Joe tackles 3 of the supposed “contradictions” addressed by Redeemed Zoomer in his recent video.

Transcript:

Joe:

Welcome back to Shameless Popery. I’m Joe Heschmeyer, and as many of you may already know, Redeemed Zoomer recently released a video where he laid out 14 examples of what he believed were Catholic contradictions. Four of them were claims that he made where the Catholic church he said had contradicted itself and infallible declarations. Now, Trent Horn has already done a fantastic reply looking at all 14 of those, but it’s really hard to do justice to 14 largely unrelated topics and give them the time and attention they deserve. So I’m not going to even try to do that. I’m going to go deep on three of the issues that he presented. So on the list of infallible contradictions, I’m going to leave alone for now and if you want me to cover these issues, let me know here in the comments or better yet over in shameless joe.com on my Patreon.

Leave it in the comments there. If you want me to cover some of these other alleged contradictions, I can get into that. But again, I’m going to link to the Trent’s video at the end. It’s fantastic, but on the alleged infallible contradictions he’ll, four, the question of salvation outside the church, the history of icon veneration and the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of Protestant baptism, I’m going to leave those three alone and focus on the strange history of conci and the question whether popes or ecumenical councils have the last word. If there’s a conflict between the two, those are the four that he views as infallible. The other ones, he doesn’t claim that they’re like a silver bullet. Oh, the church infallibly contradicted herself. That would be the end of Catholicism, but here’s got 10 others where he views a contradiction that he at least thinks undermines the church’s authority.

So that’s going to be things like the history of secretive confession, the death penalty. Can Catholics participate in non-Catholic worship usury? We’re going to leave all of those alone and focus on a much more obscure one for many of you, which is when you go to receive communion, should you receive the host or should you receive from the chalice or both? And a contradiction he alleged occurred in history and we’ll get into that. And then more of the last five that he had were about the Pope’s political authority and universal jurisdiction, divorce and remarried people receiving communion, religious liberty. We’re going to leave those alone and focus on whether the mass must be in the common language. And the reason I’m doing this is largely this. I think Trent does a great job on covering the broad 14. These were three areas where I thought I think we could go deeper on these and show that the argument is maybe a little weaker than you might imagine if you don’t know the sources very well.

Now I want to lay out a standard by which I think you can judge this reply and then a standard by which I think you can judge redeem Zimmer’s original video. So I love Austin at Gospel Simplicity. He is one of my favorite Protestant YouTubers and he lays out a fivefold standard for what a good reply video looks like, and I want you to hold me to this. You can decide if it’s good or bad based on whether it meets this criteria. So number one, I should show an understanding of the central thesis and not just focus on unrelated rhetoric or minor points. Number two, focusing on arguments rather than the character of the opponent. I don’t think that’s going to be a problem. I like redeem zoomer. We’ve sparred in the past, but I think he’s a good faith guy. Number three, looking at seeking the truth together, not simply defeating an opponent.

So I’m going to try not to just say debunked in all caps or something at any point. Number four, focusing on the question content at hand, not unrelated questions and content. Number five, as a Christian working with fellow Christians to seek unity and truth, I think those are great criteria to look for in this episode and in any response videos or back and forth that you see because it’s really easy on YouTube and just the online space in general to not live up to that. Now what about maybe standards you can hold redeem Zoomers contradiction video to? And here I think again, this is going to be true of contradiction videos in general. A week ago I released an episode on the Islamic dilemma where the Quran contradicts, I mean it lays out a standard that disproves itself without revisiting the whole thing. Basically the Quran says if we want to know it’s true, we should look to the Torah and the gospel.

When we look to the Torah gospel, we see that Islam is false and so it’s self refuting intentionally. I didn’t look to the secondary and tertiary sources because a Muslim doesn’t have to accept those secondary and tertiary sources. I’ve known other people who have done a bolstered case where they look at all these other times and places where it seems like there are more contradictions I tried to stick with, okay, just at the highest level, what are we going to get? Because if you’re claiming, Hey, this Catholic doesn’t follow Catholic teaching, that’s not an argument against the Catholic church. Just like if they say this Muslim doesn’t know the Quran very well, that’s not really an argument against Islam. So if you’re going to make a contradiction video, if you’re going to argue, hey, this thing is actually self-refuting, that is a high bar to lay out for yourself.

So I want to just acknowledge that at the outset and then one of the comments that I received on that video, I want to show why I think we have to be careful with it because Hassan, I don’t even know who this person is, just one of the YouTubers or one of the YouTube commenters, excuse me, claimed that one of the lies which made Christianity done for is the idea that God is one in three at the same time, but any Trinitarian knows. Sure, that looks like a contradiction at the outset to say, oh, how can God be one and three, but if you’ve done any work, okay, well it makes sense that there could be three divine persons and one divine substance that might be mind blowing, but it’s not contradictory. So we should have a high standard for what it takes to be a contradiction and we should strive in the spirit of charity to say, is there a way of interpreting these where it’s not contradictory? Because if you don’t take that standard, you can make anything look ridiculous, Christianity, you name it, but I just say hold me to the standard of charity and understanding his argument and hold redeem zoomer and anyone making contradiction videos to the standard of are you looking to the actual sources and is this a real contradiction or just a surface level contradiction that when you dig in, it actually turns out there’s an explanation for it and redeem zoomer for his part lays out this standard for himself.

Redeemed Zoomer:

Unlike Joe Hess Meyer, I don’t judge other denominations based on the average street level understanding of them. I judge them based on the official confessions.

Joe:

Now I think when you actually hear his argument against Catholicism, you’ll hear that he frequently doesn’t live up to his own standard. I find him doing right away things like this.

Redeemed Zoomer:

Bishop Robert Baron famously told Ben Shapiro that not only Jews but atheists of goodwill can reasonably hope to be saved.

Joe:

But while Pope Leo and Ben Shapiro might both occasionally wear skull caps, only one of them is viewed by the Catholic church as infallible. In all seriousness, Bishop Robert Barron might’ve said something off the cuff in an interview with Ben Shapiro that was inaccurate and not a great way to answer a question that doesn’t undermine the authority of the Catholic church or the Catholic claim in any way. That’s just not how Catholic teaching is established. It’s fine to say I believe the claims of the Catholic church and sometimes people, whether it’s Bishop Baron or even Pope Leo himself when asked a question, might give an off the cuff answer that is inexact, inaccurate, maybe misleading. There’s no contradiction there as just the nature of being human and answering questions off the cuff. So I think by R Z’s own standard, we’re going to want something better than that.

Now in fairness, he offers some other things as well, but we’re going to want to distinguish some of the wheat from the chaff because there’s a lot of these areas where he makes these claims that don’t seem to be very well sourced. For instance, he seems to think that the Catholic view is that the entirety of ecumenical counsels, everything they say is infallible, which is not the Catholic claim. I’ll show you a couple places that he says this. One of them he just vaguely cites to Cardinal Dolan and Father Francis Sullivan alleging that they taught that Vatican two was infallible.

Redeemed Zoomer:

Catholics may also try and say that Vatican two is somehow not infallible. While this is a controversial opinion opposed by major Catholic theologians like Francis Sullivan and Cardinal Dolan even granting the possibility that this is true, Catholics today are still bound to submit to something Vatican two that contradicts previous infallible teaching.

Joe:

Trent mentioned this in his reply as well, but I have no idea where he’s getting either these claims about Sullivan or Dolan. I looked for Cardinal Dolan to see if he’d said anything that approached this and AI was confused for his part. Father Sullivan says the exact opposite. He actually wrote an entire book on the magisterium in different levels of teaching authority in the church and he makes it very clear that the second Vatican council is an ecumenical council. But whereas Trent and Vatican one exercised the supreme teaching authority of the Episcopal College, which fullest extent by solemnly defining documents of faith, which is to say acting in this infallible way, Vatican two chose not to do so. It had the authority to do so if it had wished and chose not to. So he explicitly doesn’t argue yet they’re doing the kind of dogmatic definitions that Vatican one or Trent are doing. So I’ll leave it up to RZ to clarify where he’s getting these claims, but they don’t seem to be true. So with that said, let’s turn to the first of the alleged contradictions that the mass must be celebrated in the vernacular, and this was if you’re following his list, this was his very last one, contradiction number 14, he worded it must the mass be in the common language, and here’s how he presents the alleged problem.

Redeemed Zoomer:

One of the biggest controversies in modern Roman Catholicism is the traditional Latin mass. The mass used to normally be said in Latin, but ever since Vatican two, most Catholic parishes have used the Novus Ordo, which is in the common or vulgar tongue and allows for things like Protestant music and other liturgical liberties. There are a minority of parishes that still do the traditional Latin mass, but they’re to some degree suppressed by the church, especially under Pope Francis. However, the Council of Trent strongly condemned not simply holding the mass in the vulgar tongue but insisting on it. Trent says, if anyone sayeth that the right of the Roman church, according to which a part of the cannon and the words of consecration are pronounced in a low tone is to be condemned or that the mass ought to be celebrated in the vulgar tongue only or that water ought not to be mixed with the wine that is to be offered in the chalice for that is contrary to the institution of Christ, let him be anathema. And once again, this is not a dogmatic contradiction, but it definitely is a change in the spirit of Catholicism from Trent of Vatican two.

Joe:

So redeem Zeer seems to believe that the Novas Soto has to be said in the vernacular and even the way he words it must be said in the common language and that’s just factually untrue. The Pope pointed out recently that no, you can say mass in Latin right now in the Novas Soto, I mean Novas Soto is in Latin. I mean those where those words come from. And so if we’re looking at official sources, now granted it’s the Pope giving an interview, so still not like the highest level of authority, but we’re going to get to more clear church teaching on this point. It’s just not true that you have to say the mass not in Latin. And the reason that this matters is because the alleged contradiction is that the Council of Trent condemns the idea that the mass ought to be celebrated in the vulgar tongue, only that it can only be celebrated in the vernacular, but that’s not what Catholics have ever taught.

So there’s no contradiction between Trent saying the mass doesn’t have to be in the vernacular, and the church today is saying the mass doesn’t have to be in the vernacular. That’s not a contradiction at all. In fact, if you read the general instruction of the Roman missile, it talks about this change where Trent considered creating the mass at that point in the vernacular and decided against it. But it’s worth getting into the weeds here just slightly if I may. So this paragraph 11 of the germ, the general instruction of the Roman missile, it says many were pressing, this is at Trent for permission to use the vernacular in celebrating the Eucharistic sacrifice, but the council weighing the conditions of that age considered it a duty to answer this request with a reaffirmation of the church’s traditional teaching according to which the Eucharistic sacrifice is first and foremost the action of Christ himself and therefore its proper efficacy is unaffected by the manner in which the faith will partake of it.

Now notice what’s happening there. The fathers at Trent are aware of all the reasons you might want the mass to be in the vernacular and they’re sympathetic to them. They’re worried about the arguments the reformers are making, which makes it seem like the mass is only as valid as our contribution to it, and this undermines the priestly efficacy of Christ’s action in the mass. This is ultimately a participation in the sacrifice being offered by Jesus Christ. And so they don’t want to make the switch at that point in that context because they know that this is kind of a powder keg situation with the reformation. And so the German goes on to say the council for his reason stated in firm but measured words and then this is a direct quote from Trent, which matters a lot, although the mask contains much instruction for people of faith.

Nevertheless, it did not seem expedient to the fathers that it be celebrated everywhere in the vernacular. So very clearly it is laying this out as a prudential decision. It didn’t seem expedient. It’s not saying it is a matter of 2000 years of Catholic faith that we can never celebrate the mass in the common language. It’s not saying that at all. So there’s no dogmatic point that is at issue here at all. They just decide prudentially, it doesn’t make sense to move to the vernacular right now when that’s going to be read a certain way through the lens of the reformation. Then the germ points out by the time you get to the second Vatican council, things have changed quite a bit and so the fathers of Vatican two decide, well, okay, we seem like we’re in a different enough situation. And so here I want to quote from the germ directly, since no Catholic would now deny the lawfulness and efficacy of a sacred right celebrated in Latin, the council was also able to grant that the use of the vernacular language may frequently be of great advantage to the people and gave the faculty for its use.

So a thing that they had considered permitting before they now permit because the circumstances had changed and critically the circumstances changed because they were no longer worried anyone would claim the thing that redeemed zoomer is claiming that the mass has to be in the common language. So the actual contradiction is not between two Catholic sources, but between what the Catholic church actually says no Catholic would now deny the lawfulness and efficacy of a sacred right celebrated in Latin with redeemed zoomer claim that the Novas Ordo is celebrated only in the common language. So that’s the contradiction, but it’s not between the Catholic church and herself, it’s between R Z’s description of the Catholic church and what the Catholic church actually says in her documents. So using the standards redeem zoomer lays out for himself. I think we can say these kind of contradictions just simply are not contradictions. He’s just factually mistaken. Okay, now onto the second contradiction, this idea about communion in both kinds. Here he’s going to make a citation to an alleged quote from Pope Gallius arguing that you actually have to receive both the host and the chalice at mass.

Redeemed Zoomer:

Over the centuries, people began worrying that they would accidentally spill a drop of wine. Pope Gallius the first condemned this growing practice saying, we have ascertained that certain persons receiving only a portion of the sacred body abstained from the cup of the sacred blood. Such persons without a doubt are to be held bound by a certain superstition. Pope Gallius also said that division of one in the same mystery or sacrament cannot come about without a great sacrilege.

Joe:

This is an old claim that was made against the Catholic church and it’s been debunked many times. Let’s go through several of the problems with it. Number one, there is no citation that he gives in terms of like, show me the source where Glas actually says this. He just claims he says it. And this is a problem because as Father FC Husbeth pointed out back in I believe the 19th century, he said The authenticity of this epistle of Galatians is very doubtful. It’s not found in his genuine works. We don’t find it quoted before the 12th century. Those are big red flags. So we don’t actually know that Galacia said anything like this. It might have been someone else and then later ascribed to him. Nevertheless, it’s clear somebody said that you need to offer both. You need to receive both. That then raises the second problem that in context, because this is taken up into Ian, into his works on Canon law, which is how we have it today, and Ian clearly understands it to be about priests.

We don’t have the original source. We have Ian believing that it applies to priests. Now why does that matter? Because unlike the laity, the priest is bound to receive both the host and the chalice. And again, if you read the general instruction of the Roman missile, it makes this explicit. It’s most desirable. The faithful just as the priest himself is bound to do, receive the Lord’s body from host consecrated the same mass, and that in the instances when it is permitted, they partake of the chalice. So these are nice for the laity. They’re not required. In fact, you’re not required to receive communion at all When you go to mass, a lot of people go to mass and they have not properly prepared or they’re in a state of mortal sin, et cetera. They’re not required to receive under either form. The church is not saying when you go to mass you are required to receive.

That’s simply not true. The priest in making the offering is required to receive both because it’s part of the sacrificial action as a priest. So it doesn’t really make sense that Glacis would be talking about the laity because the whole reason why the priest has to receive both is because he’s making a priestly sacrifice. You as a lay member of the congregation share in that sacrifice, but you’re not the one presiding or offering. So that’s a second pretty obvious problem is just like it doesn’t get the sacramental theology right, and there’s every reason to believe given the way Ian is using it and the way this quote was received until the reformation that we’re not talking about the Catholic laity at all. And if we’re talking about priests, there’s no contradiction because priests are still required to receive both because of the nature of priestly offering. I could get more into that, but I don’t want to get bogged down in the details there. But the third problem is as Father Waterworth points out that this appears to be part of a controversy over manism, which is why there’s this reference to superstition.

I dunno if you paid careful attention to what redeem zoomer said. He said over the centuries people began worrying that they would accidentally spill a drop of wine. That is simply not true. That is not what’s happening in the mannequin controversy. Rather as St. Augustine explains, the Manican prided themselves on the fact that they didn’t eat flesh or drink wine. Why? Because the Manne had a disdain for worldly realities and particularly for anything that might be connected with fleshly delight. And so meat and wine were forbidden to them, and Augustine actually mocks them by saying that as Catholics, we look at their abstaining from meat and wine the same way we would look at cattle or birds or worms. Yeah, they don’t eat meat and wine either, but we’re not super impressed by how holy they are. So I just mentioned that as the third thing that he’s not saying.

First of all, he’s not saying the lady are always required to receive, and also we know from the mannequin context that the gal and then also the Leo quote that redeem Zimmer has in the same episode, the context of them is condemning a specific heresy where Manichean priests wouldn’t want to receive both because they didn’t believe that wine was good. That is simply not at all relevant to the controversies that we’re dealing with today. That then leads to the final thing that I think pretty thoroughly debunks the idea that there’s any kind of contradiction here.

Redeemed Zoomer:

Communion of both kinds was the ordinary practice of the early church. There were exceptions such as lacking one of the elements or being unable to receive them, but they were exceptions.

Joe:

So redeem zoomer admits that people in the early church sometimes only received one. They didn’t always receive both. Now that clearly shows that they weren’t just manican or superstitious or it was destroying the validity of the right. Simply not true. The ordinary laity would regularly, maybe not as regularly as later, but there are plenty of instances where they would receive one or the other and not both. I’ll give you a few examples. St Ian of Carthage in his treatise on the laps treatise three gives a reference to a young child. Remember early kids, early kids, kids in the early church would receive communion after they were baptized. And so there was a baby who was too small to speak, who in the context had been consecrated to demons or something by foster parents. A horrible situation and the way they find out is that the baby won’t receive from the chalice, but significantly the baby’s only receiving from the chalice is not receiving the host because a baby can’t receive hosts they can’t chew.

On the flip side, basil, the great points out that it’s unnecessary to point out that in times of persecution you have people who receiving communion in their own hand without the presence of a priest or minister as long as custom permits it. So there would be people who would self communicate with the Eucharist because of persecution they couldn’t receive from the priest. So you have a second. So you’ve got babies receiving under one kind. You’ve got people who can’t have access to a priest because of persecution receiving under one kind, and basil gives a third example of people like monks. Well, what do you call solitary in the desert? These are people who lived like this radical if think abou... Read more on Catholic.com