When atheist magician Penn Jillette got into an argument over the Catholic Church with Catholic TV host Piers Morgan, Jillette ended up defending the pope and the Church against Morgan’s criticisms.
Jillette, part of the Penn & Teller illusionist team, is the author of Every Day is an Atheist Holiday and God, No!
Morgan, former editor of British national newspapers including the Daily Mirror, hosts Piers Morgan Tonight on CNN.
During their discussion on the CNN show, Morgan listed some Catholic rulings that are not spelt out in Scripture, such as priestly celibacy, no remarriage for divorced Catholics, and no female priests.
He said none of these actually came from Jesus Christ’s mouth, prompting Jillette to respond by saying that Morgan sounded like a Protestant.
“That was Martin Luther saying that an individual…could interpret the Bible themselves,” Jillette said. “The idea, as I understand it, of the Catholic Church is that it’s not interpreting the Bible yourself. You have somebody who is actually able to do that….
“It seems like you either agree or you don’t,” Jillette argued. “You either say, like Martin Luther, I’m going to have a direct relationship with the word of God, or I’m going to go through a conduit of God on earth, which would be the pope.”
Earlier the atheist magician asked Morgan, “You call yourself a Catholic. Don’t you follow everything?”
Morgan replied, “No, that’s the point. I have become increasingly like many young Catholics, I think, really disgruntled by the failure of successive popes and the Vatican to move at all with the times when society is changing so fast.”
Jillette responded: “I would say on my side that if you have someone who is a conduit to God and is speaking God’s word, even if you can’t understand exactly what God’s plan is, even if you do see suffering that you consider unacceptable, or any suffering is unacceptable, that still doesn’t mean you get to vote on what God actually believes.”
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