{"id":74236,"date":"2020-04-02T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-02T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/?p=74236"},"modified":"2020-04-02T11:28:45","modified_gmt":"2020-04-02T18:28:45","slug":"tnt-and-infiltration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2020\/04\/02\/tnt-and-infiltration\/","title":{"rendered":"TNT and Infiltration"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A friend recently asked me my thoughts on “TNT”, the work of Taylor Marshall<\/a> and Timothy Gordon<\/a>. I try and avoid writing about specific Catholics media personalities, but I’ve been asked about them so often I thought I’d just put down some thoughts here…<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

A gentle tongue is a tree of life<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I was an early fan of Dr. Marshall, ever since his days at The Catholic Information Center<\/a> in Washington DC. I loved listening to the talks he gave there. I really enjoyed his theology books, such as The Crucified Rabbi<\/em>,<\/a> as well as his fictional works such as Sword and Serpent<\/a><\/em> – I was actually part of the Launch Team for the second two books in his trilogy. When I had an opportunity to join his New St. Thomas Institute<\/a>, I signed up. I also really benefited greatly from his first hundred or so podcast<\/a> episodes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, towards the end of last year I stopped consuming Dr. Marshall’s material. I just had fatigue. I think it was towards the end of 2018, around the time that Timothy Gordon began appearing on his show, the trajectory of his ministry took a notable shift. The episodes started getting longer and longer, and the criticism more sustained. The comment sections on YouTube and Twitter followed suit, becoming increasingly toxic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I reached the point where I just had to stop. I just found that, after listening to an episode, I would go away feeling anxious and exhausted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Infiltration<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

A little bit before I stopped consuming Dr. Marshall’s material, he released Infiltration<\/a><\/em> a book “showing how these enemies of Christ strategically infiltrated the seminaries, then the priesthood, then the episcopacy, and eventually the cardinal-electors all with the eventual goal of electing one of their own as pope.”<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, admittedly I have not read this book from cover-to-cover. I did, however, get the chance to look through a copy which one of my friends had purchased. Rather than argue over the details of Dr. Marshall’s book, allow me to express my chief issue with the book… <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let’s say for sake of argument that the criticisms of this book are unfounded. Let’s say that everything stated and implied within its pages is accurate (I have no easy way of disproving many of the claims anyway). Let’s assume that there have indeed been coordinated conspiracies to take down the Catholic Church. Here’s my question…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What difference does that make to me?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can I change who is Pope? No.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can I change the actions of the USCCB? No. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can I even change the actions of my own Bishop? No.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, if I have no scope of influence in the areas discussed by the book, how do I really benefit from its pages? What fruit will it produce in my life, other than anger and anxiety?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I need to home and love my family<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I posted a comment on Dr. Marshall’s Twitter account a while back saying that I needed to take a break from his materials due to the relentless negativity and said that I would love to see him return to producing the spiritually nourishing material of his earlier years. While Dr. Marshall was kind, many of his acolytes were not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don’t begrudge Dr. Marshall or other Catholic commentators for doing what they do. Perhaps it gives ensures some kind of accountability for some clerics? Maybe…it’s hard to say. However, I do know it’s just not for me. When I come across folks who consume this kind of material day-in-day-out, they don’t seem joy-filled. They remind me of politics junkies who spend their days getting angry about the words and actions of politicians who are utterly removed from their own day-to-day existence. In my opinion, that’s no way to live.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On a personal note, I’ve noticed that when I constantly focus on the faults and sins of clergy I’ve never met, I’m more liable to ignore my own faults. Naturally, Uncle Screwtape<\/a> loves this sort of thing because it means that I think about my own sins even less than I did before! Rather than spending time in humble introspection, I waste my time getting angry about people I’ve never met and about stuff I can’t ever change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, rather than listening to ninety-minute podcasts and videos complaining about Popes, Bishops and Priests, I think my time is better spent doing a Holy Hour and then going out rejuvenated to serve the local Body of Christ. As the (apocryphal<\/a>) saying of Mother Teresa goes:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf you want to bring peace to the whole world, go home and love your family.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>Not Mother Teresa<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A friend recently asked me my thoughts on “TNT”, the work of Taylor Marshall and Timothy Gordon. I try and avoid writing about specific Catholics media personalities, but I’ve been asked about them so often I thought I’d just put down some thoughts here…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[5570,2095,5569],"class_list":["post-74236","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","tag-infiltration","tag-taylor-marshall","tag-tnt"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74236","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74236"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74236\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75796,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74236\/revisions\/75796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74236"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74236"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74236"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}