Latest / Claymore: Become Who You Are / #524 Jesus Asked Them, "What Do You Seek?" Embracing Objective Truth in a World of Relativism

Transcript

#524 Jesus Asked Them, "What Do You Seek?" Embracing Objective Truth in a World of Relativism · Claymore: Become Who You Are

• 0:10
  Speaker 1: I love talking to young people.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: You know they're growing up in this milieu of moral relativism, aren't they?
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: Many of us are.
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: There is no truth, only my truth, your truth.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: And so if I'm with a large group of them, I realize they're swimming in this milieu of moral relativism.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: So I'll ask them to kind of start off.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Anybody here create the universe.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: I look around, I pause Nobody.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Nobody created the universe here.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: How about the big story that we all came into?
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Who's the author of everything that you see around you?
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Did you put the sun up in the sky?
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: Did you separate the land from the sea?
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Who wrote the big story that we all came into?
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Nobody, interesting.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: That means you came into a story, a story that was already unfolding before you arrived on the scene.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: You were exploded onto the stage of this life that you're living, but you didn't create it.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: You weren't the author of the story.
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: You came into a story.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: So the question I have for you is how shall you live?
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: How should we all live?
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: Young people will respond we have to each figure it out for ourselves, because there is no truth, only my truth, your truth.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: And I'll ask them is that true?
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: Is what true Is your statement that there is no truth true.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Well then, you already acknowledge that there is a truth.
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: It doesn't take long to start to show them that something isn't working well and there are notruth-truth story, and it doesn't make your life any better.
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: So it's important to apply the Socratic method and ask them questions until they basically answer the question for themselves.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: Otherwise, you're just going to put them on the defensive.
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: We all do that, right.
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: Nobody wants to be preached to.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: The idea is to get them and anybody else that we're talking about to think for themselves, to move out of that cultural indoctrination that they're dying in, like the proverbial frog in a pot, but this time not of water heating up, but dying from the illusion of moral relativism.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: I love the way Jesus does this, and he's our mentor, isn't he?
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: I mean, you realize how wise Jesus is.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: I love the first chapter of John, and this is John the Baptist.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: Now, this is John.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: The Evangelist, of course, writes this, but John the Baptist then is baptizing and he looks up and he's standing with two of his disciples and he looks at Jesus as he's walking by and he says behold the lamb of God and the two disciples that were with John the Baptist, we find out were John the evangelist, who actually wrote this, and Andrew, the brother of Peter.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: And they heard John the Baptist say that behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: And he repeats and they start to follow Jesus.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: Jesus turns, saw them following and said to them what do you seek?
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: And they said to him Rabbi, which means teacher, where are you staying?
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: And he said to them come and see.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Come and see.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: He invites them into the story.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Jesus does this over and over and over again.
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: Now he'll get down to the specifics when he's pressed, but first he invites them into the story.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: In Matthew 19, we see this series that are just so beautiful.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: The Pharisees had come up to Jesus talking to him about divorce, and he talks about the hardness of their hearts and he starts to unpack what marriage and the beauty of marriage is.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Right after that we find Jesus blessing the children.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: The children were brought to him and the disciples went to push him away, but Jesus rebuked them and said let the children come to me.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Don't hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: Me, don't hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven, and he laid his hands on them and went away.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: So here's Jesus talking about marriage and the family.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: And then the children, huh, who want to come to him, that are seeking something to see something in Jesus.
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: And he wants them to come.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: This is what we do.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: We invite the kids, and then the young people.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: Well, right after that is the parable of the rich young man.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: And behold, one came up to him, this young man saying teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: So he's thinking, huh, he's thinking.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: And this is good.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: And Jesus said to him why do you ask me about what is good?
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: One there is who is good, and he means God, of course.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: He said if you would enter into life, you're asking about eternal life, keep the commandments.
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: And he said to him which?
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: And Jesus said you shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother.
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: You should love your neighbor as yourself.
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: The young man said to him all these, I observed, but I'm still feeling something.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Then he says what do I still lack?
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: He's into his heart.
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: Huh, he's looking for something more.
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: This is what all of us do.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: We're looking for something more and this is what we want to bring out of the young people today.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: Jesus said to him if you would be perfect, go sell what you possess, give to the poor and you are a treasure in heaven.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: And in Mark's gospel it says Jesus looked on him and loved him when he said that.
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: And he said then when you give to the poor, you will have treasure in heaven and come and follow me.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: He invites them to come and follow him, just like he said in John to John's disciples come and see.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: When the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions, whoa.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: And Jesus said then to his disciples, after the young man walked away, sorrowfully truly, I say to you it would be hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: Again, I tell you, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: And they go on and ask him who can be saved?
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: And they go on and talk about other things.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: Later on, right after this, he's talking about the laborers in the vineyard and he tells us all to go out.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: To go out Once.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: We understand the gospel once we follow Jesus, to go out and tell people the story.
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: And let me just unpack that a little bit more.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: Jesus said to his disciples in John, chapter 12, amen, amen, amen, amen.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: But if it dies, it produces much fruit.
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: Now here's the thing.
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: So we have to die.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: We have to die to ourselves.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: Jesus says we have to die to sin huh.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: And we have to open ourselves up, just like a grain of wheat would have to do.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: We have to open ourselves up, just like a grain of wheat would have to do.
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: We have to be reborn.
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: He's bringing us into a story Come follow me.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: He's bringing you into eternal life, just like the young rich man asked.
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: And he goes on to say whoever loves his life loses it.
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: Whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life.
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: Listen to this now Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also, will my servant be.
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: The Father will honor whoever serves me.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: He's talking.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: He's bringing him into the story again.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: See, if we love our possessions and stuff, we have a disconnect.
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: We want to just hold on to this life and, of course, our possessions are okay.
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: We need certain things.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: What Jesus knows is the Father knows this, and Jesus unpacks this over and over again.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: And St Paul talks about this.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: He says whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: Whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: Each must do as already determined, without sadness or compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: We have to become people who give, just like Jesus does.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: He comes into this world not to take, not to condemn, but to save, to give his life.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: Moreover, st Paul goes God is able to make every grace abundant for you so that in all things, always having all you need, see all you need, you may have abundance for every good work.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: God knows what we need in this life.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: He's going to supply that, but we have to trust in him.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: In Luke 12, this is another story of a rich man, and he told them a parable saying the land of a rich man brought forth plentifully and he thought to himself what shall I do?
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: For I have nowhere to store my crops?
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: And he said I will do this.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: I will pull down my barns, build bigger ones.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: Then I will store all my grain and all my goods.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: He wants to keep them for himself.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: And I will say to my soul soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Take your ease, eat, drink and be merry, just enjoy this life.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: But God said to him fool, this night, your soul will be required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: So is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God?
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: See, he's bringing us into eternal life.
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: He knows that this is just a small little time on this earth.
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: What do you see?
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: Come and see, follow me.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: And then Jesus looked upon that young rich man earlier on, and he loved him.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: You know, from an examination of the gospel text, we see that this look was, so to speak, christ's response to the testimony, which the young man had given up his life to that very moment, of having acted according to God's commandments.
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: I have done all these things, all these things I have observed for my youth.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: At the same time, this look of love as he's looking down at the young man was an introduction to the concluding phase of the conversation.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: In Matthew's account, it was the young man himself who opened up this phase, since not only did he declare the personal fidelity to the commandments of the Decalogue right, the Ten Commandments which had marked his previous contact, his conduct.
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: He's trying to live this out, but at the same time he asks a new question, because it's in his heart what do I still lack?
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: If we pay attention to our heart, we know that it's got to be more than this right.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: This very question is an important one.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: It shows that in the moral conscience of a person, and more precisely of a young person who's forming the plan for his or whole life, there's a hidden aspiration to something more.
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: This is what we want young people, all of us, to realize there's still something more than this world has to offer.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: When the young man asks about the something more what do I still lack?
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: He says.
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: Jesus looks upon him with love, and this love finds here a new meaning.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: See, man is carried interiorly.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: We have an inner essence, and by the hand of the very Holy Spirit that God gave us, from a life according to the commandments to a life in the awareness of the gift.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: See, it's moving beyond just rules and regulations and things to follow, even though those are important, yes, but there's more, because God's looking for an intimacy with us, a love story that we can enter into that will carry us on to eternal life.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: And Christ's loving look expresses this interior transition.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: He wants us to go deeper, because Jesus says if you would be perfect, go sell what you possess, give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven.
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: And come and follow me.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: I will show you what you lack.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: And come and follow me, I will show you what you lack.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Yes, my dear friends, john Paul II said to young people the Christian is capable of living in the dimension of a gift.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: Indeed, this dimension is not only higher than the dimension of mere obligations known from the commandments, but it's deeper, it's more fundamental within a human being.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: It bears witness to a fuller expression of that plan of life which we begin to construct in our youth.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: The dimension of gift also creates the mature outline, john Paul II said, of every human and Christian vocation.
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: What is that?
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: The vocation to love, to be filled with divine life and love and then to become a person of love.
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: That's why your riches, when you become selfish with your riches, you don't give them away, you want to hold them for yourself.
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: This is what stifles our whole life, gets us into sin and ultimately into death, eternal death.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: John Paul II would say to young people so often, young people, you know that your life has meaning to the extent that it's given as a sincere gift to others.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: This is how we find our vocation, our meaning, the deepest aspirations of the human heart.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: For that, something more, we're looking for to be filled again with divine life and love and to become persons of love.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: See, we live in an age that has forgotten God, an age of moral relativism, and comparing it to the young man who has kept all the commandments since his youth and still seeks something more, this is an inhuman heart.
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: The basic question should be asked then can one oppose the moral or natural law?
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: Can someone oppose the truth, in other words, and live an authentic life of love?
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: And we're looking for love.
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: You know love is love.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: It's a popular slogan and yard sign.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: You see them around?
• 13:24
  Speaker 1: According to St Thomas Aquinas, god created the world through his love, and John Paul II reiterates this in his teaching on theology of the body and therefore in the human body.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: Are found the signs of God's love?
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Right in your body, the theology of the body, the study of God in the human person in the human body.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: In John Paul II's first encyclical called Redemptor Hominis, the Redeemer of man, that he wrote and he said I already carried this from Poland when I became Pope and I just wrote it down and he says this in number 10 of the Redemptor Hominis, he says man meaning men and women cannot live without love.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: He remains a being that's incomprehensible for himself.
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: His life is senseless if love is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he does not intimately participate in love.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: Love is the key Even to his encyclical on moral theology, on what is the truth and how to live, called Veritatis Splendor, the splendor of truth, he says.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: Love is still even the key to that.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: We may then regard love as an overall interpretive key to all the writings of John Paul II.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: If mankind men and women cannot live without love, then we best seek the truth of love.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: Or it seems that we're running the risk of living in a world filled with a lot of unhappy people.
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: Look around today, isn't that true?
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: If the slogan love is love moves us to seek the truth of what love is, then it may be on to something.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: On the other hand, if what is applied in that slogan love is love has no meaning or truth other than one's own subjective feelings, is it anything or everything?
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: Where does that leave us?
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: If love has been reduced to subjective feelings and emotions, does that mean that my love will be different than the person who is the object of my love?
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: In other words, when two people come together and all they have is subjective feelings and emotions in constant flux, each seeking their own self-fulfillment, can they ever come together and build a life and a family together that we seek?
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: This is a good question, huh?
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: Look how many divorces, how many unhappy people there are in the world seeking love but can't find it with each other.
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: So they move on to the next person, the next person, the next person, always looking to be filled instead of being filled with divine life and love, and then becoming a person of love and giving that to one another.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: See, if love is subjective and has no concrete reality, then is the love that every human being desires just an illusion?
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: Is the human heart being mocked by some perverse accident of evolution, perhaps as a beautiful young woman confided to me after her boyfriend walked out of her life when she wouldn't agree to an abortion of the child that they conceived together.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: She said this to me she goes, it felt like love until it didn't.
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: I was told sex was love and found that it wasn't.
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: Will my child and I ever experience what it means to be loved for our own sakes?
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: If you're an adult or anyone listening to this, please know that I respect your God-given freedom to voice your own opinion, but it makes little difference to me because I'm not speaking about opinions.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: In fact, there's one opinion that I especially don't want to consider my own, for, like you, I grew up in this culture of death where opinions, lies and distortions simply flow in and out like the ocean tide or being carried along by ever-changing winds of the spirit of this age.
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: George Orwell wrote each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it and wiser than the one that will come after it.
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: You see, end quote.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: It seems that the so-called modern mind, declaring that there is no truth, only your truth or my truth, has once again forgotten the lessons of history and embraced an old story from Genesis, chapter 3.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: The serpent said to the woman you certainly will not die.
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: No, god knows well that the moment you eat of it, your eyes will be open and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is evil.
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: This is moral relativism at its earliest start.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: Ever since men and women lost Eden, a brutal war was unleashed against humanity.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: It did not take long after the fall for Cain to kill his own brother, abel.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: Today, we, the people, elect politicians who promise they will legislate their opinion into law, granting its citizens the right to murder their children in the safety these children in the safety of their own mother's womb.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: Then, for those children fortunate enough to be born, next up in the human pulverization line are the teachers' unions, local school boards and districts that use our own tax dollars to pay teachers to promote pornography and gender ideologies, starting in kindergarten.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: Even more baffling to me sometimes are the parents who look the other way.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: You know we're engaged in a definitive battle between the forces of the culture of life and the culture of death.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: In this battle, there's going to be no grand leader or political force riding on a great white stallion to rescue humanity.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: Yet there's a hero, or better yet, millions of heroes.
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: That hero is you and the millions of others who choose to be a force for truth and goodness in the world.
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: In some sense, we all stand before that tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and we are called to salvation through faith in Jesus Christ, the true light that enlightens everyone.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: People become light in the world then, children of the light which scripture says over and over again, and are made by obedience to the truth.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: Ooh, disobedience isn't easy, is it?
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: As a result of that mysterious original sin committed at the prompting of Satan, the one who was a liar and a father of lies?
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: Jesus called him.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: Mankind is constantly tempted to turn his gaze away from the living and true God to direct it toward the idols Exchanging St Paul said the truth about God for a lie.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: Man's capacity to know the truth is also darkened, and his will to submit to it then is weakened.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: Thus, giving himself over to relativism and skepticism, he goes off in search of an illusory freedom.
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: Apart from the truth himself, he's not going to find it.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: See, the gift of the Ten Commandments was a promise and a sign of the new covenant in which the law would be written on the human heart, replacing the law of sin, which had defigured the heart.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: This is what the Ten Commandments did in the Old Testament.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: And then Jesus brings God's commandments to fulfillment, particularly the commandment of love of neighbor, by interiorizing their demands and by bringing out their fullest meaning.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: Love of neighbor springs from a loving heart which, precisely because it loves, is ready to live out the loftiest challenges.
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: Jesus shows that the commandments are a path involving a moral and spiritual journey towards perfection, and at the heart of this is love.
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: Thus, the commandment you shall not murder comes a call to an attentive love that protects and promotes the life of one's neighbor, especially the most innocent among us, the child still within the safety or safe place of its mother's womb.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: That our culture demands the right to take that life for itself.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: This is my body.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, no.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: You have to become a person of love.
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: That child is not your body, it's in your body.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: See, then, it fails to provide for its own children.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: So who stands for those children?
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: Is love?
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: Is love just a slogan to do with self-indulgence, or does it include the best interests of our children?
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: This is what we have to ask If somebody says love is love, just say well then, if that's true, then if love is love, do we not extend this toward children, especially the most vulnerable and innocent among us, for the old people that are being killed by euthanasia?
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: No, no, no.
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: Love has to extend to all people.
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: Huh, are parents who stand up to local school boards to protect their children from being desensitized, groomed and ultimately victimized by pornography and gender ideologies?
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: Are they haters and terrorists, or do they love their children?
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: Or are they simply people with the courage to stand up against the principalities, the powers, the world rulers of this present age, as St Paul would say?
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: Are they haters because they do not believe that a man can become pregnant and breastfeed a child?
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: Does truth and concrete reality not matter anymore?
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: You know, in 2 Timothy, st Paul writes this for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but will have itching ears.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: They will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander into myths.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: As for you, always be steady, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: He writes in 2 Timothy, chapter 4, verses 3 through 5.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: In the Gospel of Matthew, again, we come upon this incredible scene where a rich young man comes up to Jesus saying teacher, what good must I do to have eternal life?
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: And he said to him.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: Jesus said to him why do you ask me about what is good One there is.
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: Who is good, this is God, of course, if you would enter into life, keep the commandments.
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: And he said to him which ones?
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: The young man asked Jesus.
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: And Jesus says you shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, Honor your father and mother and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: The young man said to him all these I have observed.
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: What do I still lack?
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: You see, the young rich man, despite thinking that he has kept all the commandments, continues to desire something more and experiences the law written on his heart.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: This is what we have to prompt young people to get to.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: Jesus knows all this, of course, and, while probing the rich man's heart, says to him if you would be perfect, go sell what you possess, give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: And come, follow me.
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: Come, you will see.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: Come, follow me.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: I will show you what you're looking for.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: When the young man heard this, though, he went away sorrowfully, for he had great possessions.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: Isn't that what we do today?
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: This is why Jesus says you know, for the rich, the wealthy, like in the United States, we have so much, so plentiful, that we don't want to come into the story.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: We reject God.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: And when we reject God, we see what's happening all around us it all fails.
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: I will challenge all who believe that love is love to invite Jesus Christ, who searches hearts, into your heart.
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: The commandments of which Jesus reminds the young man are meant to safeguard the good of the person, the image of God, by protecting his goods.
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: What are his goods?
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: First of all, it's his life.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: You shall not murder, then you should not cheat on your spouse.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Right, you have to become a person of love, so you should not commit adultery.
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: You should not steal from other people.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: You should not bear false witness and lie about others.
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: There are moral rules, you know, formulated in the turn in the terms of prohibitions.
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: Right, don't do these right, these negative precepts express, expressed with particular force, the urgent need to protect human life.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: Do not kill the communion of persons in marriage, you know.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: Stay together.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: You have to learn to love one another.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: How do you do that?
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: You have to unite your heart with Christ.
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: About private property, don't we hear today, you will own nothing and be happy.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, no.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: We Don't.
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: We hear today, you will own nothing and be happy.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, no.
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: We are all given what God wants to provide for us Truthfulness.
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: We have to stay true.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: Well, there is no truth?
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: Well then, it's just chaos.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: We have to keep people's good names.
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: We can't demean them.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: Gospel about them, right?
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: Well, the commandments thus represent the basic condition for love of neighbor.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: At the same time, they are a proof of that love.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: We have to live those out.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: They are the first necessary step on the journey towards freedom.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: It's freedom's starting point, the beginning of freedom.
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: St Augustine writes, and he says what's the beginning of freedom?
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: It's to be free from crimes such as murder, adultery, fornication, theft, fraud, sacrilege and so on.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: It is only in true freedom then that we are free to become persons of love.
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: Then, jesus says, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: See, love does no wrong to a neighbor, especially the most innocent among us.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: Therefore, it's love that is the fulfilling of the law, our reason for what we do at the John Paul II Renewal Center is simple we want to bring the gospel of love to the young people of today who are growing up without hope in a very distorted, twisted and toxic culture.
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: They've been repeatedly lied to about the very basics concerning the meaning of marriage, the family, what authentic love is, the true meaning of sex and sexuality and much more.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: Well, this has left many of them anxious, depressed and even hopeless, to the point of considering suicide.
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: How many lives, these young lives, could be saved if we are not afraid just to what?
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Go out into the vineyard and tell them the truth.
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: John Paul said the more the world deprives young people of what's true, good and beautiful, the more earnestly they will yearn for it.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: The vacuum of modern secularism.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: You know this.
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: There is no truth, only my truth, your truth.
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: This moral relativism is actually a fragrant invitation for young people to rediscover the sacred.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: But someone must be willing to proclaim the gospel to them.
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: In 2 Timothy 4 again, I charge you in the presence of God and Jesus Christ, preach the word, be urgent, in season and out of season.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Well, we're out of season now, aren't we?
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: Huh With truth, we swim in this, like I said, with the proverbial frog not in hot water, but in this toxic sewage of moral relativism, there is no truth, but it's not enough for the human person, the human heart.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: So invite people into the story, don't be afraid to proclaim the gospel to them, because without that, huh, we will never inherit eternal life, we will never find what we're looking for Good to be with you today.
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you just to consider something.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: Consider being a sponsor, a donor.
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: It's all in the show notes.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: We built up the team and we're going out into more and more places and more and more churches and finding young people to speak to.
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: And in order to do that, we have to build up a team and go out.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: And as we're building up that team, everything costs money.
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: So please consider being a donor.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: A one-time donor is fine, but if you can make a small monthly donation, that is going to really be the substance and it has always been the substance of how we go out into this world.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: You know we're very, very careful with what we spend.
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: It's amazing.
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: We have no waste in this organization, but we do have to support our people.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: We have to pay for gas and hotels and travel and all kinds of things.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: Please consider helping us out.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much, and that way, through us too, you will go out and labor in the vineyard.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: God bless you.
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: Thanks everyone.
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: Bye-bye.