Interview With Timothy Flanders

Happy St. Patrick’s day!  I know things aren’t too cheerful out there with the coronavirus but now is a good time to grow in the faith.  Many people are isolating themselves and many that aren’t should.  We shouldn’t go to unnecessary gatherings.  This gives us a chance for prayer, holy reading, and a little Catholic YouTube.  I recently interviewed Timothy Flanders who runs the website meaningofcatholic.com.

I had interviewed Flanders before on his conversion story but I wanted to have him on to talk about his new book which is called Introduction to the Holy Bible for Traditional Catholics.  This book deals a lot with higher criticism of the Bible.  In talking with Protestants or even Jews, this is a minor issue.  However, anyone who deals with Muslims has to know the higher criticism game.  It’s pretty much the only bullet in their gun at this point.

In the Gospel of John we read:

For if you did believe Moses, you would perhaps believe me also; for he wrote of me.  But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?

– John 5: 46-47

Jesus Christ is affirming Mosaic authorship of the Torah here.  We also get a similar statement in Mark 10:5.  Although they claim to believe in Christ, in practice they reject him.  Why do they reject Him?  It has to do with a rejection of the Torah.  Liberal so called Christians have fallen in love with the documentary hypothesis.  A hypothesis that has absolutely no evidence for it.  None whatsoever.  Sadly, Pope John Paul II fell victim to this bogus theory and this can be seen in Evangelium Vitae 35.

Another collapse of modern Biblical scholarship is called Markan priority.  It’s the belief that Mark is the first gospel written which isn’t true at all.  The Church has always stated that Matthew was written first.  This actually came up in the recent debate between Shabir Ally and John Tors.  I’m glad that there is opposition to this movement.  In the interview Flanders talks about how this was done in Germany in the 19th in an attempt to undermine the Papacy since the keys of the Kingdom are given to St. Peter in Matthew and not Mark.  It can then be written off as a later development.  Of course, traditional Christianity has always regarded Matthew as the first gospel.  Have you ever wondered why it’s the first of the four gospels in your Bible?

Since a lot of us are going to be staying in isolation for the near future, now is the time to read this book.  It’s very cheap.  I have many books in my library that are well over $50.  Obviously some books aren’t cheap; this one is.  Let’s use the pandemic to help us become better Christians.