Avoiding Babylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!A fake video goes viral, a holiday explodes across timelines, and suddenly everyone’s arguing about culture, borders, and the Church. We dig into how AI hoaxes and algorithmic rage bait are reshaping the conversation around faith and public life, and why the loudest narratives keep winning—even when they’re empty. From the latest deepfakes attributed to church leaders to the Vatican’s two-year TLM extensions, we unpack mixed signals, real consequences, and the deeper question: what holds a community together when trust is thin?We share how these online storms feed real exhaustion, then look squarely at leadership and language. When violence targets Christians, “it’s just social conflict” won’t do; words matter when souls and lives are at stake. We explore the line between preaching principles and prescribing policy, why unity requires honest clarity, and how ecumenism can serve truth without dissolving identity. Along the way, we examine the pipeline that turns AI slop into viral fuel, the role of click farms with no stake in the Church, and the spiritual hazard of living inside an outrage machine.Finally, we turn inward: a new generation of orthodox seminarians, old power networks, and how healthy parishes can coexist with conflicted leadership. The path forward isn’t flashy: curate your inputs, guard your attention, build local trust, support clear teaching, and pray for courage. If you’re tired of noise but hungry for substance, this conversation keeps the focus on first things—truth, charity, and the hard work of real unity.If this resonated, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a rating with one takeaway you want more of next time. Your feedback shapes what we tackle next.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!A shaky ad read and some friendly ribbing give way to a rare, candid conversion story: a Reformed pastor worn thin by 2020, family burdens, and Sunday dread begins asking God for an exit ramp he can’t yet name. An old friend—now Catholic—offers a simple challenge: read the Catechism to learn the Church from the Church. So he does, pencil in hand. Circles for “yes,” rectangles for “I need more,” triangles for “no way.” Then daily Mass. Then Latin Mass. What surprises him first is the familiarity—the lectionary, the reverence, the shape of worship echoing his Lutheran childhood. What changes him next is Scripture: Hebrews 12 reframes worship as a present communion with the saints; Isaiah 22 and Matthew 16 connect the key and the office in a typology he already loves to preach.Meanwhile, life doesn’t pause. His wife grieves, becomes a guardian overnight, and shoulders state paperwork while he strains to shepherd a congregation on an empty tank. One prayer breaks through the fog: Mary, be a mother to my wife while she’s losing hers. Grace answers. The exit ramp appears on a Florida trip when his wife says, Maybe this is it. He resigns gently, stays through year‑end, and answers one summer’s worth of honest questions—including a sermon on Mary’s perpetual virginity built from the Reformers themselves. In January, they slip out of town to worship quietly. Friends notice and ask. There’s no recruiting, just real answers. The Holy Spirit moves: four couples and their children, plus two reverts, begin OCIA and enter the Church. Seventeen souls. More ripples follow—his oldest starts OCIA in another city.We also talk about the temptations after conversion: platform, hot takes, “professional Catholic” life. He chooses stillness over speed, daily Mass over instant punditry, Our Lady and the saints over arguments for their own sake. He’s drafting a practical guide to help Catholics “speak Protestant,” especially on typology and authority, but only with spiritual direction and doctrinal checks. If you’ve ever wondered how Scripture, suffering, and friendship might converge to redirect a life—and a community—this story will meet you there.If this moved you, share it with someone discerning, subscribe for more thoughtful conversations, and leave a review with the one moment that surprised you most.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!A microphone squeal, a sarcastic wine ad, and then the floor drops out. We go from laughs to the fault lines running through Catholic life right now: a made-for-camera stunt at an ICE facility framed as “Eucharist denied,” diocesan letters pushing Latin Mass communities to fold into “reverent” alternatives, and families who built their lives around stable liturgy wondering where to go this Sunday. We don’t dress it up—trust breaks when sacraments and headlines get blended for optics.We walk through Knoxville’s announcement, the signals from Rome’s DDW, and what the first week’s numbers look like when a thriving TLM map gets redrawn. Behind every statistic is a home sale, a homeschool co-op, and a seven-year-old who just lost the friends he prays with. We press the claim that liturgy forms people: habits at the altar shape what your conscience tolerates on Monday. That doesn’t deny validity; it insists that culture matters and that “reverent Novus Ordo” promises feel thin when the same authorities hint they’ll remove kneelers if challenged.Cardinal Robert Sarah’s voice serves as a compass: encourage those who actually practice the faith. We contrast that fatherly posture with an impulse to homogenize—whether in worship or in how leaders talk about identity and assimilation. The throughline is consistent: distinct forms, memories, and practices keep people rooted. Erase them and you get a bland surface where convictions evaporate. We wrestle with obedience, courage, and prudence without pretending there’s a single neat answer. Endure what purifies; resist where your duty to your family demands it. And stop popesplaining people’s pain—compassion is not disloyalty.Along the way we share bright threads: a young seeker finding the Latin Mass, a Protestant pastor-turned-Catholic who brought seventeen souls with him, and a reminder that different voices in the Church play different roles. If worship shapes belief, then the task is simple and hard: guard the forms that train hearts to love God, name the costs honestly, and build communities that don’t fold when the memo arrives. If this resonates, subscribe, share the episode with a friend who needs it, and leave a review so more displaced Catholics can find a lifeline.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!Warning: Some F-Bombs were dropped in this sectionStart with a careful read of the room: families are stretched thin, culture is noisy, and the heart still aches for God. We sat down and opened a fresh Church document on charity and the poor, then asked a hard question—why does the guidance we hear so often miss the pain points we face each week? Caring for the poor is essential; the Beatitudes aren’t optional. But parents are also navigating social media modesty battles, identity confusion, and a five-hour Sunday just to reach the sacraments. Where is the pastoral help that speaks to those fires?We dig into the difference between moral teaching and prudential policy, especially around immigration. Compassion matters, and human dignity isn’t up for debate. Yet the on-the-ground strain—parish distance, stretched budgets, cultural fragmentation—rarely earns direct acknowledgment. We argue for a both/and: real charity and a realistic defense of community life, parish stability, and the spiritual formation of children. That requires leaders who will name the demons of our moment—pornography, contempt, factionalism, and despair—along with the corporal needs we already know by heart.Along the way, we wrestle with our own tone. Social media rewards scorn, but the Gospel commands love of the person in front of us—even when we disagree. We talk about reverence for the Eucharist, when not to receive, and how to keep Sundays from souring into resentment for teens. Underneath it all is a plea for shepherds to meet spiritual hunger with supernatural hope: clear teaching, reachable sacraments, and courage that transcends politics.If this resonates—if you’ve felt unseen while trying to hold your family together in a loud age—press play. Then tell us what help you most need from your parish and your leaders. Subscribe, share with a friend who’s on the same road, and leave a review so more families can find the conversation.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!Forget the safe take. We go straight at the knot that ties American power, Israeli policy, media gatekeeping, and the Catholic conscience—and why so many big voices choose silence when the stakes are highest. The conversation contrasts a clean non‑intervention case with a thornier identity lens and then brings in the missing third rail: theology. That’s where the ground shifts—Scripture’s patterns of elder and younger brothers, covenant faithfulness and rupture, and the Church’s self-understanding after Christ illuminate why this debate won’t stay “just politics.”We talk candidly about incentives in conservative media, the “I don’t care about Israel” cop‑out, and how American funding and weapons erase neutrality. Clips from Dave and Nick frame the battle lines; our take argues that morals don’t disappear because a topic risks your job. We press on papal rhetoric and immigration, not to harden hearts, but to ask whether sweeping statements replace prudence and ignore those of us who serve immigrants and the poor up close. Compassion needs order; pastoral care needs the parish and the Eucharist, not only headlines and hashtags.There’s a cultural spine here too: how post‑WWII trauma shaped public life and even Church tone; how the old TV gatekeepers collapsed; how suburbs, highways, and the melting‑pot myth atomized communities that once anchored faith and duty. If America is only ideas, no one belongs anywhere. If America is people and places, stewardship demands honesty about borders, aid, and the costs we export and import. Through it all, we call for courage without hatred—love of enemy, willingness to suffer, and the resolve to tell the whole truth even when it burns.If this conversation challenged you—or gave you language for what you’ve felt—share the episode, leave a review, and hit follow. Your support helps honest talk outpace strategic silence.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!A calendar date can feel like a footnote—until you realize it’s a battle cry. October 7 isn’t just ink on the liturgical page; it’s the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, born from the battle of Lepanto, when a divided Europe found the courage to row into the wind. We sat down with historian and translator Ryan Grant to unpack how a six-year Dominican papacy, a “nobody” commander, and a sea full of galleys redirected history—and why the story still reads like a map for our moment.We start with Pope Pius V: a reformer forged by Trent who promulgated the Roman Missal, backed real clerical renewal with St Charles Borromeo, and refused to flatter power. Against a backdrop of French gamesmanship, Protestant pressure, and Spain’s global overreach, he formed the Holy League and handed command to Don John of Austria, an illegitimate son with legitimate nerve. Ryan breaks down the fight the way it actually happened: tercios turning decks into battlefields, matchlocks hissing through smoke, Venetian galleasses doing less than legend says, and Ali Pasha betting the center at the wrong time. When El Sultana fell and the standard changed hands, morale cracked and the tide turned.But does Lepanto “matter” if the Ottomans rebuilt a fleet in six months? We tackle the revisionism head-on. Strategy and psychology shifted: no amphibious assault on Italy, no march on Rome, a Mediterranean suddenly contested. Bells rang in hostile lands, and the Church enshrined the memory as Our Lady of Victory—later Our Lady of the Rosary—cementing a devotion that would shape lay prayer for centuries. We explore the rosary’s Dominican roots without forcing a neat origin story and get practical about devotion: pray on the commute, love Mary first, learn a saint well enough to ask for help often.Most of all, we take the human lesson home. Don John didn’t wait for the perfect hierarchy; he went. If you’re looking for permission to begin—prayer, study, service, leadership—consider this your signal. Learn the feast. Know the history. Pick up your beads and move. If this conversation gives you something to chew on, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review so more people can find thoughtful, faith-filled history that speaks to right now.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!The cavalry isn’t coming—and that’s not a doomsday slogan, it’s the lived reality in towns cutting police hours and cities where 911 stalls. We take that uncomfortable truth and turn it into a plan: how to build a small, Catholic mutual assistance group that actually holds under stress. No cosplay, no fantasy—just clear roles, shared skills, and a prayer life that anchors everything.We start by puncturing the lone-wolf myth and mapping the real constraints: unpredictable platform rules around firearms, DAs who change the stakes by zip code, and emergency services that prioritize institutions over families. From there we get practical. Family buy-in comes first and it’s won with everyday examples—water when mains break, heat when the grid falters, first aid when minutes matter. Then we go find people where seriousness congregates: USPSA and IDPA matches, ham radio clubs, CERT and volunteer rescue, 4-H, homestead circles, and Knights of Columbus councils ready for renewal. Skills beat swagger—medics, electricians, welders, growers, and comms nerds are the backbone; rifles are the tip of a much larger spear.Leadership gets one chair. We outline a lean structure, redundancy across roles, simple comms plans, on-paper inventories, and an intel habit that shrinks the fog of war. We keep it legal and layered—cookouts before carbine days, no shortcuts, no stunts. Spiritual life isn’t a bolt-on; we pray the Rosary, read, and keep Sundays, because order in the soul builds order in the street. On gear and training, we favor standardization, sustainable ammo budgets, and drills that sharpen judgment over ego. Fitness becomes logistics you wear: walking, rucking, lifting—the quiet work that lets fathers carry children upstairs when it counts.If you’ve wondered how to move from anxiety to action, this conversation is your blueprint. Subscribe, share with someone who should be on your team, and tell us: what skill will you bring to your group this month?Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!The fights are loud; the fixes are quiet. We open with a hard look at how Catholics talk about the Pope—prudence vs. fear, why “seamless garment” rhetoric detonates in trad circles, and what we learned from mistakes under Francis. Then the conversation drops from theory to battle: a sudden wave of despair, the urge to relapse, and the shock of deliverance prayers that cut through the darkness in minutes. No theatrics. Just binding, sealing, and mercy that holds.From there, we trace the slow road back to reverence. A wife resists the Latin Mass, refuses a veil, and breaks into tears mid-liturgia; a father stops arguing and starts praying the rosary with his kids; families watch baptism in the old rite wake up something deep and ancient. We ask why anyone would restrict the one thing setting young hearts on fire—and we name motives without denying the spiritual stakes. Outrage is easy; building is harder. So we get practical: chant where you can, add vespers, catechize at home when programs fail, invite a Novus Ordo friend to High Mass and lunch for four Sundays in a row.Callers sharpen the edges. When does venting become gossip? How do you start a Catholic channel without becoming an apologist clone? What lines do you draw around invalid marriages when little eyes are watching? We offer simple rules that keep charity intact: love widely, scandal never, and let the holiness of your home do the talking. We also face Canada’s euthanasia slide and what real honor for aging parents looks like when it hurts.Along the way, we detour through Augustine, Israel, and typology—not as trivia, but as ballast for the soul. If you’re tired of online shots and hungry for what actually works—deliverance, confession, Latin Mass, fatherhood that keeps its vows—this is your map back to clarity.If this resonates, share it with a friend, subscribe for more honest conversations, and leave a review to help others find the show. Then tell us: what will you build this week?Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Want to reach out to us? Want to leave a comment or review? Want to give us a suggestion or berate Anthony? Send us a text by clicking this link!A single viral moment can do what a shelf of encyclicals can’t—and that’s exactly what we unpack. A papal quip about the death penalty, a glossy “ice blessing” clip, and days of Twitter crossfire reopened old wounds about the “seamless garment” and whether the Church is speaking with a clear voice. We talk frankly about why many Catholics who lived through John Paul II and Benedict bristled at the language of “inadmissible,” how prudential judgments differ from absolute moral norms, and why it matters for trust in the Magisterium. No strawmen, no gotchas—just the real stakes underneath the noise.We also get honest about the rift between trads and normies. Converts often defend the papacy out of genuine gratitude for authority after Protestant fragmentation. Trads speak with urgency that can read as judgment, especially online. We explore how form shapes faith—why the quiet gravity of the Latin Mass naturally invites reverence, dress, and silence—and how Novus Ordo communities can cultivate the same without culture wars. Along the way, we ask hard questions about optics: when Catholic leaders cozy up to climate theater, do we risk laundering ideology that sidelines the unborn, the family, and subsidiarity? Stewardship of creation is good; ceding our moral voice to technocratic agendas is not.What do we do next? Steelman the other side. Drop the labels. Seek clarity from Rome that upholds the unique horror of abortion while acknowledging legitimate debate on the death penalty. Build locally—beautiful liturgy, solid catechesis, and real friendship travel further than hot takes. If authority wants trust, it must choose precision over vibes. If we want renewal, we must choose reverence over rage. Hit play, then tell us where you stand and why—we’ll read and respond. And if this conversation helped you think more clearly, subscribe, share the show, and leave a review so more people can find it.Support the showTake advantage of Recusant Cellar's "Christ the King" sale by heading over to https://recusantcellars.com/ and using code "BASED" for 20% off at checkout!********************************************************Please subscribe! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKsxnv80ByFV4OGvt_kImjQ?sub_confirmation=1https://www.avoidingbabylon.comMerchandise: https://avoiding-babylon-shop.fourthwall.comLocals Community: https://avoidingbabylon.locals.comFull Premium/Locals Shows on Audio Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1987412/subscribeRSS Feed for Podcast Apps: https://feeds.buzzsprout.com/1987412.rssRumble: https://rumble.com/c/AvoidingBabylon

Fr. Chad Ripperger, a traditional Catholic priest and skilled exorcist, dives into the chilling connection between demonic activity and recent violent acts, explaining the nuances of obsession versus possession. He discusses the societal impact of malformed consciences and the cultural shifts leading to spiritual confusion. Ripperger highlights Generation Z's pull towards both the occult and traditional Christianity, while emphasizing the urgency of preserving sacramental life to combat demonic influences. He also tackles the spiritual implications of tattoos and the efficacy of curses.