← Unpacking The Mass
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Welcome to Unpacking the Mass with Keith Nestor. On this podcast, we dig into the week's readings for the upcoming Sunday for the Catholic Church so that when you go to Mass, you are ready to hear what God has to say to you through the Scriptures. So grab your Bibles and let's get digging. Hello, my friends. Welcome to Unpacking the Mass. Today we are studying the readings for the sixth Sunday in Easter. That's kind of hard to say. The sixth Sunday in Easter. And we're continuing in our readings from the Book of Acts, the Book of Revelation, and the Gospel of John. I love these texts. I love seeing what the Church does. I love seeing how Christ has enabled the church and empowered the church to accomplish his will in the world. And I love seeing in Revelation the end result of everything that happens. I love reading this, knowing that in the end, Jesus wins. Let's jump in, my friends, and take a look at our first reading from the Book of Acts, chapter 15, verses 1 through 2. And then it skips ahead to 22 through 29. Some who had come down from Judea were instructing the brothers, unless you are circumcised according to the Mosaic practice, you cannot be saved. Because there arose no little dissension in debate by Paul and Barnabas with them. And it was decided that Paul, Barnabas and some of the others should go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and elders about this question. The apostles and elders, in agreement with the whole church, decided to choose representatives and to send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. The ones chosen were Judas, who was called Barsabbas, and Silas, the leader from among the brothers. This is the letter delivered by them, the apostles and the elders, your brothers, to the brothers in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia of Gentile origin. Greetings. Since we have heard that some of our number who went out without any mandate from us have upset you with their teaching and disturbed your peace of mind, we have, with one accord, decided to choose representatives and to send them to you along with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, who have dedicated their lives to the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. So we are sending Judas and Silas, who will also convey this same message by word of mouth. It is the decision of the Holy Spirit and of us not to place on you any burden beyond these necessities, namely to abstain from meat sacrificed to idols, from blood, from meats of strangled animals, and from unlawful marriage. If you keep free of these, you will be doing what is right. Farewell. Okay, man, there's a lot to unpack Here I'm gonna get into some of it, but probably not all of it, my friends. So what's going on here? Remember from the weeks previous, we've been seeing the ministry that Paul and Barnabas and others have been having with not just the Jewish believers in Christ, but the Gentiles as well? Well, this opens up all sorts of questions about what are we supposed to do as the church, we with people who come into the Christian faith that aren't already part of the nation of Israel. Because remember the nation of Israel, the Jewish people had all of these things that they did to practice their faith. The dietary laws, keeping of the feast, all of these things, circumcision. And there were many people that were unsure if their salvation came as the result of keeping these things in the context of following Christ or if when Christ fulfilled the. The law, that meant that these things no longer applied to them and they had to try to figure this out. It's. It's interesting how this issue shows up right away in the church. And what, what happens? Well, as we can see, Peter and others are going around, they're seeing Gentiles coming into this faith, and they're saying, whoa. It's apparent that God's power is given to all. Remember Peter's vision that he has where. Where all of these unclean animals come down. Remember, representing the Gentiles and God says, call no unclean thing that I have made clean. And Peter immediately recognizes what's going on here, that this is about the Gentiles being allowed entrance into the kingdom. But what are they supposed to do to be converted? And apparently there were some that thought, okay, if you guys want to come into the. To Christianity, you can do that, but you have to first keep all these Jewish laws and come alongside that. Then you can become a Christian. So what happens is in Acts, chapter 15, we see what we. What's referred to as the Jerusalem Council, the first ecumenical council of the Church. Now, our reading today doesn't go into all the details, but I would encourage you to read it, see how this takes place. What's important here is, in my view, the. The way that God has chosen to reveal himself through the church. This is huge, my friends, because what you don't see in this text are a bunch of people that gather around, open up the Bible, and everybody goes, well, this is what it says to me. This is what it says to me. Well, okay, well, we contradict each other. So I guess you go, do you. I'll go do me. You guys can start your own Little group over here, we'll start our group over here and all that. That's not at all what we see. What we see is these apostles gathering together and discussing and praying and deciding. And I think it's interesting that they say this, this we agreement, it seemed good to us and to the Holy Spirit that this is what the decision should be. And then they lay down these specific things and I'll get into what those are in a second and why they were a big deal back then. But what's important to think about is this. In, in my view, anyway, the key part of this text is what happens afterward, how they then take this decision and send it out to all the believers everywhere and say, this is what we, the leaders of the Church have decreed and it's binding for all of you. There wasn't this, this loosey goosey understanding of what the Christian church was supposed to be back in the first century, where everyone just did whatever they felt like doing and local church leaders in those areas had all of the authority to make decisions for what was best best for them? No, that's not how it worked, my friends, because that's not at all how Jesus said it was going to work. Jesus, as we'll see in the Gospel, has a very specific plan for how he wants the deposit of faith to be passed down to the apostles and then given to the rest of the world by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Now let's talk again a little bit about, or let's talk a little bit about what these things are that the Church decreed for the Jews. So notice that the, the first thing that was proposed was circumcision. Okay? So you have to be circumcised in order to be saved. And, and that was never even on the table. As a matter of fact, you'll see Paul later who will say circumcision is nothing, okay? He understood that Christ had come to fulfill the law and that in essence, baptism has replaced circumcision as the sacrament of entrance into the people of God. So St. Paul himself will say, nope, you don't have to do that. Now what's interesting though, is that Timothy as an adult was circumcised as a convert. Now why would he do this? And it has to do with the answer to the question of why these other things that are, that are brought forth. And here's the bottom line, okay, let's just go through them again one at a time. Here he says, abstain from meat, sacrifice to idols, from blood, from meats of strangled Animals. And from unlawful marriage, some. Some translations say from sexual immorality. Now let's talk about why these things were a big deal. Because today in our life, like, typically for most of us, those things aren't a big deal. I mean, the sexual immorality, yes, but what about these dietary things? What was the. What was the deal? Well, ultimately, what this was about, and I know I'm just scratching the surface here, this happens, had to do with a discipline that they were passing down as to avoid scandalizing these Jewish believers, because for them, so much of what they grew up in, recognizing that it had come from God as part of the old covenant, had to do with what they could or couldn't eat, especially around the idea of blood. So there were all these things that they had to keep. And with regard to idols. So, you know, we don't live in a world today where you go buy meat that has been sacrificed to idols, but for the Jewish people, this was a huge issue of scandal. And you can see Paul wrestling with this with the church, with different believers and different things that are going on. You can read about this in Romans and in 1st Corinthians and in Galatians, he talks about some of these things too. So there's this tension that exists between what is permissible and what is forbidden when it comes to these things that exist in the culture. And the overriding principle that is being put forth here in this text is, look, we don't want to put an undue burden on people that they can't deal with. But in this particular situation, there are some things that if you just take that, that freedom that you have and exercise it in a context with other believers in Christ who come from a Jewish background who are highly scandalized by these things, this is going to take us into a place of conflict and scandal. So what we're asking you to do is avoid that is to avoid that this wasn't given as like God has ultimately decreed for all time and all places that you can't have meat sacrifice to idols, okay? Because as St. Paul would say later, he would say, an idol is nothing. He'd say, don't. When you go to the market, don't get worked up about things because an idol is nothing. There's nothing inherently different about that meat because it's sacrificed to an idol than if it wasn't because the idol is nothing. But he also says, but if someone is scandalized by this, did you know when you're served this was sacrificed to an idol, don't eat It. Why? Because it's more important, as St. Paul would say, like in First Corinthians, chapter eight, he says, look, we don't want to cause other people to stumble. And if by eating this thing that that person is scandalized by will cause them to stumble, then I'm not loving my brother if I do that. So this was a huge cultural issue back in the day. Now, if you look at Romans 14, you see Paul says, look, at the end of the day, the kingdom of heaven isn't about eating or drinking. It's about love. It's about the truth of God. But in order that we don't cause one another to stumble, we need to be aware of these things. Now, the sexual immorality part, you might say, okay, sweet. So does that mean that we can just do whatever we want to sexually? Because that was a cultural thing? No, that's an issue that goes beyond just a cultural disciplinary issue that comes down from God Almighty and was not fulfilled in. In the New Covenant the way that these other things were fulfilled by Jesus in the Old Covenant. But you can understand that as the church was beginning to grow, there were certain things that. That they had to say, look, avoid this. But I think it's kind of interesting that they tack that on at the end, because maybe there were some things that were happening and there were some people that were advocating for some sort of sexual liberty. So, you know, we don't really know all those details, but here's what we do know. We do know, ultimately, that as the church began to grow and this controversy was settling itself and the church was moving away in practice from this. This weird tension between Gentile converts and Jewish converts, okay? As more of this was kind of pushed in the background, the church moved away from this until ultimately in the Council of Florence, what was decreed here in Jerusalem. And the disciplinary thing, remember, this was not dogma. This was a disciplinary thing. It was reversed. And I want to give a shout out to my friend Michael Lofton, who made a video about this, and him and I were talking about this. So I want to shout out to him for. For talking. Talking about this with me the other day. But here's the thing. What does all of that mean? The fact that this can be reversed by a church council is sort of the point to what we're talking about here. Because what we're talking about is the church given to the world by Jesus Christ, who can bind and loose in these matters of discipline and doctrine. The church can lay down the law and say, this is what The Lord has said to us as dogmatic things that must be believed. And there are there, then there are these other things that are disciplinary measures, things that, that may need to be changed based on how things are in a culture, in a time and in a space. Well, who gets to decide that? Have we ever thought about that? See, the Catholic Church at one point in time finally got to a point they said, okay, we're just going to just officially address this, but what about our Orthodox brothers and sisters? What about our Protestant brothers and sisters? Because they, to my knowledge, I don't know who has the authority in those camps to make that binding and loosing, or I guess in this case, that loosing of, of that practice. I mean, and I know there are still some, by the way, Protestants, like Seventh Day Adventists, who hold to the biblical Old Testament, biblical dietary laws, okay? There are certain people who are, we'll call them Messianic Jews or whatever, Torah observant Christians who still hold to the, to, to all of those things, right? And I guess I would say at least, you know, they're consistent with their view because they, they don't look back and, and of course they don't adhere to the ecumenical councils. So they would look back and say, well, there was nowhere in the scripture where that was alleviated. So we're going to stick with that. You know, I don't agree with their take on it here today, but I will say this. They at least have a consistent understanding of that where they haven't just randomly decided that it has been reversed or fulfilled or whatever. Whereas in the Catholic Church, we recognize the authority the church has, and that was exercised in a way to say, look, okay, if you want to eat that way, you can, but you don't have to, okay? And remember, I could, I could get really deep in the weeds on this thing. But the point of this is to recognize how the Church exercises her authority in the world to help an ever changing and growing world wrestle with these issues. And the overriding principle here is truth and charity, okay? Truth and charity. They could have just said, you know what? Do whatever you want. Because none of this stuff makes a difference anyway. I mean, stay sexually pure. But there was a concern for the, the Jewish Christians who would have seen this and been so scandalized, they probably would have walked away from the faith. They would have been like, no, we're, we're freaked out. Sometimes we have to do that. You know, there's practical applications for this too, in our own lives, okay? And I mean for me, as A Catholic. I guess the biggest one I could think about has to do with, like, the use of alcohol. Okay? When I was a Protestant, there were certain camps of Protestantism. I guess that's true whether I'm a Protestant or not. But I'm just thinking back to my own experience that taught emphatically that any use of alcohol is a. A serious sin is a. Is a sin. Okay? So if you drink a glass of wine with your pasta, boom, that's sin. If you have a beer with your buddies while you're watching the game, boom, that's sin. There's no scenario where. Where that's not bad. So they forbid it, okay? They forbid it. Now, there are other groups of Protestants that don't live like that. Catholics don't necessarily live like that. Now, we all agree that drunkenness is a sin. I haven't met anyone who says that's not a sin. But, you know, drinking alcohol before drunkenness, okay, you know, that in and of itself is not a sin. Has been the position of many different. The vast majority of Christians throughout the world. So here's the deal. If I am out to dinner with my wife and I want to have a glass of wine with my. With my dinner, that. That's no sin. Okay? That's. That's not a sin. But if I am with some of my Protestant friends that are scandalized by that, maybe it's because they have alcoholism in their family, or maybe it's because they read scriptures that talk about wine is a mocker, or they see drunkenness as a sin, and they can't distinguish between drinking alcohol a little bit and drunkenness. And for them, it's this huge deal. I don't walk into those situations, be like, all right, hey, I know you guys can't, but I'm going to, you know, suck down a pitcher of Guinness here. That would just be dumb. Why do that? Why. Why. Why scandalize people intentionally? Okay, so sometimes we have to. We have to be loving and motivated by love in an attempt to not scandalize people. And that's kind of the principle here. Now, it's tough to know when and where that starts and stops in the world sometimes, because people could be super judgmental. And when someone could judge me and say, oh, Keith, you know, you like to drink, you know, bourbon once in a while, or you have a beer once in a while, or I saw a picture of you drinking on your Instagram or whatever, you know, you're a sinner. Okay? I don't appreciate that judgment. But at the same Time. You know, we have to be aware. We have to be aware. You know, I. I do have some friends that have struggled with alcohol. And when I'm with those friends, I remember we were. We were with some people not too long ago. We went out to dinner, and I knew this. This particular person was a serious alcoholic. You know, I guess all alcoholics are probably serious alcoholics. But. And he talked about that in his testimony. He shared about that. And I was out to dinner with him, and I was kind of thinking, maybe I'll get a beer or something. But I asked him a question. I said, hey, can I just ask you. And I want you to be completely, brutally honest with me. I want to know, if I order a glass of beer, is that going to scandalize you in any way, shape or form, is that going to cause you to stumble? Is that going to cause you to struggle? Is that going to throw you off in any way? Because if the answer is yes, and you don't need to explain it, if you say yes, you know, I want to know, and I won't do it. And he was like, no, you're fine. You're fine. I'm okay with that. So I felt freedom to do that. Now, there are other people in my life that I know the answer to that question is, yeah, that'd probably be tough for me. We don't even go there. This is that kind of thinking in our lives today. Now, that's one example. Are there others? Yeah, there are. You know, you can run into these situations, for example, with music. You can. You can run into this kind of situation with movies with certain things that you may or may not want to see that may or may not be inherently sinful, but could cause another person to stumble. And if that's the case, you shouldn't do it. You know, if you have a friend who's struggled with an addiction to gambling, when you invite them over to your house, don't suggest that you start playing poker, okay? Don't do that. Don't go to that person who's a. Who's struggling with gambling and say, hey, you know, let's go hang out at the casino. You shouldn't do that. You know, you should be aware of where people have had struggles so that in love, you can focus on the things of God. All right? That's a lot to say about that issue, you know, But I think it's important for us to understand the guiding principle behind all of this, though, is the Holy Spirit, who gives us the ability, as the church, gives the ability to the church. Okay, not me from the church, I'm in the church, but the magisterium of the church to bind and loose in these areas. All right, Sorry about all of that stuff there. But I think it's important for us to know the context of these things. If you want to read more about it, read the rest of. Of Acts 15. We just got to see. We got to see the beginning and the end, but we. We didn't see the middle, so. So check it out and look at that. All right, let's look at our response. Oriole Psalm, Psalm 67. O God, let all the nations praise you. May God have pity on us and bless us. May he let his face shine upon us. So may your way be known upon earth among all the nations your salvation, O God, let all the nations praise you. May the nations be glad and exalt, because you rule the peoples in equity. The nations on the earth you guide. O God, let all the nations praise you. May the peoples praise you. O God, may all the peoples praise you. May God bless us, and may all the ends of the earth fear him. O God, let all the nations praise you. I love this, this sense here, that his way would be made known upon the earth, the salvation of the Lord. Again, that's what we're talking about here in the church. All right. Revelation chapter 21. We're almost the very end. There's 22 chapters in Revelation. This is. This is the 21st chapter. As, remember, John has been given this vision of what ultimately it looks like when God comes to institute his kingdom on earth and we have a new heaven and a new earth. Revelation 21. The angel took me in spirit to a great high mountain and showed me the holy city of Jerusalem. Coming down out of heaven from God, it gleamed with the splendor of God. Its radiance was like that of a precious stone, like Jasper, clear as crystal. It had a massive high wall with 12 gates where 12 angels were stationed and on which the names were inscribed, the names of the twelve tribes of the Israelites. There were three gates facing east, three north, three south, and three west. The wall of the city had twelve courses of stone as its foundation, and on which were inscribed the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb. The city had no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gave it light and its lamp was the Lamb. All right. Wow. What incredible stuff we see here. I think it's very interesting to notice how we have the 12 gates with the names of the 12 tribes of Israelites. But then we also have these 12 courses of stone as the foundation which were the 12 apostles. So of course we clearly see that God is the God of the old covenant and the new covenant. It isn't like the old covenant has been wiped away. It's been fulfilled, friends. So we see the foundation of the new city is on the apostles. But what the gates have inscribed on it are the 12 tribes of Israel. It's beautiful thing how we see God bringing in the Gentiles and the Jews together. But built upon this foundation of the apostles. Friends, what a beautiful picture. You know, when God comes to make all things new, God isn't giving new revelation at that point in time, he's bringing forth that which he has always brought forth, the truth of the old covenant. And the new covenant has been fulfilled. So we see that in this new city. Beautiful. Coming down from heaven. Friends, this is our hope, this is our goal. Now what does that mean for us? The twelve tribes of Israel remind us that God has always and will always remember his covenant with Israel. It's interesting how those tribes get dispersed and we don't know where they are. God knows where they are. We might think, oh well, it doesn't matter anymore. Well, it matters to God, because there it is in heaven. But yet this is built upon the foundation of the apostles. Of course, you remember the words of Jesus to Peter, upon this rock I will build my church. You know. Interesting. And we see also in the New Testament that the church is built on the foundation of the apostles. Friends, how has God designed his Word to go forth into this world? It's through the apostles, their foundation. And that's what we see in our Gospel. Let's take a look at it together. Alleluia. Alleluia. Whoever loves me will keep my word, says the Lord. And my Father will love him, and we will come to him. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. From John 14, Jesus said to his disciples, whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him. Whoever does not love me does not keep my words. Yet the word you hear is not mine, but that of the Father who sent me. I have told you this while I am with you. The advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you. Peace. I leave with you. My peace. I give to you. Not as the world gives. Do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid. You heard me tell you I am going away and I will come back to you. If you loved me, you would rejoice that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. And now I have told you this before it happens, so that when it happens, you may believe. Wow. Again, so much ultimately to unpack here. But remember, the overall theme of the readings this week is that God is working through the church to bring his truth. Okay, but what is the way that God is doing that? Through the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus says, look, I'm going away, but the Father will send you, the advocate in my name, the Holy Spirit, who will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you. And that's what we see in the church. That's what the Church teaches, by the way, that. That the Holy Spirit is the illuminating power, not the wisdom of men. Not super smart dudes who've got it all figured out. The Catholic Church understands that it could never do that because left to its own devices, it would completely fall apart. But because the Church is illuminated and. And filled with the Holy Spirit. That's why the Church has been given the ability to bind and loose, to teach authoritatively. That's why we need to listen to the Church. It's so important, friends. You know, I used to think that the Catholic Church was just one of many churches, and why pick this one over that one? But when you recognize that this is the church built on the foundation of the apostles, this is the church promised by God that would not have the gates of hell prevail against it. Illuminated by the Holy Spirit built upon the rock of Peter. That's what Jesus did. Remember, Peter didn't just wake up one day and go, all right, hey, guess what? I'm in charge. No, Jesus was the one who said this. Matthew 16:18. Friends, this is where we see this. And this is how it plays out. And notice what Jesus says. He's like, look, if you love me, okay, you will keep my word. And what did he say to the apostles? And whoever hears you, hears me. So we need to obey the church, because when we obey the church, we obey Christ. I think of St. Ignatius of Antioch who said, obey your bishop as the Lord. Obey your bishop as if he's Jesus Christ, because he stands in the presence of Jesus Christ, like in the place of him as far as his teaching authority. So we've got to be obedient my friends. That's why we can look at things that happen in Acts 15 and go, okay, this is what they did. We see it happening in real time back then, and we have to see it in real time in our day. What's the purpose of this? Christ gives to us peace. And we can find peace when we're unified in our doctrine, can't we? But when everyone's trying to do his or her own thing, everyone thinks they can decide what Christianity teaches. I've got the Holy Spirit in the Bible. I can't tell you how many times I get that from people. Well, Keith, you just have to have the Bible, duh, You know, you idiots just read the Bible and, you know, I mean, I can't. It's. If I had a dollar for every time someone said to me, oh, well, Keith, if you want to understand the truth and why Catholicism is evil, just read the Bible. Never thought of that one before. It'll be clear. Well, why is it clear to you, but not to the millions of other people who've read the Bible that have different conclus than you do? You see, here's the thing. We have to see in the Bible what the Bible teaches about how God's plan is to deliver the faith unto the world. And it's through his church. That's what the Holy Spirit does, my friends, guides the church. And that will bring us peace. We're not gonna have peace without that. And we see that. That's why we're so divided in Christianity. You know, I know people get riled up about the 30, 000 denominational number. I don't know if it's 30, 000. That might be overstated, but. But it's a whole lot more than it should be, isn't it? What if it was 5,000? Is that too many? Yeah. What if it was 2,000? Is that too many'? Yeah, they're supposed to be one. My friends, Jesus prayed that we would be one, that we would be unified in doctrine, in discipline and in peace and in love. I know we're not going to solve that here today on unpacking the mass. But you know what we might be able to solve? We might be able to solve our own hearts where maybe we have not been united with Christ and his church. Where maybe we've found areas in our own life where we have wanted to not obey, where we've said, yeah, I know the church teaches this, but yeah, I don't like that. Friends, if that's where you're coming from, then I would encourage you. Remember what Jesus said. He said that whoever does not love me does not keep my words. So we have to keep his word if we love him. I know that might sound so painfully simple, but it really, it's that simple. Whenever I talk to people who want to argue about theology and why we should change this and that, what they always start with was, well, that's a complicated issue. You know, whenever someone starts with, well, that's a complicated issue, and their desire is to disobey the teaching of the Church, you know that what's going to come next is just a bunch of bull crap, okay? Think about the arguments that we hear against the pro life position. Well, it's a complicated issue. When does life begin? Think about the arguments that we hear when it comes to human sexuality. Well, it's a complicated issue, friends. It's not. Here's. Here's the solution. Obey the words of Christ. Obey the words of the Church that he founded, that he has given the Holy Spirit to. To remind him of everything he taught to bring us peace not as the world gives, okay, but as he gives. Now, how does the world give peace? The world's peace is very surface level and dependent on your circumstances, isn't it? The world's peace is all about, well, how are things going for you? Everything good. If everything's going good, whatever that means to you, then you can have peace, supposedly. Okay? Well, the peace that Christ gives isn't based on that at all. Because you can have peace when everything's going bad from a worldly perspective, okay? You can. You can have persecutions coming. Remember we talked about that last week when. When Paul said we must endure this necessary for us to undergo these trials, okay? That doesn't mean we can't have peace. Remember, Jesus is telling us these guys right before he's about to go into his passion, right before they're about to be entering into this very difficult time. He's like, this is how you have peace. How is that possible? I'll tell you how it's possible. Because the peace of Christ surpasses understanding. It goes beyond our worldly circumstances. It goes into our heart. See, the peace of Christ is about one thing and one thing only, and that is loving God and knowing that God loves us. But when we disobey, we step out of that. So, friends, let not your hearts be troubled. And that isn't just some little platitude given to you to make you feel better. That's a command, right? That's a command. But it's not a command that is unconditional, meaning that it's just going to happen. It's something that is a result of what you do. You want to know how you let not your hearts be troubled? Obey Jesus Christ. You receive his peace. Boom. That's the bottom line. If you're out there sinning like crazy and abandoning your faith, you're not going to have peace. That command of let not your hearts be troubled does not apply to you in that situation. Now repent, turn back to God, follow Jesus, obey his teaching, and then you can let not your heart be troubled, nor be afraid. Friends, the Lord has told us these things so that we would know how to live in this world. Remember last week we talked about how important it is to persevere, how important it is to have hope, and how important it is to love each other in the midst of all of that. Right? Well, we add to that today this principle of not doing anything to scandalize one another, not not recognizing our own freedom in Christ as a. As a means to flaunt that before other people. But we also recognize what it means to seek the truth given to us in the church. And we see how that played out in Acts 15. And guess what, friends? That church continues to play itself out in that way here today. And I pray that you would experience that peace. All right, friends, thank you so much for joining me here on unpacking the Mass. It's always a privilege to walk through these readings, and you may see stuff in here that I didn't see. That's okay. Your priest is probably going to preach a way better homily than my reflections here. I hope so. That would be awesome. We do this so that we can have our ears perked up and our minds open to receive what the Lord would have to say to us. Okay. This isn't a substitute for your. For your priest's homily. This is a primer to get our ears ready. Remember, Jesus said, let he who has ears to hear. He let him hear. So, friends, may we all hear the word of God preach to us as we unpack the Mass. God bless you all, my friends. Take care, and we'll see you next time.