Ep. 1949 - Christianity Is NOT Compatible With Socialism

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The CIA director, John Ratcliffe, has just discussed one of the craziest weapons you've ever heard of, which was apparently used in that rescue mission, the Good Friday to Easter Sunday rescue mission in Iran. We'll get to that momentarily. First, I want to tell you about Done With Debt. Go to DoneWithDebt.com. The numbers do not lie. Financial stress in this country is through the roof. People are maxed out, credit cards are choking them, prices keep climbing, paychecks don't. This is not just the poor anymore, the middle class, the people who built this country are hitting the wall too. This is not only about reckless spending or bad decisions. It's also about everyday Americans running out of options because the system seems stacked against them. If debt is crushing you, you're not alone. Doing nothing does not fix it, just keeps that interest bleeding you dry. You do not need another loan, you do not need bankruptcy court, you need a real plan. 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So anyway, we'll get to that claim in a moment. First of all, I am so pleased to be joined by Tim Burchett, congressman and man of the hour, you know, a very popular US congressman, but also one of the congressmen who's focused on some of these UFO, UAP extraterrestrial claims. First of all, congressman Burchett, thank you very much for making time to come on the show. Thank you for two things. One, having me on the show, and two, for saying my name right. You will not make my highlight film on people that have said my name wrong. So, you know, congressman, I have noticed for 10 years now, I go on TV shows, podcasts, whatever, and people cannot pronounce my name either. They say there's a Michael, it's like they have marbles in their mouth. So I totally empathize and I'm glad that I was able to articulate your name properly. I, congressman, I've been watching all of your clips, all of these interviews you've been doing, I'm pals with some of your colleagues on the UFO panel in the House of Representatives. I've been following this for a long time and then your former colleague Matt Gates came out and he said that there is a human extraterrestrial hybrid breeding program in the guy. And I said, you know what, look, I've gotten along great with Matt Gates over the years, but this is completely bonkers. I don't buy it. I don't believe in aliens. No way, no how. But then you've been making the rounds, saying some of these claims are not as crazy as they might appear. That's true. Matt was actually briefed by a member of our military in uniform on that subject. But, you know, I've heard a lot of wild things. I've been in, let's just say, I've been briefed by a lot of high ranking officials. And the thing I want to warn people about is there's a word called PSIOP, or two words, I guess. And these agencies, a lot of them were just chasing dollars and they would laugh at me when I would talk to them about UFOs or UAPs, which is a complete distraction. I just go UFOs. And now they're, they're, they've seen that the polling kind of the population of this great country believes that we are not alone. And there is something extra out there. And so now they see a dollars. And so now, all of a sudden, a lot of these alphabet agencies are putting stuff out. And I would warn people, if you don't see it with your own dad gum eyes, don't believe it. And it's, and to me, it's not about little green man or flying saucers. It's about what are we spending tens of millions, if not billions of dollars researching something. And why do they say they don't exist? But yet, every dad gum department, except the IRS, maybe they do, I don't know. But I don't want to get the IRS ticked off at me just yet. It's getting close to me. But dad, why are they all investigating this, this object that doesn't exist? And why do I sit in a secure briefing in this little punk with a man bun comes in and tells me that he has no data points on something. I said, well, that gum it's, let me give you an example. And I gave him example of a nuclear facility that shut down literally after they saw these UFOs flying over it. It's a documented case. You can go on news reports have, have, I mean, legitimate news people have talked about it. So, you know, it's a, it's a phenomena and we need to get to the bottom of it. I've talked to the president about it. And, you know, and also one other thing that ought to, it's kind of a chilling effect to me is when I'm talking to one of these little gutless bureaucrats that's not elected. And they tell me the president is on a need to know basis. That should, that should scare you right there. But I have seen some things and talked to some people about it, about this issue that would, it would keep you awake at night. Congressman, you mentioned the IRS here. I guess one of the greatest arguments against the existence of extraterrestrial aliens is if they existed, the IRS would find a way to tax them. So that's one mark against the aliens on the point though of these unidentified objects. Obviously, there are unidentified flying objects. There's no question about that. And it seems to me that speculation falls into three camps. Your colleague, Annapolina Luna said in an interview that she, she thinks that these beings are not necessarily physical. So that would seem to fall into the camp that I find myself in, that the vice president apparently finds himself in, as he said in an interview to Benny Johnson, that he, to put it bluntly, he thinks the aliens are demons. And then there are some people like my colleague, Matt Walsh, who thinks the aliens are little green men or Mars attacks or something like that. And then there is a third camp, which says that the UFOs are either our own technology or China or something, you know, a terrestrial adversary. Right. And I was speaking to a member of Congress and I said, you know, I'm not sure what's scarier if the aliens are demons or if the aliens are Chinese, because if the Chinese have this kind of technology and we don't, that's pretty scary to me. Can you weigh in on? Yeah, let's start at the top, the last one there, the Chinese. If the Chinese or we had that, there wouldn't be an Iranian conflict right now and China would own the world. I mean, they pretty much do. They own Congress because we're a bunch of gutless people and we allow the K Street lobbyists to run our world, but I'm not better. But the, and if the Russians had it, you know, Putin would, he would fly UFO down, landed on the front steps of the White House and get out and wrestle a unicorn or something, you know. And so I don't, I don't, I don't go that route. And what I do think is it's a combination of things. I think if you allow me to expound, if that's okay. Please, please do. And sorry, I'm jumping around here. I'm in a car. We got our time zones fixed up and that's totally my fault. So, but I have, I'm going to a meeting. You're a busy guy. Appreciate it. No, brother. It's an honor being on with you. Now, the, in the spiritual realm, I don't really have a grasp on that. I'm a Christian. I'm a born-again Christian. I'm a very imperfect one though. I mean, I'm on the forgiveness end of the scale. Aren't we all? Well, all my buddies get to heaven. They're going to look over in the corner and they say, dad, get out. I'm a merchant. Get in here. God must have lowered his standards. But anyway, but I'm not worried about that because as a Christian, I'm, I don't mess with the demonic element, but I do know that I'm protected because I am a Christian. But I, and as far as all the other goes, I think we've got something in one of these labs. And what they've done is they put it in a, and it's not foyable and it's freedom of information act because they put it in a non-government corporation because as a congressman, I can foy you anybody, but they don't have to come. I can only foy you government or government, more or less government associated entities. So like Ford Boder Company, I want to find out, you know, why are they going on something else? You know, why are they doing electric? I can, I can foy them, but they're not going to respond. They don't have to respond. But say the FBI or somebody else, they generally have to respond at some point. So what they've done is they've gotten this material or a craft or a human or a humanoid or whatever it is, and they put it off on these government contractors. So there's probably five or six of them that we know. They're, you know, they're the, the major, the big boys. Raytheon, that sort of thing. Yeah. The war pimps, the industrial war complex, or I call them war pimps, which they don't like it when I do that. So I'm calling them war pimps because I don't care. I'm over them. They're all a bunch of portfolio warriors and I got an 18-year-old daughter and I don't want to see her going overseas fighting any dad-to-dad war. But they do this, and it's so compartmentalized that nobody really knows what the other one's doing. Case in point, I knock on doors. That's how Tim Burchett gets elected. The big boys don't shower me with money to get elected. They always support me the day after the election, you know? And I get $25 in a Bible verse from a sweet little lady. That's the people that elect Tim Burchett and I dig that. So I'm knocking on doors. That's how I get elected. And I'm out in, in the Farragut community, which is west of Knoxville in Knox County. And this guy comes to the door and he's got his flag out. I said, were you a veteran? And he kind of said, no, no, I really wasn't. And I said, and he was sort of acted like he was almost ashamed. And I said, is it really what, because you're an older gentleman, I said, what'd you do during the war? And he said, well, actually I worked at Oak Ridge. And I said, you know, my daddy was on Okinawa and they thought they were going to invade. And daddy fought on Pellew in Okinawa. He's in the Marine Corps. He said they thought they were going to, going to have to invade Japan. I said, and if, if he were here, he'd hug your neck and thank you. And the guy said, you know, the funny thing is, and this is what I go back to the UFO thing. He says, my wife worked with me at Oak Ridge as well on the nuclear project. And because, you know, the nukes, if we hadn't dropped the nuclear bomb, we would have, the nuclear bombs, we would have had to invade Japan. And my dad probably would have died. And so, and my life would be totally different now. But, but my point in this is that his wife, who worked with him at, at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, he was married to at the time, he did not know what she did. It was that compartmentalized. And that is exactly what you're seeing now. But now everybody's got a book, they're not going to, I mean, they're not going to do a book deal. They got a computer, they got a webpage or something, and they leak it out. So what's happened is, Roswell, New Mexico, anyway, whether you argue something did or did not seem to believe something did happen there. I don't, I think I have a general idea. But anyway, the information they gathered there then has been put, farmed out to one of these corporations. And if anybody that had any association with it now is dead, and that is the best compartmentalization you can have, and they've got stuff, they don't know where it came from, or who brought it to them, but they've got it. And so, and the technology is so advanced, in my opinion, from what I've heard. It would be like, and I'm a motorcycle guy. So if you brought somebody a brand new Indian chief or a big Harley, fat boy or something, and you dropped it on the people that came over here on the Mayflower, it'd just be a bright, shiny object, dude. They might, they might one day figure out how to start it. They probably are not going to get the fuel because of the octane. They sure as heck couldn't clean the injectors. They wouldn't know how to change a spark plug, any of that. And that is exactly what I think has happened to us with this stuff. Now, is it interdimensional, or are these, there's a law of, and I always forget which one it is. It's a, it's a, it's a scientific law that it's just basically, if something can be over there, been proven, and all your scientific people will be texting you and say, that idiot is such a such an, I just can't remember what it is. Right. I always want to write it down. I tell my folks in DC, remember what this is. And, but anyway, and to me, that proves there's a God because science proves a God because it can be here and instantaneously be over here. And so if that is a capability that something can travel like that, that would prove, you know, light years, if something travels light years, it's just not possible that you could survive. You would, you would, you'd need nourishment years, you know, the closest and it's, you know, thousand light years. So it travels at the speed of light, takes a thousand years to get here. It's just a friction and all that is not possible for us, as we know it. So all that combined, to me, I just think that, that there's a lot of confusion and there's a lot of misinformation out there. And the only dadgum person that's going to be able to put this out is Donald J. Trump. And I, and he has to because you're not going to get the scientific, you're not going to get these bureaucrats that are know-it-alls. And everybody's, and there's a economic component to it. And there's also an arrogance component, which is what Washington, Washington's is about power, control and money. Right. So I had a disclosure bill. It was two pages long. You can tell I'm not much into all the BS. I don't need a bunch of weather fores and, you know, and when I go into questioning, I don't talk about what a great day it is and how this person is this. I just go straight for the jugular. And so my bill for disclosure was two pages. Well, the UFO community and everybody and all the bureaucrats love the Senate version by Chuck Schumer. Oh, Chuck Schumer's on board. He was the rank, the number one most powerful member of the Senate. And he couldn't get the bill. I'm throwing up air quotes. He couldn't pass it. Right. He couldn't. And that's total BS. You know, he can make it rain. And he could make it rain right now. So it's only the president, really, who could get this done. Two last questions before I let you go. One, do you think that we will have disclosure of whatever information we have regarding the UFOs? And two, just something you mentioned just now, what do you think happened at Roswell? No, we will not have disclosure. I don't think so. I just don't. I think it's too deep. And I think it's too, it's too strong. And they're going to claim military intelligence, you know, it's like it's our military, which is what the Schumer bill did. And so anyway, no, okay, no, we're not going to ever get it. They don't want it out. And I don't think I'll have it on this side of eternity. Maybe my daughter's generation will hear something, but I just don't, I'm going to keep busting their ass on it though. Don't get me wrong. I'm going to keep fighting. I'm a flagrant fence swinger, dude. I swing for the fence every day of the time. And I'm sorry, what was your second question, brother? Will you mention you think you have an idea of what happened at Roswell? Probably the most famous incident of UFOs. Do you, what do you think happened? And I'll tell you how I got it. I was, I used to have a truck and trailer business and I was putting this guy's trailer hitch on. And, and I remember he had a Jeep and this was probably, I don't know, 20 years ago. And he was, and he was out in the shop. He was smoking a cigarette. And I looked at his license plate and it said New Mexico. I was a state senator in Tennessee. This was years ago. And I said, Hey, New Mexico. I go, you ever heard of Roswell? And he said, Yeah, he goes, my dad was in the Army Air Corps and see the Army Air Corps preceded the Air Force. And in 47, when Roswell, I think occurred, we still had an Army Air Corps. And, and then my ears perked up because I realized this guy knew what he was talking about because I knew a lot. As state military dad is in the Pacific, my mama flew an airplane during the Second World War. So I know a little bit about the Air Corps. And, and he said, I said, I said, Yeah, I said, you ever heard about that UFO thing? And he goes, as a matter of fact, my dad worked at that base. I was an army brat, whatever you call it, Air Army Air Corps brat. And I said, Really? He said, Yeah. He said, We always thought that it was what we'd heard. It had saw was it there was an explosion in the air. So apparently, two craft hit each other. And there's a documented case of a very similar in a time in that time period of a crash somewhere else in the world, maybe Russia or something else. And I can't remember all the details. But it was a long distance away. So you think something traveling at supersonic speeds, you know, be over there pretty quick. And he said, and that was it. And he said all the other stuff was was a big cover up, you know, and they had this Air Force officer, I remember in the nineties or something in his like case closed, and he was a smart aleck, and he was fat. And he was doing this press conference. And I remember my daddy and I were watching daddy said, Yeah, I don't buy that. I don't buy that at all. That was like I was an arrogant jerk. And so yeah, I think there was a midair collision. I think there was a cover up. I mean, the press, the army put out saucer recovered. Now, how do you go from a hot air balloon to saucer recovered? And they're saying, Oh, we were we were covering up because we didn't want the Russians to know we had this dead gum hot air balloon. I mean, give me a freaking break. You know, a hot air. Are you kidding me? They were they knew we had when when German was was that a was it Potsdam or wherever it was. And after Roosevelt had died and Stalin was there. Stalin knew we'd already detonated atomic bomb. Right. Because they had people on the ground there. Listen, they say, Do not believe the government. Do not trust them. I don't care what they I don't care if it's that I'm with you, Congressman. That is my I would say that is my political gut instinct is when when the government seems to really want me to believe something. I say, there's got to be a lot more to the story. Congressman, I greatly appreciate your making the time, especially on the road and meet everything else. And we'll see we'll see what happens. I think you're probably right on disclosure, but who knows? Maybe they will disclose it. The world will become unglued, and we won't sleep it ever again. Good to see you sir. Thanks for being here. It's an honor, brother. It's a real pleasure being on with that. What kind of cigars do you smoke? You know, this is providential congressman. This is my very own cigar, Mayflower cigars. You just mentioned the Mayflower. I think I think that that coincidence has to do with even more cosmic forces than the aliens. I think it goes up even higher than that, but we'll have to get you some, Congressman. We'll have I would very much look forward to a cigar and hearing more about the things that you won't say on air for next time. Let's talk to you. See you back. Good to see you. Now, I want to tell all of you before I tell you some amazing Mayflower facts, I want to tell you about equip foods. Go to equipfoods.com slash Michael Knowles. You've heard me praise equips prime bars before. Now the team is hooked on their prime protein too. Men's Health called the cleanest protein on the market. I think that really checks out. I don't like protein bars. I don't because they just they taste weird. They don't that. That's actually why I love equip foods. 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Use code Michael Knowles at checkout to get 25% off prime protein purchases, 40% off your first subscription order for a limited time. E-Q-U-I-P foods.com slash Michael Knowles. Code Michael Knowles at checkout. Folks, this is an amazing tie-in. The congressman mentions Mayflower. I'm smoking a Mayflower cigar right here. I'm smoking this Mayflower Dawn Churchill because today is Winston Churchill day. Today in 1963, President Kennedy and the Congress gave Winston Churchill honorary American citizenship. So I'm sitting in the makeup room, preparing to light my Mayflower Dawn Churchill. And I said, wait a second, Churchill, his mother was American. And I'm pretty sure I remember reading that Churchill was a descendant of the Mayflower. That's a kind of funny coincidence. Hey, let me just google who his ancestor was. I find out moments before I light up my Mayflower Dawn Churchill on Winston Churchill day that Winston Churchill is my cousin. You can see the resemblance. Churchill and I both descend from Dr. Samuel Fuller on the Mayflower. So I'm smoking a Churchill Mayflower cigar, a cigar named both after him and our shared family. Okay, I'm going to table the UFO stuff for a second. And get back to more spiritual matters because I think the aliens are demons anyway. There's a guest who just went on Tucker's show and went completely viral all over the internet. This guy's name is Nathan Apfel. And he made a claim that I find much more shocking, preposterous, and disturbing than any of the UFO claims. This guy claimed that Christianity at its core is socialist. And I would actually argue, and this is a bold statement, the Democratic Republic is the greatest government experiment in the history of humanity. I would say that. I've enjoyed it. Yeah. You enjoyed it. Yeah. So we enjoy it. We love, I love America. You love America. I do. Capitalism should not be anywhere near Christianity. You think? Christianity is more, and I don't like the word socialist with the way it carries, but Christianity is socialism at its core. Non-authoritarian. It's the marker to build social capital. You look at that early Church of Acts and it transformed Rome within a couple hundred years, the greatest superpower of its time to where Constantine was like, I'm a Christian hanging out with these dudes. They had no money. They had no buildings. But somehow the love of their neighbor transformed the greatest superpower of its time. That's dangerous. Okay. So what this guy just said is completely, totally, unequivocally, without exception, wrong, totally wrong and crazy. No, look, he's not a theologian. He's a filmmaker. So I don't know how seriously he takes religion. I don't know how much he's thought about this, but in any case, he's made an egregious error by saying that Christianity is socialist. And it's tragic because he could have made a good point. There is a good point that he could have made, but he didn't. The way I know that Christianity is not socialist is on the one hand, we have this guy, Nathan Appfel, who says Christianity at its core is socialist. On the other hand, we have blessed Pope Pius IX, who describes socialism as a wicked theory that would quote overthrow the entire order of human affairs. Pope Leo XIII calls socialism a hideous deformity of the civil society of men and almost its ruin, calls socialists a seditious society. But Pius XI says that socialism is fundamentally contrary to Christian truth, says that socialism is based nevertheless on a theory of human society peculiar to itself and irreconcilable with true Christianity. Religious socialism, Christian socialism are contradictory terms. No one can be at the same time a good Catholic and a true socialist. Pope John XXIII, who's actually a pretty liberal pope. Unlike Pius IX, who started out liberal, became very, very conservative. Pope Leo XIII, who was kind of, he appeals to both the left and the right, but he's more of a conservative figure. Then Pope Pius XI, very conservative. Pope John XXIII is considered a more liberal pope. He said in no uncertain terms, no Catholic could subscribe even to moderate socialism. Socialism is anathema from the Christian perspective. I could go on. I could quote Pope Paul VI, Saint John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI. You get the point. No, Christianity is not in any sense socialist. It is a major theological and historical misunderstanding that would lead anyone to say that. Now, the point that Tucker's guest could have made that is worth pointing out is that there are problems with capitalism too. It's not that we say Christianity is not socialist. Therefore, it is entirely capitalist. That is not the case. There is an important aspect of capitalism for Christianity. You see this in the writings of Pope Leo XIII. You see this reaffirmed by John Paul II in Chantezi Musannus on the 100th anniversary of Pope Leo XIII's encyclical Ray Rume Navarro. Capitalism, which is just to say private property and markets, can be a good thing. John Paul II said that free markets are the most efficient way to allocate goods around society. And Pope Leo XIII went further to say that people have a right to their private property. The socialists and the communists say you have no right whatsoever to your private property. Leo XIII says, no, you do have a right to private property. However, this is the crucial part. It is not an absolute right because of something that Christians call the universal destination of goods. That is to say that created goods are for ultimately humanity. However, it is important as a matter of dignity, as a matter of the efficient allocation of resources, as a matter of functioning societies, that we have private property. But it's a conditional right. It's conditioned on the notion that there is in fact a universal destination of goods. So what we would say is not three cheers for capitalism. We would say two cheers for capitalism. Capitalism is good, but we don't want the tail to wag the dog. We're not a society. We're not human beings living in service of an economic market. However, the economy is to be arranged in such a way that it is conducive to human flourishing. Socialism gets no cheers. Socialism is wicked, evil, totally contrary to the Christian faith. People who think Christianity is socialist just don't get it. They're not going to make it. However, there are critiques of pure capitalism, laissez-faire capitalism, hyper-individualist capitalism that are legitimate from a Christian perspective. But folks, let's not be so contrarian that we're going to pretend that socialism goes along with Christianity. Quite the opposite. Socialism and communism arising from false premises about human nature have been enemies of the church from day one. Okay, speaking of Christianity, great news. Conversions way, way up and the Libs fighting Christians tooth and nail. Catholic nuns now being punished. Catholic nuns who are caring for terminally ill poor people being punished because they won't accept transgenderism. And a new trans initialism comes out in Canada. First, though, I want to tell you about Pure Talk. Go to puretalk.com slash nolls, K-N-W-L-E-S. I've worked with Pure Talk for a long time now. I've been a Pure Talk customer for a long time now. In part, it's because I wanted to work with a wireless company that shares my values. Pure Talk is veteran-led. Helping veterans is extremely important to them. They've donated over half a million dollars to America's Warrior Partnership, a terrific organization on the front lines of preventing veteran suicide. Pure Talk is creating American jobs with a U.S. only workforce. I love that. It'd be a lot cheaper to send jobs overseas like the other companies do. Pure Talk is committed to delivering the best experience possible for customers. I love that both for the jobs and the fact that people speak English when I call them. I also, and this is the most important, I love Pure Talk service because they give you the same towers, the same network, the same 5G coverage as one of the big guys for a fraction of the price. I'm not saying similar coverage. I'm not saying similar towers. I'm saying the same ones. I love it. I've had my Pure Talk phone for what, six years now. It's great. It even works overseas. I choose to do business with a company that shares my values, supports veterans every single day, creates American jobs. You can too. PureTalk.com slash Knowles to switch to Pure Talk. PureTalk.com slash Knowles switch to my wireless company, America's wireless company, Pure Talk. We've seen percolations of this story coming up for months, even years, that conversions, baptisms, Christianity, and Catholicism specifically, way, way up. Well, now we have the numbers after Easter Sunday, after a lot of people received into the church. In the United States, adult conversions were up 38%. 38% after 2025, in which conversions were already way, way up, there is something happening. It is happening broadly to religion. New atheism, deader than disco, religious faith is back because new atheism is dumb and indefensible. And it's not even as good as the old atheism, which is also dumb and indefensible. Whereas religion speaks to the eternal questions and the eternal longings of man and eternal truths. And Catholicism in particular is way, way up. Why is Catholicism in particular way, way up? I've mentioned on the show before Alexei de Tocqueville, who wrote Democracy in America, the greatest analysis of American democracy ever. He writes it in round 1830. Alexei de Tocqueville predicted that even though America is a Protestant country, it would tend in two directions as time went on. It would tend toward atheism on the one hand, and toward Catholicism on the other. And the reason Tocqueville said is because in democracies, you heard Tucker's guest actually say that Democratic Republican government is the greatest form of government ever. That's in itself a dubious claim, but we'll leave that for another time. Tocqueville observed that if you're going to have democracy, people under democracy are going to want to throw off all authority, including religious authority, so they're going to become atheists. However, if they are going to accept religious authority at all, because man is a religious creature, you can't get away from those eternal questions, if he's going to accept religious authority, he wants it to be uniform and universal, which is what you get in Catholicism. There's a distinction between the clergy and the laity, perhaps, but among the laity, everybody's equal. And so he saw not just because of migration, not just because there were Irish coming into America and Germans coming into America, those mass waves of immigration actually didn't happen for years after Tocqueville published Democracy in America. What Tocqueville was seeing was something intrinsic too, in the nature of American democracy, democracy generally, that would tend toward Catholicism. That's one reason. The other reason is that man is a liturgical creature and a lot of modern Protestantism, not high church Protestantism, not the Presbyterians and the Anglicans and the Episcopalians, but more of the low church, evangelical, Baptist, non-denominational, capital and capital D. That kind of Protestantism is less liturgical. They don't have rights and rituals, they often don't have icons, it's much more personalist, it's much more emotivist. And some people like that, I'm not even knocking your tastes or your preferences, I'm just pointing out man, because we're embodied creatures, we're liturgical creatures, we're creatures of habit. We do things with our bodies and we do things in patterns and we do things in cycles and in habits. And so liturgical religion is going to speak to that. We've neglected our physicality for so long, you saw that peak, I think, during the transgender moment where we said our bodies have nothing to do with who we really are. And I think it's no coincidence that that year was the turning point. And after that madness had passed, you saw a huge tick up, specifically in liturgical religion. And then the other reason is that subjectivism is exhausted. We've been quoting a lot of popes today. Pope Benedict XVI talked about the poison of subjectivism, this tyranny of subjectivism that had overtaken the West, where we don't really know if anything's true or false. And it doesn't just go back to the 1960s, it goes back much earlier. Really, it goes back to Descartes, René Descartes, who said, I think therefore I am. And what he concluded was that the only thing that we can really know for certain is that we think things. In other words, that the only certain knowledge that we have is what's banging around in our own head, that we don't necessarily interact with reality as such. That was a major break from the scholastics of the Middle Ages, from antiquity. And it, in my view, marked the beginning of the end of a stable civilization. So that trend has been building for hundreds and hundreds of years. I think that reached a tipping point also really with the transgender craze, where you say, I can't even know what my sex is. You can't know what anyone's sex is. We can't know anything at all. It tends toward almost a philosophical solipsism. And at that point, people said, no, you know what, I'm pretty sure there is truth. And I want to touch truth and I want to touch reality and I want to be grounded in something real. And that would tend toward the more mainline Protestant churches, the more liturgical churches, but then ultimately toward the Catholic Church, which is the only institution in the West that has survived since antiquity. That's why it's up. Look, I also believe the reason it's up is because of the moving of the Holy Spirit and also because I think that the Catholic Church is divinely instituted. So I obviously believe that. But I'm just observing the sociological reasons why Catholicism in particular is having such a resurgence now. No one should be surprised by that. This has been something 500 years in the making. Now, because of that, the Libs are really on the move fighting Catholics in particular, Christians generally, religious people generally, but Catholics in particular. This is fight. Catholic nuns serving dying patients are now being punished by New York legislators because New York legislators are insisting on a transgender mandate for pronouns and for rooming. So you have these sisters in New York. It's the Dominican sisters of Hawthorne. We love our Dominican sisters, one of the great religious orders of all time. The Dominican sisters of Hawthorne in New York are a 125 year old organization that has done one thing, taking care of poor dying people. All you have to do to be taken care of by these sisters is show up, say, I have a terminal illness and no one can take care of me and they will take care of you. This is as wonderful an organization as ever there was. And the New York legislators are trying to punish them because they're saying, listen sisters, if a guy shows up and he's a man, but he says that he's a woman, you need to call him a woman, you need to violate your conscience, you need to lie, you need to commit a mortal sin, you need to deny reality and furthermore, you need to room him with the women. And the sisters say, no, we can't do that because that's a sin and that's a lie and it's dangerous and it's for a billion reasons we can't do that. And the New York legislators are saying, well, we're going to punish you. This reminds me of Joe Biden when he was vice president and the Joe Biden nominally a Catholic, it's the Obama administration, what did they do? They sued nuns. Nones really are a specific type of religious sister, but colloquially we refer to all religious sisters as nuns, I guess. He was suing nuns. He was suing nuns, the little sisters of the poor because they wouldn't pay for abortions. And I just think as a rule of thumb, this is hideous stuff, obviously, if you're in New York, call your legislators, this is disgusting, more persecution of the church, Christianity being the most persecuted religion in the world by the numbers not even close. But as a general rule of thumb, you know me, I'm not the loftiest intellectual in the world, no false modesty, I'm not. I'm not saying that I'm the deepest theologian or philosopher, I'm a simple man, I'm a simple man, I'm a political creature and I like rules of thumb and I like shortcuts. And here's a political shortcut for you, whichever side of politics is suing nuns, that's the bad guys and you should be on the other side. Whether we're talking about New York state legislators, whether we're talking about the Spanish Civil War, where the Republicans, the freedom fighters in the Spanish Civil War, open up the war by shooting at a statue of Jesus and then attacking nuns and priests, those aren't the good guys, those are the bad guys. They were communists, by the way, there were socialists and communists, a perfidious and wicked society that is contrary to the Christian faith, just a good rule of thumb. Whatever side is attacking the nuns, be on the other side. Okay, now, speaking of weird sexual identities, a Canadian member of parliament has dropped a new initialism, LGBTQ is out, there's a new one, we'll get to that momentarily first though, I want to tell you about Ticovas. Go to ticovas.com slash noles, Canada B.L.A.S. Anywhere worth going is worth going in good shoes and boots and our sponsor, Ticovas, makes the best. Am I flexible enough to show you? Let me see if I can. These are probably my absolute favorite shoes that I wear every day. Now, it's hard for me to pull off the boots, though I do have my Ticovas boots and I do wear them sometimes. The shoes are also magnificent. I even have a Ticovas wallet on me, which a very prominent person and style magnate was just, he looked at it, he said, Michael, where'd you get that wallet? I want that wallet, it's Ticovas wallet, they're all great. All their stuff is just absolutely terrific and you need to get it to look good, to feel good. Right now, I get 10% off at Ticovas.com slash noles, Canada B.L.A.S. When you sign up for email and text, set us 10% off at TECOVAS.com slash noles, Canada B.L.A.S. Ticovas.com slash noles, see site for details, Ticovas, point your toes west. A lot is happening right now. It's hitting everything from your paycheck to your freedom so you can either guess or you can know. The Daily Wire gives you live breaking news, investigative reporting, ad-free daily shows, and experts who are actually part of the story. This is really exciting. I've been pushing on this for a while now and I'm very glad we're doing it. We're adding a ton of investigative journalists. We have this great new show with Cavett Phillips wired in live, leaning heavy into reporting and journalism on top of the most important thing, of course, which is certain of the opinion shows with nice cigars and nice candles and all the rest of a certain Junus se quoi. Daily Wire is giving you all of that plus entertainment, plus community experience. You got to join right now, dailywire.com slash subscribe. Subject to application, financial circumstances and boring history, teas and seas apply. Now, I did not pick the comment today. I was too excited to discover that I am a cousin of Winston Churchill. We are specifically cousins through the Mayflower and I am smoking a Mayflower Dawn Churchill cigar today. How glorious Providence is and you can get yours. So, I didn't pick the comment. The producers picked the comment and here's the comment they picked. We'll see if I like it. From Cole XN7N0, as a certified person who's never worked in firefighting, never spoken with a fire marshal, please trim that candle wick before it burns the place down. Stay safe. Okay, you know what? Is this members of the makeup and wardrobe staff writing into me right now because they tell me all that they say, Mike, you got to trim your wick. So, is that a euphemism? What did they say? No, you have to get this thing. They gave me a thing. Did you know this men? I'm sure the women knew this in the audience. Did you know there's such a thing as a wick trimmer and you're supposed to cut, you're supposed to clip with this little tool. Looks like a medieval torture device. You're supposed to clip the wick on your candle. I'm a candle mogul and I didn't know that for a very long time. Anyway, lots of combustibles on the table today that I have produced, the candles and the Mayflower Dawn Churchill. A new initialism has dropped just when you had learned the LGBTQ plus LMNOP, just when you learned that. That one's out. Because a member of parliament in Canada has a new one. Deal with the ongoing genocide of MMIW G2SLGBTQQIA plus. This is abhorrent. Did you know there was a genocide going on? A genocide of MMIW G2LGBTQQIA plus people. I looked it up. It stands for missing and murdered indigenous women, girls and two spirit. Two spirit, which is a term that they say it's an indigenous native term going back centuries and millennia. It actually was invented by a lesbian activist in 1990. And she said that the term came to her in a dream. So it has no connection whatsoever to ancient indigenous communities. On top of that lesbian gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, intersex and asexual plus people. So the addition here, it's not just the weird sex stuff, it's the missing and murdered part. Missing and murdered. So not only have these people been oppressed by the bathroom laws and the girls volleyball team rules, no, they're also now being murdered and kidnapped. The Libs have taken this up some extreme Libs like this member of parliament and blamed colonialism for this. They've said, you know, it's colonialism, it's racism, it's prejudice, it's the patriarchy that is attacking the MMQP, LB, whatever. But I looked it up because that didn't sound right to me. And it turns out that when you try to figure out who is murdering these people, 80 to 86% of the time the people doing the murdering are intimate partners, spouses, family members and acquaintances. In other words, the people who are murdering the MMIWG2 LGBTQIA people are the MMIWG2 LGBTQIA people. That's who's doing it, which has always been the case. There was this meme some years ago, not like three or four years ago, that said, you know, trans women of color are being murdered around this country. And then you look who they're being murdered by, and they're being murdered by other LGBTQIA people. Most of them are prostitutes and drug addicts who are being killed in criminal acts by other people of the same community. Has nothing to do with the other communities. That's who it is. So anyway, my heart goes out to the MM, etc., people. But if they are being M and M, if they're going this thing and being murdered, then the people to blame, most of them, almost all the time, are the other people in that community, and they should probably get their act together. Speaking of gender politics, Lawrence O'Donnell of MSNBC is really upset with Pete Hegseth and with the Trump administration, specifically really upset over that rescue mission in Iran that got the downed pilot on Easter Sunday. And you say, well, how can he be upset? Because it was a complete success and there were no American casualties in it. It was just this amazing rescue of a guy who seemed totally hopeless. And so what would, what could Lawrence O'Donnell possibly be upset about in that mission? Take a listen. That brilliant rescue was described by the Secretary of Defense and by General Dan Cain, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as a longstanding American military rule of never leaving anyone behind. We leave no man behind. That is of course the old school version of the idea back when only men flew American military planes. General Dan Cain, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, put it this way. We leave no one behind. The general knows, unlike Pete Hegseth, that that could have been a woman they were trying to rescue and it might be a woman the next time. Perfect, perfect. Love it. You can just imagine Lawrence O'Donnell stranded on a desert island, stranded on a desert island with, you know, his sister, his daughter. They're there on the island and when all hope is lost, someone shows up says, hey, I've got a rescue boat. Sir, ma'am, I have a rescue boat. Did you just call my daughter ma'am? Did you assume, did you assume her gender? How dare you? I've got, you're gonna die. You're on the brink of death. Please get on the ship. A tsunami is coming. Please. Did you just miss gender? I'll stay right here. Thank you very much. This is how you know, this is how you know that in spite of everything and the fall on nature of the world and the fact that politics is always going to be kind of broken, there's always going to be something to complain about. This is how you know the Trump administration is doing a great job. This is how you know the administration is doing a great job. Even in something relatively controversial like this operation in Iran, this is how you know they're doing a really bang up job at the end of the day when all is said and done. You know how I know? Because the best thing that Lawrence O'Donnell could find to criticize is Pete Heg Seth saying, leave no man behind. Because man, by the way, is a gender neutral term, just as he is the gender neutral first person. There's a third person singular pronoun, but if that's the best thing these guys have to criticize, there's nothing to criticize. You know, they would love to criticize oil going to $150 or $200 a barrel, but oil actually just plunged after the announcement of the ceasefire to $90 a barrel. They would love to complain about rampant inflation elsewhere. Heg is hitting $10, $11 a dozen as they did under Biden, but you know what? They can't. Eggs have declined 63%. They would love to complain about crime surging around the country. They can't because Trump tackled the crime. They would love to find some way to complain about immigration, even though they're pro mass migration, pro illegal immigration, but they'd love to find a way to complain about it. They can't really. Not right now. They're complaining about the phrase leave no man. They're complaining that when the military pulled off the most amazing rescue, probably ever in American history with no casualties whatsoever, they didn't use the politically correct noun. It's a good mark for Trump. Okay, so much more to get to. I want to get to this CIA crazy super weapons speaking of that rescue, but I don't have time, so you have to wait for tomorrow. Today's Theology Thursday, the rest of the show continues now. You do not want to miss it. Become a member of UseCodenolesCanadaVL.com. Check out for two months free and all annual plans.