Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Welcome to the Truth Exchange podcast. This is a weekly program with Dr. Jeffrey J. Ventrella where he answers questions from subscribers around the globe, answering questions about worldview, cultural apologetics and other miscellaneous items.
I'm your host, Joshua Gilo, and this is another edition of the Director's Bag.
We've had a miscellaneous number of questions regarding the new Pope.
And as a Protestant, I just say, well, he's not my Pope. Christ is my head. But we had some very specific questions, such as, what does this mean for Protestants? Is this new pope going to be good? Should we care about who the Roman Catholics are elect as a pope? What does it mean for us?
What does that have to do with on issues and conversations of ethics, specifically sexuality?
Immigration seems to be a big one that is coming up in conversations and all over the social media realm.
[00:01:10] Speaker A: Yeah. So it's a very important question to understand and to navigate. Well, and to navigate as a Christian.
So a couple of thoughts, general and specific. The general ones are how should we think about this development?
And one of the things we need to understand is that the world oftentimes gets its Christian message from the Roman Catholic Church. And so so goes the Roman Catholic Church, so goes how the general populace views what Christians are, and so on, so forth. To the extent that that particular tradition is faithful to Christ and His Word, that's a good thing. To the extent it perhaps de emphasizes some important things or perhaps goes askew, ethically, that's a bad thing.
We also have to recognize that this is a very large institution, both fiscally and geographically.
As I pointed out in a prior dictator, though, the Utah Mormons and their assets dwarf the Roman Catholic Church in terms of assets, not in geographical span.
So the point being there is that because it's such a large institution, it does have to recognize there's been some just horrendous behaviors, including sexual abuse and all those sorts of things not limited to Roman Catholic clergy. Of course, there's been a lot of abuse in evangelical and reformational situations too. But generally we need to understand that this is important because when the Pope declares something that is going to be imputed to all who name the name of Christ, whether people understand the ecclesiology or not, they understand the term Christian. And so we've got to be very careful with respect to that. The second general observation is we tend to view these things through American eyes.
But having traveled the globe many times, what happens in the Vatican is heard very differently than what happens in Boston or Des Moines. Oh, that's interesting, Antonio. Or In San Francisco and so off. Oftentimes when the Vatican speaks about something, it is tempering it to hit home in a particular geographic reason region. And so my friends in Argentina hear something very different than my friends in India and of course in the UK and so forth. So yeah, we need to I think temper any reactions to have to try to explore a little bit more what's going on there. So I mean I, I would direct people.
Al Mohler, the. The day after this cardinal was elevated to become Leo the 14th Prevost was his name. Robert Prevost.
Mohler had a very good perspective on how, how should we think about these kinds of things without in any way shaving off the clear distinctions and the clear differences that reformational people have.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: Right, right.
[00:04:35] Speaker A: Roman Catholicism specifically. I don't know very much about this particular cardinal. He was kind of a dark horse.
I know he's a trombone player from Chicago and that's a really good thing in my view.
I would say that, you know, he's 69, which means he could have a very vigorous reign that. I don't know if that's the right word but holding that office.
So if he's good, that could be very good. If he's not so good, that could be very bad.
We know too that he was hand picked by Pope Francis to occupy the diacastry.
That's a particular group that nominates and kind of vets bishops. And so under Francis's time as pope, a lot of those, a lot of people, a lot of the conservatives would say this thing has been diluted and they moved to the left in terms of both theology and practice. We also know that this particular pontiff spent a ton of time in Peru. In fact, he's a dual citizen.
I've been to Peru many, many, many times. There's a lot of faithful Christians in Peru, both Catholic and non Catholic.
He was in Chiclayo there and was the bishop of Chiclayo. I've been there many times. Chicklayo has the best ceviche in the nation, probably the world.
It's very poor. I remember I was chatting with, we were actually in Lima together, Bishop Michael Nazar Ali, who's an Anglican at that time.
And he was just chatting, he said he's been all over the world, you know, India, Persia, so on and so forth.
[00:06:19] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:06:19] Speaker A: And he said he's never, never seen poverty like he's seen in Peru.
And so my, my thinking is that because this, you know, Leo XIV spent so much time, so immersed so many decades in kind of where, you know, liberation theology reigned and also where there's lots of people who have literally nothing that's going to be formational.
And so we need to, to understand that he's got this filter, this lens that's going to interpret things from that particular perspective.
[00:06:55] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:06:56] Speaker A: I think we also know because he was the head, he served two terms as the head of the Augustinian order, which is one of the oldest orders of clergy. He certainly knows how to get things done. And I don't mean to be pejorative and say, you know, he understands the bureaucracy, but I think he understands leading these various kinds of things. So whereas Pope Francis was kind of like bull in a china closet, he's been described as, you know, bumping things and saying things off the cuff. I think that Leo XIV is going to be much more sophisticated in his methodology, which again, could be good or it could be not so good. He's certainly been very pro life, at least historically.
We don't know where he is on some of these other issues. And I would caution our listeners not to engage in confirmation bias this early in his holding of the office. Meaning that, aha, here's something he said. And these three lines could be interpreted to mean, you know, really good things or really bad things. I think that's just borders on bearing false witness. I just don't think we know at this point.
I, I chagrined to see that one of the very left priests, James Martin, the Jesuit who's fully embracing LGBT sorts of inclusion, said it was a brilliant choice.
Well, that's, that's an ambiguous comment, but he seems to be quite happy.
That disturbs me greatly because Martin. Martin has rejected a lot of the cons, biblically faithful notions concerning human sexuality, so on and so forth. So that's kind of a. Off the top of my head, but I think we do need to be aware of it. We ought not to be, you know, with pitchforks in hand or anything like that.
[00:08:43] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, here's a side. Two side questions is one, you mentioned liberation theology, for those of our listeners who are not familiar with that movement and type of theology that has, it seems to me, has reigned quite dominant in certain wings of Roman Catholic circles. Certainly in there is a type of black liberation theology, which is kind of the offshoot of liberation theology. Could you talk to our listeners about that? And then my second question is regarding ecumenical work. Is there any kind of hope of restoration, as it were, between the Protestants and the Roman Catholics?
[00:09:22] Speaker A: Yeah, so that's a great question. I'll Take the first one first.
Liberation theology is essentially baptized Marxism. Liberation theology was generally developed in Latin America and it was the idea that ah, the Exodus event is all about unshackling people from oppression.
And so consequently they read everything through the lens of a Marxist dialectic of oppressed and oppressor. And so would say things like God is on the side of the poor, that capitalism is oppressive. And so liberation theology was co opt by a lot of the revolutionaries in the seventies and of course brought all kinds of grief through what was going on.
An offshoot of that, that we've seen in the last several years of Francis and also with Cardinal Prevost has been this idea of immigration.
So the idea of unfettered immigration, the, the homeless or the, the migrant I guess would be a better way to put it that, that we ought to do all things with respect to that and just allow this to have free flowing kinds of ideas.
Now we're certainly to love our neighbors, we're certainly to help those in need. That's a very, very different question as to what the state's responsibility is to protecting the nation state and so on, so forth.
So I think we're going to see things like, I've already heard rumblings of kind of like liberation theology soft and that will become through the eyepiece of this immigration problem that we're having where predominantly Latin America where liberation theology has stewed for many decades.
[00:11:13] Speaker B: Second question regarding ecumenical. You know, for Protestants there's been since Vatican II probably the issue of a doubling down on Trent, which in the Council of Trent they said that Protestants are anathema because of their perspective or they're holding to the specificity of what we call the Gospel.
And so is there, is this something that Protestants should be hopeful for ever as we long for Jesus coming, that there would be restoration?
Even Protestants would call the Roman Catholics to repentance of what we perceive as idolatry and a works based gospel.
Does this pope kind of shed a light of maybe this might change or.
[00:12:04] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't know the answer to that. But I think from a theological perspective, you know, we are to be one. Christ prays for that.
And sectarianism is not the biblical ideal because in sectarianism someone needs to repent and someone needs to forgive. And so ecclesiastically I think it's really a scar on who we are as Christians to be so divisive on those kinds of issues. Now make no mistake, doctrine divides and I don't want to be misheard here, but I do think having again traveled the world. There is a lot of misunderstanding and a lot of bearing false witness going both ways on these kinds of, kinds of dialogues. So I think we have to be very careful. Now. I don't know enough about what this cardinal has been up to in terms of where his heart is or anything like that.
We know that Francis made some great strides in this with respect to orthodoxy and with respect to certain relationships with the Church of England.
But I think there's some huge hurdles, particularly with Tridentine, that is to say, Latin rite Catholics who think that the Council of Trent is infallible, inerrant and everything it does.
But let's just, let's just be clear.
Even Trent itself, when it comes to the doctrine of concupiscence, that is to say, desires of the heart, says that. Well, the apostle says X. But we think, and they differ themselves from the Apostle Paul's understanding of, of things like evil desires and all that sort of stuff. There are people that I know that will die on that distinction. And so, you know, everyone talks about justification by faith alone as a huge bridge too far.
Well, I think with the right understanding that may be able to be broached, but I don't see concupiscence being broached because it's fundamentally dealing with the doctrine of humanity and with hammer theology, the doctrine of sin. And so, and until they understand the nature of fall is pretty important here.
So I think there's, there's some issues there and you know, I think partly what the Reformation was all about, how salvation applied. And we have different understandings about that. And those understandings can help us appreciate how people are saved, redeemed.
But of course, the bottom line is we're not saved by our formulas. That would make us just ritualistic like anybody else. We're saved by Jesus.
We explain what happens in that. And I, and I believe, unlike some of our classical theistic friends, that there is in fact the wrath of God which is real, that in fact transitions to the grace of God on the, on the object of the sinner. And so there's a lot of stuff like that that we need to wrestle with.
I, I, I'm not, I don't have the patience of Job probably to do that in this life. I want to be respectful, I want to, I want to join in the ecumenical creeds and not necessarily do the sectarian creeds, which I think that Trent is, and I think that even our, you know, three forms of unity and Westminster standards and 39 articles, I think those are sectarian. Let's Just be candid about it.
I think that if we can stand side by side and recite the Nicene Creed with the philokine clause in it, of course, as a Western Christian. But we got a lot, we got a lot to think about and a lot to work on. But until we do, having those being unresolved does not take away.
We're not purists in that sense. It does not take away the ability to do well together, one with another, supporting one another. There's nothing that requires uniformity to walk.
Think about your own churches, your own congregations.
Not everyone believes the same thing, folks.
Now if they're heretical, like, you know, denying the second coming or saying it's already come, then we have a big problem. A really big problem.
[00:16:28] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaking of problems in the church, there's been some, some issues that have recently risen with some of the parachurch organizations in the circles of the particular Baptist. And without getting into the weeds of all that, you know, our listeners can go out and find, you know, what we're talking about or can figure out what we're talking about.
But one of the things that has arisen out of this issue is whether or not there should be Christians should be acting anonymous online.
And kind of the heart of the matter is with Christians being anonymous online via Twitter or Reddit, Facebook, actually with Facebook you can't be too anonymous, but Christians will go in and act unchristianly. And so there has been some discussion, I know some of our, even with our truth exchange scholars have mentioned, like P. Andrew Sandlin has mentioned about Christians behavior.
And I'd like to know just Jeff, from your perspective of how we engage, why that's important, especially for the unbeliever and how we behave. But what do you think? Do you think, should Christians have anonymous or Anon accounts?
[00:17:48] Speaker A: Yeah, there's a lot of factors going on here. I think that we need to start out with understanding that the Book of James has some very direct and specific warnings and in fact even condemnations with respect to the misuse of the tongue. That is to say how we, how we communicate and what we communicate. And I don't think that's suspended simply because our tongue speaks through our keyboards. And so there's no exclusionary clause for this when we're behaving online.
And the trouble is being online allows us somewhat of a cushion against being punched in the nose by saying something inflammatory or what have you. People get away with it. They think it's really kind of snappy and smart and look What I did, I just dunked on this guy. Ah. And all that sort of stuff. So. So I think that as a bottom line, the ninth commandment applies, as well as the adverbs of grace apply on how we, how we talk about these things, how we talk about anything, whether that's the color of the rose or anything else. Now take it one level further. Is it per se sinful to have an anonymous account? I. I can't get there yet. And the reason is, is that we've seen in intellectual history people using pseudonyms and using, you know, anonymity in order to have ideas carry the day rather than personalities carry the day. So, so, for example, the. The Federalist Papers and the anti Federalist Papers used, you know, monikers of Publius in the case of Federalist Papers, largely Brutus and Cato, the anti Federalist papers. And the reason was that the rhetoric was designed to carry the argument, not, oh, that was Alexander Hamilton or something like that.
So I'm willing to. To concede that sometimes in some context, for certain purposes, anonymity may actually be a prudential choice. But that's not what's happening on the online stuff. We're seeing people stir puts. We're seeing people poke eyes. We're seeing people basically being self indulgent, trying to get more clicks.
We're seeing people starting fires so that then when they're not anonymous, they can come in and solve the problem. You know, let's just face it, that's like Scientology, right? It's like, we're going to give you a problem and then we're going to solve the problem.
Well, that's just really dangerous. And it's happening.
Well, far too much. And so it seems to me the rule of prudence, if I were counseling someone, I say, don't do it at all. Just don't do it. The temptation of sin, the. The delusion that you will not be held accountable is just high. And besides which, it's a lot of. I have to say, it's a lot of the neo masculinity guys that are out there being anonymous using some fake, you know, you know, Vlad the Impaler or some stupid name like that. And, and what happens is they lack courage. They. Here they are pounding their chests and trying to be, oh, you need to be manly. You need to be like, courage. We. Bravery. It's like, well, who are you? I'm not gonna say because I'm. I'm in. I'm in my basement. Oh, let me eat some more Cheeto. Cheetos. That's just. I just think it's a lightweight move, to be blunt. If you can't say it to my face, if you can't say it by talking about it, then you're not worth really reading. And that's what I think it really gets down to.
[00:21:33] Speaker B: This concludes a recording of the Director's Bag. For more resources from Truth Exchange, please visit us online at www.truthexchange.com. you can follow us on X as well as Facebook for more updates and content related to Truth Exchange. Be sure to join us next week for more questions from the Director's Bag. I'm your host, Joshua Gilo, and this is the Truth Exchange podcast.
