October 3, 2025 • 49 mins
In this episode of Prayerful Posse, Raymond Arroyo, Fr. Gerald Murray, and Robert Royal unpack Pope Leo’s controversial “pro-life” comments and the firestorm surrounding Cardinal Cupich’s award to pro-choice Senator Dick Durbin. What does it mean when the Pope suggests abortion isn’t the only issue that matters? The panel dives deep into Catholic teaching on abortion, Communion, the death penalty, immigration, and why clarity from the Vatican matters now more than ever.
We also explore new restrictions on the Traditional Latin Mass in Charlotte, the Pope’s comments on war and peace, and even his surprising appearance at a climate conference with Arnold Schwarzenegger. How should Catholics respond to these developments, and what is the true role of the Pope in defending Church teaching?
Join us as the Posse tackles the week’s most pressing Church controversies—with insight, candor, and a call to remain steadfast in faith.
Support the Prayerful Posse by subscribing for free, or make a donation to help us continue this work at www.raymondarroyo.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Poe Leo sounded off on a church honor to be
bestowed on a pro choice senator, but he may have
caused a bigger blowback than the initial controversy. The Prayerful Posse.
We'll explore it all next. Welcome to an important Prayerful Posse.
(00:22):
Be sure to go subscribe to the show now. It's
a wonderful way to show your support for our work
and it's totally free, or you can visit Raymond Royo
dot com. Let's convene the posse. Canon lawyer Priest of
the Archdiocese of New York, Father Gerald Murray, and the
editor in chief of The Catholic Thing dot Org, Robert Royal. Gentlemen, boy,
do we have a week? Last week we reported on
(00:44):
the ten US bishops to crying Cardinal blaze supitous decision
to bestow that Lifetime Achievement award on Catholic Illinois Senator
Dick Durbin. Durbin, of course, has been vehemently pro abortion
for decades. He's been banned from receiving communion in his
home diocese in Springfield Well. Durbin eventually refused the honor
(01:04):
due to the firestorm, but only hours earlier, Pope Leo
was asked by EWT and News in Rome about the controversy,
and he said this.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
I'm not terribly familiar with the particular case. I think
that it's very important to look at the overall work
that a senator has done during if I'm not mistaken,
forty years of service in the United States Senate. I
understand the difficulty and the tensions, but I think, as
(01:35):
I myself have spoken in the past, it's important to
look at many issues that are related to what is
the teaching of the church.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Bob, is it conceivable that the pope a Chicagoan, with
ten US bishops, his bishops protesting and apparently the entire
bishop's conference about to issue a statement on this durban thing.
Is it conceivable that he was not familiar with his case?
Speaker 3 (02:00):
I already to have to say that I think he
knew about it, but he hoped that he was pouring
oil on the waters, And actually I think he poured
gasoline in the fire. Because we know that for decades
this has been the kind of the two step that
people who want to not to have to take the
hard steps of telling pro abortion politicians, usually democrats, not
(02:24):
to present themselves for communion. There have some very few
bishops in America that do this. Bishop Proprocy in Illinois,
Archbishop of Cordlone even told Nancy Pelosi not to present herself.
So I think he had to know about this. And
unfortunately he's getting his feet and I think we have
to allow him. I mean, this was a kind of
a spur of the moment question at a press conference,
(02:45):
and he's getting his feet under him as a pope.
But I think we have to hope that he begins
to grow in the job a bit, because you can't
keep repeating the same excuse that we've had for forty years,
that you can kill innocent life in the womb if
somehow you're so called good on other issues. That was
refuted by then Cardinal Ratzinger bag in a letter to
(03:08):
the Bishops of America in two thousand and four. As
we know, Cardinal McCarrick tried to misrepresent that letter to
our bishops. But in fact, what Cardinal Ratzinger said is
not all moral issues are on the same plane, and
obviously killing innocent human life is something different than being
so called good on immigration.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Father, it seems to me we have a trend going here,
I mean this interview, and I get that it was
a walk by as he left for Costal Gondolfo. But
there's an easy way to deal with this. Don't answer
the questions. Okay, wave and bless people and keep moving.
But when you couple this statement with what we heard
from that extended interview about church teaching and if you
(03:52):
change social attitudes, then we can change church teaching. I mean,
is it important to look at many issues related to
the teachings of the church while ignoring the most glaring one,
Durban's support for abortion when considering a record of a politician.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
Yes, you mentioned the circumstances. It was actually in the
evening he was leaving Castle Gondolpho, because Pope Leo has
the custom now of going there every Tuesday to kind
of do some work off site and to relax a
little bit. So yeah, he chose the number one. Why
were the reporters allowed to be there? The Holy See
could have shut him down and Pope wouldn't have even
(04:30):
seen them, but they were allowed to be there, and
then the Pope walked over and answered their questions. So
I think what we're getting is a repeat of what
Francis did, and admittedly Pope John Paul the Second and
Benedict did similar things, which is to grant access to
reporters who then of course talk about topics that are
in the news. And knowing that Pope Leo, you know,
(04:54):
could anticipate it would seem to me that there be
a question about this, because it's a major scandal in
the United States when a pro abortion Catholic is honored
by the Cardinal Large Bishop of Chicago. So I think
he knew that he was probably going to have to
answer it, and then while demuring a saying didn't know much,
he certainly knew enough to say that this man's career
(05:14):
merited further consideration beyond his pro abortion stance, to which
I say, what consideration could mollify or minimize his support
for killing unborn children. Nothing. The US Catholic bishop said
the priority item that the Catholic Church focus on the
(05:35):
US is to end the killing of children by abortion.
So Cardinal supic And giving the award knew that he
was going against the constant policy of the bishops of
the United States. It's even in his own diocese in
guidelines not to honor pro abortion Catholics. So the long
and the short of it is, Pope Leo decided to
(05:56):
wade into this in a way that is not, I
think the most careful way to do it, and he
did so stating this and other things that you know,
quite frankly, don't compute with me and do not conform
to the way the Catholic Church presents her teaching Bob.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
In some ways, the Pope is echoing Cardinal Supach's original
defense of that award that there are many issues to consider,
not just one. Do you buy that? No?
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Look, as I said earlier, this is what we've been
hearing for decades from our bishops who don't want to
take a hard stance and recognize really what is at
stake here. Cardinal Supauc himself, in trying to defend what
was going on in Chicago, said that, well, because of
polarization and politicization of the United States, no Catholic politician
(06:48):
is really able because of the way the parties are
to be fully Catholic, that there is no real.
Speaker 5 (06:54):
Home for Catholics. Right.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
I think this is a nonsensical way to approach this question,
because if that's the case, if neither the Republicans nor
the Democrats have a holy Catholic approach to issues, well,
then don't give political awards. I was in Chicago last
week and I spoke to a group called Aid for
the Women, which was created independently right after Roe v. Wade,
(07:17):
and for all the years since Roe v. Wade has
been defending women, helping women with problematic pregnancies, giving them
homes to live in, helping them take care of their babies,
getting them jobs afterwards. This is an organization that for
fifty years is defended life in Chicago and the general
Chicago area. You want to honor somebody, to honor them.
(07:37):
If the politicians don't come up to snuff, then fine.
Politics is not entirely separate from Catholicism. But we don't
have to honor anyone. There's no urgency to do that,
especially when we have somebody who's flagrantly not only in
favor of abortion, but in favor of gay marriage and
a variety of other things.
Speaker 5 (07:54):
The country to Catholic teaching.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
All right, I want to move on to the next
portion of Leo's comments. Here we talked about the meaning
of the term father pro life.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Someone who says I'm against abortion, but says, I'm in
favor of the death penalty is not really pro life.
So someone who says that I'm against abortion, but I'm
in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants or in
the United States, I don't know if that's pro life.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
You don't. I don't mean to be impertinent, But he's
the Pope. Why doesn't he know?
Speaker 4 (08:27):
Father, Well, he's posing rhetorical questions to make a point
without stating it flat out. Instead of saying, if you're
pro in favor of the death penalty, you're not pro life,
he says, I don't know if they're pro life. Well.
As a matter of fact, the Catholic Church has never
taught that the death penalty is immoral. And this is
a big problem that we inherited from Pope Francis where
(08:48):
he changed the categorism the Catholic Church and he used
very puzzling language where he said the death penalty is inadmissible,
not a moral category. That's a prudential judgment about the
use of a penalty. But is it inadmissible because it's
immoral or is it inadmissible because there are too many
mistakes when you use it?
Speaker 5 (09:07):
Well?
Speaker 4 (09:07):
In other things, Pope Francis said that it is a
violation of human dignity to use the death penalty, so
that indicates he thought it was immoral. So with all
that background, Pope Leo is continuing that line of thought.
The problem is the Catholic Church has always taught that
the death penalty is a legitimate penalty that civil authorities
can impose for serious crimes. And if you can't be
(09:30):
pro death penalty and be pro life, well, you know,
look at all the saints in history. Saint Augustine and
Saint Thomas Aquinas justified this. Saint Jerome justified it. You know,
it's not helling, it's the administration of justice. So it's
very disheartening also to have by implication saying that the
(09:52):
removal of illegal immigrants or illegal aliens in the United
States is in himself in human. I don't believe that
we live in a democracy. We live in a rule
of law, and ice agents and other people, border patrol
people are trained professionals, and if someone's resisting arrest, of
(10:13):
course you're going to seize them. But that we don't
go in with truncheons and start hitting people over the
head and throwing them into the ground if they if
they agree to, you know, if there's some and then
say you're under arrest and they don't try to fight
the officers and there is no physical altercations. I don't
That's another thing I don't like. I don't believe either
(10:35):
in ways they're doing it or the whole even the
proposition that to deport someone is in human it's not
see itself doesn't allow illegal aliens to sleep in the
Vatican gardens, right right.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
I'd like to try it with a you know, with
one of those raybam glasses on and see what happens
to me. They will toss me out faster than I
could walk in the gate. But the challenge here, father,
and Bob and Father, I'm going to pick up on
something you said. The Church has always taught that the
death penalty was admissible because it is a penalty for
(11:10):
taking innocent human life and spilling innocent human blood. And
it's not done by an individual out of vengeance. It's
done coldly and clinically by the state after someone has
been tried. That is not the case of an unborn child. Bob,
the Pope and Cardinal super you're basically saying the same thing.
We should not be single issue voters as citizens, but
(11:34):
they seem to have a single issue about which they're
most concerned, and that's immigration. They want no limits on immigration.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
Yeah, and I'm afraid that this is a kind of
a loser, not only politically but even religiously. Yes, the
developed world, which is, you know, the countries in Europe
and the United States and Canada where I mean Australia
where many of the poor people in the world.
Speaker 5 (11:58):
Want to travel to.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
All these countries are feeling the effects of illegal immigration.
And the other moral consideration is what does it do
to the countries where massive numbers of people arrive who
may or may not be integratable into those societies, who
bring with them crime and other sorts of problems. Look,
(12:20):
it's been reported even in political circles that under President Obama,
who most people think are very humane in the way
he was willing to receive people from other countries, two
million people were deported during the two administrations of President Obama.
Any country that does not have a control of its
(12:40):
border is not a country, to use the phrase that
we we often hear, and there's a reason for that.
There's a reason for the same reason that if somebody
shows up in your house without your permission, they're not undocumented.
This is a phrase that the Cardinal McElroy and doing
a mass for migrants and immigrants the other day. The
(13:01):
Cardinal Archbiser of Washington, DC eleven times use the term
undocumented as if it's just like somebody forgot their driver's
license and they showed up and suddenly people are picking
them up. No, what's happening is people arrived here illegally.
And so when people try to enforce the law, yeah, okay, occasionally,
like with a policeman, maybe there is somebody who loses
(13:22):
his temper and then we're going to see a you know,
a iPhone taking the pictures of that. But to have
a cop that is losing his temper doesn't mean that
policing as such is immoral. And similarly, to remove people
who arrived here illegally. Now I'm going to make a
controversial statement. I think that the United States bears a
(13:43):
certain responsibility, a moral responsibility. If people say, have been
here ten years, haven't broken the law, have observed our laws,
have supported themselves, had jobs, et cetera, then we a
conversation about maybe a compromise. But people who just arrived here,
especially people who are criminals and causing trouble in the society.
(14:04):
This isn't only not inhumane, it is being humane towards
the people who are here and have to suffer the
problems that are brought and then pay for people who
show up. It's a problem of all the developed countries,
and I'm afraid the Church is going to have to
come to terms with the fact that this is not
simply racism or anti immigrants sentiment. It's realism about what
(14:26):
it's life to live in a particular nation.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
Now we're seeing this all across Europe, father, and I
mean one could make the argument and having been to
the Rio Grand watching young girls and women trafficked across
those waters, you know, the unfettered and unregulated immigration only
encourages human trafficking, sexual exploitation. And talk to border officials
(14:49):
and people in law enforcement along those border communities. They
will show you the carnage. They'll show you what inhumanity
looks like. And it's these cartels who abuse these women particularly,
and men who make this journey. I'll give you the
last word on this before we move on.
Speaker 5 (15:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:04):
No, that's right. I mean, imagine if the Drug Enforcement
Agency announced we will no longer interdict drugs coming into
the country. What do you think would happen. This is
what happened in the last administration. Would it be in
humane to say, now we're going to stop the drugs coming.
Of course not. It's the same thing with people. Now
people are not objects their personal beings, but personal beings
have more responsibility, and when you arrest them, you're reminding
(15:27):
them you had a knowledge that you were entering illegally.
Therefore you have to be responsible for your acts. And
as the administration has said, if you voluntarily self deport
you have a chance to come back in the future.
So our country is a country based on law and justice.
It's not in human or in humane to say I'm
sorry people come in here legally cannot stay. Well.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Also, in light of what we're seeing law enforcement shot attacked,
I think it's very very dangerous for anyone in the
public domain, particularly legis leaders, to somehow say that person
is inhumane. They're inhuman in what they're doing. That's targeting
people who are enforcing the law, and in many cases
(16:11):
Catholics who are 'enforcing the law. But I want to
move on. This is the next part of what Pope
Leo had to say about the complexity of the life
issues WAD.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
They're very complex issues. I don't know if anyone has
all the truth on them. But I would ask first
and foremost that there'd be greater respect for one another
and that we search together, both as human beings in
that case, as American citizens or citizens of the state
of Illinois, as well as Catholics, to say we need
(16:44):
to you know, really the closes at all of these
ethical issues and to find the way forward as church.
The church teaching on each one of those issues is
very clear.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
Father, the Pope calls for respect and that we're somehow
searching together for what a clear moral teaching on the
gravity of abortion. What are we searching for?
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Well, I would ask a question forward toward what. And
as you know, the Catholic Church is a body commissioned
by God. Christ commission the Church to teach the truth.
So we know where the truth is. The truth which
sets us free is in the teaching of the Church,
and those who are faithful to the teaching the Church
have the truth. So when you say nobody has all
(17:24):
the truth, well, okay, that's the way you can justify
that statement. But we have to be quite clear. Pro
abortionists are peddling lies and falsehoods. People who defend the
right to life are propagating the truth. Now, the last
thing I'll say is I respect people, but I don't
always respect their opinions. And that's that's the logic that
(17:44):
we live life on. You know, if somebody walks into
my church and wants to say a prayer, if I'm
very happy, if I find out, you know, that they
don't believe in Jesus as the son of God and
they're praying to a false God, that's I don't respect that.
But I'm going to say, Okay, I'm not going to
say stop you from doing that. Privately, you can't come
in and seize my church. So no, The point here
(18:05):
has to be why is it that whenever people who
violate Catholic teaching are called to task, there's a whole
bunch of people line up and say, don't be mean
to that person. He's only doing what he thinks is best.
We never say that about people who pedal drugs or
run prostitution rings. They think they're doing what's best for them. No,
they're exploiting other people. And people who promote abortion are
(18:28):
killing other people, maybe not themselves directly, but they're paying
for it and they're defending its continued legality. Let's get
real here, Dick Durbin is not an innocent bystander who
is ambushed by Bishop Pprocky. This is a moral agent
who knows that thet says don't do it, and he says,
I don't care, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
Bob, your thoughts on this, this idea that we're still
searching for. I guess the truth together, But in my estimation,
it's the pope's job. Indeed, it's his function to tell
us that truth. He is the protector of the doctrine
of Jesus Christ. Either that's true and it's solid and
it can be passed on, or it can't.
Speaker 5 (19:09):
Look I would like to cut him a little bit
of slack here.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
I think that this kind of answering the question on
the fly is a very dangerous thing to do. And then,
of course he relies on what is kind of the
common way of getting out from under a political difficulty.
Speaker 5 (19:24):
But if we want to think very.
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Carefully about these issues, it's not actually all that hard.
The Church has thought about these things for years and years.
We have some very clear teachings, and he keeps pointing
back to those teachings. He says, in fact, that if
we follow the Catechism, that's the way to avoid division
in the church. And what the Catechism would tell us
about the so called complexity of issues is, yes, there
(19:48):
are several important moral questions in a society. But let's
take a question about poverty programs. I mean, that's a
prudential judgment. Is it better to have policies directly give
money to the poor or is it better to have
policies that create more jobs. I mean, that's a legitimate debate.
It's a political debate. Is it better to have more
(20:08):
immigration or less, that's a political debate. Those things are
prudential judgments that people can disagree about, and it's not
one side or the other that is simply immoral. But
when it comes to the taking of human life, we
are in the presence of something that is an absolute evil.
It is something that is a model them in say,
if I can use some ecclesial Latin here, it's an
(20:30):
evil in itself. We know the committing murder is an
evil in itself, and it's if you don't believe the
killing a baby in the woman is the same as
killing a person who's walking around alive, well, then you've
departed from Catholic, really deep Catholic social teaching, because the
respect owe to the dignity of every human person is
(20:50):
for every human person unborn near the end of life
and in the middle. There's clarity here. The Pope kind
of half has said this, and perhaps as he gets
more comfortable in the job and more capable of dealing
with these situations, he'll bring that kind of consistency even
to these situations. But clearly he hasn't quite yet connected
(21:12):
at the level of being able to talk off the
cuff about a difficult issue.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Like, well, I have to say, and Father, i'd like
your response on this if I were advising him, and
I'm not, but if I were, one of the first
things I would say is you're the Pope. What you
say now has enormous weight. And when you see people
in other faiths saying in headlines above this statement, the
video of this statement by the Pope, this is why
(21:38):
the Scripture has to be the final word for Christians.
On doctrine and not any man. This undermines the evangelical
witness of the Church, and I would argue the clarity
of the church. And you should see my comments. The
faithful are just shattered by this. Father. Your reaction to that,
whether the Pope should continue Pope Francis's trend of kind
(21:58):
of doing these off the cuff interviews and do you
think this sturban refusal was really a face saving operation.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
Well, No, as regards to interviews, he should not do
interviews while he's walking out of a building, or I
would say even on a plane. The Pope is the
principal teacher of the Catholic Church, and therefore what he
says is paid attention to. If a bishop in a
far away place says something very few people hear it,
(22:28):
the Pope has heard universally. Plus, he's the guarante of
truth because he enjoys the charism of infallibility, and he's
not invoking that here, but he knows that his responsibility
is to teach infallible truths on a constant basis, I
would say, no more interviews like this. What I would
say is give teaching that is accessible. In other words,
(22:49):
the colloquial style of an interview should also be reflected
in his writings. And you know you're a good editor
of Raymond and Roberts. You know what it is. Concision
allows people to read something and not fall asleep.
Speaker 5 (23:03):
You know.
Speaker 4 (23:03):
So too many of the documents in the church are
one hundred and fifty pages long. The only ones who
read it are those paid to read it, like people
like us. So on that point, I'll say that's the
way I would go. Now, on the deeper issue that
we have here, I think the Pope has to, you know,
take stock that if he's going to say I really
don't know enough about it and then talk about it,
(23:26):
then he says he really does know enough about it,
when I would say, has Bob did it? I don't
think he knows enough about it? In one sense, because
this involved not simply Soupic and Durban. This involved other bishops,
that involved the US Bishop's Conference, right, involved the entire
non Catholic world looking with wonderment at the Archbishop of
(23:46):
Chicago because he did something no archbishop in the United
States has done, which is to single out a pro
abortion man of some prominence and say you deserve an
achievement of war for your lifetime activities. This is you know,
Evangelicals don't expect this. Jewish people who are against abortion said,
(24:08):
wait a minute, I thought you were on our side,
you know, Cardinal Supic So it's a problem.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
But to pick up on that though, Bob, don't you
think by the Pope weighing in this way and trying
to almost give some cover to Cardinal Supage on this question.
The whole Durban Soupage scandal that the bishops are up
in arms over, that's kind of been blown away. Now
we're talking about the pope who is freelancing on these
(24:39):
moral issues and can't really say that abortion is of
a higher grave matter than the immigration reform.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Well, I think he can. And again I would say
that I think he's finding his way. He's admitted that,
you know, to be the be playing on a world
stage like this is something that he's never done before.
We can hope and pray that he's going to mature
in the job and become more capable of what's doing.
And I wouldn't neglect as father rightly said that there
were ten bishops and we know at least we hear
(25:09):
because it's hard to get insider information about this, that
the entire US Bishop's Conference was preparing.
Speaker 5 (25:16):
A statement about this.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
They've crossed swords with Cardinal Suppitch in the past and
Cardinal Supermach in the past how to support of Pope Francis,
of course, But I think from what I'm hearing that
the Bishop's Conference told the Nuncio here in Washington, and
they alerted Rome to the fact that there was a
statement coming out, and so, you know, to get in
(25:38):
between all of that, I think that what Leo probably
wanted to do was to keep himself out of it,
and he didn't have the chops yet to just stay
away from it. And he probably doesn't want to be
a micromanager in places even like Chicago, which he is from.
But still, if you're going to be the pope, you
have to measure every word. I often say there are
two people on earth who have to measure every word,
(26:00):
Rome and the President of the United States, because both
of them can have world shattering effects from the words
that they pronounced.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
Yeah, Father, I think you could call this episode the
last victory of Theodore mcarrick in some way. I mean,
Bob referenced this earlier back in two thousand and four,
when Cardinal mcarick met with the future Pope Benedict and
the US bishops wanted to deny communion to John Carey,
another Catholic politician who supported abortion. McCarrick basically suppressed the
(26:29):
letter written by Cardinal Rothzinger advising the bishops to meet
with politicians, warn them, and if they continued in their
public manifest sin deny them communion, and he added this quote,
I'm going to read this. It's so important. There may
be legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging
(26:50):
war and applying the death penalty, but not however, with
regard to abortion or euthanasia. My question to you, father
is what chain?
Speaker 5 (27:01):
What changed?
Speaker 4 (27:02):
Is the man occupying the throne to Saint Peter, you know,
I mean, that's what the obviously what changed. But also
what changed, I think is that Pope Leo has demonstrated
that he is much more comfortable in talking about these
issues in a way that represents an attempt to find
an accommodation with people who promote abortion and other horrific
(27:25):
things in the life of the church. Certainly, his statements
in his interview to the Crux reporter release Allen regarding
how we're going to deal with the question of homosexuality
in the church. And that was previously. That was James
Martin having a private audience and coming out and saying
the Pope said, continue your work. This is not how
(27:49):
John Paul the Second and Benedict managed things. This is
how Pope Francis did things. And I think we're seeing
more of that. Back to the Mcaray thing though, I mean,
as people may may be aware that he was a
very fraudulent person in so many ways. He cried exactly
to prevent Cardinal Ratzinger's letter to the bishops from being
in their hands. He summarized it for them. Fortunately it
(28:11):
was leaked and made the media. In fact, I compliment
e WTM because they put it on their website and
that's where I got a copy of it. So yeah,
the fact of the matter is the good of the
church demands that its leaders speak consistently and truthfully and
not do this dance routine where if a cardinal says something,
nobody can criticize him because he's a cardinal. Thank God
(28:33):
the time bishops stopped that. But now the next question
is Holy Father, now that you've said this, there are
other concerns that are raised. Would you please address those.
I hope and pray that the American bishops would tell
the Pope that we need more clarity when it comes
to these type of teachings.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
Well, here we come to the point of clarity and
the Pope's roll, the Pope's job, if you will, in
the church. The Pope was also asked about in Italian
about US foreign policy and the distinction between the Department
of War, which is its new name, and the Department
of Defense, the former name before Trump changed it. He
(29:10):
said this, I'll read it to you. This way of
speaking is worrying because it shows each time and increase intentions,
this vocabulary, even shifting from Minister of Defense to Minister
of War. Let's hope it's only a way of speaking. Certainly,
they have a style of government where they want to
(29:31):
show strength to put pressure, and we hope it works,
but that there will not be war. One must always
work for peace. Bob Ah. It's kind of ironic the
Pope's urging clarity of language when he just had this
moral quicksand he was caught in Isn't this a prudential judgment?
(29:52):
And trusted to elected authorities to name departments in a
government whatever they want.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
Well, you know, we keep trying to gauge home much
our American pope actually knows about America. Maybe he hears
about America from certain people. I don't think he spends
a lot of time, probably reading American newspapers, and God
knows what the American newspapers are like these days, especially
the Chicago Tribute, if he's reading that, which is very,
very far left publication. But you know, I would point
(30:19):
out this since we try to talk like Catholics when
we deal with these issues. We have in the church
something that is called just war theory, not just defense theory,
just war theory, and just war theory follows Saint Augustine.
Augustine was one of the primary developers of the idea
of just war theory from some classical sources. And the
(30:41):
reason why we talk about just war is war is
not only about defense. It may also have an element
of imposing justice, just as the capital punishment is intended
to impose justice on situations where violence is taking place.
So let's say there's a genocide taking place in some
far off country. Well, we're not defending ourselves by going
(31:04):
there or trying to stop the carnage is going on
between two different sides. We are making war. I actually
said this in Italy, just some members of the Italian
parliament once. I used the term in Italian making war,
and they said to me after, we.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
Don't like that term making war. It sounds kind of nasty.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
I said, yeah, but we are are Americans and we
are actually called on to do this sort of thing.
Italy is not going to be called on to do this.
Europe's not going to be called on to do this.
We very often are the ones who have to put
our men and women and our treasure on the line
to try to seek justice.
Speaker 5 (31:36):
In some terrible things that are happening in the world.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
So look, you can argue this either way, whether it's
a good idea to be the Department of War the
Department of defense. But our deeper Catholic tradition looks at
something other than defense. It looks at other things as well,
and in that perspective, I don't think the idea of
a Department of War is all that outside of our bounds.
Speaker 1 (31:58):
Okay, I have some happy news amid all this confusion.
We all need a spiritual recharge, I know I do.
So I'm going on a cruise to the Grecian Isles
in the footsteps of the apostles Saint Paul and Saint John.
We're going to Philippi, Thessalonia, Athens, corinth Crete, Patmos, and Ephesus,
where I've never been, to visit the Blessed Virgin's House.
(32:20):
Monseignor Christopher Nolty will be joining me for daily mass
and reflections. And space is very limited, but this eleven
day cruise, say in September of twenty twenty six, is
going to be incredible. Go to Raymondarroyo dot com. You
can reserve a spot there. It's going to be one
of those life changing trips raymondroio dot com. I want
to move on to another controversy issue we have been
(32:42):
covering for months, if not years now, a holdover from
the Francis Pontificate, the traditional Latin Mass. This week in
the Diocese of Charlotte they are banning the traditional Latin
Mass in all parishes in the diocese save one small chapel.
The Diocese of Brooklyn and Austin are also instituting similar bands.
(33:05):
So just for those keeping score politicians who opposed church
teaching publicly. That's a good thing. The Reverend Mass of
the Ages, that's a bad thing. Bishop Michael Martin of
Charlotte issued a September twenty fifth letter and he reiterated
his new restrictions. He writes, God has been at work
in your lives through this particular celebration, the right of
(33:28):
the Mass, the Tridentine right, and it is hard to
imagine how the Holy Spirit could want otherwise. This chapel,
the only one that will celebrate the Mass, holds approximately
three hundred and fifty people and has recently been renovated
specifically for the celebration of the Tridentine Latin Mass. Please
understand that the chapel is not intended to accommodate everyone
(33:50):
currently attending the tradition Tridentine Latin Mass in their respective parishes.
So Father, I guess the bishop he also recoons men's
of the faithful attend the Tridentine Mass of the chapel
later in the month, or even wait until November, because
the chapel is so small. Your thoughts on the tone
of this letter.
Speaker 4 (34:10):
The tone of the letter is lamentable, to say the least,
and it betrays the hostility that is being directed at
a group of people who don't deserve it. Now, when
it came to Catholic politicians, Pope Leo says, we have
to consider the whole of their totality, of their activities
and career over forty years, I've celebrated the Latin Mass,
(34:34):
you've gone to it. I walk into that church, I
don't see a bunch of people causing problems in the
life of the church. And they're not a bunch of
people calling attention themselves either looking for honors. They said,
we want to be left alone, and yet we're told
because the Latin Mass causes disunity. I don't buy that premise,
but that's what we're told. It's the source of disunion
(34:54):
in towords. Therefore it has to go away. This betrays
that this whole project, which began under Pope France, has
to be abandoned by Pope Leo if he wants to
be pastorally sensitive and I think serve the cause of justice.
There is no reason in the world why you would
tell a group of people, I'm sorry, the church is
too full and we're not giving you a bigger one.
(35:17):
This is a manipulation of people. It's wrong, it shouldn't happen.
And you know again, the bishop could easily Bishop Martin
could easily go to Rome and ask Pope Leo or
Cardinal Roach and say, look what am I supposed to
do here? Am I supposed to throw people out of
their parishes? Am I supposed to give them pastorals care?
(35:38):
And it's up to the Pope and Cardinal Roach to
say we got to stop this.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
This is wrong. Yeah, well this is I guess human
dignity ends for those for those who want to take
part in the light and Mass. And Bob researchers at
William Patterson University in Wayne, New Jersey. They just published
a study in the Catholic Social Science Review, and it
shows that more traditional liturgical practices, like the traditional Latin
(36:04):
mass communion on the tongue, that that translates to greater
faith in the real presence contained in the Eucharist. Though
the study finds it only about fifty seven percent of
Catholic surveyed believe in the real presence of the eucharists,
that number is significantly higher among those who expressed a
preference for communion on the tongue. Or attending the Latin Mass.
(36:24):
So if the church is so concerned about attendance, in
reaching the young and belief in the Eucharists, they spent
millions on this, why are they suppressing this traditional form
of the Mass.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
Yeah, I have to confess that I'm always a little
skeptical of sociological service. I hope those numbers reflect the
reality that you just described, Raymond, because look, good sociologists
try to be careful.
Speaker 5 (36:47):
With their data, and I don't mean to impugne all
of them, but just this sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (36:52):
Do we know whether the people who go there self
select because they go there because they already believe in
the real presence, say, or you.
Speaker 5 (37:00):
Know, and vice versa.
Speaker 3 (37:01):
But in any event, there's clearly a correlation between these two,
if not an actual causation. And we know that our
bishops have been trying to raise the visibility of Eucharist.
They've been having eucharistic processions, eucharistic conferences and whatnot. So
if this is one of the to put it kind
of in a pedestrian way, one of the tools in.
Speaker 5 (37:22):
The toolbox, why throw it away. It's useful.
Speaker 3 (37:26):
It doesn't as far as Father rightly says, it doesn't
seem to really cause any problems. If there had been,
you know, a conflict between people in the Latin Mass
and others in North Carolina, well then you know, we
understand that a bishop need to take steps, and you know,
this apology it just doesn't seem it just doesn't sound right.
I mean, if you really didn't want to harm the
(37:48):
liturgical practices of a people, you wouldn't you wouldn't tell
them that what they've been doing has been great, but sorry,
you're not allowed to do it anymore. So you know,
what's the motivation behind this? We know that the Bishop
Martin tried also some very he proposed at least some
radical steps like you know, not kneeling the received communiyon
not receiving communion under tongue, removing everything on the altar
(38:12):
so that there would be an unobstructed view of the priest.
I mean, his intentions are really even more radical than this,
which is already quite radical itself.
Speaker 5 (38:23):
So what's the motivation?
Speaker 3 (38:25):
I don't know, but it just doesn't strike me as
something that a Catholic bishop at this point in twenty
twenty five in the United States of America should be doing.
Speaker 1 (38:33):
Yeah, I want to move to something else that happened
to the Vatican. Father, You're going to love this. One
thousand religious leaders, climate experts, and political leaders or at
this meeting at Costal Gondolfo, and it's called Raising Hope
for Climate Justice. And also attending was that climate expert
and Catholic former governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who he
(38:56):
prays on the Vatican for its commitment to be the
first carbon neutral state in the world. He called the
Vatican a powerhouse for environmental activism and then said.
Speaker 6 (39:06):
This, every single one of this one point four billion
Catholics can be a crusader for the environment and can
help us termin it pollution.
Speaker 1 (39:19):
Father, is this your new mission to be a crusader
for the environment? What about crusading for the faith? Can
we start there before we move on to the environment.
Speaker 4 (39:28):
Well, you know, I have no control over the environment,
so to speak. And I mean this, let's just put it.
You know, quite clearly, this fixation on what is essentially
a liberal policy to try to control world economics is
the climate change thing going on, and you know it's
(39:51):
scientifically debated. So I'll leave it that and hand the scientists,
the economists can tell you, fine, you want to eliminate
a carbon product, you're going to impoverish the world. So
this is not what we want. So yeah, what are
we Let's just step back a little bit. What the
heck are we doing. We're getting Schwarzenegger at a conference
(40:13):
to tell us what the priests and people of the
Catholters need to be doing. I would much rather that
we get a bishop to give a sermon, to encourage
people to go back to confession, to baptize their children,
to receive confirmation, to do acts of charity to actual
poor people, you know, to do the loving kindness thing
(40:34):
with the elderly.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
You know.
Speaker 4 (40:36):
I remember a few years ago when they had the
big heat wave in France and many older people died
because their children couldn't be bothered to go to the
apartment to help them because they were on vacation. I mean,
that didn't just happen to France, happened else. But that's
an examination of conscience thing that should be preached about,
which is charity to unknown strangers in the third world
(40:59):
is meaningless. You have to love your family, you have
to love those close to you and deal with any
situation that comes forward. By the way, where in the
world is the outrage now coming out of the Vatican
about the Russian six hundred drones a day attack on
Ukrainian civilians. We never really hear about it. All we
(41:19):
hear about is we got to get to the negotiating table.
How about we get to the evangelical rebuking, the sinner phase,
where we tell Russia stop murdering Ukrainians. Is I would
be much happy if the Holy See's political approach were
directed toward identifying and supporting the legitimate rights of Ukraine
(41:39):
not to be attacked by Russia.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
Well again, Father and Bob, I get so many notes
from people, you know. Look, I have evangelical friends, I
have Jewish friends. I have people who have no faith
at all, but they're interested in what the Catholic Church
is saying. And they're certainly because of the media attention
fixated on the Pope. And I got a ton of
questions about this. Just look at the visuals of this. Okay,
(42:02):
this is that environmental conference of the papal summer residence. Okay,
And Pope Leo blessed an Iceberg. They actually had a
piece of ice that he came forward and blessed and
then they had a song. I'm gonna play this for you.
This is Loudacto C, which is a reference to Pope
Francis's environmental encyclical, complete with Schwarzenegger making waves. You can
(42:25):
see what I mean now, Dot to see missing you Quantuo, Bob.
Your reaction to this and what does it tell us
(42:48):
in this moment? And does this lend credence to the
visual sense that people have that this just isn't serious.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
Well, it's interesting that Determinator is trying to terminate all
these environmental problems. You know, Pope Leo has I think
rightly said that it is not his task to solve
all the world's problems, and I hope he would come
to understand that even in a more in a deeper
and deeper way, and this, you know, this kind of
greta Toneberg level symbolism. In point of fact, I wrote
(43:20):
a book a couple of years ago, twenty years ago
about religion and environmentalism, and it's actually the case that
in a city like Paris, more people die out from
cold than they do from heat, even during these these
heat waves. There's rightly points out that there also should
be people trying to help. But both the people who
were out in the cold and the people were out
in heat. So there's a debate about all of that.
(43:43):
But this idea of kind of blessing a piece of ice.
I hope that that was something that was sprung on Leo,
because if I'd known about that in advance, if I
were him, I would have said, Look, we're not going
to engage and engage in this kitty environmentalism. We're going
to be If we're going to be serious about environmentalism,
we're going to be serious about it with serious things,
(44:05):
rather than these these sort of stunts that seem to
crop up in a variety of different circumstances in the
Vatican these days, these these drone images that are over
on Peter's and you know, some sort of crazy concerts
that are being held in Saint Peter's Square. There's something
that's that's broken loose inside the Vatican that I think
(44:26):
if I were Leo, I would pay some attention to,
because it's a very undisciplined way that a lot of
people are trying to send out messages.
Speaker 1 (44:34):
Yeah, and Father, this is very u n I've seen
these kinds of you know, pseudo blessing, you know, ritual
practices with you know, audience participation, waving the waves and
all that stuff. You see this at the UN a lot,
Well you were, you were across the street from the
un for years. You're more familiar with this than I am.
But what did you think when you saw this?
Speaker 4 (44:53):
Well, this is a theatrical and sort of self congratulatory
in the world of environmentalism, because they bought up a
new way to get attention for themselves, putting a big
chunk of ice in front of the Pope and having
him blessed that. But I would say, okay, environmentalists, you're
you're interest having the Pope bless uh the iceberg. Are
(45:14):
you willing to listen to the Pope when he says
you have to stop killing unborn children? You know? Are
you willing to cooperate with ending the pseudo marriage that
gay people are engaging in, you know, in civil society?
How about the trans fraud? Are you willing to say
we got to stop mutilating children? Of course, the environmentalists
(45:34):
by and large are not going to agree with us
on that. So the question is, well, what are we
doing here? Anyway, then the Catholic Church is fully capable
of preaching its environmental teaching without any reference to secular organizations.
Why are we getting in this bandwagon becoming an accessory?
As you know the Greta Thunberg moment. And you know,
(45:54):
poor Greta, she started out as a high school kid
who was put forward, and now she's become an antieist
Israeli activist. I mean, what is this. We don't want
to This is not our world to be as the Vatican.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
Yeah, when I first saw that Iceberg, I thought maybe
it was a Titanic re release or something. I didn't know
what they were doing. But the interesting thing here, as
you spoke, it reminded me Arnold Schwarzenegger thanked the Pope
for putting solar panels on the roof of the buildings. Well,
it was Pope Benedict that did that. Actually, I'm Paul
the sixth Paul. But his play there was to make
(46:28):
a nature argument and a natural argument that he saw
moving in the culture, to reach all of those Granola
people who might be interested and open to the Church's
vision of creation and worshiping God who created all. That
was the play there, and it seems we've dropped that
evangelical edge and it's all become climate activism that you
(46:50):
could find at the un any day of the week.
I'll give you the last word, Bob.
Speaker 5 (46:55):
Yeah, you know, even the language. I know.
Speaker 3 (46:57):
I'm a little hypersensitive to this because following this right,
even to talk about defending our common.
Speaker 5 (47:04):
Home Earth is not our home.
Speaker 3 (47:07):
I mean, we understand that we want to protect our environment,
we want to reconnect with God's creation, all that, insofar
as it's it's it's wrapped up in what the church
is doing, is fine. But it's always been the teaching
of the Church that we should not get to start
to feel too much at home on Earth because we're
not here forever. That ultimately what the Church wants to
(47:29):
teach us about is our eternal destiny. Doesn't mean that
we neglect, you know, either the environment or one another,
or the poor or whatever it may be. But we've
got to get this in the right perspective. If we
if we're we're clear that ultimately what we're concerned with
is a relationship with God and our.
Speaker 5 (47:46):
Eternal destiny, and some other things will.
Speaker 3 (47:49):
Take their proper places, but if we put those first,
then we're just repeating a kind of a worldliness that
it isn't as obvious as it is in other sects,
but it's a worldliness all the same.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
Well, there are reports that the Pope has a new
encyclical coming out or an apostolic letter. We don't quite
know yet. We'll keep our eyes on that. But next
time we meet, guys, I'm going to carve out a
portion that's all positive, where we just talk about the
mission of the church. Questions people have, We're going to
get into those things. In fact, I'll encourage people, if
(48:24):
you're watching listening, send questions to the community pages on
both places and we'll get to some of those questions. Gents,
Grateful to you all as always, and if you want
more of the Arroyo Grande Prayerful Posse, subscribe at the
Arroyo Grande Show on YouTube or a Royal Grande podcast
wherever you get yours a maf of Robert Royal, Father
Gerald Murray. Until the Posse rides the game, stay the course,
(48:47):
follow the light. I'm Raymond Arroyo. We'll see you next time. Bye, guys.
Arroyo Grande is produced in partnership with DP Studios. And
iHeart Podcasts, and it's available on the iHeart rate, your Apple,
wherever you get your podcasts.
Poe Leo sounded off on a church honor to be
bestowed on a pro choice senator, but he may have
caused a bigger blowback than the initial controversy. The Prayerful Posse.
We'll explore it all next. Welcome to an important Prayerful Posse.
(00:22):
Be sure to go subscribe to the show now. It's
a wonderful way to show your support for our work
and it's totally free, or you can visit Raymond Royo
dot com. Let's convene the posse. Canon lawyer Priest of
the Archdiocese of New York, Father Gerald Murray, and the
editor in chief of The Catholic Thing dot Org, Robert Royal. Gentlemen, boy,
do we have a week? Last week we reported on
(00:44):
the ten US bishops to crying Cardinal blaze supitous decision
to bestow that Lifetime Achievement award on Catholic Illinois Senator
Dick Durbin. Durbin, of course, has been vehemently pro abortion
for decades. He's been banned from receiving communion in his
home diocese in Springfield Well. Durbin eventually refused the honor
(01:04):
due to the firestorm, but only hours earlier, Pope Leo
was asked by EWT and News in Rome about the controversy,
and he said this.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
I'm not terribly familiar with the particular case. I think
that it's very important to look at the overall work
that a senator has done during if I'm not mistaken,
forty years of service in the United States Senate. I
understand the difficulty and the tensions, but I think, as
(01:35):
I myself have spoken in the past, it's important to
look at many issues that are related to what is
the teaching of the church.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Bob, is it conceivable that the pope a Chicagoan, with
ten US bishops, his bishops protesting and apparently the entire
bishop's conference about to issue a statement on this durban thing.
Is it conceivable that he was not familiar with his case?
Speaker 3 (02:00):
I already to have to say that I think he
knew about it, but he hoped that he was pouring
oil on the waters, And actually I think he poured
gasoline in the fire. Because we know that for decades
this has been the kind of the two step that
people who want to not to have to take the
hard steps of telling pro abortion politicians, usually democrats, not
(02:24):
to present themselves for communion. There have some very few
bishops in America that do this. Bishop Proprocy in Illinois,
Archbishop of Cordlone even told Nancy Pelosi not to present herself.
So I think he had to know about this. And
unfortunately he's getting his feet and I think we have
to allow him. I mean, this was a kind of
a spur of the moment question at a press conference,
(02:45):
and he's getting his feet under him as a pope.
But I think we have to hope that he begins
to grow in the job a bit, because you can't
keep repeating the same excuse that we've had for forty years,
that you can kill innocent life in the womb if
somehow you're so called good on other issues. That was
refuted by then Cardinal Ratzinger bag in a letter to
(03:08):
the Bishops of America in two thousand and four. As
we know, Cardinal McCarrick tried to misrepresent that letter to
our bishops. But in fact, what Cardinal Ratzinger said is
not all moral issues are on the same plane, and
obviously killing innocent human life is something different than being
so called good on immigration.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Father, it seems to me we have a trend going here,
I mean this interview, and I get that it was
a walk by as he left for Costal Gondolfo. But
there's an easy way to deal with this. Don't answer
the questions. Okay, wave and bless people and keep moving.
But when you couple this statement with what we heard
from that extended interview about church teaching and if you
(03:52):
change social attitudes, then we can change church teaching. I mean,
is it important to look at many issues related to
the teachings of the church while ignoring the most glaring one,
Durban's support for abortion when considering a record of a politician.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
Yes, you mentioned the circumstances. It was actually in the
evening he was leaving Castle Gondolpho, because Pope Leo has
the custom now of going there every Tuesday to kind
of do some work off site and to relax a
little bit. So yeah, he chose the number one. Why
were the reporters allowed to be there? The Holy See
could have shut him down and Pope wouldn't have even
(04:30):
seen them, but they were allowed to be there, and
then the Pope walked over and answered their questions. So
I think what we're getting is a repeat of what
Francis did, and admittedly Pope John Paul the Second and
Benedict did similar things, which is to grant access to
reporters who then of course talk about topics that are
in the news. And knowing that Pope Leo, you know,
(04:54):
could anticipate it would seem to me that there be
a question about this, because it's a major scandal in
the United States when a pro abortion Catholic is honored
by the Cardinal Large Bishop of Chicago. So I think
he knew that he was probably going to have to
answer it, and then while demuring a saying didn't know much,
he certainly knew enough to say that this man's career
(05:14):
merited further consideration beyond his pro abortion stance, to which
I say, what consideration could mollify or minimize his support
for killing unborn children. Nothing. The US Catholic bishop said
the priority item that the Catholic Church focus on the
(05:35):
US is to end the killing of children by abortion.
So Cardinal supic And giving the award knew that he
was going against the constant policy of the bishops of
the United States. It's even in his own diocese in
guidelines not to honor pro abortion Catholics. So the long
and the short of it is, Pope Leo decided to
(05:56):
wade into this in a way that is not, I
think the most careful way to do it, and he
did so stating this and other things that you know,
quite frankly, don't compute with me and do not conform
to the way the Catholic Church presents her teaching Bob.
Speaker 1 (06:13):
In some ways, the Pope is echoing Cardinal Supach's original
defense of that award that there are many issues to consider,
not just one. Do you buy that? No?
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Look, as I said earlier, this is what we've been
hearing for decades from our bishops who don't want to
take a hard stance and recognize really what is at
stake here. Cardinal Supauc himself, in trying to defend what
was going on in Chicago, said that, well, because of
polarization and politicization of the United States, no Catholic politician
(06:48):
is really able because of the way the parties are
to be fully Catholic, that there is no real.
Speaker 5 (06:54):
Home for Catholics. Right.
Speaker 3 (06:55):
I think this is a nonsensical way to approach this question,
because if that's the case, if neither the Republicans nor
the Democrats have a holy Catholic approach to issues, well,
then don't give political awards. I was in Chicago last
week and I spoke to a group called Aid for
the Women, which was created independently right after Roe v. Wade,
(07:17):
and for all the years since Roe v. Wade has
been defending women, helping women with problematic pregnancies, giving them
homes to live in, helping them take care of their babies,
getting them jobs afterwards. This is an organization that for
fifty years is defended life in Chicago and the general
Chicago area. You want to honor somebody, to honor them.
(07:37):
If the politicians don't come up to snuff, then fine.
Politics is not entirely separate from Catholicism. But we don't
have to honor anyone. There's no urgency to do that,
especially when we have somebody who's flagrantly not only in
favor of abortion, but in favor of gay marriage and
a variety of other things.
Speaker 5 (07:54):
The country to Catholic teaching.
Speaker 1 (07:56):
All right, I want to move on to the next
portion of Leo's comments. Here we talked about the meaning
of the term father pro life.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
Someone who says I'm against abortion, but says, I'm in
favor of the death penalty is not really pro life.
So someone who says that I'm against abortion, but I'm
in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants or in
the United States, I don't know if that's pro life.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
You don't. I don't mean to be impertinent, But he's
the Pope. Why doesn't he know?
Speaker 4 (08:27):
Father, Well, he's posing rhetorical questions to make a point
without stating it flat out. Instead of saying, if you're
pro in favor of the death penalty, you're not pro life,
he says, I don't know if they're pro life. Well.
As a matter of fact, the Catholic Church has never
taught that the death penalty is immoral. And this is
a big problem that we inherited from Pope Francis where
(08:48):
he changed the categorism the Catholic Church and he used
very puzzling language where he said the death penalty is inadmissible,
not a moral category. That's a prudential judgment about the
use of a penalty. But is it inadmissible because it's
immoral or is it inadmissible because there are too many
mistakes when you use it?
Speaker 5 (09:07):
Well?
Speaker 4 (09:07):
In other things, Pope Francis said that it is a
violation of human dignity to use the death penalty, so
that indicates he thought it was immoral. So with all
that background, Pope Leo is continuing that line of thought.
The problem is the Catholic Church has always taught that
the death penalty is a legitimate penalty that civil authorities
can impose for serious crimes. And if you can't be
(09:30):
pro death penalty and be pro life, well, you know,
look at all the saints in history. Saint Augustine and
Saint Thomas Aquinas justified this. Saint Jerome justified it. You know,
it's not helling, it's the administration of justice. So it's
very disheartening also to have by implication saying that the
(09:52):
removal of illegal immigrants or illegal aliens in the United
States is in himself in human. I don't believe that
we live in a democracy. We live in a rule
of law, and ice agents and other people, border patrol
people are trained professionals, and if someone's resisting arrest, of
(10:13):
course you're going to seize them. But that we don't
go in with truncheons and start hitting people over the
head and throwing them into the ground if they if
they agree to, you know, if there's some and then
say you're under arrest and they don't try to fight
the officers and there is no physical altercations. I don't
That's another thing I don't like. I don't believe either
(10:35):
in ways they're doing it or the whole even the
proposition that to deport someone is in human it's not
see itself doesn't allow illegal aliens to sleep in the
Vatican gardens, right right.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
I'd like to try it with a you know, with
one of those raybam glasses on and see what happens
to me. They will toss me out faster than I
could walk in the gate. But the challenge here, father,
and Bob and Father, I'm going to pick up on
something you said. The Church has always taught that the
death penalty was admissible because it is a penalty for
(11:10):
taking innocent human life and spilling innocent human blood. And
it's not done by an individual out of vengeance. It's
done coldly and clinically by the state after someone has
been tried. That is not the case of an unborn child. Bob,
the Pope and Cardinal super you're basically saying the same thing.
We should not be single issue voters as citizens, but
(11:34):
they seem to have a single issue about which they're
most concerned, and that's immigration. They want no limits on immigration.
Speaker 3 (11:43):
Yeah, and I'm afraid that this is a kind of
a loser, not only politically but even religiously. Yes, the
developed world, which is, you know, the countries in Europe
and the United States and Canada where I mean Australia
where many of the poor people in the world.
Speaker 5 (11:58):
Want to travel to.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
All these countries are feeling the effects of illegal immigration.
And the other moral consideration is what does it do
to the countries where massive numbers of people arrive who
may or may not be integratable into those societies, who
bring with them crime and other sorts of problems. Look,
(12:20):
it's been reported even in political circles that under President Obama,
who most people think are very humane in the way
he was willing to receive people from other countries, two
million people were deported during the two administrations of President Obama.
Any country that does not have a control of its
(12:40):
border is not a country, to use the phrase that
we we often hear, and there's a reason for that.
There's a reason for the same reason that if somebody
shows up in your house without your permission, they're not undocumented.
This is a phrase that the Cardinal McElroy and doing
a mass for migrants and immigrants the other day. The
(13:01):
Cardinal Archbiser of Washington, DC eleven times use the term
undocumented as if it's just like somebody forgot their driver's
license and they showed up and suddenly people are picking
them up. No, what's happening is people arrived here illegally.
And so when people try to enforce the law, yeah, okay, occasionally,
like with a policeman, maybe there is somebody who loses
(13:22):
his temper and then we're going to see a you know,
a iPhone taking the pictures of that. But to have
a cop that is losing his temper doesn't mean that
policing as such is immoral. And similarly, to remove people
who arrived here illegally. Now I'm going to make a
controversial statement. I think that the United States bears a
(13:43):
certain responsibility, a moral responsibility. If people say, have been
here ten years, haven't broken the law, have observed our laws,
have supported themselves, had jobs, et cetera, then we a
conversation about maybe a compromise. But people who just arrived here,
especially people who are criminals and causing trouble in the society.
(14:04):
This isn't only not inhumane, it is being humane towards
the people who are here and have to suffer the
problems that are brought and then pay for people who
show up. It's a problem of all the developed countries,
and I'm afraid the Church is going to have to
come to terms with the fact that this is not
simply racism or anti immigrants sentiment. It's realism about what
(14:26):
it's life to live in a particular nation.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
Now we're seeing this all across Europe, father, and I
mean one could make the argument and having been to
the Rio Grand watching young girls and women trafficked across
those waters, you know, the unfettered and unregulated immigration only
encourages human trafficking, sexual exploitation. And talk to border officials
(14:49):
and people in law enforcement along those border communities. They
will show you the carnage. They'll show you what inhumanity
looks like. And it's these cartels who abuse these women particularly,
and men who make this journey. I'll give you the
last word on this before we move on.
Speaker 5 (15:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:04):
No, that's right. I mean, imagine if the Drug Enforcement
Agency announced we will no longer interdict drugs coming into
the country. What do you think would happen. This is
what happened in the last administration. Would it be in
humane to say, now we're going to stop the drugs coming.
Of course not. It's the same thing with people. Now
people are not objects their personal beings, but personal beings
have more responsibility, and when you arrest them, you're reminding
(15:27):
them you had a knowledge that you were entering illegally.
Therefore you have to be responsible for your acts. And
as the administration has said, if you voluntarily self deport
you have a chance to come back in the future.
So our country is a country based on law and justice.
It's not in human or in humane to say I'm
sorry people come in here legally cannot stay. Well.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
Also, in light of what we're seeing law enforcement shot attacked,
I think it's very very dangerous for anyone in the
public domain, particularly legis leaders, to somehow say that person
is inhumane. They're inhuman in what they're doing. That's targeting
people who are enforcing the law, and in many cases
(16:11):
Catholics who are 'enforcing the law. But I want to
move on. This is the next part of what Pope
Leo had to say about the complexity of the life
issues WAD.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
They're very complex issues. I don't know if anyone has
all the truth on them. But I would ask first
and foremost that there'd be greater respect for one another
and that we search together, both as human beings in
that case, as American citizens or citizens of the state
of Illinois, as well as Catholics, to say we need
(16:44):
to you know, really the closes at all of these
ethical issues and to find the way forward as church.
The church teaching on each one of those issues is
very clear.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
Father, the Pope calls for respect and that we're somehow
searching together for what a clear moral teaching on the
gravity of abortion. What are we searching for?
Speaker 4 (17:02):
Well, I would ask a question forward toward what. And
as you know, the Catholic Church is a body commissioned
by God. Christ commission the Church to teach the truth.
So we know where the truth is. The truth which
sets us free is in the teaching of the Church,
and those who are faithful to the teaching the Church
have the truth. So when you say nobody has all
(17:24):
the truth, well, okay, that's the way you can justify
that statement. But we have to be quite clear. Pro
abortionists are peddling lies and falsehoods. People who defend the
right to life are propagating the truth. Now, the last
thing I'll say is I respect people, but I don't
always respect their opinions. And that's that's the logic that
(17:44):
we live life on. You know, if somebody walks into
my church and wants to say a prayer, if I'm
very happy, if I find out, you know, that they
don't believe in Jesus as the son of God and
they're praying to a false God, that's I don't respect that.
But I'm going to say, Okay, I'm not going to
say stop you from doing that. Privately, you can't come
in and seize my church. So no, The point here
(18:05):
has to be why is it that whenever people who
violate Catholic teaching are called to task, there's a whole
bunch of people line up and say, don't be mean
to that person. He's only doing what he thinks is best.
We never say that about people who pedal drugs or
run prostitution rings. They think they're doing what's best for them. No,
they're exploiting other people. And people who promote abortion are
(18:28):
killing other people, maybe not themselves directly, but they're paying
for it and they're defending its continued legality. Let's get
real here, Dick Durbin is not an innocent bystander who
is ambushed by Bishop Pprocky. This is a moral agent
who knows that thet says don't do it, and he says,
I don't care, I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
Bob, your thoughts on this, this idea that we're still
searching for. I guess the truth together, But in my estimation,
it's the pope's job. Indeed, it's his function to tell
us that truth. He is the protector of the doctrine
of Jesus Christ. Either that's true and it's solid and
it can be passed on, or it can't.
Speaker 5 (19:09):
Look I would like to cut him a little bit
of slack here.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
I think that this kind of answering the question on
the fly is a very dangerous thing to do. And then,
of course he relies on what is kind of the
common way of getting out from under a political difficulty.
Speaker 5 (19:24):
But if we want to think very.
Speaker 3 (19:26):
Carefully about these issues, it's not actually all that hard.
The Church has thought about these things for years and years.
We have some very clear teachings, and he keeps pointing
back to those teachings. He says, in fact, that if
we follow the Catechism, that's the way to avoid division
in the church. And what the Catechism would tell us
about the so called complexity of issues is, yes, there
(19:48):
are several important moral questions in a society. But let's
take a question about poverty programs. I mean, that's a
prudential judgment. Is it better to have policies directly give
money to the poor or is it better to have
policies that create more jobs. I mean, that's a legitimate debate.
It's a political debate. Is it better to have more
(20:08):
immigration or less, that's a political debate. Those things are
prudential judgments that people can disagree about, and it's not
one side or the other that is simply immoral. But
when it comes to the taking of human life, we
are in the presence of something that is an absolute evil.
It is something that is a model them in say,
if I can use some ecclesial Latin here, it's an
(20:30):
evil in itself. We know the committing murder is an
evil in itself, and it's if you don't believe the
killing a baby in the woman is the same as
killing a person who's walking around alive, well, then you've
departed from Catholic, really deep Catholic social teaching, because the
respect owe to the dignity of every human person is
(20:50):
for every human person unborn near the end of life
and in the middle. There's clarity here. The Pope kind
of half has said this, and perhaps as he gets
more comfortable in the job and more capable of dealing
with these situations, he'll bring that kind of consistency even
to these situations. But clearly he hasn't quite yet connected
(21:12):
at the level of being able to talk off the
cuff about a difficult issue.
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Like, well, I have to say, and Father, i'd like
your response on this if I were advising him, and
I'm not, but if I were, one of the first
things I would say is you're the Pope. What you
say now has enormous weight. And when you see people
in other faiths saying in headlines above this statement, the
video of this statement by the Pope, this is why
(21:38):
the Scripture has to be the final word for Christians.
On doctrine and not any man. This undermines the evangelical
witness of the Church, and I would argue the clarity
of the church. And you should see my comments. The
faithful are just shattered by this. Father. Your reaction to that,
whether the Pope should continue Pope Francis's trend of kind
(21:58):
of doing these off the cuff interviews and do you
think this sturban refusal was really a face saving operation.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
Well, No, as regards to interviews, he should not do
interviews while he's walking out of a building, or I
would say even on a plane. The Pope is the
principal teacher of the Catholic Church, and therefore what he
says is paid attention to. If a bishop in a
far away place says something very few people hear it,
(22:28):
the Pope has heard universally. Plus, he's the guarante of
truth because he enjoys the charism of infallibility, and he's
not invoking that here, but he knows that his responsibility
is to teach infallible truths on a constant basis, I
would say, no more interviews like this. What I would
say is give teaching that is accessible. In other words,
(22:49):
the colloquial style of an interview should also be reflected
in his writings. And you know you're a good editor
of Raymond and Roberts. You know what it is. Concision
allows people to read something and not fall asleep.
Speaker 5 (23:03):
You know.
Speaker 4 (23:03):
So too many of the documents in the church are
one hundred and fifty pages long. The only ones who
read it are those paid to read it, like people
like us. So on that point, I'll say that's the
way I would go. Now, on the deeper issue that
we have here, I think the Pope has to, you know,
take stock that if he's going to say I really
don't know enough about it and then talk about it,
(23:26):
then he says he really does know enough about it,
when I would say, has Bob did it? I don't
think he knows enough about it? In one sense, because
this involved not simply Soupic and Durban. This involved other bishops,
that involved the US Bishop's Conference, right, involved the entire
non Catholic world looking with wonderment at the Archbishop of
(23:46):
Chicago because he did something no archbishop in the United
States has done, which is to single out a pro
abortion man of some prominence and say you deserve an
achievement of war for your lifetime activities. This is you know,
Evangelicals don't expect this. Jewish people who are against abortion said,
(24:08):
wait a minute, I thought you were on our side,
you know, Cardinal Supic So it's a problem.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
But to pick up on that though, Bob, don't you
think by the Pope weighing in this way and trying
to almost give some cover to Cardinal Supage on this question.
The whole Durban Soupage scandal that the bishops are up
in arms over, that's kind of been blown away. Now
we're talking about the pope who is freelancing on these
(24:39):
moral issues and can't really say that abortion is of
a higher grave matter than the immigration reform.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Well, I think he can. And again I would say
that I think he's finding his way. He's admitted that,
you know, to be the be playing on a world
stage like this is something that he's never done before.
We can hope and pray that he's going to mature
in the job and become more capable of what's doing.
And I wouldn't neglect as father rightly said that there
were ten bishops and we know at least we hear
(25:09):
because it's hard to get insider information about this, that
the entire US Bishop's Conference was preparing.
Speaker 5 (25:16):
A statement about this.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
They've crossed swords with Cardinal Suppitch in the past and
Cardinal Supermach in the past how to support of Pope Francis,
of course, But I think from what I'm hearing that
the Bishop's Conference told the Nuncio here in Washington, and
they alerted Rome to the fact that there was a
statement coming out, and so, you know, to get in
(25:38):
between all of that, I think that what Leo probably
wanted to do was to keep himself out of it,
and he didn't have the chops yet to just stay
away from it. And he probably doesn't want to be
a micromanager in places even like Chicago, which he is from.
But still, if you're going to be the pope, you
have to measure every word. I often say there are
two people on earth who have to measure every word,
(26:00):
Rome and the President of the United States, because both
of them can have world shattering effects from the words
that they pronounced.
Speaker 1 (26:06):
Yeah, Father, I think you could call this episode the
last victory of Theodore mcarrick in some way. I mean,
Bob referenced this earlier back in two thousand and four,
when Cardinal mcarick met with the future Pope Benedict and
the US bishops wanted to deny communion to John Carey,
another Catholic politician who supported abortion. McCarrick basically suppressed the
(26:29):
letter written by Cardinal Rothzinger advising the bishops to meet
with politicians, warn them, and if they continued in their
public manifest sin deny them communion, and he added this quote,
I'm going to read this. It's so important. There may
be legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging
(26:50):
war and applying the death penalty, but not however, with
regard to abortion or euthanasia. My question to you, father
is what chain?
Speaker 5 (27:01):
What changed?
Speaker 4 (27:02):
Is the man occupying the throne to Saint Peter, you know,
I mean, that's what the obviously what changed. But also
what changed, I think is that Pope Leo has demonstrated
that he is much more comfortable in talking about these
issues in a way that represents an attempt to find
an accommodation with people who promote abortion and other horrific
(27:25):
things in the life of the church. Certainly, his statements
in his interview to the Crux reporter release Allen regarding
how we're going to deal with the question of homosexuality
in the church. And that was previously. That was James
Martin having a private audience and coming out and saying
the Pope said, continue your work. This is not how
(27:49):
John Paul the Second and Benedict managed things. This is
how Pope Francis did things. And I think we're seeing
more of that. Back to the Mcaray thing though, I mean,
as people may may be aware that he was a
very fraudulent person in so many ways. He cried exactly
to prevent Cardinal Ratzinger's letter to the bishops from being
in their hands. He summarized it for them. Fortunately it
(28:11):
was leaked and made the media. In fact, I compliment
e WTM because they put it on their website and
that's where I got a copy of it. So yeah,
the fact of the matter is the good of the
church demands that its leaders speak consistently and truthfully and
not do this dance routine where if a cardinal says something,
nobody can criticize him because he's a cardinal. Thank God
(28:33):
the time bishops stopped that. But now the next question
is Holy Father, now that you've said this, there are
other concerns that are raised. Would you please address those.
I hope and pray that the American bishops would tell
the Pope that we need more clarity when it comes
to these type of teachings.
Speaker 1 (28:50):
Well, here we come to the point of clarity and
the Pope's roll, the Pope's job, if you will, in
the church. The Pope was also asked about in Italian
about US foreign policy and the distinction between the Department
of War, which is its new name, and the Department
of Defense, the former name before Trump changed it. He
(29:10):
said this, I'll read it to you. This way of
speaking is worrying because it shows each time and increase intentions,
this vocabulary, even shifting from Minister of Defense to Minister
of War. Let's hope it's only a way of speaking. Certainly,
they have a style of government where they want to
(29:31):
show strength to put pressure, and we hope it works,
but that there will not be war. One must always
work for peace. Bob Ah. It's kind of ironic the
Pope's urging clarity of language when he just had this
moral quicksand he was caught in Isn't this a prudential judgment?
(29:52):
And trusted to elected authorities to name departments in a
government whatever they want.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
Well, you know, we keep trying to gauge home much
our American pope actually knows about America. Maybe he hears
about America from certain people. I don't think he spends
a lot of time, probably reading American newspapers, and God
knows what the American newspapers are like these days, especially
the Chicago Tribute, if he's reading that, which is very,
very far left publication. But you know, I would point
(30:19):
out this since we try to talk like Catholics when
we deal with these issues. We have in the church
something that is called just war theory, not just defense theory,
just war theory, and just war theory follows Saint Augustine.
Augustine was one of the primary developers of the idea
of just war theory from some classical sources. And the
(30:41):
reason why we talk about just war is war is
not only about defense. It may also have an element
of imposing justice, just as the capital punishment is intended
to impose justice on situations where violence is taking place.
So let's say there's a genocide taking place in some
far off country. Well, we're not defending ourselves by going
(31:04):
there or trying to stop the carnage is going on
between two different sides. We are making war. I actually
said this in Italy, just some members of the Italian
parliament once. I used the term in Italian making war,
and they said to me after, we.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
Don't like that term making war. It sounds kind of nasty.
Speaker 3 (31:22):
I said, yeah, but we are are Americans and we
are actually called on to do this sort of thing.
Italy is not going to be called on to do this.
Europe's not going to be called on to do this.
We very often are the ones who have to put
our men and women and our treasure on the line
to try to seek justice.
Speaker 5 (31:36):
In some terrible things that are happening in the world.
Speaker 3 (31:38):
So look, you can argue this either way, whether it's
a good idea to be the Department of War the
Department of defense. But our deeper Catholic tradition looks at
something other than defense. It looks at other things as well,
and in that perspective, I don't think the idea of
a Department of War is all that outside of our bounds.
Speaker 1 (31:58):
Okay, I have some happy news amid all this confusion.
We all need a spiritual recharge, I know I do.
So I'm going on a cruise to the Grecian Isles
in the footsteps of the apostles Saint Paul and Saint John.
We're going to Philippi, Thessalonia, Athens, corinth Crete, Patmos, and Ephesus,
where I've never been, to visit the Blessed Virgin's House.
(32:20):
Monseignor Christopher Nolty will be joining me for daily mass
and reflections. And space is very limited, but this eleven
day cruise, say in September of twenty twenty six, is
going to be incredible. Go to Raymondarroyo dot com. You
can reserve a spot there. It's going to be one
of those life changing trips raymondroio dot com. I want
to move on to another controversy issue we have been
(32:42):
covering for months, if not years now, a holdover from
the Francis Pontificate, the traditional Latin Mass. This week in
the Diocese of Charlotte they are banning the traditional Latin
Mass in all parishes in the diocese save one small chapel.
The Diocese of Brooklyn and Austin are also instituting similar bands.
(33:05):
So just for those keeping score politicians who opposed church
teaching publicly. That's a good thing. The Reverend Mass of
the Ages, that's a bad thing. Bishop Michael Martin of
Charlotte issued a September twenty fifth letter and he reiterated
his new restrictions. He writes, God has been at work
in your lives through this particular celebration, the right of
(33:28):
the Mass, the Tridentine right, and it is hard to
imagine how the Holy Spirit could want otherwise. This chapel,
the only one that will celebrate the Mass, holds approximately
three hundred and fifty people and has recently been renovated
specifically for the celebration of the Tridentine Latin Mass. Please
understand that the chapel is not intended to accommodate everyone
(33:50):
currently attending the tradition Tridentine Latin Mass in their respective parishes.
So Father, I guess the bishop he also recoons men's
of the faithful attend the Tridentine Mass of the chapel
later in the month, or even wait until November, because
the chapel is so small. Your thoughts on the tone
of this letter.
Speaker 4 (34:10):
The tone of the letter is lamentable, to say the least,
and it betrays the hostility that is being directed at
a group of people who don't deserve it. Now, when
it came to Catholic politicians, Pope Leo says, we have
to consider the whole of their totality, of their activities
and career over forty years, I've celebrated the Latin Mass,
(34:34):
you've gone to it. I walk into that church, I
don't see a bunch of people causing problems in the
life of the church. And they're not a bunch of
people calling attention themselves either looking for honors. They said,
we want to be left alone, and yet we're told
because the Latin Mass causes disunity. I don't buy that premise,
but that's what we're told. It's the source of disunion
(34:54):
in towords. Therefore it has to go away. This betrays
that this whole project, which began under Pope France, has
to be abandoned by Pope Leo if he wants to
be pastorally sensitive and I think serve the cause of justice.
There is no reason in the world why you would
tell a group of people, I'm sorry, the church is
too full and we're not giving you a bigger one.
(35:17):
This is a manipulation of people. It's wrong, it shouldn't happen.
And you know again, the bishop could easily Bishop Martin
could easily go to Rome and ask Pope Leo or
Cardinal Roach and say, look what am I supposed to
do here? Am I supposed to throw people out of
their parishes? Am I supposed to give them pastorals care?
(35:38):
And it's up to the Pope and Cardinal Roach to
say we got to stop this.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
This is wrong. Yeah, well this is I guess human
dignity ends for those for those who want to take
part in the light and Mass. And Bob researchers at
William Patterson University in Wayne, New Jersey. They just published
a study in the Catholic Social Science Review, and it
shows that more traditional liturgical practices, like the traditional Latin
(36:04):
mass communion on the tongue, that that translates to greater
faith in the real presence contained in the Eucharist. Though
the study finds it only about fifty seven percent of
Catholic surveyed believe in the real presence of the eucharists,
that number is significantly higher among those who expressed a
preference for communion on the tongue. Or attending the Latin Mass.
(36:24):
So if the church is so concerned about attendance, in
reaching the young and belief in the Eucharists, they spent
millions on this, why are they suppressing this traditional form
of the Mass.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
Yeah, I have to confess that I'm always a little
skeptical of sociological service. I hope those numbers reflect the
reality that you just described, Raymond, because look, good sociologists
try to be careful.
Speaker 5 (36:47):
With their data, and I don't mean to impugne all
of them, but just this sort of thing.
Speaker 3 (36:52):
Do we know whether the people who go there self
select because they go there because they already believe in
the real presence, say, or you.
Speaker 5 (37:00):
Know, and vice versa.
Speaker 3 (37:01):
But in any event, there's clearly a correlation between these two,
if not an actual causation. And we know that our
bishops have been trying to raise the visibility of Eucharist.
They've been having eucharistic processions, eucharistic conferences and whatnot. So
if this is one of the to put it kind
of in a pedestrian way, one of the tools in.
Speaker 5 (37:22):
The toolbox, why throw it away. It's useful.
Speaker 3 (37:26):
It doesn't as far as Father rightly says, it doesn't
seem to really cause any problems. If there had been,
you know, a conflict between people in the Latin Mass
and others in North Carolina, well then you know, we
understand that a bishop need to take steps, and you know,
this apology it just doesn't seem it just doesn't sound right.
I mean, if you really didn't want to harm the
(37:48):
liturgical practices of a people, you wouldn't you wouldn't tell
them that what they've been doing has been great, but sorry,
you're not allowed to do it anymore. So you know,
what's the motivation behind this? We know that the Bishop
Martin tried also some very he proposed at least some
radical steps like you know, not kneeling the received communiyon
not receiving communion under tongue, removing everything on the altar
(38:12):
so that there would be an unobstructed view of the priest.
I mean, his intentions are really even more radical than this,
which is already quite radical itself.
Speaker 5 (38:23):
So what's the motivation?
Speaker 3 (38:25):
I don't know, but it just doesn't strike me as
something that a Catholic bishop at this point in twenty
twenty five in the United States of America should be doing.
Speaker 1 (38:33):
Yeah, I want to move to something else that happened
to the Vatican. Father, You're going to love this. One
thousand religious leaders, climate experts, and political leaders or at
this meeting at Costal Gondolfo, and it's called Raising Hope
for Climate Justice. And also attending was that climate expert
and Catholic former governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who he
(38:56):
prays on the Vatican for its commitment to be the
first carbon neutral state in the world. He called the
Vatican a powerhouse for environmental activism and then said.
Speaker 6 (39:06):
This, every single one of this one point four billion
Catholics can be a crusader for the environment and can
help us termin it pollution.
Speaker 1 (39:19):
Father, is this your new mission to be a crusader
for the environment? What about crusading for the faith? Can
we start there before we move on to the environment.
Speaker 4 (39:28):
Well, you know, I have no control over the environment,
so to speak. And I mean this, let's just put it.
You know, quite clearly, this fixation on what is essentially
a liberal policy to try to control world economics is
the climate change thing going on, and you know it's
(39:51):
scientifically debated. So I'll leave it that and hand the scientists,
the economists can tell you, fine, you want to eliminate
a carbon product, you're going to impoverish the world. So
this is not what we want. So yeah, what are
we Let's just step back a little bit. What the
heck are we doing. We're getting Schwarzenegger at a conference
(40:13):
to tell us what the priests and people of the
Catholters need to be doing. I would much rather that
we get a bishop to give a sermon, to encourage
people to go back to confession, to baptize their children,
to receive confirmation, to do acts of charity to actual
poor people, you know, to do the loving kindness thing
(40:34):
with the elderly.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
You know.
Speaker 4 (40:36):
I remember a few years ago when they had the
big heat wave in France and many older people died
because their children couldn't be bothered to go to the
apartment to help them because they were on vacation. I mean,
that didn't just happen to France, happened else. But that's
an examination of conscience thing that should be preached about,
which is charity to unknown strangers in the third world
(40:59):
is meaningless. You have to love your family, you have
to love those close to you and deal with any
situation that comes forward. By the way, where in the
world is the outrage now coming out of the Vatican
about the Russian six hundred drones a day attack on
Ukrainian civilians. We never really hear about it. All we
(41:19):
hear about is we got to get to the negotiating table.
How about we get to the evangelical rebuking, the sinner phase,
where we tell Russia stop murdering Ukrainians. Is I would
be much happy if the Holy See's political approach were
directed toward identifying and supporting the legitimate rights of Ukraine
(41:39):
not to be attacked by Russia.
Speaker 1 (41:41):
Well again, Father and Bob, I get so many notes
from people, you know. Look, I have evangelical friends, I
have Jewish friends. I have people who have no faith
at all, but they're interested in what the Catholic Church
is saying. And they're certainly because of the media attention
fixated on the Pope. And I got a ton of
questions about this. Just look at the visuals of this. Okay,
(42:02):
this is that environmental conference of the papal summer residence. Okay,
And Pope Leo blessed an Iceberg. They actually had a
piece of ice that he came forward and blessed and
then they had a song. I'm gonna play this for you.
This is Loudacto C, which is a reference to Pope
Francis's environmental encyclical, complete with Schwarzenegger making waves. You can
(42:25):
see what I mean now, Dot to see missing you Quantuo, Bob.
Your reaction to this and what does it tell us
(42:48):
in this moment? And does this lend credence to the
visual sense that people have that this just isn't serious.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
Well, it's interesting that Determinator is trying to terminate all
these environmental problems. You know, Pope Leo has I think
rightly said that it is not his task to solve
all the world's problems, and I hope he would come
to understand that even in a more in a deeper
and deeper way, and this, you know, this kind of
greta Toneberg level symbolism. In point of fact, I wrote
(43:20):
a book a couple of years ago, twenty years ago
about religion and environmentalism, and it's actually the case that
in a city like Paris, more people die out from
cold than they do from heat, even during these these
heat waves. There's rightly points out that there also should
be people trying to help. But both the people who
were out in the cold and the people were out
in heat. So there's a debate about all of that.
(43:43):
But this idea of kind of blessing a piece of ice.
I hope that that was something that was sprung on Leo,
because if I'd known about that in advance, if I
were him, I would have said, Look, we're not going
to engage and engage in this kitty environmentalism. We're going
to be If we're going to be serious about environmentalism,
we're going to be serious about it with serious things,
(44:05):
rather than these these sort of stunts that seem to
crop up in a variety of different circumstances in the
Vatican these days, these these drone images that are over
on Peter's and you know, some sort of crazy concerts
that are being held in Saint Peter's Square. There's something
that's that's broken loose inside the Vatican that I think
(44:26):
if I were Leo, I would pay some attention to,
because it's a very undisciplined way that a lot of
people are trying to send out messages.
Speaker 1 (44:34):
Yeah, and Father, this is very u n I've seen
these kinds of you know, pseudo blessing, you know, ritual
practices with you know, audience participation, waving the waves and
all that stuff. You see this at the UN a lot,
Well you were, you were across the street from the
un for years. You're more familiar with this than I am.
But what did you think when you saw this?
Speaker 4 (44:53):
Well, this is a theatrical and sort of self congratulatory
in the world of environmentalism, because they bought up a
new way to get attention for themselves, putting a big
chunk of ice in front of the Pope and having
him blessed that. But I would say, okay, environmentalists, you're
you're interest having the Pope bless uh the iceberg. Are
(45:14):
you willing to listen to the Pope when he says
you have to stop killing unborn children? You know? Are
you willing to cooperate with ending the pseudo marriage that
gay people are engaging in, you know, in civil society?
How about the trans fraud? Are you willing to say
we got to stop mutilating children? Of course, the environmentalists
(45:34):
by and large are not going to agree with us
on that. So the question is, well, what are we
doing here? Anyway, then the Catholic Church is fully capable
of preaching its environmental teaching without any reference to secular organizations.
Why are we getting in this bandwagon becoming an accessory?
As you know the Greta Thunberg moment. And you know,
(45:54):
poor Greta, she started out as a high school kid
who was put forward, and now she's become an antieist
Israeli activist. I mean, what is this. We don't want
to This is not our world to be as the Vatican.
Speaker 1 (46:06):
Yeah, when I first saw that Iceberg, I thought maybe
it was a Titanic re release or something. I didn't know
what they were doing. But the interesting thing here, as
you spoke, it reminded me Arnold Schwarzenegger thanked the Pope
for putting solar panels on the roof of the buildings. Well,
it was Pope Benedict that did that. Actually, I'm Paul
the sixth Paul. But his play there was to make
(46:28):
a nature argument and a natural argument that he saw
moving in the culture, to reach all of those Granola
people who might be interested and open to the Church's
vision of creation and worshiping God who created all. That
was the play there, and it seems we've dropped that
evangelical edge and it's all become climate activism that you
(46:50):
could find at the un any day of the week.
I'll give you the last word, Bob.
Speaker 5 (46:55):
Yeah, you know, even the language. I know.
Speaker 3 (46:57):
I'm a little hypersensitive to this because following this right,
even to talk about defending our common.
Speaker 5 (47:04):
Home Earth is not our home.
Speaker 3 (47:07):
I mean, we understand that we want to protect our environment,
we want to reconnect with God's creation, all that, insofar
as it's it's it's wrapped up in what the church
is doing, is fine. But it's always been the teaching
of the Church that we should not get to start
to feel too much at home on Earth because we're
not here forever. That ultimately what the Church wants to
(47:29):
teach us about is our eternal destiny. Doesn't mean that
we neglect, you know, either the environment or one another,
or the poor or whatever it may be. But we've
got to get this in the right perspective. If we
if we're we're clear that ultimately what we're concerned with
is a relationship with God and our.
Speaker 5 (47:46):
Eternal destiny, and some other things will.
Speaker 3 (47:49):
Take their proper places, but if we put those first,
then we're just repeating a kind of a worldliness that
it isn't as obvious as it is in other sects,
but it's a worldliness all the same.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
Well, there are reports that the Pope has a new
encyclical coming out or an apostolic letter. We don't quite
know yet. We'll keep our eyes on that. But next
time we meet, guys, I'm going to carve out a
portion that's all positive, where we just talk about the
mission of the church. Questions people have, We're going to
get into those things. In fact, I'll encourage people, if
(48:24):
you're watching listening, send questions to the community pages on
both places and we'll get to some of those questions. Gents,
Grateful to you all as always, and if you want
more of the Arroyo Grande Prayerful Posse, subscribe at the
Arroyo Grande Show on YouTube or a Royal Grande podcast
wherever you get yours a maf of Robert Royal, Father
Gerald Murray. Until the Posse rides the game, stay the course,
(48:47):
follow the light. I'm Raymond Arroyo. We'll see you next time. Bye, guys.
Arroyo Grande is produced in partnership with DP Studios. And
iHeart Podcasts, and it's available on the iHeart rate, your Apple,
wherever you get your podcasts.
Host
Raymond Arroyo
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