberty described in Dignitas and in the catechism it's significantly different than the false doctrines that are condemned in things like the syllabus of errors.
¶625Now, I'm admittedly I'm only scratching the surface of this topic or really any of the three that we've talked about here. If you want to go much deeper on the alleged contradiction here, I recommend Thomas Pink's debate with Father Martin Ronheimer as well as John De. Ro's two interviews with Michael Dunigan. I'm going to link to all three of those in the description below. And I know that Larry Chap is in the middle of working on his own essay form looking at harmonization there.
¶626So, I'll link to those as well. >> And guys, this Dunigan book was a gamecher for me. I mean, if any of you know Michael Dunigan, you should totally send him this part of the video um because he was hugely responsible for helping me through like a huge barrier to Catholicism and I am eternally grateful to him for that. I even texted some of my friends the following as I was reading it. This Dunigan book is exceptional.
¶627He goes through the drafting process of dignitaratisman, the relatios of the bishop serving as relative for the declaration uh and the transcripts available for the debates among the council fathers about what to include in dignitaratisman and why. There were trad factions, progressive factions, pragmatic factions, and quite astonishingly, the end product is very convincingly argued to be in deep harmony with the 19th century papal pronouncements on religious liberty. Like literally, it looks to me like this is a non-negligible evidence of the guidance of the Holy Spirit. What's also super cool is that some of the earlier drafts of dignitaratismani included justifications for the right to religious liberty, which were in genuinely quite subtle conflict with the past magisterium, but those were removed. In fact, Dunigan argues that there isn't just non-contradiction here, but quite a profound underlying unity between them in their focus on the integrity of the human person.
¶628That is the coherence between his or her private and public life, which integrity is preserved in different ways by the two different rights being discussed in dignitas human and by 19th century popes. And here are some other effects that the book had on me from a private video that I recorded. Um, another thing that I went through in February was Michael Dunigan's book, Religious Liberty and the hermeneutics of continuity. This was like this did wonders for my epistemic life. It almost like the scales fell for my eyes.
¶629So, it first it took what I thought would be a slam dunk magisterial contradiction and basically nullified it to the point that I'm not concerned about religious liberty anymore. Second, seeing the extreme care of the council fathers in debating and drafting and revising dignitaratis human and seeing that the church is basically run by philosopher theologians made the unity mark of the church stick out like a sore thrum a sore thumb like no one else can do this. No one else is unified enough. Um third this in turn just made tangible like the vivacity the liveless of the church. As I said orthodoxy is oified since it was cut from the branch.
¶630Protestantism is splintered unto death. No one else is continually growing and expanding into a mustard tree with what appears to be like living authority. Fourth, I don't know, it's very surprising to me if Catholicism is false that the council fathers managed to delicately land on a formulation of the right to religious liberty and a grounding of that right, which is a continuous harmonious development of previous doctrine. There were so many ways that they could have screwed up on this front and they were just like demonstrably close to screwing up in earlier drafts of dignitaries human and yet they didn't. This is what the Dunning book brought out and it seems I don't know it seems like suspiciously like guidance from the Holy Spirit maybe.
¶631I don't know. Uh and then fifth as a kind of high order point going through the Dunning book it sort of just like inspired confidence that with enough care and scholarship I could work through and like reasonably satisfactorially resolve my other magisterial problems and maybe even my non-magisterial problems too. It kind of just showed me like, wow, I I thought that this was just like a boom, clear contradiction in [laughter] the magisterium. Like, look, look how wrong I was. Okay, so another of one of these puditively slam dunk contradictions in the magisterium is just falling by the wayside as you dig in deeper.
¶632Uh let's go to a third and final puditive contradiction uh from when this actually isn't a contradiction. This one is just a seemingly false statement. So, this is from Xerj Domin. Um so the final magisterial difficulty that I resolved was uh one of the papal condemnations in uh the bull exs Sergey domin's 1520 bowl against Martin Luther in which he condemned 41 propositions drawn from Luther's writings among them was the proposition that heretics be burned is against the will of the spirit or more colloquially it is against the will of God that heretics be burned that was condemned right that was condemned by a pope that it is against the will of God that heretics be burned. And that initially seemed to me to be like morally appalling.
¶633Like surely burning people alive for heresy is against the will of God. So like why would a pope condemn the statement that it is? Seemed like when I first came across this, oh boom, it's over. Game over for Catholicism, right? But here too, Dunigan offers a resolution.
¶634Xerj dominate does not specify the particular censure applying to each proposition. Instead, Leo condemns the 41 propositions collectively. He issues a non-specific condemnation, a blanket condemnation. And the collective condemnation of the 41 propositions, they're they're condemned as either quote heretical, scandalous, false, offensive to pious ears, or seductive of simple minds," unquote. And he doesn't tell us which propositions fall under which category.
¶635So the claim about burning heretics need not have been condemned as false or heretical. It easily could have been judged as simply misleading or dangerous in its historical context. Given the widespread but mistaken assumption that punishment for heresy should involve execution by burning. Saying heretics should not be burned could easily have conveyed to ordinary hearers to ordinary lay Catholics that heresy was no big deal or should receive no ecclesiastical censure at all. Like I mean compare someone today announcing we shouldn't imprison child rapists.
¶636You'd be like whoa hold on hold on a second. Like that statement could easily be understood as denying that child rape deserves punishment since imprisonment is the minimum punishment that most of us envisage for such a crime, right? Given our prevailing socioultural circumstances. And that's true even if the speaker actually thinks that yeah child rapists should be punished but just by some non-carceral means. So I might condemn that statement as offensive to upstanding ears or misleading to simple folk even if I'm not intending to say that your statement is false.
¶637And so by analogy the condemnation of the proposition her burning heretics is against God's will does not imply that it's Catholic doctrine that burning heretics accords with God's will. The proposition easily could have been condemned simply because it's misleading to simple minds or apt to cause offense to devout Catholics at the time given the prevailing uh socioultural circumstances and their prevailing understandings of uh what the sorts of punishments are for um different things. To give another analogy, there were periods in which helioentrism or evolution would have offended many sincere and pious Catholics because they mistakenly believe that scripture required geocentrism or young earth creationism. But those interpretations of scripture are false. And neither geocentrism nor young earth creationism ever constituted Catholic doctrine.
¶638Consequently, a true proposition like helioentrism could offend pious ears and could be condemned as such like that's within papal authority. They could condemn that as offensive to pious ears. So like such that at the time like you know you shouldn't be saying this even if the denial of the relevant proposition even if the denial of helioentrism so geocentrism is not Catholic doctrine. So likewise, the proposition burning heretics is against God's will may be both true and offensive to pious ears and condemned as such, even if its denial is not Catholic doctrine. And so consequently, yet another seemingly intractable magisterial proposition fell by the wayside through diligent, careful investigation.
¶639Of course, I had other magisterial objections. You know, I I had certain objections to uh the Marian dogmas. They didn't bother me all that much to be honest. um and various other teachings. But these just, you know, pald in comparison to the foregoing three that we already went over.
¶640But just briefly, because I know some of you think about these things and are worried about them. I mean, just take Mary's perpetual virginity. I could go into all the reasons why Protestant objections here are weak, but others have already done that. See, for instance, you know, the Ecclesia Antiqua article here on screen, did Jesus have biological brothers? Why Protestants should be agnostic?
¶641that's uh linked in the resource document as well as the the various books and videos in the resource document and the books that I'll mention momentarily. So like I could go through like all those reasons why the Protestant objections here are weak. But honestly, like come on, man. Like, if you have objections to the Catholic dogma here, maybe, just maybe, the virtually universal consensus on Mary's perpetual virginity in the Western and Eastern Christian tradition for well over a thousand years before Protestantism even existed, is aware of something that you're not. Or maybe you've simply misappraised the evidence or made some other error in your thinking.
¶642And the utter barrage of empirical evidence for Catholic vindicatory miracles is just screaming that you've missed something. Like it wouldn't be the first time that that's happened to you on abstract theological topics, including ones that you studied in depth. The Pharisees thought they had a correct reading of scripture and tradition when they denied that any man has the authority to forgive sins. Christ pointed to a vindicatory miracle to refute them. So that you may know that the Son of Man has the authority to forgive sins, get up and walk.
¶643You don't want to be like the Pharisees, clinging to your abstract theoretical interpretation of scripture in the face of a manifest demonstration of divine power to the contrary, do you? And like, my dude, just snap out of it. We literally have Mary appearing to people and telling them that you're wrong. Like, conform your mind to the empirical facts. Like, like your Protestant errors about the Marian dogmas have been refuted by the mother of God herself.
¶644Through her, God has vindicated with manifest miraculous signs the immaculate conception and the assumption and prayers to her and consecrations to her and on and on and on and on and on and on and on. My friend, at some point it becomes obstinacy. Anyway, if you're interested in the Marian dogmas, definitely check out uh Dr. Cesar Bernstein's article um the book by Barrett Petra. He has a really good chapter in there on um uh perpetual virginity and you know like the other marrying dogmas as well.
¶645Scott Han has or was it no Staples I think Staples has behold your mother and then yeah Scott Han has hail holy queen so check out um you know those books for more on the Marian dogmas those defend them in at extensive length um you can also see this video defending the assumption this is just utterly fantastic this three-hour video between um Ethan Muse Swansona and William Alrech on capturing Catholicism like you absolutely need to watch that um and they recommend further academic resources therein And also of course you again check out all the other videos in the resource document. And if if you have other magisterial problems, check out that document since it'll contain links about a number of other things. Okay, so now we've just seen how my, you know, magisterial objections, my magisterial barriers fell by the wayside. Onwards we marched to my seventh barrier, theological problems. Okay, so like foremost among these were problems with trinitarianism, the incarnation, and the Catholic model of God.
¶646I've also included purgatory for good measure since, you know, while that wasn't something that I struggled with, I I know it's something that many Protestants struggle with. So, I'll say a few things about that very briefly, just maybe to make it like make some conceptual sense for people who might otherwise be inclined. Um, okay. Trinitarianism. Trinitarianism commits us to thinking that the father is God and the son is God.
¶647But if A is B and C is also B, well then it seems like A is C by transitivity, right? So the father is the son. But that conflicts with trinitarianism which says that the father is not the son. So you like what what's going on here? Isn't trinitarianism incoherent?
¶648Uh no it it's not. The argument here assumes that the word is in the claims that the father is god and the son is god is strict absolute linenian numerical identity and that if it is then such a relation must be transitive in all cases. But there are just tons of totally consistent or and orthodox models of trinitarianism in the literature on which the word is in those claims is instead the is associated with constitution or qua objects or relative identity that is identity relative to a sortal like one and the same being as but not one in the same person as and just like so on down the list of a bunch of different consistent metaphysical models. Um heck there are also sophisticated defenders who who do go in for strict absolute limits numerical identity I think. um but who think that transitivity can fail in certain cases and they have like putitive counter examples to that.
¶649Now I'm not going to wade into the theological depths here. Just like check out the resource document for some, you know, some papers and podcasts and videos and whatnot. Instead, I'll just make like a few general points that, you know, just removed this barrier for me. Um so first, as I said, there are just like lots of non-silly models and moves available in the philosophical and the theological literature for getting a consistent model of trinitarian for getting a consistent and orthodox model of trinitarianism. and their disjunction is not at all super unlikely and I shouldn't be super confident that like all of the various models and moves fail.
¶650But then the objection to trinitarianism just seems like really weak. Second, this is just like an abstract speculative theoretical objection. And you know, again, we know that we're kind of sucky at reasoning about these matters. So I should have a lot of higher order uncertainty about the objection to begin with. Uncertainty that, you know, tempers the force of the objection to the point that it's easily overcome by the enormous evidence from miracles.
¶651Third, by Catholicism's own lights, the Trinity is a deep mystery of the faith. So, we shouldn't expect to fully understand it or see exactly how it works. As Alexander Puce notes, we already know from science and philosophy that fundamental aspects of the world are mysterious and verge on contradiction. You know, like photons or particles and waves, light from the headlamp on a fast train goes at the same speed relative to the train and relative to the ground. Objects persist while changing.
¶652We shouldn't murder, but we should redirect the trolley and the trolley problem, etc. Like given like given that the deeper we dig in physics and philosophy, the stranger and more counterintuitive and paradoxical seeming things start to seem, it shouldn't be too surprising that the same would happen with like literally the deepest and most ultimate fact about the world, namely God's inner trinitarian life. Okay, so what about the incarnation? Now, my main worry for the incarnation was that incompatible predicates seemed true of the one person Christ. You know, because he's essentially God and essentially man, he has the essential attributes of each.
¶653But then Christ is both immutable and mutable, impeccable and peeable, timeless and temporal, immaterial and material, simple and composite and so on. Like doesn't this land us in contradictions galore? No, it doesn't. And these three books by Tim Paul together resolve the contradictions entirely. In short, we can cash out the meanings of these predicates as nature relative.
¶654So for instance to be timeless in the sense relevant to christoologgical predication is to have a nature which exists outside time and to be temporal is to have a nature which exists in time. So being timeless and temporal is indeed contradictory for any being with only one nature. But if a being has two natures which doesn't seem logically inconsistent in itself then that being can be both timeless and temporal in the senses relevant to christoologgical predication. Now, that's just a brief glimpse into Tim Paul's model. You should definitely read those books for more.
¶655And in fact, it turns out that there are just like a bunch of metaphysical moves in the philosophical and the theological literature in addition to Tim Paul's that would also avert the contradiction like introducing qua operators or various other fancy philosophical. I'm not going to explore these. I'm not going to explore these further. My main point is just that as with trinitarianism, there are just tons of non-silly models and moves available in the philosophical and theological literature and their disjunction suffices to make objections to the incarnation not particularly serious. And again, you know, first, this is an abstract speculative theoretical objection.
¶656We know we're kind of sucky at reasoning about those matters. Second, the positive evidence for Catholicism and Christianity just clearly overwhelmingly outweighs the force of the objection at hand. Third, by Catholicism's own lights, the incarnation is a deep mystery of the faith. So, we shouldn't expect to fully understand it or see exactly how it works. Again, this is like an ultimate or deep fact about the world and and we've already learned from physics that like stuff down there can be pretty counterintuitive and confusing and hard to wrap your mind around.
¶657Okay, turning now to my concerns with Catholicism's model of God. As many of you know, I I have had lots of worries. I've published lots of worries about the Catholic model of God. And here, I'll just briefly cover some of my main worries. But again, like the same recurring points were most forceful to me.
¶658These are abstract speculative theoretical objections concerning which there's lots of disagreement. We know we're kind of sucky at this sort of reasoning and much worse than we are at empirical reasoning. Like listen, did he have a leg or not? [laughter] Did he have a leg or not? Like pretty hard to be mistaken about that.
¶659Like or did she have lupus vulgaras ulcers all over her face or not? Like [laughter] not not too hard to be wrong about that. Um, and the positive evidence for Catholicism, again, this is a recurring theme, just completely mogs these like tenuous objections ultimately based on highly fallible, not widely shared abstract intuitions. Okay, so again, those were just like the metapoints that I keep on returning to because they're they're forceful and I think they succeed. But like my biggest objections on the first order level to Catholicism's model of God concerned divine simplicity and divine timelessness.
¶660So let's take each in turn. So Catholicism teaches divine simplicity, which is the view that God is simple. He's not a composite being made up of parts. But you know there are a number of objections to divine simplicity including ones that I've pushed in the past. You can see my paper for instance uh from modal collapse to providential collapse in philosophia for you know some objections that in the past I took to be forceful.
¶661I'm not going to comb through like all the objections to divine simplicity. Uh instead I'm going to explain my general strategy for responding to them qua challenges to Catholicism. So first most of my objections were to a high octane tomistic model of divine simplicity. But Catholics are not magisterially bound to accept the tomistic model of divine simplicity and that just voids many of the objections to divine simplicity of force if they're profered as criticisms of Catholicism. So allow me to elaborate and you know of course if anything I say is at odds with the magisterium burn what I say utterly disregard it and let me know so that I can you know update my beliefs.
¶662Um, so the important point to see is that there is no magisterially defined metaphysical analysis of parthood. As Dr. Tim Paul put it to me in private correspondence, there's therefore real room for a large swath of answers to that question about what exactly part is or consists in. And the notion of simplicity in Catholic dogma, he continues, is philosophically underdetermined and allows various views. So then I mean like here are just like some things that I don't know like for all I'm aware of are consistent with Catholicism.
¶663Um, maybe parts have to be concrete objects, in which case God having distinct properties wouldn't compromise God's simplicity. Or maybe parts have to be explanatory prior to their whole in at least some respect. And in which case, like God having distinct properties would not compromise God's simplicity if they're in no way explanatorily prior to him. Or maybe to be part of a whole, you have to stand in some metaphysically robust distinction relation to that whole even if there are less robust relations of distinction like numerical distinction or formal distinction, etc. that don't introduce composition.
¶664Now I'm again I'm not saying that any of these claims are true or altogether devoid of problems. The point is just that there may be a wide variety of metaphysical analyses of parthood consistent with the Catholic dogma that God is partless but which avoid almost all the objections to divine simplicity since almost all those objections are directed toward you know extremely stringent conceptions of parthood and also there just like are several extant non-toistic models of simplicity which don't face all the objections to toistic models such as Scottistic models of divine simplicity from from Scotus you see the work work of Keith Ward there and truthmaker accounts of divine simplicity you can see the work of um Alexander Pruce his paper like onto problems of divine simplicity or um Jeff Brower his paper making sense of divine simplicity. So that's my fir so that's my first response. Second of all even high octane models of divine simplicity are quite robust to criticism. I've argued in print that modal collapse objections fail.
¶665I have this paper called the fruitful death of modal collapse arguments published in the international journal for philosophy of religion where I think I show quite convincingly if I do say so myself that um modal collapse objections are just like manifest failures. Um, Tim Paul and W. Matthews Grant have made like good responses to my aloneeness argument, so you should read their paper published in religious studies in response to my aloneess argument. And also, I think that like ultimately the real underlying problem that I had for divine simplicity, um, just went back to these problems of providential and intentional collapse, but I'm no longer convinced that those objections work. So, yes, I do repudiate a lot of my past work, my past published work.
¶666Uh, I was wrong. Koopa Koopa [laughter] Mario. Okay, I'll be brief here because only like 01% of you will understand what I'm about to say. But to take just my providential collapse objection, ultimately it fails because agent causing an intention with leeway is something over which agents can have control. And yet the principles that I rely on in that paper would implausibly imply otherwise.
¶667At the very least, nothing in the paper shows that leeway agent causal libertarianism is incoherent. Yet, it would need to do so in order to succeed. Third, I did worry about how to mesh trinitarianism with divine simplicity, but once again, there are so many non-silly ways to respond to that challenge in the literature. And besides, this is like abstract philosophy, and I just can't compete with the manifest miraculous evidence. Like, I just like imagine like seeing Jesus and being like, "Well, hold on a second.
¶668Like, how do you mesh trinitarianism with simplicity, huh?" Like dude, you know, I'm feeling his wounds. I'm like one person removed from a like a s from a doctor producing a signed report palpating the wounds like basically the passion wounds uh reduplication of the passion wounds of Padre Peio, right? Like I'm I'm one I I'm one testimony removed from that. And you like there are bunches of other doctors who were there and saw like multi complex multimodal experiences with Padre Pio's passion wounds as well. And you know here I also like uh Tim Paul's clever quip.
¶669He says like, "Well, what of the trinity? Check to the mate, Aquinus." In reply, the persons are not bits or bobs or constituents or parts of God. So, the trinity is no counterexam to the traditional doctrine of divine simplicity. Also, come on. You think you can snag Aquinus in a contradiction just like that between sips of coffee?
¶670He's a pretty clever fellow. Even if you think his answer is eventually unsatisfactory, his theology of God isn't immediately blatantly idiotic. Give him more credit than that. Again, check the resource document for uh you know, lots of excellent defenses of divine simplicity. Okay, turning now to divine timelessness.
¶671Catholicism teaches that God is altogether outside of time. His life is totally devoid of succession and there's no before and after in his life. In fact, he's immutable or unchangeable. My biggest objection to divine timelessness came from dynamic theories of time. According to these theories, there is objective temporal becoming or like real passage or flow of time.
¶672the future doesn't exist, but it genuinely comes into being as the present kind of like advances. There's also an objective distinction between past, present, and future. And the present is kind of like metaphysically privileged in some way. Now, there are lots of reasons to believe a dynamic theory of time. And under a dynamic theory of time, it seems like God's knowledge must change in order to track the changing facts of the world.
¶673So, for instance, it seems like God must go from knowing that dinosaurs exist to knowing that dinosaurs don't exist as dinosaurs pass from existence to complete extinction. But like how can God be immutable if his knowledge changes? Well, at least three responses can be given to this challenge. First, consider that not all of our knowledge is mediated by mental representations. We can know about our mental states by direct acquaintance.
¶674In other words, we can be immediately aware of our mental states. Aware of them directly, not by virtue of our awareness of like representations of them. So, for example, when you're in pain, you can simply notice or attend to your pain without having to consult like a distinct state which represents that pain. And God's knowledge of the world may be analogous. God can know about the universe by direct acquaintance without having to rely on internal representations of it.
¶675I mean, God, after all, is like cognitively perfect, right? He doesn't need to rely on internal representations that mediate his access to the facts. Instead, the facts are immediately present to his gaze. But then notice that if the facts themselves change, that doesn't mean God needs to change since he doesn't have any internal model that needs to like change to track the changing facts. So the changes on this model are wholly on the part of creation, not in God.
¶676And so we can preserve God's timelessness even under dynamic theories of time. Second, we could instead adopt a strange but really cool picture of reality on which like what exists is relative to one's perspective or reference frame. So from the creaturely perspective, sure, maybe past and future don't exist. Only the present exists and time like dynamically progresses forward. But from God's perspective, maybe all of the past, present, and future are laid bare before his gaze.
¶677And so past, present, and future all exist equally for God. And for God, time does not dynamically progress. Now granted, like that's a weird view, but you know, hey, the weird and the incoherent are very different things. And it wouldn't be I don't know, it wouldn't be too surprising if these deep and ultimate features of reality, you know, are pretty counterintuitive and difficult for us to grasp. Uh, and even if you find the view here implausible, again, all I'm trying to do is sufficiently mitigate the force of the objection to allow the miraculous case to win the day.
¶678But but anyway, like that's not my favorite approach. Um but it is another approach that one can take in response to this challenge to divine timelessness. Third of all, dynamic theories of time are very controversial and in fact seem to be you know the slight minority among philosophers compared to static theories of time. According to static theories of time, the universe is a four-dimensional block. Time is a fourth dimension along which things extend much like they extend in space.
¶679And there's no objective becoming or dynamism or like recession of events from the future to the present and then into the past. And if a static theory of time is true, then the objection just completely dissolves. I mean the objection just like manifestly rests on um dynamic views of time. Okay. So that's how I work through my objections to the Catholic model of God.
¶680Onwards we march to um purgatory. Yes indeed. Purgatory a substance a substance has properties that is to say. Uh okay. Uh now in my appendix okay getting back to the video.
¶681I know this is a sticking point for some Protestants. First, I'd strongly recommend these resources, which are also contained in the resource document. Like, you need to you need to read these, my friends, uh, or watch them. One of the biggest worries that certain Protestants have is that purgatory makes a mincemeat of Christ's atoning sacrifice, denying that it's sufficient to cover all sin. But that's not right.
¶682Suppose I destroy your car. I completely total it. I apologize, sincerely ask for your forgiveness. You forgive me, and so no longer jeritically hold me guilty. But your car is still destroyed and I plausibly owe you some sort of like reparation or amends or satisfaction to restore the order of justice.
¶683You know, I should like pay your insurance dues, for instance. Or maybe I should even buy you a new car or at least pay for a large chunk of your new car. That's analogous to temporal debt due to sin. I've been forgiven. Yeah, but right order should be restored and I should make amends for what I did.
¶684The analogy isn't perfect, you know, since Christ already like super abundantly satisfied for our sins. Um, and this objectively sufficient satisfaction though is only applied to us personally if we cooperate with God's grace through penance and satisfaction. So it it's more like the following. Your very generous best friend paid you in full, nay, in excess, for the car on my behalf. So my debt has been paid by another.
¶685However, you have the choice whether and how to accept this offering of your best friend and in particular how it applies to the relationship between you and me. Specifically, it might be fitting and perfectly appropriate for you to only apply this payment to my account if I perform the above mentioned reparatory acts which will be painful for me. Here in your justice and wisdom, you choose to apply your friend's repayment in a way that not only satisfies the objective debt, but also repairs our relationship and reforms my character. I might freely resist your conditions here. In which case, even though my debt to you is objectively paid in full, the fruits of that repayment, like a restored relationship, etc., do not acrew to me.
¶686or I might accept those conditions but still occasionally treat you sub-optimally. And in those cases, it might be perfectly appropriate for you given your standing conditions for applying the fruits of the objectively sufficient repayment on my behalf to ask me to perform certain further acts of reparation which derive their efficacy from and are fully enabled by the person paying my debt to you on my behalf. Like, you know, like had he not done that, I I wouldn't be able to have this standing condition uh offer from you. This seems this seems to me to be a perfectly sensible way for you to go about our interpersonal relationship and my standing in relation to you. It also allows me to freely participate in the satisfaction for my sins as an instrumental derivative secondary cause applying and appropriating your generous friend's satisfaction.
¶687And it also builds my character in the process. If we further add in my own ability to vicariously apply the super abundant payment from your friend on behalf of others who have wronged you in various ways, I can be a differencemaker in the lives of others because I can diminish how much they need to repair their relationship with you through costly sacrifices. And the analogy by now should be clear though no analogy is perfect. Christ is your generous friend. You are the father.
¶688I am a sinful human. Christ's atonement is objectively more than sufficient to satisfy the whole debt of the human race. However, the application of this satisfaction to the debts of particular individuals is participatory, right? Like we must freely cooperate with God's grace for the satisfaction to personally apply to us as individuals. The limitation, as as Ethan Muse once put it to me, like the limitation of satisfaction is not grounded in a deficiency in Christ's merit, but a deficiency in our reception.
¶689You know, like sometimes we just don't accept God's conditions or only imperfectly fulfill them, just as I may not have accepted your conditions on applying the repayment on my behalf. It is totally fitting and appropriate and not very surprising and reasonable that the application of Christ's merits be contingent on cooperation with sanctifying grace and proportionate to the measure of cooperation just as you had justifying reason to make the application of your friend's super abundant repayment contingent on my free acceptance of your relationship repairing and personally sanctifying conditions. And this is what Paul is getting at when he says that I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake and in my flesh I fill up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body that is the church. There is nothing lacking in Christ's suffering considered in itself and objectively. But there remains something lacking in its application to and participation by humans and the church.
¶690Our satisfactory or reparative acts have derivative and participatory redemptive value. They apply the fruits of the passion to ourselves and others, but they don't add to Christ's intrinsic merit. They are, as it were, mere conduits through which Christ's merits are applied and directed, much like how mirrors direct and apply the sun's light. So like here, mirrors are the secondary participatory causes of illumination, whereas the sun is the primary unervative cause or sole source thereof. And much the same way with grace and merit and whatnot, right?
¶691Christ is like the son. He's the, you know, the underivative cause or source of grace. And we are like, you know, the conduits, the secondary participatory causes of, you know, like meritorious graces. And with all this in mind, we can see how purgatory does not deny Christ's super abundantly atoning sacrifice. Christ's sacrifice is objectively more than sufficient to cover not only the guilt of all sin, but also all the temporal debt of sin.
¶692But it's up to God's sovereign decision how that super abundant merit is applied personally on each individual's behalf. And God has just contingently freely ordained that the guilt of one's personal sins are only remitted through baptism and repentance. Likewise, he has ordained that the temporal debt of sin is only remitted through baptism and uniting one's sacrificial acts and suffering with Christ's passion for the sake of reparation. If one dies without having made enough reparation for one's forgiven sins, that reparation and attendant purification from attachment to the sins continues for a period in the afterlife. And that period of pgation and reparation or satisfaction is purgatory.
¶693And we also see in the Bible the distinction between forgiven sin and remaining temporal debt. You know since God forgives David but David still suffers temporal punishment owing to his sins namely the death of his child. And note that even Protestants tend to think that one is only forgiven of one's sins if one appropriately repents or if one has faith or you know whatever whatever they say. So Protestants themselves need this distinction between the objective sufficiency of Christ's atonement and its personal application to individuals. I mean unless they want only like a limited atonement which is just flatly unbiblical.
¶694Christ died for all. God wills the salvation of all. You know we don't even need to get into all the passages here but like like you know consider the unregenerate sinner who is currently unrepentant and unfaithful. Their sins are not currently forgiven. You know they are still guilty of sin right yet Protestants generally they don't tend to think this means that Christ's death was somehow like not sufficient to atone for that person's current sins.
¶695Like no, on the contrary, Christ's sacrifice is perfectly sufficient to cover the guilt of that person's current sins, but Christ's merits do not yet apply to their current sins because the person has not yet sought forgiveness or made an act of faith or whatever. But anyway, you know, I hope that this humble and wicked servant has been able to at least help at least some Protestants in the audience who worry about purgatory at least make some kind of conceptual sense of this this doctrine. And like you might just think like, but but why why does God do this? Well, it's a means by which we can help each other, right? Like we here on earth, we can do acts, we can do self-sacrificial acts to um help people in purgatory and that may very well enable an infinitely better afterlife for us and the souls in purgator purgatory that we helped because it may very well make our relationship with them better for all of eternity because some of us here on earth for instance took on some acts of self-denial united to Christ's passion in love for the sake of that soul in purgatory.
¶696And like you know and about like participatory redemptive suffering more generally like this is just one of the means that God instituted by which we can spiritually aid one another out of love right love is a gift of self to another. It manifests profound love when you serve others through some cost to yourself either of time or comfort or whatever. This is why greater love hath no one than this than a man lay down his life for his friends. Mortifications are a form of laying down your life for others. By putting them and their intentions above your own pleasure and comfort and time and and by voluntarily foregoing pleasure or taking on some kind of discomfort or suffering, we can turn these acts into prayers.
¶697It's a spiritual sacrifice offered to God in love that serves as a meritorious cause of grace toward a salutary end. And again, you know, just like stepping back, even if you can't resolve your particular difficulties with purgatory, you know, like again, God has manifestally vindicated the Catholic Church, so you should submit to Rome TM. Uh, even if you can't make sense of all of its teachings upon, you know, your own private scientific examination. I mean, like, you know, compare the example of seeing the risen Christ and not being able to understand his teachings or even being able to see how they could be true in light of other things you take yourself to justifiably believe. All right, barrier number eight.
¶698Catholicism is so complex. So listen, there are so many commitments of Catholicism. Like it's just this towering edifice of claims that all have to turn out right if Catholicism is true. And if even a single one turns out false, the whole Jenga tower just falls. It collapses.
¶699And that and that and that may seem daunting from a psychological standpoint, but on a probabilistic level, doesn't it seem like Catholicism should therefore have like a prohibitively low prior probability? Like after all, it's a massive conjunction of claims, and conjunctions can't be more probable than their least probable conjuncts. Moreover, the improbability of the whole conjunction is just going to dwindle and dwindle the more uncertain claims you add to it. So, we might worry that this ginormous conjunction and therefore Catholicism itself is going to be hopelessly unlikely from the outset such that, you know, only the most astonishingly decisive evidence could possibly overcome its initially microscopic probability. Okay, so how do I respond to this objection?
¶700Um well first as it happens and as we've seen there literally is the most astonishingly decisive evidence for Catholicism in the form of a veritable army of manifest vindicatory miracles. Like what am I to tell you my friend? But like I don't know I think the objection fails on several other counts as well. So let let's go through those. So second the the objection neglects that the manifold Catholic commitments are clearly highly probabilistically dependent.
¶701To see this, imagine that the Virgin Mary visibly appeared to the whole world and then literally rearranged the stars in the night sky to write three claims. The mass is a propetiatory sacrifice, transubstantiation is true, and purgatory exists. That would obviously just be decisive evidence for Catholicism. I mean like if we saw this evidence, everyone should become Catholic. But notice that only like three doctrines are vindicated here, right?
¶702Like propishiatory, sacrificial nature of the mass, the existence of purgatory, and transubstantiation. Even so, the entire Catholic system is almost certainly true if we witness this evidence. It's mathematically provable from this that u of Catholic commitments are highly probabilistically correlated in such a way that they cannot be treated as independently compounding costs or or sources of significant compounding uncertainty. If we conditionalize on just a few central or distinctive doctrines, the rest very naturally follow. Heck, vindicating just one distinctive doctrine seems enough.
¶703Like if Mary just wrote in the stars, "Yep, the mass is a propy sacrifice." [laughter] then that would be enough I think to show that Catholicism is is true or at least probably true. Third, many of the reasons why people are so uncertain about or unconfident in Catholic commitments are themselves also highly probabilistically correlated such that if you found out that you were mistaken about one of the Catholic commitments, your source of uncertainty about the others would be undermined. As we saw earlier, this is certainly true with respect to intuitions, right? Like if you found out that the Catholic Church was right about contraception, that it's intrinsically evil, or like, you know, right about gay sex, you should significantly decrease your confidence in your other intuitions against Catholic teaching, like you being mistaken about these confirms that there's some deeper story going on here, which accounts for why your intuitions might be going ary with respect to a wide range of other intuitions, including ones about transgenderism and suicide and hell and the male priesthood, etc. Like maybe your conscience is just ill-formed either as a either as a result of the errant socioultural mores that you've embied or the intellect darkening effects of original sin or your sinful actions which had deadened your conscience or whatever or maybe you're making some false philosophical assumption that is biasing or tainting your intuitions or which undergirds many of your non-atholic moral judgments and you know like again stepping back like this this point doesn't just apply to intuitions uh it also applies to lots of other stuff like like if you learn that Protestants were wrong about solid Okay.
¶704And that even Paul teaches that only faith animated by charity justifies. You should start to think that maybe you just grew up in an epistemically deficient Protestant community, which is just bad at interpreting scripture, which should then cast doubt on your other interpretations incompatible with Catholicism, right? So like a lot of these sources of uncertainty for Catholicism are like actually probabistically correlated. Fourth, many apparently exotic Catholic commitments are not actually very improbable conditional on much thinner background assumptions. In fact, many of its seemingly strange and improbable commitments fall out quite naturally from independently plausible views about God, creation, the moral life, and revelation.
¶705Take angels for example. As we saw in part five in the section on demonic phenomena, if God exists, it's hardly anticently implausible that he would create angels and give them a genuine choice about whether to love and obey him. Some might then abuse their freedom and turn against God, that is, become demons. And it's likewise not terribly surprising that God might delegate to some of these beings particular responsibilities within creation including responsibilities for helping other creatures spiritually and physically. Like we already know that we have differencem responsibility over the lives of other humans and animals.
¶706And we already know that these can improve our relationships with each other and with animals. So again like why not do the same with higher beings with respect respect to us. The idea of guardian angels for example can be understood as one way God might distribute responsibility by entrusting particular persons to the care of particular angels. And again this is just like one example. When you unpack the Catholic picture a bit more, a whole range of apparently exotic or primmaacia anticedently implausible Catholic commitments start looking considerably less anticedently improbable.
¶707Something similar applies to the church and the papacy. Suppose God creates creatures like us and wants to reveal himself to us. Since we're embodied beings, it would hardly be surprising if he revealed himself through physical and historical means like establishing an earthly community or kingdom. And if God establishes such a kingdom, it would be totally unsurprising that in addition to giving it a law code, as I've said before, he gives it a living means of resolving disputes about the law code. Like who establishes a kingdom without anything analogous to a court system or some authoritative method of adjudicating disagreements?
¶708And it also wouldn't be too surprising if there is some single visible head so that you know whether you're in the right church by whether you're united to him and where he has the final say when doctrinal disputes arise. unlike a group of patriarchs or private individuals who can't settle disputes when they disagree because none has more authority than the others. So like even from the armchair, it's not especially surprising that revelation might come with a visible institution with a single head and a living teaching authority capable of settling disputes. So the papacy just fits like I don't know kind of naturally into a broader picture of how how God might govern and teach an embodied social species. Oh, and notice that this also makes it not super surprising that if there is a true religion, then it might actually be a pretty articulated system, right?
¶709Like if, as I've argued, it's not like super surprising that God would establish a visible institution for preserving and promulgating his revelation to the world, then as controversies naturally arise, that institution would need to make increasingly precise and elaborate distinctions and clarifications and condemnations in order to exclude increasingly precise errors, right? I mean, the same thing happens with like scientific theories, right? like when in and when increasingly elaborate misunderstandings and um false views come into play like you got to get increasingly detailed and elaborate in like trying to explain no no those views are false stop you know here's what the the theory actually says and you know as you learn more and more and unpack your scientific theory more and more it actually becomes more and more elaborated here's my fifth response to the Catholicism is so complex objection the logical strength of Catholicism is a theoretical virtue because it gives Catholicism greater predictive power. A theory that doesn't say much is difficult to falsify, but for the same reason, it receives relatively little confirmation when something compatible with it occurs since it simply doesn't make strong predictions. Catholicism sticks its neck out.
¶710It makes highly specific claims about Mary, the Eucharist, saints, demons, sacramentals, ecclesial authority, and so on. So when the world contains striking Marian apparitions and eucharistic miracles and saintly charisms and phenomena associated with demons and exorcisms and the like, Catholicism predicts that evidence far better than less contentful views like religious pluralism or Protestantism which have to merely in flailingly at that accommodate the data. So Catholicism's logical strength yields massive confirmation of Catholicism when its risky predictions come out true. And boy have they. Sixth, let's just get a vibes check.
¶711Catholicism is like one of the biggest theological traditions the world has ever seen. It's enjoyed some of the smartest people the world has ever seen. It's produced many of the saintliest people the world has ever seen. It's taken seriously by very highly intelligent people and by over like a billion people around the world. Like if over a billion people accept something, if it's a saintmaking factory, you know, if it's been one of the biggest benefactors in human history, if it has some of the best philosophy and some of the best philosophers, it would just seem odd [laughter] to assign it just like a negligible prior, like to just be so supremely confident that it's false before looking at the evidence.
¶712Like, like, come on, dude. Like, just just vibe just vibe with me for a moment. Why would you be basically certain it's false when there are these towering intellects of the past and present who adhere to the religion and who have like 300 IQ as well as these demonstrabably saintly Catholics who just overwhelmingly mock us in terms of their holiness. Like you know Padre Peio is describing himself as the least of the servants of the pope. He's saying how all of his sufferings and prayers and penences are insignificant.
¶713Meanwhile, he's feeling the scourging at every mass he offers. And you know maybe maybe you've seen the scourging in Mel Gibson's The Passion of Christ. It's like the most disgusting agonizing thing you can basically witness. And you know like Padre Pio is feeling that like basically basically every mass according to his testimony if I recall correctly and he's doing a mass daily and he's saying this is insignificant and he's offering up for people. Oh and like Maxim KBY is volunteering to starve to death in Ashvitz to save a family man.
¶714And Mia Gerretti is not complaining when she's given a barbaric surgery without anesthesia and she's forgiving her attacker and offering up all of her suffering for like the salvation of souls. And Damon de of Malachi is traveling to the outcast and downtrodden at an island of lepers to administer to them eventually succumbing to the disease himself. Like if a tradition is DOING ALL OF THAT, IF it has that effect on people, the vibes should not lead you to assign a negligible credence to this thing before looking at other evidence. The vibes are like, whoa, like maybe there's something going on here. Like I don't know, it seems to have a radically transformative impact on people who take it particularly seriously.
¶715And again, the vibes check. Like if this is like one of the biggest religions the world has ever seen, it's a saintmaking factory. Billion over a billion people today accept it. Like you should not start off with a negligible prior in this sort of thing. Like you, my friend, could be mistaken about which religion is true.
¶716That wouldn't be super surprising. And you're like, I've gone through a lot of evidence here that maybe you weren't even aware of or didn't even know existed. And all this leads me to my to my seventh point, which is that like we should just have like higher order uncertainty about the right way to distribute our priors. So like even if you think mistakenly that Catholicism should probably start off inquiry with a negligible chance, you shouldn't be certain that it should start that way. But so long as you're not certain that you should have a negligible prior and you have at least some non-negligible credence in the various responses I've been giving for why Catholicism should not have a negligible prior.
¶717Indeed, so long as you think there's maybe like a one ina million chance that I'm right, then just multiply whatever non-negligible prior that my stories would give you by the one in a million chance that I'm right and the result will be non-negligible. And that should then be your and and arguably that should then be your credence in Catholicism before taking other evidence into account given your higher order uncertainty. And so long as I get you to a non-negligible credence, the miracles will do the rest. Ether Muse and Pat Flynn also respond to the complexity objection to Catholicism. I think this is important because one objection, sorry I'm putting a lot on the table.
¶718You can take what you want, leave what you don't. Um that you sometimes hear about Catholicism is this. It's like, oh man, you know, Catholicism seems cool. They like are into skulls and bones and stuff like that. But the problem is is like there's just so many more commitments, man.
¶719There's just so many more propositions. And when you just you bundle that all up, the likelihood of them all being false, it just it just it just sinks Catholicism for me. I'm going in with my minimal Christianity. So far, you know, fewer commitments, so on and so forth. I think that's a very bad objection because there's there's really only kind of like one thing you need to affirm Catholicism and you get the rest for free.
¶720But I want to hear I want to hear your response. I'm sure you've heard it, right? It's a pretty it's another common objection. Uh and you you already just said we don't you don't have to and should not have to go substantively investigate every single Catholic. Okay.
¶721Is is the immaculate conception true? Is the assumption true? That would be unreasonable, right? Nobody should be expected to independently adjudicate all. It'd be impossible.
¶722So, what's wrong? What's going on here? Ethan, help us think through this. Yeah. >> Yeah.
¶723And just like basically so there's one problem which you point out which is that a lot of times the objector is assuming that the probability of all of these propositions they're basically all probabilistically independent of each other and so therefore like whatever their uncertainty is about each they sort of it multiplies >> and then and then they get to a very small final value. >> Right. >> Right. But the problem is that like with the entire Catholic system, like all of these propositions that are being proposed are all highly correlated with each other rather than independent of each other. >> And so therefore, even if there's a lot of commitments that all come, there's such a um intimate connection between all of them.
¶724Like if if someone were merely coming to you and saying like basically Jesus all the things that Jesus ever said during his entire life, take away the fact that Jesus said them and just lay them on a piece of paper and then someone approaches it and then they're assessing the probability that every single statement on the piece of paper is true. >> They probably will get to a low probability. >> But then I I give you the additional context that Jesus said all of these are true and rose from the dead. >> Yeah. >> And he cannot and he cannot be wrong about them.
¶725Right. Yeah. >> Right. [laughter] Exactly. So if if it turns out that he said all these things are true and then he rose from the dead and so he's accredited to us by God and we don't think God's a liar and we don't think he's going to accredit to us a false revelation.
¶726>> Well then all of a sudden like it's not it doesn't seem as ownorous to accept that if there's any appearance that these are false that this is just ignorance on our part or we don't see why it's true or we don't know all the the relevant evidence and the facts. >> It's it's not ownorous at all. Right. I mean, like, okay, yeah, you first maybe have to, you know, you use your your head, your little noggin, right, to get to the resurrection and the divinity and all this or that, but then you really get all the other all the other stuff for free or at least very cheaply. But on the Protestant paradigm, >> just just just there needs to be a distinction that's made.
¶727What what comes with cost >> is things that will be actively damaging to Christ's credibility, right? And so if Christ starts asserting things where you start out with an exceptionally low prior, so there's just a default prior for any statement where we have no reason to believe it's true, no reason to believe it's false. >> Yeah. >> And so the for specific statements, those priors will be low, but they actually won't cost us nearly anything when we get a good reason to believe them on authority, right? >> And so like if like the mundane claim that like um my fiance went to the grocery store yesterday, right?
¶728that now she doesn't go to the grocery store with that high frequency, right? And so therefore, my prior with no evidence at all will be fairly low that she went to the grocery store. But then when she gives me her testimony that she went, like I become virtually certain that she did in fact go like it there was no active impediment to it. It was a specific claim. And so because of its specificity, it was low, >> but there was very little friction for me updating very high.
¶729When I got credible testimony, it was true. Mhm. >> So it wasn't it's not something that I have active reason to suspect or to doubt. >> It was just I doubted it cuz I didn't have a motive and there were many options and then when I got a good motive I just accepted it. Right?
¶730And so a lot of statements are going to be like that where it's like you have insufficient motive to accept them at the outset but they once you have good reason to accept the authority of the person that's proposing them then they come at no cost really virtually trivial cost. Then there are some statements where okay the person's going to actually have to cash into the credibility that they earned to where it will kind of count against them. Yeah. >> Right. So like if someone comes and asserts to me the trinity and at first I can't see how the trinity is coherent.
¶731Right. So like I don't see the logical coherence of it or it seems dubious to me that it even makes sense. >> That's going to be something that may undermine that person's credibility. It's going to come at cost for them to assert it. Now they may have enough credibility that I'm willing to accept it on faith because I believe them, right?
¶732But it's cost every time they assert something where I have active grounds for suspicion or doubt. >> Now take but then if if it turns out that a lot of the places where I have grounds for doubt, they're all correlated, then that comes at even less cost, right? So let's say I go to the Old Testament and I realize there's a lot of fragmentaryary evidence um concerning these events that happened in ancient history to where we can't really prove one way or the other on independent grounds. And then there seem to be some things that are discrepancies or whatever within the Old Testament text, right? >> And so then I could just say, okay, assuming I had no reason to think, no unified reason to think that there was a resolution to all these apparent historical discrepancies, >> what would be the probability that all of these would work out in favor of basically the harmony of the biblical text?
¶733>> But that's actually a bad way to approach the probabilistic reasoning, right? because it's not it's it's not that simple. It's not just that I'm going to regard it as the probability assuming I didn't have a reason to accept inspiration and to regard these as sort of exceptionally reliable texts. >> What's the probability that just if these were ordinary records that they that there would be a harmonization? No, no, no.
¶734The question is conditional on inspiration. What's the probability there would be the appearance of these levels of discrepancies? >> Right. Right. Yeah.
¶735>> The question is not assuming non- inspiration. What's the probability that there would be a harmonization for all of these? >> But people often wind updating on the second rather than the first. >> Yes, they do. >> Probability there would be the appearance of this much discordance or this much like sort of incredulous statements >> rather than they they want to update on assuming that the Catholic Church weren't inspired.
¶736What's the chance that all these propositions the Catholic Church asserts would all just randomly turn out to be true? No, no, that's not the question. >> That's not the question, right? Yeah. >> Okay.
¶737The ninth and final barrier were psychological and social barriers. So like in addition to you know the intellectual barriers that I had to Catholicism there were lots of psychological barriers. So you know it would put strain on various relationships it would be difficult for my career. It would mean that I you know I've been massively scandalizing and deconverting people for like a decade and my entire public persona is tied up with criticism of theism and Christianity and various tenants of Catholicism. I would have to change my life in lots of ways and stop pursuing various pleasures that I enjoyed pursuing.
¶738Perhaps the most difficult of all, I had to exhibit a profound amount of docsility and submission and readiness toward instruction, which is, you know, very difficult for a stubborn and prideful philosopher like myself. So, how did I overcome these psychological barriers? Well, God's grace obviously, but on a more practical level, it was a few things. I mean, first, just like the lives of the saints as I've talked about, you know, St. Maxmine KBY, St.
¶739Margaret, St. Damian of Machai. Second of all, just like the palpable call to saintthood that I felt and just like this magnetic pull to Catholicism that I felt. I talked about this in my um announcement video. Um third, just like I don't know, appreciating the sheer beauty of Catholicism, the Catholic tradition was just like another thing that helped me overcome these barriers.
¶740Um, fourth of all, Pascal's wager is actually a good argument for practically committing to the religion that you take to be the most probable or as I'll put it in the next section, the the religion that's most likely to land you um like with an infinitely good afterlife with God, commune with God, and loving God um in a beautiful relationship for all eternity. So, even these various finite earthly costs seem to be worth the practical commitment. And in any event, death comes like a thief in the night. Was I really willing to risk seeing Christ after death and citing all these pretty lame personal considerations? Like, dude, the martyrs were literally killed and tortured for their commitment to Christ, and I'm hesitant because maybe an adviser won't like me as much.
¶741Like, I think I knew what Christ would have said to me if I cited these factors in explaining why I held off. Fifth of all, there are really convicting Bible passages for those who are struggling with like psychological barriers, or at least, you know, they were convicting for me. Um if anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, even their own life, such a person cannot be my disciple. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
¶742And whoever does not take up his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. And everyone that hath forsaken houses or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands for my name's sake shall receive a hundfold and shall inherit everlasting life. Meditate on those and see what that meditation does for you. Sixth, I now see the docsility involved in submitting to the magisterium profoundly freeing in various ways.
¶743So, for starters, there's still so much to explore and investigate within magisterial bounds. But importantly, for a little while, I was slipping into a more and more pessimistic and skeptical outlook, just like doubting my ability to figure out anything particularly interesting in philosophy. Thankfully, the magisterium provides guardrails and a good foundation for building off of. So far from stifling my intellectual journey, I now have like the requisite structure to make real genuine progress toward the deepest understanding of the world imaginable. And like in any case, I also don't really see what's valuable or desirable about like complete, unbridled, unadulterated, unlimited, unmititigated intellectual autonomy.
¶744Certainly, there's nothing valuable or desirable about that in the practical sphere. Like practical autonomy should be limited by the good, right? Like you should only pursue the good and you should avoid the bad. In one's actions, one should submit to the moral truth. And it's just the same thing when it comes to intellectual autonomy, like you should submit to the truth.
¶745And it just so happens that as a matter of descriptive fact, there's a perfect being out there who instituted an authoritative teaching office safeguarding the most important truths. And since we owe intellectual submission to the truth, we owe submission to this teaching office. We also rely on epistemic authorities in almost all contexts, right? Like I didn't do the experiments that, you know, show that evolution is true or that climate change is happening or that, you know, the efficacy of vaccines, etc. I simply believe all that stuff on the basis of the testimony of credible authorities.
¶746Ones which have been accredited to me by external evidence as ones which have been accredited to me by external evidence as authoritative and to which I owe difference. Why should religion be any different? I believe lots of religious truths on the basis of the testimony. Why should religion be any different? I believe lots of religious truths now on the basis of the testimony of a credible authority, the church speaking on behalf of God.
¶747an authority which has been accredited to me as authoritative by external evidence, miracles, prophecies, other motives of credibility, etc., and to which I owe difference. This difference to accredited epistemic authorities is what we reasonably do in nearly every other context. Like why would it be different for religion? [music] Okay, so part seven key realizations. In this section, I'll cover seven key realizations on my pastic Catholicism.
¶748These were some important high order points or recurring themes or methodological points or metal level points that really cut to the heart of my intellectual barriers to Catholicism. So the first realization is that theism and Catholicism are both analogous to evolution. I recall why theism was so attractive to me. It offers an elegant, simple, unifying explanation of disperate phenomena that other views explain peace meal if at all. And I started to see Catholicism in the same light, right?
¶749Apparently, Catholicism uniquely offers a unifying explanation of the philosophical evidence for theism I covered, together with all the miraculous data, explaining both individual miracles that scream Catholicism and the general pattern of miracles that advances a manifest divine intent to privilege Catholicism above everyone else. And Catholicism also had internally plausible unifying explanations for why I would be going astray with respect to objections to Catholicism. The following clips from a call with Ethan were very influential for me here and nicely illustrate this first realization. [clears throat] If they were open-minded about the possibility of miracles, what conclusion would they arrive at? Is a good question to ask yourself because then you can start seeing to the extent like here's the project that I take them to be engaged in.
¶750The project I take them to be engaged in is we are strongly convinced not for irrational reasons, but we are strongly committed to naturalism. We expect that we are going to have problem cases. This is probably a problem case for us. But here, let's try to put our resources to work and see what we can do to try to problematize the explanation we don't like and maybe give ourselves some hope that there's some way to make sense of all this. Um, and then basically I'm coming and I'm like, woohoo.
¶751Like, yeah, we just this proves Catholicism straightforwardly. like just look at this most obvious interpretation of what the facts are and sort of just like almost restate much of the skepticism, you know, and just use different words and then sort of show that there's it reeks of desperation in many cases what people are having to say to avoid the obvious conclusion of all the data. And so I think that in itself is some higher order evidence which is that like um if I'm much happier to argue my case on this one than I think the skeptics are to argue theirs. Now that doesn't mean they're more happy to to have my case overall you know for my worldview. But as regards this particular example at the very least you'd rather have my side.
¶752Then we start going and we start asking, okay, what does that mean for Joe? And we say, well, I think what it means for Joe is he's like way less hardcore naturalist than all these people that we're having to turn to to do the desperate maneuvers to explain away this data. And so it seems like if you're open to miracles and it seems like you are just there like regardless of whether you accept Catholicism or not. I mean you're leaning towards theism or like you basically the point of accepting theism. So you believe miracles are like possible and plausible in principle that God would intervene in the world.
¶753So just a question of whether he does. Then you go and you look at these cases like Kanda and you just like hate what you have to say to be a naturalist and try to explain away all this stuff or like exorcist or like the stigmatist that you know and all this stuff. I think you're going and you're realizing like, okay, maybe we live in a weirder world than Scott Alexander and Mark are willing to admit, you know, and so like um when you're at that point, it feels like your prior for the Fatima stuff being authentic should just be so much higher than the skeptics to the point where from the higher order evidence standpoint, I wonder if with your looking at the evidence with your eyes, with your background commitments, It's not at all queer to me that Scott would reject it. >> Yeah. >> But it's also just like another thing that I would like to keep emphasizing is um like a demand for explanations.
¶754So, here's one thing that I think I could see you being tempted to do because I would be tempted to do it in your situation, which is basically just going and being highly disjunctive, right? and then just going and being like there's a million explanations that are possible and probably most of them I would never think of and so therefore like I don't actually need an explanation for all of the facts um and then I should just look towards basically general considerations to see um you know does the miracle explanation hold itself together you know how well does the naturalist explanation comport with it blah blah blah blah blah So there is that sort of highly disjunctive approach and I would say that disjunctive approaches are only reasonable within certain limits and that's something that's hard easy to forget especially when we are like wanting to avoid a certain conclusion. It's really easy to forget that there are limits to this move for when and then when we actually force ourselves to live with it like we force ourselves a me immerse ourselves in the facts and say am I saying Lucy is a liar? Am I saying this bizarre delusive trance happened? Am I saying it was a group hallucination?
¶755It's like I don't really believe any of this like and it's like the disjunction of all of it is like it's so uncomfortable, right? And then I start I just need to make a mental note that I'm really uncomfortable with this fact. And then we go to Aniano. I'm really uncomfortable. Padre P.
¶756I'm really uncomfortable. You know, Lords, I'm really uncomfortable. And so we start immersing ourselves in that. Okay. Um, but the disjunctive limits, just to give an example, like if you were personally there and witnessed all the events in Jesus's life and they happened exactly as described in the Bible, to persist in a disjunctive approach, I think would be a little bit ridiculous.
¶757>> Yeah. >> And so we have to ask ourselves like what is it that makes it [laughter] to to where doing this disjunctive approach is unreasonable. So like when it turns out that you have like multiply attested witness testimony that's describing in detail that has every appearance of credibility that this lady is appearing to them supernaturally and then it says I predict on this specific date and time that there's going to be an extraordinary event and then 100 thousand people see it and people from hundreds of miles away see it and there's photographs and there's rapid drying and people were not trying to avoid optical effects and blah blah blah and there's healings and clouds of smoke and all this stuff. Is that past the point where it's like if I'm having to do a bunch of painful disjunctions for like a bunch of different things? So here's my painful disjunction for this, here's my painful disjunction for this.
¶758And meanwhile, there's an alternative that unifies everything like neatly where I've got like a few things where I've got like mildly annoying disjunctions but not painful ones. I don't know. Then I mean the last the last thing I would probably say with regards to this is like um compare your Catholicism problems to your naturalism problems. Okay? Then compare your like generic theism problems with your Catholicism problems.
¶759And here's the thing that I think we're doing that's another instance of the disjunctive mindset. We're not weighing Catholicism against each of its competitors, but we're sort of saying here here is a set of things that I worry about. And actually, it turns out that there's no coherent alternative position from which I could fully exploit all of these consistently. Let's take um let's take morality. In those cases, it seems to me that the objection hinges on speculative philosophy, right?
¶760Where a person is coming and saying, "Here, I have an ethical intuition. Lots of other people have other ethical intuitions, but I can do a process of basically like discursive reasoning where I'm going to decide that I'm the one who has the most reasonable intuition about these matters where there's lots of controversy. Now, I know lots of people, some of them smarter than me, some of them similarly smart as me, do this all the time, including myself. And oftentimes I miss something [laughter] and oftentimes they miss something. and we arrive at a whole bunch of diverse conclusions using this method starting from these premises.
¶761So then we say, okay, is it plausible that I'm missing something and that it turns out that there's a way to make sense of this moral proposition that otherwise seemed very problematic to me? And then is it true that Catholicism is strictly committed to the moral proposition in the sense in which I give it uh the sense in which I'm giving it based on the impression that I have or also there are creative ways within the Catholic system to accommodate basically the opposite judgment and so I start building that disjunction. >> Yeah, that that has been so helpful with me with hell. I mean the the disjunction thing has almost removed my problems for hell to be honest. Anyway, that that was just a comment.
¶762>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But so then that's that's something that we start doing is um we start realizing first the reasoning that I'm using here. I already know it's a type of reasoning that is unreliable.
¶763And the reason it's unreliable is because there's such a diversity of conclusions that are reached by people that are equally competent to me applying the same method from the same premises. And so therefore, for me to be very strongly convicted on the basis of an argument with this character seems odd. Second, I know Catholicism basically is a whole system that's almost predicate like it's the whole system is based on subtle distinctions, right? And it turns out that through a very slight change in my understanding of a commitment of Catholicism can come a whole cascade of consequences, right, that make it to where objections that I previously thought were pertinent are no longer pertinent. So for instance, just the classic example is yeah, people who take these sort of like like literary criticism approaches to trying to resolve discrepancies within the Bible, right?
¶764And so um and like with moral theology there's lots of subtle distinctions that can be introduced within those systems. So anyways for how this leads me to where I've been going the upshot of all this. How painful are my accommodations and also how independent are the errors that I would be solving through invoking these accommodations? So, how many separate accommodations am I having to make? So, one thing that seems problematic is if I'm going to have to do an independent accommodation, for instance, for each purported error in the Old Testament, right?
¶765>> Yeah. Yeah. >> Or for a whole great diversity of moral conclusions that I found problematic. I'm going to have to do an accommodation. Now if it turns out that there's just one principle and it follows from that principle the resolution of this huge number of different errors of diverse errors.
¶766So then I have to ask myself okay how plausible do I find it that there is such a principle that I'm missing that will resolve all of these tensions and apparent contradictions and implausibilities that exist within this system. Now relatedly, let's ask the same question for Catholic miracles. What is the possibility that there's just like one principle, one posit, one sort of simple unified thing that's going to solve Laniano and solve Fatima and solve Lords and solve Padre Peio and then solve each aspect, right? So solve the um testimony of the visionaries and solve the delore photographic analysis and solve you know the witnesses who didn't stare at the you know and so um it's it starts to look like the problems I have as an anti-atholic are much more independent of each other and that I have a great many pieces of data to accommodate if I come at it with this anti-atholic or Catholic skeptical mindset. Um meanwhile in the Catholic case, it seems like most of the objections that I have that are directed against the Catholic system are ones that can be um like systematic errors on my part where once a few things fall into place then I could make sense of how to reconcile all these things.
¶767And so there's enough flexibility with Catholicism that it's hard to rigidly falsify it. But it's not clear that like non-atholicism is flexible enough to accommodate all these miracles in any similarly elegant way. >> Yeah. [clears throat] >> Yeah. Yeah, and I mean that goes back to your point which has been helpful still thinking it through um that you know Catholicism seems to have an internally coherent debunking explanation of at least many of the contrary intuitions whereas there's no comparably plausible debunking explanation of contrary intuitions for non-atholics one might think.
¶768>> Yeah. So those are my two big ones for trying to solve these problems. My first one is my epistemic fine-tuning point which is just like great evidence against great evidence for is much more strongly predicted by Catholicism than not Catholicism which happens to be a virtue of Catholicism as a theory. Right? So Catholicism has an explanation for instance for why the Bible even if it were inspired and inherent it wouldn't be conspicuously so.
¶769And for it to not be conspicuously so, it has to have lots of apparent contradictions and historical discrepancies because otherwise it would be conspicuous. Right? If you had, you know, 40 authors in like three different languages writing over 2,000 years, something that was perfectly consistent and where there were no apparent historical difficulties whatsoever, right? That would violate these sort of hiddenist constraints that we're saying the epistemic fine-tuning. So basically, we have something which is correlating all of these difficulties relating to the Bible without actually saying that there's going to be a unified explanation for each of them, but it's correlating them because it's saying here's a reason we might expect the Bible to have the sorts of properties that cause you to doubt whether it is inherent, but yet for there to be a way to resolve all of them that is not obvious, even though you might actually have to particularize the facts to each, right?
¶770So that's something that's correlating the air. So that's something that's helpful, the epistemic fine-tuning or like when you have miracles, why is it that you have embarrassments alongside what seem like decisive reputations of all the alternative explanations, right? Why is it like that? So epistemic fine-tuning is a good resource for that and a good resource for explaining away difficulties, you know, and it's just in general a good way for someone to be like, "Oh, if Catholicism were true, I wouldn't expect all these things that seem hard to explain given Catholicism." But I'm completely severing that inference. What I'm saying is given Catholicism, you expect things that are puzzling on Catholicism.
¶771And given that that is so, you cannot reason about those types of embarrassments the same way that you would for an ordinary hypothesis. And that that's what I think is causing some facious reasoning just for lots of people where we're reasoning about it as if we're saying if Catholicism were true, I would expect everything to have an obvious explanation given Catholicism, which just is not a prediction of Catholicism. You know, the Bible says it's the glory of God to conceal. Um but the the second um the second strategy I have to correlate all the errors is um basically the sort of like um asymmetric debunking that you were talking about where we're we're going and we're we're saying given that Catholicism were true, I would expect because of those noetic effects of sin for many people to find much of Catholic teaching to be like implausible and hard to accept. And so therefore, and I and I have an easy explanation for why people are making mistakes because their mental faculties have been corrupted.
¶772And so then it's easy to see see how there would also be systematic error against Catholicism in things like the intuitive judgments that you're making about the plausibility of these moral precepts. >> Yeah. >> Or about how God would interact with creation or whatever. >> Um now I don't know. It also just seems to me like I can prove to myself intuitively that miracle evidence trumps philosophical evidence.
¶773Like Jesus, if I saw him do everything and like resurrect from the dead and all that stuff personally with my own eyes, like I could accept biblical inherency if he taught it. >> And that of course gets us into realization number two, which is that empirical evidence trumps abstract theoretical speculative objections. Empirical evidence imposes itself upon the mind. Like we have photographs, we got videos, we got medical documentation showing that Catholic miracles happen. your abstract fancy pants, intuitions, and high flutin theoretical arguments are not even on the same level.
¶774They're almost just like qualitatively different in evidential force, or at least that's how it seems to me. And you know, again, to bring this out, we just go back to this case where like you just witness Jesus doing everything as it's described in the Gospels. And it would be absurd to deny Christ's teachings on the basis of like you know these kind of like philosophical historical intuitive or like textual critical considerations after directly witnessing with your own eyes him like heal lepers and raise people from the dead and cure paralytics and raise himself from the dead and fly to heaven after interacting with you for 40 days. Um and yet I think that you know our evidence for many Catholic vindicory miracles is like at least collectively approximately as strong as witnessing that like we have before and after medical tests of naturalistically inexplicable lure healings. We have direct eyewitness testimonies to palpations of Padre Pio's reduplicative fashion wounds.
¶775We've got pictures and videos of them. We got pictures of him with no scars immediately upon death and on and on and on. You know, we've already been through it. And like, you know, as I've said, like just humans just seem clearly better at empirical stuff than speculative theorizing. Did he have a leg or not?
¶776It's not very hard to tell versus like is utilitarianism true or not? like I oh I've got to examine like dozens of philosophical arguments and I kind of also need to know a bunch of like complicated math and epistemology of debunking and like what's intrinsically valuable and like oh my goodness like what's going on? There's clearly a disparity in evidential force here. I do think the empirical trumps the speculative. The third realization was this hiddenist model of divine activity.
¶777you know that that hiddenism kind of perfectly predicted my newfound evidential situation as Ethan was kind of saying in that clip like I don't know I just came to have such strong evidence for Catholicism but also like good but not conclusive evidence against it and it was just causing this massive cognitive dissonance and almost making it like a choice which way I could go and it was like oh man and Catholicism was then just like basically calling me out. It's like calling my evidential situation out. It was almost exactly predicting the sort of evidential situation I was finding myself in. The fourth realization is the probabilistic dependence of the best atheistic and anti-atholic intuitions. I think the best atheistic objections boil down to the problem of like bad or sub-optimal stuff.
¶778As we've seen and as I've gone through, I think some of the best objections to Catholicism are probabilistically correlated in several ways. Tons of them just rely on highly cognitively penetrated socioulturally bound, not very widely shared, relatively easily debunkable, table thumping moral intuitions. And lots of them fall prey to the hiddenist model, you know, recalled the muse clip. The fifth realization was that asymmetric debunking of contrary intuitions. And it's this it's just this point about asymmetric debunking of contrary intuitions.
¶779So it's like under Catholicism we have a plausible story to tell of why I would I would find certain Catholic doctrines just difficult to accept on intuitive grounds because of you know the knowetic effects of sin because we you know we have darkened intellects because it's like it's not at all implausible that I might have a malformed conscience under Catholicism. Um, and so like even within the Catholic worldview, there's like a plausible debunking account of my intuitions. Um, but that's asymmetric with non-atholic views, right? So this is why it's asymmetric. Like there doesn't seem to be a comparably plausible coherent debunking story of all my intuitions and evidence um pointing towards distinctively Catholic vindication, right?
¶780Um, it's just instead just like deeply mysterious under alternative views. Why? Like the universe is like basically conspiring to make it look like Catholicism specifically is true. Um, notice the asymmetry. The non-atholic worldview doesn't predict that you'll have a bunch of misleading Catholic miracle evidence that uniquely favors Catholicism given their worldview.
¶781>> Right. >> Right. But meanwhile, the Catholic worldview does predict that you'd have misleading moral intuition evidence against Catholicism given Catholicism was true. >> Yeah. >> So if you have two really strong considerations that you don't know how to reconcile.
¶782So you've seen all the evidence for Lords and you've seen all the evidence for Padre Peio and St. Charbell and you've seen it for Fatima and for all the Eucharistic miracles and you're like, I don't know how to reconcile that. But it's also morian for me that hell can't be justified. Right? Well, here's a good way to break the tie.
¶783A good way to break the tie is Catholicism predicts that you'd get misleading evidence like morian intuitions that hell is not right. But meanwhile, non-atholicism doesn't predict that you'd get a consilience of a bunch of miracle evidence that gave the false appearance that Catholicism was true. >> Right. Spot on. >> So that selective debunking already is an evidentially relevant asymmetry, which is it's about the predictions made both by both models about what types of evidence you'd get.
¶784And so Catholicism predicts misleading moral evidence against Catholicism. Meanwhile, rival views don't predict misleading moral miracle evidence in favor of Catholicism. >> A sixth realization I had is that like listen, I could resolve my remaining objections uh with enough attention, care, and diligence. Um I had gained a lot of high order evidence for that from resolving my magisterial problems, especially that Dunigan book. It just it just convinced me that like, oh wow, like you know, I thought that it was like a very serious problem.
¶785I go through Dundigan and it's not a very serious problem. [laughter] So I'm like, okay, uh, you know, I just picked up this one book. Granted, it was like hundreds upon hundreds of pages long, but you know, I picked up I picked up the book and I was able to resolve the difficulty. So like, you know, I can do that with due care, attention, and diligence. I could resolve remaining or future problems.
¶786And even if I can't, you know, I've got so much overwhelming evidence that like, okay, [clears throat] even if I can't figure out exactly where they go wrong, I know they must go wrong somewhere. So um, so that's the sixth realization that I had. The seventh realization they had is that Pascal's wager is good. Actually, it's like it's like a reasonably good argument. Um, and there's Pascal.
¶787He's like, you know, you better wager or else. So, up here on the top, we've got states of the world. God either exists or he doesn't exist. Uh, on here on the left we've got the actions that you can perform. So, you can either commit to God or not commit to God.
¶788Committing to God involves taking steps to establish a relationship with God, trying to cultivate belief in God, trying to, you know, pray, attending religious services, reading scriptures, etc. Now, if God exists and you commit to God well enough, you know, you're going to get the infinite payoff of like an infinitely blissful heavenly afterlife very plausibly. If you don't commit to God, you know, again, I'm just like sort of setting up the basic wager. I mean, obviously, you'd be a little bit more complicated and you'd have to split it up. And we're going to talk about some potential splitting up splittings up in a second, but um you know, if God exists and you commit to God, you know, like heaven's in store, very plausibly.
¶789If you don't commit to God and God exists, well then, well, what is in store? That's a good question. It depends on on what God does. But um you know maybe it's negative infinite utility if you go to hell. Maybe not.
¶790Maybe if even if you go to hell maybe your life is still on the whole worth living. So maybe it's like a finite positive your life on the whole is like a finite positive utility or something. Um or maybe it's like finite negative. Like there are lots of ways you could go here but it's not plausibly positive infinity. I mean unless of course you're universalist but even then like there are inegalitarian universalist views where like you know committing to god now could result in an infinitely better afterlife.
¶791So, uh, and also like again later we'll split it up into specific gods and I'll I'll I'll get like a specific principle that we can use to try to help you decide what you should wager on. Um, if God doesn't exist then, you know, whether or not you commit to God or not to commit to God, um, most likely, you know, it's finite utility in store either way for for either of those choices given the state of the world, whether it's positive or negative. So like the expected utility or expected value of committing to God is the probability that God exists times the utility that God exists given that you commit plus the probability that God doesn't exist times the utility of God not existing given that you commit. And so long as the probability that God exists is non zero. The expected utility of committing to God given the setup is infinity.
¶792But when we run the expected utility calculation of not committing to God, we see that it's a finite number whether positive or negative. Right? To get that, you multiply the probability that God exists by the utility that God exists by the utility of not committing given that God exists. And then you multiply that by the probability that God doesn't exist times the utility of not committing given that God exists. That that's going to be some non-zero number times a finite number plus some number less than one times a finite number, which is going to be finite.
¶793So committing to God maximizes expected utility and is therefore seems like the practically rational thing to do. Indeed, it doesn't just seem practically rational. seems practically rationally obligatory so long as you're not violating any deontic side constraints in committing to God, which you plausibly aren't. Now, there are lots of objections to Pascal's wager, but I think they can be overcome. So, you know, there's this objection from doxastic volunteerism, which is like, hey, we can't control our beliefs.
¶794I mean, as it turns out, under certain conditions, I think we can, but set that aside. The argument, as I formulated it, avoids the objection that we can't directly control our beliefs. Since I'm not saying that you should directly will to believe in God, I'm talking about practical commitment, which is under your control. The next objection is the self-interest objection, right? So, some worry that Pascal's wager is like mercenary or manipulative or self-interested or impious, and God would know that we're committing to him out of self-interest and wouldn't reward that.
¶795But here, like, I mean, just read Liz Jackson's paper, faithfully taking Pascal's wager. I think first, wagering need not even be motivated by self-interest, but rather a recognition of how beautiful and wonderful and amazing and infinitely good it would be to be in an eternal loving relationship with the perfect creator of the universe. the goodness and beauty of the potential relationship can be the motivation rather than self-interest in being rewarded. None of us think that it's gross or mercenary or manipulative or wrongly self-interested to forge relationships with each other on the basis of recognizing how valuable and good and beautiful those relationships would be. Second, even if wagering is initially motivated by self-interest, it need not and should not remain that way.
¶796As you progress in devotion and commitment to God, your motivations will change or at least they'll probably change. You know, you'll probably genuinely come to love God and you'll seek to be virtuous, etc. etc. Right, etc. Right, those dirty pascalians, right?
¶797Third, what's wrong with self-interest per se? Is it wrong to want to be happy? To be motivated by the goal of happiness is not in itself morally problematic. And the action taken here seeking a relationship with God also is not morally problematic. So like what what's the problem here?
¶798Fourth, so long as there's some chance that God would reward even self-interested commitment. Committing to God even out of self-interest ends up maximizing expected utility assuming you're not thereby more likely to be damned than not committing to God. There's also the famous in many gods objection. You know like which god do you believe in? There are many different conceptions of God.
¶799The Muslim conception, the Christian conception, the Jewish conception, the Hindu conception. Heck, we can even imagine an atheist loving God who punishes believers and rewards atheists with an eternal afterlife. Many if not all these different conceptions of God also have a non-zero probability of being true. And for many of them, you know, you'll lose out on infinite reward if you fail to believe in them. And this just like massively complicates the decision matrix and also implies that any belief here including atheistic belief has infinite expected utility.
¶800So you know we're left without any rational obligation to believe in any particular god or even to believe in any god at all. But I don't think this is a particularly forceful objection. First we can just add a supplemental principle in cases with multiple incompatible actions having infinite expected utility. Do whatever action maximizes your chances of infinite reward. Right?
¶801And [laughter] this is independently plausible. So like imagine that you have two doors. You can only choose one. Choosing door number one gives you a 99% chance of eternal bliss and a 1% chance of instant annihilation. Choosing door number two gives a 1% chance of eternal bliss and a 99% chance of instant annihilation.
¶802Well, it seems obvious that you should choose door number one. Uh even though they both, if you do the calculation, they both have infinite expected utility. And the supplemental principle plausibly underlies this judgment. Second, as Alexander Puce notes, this is in um you know like one of his blog posts on Pascal's wager and infinity. You can see that in the resource document.
¶803We can simply work with like non-standard analysis or surreal numbers here which will make the probabilities matter a lot and that'll help us avoid the many gods objection when you just like flush out the matrix. Third, we can also just replace infinite utilities with like overwhelmingly high but finite utilities and then the probabilities will really matter. And so like the general lesson here is that you should commit to whatever religion is most likely to lead to the infinite heavenly reward by committing to it. Like that's at least what's like on practical terms the most rational thing to do. And again, like I'm assuming here that you're not violating any Deontic side constraints.
¶804Don't violate don't violate those. Okay? Like, you know, as a as a certified deontologist and proud Deontologist, um like please don't do that. But like again, I think you can I think you can faithfully take Pascal's wager in a way that doesn't do that. Um similar points, by the way, also address the mixed strategies objection to Pascal's wager.
¶805Like just among the actions which deliver infinite expected utility, you should simply perform the action or actions that maximize your chances of getting the infinite payoff, right? like or you can work with extremely high but finite utility values. And then finally, you know, there's this objection from discounting. It turns out that like with extremely tiny probabilities of extremely large payoffs, you can get some highly counterintuitive verdicts. So like maybe we should just disregard extremely tiny probabilities.
¶806But like in addition to all the other objections to discounting, um we can just stipulate that at least one religion's probability needs to be non-negligible before running the wager. In other words, so long as some religion is a non-silly option for you, you should then commit to whichever religion maximizes your chances at the infinite payoff. Okay, so you know, I've just like speedrun through some objections that are pretty popular to Pascal's wager. And I don't know, I I take the wager to be like a reasonably good argument for practically committing to whichever religion maximize your chances of heavenly bliss so long as firstly, you don't violate any deontic constraints in doing so. And secondly, there's a non-negligible chance that there is such a religion.
¶807And I uh I hope to have convincingly argued that Catholicism fits the bill. Also, interestingly, Pascalian reasoning pretty clearly favors committing to Catholicism over Protestantism. Even if you think Protestantism is more probable than Catholicism, so long as you think that like you're not deontically bound to go with something that you think is like more probable than something that isn't. Only under Catholicism is there a grave obligation which you might be culpably and therefore damnably violating in being Protestant. There is nothing comparable if Protestantism is true since by far the most plausible versions of Protestantism hold that Catholics are saved.
¶808Of course, you know, there are very radical versions of Protestantism on which Catholicism is evil and there's a grave obligation not to be Catholic and violating grave obligations dams you even when you believe that Christ is Lord and Trinitarianism is true and the Bible is the inspired inherent word of God. But that's just like a ludicrous version of Protestantism. So, you know, you'll still maximize your chance of heaven by being Catholic, even if you think Catholic inclusivist Protestantism is more probable than Catholicism. So, think of it like this. If any remotely plausible version of Protestantism is true, you're good.
¶809You're good by you're you're good by being Catholic, right? You're going to be saved by being Catholic or by being Protestant. Either of those will save you, right? By contrast, if Catholicism is true, there's generally a smaller chance that you'll be saved by being Protestant since you're materially mortally sinning in doing so and possibly formally materially sinning. I mean, if the heart is desperately wicked, who can know it, etc.
¶810And and of course, you know, you're also not availing yourself of the full suite of valid sacraments that Christ instituted, which are like, you know, basically like holiness boosts, right? They're like they kind of help you along the path to salvation. So, so I think Catholicism just decision theoretically dominates Protestantism. Whether Catholicism or Protestantism is true, you're better off being Catholic. Now, of course, like here I've got um a brilliant uh friend who is considering religious pluralism and and uh this friend is sympathetic to like in egalitarian universalism and has pushed the objection that well, you know, like if you're if you're wagering on the basis of like a fear of hell or something like that, then you know, that might be some kind of like something improper like at the very least your relationship might be better for all of eternity if you um you know, you don't do that.
¶811Um, but I don't know, that's not clear to me because like you don't have to have fear of hell be like the basis of the wager, you know? Um, it can instead just be like uh fear of offending the infinite God, right? or like fear of losing this beautiful profound relationship or um yeah like I do think like this just kind of falls into that more like self-interest objection where it's like no no no like the the motive for going in for Catholicism here even even though I've appealed to like hell indemnation and whatnot because that just makes it kind of palpable like the point is like you're losing out on a relationship with God and so it really can be motivated out of like a love for God and just this desire for a profound beautiful relationship uh that you're maximizing your chances of um that you wager on Catholicism specifically for these kind of like decision theoretic uh domination reasons. And so it's not at all clear that like even under egalitarian universalism that like you'd somehow be making your relationship with God much worse by be by becoming Catholic. And also like I don't know um for starters the very fact that like I don't know I think even if you have like a low credence it shouldn't be zero that you know under Catholicism uh the infinite payoff the payoff for going to hell is indeed negative infinity and I think that could like that could actually um come into play here.
¶812I haven't actually sat down to like work through the decision theoretic machinery to see how that actually affects things, but that might help with the dominance argument. And then another thing that might help with the dominance argument. I don't know. Like we could go to some sort of like lexical priority view where it's like, you know, under Catholicism like I don't know like being united to God versus not being united to God. It seems like, you know, being united to God is almost like lexically prior.
¶813So like if you I'd have to think about that that it would complicate things. Um but anyway, we don't need to go into the spontaneous philosophizing. Uh let's just get on to part eight, existential resonance. So that's it. That's my intellectual case for Catholicism.
¶814That's what I've hope I hope to have taken you all the way from atheism to Catholicism. I know many of you won't be convinced, but hey, I've I've tried my best. Oh, there's a lot more than I could have gone into. I know this has been many hours long, but I could have gone into so much more. I held back.
¶815So, believe it or not, I held back on the miracle evidence. [laughter] There's so much more. You don't like you don't even know, my bro. You don't even know. like you got I mean check out the the resource documents but like there there is even more and there's more coming there's more coming trust me um you know on substack with people that I know like brace yourself brace yourself my friends brace yourself so um like it's just started it's just beginning so that's my uh that's my intellectual case for the Catholicism but you know as I said conversion is never solely intellectual it's also personal it's spiritual and so I was therefore only ready for conversion when the gospel message when the gospel message and Christ's church resonated with me on a deep existential level.
¶816When I talked about my psychological barriers in part six, I noted some of the personal and spiritual factors in my conversion very briefly, but you know, you can see some of my other interviews coming out very soon about those. But like another factor that really influenced me was just like the love of Christ. Christ's two highest commandments were to love God and neighbor. And he claimed that you know these were the foundation for all other precepts. And like as this this book uh Christ science and reason by father Robert Spitzer has helped me see I think I kind of drew some of these points from from his book so much of Christ's teachings were dedicated to love.
¶817I mean the biatitudes the parable of the good Samaritan about half the sermon on the mount a large portion of the gospel of John the parable of the prodical son like you could go on. Everything is subordinate to love. We must love our enemies. Pray for those who persecute us. Forgive everyone from the heart.
¶818see everyone as our neighbor, especially the poor, the downtrodd, and the outcast. As Christ says, "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." And Christ's sacrificial life evinced the most profound radical love imaginable. Like, I want you right now to imagine Christ getting brutally scourged at the pillar. His flesh is being repeatedly ripped off his back. Many of the wounds are so deep that you can see his now mangled raw muscle.
¶819He's being spat on by onlookers, which burns as the spit seeps into his wounds. One of the Roman guards decides to rub dirt into one of his open wounds, mocking him in the process. his apostles, you like his closest followers, confidants, and best friends have all abandoned him except John. Meanwhile, Christ is upholding all of his abusers in existence while they torture him. More importantly, he's forgiving them as they torture him.
¶820While in agony, he catches sight of you. Despite his misery, he looks at you with pure, unadulterated love and overflowing mercy. Your heart is suddenly infused with the most profound love you've ever felt. He gives you this grace as a gift while he's being tortured in front of you. You realize that he's going through all of this.
¶821Every whip, every insult, all the abandonment, every dirt rubbing into open gash episode, every burning sensation from the spit of onlookers for you because he loves you. And what profound love is this? What profound mercy is this? It's almost absurd how much he loves you. What did you do to deserve such overwhelming radical love?
¶822Are you not a sinner? Have you not flagrantly violated the moral law? And yet the God of the universe has freely abandoned himself to utter torture for your sake. And even in the midst of his torture for your sake, he's giving you special graces while forgiving his torturers. There is no poem, no song, no book, no painting that could possibly convey this depth of love for you.
¶823That is the character of God. That is the definitive divine manifestation. That is the touch point, the centerpiece, that through which everything else makes sense. St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 13 beautifully captures the the radical love at the heart of Christianity.
¶824If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient. Love is kind.
¶825It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It does not dishonor others. It is not self-seeking.
¶826It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
¶827But where there are prophecies, they will seize. Where there are tongues, they will be stilled. Where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when completeness comes, what is in part disappears.
¶828When I was a child, I talked like a child. I thought like a child. I reasoned like a child when I became a man. I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror.
¶829Then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part. Then I shall know fully even as I am fully known. Now these three remain. faith, hope, and love.
¶830But the greatest of these is love. [music] So, part nine is my metaninoia, my conversion. It happened after sitting down with Ethan Muse and talking about Padre Pio for 4 hours. Basically, I I also have on footage basically some of the moments during which I became Christian. [laughter] So, let's let's look at some of those.
¶831I I there's no chance I'm going I'm going to die and then risk seeing Jesus and be like, "Yeah, I know that you super I know that someone had supernaturally reduplicated your passion wounds. Um but I didn't believe, you know, like that's not going to happen." >> Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I'm saying it's almost exactly like the world is screaming at you that you suck at philosophy. [laughter] >> [laughter] [gasps] >> That's yes. Yes.
¶832It is almost that like that is the case or that just we in general you the human sucking philosophy. >> Um which >> and so that's what the world is screaming at screaming. >> And so maybe we go with >> I'm just going to listen to God's voice rather than my vain philosophy. >> Yeah, dude. It's it's crazy.
¶833It's crazy. It's crazy providential. I told you this in our last call that like literally before I became inundated with all this like empirical evidence for miracles like I've I was starting to get into that more skeptical mindset where it's like oh no I really don't think I can figure anything out in philosophy there's so much disagreement there's so much I it's very highly abstract there's so many divergent intuitions like can any of us know any of these substantive philosophical views and then bam just like miracle one after another just getting thrown at me and I'm just like trying to bat them away but at some point >> I mean I don't know I just don't think you should hold out forever. >> Yeah. No, dude.
¶834I I mean, it's going to sound great, but like I think I mean I'm going to have to be Christian. >> Yeah, I think so. For sure. >> At least. At least.
¶835Yeah. So, I I think that's going to be a change. >> Well, and where does that leave you with um like where are the credences at for Catholic versus Orthodox versus Protestant versus liberal Christianity? >> Well, they change so much. Um, this Dunagan thing has also changed it a lot.
¶836Um, you know, it's like there is no church as unified as the Catholic Church. Like the unity mark is just insane. Like Catholicism utterly mogs everyone else by like miles. Um, like it's not even fair. Uh, just read reading the Dunigan book kind of convinced me of that.
¶837I'm like seriously. Uh, so >> yeah. No, it's clear I mean that's clearly true. >> Yeah. Yeah, it's just like like it's also clearly just a feature of our institutional design compared to everybody else.
¶838That's also like the fact that we have the theology of the papacy that we do is the explanation for why we have the unity we do. And it just so happens that the tradition that goes back to throughout the first millennium is ex giving exactly that explanation for the papacy that it's the principle of unity, you know, and whoever doesn't gather with me scatters. And that's what's happened to everyone else. >> Yeah. They either like oify in the case of orthodoxy or they just >> or they have a ton of internalism too like they can't they can't adjudicate any new controversy.
¶839>> Yeah. >> Literally can't have panorththodox sinnods because they there's no way to actually >> um reach a final verdict because if you don't agree there's no one that you recognize as being above you that you have to submit to. >> Yeah. And then Protestantism is a mess obviously >> which is Yeah. I mean it also just comes out of nowhere after 1500 years.
¶840>> [laughter] >> It just doesn't even seem particularly similar to anything that happened before. >> After my call with Ethan on Padre Peio, I examined my conscience for like two to three hours and then made like a 45minute general confession. That was pretty rough. Um, but praise God for his bountiful mercy that I don't deserve. As an interesting aside, I also became vegan the day of my conversion as I refuse to contribute to the grotesque mistreatment of factory farmed animals for trivial benefits to myself.
¶841And I want to embody I often fail in embodying this motto, but I want to embody the motto of St. donavio death rather than sin. Now, okay, don't get me wrong, things get much more complicated for me at least. If the animal lives, if the animals live like wonderful happy lives, but the vast majority of animal products are not like that. Um, and then here are my icons and my rosary.
¶842Actually, I don't have my rosary. Well, this is one rosary in here, but there's a different rosary that I think is very beautiful. It's like a a kind of Byzantine Catholic rosary, but or okay, I won't I won't show you that. Let me just talk about my icons. So um so in addition to my other paraphernalia like you know my my arsenal scarf and my love wisdom from Purdue philosophy and boiler up um I have St.
¶843Maria Geredi right here. Here is St. Damian of Machai. I've got um another saint I've got uh I've got Padre Peio and St. Maxim KBY stickers on on my laptop now.
¶844Um this is uh my confirmation saint St. Albert the Great. Uh very St. St. Albert the based maybe I should call him now.
¶845Um, okay. And here's St. Charbell. Lots of um medically attested healings attributed to his intercession. Like tons of them.
¶846I'll put some uh cool stuff in the the resource document on that. My momento mori. Momento skully as um I think I've heard uh Parker Sedakase call it. My [laughter] momento my mory um little skull. Um here's a I think this is a third class relic of um St.
¶847Marie Gerretti. Uh here is my glorious Theotocos icon uh where she's um basically picking up and showing profound love to the the child Christ. And then here's my um icon of radical humility or or like the deposition or the taking off of the cross, but he's in the uh the radical humility position. [sighs] I've got some I've got some other things as well, you know. I mean, I put this in here, but there there's some other stuff uh that I'm not showing.
¶848But um you know, St. Hey, Maxine Colby. Beautiful, beautiful um print icon that I have of him. Um but okay, on to part 10. My challenge to you.
¶849So, remember the very beginning of this video, however many hours ago that was. I don't know how many hours. But I I still need to edit stuff. But uh okay, I've got a challenge for you guys. I would strongly encourage you to take it on.
¶850In fact, I think most of you are irrational if you don't take it on. And in fact, I'll probably go out and say you're a coward if [laughter] you don't take it on. Uh my challenge to you is just to pray every day going forward. Yes, it's that simple. And yes, it includes you atheists and agnostics.
¶851I'm talking to you guys, too. And here are the details of my challenge depending on your current position on the epistemic landscape. So yes, I got a specific challenge for each of you. All of you listening, if you are listening to this video right now, you're hearing my words go into your ears, listen up, okay? For atheists and agnostics, I challenge you to pray the following prayer in absolute sincerity every single day without fail.
¶852It will take you 10 to 15 seconds and you need to mean it with humility and perseverance. Here's the prayer. Okay? It's just a few sentences. It'll take you 10 to 15 seconds every day.
¶853You've got 10 to 15 seconds to mutter, you know, to to sincerely mutter a few breaths. You can do that. Okay? The prayer is God, if you exist, please help me to know you, love you, and serve you. Guide me to the full truth about you.
¶854If you do, I'll give you my life. And if Catholicism is true, please convert me to Catholicism. That's all you got to say every day. Atheist and agnostics. That's all you got to say every day.
¶855Mean that. Okay? Maybe you wake up and you just say it. Or just like again, like write this out on your phone and just say it every day. Ah, but Joe, you object.
¶856I I don't believe in God and you know, I don't believe prayer works. Well, you're missing the point. Imagine you're stranded and alone in a dense forest. You've gone missing for a week and you're now out of food, water, and shelter. Things are starting to look grim, but you know that there's like some chance that there that there's a search crew out there looking for you either on foot or in helicopter.
¶857Maybe you think there's only like a 1% chance of that or like a 0.1% chance or whatever. As it happens, you have a flare gun. It's super easy to use and it takes almost no energy to deploy. Once deployed, it shoots up a flare into the sky, which would alert any potential search crews to your presence. The gun gives you as many shots as you'd like.
¶858It's like basically limitless reserves of flares. Now, I submit to you that it would be crazy not to shoot the flare gun, even if you think there's probably no one out there who will see it and come to help. What matters is that there's some chance, even if it's very small, that someone's out there who cares about you and is willing to help you if you ask. And you're in a dire situation, my friend. needing help.
¶859The stakes are high. Likewise, I submit that it would be crazy not to pray in your situation, at least conditionally. Even if you think there's probably no one out there who will hear your prayers and come to help you, what matters again is that there's some chance, even if it's small, that God is out there and is willing to help if you ask. And you're in a dire spiritual situation needing help. The stakes are infinitely high, and death comes like a thief in the night.
¶860Just as it would be irrational not to shoot the flare gun, it would be irrational for you not to pray. And I'm not asking you to do some ownerous task. It is trivially easy to earnestly say that conditional prayer every day. Again, it only takes 10 to 15 seconds. And it's conditional, right?
¶861Like it doesn't commit you to saying that God exists. Like you're obviously not like violating any like deontic constraints, like epistemic obligations or like no, it's l if you exist, if you're out there, please help me. Like that's basically what's going on. So, go back up there, scroll up, take a picture of it, write it down, say it every day. Do it.
¶862Do it. I dare you. Okay. Turning now to people who believe in God but aren't Catholic. To you guys, I challenge you to pray a single decade of the rosary in absolute sincerity every single day without fail.
¶863It will take you about three to four minutes or maybe two to three minutes depending on how fast you go. So it'll take you anywhere between two and four minutes. You got you got that time to carve out for your eternal destiny on the line. You got two to four minutes every day. Do you want to potentially you don't want to risk seeing Christ and saying like if you had just prayed two to four minutes I you know I would have I would have sent all the helps possible.
¶864Um and you need to mean it with humility and perseverance. And so here's what to do. Okay. First begin by saying so again these are people who believe in God but aren't Catholics. I'm talking to you Orthodox.
¶865I'm talking to you Protestants. I'm talking to you religious pluralists and indifferentists and bartheists. I'm talking to each and every one of you. First, begin by saying, "God, I'm about to pray a decade of the rosary. If this is against your will, I'm sorry.
¶866If this is idolatrous, I'm sorry. You know my heart. I'm doing this solely to discover and follow your will. If Catholicism is true, please make me Catholic." If you're, you know, if you're okay with saintly intercession, just leave out some of those conditionals about like idolatry or whatever. Then after you say that prayer as a preface, pray the decade of the rosary while meditating on the words of the prayers or while meditating on one of the mysteries of the rosary like the scourging of the pillar or the nativity of our Lord.
¶867A decade of the rosary, by the way, consists in one our father, 10 Hail Marys, one glory be and one Fatima prayer. A decade alone takes about, you know, 2 to three minutes to pray. Finally, end your prayer with this. God, I trust that you know my intentions are pure. I seek you above all else.
¶868Have mercy on me for my sins. Okay? It's all you got to do. 3 to four minutes a day. Okay?
¶869Are you willing to do it? Are you willing to do it? You got to do it. You got to do it. You know, just if you don't if you're not convinced, just return to the analogy of the flare gun, right?
¶870Uh for the non-atholic theists listening, as I've said, you know, that same argument applies to you. If Catholicism is true, you have a grave obligation to become Catholic. And the culpable failure to fulfill that obligation is a mortal, damnable sin. The stakes are infinitely high. Death comes like a thief in the night.
¶871And the challenge I'm giving you is trivially easy. It takes 3 to four minutes a day. And God does not spurn prayers for conversion. God does not spurn those prayers. Okay?
¶872And I said, I've got a challenge for everyone. I haven't turned to the Catholics yet. If you're a Catholic, learn how to pray the five decade rosary and pray it every single day without exception. Your day should be incomplete without the rosary. Okay, maybe I shouldn't say should cuz I don't like bind people to things that they're not bound to.
¶873Okay, but like you get my point. Like I very very very very very very strongly encourage you and challenge you to pray the rosary every single day. And like you you I really think that it would be very very very very very good and important that you regard your day as incomplete without the rosary. I'm dead serious. It takes 15 to 25 minutes depending on how long you meditate.
¶874Uh or you can spread out the decades at various points in the day. And like listen, if you can't carve out 20 minutes a day for God, even just by waking up earlier, your priorities are wrong and you need to change your life. The rosary is an absolute gamecher. You've got to trust me on this. It's an extremely powerful prayer and a relationship with our blessed mother is to borrow a line from St.
¶875Louis de Montford, the safest, easiest, shortest, and most perfect way of approaching Jesus. Elsewhere, he says that the most faithful servants of the blessed virgin being also her greatest favorites receive from her the greatest graces and favors of heaven. So, so, so like I'm telling you guys, pray the rosary. If you're Catholic, learn how to pray it. Learn how to meditate.
¶876watch some videos about that and start praying the rosary daily. Finally, if any of you want to become Catholic, contact your local Catholic parish about starting OCIA or the order of Christian initiation for adults. Uh or if you are baptized Catholic but have fallen away from the faith, do a diligent examination of conscience using several examinations online and schedule a confession with a priest. Christ is beckoning you, my friend. If you want to start building your spiritual life, read the following books.
¶877Of course, the Bible, right? Starting with the Gospels in Acts, then maybe go to the wisdom literature, then maybe the Pauline epistles. Then I'd recommend like maybe in conjunction with the Bible like start reading Brandt Petri's book, An Introduction to the Spiritual Life. Read that. Very good.
¶878It'll uh set you on the right course. Also read um Landre's the book called The Plan of Life. In fact, I've got it right here, mate. Look at it. It's called What's his name?
¶879Roger. Roger. Roger Landry. All right. Read it.
¶880And then finally, read the Catholic Handbook of Prayer Student Edition. I think that there's like a teacher edition or something and it's much larger and more daunting, but like pick this up. Also, game changer. Okay. Okay.
¶881Part 11 conclusion. Alas, the time has come to wrap up. The evidence for Catholicism is overwhelming. Theism is far and away the best explanation of the world's character. And God has manifestally vindicated his church through miracles and prophecies and boatloads of other motives of credibility.
¶882So after everything we've covered, all the arguments, objections, miracles, history, everything else, I'll end with how Christ began his public ministry. The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the gospel. Don't just watch this video and move on. Repent.
¶883Turn away from your sins. Turn toward God, the source and summit of beauty, truth, and goodness. Believe the gospel and embrace the one holy Catholic and apostolic church that Christ founded. Christ himself beckons you. Come to me all you who labor and are burdened and I will give you rest.