TRANSCRIPT
(NOTE: This transcription has been automatically generated through an AI program. Consequently, this transcript may not match everything you hear in the podcast episode, and it may contain errors such as spelling, grammar, word choice, etc., due to the limitations of current AI technology.)
Hey everyone, welcome to the new season of Midnight Carmelite. I just want to first start out by saying I am happy the new year has come through. Sorry for missing. I was going to come back in the fall, but what turned out happening was I ended up being very sick. Um I couldn’t I was homebound. I’m okay. I don’t really want to go into the details because I mean it’s personal, but that being said, I’m alive. And now I’m back and I’m happy to be back and I’m ready to dive in more. And I’ve been thinking a lot about where I want the podcast to go and what I want to do with it. And one of the things that I think for me at least that I think is important is that I want to make sure that the podcast focuses on mystical theology, you know, philosophy, the spiritual life, scripture, what it says in the description.
And we’re going to kind of be returning to that. But also what I’m going to start adding in is some of my scholarship because what’s happened is I have started writing quite a bit and I’ve been published and I want to start sharing these scholarly insights and use the podcast as kind of a place where you know people will see you say like they’ll say to me you know oh Andrew you you published can I read it and they can read it but you know a lot of scholarly articles are written for fellow scholars right or for specialists subject right you know for examp If you read a a medical journal, it’s going to be for, you know, doctors.
So doctors, it’ll use certain terminology and those types of things. So what I want to do is I want to focus on explaining the article so that when you you know maybe you come across it or maybe you don’t, it’ll just be able to give you the insights. So given that I want to start by talking about a few things. So first I want to talk about something that’s been on my mind. while I was sick and you know I’ve thought a lot about this and you know I wasn’t sure if I wanted to talk about it but I think I’m going to because I think it’s time to say something and what that mainly is dealing with what I’m going to call really what I could be saying is same reality and I think we’ve entered this period where the reality of what it means to be Catholic is different for different people and that doesn’t mean I just want to be clear what that doesn’t mean is that there are not distinct calls from God for unique persons such that those calls may manifest different types of lives.
In other words, I’m not advocating that we all live identical. That would be absolutely absurd. But on the other hand, I also feel like we need to recognize that what we confess, I guess to use that word, or acknowledge or what we uh encounter, I don’t know. if it’s exactly the same for everyone anymore. Now, that doesn’t mean that the church is not Catholic. I don’t you know, I not trying to cause scandal here. I’m not trying to panic people. What I’m I’m examining it from a scholarly perspective. So, this if that’s not to your taste, you might want to turn this podcast off right now because that’s where this podcast is going. We’re engaging things from because I’m a scholar. I’m engaging things from a scholarly perspective. I’m engaging these issues and thinking about them. And if you know, I’ve encountered people where if I bring this up in conversation, they start to get their hackles up saying that, you know, oh, Andrew, why are you asking these questions? Like, you know, you shouldn’t say these things. It confuses people. No, no, no. Look, I think that if we don’t have discussions and dialogue about what we believe and kind of and not only for our own sake, in the sense of like trying to make sense of things, trying to make sense of who Jesus Christ was and what he calls us to affects our lives. I also think it puts us in a funny spot where we’re called to make and discern how God’s calling us in our life, but we can’t talk about it with anyone because we can’t talk about who God is in our life. So, in other words, if you have God, if you don’t have God as the measure and you don’t understand that reality on some level, obviously God’s a mystery.
I’m not saying we understand God completely, but you understand God on some level and who God is to you. How are you going to make choices in your life and discern like St. Ignatius talks about the good spirits from the bad? in their prompings, right? Because remember St. Ignatius, if it depends on where you are. So, for example, if you’re in mortal sin, the bad spirit’s going to push you to, you know, give you nice things, trying to keep you in sin, whereas the good spirit’s going to bite you, right? It’s going to be like, “Hey, stop this.” And if you’re trying to purify yourself, then the good spirit’s going to, you know, remove obstacles and do all these other things. The exact opposite of in the state of mortal sin. And the bad spirit’s going to bite you and put up obstacles and discourage you, you know, and we can look at this in our own lives, and that’s a whole separate podcast is dealing with discernment. But what I’m trying to say is that we need to be clear that what we declare or what we acknowledge, what we encounter, I like that word encounter, that is Christ. So in other words, if we’re claiming as Catholics and Christians, you know, I’m not trying to exclude my non-atholic listeners, by the way. I’m just speaking from the perspective that I am. I just want to be clear about that. As Catholics, if if you’re going to say Oh, well, we’re the universal church and and we, you know, contain the fullness of truth. Okay, that that’s great. I agree with that. But what I’m wondering is what exactly does that mean to you? Now, I’m not saying that in a subjective sense. So, I’m not saying that this some sort of like proportionalism or, you know, will really be some sort of knowledge proportionalism where the truth is relative, right? So, in other words, where you’d say, for example, well, my truth says X and your truth says Y. So, therefore, we’re in the state of conflict about truths. So therefore, you have to respect my truth. I have to respect your truth. But if the truths conflict or contradict one another, which they would because if you don’t have objective truth, then you can’t come to unity.
But anyway, so you have this this conflict and then basically what happens is it’s I mean frankly it’s reduces to you know a kind of niche or a kind of hobbsian leviathan where it’s like well I have this sort of power over for you. Therefore, I’m going to exert it in order to make things happen. I guess my point is the question becomes and the question I want to address and kind of just go through and I’m speaking from the heart here. I decided also by the way that I’m just going to speak from the heart and you know obviously I’ll prepare some things and I’ll have some things on my mind but I really want to just speak from the heart. I want to just kind of have it you know keeping it real as as the saying goes. How how are we going to deal with this? So John the cross talks about how if you have any any attachment, spiritual or otherwise, that’s going to keep you from God. How does that make sense with what we’re talking about here? How does this attachment make sense with God? Well, here’s why it makes sense. If your truth is not in align with the truth, then even though you may like you’re basically superseding God’s call, you know, in other words, you’re you’re saying, “I know what’s best for me. Back off.” Well, actually, God knows what’s best for you. And if God knows what’s best for you and we don’t agree about the reality of God, the reality of the church, then we’re going to be talking about two fundamentally different things because we’re starting from and that sounds scholastic, but different principles. We’re and what that means is just a fancy thing for starting point or source. So, so other words, if if we’re not starting from the same point, then we’re not at the same point ever. We’re we’re we’re going off in different directions. So, I think that’s really important here. Now, I just want to be clear. Am I saying that the church isn’t? No, I’m not saying the church isn’t the church. I affirm everything the church believes.
What I’m saying is on a scholarly perspective. What exactly do we acknowledge about Jesus Christ? And how does that affect our lives? And how does his now here’s the key word presence? Remember this word presence. How does his presence affect us and affect others? And what is that presence for everyone? And how does that presence affect them? So, we’re going to back it up again. What is the presence of Jesus Christ and how does that affect them? So, why are you bringing presence to this? Well, I think the first thing I’d say is that presence is important because we always talk about God’s presence. God’s presence in the Eucharist, you know, God’s presence in our souls, God’s presence in his providence, God’s presence, you know, even in in individual things. So, like in our marriage if you’re married or, you know, you’re single state or or a religious state you know God’s presence in you know amongst your brothers or sisters in your order or a priest among your brother priests like all these things you have God’s presence manifesting in various ways obviously you know through secondary causes or through primary causes primary causes being you know mystical theology so you’re praying and you have a consolation right something like that but the problem is is the interpretation of those consolations in relation to what the church really teaches So, in other words, now we’re saying, “All right, well, if someone gets these constellations, let’s say, or they think they’re getting consolations would be a better way of putting it. What do we what are we talking about here?”
Anyway, I’ve posed a lot of questions. I’m not trying to, you know, disturb anyone, but I really want to dive into this mystical theology, this idea of God’s presence, how we understand Christ mystically. I just want to be clear about that. I’m not making an ecclesiological argument. What I’m talking about is mystical theology. how how we have that, you know, that experience of God. How how do we what is that for us? And if we have an experience of God, who is God to us? That’s the question I’m I’m working to address. So, anyway, that’s where we are. I know it’s more questions than answers, but I think I thought it stimulating, and I will see you next time.
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