Responding to William Lane Craig on Catholicism Then Brief Discussion of Anti-Reformed Rhetoric

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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Greetings and welcome to The Dividing Line. It was sometime, I believe, in either 1992 or early 1993,

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I was working as a hospital chaplain at a major hospital in the

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Phoenix area. And one of my jobs was to go around to the waiting rooms and to the little chapel that we had at the hospital.

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And one of the jobs was to collect up all the watchtowers that the Jehovah's Witnesses would sneak in and leave in those places.

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I ended up with a stack of watchtowers and awakes over the years. And I was walking through the little chapel, which

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I'll be honest, it was very rarely used, when my eye caught something stuck in the cushions of one of the chairs.

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And I went over and picked it up and this is what I pulled out of that.

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This is a very little book. Devotions in Honor of Our Mother of Perpetual Help. And I just sort of opened it up.

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There's a section of hymns to Mary. They are to Mary. They're not about Mary.

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They're to Mary. But I just happened to open it up and I started reading at this page.

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Back then, I probably did not have to have glasses. O Mother of Perpetual Help, thou art the dispenser of all the goods which

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God grants to us miserable sinners. And for this reason he has made thee so powerful, so rich, and so bountiful that thou mayest help us in our misery.

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Thou art the advocate of the most wretched and abandoned sinners who have recourse to thee. Come then to my aid, dearest Mother, for I recommend myself to thee.

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In thy hands I place my eternal salvation. And to thee do I entrust my soul.

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Count me among thy most devoted servants. Take me under thy protection, and it is enough for me. For if thou protect me, dear

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Mother, I fear nothing. Not from my sins, because thou wilt obtain for me the pardon of them.

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Nor from the devils, because thou art more powerful than all hell together. Nor even from Jesus, my judge himself, because by one prayer from thee he will be appeased.

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But one thing I fear, that in the hour of temptation I may neglect to call on thee, and thus perish miserably.

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Obtain for me then the pardon of my sins, love for Jesus, final perseverance, and the grace always to have recourse to thee,

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O Mother of Perpetual Help. Three Hail Marys. I read those words and I was absolutely amazed.

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I had been dealing with Roman Catholicism, but I had been focused primarily upon issues like Sola Scriptura, the

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Papacy, Justification, the Mass. I hadn't spent as much time in the development of Marian theology.

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It wasn't very long after that, that I traveled to Boston and I was on WEZE with Jerry Matitix.

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And on the Janine Graff show. It's amazing I remember that. I can't remember what

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I did last week, but I can remember that. And I got this little booklet out.

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I had brought it with me. It's a little dog -eared now. And I read that to Jerry Matitix and my assumption was that he would say,

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Oh, James, James, James, that's just piety. That's not an official representation of the church, etc.,

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etc. And he looked across that studio at me through the microphone arms that look very much like these.

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There was a whole field of them. He looked across that studio at me and he said,

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James, I pray for the day when you'll be able to pray that prayer with me. And that's when

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I knew that's not some kind of off -centered weirdness. It is mainstream

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Roman Catholic belief and practice. Now, when we talk about the subject of Roman Catholicism, one of the best ways to make yourself extremely unpopular today is to say anything about the subject.

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To take a stand that we need to evangelize Roman Catholics is to guarantee that you will remain a small ministry for as long as you are in existence.

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We obviously have taken that stand over the years. We've engaged in many debates with Roman Catholics.

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It was only a couple years ago that I finally had done more debates with Muslims than I had done with Roman Catholics, mainly because Roman Catholics just generally won't debate anymore, at least not the ones that are the best known.

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They used debate as a means of establishing a foundation, but now they've got

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EWTN and their television stuff and everything else. Not much interest in doing serious debate any longer.

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But as a result, there is a tremendous amount of confusion amongst

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Christians, and specifically amongst serious Bible -believing Christians that take the

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Bible seriously and that believe that the Christian faith is divinely revealed by God, that we have a sure word from God.

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By people who want to know what the truth is, there's still a tremendous amount of confusion as to how we should relate and how we should encounter

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Roman Catholicism. And I've been saying a lot recently that as persecution comes against all forms of, well, anything other than the totalitarian views of the coming socialist state, we will be pushed closer and closer to one another.

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We will have to be dealing with these issues more and more, and if we do not have a sound foundation within our own personal convictions as to whether the gospel does or does not define the

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Christian faith, we will truly struggle to give a meaningful answer for how we interact with the

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Roman Catholic Church. As a result, I have been warning for a long time, at least a decade, at least a decade, about what's called the mere

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Christianity movement. The mere Christianity movement, which you see with very major names within what is generally called evangelicalism, whatever that means, that mere

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Christianity movement basically says that if you've got the core of the

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Christian faith, Trinity, hence the deity of Christ, though some,

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I think, waffle a little bit of personality of the Holy Spirit, the cross, and the resurrection, that's pretty much it.

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Now, to the mere Christianity folks, you can't ask the question, what is the relationship between all these things?

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You can't ask whether the gospel is Trinitarian. You can't ask what the death of Christ actually accomplishes. You just boil everything down to this teeny tiny little center, and as long as you've got that, then the rest is just fodder for discussion over Starbucks coffee.

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But it's not definitional of the faith. What's most important here is, of course, that the gospel itself becomes something that is on the side.

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Good men disagree, but hey, as long as we're Trinitarians, and as long as we believe in the resurrection, we're good.

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That's it. And so, within the apologetics community, some very, very big names now have come straight out, and they've said, hey, as long as you believe these things, whether you're a

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Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, whatever you are, as long as we've got this teeny tiny core, then you're my brother and sister in Christ.

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So, in other words, big names have taken the stand that the gospel itself is not definitional of the

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Christian faith. You can have absolutely, not just slight differences, but absolutely competing differences that historically were seen as other gospels.

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Ah, don't have to worry about that anymore. The gospel does not define the Christian faith.

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The gospel is an ancillary thing. We can disagree about whether a person is justified by grace alone, through faith alone, or by grace through faith, those alones being very important.

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Big names. It's becoming extremely popular. In fact, to stand against this is to pretty much make sure you're going to be marginalized when it comes to the big conferences.

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Now, of course, there are big conferences on both sides of this, but the big apologetics conferences, the big theology conferences, not so much.

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But the big apologetics conferences, I am simply not invited to the vast majority of them.

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Doesn't matter what my experience is. Doesn't matter where I've debated or who I've debated. It's irrelevant.

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There is a strong commitment amongst many of these folks to maintaining the safe position of paddling around in the middle of the

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Tiber River. And joined with this, then, is a generally strong commitment to a synergistic view of salvation.

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If you're a monergist, you sort of need to keep that to yourself.

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You can say it in some context, but you need to sort of prove to the gatekeepers that you won't bring that up in inappropriate contexts, basically.

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Roman Catholicism. Here is another quote that I read many, many years ago.

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It's from John O 'Brien in his popular work, The Faith of Millions. He wrote the following, When the priest announces the tremendous words of consecration, he reaches up into the heavens, bringing

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Christ down from his throne, and places him upon our altar to be offered up again as the victim for the sins of man.

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It is a power greater than that of saints and angels, greater than that of seraphim and cherubim. Indeed, it is greater even than the power of the

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Virgin Mary. While the Blessed Virgin was the human agency by which Christ became incarnate a single time, the priest brings

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Christ down from heaven and renders him present on our altar as the eternal victim for the sins of man not once but a thousand times.

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The priest speaks in low. Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest's command.

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Of what sublime dignity is the office of the Christian priest, who is thus privileged to act as the ambassador and the vice -gerant of Christ on earth.

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He continues the essential ministry of Christ. He teaches the faithful the authority of Christ. He pardons the penitent sinner with the power of Christ.

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He offers up again the same sacrifice of adoration and atonement which Christ offered on Calvary. No wonder that the name which spiritual writers are especially fond of applying to the priest is that of Alter Christus.

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For the priest is and should be another Christ. Alter Christus is the

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Latin for another Christ. That's what it means. And if you will take the time to go listen to my debate with Mitchell Pacwa on the priesthood.

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I raised the issue of Alter Christus and he affirmed without embarrassment that in his ordination vows he was called

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Alter Christus and that he embraces that as well. A week ago

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Friday, I was driving home and I once in a while,

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I'll be honest with you, I just get tired of all the political stuff on radio.

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And so there is a Roman Catholic station here in the valley,

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EWTN. And so I tuned over to Catholic Answers Live and they had a guy on whose ministry is basically, as I recall, his website's called

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Unashamed Potpourri. And the question was the issue of the sacrifice of the mass.

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Now, according to the Universal Catechism of the Catholic Church, which, you know, today the question is what really represents

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Rome. Does Pope Frankie? Well, yeah, he's the

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Pope. Does Pope Frankie believe everything in here? I don't think he believes everything in here as it was intended by the authors who wrote it.

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There is not a single question in my mind, and I don't think there can be a single question in the mind of any honest person, to be perfectly honest with you, that Francis and Benedict believe very different things on a number of issues.

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You know, you can try as you may. There isn't any question about it.

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In brief, in regards to the mass, the Eucharist is the heart and the summit of the

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Church's life. For in it Christ associates His Church and all her members with her sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving offered once for all on the cross to His Father.

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By this sacrifice He pours out the graces of salvation on His body, which is the Church. By the consecration, the transubstantiation of the bread and wine of the body and blood of Christ is brought about.

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Under the consecrated species of bread and wine, Christ Himself, living and glorious, is present in a true, real, and substantial manner,

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His body and His blood with His soul and His divinity. And reference is made directly to the Council of Trent at that point, for those people who think that the

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Council of Trent has become irrelevant. As sacrifice, the

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Eucharist is also offered in reparation of the sins of the living and the dead and to obtain spiritual and temporal benefits from God.

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Because Christ Himself is present in the sacrament of the altar, He is to be honored with the worship of adoration. To visit the blessed sacrament is a proof of gratitude and expression of love and a duty of adoration toward Christ our

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Lord. In case you're wondering what that's talking about, that's why the Roman Catholic bows and genuflects upon entering into the sanctuary, because God is physically present in the tabernacle or the monstrance because of the miracle of transubstantiation.

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That wafer has become God, has become Jesus, body, soul, blood, and divinity, at the command of the consecrated priest.

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Is this some side issue? Can anyone seriously say, who has seriously considered their theology, that the difference between an

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Evangelical and a Roman Catholic is the same as between, say, an

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Evangelical and a Presbyterian? That's what William Lane Craig says. William Lane Craig, I have said many times before, is a philosopher whose theology has been determined by his philosophical commitments.

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He is not a theologian. He is not an exegete. And this past weekend, as I was traveling to California, I was directed to a question and answer period, it's 12 minutes long, wherein

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William Lane Craig addresses the issue of Roman Catholicism. That's what we're working toward here.

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These issues, priesthood, mass, sacrifice, I just read from the Universal Catechism of the

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Catholic Church, the summit of the life of the Church. This is the central act of worship in the Church, in the

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Roman Church, is the Eucharistic sacrifice. Christ, present, bow before Him, priest, has the ability to turn bread and wine into the body, soul, blood, and divinity of Jesus Christ.

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So much so, and I had heard this before, but this expression of it on the

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Catholic Answers Live program was amazing. When a

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Roman Catholic priest is ordained, a mark is placed upon his soul, an ontological change takes place in a man's soul that cannot be undone.

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Even if he is defrocked, even if he's kicked out of the Church, he continues to be a priest until the day he dies.

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And he continues to have the special, unique, sacramental capacity of working the miracle of transubstantiation.

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Now, we may look at that, and from a biblical perspective, there isn't a shred of evidence that the apostles believed in any such thing as this.

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I mean, the idea of the Roman priesthood is clearly, and Pacwa admitted this, was clearly a development.

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You split the terms bishop and presbyter off from one another, and over time, presbyter develops into priest.

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But there is nothing in the New Testament to give any grounds to this, and in fact, there is a tremendous amount, if the book of Hebrews would actually be read by anyone, there is a tremendous amount of biblical evidence against any such concept as a sacramental priesthood, with priests having their souls marked sacramentally with the power to work the miracle of transubstantiation, which no one can understand without Aristotelian categories of accidents and presence anyways.

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Here is such a clear example of why sola scriptura is so important, and what happens when it's denied.

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But I want you to listen to this call. It was truly fascinating, and I think it'll give you an idea of why

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I'm sharing all this information with you. I am playing everything today at 1 .2,

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again, just to make sure we can get through a little bit faster. Here is the call on Catholic Answers Live.

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Terry's listening in St. Petersburg, Florida, on 102 .1 FM. Terry, what's your question for Joe Heschmeier? I have heard that if a priest leaves the

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Catholic Church, either on his own or is defrocked, he does not lose the ability to change bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus.

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Is that true? It is. You're a priest forever, according to the Order of Melchizedek, which is what it says in the

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Psalms. When you're ordained, you have an actual, what's called an ontological change, a change in your being. A priest remains a priest forever, not just in this life, but even in the afterlife, either in heaven or in hell, even.

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That never changes. And so the ability to consecrate the Eucharist, something that he carries with him, it isn't something that the

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Church dispenses on a case -by -case basis. Okay, so when we say that the Catholic Church is the only one who has the true body and blood, we mean that as an organization where a specific church who has one of our ex -priests, they would have the true body and blood in their church.

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Is that correct? Well, if that priest meant to celebrate the Mass, then yes.

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So a priest who leaves the priesthood and starts his own church, for example, I lived in St. Louis for a while, and there was an excommunicated priest there who started his own church.

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He still has the ability to consecrate the Eucharist. For that matter, even though where you go for the

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Eucharist, the Eastern Orthodox Churches, who aren't in full communion, also have valid sacraments. Because they have a valid priesthood, that means they also have a valid Eucharist.

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Even the Anglicans initially, when they broke away from the Church, had valid orders, and therefore a valid Eucharist.

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That changed because they changed the ordination rite, and they no longer were ordaining priests and started disordaining ministers instead.

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And so the Church declared that currently Anglican orders, their holy orders, are absolutely null and utterly void, was the phrase used.

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So they don't have a valid Eucharist anymore as a body. If you have a particular priest who left and then became an

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Anglican, you might have a more complicated case -by -case basis. All right, thank you very much.

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I just wanted to know if that was true or not. Yep, so yes, this was actually a controversy in the early

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Church, right after Christianity became legal. Actually, in the persecutions around the 300s, because you've got all kinds of priests who might have recanted their faith under threat of persecution and bodily harm.

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I mean, does that guy's baptism and Eucharist still count? I mean, what are you supposed to do with these priests who are bad guys? Yeah, exactly.

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This was the whole Donatist controversy. And if you think about it superficially, it seems like a bad guy shouldn't be able to be a priest.

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Well, in John 6, Jesus points out that he called 12 people, and one of them was Judas. He said, did I not call all 12 of you, and one of you is a devil?

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So if a bad guy can be an apostle, a bad guy can also be a priest. Okay, there was the call.

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And let's start with the last thing. That was not the

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Donatist controversy. The Donatist controversy would be relevant to later Roman Catholic development, this idea.

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But nobody at the time of the Donatist controversy had any concept of a priest's soul being changed so as to work the miracle of transubstantiation, which is a term that wouldn't develop for another 600 years.

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And so as normal, the Roman Catholic reads church history anachronistically, reads it backwards.

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You have this set of filters you put on, and then you look back at church history and, oh, well, we've been around all this time.

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And that's what you have going on there. The Donatist controversy would be relevant in retrospect, but that's not what they were talking about in regards to that specific idea.

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That didn't exist. The idea of ex opera operato versus ex opera operanti was the issue.

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Cyprian, Augustine, I've done numerous lectures on this particular subject, and if you're following the church history series, we'll get to it eventually.

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We're moving slow, but having fun. Anyway, but did you catch the beginning?

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The ease with which this papist, and he, hey,

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I normally don't use that term. That's a good 17th, 18th century Protestant term of negativity, but his website's

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UnashamedPopery, so I would really doubt that he would be bothered by being called a papist.

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Hebrews 7thee, without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the

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Son of God, he remains a priest perpetually. Menai hierous, eista dienekes.

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What does that have to do with the man in your church? Absolutely, positively, nothing.

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Exegetically, historically, we're talking here about Jesus as the sole and only

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Melchizedek priest, and to expand his priesthood out to where you claim to hold his priesthood.

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I know that's what you're claiming. What an incredibly blasphemous thing that is. What an incredibly blasphemous thing that is.

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You have beginning of days. You have end of life. You're not like him. The repetitive sacrifices that you offer, remember what

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I read? Renders Jesus present not once, but a thousand times upon the altar.

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Is that not Romans 10 illustrated to its nth degree? With the repetitive sacrifices which can perfect no one?

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Exactly, exactly. And yet, they don't have to worry about whether Hebrews 7thee is being exegeted properly.

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Because their ultimate source of authority isn't the Bible anyways. It's what Rome says the Bible says.

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That's what happens when you deny sola scriptura. So, here's some illustrations.

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Here's some illustrations of Roman Catholicism. And what it's really about, what it's really focused upon, the centrality of the mass is the centrality of Mary.

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And I have said over and over again that as long as the book of Galatians is in the

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Bible, as long as it's there, we will have to evangelize

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Roman Catholics. Because if the Apostle Paul could identify the gospel of the

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Judaizers as anathema, added one thing, didn't deny that faith was necessary, didn't deny that grace was necessary.

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And Rome, all the time, the mere Christianity guys going, hey, hey, you know,

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Rome says grace is necessary. Rome says that faith is necessary. Yeah, and all the reformers recognized that they did.

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There's nothing new about that. How many years has it been now?

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I've been saying the same thing over and over again. The Reformation was not about the necessity of grace.

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It was about the sufficiency of grace. It was never about the necessity of grace.

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Trent anathematized anyone who would say that you could be saved apart from God's grace.

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No question about it. That's not the issue. Never has been. Never has been. But here's the problem.

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Everybody in the mere Christianity movement is a synergist. Every one of them denies the centrality of monergism to the

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Reformation. Every one of them. There's not a single Calvinist amongst them. You can't be. It's impossible.

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And therefore, on the issue, Luther himself said to Erasmus, you alone of all my opponents have placed your finger upon the heart of the matter, the hinge upon which it all turns.

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And what were they debating? Freedom of the will, bondage of the will. Freedom of the will, bondage of the will.

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Is man fallen and dead in sin? Or is he able to cooperate? He can be a good synergist.

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Therefore, you've got the whole sacramental system, and there's enough life left.

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You may be sick in sin, but there's enough there to be able to work that system and to get that grace.

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As long as you're a synergist. The reality is you stand against the

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Luther of the early 1500s. You stand against Calvin.

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You stand against Farrell. You stand against Zwingli. That was the dividing line.

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The vast majority of people called Protestants have moved on to the other side of that dividing line. There's no question about that.

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There's no question about that. I'm glad that truth is not something that is determined by majority votes.

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But there is a tremendous amount of anti -reformed sentiment amongst the mere

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Christianity folks, which is why you have the divisions that you do. But you see, it's easy for the mere

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Christianity folks to embrace Roman Catholicism, even while saying, well, we have our disagreements.

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But they're not definitional. Because on the key issue, they've already capitulated to Rome anyways.

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They're already synergists. They're already synergists. So it's not overly shocking. It's not overly surprising.

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So what did William Lane Craig have to say? As I mentioned on Twitter, I had to make a decision this morning.

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I've got so much material to get to on the dividing line this week that I had to make a decision. We need to be dealing with the

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Mike Licona stuff, the use of his comments, his fundamental collapse on inerrancy.

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Let's just be honest. That's what it is. It's not like this just happened.

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It's just the evidence of what most of us have known for a long, long time just continues to mount, and in this situation has been utilized by Muslims as a part of their argumentation.

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But I chose to do this first, mainly because no one else was addressing it. I thought someone had addressed it, and then

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I listened to their program today, and they never got around to it, at least not to the depth that we're addressing it.

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Let's put it that way. We will be addressing it, those other issues, on Thursday of this week.

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But I wanted to go here because this is a fundamental issue that very few people are thinking through.

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And so let's listen to what William Lane Craig had to say. Again, just sped up a little bit. You can't speed

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Craig up much, because he does speak fairly quickly. So 1 .2, here we go.

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Why don't you take a stab at this, and sorry to put you in such a hot seat, and guide us through the sometimes troubled waters of the relationship between Protestants and Catholics.

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Well, Kevin, I am a Protestant, and therefore I obviously have some disagreements with Catholic doctrine.

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But having said that, I'm also not a Presbyterian. Now, I immediately stop, because you need to understand the categories that are being laid down by Dr.

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Craig. He just made, from his perspective, the difference between himself and a

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Roman Catholic equal to the difference between himself and a Presbyterian. What does that require?

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Well, that requires that we recognize that the Gospel is not definitional here, and that this is a mere denominational difference.

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This is a fundamental abandonment of the categories of the Reformation. It's really a repudiation of the

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Reformation. He may benefit from the religious freedom that came from the Reformation, but the reasons for the

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Reformation, the focus upon sola scriptura, sola gratia, sola fide.

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I'm glad next year is the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, but we've already had books come out over the past decade arguing the

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Reformation is over, that the Reformation is no longer relevant. And a bunch of us are going to be doing conferences next year, you know,

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G3 in January. These are going to be the central issues we're talking about. There's going to be a bunch of stuff done, even over in Wittenberg and things like that.

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Great, fine, wonderful. My question is, what about 2019? What about 2020? Will those things be lost?

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Will they no longer be relevant? Because I already recognize that for many, many people who fall into the

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William Lane Craig category, the idea of the Gospel being definitional has already been lost.

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They don't understand why some would be a stick in the mud. I've already been attacked today on Twitter for this allegedly attacking...

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You're attacking Dr. Craig. So you cannot criticize

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William Lane Craig. If you disagree with him, you're attacking him. I'm sorry if you can't tell the difference between attack and disagreement.

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It's sort of a necessary skill to reach adulthood, to be able to tell the difference between the two. And I realize most theological conversation these days does not take place on an adult level because it takes place on the internet, which is really a mess.

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Anyway, here's the point. Craig is saying...

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Remember when Christopher Hitchens asked him, why don't you name some false teachers amongst

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Christians? What was the first thing he said? Calvinists. It's very plain, being the synergist that he is, that he's much more comfortable with Rome's synergism than he is with Reformed monergism.

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And I think if he were honest, he would simply say, yeah, I think a full -throated Calvinism is farther from the truth than Roman Catholicism is.

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I think he'd probably be able to say that. That says a lot. I'm not an

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Episcopalian, so I have disagreements with those denominations as well. So the fact that I have some disagreements with Catholics and therefore could not,

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I think, in all good conscience, be a Catholic myself, isn't to say that I regard

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Catholics as somehow sub -Christian or... So if they're not sub -Christian, then they are fully

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Christian. So you can teach all that stuff that I was saying. Purgatory, indulgences, prayers to Mary, Eucharistic sacrifices, the priesthood is an altruist, the pope is the vicar of Christ.

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None of that is definitional to the faith. Adding one thing to the

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Gospel in Galatians was, but all the rest of this stuff isn't. I'm not

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Christian any more than I think Presbyterians and Episcopalians are. So we could talk, if you wanted to, about some of the areas where I myself cannot in good conscience affirm

37:00

Catholic doctrine, but on the other hand, I do want to affirm that my fundamental goal with reasonable faith is to defend what

37:07

C .S. Lewis called mere Christianity, which is the Christianity that is common to all of the great branches of Christendom, whether they be

37:14

Catholic, Protestant, or Orthodox, or Coptic. That's my burden. It's what unites us rather than what divides us.

37:21

Now, very, very important enunciation of the mere Christianity principle. There it is. I'm not misrepresenting

37:27

Dr. Craig. I'm not misrepresenting him. I think that's a fundamental capitulation.

37:32

I think that is sub -Christian. That's not biblical. I would love to challenge

37:38

Dr. Craig to discuss this with me from the text of the book of Galatians, from the text of the book of Romans.

37:46

He won't do that. Everybody knows the willingness exists on our side. The unwillingness exists on his side.

37:54

That has been the case for years. When people ask me after the debate with Shabir Ali at Biola University, what other debates would you like to do?

38:03

How about William Lane Craig? How about we do Molinism? How about we do apologetic methodology? How about we do this?

38:11

And there is no question that we have demonstrated the ability to address these things in a meaningful fashion.

38:19

There is no question about that. I saw, you know folks, the attacks coming our direction these days from so many different angles.

38:31

I've never seen anything like it. But so many from those who call themselves

38:36

Christians. You know, it's one thing to deal with the Hebrew Israelites or Islam or something like that.

38:43

But man, I'll tell you. The level of nastiness and just vile, vituperative anger that you can just find just in Facebook, let alone

38:58

Twitter or any place else on the web. Truly amazing. And you know, so there's this guy.

39:06

You know, someone put up a meme this morning. A member of my church contacted me.

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Do you know this guy? And I looked at the stuff he had put up and basically it was saying that when

39:17

I debate Christians I'm just this mean, terrible, horrible, nasty person. But when I debate heretics, debate people like Muslims and stuff like that, then

39:26

I'm just all fist bump, nice, so on and so forth. And this guy was saying that I'm just this arrogant, vile, mean -spirited person.

39:35

And he was saying, and believe me, I know. I know things the rest of you don't know. Don't you just love those folks on the internet who have never met you, wouldn't know you from Adam, but they know things you don't know.

39:47

You know, behind the keyboard it's amazing how the level of honesty goes...

39:55

because you somehow feel that there is this anonymity. But just the attacks, absolutely incredible what has been going on just over the past number of months out there.

40:08

And only going to increase it by addressing a subject like this, but we have to address a subject like this.

40:18

That enunciation of mere Christianity, that is not sufficient to define the

40:25

Christian faith. That's not how the apostles defined the Christian faith.

40:31

That's not how they functioned. And so, if your calling is to stand firm for biblical truth, you have to stand firm for all of it.

40:41

You can't give up on the part where, well, you know, it's uncomfortable. You know, my support base would be really upset with me if I took a real strong stance on this

40:53

Roman Catholic stuff. Well, yeah, that happens.

40:59

But the question is why do you do what you do? What's the motivation? That really is the question.

41:08

You're already going to draw criticism from those who say, well, you need to take a harder, tougher line on Catholicism.

41:15

How about just taking a biblical line? How about just taking a biblical line? I started off reading

41:24

Roman Catholic sources. I'm not your standard

41:31

Jack Chick, Alberto Rivera anti -Catholic. I don't buy into that.

41:41

Look, I've said many, many times, there are people who are opposed to Rome simply because they are bigots.

41:51

It's their tradition. It's what they've been taught. They don't seek to accurately represent

41:58

Rome. I'm sitting here reading from the Universal Catholic Catechism. You say, well, that's not an official book.

42:03

I wrote an entire book on Mary and drew all my sources from Roman Catholic.

42:11

This is nothing. I don't have the book in here right now, but you think this is relevant?

42:18

All you've got to do, go pick up The Glories of Mary by Alphonsus Liguri. Go buy the book.

42:26

Alphonsus Liguri, Doctor of the Roman Church. That is one of the highest honors that can be bestowed upon anyone.

42:34

And his book has gone through 800 editions. This is representative of mainline papal teaching.

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No question about it. So, I attempt to be accurate in my representations.

42:55

I ain't quoting Jack Chick. I ain't quoting Alberto Rivera. And I'm not going to. There's no need to. The issues are really straightforward.

43:03

In fact, going for the stuff they go for dilutes any meaningful presentation in speaking to an honest -hearted, well -read

43:13

Roman Catholic. We have to be just as accurate here as in dealing with anybody else.

43:21

And, please note, who's actually playing the entirety of William Lane Craig's comments?

43:30

How can you confuse this with an attack? Yes, I'm saying he's wrong. Can't you tell the difference between an attack and a fair demonstration of error?

43:40

If you can't tell the difference, then you are a millennial. And you think with your emotions rather than with your mind.

43:46

That's just all there is to it. It distorts the gospel, and so on. So you can't win in this. I think, however, we can win.

43:53

You can't win in this? Yes, you could. Just be accurate and biblical.

43:59

That's how you win in this. By maybe just discussing some of the places where Protestants and Catholics disagree.

44:05

Protestants are just Catholics who think that the Catholic Church needs some reformation, perhaps. Well, and Catholics now, since Vatican II, regard

44:13

Protestants as separated brethren. Now, that's a nice phrase. What does it mean?

44:20

How does that interact with the historic teaching of the Roman Catholic Church regarding necessity of submission to papal authority?

44:31

How does that interact with the teaching that unless you have access to the sacrament, the

44:39

Eucharistic sacrament, you cannot have life in yourself because you cannot partake of Christ's body and blood?

44:47

These are questions that you can say, well, they've just sort of been dismissed, but so why should we accept any claim of authority over time?

44:59

Why should we accept the idea, well, this is the 2 ,000 -year -old church, when the church has taught X in the past and now is teaching, well, sort of X, but not really

45:07

X now. These are questions that are really in the forefront now, especially with Pope Francis, because it is so obvious that his worldview and his interpretive structure is so different than what gave rise to the dogmatic teachings of the church in the past.

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Do not condemn Protestants. They think that Protestants are Christian brothers and sisters, but separated from the church, the true church that Christ has established.

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Right, so our churches are not true churches. Let's just make sure that that's very clearly ut unum sent.

45:41

What year was that? I forget which year it was. Was that John Paul II? I think it was John Paul II. Made that very clear.

45:48

Ours are not true churches. We certainly are living in a new era, I think, in which Catholic -Protestant relations are much friendlier than they have been in the past.

45:57

I see a lot more Bible reading among my Catholic friends who have often complained that they weren't encouraged to read the

46:02

Bible. That is true. However, if you listen carefully to EWTN, they will frequently reemphasize the fact that the

46:14

Bible is a part of sacred tradition, and as only a part, it requires the rest of that sacred tradition, which, of course, is vouchsafed to the

46:27

Roman church, and specifically only knowable, truly, to the Bishop of Rome, to be valid.

46:34

It must be interpreted by the Roman Catholic Church. Very, very important.

46:41

And I don't know what that is, but I've seen a lot of fruit there from our Catholic friends getting into the

46:46

Word and digging in themselves. Yes, and that can only be a very positive development, I think, as they become familiar with the

46:53

Bible and submit themselves to what the Bible has to teach. I think that we can all rejoice in that.

46:59

What would keep you, or prevent you, from being a Catholic? Well, one of the difficulties that I have would be with the doctrine of justification as it was enunciated at the

47:09

Council of Trent. Now, maybe it's just simply the Craigian way of speaking.

47:17

But, what you will not find the Reformers doing is putting the doctrine of justification into the scholastic language of,

47:30

I have a problem. You know, this, you know, it's such a diminishment of the centrality of the

47:42

Gospel. But, I'm glad he's talking about justification by faith, but we've already established earlier in the program today that that arises out of an entire complex of issues in Roman Catholic theology.

48:01

You can't have justification by grace alone through faith alone in the sacramental, synergistic semi -Pelagianism of Rome.

48:13

And that derives from the reality, and this is where, folks, this is where the rubber meets the road.

48:20

I've got a bunch of people who come up to me and say, you know, I'm not real big on your Calvinism, but I agree with everything else you say.

48:26

And I've never understood that, because if you listen carefully to what I'm saying, my

48:32

Calvinism is central to everything I do because it's definitional of the Gospel. And, I realized long, long ago when

48:42

I was writing my very first book, came out in 1990, Fatal Flaw, that, which

48:50

I just heard a voice say from somewhere, I have no idea, must have been up in the ceiling or something like that, is available on Amazon, on the

48:57

Amazon Kindle. I realized, and, you know, again, today, people hear this, and I get accused of being mean -spirited and angry and unloving.

49:13

It's all because you emote rather than think. Just turn the emotions off and listen to what I'm saying. Only Reformed Christians can consistently respond to Rome's doctrine of salvation and especially the

49:27

Eucharistic sacrifice. Why? Well, it makes perfect sense.

49:33

To give a consistent response to Rome means you have to be consistent with what the Bible says.

49:39

As a Calvinist, I believe that there has to be consistency in the Gospel and therefore, a perfect, finished sacrifice on Jesus' part goes consistently with the

49:51

Father's decree of election, which goes consistently with the application of the Holy Spirit in bringing about the salvation of God's elect people.

50:00

And so, when you have a universal atonement, which is central to the universal Catholic Catechism, absolutely central, and it's just as central to the vast majority of Baptists, not all, thankfully, not all historically, but today, they don't realize they enroll hand -in -hand with their universal atonement concept, not realizing what it means, not realizing

50:30

I guess I am saying the death of Christ doesn't really save, it just makes men savable and haven't really thought through these issues, then

50:41

I have said for 26 years now that the synergistic

50:50

Arminian has no consistent way of responding to Rome's teaching on the doctrine of the

50:57

Eucharistic sacrifice, and that's what stands behind the whole concept of their doctrine of justification, the sacramental system, the state of grace, growth in justification, merit, mortal sin, temporal sin, purgatory, indulgences, they're all related to one another.

51:20

Unfortunately, the vast majority of non -Roman Catholics who have never been Roman Catholics don't see how these things are related.

51:25

They seem like differing, strange doctrines, but they're all related to one another.

51:32

And to give a central, consistent response to Rome's false gospel requires you to be thoroughly

51:45

Biblical. And if you're not thoroughly Biblical, then you're not going to be able to give a consistent response.

51:52

And that's what the mere Christianity movement is all about. Which is one of the most important Catholic councils for enunciating

51:59

Catholic doctrine. In the Council of Trent, it has a description of how justification takes place, and it makes it very clear that our response to God's grace is just that.

52:14

That God takes the initiative, God's grace leads out. We then respond to God's grace, and He infuses into us

52:21

His justifying grace. And what this grace does is give us the power to perform good works, which in turn merit eternal life.

52:32

So in other words, he is correct at this point. In Roman Catholic theology, when you are baptized, when an infant is baptized, grace is infused into them, and they are made pleasing in God's sight.

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The reason they go to heaven is because they are intrinsically pleasing to God. There has been a fundamental change in what and who they are.

52:59

When you commit a mortal sin, you lose that grace of justification, and now you go to hell if you die because you're no longer pleasing to God.

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Now, I'll be honest with you, that's the historical Roman Catholic teaching. Whether Francis believes that or not,

53:13

I am extremely doubtful that sitting around the campfire with Pope Frankie, after a couple cool ones, that he would honestly say that a person who commits a mortal sin would end up going to hell.

53:36

I just, in fact, to be honest with you, especially in Europe, but maybe even worldwide,

53:43

I really wonder if even the majority of the magisterium of the church would affirm that any longer.

53:52

Can't prove it. It's not like they're taking phone calls from me for a poll.

53:58

But that's the historic doctrine of the church. That's the historic teaching of the church. That's certainly what the Council of Trent was saying, and that's what the authors of the documents, the

54:06

Council of Trent, meant, historically. Honestly, we're in a situation here very similar to what we face in the

54:13

United States. We know what the Constitution meant from what its authors wrote.

54:22

Look what's happened now. That's irrelevant. Authorial intent? Who cares? A living document.

54:29

Come to the canon's decrees, the Council of Trent, authorial intent? Yeah, you can determine what it is.

54:35

They wrote commentaries and catechisms, and if someone really wants to know what they meant back then, you can determine that.

54:44

But, hey, the church is a living church. The church is a living organism, so its meanings can change and evolve.

54:56

Now, it's that last bit that really gives me pause.

55:01

All the rest of it, I think, is great, but I don't think of the good works we do as being meritorious of eternal life.

55:10

That seems to me to teach salvation by works. If you say that God gives me the power to do meritorious works that then earn salvation, that seems to me to undercut the doctrine of salvation by grace alone.

55:23

Now, what our Catholic friends will very quickly say is, ah, but these works are only done by God's grace.

55:30

Obviously, he's had some conversations. And here's the problem. You see, grace if you're sort of losing track, slap yourself a few times and focus in here, folks.

55:45

What did I say just a few minutes ago? Rich just slapped himself. That's good.

55:52

The Reformation was not about the necessity of grace, but the sufficiency of grace.

56:00

William Lane Craig's synergism puts him in a situation where his view of grace is no longer the

56:08

Reformation's view of grace, and I would argue the Bible's view of grace, but instead shares more in common with Rome's view of grace than with the powerful grace that actually saves.

56:20

If your grace tries to save but fails, that's Rome, and that's Craig. That's not the

56:27

Biblical grace. Prevenient grace, all that kind of stuff, not Biblical. It's not there.

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If you believe that God saves by His grace, that's what sola gratia means, then now you see what the real issue is here.

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Because if you believe in the sufficiency of sola gratia, then you have an answer to Rome.

56:56

But he doesn't have a consistent answer to Rome because he doesn't believe in sola gratia in the sense of grace being sufficient.

57:05

That grace makes salvation possible, but it doesn't save. There's a synergism involved.

57:11

See where the dividing line is? It's clear. It's stark. It is all related. It all makes sense.

57:17

We may not talk about much anymore, but here's where the issues are. Here's where the dividing line is.

57:25

And as I said, the vast majority of people who call themselves Protestants are no longer Protestants when it comes to the issue of grace, the power of grace, and the purpose of grace.

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Because if grace is just peanut butter grace, God just sort of slaps it all over the place, if that's your perspective.

57:45

Okay. But you see, from the Reformed perspective, grace has a purpose because God has a purpose.

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It's all consistent. God is working out His purpose, and His grace is

57:59

His power to redeem those unworthy of grace, worthy of condemnation, sinners, in whom

58:09

He is going to reproduce His Son in them, conform them to His image, all to His honor and glory.

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That grace becomes powerful, purposeful, focused. If you don't have a grace like that, and as a synergist, you can't, by definition, because that kind of grace denies what?

58:31

The autonomy of man. That grace has to be free, and it has to be powerful. It has to be free, and it has to be powerful.

58:40

There's where the difference lies. There's... That's why, for William Lane Craig, this is a matter of taste.

58:46

Well, I can't in good conscience. This seems to be...this might do this. Huge difference between what you read at the time of the

58:53

Reformation, huh? There's a reason for it. It is God's grace that gives you the power and the drive to do these meritorious works, and so in one sense it wants to say, no, no, these works are only grace.

59:07

It is ultimately grace and not works. But nevertheless, the bottom line, it seems to me, still remains that whether through the grace of God or not,

59:16

I perform works which then merit eternal life, and I don't think as Biblical Christians that we want to say that.

59:24

There is a difference between saying, and I don't think as Biblical Christians that we want to say that, and saying as Biblical Christians we cannot say that, and that therefore creates a fundamental division that must be maintained if the truth of the gospel is going to remain with us.

59:47

And that's what Galatians 2 was about. That's when people came into the church trying to add one little thing, one little meritorious action, one little thing that would control the grace of God.

01:00:02

What did Paul say? We did not put up with them for even an hour. Why? So that the truth of the gospel might abide, remain with you.

01:00:15

Not so that we can have differences of opinions. The issue was the truth of the gospel.

01:00:22

If you do not possess the truth of the gospel, you do not possess salvation.

01:00:29

That was Paul's point. I would like to be able to tell you how

01:00:35

Dr. Craig or people who think like him respond to Galatians 2. I don't know because they won't debate this issue.

01:00:44

They won't dialogue on this issue. They won't go there. I'd like to know. It certainly doesn't come up here.

01:00:51

When you start off by saying, eh, it's the Presbyterian, Catholic, Episcopalian, eh, you know, you're not going to be going to Galatians 2 and actually dealing with the real issue.

01:00:59

But this is the real issue. This is the real subject. That is one of the aspects of Catholic doctrine that gives me real pause.

01:01:07

Bill, I cannot count the number of times when I've gotten in discussions with Catholic friends who have said to me, Kevin, just what, by the way, what is it that distinguishes you and me?

01:01:17

What do you guys believe? They want to know what the differences are. Where do you think in opportunities like that, where should we go?

01:01:24

First to justification, is that? Yes, I think that's the bottom line, really, Kevin. I mean, other things such as...

01:01:30

No, no, wait a minute. I'm sorry. This is, it is definitional. But bottom line?

01:01:37

I would really think that Craig as a philosopher would at least recognize that the epistemological claims of Rome are absolutely central here.

01:01:48

But maybe he doesn't realize how fundamentally different Reformed epistemology is to Rome's because he is horrifically compromised in the exact same area.

01:02:03

Maybe he just doesn't see that. But anyone who's had extensive dialogue with believing

01:02:10

Roman Catholics knows that even if you start with justification, where is it going to end up at?

01:02:17

What's eventually going to come up by the end of that debate? Sola Scriptura. Because if you dare go to any of these texts, and Craig would have to go to certain texts to substantiate what he said here, the question then becomes, well, who has the authority to interpret that?

01:02:35

And so, at the time of the Reformation, you had the formal principle and the material principle of the

01:02:45

Reformation. The material principle was justification by faith, sola fide. That's what was preached, that's what gave deliverance, that's what gave peace, that was the material, the functional, this is what we're preaching.

01:02:57

But there was a formal principle of the Reformation that gave the basis, the necessary basis for the material principle to be able to be preached with power, and that was sola scriptura.

01:03:10

Rome's denial of sola scriptura is not just an accident of history, it is absolutely definitional of what

01:03:15

Rome is. Rome could never teach what she teaches as dogma if she was subject to Scripture.

01:03:23

But she's not. That's why she can teach what she teaches about Mary. That's why this can happen, is because of a fundamental rejection and a leveling of sources of authority so that you have a diminishment of Scripture's authority, and then, instead of Scripture being theanustas, now it's just a part of the larger category of tradition.

01:03:48

And once that happens, foundations are washed away. Church government, or the sacraments, or other sorts of doctrines are important, but really at the heart of it is going to be justification, because justification by grace alone through faith,

01:04:07

I think is the central Protestant insight, and I think it's a biblical insight, and therefore that's something

01:04:14

I think that we need to insist upon. Now, what I find in talking to Catholic friends is that their understanding of the doctrine of justification at Trent is really the same as mine.

01:04:26

They don't think that they earn salvation. Now, here is where, once again, the mere

01:04:32

Christianity concept and synergism, vitally important to understanding why

01:04:37

William Lane Craig comes down where he comes down. If you're a synergist, if you have prevenient grace, if you have grace that doesn't save, if you have the death of Christ making man savable, then that explains this, because when

01:04:56

I talk with Roman Catholics, I don't come to this conclusion. I see a huge and a vast difference between us, because I recognize that apart from God saving grace,

01:05:08

I could do nothing. It's not just prevenient grace. It's not just a grace that helps me do something.

01:05:14

It's God's actual accomplishment. I hold to justification by faith.

01:05:23

I cling to it as my only and sole hope before a holy God, because I recognize the truth of who

01:05:31

I am as a synergist who does not believe that I am dead in sins, but that I can cooperate with this prevenient grace to bring about its accomplishment.

01:05:43

That's what gives rise to this. That's why there are two fundamental responses here, and it all goes back to theology.

01:05:50

It all goes back to what you believe, and that's why we have criticized the

01:05:57

William Lane Craig, Mike Lycona, mere Christianity apologetic methodology, because again, it goes back to theology.

01:06:08

Your theology determines your apologetics, not the other way around. Well, it should.

01:06:15

Your theology should determine your apologetics. Far too often, it is the other way around, and that creates disaster.

01:06:22

...think that they perform meritorious works that are in salvation. The way they interpret it is that God, by His grace, gives me the power to live a good life, and therefore

01:06:32

I go to heaven, and it's all due to God's grace. It's holy by grace alone. So the line of distinction becomes very blurred, or very fine.

01:06:43

Very blurred? Very fine? With a Roman Catholic who's going to Mass four times a week to get grace, but yet not being perfected by it?

01:06:56

Theology matters. And I think that in many cases, practicing

01:07:01

Catholics may not be much different than Protestants. Do you see what I mean? There may be these council, conciliar statements on paper, but the way certain born -again

01:07:13

Catholics really live, and what they really believe, may be much closer to what

01:07:18

Protestants think than what these conciliar statements literally say. Sounds like he's saying that they're

01:07:26

Catholic in name, but not actually in having a consistency between their practice and their theology.

01:07:34

Now, over and over again, people say, well, you're saying no Roman Catholic can be saved.

01:07:40

Well, I know lots of Roman Catholics who have been saved. But, there are people who say, well, do you think there are any who are who die as Roman Catholics who can be saved?

01:07:50

And my answer has always been the same. If they're saved, it's in spite of the church, not because of the church. It's because they believe in the Gospel, not in the

01:07:57

Roman Gospel. That Gospel does not save. There's no question about that. Again, if you can explain

01:08:03

Galatians away, if you can get out of the canon or something, then you might have somewhere to go.

01:08:09

But if you can't, there's something you can do about it. But, what we're hearing here is, you know, hey, from our perspective, as synergists, we've got a lot in common here.

01:08:23

You know, the divisions aren't quite as big as we thought they were. Well, the reason for what's being said here is the conciliar statements,

01:08:31

Trent, they knew what the issues were. You're ignoring what those issues are. And are there

01:08:37

Roman Catholics who ignore what those issues are? Sure. Sure. But that makes them less consistent, less well -read

01:08:46

Catholics, just as it makes you a less consistent Protestant to be compromising on these key issues as well.

01:08:54

Protestants are often drawn to the beauty, reverence, and the high church style of the

01:09:01

Catholic Church. And they think, well, maybe we're a little too loosey -goosey in ours, and they're drawn to that.

01:09:07

Sure. Not even an argument here. I mean, if all you've experienced are laser light shows and fog machines and skinny jeans, yeah, yeah, you're going to be looking for something different.

01:09:26

And smells and bells can become very attractive to folks. Very, very attractive to folks. But like I've said so many times before, when

01:09:37

I talk to people who have professed, not nominal evangelicals who are just by tradition, just what

01:09:49

I grew up with, people who claimed to have had a true conviction of the gospel, that they believed in justification.

01:09:55

Christ is my only righteousness. And they start going for the smells and bells. I have, and most of you know by name, some of the individuals that I've talked to, looked at them and said, how can you tell me that you are going to trade union with Christ, His perfect righteousness, your being in Him, which is the only place where there is forgiveness and sanctification, eternal life, the perfection of the mediator in the presence of the

01:10:29

Father, you're going to trade that for the treadmill of penances and sacraments. Look me in the eye and tell me why you're going to do that.

01:10:38

They can't. They can't. They just can't do it. Because they never really believed it.

01:10:46

They may have professed it, may have even preached it loudly. Can't do it. We still need to look at doctrine.

01:10:53

I think so, Kevin. That's the bottom line. I mean, I am tremendously attracted to this great tradition, this great historic

01:11:01

Catholic tradition, and to the great thinkers that have graced that church.

01:11:06

And to the beauty of the worship service, of the ceremonies. Oh my.

01:11:13

Again, I understand it. I get it. I get it. Remember a few years ago?

01:11:21

I forget what year it was. I've only been to Italy once, and it was an interesting trip. But I went to the

01:11:28

Vatican and I created a huge firestorm when

01:11:36

I talked about how gaudy it seemed to me. It did. Gold and marble and the church that Christ founded didn't have a misapplied text from Matthew 16 in gold around the top of the building.

01:11:55

It was a complete contradiction to the humble servant

01:12:03

Messiah that we see in Scripture. And I am not for a second attracted to the smells and bells.

01:12:16

Why? Because I know what it means. I know what's going on up there at the altar, and I know what they think is going on, and that is a denial of the finished work of Jesus Christ.

01:12:34

That man up there thinks he's making Jesus present upon that altar. And everyone going up to receive of this will not be perfected by it.

01:12:43

That is a denial of what the Bible teaches about the death of Christ. So I can't rejoice in that.

01:12:52

I can't find that attractive. And I don't understand why anybody would.

01:12:59

And it concerns me when people say, oh, it's just so beautiful. If you can separate the external from the meaning, okay, silly me,

01:13:10

I can't do that. The buildings and so forth. I do find all of that very attractive, and so I can understand people who would want to be

01:13:19

Catholic because of those things. But ultimately, it does get down to doctrine. And if you can't in good conscience subscribe to the doctrine, then

01:13:27

I think you shouldn't be a Catholic. And similarly, I couldn't be a Presbyterian.

01:13:33

Similarly, similarly, so my disagreement is thrown, similarly, same categories with Presbyterian.

01:13:43

So this brings papacy, Mary, indulgences, purgatory,

01:13:49

Mass, priesthoods, all this stuff at same level. Same level.

01:13:56

Really? That's amazing. ...or an Episcopalian because I just don't believe the doctrines that these denominations teach.

01:14:03

And so even though I may be very attracted to them in other ways, I couldn't be a member of that denomination.

01:14:11

And so ultimately I think if we're not going to be religious hypocrites, we have to ask ourselves, can

01:14:16

I in good conscience believe the things that in this case the Catholic Church stands for?

01:14:22

And I find myself over and over again saying, well, I can't really affirm that in good conscience. Dr. Craig, the

01:14:28

Virgin Mary is a real sticking point as well between Catholics and Protestants. Probably a lot of misunderstanding there as to her status.

01:14:35

There was a move a while back to really elevate Mary almost to the equality with Christ, co -redemptrix.

01:14:41

I don't think that ever got off the ground. Never got off the ground? How about it has been the teaching of the

01:14:48

Popes for 120 years? You see, something can be a teaching.

01:14:54

It can be a doctrine without being a dogma. And the last I had seen a number of years ago was over 6 million petitions.

01:15:02

6 million signatures on petitions had been submitted to the Vatican to define that dogma. So that's not just not getting off the ground.

01:15:11

That's just was not defined as a dogma. So you can believe it along with all the

01:15:18

Popes who have taught it and the language is used in Vatican II documents but you don't have to.

01:15:27

It's not de fide. It's not definitional of the faith, but you can certainly believe it as blasphemous and absurd as it is along with the other

01:15:36

Marian dogmas that are just as blasphemous about the assumption. That, however, is de fide.

01:15:42

Though in Western Roman Catholicism I would sort of doubt even a majority of people believe it which is, you know, one of your major issues that we won't get into right now.

01:15:57

In the Catholic Church, but there was a move there that was very distressing to Protestants as well who see

01:16:02

Catholics as worshipping Mary, a human being and Catholics resist that vigorously say we do not worship

01:16:09

Mary. She is honored but she is not the subject of worship.

01:16:15

It would be nice if he would provide a criticism here of the fallacious

01:16:21

Roman Catholic apologetic without just repeating it. Yes, Rome denies worshipping

01:16:28

Mary. The means by which she does has been fallacious since the days of the

01:16:34

Reformation and has only gotten more so with the exaltation of Mary that has taken place.

01:16:41

You've got to realize two of the major Marian dogmas were defined after the

01:16:47

Reformation and so the Reformers could only respond to what

01:16:53

Rome had defined up to that point but two of those dogmas have been defined since then 1854 and 1950 so bodily assumption issues immaculate conception issues were present in Roman Catholic piety at that time but had not yet been dogmatically defined.

01:17:18

In the same way, but not in the same way, but the concept of Latria and Dulia and Hyper Dulia was present in the day of the

01:17:28

Reformation and you can read Calvin who shreds that argumentation in the

01:17:38

Institutes and in his other works when he was writing his antidote to the Council of Trent.

01:17:44

Shreds it because it's totally shreddable it is not defensible listen to the debate we did with Patrick Madrid on that subject and here you have one of these situations where again the doctrine seems to be right but the practice in many cases does seem to verge on idolatry the doctrine is not even close to right.

01:18:08

What are you talking about? Bodily assumption immaculate conception as dogma's definition of the faith

01:18:18

I'm sure Dr. Craig has probably never listened to Jerry Matitix who of course is not an

01:18:28

Orthodox Roman Catholic anymore well from his perspective he's one of the only Orthodox Roman Catholics there are but I wonder what he would say if someone like Jerry Matitix stood in his presence because Jerry said this when he was still an

01:18:46

Orthodox Roman Catholic what would he say to Jerry Matitix when he said that you have the exact same epistemological warrant to believe in the bodily assumption of Mary as you have for the resurrection of Jesus Christ what would

01:19:08

William Lane Craig say to that? because we know the minimal facts argument this is absolutely essential to his apologetic but from Rome's perspective the reason you believe in the resurrection and the reason you believe in the bodily assumption is the same reason the church says so the church says so so don't tell me they've got the theology right but the practice wrong they've got them both wrong big time and again if Paul anathematizes the

01:19:44

Judaizers in Galatia for the addition of one thing to the gospel and Rome adds both the ematic conception and the bodily assumption as de fide and anathematizes anyone who rejects these things how do you not see the connection that really

01:20:08

I think is an important question it's distressing for a protestant to go into a cathedral or a church and see the altar to Mary ablaze with a forest of candles and another altar where Jesus is pictured has hardly any candles in front of it where prayers are offered it does seem in practice many times a kind of mariolatry does occur but its foundation is in the teachings of the

01:20:39

Pope and in the dogmas of the church that's not some aberration I've got to hope that Dr.

01:20:50

Craig has never read the Glories of Mary because if he were to read the Glories of Mary he would not speak like this he could not speak like this honestly what

01:21:02

Rome does what you see in the practice flows directly from the teaching of the church there is no inconsistency none in Mexico there's that kind of an image of a very rigorous vigorous

01:21:15

Mary exalted arms outstretched very much alive but then the crucifix has the crucified beaten savior and so Jesus is not seen as vigorous and alive as Mary just in the statuary and so on right and for the average peasant so often it will be

01:21:33

Mary that he approaches in prayer and seeks help and succor from instead of Christ and she really does in again practice

01:21:41

I think and in theology and in the teaching of the

01:21:49

Popes who have repeated these very things what was John Paul II's motto

01:21:56

Dr. Craig do you know you should know if you're going to be addressing these things in a public format as an expert what was his personal motto totus tuus totally yours right that's only part of it totus tuus sumaria to Mary totally yours that was his motto he taught that she was advocate mediatrix he taught these things so don't tell me that that peasant seems to understand the official teachings of Rome better than you do maybe you should stop hanging out with the westernized clerics and maybe read some

01:22:42

Roman Catholic literature preempt the role of Christ so this would be kind of the mirror image of what

01:22:49

I was saying before where sometimes practicing Catholics attitude toward justification is better than the doctrine in this case

01:22:55

I think the doctrine is better than the practice many times the doctrine of the church is very clear that it doesn't worship

01:23:00

Mary or think of her as on a par with Jesus total ignorance

01:23:06

I'm sorry but here I just it's not in paper print anymore but it's still available electronically

01:23:18

Mary another redeemer it's not long well documented straight from Roman Catholic sources and I would recommend it to Dr.

01:23:28

Craig's reading but in popular Catholic piety sometimes it seems that that line is crossed in conclusion today

01:23:36

Dr. Craig if you were to sit down have coffee with a person of the Catholic faith what would be your approach with them what would you want to know find out

01:23:43

I think I'd want to know whether or not that person has a vital relationship with Christ or whether or not how about whether that vital relationship is mediated through the sacraments of the church and through the perpetuatory sacrifice of the mass there are

01:24:01

Roman Catholics watching this going he knows what the issues are he knows what the issues are yeah

01:24:08

I do vast majority of other folks are just flitting around on the surface but yeah that's the issue isn't it sure is sure is that person has simply been raised in the church and this is a kind of pro forma religion that hasn't really resulted in a regenerate heart and that may be difficult to discern but I do think that that's the bottom line

01:24:32

Catholics that I've talked to that are clearly born again believers will readily say the

01:24:39

Catholic church needs to be evangelized and they will admit this right from the beginning that the church is in need of evangelization and so I think by the way yes they will but what they mean by evangelization and what we mean by evangelization are not the same thing if you spend an hour listening to EWTN you will hear that term evangelization and there's the problem you're redefining it in your protestant mind to mean something completely different than what it is understood in the

01:25:14

Roman Catholic mind and two ships passing the night here definitions same words different definitions it's the most important thing to try to discern is whether this person we're speaking with is someone who really knows

01:25:25

Christ and is a regenerate Christian or not if not then we want to try to help that person to make that commitment and move the knowledge from the head to the heart well there you go of course

01:25:39

I would ask even at that very end and would you direct them back to their Roman Catholic church where they've been at but never heard the gospel that's part of the question vitally important issues folks

01:25:55

I hope you've listened and I know there could be all sorts of people oh

01:26:02

White's attacking Craig again he's just jealous and blah blah blah key issues theology matters and here it is illustrated to the nth degree to the nth degree it truly truly does alright now we've gone jumbo length

01:26:29

I wanted to go there first because it is so vitally important and I want this program to be useful to people and so I did not want to make them have to skip into the program someplace to get to that discussion of Roman Catholicism but I do need to spend a few minutes we won't go the full mega size but 10 -15 minutes to talk about anti -Calvinist derangement syndrome that's a somewhat funny but sadly often just far too accurate acronym to describe the outrageous behavior that opposition to the reformed faith can sometimes produce in men and women unfortunately often on the web of course but in real life as well on Friday of last week

01:27:38

I flew to California ostensibly to engage in a debate with Pastor Steve Tassi of the

01:27:51

Calvary Chapel Missions Church in Norwalk on Thursday of last week

01:27:59

I did a program which many of you have seen where I played Pastor Tassi's comments from a video that he himself had uploaded four or five years ago addressing me and titling it

01:28:13

The Freedom to Blame the Potter and I made it very clear in my having recorded that that my desire here was to lay aside all these canards because they were canards so that we could actually have a debate that was focused upon the text of Romans chapter 9 that wouldn't have to go into all this other stuff unfortunately what

01:28:43

Pastor Tassi chose to do was to take that program accuse me of having started the debate a day early

01:28:53

I'm not sure why he didn't realize that would mean that he started the debate four years early but anyway um and go after all of what was said in that video rather than debating

01:29:09

Romans chapter 9 he just abandoned the debate there was no debate

01:29:15

I'm not going to list it as one of my debates I apologized over and over again to the audience it was beyond my control

01:29:25

I was the first one to speak and as everyone will be able to see when the video is posted

01:29:32

I will have to admit this would be the kind of thing that could all of a sudden experience a catastrophic hard drive failure um but I hope not uh once it's posted you'll be able to see that I gave a 20 minute opening presentation on Romans chapter 9 and it was pretty much almost identical to what

01:29:55

I said a year ago in Dallas on Romans chapter 9 because when you have 20 minutes both times to exegete the same text of scripture

01:30:05

I hope you don't say much different because the meaning of the text hasn't changed in one year

01:30:14

Pastor Tassi got up and within I would say 60 seconds was disqualified from the debate it was done it was over any meaningful debate judge anything like that pulled the plug that would have been it well we didn't have any judges and so we had to endure a 20 minute harangue about how terrible

01:30:35

I am and people don't want to debate me because I'm so mean I don't remember how many times the term

01:30:41

James White was used in those first 20 minutes but a dozen at least and obviously then once we got to the cross examination it was extremely challenging because I was trying to it was a difficult situation the place was packed out we had to turn at least 100 people away the air conditioning wasn't keeping up it was swelteringly hot people had traveled from a long distance to be there and so I felt a very strong necessity upon me to try to make something positive come out of this

01:31:24

I attempted in the cross examination to to do this but and there's some cell phone video clips floating around that still don't give you the full extent of this

01:31:38

Pastor Tassi would not respond to my questions not that he just stood there quietly, it's just his responses were irrational irrelevant, disconnected no matter how hard I tried

01:31:50

I could not get the man to interact with me in a meaningful fashion and so in the first cross examination

01:31:58

I don't remember how early I just gave up but then there was a break and in the second cross examination he had said something about John chapter 6 so I thought maybe there's a possibility that I could go to the words of Jesus maybe this could bring some calm and we could reason because no reasoning had taken place at this point and if you'll listen to the second cross examination

01:32:32

I tried every possible way to get

01:32:38

Pastor Tassi to explain what John 644 meant he kept going back to Calvinism and predeterminism and I said let's pretend

01:32:54

I'm not even on planet earth if someone came up to you after a

01:33:01

Sunday morning service with their Bible open and said Pastor what does this text say are you telling me you would go into a discussion of Calvinism James White and predeterminism how would you answer the question he could not tell us what

01:33:21

John 644 meant without going into an attack upon Calvinism couldn't do it so I gave up then he asked me what it was saying so I gave a nice quick sermon on John 6 what else could you do and in my closing statement

01:33:41

I opened up Romans chapter 8 I realized God has a purpose in everything and it was great to meet a lot of folks it was really neat a young lady came up to me and had me sign the

01:33:53

Roman Catholic controversy and gave me her testimony of salvation while reading the book she had been delivered from Roman Catholicism that's always exciting and a lot of people saying the ministry has had tremendous meaning to me and impact a lot of people said it kept me sane during seminary

01:34:10

I love to hear that so it was great to meet folks and I stood outside for a long time afterwards greeting people and talking to people and we destroyed many many selfies lots of pixels wasted with pictures and stuff like that I understand

01:34:29

God had his purposes but what was truly troubling I've contemplated this encounter and I have a feeling that what was really going on is that Pastor Tassi's church is dependent upon the

01:34:47

Calvary Chapel movement and from his perspective I am just the worst nastiest person in the world to the

01:34:54

Calvary Chapel movement why? well because so many people have left Calvary Chapel over the issue of quote unquote

01:35:02

Calvinism well why? I've said this and I will say it again until the

01:35:08

Calvary Chapel movement stops trying to bury the discussion and starts dealing with it in a meaningful fashion and not giving the kinds of answers that Chuck Smith and Brian Broderson and George Bryson have been giving on the subject

01:35:25

Calvary Chapel will continue to produce a large number of Calvinists why? because Calvary Chapel teaches people to believe the

01:35:32

Bible Calvary Chapel actually teaches people to do a meaningful job of exegesis and interpretation and so they contain within themselves the seeds of their own destruction they're going to have to become liberal in their view of the

01:35:51

Bible to maintain their their perspectives it's actually a compliment to say that Calvary Chapel teaches people to exegete the scriptures and when they do they discover that they teach the sovereignty of God and salvation because using the same form of hermeneutics by which they defend the resurrection

01:36:10

John 6 says what John 6 says, Ephesians 1 says what Ephesians 1 says, Romans 9 says what

01:36:15

Romans 9 says and as long as they just shh shh shh, can't talk about that they will continue producing

01:36:22

Calvinists and I can guarantee you there were people there as Calvary Chapel folks who will end up in a reformed church why?

01:36:34

because of exactly what I've been saying but it seems that in certain people's minds, instead of hearing what

01:36:40

I'm saying and realizing the truth of that it's you are terrible and you are mean and you are attacking and blah blah blah instead of dealing with the issue as long as they keep focusing upon personal stuff that's what's going to happen

01:36:56

I have pondered whether what

01:37:01

Pastor Tassi did was his way of demonstrating his love for the

01:37:09

Calvary Chapel leadership in taking a shot at that terrible horrible meanie we have to take phone calls about stuff that he says and we know that there have been people who were coming up in the

01:37:22

Calvary Chapel movement they were future leaders and now they're off in some reformed Baptist church someplace or a Presbyterian church someplace and it's all

01:37:31

James White's fault and I'm going to let him have it, I don't know all

01:37:36

I know is a debate didn't take place and I apologize for that but I hope that for those that came out at least what

01:37:45

I tried to do was of some benefit along the same lines of anti -Calvinist derangement syndrome another video came out from Jacob Prosh and in this he says

01:38:06

I'm an embarrassment he's addressing the Muslims and apologizing for me being such an embarrassment and things like that Jacob Prosh pretty much has the take no prisoners, black flag scorched earth approach to everything and since we dared to respond to him, which he interprets as an attack since we dared to point out that making assertions like Calvin got his doctrines from the

01:38:39

Muslims, that that requires a certain level of reasoning and historical argumentation that Jacob Prosh has never even attempted to offer he's decided that alright, even the witness to Muslims can be sacrificed for his attack upon me as an individual and he attacks many other people,

01:39:04

I've seen all sorts of videos where he attacks John MacArthur and all the rest of that stuff he's a very divisive individual extremely divisive, people accuse me of being divisive, oh you were just talking about William Lane Craig and I did so without engaging in ad hominem against William Lane Craig and if any of you think that I did you clearly don't know what ad hominem is that's the problem

01:39:29

Jacob Prosh knows what it is and is expert at it ok but in this video he seems to have an absolute obsession with his knowledge of languages evidently this is extremely important to him, now

01:39:51

I've never seen a vitae I don't know where he's taught he started and it's interesting, there is a progression in those who have

01:40:04

ACDS where they make an argument at one point and then two videos later that argument has grown massively without ever having been substantiated by factual information so he doesn't like that Columbia Evangelical does not have

01:40:22

ATS accreditation now I guess Fuller doesn't have ATS accreditation either and Grand Canyon doesn't have

01:40:29

ATS now all my degrees are unaccredited every single one of them it's just amazing how things grow over time it's funny and my having taught both

01:40:44

Greek and Hebrew at in fact, let me think a second now

01:40:49

I think about it I have never taught the biblical languages at an unaccredited institution

01:40:55

I've only taught them at accredited institutions maybe Jacob Prosh has done as much teaching as I have in that area

01:41:04

I don't have any evidence of it he evidently was extremely offended that I pointed out that every time

01:41:10

I talk with Muslims around the world they say Inshallah, if God wills his pronunciation

01:41:16

I had never heard a Muslim use and so I pointed that out well, I guess

01:41:22

I shouldn't have done that but I want to just play one clip because what is the one thing that we have pointed out repeatedly over and over and over again that he has ignored and that is the thing we focused upon in Radio Free Geneva, which is not the name of my ministry haven't heard any correction to that either, but that's sort of how that goes um what we played in that Radio Free Geneva that I did from Colorado was the issue of what 1

01:42:01

Timothy chapter 2 is about and the fact that any meaningful fair, accurate exegesis of that text is going to see the flow of the text and going to see that Paul is talking about types and kinds of people because he talks about kings and those in authority you cannot avoid if you ask the question what category does kings and those in authority fall into it is kind and type you can't avoid that and then sometime last week

01:42:40

I think I pointed out because evidently he has followers that listen to the dividing line

01:42:47

I pointed out that 1 Timothy 2 3 begins with the demonstrative pronoun

01:42:52

Tutah Hutashate Tutah is the lexical form, Hutashate Tutah the masculine feminine and neuter forms and this is good and acceptable before God our

01:43:08

Savior and I pointed out that this clearly connects the subject of verses 1 and 2 that is prayer for those who are in leadership with verses 4 and following not only grammatically but conceptually as well this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our

01:43:38

Savior who desires all men to be saved to come to the knowledge of the truth so the all men of verse 4 by any fair, rational means of exegesis is connected with what came in verses 1 and 2 which is what

01:43:59

I said from the start that also means then that we have to go on into verses 5 and 6 and the issue of Jesus as mediator between God and man what mediation means, what's an intercessor and who is

01:44:12

Jesus interceding for that part Mr. Prosh has completely ignored thus far, unless there's a video up that didn't get posted on his

01:44:24

YouTube site or something, I don't know so there's the background and I think that every person in this audience, whether you had ever heard of Hudas Haotei Tutah before or not understands that when it says this is good and acceptable that the this has to have an antecedent, it has to be referring to something, it doesn't just pop into the conversation out of nothing and that this is referring to the prayers for all men right?

01:45:00

okay, so that's pretty simple and you see I can explain that to folks without having to go deeply into without having to claim to have degrees and this that or the other thing and I can actually explain it in English to folks that's a good thing to be able to do evidently

01:45:22

Mr. Prosh struggles in that area so here's you got it ready?

01:45:28

here's Jacob Prosh allegedly talking to Muslims by the way um

01:45:35

I really wonder what the Muslims are going to do with this, I mean I know what certain people there are certain, you know,

01:45:42

Yahya Snow Muslim by choice but let's just be honest what he says in this video if the

01:45:54

Muslims are consistent, they are going to come after him with pitchforks um um they really are and if they're honest with themselves they're going to go oh wow,

01:46:08

White's arguments are really different than this guy's and White listens to us and this guy's not if they're honest some of them aren't some aren't they do what they do to create confusion, not promote truth but anyway, here's let's take a look at it ...

01:46:56

and they demean the Shia scholars of Iran they demean them as being ignorant and unlearned this is not a problem peculiar to Islam, neither is it an issue peculiar to Christianity yes,

01:47:14

James... ok, everybody in channel is saying there's no sound you fixed it? lost the first part oh, ok well, that's his fault, not my fault my bad you know what's going to happen

01:47:31

I'm going to be accused of editing hiding it's not being very skilled in the

01:47:44

Arabic language ok, let's back up here just a second this is not a problem peculiar to Islam, neither is it an issue peculiar to Christianity yes,

01:47:55

James White revealed himself as not being very skilled in the Arabic language

01:48:01

I sort of I'm wondering what he's referring to I I I would imagine in Mr.

01:48:14

Prosh's mind he actually thinks he has substantiated this but I honestly can't tell you what it was what's he referring to?

01:48:25

I got the distinct impression that he thinks you learned Arabic at Columbia he has no idea how you came into Islam as a study he's totally clueless he's clearly never seen any of my debates read any of the books or how you learned

01:48:47

Arabic with an Arabic tutor I don't know he's completely ignorant

01:48:53

I don't know, it just sounded to me like he was claiming that he has documented some major faux pas on my part

01:49:01

I mean, the worst I think I could find is, I do the ghayn,

01:49:07

I really struggle to be able to pronounce that I'm not sure any Scotsman can we can say loch, but I'm not sure we can say the other one and the other thing is, in Whatever Christian News about the

01:49:24

Quran, and I've said this before by the way it wasn't forced out of me by Jacob Rosch I slipped over to a

01:49:34

Hebrew plural once when talking about oh,

01:49:39

I said Mushrikim instead of Mushrikun somewhere in in Whatever Christian News about the

01:49:47

Quran but I just don't know what he's referring to but like I said, that's what made me go was there a video that was posted, then taken down posted someplace else

01:49:59

I don't know about I looked at where all these other ones have been posted and I couldn't find anything

01:50:04

Or, here's another consideration, has he been watching Muslim by Choice's videos? Well, someone had obviously referred him to one

01:50:11

Learning things he thinks he knows are true That's possible, that's possible too

01:50:18

I'm a master of it but I can certainly speak to you

01:50:25

My wife of course knows Arabic much better than I do Be that as it may she knows classical

01:50:31

Quranic Arabic Be that as it may It was obvious that James White did not really know

01:50:40

Arabic People are also picking up on the fact, some of them

01:50:46

Muslim, that he doesn't appear to know Greek very well either Yesterday we explained this

01:50:52

He tried to make much capital out of the pronoun Tawtoo in verse 3 So, Tawtoo Tawtoo is how he pronounces

01:51:03

Tutaw So, this is where Yesterday, what was yesterday?

01:51:08

I can't find it I tried to look at days posted I couldn't find anything

01:51:14

I would love because if there's been a commentary someplace where he actually has finally tried to do serious interaction with the text of 1

01:51:23

Timothy 2 I just, I haven't found it but here's a demonstration of my

01:51:30

Now remember, when he first responded, remember what he said? He had high compliments for the

01:51:36

King James on the controversy What's in the King James on the controversy? Isn't there a fair amount of Greek in there?

01:51:42

Ah, there's a lot of Greek in there Hmm, things change Chapter 2

01:51:52

That's a pronoun Now the reason it's a pronoun is because it's referring to the previous two verses that are adaptive case

01:52:03

That's the only reason they're adaptive case in Greek. It refers back to either a person, a noun a thing, and the action they perform or the action performed by a person.

01:52:16

It's never extraneous to a noun It's simply a grammatical requirement but a pronoun does not establish a continuity of theme or of context or of topic

01:52:32

Now, did you hear what he just said? He said that tuta refers back to verses 1 and 2 but that does not establish continuity of topic or theme

01:52:51

So, it does refer, this is good Prayers for kinds of men is good because this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our

01:53:00

Savior who desires all men to be saved The natural way of interpretation in English Greek or anything else connects the two together

01:53:09

He refused to see it admits the tuta is referring to verses 1 and 2 but that doesn't mean the all men of verse 4, that's different In Greek, as we explained on our previous broadcast that is always done by the use of an adverb usually which we translate as either therefore or since So, I guess is

01:53:41

I'm just got to figure out this interesting pronunciation methodology that we have here

01:53:47

Therefore it means what's going to be stated now is predicated upon or derived from what is stated in the verse or verses preceding it

01:53:58

That's done adverbially It's not done with a pronoun Except here, where it does refer to verses 1 and 2

01:54:05

I mean Is he really trying to argue that tuta never functions this way?

01:54:10

If that's what he's trying to argue time to absolutely bury him in every single introductory, intermediate, and advanced

01:54:20

Greek grammar ever published by man If that's what he's trying to say but I'll be perfectly honest with you he seems to really be struggling to express himself at all

01:54:29

It's really hard to figure out what this is about, which is why if anyone else has seen this other video thing that's being referred to here which

01:54:40

I cannot see anywhere please let me know because I really would hate to miss it

01:54:46

He does not seem to know Greek very well and he certainly doesn't know Arabic very well

01:54:52

I don't know about his Hebrew though I have my doubts he knows Hebrew very well Nonetheless Brother Eris When you have

01:55:04

Well, there you go That was as close as we got to any type of meaningful discussion of the text or anything

01:55:10

The rest of it is just how embarrassing I am and all the rest of this stuff Then he starts talking about Islam and like I said

01:55:17

I I would just invite those

01:55:22

Muslims that are promoting him to listen to what he has to say and it'll be interesting

01:55:29

Anyway, there you go Just wanted to briefly address those issues get them out of the way

01:55:37

So here's the plan for Thursday A lot more really important stuff

01:55:46

What happened is a couple weeks ago Dr. Mike Licona appeared on Jonathan McClatchy's webinar which

01:55:54

I appeared on about two weeks ago I think talking about New Testament papyri which

01:56:01

I guess didn't cause any major shockwaves because it's just sort of not the kind of topic that's going to cause shockwaves and said some things that Muslims like Yahya Snow are using to once again attempt to create division and some of the things he said do need to be addressed specifically and now people have already addressed most of these things

01:56:36

People beat me to the punch but that's fine I want to respond on a little more deeper level like we just did with William Lane Craig because there's actually a connection here

01:56:49

There really is a connection here Licona's discussion of Mark being confused

01:56:57

He says, well I just sort of think Mark was confused in regards to where the feeding of the 5000 took place

01:57:05

Then he likewise repeated a summary statement as if he agreed with it regarding the birth narratives of Jesus.

01:57:15

Both of which reveal a fundamentally degraded view of scriptural authority, certainly of any concept of inerrancy and but they go back to theological epistemological, philosophical apologetic differences between the

01:57:35

William Lane Craig Mike Licona apologetic methodology and a reformed epistemology and apologetic methodology

01:57:45

They really do and so we'll address those and then there was oh, then

01:57:53

Yaya Snow demonstrated further his ability to do Yaya Snow jobs attempted to create a contrast between myself and Dan Wallace and Mike Licona not recognizing that Licona was talking about Old Testament not

01:58:10

New Testament, but we'll clarify all of that. Not that it'll make any difference to Yaya Snow because even when corrected, he'll still repeat that in the future and he'll leave that stuff up because there's no concern about accuracy, truthfulness, anything with the snow jobs that we have regularly posted.

01:58:28

So that's what we're going to be doing on Thursday. I don't know how long that's going to take because this turned out to be a full, mega -sized dividing line in of itself and that's just,

01:58:39

I guess the way that it goes. Someone in the channel just said, he's still talking? Yes.

01:58:45

Well, we're wrapping up. Thank you very, very much. Again, please listen carefully to what we said today.

01:58:50

Please do not fall into the trap of thinking this was just, oh, you're just jealous of William Lane Craig.

01:58:56

It has nothing to do with personalities at all. Please listen to what was really said.