Our Lady of Fatima Made Me Catholic w/ Gideon Lazar

Matt chats with Gideon Lazar about his conversion from secular Judaism to Eastern Orthodoxy to Catholicism. They also talk about the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima as well as young earth creationism.

Watch The Post-Show Q&A: https://pintswithaquinas.com/support/

Intro music by Emma Fradd

00:00 Video starts
5:30 Intro
6:29 Summary of Gideon’s story
7:11 Jewish bread (challah)
7:46 Movements in Judaism (Conservative movement is traditional in liturgy but liberal in theology)
9:15 Interest in religion as an atheist
9:35 Interest in history lead to reading the gospels (and discovering a Jesus different to the weird hippy Jewish democrat voting he heard about growing up)
10:55 Jesus speaks with distinct authority and indescribable voice that no one else speaks with
11:24 Debating the evidence for the resurrection (Argument from incredulity)
15:11 Our Lady of Fatima and the argument of alleged mass hallucination
16:33 Initially kept secret the realisation that Christianity was true until he found which is the right type to follow
18:07 Interest in politics lead to joining FB political groups (and found religious people there who turned out to be Eastern Orthodox that mentioned the church fathers and that the church is meant to be passed down from generation to generation)
18:47 Accepts the resurrection of Christ (it was difficult to go from being convinced by the evidence to actual faith in Christ).
19:07 Learning how to pray
20:15 The eastern version of Hail Mary
21:13 Attends church for the first time at the age of 17 when his parents were out of town (describes his experience at Greek Orthodox)
24:16 Jewish summer camp
29:25 Genocide and religion
30:17 Gideon’s parents say he is allowed to be Christian but just not Pro-life
32:39 Writing an English essay in high school convinced him of the Pro-life stance (and it still enabled him to fight for left wing socialist ideals i.e. for a marginalised group and those who cannot speak out for themselves)
34:07 The feedback on a contrarian group paper on ‘Should there be bible study classes on public schools’ showed that the bible is viewed different to other ancient texts in Greek.
34:46 Story about being a Catechumen in senior year (and how some online groups can be toxic)
35:33 The importance of the bible
38:03 First exposure to the Catholic church through a Catholic university
39:07 Gideon’s view on Catholic at the time
39:53 The average Orthodox parish has a more balanced view than what you find online
40:50 Russian Orthodox is more traditional
41:29 Schism between the Greek and Russian (and how it affected where to do his baptism)
43:10 What it was like seeing this Schism about 2 years after becoming a Christian
44:08 There was no a reciprocal breaking in communion by ecumenical patriarch
45:10 Looking at churches from an ethnicity perspective e.g. Irish Catholic or Polish Catholic is not a good argument because they are not breaking communion
46:01 Western rite Orthodox
48:58 What is Epiclesis
50:41 Livestream of St. Patrick Orthodox Church, Bealeton, Virginia.
51:38 Liturgy
52:31 Debating Catholics friends meant he had to do more research
53:09 What is Filioque (and how it affects the metaphysics of the Trinity)
1:04:43 How Duns Scotus reconciled St. Augustine and St. John Damascene
1:05:32 How to view infinity
1:07:35 Why the Essense/Energy issue is confusing to a Thomist
1:09:00 Divine simplicity
1:10:32 Byzantine Scotus youtube channel
1:10:56 Who is right on the Filioque
1:12:12 Gideon’s first Catholic mass experience
1:15:58 Anybody who is a good chanter or organist leave a comment
1:16:07 high mass and low mass
1:18:15 Felt a calling to be Catholic and then first started seriously looking into becoming Catholic
1:18:37 Gideon’s first experience praying the rosary
1:19:58 How he met his wife
1:20:16 Rosary translated into Braille
1:22:54 How changes in enthusiasm do not lead to a change a worldview
1:24:46 God's providence
1:27:06 Response to scandals
1:31:07 Why Gideon is Catholic
1:32:54 What did the people at Fatima witness?
1:33:42 The possible explanations for what was witnessed
1:36:37 Why think it was not a mass hallucination
1:38:59 Why think it was not demonic
1:40:47 Orthodox and the immaculate heart of Mary
1:42:32 Consecration of Russia
1:44:26 Felt saint calling him to become Catholic (the last emotional push after being convinced intellectually)
1:47:28 What did Gideon’s parents think of him becoming Catholic
1:48:09 Does he maintain his devotions
1:49:19 Byzantine Catholic attendance
1:50:50 Learning to better appreciate the divine liturgy after reading the scholastics
1:51:30 What is the best argument against being Catholic and why it fails
1:54:19 Orthodox and contraception
1:55:54 Papacy played a minor role issue because even though there were good arguments for it the history is very debatable and very Nuanced!
1:56:28 Addressing evolution
2:24:59 Show wrap up.