In this clip, Cy Kellett welcomes Karlo Broussard to discuss the reasons behind Thomas’s departure from Catholicism to Coptic Orthodoxy. Karlo dives into the complexities of papal doctrine and the implications of the Council of Chalcedon, challenging the foundations of faith and understanding. Join us for a thought-provoking conversation that questions the very essence of Christian belief!
Transcript:
Cy Kellett: I have to tell you something, Thomas. We don’t get very many people who call up and say, I used to be Catholic, but the Council of Chalcedon is the one that threw me off. I’m just curious, how did that happen? How did you come to study that council and decide that the Catholic position was wrong?
Caller: Yeah, good question. So it really came to. I had interacted with Oriental Orthodox, and I tried to. I tried to essentially show, okay, I can accept that your Christology is Orthodox, but you were at fault for not accepting the Council of Chalcedon because of either the papacy being the end all, be all, or because our Christology is Orthodox too. And both of those ended up failing in the end. Okay.
Karlo Broussard: All right. Yeah. So, Thomas, this is an interesting position you stated at the outset. So we have two issues here. So one that’s more fundamental, namely the papacy and the role that the papacy is going to play, which, from the Catholic point of view, as you know, Thomas, would be the guiding rule in order to discern what is authentic Christology and what is the appropriate understanding of Christ. So let me ask you this, Thomas. On whose testimony do you rely, definitively speaking, in order to know that the Chalcedonian definition of the two natures united into one person of Christ is false? What infallible testimony do you rely on to make that judgment?
Caller: I believe that our. This is an epistemological question. I believe that epistemologically, we answer these questions by reception. What might be called reception theory. And you see this in the. And the seven councils that the Eastern Orthodox hold as ecumenical, where the. The approach to determining what is true doctrine is what the Church Fathers taught and what has passed down from them. Okay. And if the way we can know that some view is false is if a previous ecumenical council, or the consensus of the Fathers, or the consensus patrum, if it contradicts what is being proposed, then, well, we know which one is right and which one is wrong.
Karlo Broussard: All right? But by looking to prior ecumenical councils, that would assume that those ecumenical councils and the judgments that they make are valid and have infallible weight behind them in order to judge for us what is divine revelation. But that just kicks the problem back one step, kicking the can down the road. Because then we’re faced with the question, again, in virtue of what authority or in virtue of what principle does this synod of successors to the apostles have in order to make that judgment? Because often you have within these synods a disagreement among those who participate. So what is the principle in virtue of which There can be unity for the church as a whole whenever there’s a disagreement, even among the Council Fathers. So I’m sure you’re familiar with the Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15. There was a theological disagreement there, and we have to ask the question, well, in virtue of which principle do we rely on in order to know what is going to be the judgment or the truth concerning divine revelation, whether circumcision saves or not? And at the Council of 15, Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15, it seems to me that Peter makes that decision and exercises that authority in order to determine the truth of that revelation. And so we have a principal source of unity there in order to justify the belief that this is true. And that’s the testimony we rely on. Whereas on your model, if there’s no single voice to speak on behalf of God in order to unify those who participate in a gathering of successors to the apostles, then we’re just faced with the same problem as me and you when we’re faced with theological discussion. I mean, granted, we’re not successors to the apostles, but if you’re looking at successors to the apostles and valid bishops, they’re still going to be in disagreement and you’re going to need at least a final arbiter to settle the matter.
Caller: Right? Well, I would say the first thing I think that’s important is that you brought up Acts chapter 15. It’s scripture, so we both have to believe it. But when you look at what the Church Fathers say about it, especially St. John Chrysostom, he says, he makes three times, says that St. James was in charge and that St. Peter was actually in lesser authority. He says this in three remarks within the same, like, two paragraphs. Okay. And then with regards to synodality and having this final voice, well, Catholics, our Catholic brothers and sisters would say that you have this papal infallibility and the center, visible center of unity. And we would say you don’t have to have that much epistemological certainty to know that, to know which side is the side which the Church rules on. And we would also, though, accept an infallibility, but a collegial infallibility where there will always be a clear majority, so to speak, at the rise of an issue. So we see that clearly with the Council of Ephesus, with the Council of Nicaea. But this whole idea of a, of the consensus patrum is really central to orthodox ecclesiology and also the synodal infallibility. And so I would say we do believe in infallibility, just not that it is Papal infallibility. It’s rather a synodal infallibility. And I would argue, if you are making it this idea of papal infallibility, where you do have this one man who is able to be very definitive, you then run into the epistemological problem of how we know the person who is claiming to be pope is the pope. And this was dealt with in the, like, 17th century when Anglicans brought up a bunch of bad popes, and they essentially said that when the Church receives a valid pope, that we epistemologically are certain that he is a valid pope. But that’s the same thing we say just with regard to ecumenical councils and controversies. So we’re saying the same thing, just yours is one step removed.
Karlo Broussard: Yeah. I think in response, I would say that still with synodal infallibility, there would have to be some criteria by which you judge that synod is infallible in its statements. And once again, we face the problem, well, what if there is disagreement amongst those who are participating? You mentioned a majority, but what is the specific number that constitutes the majority? And if you have a specific number, where do we find that specific criteria that determines the majority, which in turn determines infallibility? That would be rooted in Scripture given to us by the apostles. So I think you have a problem there. In order to determine those criteria, in virtue of which you’re going to be able to judge, these statements are infallible, whereas on the Catholic model, you have a single testimony and a single voice who has the invested authority to determine the matter. And the criterion for that is because he’s the successor to St. Peter, whom we would say was the first individual leader who had that authority given to him by Christ. So the infallibility of the synod seems to me, and to us as Catholics still, to be dependent upon some more fundamental source of unity and voice for infallibility. So I think we’re going to be arguing back and forth as to whether we’re able to have that infallible knowledge based upon a judgment made by a collective group of people that has no principle, that cannot in principle be unified, because there is no single source of unity for that collective group.
Cy Kellett: Thomas, I feel very grateful for that. It’s fascinating to me that the Christological problem of the identity of Christ is actually rooted in a question that you use the word epistemology several times and a question of, well, how do we know what is the real teaching of the church? And that is all centered around a problem around the papacy. So it Seems to me that resolving the papal problem is the fundamental thing there. We have a book called Pope Peter. It’s by our good friend and colleague Joe Heschmeier. About what really essentially about why you should accept the Pope. If you’d like a copy of it. Hang on the line. Did you want to say something else, Carla, before we went?
Karlo Broussard: Yeah, I was just, you know, you mentioned how the papal issue will help us discern the Christology. And I think the christological issue about the precise nature of Christ and the two natures in the one person of Christ, which is where Thomas and I would be going back and forth on, that’s a case in point of disagreements concerning theological issues. I mean, these are successors to the apostles saying one thing, other successors to the apostles saying another thing. And so, once again, we’re faced with that fundamental problem. How do we discern the truth from error, where you have a collective group of bishops contradicting each other concerning the very nature of Christ himself. And if we did not have a single testimony, infallible voice on this earth to speak on behalf of Christ, then we would be simply left with educated guesses and what we might think is the more persuasive position, but we could not have that infallible knowledge because there would be no infallible testimony to base our judgments on.
Cy Kellett: Yeah. And it’s interesting to me that you could sit here and Thomas is such a wonderfully well educated person.
Caller: Indeed he is. Yeah. You could have a respect. I’m very appreciative of his cordial spirit there. But the two of you could have a long and ongoing conversation about does
Cy Kellett: Christ have one nature or two natures? You know? Right. And that might be convincing or not convincing, more convincing, less convincing to one or both of you, but fundamentally, one of you is saying, I accept what the Church teaches in union with the Pope. And one of you is saying, no, I don’t.
Karlo Broussard: That is correct. And what’s distinct about that question is versus the papacy question is that the former, the question about Christ, has to do with supernatural revelation. That has to do with what is revealed to us from God, which we cannot have access to or know by reason alone. The papacy question, we’re able to start from reason, from history. Right. And establish the historical grounds for the conclusion that there is a papacy, that there is an individual leader that Christ appointed to lead his flock here on earth. And once we have those historical grounds, then we can look to the judgments of the successors to St Peter concerning the supernatural truths of divine revelation. Once again, without that testimony, we’re left simply with our own educated guesses about what this supernatural revelation is. But also to psy, we would be also left with simply educated guesses concerning what is supernatural revelation, what are the sources of supernatural revelation? In order to have infallible knowledge about that, we would have to have an infallible testimony on which we could rely, which would be the apostles and their successors.
Caller: Again, Peter, thank you very much, Thomas. I hope you will get the book, and I hope we’ll get to talk again and maybe move beyond the question of the papacy into the nature of and the two natures and the one person of Jesus Christ, because that’s a good one, too. But there are lots of other folks on the line, and we have to take a break. Now. We’re asking you, why aren’t you Catholic.