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Guardian Angels and Aquinas's Eight Questions | The Catholic Man Show

The Catholic Man Show

SHOW NOTES Adam opened with a cross-examination. Is perseverance a virtue? Dave pleaded the Fifth. When the breaks are beating the boys, do you keep them on the run until you cross the goal line? Counsel says yes. And did that heroic virtue just re-crown the rightful champions of the 11th annual Catholic Man Show Camp Out cornhole tournament? It did. Last year's title went to Jake and Justin out of Texas on what the guys still call a technicality, the technicality being that they lost. This year Jake and Justin had them down early, a "best of 11" got announced right after the first loss, and the final games were played in the dark with Mark holding the flashlights. Sponsors: OréMoose David Kruse and the craftsmen at OréMoose make Catholic leather goods by hand, built to last and built to be handed down to your kids and grandkids. Made in America for the glory of God. TCMS listeners get 30% off everything at oremoose.com with code TCMS. Alto by Ascension If the Liturgy of the Hours has ever intimidated you, Alto makes it simple. It's a monthly print prayer companion with Morning and Night Prayer, the daily Mass readings, reflections, and a monthly mini study, and it shows up in your mailbox instead of on your phone. Use code TCMS10 for 10% off. Select International Tours When Adam and Dave set out to lead their first pilgrimage, everybody they asked said the same thing: use Select. Now they can vouch for it themselves. Leading one or joining one, start at selectinternationaltours.com. The Camp Out stories kept coming. Brother Joseph showed up with his sheepdog and a narrow hook for snagging a back leg, and Dave rode back to camp in the back of a truck holding a roped sheep that didn't stay very roped. That mutton was born, raised, harvested and eaten on monastery land. Juan buried a whole cow head and cooked it underground for his midnight meat snack. At home, Dave put eight roosters in the freezer with help from his best chicken pluckers, the Elizabeth, Mary and Bernadette models. In the glass: Redwood Empire's Colonel Armstrong wheated bourbon out of Northern California, 94 proof. It scored a 4.01 eleventy billion on the yummy scale. Jim was back in the studio, and he's the reason for the topic. He walked out of Mass with questions about guardian angels, and with the feast just behind them, the guys took his questions to St. Thomas. Adam walked through the Summa, Part I, Question 113, with a tip for first-time readers: read the question, jump straight to "I answer that," then go back to the objections so you don't mistake Thomas steelmanning the other side for his own view. Some of the answers are pure comfort. Each man gets his own guardian because God's providence deals with each immortal soul one by one. As Adam put it, you're not a number on heaven's spreadsheet. Others start arguments. Thomas says Christ had no guardian angel, since as man He was guided immediately by the Word, though angels ministered to Him. Dave held his ground anyway: "I'm not willing to be wrong yet." Thomas puts the angel's arrival at birth. Knowing what we now know about conception, both hosts put it at conception instead. Stay for the podcast tail. Thomas says angels don't grieve over our sins, and Dave made a distinction that let him disagree: no sorrow, but they'd rather we hadn't done it, and he's calling that disappointment. From there it's good angels resisting one another over the prince of Persia, and whether a demon gets assigned to every man. They land on prayer. The one you learned as a kid still works. So does this one: before a hard conversation, send your guardian angel ahead to talk to the other man's. Raise your glass.TOPICS COVERED * Adam's cross-examination of Dave on the virtue of perseverance, and Dave's Fifth Amendment defense * Re-crowning the champions of the 11th annual Camp Out cornhole tournament, played in the dark by flashlight * Three days at the Camp Out without touching a phone * Camp Out conversations on fatherhood, marriage and NFP, with men from their early twenties to their seventies * Brother Joseph's sheepdog, a shepherd's leg hook, and restraining a sheep in the back of a truck * Why mutton's bad reputation is totally unjustified * Juan's buried cow head and the midnight meat snack tradition * "Harvested" versus "slaughtered," per Brandon Sheard * Dave's eight roosters and the Elizabeth, Mary and Bernadette model chicken pluckers * Redwood Empire's wheated bourbon and the case for cube roots * Feast days of St. Faustina and St. Bartolo Longo, the satanic priest who became the Apostle of the Rosary * Fr. Bonaventure Chapman's case for St. Faustina as a Doctor of the Church * Why it isn't quite right to count how many angels are in a room * How to read the Summa without getting lost in the objections * Peter's angel breaking him out of prison in Acts 12, and Rhoda leaving him knocking at the door * "Their angels always behold the face of my Father": the Lord's own words in Matthew 18 * Do men even need guarding if they have free will? * One angel per man, and why God deals with each soul one by one * Whether you can ask for a second guardian angel, or a legion * Why guardian angels don't get "recycled" * The nine choirs of angels and why St. Michael, an archangel, still commands them * Angels over nations: the prince of Persia in Daniel and the Angel of Portugal at Fatima * Public versus private revelation * Did Christ have a guardian angel? Thomas says no * Birth, baptism or conception: when your guardian angel's charge begins * Can a baby be spiritually attacked before the age of reason? * Is your guardian angel ever disappointed in you? * Can good angels be in discord, and can that discord persist? * Is a demon assigned to every man in mockery of the heavenly order? * The "Angel of God" prayer and its partial indulgence * Sending your guardian angel to talk to the other person's before a tense meeting * Your guardian angel as the saint who has a devotion to you REFERENCED IN THIS EPISODE The main text: * St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I, Q. 113, "Of the Guardianship of the Good Angels". Its eight articles ask whether men are guarded by angels; whether each man is guarded by an angel; whether guarding men belongs only to the lowest order; whether angels guard all men; whether the guardian is appointed from birth; whether he ever forsakes a man; whether angels grieve for the ills of those they guard; and whether there can be strife among the angels Scripture: * Acts 12:1-17, Peter freed from prison, Rhoda at the door, and "It is his angel" (12:15) * Matthew 18:10, "their angels always behold the face of my Father who is in heaven" * Daniel 10:13, the prince of the kingdom of Persia and the help of Michael * Matthew 4:11, angels ministering to Christ * Luke 1:26-38, the Archangel Gabriel sent to Mary Saints, theologians and teaching: * Pseudo-Dionysius and the nine choirs of angels, along with St. Thomas and St. Bonaventure * St. Gregory the Great, Moralia, cited by Thomas on the prince of Persia as a good angel * St. Augustine, Confessions I, on the jealousy of a nursing infant * Ludwig Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, on the theological opinions about when the guardian is assigned * St. John Paul II on the human person from conception (see Evangelium Vitae 60) * Catholic Answers (catholic.com), on the claim that ordination brings an additional guardian angel * St. Michael the Archangel, and the meaning of his name, "Who is like God?" * The "Angel of God" prayer (Angele Dei), which carries a partial indulgence in the Enchiridion of Indulgences Feast days and shout-outs: * St. Faustina Kowalska, feast October 5 * St. Bartolo Longo, feast October 5, canonized by Pope Leo XIV on October 19, 2025, a Dominican tertiary and the "Apostle of the Rosary" * Fr. Bonaventure Chapman, OP, and his recent TCMS episode making the case for St. Faustina as a Doctor of the Church * The Dominican Friars of the Province of St. Joseph * Joey Spencer and his earlier TCMS episode on angels (on YouTube) * Our Lady of Fatima and the 1916 apparitions of the angel Camp Out and the farm: * The 11th annual Catholic Man Show Camp Out at Clear Creek Abbey * Brother Joseph of Clear Creek and his sheepdog * Jake and Justin (Texas), Mark on flashlight duty, Keith Lee and Sean at the chess board, and Juan's cow head * Brandon Sheard of Farmstead Meatsmith * chess.com and bullet chess In the glass: * Redwood Empire Whiskey, The Colonel Armstrong Wheated Bourbon, 47% ABV (94 proof), a blend of sourced high-wheat bourbons and Redwood Empire's own distillate, aged in Northern California. John Muir's "going to the woods is going home," as read from the label on air Pop culture: * The Beach Boys, "Help Me, Rhonda" * The Beatles, "Let It Be" * 300 and its version of Xerxes Sponsors: * OréMoose, code TCMS for 30% off * Alto by Ascension, code TCMS10 for 10% off * Select International Tours Hosts: * Adam Minihan (host; Lady Haylee, Porter and Prairie Farms, M6 Marketing, The Grounded Builder on Substack) * Dave Niles (host; Niles Ranch and Fecundity Farms, Lady Pamela) * Jim (in studio)