Latest / Virtuous Leaders with Dr. Johann D'Souza / Ep.77 – Juggling Motherhood & Mission: Catholic Wisdom for Today | Faith & Family | Balancing Life | Catholic Moms | Conservative Values

Transcript

Ep.77 – Juggling Motherhood & Mission: Catholic Wisdom for Today | Faith & Family | Balancing Life | Catholic Moms | Conservative Values · Virtuous Leaders with Dr. Johann D'Souza

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  We try to bring a faithful Catholic voice to the public
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  square. So we'll write, do media
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  appearances. We host our own nationally
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  syndicated radio show called Conversations with Consequences,
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  also available as a podcast. We take turns hosting and Co
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  hosting. Sometimes we just do a team chat
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  with 2-3 or four of us of a different topic that might be in
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  the news right now. We address topics that are
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  important to Catholics, not just Catholic topics, but things that
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  national news, local news, and we bring a Catholic perspective.
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  Not necessarily necessarily only for Catholics, because we
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  publish in mainstream publications as well as Catholic
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  publications, but that's what we do.
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  And it's a very collegial group. We work together, we co-author,
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  we research for each other, and it's a really fantastic setup
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  and it's built for women who are primarily moms so that we can do
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  both and we don't have to step out of the game.
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  So you are a prolific writer and you're a fellow at the Catholic
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  Association. Can you just share a little bit
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  about your mission there? Sure, we are four women moms.
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  One of us is a young grandmother.
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  We try to bring a faithful Catholic voice to the public
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  square. So we'll write, do media
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  appearances. We host our own nationally
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  syndicated radio show called Conversations with Consequences,
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  also available as a podcast. We take turns hosting and Co
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  hosting. Sometimes we just do a team chat
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  with to three or four of us of a different topic that might be,
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  you know, in the news right now. We address topics that are
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  important to Catholics, not just Catholic topics, but you know,
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  things that, you know, national news, local news that and we
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  bring a Catholic perspective, not necessarily only for
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  Catholics, because we publish in mainstream publications as well
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  as Catholic publications, but that's, that's what we do.
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  And we are, it's a very collegial group.
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  We work together, we co-author, we research for each other.
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  And it's a it's a really fantastic set up and it's built
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  for women who are primarily moms.
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  And so that we can do, we can do both, and we don't have to step
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  out of the game. Wonderful.
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  Do you have a sense for what kind of impact that's had?
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  You know, we're growing, we're getting more social media savvy.
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  Our Twitter feed has been really picking up lately.
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  Two of our team, therefore, two of our team were in Rome for the
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  Conclave and did some hits on ABC and NBC and I think Fox
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  News. A lot of EWTN, of course,
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  they're good friends of ours and we're quoted extensively.
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  Ashley McGuire, my colleague, was, I think, quoted in both the
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  New York Times, the New York Post, maybe even the Washington
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  Post. My other colleague, Mary
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  Fiorito, too. We are stepping into sub stack,
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  but we're we're figuring that out exactly how we want that to
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  look. But we're hoping it'll be some
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  more hot takes from us on, you know, minute by the minute news
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  rather than having to wait for us to, you know, write a piece
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  and then place it. And, you know, we'll be able to,
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  you know, shoot out something quick on our sub stack for a
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  reader. So how do you balance being a
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  mom and doing all the writing that you do with various outlets
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  and especially the Catholic Association?
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  Well, I have a very supportive husband who also as a professor,
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  has a flexible schedule. He's actually been on sabbatical
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  this year. And he's also, well, we're both
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  writing books this year. And so we've both been home,
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  which has been great. You know, we do have some
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  childcare help. You know, we just, you just keep
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  throwing balls in the air and, you know, just keep sticking
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  your arms out to catch them. And it works this year, too.
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  Speaking of the collegiality of the women of the Catholic
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  Association, since I am writing a book and I'm almost done and
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  it'll be coming out early next year with Sophia Institute
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  Press, my colleagues have really picked up the slack for me.
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  I haven't done much hosting of the radio show, except if, when
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  it pertains to something related to my book.
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  I think once I was a guest on our own radio show as a way to,
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  you know, keep me relevant but not, you know, put extra burdens
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  on me to prepare for a guest. And I've I've stepped back a
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  little bit from the editorial writing.
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  What's your book about? Infertility from a Catholic
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  perspective. Can you tell us more about that?
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  Sure. I had a couple, two or three
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  pieces in the National Catholic Register that, you know, I think
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  saying things went viral is kind of a overused term at this
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  point. But it was really, really well
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  received. And I think a lot of women and
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  even couples and even priests reached out to me and said, hey,
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  this is important, this is real. Thank you for writing this.
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  Thank you for writing this. Priest said, I'm going to keep
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  this on file to give to the people who come to me because
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  sometimes I don't know what to say.
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  And then I just had another mentor of mine just said to me,
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  Lee, this is your book. And so I went together putting
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  together a proposal. And then Sophia Institute Press
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  picked it up. And so here I am almost done.
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  It's it's somewhat autobiographical.
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  I sort of use our path is, you know, we got married young and
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  we've never been pregnant once. And we had, you know, some ups
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  and downs. We adopted our four children and
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  we were still in the process of trying to conceive.
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  And I'm also, I've, I've interviewed several women.
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  Somehow we have found each other across the universe, other
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  Catholic women who have suffered from infertility because
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  everyone's got a kind of different flavor.
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  You know, some people don't find marriage until maybe they're in
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  their 40s. So that's, you know, different
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  than someone in their 20s experienced infertility.
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  Or some people have had medical conditions where they've had to
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  have a very, very early hysterectomy and then have
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  permanent infertility at a young age.
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  So I want anyone who sort of picks up the book to be able to
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  see themselves in it. I'm pretty, you know, I'm pretty
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  real about feelings, feelings of jealousy, feeling of inadequacy.
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  I have an imaginary character that I had invented in the days
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  of, you know, really, really sort of being sad and really
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  desperately wanting to be pregnant and not getting
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  pregnant. And she was called Fertile
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  Myrtle. She was basically a super devout
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  Catholic supermodel and she had a lot of, she could just get
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  pregnant. And I was really worried my
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  husband was going to fight her and leave me for her.
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  I had dreams about Fertile Myrtle, you know, So I try to
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  keep it real. I try to keep it a heavy
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  subject. I try to lighten it up a little
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  bit with just like a conversation, but also reminding
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  people of the church's teaching on say like artificial
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  reproductive technologies and explaining that pro technology
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  and things like that. If people want to find Fertile
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  Myrtle, where would they look? Oh, I you know, she was a
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  figment of my imagination. So they could.
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  That's a joke, sorry. Sometimes I was like, wait a
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  minute, what did I say when I introduced fertile Marlins?
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  And make him think she is real. Or, you know, I've actually
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  stashed her in the basement so she wreak her fertile havoc on
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  the husband. They just turned it to a Stephen
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  King novel. Yeah, I'll be one of those
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  documentaries. True crime.
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  So you've been featured on a bunch of different outlets.
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  What was your process for getting access to those?
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  You know, we have Catholic association, we have a media
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  team that places our pieces like it just sometimes it a lot of
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  times it's also friends. We can just get directly to
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  them, like at that a piece or I've got an idea for a piece.
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  Do you think you'll you know, is I have room for that this week.
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  Are you or you know, has a new cycle moved on?
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  We'll send out feelers like that.
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  A lot of us have been in sort of like the Catholic policy media
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  stuff circles for a long time. And so we know a lot of each
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  other, you know, so we know people at some different
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  outlets, but usually it's just a matter of getting your piece
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  done and making a good point. And then our team media team
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  pitches it to different outlets. And yeah, I needed help for the
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  best. And sometimes it doesn't get
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  picked up, you know, And then it was just a good exercise.
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  Well, I think it's really cool that y'all found a niche where
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  you can be moms and you can contribute to society in a more
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  public way. I'm not.
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  Well, I've had a guest on my show, Erica Commissar, who
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  speaks about the danger of being away from your baby for extended
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  periods of time. So I'm not in principle opposed
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  to moms working. What I'm opposed to is moms
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  being away from their babies for long periods of time.
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  And it sounds like you all found a way to balance that.
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  Yeah, absolutely. In fact, I mean, I think when we
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  my youngest is 3 and I had been with the Catholic Association
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  about a year, but immediately it was understood that I wouldn't
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  even be joining in our weekly Zoom calls, you know, for a few
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  months. And then he often still joins me
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  on the Zoom calls. Yeah, it's, it's nice.
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  Everybody works from home. We don't travel a lot.
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  We're not away from our families.
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  And, you know, if something comes up and you were committed
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  to do something, all you have to do is say the word.
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  This is happening. You know, I can't do it.
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  Like my kid forgot their lunch at home and I had to take it to
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  school. I can't record the podcast
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  today. And that's that's enough.
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  You know, that's enough because we're all moms and we all
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  understand. I.
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  Want to get to more specifics of what the Catholic Association
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  covers? You said you're covering news
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  for faithful Catholics. What do you think are the issues
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  that you most want to highlight for faithful Catholics?
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  What are the most, the biggest challenges that our world faces?
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  They all want to address. Yeah, I think, well, we really
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  concentrate a lot on abortion legislation and abortion news.
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  I guess we try to, we try to highlight the positive.
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  For instance, my colleague Ashley McGuire and I wrote a
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  piece maybe a year and a half ago, maybe just a year ago
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  anyway, and it got put published in Newsweek.
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  And it was around the time that the Britney Spears memoir had
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  come out. So this is sort of where we
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  engage with the culture while, you know, representing Catholic
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  values. And she talked about how
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  tragically she had suffered from a medical abortion in her
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  bathroom. Oh.
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  My gosh. It was heartbreaking.
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  And you think this gazillion dollar pop star, you'd imagine
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  that she'd have some sort of luxury abortion suite at a
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  private hospital. But there she was suffering
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  alone in the bathroom. And we used that to highlight
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  Attorney General Lynn Fitch, her program in Mississippi, and she
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  is called Mama. And it's about empowering women.
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  And the motto is you can do this.
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  And so she's doing the hard work there on the ground.
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  And we used, you know, a popular trending news item to promote
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  her and to, you know, like, let people know the good work that
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  she's doing. That'll be something we would
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  do. There's been a lot of work on
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  the misrepresentation of the complications from medical
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  abortions. Some of my colleagues have
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  written on that. A lot of emphasis on some of the
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  school, like required reading things that were happening in
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  Montgomery County, Maryland, children being, you know, given
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  books about all kinds of things that, you know, as preschoolers
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  and kindergarteners and not being allowed to opt out of
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  those lessons. You know, whenever there is some
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  sort of religious liberty violation, we try to highlight
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  that. But also, if, you know, if
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  someone writes, you know, a beautiful new book, like we've
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  had Jennifer Hooton Wilson on our podcast a lot of times and
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  the podcasts tend to be a little bit more, more fun than some of
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  our op eds because we it's a conversation, you know, but it's
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  something that really matters. We like to highlight the good
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  work that's happening, you know, with priests and with religious
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  sisters, with people being married.
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  And, you know, it's it's really can run the gamut.
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  Anything that sort of strikes our fancy are the things that we
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  like to concentrate on. You know, this gender ideology
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  in school is so irrational and evil and disturbing, but I
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  sometimes wonder if it's actually a distraction from an
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  even greater evil, which is a tyrannical one world government.
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  Yeah, maybe. I mean, that's that's upsetting.
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  But yeah, tell me more about that.
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  Tell me more about that idea. Divide and conquer.
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  So the devil's tool is disunity. The Holy Spirit brings unity.
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  These hop on issues are very controversial, very polarizing
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  and at the same time they're just so irrational.
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  The people who the people who propose them, they don't seem to
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  me very well educated, smart. So the question is why are they
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  getting so much traction? And I think that those who would
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  want an empire that extends across the whole globe in order
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  to have a totalitarian government, they would want to
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  put people at odds with each other to distract from the real
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  agenda. Well, and it's attack, it's an
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  attack on the family, too, right?
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  Which we know is the devil's playground.
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  Yeah. No, I can see what you're saying
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  there. Yeah.
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  I hadn't, I guess, thought about it beyond, you know, saving my
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  kid right now, you know, the sort of immediacy of it.
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  But, yeah, I think that you. Yeah.
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  I mean, yeah, it's hard to know who's behind everything.
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  So many layers. So many layers.
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  The evil onion. Yeah, yeah.
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  So, yeah, that's, well, that's another thing I think that it's,
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  it's important to note too, that Planned Parenthood isn't even,
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  isn't always just in the crosshairs because of its role
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  with abortion, but also with its providing transitional drugs and
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  hormones to people. That's a big part of their
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  business. So that would be something we
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  would point out too. Good.
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  Well, I'm glad someone's exposing these people.
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  Yeah. Willie, you have some great
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  work. Is there anything else you want
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  to share with us? No, I well, you know what we do
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  a media eclipse everyday, the Catholic Association.
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  So if you want to go to catholicassociation.org and
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  subscribe, you get a daily e-mail of different mainstream
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  media and also big Catholic media, a selection of clips
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  every day. It can range from maybe 6 to,
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  you know, when there's something big happening, like the
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  conclave, it's going to be more like 15 or 16.
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  But it's great. It's I would subscribe even if I
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  wasn't part of the Catholic Association.
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  I would say tune into our podcast Conversations with
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  Consequences. And yeah, you know, reach out
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  and if you have any story ideas. One story idea which I'll wrap
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  up into my last question. Sure, what do you think the odds
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  that the new Pope is a closet based Trump supporter?
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  I just read a fantastic piece by Kathleen Parker in the
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  Washington Post about his brother.
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  So I don't know. I mean, you know, they seem like
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  they're close. I, you know, I, you know, you
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  just, I couldn't say, you know, it's people.
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  People have kept their Trump likes or dislikes pretty close
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  to the chest. And whether or not that is
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  telling, I guess remains to be seen.
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  Fair enough, thankfully. Great.
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  Thank you. Yawn.