We are going to go to Anonymous in Syracuse, Indiana. Anonymous, are you
with us? Yes I am. And guess what the question is? The question is: why are you
Protestant? Why am I Protestant? Okay, well, like many others, I'm Protestant mostly
because I was born Protestant. I was raised in an Anabaptist family. My
parents were Amish, I was raised Mennonite; and I live in a
very large Mennonite community, and honestly Catholicism was never even on
my radar. I can relate. Yeah, like in high school I think maybe we had one
Catholic family, you know. And then the little touches that I had with
Catholicism, just, I wasn't interested. You know, like, I went to a Catholic wedding
and it was, like, ridiculous. You know, like everybody was drunk and it was crazy and
it was just like, I couldn't-- I can assure you, Anonymous,
having been married two years ago in the Catholic Church, the wedding with my wife
was nothing like that, so that must have been an anomaly.
And mind you, it wasn't the wedding; I'm sure you're talking about the reception.
Exactly, you're right! It would be really bad if it was at the wedding. Right, exactly, it was the
reception. But it was just, there was nothing along the way that would have made me
interested at all until about three months ago. I have a long drive to
work, and I was so tired of NPR, and I couldn't, you know, I didn't want
sports talk, I find Christian radio pretty boring, and all of
that. So I was just channel surfing and I found Catholic radio, I--first of all,
I was just blown away. So I've been listening a lot the last three
months, but things that have--and there's a
lot of things I don't have an issue with, like the idea of a universal Church
and a universal authority. I actually believe in that, but it's just
hard--so who should have that authority? That's not really
my question, though. Okay. So what is really getting at you, Anonymous?
Ok, so here let me tell you, so why am I not Catholic? Yes, okay. And
help me with this hurdle, and it might just be personal, but it has to do
with the physical part of Catholicism. Okay.
Like, I would hear stories sometimes about, like, there was miracles by
a Virgin Mary statue or something, and she was crying, and I just felt like that
just seems crazy. Like, you know, hocus-pocus stuff or whatever. So that
was in the past; but even now today, like a couple times I've been in Catholic
churches and I find the statues really offensive. Like, personally
offensive, and let me explain a little bit why: growing up in the Amish
tradition, you don't even take pictures, because those are "graven images,"
you know? So like, in my home now, even though I'm no longer even Mennonite, I'm
just in a mainstream Protestant Church, I don't have nativities in my home,
I don't have pictures of Jesus in my home, I don't wear a cross with the crucifix.
That is very consistent where many Protestants are not, Anonymous. That's right. I
really appreciate what you're saying. You know what, I think I got the gist of this,
so if I could jump in, Anonymous. I think the key here is to understand, even from
the Old Testament, that that Amish sort of
Mennonite understanding is really not biblical. When you go back to the Old
Testament, for example, in Exodus 20, where you have the Ten Commandments, right, "Thou
shalt not make any graven image of any likeness of anything being in heaven or
earth or under the sea;" if you go just five chapters later, just five chapters,
in Exodus 25:18, what do you have? God commands Moses to make the Ark of
the Covenant, and over the top of the mercy seat you have two enormous
five-foot-tall golden angels. They're cherubim. And so God
commands--and I love the way that it's written there in the King James Version.
It says: "Thou shalt make two golden cherubim out of beaten gold." So wait a
minute, God said "No statues," and then He commands Moses to make a statue. And
think of this as well: the Ark of the Covenant, where
you have these enormous golden statues, became a source of God's
grace and God's power for God's people. And then you go to Numbers chapter 21
verses 8 and 9 and you see, when Moses and the children of Israel were in the
wilderness and they began to rebel against God, God sends a plague of snakes
among them, Moses intercedes for them; God commands Moses once again, He says: "Make a
brazen serpent, put it up on a pole," and when the children of Israel looked to it,
they were healed. Now, you and I know that in John chapter 3 verses
11 and 12 in the New Testament, we find that is a type or an image representing
the coming Christ. But nevertheless, the point is: God uses stuff. He uses the
physical world to be instruments whereby he brings his blessing to his people. And
so even in the Old Testament you have that. Now even though you don't have any
images of God in the Old Testament, because God in Deuteronomy 4:16 has a
stricture against having images of God-- but even there it's an interesting point
here, Anonymous. He says--God tells them why. He says: "I did not command you
concerning the making of images when I brought you out of Israel because I took
no form among you." So God tells them why. "I don't want you making forms because I
didn't take a form." Well, guess what? In the New Testament, He does: "The Word was
made flesh and dwelt among us." And we believe, Anonymous, that in the
Incarnation, now God has become flesh. And so while we only have that limited use
of images in the Old Testament, we have a much fuller sense of images in the New
Testament because, well, principally in Colossians chapter 1:14-15,
especially verse 15, it says: "Christ is the image of God, the firstborn of all
creation." And the Greek word there for "image" is "eikon," or "icon."
Christ is the ultimate icon because of the Incarnation. We believe that in the
the Incarnation God became physical, and so he relates to us physically. Not that
he didn't in the Old; yes he did, through the ark and the
the brazen serpent and such. But now it's a much more intimate and physical relationship.
So Tim, let's pull this together, and then Anonymous, we'll hear from you. So
you're saying, Tim, that when God said, "Do not make graven images,"
He wasn't saying, "Do not make images of any kind," because He later commanded people
to make images; rather, He was forbidding the creation of images people would
worship in idolatry. Absolutely right, Trent. And Anonymous, He's condemning
idolatry, not the making of statues, because if He was condemning the making
of statues, He contradicts himself. Right, because He wouldn't command you later to do
something he said not to do before. So Anonymous, that was a lot to take in; is
that helpful for what you're searching through? It is helpful. I do--
one question that you know I'd have as a follow-up is the Old Testament and the
New Testament thing, but I can read about that. I do have one more question, though,
that's related to the physical, okay? Like, to dwell in the tabernacle--
you know, do you believe that the presence of God is in the building?
Like, the cathedrals or whatever? Like I go there and the
presence of God dwells there? Because that's a hang-up I have too, like
in Ephesians 2 where it says "We are being built into the dwelling place of
God in spirit," and "Where two or three are gathered, I'm there in your midst." So what
what is it about, that the presence of God is in a building?
Absolutely. Here you ask a very important question. First of all, we
believe, just as you do, Anonymous, that God dwells in all Christians in a
special way. Through our baptism, the Holy Spirit comes to dwell within us. Matthew
18:19, which you quoted, "Where two or three are gathered together in my name,
there am I in their midst," so not only is Jesus
present with us via the Holy Spirit individually through our baptism, just as
when Jesus was baptized the Holy Spirit descends
upon him, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased;" that's, you know, Jesus
didn't need to be baptized, because he was God, but He's showing us this is the way
that, as individuals, God the Holy Spirit comes to dwell within us. So as
individuals, God dwells within us. Collectively, there is a special way in
which God dwells within us, as you mentioned in Matthew 18:19.
So in other words, we agree with you, Anonymous, on these
things. However, there is a special way in which Christ is present in his Church,
and that is in the Eucharist. Because Jesus comes, as he said in John 6:53, he
said: "Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life
in you." Jesus said "This is my body" on Holy Thursday, and St. Paul tells us, in
1 Corinthians 11:27-29, that Jesus is actually present--body, blood,
soul, and divinity--in the Eucharist; and because of that fact, in the Tabernacles
in all the apostolic Churches around the world that have valid Eucharist, Jesus is
present in--as Trent mentioned in the last hour--in a physical reality. He's
present body, blood, soul, and divinity. So there is a special presence even beyond
that individual presence where the Holy Spirit's in us. He's in us collectively; in
Catholic Churches, he's in the tabernacle, body, blood, soul, and divinity. Anonymous, I hope that
that's helpful. If you have other questions, call us back or go to Catholic.com.