Latest / Virtuous Leaders with Dr. Johann D'Souza / Ep.88 - Running Your Business Like a Saint with Catholic Founders' Silas Mähner | Catholic Entrepreneurship | Faith-Based Business | Building God's Kingdom

Transcript

Ep.88 - Running Your Business Like a Saint with Catholic Founders' Silas Mähner | Catholic Entrepreneurship | Faith-Based Business | Building God's Kingdom · Virtuous Leaders with Dr. Johann D'Souza

• 0:00
  I believe that especially, you know, the Catholic billionaires
• 0:02
  or the Catholic multi multi millionaires of the world, they
• 0:05
  should be much more willing to share their success to inspire
• 0:09
  others do so because a lot of times the only examples that
• 0:12
  young men will see, for example, is, you know, people like Elon
• 0:15
  Musk or Jeff Bezos, right? This is Virtuous Leaders, the
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  podcast for based Catholics who will speak truth, do good, or
• 0:21
  die trying. Here's the show.
• 0:27
  You're the founder of Catholic Founders.
• 0:28
  That's similar to what I'm aiming for in this podcast, and
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  I gotta go a little bit broader, but I'd love to hear more about
• 0:33
  your mission. Glad to talk about it.
• 0:35
  So Catholic founders is kind of in essence, it is the, the
• 0:39
  objective is to understand how to run your business as if a St.
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  was running it. So this idea came to me kind of
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  probably 20 late 20 nineteens when I first had the idea of,
• 0:49
  you know, what would it look like if Jesus was the CEO of a
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  company? I'm pretty sure it'd be
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  profitable in the long term and it would be run very differently
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  than what we see a lot of modern corporations.
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  You know, how they how they run, but I didn't know the exact
• 1:01
  answers, like what are the actual tactics of how that would
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  be done? So yeah, this ended up stewing
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  my head for a long time, but we we launched it in on May May 1st
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  of 2024. So Saint Joseph, the workers
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  face day and with the main intention of hey, we're going to
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  interview people. We're going to just try to
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  distill the tactics of how to actually run your business like
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  a St. and not just about, you know, virtue with how you treat
• 1:22
  your employees or how you treat your customers.
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  But also how can we kind of lean into this, this opportunity as
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  Co creators that God has given us that like this kind of core
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  part of our nature. We we have this creator
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  mentality inside of us. How can we really lean into
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  that? Because the people who are
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  called to entrepreneurship, which, you know, I would argue
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  is actually a lot more than most people say.
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  How can we lean into this and not only do it well and treat
• 1:48
  our people well, but also go to further extremes like Saint
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  Paul? Like we're going to go all the
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  way we can and proclaim the Gospel through this.
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  We're going to use our financial treasure and success from that
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  to build murals to Saint Joseph or whatever.
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  But we're we're going to do things to take back the culture.
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  And I think that entrepreneurs specifically have a really
• 2:05
  unique opportunity to do that. So that's what Catholic founders
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  is trying to do. And, and what we are now is, you
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  know, it may evolve, but we're a podcast that comes out weekly, a
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  Monday newsletter called The Saintly CEO.
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  And then we have a paid community of other Catholic
• 2:17
  entrepreneurs. That way you can kind of network
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  with other people and just learn from each other, buy from each
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  other, whatever you got to do to move the ball forward basically.
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  What did you learn from the Catholic founders that you
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  interview? Oh.
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  Man, there's a lot of things. I'm actually currently putting
• 2:30
  together kind of 25 insights from 25 episodes, but there's a
• 2:35
  lot of things I would say. Perhaps one of the I'll, I'll
• 2:40
  pull from some of the things I'm doing right now as I'm recapping
• 2:42
  these episodes. But number one was with
• 2:44
  Alessandro De Santo from Hallow. The first episode we did, we
• 2:47
  talked about prayer a lot because I was like, you know, I
• 2:48
  think this is the best place to start as an entrepreneur.
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  And it was really to me, we can't understand our unique
• 2:55
  calling as entrepreneurs specifically without making
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  silence, making space for silence so God can speak to us,
• 3:02
  right? And there's been a theme that's
• 3:03
  come up quite a few times just through the readings I've had
• 3:06
  recently and other other, you know, life experiences where
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  it's like God is usually, I think, I think CS Lewis says
• 3:13
  this. He speak, he, he whispers to us
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  in our comfort. He speaks to us in our
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  contemplation. And then he shouts to us in our
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  pain. So, you know, obviously a lot of
• 3:23
  entrepreneurial journeys have begun out of some kind of pain.
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  Like, ah, man, like I have to deal with this thing, so I'm
• 3:28
  going to solve it, right? And it becomes very obvious.
• 3:30
  But we can as people who are hopefully living good lives, you
• 3:34
  know, virtuous lives, we shouldn't necessarily be in that
• 3:36
  kind of pain category where something went terribly wrong.
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  We should be seeking God in the whisper, in a quiet whisper as
• 3:42
  to what he's calling us to do. So that's one big thing, Another
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  one that I'm, I've been really fascinated by lately.
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  I haven't gotten exact answers to this, but just trying to
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  retake the mystical aspect of our faith, right?
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  I think a lot of people in the modern era have been, you know,
• 3:58
  everything is, you know, black and white is just how it is.
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  There's no, there's no nuance to it.
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  There's only, yeah, it's just, it's just out as it is.
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  There's no mystical or spiritual aspect.
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  But I think that the, the circumstances that we were born
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  into, all of us being born in this particular time in history
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  with these particular parents in this geography, the people that
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  we encounter, it's all effectively this well crafted
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  and unique. You could say, like seen in a in
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  a movie or in a play, that God has created this set for us and
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  we are independent actors in the set.
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  We can do what we want, but he's got an idea of what he wants us
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  to do. And that environment kind of
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  shapes our unique calling as people, our unique objective as
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  entrepreneurs, what we're really called to, again, outside of
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  the, the basics, you know, heaven, our vocation, and then
• 4:48
  the earthly calling, right? The third thing, that's kind of
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  how I structure it and I like to think about that a lot because
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  it it helps you maybe tune into the the small things that you
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  may not be paying attention to. If you were, you know, if you
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  were a little bit more like, oh, you know, it's life is just
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  life. You can do whatever you want,
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  but really God has ideas for you.
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  He sets you up and he's giving you particular skill sets and he
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  also makes the the best out of your mistakes to prepare you to
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  be, you know, a better example or better husband, a better, you
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  know, father, whatever. All of these things are kind of
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  mystical in nature. And I like to think about that a
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  lot because I, I just, it seems like that that's the way that we
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  lean into our understanding of God and he brings us closer to
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  him through it. Right.
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  Andreas Widmer was on my podcast too, a while ago.
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  And he said this thing. I don't know exactly how he
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  structured it. I think it was like when God is
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  calling you to something, it's like jumping out the window, You
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  know, it's like a second or third story window because you,
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  you know, he's calling you to do it.
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  And you're like, hey, like God, you better help me out here.
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  He catches you and he brings you, you run back up the stairs
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  and you do it again over and over and over.
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  And you get to the point where you are no longer fearful of
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  jumping out the window because you know God will catch you.
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  And to me, that's what entrepreneurship is.
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  We are leaning into this kind of fear that eventually brings us
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  culture to God. So if you will, it's a, it's a,
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  it's a mechanism to deepen our faith, which is something that I
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  didn't think about when I started this whole journey, but
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  that has become very apparent to me.
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  Have you heard any particular success stories of someone who
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  maybe they are Catholic, but they weren't living the mission
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  through their work and then you were able to guide them or you
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  heard of some of that was able to guide them to do so?
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  So not not exactly in that context.
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  There was 11 individual I spoke with, you know, I usually do pre
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  calls with people and I did a pre call with him and I was
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  like, Hey, So what are some of the ways, you know, he runs a
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  you know, it's a non, it's not like a externally Catholic
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  organization. It's just a tech tech company.
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  And I was like, what are some of the ways that you like, like to
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  bring the work, bring the faith into your work.
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  And he's like, because I, and then I proceeded to say, you
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  know, because I'm, I'm kind of thinking about this idea of
• 6:53
  separation of church and state. And you can't really separate
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  them because, you know, you as an individual are still making
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  decisions that have eternal consequences.
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  And then he's just like, well, actually, I actually don't agree
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  with that. I, I think that we should keep
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  him separated. I was like, Oh, well, this might
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  be an interesting podcast. And it turns out through the
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  conversation, we realized like, oh, actually he does do it some
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  way. It's like he keeps your rosary
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  on his desk. He, you know, he prays to he
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  asked the interception of Blessed Carlo Acutis every time
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  they deploy code. Like there's like a very unique
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  ways he does it, but he doesn't try to force it upon his
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  employees who are mostly, I shouldn't say mostly secular,
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  but he definitely has some Catholics that work there.
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  But it's, you know, a lot of secular people.
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  So he's like, I'm not going to try to turn this into, you know,
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  our our Monday morning standups. We're going to be, you know,
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  preaching the Gospel, which is fine.
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  But it was nice to see that through the conversation, you
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  know, he came to a maybe in a different understanding of how
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  it would have means to bring your face to work.
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  Yeah. And on the other end of the
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  spectrum, who have you talked to or read about that you think
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  does this really well exemplary. Oh man, this is tough.
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  Let me have a think through. I think the perhaps the best,
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  and it might be unfair. I think you might have had him
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  on the show is Jeff Shufflebine. He I mean like his whole thing
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  is undivided life. So maybe it's not fair because
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  this is literally like the purpose behind it.
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  But he he points out and he's on the show too.
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  He points out that all of our decisions are, you know, we as a
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  person cannot be separated from the eternal consequences,
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  whether we're doing that in work or how we treat our spouse or
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  our children or whatnot. We have to live with everything
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  united, every decision. There shouldn't be some
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  separation of I think I haven't seen the show, but I reference
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  it because I'm pretty sure I understand the the context of
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  severance, right? Where people are like at work
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  with one mentality and then as soon as they leave, there's like
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  another brain turns out or something, right.
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  We shouldn't have that. We should be able to bring our
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  whole selves to work and the environments that we have now
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  are Gen. generally not conducive or not kind to that.
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  Unless you you don't have a good Catholic boss, maybe.
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  But Jeff was probably the embodiment of living those
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  things fully united. 0 separation.
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  Well, I love your mission. So on a practical level, what's
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  your strategy for finding these good guests and where do you
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  want to go with this? So finding the guests, and you
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  might have to remind me of the second question.
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  My ADHD tends to get out of hand.
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  Finding the guest is kind of like, I don't know, I, I,
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  there's some people that I've sought out because I'm like,
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  hey, this would be a great guest to have on.
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  And I had kind of seen them on LinkedIn, but sometimes they
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  just stumble into my lap, right? And some of them have been
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  people, people that have coming on in the show in the future are
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  people I went to church with. And it's like, hey, they're
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  running this small business that they bought 20 years ago and
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  little by little, they're kind of dominating the entire
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  industry because they have good customer service.
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  So that's a great 'cause that's a great story to tell.
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  I had a couple ideas of, you know, different topics I wanted
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  to cover. So I would reach out to specific
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  people, But I, I kind of let the Holy Spirit guide me, you know,
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  because sometimes these, these conversations will lead to more
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  questions. And you're like, I wonder where
• 9:58
  we can go from that. We also have the paid community,
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  which will oftentimes bring people to ask certain questions.
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  And you're like, oh, wow, maybe we should try to find somebody
• 10:05
  with that specific calling. But my goal in the long term,
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  and I think this was the second part of your question is I want
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  to be able to bring the people who are not Internet
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  entrepreneurs, right? There's a lot of us who are
• 10:16
  like, hey, we're trying to promote our podcast, We're
• 10:18
  trying to do what we do. And we live on the Internet to
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  an extent because we're, we're promoting it or we're selling
• 10:23
  something. And I want to find the people
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  who are literally not in the Internet at all, the people who
• 10:29
  have achieved some, some sort of success, but they're not out
• 10:32
  there blasting it, you know, from the rooftops of, of
• 10:34
  LinkedIn. Because those people, you know,
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  I believe that they're doing this for the right reasons, that
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  they're, they're trying to be humble, that they don't want to,
• 10:44
  you know, brag about their success.
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  They don't want to talk about those, those kind of
• 10:48
  achievements. But I actually think it's the
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  wrong mentality. I think that our success and
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  our, I mean, all of our virtue, all of our skills, everything
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  comes from God, right? And if we are doing a good job,
• 11:03
  we're being the stewards of those of those skills.
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  And we're, we're basically building up more treasures so
• 11:07
  that we can return it and become instruments of God, right?
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  If we achieve success in doing so, why should we keep it to
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  ourselves, right? I understand like privacy
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  concerns and everything, but I believe that especially, you
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  know, the Catholic billionaires or the Catholic multi multi
• 11:21
  millionaires of the world, they should be much more willing to
• 11:25
  share the success to inspire others to do so.
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  Because a lot of times the only examples that young men will
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  see, for example, is, you know, people like Elon Musk or Jeff
• 11:33
  Bezos, right? You know, there's some things
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  you can emulate about them, but there's a lot of things you
• 11:36
  don't want to. So we need more people who are
• 11:39
  willing to like effectively put themselves out there.
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  People like Tom Monahan who have been kind of, you know, for him,
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  it was not necessarily the intentional.
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  He, he, he started out being very in the spotlight because he
• 11:49
  enjoyed it. And then, you know, toned it
• 11:50
  back. But being willing to Share your
• 11:53
  story, I think it's very important because you can,
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  there's so much witness that can happen.
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  And also if you're, if you're afraid of sharing your story,
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  maybe, just maybe there is a little bit of you that's not
• 12:05
  doing as much as you could. Maybe you're not giving as much
• 12:07
  as you ought to. Maybe you're not really taking
• 12:09
  the faith as seriously as you could within your company, or
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  you're not treating your employees the way you ought to.
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  So that's my goal is find those people, whether it's a small mom
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  and pop business on Main Street or it's some, you know, multi
• 12:19
  billion dollar organization that's got a very quiet sea
• 12:23
  who's Catholic running it. I want to find those people and
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  get them on the show to to really extract their insights.
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  Yeah, I think there's an element of not wanting to be a public
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  figure. I've experienced that myself and
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  my my way of thinking about. I'd be curious to hear your
• 12:39
  comments on that, on this is and we have to sacrifice something
• 12:44
  in order to have a positive impact on the world.
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  And I'd much rather be retiring anonymous guy doing my own thing
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  out of the digital world, which I personally find annoying and
• 12:57
  part of me wishes didn't didn't exist.
• 12:59
  But if I'm going to have the most positive impact I can, I
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  see the way of doing it as going through being at least somewhat
• 13:06
  of a public figure and. So we've got people like Tim
• 13:08
  Connor. So.
• 13:09
  So I just did an episode with Tim Connors that came out.
• 13:12
  I mean, we're recording this. I don't know when this will come
• 13:13
  out, but when we're recording this, it was last week.
• 13:15
  And Tim is to me a shining example of this.
• 13:18
  I don't believe that he by any means set out to be a public
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  figure. He ended up getting into a
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  venture capital kind of by accident early on.
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  And then went on to become somebody who's now been on the
• 13:29
  Midas list of the, the Forbes Midas list 4 times, which is
• 13:32
  really crazy. And he in my mind, is kind of
• 13:35
  the number one Catholic venture capitalist.
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  But he is at a point where he he really embodies the Caritas and
• 13:42
  Veritante encyclical. Where, where, where Benedict
• 13:44
  said. Then the 16 said we need to
• 13:47
  solve the problems of our neighbors or we need to love our
• 13:49
  neighbor to the greatest extent we can through solving their
• 13:52
  problems to the Max ability that we can given our state in life
• 13:57
  and our influence in the world. And so this guy now, you know, I
• 14:00
  don't know how how much money Tim has, but he is going out and
• 14:03
  doing everything in his, in his possible abilities to convince,
• 14:07
  you know, people at Harvard to write studies that prove that
• 14:10
  loving your customer actually results in higher NPS scores.
• 14:13
  He's trying to get some amendments to the Canon law so
• 14:17
  that way we can make sure that nobody is.
• 14:19
  So we have basically greeters at our churches to ensure that new
• 14:22
  people are actually getting integrated into the church so
• 14:25
  that we don't lose people. He's viewing everything from a
• 14:28
  from a systems perspective and trying to go solve it.
• 14:30
  Things that most of us would be like, you know, oh man, this
• 14:33
  thing sucks is it's terrible. Like what do we do about it?
• 14:36
  And we would just talk about it. We wouldn't do anything.
• 14:38
  But Tim is going to the fullest extent.
• 14:40
  He's pushing the boundaries of what he could do or what's
• 14:42
  natural by saying, hey, I've got this influence I'm going to
• 14:45
  reach in and I'm going to change things.
• 14:47
  And that's, I think what we ought to be doing because if
• 14:50
  we're doing it with the right attentions, with God at our
• 14:52
  center, it is not, it's not selfish in nature, right?
• 14:56
  And this is another topic that's come up is, you know, whether
• 14:58
  ambition is good or bad. And a lot of Catholics have, you
• 15:02
  know, mixed, mixed feelings of power on that.
• 15:06
  Yeah, I think Aquinas actually answers that question, as he
• 15:09
  does for many questions. And he says part of the analysis
• 15:13
  is knowing what you're capable of, and you shouldn't seek
• 15:17
  something beyond what you're capable of, although you can
• 15:20
  make an argument that you can do.
• 15:21
  So God's assistance, I was going.
• 15:23
  To say I, I actually think that most people, at least the
• 15:26
  circles I tend to, the circles I grew up in, most people are they
• 15:31
  severely underestimate what they could achieve.
• 15:33
  Yeah, because they're afraid of this idea of becoming greedy or
• 15:38
  becoming, you know, worldly in terms of, you know, there's that
• 15:41
  there's that piece of the Bible, right?
• 15:42
  It's easier for a camel to pass the eye of a needle than for a
• 15:45
  rich man in heaven. And I think that they really,
• 15:48
  really focus on this and they maybe overlook things like the
• 15:51
  parable of the talents, for example.
• 15:53
  And they use it as a fear or a kind of a, a way to say, hey,
• 15:57
  This is why I'm not going to pursue the career ladder.
• 15:59
  So I'm not going to grow. But if you look at there's so
• 16:01
  many examples of there's a book called Encounters, which is
• 16:04
  basically stories of Opus Dei members who they achieved
• 16:09
  incredible things in their careers, but they maintained
• 16:13
  absolute humility and and incredible spirit of God in
• 16:17
  their lives. So it's, it's, it's a very short
• 16:19
  sighted thing to say. Oh, you know, because you have
• 16:21
  money, you can't be holy. And I believe that if we are
• 16:24
  willing to just let God take the reins, He will do 100 a thousand
• 16:29
  X more than we ever think that we're capable of if we become
• 16:32
  his instrument, if we're allowing Him to act through US.
• 16:35
  You know what I mean? Absolutely, and I wonder if
• 16:38
  people are honest with themselves how much of that
• 16:40
  desire not to seek greatness is driven by fear or laziness.
• 16:45
  Exactly, Yeah. OK, so yeah, I was going to
• 16:49
  actually ask you any particular Saints that you look to for
• 16:52
  inspiration? Man, that's really tough one.
• 16:54
  So I would say one of my favorites.
• 16:58
  I like a lot of people, so I would say definitely Jose Marios
• 17:00
  Cueva is really awesome. I like him a lot.
• 17:04
  Technically, I don't know if he's referred to as a St. but
• 17:06
  Joseph of Arimathea to me is epic because I think a lot of
• 17:10
  people, these gloss over that part of the Bible where Joseph
• 17:14
  was involved with, you know, burying Jesus.
• 17:17
  But I forget where I heard this from somebody.
• 17:20
  Did I think it was an exegesis that was explaining a few pieces
• 17:23
  of this? And I was like, wow, that's kind
• 17:24
  of crazy that he was so wealthy that he was able to get an
• 17:28
  audience with Pilate and he was in the Sanhedrin.
• 17:30
  Like this guy was mega wealthy. He was definitely like
• 17:34
  billionaire equivalent in their times.
• 17:36
  He had his own tomb. Like these things were not,
• 17:39
  Yeah, the average person's thing.
• 17:41
  And so to me, it's like, I like that because it shows us that
• 17:45
  there is definitely a place for these people, right?
• 17:47
  I grew up going to a church where we.
• 17:50
  The church was restored by this guy who had sold his company for
• 17:52
  about $100 million and spent I think like 20 million or
• 17:55
  25,000,000. I don't actually know the number
• 17:57
  restoring the church and turning into this absolutely beautiful
• 18:00
  place that that I was able to have the gift of, of growing up
• 18:03
  going to beautiful community. So we need these people and I
• 18:08
  think it's often overlooked. Maybe we don't need, you know,
• 18:10
  not everybody's called to be at that level, but there are
• 18:14
  certainly positions for those people and God has positions for
• 18:18
  the people in mind. But yet he was a very holy man,
• 18:20
  right? It doesn't it does it points out
• 18:22
  how committed he was to that. I mean, think about how scared
• 18:27
  even the apostles were at that point right after he died.
• 18:29
  Like, but he was willing to go and it kind of like face the
• 18:32
  situation and say, Hey, I need to get the body of Jesus down
• 18:35
  and we're going to do this thing.
• 18:36
  So to me, he's probably one of my favorites to think about.
• 18:41
  Yeah, because magnanimity, it it brings more than one good with
• 18:45
  it. I mean, you become good
• 18:46
  professionally with it, but then you can also dream about how to
• 18:50
  advance God's mission on earth through it.
• 18:52
  So I do find that these entrepreneurs who are values
• 18:58
  aligned, they can be even more effective in the faith-based
• 19:03
  world because they're more competent.
• 19:05
  Yep, it's not. It's not just goodwill.
• 19:07
  They know how to get things done.
• 19:09
  Yeah, because they've they've done so many incredible things
• 19:11
  already. And, you know, you obviously
• 19:13
  have to walk the fine line. But I think that if you are just
• 19:17
  pursuing success for, you know, money sake or ambition or like
• 19:20
  recognition, that's obviously wrong, right?
• 19:22
  You have to pursue it for the right objectives.
• 19:24
  And I've, I've been been blessed to be able to meet a number of
• 19:28
  especially Silicon Valley Catholics who are the most
• 19:33
  ambitious people I've ever met in my life and very, very
• 19:35
  Catholic. And they constantly are asking
• 19:37
  these questions like, ah, man, how can we basically like
• 19:40
  they're in this mission to transform San Francisco and make
• 19:42
  it Catholic again. It's like, how can we do that?
• 19:45
  We can't do it without any money or resources.
• 19:47
  So we need to, we're going to keep building.
• 19:48
  We're going to get good at our craft.
• 19:50
  And I have no doubt that many of these people I've been able to
• 19:53
  meet will become billionaires one day because of how like
• 19:56
  relentless they are at this focus.
• 19:57
  But yet they're really committed to their faith.
• 19:59
  And the reason they're doing any of this is because they, they
• 20:01
  have this broader mission of bringing God back to the world
• 20:04
  and bringing the truth to the world.
• 20:06
  Because they see so many people around them who are just
• 20:09
  embodied in this the secular world and they see how lost they
• 20:12
  are and they want to help them, right, because they have love
• 20:14
  for their fellow man. So.
• 20:16
  Yeah. I, I, I don't know, I kind of
• 20:17
  went on tangent there, but I, I am, I'm very bullish on this, on
• 20:20
  this idea. It's so encouraging to know that
• 20:22
  there's good people like that out there.
• 20:24
  That's part of the reason I started this podcast is to to
• 20:27
  meet more people like this. And there's more than we think.
• 20:30
  Oh yeah, a lot more than we think.
• 20:32
  I think the devil does a good job of trying to convince us
• 20:34
  that there's only a couple of us, Make us feel lonely.
• 20:38
  Speaking of which, of winning that loneliness, You're also a
• 20:41
  member of the Lumen Institute. Can you just share what that's
• 20:43
  all about? Yeah.
• 20:45
  So I believe I'm still paying members of the limited suit.
• 20:47
  So limited suit is, I believe the history is it was started by
• 20:51
  a couple guys, one of them being Steve Off who if I'm not
• 20:54
  mistaken is currently the, the chief investment officer at
• 20:56
  Federated Hermes. And their intention originally,
• 21:00
  I think this was 2000 ish, 2001 was they wanted to effectively
• 21:05
  have a ministry to Wall Street, right.
• 21:07
  They wanted to be able to, to help people, Catholics on Wall
• 21:11
  Street to, to really live their faith.
• 21:13
  I don't know all the history, but I was part of the, the Lumen
• 21:16
  Fellows, which is kind of like the junior group that these guys
• 21:18
  eventually started for their, for their sons effectively.
• 21:22
  And it's a it's a small group every, they meet every every
• 21:25
  month. And they talked about different
• 21:27
  topics. They have a, a priest that is
• 21:28
  always guiding kind of the, the conversations that you have as a
• 21:31
  spiritual director for you and your family.
• 21:33
  So they help you implement a plan of life.
• 21:35
  And I found it to be very, very edifying.
• 21:39
  You know, there was there's one particular opportunity that we
• 21:41
  had that we we were invited by the the senior fellows or the
• 21:45
  senior man to do one of our circles.
• 21:47
  They call him a circle every month on one of these guys yacht
• 21:51
  and I was like, oh, wow, this can be interesting.
• 21:53
  So like, I'm going to definitely make time to do this.
• 21:55
  So we go out, we're on, you know, on the the Hudson, doing
• 21:58
  our circle late at night. And these guys who are very
• 22:00
  successful, they're on hedge funds.
• 22:02
  They're very like financially smart and just like everything
• 22:06
  like very at the top of the food chain, if you will, right?
• 22:09
  Literally in the place like New York City finance cap of the
• 22:11
  world. They are the people at the top
• 22:14
  and they're talking about their spiritual lives and they're
• 22:16
  being vulnerable. And one guy convinced me.
• 22:19
  He didn't even try to convince me.
• 22:20
  He was just explaining how he went to daily mass every single
• 22:22
  day while he was working on Wall Street, like working super
• 22:26
  stressful jobs. And I was like, if he could do
• 22:29
  it and I don't have AI, don't have a Wall Street job, why
• 22:32
  can't I do it? So I was like, at that moment I
• 22:35
  decided I'm going to try to get to daily mass everyday that I
• 22:36
  can. And ever since then, it's just
• 22:39
  so, so it's very inspiring to meet these people and people
• 22:42
  like Steve. If if you've not already heard
• 22:44
  of Steve, I would highly recommend checking out his
• 22:45
  books. He has three books now, but one
• 22:47
  of them is about his story of founding.
• 22:50
  I, I don't know exactly know what they call it, but the book
• 22:53
  is called The Missionary of Wall Street.
• 22:55
  And at Old Saint Pat's in, in Manhattan, they start doing this
• 23:00
  thing now. I think it's in the Holy Week.
• 23:03
  And I believe it's one week during Advent where they
• 23:05
  position missionaries for, I think a 12 or 8 or 12 block
• 23:09
  radius around the church. And they're basically on the
• 23:12
  street corner trying to hand out rotaries and trying to get
• 23:14
  people to go light a candle in the church.
• 23:16
  And in the church, they've got a priest stationed there just
• 23:18
  doing confessions the whole time, right?
• 23:20
  They're just trying to bring people who have been touched by
• 23:23
  the faith in some way back into the faith.
• 23:25
  And he, as this guy who was again, by all means the top of
• 23:29
  the food chain financially and successful, was out there doing
• 23:32
  this. He started it kind of on its
• 23:35
  own. Then he got group people
• 23:36
  together and they they grew this and I don't even know how many
• 23:38
  people they've touched through this, but to see somebody have
• 23:41
  the humility to do that, you know, the kind of person who
• 23:44
  would usually end up being, you know, hold around in some, you
• 23:47
  know, black suburban or whatever, like all the time.
• 23:50
  Like he's willing to be there with the people because Christ
• 23:53
  was with the people of Christ was way more important than any
• 23:55
  of us. But yet he was there with the
• 23:56
  with the lowliest of the low. That to me was inspiring.
• 23:59
  So that was a bit of a tangent, but that's kind of a little bit
• 24:02
  about the about the Lumen Institute.
• 24:04
  Not a tangent, so do you know who was behind the Lumen
• 24:07
  Institute? I don't know who officially runs
• 24:10
  it per SE, but it was founded again, I think Steve was one of
• 24:13
  the founders. And there's other people like if
• 24:16
  I'm not mistaken, the the one of the one of the Co founders is
• 24:21
  the founder of The Carlyle Group I believe.
• 24:22
  So there's a lot of finance guys.
• 24:24
  It's very large in the Northeast area.
• 24:27
  I think they have a couple chapters in Florida and Texas
• 24:32
  but don't quote me on that. I'm not super plugged into the
• 24:35
  top levels. OK, cool.
• 24:38
  So from 1, from 1 solopreneur to another, I'm just wondering what
• 24:42
  what's your plan of financial stability through this?
• 24:46
  Are you hoping to make this your main your main hustle?
• 24:51
  Yeah, so I mean, the, the way I actually pay the bills is I run
• 24:54
  a recruitment consultancy called Earth Tech Talent.
• 24:57
  That's just, you know, it's what I've done for, for I had done it
• 25:00
  for 4 1/2 years and I decided, hey, it was about time I start
• 25:03
  my own. So I ended up starting my own
• 25:04
  about a year and a half ago. That's how I paid the bills.
• 25:07
  And then I run Catholic founders.
• 25:08
  So yeah, I, I don't really know exactly where I'm called to go
• 25:12
  with this. My, my gut tells me that in
• 25:15
  order to achieve the, the life I want and the things I want to be
• 25:19
  able to build for my kids and, and the kind of the legacy, if
• 25:22
  you will, I believe I'll continue running the recruitment
• 25:25
  consultancy because it's a very good business and grow it to a
• 25:28
  point where hopefully it can provide jobs or at least income
• 25:32
  for, you know, many, many of my family members in the future.
• 25:34
  I look at people like the Zignago family in, in Milwaukee,
• 25:39
  who they have, I mean, I don't even know, probably like 50 or
• 25:44
  60 of their family employed by this company that makes cement
• 25:47
  and they've been huge donors to the local, to the local church
• 25:50
  there. That's kind of what I would like
• 25:51
  to build. So I think that you need to do
• 25:52
  that through AI. Guess you could say a standard
• 25:55
  business, if Catholic founders could be the main thing someday,
• 25:58
  maybe that that would be, that would be amazing because it's
• 26:00
  the thing I get the most passionate about.
• 26:02
  It's the thing I spend way too much time on.
• 26:04
  Like it, like I don't have the time to do it, but I end up
• 26:06
  making the time to do it anyways because I just love it.
• 26:09
  I love learning these things and I'm very, very obsessed with
• 26:12
  understanding how we do this well.
• 26:14
  So I don't know, man. Like I think it's kind of in
• 26:16
  God's hands. I'm what I'm trying to turn it
• 26:18
  into right now. Is that the first stop for any
• 26:21
  Catholic business owner or entrepreneur or even aspiring
• 26:24
  entrepreneur where there's places like scent network, scent
• 26:27
  ventures, which I believe are doing incredible work to have
• 26:30
  these small groups for successful CE OS to or, or
• 26:33
  founders to, to really go deep in their faith.
• 26:37
  And I think that is a really needed, that's a really needed
• 26:41
  service. We need this kind of
• 26:42
  organization and, and the capital that goes along with it.
• 26:46
  We need that and we need places like Lugatu.
• 26:48
  So just for more for the professional world, you don't
• 26:50
  have to have started the company, but you got to be, you
• 26:52
  know, senior executives. We need all these things, but we
• 26:54
  also need the top of funnel. If you are kind of like the YCP
• 26:57
  was for, you know, all Catholic young people to get in and then
• 27:02
  to get deeper into a particular group so that their faith
• 27:04
  becomes really rooted. We need the same thing for the
• 27:07
  business side. And that's what I'm trying to
• 27:08
  build is anybody who's a Catholic business owner or
• 27:11
  founder or wants to be, they can come here.
• 27:13
  There's going to be some resources, there's going to be a
• 27:15
  great group of people and anybody can afford it.
• 27:17
  It's 100 bucks a year to join this paid membership.
• 27:19
  So literally like nobody can complain about that, but we'll
• 27:22
  get them in and then we'll try to funnel them to where they
• 27:24
  belong to a, a group that will go much deeper with them and
• 27:27
  give them more resources and help them grow.
• 27:29
  But we need to have some sort of like organizing function.
• 27:31
  And that's, that's what I'm trying to do with Catholic
• 27:33
  founders. Whether they're or not, that's
• 27:35
  what God exactly wants me to do. I'm not 100% sure, you know, we
• 27:38
  take it day by day, but that's the goal with it.
• 27:40
  It's just really grow this. And if it turns into more Amen.
• 27:44
  But at the bare minimum, I love learning from all these
• 27:48
  entrepreneurs because I can then implement those things into the
• 27:50
  way I run my business more. What do people get out of the
• 27:54
  $100 a year subscription? It's a great question.
• 27:57
  Currently, we have monthly membership calls and we're going
• 28:00
  to be starting very soon. We're going to be having once a
• 28:04
  month at least unique discussion topics where we'll we'll talk
• 28:07
  about one particular thing. We'll get anybody who wants to
• 28:09
  attend who's a member on the group and we'll have a prompt,
• 28:12
  maybe we'll have somebody present on it who's a bit of an
• 28:14
  expert. I think we're pretty soon we're
• 28:16
  going to do 1 about AI and we'll just talk about this one thing.
• 28:20
  And from it you obviously make make friends.
• 28:23
  You make you meet other founders in this space.
• 28:24
  I think I don't even know actually know the number, but a
• 28:27
  lot of the business owners in Catholic founders have done
• 28:30
  business with each other. So it's a place to find
• 28:32
  business. I wouldn't suggest people come
• 28:34
  for that reason. I would suggest people come for
• 28:36
  camaraderie and to be surrounded by people of your kind.
• 28:39
  Because for me, I grew up in the middle of nowhere Wisconsin.
• 28:44
  It was really difficult to find ambitious business people who
• 28:47
  were also Catholic. You can find ambitious business,
• 28:49
  ambitious business people and very Catholic people.
• 28:52
  But finding the two of those things is very challenging.
• 28:55
  And when you do find it, it just motivates you.
• 28:57
  It gets you going and gets you like really excited to get out
• 28:59
  of bed during the hard days. You can, you're somebody you can
• 29:02
  talk to and there's just so many resources there.
• 29:04
  So one other thing that comes with it is there's, we have a
• 29:06
  directory of members. So it's like, hey, you know,
• 29:08
  maybe I need a plumber or something like I go check the
• 29:11
  directory. Like is there somebody in my, in
• 29:12
  my area? But that's the core thing.
• 29:15
  And we'll be adding, adding more paid content as well.
• 29:18
  But that's the core kind of aspect of it is that camaraderie
• 29:21
  with other people who share the same ambition and you can meet
• 29:24
  them and, and just learn of them and do business with with each
• 29:26
  other. Anything else you want to share
• 29:29
  with our audience, Alice? No, I would just say if anybody
• 29:33
  is on the precipice or thought they think that they want to
• 29:37
  start a business, or maybe they never, maybe never even thought
• 29:39
  about starting a business, but you're as a Catholic, you're
• 29:42
  frustrated with how things are going in the corporate world for
• 29:44
  you, you know, it's difficult. You don't have time for your
• 29:46
  family or they, they don't respect, you know, the ability
• 29:49
  that you want to take holy days of obligation or whatnot.
• 29:52
  Really ask yourself if God is calling you to be an
• 29:54
  entrepreneur because as we, we glossed over at the beginning,
• 29:58
  each of us is created with the in the image and likeness of
• 30:02
  God. And that doesn't mean how we
• 30:04
  look, right? That's not about our our looks,
• 30:06
  it's about our nature and our nature is is a Co creator within
• 30:10
  the bounds that God has given us.
• 30:13
  So and think about this too. A lot of people who are really
• 30:16
  good Catholics are very, very family oriented.
• 30:19
  In Genesis, there's 2 two things that are said in in one
• 30:21
  sentence, right? Be fruitful, multiply and subdue
• 30:24
  the earth. Those are in one sentence.
• 30:26
  That's kind of like the core human calling is to have
• 30:29
  families and basically build is is effective what it is right?
• 30:32
  We're going to subdue the earth. We're going to be builders of
• 30:35
  some sort. We find fulfillment through
• 30:37
  those things. And through those two things, we
• 30:39
  also come closer to God. I have learned more in eight
• 30:42
  months or 8 1/2 months of being a father than a lot of my life.
• 30:45
  Because the things that your children end up teaching you
• 30:48
  about yourself or about your relationship to God are massive.
• 30:50
  The same thing is true entrepreneurship.
• 30:52
  The things that you learn through being an entrepreneur.
• 30:54
  If you're having to trust in God, it's it's, it's incredible.
• 30:57
  So I would encourage anybody to really think about that.
• 31:00
  If God is calling you to something, why aren't you
• 31:03
  willing to trust him, right? Don't do things in a very silly
• 31:06
  kind of non thoughtful way. But if God is calling you to
• 31:09
  something, first of all ask if he is.
• 31:11
  And then if he is, just follow him.
• 31:12
  He will. He will lead you to whatever it
• 31:14
  is that he's calling it to if you're willing to cooperate with
• 31:17
  him. Just you know, you got to like
• 31:19
  relax on that river as it rushes down or even over the Rapids and
• 31:23
  over the waterfall. Feels like care of you though.
• 31:26
  Quit your job and be your own boss.
• 31:27
  It's worth it. A. 100% it's so worth it for
• 31:31
  anybody who like a lot of people say this, but one thing I'd like
• 31:34
  to give as an example is even if you make less money doing your
• 31:37
  own thing compared to working for somebody else, the you can't
• 31:41
  quantify, it's not possible to quantify the value of having
• 31:45
  your own schedule and being able to go to daily mass to spend
• 31:47
  time with your family when they need you like that is
• 31:50
  invaluable. There is no amount of money that
• 31:52
  you can put on that. And if you want to build a
• 31:54
  strong family, you want to be there for your family.
• 31:56
  You, you should consider finding a way to at least be, you know,
• 31:59
  self-employed. And it also forces you.
• 32:01
  We found Dan and I were talking about this.
• 32:03
  It forces you to dig deep into use virtue to learn and to, to
• 32:08
  grow because you are the one who's got to put food on the
• 32:11
  table. You're the one who's got to go
• 32:12
  and, and work hard and it forces you to get better.
• 32:14
  So I'm a big fan of it. It's a it's a good virtue growth
• 32:18
  hack as well. Teaches you how to be a man.
• 32:21
  100%. Thank you, Silas.
• 32:24
  Keep crushing it. Thank.
• 32:25
  You, man, it's been a pleasure. Thanks for listening.
• 32:27
  Please like, subscribe and share with your friends.
• 32:30
  See you next time.