Best Jeffrey Tiel Podcasts (2024)

1
Are Unforgivable Sins Real? 22:59

24d ago22:59

22:59

The notion that there might be a sin or sins that are absolutely unforgivable, even by a bishop, is pretty terrifying. Given what the Church teaches about the sacrament of confession and reconciliation, it’s hard to see how a priest or the bishop wouldn’t be in a position to provide some way back to God. What’s more, isn’t baptism, the originating …

1
How Did We Get Here? The Evolution of Transgender Ideology 26:08

4M ago26:08

26:08

Many Catholics are puzzled by the embrace of incoherent ideas and straightforwardly bizarre practices advanced by the cultural elites in contemporary American society. How can young men claiming to be women seriously expect to compete in women’s athletics? But they do. And they are competing. How can women in their final weeks of pregnancy discredi…

1
Can I Change My Gender? 22:30

5M ago22:30

22:30

Let’s begin our exploration of the way in which human nature is essentially expressed through gender by taking a look at the current lay of the land on sex, sexual preference, and gender. What, in other words, do our universities, entertainers, and cultural elites showcase as the truth of the matter on these issues?…

1
What did Mary Know? 16:26

7M ago16:26

16:26

Imagine entering a quiet church, looking about to ensure no one else is there, then walking up the center aisle toward the altar, bowing, and sitting in one of the first couple of pews on the right. You drop the kneeler and take on the position of a supplicant to God, beginning your prayers. But unlike the many times you have done this in the past,…

1
Why Does Mary Matter? 10:17

7M ago10:17

10:17

Other than the Pope, no person rankles Protestants more than Mary, the mother of Jesus. Protestants see what looks like hysterical Marian worship in many videos of third world Catholic masses, hear Mary described as co-Redemptrix and the Queen of Heaven, and observe her being called theotokos, the very “Mother of God.” If Mary is divine, then who n…

1
How do we Face the Challenge of Infertility? 13:10

7M ago13:10

13:10

I’m writing this question at the outset of Advent, which might seem an odd time with the season’s emphasis on the birth of Jesus to instead write about marital infertility. However, the Christmas story does not begin with the annunciation, but instead with an infertile couple, Mary’s relative Elizabeth and her husband Zechariah. So, Advent is exact…

1
What if we are not Alone? 18:14

12M ago18:14

18:14

As Congress continues to be briefed by numerous whistleblowers concerning a significant program to recover and reverse engineer extraterrestrial UFO technology, we appear to be ever-closer to what UFO-researchers call “Disclosure.” Disclosure is the moment when government officially acknowledges or reveals the existence of alien life, particularly,…

1
How do I Know if I should become a Priest? 14:12

1y ago14:12

14:12

Because the choice of the priesthood or the consecration of a nun (just two examples of the non-marital vocation) is unnatural insofar as it requires non-marriage as part of its discipline, it’s quite rare. People accordingly figure that there must be some means by which God selects who will join this separate vocation. And as such, they say that G…

1
How can we Tell if God Answers our Prayers? 11:29

1y ago11:29

11:29

Let’s begin our exploration of this question by remembering that all of the created world is a divine gift. Thus, we should be thankful for everything regardless of whether God did a second miracle (after the miracle of creation) to convey one of his products to us in an hour of need. So, we can always give thanks, because God has already provided …

1
Could God be Evil? 17:38

1y ago17:38

17:38

This question haunted me for a very long time during my slow philosophical education into the Faith. I could clearly see why God had to be all-knowing and all-powerful if he were infinite, but why good? It wasn’t until I read into St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Contra Gentiles that I finally understood the essential nature of divine goodness, something,…

1
Who is This Jesus? 24:07

1+ y ago24:07

24:07

After Jesus rose from the dead, the Church started thinking about everything Jesus had said, what he had done, what God had said about him, and what the Hebrew Bible (our Old Testament) had prophesied about him as Messiah. They recalled how Jesus had called himself both the “son of man” and the “son of God,” and they were accordingly struck both by…

1
Is it Ever Ok to Lie? 24:04

1+ y ago24:04

24:04

The answer to this question is “no, never” or “yes, and a lot more often than you might think,” depending on exactly what we mean by a “lie.” The problem is complicated by the multiple ways people use that term. For example, you’ll often hear someone confess to you, “I lied,” when what the person really means is nothing more than, “I made an error.…

1
How can We Know God? 15:31

1+ y ago15:31

15:31

Knowing God is understandably a major problem for creatures like ourselves. We are the bottom rung of rational creatures, heavily linked to our physicality that narrows the extension of our minds. Nearly all of our knowledge is derived through our sensory systems, yet God is not subject to sensory inspection. What color is God? Does God smell of ci…

1
Is Judging Always Wrong? 8:28

2y ago8:28

8:28

The term “judge” seems to connote different things in different contexts. Legally, we think of the judge as the person who oversees the judicial process, ensuring that the law is followed. We tend to feel pretty good about him. Morally, we often think of judgment as something suspicious, that we’d best tend to our own affairs rather than sticking o…

1
What is the Immaculate Conception? 13:03

2y ago13:03

13:03

Since not all of you are Roman Catholic Christians, the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, the mother of Jesus, may be less well known to you. It is different from the Virgin Birth of Jesus and different yet again from the Incarnation of the Son of God. Let me start, then, with those two doctrines in order to set up the contrast clearly…

1
Do We Seriously Want to Meet God? 9:10

2y ago9:10

9:10

One of the more surprising stories in the Old Testament book of Exodus receives little attention, perhaps because the story is so short. But Moses is up on Mount Sinai receiving the Law, and God tells him that He intends to come down into the camp and meet the people in three days. Moses accordingly reports God’s intention to the people down below …

1
Do You Have a Goddess Within? 9:08

2y ago9:08

9:08

My wife and I recently found ourselves at a dinner/musical performance where a young female singer began her set with a question to the audience: “How many of you have ever met a goddess?” We were mildly alarmed when some forty percent of the audience raised their hands. Was it possible that paganism was making major inroads into the American heart…

1
Can We Derive Norms from Nature? 7:40

2y ago7:40

7:40

A British empiricist philosopher named David Hume is famous for his skeptical arguments attacking the notion of a natural morality. Hume claimed that no moral (“ought”) claims could be derived from descriptive (“is”) claims. From the mere fact that something happens to be a certain way, it doesn’t follow that it’s supposed to be that way. Hume assu…

1
What if I Just Want to Give Up? 6:46

2y ago6:46

6:46

There are many times in our lives where fatigue, suffering, disease, and sorrow weigh down on us unrelentingly. We shake our heads and wonder if going on like this makes any real sense. Why not just throw our responsibilities to the wind and go out on a bender?By Jeffrey Tiel

1
What if I am Asking the Wrong Question? 9:45

2y ago9:45

9:45

Religious people are often obsessed with the question of how to get into the kingdom of heaven, how to guarantee a spot there rather than the fiery alternative. But sometimes what heaven is seems less important to us than getting in, and that failure to consider heaven’s nature might well inhibit our entry. In fact, I suspect that asking how to get…

1
How Can Submission to God Free Us? 9:40

2y ago9:40

9:40

Human beings possess gifted imaginations. One misuse of this remarkable faculty is to reconstruct reality so that it fits our own vices. Sometimes we reconstruct the world so that we are “forced” to obey a set of absolute moral requirements maintained by the authority of an angry deity, an unrelenting Church, or a social order that still occasional…

1
Is Unconditional Love Really Good? 8:03

2y ago8:03

8:03

It is common to hear both from the pulpit and in popular culture the merits of unconditional love. From the one, we hear that God loves us unconditionally, that heaven is a free gift, that a last-minute prayer can save us from the flames of hell. From the other, we hear that we are only truly loved when those who love us do so without any direction…

1
Should I Follow My Heart? 6:20

2y ago6:20

6:20

Much is made today of the dictum, “follow your heart.” Usually, it is a popular appeal to the relativistic sentimentalism that has replaced traditional rational morality. But there’s an odd twist on this imperative that can infect Christian ethics, for it is sometimes thought that one’s inner life—one’s emotions and desires—must be put in order pri…

1
Why Did Adam Fall? 7:52

2y ago7:52

7:52

Why did Adam fall? It’s an intriguing question, because we are told by the old texts that Eve fell through the seduction of a deceiver, the serpent, who tricked her into misunderstanding the aim of the divine prohibition.By Jeffrey Tiel

1
Lecture 17: Body Dynamics 1:11:32

2y ago1:11:32

1:11:32

What is spiritual growth, and how do we all fit into the Body of Christ? Every single one of us is a unique presentation of the image of God, so it follows that every single one of us has an important role to play not just in the human race, not just in our families, not just in our bodies politic, not just in our professions, not just in our socia…

1
Lecture 16: Fasting & Feasting 1:21:32

2+ y ago1:21:32

1:21:32

Why do Catholics fast? What is the point? Why must feasting always follow fasting? Why is fasting intrinsically linked to prayer? How does the Fast fit into the Catholic concept of "co-suffering" with Christ and our fellow Christians? What is Lent and how does our Lenten observance of fasting, prayer, and alms-giving prepare us for the great Easter…

1
Why is the American Church Shrinking? 14:32

2+ y ago14:32

14:32

American Catholics are becoming increasingly alarmed as once-overflowing parishes find their pews emptying, their pulpits shared with other churches, and their college-aged kids abandoning the faith in unprecedented numbers. Why is this happening? And what can we do about it?By Jeffrey Tiel

1
Are Humans Like Butterflies? 9:50

2+ y ago9:50

9:50

The caterpillar lives a fairly simple existence, slinking along, dodging the ravenous appetites of birds, all the while devouring as much food as possible. At some point he finds a choice spot and forms a cocoon around himself and begins one of the most astonishing transformations within nature: he turns into a butterfly. During this metamorphosis …

1
Lecture 15: The Word of God 1:18:56

2+ y ago1:18:56

1:18:56

Is the Word of God a book or a Person? How do we understand the relationship between the Church and the Bible? Can individuals authoritatively interpret the Bible on their own? What is the difference between literal and symbolic interpretation of the Scriptures? How does the enriched, multifaceted interpretive model of the Church open up the unveil…

1
How can God Love us as Spouse? 10:26

2+ y ago10:26

10:26

Idealizations of human love run deeply within the human imagination. While contemporary romantics search longingly for their soulmates, the ancient Greeks spoke of seeking their other half. If human beings were made for intimate love, then it seems that human lovers must be two halves of one whole. Neither is fulfilled in themselves, but each needs…

1
Why are we Drawn to Vampires? 12:21

3y ago12:21

12:21

Science fiction tends both to illuminate and obscure many issues related to human nature and its relationship to the animals below it and the spiritual natures above it. Our science fiction literature and film are filled with creatures with supernatural qualities as well as hybrid human qualities, not all that different from the ancient myths’ depi…

1
How do we Know that Israel Really Escaped from Ancient Egypt? 7:04

3y ago7:04

7:04

The dramatic story of the Israelite escape from slavery in ancient Egypt makes riveting reading from the book of Exodus, but when we look into Egyptian history for some record of the event, we find next to nothing. So, is there any reason to really think that those events occurred, or does it all just amount to Israelite myth?…

1
If I Enjoy Doing Good, am I Less Good? 25:18

3y ago25:18

25:18

A very famous philosopher named Immanuel Kant flipped traditional ethics on its head when he suggested that the commitment to moral goodness is only truly noble and “pure” when it is fully detached from any reward, from any happiness, from any other purpose whatsoever. Kant was worried about the problem of ulterior motives that, he thought, could w…

1
What is the Meaning of Life? 11:15

3y ago11:15

11:15

While most people consider the question of the meaning of life to be the biggest mystery of all, in fact it’s one of the easiest questions we’ve confronted together in Questions from the Unsettled Mind. Why? Because we already know the answer! What is less clear, perhaps, is why it is the answer, but even more importantly for human destiny, why we …

1
How Can I Overcome Grief? 14:10

3y ago14:10

14:10

Sometimes religious people have this idea that religion allows you to shortcut the normal human processes of agony, misery, decay, and death. I mean, if God is with you, why shouldn’t he enable you to be happy? But that’s not how it works. In fact, with respect to grief, St. Paul himself warned that we Christians do grieve, just not as others griev…

1
Does Tradition Matter? 9:29

3y ago9:29

9:29

There has been a trend in modern historical methodology to pretty systematically ignore tradition. The irony with this approach is that it is fully anachronistic, imposing contemporary categories onto the past, since all ancient cultures embedded their history in tradition, in practices that could be handed down to future generations. Many cultures…

1
What is Esoteric Knowledge? 22:00

3y ago22:00

22:00

Esoteric knowledge is one of those things that sounds very cool—that word, “esoteric”—but for most of us lacks a clear definition. It conjures up the mists of the East, ancient riddles, dark secrets, and the promise of ultimate power—all things that entice many contemporary human beings, because, whatever esoteric knowledge is, it seems that an exc…

1
Why Does God Need a Mother? 6:42

3y ago6:42

6:42

While various Protestant sects have their go-to complaints with what Catholics believe about salvation apart from grace (Catholics don’t believe that), worshiping saints (Catholics don’t do that), or even that the pope is the anti-Christ (he isn’t), there’s probably no one issue that galvanizes them more than the Marian doctrines, that Mary is elev…

1
Is Reincarnation Real? 16:37

3y ago16:37

16:37

Of course, it is! Re-incarnation strictly means that the human soul-spirit is reconnected to the body after being separated from it. We have enormous evidence of this happening in near death experiences (NDEs). During an NDE, a person experiences separation from the body and its associated processes (especially pain, but also all sensory links to t…

1
What is Spiritual Warfare? 28:29

3y ago28:29

28:29

When faced with an enemy assault, it is critical to identify the strategic objectives of your enemy, for once these are known, you can create effective counters to his aggressive moves. However, as we know from metaphysics, evil is not a positive objective but instead is classified as a privation by philosophers, meaning that it merely negates what…

1
How can I Think of God as Father When He Fails to Treat Me Like a Father Should? 15:15

3y ago15:15

15:15

We often pray to God as our Father for things that we think would very much improve our lives, yet we usually find ourselves empty-handed afterward. We are told to pray harder, so we try that, but the results are the same. Church leaders might suggest that we give more, and though we rightly smell a rat, we very marginally increase our giving just …

1
Why Does God Let Kids Die? 10:38

3y ago10:38

10:38

The problem of evil—that great suffering is permitted by God in this world—haunts many people. It seems that if God really loved us, then he would do something to assist us. So, if he does nothing, it appears that he doesn’t really love us, in which case he isn’t all that good. But if he isn’t good, then he isn’t God. As such, it seems that God can…

1
Lecture 14: The Common Good 1:16:18

3+ y ago1:16:18

1:16:18

How do the City of God and the City of Man relate in the quest for charity?By Jeffrey Tiel

1
Why Bother Being Good if you Could Get Away with Being Bad? (Part 2) 45:53

3+ y ago45:53

45:53

In a previous podcast, we examined Plato’s famous “Myth of the Ring of Gyges” story. In that story where, as usual, Socrates is Plato’s primary dialogical character, we faced the ultimate moral challenge: what would we do if we were put into a situation (the invisibility ring) in which all of the rewards for justice were replaced by all of its pena…

1
What Happens if I Miss the Rapture? 9:56

3+ y ago9:56

9:56

This is one of those questions that terrifies a great many people around the world, since they have been told that at some point in the future Jesus will secretly arrive in the clouds, yank all of the believers into the air, and then zip back to heaven, “leaving behind” all the wicked unbelievers. Portrayed in the books and films of the “Left Behin…

1
When Should We Not Fast? 13:17

3+ y ago13:17

13:17

Since posting the blog and podcast on the point of fasting, I’ve run across some very screwed up applications of fasting that is undermining some people. So, I’m going to address these misunderstandings in this follow-up blog on when not to fast. The fast recognizes that we are spiritual/physical hybrid creatures, so that what happens in the body i…

1
Why Bother Being Good if you Could Get Away with Being Bad? (Part 1) 27:09

3+ y ago27:09

27:09

Are you a good person? Or perhaps that is too strong. Would you like to think of yourself as a good person? Almost everyone answers this question with a resounding “Yes!” There is something about goodness that we human beings find attractive. We want good steaks, good sex, good kids, good government, and we want a good God. But why? What is it abou…

1
What is the Point of Fasting? 11:35

3+ y ago11:35

11:35

Christians and Jews of the ancient world practiced periods of fasting pretty seriously. Jesus did too, including those forty days in the wilderness prior to his temptation. But many Christian communities around the world don’t fast at all. Some Protestants suspect the activity, thinking it confuses genuine spirituality with mere ritual. They believ…

1
Who is Melchizedek? 7:49

3+ y ago7:49

7:49

“The ancient Epistle to the Hebrews contains a hitherto unnoticed enigma. It refers to a man without beginning or end – one who lives forever. So, who is he, and where is he?” These words of enticement draw the reader into my novel on Melchizedek, entitled, The Search for Melchizedek. The text of Hebrews really does describe him as a man who never …

1
How can God Be Love? 14:40

3+ y ago14:40

14:40

We tend to distinguish who we are from what we do. So, I am Jeff, and I am always Jeff. I might be skiing or not skiing. I might be fishing or not fishing. What I do can change, but what I am remains the same. In modern times our names don’t tend to tell us very much about who the person is that bears it, but this wasn’t always the case. Take the f…

Podcasts Worth a Listen

Jeffrey Tiel Podcasts

Podcasts Worth a Listen

Quick Reference Guide