 All right, Jason Jason Gale Tans content manager Thanks for being here and you're gonna help us explain the catechism explained. Yeah, so Anyway, so let's let's just dive right in first of all before we get to the The book itself, which I think is amazing and I'm so excited as the publisher to finally have gotten this because it's been a work and Long time in coming Tell us a little bit about Your background as a catechist because you got about as much Street cred as a catechist can have so kind of tell us about that. Sure. So I Wasn't always interested in catechesis. I Was catechizing the 80s So as you can imagine, I was probably poorly catechized except for my my own parents Who did a great job and you're still a Catholic and I'm still Yeah, yeah I was a Ford mechanic before this and I decided to go back to school to study theology and I really got interested into Catechetics in the history of just figuring out what went wrong, you know And so that really piqued my interest and it got me diving into different theories of catechetics The particularly the modern history of what what went wrong Shortly after the council was it better before the council, you know diving into all these Interesting questions and it led me to get, you know a degree in catechetics and then further I went on and got a an ecclesiastical license With a specialty in catechetics. So this is very much In my field of expertise and I'm very excited that that tan Has put this book out because I think from And again, the majority of my experiences has been in catechesis And we make that distinction between theology that, you know, catechesis really it dives into explaining the faith and Helping others to to have a mental grasp of it to be able to understand it and to live it Whereas, you know theology it dives into all the the the house and and whys and things like that Whereas catechesis is is much more foundational But it's also involves, you know educational theory and things like that and so For me diving into this one was was particularly exciting because of What it is and especially also, you know, the little we do know about Father Sparago is inspirational because he was very much a catechist Yeah, so why don't you tell us about Father Sparago himself kind of his uh his personality and kind of his background because I I think it it seems to Bear fruit in this work Yeah, so we we don't know a whole lot about it. We have some um Some stories out there some anecdotes And for and I think our audience will be surprised for a guy who Again, according to the anecdotes for a guy who hated to be boring And always tried to uh and always wanted to give lively presentations and teachings He wrote a massive book, right? I mean that's that's massive. It is massive It is I think it's the I think it's the uh the largest one that tan publishes now But he wrote several types of catechisms and he was even uh championed as a pioneer Uh of popular catechesis. So again, we're talking, you know, uh, the like 1800s Yeah, yeah, yeah, he he died in 1942 born 1862. So right at the turn of the century. He wrote this in 1899 and so um Again for for for a guy whose whose heart was a pastor and he really wanted to help people come to an understanding of the faith He wrote a massive book And the the title the catechism explain the title he's referring to is the roman catechism And so while he doesn't really have references throughout it as saying I'm getting this from and when we say the roman catechism, we're talking about the catechism of the council of Trent um, he's explaining this And that was really the the primary catechism that people were referring to back then. Yeah, and for whatever catechesis I guess they had People were reading that yeah, so he's like, hey That's a little tough to read. Let's make that more applicable And useful and easy to understand, right? I mean that's that that was the inspiration for this book Right, and he wrote it for for three primary reasons. So I mean the first was to be a source book for preaching which Uh, uh, even the modern catechism says, you know preaching is a it's a privileged place for catechesis Uh, and so for the for the pastor Uh, he wrote this for to to be able to put a lot of the ideas that were in Trent And even when you when you look at the the catechism of the council of Trent Many times it'll say The pastor ought to say this the pastor kind of ought to teach this aspect So it's so it's very much written for the pastor, but he also writes it for the catechist so for the For the lay catechist that is in a classroom for the lay catechist that is in Any other sort of extracurricular group as many of the the different methods that were going on during that time Just sort of outside groups outside of classrooms and things So it was written for the the the catechist, but also the parent as And again as big as it is as a statement Of the faith Which is a massive statement because the our faith is is so rich and so valuable and just so Um, uh, it's it's inexhaustible and so we can continually study it and try to go from it um One of the other things that I think should be highlighted about the way that spirago wrote in here was that um He really stays away from uh, kind of very technical terms He's writing in a very popular manner So I mean while the book itself may be daunting for those that pick it up and begin to read it It's it's easy. It's perfectly clear. Yeah, that's the amazing thing is when I was Looking through this before we Did this new edition and brought it back with some features which we'll talk about As I was thumbing through it and man, this is perfectly clear It's it's not hard to read at all Like a number of older books written in that time period Maybe archaic language a little clunky, but no this guy was a master at the simplified language Yeah, and you can tell that he was he was you could tell that he was a pastor In practice, right? He wasn't uh, he wasn't, you know, one of the like, you know, a priest that never saw the inside of a classroom or You know taught any catechesis. He himself was very much a catechist and so you it really comes out in his own in his own writing um you know another feature I think of That I think our audience will appreciate with this book is That it's very Christo centric and even when you look at the organization you may say well, it's And it's kind of divided up similarly to the the other catechism. So with you know, trend and and the 92 catechism You know, we have uh the creed the sacrament's morality and prayer. So it's kind of divided up into those four parts um whereas Sparago he divides it up into the faith Morals and the means of grace which he goes into he kind of puts together prayers And the sacraments he kind of puts those together But the way that it's Christo centric is that it really presents christ as in the first part christ as teacher of the faith Um, and then it presents christ when we're talking about morals christ and his character of kingship, right? So he's he rules and and in a similar way we're we're called to Rule over ourselves how have that self-control be a king of ourselves first And then three when he gets into the means of grace, you see you see christ as high priest And so in a very beautiful way he brings together all of the truths of the faith And manages to keep christ at the center Fulfilling each of these different roles that that christ showed us in the gospels in his own life So it's really fascinating how he how he's able to kind of bring all of these things together In popular in kind of popular language where we're we're kind of it doesn't have all of the the the technicalities In the technical language that sometimes you'll find in large theological manuals Is he saying let them be anathema? Like a hundred times like it does in the council of trend. Yeah, so no it Sad to some people's dismay he leaves those parts out We were joking right before maybe we could make our own list of anathema and put it as like an appendix We just get to choose who to Anathematize or whatever you call it But anyway, so no it's it's not uh, it's not antiquated sort of with that language that the council of trend is It's very modernized But I think a lot of people would like to know especially those who have this love and appreciation for for tradition Like tan is so well known for This is the council of trend Catechism explained. That's what it refers to right? And we'll get to you know, how we've annotated it, but let's let's let's talk a little bit more about How you see this catechism is is unique. I mean we've talked about it a little bit, but Yeah, tell tell us a little bit more about that particularly as it relates to the soul the human soul Yeah, so one of the things a lot of times kind of a Just kind of a common complaint against catechesis is that they'll say well, it's It's dry or all you're doing is trying to give information about christ. You're not you're not leading others to christ You're not doing things like that Spirago makes very clear that the aim of this catechism is is to to cultivate within the human soul And and help develop the three powers The understanding the affections and the will to bring them all together So his his his aim and the whole thing is to is to really form The whole person as opposed to just the understanding right right because if it's just like education if it's just pure Theology training it's really just shaping the mind the understanding right not necessarily forming the person to go Put this into into action right which is where the affections or the appetites And the and the will come in. Yeah, so I mean a good maybe a good way to understand it is um Not every sentence begins in here with the church teaches that because that's very much kind of a You're you're you're trying to form somebody's understanding of what the church teaches. It's you know, whereas He dives much more into that here's a good example of of what he does that that separates it Maybe a little from these catechisms, but also shows that he cares deeply about The person that he's catechizing So if you go to the section towards the end of the The creed so similar to these other catechisms right the the first part 290 Or right before 288 so One of the likes so like these other catechisms he begins. He does begin with going through the articles of the creed But if you look at these other catechisms The way that they end those sections will be kind of here's the last article of the creed And we're done and now we'll move on to the sacraments or we'll move on to morality, right? But spirago doesn't again because he has very much in mind The the entire human person and so He ends the part on the creed with talking when he gives those beautiful little treaties on christian hope Which he doesn't necessarily you know in the beginning He does talk about faith even before the creed which the other catechisms Do follow to some extent but he ends the part on the creed with christian hope because It is from the faith The faith stands as the foundation of our hope right and the end of the end of our creed You know when we talk about the things to come and so he he ends the section on the faith Talking about the essence of christian hope and so he goes into kind of defining it very clearly And you'll see this when you go through the book as well are we've We've organized the material for you in a very Uh beautiful way that the that I think the reader will be easily They'll be able to easily navigate. So you're talking about the typesetting. Yeah, the layout of the book really is beautiful. I mean Absolutely because I mean this the typesetting a book of this size Very artistically is is a big challenge. It is a long time And you know scanning an old document that's public domain or whatever and then trying to Make a beauty it takes a lot of work. So we spent a lot of time and energy Really making this a beautiful layout and I think I think it did the job Absolutely and very usable because I could sit here in this section on um On christian hope and I can just flip through the three pages And I can say here's a definition of christian hope and here's kind of three essential points That I need to know in order to understand what the church teaches about christian hope And I can do that very quickly and then if I need an explanation of any of those points I can go and read deeper. So it's it's it's a very usable text And again because parago had in mind the catechist So the fact that he ends uh, he doesn't he doesn't wait until the party says, okay, well okay, we've talked about the uh the articles of the creed and then we'll we'll get to the uh The the virtue of hope when we talk about the theological virtues later on in the section on morality He doesn't do that. He says no this the the faith that we have just gone through and explaining and understanding The articles of the creed. This is the foundation of our hope, right? This is why we have hope and here's how to have hope So, I mean when you when you're when you're looking at this book, you know I can just imagine somebody that's going through our cia They've just gone through the articles of the creed saying here's what the church Believes here here is everything kind of the entire faith condensed into this this creed a formula And it stands not just as something from my mind to grasp but Hope is primarily an action of the will and so The creed gives us the the the object of that hope which is the life to come The resurrection of the body and so we've just covered those and so Sparago very beautifully goes right into this explanation on hope So while, you know, you may look at the the the contents and you say, okay. Well, that's similar to other catechisms It's it's very different in a lot of different ways And I think in a very beautiful way that I think catechists especially will will will enjoy Well, let's talk about how it kind of fits in between the council of Trent catechism and the 92 catechism Because yeah, we've done something quite interesting here to kind of bridge the gap Yeah, so we're talking about it, you know a time period of 500 years You know, uh, which is which is huge and you know, one of the you know, one of the tendencies that I think That I think we as catholics have Can be when when something new comes out and replace it has replaced the old So, uh, which I think is it's a horrible way to do theology It's a horrible way if you've ever tried to to study scripture of just you know, saying well, it doesn't matter what all these These old dead guys said, uh, here's what I think No, that's not a proper way to study. It's not a proper But for for some reason sometimes we say well, you know, we have the the the council of trimp, but You know and it has its catechism, but we have the new catechism, which changes everything, which is Which is the new standard We should look at this, you know in in both its integrity Right. So how does uh, how does the council of trint Lead to the catechism explain and how does it also shape the foundation of another universal catechism? um, and so one of the things that tan's done that I absolutely love is they've annotated The catechism explains so again, you have a priest a catechist somebody who's a pastor of souls Writing on the catechism of the council of trint explaining it to his flock And then what we've done is we've also annotated it Um with the 1992 catechism so that when you as a reader Are going through this you could say This there's something that might be a little bit different here I wonder I wonder if it's the I wonder if it's the same or I wonder if anything's changed or how has it changed How is the wording changed? You'll be able to quickly see how a priest explained the catechism of the council of trint And where to go to see how the church explains it today Many times you'll find that it's it's a clear reference You uh, you'll you'll see that that that the 92 catechism Is clearly going back to trint In other places you you will see differences, uh, and you'll also see Um And again for for you as the catechist, it's good for you to to understand maybe even some of the development of these things So how has the wording changed or how did they word it before? Maybe some parts are unclear, right? So when you're looking at maybe three different texts, you'll be able to get more clarity as to what it says If you're looking at a a book that was written for the popular masses You'll get a little bit different flavor than you know, both of these are can Be safely said to be more written as a reference text, right? And that's how And that's how come their their format or at least the the 92 catechism is formatted the way it is with all the footnotes sidenotes And the references and the margins and things like that Um, but we've we've we've annotated so every page you'll see at the bottom That sometimes sometimes three or four references to the to the 92 catechism It just shows to me jason what this is Showing is the continuity of our faith, right? That's why I've had the idea a long time ago to take this catechism the catechism explained, which is A favorite among more traditional catholics But i'm not willing to say ignore the 92 catechism. I'm so I was saying hey, how do we bridge this? How do we bring it together and it's what the references this with footnotes? So basically every page has a couple references to the 92 catechism And it's the continuity of our faith the teachings has not changed But it's it's the I guess the explanation of truths have been evolving Ever since the apostolic age. Yeah, absolutely. And and one of the things that that I love is that you'll you'll see even in certain parts Where even when say, you know Many times you might see where indulgences have like specific Let's say a specific number of days Attached to them where you know if you say this indulgence 40 years will be knocked off of purgatory or something like that What I what I love about This addition here that we have is that This in the explanation of indulgences it explains kind of that that Temporal allowance that was given to each individual indulgence, right? But then in the footnote it talks about how Paul the six Produced an apostolic constitution that eliminated any determination of days or years established with indulgences So right here in a beautiful way and it also gives the catechism reference So right here in a beautiful way for those that are studying the catholic faith They can say, you know, here is how the church explained indulgences It was changed by paul the sixth And here's the catechism reference to to to how the church Goes through the teaching of indulgences today or states the the teaching of indulgences today So and one text you can get kind of a beautiful development or a beautiful however you want to however you want to look at this Understanding or or you know dive into this aspect of indulgences you can get a you can it's a great reference I love that way. No, I say you're that's a great example because if you had either the council of trend Yeah, you have something that's In some ways outdated and then you have if you have them just the 92 catechism You're probably you could be lacking some of the interesting And and in a certain way edifying and important things to know about the way the church handled Indulgences for so many years. So this is that bridge that brings it together. I just think that this I think every catechist should have this and I think every pastor should have this for his Catechizing of his pairs and I think families, you know, and so every family has to have You know a catechism in their house and this is a great thing when you're talking with your kids or friends And you need to you need to make a quick glance at something You know, this is a great way to do it and it has a very thorough Index yeah to where whatever the topic is You can flip to that and and the table of contents in the beginning. We were joking. It's like a book Yeah, it's huge. It's huge. And so it's so thorough. So it's super easy Yeah to kind of find what you're looking for and then you're going to find a very traditional Explanation of that. Yeah with all the references you need To the 92 catechism and more even, you know, other things like you you you mentioned the indulgence is not just the catechism But some other references that help somebody understand how some of these things have evolved or changed over time Yeah, and that's probably one of the things I appreciate so much about this book is Spirago is is is so clear With what the church teaches and and again, so so the people that one of the reasons why I love the catechism the council trade is It's clarity like it's it's it's very firm in its statements. There's no Many of the statements and Trent you can't Um, can't get around. Yeah, you can't you can't get around. There's no really wiggle room to well I'm going to interpret it in this way. No, you can't right, right? It's it's very clear Sparago Sparago holds on to that, you know, but he also incorporates In and I'd like to point to one more, you know, one more example I could I could keep going There's you know, there's there's other examples where You'll see similarities Between the 92 catechism and the council of Trent And then there's there's parts where Sparago goes even deeper which which I love And one of those is, you know, all three of them acknowledge when it's going through the 10 commandments, you know All three of them acknowledge, uh, St. Augustine's kind of Common distinction between the Between the commandments you have the first three that relate to our relationship with God And then the last seven relate to our relationship with each other. And so there's this kind of Yeah, and that's kind of well known you're teaching your kids in second grade the 10 commandments And that's pointed out in all the all the curriculum out there, right? And it's in the 92 It's in the council of Trent. It's in Sparago as well But Sparago he he goes a little bit further again because he's He's he's a teacher of souls. He's a pastor of souls And so he when he when he's looking at the catechism, he says yes the first three and then the last seven But he kind of picks out the fourth, uh, the fourth command my favorite commandment, right? Being a dad of a bunch of kids. Yeah, I remind my kids every night Maybe say the rosary and then I remind them of the fourth commandment and we go to bed. That's great Uh, but one of the but so he picks out this fourth commandment which is honor your father or mother Right, so he picks that out and he and he kind of puts it in the middle because Um parents are God's natural representatives For those children. Wow. And it's a bridge. Yeah, it really is a bridge. So, you know, we're you know The the the the following commandments you can see them as Yes, those relate to God as well because they're They they needed they're respecting God's gifts to creation. They're respecting The other person as a gift from God as well. So we're but at the but there's a little bit of a difference There's there's there's something deeper Of the relationship between parents and children that Sparago pulls out and so he really kind of again Like you said naturally bridges that together because the first three are directly related to God The last ones are directly related to each other But this fourth one, right that there there is that obedience to parents who you know So they are our others, but at the same time, they're not just others, right? There's there's something distinctive about the the parents are really God's representative in the home, right? I think and and again this goes back to you know A point where I think Sparago Goes a little bit deeper than then you'll find in these other things then you'll find in these other Catechisms he goes a little bit deeper to highlight a point which As a as both a catechist and a parent. I absolutely love that I love that the way that he's able to do that. No, that's a fantastic example That that shows the man has extraordinary insight and that's probably a great example of why so many well respected Theologians out there and pastors like father ripper. I mean he promotes this heavily and he said this is the one you need But not just him. There's many many more But that's probably a great example of how he breathes life into Something that you know guys like you and I say, oh, we know we we know this But then you're able to look at it in a whole new way and from a slightly different angle And that's what Sparago kind of brings to it. So yeah, I got to sit down and read the sucker cover to cover I do. I mean I've read chunks but not not all the way through Well, and one of the things when I was a catechist, I was I was constantly searching for How can I teach this better? How can how did the saints teach it? How did how did generations before me teach this difficult doctrine? Uh, and so for the catechist, it's it's one more and I would say very high on my list of resources that I go to Uh, when when when I'm saying, okay, how did how did how was this taught in the past? Um, because many times we can have a grasp in our mind Um, but it doesn't come out right, right? And and and sadly, you know, we we the church has suffered tremendously from poor catechesis of lack of clarity bad methodology bad tactics Um all all around watering down of the faith Uh, what's borago has done here again a guy? Who hated to be boring? Yeah, and you know and and was known it was you know called a pioneer of of popular catechesis He's really brought together. Um, a beautiful catechism that's aimed at conversion um, that's christo-centric Uh, and what we've done here with the annotations. I think is we we've really created a uh Um, not just a tool but a source for those entering the church and a source for those who want to grow in their faith and Understand the integrity of the faith why this is called a statement. It's not a bunch of statements. It's a statement of the faith Um, uh, spirogo has done just an absolute Marvelous job. So that's awesome. And I think tan's done great job. I'm really proud of our team Yeah, it's beautiful. It's beautiful. It's a beautiful volume. This is like a great gift looks good on your shelf It's very sturdy And I mean everything from two ribbons the end sheets are beautiful and of course the type setting and the annotations I mean, it's just kind of a total package. I we publish a lot of books And you know, it's always exciting when we come into the office and they've plopped down Some of the new new publications on your desk and you get to look at it But for some reason when I got this I was just like wow I just kept wow You know because I feel like this is like the aircraft carrier catechesis You know so many other things we do these little planes that fly off Come back down But it's a it's a fantastic product and I really hope it it helps many different segments of the catholic marketplace parents pastors Catechists uh theology students. Yeah, absolutely. So or anybody that's just really trying to dive deep into their faith So anyway, thanks for explaining all this jason And uh, you know, I guess I guess we'll be seeing you next time But you're pretty darn good at explaining this maybe we'll have to uh Return and start explaining more of the content. So that would be kind of fun. All right. See you next time. All right. Thanks