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Show 184: THE KINDS OF SIN · The Uncensored Catholic

0:51
Speaker 1: A, Hey, y all, welcome today's show. Well, I've got
1:02
some pretty big news to start this one out with.
1:05
It is that I have just completed and published my
1:11
fifteenth book, and it is my third in the series
1:16
that I do every six months on my reflections on
1:21
the day's mass readings, specifically the Gospels. In this one,
1:25
I think maybe on the next one, I will start
1:27
trying to do some of the you know, the other
1:30
readings from Acts or the Old Testament or the Psalms,
1:35
now that I've done you know, a year and a half,
1:38
you know, you the entire New Testament is read in
1:41
the Catholic Church basically, well they say in a three
1:46
year cycle, but really most of it is repeated year
1:51
in and year out. I mean, you know what you're
1:53
going to hear at Eastern right, you know, you know
1:55
your Christmas readings? Okay, So I think I probably will
2:00
start doing some of the other biblical readings. But this
2:04
one is I think the best I've done yet, and
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it is now available. It is for January through October
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of twenty twenty five. So I actually got out about
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you know, two and a half months ahead on this one,
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and God willing, I can get out about three months
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or even three and a half months ahead on the
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next one. I would really like to start putting these
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out six months in advance, so people have a chance
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to buy them, you know, before January comes around. But
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you do actually have two and a half months to
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buy this one before the readings begin January one of
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twenty twenty five. And I really do think this is
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my best one yet. I think you're going to find
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it interesting, You're going to find it insightful as often
2:52
as possible. You know, I'm quoting saints, and I'm quoting
2:55
well like Father Sparago or I'm quoting We're pulling us
2:59
on the explain mandatory passages from the Dewey Raims Bible
3:02
and expanding on those. I think, yeah, it is my
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best yet. I do believe that you can buy it
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on Amazon. Great for you, you know, you can get
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my I call it a Catholic devotional. You know, when
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I was a Protestant, we had all these books that
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were like a yearly devotional and it would give you
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like a passage from Scripture, and then you know, some
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minister would write his reflection on it. Well, I'm doing
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the same thing, but for Catholics. I mean it's almost
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like a little mini homily. You just kind of read
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an excellent Christmas gift for anyone in your life, especially Catholics,
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but especially people who may be considering conversion, because you've
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got to remember my perspective as always as one who
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converted to Catholicism, and I give the reasons. You know,
4:30
today's Gospel reflection. You know, I sent it out on
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my subject newsletter Missy O Day, a great Catholic website
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also featured it, and I talk about the Saints and
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you know why. You know, as Catholics, we don't worship saints,
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we venerate saints. Why that's right, Why it's biblical? How
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they can hear us? What the Bible says about saints?
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And you know, it comes down to that kind of question,
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do you actually believe that the saints are alive in heaven? Well,
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if you believe that the Saints are alive in heaven,
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they can pray for us, just like you ask your friend,
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your family member to pray for you. A Protestant will say, well,
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they can't hear you. Well, why can't they hear you? Well,
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they say, you know, they don't speak your language. They live,
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you know, five hundred or a thousand years ago. Well,
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when the Holy Spirit on Pentecost came on the Apostles
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and the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Holy Spirit gave them
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the ability to hear and speak all languages. The Saints
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in heaven are more filled with the Holy Spirit than
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the Apostles were on Pentecost. The Bible says that those
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in heaven are divinized, they become like God. They share
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in the divinity of Christ, which means not only can
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they hear you, but they share in Christ's mission of
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saving souls to Selviffic mission. Well, then they'll say, but
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they're out in heaven and you're here on earth. Well,
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where's heaven? Okay, where's heaven? Heaven's where God is. Well,
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the Bible tells us that God lives in the heart
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of every Christian. Oh right, when sat when Saint Paul says,
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in the Bible, we're surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses.
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Where's heaven. Then, Heaven's where God is. Where's God? God's here,
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the Bible says, in God we live and move and
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have our being. It's the Saints are here with us,
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hearing us. And you know, a book of Revelation talks
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about how the Saints are praying for us here on earth.
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We can go through it. I mean, you know, some
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of the books Martin Luther took out, like Wisdom, talks
6:32
about that same very thing. So, yeah, if you want
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make a sent, it means I'm fulfilling my duty as
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a Catholic and a Catholic Christian. I guess people say
9:12
these days, but you know it's kind of redundant anyway.
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Not all Christians are Catholic, but all Catholics are certainly
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Christian because Christ founded one church. And anyway, let's get
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back where we left off. You may remember in radio
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replies the Englishman who had been really taken a task
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about the church being Italian. This Englishman did really hated Italians. Well,
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we finally get to the heart of the matter. He
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really hates Irish. And you may know that traditionally, since
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England became Protestant, England as a nation as essentially enslaved
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and committed a genocide against the Italian I mean the
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Irish peace people. The Irish are the most enslaved people
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ever in the history of the world. English decided the
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Irish were less than human because they weren't Anglican, because
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they were Catholic. They took half the population of Ireland
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and shipped it out of the country, try to replace
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it with some pro English Scots, and then ended up
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shipping them to America and Australia. The English you think,
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you know, yeah, what Hitler did you know in World
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War Two is horrible. I mean, we're talking about the Holocaust.
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I'm not going to try to diminish it. You think
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the English are a moral nation as Protestants, they were
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a great nation as Catholics. Okay. No, Actually England is
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responsible for a far worse genocide and far more deaths
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than Hitler and Nazi Germany. England is not as a
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Protestant nation. England is not a good nation. And those
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who believe that, you know, basically their salvation hinges on
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being English, will have quite a shock when they get
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to the afterlife. But anyway, and I won't even get
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into the inmbred Moron who they now call King, you know. Okay,
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So the person says, I cannot reconcile myself to the
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Irish element which prevails in your church. Here's a good
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English Christian for you. They answer, the Irish element does
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not prevail. If ten million Irishmen in the world were
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to die to mar the Catholic Church would not be affected.
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As a church in this country. The majority of Catholics
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are of Irish descent. But to judge, and I'm I'm
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not sure if which priest is answering, you know, the
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two priests actually one in America and one Australia. Probably
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that's hard to say. I'm gonna say it's probably the
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American priest it's answering, and he was actually an Englishman.
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I think they were both English. Come and think of it.
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But he says, to judge from the local condition is
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absurd as the conduct of an Italian who would regard
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the world as Italian because he had lived all his
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life in Italy. And if you would reconcile yourself to
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the fact that, at least in this country the Irish
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element prevails, would you join the church in some other
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country in which it does not prevail? Will you rather
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do without the truth because the majority of those who
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have it in this country are of Irish descent. Yes,
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I believe this is the American I say, as the
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descendant of Charles Carroll, the only Catholic signer of the
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Constitution of the Decoration of Independence, a true American hero
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whose I guess nephew was the first Catholic bishop. And yes,
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we are proud of our Irish Catholic heritage. Is your
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dislike of everything Irish stronger than your love of Christ?
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Or will you say, Oh God, I will accept the
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gift of the Catholic faith, provided you do not ask
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me to share it with the Irish. Imagine some gentile
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in the early Church. Really, I am strongly attracted to
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this Christian religion, but I cannot reconcile myself to the
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Jewish elements which so prevails amongst its adherents. And actually,
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there if you read the early Church followers, that was
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not uncommon among the Romans and Greeks. They would basically say,
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you know, you make a lot of sense, and you
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can almost convince me, but I won't worship a Jewish
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Jesus or associate with Jewish apostles. And yeah, the pope
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was Jewish. In fact, the first three popes were Jewish,
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at least let me think it was the fourth. Anyway,
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it doesn't really matter anyway. The person answers the Irish
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do not welcome converts, and the presanswers they do. You
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are outside the church. I am within it. And if
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anybody ever says the Irish aren't friendly, you haven't met
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an irishman. Contrary, hot tempered, maybe drink a little too much,
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but we all are known to be among the most
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friendly of people on earth. Actually, even if we can
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be a little suspicious. I remember when I was taking
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a perma culture class. My teacher, he was actually from Australia,
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very you know anyway, interesting guy, and he said, never
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ask directions in Ireland. He said, how do you get
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to you know, just name a town I don't even
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know right, how do you get to Dublin wherever? And
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the person would answer, why would you be after knowing?
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And what would you be doing when you get there?
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You know, you know, we're an odd sort but friendly that. Yeah,
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you will not find a more friendly people on the
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face of the earth than the Irish, no matter how
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bad we've been treated. Anyway, the person says, I am
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the priest now says I am a purely English origin.
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As I said, this isn't you know, a man of
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English heritage, and was instructed and received into the church
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by an Irish priest and found myself more well come
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along the children of the Catholic Church. Nor was I
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expected to become a militant Irish sympathizer from any national
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point of view, nationalistic point of view, I guess I
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retain my own national ideals. But the glory of the
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Catholic Church is that she unites people into one Catholic ideal,
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yet does not interfere with the national ideals. The four
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hundred million Catholics and now we're about one point five
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billion in the world. And when he wrote this just
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think about this, okay, when he wrote this sentence, and
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I guess somewhere around nineteen thirty, there were four hundred
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million Catholics in the world. There are now one point
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five billion. In contrast, worldwide, there are only about four
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hundred million Protestants, and most of them do in ten church.
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They're nominally Protestant, some okay, say five hundred million. I've
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seen both figures. Most of them will say, you know,
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I am a Protestant Christian. I grew up in a
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Methodist or a Baptist church. Even church attenders they're not
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raising their children to be Protestants. Will their children answer
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the same anyway? He says, the four hundred million Catholics
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love very many different lands from a national point of view,
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but all love the one Catholic Church of Christ that
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are only true Catholic Church, who every member is in
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communion with the Bishop of Rome successor of Peter himself.
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The guy goes on, what do you mean to say
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that the true church must be Apostolic? And he says,
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I mean the true Church must be able to exhibit
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as a historical fact that she possesses the lawful and
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uninterrupted succession of her bishops from the Apostles, her faith, worship,
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and discipline remaining ever the same in all essential things. Briefly,
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this means the identity of the Church today with that
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of the Apostles. And the guy asks, are not the
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Greek churches of Apostolic And they answer, And this is
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very important to know. You will talk with many Orthodox.
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You do not understand that any answer no, the mere
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fact that they are in schism involves a secession from
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the Church of the Apostles. Now, the Orthodox churches were
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founded by the Apostles. Okay, they do have to some
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degree valid sacraments. Who will find some very differing ideas there.
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I mean, for instance, a lot of the Orthodox churches
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allow divorce. You know, Jesus said no divorce. So but
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they do not acknowledge the authority of the Pope and
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are in schism. We're not the same. And they'll be
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the first to tell you that. Catholics are usually like, yeah,
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the Orthodox are great. We love the Orthodox. We're like
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on the same page. You ask an Orthodox, They're like,
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you know, we hate the Catholics. We don't want anything
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to do with the Catholics, you know, seriously, but anyway,
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and not all I mean, there's certainly good people on
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both sides. I just mean the Orthodox will be glad
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to tell you why they are not Catholic anyway. Prior
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to their succession, the Greek submitted the absolute necessity of
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the union in the bond of Apostolic apostolic authority. The
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early Greek ecclesiastical writers afford sufficient evidence for this. And
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the person asks, what of Protestanism, And here's a very
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simple answer. Protestantism is in a still worse plight, involving
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a more far reaching constitutional change. Most forms of Protestantism
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do not even claim to inherit apostolic authority. Very true,
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of course, when he says most you will find Anglicans
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who claim to have some Apostolic authority, because the Anglican
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churches were once Catholic, Catholic as in Catholic, and you know,
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their priests were generally ordained by Catholic priests and bishops,
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and then apostaized, became schismatic, left the Catholic Church and
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became Anglican. And actually, as you go through the history,
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now even though the Anglican vicars may claim Apostolic succession
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that has been broken. The last of the Anglican bishops
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and priests who came in the lineage of the Catholic
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Church died out, and the ones who are here today
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I think we can go back to about the late
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eighteen hundreds mid eighteen hundreds, there has not been Apostolic succession,
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meaning that they cannot trace their ordination to a priest
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who was ordained by a priest who was ordained by
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a priest who was ordained by a priest who two
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thousand years ago was ordained by Saint Peter or Saint
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you know, Timothy or Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, et cetera.
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That's Apostolic succession. So while they may claim it, they
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did actually lose that probably about two hundred years ago,
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I mean, and they haven't been around but about five
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hundred years, maybe even further back than that. Did only
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the Lutherans. Every now and then you'll find a Lutheran
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who will claim Apostolic succession, but they have no none
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do I mean, they don't even have a I mean,
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they weren't actually like Catholics who became a Catholic priests
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who became Anglican right the way the Anglicans did. They
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just you know, abandoned the pope and swore allegiance to
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the king. But they were still ordained by a Catholic priest.
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Lutherans not ordained by anybody an apostolic succession, you know,
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no claim to it whatsoever. The Orthodox do at least
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have the claim, and they do have some valid sacraments,
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but their schismatic and not in any way Catholic until
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they will return to the Catholic Church and accept the
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authority of the pope and the cardinals and bishops along
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with him. And we talked about that the whole episode
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on it. Actually, you know, at one point the Orthodox Churches,
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especially the Greeks, not only decided not to submit to
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the authority the pope, but were actually ruled by a caliph,
21:29
a Muslim authority. And at that point in time, it's
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really hard to say they remained even truly Christian because
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their version of Christianity became Christianity as allowed by the
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Muslim caliph. And again just a few generations after that,
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you know, a couple of hundred years actually, but the
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Russian Orthodox said, you know, our authority isn't the Pope.
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It's the head of the Soviet Union. You know, we
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and it's you know, we don't how do I put it.
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I'm not saying they're not good Christians, and there are
22:20
there many. I have known some. You know, one of
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my best friends was Russian Orthodox. She has sense well
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she's Ukrainian and she now hates everything Russian, so she's
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no longer Russian Orthodox. But you know, they had a
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lot of struggles. Basically, the Soviet Union said, you can
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have your church, but your ultimate authority becomes the Soviet Union,
22:46
the Soviet Dictator, not God, and not the pope. And
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once you do that, I mean yeah, I mean you've
22:57
got a Bible and you've got the liturgy you inherited
23:04
from the Catholic Church, but you're not under I mean,
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you know, the Christian says, there's no king but Jesus,
23:13
and Jesus is represented upon earth is the pope, because
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that's what Jesus said. Well, whether it was the Greek
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Orthodox under the Muslim Caliph or the Russian Orthodox under
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the dictator of the Soviet Union, they said, well, we
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bow the knee to this earthly ruler, and everything we think,
23:37
do say and believe is not subject. Jesus isn't the
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final word, the Kita Krushchev is. You know, that's it's
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very problematic. It's no, I mean, that's it's no different
23:53
than the Anglican Church that said, you know, King Henry
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the Eighth is the ultimate authority, He's the head of
23:58
our church. He speaks as God. That's exactly what the
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Orthodox churches did to the Muslim Caliph and the you know, atheist,
24:10
evil Soviet dictators and other you know, Chowchevsky and Romania,
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and I could go through them, you know, I know
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these are horrible, horrible people. And if you say that,
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you know, if he says your religion has to teach
24:27
this and he won't allow that, and you to respect
24:30
his authority more than God, well you're not exactly following
24:33
the dictator of Jesus rendering to Caesar what is Caesar?
24:36
And under God? What is God's? But anyway, and now
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let's return to Father Spirago's exhaustive Catechism of the Catholic Church,
24:45
and we'll do a short entry because afore we talked
24:49
about a lot today when we've been talking about sin
24:52
and we're in the third part, this is the kinds
24:54
of sin, and this is something that Protestants really don't understand.
24:58
There are different kinds of All sins are not equal
25:01
to God. The Bible says specifically some sins cry out,
25:06
and that, for instance, sin against the Holy Spirit could
25:10
not be forgiven. Protestants will say all sins are equal. No,
25:14
actually they're venial and mortal sins. Will actually get into
25:16
that in the next show. We'll get into the gravity
25:21
the differing degrees of sin, but we'll start with the
25:24
kinds of sin. And he says circumstances which alter the
25:29
nature of sin must be specified in confession. All those
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sins which violate different commandments or which are opposed to
25:36
different virtues, are distinct in their nature from one of
25:40
one from another. And also are those sins by which
25:44
one and the same commandment is transgressed, or which are
25:47
opposed to one of the same virtue but in different ways.
25:52
For instance, theft and lying are two different types, two
25:55
different kinds of sin. But because by theft the seventh
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and by lying the eighth commandment is broken, Pride and
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avarice are sins of a very different kind because they
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are opposed to two different virtues. Humility and liberality. Theft
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and cheating are two sins of a different nature because
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they violate the Seventh Commandment into several ways. Presumption of
26:19
God's mercy and despair are two sins of a different
26:22
nature because they are opposed to the virtue of hope
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in two different ways. Sins are generally divided into sins
26:30
of word, thought and of deed. Hatred, of murder, or
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two different kinds of sin, because the Fifth Commandment is
26:36
transgressed by them in different ways, by thought and by deed.
26:41
Boasting in speech and ostentation and dress are two different
26:45
kinds of sin because they offend against the virtue of
26:47
humility in two different ways, by word and by deed.
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A distinction also exists between our sins and the sins
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in which we cooperate. Our own sins are those in
26:58
which we our selves commit. The sense in which we
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cooperate are those which we do not indeed commit ourselves,
27:06
but for which we are to blame. We may be
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an accessory to another sin by command, consent, counsel, praise, assistance, defense,
27:15
by provocation, or by silence, or by abstaining from punishing
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the ill done, although we might and ought to have
27:23
prevented it. The sinner is like a man with leprosy.
27:27
He leads other and sin as the leopard infects others
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with his lonesome disease. In that case, the guilt of
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their sin lies at his door. If the guilt of
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their sin lies at his door. If a man sits
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fire to a house, he is to blame for the conflagration.
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It just means burning. I like that word, though we
27:47
don't use that very often in modern times. Conflagration. If
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he gives to his if he gives his neighbor poison,
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he is answerable for his neighbor's death. The same is
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true of us if we lead any one into sin,
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or even if we do not endeavor to prevent the sin.
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To leave a crime unpunished is to teach others to
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commit it. If the bodyguard of an emperor were to
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hear that an attempt had been made on the person
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of their imperial master, they would be sorely alarmed, for
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they would know that to allege that they had no
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part in it would be of no avail as an excuse.
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In like manner, we shall have good cause for apprehension
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if through our cowardice or negligence at affront has been
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offered to the Divine majesty. He who might prevent an
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evil deed and does not do so is to blame
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for that deed. In illustration of this, remember how Herod
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commanded the murder of the Holy Innocence. Aaron consented to
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the Israelites demand and made the Golden Calf. The Jews
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were pleased because Herod had put the apostle James to
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death and induced him to comprehend Saint Peter with the
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attention intention of executing him. Also, that's Acts twelve. Saul
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assistant in the men who stone Stephen. By taking care
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of their garments. Job's wife provoked her husband to anger
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and impatience. Tobias's wife did the same. Eli the High
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Priest did not rebuke his sons for their misdeeds, nor
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correct them. For this, God reprimanded him by Samuel's mouth.
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First Kings, those two who, being members of the Council
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through human respect, do not protest against the passing of
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unjust decrees are guilty of sin. The prophet compares such
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person to dumb dogs, not able to bark Isaiah. I'm
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not sure what chapter that is. It's in Isaiah. We'll
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go with that earthly potentates. That means rulers, legislative bodies,
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parents and superiors, employers of labor, editors of periodicals, and
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publishers may easily render themselves guilty of the sin of others. Boy,
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is that not true? I had, you know, I used
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to be an editor of a publication. I had a newspaper,
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and it was very hard, very very hard, very very
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hard to make sure everything we were printing was absolutely
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true as we knew it to be. It was a
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burden like you cannot believe when you have, say, caught
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a politician, let's just say, immortally or illegally making several
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million dollars off of the taxpayer's dime, and you print it.
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You better be darned sure you're right, because one, if
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you're wrong, you can get sued. Two, if you're wrong,
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you're committing a sin. You're committing a sin of you know,
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slander and or dishonesty if you actually know it's false,
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which you know, I never did anything. I knew it
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was false. But what four? Where are we up to? Four?
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He's going to come after you, and I'll never forget
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an FBI agent telling me to check the trunk of
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my car, check under my seats, look for explosives or
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contraband every time I got into my vehicle, and never
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go anywhere unarmed, and keep checking your rear view mirror
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in case somebody's going to run you off the road.
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And he had a whole list of things, because I
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was right. But yeah, that was You know, in every case,
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when you're reporting on public corruption or whatever, it is
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a huge burden. It is really hard. So, returning fathers Barago,
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he says, if the rule of our nation, if the
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ruler of a nation enters upon an unjust war, is
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he not answerable for all the crimes which are perpetrated
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in that war? Who is to blame? When laws are
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passed antagonistic to religion, whereby the salvation of many are imperiled,
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who is to blame? With the daily papers are the
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means of stirring up national and religious animosities and rousing
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the spirit of persecution. Who's in such cases is the
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greater sin? He who is to blame for another man's
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sin deserves punishment quite as well as much as if
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he had committed the sin. Himself. He who tempts another
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to sin is perhaps more blame worthy of the two.
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Remember that God punished Eve more severely than Adam because
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she led him into sin. Even to this day, the
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consequences of original sin weigh more heavily upon the weaker
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than upon the stronger of the sex. To tempt others
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to sin is a sin against charity. It is like
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the devil, who not content with being evil himself, makes
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others evil. For this reason, our Lord exclaims woe to
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that man whom scandal cometh. It were better for him
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than a middlestone should be hanged about his neck, and
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he should be drowned in the depths of the sea.
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Matt's Matthew eighteen six. All right, we're gonna wrap it
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up there. So it's a hard passage. You know, how
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many of us in our lives have not tempted another
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to sin? I have. I fully admit to it, and
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I've gone a confession and apologize. We all made mistakes,
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especially when when we were younger, but you know we
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all learn and hopefully become better people. Anyway, y'all have
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a great evening. Remember the words of Saint Padre Pio, pray,
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hope and don't worry, and I'll talk to you next time.