Latest / The Manly Catholic: Training Soldiers for Christ / Father Dom's Homs: The 50-Billion-Dollar Debt We Couldn't Pay
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- James Caldwell: This is the Manly Catholic, the podcast that calls you out of the shadows and into the fight. Here we forge men into warriors for Christ, husbands, fathers, and leaders who refuse to kneel to the modern world's lies. No more passivity, no more excuses, no more lukewarm faith. This is your battle crowd, your call to arms. The time for weakness is over. It's time to fight. Welcome to the Manly Catholic. Let's get to work. In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Last Sunday we were able to look at the power of love, to go deep within ourselves, and to look at what love is and most especially to embrace in ourselves the love that God has for us, for God is love. He doesn't choose, He is love, and we are created in His image and likeness, which which means we're built for love, to give love and receive love, and it's a very powerful thing. And in our readings today, we have another opportunity to look deep within ourselves again and look at the thing that can destroy love or weaken love. It's the number one thing we have to stay away from in our lives as we journey from this life to heaven, as we're pilgrim people journeying from earth to passing that threshold of death, that door we all have to walk through someday and and enter the kingdom of heaven. And the one thing we have to stay away from that keeps us from that paradise is sin. And so our readings today are all about that. And it does us well to take a deep, honest Look within ourselves, within our soul, with our relationship with our Heavenly Father, our relationship with ourselves and our neighbor. Look at the areas in the life where, yes, we fall short. We are sinners. But there's another side of our readings today that show the infinite mercy and depth of God's peace and love and forgiveness and restoration for us. So long as we let Him in and we stay committed to Him and we stay away from sin. For in our first reading today, the very first sentence hits profoundly. From the great book of Sirach, from the collection of wisdom literature, the writer says this right from the start: Wrath and anger are hateful things, yet the sinner hugs them tight. I don't know about you, but I can relate to that. I don't know why I wanna hug on to my sins. I don't know why I wanna keep them close sometimes, especially before I gave my life to our heavenly Father. Anger and hatred and impatience and pride reigned supreme in my life. And sometimes it felt good to get angry. I don't know why. A sell a sense of controlling the situation, a sense of maybe controlling other people. Sometimes it it felt good and that's a dangerous thing, a dangerous place to be but God came crashing into my life and I gave my life to Him at the age of 27. Those things began to disappear. I had no desire for those sins. Instead of wrath, instead of anger, impatience, I was filled with peace and love and joy, freedom. And that's what I wanted to bring to other people. I wanted to bring to other people the experience I had by encountering our Heavenly Father, by being forgiven, by being wiped clean, by giving new life, freedom, power, restoration. I wanted to take that to the world. I wanted to bring everybody to Jesus so that they too can encounter the privilege that I had. I could have let that go. I could let that pass. But in that moment I reached out to God and He came into my life and changed it forever. And that wrath and anger that held me down, trapped, enslaved, was gone. Reminds me of a time in my life where I was kind of into scuba diving. How many of you have ever scuba dived? Okay, a couple. It's very important that you have the right gear, isn't it? Everything that you put on, everything that you're trained for is very important. Plus the other fellow divers, you never dive alone. You dive as a unit, you dive as a community. And so I remember when I was getting paddy certified, and I remember being in the pool, and I remember our first time out into the ocean. This was off the coast of Costa Rica, and it was our first time diving in the ocean, putting everything into practice. And if you know anything about scuba gear, it's very important. Most especially your BCD, which is your buoyancy control device. So it's a big vest that you put on. And your tank is is attached to it. Your regulator, your at your oxygen hose, your emergency oxygen hose. The regulator that controls the oxygen that goes in your vest and fills bladders that you can precisely control your buoyancy. And there's also pockets in front that have weights. And on the end of the weights, velcroed in are tabs. But you're weighted. And in the boat, you're very, very heavy. But then when you land in the water. And if your buoyancy is controlled properly, you're light as a feather. So I remember we entered the water and then we were controlling the the the bladders and so we were descending ten feet, twenty feet, thirty feet, forty feet, fifty feet, sixty feet, seventy feet, boom, hit the bottom. It was clear as could be. It was the most beautiful thing I've ever experienced, the bottom of the ocean there. You could see everything. But you needed to know your equipment and you needed to trust your partner. There was one dive where I took my buddy and we went to my parents' lake here in Michigan, not too far from here. And it was the beginning of June, and there's a couple spots in the lake that are about 60 feet. And it used to be one of the cleanest lakes in Michigan. And it's like, ⁓ yeah, come. You can ⁓ come to my parents' lake and we'll go diving. It's gonna be great. It's gonna be crystal clear, it'll be a blast. We'll go down, we'll hit all the deep holes in the lake, 60 feet. Okay, great. When we got there, there was a huge algae bloom beforehand. So that's okay, we'll still dive. At least we'll be able to read our depth gauge. When we hit 60 feet, we'll know we'll be at the bottom and we'll just ascend up. So we get in the water, and immediately I lose my partner. I'm sinking faster than I should because this isn't salt water, this is fresh water. So I'm trying to control my buoyancy device. And I'd catch my buddy sometimes. He'd go like this, and I'd go like this for like 20 minutes. And then all of a sudden he was going. And I couldn't see. Because the deeper I went, the darker it went, the colder it got. That was the coldest water I've ever been to. And I had trouble releasing the pressure out of my ears for decompression as I was descending. So my ears were hurting. I was getting dizzy. It was hard for me to find my regulator to put air in my my BCD to get me up out of there. But deeper, colder, darker, heavier. So I just I ejected. I just pulled all the weights. Out of my vest, and then ascended, exiting me out of the weightiness, the darkness, the coldness, into the warm light, the warm water, and I could see and I was free. The fear and the anxiety were gone. And isn't that what sin does to us? It weighs us down, it brings us into that dark, cold place where Satan wants us to be. There's the fear and the anxiety. And then when I released that weight, it was like I just gave my life to the Lord and He saved me. Maybe a funny analogy for what we're looking at, but there's a lot of truth to that. So we look at sin and we have to know that yes, when we choose to sin, when we choose to mortal sin, we know it's a sin, we know what it does. It removes sanctifying grace from our soul, which disconnects us from God, yourself. And the body of Christ your neighbor, knowing all those things and its consequences, knowing it's a mortal sin, knowing that it disconnects your life of God, and you do it anyway, that's dangerous. And that's what our Heavenly Father Jesus is talking about in our gospel today. Yes, he's reminding us of the weight of sin. The number one thing in our life is to stay away from sin. And we can only do that through Jesus Christ in the sacraments. In all things, we can do all things in Jesus Christ who gives us strength. Outside Jesus Christ, we can't do anything. See, that's the power of Christ. That's what changes everything in our worlds. And that's why we have nothing to fear. So in our gospel today, Jesus is explaining to Pi Peter. Transformation or a transition from the way the world looked at things to now the way we look at the world through the lens of Jesus Christ. And so Jesus is getting Peter ready for that. Beginning of our gospel, Peter approaches Jesus and asks him, Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive? As many as seven times? And Jesus answered, I say to you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. What's going on here? It's very interesting. Si in the Jewish tradition forgiveness was an interesting thing. In Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy, we see something that goes against forgiveness. Exodus twenty-one, twenty-three to twenty-five. If there is a serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise. Leviticus twenty four, nineteen to twenty. Anyone who injures their neighbour is to be injured in the manner they have injured them. Fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, the one who has inflicted the injury must suffer the same injury. Duterony nineteen twenty one. Show no pity. Life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot. Well, that's the environment that Peter was raised in. He's Jewish. He knows Scripture very well. And so he's going to Jesus, knowing Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. Peter is saying to Jesus, Well, I'll forgive seven times. That's a biblical number. Peter's thinking to himself, well, seven times, that's a lot. Jesus will be satisfied with this. You know, I'll be patted on the head. Yes, good Peter. Seven times. Good. Well, Jesus changes everything, doesn't he? He fulfills the Old Testament in always. Jesus says, not seven times, but seventy-seven times, infinite. You never stop forgiving. You forgive all the way to the end. That's what Jesus is saying to Peter. Changing his mind, illuminating his intellect, knowing that forgiveness is part of love. It's very powerful. And holding on to unforgiveness is very weighty. Well, Jesus, to magnify this. situation he tells a parable. He says that's why the kingdom of heaven may be likened to a king who decided to settle accounts with his servants. When he began the accounting, a debtor was brought before him, you, me, whom owed him a huge amount. Well in the Douate Reims translation of the Catholic Bible, it says the amount. The huge amount is ten thousand talents. So we have this debtor, a sinner. Like you and me, coming before the king, coming before God, he's being called to make an account of his sins, and he comes before the master. And the master says that since you can't pay it back, because it's a huge amount, 10,000 talents, he his master ordered him to be sold, along with his wife, his children, all his property, and payment of the debt of sin. In confession, we're forgiven of our mortal sin, to be sure. But sometimes our mortal sin can destroy our family, can Can hurt our children, can hurt our property, our house, our friends, our coworkers. That is a great debt. Sin destroys so much. That the servant fell down, did him homage, and said, Be patient with me, and I will pay you back in full. There's contrition. There's the sinner going into the sacrament of reconciliation before the king. And the king sees his contrition. What does he say? He was moved with compassion. That is our Heavenly Father. And he was forgiven of his sins. You see, sometimes we're so ingrained with sin that we like and we cherish, and we hold on so tightly we fall back into our old way of life. And that's exactly what that debtor did because he found one of his servants that owned a smaller amount. In the Due Rains transl translation, the smaller amount is one pence. And I'll get to what ten thousand talents in one pence is in just a second. He seized him and started to choke him, demanding, pay back what you owe, again, wrath, anger, hurting other people. But that servant falling to his knees begged, he said, Be patient with me, just like the debtor said to the king. But he didn't show patience. He didn't forgive. Because of that, the master summoned that he be thrown in jail till every debt is paid. Now I'm not sidetracked, I can spend an hour in that. That's part of the doctrine of purgatory, by the way. You're thrown in until everything is paid, then you're set free, you go to heaven, but that's a different thing. It is Catholic doctrine, by the way. So then what is ten thousand tail? It's a huge amount. Depending on how you cal calculate the value of 10,000 talents. If in modern day US dollars, it's around 50 billion dollars. 50 billion dollars. Now, if someone were to work to acquire that, it would take 60 million days of a normal day's labor for one laborer. 60 million days. 200,000 years of labor. So this is a massive sin. That nobody can forgive except God because his mercy is infinite, taking something so huge, so big, so unfathomable, washing it clean with the blood of Jesus. That's the power of confession. Now the debtor goes to his servant and who owed a smaller amount, and it was one pence. It was a hundred pence. That's what the scripture says. One pence is a dollar thirty-five. So that servant owed a little over a hundred dollars. And he wouldn't even forgive him of that. Also, one talent was a unit of measurement of weight. So 10,000 talents was 375 tons. Weight, weight, a weight of 375 tons. So mortal sin is very expensive, it's very pricey, and it's very heavy. But as we let these readings wash over us, we give thanks for the mercy God has for us. His love is without end. All we have to do is continuously come to him. Prayer. Fasting, live a sacramental life, go to confession and love and forgive. And so as we receive the Eucharist today, God's body, blessed, soul, and divinity, we give thanks for Jesus being in us, taking care of us, forgiving us, so that we can forgive others who are around us in our lives. In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Brothers, thank you so much for listening to this episode. If the show has added value to your life, I'm going to ask you to do three things. Share with a brother who needs it, leave us a review, and finally support the show so we can keep fighting. Links are in the show notes. We'll see you next week.