Hello, my name is Father Gregory Pine and I'm a Dominican friar of the province of St Joseph and I teach at the Dominican House of Studies and I work as an assistant director for the domestic institute and this is Pines with Aquinas.

In this episode we're going to talk about Skism. And this is Pines with Aquinas.

In this episode we're going to talk about schism,

like what is the sin of schism.

But before doing so, a quick announcement,

I suppose a thank you.

This past week I went back to Switzerland where I had been for the past three years working on my doctorate

and I had my defense and it went well I passed and so I just wanted to thank you for your prayers. I had made mention of it in an earlier

episode and in the actual defense itself I rarely have experiences of prayer or intercession or like people's support in recognizable or intangible ways, but it was a very wonderful experience, a beautiful experience where I felt born on by or

yeah really helped out by the prayers of others so thanks for praying I am super

appreciative no my prayers for you. Okay, schism. Back to this very different thing. I first came

across the sin of schism when reading the divine comedy or the notion of

it because when you go through the various circles of hell and the

inferno you come across various types of sinners and they all suffer these terrible

contrapasos so the punishment fits the sin and I remember being

very struck by the punishment of the schismatics because the very flesh is torn

or like cut into ribbons by their sins and I just didn't know what to make

of that and then you know since having entered the order and bidding ordained a priest at

you hear the word schism bandied about with some frequency as it is attributed to certain people or laid at certain people's doorstep and so I thought it's you know it's good to be precise in our language and also to be careful in our concepts so

as better to understand what's at stake so that way we can know the church and love the church,

ultimately know and love the Lord who gives himself to us in the church's life.

So let's get after it. Here we go.

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