Latest / Arena Ablaze Podcast / Meekness Is Not Weakness | Becoming a Man After the Heart of Jesus

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Meekness Is Not Weakness | Becoming a Man After the Heart of Jesus · Arena Ablaze Podcast

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I, a repentant sinner, renew and ratify today,
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in your hands, O Immaculate Mother, the vows
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of my baptism.
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I renounce Satan and resolve to follow Jesus
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Christ even more closely than before.
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Mary, I give you my heart, please set
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it on fire with love for Jesus.
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Make it always attentive to his burning thirst
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for love and for souls.
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Keep my heart, and your most pure heart,
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that I may love Jesus and the members
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of his body with your own perfect love.
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Mary, I entrust myself totally to you, my
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body and my soul, my goods, both interior
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and exterior, and even the value of all
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my good actions.
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Please make of me of all that I
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am and have whatever most pleases you.
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Let me be a fit instrument in your
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immaculate and merciful hands for bringing the greatest
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possible glory to God.
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If I fall, please lead me back to
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Jesus.
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Wash me in the blood and water that
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flow from his pure side, and help me
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never to lose my trust in this fountain
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of love and mercy.
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With you, O Immaculate Mother, you who always
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do the will of God, I unite myself
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to the perfect consecration of Jesus as he
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offers himself in the Spirit to the Father
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for the life of the world.
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Amen.
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Welcome into the arena.
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This is the Arena of Blaze podcast, and
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I'm your willing host, Marco Sandoval.
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I'm joined, as always, by my fellow son
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of Mutt, Todd Powers.
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Today, we have the privilege of being joined
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by Father Kearney.
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Father Kearney is the priest walking the streets
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of Wichita, Kansas, and preaching on the devotion
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of the Holy Face to the Holy Face
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of Jesus.
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He's a prolific author.
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I didn't realize how many books you had
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written.
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He's written Walking the Road to God.
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He's written The Remedy, a book, The Secret
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of the Holy Face, The Devotion Destined to
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Save Society, The Consecration to the Holy Face,
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The Cassock, Meekness, and 365 Days of Reparation.
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So we'll be talking two of those books
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we have on display of the shelves.
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I've read the Holy Face Devotion book, and
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then I'm in the middle of The Consecration,
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excellent books.
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I thought a good place to start today
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would be the Sacred Heart of Jesus, since
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it's We were talking about tenderheartedness and hardness
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of heart.
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I did a confession at the cathedral, probably
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within the last year, maybe a year or
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so ago, and something I had noticed about
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my heart is that it just felt like
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a rock that had been fractured.
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And I felt like the light, if you
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put a rock in light that's fractured, there's
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shadows in your heart.
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And so I took that to confession that
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there are things in my heart that are
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deformed and I can't get to them, I
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can't see them, that are causing me trouble.
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And the priest, the good priest at the
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cathedral, he gave me Ezekiel 36, 26.
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I will give you a new heart and
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a new spirit I will put within you.
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I will remove the heart of stone from
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your flesh and give you a heart of
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flesh.
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I just thought that scripture was very impactful
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to me.
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I took that to prayer and it's been
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kind of in my mind.
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So the question for me would be, men,
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and when we're looking to build an army
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of men, what's the importance of the Sacred
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Heart in that process?
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Yeah, when I was praying Mass today for
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the Sacred Heart, before the Gospel, you have
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a gradual, and I've read this probably a
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hundred times, but it said, a man's meekness
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will allow him to find my path.
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And it just struck me, meekness is one
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of the two virtues that Jesus wants us
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to have in the Sacred Heart devotion.
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He said, be meek and humble of heart
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like me.
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And so we usually focus on humility because
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it's a very important virtue.
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It's not the most exalted.
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That's the queen of all virtues, which is
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charity.
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But meekness is the gateway to all the
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other virtues, and virtue means to do a
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good thing over and over again.
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So we don't focus on meekness much.
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But meekness is that virtue where we have
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righteous anger.
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We need to, to protect families, to call
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something out when it's wrong.
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But sometimes that anger gets inordinate, and that's
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where meekness curbs that.
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And so if we want to be spiritual
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men and women today, there's a lot of
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people attacking us, and so we need meekness
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so that when we get too angry, that
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meekness curbs it, and then we'll know the
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path to take.
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And so the path to heaven, Jesus said,
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is very narrow.
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But it's easy if we try and focus
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on the virtues.
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And so to me, at least, that meekness
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is key.
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In fact, I've written a book, which is
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in my publisher's house right now with Sophia
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Press, and I think that meekness is going
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to form the heel of the Blessed Virgin
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Mary that will crush the serpent and bring
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about a hastening for the triumph of the
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Immaculate Heart.
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So you can never separate the Sacred Heart
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from the Immaculate Heart in this devotion to
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the Holy Face.
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Jesus told that to Sister Maria de St.
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Pierre.
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So those are some thoughts.
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Meekness leads us to the path that Jesus
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wants us to get on, brings us to
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heaven.
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I noticed that you had a book, Meekness,
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coming out, and that caught my eye.
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I have a story of meekness.
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I think meekness is very difficult for men.
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I remember Father Uroch gave a sermon, and
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he had mentioned meekness, and I went up
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to him afterwards and I told him, I
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hate meekness.
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I don't want to be meek.
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Meek is weak.
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I mean, help me, because I don't under—meekness
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is difficult for me.
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And so he was new at the parish,
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and he said, I got an article, I
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got a book for you.
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And he came and he handed me Uroch's
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copies of some writings of Brother of Agrius,
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the Desert Fathers.
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And I thought, man, I'm special, because I
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have Father Uroch's writings, and he's got notes
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in the margins.
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And so I went and read that, and
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it was very interesting.
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It just started me on a path of
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thinking about meekness.
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I did further study, and I found an
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article, which it kind of shapes in my
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mind what meekness truly is.
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It said, you know, the Romans used to
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go and find horses, they'd go round up
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horses, and the most—they would be looking for
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the most spirited of horses.
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And so they would round up the horses
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and they'd separate them, and the most spirited
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horses would be their war horses, and they
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would take them to training.
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Now, they had to be meek, so meek
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meant basically that they would be bridled and
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that they would be spirited, they would run
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into battle with fire coming at them, arrows
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coming at them, but they had the fortitude
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and courage to run into battle, but yet
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they were perfectly docile under the reins of
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whoever their rider was.
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Their master.
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Yeah.
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That's my problem.
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I have the ability to be a literal
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killer, but, you know, winning takes me putting
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my personal feelings aside.
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I remember my first wife one day on
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the way home from Mass asked me if
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I was happy, that I know it was
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a loaded question that was leading down a
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path of, she wasn't happy.
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My response was, what do you mean am
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I happy?
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If I thought about that before I got
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out of bed every morning, I'd never get
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out of bed.
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I have duties, obligations, and responsibilities as a
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man.
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I don't think at all about any of
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that because it keeps me from my goals,
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goals of Todd Powers.
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We've talked about this a lot lately, the
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burning bush, I am who I am.
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I am existence itself, but when I'm asked
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to say who I am, I have a
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name.
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Why is that?
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God is not in my heart when I
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say my name.
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I feel my ego, my in, my being
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demands that I put those feelings aside.
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I don't quite know how to incorporate the
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sacred heart and the meekness aspect when I
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feel like my physical and psychological survival over
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much of my life has trained me to
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harden the heart, if that makes any sense.
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So how can we get meekness?
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One way I like to tell people is
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pick up your rosary and pray a decade
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for certain virtues.
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So maybe a homework project is to pray
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a decade of the rosary for meekness for
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a month, starting today.
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The rosary is a very powerful vehicle of
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allowing us to have what we need, not
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what we want, but what God wants us
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to have.
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So you may be thinking, well, this rosary
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is a little different.
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So I'm going to plug here the Carmelite.
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This is the Bridgetine rosary.
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It also is a Carmelite rosary because it
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has six decades instead of five.
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And so Martino made it for me in
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California, and it's got brown and blue, which
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are the colors of Carmel.
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So we have a third-order Carmelite here
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in Wichita that's been around for two years,
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and we're going to all have a Carmelite
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rosary.
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So you may be asking, well, Father, what
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are the extra decades?
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Because there's six times three, you know.
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The old mysteries are given in this.
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And so for the glorious mystery, the extra
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decade is the patronage of the Blessed Virgin
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Mary, Queen and Beauty of Carmel.
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I love that.
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And then for the joyful mysteries, the extra
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decade is the conception of the Blessed Virgin
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Mary.
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And then the last one, joyful, so sorrowful,
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would be the body of Jesus being placed
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in the arms of the Blessed Virgin Mary
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at the foot of the cross.
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So God has given us the means by
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which we can become tender to the Sacred
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Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of
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Mary, and it's the rosary.
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You told me a story about that rosary
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that you have.
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You want to share that with us?
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So I went to Blessed Sacrament, and in
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the second grade, I was received first communion
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with my class.
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I still have that class picture.
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And I believe we were all given this
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rosary by the pastor of Blessed Sacrament, Bishop
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Father Gerber.
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And I just happened to keep this, and
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Pope Paul VI was the pope at the
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time, and the reason I kept this was
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because I was enamored with the fact that
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my priest gave me a rosary that was
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blessed by a pope who happened to be
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beatified recently.
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And I just happened to keep this, and
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it's one of my most prized possessions.
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And that's neat you told me that, because
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I have another story today.
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I was talking to one of our Carmelites,
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tertiaries, which is a third order, so a
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layperson.
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We were talking about what name I'm going
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to give her, because I'm going to pray
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about it and wait for that name to
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come into my heart.
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But I needed to know if she had
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any other names or devotions that could help
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me.
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And she said, part of her story was,
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when I was getting baptized, I'm a convert,
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I wasn't born as a Catholic, Father Gerber
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baptized me and said, Therese will be your
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name.
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That's a very popular saint.
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And then she told me this beautiful thing,
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every day, it seems like every day, she
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said, I get a rose, either it's a
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rose comes to me or I see a
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picture of a rose, and it happens to
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her every day.
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It's amazing.
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So the reason I brought that up is
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because it's no coincidences that you have a
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story and I have a story from someone
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I talked to today that was about Father
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Gerber before he was consecrated as a bishop.
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And I told Todd, I haven't heard any
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stories about Father Gerber for like, I hear
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them maybe every five years.
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But today I heard two stories in the
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middle of the day.
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So I love stories and people love stories.
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So I'll stop talking.
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He was the bishop that introduced stewardship to
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our diocese.
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And I was at Capon.
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My dad came to me in eighth grade
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and said, where do you want to go
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to high school?
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I said, well, I thought I was going
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to Capon.
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He said, well, you can go to Southeast
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because I can't afford to send you to
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Capon.
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Well, I was 13, going to be 14.
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I'm not getting a job.
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He says to me, they have a yard
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crew at Capon and you can work for
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eight hours a day all summer for $3
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.15 an hour and they will take that
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money that you earn and apply it to
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your tuition.
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That's $900 a summer.
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And I worked prior to my freshman year,
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prior to my sophomore year.
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It was the beginning of my junior year
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and all of a sudden my dad says,
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you don't have to work on the yard
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crew this year because the diocese is changing
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this.
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There's no more tuition that you have to
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pay to attend that high school.
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And I was on the cutting edge.
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Now all of a sudden I'm working at
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Edgemoor Pools, a lifeguard, or I'm framing houses
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and I get to keep that money.
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And I wouldn't have been able to educate
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my five children in Catholic schools.
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I don't know what would have happened to
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my kids.
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They're just soft hearted kids like their dad
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was until he is hard hearted and they
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got to go to Catholic school.
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I have a whole stewardship story I wrote
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about that.
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It all started with Bishop Gerber instituting that.
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Only diocese in the whole entire country that
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does that.
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So many places to go with that.
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I think what Todd brought out is something
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that men struggle with.
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That's why I feel like we have been
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trying to build this Men of Blue Army.
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It's difficult to get men engaged.
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I think a lot of it is because
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of that mindset of, I mean, we're the
16:07
provider, we're the breadwinner, their time is so
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valuable.
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I try to tell men your time is
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so valuable if you sacrifice one hour of
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your time to do something with other men
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for the benefit of other men.
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We were talking earlier about catching each other's
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hearts on fire.
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We have to be in close proximity for
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that.
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All the relationships that I have today that
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I'm close with other men are only with
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guys I played basketball with.
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They're only through people that I know under
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duress, how they're going to be.
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We sweated, we lived in pain, we had
16:47
the same coaches.
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I have a couple friends.
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They called me in the middle of the
16:53
night and asked me to bring some lime
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and a shovel to a field.
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I wouldn't go.
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I'm kidding, of course, but you get the
17:00
idea.
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This all came about because our home parish
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had a men's group.
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We went and I was excited.
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All they wanted to do was drink.
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I introduced, I thought, I know that we're
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not going to have a formal discussion, but
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can we introduce an informal, like here's a
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thought.
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What are you men doing with your kids?
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What's your biggest struggle as a Catholic man
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in your daily life?
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I was immediately shut down.
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Oh, we're not doing any of that.
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I was like, he noticed I immediately took
17:37
myself out of it.
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I was like, no.
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If I want to go with other men,
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I can go to a bar and sit
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at the end of the bar and we
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can talk.
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This is ridiculous to me.
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I don't even understand what we're doing here.
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This is an opportunity for people to share
17:52
details of their life to help each other.
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That's how that works.
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Not to socialize.
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And we have an opportunity to fight, like
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you said, and be under duress because we're
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in a spiritual war.
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And so I've always tried to help men
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that were athletes to transfer that drive into
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the drive of being the best Catholic we
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can be, the best adorer of Jesus Christ
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and the blessed venerator of our Blessed Virgin
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Mary and the saints.
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And so we have this procession that we've
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been doing for about six months now and
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chanting the rosary in Latin, starting at Seneca
18:37
Park in the heart of Wichita, Delano District,
18:40
and walking across the river on the bridge
18:43
on Douglas to Master Park, where the old
18:47
Eaton Hotel is.
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And the reason why we have this candle
18:51
burning is because I love show and tell.
18:54
And we haven't used this banner yet.
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And I had a lady in Lincoln, Nebraska,
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who's been working on it for months now.
19:07
And it's the most beautiful thing.
19:08
We're going to put it on a pole,
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but I want to display it.
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Is that OK?
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Absolutely.
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So I said, make something unique.
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And she did that.
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She said, this has like a curtain.
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And you take these strings and you just
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tie it around.
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It opens up.
20:00
Because this is a copy of the Vow
20:04
of Aaronica.
20:05
Underneath, we had a local print shop here
20:11
in Wichita print this on linen.
20:16
And then we had the help of Cardinal
20:18
Burke write a letter to the cardinal who
20:25
was in charge of St. Peter's Basilica.
20:27
And we had 200 of these taken there
20:29
by a few cannons who had to go
20:32
through a few codes to the Swiss Guard
20:34
to get in.
20:34
And I wasn't allowed to be there because
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the Vow of Aaronica in Rome is such
20:40
top secret security.
20:43
And they touched each one of these to
20:45
that.
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And so she put this on here.
20:49
And so men can come and chant the
20:54
rosary and do something beautiful because in true
20:57
devotion, we talk about being totally consecrated to
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Jesus through Mary.
21:03
And St. Louis de Montfort wrote about true
21:07
devotion to Mary.
21:09
And he said about the saints in the
21:11
latter times will carry a crucifix in their
21:15
right hand, a rosary in their left.
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And I can't do that because I got
21:20
to hold this up with my left hand.
21:23
Todd's going to help me.
21:23
So and then he said.
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And they will carry a bloody standard.
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And I really never paid attention to that.
21:35
And then I've known these this passage for
21:39
like 10 years.
21:40
And then I started to think, what's that
21:42
bloody standard?
21:43
And I think at least for me, this
21:46
is a bloody standard of the face of
21:47
Jesus.
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And when the Bell of Veronica was in
21:52
Rome, which it is now, it was used
21:56
to consecrate the Pantheon, which is a pagan
22:01
circle church.
22:03
It was nicknamed the Rotunda.
22:05
And one of the popes in the 7th
22:08
century took the bell out from the catacombs
22:11
and wagon loads of relics from the catacombs.
22:16
They were the martyrs of the Colosseum.
22:18
And he decorated this church with this veil.
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And that church was consecrated on May the
22:24
13th, around 610.
22:27
And each year on the anniversary of that
22:30
dedication, they took the veil out in procession
22:34
to beg the Lord to stop the revolutionary
22:37
men like the nuns to come and attack
22:39
Rome.
22:40
And so we have the world attacking Jesus
22:43
right now.
22:43
The church, us Catholics, some of them are
22:47
getting martyred over in the Middle East.
22:52
And so when there's this evil sin going
22:55
on publicly in the world, we need to
22:56
make public reparations.
22:58
So this is for men to rise up
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and to carry this standard.
23:03
Because I can't only carry the cross and
23:06
the rosary because I'm trying to chant.
23:08
So I need men to come and carry
23:09
this.
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And so we're looking for strong men to
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carry this for us.
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So what do you all think of that?
23:17
Bravo, Father.
23:19
I love it.
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I can just speak from experience of carrying
23:23
that in a procession.
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And the first time I did that was
23:26
the Saturday preceding Easter.
23:30
And I just remember thinking at one point
23:33
it hit me.
23:33
I started to sweat.
23:34
My arms started to get a little tired.
23:37
I was giving something to hold the face
23:41
of Jesus up.
23:42
And it was just my heart was getting
23:44
tilled like a field.
23:46
And I just remember thinking, wow, I'm actually
23:50
working and sweating as Jesus was sweating on
23:55
his way of the cross.
23:56
Like I envisioned myself as like Simon Sarinian
24:00
there helping him carry the cross.
24:02
And it just really had a strong impact.
24:05
And now I can't miss it because I
24:07
just love going so much.
24:08
I almost started crying just looking at it,
24:11
just the unworthiness that I feel when I
24:15
really think about myself.
24:18
You know, I go to face-to-face
24:20
confession for a reason because one day I'm
24:23
going to be judged by Christ face-to
24:25
-face and he's already going to know me.
24:27
Why would I hide behind a screen to
24:32
talk about my evil doings?
24:35
And it helps me a lot in the
24:37
dark depths of temptation.
24:40
You're going to sit in front of another
24:41
man.
24:42
You're going to look him in the eye
24:44
because I like to have that.
24:47
And you're going to tell him you did
24:49
this.
24:50
And if I do that sin after thinking
24:54
that thought, for those that don't know, that's
24:59
one thing.
25:00
For those that know and yet do it
25:03
anyways, there's that.
25:06
And I don't want to be that person.
25:09
Well, my dream is that men like you
25:11
will come on this procession.
25:14
We're averaging about 25 people once a month.
25:18
What is it, on the second Saturday of
25:20
the month?
25:21
That's correct.
25:21
Yeah, we plan on being there tomorrow.
25:22
At 10, 15, we meet at Seneca Park,
25:26
and then we march down to Eaton Hotel,
25:30
and then there's the queue line.
25:31
It's free.
25:32
You park your car at Seneca Park.
25:34
You can come back.
25:34
But my dream is that we have about
25:37
500 men marching through the streets where we're
25:40
required to get a permit from the police
25:42
department every month because that's what Catholic men
25:47
used to do in Christendom is they would
25:50
stand up and defend the rights of Jesus
25:52
Christ.
25:53
And so that's what we're about right here.
25:56
So I'm hoping that more and more men
25:59
will come out, and the women will come
26:00
when the men come.
26:02
And so this is a call for men
26:07
to rise up.
26:08
Don't be afraid.
26:11
St. John Paul II said we need to
26:13
go out into the streets and don't be
26:15
afraid to bring Jesus out there with us.
26:17
And so if you all want to come,
26:20
I know you two are coming.
26:21
You're going to have a priest there, and
26:23
you're going to have some other people that
26:24
have been coming.
26:26
And maybe it can become a good habit
26:28
for parts of the Catholic Church here in
26:31
Wichita because when people blaspheme or they don't
26:38
respect God on his day of rest, he's
26:43
offended by that.
26:43
And so we need to make public reparations
26:45
so that souls that would be going into
26:48
sin actually have the grace.
26:50
God can put that grace in their hearts
26:52
because we're going out and sweating.
26:54
And tell me, wearing this cassock out there
26:57
and you talking about carrying the banner, it's
26:59
sweating.
27:00
People are looking at us.
27:02
You can kind of get mindful of being
27:04
a witness, but we're fighting against those spirits
27:07
that they don't want us to be out
27:10
there, the evil ones.
27:12
And so that's becoming courageous.
27:14
And all the other virtues are at work
27:16
here.
27:16
So I don't know what you all think
27:18
about that.
27:19
Well, I love that you brought up the
27:20
rosary, and Todd keeps talking about the burning
27:25
bush, and I am who I am, and
27:27
it makes me think of that whole situation.
27:31
You know, Mary's been so important to me.
27:34
My wife witnessed that to me, and she
27:36
became Catholic when we got married.
27:39
And for a year, she was praying the
27:42
rosary for me, and she would tell me
27:43
she was praying the rosary for me.
27:45
And I've been a Catholic since I'm five
27:48
years old, knew about the rosary.
27:50
It's always something that's in our mind, but
27:52
I never practiced it.
27:53
And so I thought, if my converted wife
27:57
can pray the rosary for me, then surely
28:00
I can pray the rosary for her.
28:01
So then I picked up the rosary and
28:03
started praying it, and it definitely has this
28:06
type of effect.
28:07
But more to back to the burning bush,
28:09
I'm curious, because it's a bush that's ablaze,
28:14
but it's not being consumed.
28:16
I've heard it said that's an image of
28:19
the Blessed Virgin Mary.
28:21
God's voice is emanating from the bush.
28:25
Moses, a murderer, God tells him to remove
28:31
his sandals, so he's close to the earth.
28:33
He's humble.
28:35
It's in humility that he approaches, and it's
28:38
almost like a confession.
28:39
You're talking about confession.
28:41
It brings those visions to mind.
28:44
It's intimate.
28:46
God knows him and knows what he's done.
28:48
It's an intimate conversation.
28:49
So I'm just curious what your thoughts are
28:52
on that.
28:54
As we have this conversation, I'm always thinking
28:56
about how to get men engaged and how
29:00
to bring the barriers down to really catch.
29:05
The barriers need to come up.
29:07
Fissures of man.
29:08
Barriers need to be higher.
29:11
The world is so soft.
29:13
That's why more young people are converting to
29:17
Catholicism in Eastern Orthodox churches.
29:19
They're discerning because they want to do hard
29:23
things.
29:25
It's almost impossible for me to walk.
29:28
I'm two blocks behind you guys in this,
29:30
and I'm offering up.
29:32
It's not real suffering.
29:34
It hurts.
29:34
I just can't do it.
29:37
But I'm praying in my own time, offering
29:41
up my prayers, hoping that I can make
29:44
it another few steps.
29:46
I don't think we need to lower the
29:48
barriers.
29:49
I think people need to be called, suck
29:51
it up, buttercup.
29:54
Let's go.
29:56
Yeah, because Father Ripker talks about it all
29:58
the time, is we need to find discipline
30:00
again.
30:00
Yes.
30:01
When my father was born in 1948, he
30:05
was raised by the men who had fought
30:08
in World War II, and they were taught
30:10
how to be soldiers.
30:11
And so there were some beauties about growing
30:14
up in the 50s that we've lost.
30:17
There was a culture of Catholicism that Blessed
30:21
Elect Archbishop Fulton Sheen would talk about.
30:24
So I think we can lower the bars
30:27
by getting the men in, by praying for
30:29
them so that they can suck it up
30:30
and come to a disciplined prayer activity.
30:34
And then the men, I hope, will be
30:37
inspired to say, wait a minute, this is
30:39
authentic.
30:40
I can't find many authentic things in my
30:42
life anymore, except for going to confession and
30:44
going to Mass.
30:46
But I need to do more of this.
30:47
This is something that's in the public square.
30:49
And one part that I like about it
30:52
is there's the protesters that are in the
30:55
city.
30:56
When we walk on Douglas around Broadway or
30:59
Main Street, they're doing their stuff.
31:02
And then when they see us, some of
31:04
them are curious.
31:05
Some of them are deferential.
31:07
Yeah, and they want to know what we're
31:08
doing.
31:09
One man took his hat off.
31:11
They know.
31:12
Yeah.
31:13
They know.
31:14
And now we're going to have this image.
31:16
I mean, that's just something that you give
31:19
to a king.
31:20
That's the royal colors and the tassels.
31:23
And as St. Teresa of Avila would call
31:27
him, she called him all the time, His
31:29
Majesty.
31:30
That's for a king.
31:31
And he is Christ the king.
31:33
And so let's get the world back.
31:35
Let's make this world a Catholic cultural world
31:39
where Christ will reign as king.
31:43
And the popes from 1850s to about the
31:46
1950s talked about the social reign of Jesus
31:49
Christ and the devotion that Jesus gave to
31:51
us way before that before his social reign
31:53
was what?
31:55
You got it right there on your notes,
31:56
right on the top.
31:57
What is it?
31:58
Sacred heart of Jesus.
31:59
That's right.
32:01
On this feast day, may he become our
32:04
king in our hearts and in the world,
32:07
not just in our hearts, but in the
32:08
world.
32:09
And so we have an opportunity to defend
32:13
him and to make reparation for the blasphemies
32:17
against him.
32:20
So you say this is the devotion that's
32:22
destined to save society.
32:24
And I think there are a lot of
32:26
men out there that have angst and are
32:31
just frustrated to the point of you can
32:35
talk about politics, people vote a certain way
32:39
and they expect a certain result and then
32:40
when they don't get it, just different things
32:44
going on in the world.
32:45
I think there are a lot of men
32:47
who are very frustrated.
32:48
You hear people talking about we need to
32:50
have a civil war, we need this or
32:52
that.
32:53
So I'm just curious your perspective on why
32:57
this devotion is destined to save society.
33:00
Yeah, so when Pope Pius IX was attacked
33:09
twice by the Freemasons, they tried to take
33:12
his life because the prime minister of Italy
33:15
was killed in cold blood by these guys,
33:18
these Freemasons.
33:20
And he exiled himself to Gaeta to preserve
33:23
his life and he commanded all the churches
33:25
of Rome to do public reparation.
33:30
And that's when the Veil of Veronica was
33:32
put out in 1849.
33:34
This is when it all happened.
33:36
And the veil started to have a miracle.
33:39
There was like a movie picture.
33:41
Before we had movie pictures, the veil was
33:44
actually moving around.
33:45
There was a glow coming as if there
33:48
was a light behind it, but there wasn't.
33:49
And the Vatican notary certified what he saw.
33:52
They rang the bells and the Romans came
33:54
and saw this miracle for three hours and
33:56
were gasping, oh, wow.
33:58
And blessed Pius IX said, reparation is destined
34:02
to save society.
34:04
And society has gone downhill ever since then
34:07
and before then, starting with the French Revolution
34:10
and even before that.
34:12
But reparation is destined to save society.
34:14
And this devotion is all about reparation.
34:17
It was given to us by Jesus Christ.
34:19
It was approved by the Archbishop in Tours.
34:21
And this is a remedy and a blueprint
34:24
to stop the World Revolution.
34:27
And so we have the playbook right here
34:29
that is contingent on us men getting out
34:34
into the public square and defending the name
34:37
of God with official prayers.
34:38
Praying the Rosary will be prayed, chanted in
34:43
Latin.
34:44
And the Chaplet of the Holy Face, we're
34:47
going to pray it in the sacred language
34:49
of Latin too.
34:50
And so I have one more thing show
34:51
and tell before I close my mouth here.
34:56
But this is a little chaplet of the
34:58
Holy Face.
34:59
And it has sextets.
35:01
So there's six decades instead of decades, it's
35:05
sextets.
35:06
So there's six beats between the big ones.
35:07
And so basically the Chaplet of the Holy
35:10
Face is for the triumph of the Catholic
35:15
Church.
35:16
The Sacred Heart is for the triumph of
35:20
the Sacred Heart and for the social reign
35:23
of Jesus Christ.
35:24
And the triumph of the Immaculate Heart is
35:26
something Our Lady Fatima predicted would happen eventually.
35:29
So we have the three triumphs converging into
35:31
this devotion.
35:32
And so this devotion makes reparation for the
35:36
five senses of Jesus Christ.
35:39
And it prays a prayer from Psalm 67,
35:44
verse 2.
35:46
Arise, O Lord, and let the enemies you
35:48
defeated and let all that hate thee flee
35:50
from before thy face.
35:52
And so St. John Christendom was exercising a
35:56
demon.
35:57
And the Ergomen, as we call the demon,
36:00
the possessed person, under obedience, tell me what
36:04
scripture do you hate the most?
36:06
And the demon said, Psalm 67, verse 2,
36:08
that one.
36:09
Arise, O Lord, and let the enemies be
36:12
defeated and let all that hate thee flee
36:13
from before thy face.
36:14
So we're going to chant that in Latin.
36:17
It's like a minor exorcism for lay people
36:20
because the minor exorcism that was written by
36:22
Pope Leo XIII has that Psalm verse in
36:25
it too.
36:26
Psalm 67, verse 2.
36:27
So when a priest is diagnosing someone to
36:31
see if they have oppression, obsession, or possession,
36:35
they will pray that prayer.
36:37
And it's no coincidence that Psalm 67 was
36:40
used in that.
36:41
So this is a powerful weapon that comes
36:44
from the manual of the Archconfraternity of the
36:47
Holy Face.
36:47
We have the playbook here.
36:49
You know how in football or coaching basketball
36:53
you have a playbook?
36:54
Well, this is ours, men.
36:55
This is ours.
37:00
So just a word on, you know, these
37:05
days God doesn't want death of the sinner.
37:08
He wants conversion of sinners.
37:10
And I know you've mentioned, I believe it's
37:12
in Leviticus, where it talks about the scripture
37:18
about one praying for sinners.
37:23
It's an exponential.
37:24
Yeah, so it's Leviticus 26.
37:27
I think it's verse 8.
37:31
The Holy Written Word of God basically says
37:34
this.
37:34
I'm just going to paraphrase.
37:36
Five of you will pursue a hundred.
37:39
A hundred of you will pursue ten thousand.
37:44
Your enemies will fall by the edge of
37:45
the sword.
37:46
Okay?
37:47
That's the Old Testament.
37:49
In the New Testament, this devotion, we don't
37:51
want the death of the sinner, Jesus says,
37:52
but their conversion.
37:54
And so let's go to the numbers.
37:55
Five pursue a hundred.
37:57
What's the common denominator?
37:58
Five.
37:59
You got one to 20 odds when you
38:00
divide both of those numbers by five.
38:03
And then you got a hundred and ten
38:06
thousand.
38:06
What's the common denominator there?
38:07
A hundred.
38:08
And then you divide those all by a
38:10
hundred.
38:10
You got one to 100.
38:11
So what happened?
38:12
You got one to 20 odds goes to
38:13
one to 100 odds.
38:14
You have exponential growth.
38:17
And so the Blessed Virgin Mary also in
38:19
the devotion to the Holy Face talks about
38:21
exponential growth too.
38:23
And so what does that look like?
38:24
Take a hockey stick.
38:26
The top of the blade is flat, but
38:27
when you get to the handle, it will
38:29
spike up.
38:30
And so at the beginning, there's going to
38:31
be a few men that will fight.
38:34
But as more and more come, more and
38:36
more men will be inspired because of the
38:37
prayers of those first men.
38:39
So what's the key here?
38:40
Get in now while the blade is still
38:44
flat because you'll get merit for all those
38:46
men that come in later.
38:47
So my goal is to get a million
38:50
people to sign up into this confraternity.
38:54
There's six conditions we talked about in an
38:56
earlier episode.
38:58
And so we don't want the death of
39:00
the sinner, but his conversion.
39:03
So the sport here is there's many souls
39:05
going to hell.
39:07
And so if we can rise up and
39:10
give this devotion some thought and discernment and
39:13
live it and pray it, we can help
39:16
turn those men around from going head over
39:19
heels into hell.
39:20
Like Our Lady Fatima said, they're falling in
39:21
hell like snowflakes.
39:24
She said, pray the rosary for poor sinners
39:27
because there's no one to pray for them.
39:28
And then we have this devotion too.
39:30
And so we have the combination of Marian
39:32
devotion and devotion to the Sacred Heart of
39:34
Jesus and the Holy Face of Jesus.
39:37
They're powerful.
39:40
And I have miles to go before I
39:42
sleep.
39:43
Miles to go before I sleep.
39:45
There's a couple of things you've said recently
39:47
that have really been excellent for me.
39:50
I have been praying for a long time,
39:54
teach me how to pray for my enemies.
39:57
I have enemies that I am trying to
40:01
love, trying to forgive, trying to pray for.
40:05
And I've been praying that prayer for a
40:07
while.
40:07
And recently I've heard a couple of things
40:09
that you've said.
40:11
One is if it were not for the
40:14
prayers of the Blessed Mother, we wouldn't have
40:16
a St. Peter.
40:17
And if it wasn't the prayers of St.
40:21
Stephen, we wouldn't have a St. Paul.
40:23
Those things have really touched my heart, given
40:27
me new fertile things to pray over.
40:30
And when it comes to these reparation prayers,
40:35
it's kind of given me a new mindset
40:36
as far as how valuable your prayers are
40:41
for others as really as a way of
40:44
growing this army.
40:45
Jesus called us to love as he loves,
40:49
and he forgave his enemies from the cross.
40:51
What did he say?
40:54
Father, forgive them for they know not what
40:55
they do.
40:57
And so whenever we're tempted to be reminded
41:03
of past hurts, we can either get better
41:08
or bitter.
41:10
Archbishop Sheen used to say that.
41:12
And so how do we overcome that bitterness?
41:15
Asking in the rosary for meekness.
41:20
And so when we ask for that meekness
41:21
and that temptation comes, that is a bell
41:25
to say we need to pray for our
41:26
enemies.
41:27
And Jesus told us those who pray for
41:30
the enemies, that's a sign they're going deep
41:32
into the interior life.
41:33
I mean, he didn't say it exactly like
41:35
that, but that's basically the point.
41:36
And so this is spiritual 101.
41:42
Spirituality is every temptation can be transformed into
41:46
a prayer, and that's the temptation that we
41:50
would have fallen into becomes the virtue that
41:52
we grow in instead.
41:53
And so it's a beautiful thing to be
41:55
part of the church militant and think like
41:57
that instead of just getting bogged down in
41:59
our sins, which brings about despair and hopelessness.
42:04
But to have a prayer for our enemies
42:07
that they convert, that's a beautiful thing, and
42:10
I'm challenging that every day because I have
42:13
enemies too as a priest.
42:16
But when they do bad things, that's an
42:18
opportunity for us not only to pray for
42:21
their conversion, but God gives us great merit
42:23
when we overcome those temptations and we get
42:26
stronger, and that's what virtue is, doing a
42:28
good thing over and over again.
42:29
And it comes from the root word virtus,
42:34
means strong, and vir in Latin means man.
42:39
So men, man up, become virtuous, and that's
42:45
what you guys are here for.
42:46
You're spending an hour of your time to
42:49
reach people out there, especially some men.
42:53
Maybe you can tell me more about the
42:55
Blue Army and what your goals are because
42:57
I haven't heard much of it, but I
43:00
love what you're doing here.
43:01
It's nice to have this opportunity in my
43:04
hometown where I was born and raised.
43:08
Yeah, the Blue Army men.
43:10
It's just a comes from Our Lady of
43:13
Fatima, so this will be part of my
43:16
kerygma that we do, but it's really the
43:20
school of Mary, total consecration to Mary.
43:25
One of the first fruits of that for
43:27
me was all the apparitions.
43:28
I had never thought much about the apparitions
43:31
of Mary.
43:31
I mean, familiar with Our Lady of Guadalupe,
43:33
of course, being in the Americas, but really
43:37
reading those accounts and focusing on the words
43:41
that were spoken in those accounts, it's amazing.
43:45
And so Our Lady of Fatima really captured
43:48
my imagination, and so I had talked earlier
43:52
about during COVID when I was trying to
43:54
transition and make my life more intentional, doing
43:57
the true and good always, even when it
44:00
wasn't easy, and I first decided to turn
44:03
my softball team into something different that was
44:07
faith-focused.
44:08
I went out there and was like, okay,
44:09
Our Lady of Fatima, what am I?
44:11
I thought about being a militia immaculata was
44:14
very interesting to me at that time, another
44:16
military-type thing, but the Blue Army apostolate
44:21
kind of struck me, and so it was
44:25
not really an active thing, so I kind
44:26
of took that name, and really to me
44:30
very succinctly what it is is I feel
44:35
like it's on my heart to try and
44:39
fish and gather as many men as I
44:41
can and bring them to the foot of
44:45
the total consecration to Jesus through the Immaculate
44:47
Heart and let Mary do the rest.
44:49
And I think, I believe that Mary is
44:53
the key and the path to taking men,
44:57
piercing their hearts, and bringing them on the
44:59
way to the Sacred Heart and the Holy
45:01
Face devotion and the Carmelite way even.
45:04
Let me sum that up because you overthink
45:06
things.
45:08
I'm the engineer of the group.
45:10
I'm 58.
45:11
I've never been 58.
45:12
I don't know what I'm doing.
45:14
I'm making my life up as I go.
45:16
I live my life for most of my
45:18
life spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally, intellectually in a
45:22
vacuum.
45:24
Only things that I get, it's so homogeneous
45:29
that my draw to this is I feel
45:36
your words imprinted upon my heart because you're
45:39
so different than me, and I never get
45:43
fed this.
45:45
I'm being fed.
45:47
When we're around young men that are fighting
45:49
temptation, okay, when I was young, everybody was
45:53
doing what I was doing, and that was
45:56
nobody was telling me, don't go have sex
45:58
with that girl.
45:59
Don't go to that keg party.
46:00
We were all doing those sort of things.
46:04
Therefore, I never received the graces by denying
46:07
myself the temptation.
46:08
As an old man, my sex drive has
46:10
gone down.
46:11
It's very rare that I find my wife's
46:14
in Rome.
46:15
Why when my wife travels do I feel
46:17
a desire for her?
46:19
Well, because there's temptation afoot.
46:23
It's not like it was when I was
46:25
18, 20, 25, but these young men don't
46:29
understand there are so many more graces in
46:31
the thick of mind-numbing sin, the denial
46:38
of that, the embracing of God's will over
46:42
mine.
46:43
There's so many graces, and I want to
46:45
impart upon them, and we have a couple
46:47
young men that come and talk about their
46:49
lives, and I want to say, please, please,
46:53
please just think about these things.
46:58
Deny yourself this.
47:00
There's power.
47:01
There's power for you in this that you
47:03
receive from our Lord.
47:07
Nobody ever communicated that to me at all.
47:13
So I tell my kids, I've been 20.
47:16
I know how to be 20.
47:17
I've been 30.
47:18
I know how to be 30.
47:19
I'm not saying it's easy, but I have
47:20
some answers.
47:22
But when I get up in the morning,
47:24
and I've been married twice, and I'm the
47:26
common denominator, the difference is the one woman
47:29
I'm married to now is a bit older,
47:30
much more mature, much more long in her
47:33
faith, and is much more willing to deal
47:35
with me than the other one.
47:37
But I am the common denominator.
47:39
I still bring to the table the same
47:41
problems, the same sins, the same, and most,
47:44
when I go to confession, most of my
47:46
sins are towards my wife, because she's the
47:50
closest person towards me.
47:52
She's the closest person to me of all
47:55
the things in the world.
47:57
My reason for wanting to discuss this with
48:00
other men is I live that life in
48:03
a vacuum.
48:04
I made it up as I went.
48:07
I have no idea what I was doing.
48:09
There's got to be a better way.
48:11
Our Catholic parishes, we show up, we go
48:13
to Mass, we leave, we fight in the
48:16
parking lot, we flip somebody off for cutting
48:18
us off right after receiving the Eucharist.
48:20
I've done it.
48:21
I've seen it happen.
48:25
There's got to be a better way.
48:27
There's got to be a better way to
48:28
bring men together where they're not saying, hey,
48:30
wife, I'm going to go on Thursday night,
48:32
and it's an excuse for me to get
48:34
a solid buzz on, with, oh, I'm going
48:38
to the church.
48:40
I'm in recovery.
48:43
I know how this works.
48:45
What a great opportunity, if you're a drinker,
48:48
to do that.
48:51
Words made for so much more.
48:54
You read the accounts of the saints and
48:56
all that they did in such short lives
48:59
and how they were doing so much more
49:02
in their 30s and 20s, and it's because
49:06
this world just beckons us into such a
49:08
low grade.
49:09
Like as you were saying, we need to
49:11
raise the stakes.
49:14
The pathway to destruction is so easy and
49:17
smooth, and it's like, young man, you were
49:20
made for so much more than this.
49:22
Do hard stuff.
49:23
Suck it up.
49:25
I wish somebody would have told me that.
49:27
I had a coach that picked me out
49:29
of a crowd.
49:31
A man picked me out of a crowd,
49:32
not because I could play basketball, but he
49:34
saw that I had a spirit about me
49:36
that I could compete, and he developed that.
49:40
And I was a good basketball player that
49:42
put myself through college on a scholarship, but
49:45
my life had nothing to do with that.
49:47
He taught me.
49:48
He developed that competitive nature, and that is,
49:53
we don't have that in our world anymore.
49:55
You brought up something recently that there are
49:59
different levels to heaven, and I didn't know
50:03
this, and you can be closer to the
50:05
Lord or you can be far away from
50:07
the Lord, and after walking away from that
50:09
conversation, I thought I'll just be lucky to
50:11
get in.
50:11
If they just give me a seat inside,
50:14
I'll be happy.
50:16
It never occurred to me that there's levels
50:20
to this, and I just want to be
50:23
part.
50:25
I've almost died many times in my life,
50:28
and for whatever reason God's keeping me around,
50:31
I don't want to be on my deathbed,
50:33
dying of an ingrown toenail.
50:35
Nothing glorious, something simple, and not have tried
50:40
to participate in the lives of those around
50:42
me.
50:42
That's all.
50:45
Perfect.
50:46
Yeah.
50:46
I would just like to give a blessing,
50:48
everybody.
50:49
Please.
51:12
Amen.
51:13
Amen.
51:15
Thank you, Father.
51:16
Wonderful.