Roman Catholic Conflicts in Context

Charges of intrigue, heresy, and civil war surround the Vatican after the recently concluded Synod on the Family in Rome. And a 30-something writer on Reformation Day searched for higher grounds of authority than Roman Catholic theologians, including Pope Francis himself. What’s happening?

My guest on this week’s podcast is Gregg R. Allison, professor of Christian theology at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and an elder at Sojourn Community Church in Louisville, Kentucky. Allison has taught at several colleges and seminaries, including Western Seminary in Portland, Oregon, and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. He has written numerous books, including Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment. He joined me to try to make sense of the conflicts between liberal and conservative Roman Catholics following the recent Synod on the Family, and to answer the question of how much power the pope actually has to transform the church.

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Collin Hansen serves as vice president for content and editor in chief of The Gospel Coalition, as well as executive director of The Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics. He hosts the Gospelbound podcast and has written and contributed to many books, most recently Timothy Keller: His Spiritual and Intellectual Formation and Rediscover Church: Why the Body of Christ Is Essential. He has published with the New York Times and the Washington Post and offered commentary for CNN, Fox News, NPR, BBC, ABC News, and PBS NewsHour. He edited Our Secular Age: Ten Years of Reading and Applying Charles Taylor and The New City Catechism Devotional, among other books. He is an adjunct professor at Beeson Divinity School, where he also co-chairs the advisory board.

Gregg R. Allison is professor of Christian theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is secretary of the Evangelical Theological Society and a theological advisor for Harbor Network and Upstream Sending. He is author of five major works: Historical Theology: An Introduction to Christian Doctrine (Zondervan, 2011), Sojourners and Strangers: The Doctrine of the Church (Crossway, 2012), Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment (Crossway, 2014), 50 Core Truths of the Christian Faith: A Guide to Understanding and Teaching Theology (Baker, 2018), and with Andreas Köstenberger, The Holy Spirit (B&H Academic, 2020). He and his wife Nora live in Louisville, Kentucky, where they attend Sojourn Church Carlisle. They have three adult children and 11 grandchildren.