May 31, 2016 Show with Mark Michael Zima on “Mother Teresa: A Saint to be Revered or A False Teacher to be Exposed? A Legendary Figure to be ‘Canonized’ by Rome Under Scrutiny”

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Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister

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George Norcross in downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

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Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs 27, verse 17 tells us iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Now here's our host, Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity who are living on the planet earth listening via live streaming.

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This is Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron, wishing you all a happy Tuesday. On this last day of May 2016, and you just heard it live, folks, a fruit fly flew into my mouth just as I was making the announcement.

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Excuse me, that's a first in the history of Iron Sharpens Iron. Well, today we have a very controversial program.

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In fact, it's the first of two programs that they will conclude tomorrow on the issue of Mother Teresa of Calcutta.

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Is she a saint to be revered or a false teacher to be exposed, a legendary figure to be canonized by Rome under scrutiny?

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Many of you may have heard that Mother Teresa, it has been announced that Mother Teresa will be canonized by Rome officially as a saint this fall, this

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September, I believe. And I think that it is very appropriate since she is a beloved figure, not only by Roman Catholics, but she is a beloved figure highly revered by mainline

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Protestants and even many evangelical Protestants, evangelicals, many of whom even claim to be conservative and Bible believing.

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Many people across the Christian spectrum highly revere Mother Teresa. And it is very appropriate that since the news is no doubt going to be saturated with stories on her, especially this fall regarding her canonization,

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I think it's very appropriate that we put her under the microscope and we are going to be doing that over the next two days.

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We're going to be starting off by hearing a program that originally aired on February 18th and February 19th, 2008.

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It was an interview I had with a Roman Catholic author, Mark Michael Zima. He is a traditionalist

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Catholic in good standing with the Church of Rome. And he wrote a book called

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Mother Teresa, The Case for the Cause. Is Mother Teresa of Calcutta a saint? This is a very highly controversial book that gained him a lot of opposition from his fellow

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Roman Catholics because Mark Michael Zima stood in staunch opposition to the canonization of Mother Teresa and wrote a lengthy letter to Pope Benedict, who was the

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Pope of Rome at the time, back in 2008 when he wrote the letter.

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So I thought it was very appropriate since Mark Michael Zima had done a lot of research into the life, writings, and teachings of Mother Teresa to interview him.

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So it would not be viewed by Catholics and ecumenists as being nothing more than hate speech on my part.

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That is bigotry and hatred have nothing to do with this. I have members of my own family who are

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Roman Catholic that I love dearly. I have very close friends who are Roman Catholic whom I love dearly, and even some of them,

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I prefer their company over some professing evangelical Christians that I know. So this has nothing to do with hatred at all.

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And I hope that you can put that smoke screen out of your mind as you listen to this two -day examination of Mother Teresa.

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Tomorrow we are going to have Dr. Tony Costa, who is a former

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Roman Catholic and is now an evangelical Christian and Calvinist and professor of apologetics at Toronto Baptist Seminary.

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He is going to be analyzing the interview that I'm playing today that I had with Mark Michael Zima in 2008.

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So without any further ado, I'm going to begin the program. You're going to hear an interesting program because it's a blast from the past.

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This is, as I said, from 2008, and that's back in the day when we were broadcasting from WNYG and WGBB in Babylon, Long Island, New York, and we were taking live phone calls during those years broadcasting from Long Island rather than just taking emails from our listeners.

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So you're going to hear that the phone lines were certainly jammed during these broadcasts.

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In fact, what you're going to be hearing is two broadcasts, since my program is only an hour long back in those days, you're going to be hearing two broadcasts back -to -back that have been put in a form where you can hear them all in one day.

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So I hope that you are blessed. I hope that you get on the phone and call your family, friends, and loved ones or get behind your computer keypad and start texting and emailing and however else you communicate with your family, friends, and loved ones, especially if they're

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Roman Catholic, and tell them to listen in at ironsharpensironradio .com

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to today's broadcast. But without further ado, here is my interview from February 18, 2008 with Mark Michael Zima.

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Good afternoon, Long Island, New York, Connecticut, and those listening internationally over the internet.

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This is Chris Zarnes, and your host of Iron Sharpens Iron. Catholics, mainline

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Protestants, and even many evangelicals uphold Mother Teresa of Calcutta as one of the greatest heroes of Christendom.

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Ten years after her death, she still holds the moral imagination of the world. Those who question

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Mother Teresa's sanctity are treated as misguided fools who would better their time imitating her virtues than probing for her peccadilloes.

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The Christian world will praise Mother Teresa of feeding the hungry and giving drink to the thirsty, but what faithful Christian will praise her for saying,

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I've always said we should help a Hindu become a better Hindu, a Muslim become a better Muslim, a

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Catholic become a better Catholic? Well, today we are going to be interviewing Mark Michael Zima, a traditionalist

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Catholic in good standing who is going to address the very controversial question, is Mother Teresa a saint?

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A Catholic's critical examination of a modern -day Catholic hero. Mark Michael Zima is the author of the newly published book,

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Mother Teresa, the Case for the Cause. When I pick up the phone during the station break and call your family, friends, and loved ones, perhaps if they have a high esteem and admiration for Mother Teresa and have them tune into the program via live streaming.

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We'll be right back after these messages with Mark Michael Zima and your questions don't go away. I'm James White of Alpha and Omega Ministries.

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That's nasbible .com. Welcome back. This is Chris Sarnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron.

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If you've just tuned us in, our guest today is Mark Michael Zima, a former religious brother of two communities, the

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Brothers of Our Lady of Reconciliation and the Slaves of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

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He has devoted much of his life to theological and philosophical studies as well as the evangelism of Catholicism.

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He has taught sacred scripture as well as rite of Christian initiation for adults and has been a

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Catholic youth director at a parish in Oregon. He has been associated with many different Catholic organizations, including the

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St. Augustine Institute of Catholic Studies, the St. Anthony of Padua chapter of Una Voce, and the

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Fatima Crusader. And I want to offer this caveat to our listeners. This interview is not to be mistaken as an expression of modern ecumenism between this

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Reformed Baptist host and my Roman Catholic guest on this broadcast. I merely believe that a critical examination of Mother Teresa from a scholarly

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Catholic perspective is not only something that may never be heard or seen elsewhere in the media, but is a valuable topic for discussion in a day and age where the desire to preserve theological purity has been replaced with sentimentalism in both modern

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Catholicism and evangelicalism. In addition to that, when considering the life of a much -beloved Catholic figure who is a hero to countless millions worldwide spanning religious boundaries,

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I believe if a fundamentalist or evangelical Protestant were to provide the critique today, many would not seriously evaluate the contents of this broadcast due to a misconception that religious bigotry was the underlying motive of this discussion.

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Well, I want to welcome to this program for the very first time Mark Michael Zima. Good afternoon.

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Thank you, Chris, for having me on. Yes, I'd like you to, first of all, before we even get into the discussion about Mother Teresa, give a further explanation of your theological perspective, just so our listeners will have a clear idea of the one who is making this evaluation about a

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Catholic hero. Okay. I'm a traditional Catholic, very, you know, would be considered a mainstream traditional

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Catholic, not someone who's estranged from the papacy.

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I believe in the papacy and in the altar of that office that is the 16th.

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I am someone who believes that all the documents of the church that are consistent with the order of authority, that highest authority being first, that all documents have to be in that line, and so I'm not someone who would believe that just because the

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Pope makes a statement one day that, ergo, every Catholic has to believe it if it's not in line with that tradition.

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Well, tell us why you wrote this very controversial book. It couldn't have been in an effort to make friends.

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Yeah, it was merely, as I have in the dedication of the book, it was to defend our

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Lord and the faith and to honor the saints of history. It wasn't a contest of how to win most of the church or even different fractions of the church.

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To me, it was merely just to be faithful to that tradition, and I saw that I had to do that in light of the faith and that the parameters of the faith in this day defend my position on that.

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I'm not doing anything which would be considered outside of the fidelity that any

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Catholic could offer, even if you weren't a traditional Catholic, because my defense of my position is very much rooted in, to start off with, the conciliar and post -conciliar documents.

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I found this part, this section of your book, to be something helpful to quote to our listeners today.

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Okay. You say here in your book, if this book will be of any profit to you, you must separate the

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Mother Teresa of shadow from the Mother Teresa of substance. The popular image formed in head and heart of Mother Teresa must be put aside for the objective, non -emotional reading of the evidence.

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Your challenge is to ask yourself the following questions. If anyone else who was not

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Mother Teresa said and did these things, what would you think? How would you respond?

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Did Mother Teresa follow the faith once delivered to the saints? By her words and deeds, did

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Mother Teresa follow in the footsteps of the saints who preceded her? Did Mother Teresa believe and consistently teach that only in truth can man find salvation?

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Did Mother Teresa believe and consistently teach that no one knows God except anyone to whom

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Jesus wishes to reveal him? Did Mother Teresa teach another gospel? And did Mother Teresa believe in a new

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God? And we're going to be covering as many of those questions as we can during this discussion.

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Is there a big move in the Catholic Church to have Mother Teresa canonized as a saint?

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Oh, absolutely. Actually, the five -year waiting rule to begin her cause was actually waived by John Paul II.

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So that's six years after she had died, she was already declared a blessed by the church.

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So yeah, in the words of the Prefect of the Congregation of Causes, he said, well, he said the tide of public opinion just kind of rolled into our office.

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And that's one of the reasons why in past decades and centuries there was actually a longer waiting period, as much as 100 years, before they'd even start a cause.

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You consider the person whether or not they should be canonized because they know how much of an effect public opinion can have on people that they're so close to the tree they just can't see the forest.

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Well, why don't we begin, before we even get into some of the criticisms that you have, why don't we begin by giving some background of Mother Teresa as much as you can on how and, or should

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I say why and when she became a nun and some of the works of mercy and the honorable things that she was and is very well known for.

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Well, she was, go ahead. Is that your question? Yes. Okay.

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She was born in 1910. And what is, she's Albanian descent and what is today

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Yugoslavia. She, at 18, which is very traditional to do, that she entered the convent in 1928.

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She entered for the Sisters of Loreto and was with them for, oh, about 20 years before she started

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Missionaries of Charity. Her desire to become a sister was just, it was a natural flow.

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It was something that she had desired from her youth. And the history of her starting

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Missionaries of Charity is kind of, it's debated. There are two different traditions on that, whether or not that she was on a, in 1946 she had a vision on a train that God was calling her to help the poorest of the poor.

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Or there's another tradition that she was assisting a man on a train station and helping him pass.

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And that was where she kind of got the inspiration for the order. As far as her order is known, they're basically known for their works of charity.

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Their corporal works of charity. And that is, that's their popularity. It's about an order of, oh, about 4 ,000 sisters or so.

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And there's a brother's order to that and they're not quite as large. Well, let's go into some of your questions.

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Did Mother Teresa follow the faith once delivered to the saints? Yes and no answers here.

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Well, my thesis is simply to say no. And that's the reason why I wrote the book. But I tried to present the book in light of that.

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One of the reasons why I wrote the book is simply because no one else had done it. And that saddened me.

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That's to present her total teachings consistently.

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That's present her virtues and her vices. And not to just hammer her and say, well, she had no virtues whatsoever.

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And so you have to really separate her corporal works of mercy from her spiritual works of mercy.

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So in what ways do you think that she departed from the faith once delivered to the saints?

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Well, you know, Christians always debated whether or not what the gospel is.

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Yes, I'm sure you and I would have some very strong disagreements. Well, no doubt.

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And yet we wouldn't disagree that it had to be what the gospel is has to be spread.

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Yes. Yet in Mother Teresa's case, her gospel was to help Hindus become better Hindus, Buddhists better Buddhists, Muslims better Muslims, and whatever religion you are, become a better whatever you are.

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Now, if you can name somebody in Christian history that taught that and was regarded as a saint,

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I'll take my hat off to you. But I don't know of anybody. Did Mother Teresa believe and consistently teach that only in truth can man find salvation?

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Well, inevitably, if you're helping people become better Hindus and teaching that to help them become a better whatever they are, then you're kind of in a situation where no, necessarily it's not.

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Truth kind of takes a back seat to what the faith truly is.

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And so the answer is just simply no. Now, how do you respond to the catechism of the

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Catholic Church in Article 841? It says the church's relationship with the

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Muslims, the plan of salvation, also includes those who acknowledge the creator and the first place amongst whom are the

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Muslims. These profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us, they adore the one merciful

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God, mankind's judge on the last day. Now, obviously, from what you've just said, you must have a strong disagreement with the modern catechism of the

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Catholic Church. Well, as I said earlier, all documents of the church have to be read in light of the higher authority.

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It doesn't have to be consistent with that. So if something is inconsistent with a prior dogma of the standard teaching of the faith over the last two millennia, that teaching becomes null and void.

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And in this case, Vatican II was constructed to basically restate what

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Catholics, from the words of the hierarchy themselves, to just restate the faith as it always was believed.

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And this is one of the reasons why you have a traditionalist movement in the world today, simply because traditionalists and Catholics in general don't remember believing that Muslims worship the same

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God as us. So, yes, I would say that that teaching is pretty regrettable that they did state that.

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So the present -day catechism of the Catholic Church is not binding upon Roman Catholics as far as dogma?

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Well, here's where you get into the problems that are going on in the church today. There are many statements in the catechism which are very good and wonderful.

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The only thing is some people have said, well, it's an infallible document. Well, that's an interesting thing to say, considering the thing was revised five years after it was initially printed, which

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I don't remember any revisions of dogmas of the faith. And so people who make that statement,

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I know they're looking for the kind of clarity that came out of Rome 50 years ago, where you had a very much united profession of faith, and that translated into the laity themselves, right down the ranks.

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But unfortunately, we're not living in that time. We're living in an age of apostasy. And so that's the difficulty they're facing on how do they deal with this.

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Yes, how do you respond to the notion of some Catholics? In fact, several years ago,

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I organized a theological debate between the theologically reformed apologist

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Dr. James R. White and the Roman Catholic apologist Gary Maciuta. Actually, no, it wasn't with Gary Maciuta on the specific.

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That was on the Apocrypha. It was another debate with an individual whose name escapes me, a

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Catholic apologist. And the issue was on can non -Christians enter heaven.

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And it seems that the position of many Catholics today is that, yes,

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Jesus Christ is the only way that a human being can be saved.

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But you do not have to acknowledge that in order to receive the benefits of his death.

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How do you respond to that? Yeah, that's the new thing. It's kind of the Barthian way. Let's separate faith from grace.

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And that's kind of the push to say that, oh, God's desire to save all men is so grand that, you know, he'll just start cutting the corners of everything that he ever said.

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And somehow grace just applies to everybody. And through that, they're just saved where they're at, as long as they're sincere.

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And that has made its way, I mean, through the ranks, through Catholics and Protestant ranks.

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And it's just becoming so popular anymore. And that's probably one of the premier heresies that have spun off of, you know, not having a proper understanding of vicarious atonement and the doctrine of predestination.

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Yes, well that brings me to the next question that I thought was interesting that you, a non -Calvinist, would ask this.

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Did Mother Teresa believe and consistently teach that no one knows God except anyone to whom Jesus wishes to reveal him?

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Very interesting question coming from a Catholic. Right. What was the question again?

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Well, the question that you asked in your book. Did Mother Teresa believe and consistently teach that no one knows

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God except anyone to whom Jesus wishes to reveal him? Well, you know, obviously the answer is no.

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Yes. And, you know, that's part of the,

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I mean, consistently, she was very consistent in her faith. It's just that faith was not the biblical faith.

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So, you know, she was, in many respects, well, I don't want to answer some of your other questions, because if I go on,

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I'll be answering some of the other questions you're going to be answering, so I'll just stop there. Okay. Now, was this, was

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Mother Teresa, to your knowledge anyway, did she always hold this pluralistic view?

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Well, that's the strange thing about it. If you look at her private writings, which came out in September of last year, what is fascinating is she convinced the

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Archbishop of Calcutta to let her found the order based on that she was saying that the poor

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Indians were ignorant of the gospel and of Christ and wallowing in their sins and had to be evangelized.

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But then, after she found that the order, the public profession she was making, was if the

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Indians would approach her, she would say, Oh, yes, I convert you, I convert you to be a better Hindu or Buddhist or whatever you are.

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And so there was this dualism going on. So people were shocked that there was a dualism in her private life that they never knew about until her private writings came out.

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And now, my book on the heels of that, By the Providence of God, is stating that, oh, there was a dualism also in her theological life.

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And the two actually were hand in hand. We have to go to a break right now. And there have been many

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Roman Catholics who have been informed about this interview, including a man who served as Mother Teresa's attorney for several years.

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Who knows, he might be even pulling in as well. Don't go away. We'll be right back. Lynnbrook Baptist Church on 225

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Call Lynnbrook Baptist at 516 -599 -9402. That's 516 -599 -9402.

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Or visit lynnbrookbaptist .org. That's lynnbrookbaptist .org. Welcome back.

27:15

If you've just tuned us in, our guest today is Mark Michael Zima, a traditionalist Catholic in good standing.

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And he's discussing his book, Mother Teresa, the Case for the Cause. And another couple of interesting things about Mark.

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He knew and visited the late Father Malachi Martin, a theological expert on the Second Vatican Council and author of the

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Jesuits and many other popular Catholic books. He has worked to found Catholic monasteries with Catholic priests.

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He has written to Cardinal Ratzinger before he became Pope Benedict XVI. And the

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United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to address the theological problems in the Catholic Church.

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And how did Mother Teresa capture the imagination of the entire world?

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How did she become so famous? Yeah, good press. Definitely. I mean, there's obviously a lot of people in the world who do the things that Mother Teresa has done and the things that Mother Teresa has said.

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But, you know, as someone who works in the media, Chris, you're probably well aware that if you get on television, you get on radio, and you get in the spotlight long enough and everybody sees you, well then you become someone special.

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I mean, of course, all of her 4 ,000 sisters do exactly what she did, but they don't have the same press.

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She's in a special category. And then on the other hand, I would also say that the world is looking.

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It's looking to get rid of the supernatural, to naturalize or to really cut off the distinctions of confessions and just say, oh, look, we all worship

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God. Let's get together and hold hands and, you know, sway the music and turn the lights down low. And they don't really want to deal with the distinctions that would have separated

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Protestants and Catholics of the past and that type of thing. So if you concentrate on someone who just practiced the corporal works of mercy, of feeding the hungry and giving drink to the thirsty and so on, then that's the kind of new saint they want.

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That's the kind of Christian they want. So probably one of the most crucial questions

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I can ask, and you've really in many ways already answered it, but to put it as bluntly as you did in your book, did

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Mother Teresa teach another gospel? Well, absolutely.

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Sadly, yes, she did. And, you know, you asked what was her teaching, and I actually was amazed to find that almost word for word that the teaching that she taught was,

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I help you become a better Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, whatever you are.

30:04

There's a group of Hindu monks in Calcutta named the

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Ramakrishna Movement. And out of the 19th century is when they were founded, and that's actually, that is their creed.

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And I found the comparisons, considering her order was founded in Calcutta, that that was very shocking to me.

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And then I started looking at what were the Hindu and Mother Teresa comparisons that I drew, and I tried to pull them out in the book.

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Well, the evangelical would obviously not believe in the

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Catholic concept of canonization of saints, but we would say, most of us anyway, would say that if a person did not believe and teach the true gospel, that person is not a

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Christian. Would you make that same evaluation of Mother Teresa? Well, as Catholics, and this is a

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Catholic -Protestant distinctive, to be a Christian as a Catholic, one has to have a valid baptism, and has to make a general profession of the

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Trinity, Christ as their Savior, Incarnation, and they have to have certain rudiments that you have to hold.

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But outside of that, one, you would still be a Christian in the light of the

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Catholic faith, but if you, say, then reject it, the central article is like what she did.

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In this case, yes, there's a rejection of the Christian faith in her case, and so she, yes, should be considered someone that we would call, not an apostate, someone who was a

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Christian, someone who became an apostate. We do have a caller on the line, an internet listener in Corpus Christi, Texas.

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Pastor John, welcome to On Sharpens Iron. Hello, Chris. Yes, I'm having a little trouble hearing you.

32:15

Hello. Our engineer is going to be working on turning up your volume, because I can barely hear you.

32:20

Right. John, are you there? Yes. Okay, I hear you a little bit better. Oh, is this

32:26

John Otis? Yes, it is. Well, welcome to the program. Greetings. You have a question for our guest today?

32:34

Yes. He was mentioning whether concerning whether non -Christians can be saved, and I just wanted to have his input on two of the questions, for example, that are in the

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Christian and Answer Catholic Catechism that Father John Hardin wrote with the approval of John Paul II, and one of the

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Catechism questions, 176, says, The answer, yes,

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God gives sufficient grace for salvation to all human beings. of revelation they have received.

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And then Catechism question 418 says, And the answer is,

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Non -Christians can be saved through the church according to their faith in whatever historical revelation they come to know and by their cooperation with the internal graces of the

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Holy Spirit which they receive. Now, in getting this, it's my understanding that when the

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Pope signs off on this authoritative teaching, and he speaks in his official capacity as the

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Pope, that these Catechisms are official church dogma. I mean, what is s**t on this?

34:12

And John, could you take your answer off the internet? Because we have a jammed phone line, people trying to get through. Take my answer off the internet?

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Yes, in other words, if you could hang up and listen to Mark's answer over the internet. Do you follow?

34:27

Pastor John? Yes, I'll hang up. Thank you very much. Sorry about that. Yes, Mark?

34:34

Yeah, sure. Yeah, that's the question of the imprimatur that certain books have received in the past.

34:43

And, you know, those books are supposed to be free from error. The imprimatur is very helpful, but it's not a dogmatic statement.

34:53

And the other statement would be the Nero Obstates, where there's nothing permitting the imprimatur being allowed to be printed.

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And that those statements aren't, if you have, mostly they come from bishops.

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But if you have one of those, it doesn't necessarily mean that the statement, the book is completely free from error.

35:13

It's just, it's very helpful. But I've come across books that have imprimatur and, yeah, as a

35:23

Reformed individual, I know, and I think you'll enjoy this, that I know of books that are pre -Vatican

35:29

II that will openly say that as Catholics we don't believe in predestination.

35:36

If you do any homework, you know that the Church has dogmatic definitions on predestination.

35:43

In fact, if you read Trent, the whole debate, if you read the documents, it's very clear on the

35:48

Assurance of Salvation what Trent was saying there. He was saying that you have assurance of your predestination, a metaphysical assurance of your predestination.

35:56

And so for someone to miss that, it's obvious why we had some of the upheaval that we've had in the last 50 years.

36:08

Yes, just out of curiosity, I wanted to get your opinion on this, being a Roman Catholic.

36:14

I have been accused by Catholics and evangelicals alike of being guilty of religious bigotry because I make the statement that the

36:26

Catholic Church, in my opinion, has a false gospel, and therefore those Catholics who are faithful to the dogma of Rome regarding justification are not true

36:36

Christians. Now, obviously, you disagree with me on that, but do you think that that renders me guilty of bigotry?

36:46

Absolutely not. In fact, we need a little more of that. It would be refreshing in this age where we're all, as I said earlier, we're trying to be so friendly that what's happening is we're just getting mush.

37:01

So people are looking. It's a natural inclination of men to seek certainty and to seek absolutes.

37:11

And so they will go anywhere they can find that. And that's one of the reasons why there's been a flood out of the

37:17

Catholic Church and liberal Protestant churches are dying because they're promoting that all the time.

37:24

And that's not popular in the secular world, but in reality, it's the old question.

37:32

Someone says to you, well, there's an absolute truth, and you just ask them, well, are you absolutely sure?

37:38

So, no, I don't think you're a bigot at all in that statement. Well, thanks. It's good to hear a

37:45

Catholic say that, though. You're not going to hurt my feelings. I'll recover. Well, we do have a caller on the line.

37:52

I believe this is Jim Tuohy from Pennsylvania, who is an advocate of Mother Teresa.

37:59

And welcome to the program. Jim Tuohy in Pennsylvania, welcome to the program.

38:04

For some reason, Jim Tuohy cannot hear us, I don't believe. And now

38:09

I'm deaf as well. So let's go to a break right now. Actually, it's time to go to a break anyway.

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40:32

This is Chris Arns and we are interviewing Mark Michael Zima, a traditionalist Catholic in good standing, who is the author of the book

40:39

Mother Teresa, the Case for the Cause. Our guest, Mark Michael Zima, is taking the position or takes the position that Mother Teresa of Calcutta is not a saint.

40:52

And we do, I hope, have our caller still on the line, Jim Tuohy in Pennsylvania. Hello, how are you?

40:57

I can barely hear Jim for some reason. I can very faintly... Speak up as loud as I can, Chris.

41:03

How are you? Okay, I'm doing all right, but I don't know if I'll be able to understand your statement. Apparently, our engineers have done all they could to increase your volume.

41:11

I'm calling on a cell phone, Chris. Sorry about that. I'm calling from a cell phone. I'm down in Florida right now.

41:18

Oh, okay. Well, if you could just very briefly comment then on or respond to Mark Michael Zima's statements that Mother Teresa embraced and taught a false gospel because she gave the hope of salvation to even those who reject

41:36

Christ and are adherents of other religions other than Christianity. How do you respond to that? Well, I think that she saw everyone as children of God.

41:46

She was profoundly in love with Jesus Christ. She was devout in her faith and longed for all people that she encountered to know the fullness of the faith.

41:56

And so she was certainly not indifferent to the plight of souls that she dealt with.

42:01

But she also, I think, mirrored Christ's infinite patience with individuals' free will and that she recognized some people and their right to worship as they chose.

42:12

She was not indifferent to it. Many people were converted to Christianity and exited the Catholic Church in her care.

42:19

But she certainly wasn't trying to force people to do that. And she respected their right to seek

42:25

God in their manner. Although, you know, her nuns were out there doing catechism in Calcutta and throughout the world.

42:32

So the idea that somehow Mother Teresa was indifferent to the spiritual welfare of individuals or felt that Catholicism and Christianity were just one path to God, that's just not true.

42:46

Well, Mark, do you have a response? Yeah, it's very difficult for me to hear him.

42:51

I only heard a couple of statements that he made. And the first one is actually, it doesn't help

42:57

Mother Teresa with this first statement he made, that everybody was a child of God, because as Protestants and Catholics would agree, that you're not born a child of God.

43:09

You become a child of God through regeneration. We disagree how that happens, but you're not born as a child of God by nature.

43:20

You're actually born a child of the devil. So that doesn't help her. Now, some of the other statements, can you kind of tell me some of them?

43:28

Because I really wasn't able to hear them. Well, he was making the case that she was not at all indifferent to the conditions of the souls of men.

43:37

I don't think any of us made that claim that she was indifferent, that she was just seriously mistaken as to how one demonstrates true concern for the souls of men if you want them to enter

43:48

Heaven. Sure. Well, you know, I understand that. But you see, the popularity that Mother Teresa had, most of the books that were written on her were written by non -Christians.

43:58

And the reason why they liked her so much, in fact, the authorized biographer of Mother Teresa is not a Catholic. And she was comparing her teachings to Hinduism, and you'll find this in her work,

44:12

Miracle of Love, where she goes on for about four pages and says, Mother Teresa's mission wasn't primarily to convert people.

44:19

It was to help them become a better whatever they were. And this is the authorized biographer for Mother Teresa who made these statements.

44:26

And I can understand why people have a great love for her, would jump to her defense in this, but I think that she was desiring to convert them to what she thought was

44:38

Catholicism and Christianity, but inevitably it turned out it's not in anybody's stretch of the imagination, whether it be

44:46

Catholic or Protestant. John, are you still there? Catholicism is, I think that's the difference probably from even the

44:53

Pope. I mean, to believe what you're saying, you would have to believe that John Paul II was deceived by Mother Teresa, and because she was probably as close to him as anybody could live, and he fully understood what she was doing in India and in the church.

45:09

So while I can understand you might have an axe to grind with how she lived her faith, the reality is

45:15

Pope John Paul II saw her life, saw its vitality, saw her faithful witness to Jesus Christ, and he encouraged her in it.

45:25

So I guess what you're arguing is that John Paul II also was not truly a devout

45:31

Catholic. You guessed the topic of our next program. But John, I didn't say that.

45:38

I don't. That's a pretty extraordinary statement. That's fallacious to say that because perhaps whether or not it's a whole other issue, whether or not he was approving of her theology or whether or not he knew of it, but you can't say that just because he supported her that necessarily he knew everything that she was teaching, or that somehow he's not a devout

46:01

Catholic just on the basis of him supporting her.

46:08

So there are many issues there that's a bit too glib of a response.

46:14

By the way, John, are you the individual who was Mother Teresa's legal captain? Hello? Hello, John?

46:22

I guess John's been disconnected. Well, actually because of the problem we're having hearing

46:30

John, we might as well go on to the next caller. But that brings me to an interesting question,

46:38

Mark. Are you still there, Mark? I am. I thought I got knocked off there a moment. Yes, we're having technical difficulties,

46:45

I think. Mark, are you there? Yes, I am. That leads me to the next question, which

46:53

I think follows dovetails on what was just said by our caller in Pennsylvania, John Toohey.

47:02

The very fact that Pope John Paul II made very similar statements, and there's the famous photograph of him that we've all seen on the

47:12

Internet of him kissing the Koran and making very pluralistic statements about those and other religions having access to heaven and so forth.

47:25

If you could comment on that. Well, now you're presenting evidence, and those things are very troubling.

47:35

It's hard to say, but it has to be said. He was probably the most progressive pope ever in the history of the

47:41

Church. And so I know some of the listeners now are going, Oh, you know, he's an extremist, but you have to do the same thing with him as you do with Mother Teresa.

47:52

He's our Holy Father. He's not our Holy Pure. And so he's not a dictator who just tells us what to do.

47:57

He can do whatever he wants. He's bound as the successor to St.

48:06

Peter and the vicar for Christ to what the parameters that Christ has laid down for him.

48:14

So if he goes outside those boundaries, he can just as well be critiqued.

48:19

And this is very much in tradition of the Church. So yes, when he did things like that, he really wasn't representing fidelity to his office, sadly.

48:31

We do have another internet lister on the line, Warren in New Hampshire. Welcome to Iron Sheriff Bazaar, Warren. Well, thank you.

48:38

I'd like to take the time to corroborate Mr. Zima's statement about Mother's theology on salvation.

48:46

At one time, she had said that the souls of aborted babies go to heaven.

48:52

And when she was called on that, she retracted it to the present position of we have good hope, which

49:00

I think that we can judge Mother Teresa as being a victim of the modern

49:08

Catholicism that we see today. We call it modernism. Well, as being one myself.

49:14

So she retracted it back to the statement that we can have good hope. And as you know, there's a statement that was put out by the

49:24

International Theological Commission saying that, yes, we do have good hope, clearly contrary to Catholic doctrine that says that there is no hope.

49:34

So she is basically or was a victim of a watered -down

49:40

Catholicism that we've been experiencing for the last hundred years, and especially in the

49:45

United States since colonial times. Can you take Mark's response off of your internet because we have a jammed phone line,

49:53

Warren? Pardon me? Can you take Mark's response over the internet because we have a jammed phone line?

50:00

Can you listen to Mark's response over the internet? I can hear it over the internet. Yes. Thank you very much.

50:06

Okay. You got my statement? Yes. Yes. Okay. But I actually believe that aborted babies will be in heaven, and many evangelicals do, although there is some disagreement amongst my fellow

50:19

Calvinists over this. Some believe it's a mystery what happens to an infant who dies at that age, and others believe that, like Charles Haddon Spurgeon believed, that infants would certainly be in heaven if they died while in infancy.

50:36

But do you have any comments on Warren's statement? Well, that's one of the theses, to try to defend her.

50:47

It's very charitable for Warren to say that, that they're looking for reasons to say, She became a victim of the time, and many people have actually made that remark about John Paul II and others, that they got too swept up into the system of what's going on in the secular world, and it kind of influenced their thinking and their acts.

51:11

The problem that I have with that is that everybody knows of the CC86 with John Paul II, because you just mentioned him.

51:19

But nobody knows that ten years prior to a CC, almost to the month and the day, there was

51:26

Mother Teresa's 76th prayer meeting that she had in Calcutta, when she asked the

51:32

Archbishop of Calcutta whether she could go to 25 different houses of worship of all different religions and go pray with them.

51:40

And it wasn't just kind of following. Some people said, well, she was just kind of going along with what the spirit of Vatican II was.

51:49

And the problem is she was kind of running ahead of it in many respects of what she was doing. So it's questionable whether or not she was a victim of that.

51:58

And the other thing you have to think about is she was a sister for 34 years before the

52:07

Council even commenced, Vatican II even commenced. Go ahead.

52:12

No, I was just coughing. Oh, okay. I'm sorry. So she wasn't a spring chicken.

52:19

I mean, she was already in her 50s when this was commencing. And so she was well aware.

52:26

She was very well schooled in the faith. She wasn't a dumb woman. I found her to be very learned in the faith.

52:32

She said she wasn't, but I would say that she was.

52:40

But that's my response to Warren. This is probably the most profound question you ask in your book.

52:48

Did Mother Teresa believe in a new god? The answer is yes.

52:56

She had made a statement, an open letter to, I'm finding it right now in that chapter, to the

53:07

Prime Minister of India. And her statement was, Some call him Ishwar, some call him Allah, some simply

53:13

God. But we all have to acknowledge that it is he who made us for greater things, to love and to be loved.

53:18

Well, Shiva and Allah and Vishnu didn't make me. They're not other names for Jesus.

53:26

They're not other names that you can apply. If, say, an

53:31

Israelite came up and said to Moses that, Oh, well, you know, it doesn't matter whether or not we address

53:40

Adonai as Adonai or whatever. We could say, you know, the dragons are right.

53:50

We can use that name. Or we can use Baal. Or we can use Khmush. Or some other

53:55

Egyptian. He would obviously say, you know, you've just violated the first commandment. And that person would be in a lot of hot water.

54:02

But when it comes to Mother Teresa, well, it's hands off. And that she's unquestioned on this.

54:09

But she made other statements, such as the fact that you could replace Jesus by God if you're not a

54:15

Christian. So there's, unfortunately, yes, I do believe that she taught another god.

54:22

Yes, I guess she agreed with George Burns in that movie, that horrible movie that he starred in where he said,

54:30

In the words of God, Jesus is my son. Mohammed is my son.

54:36

Buddha is my son. Obviously, she had a similar theology. But anyway, we have a caller on the line.

54:42

We have Peter in Oyster Bay, Long Island. Welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron, Peter. Are you there,

54:48

Pete? For some reason, Pete either can't hear us or I can't hear Peter. We're going to go to a break right now.

54:54

We're going to go to a break right now. And we'll have Pete's question, hopefully, after we return.

55:00

And we'll be right back after these messages. Paul wrote to the church at Galatia, For am

55:06

I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man,

55:12

I would not be a servant of Christ. Hi, I'm Mark Lukens, Pastor of Providence Baptist Church. We are a

55:18

Reformed Baptist Church, and we hold to the London Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689. We are in Norfolk, Massachusetts.

55:25

We strive to reflect Paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how God views what we say and what we do than how men view these things.

55:33

That's not the best recipe for popularity, but since that wasn't the Apostle's priority, it must not be ours either.

55:40

We believe, by God's grace, that we are called to demonstrate love and compassion to our fellow man, and to be vessels of Christ's mercy to a lost and hurting community around us, and to build up the body of Christ in truth and love.

55:53

If you live near Norfolk, Massachusetts, or plan to visit our area, please come and join us for worship and fellowship.

55:59

You can call us at 508 -528 -5750. That's 508 -528 -5750.

56:05

Or go to our website to email us, listen to past sermons, worship songs, or watch our

56:10

TV program entitled, Resting in Grace. You can find us at ProvidenceBaptistChurchMA .org.

56:17

That's ProvidenceBaptistChurchMA .org. Or even on sermonaudio .com. Providence Baptist Church is delighted to sponsor

56:24

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Welcome back. Is Peter in Oyster Bay, Long Island on the line?

56:31

I'm here, Chris. Oh, great. Welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron, Peter. Thank you. Chris, thanks for having me on the show.

56:37

I just want to comment. I think that there's a fundamental mistake here in this analysis of Mother Teresa.

56:46

Mother Teresa saw her ministry and the ministry of her order in a specific way of carrying out, as Mr.

56:53

Demo pointed out, the corporal works of mercy and showing the poorest of the poor the love of Jesus.

57:01

All you have to do is read what she had to say to realize that she was deeply rooted in the gospels, deeply rooted in Jesus and her spirituality.

57:11

She didn't see her particular ministry as that of active evangelization, of trying to draw people into an explicit faith in Jesus.

57:22

She supported that of the church. Just one example. She hardly ever got involved in political questions, but when there was a law proposed in India to make it illegal for a

57:34

Hindu to convert to another religion, she opposed it. She just saw this work as different from her work, just as a contemplative isn't going to spend a lot of time either evangelizing or doing the corporal works of mercy or someone who's out on the street corners proclaiming the gospel might not do as much in the way of taking care of the sick and the poor.

57:58

Do you have a response, Mark? Sure. The difference between a contemplative and a missionary is that the missionaries are working with the people hand -in -hand.

58:11

When she is going forth, it isn't just that you can say, well, that wasn't the emphasis of her order.

58:19

It was to spread the corporal works of mercy and just tell people, show them, and tell them about the love of Christ.

58:25

The problem isn't that that's a good desire. The thing is that the gospel you bring when you do that, when people say, okay, what is the gospel?

58:35

What is the teaching? Why are you here? You do have to tell them. You can't say, I'm here to convert you to be a better Hindu or a better whatever you are.

58:41

You have to say, I'm here as a missionary for Jesus Christ and I want to bring you to the salvation which he offers you.

58:49

You can't obfuscate on that. That's where she fell.

58:55

Did she in fact obfuscate or did she in some public statements try to make a distinction between her ministry and the active ministry of evangelization?

59:12

My understanding of it is that she would tell people, I'm showing you the love of Jesus.

59:19

And that was a way of preparing them to eventually receive. And as your earlier caller,

59:25

Mr. Too -Bad -You -Didn't -Have -More -Time -With -Him pointed out, she had some of her sisters did in fact instruct people in the faith.

59:36

I think you're criticizing her for doing something that was just different from her immediate purpose.

59:44

I do address this, Peter. The thing in the book that I try to be very careful about is to emphasize her virtues as well as what

59:53

I believe her voice is to be. I have those quotes in the book which are very laudable that she is consistent with Catholic teaching.

01:00:03

But then I have to point out at the same time, and I think we all have to point out to be honest, the things that were not consistent with the

01:00:10

Catholic faith. That's the difficulty here. She did say things which were laudable and true but at the same time, these things no

01:00:24

Christian could say, no Catholic could say, and still say, I'm working in fidelity with my

01:00:30

Lord. That's the sadness of it. I don't take any pleasure here in critiquing her.

01:00:36

That's the sadness. I wrote this book out of fidelity to our Lord, not because I wanted to bash Mother Teresa.

01:00:42

That was going to be interpreted that that's what I'm doing. I mean, Pete, if you wanted to look at a parallel example, if an evangelical is running a soup kitchen in a city for the homeless, and he's doing a wonderful act of mercy there, feeding the poor and starving and so forth, but he's teaching people, you can believe in God, in any

01:01:03

God that you want, and you will still enter heaven when you die, regardless of the good works the person is doing, he is reflecting that he does not truly believe the gospel of Jesus Christ.

01:01:16

I'm not sure that that's an accurate description of what Mother Teresa was doing. I think

01:01:22

Mother Teresa was trying to emphasize one thing and didn't go tell people, you can believe whatever you want to believe.

01:01:32

She was deeply rooted in Jesus Christ, and her writings are very, very clear on that.

01:01:38

I think what she, she just didn't see her role as emphasizing that, to individuals.

01:01:48

She saw other people. She supported the evangelical efforts of others.

01:01:54

She would have no problem with someone else doing it, but she, there was, there is a history in Christianity of missionaries serving people, and somehow the people that are being served felt like there was a condition to this.

01:02:09

We'll only help you because we want you to find Christ, and what she was trying to do was to demonstrate

01:02:17

Jesus' unconditional love, and it was the work of others to more explicitly call them to clear faith in Jesus Christ.

01:02:29

Well, I understand what you're saying, but no matter what wonderful works of mercy any professing

01:02:37

Christian demonstrates, that does not excuse a lie.

01:02:44

It does not excuse a false gospel being proclaimed. But anyway... First of all,

01:02:49

I really hate that term, false gospel. You can disagree with her proclamation of the gospel in certain areas without calling it false.

01:02:57

Well, let's see if it's true or it's not. Yeah, but, you know, as they used to say on the south side of Youngstown, Chris, who made you

01:03:04

Pope anyway? You know, you kind of define true

01:03:11

Christianity as Protestantism, and then evangelical Protestantism, and then if they don't agree with evangelical Protestantism, well, we can see clearly that this isn't true

01:03:19

Christian. Well, I have to be a Berean. That's what the Apostle Paul commended to the Bereans for, that they searched the

01:03:26

Scriptures even to test to see what Paul was saying was true. But anyway, all of you folks who have been trying to get through, you'll be happy to know that Mark Michael Zima has agreed to be interviewed tomorrow on Iron Sharpens Iron for part two of this discussion.

01:03:41

And I just want to let you know that if you're interested in purchasing the book Mother Teresa, The Case for the

01:03:47

Cause by Mark Michael Zima, you can go to www .coldtreepress

01:03:53

.com. Coldtreepress .com. I want to thank you, Mark Michael Zima, for being my guest today.

01:03:59

Thank you, Chris. I want to thank Peter and everybody else who called in, and I look forward to hearing from you tomorrow.

01:04:05

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater

01:04:11

Savior than you are a sinner. Good afternoon, Long Island, New York, Connecticut, and those listening internationally over the

01:04:18

Internet. This is Chris Arnsen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron. If you were to ask the average person on the street, whether they are

01:04:27

Catholic or Protestant, to name a modern -day saint, I'm nearly certain the vast majority of those you ask would immediately respond,

01:04:35

Mother Teresa. But our guest today on this program, Mark Michael Zima, would strongly oppose that assessment of Mother Teresa of Calcutta, and he is a

01:04:44

Roman Catholic. We had such a jammed phone line yesterday during our interview with Mark Michael Zima that we wanted to give more of you who couldn't get through the opportunity to call in with a question for Mark Michael Zima regarding his book,

01:05:01

Mother Teresa, the Case for the Cause. Whether you wholeheartedly agreed with Mark Michael Zima, whether you radically opposed what he was saying, or that you just weren't certain.

01:05:11

Whether you are Roman Catholic, Evangelical, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, or none of the above, we would love to hear from you.

01:05:18

I want to pick up the phone during the station break. Call your family, friends, and loved ones. Tell them to tune in, but they can hear the program anywhere on the planet

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01:06:56

Welcome back. If you've just tuned us in, today we are airing part two of our discussion with Mark Michael Zima on his book

01:07:05

Mother Teresa, The Case for the Cause. Mr. Zima is a former religious brother of two communities, the brothers of Our Lady of Reconciliation and the slaves of the

01:07:16

Immaculate Heart of Mary. He has devoted much of his life to theological and philosophical studies, as well as the evangelism of Catholicism.

01:07:23

He has taught sacred scripture, as well as the rite of Christian initiation for adults, and has been a

01:07:30

Catholic youth director at a parish in Oregon. He has been associated with many different Catholic organizations, including the

01:07:36

St. Augustine Institute of Catholic Studies, the St. Anthony of Padua chapter of Una Voce, and the

01:07:44

Fatima Crusader. Welcome back to the program, Mark Michael Zima. Thank you,

01:07:50

Chris, for having me back. I also wanted to repeat the caveat they announced yesterday.

01:07:57

Mr. Zima knows that I am not a modern ecumenist. In fact, we would both certainly agree that the gospel of the

01:08:06

Roman Catholic Church is a different gospel than the gospel presented by the

01:08:12

Reformers and embraced by evangelical Christians. We would differ, obviously, on who is right and who is wrong, but I believe that this program today would be valuable because to hear a

01:08:29

Catholic criticism, a critical examination of Mother Teresa from a scholarly

01:08:34

Catholic perspective may never be heard anywhere else in the media, and also because of the fact that the immediate notion in some folks' minds that if I were to do this program exclusively with fundamentalist or evangelical guests discussing the subject of Mother Teresa, their minds would be clouded with the false notion that the motive behind it was religious bigotry and hatred.

01:09:04

So to cut through that smoke screen, I want people to focus more on the issues at hand rather than any preconceived notions that they may have about my motives.

01:09:17

But anyway, we did address several, actually seven,

01:09:24

I believe, very crucial questions regarding Mother Teresa yesterday and I wanted to read you the list.

01:09:34

The second set of questions that you include in your book, was the miracle attributed to Mother Teresa really miraculous?

01:09:44

In an age that is as wicked as this one, why is Mother Teresa almost universally loved?

01:09:51

Would wicked people not hate a holy person? Jesus and the saints were not loved by the world.

01:09:58

How was Mother Teresa loved by the world but her Lord and the saints were not? Was the work of the saints all a lie?

01:10:06

Did the saints suffer and die for nothing? Were the saints wrong then? Is Mother Teresa right now?

01:10:12

Were the saints right then? Is Mother Teresa wrong now? And we'll be addressing as many as those as we can during the course of this program.

01:10:20

But let's give a little recap of yesterday, Mark, so people who are tuning in for the first time understand where you're coming from and what the focus of this book is.

01:10:33

You acknowledged that the Roman Catholic Church, there is a very large push amongst many

01:10:40

Roman Catholics to canonize Mother Teresa as a saint. And you not only yesterday claimed that that would be a huge error, but you claimed that she is not a saint and not only that you believe she is an apostate from Christianity.

01:10:59

Is that correct? Sadly, yes, that is correct. Further describe the theological perspective you are coming from as a traditionalist

01:11:12

Catholic. Traditionalism actually arose out of the response, but a true

01:11:20

Catholic is always a traditionalist. He's one holding to the traditions which have been handed down everywhere and by all.

01:11:27

I'm someone who stands in that line. A traditionalist isn't somebody who just goes along with whatever the

01:11:36

Holy Father says, no matter how he says it. He's not our Holy Führer.

01:11:42

He's not our dictator. He's our Holy Father. So if he tells you at one point, don't touch hot pots just like your natural father, and then later on he says, go ahead and touch hot pots.

01:11:53

You have a right to say, wait a second Dad, just as you have your natural father to say you told me in the past not to do this and that was wrong.

01:12:02

And I experienced in knowing that it's wrong, but now you're saying this is all right. He doesn't have a right to do that.

01:12:08

He doesn't have that kind of dictatorial authority over you. They're the aspects of a traditionalist.

01:12:15

A traditionalist is someone who is holding the faith, but also is not someone who would love the traditions in every aspect, but doesn't say, okay, we'll have just the traditions over here, not the traditions over here, such as people who would concentrate on just liturgical traditions, opposed to the revelation of God.

01:12:35

Now, there were a few Roman Catholics who listened to the program yesterday who responded to me off air and said that you were a

01:12:45

Phenite. If you could explain what that is and are you a Phenite?

01:12:53

That has become the curse word in the last 60 years in church history.

01:12:59

Father Phenie was a Jesuit priest, a Jesuit scholar who was born in the latter part of the 19th century and was very well known in Catholic circles.

01:13:11

And because of the liberalism that he saw in Boston College, where they were teaching you could be saved in any religion whatsoever, and a lot of students there were losing their faith, he decided to respond to that and to start looking into what was the root of their position.

01:13:29

And he found out that what they had done is taken a theological viewpoint in the church known as baptism of desire, and they had extended and stretched it to such a point that it was well past the parameters that tradition had laid down.

01:13:47

So baptism of desire in the early church was the belief that you had to desire baptism, desire the faith, and that perhaps, if you weren't baptized, would suffice.

01:14:01

But it later became a position where if you just had this unconscious longing and desire, which was known as implicit desire, then that would be enough to suffice for salvation.

01:14:15

And does invincible ignorance tie in with that? Well, yeah, that's actually an aspect of it.

01:14:22

Excuse me just a moment. What happened with invincible ignorance?

01:14:32

Well, it's part of it, but it's not entirely the issue. And so to sum it up, what happened was

01:14:40

Father Feeney, there was a whole speculation whether he was excommunicated and what happened to him and so forth.

01:14:46

And later on he was supposedly reconciled, even though he never retracted what they claimed to be a heresy.

01:14:54

And in 1987, his diocese of Worcester approached the

01:15:01

Congregation of Causes and asked them whether or not this position that the

01:15:06

Slaves of the Heart of Mary had held, the congregation he founded, was a viable position.

01:15:12

And they stated unequivocally, the judicial vicar of the diocese said that that position was completely viable and the church allows a more liberal position, as well as those who hold the traditional viewpoint.

01:15:29

So that's pretty much it in a nutshell. And are you a Feneite? Well, probably for most people

01:15:36

I would be considered that way. My viewpoint is simply the traditional view of the church, which is that baptism is something which is necessary for salvation.

01:15:46

Baptism is a desire of being and blood being speculative theories of theologians which have become very popular but are undefined.

01:15:55

Perhaps, I'm just saying perhaps, that they may be true and they perhaps would suffice for baptism but we have no assurance of that.

01:16:04

So we won't preach it. I wouldn't preach that, nor would I tell somebody that you could just have baptism of desire and blood.

01:16:10

The only thing we have assurance of is that you have to have a true faith for salvation and you have to be baptized.

01:16:16

So that in many people's eyes would categorize me as a Feneite, but perhaps not entirely to those who are really true

01:16:25

Feneites. Yeah, not to go too far off the topic, but was not Father Fene officially excommunicated by the

01:16:33

Roman Catholic Church? It was supposedly an excommunication but the irony of the situation was that he was excommunicated for disobeying his bishop supposedly through the

01:16:56

Holy Office, which later became the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The problem with that was the

01:17:03

Holy Office doesn't excommunicate you for disobeying your bishop or your priest.

01:17:09

That would be another office. The Congregation of Bishops, somebody else would do it.

01:17:14

So there was a question for that, but then the question was what was the validity of that excommunication, considering that when he was so -called reconciled, they asked him to say the

01:17:24

Athanasian Creed, which you may know starts out by saying that whoever desires to be saved must hold the

01:17:32

Catholic faith. So he was very willing to say that Creed and then all of a sudden read it in the newspapers that all of a sudden he was reconciled.

01:17:44

So the question goes up how was he excommunicated? And also in light of the statements of the

01:17:53

Congregation now saying you have latitude to do either one. So I know there is much speculation on this and unfortunately part of the issues that we're dealing with and some of the theological viewpoints of Mother Teresa and elsewhere have been the responses that we will receive will probably be because of the confusion on this one doctrine.

01:18:15

And would those who would be under the umbrella of Phenism today, would they be in communion with Rome?

01:18:24

Well, they wouldn't be out of communion based on that doctrine, based on that dogma.

01:18:32

It depends on the individual. There are individuals who hold that dogma who are set of a cantus perhaps and others.

01:18:44

And actually that is for a set of a cantus. This is their mainstay dogma.

01:18:53

That's part of it. There are variables in between. It's not just that dogma that would put you out of communion with Rome.

01:19:00

You really have to reject something else that's going on. Are you in communion with Rome?

01:19:07

Absolutely. I have no canonical penalties that have been brought against me. I have personal friends who are

01:19:14

Diocesan priests and the list could go on. I just wanted to make it clear or make it clearer what your background was.

01:19:24

Because as it is with most debates you will have folks automatically dismissing someone who is opposing their own view.

01:19:35

I've already heard off the air from a couple of Catholics, why did you have this kook on and so forth.

01:19:44

What I would ask any of you who think that just examine the evidence and call in today if you'd like to seek to disprove what

01:19:54

Mr. Zima is saying. But I wanted to go to one email

01:19:59

I received in response to yesterday's program. This is from a Catholic listener and he'll remain anonymous since he did not give me permission to read this email.

01:20:12

It's quoting Mother Teresa. I've always said we should help a Hindu become a better Hindu.

01:20:19

A Muslim become a better Muslim. A Catholic become a better Catholic. I am not at all bothered by this statement.

01:20:26

I believe your view is that only a Christian can be saved. While I am uncertain as to exactly how

01:20:32

God judges each of us I am strongly inclined in a different direction. While the gates of heaven were indeed opened through the life of Jesus, I believe it is possible for a moral living

01:20:43

Muslim or even a Hindu to be saved. And we surely want Muslims and others to become better persons e .g.

01:20:51

by not killing innocent civilians, being charitable to others being respectful to those with different religious views etc.

01:20:58

The second great commandment said Jesus is to love our neighbors as ourselves. Even if they are not

01:21:04

Christians is how I view this statement. And Jesus himself gave us the story of the

01:21:10

Good Samaritan. If you could respond to that comment by a Catholic listener. Yeah, this is part of a common theological viewpoint of how grace works.

01:21:22

That you have a stepping stone theology. That you kind of help them along to perhaps, depending on where they are at, to kind of embracing some of the good virtues that they see in you and getting interested in what you are doing.

01:21:38

And then inevitably perhaps they will get interested in your faith and realize that you are a Christian. The problem with that is that is not the mandate we received from Christ.

01:21:47

He didn't say well if you run into people who are pantheist or whatever try to get them to be theist first and then kind of work your way up.

01:21:54

The apostles never did that. They never approached the grief that way. They just were okay, there is one

01:21:59

God and this is his revelation. His son has come and salvation is only found in him.

01:22:08

It's over then. For that they suffered a lot.

01:22:14

They never tweaked the message to appease the audience. It was do that or tell the message or die trying.

01:22:28

Yesterday I was trying to remember the name of the Catholic apologist that James White debated in 2005 on Long Island.

01:22:38

It was a debate that I organized on the theme, is it possible for a non -Christian to enter into heaven? Dr. White took the position, no it is not possible.

01:22:49

The Roman Catholic apologist took the position, yes in keeping in harmony with the

01:22:55

Catholic Catechism Articles 841 and 1260. That debate,

01:23:00

I looked up that information because I could not remember the Catholic apologist name yesterday.

01:23:06

That was Bill Rutland. Dr. James White debated Bill Rutland in 2005 on Long Island as I said.

01:23:13

If you would like to order the DVD of that debate you can go to the Alpha Omega Ministries website www .aomin

01:23:23

.org www .aomin .org

01:23:28

I thought it was quite interesting that Roman Catholic apologist

01:23:34

Jerry Meditex who is now a traditionalist Catholic he said that he wanted to actually go to that debate to hand out tracts to Catholics telling them that James White was actually right on that issue.

01:23:48

I would have actually joined Jerry in that. That would have been a strange cross confessionalism we have going on today

01:24:01

I would have definitely been joining Jerry in that. Don't go away, we'll be right back.

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01:24:58

We have an internet listener on the line with a question for Mark Michael Zima We have

01:25:03

John in Corpus Christi, Texas. Welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron, John. Thank you, Chris. Oh, that's

01:25:09

John Otis. Can't mistake that voice. Yes, sir. I have four quick questions

01:25:15

I would like your guests to answer for me, please. Sure. The first one is is the

01:25:23

Magisterium consisting of the Bishop of Rome and the College of Bishops are they infallible?

01:25:31

Number two, what is your personal authoritative source as a

01:25:37

Catholic? Number three, is Vatican I correct but it taught people infallibility?

01:25:49

That's three questions. That's right. The fourth one is since the

01:25:55

Pope is the one who does determine canonization, if Pope Benedict XVI decides to make

01:26:03

Mother Teresa a saint if you disagree with that, are you not violating a major tenet of your faith?

01:26:13

Well, I appreciate those questions. Those are all good questions. If you could go through them one by one Mark First question, the

01:26:23

Pope and the Bishops in communion with him, are they infallible? When declaring as such there's the criteria of infallibility and so they would have to be making an infallible statement just any statement from the

01:26:38

Pope any statement from the Bishops that's not infallible even if they're just agreeing with each other there has to be more to it than that What was the second question?

01:26:49

Your personal authoritative source. Okay, my personal authoritative source is the apostolic tradition handed down from the apostles through the scripture and tradition and defined by the church

01:27:04

I can look back and I can say, okay, the church defined this defined that, defined that, and that's their authoritative source too the

01:27:11

Bishops and the Pope in communion with them they can't wander outside that boundary when the definition is defined that's the interpretation.

01:27:21

Some people say, well you can interpret dogmas this way. Well, people talk about we just mentioned no salvation inside the church and they want to have a liberal and they want to have a traditional interpretation of that.

01:27:33

Well, we don't have a liberal and a traditional interpretation of the Trinity and it's because when we start talking about salvation, it kind of touches people in a way that doctrines like the

01:27:46

Trinity and the hypostatic union don't What was the third question? Was Vatican I correct on papal infallibility?

01:27:56

Well, I would say as a Catholic, yes, because if I didn't I wouldn't be a

01:28:02

Catholic I have to believe I should be a Catholic And repeat the fourth question.

01:28:07

I didn't get that, John Since the Pope is the one who has the authority to determine canonization if the present

01:28:17

Pope were to decide that Mother Teresa should be a saint, how would you square that with the idea of papal infallibility since he would be making a cathedral statement

01:28:30

John, by the way, could you take that answer off of the internet because our lines are jammed again

01:28:35

Thank you very much for calling Well, that fourth question is a powerful question and the issue of infallibility in church history had only sprung up and it's a general viewpoint among theologians as a dogmatic fact or a material dogma meaning that it's not formally defined canonization is not formally defined that when the

01:29:00

Pope canonizes somebody that that is something that's de fide and has to be believed but it's a general belief that's been held since 1588 in church when the process of canonization was worked out that we're holding today so the response to that is and Catholics have been thinking about this how to deal with the numbers of beatifications and canonizations that have sprung up under the pontificate of John Paul II and some have said, well that they violated the procedures so those canonizations could never be considered infallible which is actually an aspect of Mother Teresa's own canonization at this point her beatification was that they violated the rules to move ahead with that and there's some other serious questions that have to be asked that would go along with that so without going much farther

01:30:02

I would just give you that answer and one of the critiques that some bring up in opposition to the oh actually we have another caller on the line who's on long distance,

01:30:15

I'll go to that before I ask my question we have a caller

01:30:22

Lawrence, I believe it is Lawrence in Colton, California welcome to Iron Sharpens Iron, Lawrence Hi, how are you?

01:30:31

I had a question to ask is it

01:30:39

Mike or Mark? Mark, that's fine he mentioned earlier that it was a theory about the baptism of desire or baptism of blood but could he comment on the

01:30:55

Council of Trent in Session 6, Chapter 4 where it says what did the

01:31:16

Council of Trent mean when it said the desire for it if it didn't mean that the baptism of desire is a viable means of regeneration well that's the debate do you understand, are you a

01:31:31

Catholic? yes I am do you know about the Fenian debate and study their background and history the argument that they would use that they had brought up was simply that one could be justified one could be regenerate through blood desire but one couldn't one couldn't be saved without baptism and they would link that with providence that God who not only predestines the ends he predestines the means and he made the means of baptism to be an absolute necessity and so that's the difference of the viewpoint now as far as a formal definition that's what

01:32:19

I was saying there's no formal definition of blood desire and that's the reason why it's stretched you have all these different opinions of exactly what it means because it hasn't been clear in fact the viewpoint of implicit desire which has led us to a very common universalism that's very popular in the modern mind today some conscious longing and desire is based on implicit desire which popped around the time of Trent but it was never in the history of the church part of that Lawrence, you identify yourself as a

01:32:54

Catholic where do you stand on this issue our guest believes that not only should

01:33:00

Mother Teresa not be canonized in the Roman Catholic Church as a Saint but that she was an apostate from Christianity and not a

01:33:08

Christian well actually this is Lawrence the one that you were emailing with I actually found the topic very interesting and I think he raises a lot of good points but as far as Mother Teresa being an apostate

01:33:28

I think it's a pretty strong statement I mean how exactly can a person reconcile, wouldn't the person just need to come back to the faith and go to confession can you listen to your answer off the internet because our phone lines are jammed again

01:33:47

I was just going to say, how can you come to the conclusion that she was an apostate

01:33:53

I mean for the rest of her life that she wouldn't be qualified to becoming a

01:33:59

Saint later what if she were to privately come back to the faith later on yes, if you could take the answer off the internet that would be great our lines are open now if you'd like to get through that's a fair question from a

01:34:14

Catholic yeah sure, that's actually a common and I hope,

01:34:20

I do hope that she repents before she did pass but the issue here, and this is the confusion isn't whether or not someone repents and inevitably makes it to heaven the role of the canonization process is not a right of Catholics, it's a privilege and so when the church canonizes somebody they're holding them up as a model and saying this is in their theology and in their works and everything that they did this person is a model for all

01:34:49

Christians and so you can look to them and say this is one of our heroes here's God's grace incarnate and this is what he did through this individual and you can't, when you have someone like Mother Teresa who was saying to everybody to the people who died in her shelter she was just saying they're all up in heaven or that she was saying

01:35:13

I don't convert you and then turning around and doing invalid illicit baptism unfortunately that's just not a model of a saint one argument that I've heard against Mother Teresa not only being a proper candidate for sainthood is that and also that she was not a

01:35:41

Christian one argument for the notion that she was not a Christian and not a good candidate for sainthood is that she received the right of exorcism to have demons exorcised from her is that true?

01:35:56

That is true, that was confirmed and confirmed by the diocese of Calcutta and it's a very well known fact and you could even go on EWTN and I believe

01:36:07

Father Benedict Rochelle was asked that question recently on the air on EWTN, Internal World Television Network which everybody might know of Mother Angelica if you have cable you could watch that program that he was asked that question and he said yes, she did have an exorcism

01:36:26

We do have another caller on the line Russ in Amityville, Long Island, New York Hello Chris, his name is

01:36:34

Mark Mark, if we could deviate if you don't mind in light of next month celebrating

01:36:42

St. Patrick's Day and you being a traditionalist is there a couple of questions

01:36:48

I guess I want to ask one, has St. Patrick ever been canonized by the church? and number two maybe if you could give us some history about him and what writings that we know about him

01:37:00

In fact, could you take your answer off the radio, Russ? Ok, that's fine

01:37:05

Yes, and actually Mark will answer that question when we come back from the break Ok, very good

01:37:10

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01:37:58

that's wrbc .us Mark, if you could just very briefly respond to that question since it's not really on the issue at hand

01:38:14

Right, well prior to the 12th century there was really no process at all for canonization of saints and so many of them, like St.

01:38:25

Patrick who lived in the first millennium was a popular appeal and so he was never formally canonized by the church and so that wasn't part of the process at all and you have certain examples of those who didn't go through the process like St.

01:38:44

Clement of Alexandria who after a thousand years of believing to be a saint and he got knocked off the calendar entirely

01:38:51

What was the second question? He said can you give us some historical background but obviously we don't have the time to do that because it's off subject

01:38:57

I can invite our listener to tune in, God willing on St. Patrick's Day or near that day because I plan on doing a program on why many evangelical

01:39:09

Protestants revere Patrick as a great hero of the Christian faith and why they would take the position that he was not a

01:39:17

Roman Catholic You said that you affirmed before the break that Mother Teresa did receive the right of exorcism

01:39:29

Now do you as a Catholic the Calvinist position would be that a true

01:39:36

Christian, a regenerate individual could not become demon possessed I don't know what the

01:39:41

Roman Catholic view is on that Can a regenerate Roman Catholic become demon possessed?

01:39:49

Well this is part of the differences between us Remember we spoke yesterday about the difference between a

01:39:54

Christian A Christian is defined only by a Calvinist as someone who is a member of the elect and they get regenerate, sanctified and the whole

01:40:08

Hortus Lutus by faith and that faith is given to them by Christ The Catholic viewpoint is that one can get the faith, temporary faith using the example of the sower and the seed and then later on that person could fall away and so those people wouldn't be considered among the predestined and only the predestined are going to heaven

01:40:34

I personally believe that no one who is among the elect, no predestined soul after the regenerate could ever be possessed

01:40:44

And ironically the issue of Mother Teresa's sainthood was brought up on that brilliant theological think tank today, it's called

01:40:53

The View It was kind of humorous that they were bringing this up Yeah, I think they're going to have me on But one of the questions that you ask in the book, and obviously you answer it as well, was the miracle attributed to Mother Teresa really miraculous?

01:41:14

Right, the answer is very clear It's no, and see if you, the woman who

01:41:22

Monica Bessra was the woman who supposedly was healed through Mother Teresa's intercession and if you examine the case what happened with her was that she was diagnosed with either some sort of stomach tumor or cyst of some sort, she was put on antibiotics and then apparently at the prayer session that they had when she was staying with the

01:41:47

MC's, Missionaries of Charity she all of a sudden had this feeling that she was getting better after being on medication for a couple months and then a couple days later, supposedly she was up on her feet and the tumor the cyst was gone and that doesn't fit the criteria for a miracle and actually

01:42:13

Catholics and Protestants agree with this and I actually quote B .B. Warfield or at least that particular reformed theologian but it's kind of a common viewpoint that a miracle to be a miracle has to be instantaneous it has to be complete, it has to be permanent and it has to be totally scientifically inexplicable and it doesn't fit the criteria of Monica Bessra she only had one of those qualifications that actually would fit in, which was that it was permanent she had no relapse so I'm assuming by this question that a miracle is something that is essential in the

01:42:49

Roman Catholic Church for someone to be canonized as a saint yes, today it's required you have to have two miracles, one for beatification and one for canonization it used to be that there was four and the process was much more strict prior to 1983 when it was revised by John Paul II your next question is in an age that is as wicked as this one, why is

01:43:20

Mother Teresa almost universally loved? Would wicked people not hate a holy person?

01:43:26

Our Lord didn't say that the world is going to love you expect that he told the apostles quite clearly that if they despise the

01:43:38

Master they're going to despise the servants and that's going to be the response but apparently, if you look at my book and I list all the awards that Mother Teresa received from the world and the adulation and even your introduction when you said that if you have somebody named a saint that her name would come up that someone in an age like ours where we're murdering our own children we're so disinterested in the ways of God and even the present

01:44:11

Pope Benedict and John Paul II and others would attest to this that how is it so that someone like Mother Teresa is so well loved?

01:44:21

In fact, I think it's quite interesting that you might even say or some might say, well the world generally loves

01:44:30

Jesus, don't they? Even Jews who reject him as the Messiah today usually say very kind things about him but they're actually loving a

01:44:38

Jesus that is a figment of their imagination and greeting cards they're not really loving a

01:44:44

Jesus that is the Jesus of the scripture. Right. And with Mother Teresa it's that they love her because of her doctrine

01:44:51

I mean, she came and said, you know, there's no under name under heaven by which you must be saved and repent and be baptized for the remission of your sins and that I am the way of the truth like no man comes to the

01:45:05

Father but through me instead of the statements that she made about helping Hindus become better Hindus and that she even

01:45:11

Vishnu or other names for God and things like this yeah, that's quite a difference.

01:45:20

Now, this really hinges on that question I thought it was very telling when

01:45:26

I witnessed some of the funeral of Mother Teresa on television the Hindu priests that were praying at this ceremony.

01:45:35

Now, if she were really an evangelist for the cause of Christ, would the

01:45:41

Hindu priests have embraced her with such admiration and love even to pay tribute to her at her funeral?

01:45:49

Well, I would draw the same conclusion. Why are the pagans attracted to this person?

01:45:56

But if you look at the gospel between the two, and I make these parallels all throughout the book, that with the group, the

01:46:04

Ramakrishna movement which is in India that preached the same exact gospel as Mother Teresa that the characteristics of the two are very telling.

01:46:16

That's why they would be there in the first place. Yes, from what I've heard from people who have evangelized

01:46:22

Hindus who work on the mission field in India have said that a

01:46:29

Hindu will have no problem with you at all if you say that Jesus Christ is your

01:46:35

God. Where they get furious, in fact, at times even to the point of martyring the individual is when you believe

01:46:42

Jesus is the only true God. Right, yeah. Well, that's an amazing thing and I bring that up in the book that Hinduism presents itself in this typical aspect of Pantheism, it presents itself as so inclusive.

01:46:55

But naturally if you push it, it actually is. It's not both then, it's either or because it's either you accept their position or you're wrong and that's when they respond.

01:47:08

But it's all love and games and I remember as a missionary brother running into a Hindu priest and he was being so ecumenical with the other brother

01:47:16

I was with and he was saying, oh well, we agree on everything we have the same faith and so forth.

01:47:23

So the other brother looked at me and said, you know what, I know how to get this guy. He said to the

01:47:28

Hindu priest that, okay, well, our church believes our faith believes that there's no salvation outside the church and instantly this

01:47:37

Hindu priest freaking out said, that teaching has nothing to do with God. So that's the response that all of a sudden that we didn't have things in common.

01:47:49

So he said, okay, well I guess then we're not unified. He went, okay, I guess not. Now these last four questions all hinge together so I'll just ask them all at the same time because their answers really, when you answer one you're really answering all of them,

01:48:06

I think. Was the work of the saints all a lie? Did the saints suffer and die for nothing? Were the saints wrong then?

01:48:13

Is Mother Teresa right now? Were the saints right then? Is Mother Teresa wrong now? Right.

01:48:19

I have a chapter in the book it's the second to the last one which is titled Shunning the Saints and I give text after text after text of Mother Teresa compared to text after text after text of the saints responding to the same teaching and there's no unity between them and her and so it's either a decision that you have to make that it's

01:48:41

Mother Teresa or it's these saints and many of them did lay down their lives and they poured their blood out for their beliefs and so you'd have to say, yeah, it was just wrong and we're going to have a new type of saint now.

01:48:58

We've got a new mass and so we'll have a new saint and everything will be new and we'll sing a new church unto the

01:49:05

Lord and that's part of where they're going with this, I believe. Well, going back to her quote, one of the many quotes that you cite in your book

01:49:17

I've always said that we should help a Hindu become a better Hindu, a Muslim become a better Muslim, a

01:49:22

Catholic become a better Catholic. Is the world a safer place if Muslims become better Muslims?

01:49:30

Well, probably many missionaries would probably say no to that that, you know, who have died getting burned in their cars because of their upsetting missionaries or upsetting the

01:49:43

Hindus and then also, you know, those who have studied culture realize, and I know you know the reformed thinker

01:49:54

Cornelius Van Til, probably the philosopher and theologian who said, you know, religion is just merely religion is the culture culture is the religion externalized, was his statement and someone like Christopher Dawson a

01:50:11

Catholic historian always was saying that too in his historical works so you look at the burden of where India is and the effect of, gee, that's in socioeconomic and all different other areas and you think, well, gee,

01:50:30

I really don't want to see that over the world and hinging on this whole subject of Mother Teresa I've heard that there is a movement among some

01:50:45

Roman Catholics to canonize Pope John Paul II what would your reaction to that be?

01:50:51

I've already been asked to do a sequel to my book, yeah you all it is true that Benedict XVI did waive the five year rule to proceed with his cause and so that is something they want to do obviously

01:51:13

John Paul II would be extremely problematic also not quite as much as Mother Teresa, but definitely it would be a huge problem would you go as far as to say that he was an apostate?

01:51:32

oh, boy I really want to get you in trouble today his doctrine was really pretty light in comparison to hers a lot of his errors have to do with heteropraxy more so than Herod's doctrine so I wouldn't go so far as to label him in the same classification as Mother Teresa across the board

01:52:02

I guess where some evangelicals have a difficult time understanding the doctrine of papal infallibility is how you could believe a person is still the vicar of Christ on earth and yet be a heretic and I just think if you could answer that when we come back from the break we have to go to a break right now, don't go away give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own you need to read

01:53:44

Mark the issue of as I said before evangelical

01:53:50

Christians have a hard time understanding how Catholics could simultaneously hold to infallible papacy while at the same time admitting that some folks have been and are heretical

01:54:02

I was brought up a Roman Catholic and the only thing that I really knew growing up that was taught by my church was that he was infallible in matters of faith and morals when

01:54:17

Pope John Paul makes declarations that are very pluralistic similar to those of Mother Teresa how could he have been infallible in a matter of faith in that regard there hasn't been a dogma of the faith pronounced since the

01:54:38

Assumption in 1950 so you have a couple of popes read down the line

01:54:44

John Paul II being one of them who never made an infallible declaration he just taught generally on issues in a defense of that how could possibly a heretic even one pope in church history was condemned as a heretic how exactly they could be we give the example such as in Matthew 23 where Jesus is saying the scribes and pharisees sit on Moses' seat so you must do as they say but not do as they do obviously they were in many respects heretics in many respects very poor examples of the faith of that time but there was a distinction made between what the true faith was handed down and what they were doing the other aspect or even some of the other false teachings the other example would be that when

01:55:40

Caiaphas prophesied that Jesus must die St. John in John 11 says he said this not of himself but he prophesied because he was the high priest of that year that Jesus would die

01:55:56

God can work through heretics and people who are of that nature to keep the faith going so those are the answers

01:56:08

I would give for that so I would assume then folks like Jerry Matitix of the Sedevacantist ilk would disagree with you on that he definitely has answers as I understand it for these problems and obviously we are having a problem in church history if we have to define ourselves as traditionalist or neocons or conservatives or liberals this type of thing 50 years ago no such terminology even existed so what

01:56:39

Catholics are trying to do is gee how do we all the upheaval that has been unleashed on us how do we make sense of it all and what

01:56:49

Jerry has done is he has chosen he looked at the documents of the past and he said well the only conclusion

01:56:56

I can come to at this point is that these guys are heretics and apostates and I can't believe that any of them are popes and by the way if any of you listening are interested in hearing the discussion that evangelical protestant

01:57:11

Dr. James White had with Jerry Matitix on this issue you can look up the archived programs

01:57:18

Jerry spells his name with a G as in George but anyway in conclusion would you like to say something that I may have overlooked to ask you about Mother Teresa that you would like to leave with our audience today well

01:57:34

I would like them to understand that this is not done out of a hatred for Mother Teresa and this is the only book that is in print that I know of in the world and we are on Amazon around the world and Barnes and Noble, Borders and all these other places where you can go for the information on her that will present her virtues in light of her vices as well in light of the faith that she claimed to hold and so I don't want people to walk away and think that this is done out of a hatred for her but actually a love for Christ and the faith that he handed on and I also want them to understand that I am following the canonical teachings of the church

01:58:18

I am not wandering out of I don't have to go back pre -Vatican

01:58:24

II to defend my position my thesis on her starts with the new catechism and the conciliar and post conciliar documents and then also they have a right and a duty to find out the truth and to let

01:58:41

Rome know what their viewpoint is on this and they can respond they have that freedom to do that so they shouldn't feel that somehow they are being unfaithful if they do speak up well if anybody is interested in ordering this book the publishers website coldtreepress www .coldtreepress

01:59:04

.com c -o -l -d -t -r -e -e -p -r -e -s -s dot com

01:59:10

Mark Michael Zima it was a great pleasure to have you back on the program Thank you Chris And that was our rebroadcast of our two day interview with Mark Michael Zima who is a

01:59:23

Roman Catholic opposing the canonization of Mother Teresa which is supposed to take place this fall tomorrow we have on the program live

01:59:33

Dr. Tony Costa professor of apologetics at Toronto Baptist Seminary to evaluate this discussion that we had with Mark Michael Zima so we hope you tune in tomorrow and we look forward to receiving your questions and as always