two one and we are live i'm here with pine sap pines how's it going i can't see i want to see you bigger on the screen how can we make that happen um do i need to click on you oh there you are yeah maybe if you click on me okay i think i think specso is in control of the situation and now you're big now i'm big yes nice to see your face good to see hey good to see your face david can you actually see me on your screen i can only see you which is good for my uh good for my stream oh no i didn't see you i could see everybody good good good good so uh listen you uh your pine sap griper is that your uh your handle that's that's my handle i mostly go by pine sap uh not not because i'm definitely a graper without a uh without a hint of doubt but um i kind of i kind of do pine sap more just to keep it like kind of general apologetics and maybe appeal to maybe non-gropers as well as scrapers just so it's like a kind of general apologetics thing have you ever tried retzina it's the greek resonated wine made with red red cena it's made with pine sap oh dang oh you know what i think i've heard of it i've never tried that before that's amazing yeah yeah you got to try it it's delicious i mean if you're not a snob you can have it with coca-cola that's how i drink it oh that sounds pretty good hey i ain't no snob and i love coca-cola so they do it in greece that's how they do it in greece my wife my wife is greek and we lived in greece for about a year and the food's amazing and uh you know i'm not a big drinker of alcohol but uh i sampled a few of their wares and so what's your background uh ethnically so i am mostly um you know i've never done like a 23andme or anything like that but from what i know i'm mostly i'm mostly in anglo um and and french um i have quite a bit of german in me and i uh got a fair percentage of irish in me as well there's a couple other smaller ethnicities in there i i even have a little bit of uh uh native american and me choctaw and i believe cherokee but that's a very very small amount like one or two percent mostly anglo and french though ah cause i've had people stop me and say oh you have uh some native american because of the shape of my cheekbones and stuff like that and they said chippewa or whatever it was um but ojibwe i think is another way of saying that but uh i did the i did my dna test a couple times i have mixed confidence in the natural sciences and speczo and i talked about this a little bit but you know i studied the hard sciences i studied physics and you know i have some confidence in our ability to reason in this fallen world but um the dna results were all like uh the the british isles and scandinavia a bit of germany and just a smidge of greek which made my wife happy that's terrific but uh so i like to get a little bit of background like where are you from how were you raised when did you start believing in god were you always christian were you always catholic just sketch the journey if you don't mind just so i can get to know you and my listeners can get to know you a little bit yeah absolutely so uh where i'm raised i'm just for the sake of privacy i'm gonna kind of be a little generic with it just so i don't completely tox myself um but essentially i'm in a i'm i'm in kind of like a mountain standard time state um i live live you know close to the mountains and stuff like that and um i man i i've lived in the same state my entire life um i was born in kind of like a main suburb um outline like the the capital city of my state and then when i was about three i moved to uh uh kind of the sticks still in a suburb but like it's so like kind of rural i really kind of consider it like the the sticks for all intensive purposes like yeah we have running water and stuff like that but i can be like in five seconds i could be back in the woods in um just complete and total unadultered wilderness and it is amazing that's actually where my handle pine sap comes from is i love the woods i love the mountains it's always been such an integral part of my life and so i i just wanted to express that love in my name um as much for my background i i was born uh in the uh for religious i was born in the episcopal church of america and i'm not sure you know you coming from canada david you're probably familiar quite a bit with the anglicans and stuff like that so you totally you like know the connection there um it's very liberal it's like a garbage fire honestly um i remember growing up and and my parents gave me most of my religious formation as well as um some of kind of my southern baptist family members and um you know i believed uh that everything i i don't think i ever denied that everything in the bible actually happened i think i al always believed that like noah's flood happened and that everything always occurred but i definitely was kind of nominally christian it was like oh yeah the bible's cool and all and you know jesus loves everybody and that sort of thing but i never uh kind of endeavored deeper and then when i when i kind of got to middle school i got really into like eastern philosophy and stuff like that and you know kind of the the interest there i was a huge listener to uh the band nirvana and i saw kurt cobain's like you know journey and stuff like that and how he was really into buddhism and stuff like that so i embraced um i embraced almost this horrible like religious syncretism for a while between like buddhism and christianity where i literally said that like you could choose to either go to heaven or be reincarnated because i was just making stuff up at this point um and then roughly when i was in my sophomore year of high school i really hit a really like bad bad bad bad like patch in my life and i just like did not have any like real rhyme or reason to like why i wanted to be alive or anything like that i was like nothing really seemed to matter nothing really seemed to make sense everything seemed like fake and like it would fade tomorrow and i was like what is like actually static in this world and i can't remember how but i think it was due to the fact that that was kind of when the culture war was really starting to like rise up and stuff like that and i saw especially people hating on you know christianity especially and i became obsessed you know i was always very patriotic so i kind of became obsessed with like oh what are the like christian roots of this nation and stuff like that and i actually started to read the bible and i was like i was blown away like my life was changed forever when i actually like picked up the bible i'm like jesus is not like the sandal-wearing like hippie that i thought he was he's like tough he's a he's a king he's a you know a priest a prophet and a king right and he's like actually like cool i like i love jesus and he's like mad like massively like a warrior in my life and stuff like that and it made me like excited to like get invested in christianity so i stopped calling myself episcopalian pretty later on when i realized that that kind of was a designation for being pretty liberal so i i then started to uh call myself anglican because that was kind of like the more traditional like designator and stuff like that but um by the time like high school ended and stuff like that i really started to take religious study very seriously especially my freshman college year and like anglicanism wasn't really lining up for me anymore like the the fact is is like the institutional anglican church is just like completely like doesn't even really believe in god anymore and says well maybe god's a woman or doesn't exist or this or that or the other thing um you know when jesus isn't white or you know something like you know trying to do all this like crazy and goofy stuff and you know there was the like anglo-catholic movement that was like more kind of tradition-minded anglicans that were a lot more reverent and pious but it it like there was a there was a heavy level of sadness that permeated everything it was like everything felt like it was falling into decay and it wasn't able to keep up with the forces of this world and you know it really got me thinking i'm like is this really what i where where i'm meant to be right and um you know i encountered when i when i came to college uh honestly catholicism for the like first time in a serious way you know the only thing i knew about catholics growing up was oh yeah that's that like old religious denomination from europe and i've like known maybe one person who called themselves catholic ones and oh yeah like pedophile priests and all that right and i was just i was super irreverent and and and i i i thought i hated catholicism and stuff like that and there was like a good reason why the anglicans like broke off and like i just was so filled with like hate and rage but then like when i started to look into the catholic church and especially my interactions with like medieval history and the crusades i was like this is like excuse my language with badass like this is awesome this is so cool and i didn't like anglicanism anymore really it seemed kind of like really like uh weak and effeminate and stuff like that and didn't seem like kind of like how i would ever imagine christianity but like catholicism gave me like everything i could have ever wanted and i i literally i tell this story every single time i talk about like my religious backing or something the moment that br it broke for me was when i realized that there were seven books missing from the protestant bible or at least the king james version of the bible and i literally called my friend mike who is a a former anglican like me i called them and i said mike buddy you got to tell me are there seven books missing from my bible and he's like yes pine sap yes there are and i like put down the phone i put like my my hands and my head or my head and my hands and i'm just like that i'm i'm done like i literally the next day said i'm converting i i it was almost like night and day for me i didn't even put up a fight at that point i was like this is like thoroughly convincing to me so that's kind of the long short of like my background and stuff like that very interesting so uh talk a little bit about if you know to the extent that you're comfortable about the reaction of the family during your voyage where you're keeping them up to date on your uh journey or was it a purely private thing and you weren't sharing so much with siblings and parents and uh what what do your siblings and parents believe today yeah so that's a great question um you know when i was still anglican and i was becoming a lot more religious um my my family actually loved it um they were um really really like emphatic about it and stuff like that they're like oh this is so awesome and stuff like that and i think they liked it because i was kind of getting away from like my more emo edgy phase of you know i'm gonna be a bad boy and like break bottles and stuff like that um and so really that that was welcomed um when i initially said i wanted to convert there there was a lot of tears exchanged there was a lot of um sadness um on the part of my family because i think i think for them it felt like i was going to be like separated from them or i was i was like repudiating maybe our family heritage or something like that because i mean we're we're anglican going back to like the eight like the mayflower and like when it originally started right so that's like quite a heritage to kind of like give up all of a sudden and i think it was really difficult for them um my mom especially had had known a lot of former catholics and had known like a lot of lapsed catholics and stuff like that i think it really gave her sort of um a sour taste for the church and stuff like that based on what she was hearing um and so it was it was really hard the beginning of it but i just kind of told them i was like i i have to do this like i i know this is true i have to follow where god is pointing me because if i don't like my life is meaningless and i have to do this and so when i when i told them like i got to do this they were like all right i you know we fully support you we love you and stuff like that it didn't mean it wasn't still difficult for them um but i i think that they really showed me such fantastic love being supportive of me becoming catholic and stuff like that even as hard as it was for them um in terms of my how much they knew about my journey i think that they knew for a while that i was i was delving more into anglicanism but i think when i suddenly said that i wanted to become catholic that was maybe a little bit of a shock um and i think that definitely kind of threw them off a little bit um but once i said that and and i think the dust had settled they they learned um to to accept that this was something that i needed to do and i i love them all the more for doing that i know how much how hard it was for them yeah i often think about thanks for sharing that by the way but i often think about those who are going along to get along for example the lukewarm husband of a devout catholic wife uh he'll drive her to mass i've seen this many times driver to mass pick her up for mass he's not arguing with her sometimes he may even go to mass with her and uh this is a very common thing in in canada where the wife is devout and the husband is lukewarm and i just wonder uh and they're also people that just belong to a certain denomination or religion for that matter just because that's what the family does and they don't it's just a social thing and people like you people like me uh speczo and others um who i this is not to put ourselves higher but there's a certain predisposition that people like us have where we love the truth uh in that sort of socratic way and we are willing to sacrifice everything for the truth and it seems to me that there are many paths to heaven but there's no no salvation possible outside of the catholic church obviously but there are many paths to get there but it seems to me that um the love of truth that's awakened in us for me it was as a teenager um the love of truth that's awakened in us uh seems like the the surest path and the most explicit path to god and true religion because you examine the fundamental beliefs that you carried with you from childhood you question the assumptions and the axioms and uh it seems like we are on a privileged path i'm not i'm not saying that we're perfect or we're not sinners and all that sort of thing but it's a privileged path to have the gift of god to have that pure love of truth can you just comment on that and contrast it maybe with someone who goes along to gets along and has a more winding winding path to the one true religion yeah so it's it's one of those things where it's like and i don't want to mean this with like any level of pride in my heart but i almost like can't understand that perspective a little bit because for me it's like if i see people every single day who have this like kind of emptiness in their eyes and have this like emptiness in their heart and they're like i don't like like they're just saying to themselves i don't know what to do with my life and i don't know why i'm here and i don't know what i'm doing where i'm going like what's going on right and for me it's like people who sort of have this like lukewarm attitude to meaning i'm like how could you even get out of bed in the morning honestly like if if there was no meaning to life why do anything you know i mean everything at that point is just like chemicals firing off in your brain that might make you feel good for a passing moment but it's like there's nothing in the long shot right and and so when i see especially catholics that are lukewarm and i don't mean catholics that are on fire but are sinners and are struggling i'm that's the box i fit into i'm a massive sinner and i struggle a lot but i i love god with all my heart and i and i try to get up every day even after i fall um but like people who just seem like maybe they're not even massive sinners maybe they're actually pretty like saintly in terms of their like personal virtue they don't really you know curse a lot they're not really engaging like sexual sins or anger or hatred or envy or something like that but just seeing kind of like even keel or something it's like you literally have the meaning of everything in your lap why are you just sitting there you know it's like even if you're even if you have to start off slow start off slow but it's like run with it it's like a kite like why not make that kite fly why not make that meaning fly in your life you know and and so it's like i have a lot of empathy for people but that's the one perspective i've never been able to understand is like you literally have the truth at your disposal you know it like run with it you know take that kite take that trolley ride and just go with it you know what i mean yeah get excited people it's just like the the analogy that i use and it's uh i think it's a very apt one is that little spark of faith that we're given when we have these moments of conversion i can remember to this day the very moment i went from atheist to monotheist and i said yes by the grace of god i said yes to that grace and the analogy i've always used from that moment onward is that this little spark is delicate it's fragile and i have to nurture this into a small flame and hopefully into a raging fire even jesus said that he wishes that the you know the fire would just consume the whole world the fire of this passion for the truth and goodness that is god and um and jesus was god so you can imagine the the burning desire that he had for our conversion and our ongoing struggle to uh leave aside the tawdry pleasures and our our little selfish uh sins that we cling to i mean i do i cling to my little sins because i'm sort of half-hearted about my faith i want to have my worldliness and please my wife and i also want to please god and it's it's a sort of uh i'm like hobbling myself by not just being completely uh 100 to striving to please god all the time and it's it's it's a work in progress and uh the the point i'm making here is that you know we have to advance we have to strive to advance in our faith if we're not advancing we're we are back sliding would you agree with that absolutely 100 if if we're not going back to the cross every single day we're walking away from it and we're abandoning it um you know if you if you slow down if you um say uh you know what this isn't for me or something like that you're just gonna you're just gonna lose it you know um and it's almost why i've i've gotten to the point where i think me and speczo have actually talked about this before like i still enjoy secular things you know i i still appreciate like a good show once in a while and stuff like that but like i can't even like hardly watch tv anymore i can't hardly watch movies not even like in a in a sort of like oh well i'm so over it or something like that you know kind of a pompous like haughtiness it's that like i literally can't enjoy them it's like boring you know i i i'm like i'm almost like watching um there's a really good analogy you know and it's that really good image that plato paints for us plato's cave right where it's like i've seen the sunlight and like i don't want to go back into the cave and like watch the reflections on the wall anymore it's it's just it's boring it's not even bor well it's not even boring it's like awful it's like you know i don't need to watch the the latest marvel movie coming out anymore i i don't need to watch um you know this new tv show or something like that not because i'm better than anyone who does quite the opposite but it's just more that like the truth is cool you know like there is so much to learn and to explore in in what god has created for us and in who he is and it's like just kind of um i might be getting a little off the rails here but just kind of like going back to the cave doesn't seem at all to be an appealing event like endeavor for me anymore you know and almost to like keep up that carrying of the cross i i've progressively started to kind of like strip away that fat a little bit um you know i'm to the point where i think when i come back to like college next year i'm gonna see if i maybe don't bring my tv with me you know or i unplug it and like shove it to the side or maybe i um you know i get rid of my smartphone eventually and i downgrade to like a flip phone you know just even little things that like make me say okay i'm cutting off the root here i'm i'm turning off the fountain to all these distractions and all that should be left is me loving god and praying 100 and we have to remember that even in plato's cave that analogy of the cave it is a system of slavery it is an evil demonic system of slavery we can't forget that it's not just a question of i like tomatoes and you don't and you can go ahead and enjoy your tomato soup and i like broccoli no it's this the slavery of the system satan is the prince of this world he's hypnotizing us mesmerizing us or trying to and he's very clever at it and very subtle and the you know big big everything is in cahoots wittingly or unwittingly let's hope unwittingly for the sake of their eternal souls but it's a prison system and uh i think it's almost impossible to not be in the system but we can't be of the system this is what jesus said right be in the world but not of the world that's the delicate balance we need to take but um that slavery that gray cave with the shadow dancing and on the walls we have to liberate those people and show them the fresh air and the sunlight and again not to have this messiah complex where we are so clear-sighted and all these sorts of things we too are slaves of satan but we've been liberated by by grace and by christ and uh the fascinating thing about our journey towards heaven is that it's full of intrigue and twists and turns and betrayals not by god towards us but from us to god like we betray god every time we get distracted and allow ourselves to lust after food or women or whatever it is so it's an ongoing battle it's a very interesting uh struggle that each and every one of us is undergoing and the the evil powers that run this world want us to go back to sleep and forget about that eternal battle between good and evil that's that really is the the good part of you could just talk just a little bit about the nightmare situation from your perspective i don't know uh how you feel about it um you're probably like me uh and uncooperative with the tyrants but i i'll let you talk about your perspective on that and then we'll move on to more uh uh religious topics yeah so massive l i wish i was on unfortunately i did get originally the not because i i believed it it was kind of a complicated reason and stuff like that i don't have the thank goodness but if i pass away because of the i just hope that before that time happens that i can i can give something back to people it was awful i and i i'm completely against the in its entirety it just was a it was a complicated endeavor almost um but the funny thing about was that was the time at which i converted actually because i um so a lot of people don't know this i'm not a or you know i haven't actually been like a catholic for too long i've been a catholic for about a year wow officially and i would say that um i wanted to almost become catholic even a year before that um and really that started with the fact that like because knocked everything down you know and we weren't going outside and we weren't really like distracted with kind of like the pleasures of life too much anymore i think it like really allowed time for a lot of like introspection right because i mean in those first few months i remember those first like three months i would say before things started to progressively kind of open back up a little bit it was so like locked down and restricted and and just you know not functioning that you know i i it had such um a profound effect on us really looking inward and having kind of that silence to really like listen to what our heart um was was construed with or conflicting with or where it was going and i think during that time um i i really had a lot of time to like sit down and really think about like all this stuff is gone that i like cared about i got distracted by and going these parties and stuff like that like what do what do i do now you know and like what really is the measure of of life because i think that you know people who are kind of like agnostic or a religious they suffered a lot during because it was like this world for all intents and purposes is all that they have right so when everything got knocked down for them it was like shoot well i i guess we're just gonna suffer you know um there wasn't this level of like comfort to it but in a sense i think for for for people like me it was like job you know it really was like joke being like stripped away of like all the things that he had had and all his comforts and all his possessions and stuff like that and just saying all that's left is the spirit and i want to give my spirit over to god you know father receive my spirit and that's really i think how it affected me um in terms of my state the restrictions were not as bad as it was in other parts of the country oh my goodness canada you guys like and i'm in quebec i mean quebec is the worst of the worst oh my goodness dude and and quebec like how it went from being so awesomely catholic back in the day yeah then just being like literally the most liberal place in the world and seemingly like all of canada it's like that is such a fall from grace so like for all intents and purpose purposes you experience the like worse than i did in fact i remember basically um the red county that i live in and i have grown up in like as soon as they realized everything was a bunch of bull they were like dude we're not like wearing these and stuff like that we're just gonna go like hang out and i i got to the point where i was like i'm not honestly scared of this anymore and when i got everyone was like freaking out and they're like dude you got how do you feel and i was like like thank goodness i did oh my goodness this was such a like overblown thing it was like the flu and actually i as you know david we had to reschedule because like last week i got it again and i'm just coming off of the the the slump and it was a little worse this time but like even then i'm like dude like it's not that bad man you know it really goes to show you that like the elites that wanted to lock everything down and shut everything down they had other purposes you know this was not a public health scare or nightmare it was just that they wanted to use this to affect what they they could have with like more time and stuff like that you know yeah i read close schwab's book i didn't complete it drivel but he says it's the least deadly pandemic in 2000 years but it's a good opportunity to implement all these forward-thinking things for the climate change and all these sorts of things so um you know they know they know that it's just opportunism and they know that it's a lot of smoke and mirrors using fear to control people and uh i'm i'm apolitical i've been a political my whole life i'm just a catholic now that i'm you know now that i'm religious that is that gives me my center and my my standard of truth and goodness and it gives me my principles it gives me everything but prior to that you know as an atheist and just sort of my principle at that point was the principles of satanism do it that wilt shall be the whole of the law and my my will be done in this very simple it's a very simple way of life and uh you know you also know as a satanist that there are consequences to your actions and that there are other beings ostensibly other beings that have their own will and it could be a battle of the wills you have to pick your battles and these sorts of things but i think it is the most popular religion in the world is satanism because it's not explicitly referred to as satanism but a lot of christians you see in the pews even at a catholic church are in love with their religion which is my will be done and you know i'll give some lip service to god also why not right i mean it's part of my culture it's part of my family tradition and yes i'll go and i'll bend the knee to christ but ultimately it's my will not god's will and i'm wearing my saint augustine shirt he's one of my favorite saints oh if you can see it that's good but uh he says in the city of god there are two cities characterized by two loves love of self unto contempt of god or love of god unto contempt of self those are the two world religions and all the little labels and this and that uh are really distractions from those uh ultimate fundamental options right they are and the fathers talk about how every thing that is not the worship of god in his church is the worship of satan and that's completely true you know every schism every heresy every false religion it's it's the worship of satan at the end of the day you know what i mean it's like you know there's the this distinct verse in in the book of amos uh in the old testament where um i i haven't read through um that part of scripture completely yet but i remember timothy flanders on meaning of catholic referring to it and it's god telling um telling who uh i i i think it's amos or or whoever is giving him worship he says what you offer like all the incense you offer to me is smoke like i don't care about it um you know and it's it's meaningless right and so that's how every false religion schism or heresy is it's like you're you're not working for god you're working for satan you know i love the psalm i forget which psalm it was where god says i i'm going to use a latino accent for this i don't need your stinking sacrifices you know he's like i don't if i were hungry i wouldn't tell you you know i i don't need all the rams and the bulls and the sheep they're mine okay don't get too excited about these offerings you're making to me i forget which solomon is but it's very powerful it's like hey you're missing the point of religion guys you know like it's not about sacrifice it's about obedience right amen and act self-sacrificial love so uh you know i often talk about this on my podcast the difference between faith and religion and it's it's shown to us in the old testament and in the new testament uh the stark difference between hypocritical religiosity which is easy to lean on because it's just easier to have your checklist like yeah i went to mass went to confession i did this i fasted like for this many days i did this i did that and god mocks those also who are doing their fasting for their own ego and to please the world god mocks those people too like are you sure you're fasting for me because it seems like you're fasting for yourself and for your you know to uh for your status in the community these sorts of things god is not stupid he sees through all our religious hypocrisy but to have faith to walk in faith to be like a child to to come to christ humbly and uh with innocence oh my god how can we how can we have a remnant just a sliver today of innocence even in a child when we have an education system in canada and i think in the us that is actively corrupting the youth with perverted sexual teaching right it's like it's it's how can we how can we do it it's like a miracle that we have young men like you how old are you 20 23 i'm 21. 21 young men like you making a commitment to i'm assuming a commitment to chastity if not celibacy but chastity and maybe a vocation to marriage or maybe a single life or priesthood i don't know we'll talk about that but how can it be that in this hellish fallen world where pornography dominates uh even walking down the street in montreal i see billboards with women showing me their rump derrieres and it's attractive but i have to avert my eyes from an advertisement for clothing because they're not selling they're not selling clothing they're selling young well-formed women who are basically acting like horrors and this is another thing that god talks about in the old testament a lot how we the people of god are acting like [ __ ] like we're we're just giving it away uh you know uh spreading our legs to ever pass every passerby as he says you know uh and he's talking specifically about the chosen people the jews the israelites but um this this connection between idolatry and adultery is very fascinating in the old testament you see it time and time again it's one of the easiest idols to worship is that uh intimacy idol sexual sexuality and i'm very concerned about the young people today getting confused about gender so-called gender i'm concerned about pornography people being exposed very young i was exposed to pornography at about 14 and that's when i lost my faith and i interviewed a guy and i told him just a little bit about my how i lost my faith because of puberty and sexuality and he said yeah i was on my way to becoming a priest and i was having erotic thoughts while i was praying the rosary and i tried to fight it off and i said well what if i just give in to it and then get it out of my system and so he tried that route and he's now an atheist and he's he's a happy atheist he thinks that he's found the true way you know he thinks he's found he he's he's realized that christ is a liar lunatic or a legend or all three and that there is no god and that he's just an ape and that masturbation is good and whatever it's just like he's right on board with with satan's agenda but he was there he wanted to be a priest so we have to be very careful with our faith we have to be especially careful about uh intimacy and sexuality so maybe it's just talk about that aspect if you would from your own experience and from your own readings and studies and prayer and your prayers yeah so um the main sin that i've i've always struggled with in my life is lust um a little bit of anger um i i'm kind of the thing with me is my anger's a little bit dangerous because i'm kind of a slow boil i don't really like um instantly get angry but when you know you kind of like build kind of build up a little bit you build up that heat and that pressure like i i blow my top and it it ain't good uh not that i've i've actually never gotten in a fight or anything like that but more so um i can get so angry that like i won't want someone in like my life anymore or something like that and i've had to uh some axe friendships before because i'm like i i just let it build up and it it you know always kind of results in this kind of cleaving away now part of that is probably that that friend i probably shouldn't be friends with to be completely honest it's more just be me being a little overly patient but um i've definitely struggled with that but lust permeates the biggest cross that i have to carry in my life um i was exposed to pornography when i was about 12 years old um and i didn't know what to make of it i almost instantly like hated it but at the same time it was like this um this thing that kept like calling me back it was it was this dark um like secret that i i had to struggle with um part of actually you know i shared my background and growing up part of the reason why i was experiencing such a bad depressive episode and even suicidal thoughts my sophomore year of high school was actually due to my pornography addiction because i was unbelievably ashamed of it um i was scared of getting in trouble i was scared of being seen as like a pervert or a or philanderer or what have you and i thought it would be easier for me to just die than have to deal with the shame of living with this anymore um and that is is really um a hard thing to to have to deal with um i wish i could say that those thoughts go away but they they still permeate a heavy level of life um and i'm not i'm not as out of the the situation as i would i would like to be it's it's still something i'm having to carry my cross through um pornography is evil and i think that the people that produce it need to be arrested and thrown in jail like actually for the entirety of their lives i think what they're doing is completely heinous um because it it destroys so many people's lives i mean you have these um you know women that they traffic uh in the porn industry they have um you know uh men who literally lose like their will to live or their or their flavor or zest for life you know kind of like i did um it's just so absolutely disgusting and it's like i mean honestly like these people need to you know just go away for a long time um and it's it's such a huge thing that we are having to deal with in the modern age i mean our lady of fatima talked about this and our and and uh when our lady appeared at um uh oh my goodness quito our lady of good successor of good fortune and our our mary at both uh apparitions talked about in this time purity is going to be the biggest thing that people struggle with um what with the advent of the internet what with just everything going on in kind of the general apparatus of our society it is such a unbelievable struggle that people are dealing with and it is just it's heinous you know it's a crime it's a travesty um i think the biggest thing that has helped me is honestly the the saints that have struggled with scrupulosity and i have a i have a particularly special devotion to one saint that i've i've talked about i i think before with spexo but saint andrew wuters who he's not you know he never wrote a book never wrote a treatise or something like that but saint andrew um was a dutch priest that was actually leia sized because he um uh uh i i conceived a couple children out of wedlock i was looking for the word but conceived a couple children out of wedlock uh with like multiple women and stuff like that and was totally leia's size i think was like even thrown out of his parish and one day he's like walking along and some calvinists are like well you need to renounce your allegiance to the pope or you're gonna die like it's it's these two options and he simply just responds to them he's like i uh he's like adulterer i i am heretic never and he was hung and he died instantly i went straight to heaven went straight to heaven went straight to heaven and it's like that that moment of like he he struggled with this addiction and this problem but yet he he affirmed ultimately his faith in god is just so powerful to me i i mean even peter who like there's this iconic and i don't know the painter or something but i i used it actually i think in the first like tick tock edit i ever made there's this painting of like peter on the sea as he's like drowning and you know christ like lifting him up out of the sea right and he's just like at the feet of christ and like looking him in the eyes and christ like has him in his arms and he's like i've got you and that just like hits me harder than any anything that i can ever like conceive with words i don't have i don't have words or anything from my heart to even compare to the beauty and love that comes from that wow amazing uh you've got a way with words you must be irish i mean so i i think i have quite a bit actually in me now that now i think about it yeah plus the anger that's an irish trait i'm irish scottish english welsh and oh like i said yeah scottish and irish oh you definitely got that anger yeah well it's like you it's like i'm just i'm just very very very even keeled but um yeah there you don't want to get that boiling point reached and it's very rare and a lot of the saints actually talk about this there were examples of the saints who i think it was possibly uh i won't take a guess at hooks i don't i don't want to miss tribute this to someone but one of my favorite saints was in a situation that was very controversial and a woman said to him like you should be angry about this this is an outrage and his basic answer was you want me to throw away in a few moments what's taken me 20 years to master my anger and you want me to just throw it away no i'm not going to i'm going to continue mastering my anger and there's a time and place for righteous anger and there are plenty of saints who have a righteous anger and that can wield it without the danger of falling into sin but he knew himself he knew his weaknesses he knew the danger of giving way to anger he's very good at being angry but not good at controlling it or having a righteous christ-like anger so he just said no i'm not going to throw away this i've mastered myself and i'm going to remain in control so it's interesting the idea we can learn from the saints is that they're all unique individuals they all have their strengths and weaknesses they all have a unique face recognizable we're going to recognize each and every saint in heaven and our friends and family and lo and behold we're going to recognize our enemies in heaven those who make it there right it's going to be fun it's going to be really a lot of fun to see some of our enemies in heaven absolutely and you know something that's so powerful is the power of forgiveness i the power of of of loving people despite um great odds i in in kind of our personal interactions with them i mean there's something so powerful about when we read in the new testament um i believe in the in the book of acts if i'm not mistaken the example of saint stephen who is the first martyr and the sanhedrin take him outside and there and they're stoning him and stuff like that but rather than like getting angry and getting crossed with them and what have you he says you know lord receive my spirit and he dies and he prays for forgiveness for their sake i i mean i i mentioned saint stephen what about our lord himself you know caiaphas mocking him while he's on the cross and he says if you truly are the son of god you'll come down and you'll you know establish the earthly paradise that you know i i i want you know to see you create on earth and the lord does not um act you know anger angerly or rash towards him he says father forgive them for they do not know and i think the closest times in my life where i've ever felt um an experience of like almost like is this what is this like what death feels like or like i feel like i'm like dying right now or something there's this like humbleness to it of like you realize how fr like how stupid really having anger is and and and you get so scared in that moment and you're like i don't wish this on like anybody like even my worst enemy i don't wish to feel this way um towards anybody or anything and and i just want to forgive them and it's like that experience is so profound in shaping a real like uh deep love in the very like pit of your soul in the very pit of your heart um is is understanding that it's like even my worst enemy that offends me i still love them and not to mention the people that we do love in our lives and and like make meaningful um experiences and connections and really just give life it zest its flavor its meaning like that is all connected back to christ and it's like blessed be god right yeah you you now know what it means to be the salt of the earth right it's that flavor that flavor and the saints exemplify that and we are called to be saints this is the universal call to holiness speaking of the universal call to holiness is a perfect segue into the 16 documents of vatican ii have you read any of them or parts of them oh yeah have i read them especially uh dignitatis humane is probably my my area of expertise okay i have i have read them and i gotta say i love them yeah uh i love them with all my heart i think there's it is such a holy council and i think as um i i haven't read his book yet but as cardinal mark owlette says it's still unfolding like the second vatican council is still unfolding mark wallett yeah no way yeah he he actually probably has one of the best books written on vatican 2. no way oh check that out if you want to check it out it's on ignatius press and i think it's called rediscovering the council and he talks um he writes for communio which is like a pretty good like orthodox catholic journal and he talks about like how it's it's so relevant to our time and what the council fathers wanted to accomplish in the world right um in fact mass of the ages i i watched it um i think i actually finished it today um but there was a really good quote from that movie when um they're talking about saint john the 23rd's quote saying that he wanted to open the windows right to the church everyone hears that quote and says oh he wanted to let in you know the bad stuff and the doom and the gloom and stuff like that it's like no he wanted to open the windows to let out the light from the church into the world he wanted to to make the entire world christian and you see this not only in saint john the 23rd's writings but you see in st paul vi writings you see it in cardinal john daniloo's writings in um cardinal ataviani's writings uh in oh my goodness uh jacquez maritan who i used to not like him but he's now like one of my favorite thinkers like there there's so there was such this like optimism of like we're gonna we're gonna make the world christian right and it was that post-world war two optimism of like europe's been shattered um and we need to rebuild we need to rebuild it with the crucifix at the center and helm of all of it and so it's just it's it's such a beautiful council i love it so much it's amazing it's amazing to me that young if i could use the word conservative or god forbid right-wing people are in love with vatican ii in love with the pope not only do they not only do you love the pope you actually like the pope right am i wrong i love every single pope that that will ever exist or will ever live i mean i i actually wanted to make a post on my telegram i don't even care if we had another borgia poe yeah i don't care if we had another benedict the ninth i would i would readily die at his feet if he needed me too if you're interested i did a an episode on my podcast called our sweet christ on earth and it's about uh it's about the dignity of the office but not only the dignity of the office the dignity of the human being who is pope and this includes the worst of the popes okay absolutely um and uh that quote is from saint catherine of siena when she was addressing the the pope of her day trying to to end that 70 year whatever it was uh what's the term for that uh when they were in avignon the avignon papacy and all that um i think it was i think it was called the exile if i'm not mistaken or like the roman exile or something like it's got a catchy title but i can't remember but she you know she was addressing a pope who had weaknesses flaws faults little foibles as every human does you know apart from jesus and mary probably but um i don't think i don't think uh mary had any faults whatsoever but um not even venial sin in the slightest but um you know for the most part i think you could find little little things in uh some of the other saints you know um so certainly in the popes and certainly the popes who are not canonized and certainly the popes who are looked on in catholic history books as quote unquote bad popes and yet she addressed this complicated sinner this pope as our sweet christ my sweet christ on earth because she sees with the eyes of god she sees the mystical vision of christ and his church and they are one christ in his church are one and she saw the church triumphant not only the church militant and a lot of people today who are critical of the church catholics included maybe most especially catholics rad trads instead of the cantus especially they will always only focus on the church militant and yeah it's a hot mess it's a hot mess we know that yes look in the mirror buddy it's a hot mess we know this but in if we make it to heaven then we'll be part of that perfect society the church is it's a dogma of the church that we that the church is a perfect society all the means of salvation are there the church is one holy catholic and apostolic this is not a fairy tale but we need to remember that we are the weeds are among the wheat here the wolves among the sheep here until the very end and in purgatory there's a purification taking place and in heaven the purification is complete right when jesus on the cross says it is it is finished he wasn't lying he wasn't joking he wasn't predicting it was a reality it's a mystical reality mary is body and soul up in heaven she is the church and we aspire to be her and to be uh molded into her as saint louis de montfort so beautifully describes so um i'm i'm really really proud of you and excited about you and when i say you i mean the generation of young primary it seems to be primarily men in this griper movement that i've recently discovered seems to be primarily men and i'm just very proud that you've seen through the flim flam of satan with the hypocritical whitewashed tombs who are holier than thou saying oh the good old days the saints never farted and they were perfect and this and that the other thing it's like no we live in reality reality is we are in a fallen world we're called to holiness it's not easy and it's not me i have to kill the old man i have to kill me so to speak so that christ can live in me and uh so it's it's it's a very special fine line that you're walking i don't know how if you know and realize just how graced and privileged you are as an individual and and people like you uh in this uh griper community and i don't know the whole story with uh you know nick fuentes america first the gripers all the alt-right i'm completely ignorant all i know is i see young men on fire for christ chanting christ is king and uh it's like sorry i don't see a problem i don't see a problem from my outsider's perspective looking in so maybe just talk a little bit about that and educate me a little bit what's going on um do you want to hear more so about kind of like this generation that like loves vatican ii and the popes are more so like the groipers do both do both okay totally yeah i could cover them both yeah so what's going on in the church right now is that you know i think people have hit a wall with the just like recognize and resist you know drooling over archbishop lefebvre and stuff like that kind of bull crap excuse my language but that's what it is it's such a like flimsy narrative uh about what's going on in the church um it's it's like it's sad really i mean i like i was legitimately when i became catholic and i i like was attending a society chapel i had a beautiful mass i had a beautiful confession they had a they had an incredible library and stuff like that but i was sad i wasn't having fun you know and it's not that our faith will always be fun oh goodness no oh my goodness we'll suffer and stuff like that but it was it was this like sadness of like i'm in a house that i don't want to be in and stuff like that and and you know i i saw like jay dyer enter the scene and stuff like that and you know he was he was really like egging on the eastern orthodox arguments and i even had like i had like a crisis of faith i was like did i did i choose the one true church right did i maybe i should have been eastern orthodox and stuff like that and i really had like i really had such a moment of crisis especially at the time of traditional custodes coming out where i was like oh dude this is all over and stuff like that and then my family and i took a trip to south dakota i was kind of like away from the internet and stuff like that and i really just like dwelled in my heart and and i really like prayed and and thought and reflected with god and i'm like it's not that this isn't the one true church it's that my conclusion is wrong and that's why i'm feeling this way and that's why i'm sad and so i i had to ask myself i was like what's my conclusion what's wrong with it well my conclusion is that vatican ii is a huge rupture and it's bad and it's stinky and you know oh we need to forget about it or it's like the robber council of ephesus or it's like later in five and we need to like put even though we don't forget later in five it's still fully binding to us today you know it's none of those things it's it's a council it's holy it's orthodox it brings life to the church even even if everything is not fully like fleshed out yet in the life of the church right and and i was thinking about this and i'm like i became catholic because i just wanted to have confidence in the church and i'm like how have i gotten away from that and the fact was is i was listening these talking pieces supposedly for tradition and stuff like that that were moving my heart away from christ and to this selfish interpretation of what tradition is you know i i started to almost go back to fundamentals and i i i started i traded my like kind of like rad trad heroes like archbishop lefeve or bishop de castro mayor or something for um louis vaio um cardinal pa uh cardinal uh oh my goodness i'm trying to think of some of the other guys um you know cardinal manning um you know all the attendees of vatican one who by all means were oh they were traditional right i mean they hated liberalism they hated all the like modern errors and stuff like that and i i read their writings and they're like peter is the rock of the church and peter will confirm us and pete and like this church is integral and we trust in it and we love her and i was like these guys are the guys i should have been paying attention to the entire time and i and i read their books um on tradition and stuff like that and i got a real feel for what tradition is and how the roman pontiff the apostolic sea and the magisterium confirms that tradition you know it's not just the vincentian canon over here and it's like well you know um if it hasn't been believed by the church at all times we can just disobey you know that kind of idea um and so like i got all that stuff like parsed out and i was like i now am am just a true catholic and i love the mass i love the traditional latin mass i love the eastern right i love the novus ordo i love i love where christ is and and it like made me happy to be a catholic again and really breathe like life back to my lungs and i think this is what so many other catholics i've talked to online are experiencing they're not liking this stuff i mean we even were talking about the new episode of ma episode 2 massive ages i mean you know there was some good stuff in it but it was like it just had to beat the tired old drum of vatican too bad and novus ordo bad and you know we need to go back to 1950 and everything's going to be magically finished and it's like you know not that the 1950s are bad they're still as relevant today as as it was yesterday we don't change as catholics we're the same church you know past present and future but exactly the point we're the same church the church didn't end in 1958 when pope pius xii died right and and so it's like we're tired of this sad attitude it's like look you know i love the lot of mass i love the nova sort of let's stop having just liturgy wars and just appreciate the liturgy the mass the source and summit of our christian life you know and and i'm fully on board you know get those guitars out of there get that clown stuff out nobody likes that you know but it's like when we have that stuff out what we have is just a beautiful offering of christ to us you know and so many people are realizing that and you know people are rediscovering the uh social kingship of christ they're discovering that like the encyclicals from like pope saint john paul ii stuff like that are like really based and awesome um like i i think in one of them he said he's like you know it's a man's duty to like defend his country and stuff like that and was talking about how it's like it's legitimate to be like a warrior and i don't mean this is like a fed post or anything but like it's legitimate to take up arms and like defend your country and stuff like that i was like dang this is like awesome and stuff like that um and and really rediscovering just the love um that the saints and the popes had for for just the church and stuff like that i mean i honestly and i i want to see if me and spexo can take this together because i took the anti-modernist oath when i became catholic and i i live and die by it um but i want to see if i can take the credo of the people of god written by saint paul vi it's such a beautiful creed and it like it's the source and summit of our catholic life right it's like the church doesn't change we stand fast to apostolic tradition like christ needs to be king of everything and you know sorry not to make it about me i but for for all catholics it's like we're seeing this group emerge where we're not america magazine where peter is liberals those guys are are fuddy get them out of here you know but we're not also like sspx archbishop lefebvre let's go disobey the roman pontiff and go do our own thing guys it's like we're just catholic you know i literally say this i'm just catholic now i don't need to use trad or anything like this it's like i'm just catholic because being catholic is traditional and i think that's what we're seeing and especially in the groiper movement you know the gruiper movement to me really represents like uh and i sent a super chat to nick that was kind of a little nerdy or whatever i was like referencing these like archaic political figures and stuff like that but it's like literally catholic action 2.0 um you know because catholic action like by the 1970s it it just became like weak it wasn't really what it used to be like in the 30s like in the 30s you had like muscly guys like blocking police that would like try and shut down mass and stuff like that and like that's awesome like i want that catholic action not like hey guys we're doing the after parish like bake sale or something we're catholic action you know and it's like america first and the gripers are like bringing that back it's like this like muscly catholicism you know that's always been there but we just forgot about our own heritage right and and really i see guys who are just like they trust in the church they love the holy father they would readily lay down their lives for the pope um i i mean the guys in my chat if pope francis asked him tomorrow like like the holy sees being attacked and like we're almost having like a like papal states war part two um i know all of us would sign up and we would die and and we and as we were dying would confess the um faith that we have in in christ and his vicar and so it is just this profound movement of the heart towards the catholic church and it's like we've almost transcended i i mean i'll just say this right now i think we've transcended the lame lame label conservative conserving what you know like conserving like martin luther you know conserving like these like free masonic writers that like brought down the like downfall western civilization it's like no we're catholic we are conserving the eternal truth of god and i'm just so excited to see where everything's going to go frankly i'm really excited i'm pumped and they're very nice young men yourself included i just when elon musk bought twitter i joined and i'm reaching out to gripers there and they're just very friendly approachable people they're not all catholic the ones i've met but they're all you know they all have that zest for uh for life and they seem like you know just uh enthusiastic and bright young men i'm sure there's some women involved on the periphery somehow but uh you know it's there's nothing wrong also with having a little bit of a men's uh togetherness movement but i wanted to talk a little bit about the um the liturgical reform because it's deeply deeply deeply misunderstood by the rad trads and the set of a cantus they don't seem to understand that it was a long process of very conservative bishops that had been in vatican one talking about the resource among where we go back to tradition go back to bring more tradition into the liturgy they don't seem to understand that and then the franco prussian war interrupted it and then we have vatican ii and they conveniently say oh everything changed and it's all novelty and this and that and it's what is this what is this nova zordo oh what is going on completely disconnected from the the long and arduous man hours prayerful man hours this is not godless baby killers designing the liturgy this is men of god who love and revere christ and his church who have been putting thousands and hundreds of thousands of man-hours and prayerful man-hours into looking at tradition how can we bring more tradition not less back into the liturgy which had perhaps become uh sort of uh you know as we see in the old testament they're traditions of men let's just face it there are traditions of men that creep in they're not all evil but there are traditions of men that creep in and we want to refresh the body of christ we want to make it something that's alive again and so i think that people miss the point uh about the liturgy do you agree with me i completely agree and you know the whole thing about the rest source mont is i think um i i think matthew minard or actually uh richard de clue i think is talked about it's kind of almost like a non-starter of a term because it's like designating all these guys who really like came from separate backgrounds and weren't really necessarily the same you know i i mean like um cardinal john daniloo is like thrown in with them and and he made some comments that like i don't really like and stuff like that here and there but like a lot of his books are really like kind of based and cool like he has a fantastic book called prayer as a political problem and he like takes a good grasp of like the modern world and like how catholics can go forward um in the modern world when was that roughly that that book was written i would say 19 uh oh i think like 1971. okay shortly after the close of the council not too far after shortly after the closing and it reminds me a lot of uh gotti met spaz quite a bit um about this this understanding that in the modern world we're gonna be faced with some challenges but if we have prayer as our source and summit and follow the social kingship of christ we can really accomplish something um he's got a fantastic book on that um and his patristic work was really good um and you know it's not rad trading to say that there were some sus associations here and i hate to use oh uh oh are we saying something no no no no i was just saying of course of course there were uh there were yeah there were probably freemasons uh among the bishops at vatican too probably right i don't know well and at the very least just kind of modernistic types i mean uh chanu was totally a modernist uh yves khangar um he he has actually some good writings um i i've heard his book true in false reform is pretty good i've heard his book um excuse me on tradition um sold by ignatius press is actually very orthodox and good but um at the same rate super disrespectful to like gregory the 16th to pius the 12th he blamed the crisis in the church on them and i was like how dare you wash out your mouth sir like that is just like totally disrespectful yeah you know you don't talk about the pope like that right um and so there is a fair conversation to have about like henry de lubac uh yves kongar and stuff like that and kind of parsing out like yeah not everything was good we don't need to open our arms unequivocally to them but also in the same regard not everything was bad there was an understanding that at the time um and and let me readily admit i love tomism and i'm not ragging on tomism or kind of the tired old like drum of like tomism and manualism or like manualism in terms of like overuse of the manuals uh you know was like just so predominant that it's good that it went away it's like well no those guys were actually pretty good writers and i i actually have gained a lot of spiritual fruit from their writings i think what could be better said is maybe it could have been a little bit more parsed out where it's like hey these guys aren't going away but let's have some let's have some eastern catholic like polymites or something like contribute thought to the church let's have some um you know scotus contribute some thought to the church some augustinians some you know different schools of thought um that are still fully orthodox you know we don't want to we don't want to depart from what the church teaches but just contribute a great way of of really seeing everything because i mean like for instance with like um the the history of like palmism and stuff like that they were defenders of the immaculate conception right i mean the immaculate conception of mary that actually quite a bit of thomas would reject i mean juan de torquemada my goodness he was a fantastic orthodox theologian but before our lady's immaculate concept conception was like declared um you know as a dogma right he rejected it but then you have guys like saint gregory palamos um a holy and venerable saint who you know believe in our lady's immaculate conception right and even um you know he's a schismatic and stuff like that but even mark of ephesus at the council of florence i believe upheld the immaculate conception and so it's like you know catholicism draws from the fruits of all these different schools and i think the rest source mod definitely did have some fantastic fruits to offer and there were there were some arboretum elements readily admitted but um that idea of like going back to patristics or going back to tradition or having just kind of a fully orthodox but just sort of al alternative like view or what have you um of uh thought being contributed to the life of the church and the faith i think is fully beneficial to her life the image the image i like to use of the mystical element of the church and it's an essential element it is the element of the church is the mystical element the the image i like to use is i'm not a golfer but i like to use the image of a golfer the best golfer okay it's god i'll give you a hint it's got so god's the best golfer and you know his caddy is a human a fallen human in the fallen world and so he reaches to find the most appropriate putter it's like a very expensive golf club i don't know anything about golf but i'm just using this analogy but god's just like no give me that twisted gnarly branch there that's got like worm eat an apple half eaten on the edge of this branch he just picks up the branch and he makes the perfect uh stroke and he gets a hole in one okay my my analogy is basically a regurgitation of the old line about god drawing straight with crooked lines and guess what it's better that god uses sinners and schismatics and heretics it's better it's more wonderful it gives more glory to god period and guess what it's the dogmas that are protected by the very limited charism of infallibility it's not all the fancy argumentation of the theologians the theologian's a sinner okay his ideas are hit and miss depending on how prayerful he is his ideas are hit and miss period okay if you can glean some pious thoughts from a biblical scholar or a theologian or a talking head on youtube great but say keep it what it is name it as what it is it's just a sinner that's groping in the dark period and what the mystical body of christ does is it takes the truth from this guy and from that guy and it declares a dogma but the process by which that the process by which those dogmas are declared the process is not protected the political opinions of those bishops is not protected we should not make an idol of these sinners that contribute to the mystical body of christ now to the extent that they are christian they are another christ and so we have to see christ in even our enemy much less the the cardinals and bishops right so we need to have a very clear distinction between christ and you know and uh and the uh fallen members that are struggling to hopefully be fully integrated into the mystical body of christ here in this church military is that clear what i'm saying like do you understand what i'm saying yeah oh oh absolutely i do i mean like i said like some of the figures i i mentioned like yves kongar um his i mean like i said his book true and false reform and and on tradition even though i i think he had some horrible theological opinions elsewhere and i mean had deplorable conduct with cardinal ataviani literally like peeing on his doorstep um he wrote some fantastic works that are that are worthy of praise right by the grace of god and so it's like you know i can see the good in some of his writings and it doesn't mean it's fully fleshed out uh you know on reid de lubac i i don't really vibe with a lot of his political opinions but i understood his element of like you know the the element of catholic politics is is that personal element it's the individual but on the state level cardinal ottaviani is correct it's like it's the duty of a catholic state to lock down the faith in society you don't have that you don't have the faith it can't be like a an anarchic like oh well people can kind of just go in and out of being catholic and the state needs to be secular it's like no we need a catholic state that's fundamental um and so it's like i completely understand your point david about like you know really taking all those fantastic elements and putting them together and i mean it's it's what you see really uh play out in the scriptures i mean think about moses arguing with our lord with god and saying like lord no i i don't want to you know announce anything with people lord please i don't want to announce anything with people and then he says um you know then i'll have your brother uh oh my goodness why am i friendly aaron aaron thank you it was on the i knew it was an a it was on the tip of my tongue has aaron speak for him and speak on his behalf did aaron do anything else no but he was a great speaker right and so it's like well he did make that golden cap that's kind of important yeah yeah that's true that's true oh my god that's hilarious isn't it i mean it's it's it's it's tragic but what a scene what a scene with the with the orgy at the foot of the mountain while the brothers up the holy of holies like you know seeing god face to face fasting for 80 days and his brother's down having an orgy to please the people wow that's amazing it's insane and i think that image is is really what what you and i are talking about is aaron did some deplorable things but he still announced god's word to the people right he was tasked with that and moses maybe couldn't speak up but he integrally kept god's word right and so it's like god can bring out such beautiful uh petals and flowers within us even if other parts are dark and barren but it's funny you mentioned moses because he did have that one tragic flaw which was wait for it anger and impatience remember he struck the rock he struck the rock that's true so you've got that in common with them so you're uh you're like twins with moses i actually um i've been meaning to pick up an icon of moses being given the tablets there's uh some eastern catholic icons that have been painted where he's literally being handed the tablets from god and you don't see our uh of the father's face of course not right but you see his hands hand down the tablets to him and it's like visceral it it makes me weep wow i want to talk about one of my old testament heroes if you don't mind uh absolutely the uh patriarch noah when i was when i was an atheist when i was an atheist uh especially near the end i became an atheistic satanist i hated noah hated noah hated noah he was like the target of most of my hatred in the old testament he was like the main guy for me and now he's like one of my favorites i got a little icon i don't think you can see it behind me but it's a tiny little icon of noah with his ark he's one of my all-time favorites now blows my mind so maybe just talk uh about how you appreciate noah noah is powerful to me because i remember reading um i i remember my bible reading that i started i i literally um when i was first getting into scripture started from genesis and i think i i met samuel right now and mo or noah was unbelievably powerful from the standpoint that the entire world fell into disbelief they didn't want to follow god anymore and you have this one lowly man build an ark you know build this ark of salvation for him and his family and for all of creation so that when god purifies the earth he will he will be left and i think that that like personal element to noah in the fact that he despite the pressures of a world that had forgotten god chose to love god instead and chose to follow him it's it's so extraordinary i mean there was even a movie made i think a couple years back about noah that i i felt like was very faithful um to the old testament and in that image of the entire world is seeped in chaos and noah takes up his ark and and simply lives faithfully admits the storm on this ark of salvation i think what's also so powerful about noah is how he is foundational in rebuilding the world after and i don't know if any saints ever or ever written about this but i i think i almost had this reflection just now it really prefigures the fact that christ will come to rebuild this earth that is second coming right i mean his second coming is essentially gonna be the next flood it's gonna you know there's gonna be chaos there's gonna be falling away in fire and torment but when he comes to rebuild the new earth it's it's going to pre-figure the holy prophet mo or noah um and in the fact that the earth was purified so that he could live and his descendants could live you know um in this in this purified earth that god gave him i mean what a gift from god honestly what do you think about the fact that satan has co-opted brazenly and boldly the rainbow the covenant with noah i think it's i think it's typical of of satan you know it's taking something magnificent it's taking something good the rainbow is beautiful it is a symbol of life and and light and energy i remember when i would have a bad day um when i used to do bike riding in high school and i saw and then would rain and i saw a rainbow in the afternoon having that little slice of heaven right there made my day um it made my it made my world in that moment and the fact is is it is so unbelievably satanic that satan would use the rainbow to represent a sin that cries out to heaven for vengeance the sin that sodom and gomorrah was uh punished for this the sin that saint bonaventure says you know all sodomites were killed at christ's birth because it was so such a disgusting sin it's like how how dare you know such a beautiful symbol of life and freedom be used for drudgery and the sin of slavery you know and and and especially i i fret for the poor souls lost in that sin too you know i mean it's just it's the sins of the flesh are such a horse blinder over the eye and so i think what what we overcome that with is you know really that that that um you know alphabet mafia use of the rainbow right here on earth can be overcome by looking at the real rainbow that gleams up to heaven and is a reflection of the light of god if we stick to that it is truly like christ taking the symbol of the cross a symbol of oppression and making it again once to a symbol of life it's a struggle you know it is a struggle to not be hypnotized by the inversion of hope because the rainbow is a symbol of hope the inversion of hope i see a flag behind you that one gives me a good feeling okay i don't know what exactly it is but is that an old american flag yeah it's the betsy ross flag so this was the first american flag that ever existed you know my my family name is ross right so that's pretty cool oh i didn't even think about that connection actually hey you know we got the podcast with you know david ross betsy ross flag i think it's a pretty good match but my point is i'm not disgusted by that flag um but i am sort of hypnotized by the lgbtq whatever it is flag because you know i live in montreal it's like sin city we have the gay village here not far from my house and it's everywhere and it's just like it does represent the inversion of hope and so when i see that flag it doesn't give me hope it doesn't give me joy it doesn't give me light it doesn't inspire my faith it just crushes my spirit and it just makes me think maybe i'm just an ape maybe it's just you know maybe i should just get what eat drink it be merry and get whatever i pleasure i can because hey maybe nihilism is the case maybe nihilism is the case i don't entertain that thought explicitly but it's just a background suggestion from satan and his demons like hey maybe religion isn't true and maybe you know or i could go back to my solipsism i was a hard solipsist before my conversion maybe it's all just a video game and nothing really matters just do what that will so what i'm saying is i'm exaggerating a little bit but when i see the symbols of the enemy it's just so constant being bombarded it's a tsunami of propaganda when i'm flooded by that it takes a conscious effort this is my point it takes a conscious effort to slap your face wake up and say rainbow good symbol of hope noah the flood and not only that but be aware there's another flood coming not a flood of water because god promised won't be another flood of water but it's going to be a flood of fire like you said there will be there's a flood of fire coming so there's the hope and then there's the sobriety right what does satan want he wants us drunk he wants us to sleep he wants us just hypnotized maybe i can get away maybe this isn't really a sin who am i hurting no one's watching and you know my my wife will never find about this because i'm in a different country at a business conference or whatever i'm just making an exam uh fictitious example but this is a very common thing a businessman away traveling it's like where's the harm where's the harm but when i was an atheist i could tell you a firsthand story i traveled in europe and i uh my train was separated during the night and i had snuck into the sleeping car so that i could sleep and you know i charmed a young lady into letting me sleep in the sleeping car and then when i woke up in the morning i went to the next car over to find my bags by my seat and it turns out the train had separated right exactly at that juncture and so my bags went to italy or germany or somewhere and so i had to get off the train and re take another train and try to go find my bags and it was raining in italy and i was depressed and all my money was there and i'm wearing shorts because i came from greece where it was warm and it was like october and i'm freezing and it's raining but then the sun came out and i saw that rainbow and just like you i had the that supernatural moment i was an atheist right but i had that supernatural sort of hint of hope and while i was uh in europe a second time i had a a young woman i was like into all kinds of uh demonic stuff new age and i was reading tarot and traveling with my uh wife on her honeymoon and uh doing tarot readings to survive just living like a bum on the streets of europe traveling around hand to mouth living hand to mouth but i was reading tarot in this one uh occultist shop like it's like a sort of a satanic uh candle shop or whatever and uh this sexy young woman came in and she said yeah thanks for the tarot reading that was wonderful but now let's go to my hotel room and i said well i'm i'm happily married you know just i'm on my honeymoon so i don't think this is appropriate but uh by the grace of god i said no i was an atheist i had no reason if i think about the atheist perspective the the perspective of a materialist there was no good reason to say no right but deep down inside you know i'd been baptized christian i was raised in a protestant church and some of the fumes carried me and i was able to say no to that temptation even though she was using good arguments she was saying well she's never going to find out i'm never going to see you again and it's just a little bit of fun and pleasure and whatever but by the grace of god i said no so my point my point of recounting uh these stories is that life is a mystical journey and even uh even the atheist because i was atheist at the time even the atheist has the fumes of the the christian morality the graces and uh not all of us obviously um are protected at all times i mean there are plenty of people falling into uh falling into adultery and stuff like that but um just if what i'm trying to convey to you and the listener is the mystical element of our lives if we look back and we see the moments of depression despair and then we compare and contrast that with moments of hope and moments where we have inspiration or guidance or grace even as an atheist you have to admit you have the grace to avoid a trap maybe it was at that party where there were uh some experimental drugs being passed around and you found out later that it was very addictive and very deadly and for whatever reason you said no uh to that drug that was being passed around that's never really happened to me but maybe it happened to a lot of people it's these sorts of situations where at the general judgment we're going to be on the edge of our seat watching uh watching uh god's children pass very very close to uh the fall and to uh to perdition right ultimate perdition so it's it's i want us to always keep in mind that mystical element of our our lives because it's too easy to get blinded by the propaganda of satan and to to lose hope so that's the end of my rant no absolutely it is so easy to get blinded by this world and only by the grace of god are we delivered you know from these um these awful you know happenings where uh by by all reason and by all measure like we should have given into this thing or done this thing or gone there or done this or or chosen that and god works in our lives the holy spirit works in our hearts to make us say no or say yes to something good and it's like at that point you realize you know i don't need to like see um you know some some uh miracle like saint janarius's uh blood liquefying or something at this time in the year i i've had a miracle in my own life you know i i mean that's just that's a powerful like um reflection to meditate on yeah like i had a miracle happen in my own life i remember at rcia they went around the circle and they're like oh everyone just name the your favorite miracle the biggest miracle you can think of in his in the whole history uh and everyone named these really wild miracles then it came around to me and i hadn't really uh prepared for this but it just occurred to me i said my conversion that's the biggest miracle and everyone's like what oh yeah yeah you're right it's like yeah it's it sounds very self-centered but it's true you know it is true and if we think about the angels rejoicing over the conversion of one sinner and that lost penny or whatever it was it's like it's amazing the grace of god is amazing it's so amazing and and the fact is i there's that old quote from saint john henry newman um that that says god would rather that the stars fall out of the sky than for one person to sin against him and to and for him to lose that one that one soul i mean it just shows you that it's like god loves not not just us collectively not just us as the human race but he loves you he loves you david he loves me he loves all of us he loves specso he loves every single one of us as as as broken and as messed up as we are he loves us and like sitting with that i man i always get teary when i talk about stuff like this just because i mean blessed be god right god's love is so powerful and it permeates in our lives and you see like a smile form on your face like when you were a child again you know i i don't know if you can see it but um one of my projects is to memorize this can you read can you are you able to see what that stops for the gift of tears yes and saint augustine's quote about the the gift of tears shed for our lord's passion is better than i think he said like a thousand penances or something like that i want it i want it i want to and if if you it seems like you're able to access your emotions especially with the pious religious movement of the heart then i'm jealous and i want it i want it okay because i'm my coping mes mechanism in life my defense mechanism has been to live right here in my head that's my defense that's my safe space right but there's nothing better than being fully alive that's the glory of goddess man fully of life so we have to be in the heart the hurt is the wholeness of the person right can i get a book from my shelf real quick that i gotta show you yeah i got this book um not too long ago and it like even just reading the first homily from st charbelle it's it's changed my life and i can see like why he's the patron saint of like lebanon now and like the entire maronite people um love is a radiant light and it's it's the life and it's the words of saint charbelle and his first homily talks about he he takes this the creation story of genesis but he he reflects on how you know god is not just loving god is love right and he says in the beginning was love you know and and love um is the existence of all things and nothing can exist outside of love right and i think if you really like get this book and and follow saint charbelle follow the saints um you know saint teresa of lesu um and all the saints that like loved god with all their heart david i think you'll get the tears uh uh the gift of tears instantly you know nice the things that move me the things that move me to tears are uh you know a genuine sincere self sacrificial love when i see that it moves me to tears and surprising or maybe not surprisingly uh a melody like a certain melody you know it happens to me sometimes just with the organ at church right it's just like how can that move me how is that what is going on why am i moved by this particular melody what is going on you know but we all we all are subject to that to a greater or lesser extent right absolutely well and there's a reason why i believe saint pius the 10th actually said this was the reason why he banned all instruments like except the pipe organ um was because god has given us an instrument and it's our it's our voice right it's the song of the birds it's the wind through the trees it's like that is our that is our true music oh go right ahead well i just want i didn't want to interrupt you but you know uh and without revealing too much of my intimate married life but i will say this much on my wedding night uh for whatever reason i just in that loving atmosphere like i found my my soul mate my better half and spontaneously we have this love language and it it's with us to this day every day we're speaking to each other with this love language that no one else is privy to but it's called birdie language because we just whistled to each other with these little sweet little whispers uh whistles okay so our vocabulary is about six words it's or six phrases it's i love you i'm sorry uh hello uh you know it's like a handful of things to communicate but that's how i think also about my relationship with god it's like thank you i love you i'm sorry and please help me you know that that's the gist of my prayer life right there in four basic components and it's just ironic that you talked about the song the love song the voice the birds and that that's something very special and touching to me in my romantic relationship and it's always been uh something that warms my heart in the saints when when i read about the nuptial love for christ and you know this idea that we are the bride of christ especially the women religious they can exemplify that very perfectly and mary of course exemplifies that perfect perfectly being the daughter but also also uh the mother also the spouse you know of the three persons of the trinity and uh so this this brings me back to the question of intimacy and how satan inverts everything that's good and holy intimacy being right up there near the top if not the top spot because we are to have an intimacy and a a a perfect selfless self-giving of person the whole person from the heart to jesus christ and that includes his church because christ and his church are one flesh right so maybe talk about that intimacy and without being too crass if we could talk about it in terms of sexuality with christ and it is a little bit dangerous to talk in that way but i'm sure you've read in some of the saints how they are uh careful but also explicit about the fact that there's there's uh bliss in that intimacy and that union with christ and his church right absolutely um you know really with with the intimacy that we experience with our lord and savior jesus christ we realize that god is personal he's not impersonal um you know this was something that the deists this was their heresy you know the idea that god was like this like clock like greek clock god or something i know some of them like believed in that where you know he kind of made everything but he's not really like interested in us he's over at the far edge of the universe focusing on something else that's not the god we worship um god yahweh i am who i am he's saying something to us by his his very name i am who i am i love it he's presenting himself to us and he wants us to present him ourselves to him even in all our brokenness and i think the fact is that you know when we call god our father it is so true because think about in in our own lives um and i don't want to presume to anyone listening if if you've had a bad relationship with your your father or not but you know a father loves his son um un un unadultered right he he loves his son there's no limit to his love there's no prescriptions his son could commit the worst crime in the world and he would still love his son he's still flesh of his flesh right and bone of his bone and he made his son and in that same way god the father loves us because god the father made us saint francis de sales an introduction to the devout life says that god literally had no reason for making us he's happy because he is happiness and he is joy he's happy by himself he doesn't need us so why are you here he made you because he loves you specifically not not you know you and generalities oh i you know i love all of you equal but like kind of almost in this communistic impersonal like no he loves you he loves you personally and he has so he has so much of that love for you that it overflows to everybody to the whole of the human family right but he loves every single one of us personally and that deep movement of the heart is so integral to understanding that god is love that when we pray to god it's because god you know it's not just checking a box like i and i get stuck in this too you know it's like oh gotta say my night prayer gotta say my morning prayer no don't do that you're talking to your father who loves you you're having a conversation with your father your father wants to know how you're doing how are you i love you tell him about your day and even you know pray to god like you talk to your dad you know and and and and feel that that personal nature to it don't feel like you always have to address god in these like very you know uh uh uh sort of like haughty prayers you know of using like old english or something like that or even latin it's like make prayer the movement of the heart it can be as simple as making the sign of the cross and spending an hour just talking to jesus talking to god the father and the holy spirit you know you don't have to you know make it into all these rhythms and rhymes because god just wants to talk to you he wants to just love you you know for sure so it's like that time to love him and i oh go right ahead david no i just wanted to respond to the sign of the cross because it's my favorite prayer because it's silent because as i told you i live in my head a bit of an introvert and uh if i can get away from my own stupid thoughts so much the better so the sign of the cross for me is a silent prayer it says a lot about the trinity about the incarnation about everything and it's just very very powerful and it's it's it's a manifestation of my love where it's kind of like i can give a little gift to jesus and i know it's untarnished by my stupid human way of thinking and my ego where it's always about me because when i'm praying with words is just that that that inner dialogue that's just sick you know it's just not i'm not a saint so i've got lots of baggage and lots of issues and stuff like that so when i'm praying with words it's mixed up with all that crap but when i do the sign of the cross it's just like i'm giving him a little present and uh it's it's more pure and innocent and i love it and i love the sweet little uh ejaculatory prayers as we call them just the i love the use just like i would do with my wife like it's just it's simple i love you and uh thank you like it's the power of that that pure simple child-like prayer and um i just love it so i'm glad you mentioned the the sign of the cross that we can start with just with a simple thing like that and just put ourselves in the presence of god all this all the saints talk about this in the prayer life just putting ourselves reminding yourself and i need to be reminded so thank you for reminding me because with me with my fixed prayers it's like i do about an hour a day of fixed prayers but it's always just a panic to get through i just got to get through this i got to get through this i got to get through this why what do you what's more important what are what's why why am i in a hurry and i know it's just because i'm in the world and i'm of the world and i've got you know it's just it's just a bad habit and it's a lack of lack of discipline a lack of love a lack of commitment and a lack of faith a lack of trust in god right so do what maybe i don't want to have that intimacy maybe i don't want that full intimacy right because like a lot of the prophets are like i don't wanna you talk about moses but a lot of them were like i don't wanna speak for you i don't wanna contradict the powerful people who can hurt me i don't wanna contradict them right so i think there is a little bit of that fear in me and uh probably in a lot of uh a lot of catholics that that do love god as i love god but maybe a little bit shy to give my life completely because then it's dangerous it's real it's alive it's this faith that's out of the box like right now i've got it in a nice box like i do my prayers i do my i do my sacraments i like it's all a checkbox thing and it's all well controlled it's my project oh what are you going to do to improve your your prayer life i can i'm going to do this and i'm going to do that and i'm going to avail myselves of the sacraments in a more worthy manner and i'm going to do this and that and that's all good it's all good but it's me with my stupid project and so what i'm striving for hoping for by the grace of god is to just be free of that and to be authentically uh simple and direct with god like you're saying and to be like be childlike you know and uh to take the plunge and take the leap of faith and in my romantic life a lot of people were surprised like i'd only known this woman a short period of time like a couple of months and we moved in together got married and just like just like i was not afraid to take the plunge so i know i have it in me the foolishness or the child like spontaneity or whatever you want to call it impulsiveness or whatever i have i'm willing to risk everything for god i know that but day to day with the drudgery of daily life paying the bills and all this sort of thing uh there's a tendency tendency for me to want to clamp down and control my faith walk or my religiosity can you relate to that in any way i think so um i have a real fear i think of sometimes saying like i want god to take over because i think i know how that's gonna look and i don't always know if i'm ready for that um you know i i always hear um in the gospels you know jesus talking about you know if you love me you'll hold my command you'll keep my commandments if you love me you'll sell everything you you own and you'll follow me and i think that's extremely true but i'm scared about that you know i i i'm i'm like i'm young you know i like my things i don't want to sell my things i you know i um you know i i want to follow jesus in this comfortable little box and stuff like that but i think the truth of the matter and and what what i'm going to have to face one day and i'm i'm scared for but i think it'll be the most freeing thing is finally saying i'm giving everything up and i'm gonna follow god and you know that's not gonna look the same for me or you david or anybody else but i think taking that full plunge you know like like you almost think about when you plunge into a cold lake or something like that and it it kind of stings you a little bit but there's this like freedom that comes after of like you acclimatize the water you almost feel great you feel alive i think that that will happen in our lives and it will manifest itself in such a profound way but we have to be willing either now or later to be able to take that jump take that plunge yeah you know the church the church is a wise and loving mother an understanding mother and the church does moderate a lot of the impulsiveness that maybe an enthusiastic young convert might have i'm gonna go to africa and it's over there like the vision of the what what did the saints do i'm gonna emulate the saints and one of my favorite saints is saint jose marie escriva of the opus dei oh yeah you know it's like hey dial it back and look at your actual context why are you neglecting your wife and kids why are you neglecting your your studies why are you neglecting your work hey you want to be catholic you're already exactly where god wants you to be to be sanctified and one of his favorite quotes of saint jose maria escara is uh don't say that person annoys me say that person sanctifies me so the path to sanctification can be through the drudgery of work and applying ourselves but it can also be by putting up with a lot of really annoying people and they're everywhere they are everywhere and so if you can picture them like little spiritual dollar signs like oh here comes that annoying lady yeah here she comes like thank you god it's just saying more sanctification now this is something that excites me it's kind of like uh the little way saint teresa lives here you know it's that little way like pick up a pin for jesus and that's you know if it's done with hurt that's the way i i think that embracing these little opportunities uh rather than fantasizing i'm going to be a murderer i hope the muslims take over and they chop my head off because i'm christian you know that's just a fantasy and it could happen i mean i actually hope it does happen it's like a sure way to go straight to heaven because i do not want to go to purgatory but um you know my ultimate realistic dream uh as a catholic my walk with god my realistic ambition is to embrace ordinary suffering boredom in mild inconveniences those are sometimes the worst right it's just like hey i want to do this thing and it's like just this little aggravation that's preventing me from accomplishing this small thing which is harder part of a bigger thing it's like that's a spiritual dollar sign that's gold that's a treasure in heaven and you're wasting it you're turning it from a godly exercise into a satanic exercise who are you to be frustrated and angry at this mild inconvenience which is sent by god as a gift to you and you're you're rejecting this small gift so don't expect big gifts buddy don't expect big gifts you rejected all these little gifts right so it's all about appreciation and embracing the suffering and the the mild inconveniences what do you think about that i completely agree and and i think that is such a unbelievably [Music] pertinent and true reflection um there is such a tendency to just you know kind of go with the convert deal and have this this like fantasy of i'm gonna do this and i'm gonna do that and and i suffer from this immensely um but i think really that that is so true about what cardinal both cardinal menzetti and um blessed cardinal benzetti and st jose maria said in relation to our sanctification is is through embracing our station in life um and we forget this all the time i forget this all the time you know i i always like to be like you know all this you know school stuff or all this work stuff that's just boring and i need to get done with that and then and then go on my way but that is the work that sanctifies us and and that is us tilling in the garden of the lord i mean that's i'm i'm i'm i'm definitely humbled by hearing your words um david i i think that's something i need to pray about and reflect a lot a lot more on it's powerful it's powerful because you are just surrounded by god's love and by these opportunities and these gifts it's like wow wow i don't need to wait i don't need to travel i don't it's like you know because the thing the thing about satan and his lies is that we look at we look at what the media is presenting to us and they're saying you know i i want to thank the academy and if you believe in yourself you can also have you could get whatever you want and i'm rich and famous and i'm i'm this and that even though it came from humble beginnings and you start to think hmm okay so the two kinds of people there like the elites who are like famous rich nice house nice car all the women all the wine and everything like that and then they're the little losers like me on my coach watching them and admiring them but the elites are telling me that if i believe in myself right believe in myself that anything is possible and i can have all these things that i want the pleasures and the status in life and that sort of thing that's satan's propaganda it's absolutely everywhere and it's the inversion of what i just presented to you this uh opus dei vision of the the ubiquity of sanctifying elements it's like oh my god this is again vatican ii the elements of sanctification are literally everywhere wow wow we those are the rose-colored glasses as catholics that we need to put on and it's just like you mean to tell me that this all of this is so that i can become a saint all of this but this isn't you know my clothes aren't nice my apartment's not nice my job sucks my you know whatever i could i could come up with all kinds of complaints about everything my family my even my wife but when you put on those glasses like it's like the mystical goggles like you like you emphasize like you woke me up like yeah god is love don't don't be too formal with god let's be intimate let's be in the moment and then i came back at you with the sanctification in the ordinary and it's like we're building grace upon grace and we're getting back to basics it's amazing this is why this is why i do the podcast so that we can encourage each other and build our faith up right it's just it's amazing and and god uses us to tell each other the things that we need to hear i mean it's it's so amazing when i really do think there's a moment where you're like sitting with a friend or you're sitting with someone you're talking to and that moment where they tell you something the thing that you've needed to hear i always i want to give that back to god and say that that's not them speaking or it's not you speaking it's it's god speaking through them is god using one of his children to speak the words that you need to hear you know when your friend um you know who normally just kind of hangs it's almost like that move that moment in the movie uh good will hunting when um uh i i can't remember who's the blonde actor in the movie i i can't can't remember his name um but um he he comes back after he's like rejected um doing the like teaching position and stuff like that and he's he's you know this math savant and and all that and he like doesn't want to do it and his buddy who lives um in uh boston with them and is just kind of this like hard working uh construction guy like goes over to him and rather than being kind of maybe like goofy and kind of like um you know brickheaded like he usually is he has this profound moment of reflection where he says you have a gift that none of us have and that we would kill to have and to get out of the situation that we're in don't let that gift be lost and it's like when we have those moments with people in our lives um where they speak the truth to us it really is the holy spirit speaking through them and telling telling us he's telling us exactly what we need to hear absolutely i really appreciate i i gotta let you go now it's been two hours but i really appreciate uh meeting you time has flown by yeah it has oh my goodness we'll definitely talk again and uh you spoke about friendship and uh to me you're a friend because you know what a friend what is a friend from a catholic perspective it's anyone who is sincerely striving to help their brother to get to heaven that's what friendship is and i know you don't want me burning in hell i know that right obviously this is like obvious now uh when you speak with your friends who are acquaintances who are perhaps uh don't believe in god or maybe even their explicit satanists like i used to be they can have natural virtues they can love you just like jesus talks about like even the pagans do this right like they love their family and friends and these sorts of things but they don't have that supernatural theological virtues of faith hope and love and that love that that charity that we have towards our brothers and sisters is centered on jesus christ and his church and getting to heaven like that is keep our eyes on the prize we're created to know god to love god and to serve god so we can be happy with him forever and that's what friendship is all about and that's why i'm very confident when i meet someone i meet a strapping young man like yourself a recent convert and uh i can say from the bottom of my heart i love you i wish only the best for you this is this is the christian life this is how we know that we're christian and uh it's so it's so it's so it's such a broad perspective and such an easy way of being now as compared to when you have identity politics and who are the good guys and who are the bad guys and uh when we sincerely love even our enemies it opens up and it gives it opens our heart and it gives us a certain freedom in jesus christ that uh that i didn't have when i was uh pretending to be god because that's basically what it was when i was running away from god i was pretending to be god myself i was the ultimate judge of what's good what's evil i think that's what the the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil is all about ultimately is that satanic inversion where i'm the judge and i use my private judgment and no one is above me and uh basically i'm god you know so we have a freedom in christ and we have a brotherly love in christ and that's why christ is king and that's why we need we don't need a separation of church and state we need christ the social kingship of christ amen and and and christ is truly king and he needs to be recognized as king by every single nation on the face of this earth and david from the bottom my heart i love you too you're my brother in christ and i'm thankful that you're my brother in christ i love you very much thank you as christ has loved us um and i i'm i'm overjoyed and humbled that you would even ask me to appear on your show i i i'm nobody i'm ashes and dust and i you taking time out of your busy schedule to talk to a sinner like me means the world no no no no it's the complete opposite i'm thrilled that you talked to me and we can go on like this for hours so we'll continue but listen i want to have you back on i want to talk to you uh on or off the record and keep keep my finger on the pulse of your exciting journey to to sainthood and saint pines up it has a nice ring to it i think it does so we'll talk very soon remember me and mine in your prayers it's not easy it's not easy in this fallen world my family is really struggling with a lot of brokenness and infighting and since the very beginning since i came into the world and we i need your prayers i need you to pray for me every day even if it's what i do often is i just i ask the mother blessed virgin mary will you please add pine sap to my implicit prayer list and occasionally i'll explicitly mention you by name but at least i ask our blessed virgin to put you on that implicit daily intention and my intention is primarily the true and lasting conversion of all sinners so that will include you and the relief of the holy souls in purgatory those are the sort of the two main things that i focus on all day long true and lasting conversion and the relief of the holy souls in purgatory i'm sort of setting the stage just in case i end up in purgatory it looks like i probably will but if i if i do end up there i want to be able to point back and remind god like remember all those prayers i did for the souls in purgatory yeah that included me too so let's uh let's get on with it and get me out of here absolutely david absolutely and i i need to take a key from you to say to our mother um hey can you add david to the implicit prayer list because i always i always forget to say that so [Music] yeah there's so many tips and tricks we can share all kinds of tips and tricks including next time next time we're going to talk about the indulgences i'm sure you know about the indulgences oh yeah oh absolutely we'll have fun talking about that all right well david care take good care of my brother in christ god bless you god bless you love you lots we'll talk soon