Latest / Claymore: Become Who You Are / #455 A Journey through Faith, Music, and Morality with Composer, Conductor and Writer Aurelio Porfiri: Editor of Cardinal Zen's New Book!

Transcript

#455 A Journey through Faith, Music, and Morality with Composer, Conductor and Writer Aurelio Porfiri: Editor of Cardinal Zen's New Book! · Claymore: Become Who You Are

• 0:10
  Jack Rigert: Welcome to the Become who you Are podcast, the production of the John Paul Tour Renewal Center.
• 0:14
  Jack Rigert: I'm Jack Rigert, your host.
• 0:15
  Jack Rigert: I'm glad you're with me.
• 0:16
  Jack Rigert: I am excited to have Aurelio Porfereon the show today.
• 0:21
  Jack Rigert: Aurelio is a composer, conductor, writer and educator.
• 0:25
  Jack Rigert: His music is published in Italy, france, the United States, china and Germany.
• 0:30
  Jack Rigert: He's published more than 60 books.
• 0:32
  Jack Rigert: I have one that he published on the Catholic Mass with Bishop Athanasius Schneider, of which has now been translated in several languages, very, very good.
• 0:41
  Jack Rigert: But today Aurelio will be talking about a book that he assesses on as an editor with Cardinal Zen.
• 0:49
  Jack Rigert: Cardinal Zen, you probably know he's what an incredible life that he's led.
• 0:54
  Jack Rigert: Cardinal Zen's Lenten Meditations just in time for Lent.
• 0:58
  Jack Rigert: Highly recommend this book.
• 0:59
  Jack Rigert: So buckle up and get ready for today's episode.
• 1:03
  Jack Rigert: I'm so excited and grateful to be here with Aurelio Porfere.
• 1:16
  Jack Rigert: Aurelio is a composer very accomplished composer, I might add, conductor, writer, educator.
• 1:23
  Jack Rigert: His music is published in Italy, france, the United States, china and Germany.
• 1:28
  Jack Rigert: He's published more than 60 books.
• 1:30
  Jack Rigert: I have one here.
• 1:32
  Jack Rigert: I didn't get too long ago, I didn't finish yet, but I want to touch with him with Bishop Athanasius Schneider on the Catholic Mass.
• 1:38
  Jack Rigert: It's so beautiful, it's been translated in several languages and today we want to focus on a new book coming out, cardinal Zen's Lenten Meditations.
• 1:49
  Jack Rigert: He was also the editor on that, so welcome, aurelio.
• 1:52
  Jack Rigert: Good to have you, aurelio Porfere.
• 1:54
  Aurelio Porfiri: Thank you for having me.
• 1:56
  Jack Rigert: Yes, and I know that you're in Hong Kong now right.
• 2:00
  Aurelio Porfiri: Aurelio.
• 2:00
  Jack Rigert: Porfere, yes, and for me it's six o'clock in the morning and for you it's eight o'clock at night.
• 2:06
  Jack Rigert: So, aurelio Porfere, yeah, so welcome, Welcome, well, let me ask you this how long have you been here in Hong Kong now?
• 2:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: Now I've been in Hong Kong for around nine to ten months.
• 2:22
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, I am doing several things and collaborating with Cardinal for his books, but also I am enjoying studying about Chinese culture.
• 2:35
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I am studying Chinese language and I'm studying Chinese painting and I'm studying the Gu Zhang.
• 2:42
  Aurelio Porfiri: Maybe some of your listeners don't know what it is, but the Gu Zhang is a very beautiful Chinese musical instrument.
• 2:49
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I'm doing several things because I really love Chinese culture and Chinese people.
• 2:56
  Aurelio Porfiri: I think it's a really great culture and deserve to be known.
• 3:00
  Jack Rigert: Thank you for that.
• 3:01
  Jack Rigert: How did you come to know Cardinal Zen?
• 3:05
  Aurelio Porfiri: Did you meet him in?
• 3:05
  Jack Rigert: Hong Kong.
• 3:07
  Aurelio Porfiri: No, no, indeed, I met him many years ago, maybe twenty years ago.
• 3:11
  Aurelio Porfiri: I will make it short, but in any case, at the time I was one of the organists of St Peter Basilica in Rome and the pastor of St Peter Basilica, because maybe the people may not know, but St Peter Basilica is also a pastor because he's also a parish church.
• 3:33
  Aurelio Porfiri: He knows about my family connection with Hong Kong and he said, oh, do you know that the Bishop of Hong Kong is now here in our house?
• 3:45
  Aurelio Porfiri: And I said, oh, that's good, I would like to meet him.
• 3:48
  Aurelio Porfiri: And so the bishop was Cardinal Zen now not Cardinal at the time, it was Bishop Zen and so he set an appointment and I met to him, and it was really enjoyable from the beginning, because something that for me was very surprising is that Cardinal Zen speaks Italian perfectly.
• 4:10
  Aurelio Porfiri: He is one of the very few Chinese people that I know that speak Italian almost with no accent.
• 4:21
  Jack Rigert: Isn't that something?
• 4:22
  Aurelio Porfiri: He speaks like me, so because of his story, that, if you want, I can tell you something about that, but he speaks Italian so good and I was very surprised I mean, it is really something that you don't expect with the person that, like me, I speak English but everyone can hear that I'm Italian because I have an accent, but he has no accent.
• 4:50
  Aurelio Porfiri: So that was.
• 4:52
  Jack Rigert: Isn't that wonderful.
• 4:53
  Jack Rigert: Now, where were you born?
• 4:55
  Jack Rigert: What city?
• 4:55
  Jack Rigert: Rome, in Rome.
• 4:58
  Jack Rigert: Okay, yes, so that's your home.
• 5:01
  Jack Rigert: Rome is your original home.
• 5:05
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, not far from the Vatican also.
• 5:07
  Jack Rigert: Cardinal Zen, how did he learn you were going to say maybe let's talk about just for a minute or two on how he learned the language so well.
• 5:15
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yeah, Okay, Because of his history.
• 5:19
  Aurelio Porfiri: So when Cardinal Zen was a very young child, maybe 13 or 14, the mother bring him to the Salishan in Shanghai.
• 5:30
  Aurelio Porfiri: That is his native city.
• 5:33
  Aurelio Porfiri: And he brings the young Joseph to the Salishan because he wants him to study with them with the perspective of becoming a priest.
• 5:45
  Aurelio Porfiri: And the Salishan in Shanghai were of many countries but there were many Italians there that run the house.
• 5:56
  Aurelio Porfiri: So they teach him Italian since the very young age.
• 6:01
  Aurelio Porfiri: So he learned Italian from when he was a very young adolescent.
• 6:06
  Aurelio Porfiri: So he learned it so well that now he can speak so well Italian.
• 6:12
  Aurelio Porfiri: And also his time with the Salishan is in Shanghai.
• 6:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: It's a time he always remembers because he learned so much and he was so impressed by the very good priest that he met in that occasion.
• 6:29
  Jack Rigert: Isn't that beautiful?
• 6:30
  Jack Rigert: So even as a young boy, Cardinal Zen wanted to be a priest.
• 6:36
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, most is the father, because the father of Cardinal Zen won't himself to be a priest, but he was advised that it was better to marry for him, and so the father really wished for the son to become a priest.
• 6:56
  Aurelio Porfiri: And so of course the Cardinal has a vocation, but I'm sure also the father an influence, because the father bring Cardinal Zen, the young Cardinal Zen, to five masses every Sunday, five masses, so he really was a very pious man.
• 7:19
  Jack Rigert: That's, that's unbelievable.
• 7:21
  Jack Rigert: Huh, unbelievable Did Cardinal Zendis.
• 7:23
  Jack Rigert: He have siblings, brothers or sisters.
• 7:26
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yes, brother and sister, they, they, some of them, mary, that he was the Holy.
• 7:34
  Jack Rigert: Priest.
• 7:35
  Jack Rigert: Okay, well, you know before, right before we go on to the book, we might as well finish a little on Cardinal Zend.
• 7:41
  Jack Rigert: How old is he now?
• 7:43
  Jack Rigert: He's in his 90s.
• 7:44
  Jack Rigert: Now January 13, january 13th he will be 92 is this health pretty good.
• 7:51
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, yes, some kind of issues, because you know that one year ago when Benedict 16 passed away, he visit Rome to participate in the funeral mass of Benedict 16 and at that time he was not very in good health and he has some problem in the following month.
• 8:16
  Aurelio Porfiri: But I have to say now he's in quite good health, he start to work again and, yes, he's also.
• 8:24
  Aurelio Porfiri: I am a very good spirit.
• 8:26
  Jack Rigert: Good, well, let's talk about his book and I'll put all the links in the show notes here so people can get that book.
• 8:33
  Jack Rigert: I tell us a little bit about so Cardinal Zend's Lenten meditations it's perfect timing right now will be coming up soon into Lent, so tell us a little bit about the the book and how you came to edit it.
• 8:48
  Aurelio Porfiri: So we have to say first that this book follow another book that was already released, that is about the advent and Christmas Meditations.
• 8:57
  Aurelio Porfiri: That that was a and so this book follow the same format.
• 9:01
  Aurelio Porfiri: So Mmm the cardinal has published many years ago in Chinese several books of his homilies, the three year cycle homilies, so that there was, there were all the homilies that he gave to for the people here in Hong Kong and where in Chinese.
• 9:24
  Jack Rigert: Okay so these are for anybody that missed that.
• 9:27
  Jack Rigert: So these, these are homilies that that he gave, and so the new book.
• 9:32
  Jack Rigert: The new book is also a series of homilies, no no, no, the new books.
• 9:37
  Aurelio Porfiri: Basically, I take this text and I arrange the text around certain teams.
• 9:44
  Aurelio Porfiri: This, this work I did, was reviewed by the cardinal that make corrections and say things that he likes or the like.
• 9:54
  Aurelio Porfiri: So he review and approve the final version of the book.
• 9:59
  Jack Rigert: Okay, very good, give us an idea of some of the themes that are will be in the book.
• 10:06
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, I think what is very important in this book is basically that give a side of Cardinal Zen that is maybe different from what the people usually hear about him, because we don't, we don't have to forget the Cardinal Zen, first, is a spiritual man.
• 10:28
  Aurelio Porfiri: He's a man of God is All its other actions are coming from his being a man of God, a priest, a bishop, of Someone that put God at the center of his life.
• 10:43
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I want to be this books, but that the people can see the, the the spiritual side of cardinal zen.
• 10:52
  Aurelio Porfiri: That, I think, is the most important part of what Cardinal Zen is.
• 10:56
  Aurelio Porfiri: So in the book there are several themes, there are several meditations around the liturgical themes or around the certain important character of the length season.
• 11:12
  Aurelio Porfiri: That is always this Call for us to repent.
• 11:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: I think this is also very important.
• 11:20
  Aurelio Porfiri: In the book, cardinal remind us that is very important for us to repent, to return to God.
• 11:28
  Aurelio Porfiri: That is our true home.
• 11:30
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I think it is very important for people to read this book, to have also, we may say, a Chinese perspective, okay, on this very important season.
• 11:43
  Aurelio Porfiri: And of course, the title of the book is about length, but there are also meditations about Easter is length and Easter.
• 11:51
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I think it's very important because Maybe people don't know but the cardinal is a true lover of Catholic liturgy.
• 12:03
  Aurelio Porfiri: He really enjoyed Catholic liturgy.
• 12:06
  Aurelio Porfiri: He enjoyed Gregorian chant, so I think that the people will.
• 12:11
  Aurelio Porfiri: Really I like to see also the side of the cardinal.
• 12:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: That is a side maybe people don't pay much attention because of other issues, but I think it's the most important side of Cardinal Zen.
• 12:28
  Jack Rigert: Oh, that's beautiful because, yeah, I think you know most people.
• 12:32
  Jack Rigert: I think you know good Catholics in the United States.
• 12:35
  Jack Rigert: We've heard of Cardinal Zen.
• 12:37
  Jack Rigert: We've probably read some articles about him, but we don't really know his heart like that.
• 12:43
  Jack Rigert: So I think that's important, so the theme you know, when we start to look out in the world, really today, I mean, we see a lot of evil, you know, all over the world.
• 12:53
  Jack Rigert: So this idea of returning to God, repenting, does he have a?
• 12:59
  Jack Rigert: Do you have some space in there, I would imagine, for prayer liturgy?
• 13:04
  Aurelio Porfiri: prayer Of course, of course.
• 13:06
  Jack Rigert: You know, this is something that I'm talking about a lot myself is, you know, we have these anxious hearts today.
• 13:15
  Jack Rigert: You know, we feel, I think we feel the pressure of evil around sin and evil.
• 13:21
  Jack Rigert: So what you said, the steam of repentance.
• 13:25
  Jack Rigert: You know, when we think of repentance, sometimes I think we think about just our head down and just wallowing in, you know, in this kind of a low point in our lives.
• 13:36
  Jack Rigert: But in reality, in reality, sin is something.
• 13:41
  Jack Rigert: If we release this, if we repent and we release it, we free ourselves, we free our inner life.
• 13:49
  Jack Rigert: John Paul speaks about this too.
• 13:51
  Jack Rigert: We free ourselves, you know, from this liberation from sin.
• 13:54
  Jack Rigert: He said the number one, john Paul, and I'm going to ask you about this from your perspective with Cardinal Zen.
• 14:01
  Jack Rigert: He would say the number one liberation that human beings need is liberation from sin.
• 14:05
  Jack Rigert: And then, once we move this weight outside right to offer this up with Jesus to you know, and offer this oblation of Jesus at the mass and to be there and to be taken up into the liturgy, our soul starts to move up.
• 14:22
  Jack Rigert: It's so beautiful, huh.
• 14:23
  Jack Rigert: We become free.
• 14:25
  Jack Rigert: We start to feel this weight come out from inside of us and on our shoulders.
• 14:31
  Jack Rigert: The evil is still around us, but then we don't participate in evil, we bring good into the world, huh, and so the liturgy and prayer.
• 14:39
  Jack Rigert: It's so beautiful.
• 14:40
  Jack Rigert: So I know I said a lot there, but talk to us a little bit about your perspective with Cardinal Zen, with those things.
• 14:49
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, so my perspective.
• 14:51
  Aurelio Porfiri: I want to quote here an Italian actor that was not really Catholic, that was called Carmelo Bene.
• 14:57
  Aurelio Porfiri: He said that the true revolution is the one against ourselves.
• 15:02
  Aurelio Porfiri: So, it's the one that we make, winning all the demons that take us far away from where we should be, so that there would be God.
• 15:14
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I think that what Cardinal Zen is suggesting is book, and I want to connect this with the other book you mentioned before, the one I did with Bishop Schneider about the Catholic mass.
• 15:27
  Aurelio Porfiri: And the important thing is that we, to put God at the center of our lives, we have to return.
• 15:37
  Aurelio Porfiri: If everything is going around, that If we don't put God at the center of our life, we can make many speeches about the environment or many other issues, but that are not the important issues we should care for.
• 15:53
  Aurelio Porfiri: The thing is that we have to remember that putting God at the center of life is what also gives Western civilization is big impulse to become great, not only for our spiritual life, but for our artistic life, for philosophy, for many things.
• 16:19
  Aurelio Porfiri: So if we don't understand that the people don't need so much many speeches about sociology or psychology, but need to return to God, I think and return to God is indeed what Is the land theme return to God, convert and believe.
• 16:39
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I think this book, as the book we did on the mass, is to give basically this message we should return to God if we want to Time again ourselves.
• 16:55
  Jack Rigert: Mmm, that's beautiful, that's, and you're exactly right.
• 16:57
  Jack Rigert: You know what, when I read Alexander, schultz and Nitsen and, of course, john Paul II, those themes come out the really, oh, constantly.
• 17:05
  Jack Rigert: You know, you know, schultz and Nitsen said that.
• 17:08
  Jack Rigert: You know, at the end of the day, I found out that, you know, it all comes down to this battle of the individual human hearts.
• 17:14
  Jack Rigert: Huh, between good and evil.
• 17:16
  Jack Rigert: John Paul spoke about that often.
• 17:18
  Jack Rigert: He spoke about it often to young people too.
• 17:20
  Jack Rigert: He said you know that the fiercest battle being wage is on the battlefield of the human heart, between Good and evil, between love and lust.
• 17:30
  Aurelio Porfiri: So he's trying to wrap you, but just I want to say that the problem is really there, because today, what was done is what is done.
• 17:40
  Aurelio Porfiri: Is they they most evil?
• 17:42
  Aurelio Porfiri: Because today what they do is not.
• 17:45
  Aurelio Porfiri: They say, oh, we should do what is good or what is bad, but they Blur the difference between what is good and what is bad, so that we never know If what we are doing is correct or not correct.
• 18:00
  Aurelio Porfiri: And so, if you don't know, everything is possible.
• 18:04
  Aurelio Porfiri: This is really the evil, because they um Send away God From the place he should be in our lives, in our society, and they blur the difference.
• 18:18
  Aurelio Porfiri: So we don't know what is the that?
• 18:21
  Aurelio Porfiri: That that's discrimination between what is good and what is bad, because, of course, we are all sinners.
• 18:27
  Aurelio Porfiri: I'm a sinner, I don't know you, but I'm a really yeah, I'm with you, are really all.
• 18:33
  Jack Rigert: We are brothers there.
• 18:35
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yeah, and I can tell you that For me, what is important is not that I know that I have my nature that sometimes Bring me to do the things, but to know when is the the line.
• 18:51
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I have to know that I'm crossing a line so that I can go back.
• 18:55
  Aurelio Porfiri: But if there is no line, there is no boundary.
• 18:58
  Aurelio Porfiri: So everything is possible, everything, and isn't really what we are living today, not only in society but unfortunately also in the church.
• 19:09
  Jack Rigert: Yes, yes, yes.
• 19:10
  Jack Rigert: Godium asbestos talks about that.
• 19:13
  Jack Rigert: When god has forgotten the human creature, huh himself becomes lost.
• 19:18
  Jack Rigert: Right, he becomes lost.
• 19:19
  Jack Rigert: And you're exactly right.
• 19:21
  Jack Rigert: We live in this age of moral relativism and when we're finding out, you know, and and it's accelerating, isn't it a really old?
• 19:29
  Jack Rigert: It's accelerating this sense of Evil and that's where this comes from that we have lost.
• 19:34
  Jack Rigert: When you throw god out, when you remove god, we, you know, we we kind of stand at that tree in genesis three, the, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
• 19:42
  Jack Rigert: We reject god and and then we really don't know anymore.
• 19:46
  Jack Rigert: It's, it's amazing to me as I speak to people, if they've rejected god in their life, or just apathy, you know, they just left him out.
• 19:56
  Jack Rigert: That really don't do this.
• 19:58
  Jack Rigert: They cross the line all the time, you know, on things like abortion and same-sex marriage and all those things become confusing to people when god is removed.
• 20:07
  Jack Rigert: And I think that's such an important theme.
• 20:10
  Jack Rigert: If you want to find the truth and if you want to know good in your own heart, you have to bring god back in, don't you?
• 20:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, and also I think it is important to notice that this, this kind of issue, should not only concern Catholics, but to concern everyone, because our civilization, I mean, it's Something that you, you, you have not to be catholic to be proud of what we achieve in the art, in science, in philosophy, in many, many fields of Many disciplines.
• 20:49
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I think that we really should understand that things that people like Cardinal Zen or the bishop slider or Cardinal Sarah or other people say, and and also late people that say those things Should be listened from everyone, because here is not just about A problem with the Catholic church, is a problem with our civilization that is in a condition that is, you know, if talking like from a Human type of you, you say, oh, everything is lost, I mean is that we are going down and down, and down and down and he's never stopping.
• 21:33
  Aurelio Porfiri: He's never stopped.
• 21:35
  Jack Rigert: Yeah, yeah, and I think, I think that's true, I think it is.
• 21:38
  Jack Rigert: It won't stop unless we bring god back in.
• 21:40
  Jack Rigert: So so I I want to shift just a little bit too.
• 21:45
  Jack Rigert: So so Cardinal Zen's book sounds, it's tremendous and something we need, and I think, I think, just to see this other side of Cardinal Zen, I hope people will, will, will go out and and buy this for lent and really take it seriously.
• 21:59
  Jack Rigert: And the other book that that that they should buy, I would love to have them buy now I didn't read the whole thing because I I found it a little late, but I just started to read it a week ago Is the book that you did with at the Bishop Athanasius Schneider, on the Catholic mass.
• 22:16
  Jack Rigert: I'll tell you what, aurelio, this, this is a beautiful book.
• 22:20
  Jack Rigert: I, this is so beautiful I.
• 22:23
  Jack Rigert: You know people will ask a lot.
• 22:25
  Jack Rigert: You know what's going on in the church right now.
• 22:27
  Jack Rigert: All different things, but I think, individually, first of all, I would say individually, we have to return to God ourselves, no matter what goes on in the world, what goes on in the church, because if we don't start there, we were not going to do much good in the world.
• 22:41
  Jack Rigert: So this book on from Cardinal Zen and Bishop Athanasius Schneider that you've helped with.
• 22:47
  Jack Rigert: Both of those books, I think, are a good way to start.
• 22:50
  Jack Rigert: So let me ask you this, because you know Bishop Athanasius Schneider, we'll talk a little bit, maybe, about the, the book, the Catholic mass, but also what's you know, his perspective on this new I don't know if you want to go there or not fiducia, a supplicants from, you know, pope Francis, on the blessings of same-sex marriage.
• 23:10
  Jack Rigert: Of course, you know that's a lot of things going on with that and I and people are very confused with that.
• 23:16
  Jack Rigert: Any thoughts on what's going on in the, in the church today, the situation in the church and and should should the average person or really, oh what do you think the average person that's confused with some of the signs coming out of the Vatican.
• 23:30
  Jack Rigert: Now Should we just try to ignore that and push it aside or, you know, as good Catholics, or should we stand up?
• 23:37
  Jack Rigert: And you know this is very tough for people, you know, because people are worried about saying something bad against the Pope.
• 23:44
  Jack Rigert: But on the other hand, we know, we know Catholic teaching, right and so what?
• 23:49
  Jack Rigert: What are, what do you have feelings on that?
• 23:51
  Jack Rigert: I know they could be complex, I realize.
• 23:55
  Aurelio Porfiri: So of course, I speak for me and not for Cardinal Zen or Bishop Schneider.
• 23:59
  Aurelio Porfiri: On this.
• 24:00
  Aurelio Porfiri: I can say that you you see many kind of Position on this issue.
• 24:07
  Aurelio Porfiri: So now you say the people that say all the pope Do this or the pope is great, or what have.
• 24:14
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I myself, I think that we live in and I use this word that Really consciously.
• 24:23
  Aurelio Porfiri: So we live in a dramatic situation, a dramatic, exactly what you mentioned before, because we, of course, know what is the role of the pope in our religion.
• 24:37
  Aurelio Porfiri: But the problem, you know that the thing that I think is really People don't get, is that they think that Pope Francis is like the Because of the origin of what we are living.
• 24:53
  Aurelio Porfiri: But if you study true history, you understand that this we are living is the.
• 25:00
  Aurelio Porfiri: Is the, not the end about this, the manifestation of a very long process?
• 25:06
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, this is even 200 years old.
• 25:10
  Aurelio Porfiri: So what we are living today is not because Pope Francis became pope, but he started.
• 25:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: So I always say that some people think that Pope Francis is the problem, but it is really not, not the.
• 25:27
  Aurelio Porfiri: The truth.
• 25:28
  Aurelio Porfiri: Pope Francis is just Certain acts of Pope Francis not not everything, but certain action are the manifestation Of what we are living now for hundreds of years.
• 25:40
  Aurelio Porfiri: So when the people start to talk, I have to say a lot of your country.
• 25:46
  Aurelio Porfiri: There are people that speak of the pope in a very Disrespectful way.
• 25:51
  Aurelio Porfiri: I really like.
• 25:52
  Aurelio Porfiri: I really like because he is still the pope yeah, he's still the pope and as we have to respect the role, because if we start to make fun of the pope, then we are not only disrespecting Francis, but we are also this was disrespecting the papacy.
• 26:14
  Aurelio Porfiri: We always have to maintain the papacy in with great respect, and Of course we see things.
• 26:24
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean, we see things.
• 26:26
  Aurelio Porfiri: We cannot say all these kind of things.
• 26:28
  Aurelio Porfiri: We, for us is, are good, but we don't have to focus Pope Francis.
• 26:35
  Aurelio Porfiri: The problem go way back, way back.
• 26:39
  Aurelio Porfiri: And it's not even the Vatican too.
• 26:42
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean, of course Vatican too is a moment of you know, of change, but but it's not the starting.
• 26:50
  Aurelio Porfiri: Some people say oh, before Vatican to the church was not.
• 26:54
  Aurelio Porfiri: No, is really wrong to say like that, before Vatican to we have all the Modernism.
• 27:02
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean modernism, I, it was a huge thing in the church, a huge movement.
• 27:07
  Aurelio Porfiri: I use woman movement.
• 27:10
  Aurelio Porfiri: The same pie to the 10, try to defeat.
• 27:13
  Aurelio Porfiri: But he can only maybe, like he, win a battle, but certainly he didn't win the war.
• 27:20
  Aurelio Porfiri: So all these things we should see in perspective.
• 27:25
  Aurelio Porfiri: And, of course, you, you ask me all what is the solution for this mission?
• 27:31
  Aurelio Porfiri: We have now my answer.
• 27:32
  Aurelio Porfiri: Maybe it will be upon you, but there is no solution.
• 27:36
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean, I mean, we are stuck.
• 27:38
  Aurelio Porfiri: We are stuck, we, we cannot do like people do they?
• 27:43
  Aurelio Porfiri: They create their own church, they're created.
• 27:46
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean that's not possible, but that's really not something we can do.
• 27:51
  Aurelio Porfiri: So there is no solution.
• 27:52
  Aurelio Porfiri: We can just be Like, suspended, we are waiting, and I don't know what you know.
• 28:01
  Aurelio Porfiri: We can just say, oh listen, we are going in the wrong direction.
• 28:05
  Aurelio Porfiri: But what?
• 28:07
  Aurelio Porfiri: What you know?
• 28:08
  Aurelio Porfiri: If we want to be, remain Catholic, we cannot reject the pope.
• 28:12
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean, for me this is a full solution.
• 28:16
  Jack Rigert: Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I, I agree, I agree, I, I I'm very careful.
• 28:22
  Jack Rigert: I have to be careful myself because I can get, you know, angry at some of the things coming out of the Vatican.
• 28:28
  Jack Rigert: So what I try to do is I try to just speak the truth.
• 28:33
  Jack Rigert: We know the truth.
• 28:34
  Jack Rigert: John Paul left us, and so did Benedict and and, of course, popes all through history of the left us, some beautiful and cyclicals, and we know the truth, we know that.
• 28:44
  Jack Rigert: You know that this beautiful, the positive faith, this positive faith has been coming down to us.
• 28:50
  Jack Rigert: We have to get the cat mechism, we have to go and read scripture every day, we have to pray every day and we have to do what?
• 28:56
  Jack Rigert: How?
• 28:56
  Jack Rigert: We started this earlier, don't we?
• 28:58
  Jack Rigert: We have to realize that this starts in my heart.
• 29:01
  Jack Rigert: You know, when Jesus came into the world, it was an evil, a lot of evil going on then, and and of course, they crucified him, and so this battle, like you said, between good and evil has been going on for a long time.
• 29:14
  Jack Rigert: Do you think that it's going to continue to accelerate until the say you know Jesus decides to come back at some point?
• 29:23
  Jack Rigert: You know we, you know Jesus himself said don't try to predict the exact time, but it seems that the difference is the whole.
• 29:30
  Jack Rigert: The whole world is caught up in this.
• 29:32
  Jack Rigert: You know right, it's almost at the same time.
• 29:35
  Aurelio Porfiri: Undeniable that in the last decade there was in the church an acceleration Toward the certain Progressive liberal agenda.
• 29:46
  Aurelio Porfiri: This is clear, no one can deny.
• 29:48
  Aurelio Porfiri: Some people now start to think about the that what will be the next spoke, because there will be a time where there will be a next spoke, we don't know when.
• 29:59
  Aurelio Porfiri: We we honestly and sincerely wish that Pope Francis can live as much as Possible, because is the pope, we have to respect him as such.
• 30:11
  Aurelio Porfiri: But of course we see what he is doing in certain fields that you mentioned before, filouza's upligans.
• 30:19
  Aurelio Porfiri: So there are other things.
• 30:23
  Aurelio Porfiri: But the point is I don't think that that that the next pop will, whoever will be, can do so much in the situation we are living now, because it's not only about the pope but it's Like so many bishops that are like him, so many cardinals that are like him, so many priests but are like him, so many lay people that follow this kind of ideas that we know that lead us and we lead us to destruction.
• 30:57
  Aurelio Porfiri: So what we can do it I always say, if I get to pull from a human point of view, I would say there is no hope from a human.
• 31:07
  Aurelio Porfiri: So we can only Trust God that he will do something, I don't know what.
• 31:14
  Aurelio Porfiri: Honestly I don't know, because that you may judge my own Point of view like a point of view of one that is kind of desperate.
• 31:24
  Aurelio Porfiri: But honestly, after having studied a lot, after having Written a lot or talk a lot about this, I have to say there is at the moment no viable solution, because all the made up solution so like how I make my own church, or I say the pope is not the pope, or I say that the pope is, was Benedict and still Benedict was still Benedict so all these for me are Ways that people find to deal with the problem and I think I think our solution you know it was Saint Augustine that I think say that is better to link on the right way that to run on the wrong, wrong path, wrong way.
• 32:20
  Aurelio Porfiri: You know, we know we are, you know we don't know what to do, but still, if we want to stay because there is the question, you know that the fundamental question is the question of the truth.
• 32:35
  Jack Rigert: The truth yes.
• 32:36
  Aurelio Porfiri: Yes, if we think that the church is the true church.
• 32:41
  Aurelio Porfiri: So even if the situation is like this, we cannot just leave and say, oh, I will Create my own church with the, with the right I like, with the theology.
• 32:55
  Aurelio Porfiri: I mean it seems Nice, but it's not working like this.
• 33:00
  Aurelio Porfiri: We are not protestant, you know.
• 33:03
  Aurelio Porfiri: They split and split and they do their own own form of protestantism.
• 33:09
  Aurelio Porfiri: We cannot do like this.
• 33:12
  Jack Rigert: Yeah, it's not.
• 33:12
  Jack Rigert: I agree, I agree, and, and and I.
• 33:15
  Jack Rigert: The other thing I think that you said that's so important for people to understand is this didn't come just out of Vatican II either.
• 33:22
  Jack Rigert: You know, that's that.
• 33:24
  Jack Rigert: You know the post-Toc fallacy, you know be, you know.
• 33:27
  Jack Rigert: That says, you know, since event Y followed event X, then Y must have caused X.
• 33:34
  Jack Rigert: You know it's like the rooster crows, you know, in the morning before the sun comes up, so the rooster must have have have something to do with the sun rising, you know, and it doesn't work like that.
• 33:45
  Jack Rigert: And so I know that.
• 33:48
  Jack Rigert: You know, and maybe I want to switch to the mass just for a few minutes before, you know we go.
• 33:55
  Jack Rigert: Our time runs out because of this, because we did see what, when I read Vatican do documents, and especially something like sacrosanctum concilium, you know, on the liturgy, and when I read that, it's a beautiful document to me.
• 34:12
  Jack Rigert: You know, I was a kid when I was young I'm older than you are really old when I was young, I, it was the Latin mass and then the novice ordeal came in and it was a big change and it really affected me as a child.
• 34:26
  Jack Rigert: I, I, I walked away from the church.
• 34:29
  Jack Rigert: After a while, a rock band you know music, rock band came in.
• 34:33
  Jack Rigert: Everything changed and and and I thought, wow, maybe the church, to your point, maybe the church doesn't have the truth.
• 34:40
  Jack Rigert: So I have to go out into the world.
• 34:42
  Jack Rigert: I read philosophy and I traveled and I tried to find the truth.
• 34:46
  Jack Rigert: Right, it's on our heart Really.
• 34:48
  Jack Rigert: I tried to find the truth and I came back to the church because there, you know to to this is important because at the end of the day, the church had the truth in it.
• 35:00
  Jack Rigert: But something happened after Vatican II, to the beauty of the mass, you know, with novice ordeal and, and and I'm not a, I don't pick on the novice ordeal, I, I'm not negative all the time on novice ordeal, it is what it is out there now.
• 35:17
  Jack Rigert: But I have friends of mine that that get me to go to the Latin mass and I'll tell you what you're you're involved in music.
• 35:23
  Jack Rigert: When you hear beautiful music again, you mentioned Gregorian chant, you know all of these things they do lift you.
• 35:30
  Jack Rigert: Hey, there's something beautiful that happens in the mass, in the, in the traditional Latin mass, or even a novice ordeal mass that's maybe ad oriantum, you know, facing the east, with beautiful music and incense, maybe some Latin in it, kind of out of sacrosanctum concilium, closer to that document.
• 35:51
  Jack Rigert: It's really beautiful.
• 35:52
  Jack Rigert: There is something about that and I know you know all about that from not only from your book but from the music from your work that you do.
• 35:59
  Jack Rigert: That's so beautiful.
• 36:00
  Jack Rigert: So maybe, as we start to wind down here, any any thoughts on all of that coming up as whatever's on your heart.
• 36:08
  Aurelio Porfiri: You know, this is of course sacred music is all my life, so I can say many things.
• 36:14
  Aurelio Porfiri: But I just say one thing.
• 36:15
  Aurelio Porfiri: You mentioned sacrosanctum concilium.
• 36:18
  Aurelio Porfiri: So the people that defend a certain way to celebrate the novice ordom mass they say, oh, we are defending Vatican too.
• 36:28
  Aurelio Porfiri: You traditionally start people that look backwards or you are people that are rigid, or things are there, blah, blah, blah.
• 36:38
  Aurelio Porfiri: So they say they defend Vatican too.
• 36:40
  Aurelio Porfiri: But when you go and read sacrosanctum concilium, when the documents speak about sacred music, say, oh, gregorian chant is the proper chant of the Roman liturgy, latin should be preserved, the organ should be played, polyphony should be incremented, the, the, the part I would say the treasury of sacred music should be implemented.
• 37:07
  Aurelio Porfiri: We have to form singers, organists, directors.
• 37:12
  Aurelio Porfiri: So all of this is said by the council.
• 37:15
  Aurelio Porfiri: So how come.
• 37:17
  Aurelio Porfiri: We have this situation today, where choir were thrown away from the church, that pop music is played instead of the Gregorian chant.
• 37:28
  Aurelio Porfiri: So what they defend is not really Vatican too.
• 37:33
  Jack Rigert: Yes.
• 37:34
  Aurelio Porfiri: But his own version of Vatican too, that does not exist, exists only on their.
• 37:40
  Aurelio Porfiri: This is also what Cardinal Ratzinger say in a famous book he wrote with Vittorio Messori called the Ratzinger Report in.
• 37:52
  Jack Rigert: English oh yeah, yes.
• 37:54
  Aurelio Porfiri: And the problem is these people make a Vatican, too, a sort of of a sort of a mega dogma, something that they interpret in the way they want, and they make the council to say things that the council has never said.
• 38:12
  Aurelio Porfiri: So this is really the danger.
• 38:14
  Aurelio Porfiri: You know, these people that don't talk anymore of the council.
• 38:18
  Aurelio Porfiri: They talk, they say, oh, this is not the, this is the spirit of the council.
• 38:23
  Aurelio Porfiri: But of course, if you say in the spirit, you can say everything, yes, you can yes.
• 38:32
  Aurelio Porfiri: So we really are dealing with these unreasonable people that unfortunately for most, in most situations, are running important diocese, important office in the church and we have to deal with this.
• 38:50
  Jack Rigert: Yes, yes, no, that's well said, well said.
• 38:54
  Jack Rigert: So let's do this.
• 38:55
  Jack Rigert: We're going to have to unwind because it's getting late by you and I promised 35 minutes or so and we're up in that time.
• 39:06
  Jack Rigert: But I'd love to have you come back to talk about the Catholic Mass, to talk about the book with Athanasius Schneider.
• 39:14
  Jack Rigert: I know that book came out a couple of years ago, but I'll tell you, you know it's.
• 39:18
  Jack Rigert: I'm sorry that I didn't know about it until I was getting ready to do some research on you and I saw the book, so I got it and it's just beautiful.
• 39:29
  Jack Rigert: I it's.
• 39:30
  Jack Rigert: It's everything I'm reading so far.
• 39:33
  Aurelio Porfiri: It's just beautiful, it's something that's needed right now and you take a very generous approach generous you know I just want to say something for your listener that a DCR will come, another book written by me, bishop Schneider, and Italian Physicologist that will focus on sacred music.
• 39:49
  Aurelio Porfiri: That will be in a certain way a continuation of the Catholic Mass.
• 39:54
  Aurelio Porfiri: So if you are so kind to invite me back again, we can talk about these two things together.
• 40:02
  Jack Rigert: Yes, that would be beautiful.
• 40:03
  Jack Rigert: When is the?
• 40:04
  Jack Rigert: When is the new book coming out that you just mentioned?
• 40:08
  Aurelio Porfiri: For what I know, it will come in the second half of this year.
• 40:12
  Jack Rigert: Okay, good, Good, good, good.
• 40:15
  Jack Rigert: So maybe we come back and talk about the Catholic Mass with the book that you wrote already with Athanasius Schneider and then follow that up with with the when, the music, when the book on the music comes out, it would be beautiful.
• 40:28
  Jack Rigert: Okay, it will be my pleasure and I'll tell you why because everything you said is so important to to people today to get our bearings, you know, to get our bearings, to realize I think it was so important what you said.
• 40:39
  Jack Rigert: This isn't God's hands really, you know, and it always was in God's hands.
• 40:43
  Jack Rigert: You know, we, we, we.
• 40:46
  Jack Rigert: And it's good for us to remember this, because I think we get anxious, we get nervous.
• 40:51
  Jack Rigert: I see young people get anxious and nervous and and they look out at the world and it seems hopeless.
• 40:57
  Jack Rigert: And, of course, if it's up to human beings, it is hopeless, you know, to your point, but it's not up to human beings, it's up to.
• 41:04
  Jack Rigert: God and he has a plan.
• 41:06
  Jack Rigert: And will it get worse before it gets better?
• 41:09
  Jack Rigert: I think so, but, but maybe this is the only way that it wakes people up to turn back to, to God.
• 41:16
  Jack Rigert: You know, I do know people now that are waking up and coming back, and that's why this conversation is important, because they need books like Cardinal Zenz, they need books like the one you wrote with Athanasius Schneider, because they're looking again for their roots.
• 41:31
  Jack Rigert: You know, like, like you know, what can I do, what should I do?
• 41:35
  Jack Rigert: And I think, when you bring the sacred in to music, to the liturgy, through good books, to prayer, through the rosary, all reading scripture, all of those things come together, huh, they all lift our spirits and we need to do this together.
• 41:50
  Jack Rigert: A really old you know what can we do?
• 41:52
  Jack Rigert: We can help one another find, find this path and walk together, huh, walk together toward God, and that's where we're going.
• 41:59
  Jack Rigert: Anyways, you know we're not going to be here forever.
• 42:01
  Jack Rigert: Yes, I agree with you.
• 42:03
  Jack Rigert: God bless you.
• 42:04
  Jack Rigert: Hey, thank you so much and thank you to everyone that's tuned in today.
• 42:07
  Jack Rigert: Take a look at the links in the show notes and please buy those books.