hey i'm live i'm here with uh giovanni how are you doing giovanni pretty good actually uh a little bit stressed for for university recently but okay so far so good so you were mentioning earlier some people call you john in uh countries not about italy in america in english-speaking countries yeah yeah because it's easier to pronounce it my name in italian is basically the equivalent of john in english exactly exactly and your last name is anything to do with sugar uh no no it's actually uh similar to the name that we use in italy to call pumpkins so [Laughter] you must be popular at halloween luckily for me i don't i don't celebrate halloween so oh okay that's more of a north american thing right yeah we we don't have that kind of celebration here in italy there are people who celebrate it just because it's uh festivities and they get to go out with their friends but they don't do that much of big of a deal what about the vegetable zucchini have you heard about that yes is your name related to that uh not actually uh it's more uh closer to the the actual pumpkin okay the orange pumpkin the um uh fun fact zucchini is actually the in here in italian is the plural of what we call the zucchini oh what's the singular thing yeah in in america in english it's the singular but the the name itself is actually the plural of the italian word which is zucchina zucchini oh okay zucchini interesting so uh before we chat freely about everything that's going on in the world and the church and and generally let's talk more particularly or you talk more particularly about your faith journey how are you raised uh did you stray from the faith and come back like all those sorts of exciting things in your journey up until today please okay uh well i'm i was raised in a catholic family and especially my mom is very very catholic i and it's especially very traditional i i had this luck that i was born in a in a family with uh with a mom such as this i don't know what i would have done if my mom was more relaxed in the in faith or more uh easygoing about faith i would have probably sinned more um but yeah i was raised in a catholic family i strayed from god i think when i was 14 years old before that i was never actually a believer i just used to go to the sunday mass because it's it's what we do and uh but i i was i wasn't really convinced of my faith i was i was a kid what do i know and then uh when i was 14 years old i basically said to my mother mom i i don't believe in god and i used it mainly for a rebellion i wasn't one of those atheists who were seeking the truth and were saying wait a minute i don't believe in god because it's illogical it's irrational whatever i was just one of those atheists because they're atheists because it's more comfortable i don't get to go to the sundance i get to do whatever i want i don't hold the responsibilities so yeah it wasn't even i wasn't even an interesting uh atheist because this is generic avis so to speak and yeah so i basically went on being an atheist for about seven years yeah seven years and at 21 i had my reversion to catholic faith uh it's a very strange story of how i reverted to god uh but the the essential version is that my main sin was that i was very attracted to erotism and sexual stuff essentially and i i did a lot of masturbation especially that's that was my main sin and uh essentially one day i masturbated so much that essentially one day i woke up and my uh thing didn't go up and i was so scared that i had made my hello hello hello hello hello check check i think we may have lost him temporarily let's wait and see if he comes back talk about a cliffhanger let's see i'm gonna email him okay i just sent him an email we'll see what happens i think um i think i'm still streaming i can see the numbers going up over here sorry for this technical glitch let's see if we can try it again i'm gonna end the call for everyone oh no i won't end the call he's he's gonna rejoin the call i think here we go hello hi you're back i i disappeared for a second uh so yeah i was saying you just said you just said that you were so scared because you woke up one morning and your thing didn't work and then you were so scared so what happened then because it was like a cliffhanger you left the audience [Laughter] what happened is that uh i was very scared and i felt a weight on my chest oh and i was so scared that i forgot that i was an atheist for a second i basically just said oh i feel i feel scared i should go confess my sins yes and that's how it happened i still to this day i still don't know i still do not know how it clicked how it happened but i i actually went and confessed my sins i wasn't actually convinced of what i was doing i basically just said oh the fear will go away if i just confess my sins yeah but while i was confessing my sins in the confessional booth i realized what actually i had done i realized the weight of my sins as i was saying them or at least i like to believe so because i actually ended up crying in front of nice wow and uh and yeah so while i was crying i relieved myself of that weight uh so [Music] then i obviously went catholic uh i reverted to the catholic faith and how old are you at this point i am 25 no no not today but at that time at that point i i was i was uh living at home going to school or what was your situation yeah uh yeah i i i'm still at home okay because of uh because of uh obviously i'm not vaccinated so i cannot go to university oh my god are you kidding me are you allowed to go to mass uh yeah i'm allowed to go to mass uh thank god because we can't hear you know that right oh my gosh that that's that's terrible it's horrible i'm very very very very disappointed in pope francis and all the bishops i'm very disappointed for allowing this to happen my bishop in particular promised me on multiple occasions it would never happen there will never be a vaccine passport to get into church i'll never be denied the sacraments i'll never be denied access to a catholic church yeah they pray and then they did so i understand the pressures he under he's under i understand the political pressure but the church is not subject to the state yeah the church is under god the church is under god so i'm very disappointed uh i'm a big defender of pope francis i like the man i love the man but i'm very very very disappointed in that and the fact that he promotes uh or that he seems to believe in evolution and doesn't promote creationism which i'm a big well opponent of evolution unfortunately uh i think that's one of the things that i have not against him but i there's something of what he says sometimes that it seems so like hang on a second that that's that's not true at all do you remember recently do you remember recently he said sexual sins are not a big deal do you remember when he said that yes he's and that's not just the first time that he said that i remember him hearing something like that another time he also said that truth is not an absolute thing that it's relative that there's there's no such thing as one true and how can you be the pope of the catholic faith and not believe that there's an actual truth wow you heard it from his lips in italian uh actually if it's reported in the news it might be twisted by the journalists yeah i understand that uh i i heard i obviously trust my mom because she actually knows more about the catholic faith than me and he said she actually follows a lot of many interviews not only on pope francis but uh on other priests uh i haven't looked at the interview yet i'm i'm gonna do that eventually if i actually rebuild my faith i want to actually understand what is happening in the catholic church right now yeah uh but yeah she said that in many occasions in many interviews he says something that is some seems distorted or uh it doesn't make any sense or whatever i i want to clarify this i i don't hate the man uh to me he's like uh have you read uh the last book of the chronicles of narnia yeah i've read them all he's like enigma the donkey he is he's not doing this because he wants to do evil he's i don't know if he's being manipulated or he was put there to just keep the keep the church on in under control by i don't know maybe masonry or whatever but he's not doing this be i at least i like to believe that he's not evil or he's not doing this with a purpose he's uh he's just he's there yeah he's he doesn't mean evil he's just he's just the monkey was evil what was the monkey's name uh shift if i remember okay yeah if uh if my listeners don't know about that book they should read what was the title of the book uh the last battle the last battle right so i think there's seven or eight books in the series or nine or yes exactly there are seven seven okay uh anyway it's a very very very very powerful dark image of the antichrist and i think it's about the antichrist is it about the antichrist yes because uh i think because there's a difference between satan and the antichrist yeah they're not the same the man of iniquity and the beast there are three of them right there's an unholy trinity right exactly i i do not i cannot remember if he intended it to be the antichrist or the or actually satan but what scares me about the last book of uh the chronicles of narnia is how true to what is actually happening is it's quite scary wow it's really scary i should re-read it yeah yeah you sure because you'll find that it's almost uh because the donkey is he's dressed with the in this in the guys of aslan lion's clothes right lion skin yeah the lion's skin and if you look at what what pope francis is doing or saying it's almost looks like he's dressed with a robe of of a pope but he's not qualified to be hip-hop or whatever because many of the things that he says are very superficial they're very on a superficial level of uh faith because they sound like something that like they sound amazing they sound beautiful because it talks about love he talks about uh we should all be friends uh brothers or whatever but when you try to understand what actually he's saying and the and the consequences the implications you find that it almost sounds like something that uh just a random motivator could say i don't hear anything holy about them i i cannot hear something holy about what he says i i feel like he lacks the substance of faith um i don't know if you agree but uh that well i i just i i'm very cautious about what i call pope bashing because i mean i spent my whole catholic like i converted in 2009 in 2009 ever since the the current pope and uh you know it's i've had a lot of cedivicantus and radical uh traditionalists radtrads yeah attacking pope francis and i've just been defending him uh you know with this idea that the with the hermeneutic of continuity i can interpret everything pope francis says in a way that's conformable with tradition and uh it's all well and good we have to give him the benefit of the doubt and these sorts of things and we have to love him we can't hate it we can't hate him because we can't hate anything not human we can't hate any human but you know the the main challenge for me is when i looked into evolution i realized it's obviously philosophically untenable and that uh that was sort of uh challenge for me with the most recent popes including uh pope uh saint john paul ii so that's a bit of a that's been a bit of a challenge and then with covet it was just like uh the ultimate challenge to my uh position to my position because a lot of people were thinking that i was going over the top in my defense of pope francis things that they thought were inexcusable i was trying to say let's give them the benefit of the doubt but now with covet it's like i i don't have a way of giving them the benefit of the doubt so i actually went to confession the other well months ago now but when this whole thing started when the pope was promoting the vaccine i just went to con i went to confession at that time because my wife who's anti-catholic asked about pope francis pushing the vaccine and what i thought of it and i just bluntly told her i just told her he's either stupid or evil there's no other option like he's stupid or he's evil those are the only options so i had to go to confess that to a priest and he said he said don't worry about it but you know try to be careful you don't uh denigrate the holy father he is the vicar of christ he is the vicar of christ so it's a delicate walk it's a delicate balance a lot of the conservative catholics so-called that i talked to on my podcast they say look he's uh he's our father he's the holy father but it's like with your earthly father sometimes he's a good man but he's a conflicted man he's an alcoholic he likes to go and sleep with his mistresses and he likes to cheat at his cheat on his taxes and he likes to uh maybe uh touch your little sister whatever you know he's basically a good man with a lot of uh weaknesses right so this is one approach i don't know i i'm trying not to deal with the issue just because it's so delicate so it it strikes so deep to the heart of my faith my faith is built on the papacy basically because the papacy he has the keys he's given the keys is the vicar of christ and it's a very delicate thing for me and i will uh gladly die for the papacy i'll die for pope francis so long as the church teaches that he's the pope and as i often said i've as i've also often said jokingly to rad trads instead of accountists if and when the church decides that he's not the pope that he was never the pope he was just an anti-pope or he was the antichrist or whatever you know at that point all you know all stop calling him the pope yeah i'll withdraw the special uh privileges that i that i allow to him that i afford to him but up until that time i have to afford him the greatest dignity the greatest respect and give him the maximum benefit of the dough so i'm just letting you know that's why i'm a little bit uh i don't want to contribute too much and i don't want to talk too much about it because it hurts me it hurts my heart it hurts my soul and it uh it's it's the linchpin and the key the key to my faith is the papacy and that uh the authority the infallibility of the church and the indefectability of the church so you can respond to that however you want we can move on after yeah sorry sorry if i talked about this no no no no very open way it's natural it's natural i mean i would love i would love to bash him but it's not catholic and i'm not saying that you're i'm not saying that you're bashing him in that you're not catholic i'm saying that for myself i just i'm very very delicious very very careful very careful very careful because that's the that's what i feel it this era that we are leaving now is a big contradiction everything is a contradiction we cannot trust the pope even as catholics we cannot trust what is supposed to protect us and i mean uh the medics or whatever doctors and whatever we cannot trust them we cannot trust even a vaccine that is supposed to keep us safe and again it's not we cannot trust uh the government i mean i i i don't know whenever you can actually trust the government but still and the media i you cannot trust the media you can trust journalists you can trust anyone basically everything is a contradiction and yeah you just have to live with that i i don't know if you're familiar with the old testament you read it much uh no no oh yeah i haven't it'll uh it'll come for you i think it'll comfort you during these difficult times because the chosen people of god were allowed to go because of you know because they fell from they strayed from god they were allowed to be conquered by the different nations around and they underwent all kinds of trials and tribulations and so much turmoil so much contradiction uh because they didn't keep their their end of the bargain their promises that they made through moses among others you know um but it is eye-opening to read the old testament with covet in mind with the current you know what's happening yeah with what's happening just in the world with uh the attack on the family the attack on truth the attack on everything that's good and holy it's uh it's interesting to go back and look at how god's chosen people in you know a couple thousand years ago or beyond um how how god's justice plays out and it's it's ugly it's it's not good and the the severe justice of god that's meted out in this world is like heaven compared to hell obviously if you're if you're in hell you would beg to go to the worst uh the worst position in this spatio-temporal world where we have a chance to pray to repent and to suffer for uh yeah in union we still have a chance at least yeah we have a chance to suffer in union with christ and to offer it up to god and to to be on uh the side of god the side of goodness the side of truth the side of justice and mercy and everything else and freedom right the key word today is freedom actual freedom not just not just civil freedom or no actual freedom speaking of which have you have you watched the movie a hidden life by terence malik no usual because it's it has helped me during these times in which i you're basically attacked or uh you're everything is trying to destroy you because you you don't vaccinate therefore you're an animal or whatever you they think you are an assassin or a criminal you should watch that movie because it tells the story of what happened to france jaegerstater which was uh an austrian um an australian um uh he basically uh when he was called to arms during the time of uh hitler he said no i do not swear my fealty to isler i i will not do that he had a very rough time because he was thrown in jail and they were trying to convince him please swear your lawyer still to to hitler so they will let you go you you won't spend the entirety of your life in jail and until and he never said no he never he never said yes i mean yeah he never said yes and he he actually was um uh executed for it wow but he he to till the very end he said i will not swear my loyalty to the one who is making uh who is uh who is responsible for every every everything that is bad in the world basically right now and and it's actually a moving moving movie malek he said malek terence malik yeah terence malik okay have you uh by chance have you read the book of maccabees first maccabee second maccabees it's uh yeah this uh this is something that i need still need to correct i haven't really read the i as a catholic i am embarrassed to say that i have not yet read the bible i i have read some passages especially ice the old testament the genus is because it's something that interests me and uh i will use this as to um to start what i was actually what was i wanted to talk did we lose him again did we lose him again is okay you're back you're back you cut out you cut out for a little bit you said you're going to use this to start something i i wanted yeah i wanted to talk about my fake journey uh yeah and it involves the fact that i not well informed about what actually constitutes the catholic faith okay uh because of my because of the fact that i uh reverted to catholic faith more for fear of what i had done with sin and not for actual uh you know philosophical or intellectual uh conviction uh i i was i i think i never i've never been sincere or genuine about my faith and i want to regain that sincerity i want to be sincere and genuine about what i should believe in and i want to say yes i do believe that this is actually what it's supposed what reality is supposed to be i do believe that this is uh what i should do with my life and what i should strive for and uh and another component that is really uh has been hindering me from doing so is the fact that i trust more as i told you in the comments of your video i trust more my interpretation of things rather than just looking it up on in the bible or whatever and that is why i asked you that question about the original sin and uh i need to let go of my uh i'm of my uh uh maybe for i need to let go of my pride but also i need to start trying to understand everything or trying to philosophically analyze uh or to try and come up with with an idea in my head of how catholic phase is supposed to be and start actually reading hey this is what catholic faith is don't try to figure it out on your own because you didn't invent the bible you're not gonna come up with it on your own so yeah you be humble and just read it my my i don't know if you want my advice but my advice to you would be uh use your desire in terms of philosophy religion use your desire as your guide so uh instead of saying oh i'm gonna go alphabetically or i'm gonna read chronologically or i'm gonna i'm gonna just go through systematically uh unless that's what your desire is but i mean the the way to go about it is to say well there's this burning issue in my head what is the trinity and then start looking at the trinity okay uh what um you maybe you have questions about um mary so you dive into that or maybe you have questions about uh the sacraments you dive into that or maybe you have questions about the bible so you dive into that so i mean what i'm suggesting here and you can take it or leave it is uh that you are passionate about the question and i guarantee you 100 i guarantee you every question that you're passionate about that christ and his church has the answer for you guaranteed that that's up to you right but i guarantee you the church will give you an answer and it will be a clear answer now there are secondary and tertiary issues in the church where the church is still debating and there you're you have you have the right to question you have the right to have different opinions and there are theologians who disagree and that have disagreed for centuries okay there are issues like that secondary and tertiary issues but the primary basic essential saving truths aren't that many there may be three four hundred okay of these questions that you might have and they get answered that's not a lot of questions i mean you talk to a typical fifth grader in the course of one day they probably have a hundred questions that they ask mommy and daddy in the teacher yeah so and it doesn't take you long to get the basics and but my advice is simply is to follow your desire what are you passionate about what are you excited about what question is bothering you and i guarantee you you'll get an answer and whether you like it or not that's another thing but that's part of the struggle too is uh it may be beyond you and you may just have to say well it's a question of faith and my reason it's beyond my reason even though it's not irrational it's beyond my reasonable and maybe later i'll digest it that's what happened to me there are many things that i didn't understand in the bible in the catholic faith that i just said put it aside i've tried to understand it i can't understand it i don't i don't believe it's irrational i believe it's just beyond reason or at least beyond my capacity right now as an immature catholic to understand and so i just put it aside and some of those things i've come back to them later with experience and through prayer and stuff like that and i've been able to be more comfortable with them and understand them and on that note on the note of uh using questions that i have to find an answer uh i got from amazon this which is a sum of thomas uh and it's in a format with a lot of questions about um about faith about the journey of faith and and a very short answer but that still contains what the truth of the somatologica is and i think that uh i will i will start reading it like tonight uh when i go to bed and um i will use that method of odd of trying to come up with a question that i feel that i have with a question that i feel it's natural in my heart that i feel what about maybe like what about the original sin or whatever and i'll look and i'll study maybe uh some questions per night uh maybe um i'll maybe i'll find an answer to what i'm looking for yeah there are very very very very delicate nuanced uh concepts and truths uh it's it's guaranteed they're gonna be that's part of the richness of the church is that that uh that nuance because why if you if you even look at a protestant christian why are they satisfied going to their bible day in day out and i mentioned the protestants just because they're very focused on the bible okay yeah how how can it feed their soul day after day diving in digging in reading and re-reading these same passages that they know many of the passages they know off by her so why is that well it's because god is infinite and god is good and god is beautiful and beauty is not boring goodness is not boring the truth is not boring it's infinitely exciting even though god is perfectly simple but the the beauty of creation and the beauty of uh the truth and the beauty and all this sort of thing it's uh it's never boring and it's the same thing with the the tradition of the church there are nuances that will keep you excited and keep you scratching your head and keeping you coming back for more but there'll be other issues that are cut and dry and simple you've just accepted them you've understood them and you know with certainty that uh you know abortion is evil masturbation is intrinsically disordered and homosexual active homosexual acts are intrinsically disorder all these sorts of things you just know them and it's one and done like you don't need to think about you don't need to spend a lot of time thinking about it but in its application it gets complicated what about uh you know like pope francis is trying to accommodate those who are uh you know same-sex attracted and how do we accommodate them and we don't want to abandon them and there's those things i have to agree that these are human beings who have the potential to get the faith and to get into the state of grace so we have to work with them okay but we can't we can't deny sin use their sin no we shouldn't excuse them never that is uh wholesome or whatever exactly yeah it's that's another thing he's basically saying oh who am i to judge them yeah you are the pope that's who you are to judge them you are the pope and you should not judge them like criticize them saying oh you're you're a horrible person because you do such thing just uh say them well you believe in this you believe that this is your nature or natural attraction where here's my take on this and here's why i think that your uh natural sexuality is not compatible with what you're uh what you're actually doing and which or even like teaching them that there's a distinction between uh erotic attraction and sexuality because that's the problem we usually confuse them as the same thing and until we keep on confusing this these two things we'll never find an exit we'll never say there you go this is the answer you were looking for because there will never be an answer until we keep confusing the two things and this is something that i also had to learn uh through my uh reversion to catholic faith yeah so i think i think you already understand that there's a big difference between a sort of textbook catholicism the essential saving truths on paper like what you need to believe all the dogmas and all this sort of thing and uh you have if you can get a hold of this in italian that would be good if you can read it in english fundamentals of catholic dogma yeah um it's not i don't think it's infallible although it does have the imprometer and the uh knee heel upset um it's a good guide you know it's a good guide and any catechism like the new catechism i like the new catechism i also like the older catechisms like of trent and the baltimore catechism here in the united states well i'm in canada but down in the united states there's a baltimore catechism very popular and it's there's there are many different versions of it but it's often in question answer format so if you can get a hold of catechism that would be really good too but i did what i did want to say you know the difference between that theoretical checkbox okay i believe this xyz i believe believe believably believe believe like the creeds all the creeds through history the history of the church they've uh i'd want to say evolve but there's been a growth and a refinement of the creed how we express our faith to distinguish it from the heresies that oppose the catholic faith so there's been a development an organic development of the creeds so you've got all that uh on the one hand and then on the other hand you've got your life day to day how do you pray how do you avail yourself in a worthy manner of the sacraments all this sort of thing and then you've got the messy part of uh interpersonal stuff how do i deal with my family members who are not catholic who are anti-catholic how do i deal with the church my local parish how do i deal with the hierarchy my bishop the my priest uh pope francis what's my relationship with that what's the dynamic all that messy stuff uh i think is grounded in and flows from your theoretical uh knowledge and the faith that you have which is largely um intellectual but it's also very very personal it's like the heart it's your it's your heart it's your heart you love the truth you're seeking the truth and then you find the truth and that truth is a tool that will uh help you to navigate the messy part sort of like the horizontal part where you have to deal with other human beings and it gets really really ugly and messy you know yeah and about what you were saying about uh the heart and the strive to know the truth that's actually what's my current state of faith uh i told you in the email that i sent you that i'm i'm in a phase where i'm i have a very bland uh belief let's say where i basically just believe because i'm christian and and i uh i'm generally scared of hell but that's about it not i'm not examining myself i'm not uh trying to seek for the truth i'm in a comfortable state of faith well actually this is what's what's happening to me i i lost some of the clarity that i had when i started actually being catholic some of the clarity or the awareness of what i was actually doing uh and as of now i feel something that is telling me whenever i feel depressed or whenever i feel demotivated there's something that's saying don't let go there i feel not like a voice but a plea um don't let it go please don't go away i i know that it feels irrational i know that you don't exactly understand what's going on but trust me that this is what you should do uh i'm interpreting it but that's the feeling of familiarity that i feel whenever i or whenever i'm i'm talking about god there's something that is telling me this is what you should do so please don't don't revert to being an atheist or don't do anything else please uh i know that you don't exactly understand what you're doing just keep on doing it until you it will make sense once again uh so please don't revert to your old habits just because you don't understand what you're doing at the moment and this is actually the uh the thing that is uh keeping keeping me from uh going back to being an atheist just i there's something that is telling me don't don't do it just stay here yeah well you remember that feeling you had that morning when you woke up and we're having physical malfunction uh you you know you don't need to dwell on it in a negative way dwell on it in a positive way it's like god you've given me a taste of despair you've given me a taste of hell and you've given me in the same day you gave me a taste of heaven you gave me a taste of peace you gave me a glimpse of yourself god you gave me that that chance to come to you freely without compulsion right you didn't get god didn't even offer you a free doughnut or a hot dog to come back to him right no i just did it he just did it freely freely right so the the thing the thing is the prayer that i pray um especially in the beginning my conversion 2009 i went from atheism to catholicism okay in 2009 the prayer well i used our father a lot our father who art in heaven but the other prayer that i like to pray was please god keep the spark of faith alive that you gave me a spark of faith keep it alive and make it into a small flame and make that flame into a large raging fire so i don't need to worry about it um if you're carrying a candle in the dark and there's wind you're going to be if you're in a precarious situation with danger you're going to be nervous that the wind will blow out the little flame but if you have a huge fire uh in every room of your mansion you're not going to worry walking from room to room with that candle because if it goes out you know there's a big fire that you've got blazing so same thing with your faith in my early walk with god i was very scared that i would lose the faith because it's just a little spark it's just barely even a flame and uh my prayer to god was to keep the flame alive and make it grow and it's very important that you pray that okay um it doesn't matter how confused you are about god or religion it doesn't matter like just it's not your project it's god's projects you need to uh you need to diminish and god needs to increase okay so the other the other image i think will be very helpful for you from the new testament which i'm sure you're familiar with is the the sower of the seed it saw some of the seed fell on ground some fell on good ground and the seed that fell on good ground bore fruit okay so i'm simplifying but the basic prayer intention that you have is god you made me okay you can help me to be that good soil so make me good soil the seed fell and it is growing but are the roots going to find nourishment are they going to get dried up are the birds going to come and eat me like uh i'm scared of that so please god make me good soil so that seed can grow and bear fruit that's a prayer that i would pray without words just having that image in mind and just praying without words like groaning and the holy spirit understands my groan i don't want i i don't want to lose a faith it's precious and it's supernatural it's not natural it's supernatural it's beyond my control i can't manage it i can't control it i have to pray and so that i've gone through ups and downs with my faith in the past two years have been very challenging okay satan loves attacking me and my family and i've been under a demonic attack uh this past two years on and off it comes and goes depends on how prayerful i am so i i want to emphasize with you how important it is in the spiritual battle your precious soul is on the line and satan wants it he's not going to give up till the very end and at the very end when you're on your deathbed or whatever it is before the last breath you take satan and his demons are going to amp up the the attack on you so it's an ongoing battle right to the end your precious soul is on the line it's going to go one way or the other and so you have to get in the habit of relying on god praying to god help me god i'm weak i'm a sinner if you lead me to myself you know what i'm going to do i'll end up just masturbating in one way or another physically with with sex or with food or with drugs or with uh pleasure with power with money like there's there's so many ways for us to stimulate ourselves to have pleasure it's not just sexuality all kinds of all kinds of self-stimulation it's idolatry it's adultery so we need to rely on god and we need to really pray every day all day every day to uh you know thank god for our faith and to ask god to give us more and more faith another thing i want to say and i'll let you talk is if you read the lives of the saints if you have a favorite saint um start reading what he or she wrote if you have a couple of favorite saints start looking into it if you don't have many favorite saints start reading an overview quick little paragraph overviews of their lives fall in love with one or two or three of these saints and uh if you fall in love with a saint who has written a lot like the doctors of the church if you fall in love with one of those saints or a few of those saints you will nourish your faith greatly just by reading the the clarity that they have the conviction they have and above all the love that they have the love they have and the their willingness to live and die for christ it's amazing yeah and it's a good thing that you described what um the the metaphor of the the the good soil versus the bad soil because i feel like i understand more concepts of morals faith and whatever uh i understand them better through a metaphor rather than facing them directly it's almost uncomfortable when i have to uh when i have to talk about something spiritual or whatever as it is instead of it's like i'm i'm pursued and i'm facing the meduza but the meduza is he if i look directly in the eyes of the medusa i'm gonna die if i instead look at it through a mirror or for a shield i can see the real appearance of it but i'm not like lying to myself because it's not the actual thing but i'm understanding what it is through a mirror through something that is a metaphor essentially and i can actually face it and i can actually uh understand it better there's a quote from um from a scottish writer uh george mcdonald who uh wrote about the metaphor of the mirror uh which is basically when you look at your room uh you you perceive your room through your uh lens for your perception for your preconceptions and whatever and uh you cannot see for what it is but when you start seeing your room in a for a mirror you don't see your room you see a room you see oh wow there's there's an unmade bed there's there's a there's a there's a messy bookshelf right there and so you can actually start looking at things for what they are instead of perceiving them through your mind for your perception and that's what basically a metaphor does you put some meaning in it and you mask it with a with an image or basically some even a narrative if you will uh i think that the lord of the rings is a big metaphor for christian life essentially and it's easier to understand what are the values the moral values at stake through a metaphor rather than just facing them directly talking about them directly because it it makes it makes you almost uncomfortable at least it makes me almost uncomfortable when i have to talk about especially uh like abortion or uh all the scenes that are in the world i almost say please i don't i don't want to talk about this i please i i don't want to hear about it but when i see the same exact uh situation in a like a fantasy story or a sci-fi movie that has similar morals similar values i can finally confront those issues and i can say wait that's wrong that's not supposed to happen you don't do that you should not do that please go back um and uh and it's easier for me to understand faith or faith-related um issues through um for a metaphor uh there's an italian writer his name is uh his name was dino busati who has wrote many many novels uh who have a very metaphysical uh sense in them and there are beautiful metaphors for even if it didn't acknowledge it there are there are beautiful metaphors for even christian values there's this one novel that it's called the colombre i i i highly recommended you read it which i find it to be the most beautiful metaphor that i've ever read for um for the relationship that humans have with death how they perceive it how they are scared of it as if it's gonna uh deny their existence and instead uh they don't understand that it's a part of life and it's actually the other thing that describes life birth and death without death you cannot describe what your existence was there is no there is no existence without birth and death you should accept the fact that you are going to die because it will actually make you immortal it will actually make you understand why you you need to live your life better if you accept the fact that you are in fact going to die one day and i find it to be a really beautiful metaphor yeah well it's a very important topic you bring up death and i'm reading uh my one of my favorite saints saying alfonse's liguri i think he's an italian yes highly recommend you read him uh he's very passionate about a few topics and he just drills them in over and over and over and over again and uh it's helping me it's helping me because it's that emphasis one of the things he emphasizes obviously is the four last things so death judgment heaven and hell you have to bear this in mind you know as much as possible i mean every day i think about my death every day and it's all about preparing for death and people live sadly many even christians live as if they were never going to die they're never going to meet their maker right and if you bear that in mind every day and you uh remember that heaven or hell one or the other awaits us um it's surprising that there aren't more saints walking around really it is and it's surprised the most embarrassing part is that i'm not a saint yet i mean i know that i'm gonna end up in heaven or hell so the choice is clear i have to be a saint so why aren't i why am i acting like oh well i could just be a normal guy in the world and i could just yeah catholic i go to church you know it's just like compromise like half-hearted and what did god say in revelation if you're lukewarm will spit you out of my mouth it's almost like the worst thing to be so we have to be on fire we have to be great saints but we're standing in our own way because we think oh it's my life it's my project what am i doing today i'm going to do this i want to do this i have this project that project and we're not giving god his due we're not we're not making god a priority and uh god's going to be okay he's going to be happy for all eternity no matter what but what about me if i neglect my duty to god to know god to love god and to serve god in this life so i can be happy with him in the next god's still gonna be happy but i'm gonna be miserable in hell for all eternity so if we want to be truly selfish if we want to be selfish in a healthy way we need to be catholic saints that's that's the only way yeah i remember you specifically saying something like that in a in another interview that you did uh some year ago you said that mediocrity is the biggest enemy for for a christian is being mediocre adapting to the ways of the world uh adapting to the the waves of the seed of the world that is in constant change adapting to it and just uh keep keeping low just uh saying i'll just i'll just do what everyone does and that is essentially what is happening with the vaccine situation you can either choose to be what saints should be or you can choose to adapt and do as everyone else does because it's more comfortable you don't get the hate you don't get the discrimination you don't get to be uh uh outcasted you you're not you're you'll be you'll be uh materially happy but not spiritually happy because you're gonna be mediocre you're not gonna not like stand out but you're not gonna be something in the eyes of god you're not gonna be yourself you're gonna be just another iteration of a stereotype yeah it's so important it's so important i i keep asking myself rhetorically but i guess i should ask god almighty why are you not sending us a great saint or multiple great saints who are going to stand up for the church i mean i i mean i strive to love the church i feel like i love the church i talk a lot about loving the church i mean do i actually love the church i mean if i really love the church maybe i'm the great saint that god sends but in the meantime uh as i'm struggling with my faith i'm just waiting for god to send a great saint to speak up for christ and his church because the world we know that if you love the world you're an enemy of god if you're a friend of the world you're an enemy of god this is what it says in the new testament and we know that uh if you're not for christ you're against christ right there's only these two options there's nothing you you you're you can't be in the middle you can be i'm like not opposed to christ but i'm just not no you're you can't be in the middle or either you are against him or you're with him there is no in between yeah he said christ said it both ways he said it if you're if you're not for me or against me and he also said if you're not against me you're for me so there's there's no third way as you said as you said and christ himself said it and he made sure that it was clear and that it was understood but i'm you know i as a sort of passive we in the western world were sort of trained to be dependent on the government dependent on others dependent and just sort of passive watch tv oh did you hear the news oh what's happening oh and over in this country this is happening but there's no action there's no activity there's no involvement it's just passive and you're watching tv and you're going to work and you're paying your bills and you're paying your taxes it's a very passive lifestyle so in the same way i'm sitting here waiting for a hero to come and speak up for christ in his church right but it has to be you it has to be me and we have to make we have to make it very clear that there's a hierarchy in the church god the pope his bishops and his and the bishops priests and the lay faithful right and the political leaders and those who are in big tech and big pharma whatever it might be they're not in the hierarchy i'm sorry they're just not in the hierarchy so we need we need a saint that will come and speak for christ and his church and clarify the hierarchy and yes we are supposed to uh honor legitimate authority civil authorities yes in the affairs that pertain to civil authority but not to decide if i can go into a church and pray or if i can go into a church and avail myself of confession or the eucharist that's not up to the state to decide it never has been and it never will be but we need a catholic voice with authority to stand up for me here in quebec where i'm not allowed to go to church i need a catholic with authority in the hierarchy to stand up and boldly say the truth about christ and his church and i'm just shocked and horrified that we don't have that was it was it saint augustine that said that we should uh follow uh authority even in uh um even in a civil sense well saint paul says it right oh simple sorry saint paul and all the saints all the saints and i say it i say i agree but we need to distinguish we can't just we can't give we you know one of my favorite passages in the new testament is render unto caesar what is of caesar and render to god what is of god and we have to be clear about what which is which we have to be clear and the image that i always use in with that with respect to that passage is that yes i give this gold coin to caesar because that's what's due to caesar and then i pick up caesar with that gold coin he's got the gold coin in his pocket i pick him up and the gold coin and i render that to god exactly right so the the distinction needs to be made and the hierarchies need to be clarified and how how do they work together civil authority and ecclesiastical authority how do they what's the interplay now i've read the history of the church i've read the history of papacy i've read the history of the councils and i know that politics ruins everything it ruins everything okay in the second vatican council which i'll die to my i'll defend to my dying breath the second vatican council there was so much politics right yeah muddying the waters and you know uh blatant overt politics trying to attack christ and his church and that's within within the bishops that were there so imagine what happens uh when you when you involve just regular atheists enemies of the church of course politics is going to uh be a threat to us into our faith if it's in the church obviously the threat is going to be from without the church also but um i don't know it's just uh you know we need to we need to always maintain the image of the baby jesus christ the the infant christ the pure innocent holy good baby and then the dirty bath water which is the world and that dirty bath water and we need to keep the baby cling onto the baby and get rid of the bathwater certainly don't drink it don't bathe with it get rid of it and there's a tendency to confuse categories and to get all confused in the complexity of this world and that leads to corruption that leads to compromise that leads to uh worldliness worldliness basically that's the danger right satan wants to lure us into being worldly and then he's got us and then he also wants to satan also wants to lure us into hating our enemies and demonizing our enemies and it happens on both sides the facts the unwaxed the backs towards the next like demonizing and dehumanizing our enemies like my wife said to me uh oh i heard that those who received the vax are no longer human and that the pharmaceutical companies own them they have the copyright and they own these modified creatures they're no longer human i said no no no no no no you're human they're created human and you remain human right don't believe that that's the you know my uh i mean my wife's not catholic she's very anti-catholic but she's uh she's very very on fire for the truth and the freedom movement that's surrounding kovic she she's very adamant that she's very she's not sure if god is real but she certainly knows that satan is real that's where she's at okay so at least we have that yeah so it's a crazy situation i wanted to ask you about the church in um in italy or northern italy uh northern italy how what it what are the numbers like in terms of uh those who refuse to comply i refuse to comply i'll i'll never comply they can kill me they'll have to kill me um but um and you're you're not complying to certain things it seems so how rare how rare is it to find someone that um is fighting for freedom in that way well uh it's a very difficult question to answer because you have very rare instances of someone declaring hey hey i'm i am against this i don't want to uh uh obey this kind of rules that don't make sense but when you find one you instantly find a lot of others that you you say wait what a minute are we this much are we this many uh but then you you compare it to the number of all the other people who are instead and you say okay we're not that many but we're still mending our numbers and if you if you take a look at all the like telegram groups or whatever who are um organizing protests or organizing uh movements especially the the students they're organ very organized uh they're against the what is here called the green pass um and uh you say to yourself oh wow well at least there are some students because i usually tend to not have that much faith in people of my age because they're very easily influenced and manipulated by not just the media but the opinion of others and the behavior of others and then i look at these telegram groups and they say oh okay at least we have some some people with a brain or or at least or a little conscience they at least they have a conscience and um so it's difficult to answer because you have to find one to find all the others well the thing is when it rains it pours so yeah when you actually find the rain you will you will start to see that it pours early in the uh green pass when it was first introduced i remember very clearly there was circulating in alternate media there was circulating the italians burning the green passes do you remember that i remember some instances of people doing that uh i don't think it's that common of people to do that nowadays when we are so far in ideology that yeah uh i don't think that many many people actually have said you know what uh i've had enough i've had enough i'll do the vaccine just because i i don't want to i don't want to live like this miserable life anymore yeah basically uh and i was actually talking about this with my uncle this morning because i i went running with my with my uncle this morning and he told me that there are a lot of people that are actually uh they are anti-vaccine and they are faking taking the vaccine but they're not they're not injecting anything so that they can get all the the benefits all the benefits and not actually but at least stay without the vaccine like dude if you're actually anti-vaccine please say don't fake it yeah because you're you're maybe not uh maybe you're you think you're being smart but you're actually furthering the this mentality that we have to take away natural rights and resell them as yeah hey you know i can give you this if you if you do as you say it's not like the the candy that we give to uh like uh you're like a kid or something it's our natural rights don't please don't uh encourage this type of behavior you're not being smart by just faking taking the vaccine yeah and it's very surreal i agree 100 i agree uh early on uh when i was expressing my resistance to the manipulation and the coercion like early very on early on when the vax came out in canada uh my employer and different people friends family have suggested well you can get a fake uh passport you can get fake this you just different ways to trick and uh i said no no on on principle i want to resist and i want to be counted among those who are resisting it's it's a battle it's a spiritual battle and it is a numbers game the numbers are important the numbers are very important if all those morons who complied thinking oh it's only two flat in the curve and it's only this and it's only that if all those morons had used their common sense and their principles and said no this is unreasonable i'm not playing along even though it's just a baby step and you're just saying it's only going to be a small step and it's only a small amount of time it's only a small compromise it's only this it's only that if people if everyone had followed their conscience and used their you know god-given intelligence and their conscience in their brain and their uh you know um then this never would have this never would have gone as far as it's gone like you're you're you are actually enabling these these people you know like if i were if i were wealthy and i were taken hostage by a bunch of evil people and the evil people put me on the phone with my family members and said okay well now you're gonna tell them to send you the money i would tell my family members don't send them the money i'm gonna i'm these evil people have me i'm toast borrowing a miracle from god i'm toast like goodbye i love you goodbye don't give these people anything that's what i would say and that's how i feel about these evil godless baby killers who are controlling most of the world seemingly don't give them anything don't give them anything but people just think oh it's just a little compromise it's not a big deal i want to go to the restaurant i want to go traveling i want to do this i want to do that well i'm sorry to tell you but you're being very selfish right now yeah exactly that's actually the problem ironically because they say i'm being selfish for not helping well how does it help they say that always oh you're being selfish or they even used to say this well you think you're you think you're changing the world you think you're gonna bring change to the world i'm not trying to change uh the word i'm not trying to uh i don't have the power i'm just a human i don't have the power to eliminate evil in the world i just have the power to resist it i just have the power because i i will be responsible for my actions i only have the power to say i don't want at the end of my life when i'm on my deathbed uh i don't want to be in the situation where i say dear god what i what have i done i i don't want to be in the situation when i where i have to fear for what's about to happen when i when i die i i don't i don't want to be in the situation where i will have to be ashamed of how i lived like a maggot i i don't i don't i don't want to be ashamed of how he lived i can be hated by everyone but at least i will i will sleep uh pretty decently at night knowing that i did something that i knew i was responsible for yeah i don't want to do what people say that i should do i just want to realize what i need to do in order to feel to be to to live a life with a little bit of dignity left well i don't know if you're following the trucker convoy here in canada and across the world but it started here in canada yeah yeah i i and i never where as i wrote as i wrote you in the email that they saying i i don't know if you've uh if you listened or seen the recent uh message that president trudeau has spread where they whether he's saying oh violence is not the answer you should the trackers are actually the evil guys or whatever is he's basically trying to manipulate people into thinking that he's the innocent he's the victim he's the his uh and he does that with the most innocent uh like epic tone but like he's actually saying something that he is uh he's very convinced about his he does that with a like a sad face with an innocent face he this this is what actually pisses me off dude you know what you're doing just be honest about it yeah and he's he also had the courage to say uh he also had the guts to say oh these people are not intimidating us dude you left you literally you literally left beca you basically said oops i got kobe and you left don't play as if you're not scared by them because clearly you were scared by them you know uh it's sad it's sad to think how many people are in danger of burning in health for all eternity because they're willing to lie and this we're we're in a war we're in a war it's a spiritual war but it's also a geopolitical war there's a war going on war for control and power and uh the people on the other side who want the mandates and who want to control and want to give up control and they want us to give up control to these uh baby killers um they know some of them know that they're in a war and they're willing to lie to bring about the victory for their side but you cannot what they don't understand because they're not catholic they're not good catholics i mean true claims to be catholic but he's not a good catholic what they fail to understand is that you have crossed the line when you lie you've crossed the line it doesn't matter that you justify it by the ends oh we're going to win the war and then we're going to have a you know reduced population and the earth is going to be a paradise and all your fantasy about how you're going to make the earth into a paradise i don't want it doesn't matter paradise i don't want to live on earth for the rest of my life no i don't want to earth as a paradise i mean but the the the thing is that the journalists so-called journalists who blatantly lie the most laughable ridiculous lies about these truckers and the the families that support them i honestly i have trouble understanding how they can sleep at night like when you woke up in a panic that at your conversion we went to confession okay you know that feeling where it's like i've crossed a line i'm in danger how do they not get the grace from god to feel that even if they're atheist okay just get the grace from god to feel that panic like i've crossed a line i'm lying i'm putting lives in in jeopardy my own salvation is in jeopardy i don't understand how they can sleep at night i really don't well it helps if they if they gain a lot of money it certainly helps to deal with the problem oh but uh i guess this is the problem you know how much they're paid you know how much the those uh i mean i mean here in italy there are a small group of um doctors that are usually invited on tv to say oh you should get vaccinated and whatever and they're they always repeat the same exact thing they never change their story and they're paid like for every 10 minutes of uh of showtime so let's say and we were wasting money on these idiots who had even the who haven't eaten even had the guts to say that one of the one of the the nobel prize um winners for medicine uh which is uh luke montagne he they even went on saying that he's an idiot he is uh stupid dude i never i never heard about you before the covet started please be please be humble and if a nobel prize is he's telling you hey look there's something wrong about this situation have the be humble enough to understand that he may be right because at least he has a nobel prize you you i i don't know i don't know if you like uh found the your medical license in in the pringles or whatever but please be humble enough to understand that he may know more than you do yeah well it you know we've talked a little bit about the politicians the media and then there's the you bring up the idea of doctors they're doctors on both sides of this they're scientists on both sides of this issue and the corruption the the key word is corruption like you mentioned with the money okay the corruption is blatant it's obvious uh it's embarrassing i i'm embarrassed to call these people my fellow humans um but it is easy it is easy i guess for them and um there was somewhere i was going with this oh yeah i was going to talk a little bit about the medical profession and those who compromise and how horrible that is and there's that hippocratic oath where you're supposed to do no harm and you're never you're never to procure an abortion right those are two points from the hippocratic oath and they're being blatantly disregarded and uh the chastisement that we're undergoing now comes from god and uh i think it's because there's been something like uh uh killed in the womb since uh roe v wade or whatever it was so yeah um there's a chastisement coming upon us and if you read the old testament you'll you'll get a feel for the you can start to see the pattern how this works right but um the medical corruption i do have a friend and a guest who was on my show and he said that his wife has a medical clinic and she was offered all kinds of money to do testing and to do vaccinations and these sorts of things and she just said no she just said no thank you thank you but no and so she's i wouldn't say suffering financially but she's not profiting financially as she could have and most people that have a family and kids most people are on a tight budget and they'd like some more money right and she's i'm sure she's no different i'm sure she's no different i'm sure she could have used that money to help feed her family and clothe their family and educate her family and everything else i'm sure right um but she said no she because she has principles and because she's catholic she's a good catholic so there are people in medicine and we've seen in the alternate media we've seen good doctors like luke montagne we've seen uh uh you know um i can't remember the names right now but a lot of good doctors who are uh highly specialized in virology even here in canada um speaking up at the risk of being mocked ridiculed blacklisted cancelled and you know it's it takes courage it does take courage but there are a lot of good people out there in medicine and in science uh who are speaking up for the truth and they're doing it some of them might be doing it because they see an opportunity to make money on uh sort of us yeah you know there are people there are people that are uh profiting uh even on what seems to be on our side there are corrupt people on our side but there are good wholesome honest uh people that are fighting for truth on principle and um you know if they manage to survive or even thrive financially on this side of the issue i don't begrudge them that you know um you know i do i do think that those who are profiting with the primary goal being to profit from misfortune i think they're in a lot of danger but yeah you know it's crazy it's a really crazy situation but the medical thing really does it does bother me because i'm thinking now if i do get sick i don't want to go to the hospital because i don't trust these people yeah how do you feel about that i i actually actually talked about um the hospital well here in italy northern italy at least of what i know even the hospital uh that is my city has lied about the numbers of coveted victims uh the that were actually happening because basically they got more money from the government yeah were they caught or you're you're guessing or you have proof of that or no no i'm not guessing uh one they it was reported uh many times and even then they they're still doing it basically but a friend a friend of mine uh my grandma uh had i don't know he had a problem with his eye he got something in the eye or something and he went to the hospital and he wasn't even copied positive but he was scheduled as copied positive and you've got to understand that they're basically lying to get more numbers and inflate the numbers of people who are um who are actually victims of coed and why are you doing this you're furthering a problem that you keep on saying that oh it's a problem it's a really bad situation well yeah no wonder you're you're making it worse and also what you said about the hi