Latest / Claymore: Become Who You Are / #668 From Goblins to Grace: Anthony DeStefano on "All Hallows Eve", Purgatory, and the Power of Story

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#668 From Goblins to Grace: Anthony DeStefano on "All Hallows Eve", Purgatory, and the Power of Story · Claymore: Become Who You Are

0:16
SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Become Who You Are Podcast, the production of the John Paul Two Renewal Center.
0:21
SPEAKER_01: Excited to be back with Anthony DiStefano.
0:25
SPEAKER_01: Anthony, welcome.
0:27
SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for having me.
0:29
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's been a little while since you've been on, so let me let me tell a little uh people a little bit about you.
0:35
SPEAKER_01: You best-selling author of 30 Christian books for adults and children, including A Travel Guide to Heaven, Ten Prayers God Always Says Yes to, The Donkey That No One Could Ride.
0:47
SPEAKER_01: Your work has been published in 18 countries, 12 languages.
0:51
SPEAKER_01: That's amazing.
0:52
SPEAKER_01: And have earned endorsements from notable figures such as Tony Robbins, Quincy Jones, Kathy Lee Gifford, Eric Metaxis, Timothy Cardinal Dolan, the late Jimmy Carter, Bernice King, daughter of Dr.
1:05
SPEAKER_01: Martin Luther King.
1:07
SPEAKER_01: That's a lot, Anthony.
1:08
SPEAKER_01: You appeared on a lot of shows too: CNN, Fox News, The 700 Club, Huckabee, hundreds of other national and local media news.
1:17
SPEAKER_01: You've also hosted two television series on EWTN.
1:21
SPEAKER_01: You're a New York native who attended Stuyvesant High School, where your English teacher, I thought this was interesting, Pulitzer Prize winner Frank McCourt, who wrote Angela's Ashes, inspired your passion for writing, and your first children's book, Little Star, began as a classroom assignment for McCork and decades later became a bestseller.
1:44
SPEAKER_01: You're also an avid pilot.
1:45
SPEAKER_01: You live in New Jersey with your wife, Jordan.
1:48
SPEAKER_01: So welcome.
1:49
SPEAKER_01: Great to have you on the show.
1:51
SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for having me.
1:53
SPEAKER_01: Love being here.
1:55
SPEAKER_01: Tell us just a little bit about uh Stuyvesant.
1:57
SPEAKER_01: You know, Stuyvesant's an old school, huh?
1:59
SPEAKER_01: Very well known.
2:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Stiveson's an old school, still around.
2:03
SPEAKER_00: It's one of the number uh, you know, it's one of the top schools in the country for science.
2:08
SPEAKER_00: When I was a kid, I wanted to be a doctor.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: I wanted to be a heart surgeon so badly I didn't achieve that goal because a couple of little things got in the way, like organic chemistry and uh integral calculus.
2:21
SPEAKER_01: I'm with you.
2:22
SPEAKER_01: I'm with you, brother.
2:23
SPEAKER_01: I became a professional chef after that, you know, after trying to take those courses.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: But I did go to that high school, and ironically, it was a science high school, but there was this Mr.
2:34
SPEAKER_00: McCourt who later on, after that, went on to write Angela's Ashes.
2:39
SPEAKER_00: And uh he was a pivotal figure in my life because, you know, what he tried to do was to break teenagers out of writing in a stilted, ornate style.
2:50
SPEAKER_00: You know, kids who like to write, they often use too many adjectives, too many adverbs.
2:54
SPEAKER_00: They're trying to show off.
2:56
SPEAKER_00: And the way that he tried to get us to get rid of that habit was to make us write children's books because he figured, well, a children's book you have to write simply.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: And so we wrote children's books, and then what I did was I wrote something called Little Star that years, years later went on to be published by Penguin Random House and become a bestseller.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: But I credit him with really forcing me to write simply, and that is a habit that has served me well, not only in children's books, but in writing for adults too.
3:27
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thank you for that.
3:28
SPEAKER_01: I and I write a lot of articles, and I'm finding that myself.
3:31
SPEAKER_01: You know, I I sometimes I just say, I'm gonna cut to the chase.
3:35
SPEAKER_01: You know, I write, there's a sword behind me, Anthony, that's a Claymore sword.
3:39
SPEAKER_01: That's our apostolate called Claymore for young men.
3:43
SPEAKER_01: And I find that with them.
3:44
SPEAKER_01: You know, they they want to get to the truth.
3:46
SPEAKER_01: What is the truth?
3:47
SPEAKER_01: What is the power of this, right?
3:49
SPEAKER_01: And and that's the power of the word.
3:51
SPEAKER_01: You know, the the you know, you don't use a a hundred adjectives for those guys, you know.
3:56
SPEAKER_01: They get they get antsy.
3:57
SPEAKER_01: So I I'm following you there, brother.
3:59
SPEAKER_01: Abbott pilot, where do you like to fly?
4:02
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I just do beach patrol.
4:04
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't fly across the country.
4:06
SPEAKER_00: I have this uh I've been flying since I was 19 years old.
4:10
SPEAKER_00: I just fly little propeller planes, I love it.
4:14
SPEAKER_00: Just tail draggers, old planes.
4:15
SPEAKER_00: I have a old 1947 Cessna 140.
4:20
SPEAKER_00: It's been around for over 75 years and it's never had an accident.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: And you know, it's just a two-passenger plane, and I it's it's good.
4:28
SPEAKER_00: It's it's therapy, you know what I mean?
4:30
SPEAKER_00: It's flying is beautiful because you get to experience the beauty of it, the freedom of it, the science of it, the adventure of it.
4:39
SPEAKER_00: It's got a lot of things.
4:41
SPEAKER_00: I always encourage people to try to get their pilot's license if they can, although it's getting more and more expensive, unfortunately, to do that.
4:48
SPEAKER_01: Yes, it is, you know.
4:50
SPEAKER_01: Yes, it is.
4:51
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, one more question before we dig in, and I wanna we're gonna dig into All Hallows Eve, your last children's book, which is which is really beautiful, again, just like the other ones.
5:00
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna hold this up.
5:01
SPEAKER_01: I just I love the cover, the illustration.
5:04
SPEAKER_01: We'll we'll talk a little bit about that, and uh it's just done really well again.
5:09
SPEAKER_01: But as far as the school goes, Pete Stuyvesant Yes, yeah, he must have been Peter Stuyvesant, must have been one of the founders of the school.
5:19
SPEAKER_00: No, no, I don't think so.
5:20
SPEAKER_00: Peter Stuyvesant was a figure from you know early New York history, and then uh they just named the school after Stuyvesant, and there's a a uh Stuyvesant Park is close by when there's a statue of Peter Stuyvesant, but I don't think he I don't believe he had any direct uh role in forming.
5:38
SPEAKER_01: I have a yeah, so so whether he does or not, he he was interested in education, and he said this nothing is of greater importance than the right early instruction of youth.
5:50
SPEAKER_01: So he must have had a heart for the youth.
5:52
SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm the reason I bring it up is because we I'm outside of Chicago and we we do some work in Chicago quite a bit, actually.
6:00
SPEAKER_01: And the Chicago public school, Anthony, is just atrocious, these poor kids.
6:06
SPEAKER_01: And uh I'm wondering, is is Stiverson is that a public school or is that um you know how to do it?
6:12
SPEAKER_00: Stiverson for Stiverson is a public school, and you had to take a test in order to get into that school.
6:18
SPEAKER_00: It's a high school.
6:20
SPEAKER_00: I myself went to all public schools growing up in New York, but you have to understand public schools when I went to school was different than public schools today.
6:30
SPEAKER_00: We weren't indoctrinated back there, back then, with a secular atheist liberal agenda that that they indoctrinate kids with now in public school.
6:40
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't that way.
6:41
SPEAKER_00: In fact, public school was a beautiful experience back then.
6:44
SPEAKER_00: I got to, in Brooklyn, especially Brooklyn, New York, there were so many different people, so many different races and cultures and religions that we got a good smattering of everything.
6:54
SPEAKER_00: And it prepared me later for the job of writing, not only for children, but for everyone.
6:59
SPEAKER_00: And that's why I think uh I've been in I've got a lot of those endorsements you read were from very eclectic names.
7:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they were.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: Even though I'm primarily, of course, a Catholic writer, and nothing I write goes against Catholic teaching.
7:12
SPEAKER_00: But yes, and and to your point about you know the culture right now, really the children are on the front edge, the front line of the culture war.
7:20
SPEAKER_00: Because the opposite side, the side that is anti-Christian, the secular side, they know they can't always win elections as they lose elections.
7:28
SPEAKER_00: And so what do they do?
7:29
SPEAKER_00: They've got to jump over the heads of parents to propagandize children with their secular anti-Christian message.
7:38
SPEAKER_00: That's what they're doing, not just in the school system, but in the entertainment industry, obviously, in Hollywood and the media.
7:44
SPEAKER_00: And so that's why it's so important.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: I view this job of mine of writing children's books not just something that's fun and joyful, which it is.
7:52
SPEAKER_00: I view it as vocational.
7:54
SPEAKER_00: It's it's one of the ways that I have to, you know, uh proclaim the message of Christ to the children because they're the ones that are under attack.
8:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they sure are.
8:04
SPEAKER_01: And uh you're you've you're you're a blessing.
8:06
SPEAKER_01: I have an uh um a number of your books that I've shared with my children, my grandchildren.
8:12
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's wonderful.
8:14
SPEAKER_01: What you do, and I'm gonna ask you about this one, you know, what you've done in the past is taken some secular characters and some secular ideas and then turned it into a beautiful story that we could all relate to.
8:27
SPEAKER_01: So why did you write a book on on Halloween?
8:30
SPEAKER_01: After all, Halloween's a controversial holiday, I I guess to a certain extent, you know, to Christians.
8:35
SPEAKER_01: We think of it as a as a pagan holiday, if anybody does think of it.
8:39
SPEAKER_00: So so how did that uh I wrote the book be because Halloween has been hijacked by the secular culture.
8:46
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's controversial.
8:47
SPEAKER_00: Today, Halloween has become almost exclusively about costumes and candy and ghosts and goblins, and in many cases, an unhealthy fascination with evil.
8:58
SPEAKER_00: But Halloween actually comes from the great Catholic feast known as All Hallows Eve, hence the title of the book, and that's the Vigil of All Saints Day.
9:07
SPEAKER_00: And for centuries, Christians have seen this as a holy time to remember the saints and to pray for the souls in purgatory.
9:14
SPEAKER_00: Some people uh think that that Halloween is anti-Christian.
9:17
SPEAKER_00: That's simply not the case.
9:18
SPEAKER_00: So by writing this story, I wanted to do my little part to try to reclaim this holiday for what it truly is, a deeply spiritual holiday centered on prayer and penance and remembrance of the dead.
9:30
SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to give children as well as their parents an engaging way to celebrate Halloween in line with their faith, without losing the fun, the mystery, and even a little bit of the scary excitement that kids naturally love about this season.
9:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so tell us a little bit about how you came up with the story.
9:49
SPEAKER_00: Well, the story itself, I've always wanted to write a Halloween story because, you know, I like many people, I'm drawn to scary things.
9:56
SPEAKER_00: There are people who love roller coasters, uh, there are people who love uh scary movies.
10:01
SPEAKER_00: Why do they like scary things?
10:03
SPEAKER_00: Because it gives them exhilaration, it gives them a thrill.
10:06
SPEAKER_00: At the same time, they're in the safety, they're they're safe.
10:08
SPEAKER_00: They're not really in danger.
10:10
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, the devil, always uh vigilant, he jumps on this natural human inclination and he tries to distort it and twist it into a love of what's evil.
10:22
SPEAKER_00: And that's where Halloween goes off track.
10:24
SPEAKER_00: So for a long time, I've wanted to write a Halloween story uh that had those kind of spooky thrills, but at the same time was true to church doctrine.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: And so I came up with this idea of this story of a group of children.
10:37
SPEAKER_00: In fact, the story is told through the eyes of a young girl who, along with her friends, sneak into a cemetery one night looking to have some spooky thrills.
10:45
SPEAKER_00: And instead they encounter this mysterious old woman who tells them, you know, to hey, be more respectful to the dead.
10:52
SPEAKER_00: Don't be playing so much.
10:53
SPEAKER_00: These dead are sleeping, you know, their their their loved ones may be weeping.
10:57
SPEAKER_00: And then she tells the children a story about a naughty little girl who became uh a selfish old woman, but someone who repented before she died.
11:09
SPEAKER_00: And through this tale that this old woman tells the children, they come to learn about the reality of purgatory and the need to pray for the dead and the true meaning of Halloween.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: So this children's book tries to it tries to blend suspense and surprise and even a little scariness with a strong spiritual message.
11:29
SPEAKER_01: As far as age goes, is this any different than than some of the other the books that you know that I have of yours?
11:35
SPEAKER_01: You know, the the the one through the eyes of the East the rabbit, the bunny uh for Easter.
11:40
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that was outstanding.
11:41
SPEAKER_01: That was outstanding.
11:42
SPEAKER_01: I never you know, so I so I don't know if this one is the same ages, you think?
11:47
SPEAKER_00: You know, uh this is this book is a little bit more text-heavy.
11:50
SPEAKER_00: So I think children eight, nine, ten might appreciate this book more if they're reading it on their own.
11:56
SPEAKER_00: However, you as you know, many parents, grandparents, aunts, uncle, uncles, siblings, older siblings read these books to the children.
12:07
SPEAKER_00: So I think that a child much younger, four or five or six, can appreciate this book, especially if it's read to him.
12:13
SPEAKER_00: And because they'll appreciate the pictures.
12:15
SPEAKER_00: The pictures are very uh uh like like Walt Disney kinds of pictures.
12:19
SPEAKER_00: So I I and and I and as far as you know, another point goes, all my books are written for adults, even these children's books.
12:27
SPEAKER_00: I am very aware that adults are reading these books to children, and if the kids like the book, sometimes they make the adults read it to them five, ten, twenty times.
12:36
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
12:37
SPEAKER_00: This great captive audience of adults, and I don't want to miss the opportunity to evangelize them too, or remind them of truths that they need to be reminded of.
12:46
SPEAKER_00: So I always put layers of meaning in this book.
12:49
SPEAKER_00: I try to model model myself after the parables.
12:53
SPEAKER_00: You know, you gotta model yourself after the greatest.
12:55
SPEAKER_00: And and so include layers of meaning that little kids can understand and appreciate as well as older adults.
13:02
SPEAKER_00: So it's a big range.
13:04
SPEAKER_01: One of the things we speak about, and you're touching on it right now, is the importance of getting people off of those phones, Anthony, and actually doing what you just said.
13:14
SPEAKER_01: You know, if I take this book and I'm reading to my grandchildren now, I have eight of them, and uh and you know, it it's it's really that time, that special time.
13:24
SPEAKER_01: And they're excited, they get excited, I get excited, and there's a bonding thing that goes on, and they start asking questions.
13:31
SPEAKER_01: One of the things you've done really well in here, you've you've touched on it already, is talking about purgatory.
13:37
SPEAKER_01: You know, sometimes it's it's hard for even for adults to explain purgatory.
13:42
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes I don't think they get it very well, you know.
13:44
SPEAKER_01: There's some mystery into all of these things, right?
13:46
SPEAKER_01: I mean, this is we're talking about heaven, hell, purgatory.
13:50
SPEAKER_01: But what is purgatory?
13:51
SPEAKER_01: Why is it important to pray for people in purgatory?
13:54
SPEAKER_00: And children, by the way, they're they're attracted by these big questions.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: They want to know about death, they want to know about it in purgatory.
14:02
SPEAKER_00: And if and if we shield them from these matters, it doesn't always help them.
14:06
SPEAKER_00: It actually makes them more curious and confuses them more.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: So it's better if we learn about them ourselves and then face these questions head on.
14:13
SPEAKER_00: Now, purgatory is one of the most misunderstood teachings in the Catholic Church.
14:16
SPEAKER_00: It's not a second chance after death, it's certainly not hell.
14:20
SPEAKER_00: Purgatory is a temporary state of purification for those souls who have already been saved.
14:27
SPEAKER_00: They've died in God's grace, they're going to heaven, but they still need cleansing before entering heaven.
14:33
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says in the book of Revelation very clearly that nothing unclean can enter heaven.
14:40
SPEAKER_00: Even when our sins are forgiven, the residue of selfishness or attachment to sin can still remain.
14:45
SPEAKER_00: Look, if I if I was hit by a meteor right now, you know, I went to confession last week, I'm in a state of grace.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: But guess what?
14:51
SPEAKER_00: I'm a passionate Italian, I've got lots of attachment to sin that I have, I'm not sure, you know, even though I'm in a state of grace, I can't enter heaven unless that attachment to sin is gone.
15:04
SPEAKER_00: So purgatory is the place where that gets clean.
15:06
SPEAKER_00: And it's not, it's not hard for children to understand this.
15:10
SPEAKER_00: Listen, if a if a person today, if a child today, was told that they were going to meet the president of the United States or the Pope or they had to go to a wedding or a big party, then that child would presumably wash their face or comb their hair or change out of their gym clothes, you know, before they went.
15:27
SPEAKER_00: Well, purgatory is sort of like a cleanup spot where people go before they get to heaven.
15:33
SPEAKER_00: Just like we need to clean up before attending a party.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: Purgatory is the place where we where souls get cleaned up before the most special party of all, the heavenly banquet with God.
15:42
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's something kids can understand very easily.
15:46
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
15:46
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
15:47
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for that.
15:48
SPEAKER_01: Now, I'm looking through these illustrations and they're beautiful as always.
15:52
SPEAKER_01: Is this a is this a new illustrator?
15:54
SPEAKER_01: Have you used Irwin before?
15:56
SPEAKER_01: I have.
15:57
SPEAKER_00: I have Erwin.
15:58
SPEAKER_00: Erwin's got a list of uh incredible credits.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: He's worked for DreamWorks Animation on films like Freck and Madagascar.
16:07
SPEAKER_00: He's also done many best-selling uh children's books, including two of my previous books, A Travel Guide to Heaven for Kids and The Seed Who Is Afraid to Be Planted.
16:16
SPEAKER_00: And I wanted Irwin to illustrate this book because he has a very rare gift of balancing realism and fantasy.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: You know, his artwork captures both the spooky atmosphere that kids love about Halloween, but also the reverent beauty of the Catholic teaching about it.
16:32
SPEAKER_00: And so he paints darkness and light and colors and shadows in a way that children, I hope, feel both the gravity of the subject matter and the joy of the gospel message.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: And he's managed to give the main character, this mysterious woman, Holga May, as well as the children and the cemetery and all the supernatural scenes of heaven and hell and purgatory.
16:53
SPEAKER_00: He's managed to give them a richness and a depth as well as a lightheartedness, uh, which I think perfectly matches the tone of the story.
17:02
SPEAKER_01: He's a talent.
17:03
SPEAKER_01: He he's a talent for sure.
17:04
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
17:05
SPEAKER_01: Do you interview uh illustrators like you know, and and and and work, you know, you pick out just some that you've worked with in the past, Anthony.
17:14
SPEAKER_01: How does that usually work?
17:15
SPEAKER_01: Do you develop relationships, I'm sure, with with certain people?
17:18
SPEAKER_00: I do.
17:18
SPEAKER_00: Well, first of all, my rule is I go to the best.
17:21
SPEAKER_00: You know, you know, I don't know why uh in Christian and Catholic fiction and nonfiction works of art, it it they always use it always seems to me to be rather amateur-ish.
17:31
SPEAKER_00: We're telling the greatest story ever.
17:34
SPEAKER_00: We should have the greatest production values.
17:37
SPEAKER_00: The stuff that we produce as Christians and Catholics should be just as good and better than what the secular world is doing out there in Hollywood.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: So I always want to use the best.
17:46
SPEAKER_00: Now, as far as illustrators go, most of them have are represented by agencies.
17:50
SPEAKER_00: And so you can go on these agency websites and look at samples of all the work of these different illustrators.
17:56
SPEAKER_00: And when I find one who I think can perform the mission of the book best, that's why I pick.
18:03
SPEAKER_00: For instance, I wrote a book called Our Lady's Wardrobe about Our Lady and Beautiful.
18:08
SPEAKER_00: Beautiful Seaboy.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: It was a very it was a big bestseller for me.
18:11
SPEAKER_00: But what I wanted people to get out of that book was the fact that Mary, our lady, is real.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: She's not fake, she's not a legend, she's not a fairy tale.
18:21
SPEAKER_00: She's as real as you and me.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: And right now, she's alive with a glorified body in heaven.
18:26
SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to get an illustrator who could do photorealistic work.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: What I wanted to do, photorealistic work.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: When I have a book that deals with animals, like the donkey that no one could ride, or as you mentioned before, the story of the first Easter bunny, I go to the person who's the best at animals in the world, a guy named Richard Cowdry.
18:43
SPEAKER_00: This particular book was different.
18:45
SPEAKER_00: It didn't have animals, it didn't need to be photorealistic.
18:48
SPEAKER_00: This had to capture an atmosphere, like I said, you know, dark as well as light.
18:54
SPEAKER_00: And that's why I picked this guy.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: So I picked I picked the illustrators to fit the mission and the goal and the theme of the book.
19:01
SPEAKER_01: Now that comes with experience, brother.
19:03
SPEAKER_01: I think you know you you've written long enough and enough things that that comes with experience.
19:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's a blessing too.
19:10
SPEAKER_00: I I'm a visual writer.
19:12
SPEAKER_00: And you're right.
19:13
SPEAKER_00: We having written so many of these now, I think I'm up to 21 children's books.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: When I'm writing the books now, when I'm actually writing out the verses, I think in terms of well, what's the illustration going to look like?
19:28
SPEAKER_00: And if I think it's going to be boring visually for a few pages, then I have to actually spice it up and make it more exciting, come up with some more powerful imagery because I know that children are going to be looking at the pictures as much as they're reading the text.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: In the book, you include a couple of notes to parents, as well as from the Bible, from the catechism section at the end of the book.
19:50
SPEAKER_01: What why did you do that?
19:51
SPEAKER_00: You know, I included those notes because I wanted parents to have confidence that what their children are reading here is firmly rooted in the Catholic faith.
19:58
SPEAKER_00: You know, how Halloween, as we've said, is controversial.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: It could be confusing even for adults.
20:02
SPEAKER_00: So, first of all, I thought it was important to get endorsements.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: So I got in at the front of the book, you'll see some endorsements from Cardinal Dolan and um uh Bishop Coffey and some priests, some famous exorcists, too, like Monsignor Rossetti.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, and in addition to those endorsements, you know, I've I've got uh notes from uh the catechism as well as the Bible.
20:22
SPEAKER_00: And my hope is that parents will not just read this book to their children, but just like you were speaking about before, they will use this as a teaching opportunity.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: They'll use this as an opportunity to bond with the children, to talk to them, to speak to them, and use the Bible and the catechism as references.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: So it's a very, as you said before, it was really beautiful.
20:43
SPEAKER_00: It's such a moment that you have with your child when you're reading to them or with them.
20:49
SPEAKER_00: You know, it's they'll never forget that.
20:51
SPEAKER_00: And it makes them want to read and it'll make them read with their own children.
20:55
SPEAKER_00: And like you said, it'll get them away from those phones, which which caused them to be so isolated and alone.
21:02
SPEAKER_00: That's what this, you know, social media and and the new technology can be very helpful, but it could also be a driving force in making children alone and solitary.
21:13
SPEAKER_01: And you know what?
21:14
SPEAKER_01: When when I was talking to you or when I mentioned earlier about Claymore, we're finding these young guys, they go, this is Gen Z, Anthony.
21:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
21:22
SPEAKER_01: And we're finding that.
21:23
SPEAKER_01: You know, we're finding these guys are, you know, they just put so much garbage into their heads and into their brains and so many messages without even realizing it.
21:33
SPEAKER_00: That's why the suit the suicide rate is is the highest it's ever been.
21:36
SPEAKER_00: The depression rates are higher than they've ever been.
21:39
SPEAKER_00: Rates for all kinds of mental illnesses are high, and there's a lot of reasons for that, but one of them is because these kids are in their heads and then they're not out there playing ball with other kids or playing in some other way in a in a healthy, interactive way.
21:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was just talking to them and writing actually uh a section for a book that I'm writing for them, a handbook for them, and it was about it was on Saint Ignatius of Loyola.
22:06
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, they he was you he was a soldier, you know, and it was through his reading, through his getting hit with a cannonball, and he's convalescing, and he he didn't have any material about romance novels and and all the war things that he wanted to read.
22:22
SPEAKER_01: And they brought him a couple of books on the saints and on the life of Christ, and it was filling up his mind of good things, right?
22:30
SPEAKER_01: Good lessons.
22:31
SPEAKER_01: That's what you do here with the kids' books.
22:33
SPEAKER_01: I think you bring the good lessons, you know, it's the old old fairy tales.
22:37
SPEAKER_01: You know, every fairy tale used to read, uh, Anthony as kids had some story, some message in there.
22:42
SPEAKER_01: We got away from that.
22:43
SPEAKER_01: We get into this garbagey stuff, and you do something more.
22:47
SPEAKER_01: You not only bring a lesson, you bring a uh a less, uh, a Christian message, you know.
22:53
SPEAKER_01: So you're doing all of that.
22:55
SPEAKER_00: And uh thank you.
22:56
SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it.
22:57
SPEAKER_00: C.S.
22:57
SPEAKER_00: Lewis said that you know the job of children's literature is to baptize the imagination of the child.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: You're actually baptizing their imagination, you're showing them that their imagination can be, you know, it's very powerful, the imagination.
23:13
SPEAKER_00: The imagination, you know, can be used for bad fantasies or good fantasies, you know, and it could really wreak havoc in a person's life.
23:20
SPEAKER_00: But if you baptize that imagination early and you fill the heads of children with these stories, like you said, of these fairy tales, that shows them, you know, it doesn't scare them.
23:31
SPEAKER_00: People sometimes say fairy tales are bad because uh dragons scare children.
23:35
SPEAKER_00: And they might object to some of the things in this book because they're a little bit scary.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: But no, no, no, not at all.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: What these books do, what fairy tales do, is they show children that you can slay the dragon, you could overcome the evil by being virtuous.
23:49
SPEAKER_00: That's the great lesson of fairy tales.
23:51
SPEAKER_00: And I hope one of the lessons that's contained in this book and all my children's books, very, very important this point that you're making.
24:00
SPEAKER_01: When I give a presentation called Stolen Innocence, is what's happening to our kids, right?
24:04
SPEAKER_01: To our elementary school kids in in these public school systems and the culture and on social media and all these things.
24:10
SPEAKER_01: And I and I call it that, you know, that that we're robbing them of their innocence and obliterating their moral imaginations.
24:18
SPEAKER_01: What you're doing is, and what I tell the parents and so often, and and when I get a chance to talk to young people too, that we have to restore that, how we have to lay that foundation back in.
24:30
SPEAKER_01: And that's what you're talking about.
24:31
SPEAKER_01: When you know their imaginations are powerful, let them have the awe and wonder.
24:36
SPEAKER_01: You know, all good philosophy too.
24:37
SPEAKER_01: You know, uh C.S.
24:38
SPEAKER_01: Lewis, G.K.
24:40
SPEAKER_01: Chesterton, good philosophers always start with awe and wonder, don't they?
24:44
SPEAKER_00: They do, uh, because that's the thing.
24:46
SPEAKER_00: Images.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: Images have to do with the imagination.
24:49
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's called imagination.
24:50
SPEAKER_00: They're so powerful.
24:52
SPEAKER_00: And the the devil and the secular culture understands that.
24:55
SPEAKER_00: And that's why pornography has caused so much of a problem.
24:59
SPEAKER_00: And they use the other side uses images so powerfully to twist people and pull them pull them away from what's good.
25:06
SPEAKER_00: On our side, we have to do the opposite.
25:08
SPEAKER_00: We have to use images and imaginations to pull them to our side back again.
25:14
SPEAKER_01: Some kind of, yeah, something that stays in their heads and stays in their hearts to combat.
25:20
SPEAKER_01: So what when when they hear these these secular, really demonic messages, uh, they have something to compare it to, right?
25:27
SPEAKER_01: So these children, when they when when we when when we instill virtues and values in them and we talk about these things, and we're not afraid, to your point, not afraid to say there is evil out in the world.
25:39
SPEAKER_01: You know, if if look at there's never been as much evil attacking children in the world as today, physically, uh, emotionally, psychologically, I mean, at every dimension.
25:51
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
25:52
SPEAKER_00: And kids see it.
25:54
SPEAKER_00: You can't hide.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: You we want to protect our kids from evil.
25:57
SPEAKER_00: We can't.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: They see it out there.
25:59
SPEAKER_00: They see uh shootings, they see the bad things out there.
26:02
SPEAKER_00: So we're not protecting them at all by hiding evil from them.
26:08
SPEAKER_00: We have to show them, number one, that there is final justice for those who do great evil and who don't repent, and that's the the purpose of talking about hell.
26:19
SPEAKER_00: But what we also have to educate them about God's mercy and the truth that one drop of Christ's blood is enough to wash away the sins of a billion universes.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: You have to give them that two-edged message that there is punishment and final justice for evil, but on the other hand, that if they themselves do something bad, there's always mercy as long as you turn around, go back to God, say you're sorry.
26:43
SPEAKER_00: As long as you have both sides of that message and one of you're not leaning either too much to one side or too much to the other, then they're gonna grow up with a healthy mind and a healthy view of the world, and they'll be able to battle the evil that comes their way, even if they succumb sometimes to the temptations of the world, which they will.
27:02
SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, a couple points here.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: You know, first of all, when when we're work with young people, we tell them temptation's not a sin.
27:08
SPEAKER_01: They have people have to realize that.
27:10
SPEAKER_01: But but what we do, because temptations are hitting these poor young people all the time, aren't they, Anthony?
27:18
SPEAKER_00: How are you gonna be?
27:19
SPEAKER_00: It's impossible to be kid today with when they're assaulted, their eyes are assaulted on all sides by tempting images.
27:26
SPEAKER_00: Of course, God has mercy, has mercy on them.
27:29
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure their culpability when they commit sins is greatly reduced, especially in one, you know, parent households and the way they're growing up with the of course God has mercy.
27:39
SPEAKER_00: That doesn't mean we stop saying that what they're doing is wrong or sinful.
27:42
SPEAKER_00: We always proclaim that something wrong is wrong.
27:45
SPEAKER_00: But we know that God in his mercy, you know, is looking down and understanding what's going on.
27:50
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so important because again, you know, put mercy in this temptation together when we tell people it's temptation is not a sin.
27:57
SPEAKER_01: But at that point, you've got to make a choice.
27:59
SPEAKER_01: And you got to do it pretty quickly today.
28:02
SPEAKER_01: But if you see young people, especially these young men with these pornographic images and all this garbage, when they are tempted, they look at it as an invitation to prayer now.
28:12
SPEAKER_01: And we bring them into prayer and we talk about mercy.
28:14
SPEAKER_01: You know, John Paul II was the great mercy pope.
28:17
SPEAKER_01: And uh so to open up their hearts and open it up to these beautiful images.
28:22
SPEAKER_01: You know, Anthony, as as before we go here, I want to ask you what's the main thing you want children to take away from this story?
28:29
SPEAKER_01: It's so beautiful that it's it's a we might have touched on it already, but if there's one thing you say, hey.
28:35
SPEAKER_00: I don't think we did, actually.
28:36
SPEAKER_00: The main takeaway is very, very simple.
28:39
SPEAKER_00: We gotta pray for the dead.
28:41
SPEAKER_00: You know, that's the heart of this book.
28:42
SPEAKER_00: Uh through through this woman's haunting uh but hope hopeful tale that she tells the children, I want children to see that our actions matter not just in this life, but in eternity.
28:53
SPEAKER_00: I want them to know that they, children, even as kids, they have the power to help souls in purgatory through their prayer.
29:00
SPEAKER_00: That's an incredible privilege and an incredible responsibility.
29:05
SPEAKER_00: If children finish this book with a deeper sense of reverence for the dead and with the habit of saying, look, even just one short prayer for the dead on all souls day, then I think I've accomplished my goal.
29:16
SPEAKER_00: In the end, while this book certainly is is eerie and spooky, it's it's really not about fear at all.
29:21
SPEAKER_00: It's about hope in eternal life.
29:24
SPEAKER_00: And that's the message I want to leave with kids.
29:26
SPEAKER_01: Well, God bless you.
29:27
SPEAKER_01: It's another great, another great book.
29:30
SPEAKER_01: All Halloween.
29:31
SPEAKER_01: I'll make sure when I do the edit, I'll put the nice cover up behind me here while I'm talking about this because I really like it.
29:38
SPEAKER_01: I really enjoy your books.
29:40
SPEAKER_01: I really do.
29:40
SPEAKER_01: So thank you so much.
29:41
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for writing.
29:42
SPEAKER_01: Don't don't give up on us because we we need this more and more.
29:46
SPEAKER_01: We have to get young people into the joy of reading again.
29:49
SPEAKER_01: You know, uh, you know, I think the secular public schools, again, they're doing such a poor job that we have parents and people that love those kids.
29:57
SPEAKER_01: We have to take the time to read these books to.
30:00
SPEAKER_00: them and and really open up their hearts like you said their imaginations to the the to the power of books the power of stories huh amen one one you read one sentence that could stick with you forever it could open up a whole a whole vision give you a whole vision of life and change your life one book that's happened to me multiple times in my life and it can happen to and God will use those books to impart vision to children it changed the life of Saint Ignatius Saint Augustine saying every day so many saints that you go in their lives.
30:34
SPEAKER_01: There you go hey thank you God bless you Anthony thanks thanks everyone thanks for joining us today talk to you again soon bye bye