Latest / Deep-Grace Diving with Tim Wright and Terey Summers / #117 Did you hear the one about the Lutheran Pastor and the Catholic Priest who joined a podcast?

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#117 Did you hear the one about the Lutheran Pastor and the Catholic Priest who joined a podcast? · Deep-Grace Diving with Tim Wright and Terey Summers

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  [music]
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  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to the Deep Grace Diving Podcast.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_02: I'm John Burgess.
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  SPEAKER_02: You've heard my voice before.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_02: And some of you right now are scared that I have co-opted the podcast away from Tim Wright.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: Some of you.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_02: And maybe one of you is like, finally, we get to have a podcast without Pastor Tim.
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  SPEAKER_02: Well, whether you're scared or not, I have a huge treat for you today.
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  SPEAKER_02: Pastor Tim is here and we are joined once again by our friend of the podcast,
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  SPEAKER_02: Father Scott Bailey.
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  SPEAKER_02: And today, my friends, my listeners, the gloves are coming off.
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  SPEAKER_02: We are going to talk about,
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  SPEAKER_02: my working title for the podcast is,
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_02: are Catholics really Christians and do Lutherans have any chance of getting
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  SPEAKER_02: into heaven?
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_02: That was my working title.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: It didn't make it past the editors.
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  SPEAKER_02: We have a team of editors in the back office making sure that Tim and usually Terry
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  SPEAKER_02: and I are on topic.
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  SPEAKER_02: Terry's not here today.
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  SPEAKER_02: She's still performing.
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  SPEAKER_02: And so we would all rather be watching Les Mis with Terry, but you're kind of stuck with us.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_02: And this is what I want to start with.
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  SPEAKER_02: You know,
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  SPEAKER_02: we do get a lot of questions and I certainly get them in my personal life
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  SPEAKER_02: about You know, can we be friends?
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  SPEAKER_02: Can we go to the same potluck?
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  SPEAKER_02: Or are we not allowed to do that?
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  SPEAKER_02: And so I want to start with, Fr.
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  SPEAKER_02: Scott and Pastor Tim, I want to start with some notable quotes and see if I can get us started.
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  SPEAKER_02: A contest for the ages right here on the Deep Grace Diving Podcast.
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  SPEAKER_02: But listen to some of the things that we have said to each other over the years.
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  SPEAKER_02: So Luther declared, Martin Luther, so maybe I should back up a little bit, right?
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  SPEAKER_02: We've talked a little bit on the podcast of Martin Luther,
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  SPEAKER_02: the Protestant Reformation,
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  SPEAKER_02: and You know,
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  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if I can summarize that in two sentences,
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  SPEAKER_02: but but as the least educated person on the podcast,
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  SPEAKER_02: let me just say Luther came forward and said,
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  SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure that the way the Catholic Church is presenting the gospel and the grace
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  SPEAKER_02: of Jesus is the right way.
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  SPEAKER_02: And I'm going to speak out against that.
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  SPEAKER_02: And at that time, you know, this was not 50 years ago.
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  SPEAKER_02: This was 500 years ago.
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  SPEAKER_02: The Catholic said, I don't we're not sure what to think of Luther.
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  SPEAKER_02: So let me but let me give you some quotes.
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  SPEAKER_02: Luther declared that he felt much freer once he was certain that the Pope was the Antichrist.
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  SPEAKER_02: On Rome's clergy generally,
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  SPEAKER_02: he didn't hold back either,
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  SPEAKER_02: describing the Pope,
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  SPEAKER_02: the Cardinals,
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  SPEAKER_02: and Bishops as a pack of guzzling,
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  SPEAKER_02: stuffing witches,
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  SPEAKER_02: wallowing in wealth and laziness, none of whom had ever actually read the Bible.
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  SPEAKER_02: Pope Leo X said in response,
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  SPEAKER_02: and this is quite a quite famous line, Arise, O Lord, and judge thy cause.
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  SPEAKER_02: A wild boar is loose in the vineyard.
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  SPEAKER_02: Luther, for his part,
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  SPEAKER_02: calling the reigning church leadership monsters,
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  SPEAKER_02: whose rule threatened to extinguish the faith altogether.
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  SPEAKER_02: And let me find one more here.
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  SPEAKER_02: A Roman Catholic priest who said in 1529,
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  SPEAKER_02: and he made sure to,
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  SPEAKER_02: I think he had over 200 writings on this,
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  SPEAKER_02: made sure,
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  SPEAKER_02: and I like the determination here,
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  SPEAKER_02: to denounce Luther in both Latin and German,
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  SPEAKER_02: just to make sure he covered the complete,
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  SPEAKER_02: saying that Luther was the seven-headed dragon the devil's spawn.
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  SPEAKER_02: So this starts off,
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  SPEAKER_02: gentlemen,
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  SPEAKER_02: as no kidding on both sides,
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  SPEAKER_02: a fight for the Christian faith,
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  SPEAKER_02: I think, and really starts us off with quite a long history in the church.
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  SPEAKER_02: And let me use the broad definition of church as being all of us together,
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  SPEAKER_02: what turns out to be Protestants and what has always been Catholicism,
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  SPEAKER_02: really pointing the finger and saying some of the things that That we see in
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  SPEAKER_02: the broader culture today,
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  SPEAKER_02: the broader culture being, wow,
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  SPEAKER_02: if Pastor Tim won't agree that X, Y,
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  SPEAKER_02: and Z is true,
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  SPEAKER_02: not only do I need to disagree with him,
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  SPEAKER_02: I'm just going to hate him and try to convince people not.
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  SPEAKER_02: And if Father Scott's not going to agree that this is the way
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  SPEAKER_02: that we should approach the gospel,
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  SPEAKER_02: I guess I just need to hate Father Scott and I need to spew vehement hatred
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  SPEAKER_02: towards him.
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  SPEAKER_02: And so before we get on to the joint declaration,
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  SPEAKER_02: which came along quite a bit later, let me talk about that a little bit.
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  SPEAKER_02: And let me say you two are not in the same room, so this won't come to fisticuffs.
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  SPEAKER_02: But any thoughts on the church history as we've laid it out so far?
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  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'll just start.
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  SPEAKER_01: Go ahead, Scott.
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  SPEAKER_01: I was going to say,
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  SPEAKER_01: because it was Luther who sort of fired the first few blows there,
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  SPEAKER_01: context is always really important.
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  SPEAKER_01: And one of the things we need to remember is that the church,
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  SPEAKER_01: even the Catholic church,
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  SPEAKER_01: which was the main church,
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  SPEAKER_01: not the only church,
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  SPEAKER_01: there was the Orthodox as well,
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  SPEAKER_01: but the Catholic church at that time was different than the Catholic churches today,
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  SPEAKER_01: just as the Lutheran church back then Is different than from the expression
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  SPEAKER_01: of Lutheranism today.
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  SPEAKER_01: Secondly,
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  SPEAKER_01: we need to understand that back then,
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  SPEAKER_01: and you're right, John,
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  SPEAKER_01: a lot of the rhetoric that the Lutherans and Catholics threw back
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  SPEAKER_01: and forth is pretty vile.
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  SPEAKER_01: Not unlike a lot of the language we see today,
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  SPEAKER_01: but that was really a debating style back then as well.
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  SPEAKER_01: And for as vile as we find it today,
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  SPEAKER_01: that was sort of The way that you took on your enemies,
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  SPEAKER_01: you just debased them the best that you could.
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  SPEAKER_01: The other thing I would say is that Lutherans and Catholics for many,
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  SPEAKER_01: many decades now have been in joint discussions and have
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  SPEAKER_01: in many ways become close allies together in the spreading of the gospel.
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  SPEAKER_01: And even though we still have differences theologically,
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  SPEAKER_01: just as we have differences with other denominations,
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  SPEAKER_01: The Catholics and the Lutherans have become very, very good friends.
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  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's one of the great pictures of grace that God has for us is
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  SPEAKER_01: that these two expressions of faith that were at such odds with each other for
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  SPEAKER_01: so many years have really become close allies and good friends.
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  SPEAKER_01: Now, that's not for all Lutherans,
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  SPEAKER_01: but certainly speaking for my tribe, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
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  SPEAKER_01: So that's a little bit of context from a Lutheran guide.
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  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, thanks, Pastor Tim.
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  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I was just thinking,
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  SPEAKER_03: listen to all that, like,
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  SPEAKER_03: it's hard to imagine Christians talking like that to each other for
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  SPEAKER_03: the most part today.
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  SPEAKER_03: I know that that kind of,
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  SPEAKER_03: I don't know,
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  SPEAKER_03: harsh language and just attacking the personality of the person or calling them
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  SPEAKER_03: a monster, the Antichrist, whatever.
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  SPEAKER_03: I know that that kind of thing happens,
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  SPEAKER_03: but Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp, Stapp,
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  SPEAKER_03: Stapp So it's almost laughable listening to the way that people were talking about,
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  SPEAKER_03: you know, these groups were talking about each other 500 years ago.
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  SPEAKER_03: It also, to me,
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  SPEAKER_03: shows kind of both sides,
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  SPEAKER_03: if you want to call it both sides, ultimately became multiple sides.
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  SPEAKER_03: You know, the Church of England starts up and that sort of thing.
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  SPEAKER_03: We start to see maybe multiple angles to this issue.
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  SPEAKER_03: Everyone feels like there's a lot on the line.
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  SPEAKER_03: And there's something,
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  SPEAKER_03: I don't know, I don't like hearing the way that they're talking to each other.
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  SPEAKER_03: But I'm kind of inspired by this really matter to them.
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  SPEAKER_03: They didn't just like poo poo the disagreements.
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  SPEAKER_03: They wanted to take them seriously.
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  SPEAKER_03: Now we need to figure out how do we take it seriously while also doing so in
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  SPEAKER_03: a charitable context and sharing what we can with each other
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  SPEAKER_03: and loving one another well.
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  SPEAKER_03: We've got to bring truth and love together.
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  SPEAKER_03: But it's kind of nice to see that there was
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  SPEAKER_03: at least some passion around these things as essential for salvation.
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  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_03: Well said.
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  SPEAKER_02: And I'm grateful that we are where we are.
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  SPEAKER_03: You know, in 2017 was the 500th anniversary of,
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  SPEAKER_03: I think that was the year, right, the 500th anniversary of Luther's 95 Theses.
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  SPEAKER_03: And so the Catholic Church and Lutherans around the,
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  SPEAKER_03: at least the English-speaking world,
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  SPEAKER_03: I presume the German-speaking world,
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  SPEAKER_03: too, There was this created liturgy for kind of a commemoration.
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  SPEAKER_03: And so I know that in the Archdiocese of Denver,
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  SPEAKER_03: where I live,
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  SPEAKER_03: we had a big It's weird to call it a celebration because it's kind of like a sadness
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  SPEAKER_03: to it.
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  SPEAKER_03: There's still a division here.
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  SPEAKER_03: But there was a 500th anniversary commemoration where it was hosted by a few of
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  SPEAKER_03: the Lutheran pastors kind of in our metro area here.
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  SPEAKER_03: They invited a number of other pastors from different denominations.
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  SPEAKER_03: But my archbishop participated as well, and I was there with him.
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  SPEAKER_03: And it was a beautiful service.
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  SPEAKER_03: It was really interesting to like do something liturgical together,
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  SPEAKER_03: put on the robes,
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  SPEAKER_03: sit in the sanctuary,
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  SPEAKER_03: read scripture,
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  SPEAKER_03: read reflections written from a Lutheran theologian or a Catholic thinker
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  SPEAKER_03: or whatever.
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  SPEAKER_03: And I can't remember,
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  SPEAKER_03: there might have been a couple of not exactly sermons,
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  SPEAKER_03: but kind of like different presentations or talks to pray together,
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  SPEAKER_03: to sing together and together.
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  SPEAKER_03: Pray for unity.
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  SPEAKER_03: It was really nice.
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  SPEAKER_03: It was a nice way rather than just being angry that it's still 500 years
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  SPEAKER_03: and we haven't figured out how to work through these things.
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  SPEAKER_03: It's at least a sign that we want unity with one another.
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  SPEAKER_01: John, just to put that in perspective,
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  SPEAKER_01: for Lutherans and Catholics to get together to celebrate
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  SPEAKER_01: the Reformation would not be unlike The Minnesota Vikings getting together with
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: the Green Bay Packers to celebrate a Green Bay Packers Super Bowl win.
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  SPEAKER_01: That's a major,
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  SPEAKER_01: major movement of God for Catholics and Lutherans to celebrate something like that.
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  SPEAKER_01: And again,
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  SPEAKER_01: this has been going on for decades as some of our bright minds on both sides of
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  SPEAKER_01: the aisle, so to speak, have been working together to say, where do we agree?
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  SPEAKER_01: And we find we agree on more than we disagree.
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  SPEAKER_02: Well,
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  SPEAKER_02: I can't tell you both how incredibly disappointed I am in this podcast that we have
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  SPEAKER_02: so quickly moved beyond fisticuffs and hate speech right on to congeniality.
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  SPEAKER_01: Well, you got to get us into some issues, John.
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  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
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  SPEAKER_02: Well, here's what I want to double down on before we go to that.
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  SPEAKER_02: I want to say, you
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  SPEAKER_02: know, I I'm amazed that you're both right.
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  SPEAKER_02: And Father Scott kind of started us going down this road of like,
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  SPEAKER_02: here's here's some things we agree on.
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  SPEAKER_02: But unfortunately, in today's culture, the agreements don't make the headlines.
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  SPEAKER_02: What makes the headlines is we we vehemently disagree on, let's say, infant baptism.
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  SPEAKER_02: And my concern with that always is that people who are unchurched or maybe kicking
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  SPEAKER_02: the tires or just wondering what Christianity is all about,
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  SPEAKER_02: oftentimes,
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  SPEAKER_02: I believe,
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  SPEAKER_02: look at those headlines and say,
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  SPEAKER_02: why would I be interested in being a Christian at all when the two
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  SPEAKER_02: of you can't figure out what you agree on?
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  SPEAKER_02: We seem to spend 90% of our time on the stuff we don't agree on.
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  SPEAKER_02: And I'm wondering what you two think of that.
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  SPEAKER_02: Maybe we'll ask for his answer first.
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  SPEAKER_02: How should we think about what we disagree on versus what we agree on?
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  SPEAKER_02: And what should be the way that we walk forward together?
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  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I think it's, you're right.
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  SPEAKER_03: I mean, I like the way that you kind of posed the problem there,
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  SPEAKER_03: because I have talked with many people over the years who struggle with that exact,
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  SPEAKER_03: they'll almost phrase it the way you just did.
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  SPEAKER_03: If Christians can't decide on what is essential for Christianity, why should I be Christian?
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  SPEAKER_03: And I know that's, you know, the journey looks different, maybe for every person.
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  SPEAKER_03: You know,
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  SPEAKER_03: I know we're eventually going to kind of chat about this document
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  SPEAKER_03: that was put together by We had some Lutherans and the Catholic Church in
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  SPEAKER_03: the late 90s on justification.
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  SPEAKER_03: And I think that the way that they did it was interesting.
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  SPEAKER_03: So they spent time in dialogue trying to understand one another's positions over
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  SPEAKER_03: a number of meetings, I think, over a number of years.
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  SPEAKER_03: And ultimately,
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  SPEAKER_03: the way that they crafted the document,
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  SPEAKER_03: they said,
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  SPEAKER_03: here's the areas where we have,
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  SPEAKER_03: I don't remember the exact phrasing they used,
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  SPEAKER_03: but basically, we have general consensus on these things.
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  SPEAKER_03: And let's celebrate that we have consensus on These core things right here.
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  SPEAKER_03: And then let's highlight what the Lutherans believe about this.
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  SPEAKER_03: And let's highlight what the Catholics believe about this.
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  SPEAKER_03: And let's acknowledge the places where it is actually we're back.
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  SPEAKER_03: We're actually both okay with the other one having different positions from us.
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  SPEAKER_03: And it doesn't mean it doesn't take away from the celebrating the fact
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  SPEAKER_03: that we have consensus in this other area.
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  SPEAKER_03: Um, so it started with unity and then kind of broke into here's the Lutheran position.
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  SPEAKER_03: Here's the Catholic position where we can see distinction.
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  SPEAKER_03: Um, so I think that,
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  SPEAKER_03: you know,
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  SPEAKER_03: at least that,
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  SPEAKER_03: that particular document,
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  SPEAKER_03: I think gives maybe one way of beginning that conversation,
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  SPEAKER_03: starting unity and then talk about the differences.
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  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_02: Pastor Sam.
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  SPEAKER_01: Uh, yeah, a couple of things come to my mind.
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  SPEAKER_01: First of all, um,
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  SPEAKER_01: And I'm going to bring us back to what Scott said at the beginning about the passion
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  SPEAKER_01: of the Reformation 500 years ago,
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  SPEAKER_01: that these people really believed that this was important stuff.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so on the one hand,
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'll speak personally,
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: there are things where I really believe the gospel is at stake.
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  SPEAKER_01: And when you begin to see a form of Christianity that believes that it is attached
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: to the state or the empire,
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  SPEAKER_01: That it's about power,
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_01: that it's about serving the wealthy over the poor and the oppressed.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: That's a version of Christianity that I think it's important to stand up against
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  SPEAKER_01: and say, no, that's not biblical, that's not Jesus.
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  SPEAKER_01: If there are religious expressions that say you have to do certain things in order
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: to Find your way into heaven or if you have a certain kind of lifestyle and
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  SPEAKER_01: that just means you're automatically outside of God's grace, the gospel's at stake.
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  SPEAKER_01: And I do think it's important for people to stand up and say there is
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  SPEAKER_01: a different way,
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  SPEAKER_01: there's a better way,
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: if I may say, to understand how Jesus works, how the Bible works and so on.
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  SPEAKER_01: Even down to taking the Bible literally.
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  SPEAKER_01: Well, what does that really mean?
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  SPEAKER_01: So there are some things that are at stake.
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  SPEAKER_01: And it's really important,
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  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: as leaders,
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  SPEAKER_01: we have to sort of know where do we go to fight,
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  SPEAKER_01: so to speak,
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: with grace and compassion and mercy,
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  SPEAKER_01: but to say this is not appropriate form of Christianity.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that there is a place for that.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: I also think it's important for us to remember that God is far bigger than any
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: of us can imagine.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: And there's not one expression of Christianity that can contain all of God.
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  SPEAKER_01: And any form of Christianity that says we've got all the answers
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: about God is basically playing God.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_01: And so we need to not only be committed to what we believe,
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_01: but we need to have a lot of humility when it comes to what we believe and
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  SPEAKER_01: to recognize that the spirit blows where the spirit blows.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_01: And grace always surprises.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_01: Jesus always surprises.
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  SPEAKER_01: And if we can sort of hold those two in tension,
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: really fighting for who Jesus is and what the gospel means on the one hand
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: and being humble about it,
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: I think we would be better served than falling too far on one side or the other.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_02: Father Scott, any thoughts on that?
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: Before I tear into the joint declaration and all of its problems.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_03: No, I mean,
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_03: I think that that's right,
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_03: that when we get to talking about the things that we know are essential to
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_03: the gospel,
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_03: to who Jesus is,
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_03: if we know somebody,
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_03: if someone is clearly You know,
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_03: promoting something that contradicts scripture,
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_03: contradicts what we know to be truth.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_03: We have an obligation to speak up about it.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_03: And so, you know, that it might make for some uncomfortable conversations sometimes.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_03: And in short,
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_03: not everyone's going to be persuaded by You know,
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_03: a position, but that's why apologetics exists.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_03: That's why we need to have maybe energetic conversations around certain things sometimes.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_03: We can do it in a charitable way.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_03: And we use the evidence,
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_03: you know, use what we have in hand to be able to at least back up our positions.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_03: You're going to, you know, infant baptism is an example.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_03: You're going to have,
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_03: there's some Protestant denominations that baptize babies and some that don't.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_03: It's not just the conversation between Catholics and Lutherans or Catholics and evangelicals.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_03: You're going to have disagreement even within Protestantism.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_03: And yet we're all looking at the same scriptures.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_03: And so it's legitimate if we say that Catholic position, baptism is essential for salvation.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_03: So long as a person knows that baptism is a requirement and has the opportunity,
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_03: they should be baptized.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_03: And it's an argument worth having if the situation comes up that,
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_03: if I find myself in conversation with somebody saying
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_03: that baptism is absolutely not necessary, well,
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_03: then I'm going to dive into that conversation to start talking about
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_03: the scripture pastors, all about the essentials of baptism.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_03: So there is a place,
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_03: there's a time and a place and a way to have that conversation about the things
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_03: that we understand to be essential to the gospel.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_02: Well,
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_02: let me just frame a little bit for you both the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_02: of Justification signed by the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_02: in 1999 and tell you that it was followed by the World Methodist Council in 2006,
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_02: the Anglican Communion in 2016,
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_02: and the World Communion of Reformed Churches in 2017.
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_02: So I think you two started something that was a big deal.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_02: And this, you know, you have to both forgive me.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_02: I'm just the amateur here.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to give you the core claim of what was agreed upon.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: And to me, it sounds like the ballgame.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_02: The core claim is justification happens by God's grace through faith in Christ,
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_02: not through human merit or works.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: And this was the common ground that both sides affirmed.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_02: That seems like a pretty big deal to me.
• 21:06
  SPEAKER_02: And worthy of reflection and a headline that it will probably not get.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: Like this seems to be a big deal.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it is a big deal.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: Go ahead.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: Go ahead, Scott.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_03: The word justification, I know it's used a lot in Protestant circles.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_03: It is a word that we use in Catholic theology,
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_03: but it's not a typical conversation that most Catholic audiences are even going
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: to be familiar with.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_03: Pastor Tim, would you be willing to just define justification?
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I'll define it at
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: least as far as my Lutheran background would give us.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: And this was a bit autobiographical, by the way.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm a guy who,
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: and I'm doing a lot of writing on this on my Substack,
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_01: who has come to grace the hard way.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: I would be the older brother in the prodigal son story.
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's up to me.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: I've got to be good enough.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: I've got to be perfect, work hard.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: And so grace would be difficult for me.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: And therefore, it was difficult for me to believe that God could be gracious to other people.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it was sitting in a Greek class in college with Professor Lottigs,
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_01: who was this short little gnome guy.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Apparently,
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: rumor had it,
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: and I didn't know him that well,
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: but he had spent time in a Nazi prisoner of war camp.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_01: So he was a German guy.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: And he was talking about why Greek is so important to understand.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: And he used that verse from Romans 5,
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: therefore,
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_01: since we are justified by faith,
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_01: And he talked about how justification, at least in one sense, is a law court term.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: Where you stand before the judge, i.e.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: could be God,
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_01: let's say,
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_01: and all of the evidence is stacked up on the bench before God, and it is evident.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_01: There's no shadow of a doubt that you're guilty.
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever that means, by the way, all right, whatever, however we define sin, you're guilty.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_01: The verdict should be you're guilty.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: But then Jesus stands in and says, he's with me.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so rather than declaring you guilty based on the evidence,
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: the judge or God declares you not guilty for no other reason than that Jesus
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: spoke
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: for you and said, he belongs to me, she belongs to me.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's what it means to be justified by faith,
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: that God declares us not guilty And it's not something I have to believe first
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: for God to declare me not guilty.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: God declares me not guilty.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: And because of that act of grace,
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: then I respond to that by living in that new reality that I'm now forgiven.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_01: So the movement starts with God.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: It starts with Jesus.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: And then it's my response to that.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: So my faith doesn't really save me, right?
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's Jesus who saves me.
• 24:24
  SPEAKER_01: And faith is my response to the saving work of Jesus in my life.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: Or to use the language that we used before that Paul uses, we're dead in our trespasses and sin.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_01: Dead people can't make decisions.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: Dead people don't have faith.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: And so Jesus justifies us or Jesus breathes life into us with a word of forgiveness
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: and raises us to life, justifies us.
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: And that breath of Jesus into our lives,
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: into our lungs,
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: then is as we breathe in and out, that's faith that's created by Jesus.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how we as Lutherans,
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: or at least this Lutheran, would sort of define that important word.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_03: That's great.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_03: And I don't think that the Catholic definition in terms of it all being a pure gift
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_03: of God's grace.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_03: Basically, justification is just how Christ's saving work is received by us who are saved.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it's maybe the details of what that looks like.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_03: I know it looks a little bit different.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_03: Catholics have a theology that sees it as truly transformative.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_03: Like it actually makes me righteous.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_03: And I know that's not always the case within maybe other Protestant churches.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_03: Forgive me, I don't always understand.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_03: I don't always know what's the distinction between Lutheran theology
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_03: and other theologies just because my exposure to Protestantism is somewhat less.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_03: So the details on how that looks is going to be maybe different from a Catholic perspective.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_03: But I think the general definition there of just what is justification and
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_03: that it is all God's work.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_03: This is pure gift of grace.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_03: That's why I think the way that John read that statement for us,
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_03: yeah, that is the ballgame for us.
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_03: Christians should all be able to agree to that particular statement.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_03: Hopefully, we can all come to agreement on that.
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well, and I think, so a couple things on that.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_01: One is, yeah,
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: it is transformational in that we are sort of,
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: we were dead and now we're found, or alive again, right?
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: We were lost, we were found.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's transformational.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_01: Luther talks about,
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: now we're going to get a little theological,
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: but Luther talks, he calls it an alien righteousness.
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_01: And what he means by that is, when Jesus lives in me, I'm righteous.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: It's not my righteousness.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's the righteousness of Jesus in me.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: You take Jesus out of me, I'm not righteous anymore.
• 26:49
  SPEAKER_01: You put Jesus into me, so to speak, and I'm righteous.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: That's what he would say is an alien righteousness.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's not my righteousness.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's the righteousness of Jesus living in me.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: And then the second comment I would make is,
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_01: and Scott,
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: this is where I think Lutherans and Catholics are going to agree and
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: where it's really important.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's not the case,
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: and I'm not going to pick on anybody,
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: it is not the case for a lot of denominations that justification begins with God.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_01: Justification in a lot of Protestant denominations believes with me and my decision
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: to accept Jesus, and then God justifies me.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's an if-then.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_03: Interesting.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: So the act of faith in a way kicks off the life of grace.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_03: The word we would use is prevenient grace.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_03: We would say that there's a grace that God gave to us in order to make the act of faith.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_03: We would say that grace was still active and that's common to us,
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_03: but I didn't realize that that was maybe thinking of maybe some other groups.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_03: That's interesting.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: So it would be some of our evangelical friends who say, have you made a decision for Jesus?
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: Where Lutherans would always say, well, but God made a decision for you first.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: We love because he first loved us, right?
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: There is no faith unless Jesus breathes faith into us.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: But there are a number of denominations where it really begins with my decision.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: And this is where it really becomes important.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: What is your starting point for theology?
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: If your starting point is the human condition and sin and what we need to do
• 28:32
  SPEAKER_01: to fix ourselves, then God is always responding to us.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_01: If your starting point is a God of grace and love and compassion
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: who is desperately running after his lost children,
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_01: God's lost children,
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_01: then the starting point is God and what God does in us and through us who are lost
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: and cannot find our way back.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: And this is where Catholics and Lutherans have great agreement that it starts
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_01: with God and God's grace, it doesn't start with us and the decisions that we make.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, beautiful.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_02: Hey, Father Scott,
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_02: I want to just say that you broke up a little bit when you talked about
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_02: a certain kind of grace in the Catholicism.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_02: I think it started with a P, as in Paul.
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_02: Can you just say that one more time?
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_03: So it would be broken down to before the coming.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_03: Prevenient comes from the word we use for advent, the coming.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_03: So it would be the grace that comes before the thing.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_03: So for us,
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_03: if we're not getting into Marian theology today,
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_03: I presume, but we would say that Mary was given the prevenient grace of salvation.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_03: She's preserved from sin,
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_03: but it's by the gift of Jesus' sacrifice on the cross that Mary was sinless.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_03: It's not by anything that she did,
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_03: and God the Father didn't do it apart from Jesus' sacrifice,
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_03: but Mary participated in that grace.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_02: So let me just say for our listeners that what I'm hearing from both of you is that
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_02: the agreement is basically the ballgame.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_02: And there's important things that we should debate.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not taking away from that importance, but I'm following most of what you both are saying.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_02: And what I'm hearing is on the concept of grace, what's God's job?
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: What is our response?
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_02: That there's just an incredible amount of agreement.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_02: And certainly that shouldn't be surprising given the formal agreements that have been signed.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_02: But that said,
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_02: I want to ask you some nuts and bolts questions because I think folks are going
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_02: to want to know things like,
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_02: and I'll try to ask them intentionally to each one of you.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_02: But for Father Scott, I have a question.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_02: I asked my pastor some time ago.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_02: What Bible I should study?
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_02: And there's Bibles printed that have additional information in them for Catholics.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_02: This is my take on it, by the way, and it's probably totally wrong.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_02: So you're going to have to,
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_02: you're going to have to,
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_02: by the way,
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_02: I should confess, I did take Latin in high school and I don't remember any of it.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_02: So I hope there's no Latin test.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_02: But, but,
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know whether my pastor said,
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_02: why don't you start with the one that doesn't have this extra stuff?
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if he was saying, You don't really need it.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_02: Or if he was saying,
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_02: where you are, John, it's not going to do you any good, so don't confuse yourself.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: Let's work on the basics first.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know what it was.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_02: What am I missing in my Protestant walk,
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_02: knowing that you guys have the benefit of some extra instruction from God
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_02: that I don't have?
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_03: It sounds to me like it's a reference to what we would call
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_03: the deuterocanonical books,
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_03: seven books from the Old Testament,
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_03: plus a few chapters here and there from a couple other books.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_03: I think it's Daniel and Esther that we have chapters that you won't find in other places.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_03: The history of it is maybe a little complex.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe the basic is to say that those texts were the oldest manuscripts we have
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_03: of them are in Greek rather than in Hebrew.
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_03: And so there had been debate amongst the Jewish peoples on whether they belong
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_03: within the canon of Old Testament Scripture.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_03: But they were included in the Septuagint,
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_03: which would be the version of the Bible,
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_03: presumably,
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_03: that Jesus would have referenced, this Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_03: And so, you know,
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_03: while kind of after the first century,
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_03: kind of whatever unity it looked like between the Jews,
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_03: when they kind of finalized what their canon looked like,
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_03: it didn't include those books.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_03: And the Catholic Church would make the argument that when the canon was established
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_03: in,
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_03: I think it's the 400s,
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_03: I can't remember which council it was,
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_03: a couple of councils kind of addressed the canon.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_03: And those books were included in the canon at that time in the 400s.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_03: And then when the Reformation happened,
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_03: kind of that question came up again of, do these books belong in the Old Testament?
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_03: And so, yeah, kind of famously, that's when
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_03: the canon shifted with the seven books removed.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_03: And so Catholics and Orthodox still hold to those books.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_03: We call them the Deuterocanon or the Deuterocanonical books,
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_03: which just means second canon because they were Greek in their origins,
• 34:12
  SPEAKER_03: so far as we know.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_03: Although some commentaries I've read have said that there's evidence,
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_03: by the way,
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_03: that some of them are structured There probably was a Hebrew version before,
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_03: but we don't have a Hebrew version of them anywhere to be found.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_03: So that's at least the reasoning why we would have those seven particular books
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_03: that you're not going to find in a Protestant Bible.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_03: Although when I was in college, I had a Protestant Bible that had, it was the NIV.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_03: It was my daily Bible.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_03: I was reading it just to kind of get through the scriptures in one year.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_03: And it included what they call the Apocrypha.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_03: Same seven books, but it was And even my Jewish roommate was like, oh yeah, Maccabees.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_03: I know Maccabees.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_03: So it's interesting that even though for him as a Jew,
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_03: he didn't consider it maybe canonical,
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_03: he was still instructed in what was in Maccabees at least,
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_03: which Maccabees is fascinating.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_03: It's this book that kind of tells the story of the Jews about 100 years before Jesus.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_03: So it's certainly the latest book narrative-wise in our canon.
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_03: But it does kind of give some interesting insights into just what was going on,
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_03: kind of give a sense for what sets up for the zealots and that sort of thing.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_03: So anyway, that would be why our canon is a little bit bigger than yours.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_02: So that would be the Apocrypha, which sounds like hypocrisy, but it's not.
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: What you're saying is that as the Catholics built their Bible,
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_02: they included a couple of things that the Protestants generally didn't.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_02: I'm just going to take your response to be,
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_02: read it if you want, John,
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_02: but if you're not ready for it, then don't read it right now and read it later.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_02: That's what I'm going to take your response to be.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_02: Now, I have a question for Tim,
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_02: but I have a preview question,
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_02: which is,
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_02: in your preaching,
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_02: Tim, have you ever included Information from the Apocrypha, from these extra books?
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_01: So just a little bit of background.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_01: Some of those books are actually quoted by New Testament authors.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: So we know that they had at least a working knowledge of them.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_01: I have not preached from them,
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_01: but I have taught from them,
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: especially the Maccabean books, because they are the story of Hanukkah.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_01: And depending on how you interpret the book of Daniel,
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_01: and I happen to interpret it as an apocalyptic book,
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_01: the book of Maccabees gives us great information as
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_01: to what Daniel's actually talking about.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: And so it becomes in some ways a key to understanding the book of Daniel.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_01: So I've used those two books in Bible studies because they have great historic information.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: And even though we may not consider them scripture,
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_01: the way we do the Old Testament,
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_01: New Testament,
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_01: there's still a wealth of information in there that gives us insight
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_01: into how scripture works.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_01: I think the other thing to say,
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: this is sort of tongue in cheek, Luther had a way of economizing.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_01: So if the Catholics had seven sacraments, which they do, then he went down to two.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_01: If the Catholics added seven books in, he would take them out.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_01: So he just sort of had a way of kind of economizing everything.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, those books can be very interesting from a historic perspective.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: As Lutherans,
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_01: we just don't see them as having the same authority as what we would say with
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_01: the Old Testament, New Testament.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_02: Now I'm going to try to squeeze in two quick questions,
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: one for Tim, one for Father Scott, because we're already kind of running long.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_02: That's all right.
• 37:51
  SPEAKER_01: We expected this one to go long, so it's good.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's so good.
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_02: For you, Tim,
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_02: I'm going to ask you to explain the criticism that Protestants
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_02: and maybe Lutherans can be subjected to in that we are following a cheap grace.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_02: And what does that mean?
• 38:11
  SPEAKER_02: What's the criticism and what does that mean?
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_02: And how bothered should I be by that?
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's a very complex question.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_01: And the phrase was,
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_01: if not originating from,
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_01: at least polarized by Dietrich Bonhoeffer,
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_01: who was a German theologian during World War II.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_01: And he had
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_01: Long and short,
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_01: he wrestled with a very important decision and that decision was should he
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_01: or should he not participate in an assassination attempt against Adolf Hitler.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: And when you're in Nazi Germany and you are not a part of the Christians
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_01: who were pro the Nazis, Your faith was really put to the test.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_01: He was eventually arrested and then executed just a couple of days before the allies came in.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_01: And he talked about cheap grace and costly grace.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so part of it,
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_01: we need to remember the context in which he's writing,
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_01: where literally Christians' lives were on the line by standing up for what was truth
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_01: against the empire,
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_01: which, by the way, is a big theme in the New Testament and the Old Testament.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_01: I think God always stands against the empire.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: But in our context,
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's always really important that we be careful in how we throw that around.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_01: Some people would like to say that, well,
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: cheap grace is a grace that,
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: you know, for me,
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_01: for example,
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_01: I believe that God's grace is given to everyone,
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_01: that God so loved the world that And that one day every knee will bow
• 40:03
  SPEAKER_01: and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: So I am a Christian universalist.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_01: There are some people who would argue, well, that's just cheap grace.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I would argue, you think it's cheap?
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_01: Try being a Christian universalist and listen to the criticisms that you get
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_01: from people who believe you.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_01: If you don't believe in Jesus before you die, you're going to hell.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: Sorry, Tim.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_02: Just to clarify, they say it's cheap because it apparently requires nothing on my part.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_01: Because it requires nothing on my part.
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_02: It's easy grace.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_02: Easy grace might be, right?
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_02: I don't have to do anything, which is kind of the point.
• 40:42
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yes, that is the point.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: That is the point.
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's why when people level charges of grace being too easy,
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_01: when you say that you can't do anything to save yourself,
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: That is not the easy position because the human being needs to do something
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_01: to save himself or herself.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_01: And it is costly to fully surrender everything you are and all you hope to be into
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_01: the hands of a gracious God.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's costly.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, it cost Jesus his life.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_01: So it's at great cost that God shows us what grace is.
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: And what does grace look like?
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_01: Grace is complete abandonment.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_01: Into the arms of a God you don't even know is there.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
• 41:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's laying down my rights to save myself, my need to save myself.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: That costs the human ego everything.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_01: And to say that God's grace is expansive and it's reckless and it's wild.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: In a world where almost every religion,
• 41:54
  SPEAKER_01: including many facets of Christianity, said,
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: oh, no, you've got to believe a certain way, you've got to behave a certain way.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think that cheap grace is the kind of grace where we have to work to earn it.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_01: And cheap grace is the kind of grace where I manipulate God by my decisions.
• 42:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's cheap grace.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_01: Costly grace says, God, I'm yours.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: And in response to your love for me, this is it.
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_01: Heart, soul, mind, ego, that costs everything.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: So I think it's a misunderstanding of grace when people say that that kind
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_01: of grace is cheap and easy because it costs God everything
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_01: and it costs us everything.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: Basically, the invitation of grace is come and die.
• 42:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_02: And Father Scott, you can respond to that however you wish.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_02: I would also think that maybe the other side of the easy
• 42:53
  SPEAKER_02: or cheap grace argument might be,
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_02: do we tend to,
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_02: as humans,
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_02: And
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_02: this
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_02: is totally unfair for me to level this at you
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_02: because certainly there are Protestant denominations that would not allow me
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_02: to take communion in their church because I'm essentially Lutheran, right?
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_02: But we were at a, you know, a memorial service for a dear friend that lives across the road.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_02: They're Catholics.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_02: And we, you know,
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_02: it was very polite,
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_02: but also clear,
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_02: like we're not encouraged or allowed to take communion at that funeral.
• 43:38
  SPEAKER_02: And so maybe the other side of the grace debate for you is...
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_02: Do we fairly criticize Catholicism for tradition and ritual and confession to
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_02: a priest and not to God that gets in the way of religion or of my faith sometimes?
• 43:58
  SPEAKER_02: Or help me understand what my question is before you tell me what the answer is.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, where do I want to start?
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_03: I think that conversations,
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_03: I think Tim is absolutely right that,
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_03: obviously everything is a free gift from God,
• 44:18
  SPEAKER_03: initiated from the Lord,
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_03: and anything that we do is really a response,
• 44:21
  SPEAKER_03: but that response is going to ultimately require everything of me.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_02: You know,
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_02: the other day in one
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_03: of my homilies,
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_03: we celebrate Mass every day,
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_03: I preach every day, and I found myself pointing at the crucifix.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_03: We have a gigantic nine-foot crucifix hanging above our sanctuary.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_03: And I said, that is the cost of your salvation.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_03: Like nothing you did earned your salvation,
• 44:40
  SPEAKER_03: but Jesus is paying the price and that's what it looks like.
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_03: And it's right here in front of us every time to see the absolute cost of it.
• 44:47
  SPEAKER_03: And your payment now in response is to abandon to him everything.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_03: Your desire towards sin,
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_03: your desire for riches,
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_03: your desire for power,
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_03: whatever it is,
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_03: like to surrender ourselves completely and follow the Lord in all things.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_03: It's going to feel like a major sacrifice.
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if I've ever really thought much about this distinction between cheap
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_03: and costly grace,
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_03: but that was just something that struck me and very much resonates,
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_03: I think, with Catholic thinking.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_03: Your question, do the traditional stuff, can it get in the way?
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_03: I'd say on the most part, the Catholic position is going to fight for most of those things.
• 45:33
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, there's certainly some things that are merely,
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_03: what's the word I'm looking for, that aren't essential for salvation, perhaps.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_03: Sure, if I'm getting too caught up in whether I'm kneeling or
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_03: Or praying my rosary every day or something.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_03: Those are great things if they're facilitating a deeper relationship with the Lord.
• 45:55
  SPEAKER_03: But if you're just distracted the whole time you're trying to kneel
• 45:58
  SPEAKER_03: while you're praying, then stop kneeling, please.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yes, it's in our tradition we kneel,
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_03: but then just stop kneeling if it's somehow getting in the way
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_03: of your really connecting with the Lord.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_03: Or the rosary is a nice practice,
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_03: but if you're spending so much time doing this very active type of prayer,
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_03: but you're never You're never really just sitting with the Lord and receiving
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_03: from him or opening up the scriptures, then maybe you're too attached to this thing.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_03: And so, you know, you brought up even, you know, confession to a priest.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, we would fight for that because of 1 John chapter 5,
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_03: the distinction between deadly sin and not deadly sin.
• 46:33
  SPEAKER_03: And, you know, he says if a sin is not deadly, then it is sufficient to pray for it.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_03: But if it is deadly, it is not enough to pray for forgiveness.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_03: Well, then what are you supposed to do?
• 46:43
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, it seems to me that we all have to,
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_03: you know, Catholic or otherwise, we got to somehow wrestle with that.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_03: If it is a deadly sin, what am I supposed to do for forgiveness?
• 46:52
  SPEAKER_03: The Catholic tradition since the early centuries has been confession.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_03: They used to have to confess in front of everybody at church and there's absolution
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_03: at the beginning of mass for everybody,
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_03: but it wasn't very popular to confess to the whole community what your sins were.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_03: So it didn't take long for it to kind of get tucked into a more of a private conversation.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_03: And even today,
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_03: the Catholic practice of confession,
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_03: you only have to confess the deadly sins,
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_03: which we've defined in the But most of your sins,
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_03: if they're small,
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_03: venial sins,
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_03: non-deadly,
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_03: yeah, pray for forgiveness because 1 John 5 says you can pray for forgiveness.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_03: We'll fight for the things that are essential, yes,
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_03: confession is necessary for forgiveness of deadly sins,
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_03: but it's not necessary for forgiveness of all sins because
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_03: that would contradict 1 John 5 if we said so.
• 47:45
  SPEAKER_03: I think, yeah,
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_03: I understand kind of the fear that some of that stuff's kind of going to get in
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_03: the way,
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_03: but
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_03: especially like kind of liturgical practices,
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_03: the way that we do baptism,
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_03: the way that we do mass, we're building on the way that it is reading
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_03: And right around the year 100,
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_03: I think he's the one who wrote for us in one of his apologies is what it's called.
• 48:19
  SPEAKER_03: He was explaining Christianity,
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_03: and he's the one who gives us the oldest text
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_03: that we have describing what Christian worship looked like.
• 48:26
  SPEAKER_03: He's writing like around the year 100, maybe 110, I think.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_03: And he kind of breaks down what the liturgy looked like.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_03: And it's funny.
• 48:34
  SPEAKER_03: I'll read it every now and then at Mass from my parishioners at Daily Mass on his feast day.
• 48:38
  SPEAKER_03: And it feels like a description of the way that we do the liturgy today.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_03: The presider starts with prayers.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_03: Then there's a reading from the prophets.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_03: There's a reading from the apostles.
• 48:49
  SPEAKER_03: Then the presider gives a sermon to the best of his ability.
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_03: That's my favorite line in there.
• 48:54
  SPEAKER_03: And then maybe there's a collection and those who are wealthy put money in the collection.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_03: There's a sign of peace.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_03: And then they break the bread.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_03: And then there's an explanation of allowed to receive communion.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_03: Those who believe what,
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_03: how exactly the phrase,
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_03: but basically we're in communion of belief with what we believe as Christians.
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_03: We're baptized and are living an upright moral life.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_03: Like those are the three conditions, at least in the year 100-ish for receiving communion.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_03: And so we would see it as like this has been handed down to us.
• 49:29
  SPEAKER_03: As Catholics, yes, we love the scriptures.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_03: It's divine revelation.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_03: But we also have this unique belief that it's also been handed to us through sacred tradition.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_03: And so some of these things happen.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_03: The way that liturgy is done is one of those things that's been given to us
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_03: through sacred tradition.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_03: And we're holding on to these things,
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_03: believing that the Lord has intended these things to be handed down to us.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_03: I think about those first few decades of Christianity before St. Paul wrote anything.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_03: What was Christianity without a New Testament?
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_03: The New Testament wasn't even finished until about the year 100.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_03: And so from a Catholic perspective,
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_03: there must be You know,
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_03: the faith was being handed down faithfully,
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_03: and that was being done through sacred tradition.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_03: So we hold those two things together,
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_03: and that's partly why,
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_03: we will fight for kind of those traditional expression things,
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_03: you know,
• 50:24
  SPEAKER_03: the way that we do liturgy,
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_03: the way that we do baptisms, certain practices around clergy and that sort of thing.
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_03: But it's all intended to facilitate a relationship with the Lord,
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_03: not get in the way of that relationship with the Lord.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_02: No,
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_02: I think I think the what was happening in the first 100 years is an amazing topic
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_02: for the next podcast.
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_02: Honestly, I think that's a great thing to explore.
• 50:48
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_02: So let me let me just say that I think I'm so grateful for both of you and
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_02: for your intellect,
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_02: but for also your effusive hearts of grace in understanding this.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that What I encourage people to do living at this time is just be okay
• 51:09
  SPEAKER_02: with the fact that if Father Scott goes to Pastor Tim's church,
• 51:13
  SPEAKER_02: he can have communion.
• 51:14
  SPEAKER_02: And if Pastor Tim goes to Father Scott's church,
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_02: Father Scott's going to say,
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_02: well, maybe not yet until we have a few more classes with each other.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_02: I think I'm okay with that.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_02: I'm okay with that.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_02: I think we should be okay with that.
• 51:27
  SPEAKER_02: And you geniuses can keep working on it and maybe you'll come up
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_02: with something different later on.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I think it'd be great fun, Scott,
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: if you're up for it,
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: to come back and do a podcast where we get into some specific topics.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_01: You know, today was pretty broad stroke, which is great, really important.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_01: But now that we sort of established Grace is the Deal, okay, so what does that mean for baptism?
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_01: What does it mean for communion?
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_01: Why seven sacraments versus two sacraments?
• 51:58
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 51:58
  SPEAKER_01: I think the discussion about liturgy being handed on from the year 100,
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_01: it matters to Catholics.
• 52:06
  SPEAKER_01: Does it matter to Protestants?
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_01: Not really.
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_01: And why is that?
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_01: And what do we make of that?
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_01: And how do we learn to live together?
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_01: So I think there are so many really interesting topics.
• 52:16
  SPEAKER_01: It would be just as a human being,
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_01: I would love to hear Scott talk about some of those things rather than reading them
• 52:26
  SPEAKER_01: in a textbook.
• 52:30
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't represent all Lutherans and Scott doesn't represent all Catholics, right?
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_01: We're just kind of within our tradition speaking from the best that we know.
• 52:41
  SPEAKER_01: But I think this has been really fascinating, Scott.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_01: I hope you'll come back soon and we can get back into some of that stuff.
• 52:48
  SPEAKER_03: Likewise, yeah, and thank you guys for the invitation.
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_03: I don't know if it feels uncomfortable inviting a Catholic onto your podcast,
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_03: not sure where I'm going to take it, so thank you for your openness to me.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_01: It was great fun having you.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is your third visit.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_01: So we haven't had anybody on that much except for John and Terry.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll do it again.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's just fascinating to me.
• 53:13
  SPEAKER_01: And you're just such a good, warm-spirited person.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_01: So we'd love to have you back with us.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_01: John, you did a great job today.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you, Pastor Tim.
• 53:22
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you, Father Scott.
• 53:23
  SPEAKER_02: I really wanted more vitriol, but I just can't push you in that direction.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you just get us into some things like baptism and why he's wearing a color
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_01: and I'm wearing a t-shirt.
• 53:35
  SPEAKER_01: That'll get us going.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 53:41
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, we'll be back next time.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_01: The Deep Grace Diving Podcast.
• 53:46
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks, everybody.