February 13, 2025 • 44 mins
What if truth wasn't just an abstract concept but a person who could transform your life? Join Deacon Max and Deacon Joseph as they explore this through the narrative of the Epiphany. They share their personal encounters with Truth in the figure of Jesus Christ and how these experiences have reshaped their lives. By examining the contrasting responses of the Magi and King Herod, they illustrate the power of an open versus a fearful heart. The Magi's journey symbolizes the courage to seek truth, while Herod's grasp on power reveals the destructiveness of fear and control.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Seek 25 podcast, featuring some of
our favorite podcasters recordedlive at the Max Studios podcast
stage during Seek 25 in SaltLake City.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
What's up, guys?
Welcome to another episode ofLogos Podcast.
This is Deacon Max.
I'm Deacon Joseph, Welcomeeverybody.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Wow, this is awesome.
This is Deacon Max.
I'm Deacon Joseph.
Welcome everybody.
Wow, this is awesome.
This is awesome, dude.
It's so good to see you allhere.
Thank you, we didn't exactlyknow who was going to show up,
so this is pretty cool.
Thanks for being here.
This is so awesome.
Deacon Max.
Dude, how's your seat going sofar?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
It's going well, although I'm a little
uncomfortable right now becausewe're actually sitting and we're
a stand-only kind of podcast.
It's true.
It's true, this is a new gig.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yeah, people who follow us know that we stand
when we record our podcast, sodefinitely outside of our
element right now, but this isgreat.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Seek has been awesome .
Y'all been enjoying Seek.
How's Seek been going?
God, god is so good.
You know, I actually had atransformative experience in
Seek of 2018 or 2019, wheneverIndianapolis was and so I hope
it's transformative for you allwhile you're here this time and
it's crazy that we're up hereright now.
How are you doing, bro?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
How's your Seek?
I'm good.
I'm good.
To sum up my Seek experience.
I was a little nervous for thistoday, obviously, and so Deacon
Max and I went to spend sometime in adoration before this,
and as I was getting in theelevator, I ran into some
sisters of life and they'reamazing and I see them and I
just like feel at peace.
And one of them, sisterCatherine Joy, gave me a litany
(01:34):
of trust, so I was like that'sexactly what I needed right now.
So I'm doing well, really happyto be here.
What are we talking about today, dude?
So today, today.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
today, we're going to be talking about the love of
truth.
The love of truth and we'regoing to relate it to tomorrow's
feast day that the churchcelebrates, which is the
epiphany.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
So that's it.
Yeah, that's right.
I mean, for those of you wholisten to our podcast, you know
how much we love well, beauty,goodness, but really, really, we
love truth, and Deacon Max'slife and my life have been
totally transformed by ourencounter with the truth.
The truth that we believe isthe person of Jesus Christ, the
Logos himself.
That's why our podcast is namedLogos, and so we wanted to try
(02:26):
to just share a little bit ofthat love with you today,
through the lens of the epiphanystory that we're going to be
hearing about and meditating ontomorrow at mass.
We figured that was prettyfitting and kind of the way we
want to frame the discussiontoday is by thinking about these
two, by thinking about thesetwo contrasting approaches to
(02:47):
truth that we see in theepiphany story and that we also
see playing out in our worldtoday.
That's right.
And the two contrastingapproaches are there's the
approach of King Herod, whowe'll talk about and we'll hear
more about tomorrow, obviously,and then there's the approach of
the Magi, the three wise menwho come from the East, and what
we want to propose is that onlyif we kind of become like the
(03:11):
Magi will we ultimately discoverthe truth and then be set free
by it and allow our lives to betransformed by it.
So that's kind of what wewanted to talk about today.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
That's right, I think many of us friends forget that,
as Joey pointed out.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
I don't know how many of you?
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Joseph, joseph, deacon, joseph, I forgot, you
went through a transition andwe're here to support.
That's right.
And so there it is.
So many of us forget, friends,that truth is not a set of
principles in the Christianfaith right, truth is a person.
A set of principles in theChristian faith right, truth is
a person.
So the closer that you get tothat person, the closer that you
(03:50):
happen to get to yourself andthe more that you become alive.
And so, as a contrary exampleto that, we have in the Magi
story, king Herod.
King Herod, and he has whatwe're going to call a Herodian
spirit, right, yeah, and KingHerod, for those of you who know
(04:10):
the story, what did he want todo?
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Well, it's interesting, right, Because I
mean, we've heard the story andwe'll hear it again tomorrow.
But these magi show up from theeast, and we'll talk about them
in a minute.
But King Herod hears thatthey're looking for the newborn
king of the Jews.
Right, They've been followingthis star at its rising and
they're searching for this king.
And Herod, when he's confrontedwith this revelation, instead
(04:36):
of being open to it andreceiving it with humility and
reverence, he is threatened byit right, I'm sorry, and he
tries to.
He feels like it's a threat tohis own power and he tries to
blot it out.
And then, of course, we knowthat we celebrated the feast of
the holy innocence just onDecember 28th, a few days ago.
(04:56):
And so what did Herod do inorder to try to blot out this
truth?
Speaker 2 (05:00):
He was so against truth, he hated truth so much
that he could murder, that hewas willing to murder anyone who
stood for truth In his pursuitto kill the truth in his own
heart and entering into history.
He killed, he murdered.
(05:22):
And that's the drama of acontrarian spirit towards truth,
of the Herodian spirit, when weconfront truth in our own lives
and across the world.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
And it's interesting because I was thinking about
this last night King Herod.
Here's this guy, he's a king,he's a king over the region of
Judea, right, and he ends upcommitting this terrible
atrocity of like murdering allof these innocent children.
Herod did probably not beginhis life as the type of guy who
(05:56):
was just gonna like kill a bunchof innocent children Like.
Herod probably wasn't a kidthinking one day I'm gonna grow
up and be a king and murder abunch of babies.
He probably didn't think that.
But what happens with Herod?
So Herod is pursuing some sortof good in his life, right, like
he's got maybe partially goodmotivations.
He wants power, yeah, he wantsstability.
(06:20):
Right, he sees himself as aking over this area.
He thinks that he hasresponsibility for these people,
maybe that he's in charge ofestablishing peace and order,
and so, in his desire for powerand his desire for control, he
is willing to do whatever ittakes to maintain that, even to
the point of rationalizing okay,I just got to like get rid of
(06:40):
this threat so that I can stayin charge, so that I can
maintain my power, but then whatthat allows him to do is
rationalize this horribleatrocity, and that's the thing,
right?
Speaker 2 (06:50):
So all of the power structures that he considered
himself to be governing wererooted ultimately in him, and
this is a big part of what we'recalling the Herodian spirit.
It's egocentrism at its root.
King Herod truly believed thathe could control reality, that
(07:12):
he was an arbiter of meaning,and this is a deep, profound, I
would say possession of darknessthat consumed his life and that
he operated and justifiedenough to kill innocent children
.
Speaker 3 (07:31):
So the question becomes that we wanted to just
kind of pose, just reflect onwith all of you today is like,
where do we see this Herodianspirit, the spirit of King Herod
, in today's world?
I think we see it in someextreme examples, but I think it
kind of can creep into all ofour lives because it's in a real
way.
It's kind of like the patternof sin that's present with all
(07:54):
of us.
So, deacon Max, let me ask you,where do you see the spirit of
King Herod?
Where do you see people in oursociety, in our culture or even
in your own community behavinglike King Herod did in this
story of the epiphany?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
So, friends, we're going to draw out some pretty
stark examples in history toprove our point here.
One of the examples I actuallywant to draw on more immediately
is that in 2016, the UnitedStates decided that it would
legalize the marriage ofsame-sex unions.
(08:29):
Over and against science, overand against history, over and
against religion, over andagainst truth, politics and the
larger society, the powerstructures that be thought that
they could redefine the naturalsacraments that is, marriage
(08:52):
between a man and a woman andredefine it all together and to
create a new truth according toits own logic, and this is one
of the manifestations I think wesee this Herodian spirit.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Yeah, and I I think that's a good example, because
if we if, of course, if we readthe Bible, but even if we just
kind of look at reality, at thenatural order as God created it,
we know that marriage is aparticular type of thing, right,
that that truth is kind ofwritten into the fabric of
creation.
Men and women fit together,they go together.
That is what leads to theprocreation of children and
(09:26):
family life, and we know thatthat's what constitute like a
flourishing human society that'sfounded upon that.
But what happens so and this is, of course, a hot button issue,
but it's illustrative of ourpoint is that people, in their
desire to have control and theirdesire to have power I mean
(09:46):
think about this attempt toredefine reality according to
our own preconceptions, right,according to our own desires,
maybe for good reasons or likefor understandable motivations,
like Deacon Max, and I don'tthink that people who are in
favor of same-sex unions or whoare in same-sex unions are like
(10:07):
evil, terrible people.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
They probably have good motivations, they're mixed
in with, like a disorderedpursuit of power or control, or
happiness, or also, maybe theyhave a family member who
struggles with this attractionand they see that that person in
their family is getting maybegossiped about, being abused,
being ill-spoken about, and sotheir reaction is let's defend
(10:30):
our family member, who we know,we say that we love.
And so they see this law beingpromulgated and they think to
themselves this is justified.
I see how my cousin, I see howmy brother or my sister, how my
uncle gets treated.
Of course we should do that.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
Right, right, so it's very understandable, but the
point is that when you graspcontrol of reality and try to
shape it according to your ownideologies, you don't end up
being set free, you don't end upfinding the happiness that
you're looking for.
Herod ends up becoming amonster who's capable of doing
something that he probably neverenvisioned himself doing, and
(11:08):
the same thing can happen withdisordered relationships.
Another example that we werethinking about is another
Hobbiton issue, obviously, butlike the gender ideology stuff,
right, like people who have veryunderstandable sufferings and
motivations, and like they'researching for identity and truth
and purpose, and they thinkthey find it in this lifestyle.
(11:31):
And so, because that seems safeand because they kind of have
control of that, they start toshape reality in their own image
rather than humbly submittingto the truth of their own being,
the truth that God has createdthem in, and it ultimately leads
not to happiness but tosuffering and destruction.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
Another example I want to draw on again.
These are stark historical andnow contemporary examples.
But Fulton Sheen and he wasactually one of the reasons that
we're talking who's?
Fulton Sheen fans Fulton Sheenyeah.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
There we go, venerable.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Fulton.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
Sheen incredible.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Part of this today's episode was motivated by a
reflection he had on tomorrow'scelebration on the Epiphany.
He said that one of theclearest manifestations of this
Herodian spirit of recenthistory is actually during World
War II, when the Nazi regimewas in the middle of a war.
Rather than submittingthemselves to the truth that all
(12:33):
people have human dignity, theywere literally willing to kill
millions of people.
They were literally willing tosilence, to blot out, to shut,
to put in dark corners, in darkjail cells, in dark basements,
in dark corners and dark jailcells and dark basements and
dark holes.
Rather than the Nazi regimeaccept the fact that all men are
(12:57):
created in the image andlikeness of God, they were
willing to kill millions for thesake of their own ideology.
And that's, I know, a dramatichistorical example.
But, as you pointed out rightlyearly, deacon Joseph, that's
where we get Now.
(13:18):
All of us in here are not goingto become mass murderers,
obviously that's not what we'resaying.
But what we are saying is thatthere are seeds in our own lives
where we too repeat theHerodian logic where we seek to
kill truth.
That's in our own lives.
Maybe, I don't know, maybe inyour own relationship right now
(13:38):
you're using contraception andanybody in your life who speaks
out against it, or anybody inyour life who calls that
relationship out, you can'tstand, you don't want to be
around.
Or maybe there's anotherlifestyle in your life that you
know is contradictory to the wayyou've been raised, to the way
(13:59):
our Lord in the gospel asks us,to the way that the church calls
us to, and maybe you can't bearthat truth.
Maybe you want to bury it sodeep down you want nothing to do
with it.
But here's the thing If you dothat, your life will not be
submitted to the Holy One.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
Your life will be submitted to yourself and you
won't find the happiness you'relooking for.
That's right, I mean, that'sthe point, and we're not like
trying to condemn people here.
We're just like like we wantpeople to experience the
fullness of life that the Lordwants to give them.
And one of the ways that weconstantly fail, like don't
attain that happiness and thatfullness, is by becoming like
little King Herods, who blot outthe inconvenient truths that
(14:41):
confront us every day and makeourselves like God and say I'm
going to do it my way.
It's like what Father MikeSchmitz was talking about in his
keynote talk the other night.
Like it's this we all have thisnatural inclination to become
little King Herods and to blotout truth.
I don't want to convert andchange my life.
I don't want to submit to whatGod is revealing to me as the
(15:03):
way to live.
I just want to like do my ownthing because that seems safe
and because that seems like it'sgoing to make me happy.
But what we want to propose isthat only by living in union
with the Lord and only byreceiving the truth as he's laid
it out to you, which ofteninvolves repentance and
(15:23):
conversion, will you thenexperience the fullness of life
that he wants to give you, willyou then experience the fullness
of life that he wants to giveyou?
And so I think a way toillustrate this within this very
same story of the epiphany, isby pointing to the example of
the Magi, who are, interestingly, they're not Jews, they're not
Christians, obviously, they'repagans right, they are people
(15:44):
from the East who practiceEastern religions perhaps.
But we want to point to theexample of these guys to show
what a proper response to truthlooks like.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
If the other spirit is a Herodian spirit, we're
going to call this one themagical spirit.
That's right.
Speaker 4 (16:03):
Give it up everybody Come on.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Thank you, thank you, I worked real hard for that one
.
Thank you, thank you, I workedreal hard for that one.
The Magi, as you pointed out,were not particularly religious
people.
I think in some sense maybethey were religious.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Yeah, I mean Eastern religions.
Probably.
We don't know a lot of detailsabout them.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
But we do know that they were sort of scientists of
the time.
Yeah Right, and I don't know ify'all know this story, but one
of the dramatic points of thestory which you'll hear tomorrow
is when King Herod meets upwith the Magi right, they come.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
They come to Jerusalem.
They've been following thisstar, right.
They've been gazing uponcreation, gazing upon the
heavens and allowing it to leadthem.
Right.
They allow it to, they evengive up the security of like
staying at home and being safe,and they make this sacrifice of
like.
We think, as we humbly gazeupon the heavens with awe and
(16:59):
like childlike wonder, that thisis leading us to the truth.
And even though it'd be easierto stare where we are and not
change, we're actually going toset out after that.
And then they arrive at KingHerod's palace, right, and they
meet their enemy, as it were.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
They have, they share , they break bread with their
enemy.
Here's something interestingthat Deacon Joseph pointed out
of the narrative.
You know, king Herod wasn'tuncurious, he wasn't just kind
of welcoming them in.
He had a desire to know thetruth of the situation.
I would say a thwarted visionof that truth, but he wanted to.
(17:33):
There was something in him thatwas curious.
And this is like us, right.
A lot of us are curious to knowthe truth and we pursue and we
walk and we meet people and wetalk to people, we shake hands,
we go to social parties.
We do all of these thingsbecause there's something in us
longing to meet the truth.
But here's the thing when theMagi figure out what King Herod
is trying to do, magi look toeach other, as it were, and they
(18:00):
go and they pursueauthentically the very thing
that's taken them to that dinnerand is now taking them to meet
the Christ child.
And they have a very differentresponse to the Logos, to the
Christ child.
When they meet him they, unlikeHerod, herod sought to kill the
Magi in turn, laid down gifts.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
First they laid down themselves.
First they laid prostrateCorrect.
That's the detail we hear.
First they laid prostrateCorrect In front of the.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Lord, that's the detail we hear.
They laid prostrate andworshipped Worship that's a word
used there.
They worshipped God and thentheir love was so reciprocated
that they had brought gifts togive to this priest, prophet and
king Frankincense, myrrh andgold to this child.
It's a very different spirit,friends, than egocentrism, do
(18:53):
you understand.
And they were willing to givetheir life, and by doing so they
began to discover their ownvocation.
They began to see all of theirlife.
They had studied the stars Allof their life.
They had been raised inacademies and learned All of
their life.
They have been raised inacademies and learned All of
their life.
They have studied the writingsfor this moment To meet the
(19:16):
Christ child who wanted to givethem their heart back.
He was not against them, he wasnot opposed to them, as it were
.
He actually wanted to give themtheir life back.
But they had to risk it all andbecome humble, right.
They had to serve, they had tohave wonder, they had to have
(19:36):
humility.
This is one of the things thatyou know we've talked about on
our podcast, if you've listenedto us before.
Joseph Ratzinger says that thechild is the icon of human
existence.
And what does a child possess.
It possesses three qualitiesthat I think the Magi possess
(19:59):
Humility, wonder and awe.
As adults, as growing adultsespecially many of us here
probably have jobs, probablyhave careers.
Adults as growing adultsespecially many of us here
probably have jobs, probablyhave careers, and we think we
know what's going on, or we'vesuffered, or hey look, I've
worked hard for this.
I'm going to go party, do mything, hang out.
I know what this is about.
It's my last year I'm doing,I'm with my friends, whatever
(20:20):
right.
Our Lord asks us to be humble.
We don't know everything, ourlife isn't our own right, and a
child embodies this reality,because that reality reflects
the Christ child.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
And this, yeah, you're exactly right, vicki Max.
And this is why, like, jesuswill say things in the gospels
like unless you turn and becomelike a child, you cannot enter
the kingdom of heaven.
Right?
Because a child is dependent, achild is humble, knows that he
is not God.
And this is the fundamentaltemptation that Satan issues to
Adam and Eve in the garden, andit's again like what Father Mike
Schmitz was talking aboutduring his keynote address.
(20:57):
In the garden, the serpentappears to Adam and Eve and he's
like look, if you take thisfruit and eat it, you will
become like gods, you will havecontrol and you don't have to
depend.
You don't have to depend, youdon't have to submit and you can
grasp at this power foryourself.
But the magi, who I think are agreat example for us, they're
more like children.
They were overjoyed yeah,that's right, they were
(21:20):
overjoyed at the star.
And so we can take a step backand think okay, what do the magi
do?
What are the things thatthey're teaching us that
ultimately lead them to truthand an encounter with the Lord
himself that we can kind ofimitate in our lives?
First of all, they gaze uponcreation with like an awe and a
wonder, as you were just talkingabout right.
Then, after they do that, theyallow it to shape them and to
(21:46):
guide them and they're willingto change their lives, they're
willing to get uncomfortable inpursuit of what is being laid
out before them in therevelation of God's creation.
And then this is where it getsreally crazy when they get to
Jerusalem.
This is a great point that PopeBenedict actually makes the Magi
just looking at reality thatcan get them so far, using their
(22:10):
human reason and their ownreasoning powers, powers that
can get them to a certain point.
But then, when they get to, itgets them to Jerusalem is where
it gets them, which is prettyclose, like you're in the
vicinity of where the savior isgoing to be born.
But then they kind of run outof steam.
And what do they have toconsult?
They have to consult thescriptures, right, they have to
(22:33):
go to Herod and be like look,we've been searching for the
truth, but we know that we can'tfind it on our own.
It has to come to us from above, we have to receive it from
above.
And so they're open to what theword of God is willing, is
going to share them, show tothem, and that's what eventually
leads them to Bethlehem, wherethey find the child, where they
(22:55):
gaze into the eyes of truthitself.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
Right, pope Benedict makes a point that it's
interesting how Joseph was notmentioned in the story at all.
He's like absent in the storyfor some reason, even though
he's clearly there right?
One of the things that youmentioned earlier that I want to
draw out is in the story of theMagi and King Herod.
One of the details that'smentioned kind of in passing and
(23:22):
many of y'all have heard aboutthis at the end of the narrative
is that once they'veencountered the child you know
what they do they go backthrough another way.
Speaker 3 (23:34):
They don't go straight back to Herod, they go
back by a different route, by adifferent route.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Notice.
This is what happens.
This is what happens when weencounter truth.
Who, again, is a person.
Friends, If there's somethingin our heart that tells us
that's true, that's a person.
It's not a set of principles Inthe Catholic faith, in the
Christian tradition, that's him.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
That's a seed of the Word, it's the Word, it's the
Logos who became flesh and dweltamong us and who you've
encountered every single day atMass, in the Eucharist.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
And the light seeps into every crack of our heart.
Another thing that PopeBenedict I was just reading
earlier this morning about thisis he says that when people face
the truth, one of the thingsthat the truth is similarly
related to is radiance, or lightright, which is light of the
world, kind of the theme of Sikhright.
(24:25):
The light breaks into everypart of our life, not just
what's going on now, not justthe present moment.
It actually breaks into ourpast and helps us reckon with
the things that have happened tous in our lives before.
So many of you have probablyexperienced, as you've gotten
(24:47):
closer to our Lord, you've beento reconcile with things that
have happened to you before,because that's how deep our Lord
wants to enter, right.
So the light enters the past.
The light also enters andbreaks into the present, and so
you're able to see yourselfclearer.
But the light also shows youthe future.
Not all clarity.
You don't see everythingperfectly, but you begin to see
(25:10):
your life is illuminated andyou're able to carry the torch
of the one, or I should say hecarries you as the torch towards
your ultimate call.
And this is what truth does.
It heals us, it integrates us,friends, so that when we go to
Holy Mass, what do we do?
We're remembered right, we'reintegrated, and then we're
(25:35):
offered in unity to God, theFather.
In the Mass, the particles ofthe bread and the wine are
crumbled down, are now gatheredand offered to God, in a similar
way that we're all grinded downin life into the particular
expressions of our life andunified into the universality of
(25:56):
God.
And this is what truth does,because this is who God is.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Yeah, and I guess I would.
Okay, I have one thought andthen I just want to give maybe
food for thought for people inthe audience.
St Augustine, he wrote thisbook called the City of God.
It's like a million pages.
If you want to read it, give ita try.
I haven't read it.
It's like that thick, but theplot, the whole plot.
(26:24):
He's describing all of historyand what he's saying in this
book is basically look, thereare many cities in the world
throughout space and time, butin and through all of them, at
the end of the day, there arereally just two cities.
There's the city of man.
(26:45):
The earthly, are after the samething.
They're after peace.
The city of man, the earthlycity, tries to acquire that
peace by looking down.
They're cut off from what isabove, they're not open to God,
they're oriented downwards andthey're trying to grasp and
(27:08):
create peace for themselves.
Herod was a member of the cityof man, trying to grasp after
power and establish peace in hisown life.
The Magi were members of thecity of God because they were
open to what was coming to themfrom above and even though it
required sacrifice, even thoughit was scary, even though they
had to set out into the unknown,ultimately they found exactly
(27:36):
what they were looking for,which is peace.
And St Augustine says that thecity of God and the city of man,
both of those are presentwithin all of our hearts and
there's this constant tension.
A lot of us are being draggeddownwards by sin and
concupiscence, towards the cityof man, but the work of
salvation.
The reason Christ came is todraw us back up towards that
city of God, towards thatheavenly city for which we've
(27:58):
been created, so that we canexperience the peace that he
wants to give us and that we'recreated for.
And so I guess my invitation toall of you is I'm sure, I'm sure
that over the course of thelast four days, the Lord has
been working in your heart insome capacity.
(28:18):
Maybe he's been revealing to yousome part of your life that
might need to change, or maybehe's, maybe maybe you're like
doing well right now and he'slike inviting you deeper in, to
like, maybe give me a littlemore time in prayer each day, or
maybe spend some more time withthe scriptures, whatever that
is, whatever that truth isthat's being spoken to your
(28:40):
heart right now.
There's two responses to it.
There's the response of KingHerod, of the city of man, where
it's like, ah, blotted out, notright now, I'm just, I'm
feeling good, I'm feeling secure, I'm feeling good where I'm at.
I don't really want to change,yeah, and I'm going to try to
manufacture my own happiness andmy own peace as I am now.
(29:04):
That won't work, nope, it neverdoes.
What will work is being likethe Magi and surrendering to
what the Lord is offering to youand even if it's scary, even if
it involves the cross whichspoiler alert it will.
(29:25):
Jesus promised us that it would.
It will lead to theresurrection.
That's the whole point.
It will lead to theresurrection, that's the whole
point.
It will lead to the peace, ofnew life and life in abundance.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
Our God is not a selfish God, friends.
The reason that our Lord doesthat is because he wants to give
you your life back.
Speaker 3 (29:43):
That's why and I know that, like, deacon Max and I
both, like, neither of us wantedto be priests when we were
young.
Neither of us, like had anyidea that this is what God was
calling us to.
And obviously, like, going toseminary, becoming deacons and
then priests like that requiresa lot of sacrifice, as does any
(30:04):
vocation that's worth living.
But, like our lives have beentransformed by that, and like
we've come to know the Lord moredeeply, and even though we have
all sorts of ways that we needto stop being like King Herod in
my own heart, in your own heart, like we're convinced that this
is the way, that he is the wayand the truth and the life, and
he's calling you, like all ofyou here, to himself, to be like
(30:27):
the Magi, to search for him, toseek.
It's so fitting that that's thename of the conference that
joke is made every time.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Come on, dude, it's great, it's good, it's good.
Well, guys.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
Yeah, so that's what we have.
That's what we have.
We've got like 10 minutes left.
I think Is that right.
So we wanted to open it up forQ&A.
There's a microphone right here.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
If you have a question about anything, we just
said, or anything at all, ifyou listen to Logos Podcast and
want to ask Deacon Max what hisfavorite color is and if no one
comes up, we're just going tofill the next 10 minutes with
mindless musings on whatevercomes to mind.
Speaker 3 (31:06):
So you get to decide.
And I have a lot of mindlessmusings on whatever comes to
mind, so you get to decide.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
So any questions and I have a lot of mindless musings
.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
He has many mindless musings.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Oh boy, we got a question, we got it.
We got it First customer, firstcustomer.
Speaker 5 (31:23):
Hi, I was promised a cage match at this podcast and
you came in with the WWE.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
Let's do it.
Speaker 5 (31:31):
No, my actual question is I'm curious if at
the end there you talked aboutyour unexpected call to the
priesthood.
Yeah, if either of you couldkind of share briefly what it
was that led to that answeringthat call.
Speaker 2 (31:47):
I'd say very briefly it was first the love for truth.
I didn't know it, but I startedreading St Augustine's book,
the Confessions.
He taught me how to pray.
He taught me that the liturgyof the church, that the
tradition of the church issomething worth fighting for and
worth getting to know, so thatalongside adoration and fasting,
those are very kind of basicChristian things.
(32:09):
But reclaiming those reallyhelped me discern that, like all
of the other things I was doingwhether it was a fraternity I
was in, the music I was learningor marching with in college or
whatever other artistic ordegree or job I had lined up was
all a desire to just actuallyserve our Lord in this
particular way.
He had made me for this.
So yeah, long story bearablethere it is.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Yeah, and for me it was very similar.
I mean, I actually, when I was17, I had a girlfriend who was a
pretty hardcore agnostic at thetime and she challenged my
faith.
She tried to get me to doubtthe Catholic faith and she
succeeded.
I had never had to defend itbefore or explain it before, and
so we dated for like a year andthen I was like questioning
(32:56):
everything and then I ended upbreaking up with her because I
had to figure out what was trueabout reality, about the
universe, and then so, reallyfor the first time, I'm 18 years
old and I'm like I need tostart like reading and figuring
this out.
So, even though I've beenraised Catholic, really for the
first time when I was 18, Istarted like reading every book
I could get my hand on, watchingevery Father Mike Schmitz video
(33:18):
I could get my eyes on right.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Shout out to Father Mike Schmitz.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Thank, you, Father Mike Schmitz.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
For to Father Mike Schmitz.
Thank you, father Mike Schmitz,for everything.
I don't know if he's here.
Wherever you're at, we'd loveto have you on, so if anybody
have any connections, let usknow.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
But I was quickly overwhelmed by the truth and the
beauty and the richness of theCatholic faith.
Yeah, like Jesus Christ is real.
And so I started falling inlove with the Eucharist and
started wanting to give my lifeto God, and I'd always wanted to
get married.
But then he, uh, he had otherplans as he continued to draw me
closer to himself and now I'mgoing to get married.
Uh, yeah, okay, all right, fairenough, um real quick.
(33:55):
Oh, we have another question.
Awesome, another question.
Speaker 4 (33:58):
I was just wondering how you have, how you approach
conversations with people, maybefriends or family, that seem to
to not have such a care forwhat is true.
Yeah, like whether that's theyrely too heavily on how their
emotions make them feel, and notthat emotions are wrong, but
you know, like along that line.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I mean, this is a very personalquestion.
You know A few things, I guess.
One of the first things I wouldsay is I think of Edith Stein,
St Teresa Benedict of the Cross.
She says that empathy is not thesame thing as love.
Empathy is not the same thingas love, and so when we love
(34:37):
somebody, the temptation isoftentimes well, don't say
anything, just live For years.
This can happen, and I thinkthere's something true about
just being yourself, living thetruth.
Sometimes it's enough to bepresent with that person, that
there's something convictingabout with the way you're living
.
So I would say be present, betheir friend.
You know, conversions oftentimeshappen, as many, maybe some of
(34:59):
us here today happen.
Not because somebody just cameup to us and started machine
gunning us with truth, right, Ifthat happened to you, you're a
weirdo, Just know that.
No, most of it is becausethere's a relationship that you
had with somebody that slowly,and then slowly still, I am
becoming to reckon with truth.
So I'm like I don't like thattruth, but I guess we'll do it.
(35:20):
So I'll have to say be present,be friendly.
And if it's a family member,right, you live that out.
Right, Because oftentimes we'relike well, they're the problem,
they're the problem.
No, well, like I have things Igot to work on too.
I don't know.
Those are some of the advicesthat I've had through life
myself, and sometimes you dohave to have those conversations
.
Sometimes it doesn't have to bein front of everybody.
(35:41):
Don't do it in a fit of rage.
Don't do it in a fit of rage.
Okay, Do it in a privateconversation and say hey look,
I've been thinking about thisfor a while and I want to share
this with you because I love you.
Speaker 3 (35:53):
Yeah, and if I could add something to that, um, or
two things to that.
It's a really good question.
It's super pertinent to all ofour lives.
Um, the one thing is toremember that, like even King
Herod was interested in thetruth, right?
So even somebody who's living alifestyle that is not
consistent with Catholicteaching or that you know is
harming them, ultimately thereis something within them, that
(36:14):
God placed in their hearts, thatknows deep, deep down, even if
they're not willing to admit it,even if they're rationalizing
it all these ways.
So you've got that kind of onyour side.
It's a question of awakeningthat desire for truth and
goodness and beauty within them,and to do that, it's like what
Deacon Max said you accompanythem as their friend, you love
(36:34):
them, and then I personally loveto wait until they ask a
question.
When they see you living yourCatholic faith, they see you
living the joy of loving Jesus,eventually they're going to get
curious, and for me that's themoment to maybe propose a truth
that is going to be palatable,at that moment when their
(36:54):
heart's ready to open it, readyto receive it.
Thank you so much for yourquestion.
Thank you Real quick.
I want to give a shout out tomy Columbus seminarians.
Dices of Columbus.
Really glad they're here.
Best Dices in the country byfar, bishop Fernandez, awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
I want to give a shout out to my fans from
Alabama, where y'all at Takethat Columbus.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
Okay, we got a few more minutes, so we got a next
question hey guys, Just a quickquestion, like what do you guys
for anyone here that's adiscerning vocation to the
priesthood or maybe religiouslife do you have like any advice
, like maybe a piece of advice?
Speaker 2 (37:28):
to kind of help them along their discernment journey.
It's a great question, dude.
I always heard this when I wasdiscerning and I was like dude,
whatever, like, it's the samething, but I mean it.
Pray, like.
You have to pray.
The liturgy is beautiful, I'mpretty trad, I love philosophy,
I love all of these things, butyou have to pray because those
(37:56):
things will subside, evenfriendships will subside.
You have to pray, you have toread the Holy Scriptures and
then enter into a wholesomecommunity.
Find a local community orparish wherever, serve at the
altar, talk to local priests or,if you're a woman, certainly
religious life.
Talk to a religious sister.
Now is an opportune time to doit.
Stay close to the sacraments.
I would say start there.
Speaker 3 (38:13):
Yeah.
So those are like definitelythe fundamental non-negotiables
if you're going to know yourvocation.
But on top of those things, Iwould say two things.
First of all, act Like don'tjust sit around and wait for God
to reveal it to you Like govisit a seminary or ask the girl
on the date right, like dothose things and God will speak
to you, like in thoseexperiences.
(38:33):
And then the second thing is topay attention to your own
desires and like what you'redrawn to, because if you're
living a life of union with God,he's shaping your will and your
heart to make you desire whathe desires.
So after you're in union withhim, you can start to be like
what do I want to do?
Do I want to be a priest?
Okay, like I'm going to do it,and then pay attention to how
(38:56):
that happens.
One last quote.
Speaker 2 (38:57):
There's a quote that was very important to me when I
entered seminary.
It's still important to me now.
A priest said to me who wasvery important in my life said
to me the God who made you isthe God who saves you.
What Joey is saying tap intothe elementary loves of your
heart.
What is it that I love?
And follow those with our Lordand he'll make it clear.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
Okay, we probably have.
Thank you so much.
We probably have time for onemore question, one or two more.
Speaker 4 (39:18):
Hi, I was wondering if you guys could offer some
practical tips on how to live amagical life like a magi?
Speaker 3 (39:25):
That's a great question.
Okay, I would say I've got likethree things off the top of my
head.
Um, silence, spending time insilence, allowing, uh, being
more than doing, allowing, likeyourself, to receive reality.
Go outside, like look atcreation.
So many of us live like insideall the time on computers, in
(39:46):
man-made things.
Go on a hike, like spend timegazing upon reality and being
moved by it.
And then, thirdly, reading thescriptures daily and allowing
that to like soak in your heartand your mind so that you're
being formed in the truth.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
Yeah, I would say one of the things immerse yourself
in things sacred, right?
Maybe you don't like reading,maybe you don't like art, maybe
you don't like sacred music,maybe these things.
Maybe you don't like theliturgy, force yourself, wrestle
with it a little bit.
Part of the reason we don'tlike reading today is because we
don't like sitting withourselves, right?
So sit with yourself for alittle bit.
So I would say, surroundyourself with sacred, which
(40:23):
forces you to do that Would beone thing.
Another thing I would do isread.
Read a book.
I mean, read a freaking book.
Okay, please, like, that'ssuper important.
And don't just start the book.
Read it from the front to theend.
Okay, do that, please.
I would say those are a fewpractical things I would do, and
the only way that we get themagical vision of life is
(40:44):
through grace.
It's Christ's grace that allowsus to see.
So that's it maybe one more, onemore person.
Speaker 3 (40:52):
Hey, do we have time for one more?
Speaker 2 (40:53):
question.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
One more question yes , awesome hello, I love
listening to Logos podcast.
Thank you.
Speaker 5 (41:03):
I was just curious about what was your inspiration
for starting the podcast andwhat motivates you to continue
on with that mission.
Speaker 3 (41:10):
Okay, you talk about starting it.
I'll talk about continuing on.
Speaker 2 (41:14):
Starting it, I wanted to give a shout out to one of
my good Deacon brothers that'shere, deacon Sam, please stand
up.
Deacon Sam, give us a shout out.
So, deacon Sam, it started in aconversation between him and I
at the gym, getting yoked,pushing the rock, as he likes to
say, and we're like hey yo, welove YouTube, we love some of
these bloggers, we like similarthings, we love philosophy.
(41:35):
How about we start a podcast?
But who else would we bring on?
You know, that's at leastequally as intelligent as Sam
not as intelligent as I am, butsomewhere in the middle I was
like Deacon Sam or Deacon Joeycomes to mind, deacon Joseph
comes to mind.
So that's the way it startedSimple desires.
We liked philosophy, we lovetech, we believe in the church's
mission of new evangelization,and so we're a priest of the new
(41:56):
millennia, of the newestmillennia, and so we felt a
calling to do it and we knew howto work tech a little bit.
Calling to do it and we knewhow to work tech a little bit,
knew a little bit of the wholeYouTube and audio stuff and took
it off from there.
We were just audio at first,then we moved to video.
A little over two years ago.
This will be in March.
It'll be our fourth year ofdoing this podcast, and we've
(42:18):
recorded every week since then,and so that's some of it now,
but anyways.
Speaker 3 (42:27):
Yeah, and Deacon Sam shout out to him.
He was on the podcast for thefirst two years, so if you go
back and listen to our episodes,you can hear all of his wisdom.
Now it's just Deacon Max and Iwhy we continued it?
Because it's been amazing tosee that people, like all we're
doing is talking about JesusChrist and the Catholic faith
and people want to hear it, andthat's confirming our belief
that, like, the human heart ismade for truth and it's made for
him, and we want to share thatwith people as much as we
(42:49):
possibly can, and so that's kindof what's.
But, and also like my, Imentioned my vocation.
My faith journey was soimpacted by, like Father Mike
Schmitz, all these people BishopBarron, who were doing stuff on
social media and trying toevangelize, and so we figured,
if God's given us those giftsand talents and we can do that,
(43:10):
then let's do it.
So we're excited about thefuture.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
And we want to give a shout-out.
We're going to give one lastshout-out regarding that
question to Joshua Viola.
Joshua Viola, where are you at?
Our producer is somewhere here.
He's here somewhere.
There he is.
He's our newest producer and sohe's been helpful, so things
like that keep us motivated.
Then we also got Omar Camachoover here from Lux Mundi Studio,
just out there talking to hisfriends.
(43:33):
He's been helping us this weektrip.
So a team of people that havebeen influential to us, and
we've had a lot of mentors alongthe way.
We have not done this byourselves.
A lot of donors Some of you maybe here have you given us some
money and some efforts, soplease seriously thank you guys
for everything, and I thinkthat's where we're going to end
this podcast, but just thank you, guys, and thanking to our Lord
(43:54):
, jesus Christ, who has enabledthis project to flourish the way
that it has.
Dick and Joseph, any last words.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
No, thank you guys.
So much Praise be Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
That's right, thank you guys, thanks for listening
to this episode recorded live atSeek Miss the conference, or
want to relive your favoritemoments?
Seek Replay has you coveredAccess, powerful keynotes,
inspiring talks and exclusivecontent to take your faith
deeper, anytime, anywhere.
(44:26):
Head to seekfocusorg backslashreplay to download now and don't
forget to join us for Seek 26.
Check out seekfocusorg for moreinformation and to register.
Welcome to the Seek 25 podcast, featuring some of
our favorite podcasters recordedlive at the Max Studios podcast
stage during Seek 25 in SaltLake City.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
What's up, guys?
Welcome to another episode ofLogos Podcast.
This is Deacon Max.
I'm Deacon Joseph, Welcomeeverybody.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Wow, this is awesome.
This is Deacon Max.
I'm Deacon Joseph.
Welcome everybody.
Wow, this is awesome.
This is awesome, dude.
It's so good to see you allhere.
Thank you, we didn't exactlyknow who was going to show up,
so this is pretty cool.
Thanks for being here.
This is so awesome.
Deacon Max.
Dude, how's your seat going sofar?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
It's going well, although I'm a little
uncomfortable right now becausewe're actually sitting and we're
a stand-only kind of podcast.
It's true.
It's true, this is a new gig.
Speaker 3 (00:51):
Yeah, people who follow us know that we stand
when we record our podcast, sodefinitely outside of our
element right now, but this isgreat.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Seek has been awesome .
Y'all been enjoying Seek.
How's Seek been going?
God, god is so good.
You know, I actually had atransformative experience in
Seek of 2018 or 2019, wheneverIndianapolis was and so I hope
it's transformative for you allwhile you're here this time and
it's crazy that we're up hereright now.
How are you doing, bro?
Speaker 3 (01:12):
How's your Seek?
I'm good.
I'm good.
To sum up my Seek experience.
I was a little nervous for thistoday, obviously, and so Deacon
Max and I went to spend sometime in adoration before this,
and as I was getting in theelevator, I ran into some
sisters of life and they'reamazing and I see them and I
just like feel at peace.
And one of them, sisterCatherine Joy, gave me a litany
(01:34):
of trust, so I was like that'sexactly what I needed right now.
So I'm doing well, really happyto be here.
What are we talking about today, dude?
So today, today.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
today, we're going to be talking about the love of
truth.
The love of truth and we'regoing to relate it to tomorrow's
feast day that the churchcelebrates, which is the
epiphany.
Speaker 3 (02:02):
So that's it.
Yeah, that's right.
I mean, for those of you wholisten to our podcast, you know
how much we love well, beauty,goodness, but really, really, we
love truth, and Deacon Max'slife and my life have been
totally transformed by ourencounter with the truth.
The truth that we believe isthe person of Jesus Christ, the
Logos himself.
That's why our podcast is namedLogos, and so we wanted to try
(02:26):
to just share a little bit ofthat love with you today,
through the lens of the epiphanystory that we're going to be
hearing about and meditating ontomorrow at mass.
We figured that was prettyfitting and kind of the way we
want to frame the discussiontoday is by thinking about these
two, by thinking about thesetwo contrasting approaches to
(02:47):
truth that we see in theepiphany story and that we also
see playing out in our worldtoday.
That's right.
And the two contrastingapproaches are there's the
approach of King Herod, whowe'll talk about and we'll hear
more about tomorrow, obviously,and then there's the approach of
the Magi, the three wise menwho come from the East, and what
we want to propose is that onlyif we kind of become like the
(03:11):
Magi will we ultimately discoverthe truth and then be set free
by it and allow our lives to betransformed by it.
So that's kind of what wewanted to talk about today.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
That's right, I think many of us friends forget that,
as Joey pointed out.
Speaker 3 (03:29):
I don't know how many of you?
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Joseph, joseph, deacon, joseph, I forgot, you
went through a transition andwe're here to support.
That's right.
And so there it is.
So many of us forget, friends,that truth is not a set of
principles in the Christianfaith right, truth is a person.
A set of principles in theChristian faith right, truth is
a person.
So the closer that you get tothat person, the closer that you
(03:50):
happen to get to yourself andthe more that you become alive.
And so, as a contrary exampleto that, we have in the Magi
story, king Herod.
King Herod, and he has whatwe're going to call a Herodian
spirit, right, yeah, and KingHerod, for those of you who know
(04:10):
the story, what did he want todo?
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Well, it's interesting, right, Because I
mean, we've heard the story andwe'll hear it again tomorrow.
But these magi show up from theeast, and we'll talk about them
in a minute.
But King Herod hears thatthey're looking for the newborn
king of the Jews.
Right, They've been followingthis star at its rising and
they're searching for this king.
And Herod, when he's confrontedwith this revelation, instead
(04:36):
of being open to it andreceiving it with humility and
reverence, he is threatened byit right, I'm sorry, and he
tries to.
He feels like it's a threat tohis own power and he tries to
blot it out.
And then, of course, we knowthat we celebrated the feast of
the holy innocence just onDecember 28th, a few days ago.
(04:56):
And so what did Herod do inorder to try to blot out this
truth?
Speaker 2 (05:00):
He was so against truth, he hated truth so much
that he could murder, that hewas willing to murder anyone who
stood for truth In his pursuitto kill the truth in his own
heart and entering into history.
He killed, he murdered.
(05:22):
And that's the drama of acontrarian spirit towards truth,
of the Herodian spirit, when weconfront truth in our own lives
and across the world.
Speaker 3 (05:35):
And it's interesting because I was thinking about
this last night King Herod.
Here's this guy, he's a king,he's a king over the region of
Judea, right, and he ends upcommitting this terrible
atrocity of like murdering allof these innocent children.
Herod did probably not beginhis life as the type of guy who
(05:56):
was just gonna like kill a bunchof innocent children Like.
Herod probably wasn't a kidthinking one day I'm gonna grow
up and be a king and murder abunch of babies.
He probably didn't think that.
But what happens with Herod?
So Herod is pursuing some sortof good in his life, right, like
he's got maybe partially goodmotivations.
He wants power, yeah, he wantsstability.
(06:20):
Right, he sees himself as aking over this area.
He thinks that he hasresponsibility for these people,
maybe that he's in charge ofestablishing peace and order,
and so, in his desire for powerand his desire for control, he
is willing to do whatever ittakes to maintain that, even to
the point of rationalizing okay,I just got to like get rid of
(06:40):
this threat so that I can stayin charge, so that I can
maintain my power, but then whatthat allows him to do is
rationalize this horribleatrocity, and that's the thing,
right?
Speaker 2 (06:50):
So all of the power structures that he considered
himself to be governing wererooted ultimately in him, and
this is a big part of what we'recalling the Herodian spirit.
It's egocentrism at its root.
King Herod truly believed thathe could control reality, that
(07:12):
he was an arbiter of meaning,and this is a deep, profound, I
would say possession of darknessthat consumed his life and that
he operated and justifiedenough to kill innocent children
.
Speaker 3 (07:31):
So the question becomes that we wanted to just
kind of pose, just reflect onwith all of you today is like,
where do we see this Herodianspirit, the spirit of King Herod
, in today's world?
I think we see it in someextreme examples, but I think it
kind of can creep into all ofour lives because it's in a real
way.
It's kind of like the patternof sin that's present with all
(07:54):
of us.
So, deacon Max, let me ask you,where do you see the spirit of
King Herod?
Where do you see people in oursociety, in our culture or even
in your own community behavinglike King Herod did in this
story of the epiphany?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
So, friends, we're going to draw out some pretty
stark examples in history toprove our point here.
One of the examples I actuallywant to draw on more immediately
is that in 2016, the UnitedStates decided that it would
legalize the marriage ofsame-sex unions.
(08:29):
Over and against science, overand against history, over and
against religion, over andagainst truth, politics and the
larger society, the powerstructures that be thought that
they could redefine the naturalsacraments that is, marriage
(08:52):
between a man and a woman andredefine it all together and to
create a new truth according toits own logic, and this is one
of the manifestations I think wesee this Herodian spirit.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Yeah, and I I think that's a good example, because
if we if, of course, if we readthe Bible, but even if we just
kind of look at reality, at thenatural order as God created it,
we know that marriage is aparticular type of thing, right,
that that truth is kind ofwritten into the fabric of
creation.
Men and women fit together,they go together.
That is what leads to theprocreation of children and
(09:26):
family life, and we know thatthat's what constitute like a
flourishing human society that'sfounded upon that.
But what happens so and this is, of course, a hot button issue,
but it's illustrative of ourpoint is that people, in their
desire to have control and theirdesire to have power I mean
(09:46):
think about this attempt toredefine reality according to
our own preconceptions, right,according to our own desires,
maybe for good reasons or likefor understandable motivations,
like Deacon Max, and I don'tthink that people who are in
favor of same-sex unions or whoare in same-sex unions are like
(10:07):
evil, terrible people.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
They probably have good motivations, they're mixed
in with, like a disorderedpursuit of power or control, or
happiness, or also, maybe theyhave a family member who
struggles with this attractionand they see that that person in
their family is getting maybegossiped about, being abused,
being ill-spoken about, and sotheir reaction is let's defend
(10:30):
our family member, who we know,we say that we love.
And so they see this law beingpromulgated and they think to
themselves this is justified.
I see how my cousin, I see howmy brother or my sister, how my
uncle gets treated.
Of course we should do that.
Speaker 3 (10:48):
Right, right, so it's very understandable, but the
point is that when you graspcontrol of reality and try to
shape it according to your ownideologies, you don't end up
being set free, you don't end upfinding the happiness that
you're looking for.
Herod ends up becoming amonster who's capable of doing
something that he probably neverenvisioned himself doing, and
(11:08):
the same thing can happen withdisordered relationships.
Another example that we werethinking about is another
Hobbiton issue, obviously, butlike the gender ideology stuff,
right, like people who have veryunderstandable sufferings and
motivations, and like they'researching for identity and truth
and purpose, and they thinkthey find it in this lifestyle.
(11:31):
And so, because that seems safeand because they kind of have
control of that, they start toshape reality in their own image
rather than humbly submittingto the truth of their own being,
the truth that God has createdthem in, and it ultimately leads
not to happiness but tosuffering and destruction.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
Another example I want to draw on again.
These are stark historical andnow contemporary examples.
But Fulton Sheen and he wasactually one of the reasons that
we're talking who's?
Fulton Sheen fans Fulton Sheenyeah.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
There we go, venerable.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Fulton.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
Sheen incredible.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Part of this today's episode was motivated by a
reflection he had on tomorrow'scelebration on the Epiphany.
He said that one of theclearest manifestations of this
Herodian spirit of recenthistory is actually during World
War II, when the Nazi regimewas in the middle of a war.
Rather than submittingthemselves to the truth that all
(12:33):
people have human dignity, theywere literally willing to kill
millions of people.
They were literally willing tosilence, to blot out, to shut,
to put in dark corners, in darkjail cells, in dark basements,
in dark corners and dark jailcells and dark basements and
dark holes.
Rather than the Nazi regimeaccept the fact that all men are
(12:57):
created in the image andlikeness of God, they were
willing to kill millions for thesake of their own ideology.
And that's, I know, a dramatichistorical example.
But, as you pointed out rightlyearly, deacon Joseph, that's
where we get Now.
(13:18):
All of us in here are not goingto become mass murderers,
obviously that's not what we'resaying.
But what we are saying is thatthere are seeds in our own lives
where we too repeat theHerodian logic where we seek to
kill truth.
That's in our own lives.
Maybe, I don't know, maybe inyour own relationship right now
(13:38):
you're using contraception andanybody in your life who speaks
out against it, or anybody inyour life who calls that
relationship out, you can'tstand, you don't want to be
around.
Or maybe there's anotherlifestyle in your life that you
know is contradictory to the wayyou've been raised, to the way
(13:59):
our Lord in the gospel asks us,to the way that the church calls
us to, and maybe you can't bearthat truth.
Maybe you want to bury it sodeep down you want nothing to do
with it.
But here's the thing If you dothat, your life will not be
submitted to the Holy One.
Speaker 3 (14:18):
Your life will be submitted to yourself and you
won't find the happiness you'relooking for.
That's right, I mean, that'sthe point, and we're not like
trying to condemn people here.
We're just like like we wantpeople to experience the
fullness of life that the Lordwants to give them.
And one of the ways that weconstantly fail, like don't
attain that happiness and thatfullness, is by becoming like
little King Herods, who blot outthe inconvenient truths that
(14:41):
confront us every day and makeourselves like God and say I'm
going to do it my way.
It's like what Father MikeSchmitz was talking about in his
keynote talk the other night.
Like it's this we all have thisnatural inclination to become
little King Herods and to blotout truth.
I don't want to convert andchange my life.
I don't want to submit to whatGod is revealing to me as the
(15:03):
way to live.
I just want to like do my ownthing because that seems safe
and because that seems like it'sgoing to make me happy.
But what we want to propose isthat only by living in union
with the Lord and only byreceiving the truth as he's laid
it out to you, which ofteninvolves repentance and
(15:23):
conversion, will you thenexperience the fullness of life
that he wants to give you, willyou then experience the fullness
of life that he wants to giveyou?
And so I think a way toillustrate this within this very
same story of the epiphany, isby pointing to the example of
the Magi, who are, interestingly, they're not Jews, they're not
Christians, obviously, they'repagans right, they are people
(15:44):
from the East who practiceEastern religions perhaps.
But we want to point to theexample of these guys to show
what a proper response to truthlooks like.
Speaker 2 (15:57):
If the other spirit is a Herodian spirit, we're
going to call this one themagical spirit.
That's right.
Speaker 4 (16:03):
Give it up everybody Come on.
Speaker 2 (16:05):
Thank you, thank you, I worked real hard for that one
.
Thank you, thank you, I workedreal hard for that one.
The Magi, as you pointed out,were not particularly religious
people.
I think in some sense maybethey were religious.
Speaker 3 (16:16):
Yeah, I mean Eastern religions.
Probably.
We don't know a lot of detailsabout them.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
But we do know that they were sort of scientists of
the time.
Yeah Right, and I don't know ify'all know this story, but one
of the dramatic points of thestory which you'll hear tomorrow
is when King Herod meets upwith the Magi right, they come.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
They come to Jerusalem.
They've been following thisstar, right.
They've been gazing uponcreation, gazing upon the
heavens and allowing it to leadthem.
Right.
They allow it to, they evengive up the security of like
staying at home and being safe,and they make this sacrifice of
like.
We think, as we humbly gazeupon the heavens with awe and
(16:59):
like childlike wonder, that thisis leading us to the truth.
And even though it'd be easierto stare where we are and not
change, we're actually going toset out after that.
And then they arrive at KingHerod's palace, right, and they
meet their enemy, as it were.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
They have, they share , they break bread with their
enemy.
Here's something interestingthat Deacon Joseph pointed out
of the narrative.
You know, king Herod wasn'tuncurious, he wasn't just kind
of welcoming them in.
He had a desire to know thetruth of the situation.
I would say a thwarted visionof that truth, but he wanted to.
(17:33):
There was something in him thatwas curious.
And this is like us, right.
A lot of us are curious to knowthe truth and we pursue and we
walk and we meet people and wetalk to people, we shake hands,
we go to social parties.
We do all of these thingsbecause there's something in us
longing to meet the truth.
But here's the thing when theMagi figure out what King Herod
is trying to do, magi look toeach other, as it were, and they
(18:00):
go and they pursueauthentically the very thing
that's taken them to that dinnerand is now taking them to meet
the Christ child.
And they have a very differentresponse to the Logos, to the
Christ child.
When they meet him they, unlikeHerod, herod sought to kill the
Magi in turn, laid down gifts.
Speaker 3 (18:27):
First they laid down themselves.
First they laid prostrateCorrect.
That's the detail we hear.
First they laid prostrateCorrect In front of the.
Speaker 2 (18:30):
Lord, that's the detail we hear.
They laid prostrate andworshipped Worship that's a word
used there.
They worshipped God and thentheir love was so reciprocated
that they had brought gifts togive to this priest, prophet and
king Frankincense, myrrh andgold to this child.
It's a very different spirit,friends, than egocentrism, do
(18:53):
you understand.
And they were willing to givetheir life, and by doing so they
began to discover their ownvocation.
They began to see all of theirlife.
They had studied the stars Allof their life.
They had been raised inacademies and learned All of
their life.
They have been raised inacademies and learned All of
their life.
They have studied the writingsfor this moment To meet the
(19:16):
Christ child who wanted to givethem their heart back.
He was not against them, he wasnot opposed to them, as it were
.
He actually wanted to give themtheir life back.
But they had to risk it all andbecome humble, right.
They had to serve, they had tohave wonder, they had to have
(19:36):
humility.
This is one of the things thatyou know we've talked about on
our podcast, if you've listenedto us before.
Joseph Ratzinger says that thechild is the icon of human
existence.
And what does a child possess.
It possesses three qualitiesthat I think the Magi possess
(19:59):
Humility, wonder and awe.
As adults, as growing adultsespecially many of us here
probably have jobs, probablyhave careers.
Adults as growing adultsespecially many of us here
probably have jobs, probablyhave careers, and we think we
know what's going on, or we'vesuffered, or hey look, I've
worked hard for this.
I'm going to go party, do mything, hang out.
I know what this is about.
It's my last year I'm doing,I'm with my friends, whatever
(20:20):
right.
Our Lord asks us to be humble.
We don't know everything, ourlife isn't our own right, and a
child embodies this reality,because that reality reflects
the Christ child.
Speaker 3 (20:36):
And this, yeah, you're exactly right, vicki Max.
And this is why, like, jesuswill say things in the gospels
like unless you turn and becomelike a child, you cannot enter
the kingdom of heaven.
Right?
Because a child is dependent, achild is humble, knows that he
is not God.
And this is the fundamentaltemptation that Satan issues to
Adam and Eve in the garden, andit's again like what Father Mike
Schmitz was talking aboutduring his keynote address.
(20:57):
In the garden, the serpentappears to Adam and Eve and he's
like look, if you take thisfruit and eat it, you will
become like gods, you will havecontrol and you don't have to
depend.
You don't have to depend, youdon't have to submit and you can
grasp at this power foryourself.
But the magi, who I think are agreat example for us, they're
more like children.
They were overjoyed yeah,that's right, they were
(21:20):
overjoyed at the star.
And so we can take a step backand think okay, what do the magi
do?
What are the things thatthey're teaching us that
ultimately lead them to truthand an encounter with the Lord
himself that we can kind ofimitate in our lives?
First of all, they gaze uponcreation with like an awe and a
wonder, as you were just talkingabout right.
Then, after they do that, theyallow it to shape them and to
(21:46):
guide them and they're willingto change their lives, they're
willing to get uncomfortable inpursuit of what is being laid
out before them in therevelation of God's creation.
And then this is where it getsreally crazy when they get to
Jerusalem.
This is a great point that PopeBenedict actually makes the Magi
just looking at reality thatcan get them so far, using their
(22:10):
human reason and their ownreasoning powers, powers that
can get them to a certain point.
But then, when they get to, itgets them to Jerusalem is where
it gets them, which is prettyclose, like you're in the
vicinity of where the savior isgoing to be born.
But then they kind of run outof steam.
And what do they have toconsult?
They have to consult thescriptures, right, they have to
(22:33):
go to Herod and be like look,we've been searching for the
truth, but we know that we can'tfind it on our own.
It has to come to us from above, we have to receive it from
above.
And so they're open to what theword of God is willing, is
going to share them, show tothem, and that's what eventually
leads them to Bethlehem, wherethey find the child, where they
(22:55):
gaze into the eyes of truthitself.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
Right, pope Benedict makes a point that it's
interesting how Joseph was notmentioned in the story at all.
He's like absent in the storyfor some reason, even though
he's clearly there right?
One of the things that youmentioned earlier that I want to
draw out is in the story of theMagi and King Herod.
One of the details that'smentioned kind of in passing and
(23:22):
many of y'all have heard aboutthis at the end of the narrative
is that once they'veencountered the child you know
what they do they go backthrough another way.
Speaker 3 (23:34):
They don't go straight back to Herod, they go
back by a different route, by adifferent route.
Speaker 2 (23:37):
Notice.
This is what happens.
This is what happens when weencounter truth.
Who, again, is a person.
Friends, If there's somethingin our heart that tells us
that's true, that's a person.
It's not a set of principles Inthe Catholic faith, in the
Christian tradition, that's him.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
That's a seed of the Word, it's the Word, it's the
Logos who became flesh and dweltamong us and who you've
encountered every single day atMass, in the Eucharist.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
And the light seeps into every crack of our heart.
Another thing that PopeBenedict I was just reading
earlier this morning about thisis he says that when people face
the truth, one of the thingsthat the truth is similarly
related to is radiance, or lightright, which is light of the
world, kind of the theme of Sikhright.
(24:25):
The light breaks into everypart of our life, not just
what's going on now, not justthe present moment.
It actually breaks into ourpast and helps us reckon with
the things that have happened tous in our lives before.
So many of you have probablyexperienced, as you've gotten
(24:47):
closer to our Lord, you've beento reconcile with things that
have happened to you before,because that's how deep our Lord
wants to enter, right.
So the light enters the past.
The light also enters andbreaks into the present, and so
you're able to see yourselfclearer.
But the light also shows youthe future.
Not all clarity.
You don't see everythingperfectly, but you begin to see
(25:10):
your life is illuminated andyou're able to carry the torch
of the one, or I should say hecarries you as the torch towards
your ultimate call.
And this is what truth does.
It heals us, it integrates us,friends, so that when we go to
Holy Mass, what do we do?
We're remembered right, we'reintegrated, and then we're
(25:35):
offered in unity to God, theFather.
In the Mass, the particles ofthe bread and the wine are
crumbled down, are now gatheredand offered to God, in a similar
way that we're all grinded downin life into the particular
expressions of our life andunified into the universality of
(25:56):
God.
And this is what truth does,because this is who God is.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Yeah, and I guess I would.
Okay, I have one thought andthen I just want to give maybe
food for thought for people inthe audience.
St Augustine, he wrote thisbook called the City of God.
It's like a million pages.
If you want to read it, give ita try.
I haven't read it.
It's like that thick, but theplot, the whole plot.
(26:24):
He's describing all of historyand what he's saying in this
book is basically look, thereare many cities in the world
throughout space and time, butin and through all of them, at
the end of the day, there arereally just two cities.
There's the city of man.
(26:45):
The earthly, are after the samething.
They're after peace.
The city of man, the earthlycity, tries to acquire that
peace by looking down.
They're cut off from what isabove, they're not open to God,
they're oriented downwards andthey're trying to grasp and
(27:08):
create peace for themselves.
Herod was a member of the cityof man, trying to grasp after
power and establish peace in hisown life.
The Magi were members of thecity of God because they were
open to what was coming to themfrom above and even though it
required sacrifice, even thoughit was scary, even though they
had to set out into the unknown,ultimately they found exactly
(27:36):
what they were looking for,which is peace.
And St Augustine says that thecity of God and the city of man,
both of those are presentwithin all of our hearts and
there's this constant tension.
A lot of us are being draggeddownwards by sin and
concupiscence, towards the cityof man, but the work of
salvation.
The reason Christ came is todraw us back up towards that
city of God, towards thatheavenly city for which we've
(27:58):
been created, so that we canexperience the peace that he
wants to give us and that we'recreated for.
And so I guess my invitation toall of you is I'm sure, I'm sure
that over the course of thelast four days, the Lord has
been working in your heart insome capacity.
(28:18):
Maybe he's been revealing to yousome part of your life that
might need to change, or maybehe's, maybe maybe you're like
doing well right now and he'slike inviting you deeper in, to
like, maybe give me a littlemore time in prayer each day, or
maybe spend some more time withthe scriptures, whatever that
is, whatever that truth isthat's being spoken to your
(28:40):
heart right now.
There's two responses to it.
There's the response of KingHerod, of the city of man, where
it's like, ah, blotted out, notright now, I'm just, I'm
feeling good, I'm feeling secure, I'm feeling good where I'm at.
I don't really want to change,yeah, and I'm going to try to
manufacture my own happiness andmy own peace as I am now.
(29:04):
That won't work, nope, it neverdoes.
What will work is being likethe Magi and surrendering to
what the Lord is offering to youand even if it's scary, even if
it involves the cross whichspoiler alert it will.
(29:25):
Jesus promised us that it would.
It will lead to theresurrection.
That's the whole point.
It will lead to theresurrection, that's the whole
point.
It will lead to the peace, ofnew life and life in abundance.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
Our God is not a selfish God, friends.
The reason that our Lord doesthat is because he wants to give
you your life back.
Speaker 3 (29:43):
That's why and I know that, like, deacon Max and I
both, like, neither of us wantedto be priests when we were
young.
Neither of us, like had anyidea that this is what God was
calling us to.
And obviously, like, going toseminary, becoming deacons and
then priests like that requiresa lot of sacrifice, as does any
(30:04):
vocation that's worth living.
But, like our lives have beentransformed by that, and like
we've come to know the Lord moredeeply, and even though we have
all sorts of ways that we needto stop being like King Herod in
my own heart, in your own heart, like we're convinced that this
is the way, that he is the wayand the truth and the life, and
he's calling you, like all ofyou here, to himself, to be like
(30:27):
the Magi, to search for him, toseek.
It's so fitting that that's thename of the conference that
joke is made every time.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Come on, dude, it's great, it's good, it's good.
Well, guys.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
Yeah, so that's what we have.
That's what we have.
We've got like 10 minutes left.
I think Is that right.
So we wanted to open it up forQ&A.
There's a microphone right here.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
If you have a question about anything, we just
said, or anything at all, ifyou listen to Logos Podcast and
want to ask Deacon Max what hisfavorite color is and if no one
comes up, we're just going tofill the next 10 minutes with
mindless musings on whatevercomes to mind.
Speaker 3 (31:06):
So you get to decide.
And I have a lot of mindlessmusings on whatever comes to
mind, so you get to decide.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
So any questions and I have a lot of mindless musings
.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
He has many mindless musings.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Oh boy, we got a question, we got it.
We got it First customer, firstcustomer.
Speaker 5 (31:23):
Hi, I was promised a cage match at this podcast and
you came in with the WWE.
Speaker 4 (31:28):
Let's do it.
Speaker 5 (31:31):
No, my actual question is I'm curious if at
the end there you talked aboutyour unexpected call to the
priesthood.
Yeah, if either of you couldkind of share briefly what it
was that led to that answeringthat call.
Speaker 2 (31:47):
I'd say very briefly it was first the love for truth.
I didn't know it, but I startedreading St Augustine's book,
the Confessions.
He taught me how to pray.
He taught me that the liturgyof the church, that the
tradition of the church issomething worth fighting for and
worth getting to know, so thatalongside adoration and fasting,
those are very kind of basicChristian things.
(32:09):
But reclaiming those reallyhelped me discern that, like all
of the other things I was doingwhether it was a fraternity I
was in, the music I was learningor marching with in college or
whatever other artistic ordegree or job I had lined up was
all a desire to just actuallyserve our Lord in this
particular way.
He had made me for this.
So yeah, long story bearablethere it is.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Yeah, and for me it was very similar.
I mean, I actually, when I was17, I had a girlfriend who was a
pretty hardcore agnostic at thetime and she challenged my
faith.
She tried to get me to doubtthe Catholic faith and she
succeeded.
I had never had to defend itbefore or explain it before, and
so we dated for like a year andthen I was like questioning
(32:56):
everything and then I ended upbreaking up with her because I
had to figure out what was trueabout reality, about the
universe, and then so, reallyfor the first time, I'm 18 years
old and I'm like I need tostart like reading and figuring
this out.
So, even though I've beenraised Catholic, really for the
first time when I was 18, Istarted like reading every book
I could get my hand on, watchingevery Father Mike Schmitz video
(33:18):
I could get my eyes on right.
Speaker 2 (33:19):
Shout out to Father Mike Schmitz.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Thank, you, Father Mike Schmitz.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
For to Father Mike Schmitz.
Thank you, father Mike Schmitz,for everything.
I don't know if he's here.
Wherever you're at, we'd loveto have you on, so if anybody
have any connections, let usknow.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
But I was quickly overwhelmed by the truth and the
beauty and the richness of theCatholic faith.
Yeah, like Jesus Christ is real.
And so I started falling inlove with the Eucharist and
started wanting to give my lifeto God, and I'd always wanted to
get married.
But then he, uh, he had otherplans as he continued to draw me
closer to himself and now I'mgoing to get married.
Uh, yeah, okay, all right, fairenough, um real quick.
(33:55):
Oh, we have another question.
Awesome, another question.
Speaker 4 (33:58):
I was just wondering how you have, how you approach
conversations with people, maybefriends or family, that seem to
to not have such a care forwhat is true.
Yeah, like whether that's theyrely too heavily on how their
emotions make them feel, and notthat emotions are wrong, but
you know, like along that line.
Speaker 2 (34:17):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I mean, this is a very personalquestion.
You know A few things, I guess.
One of the first things I wouldsay is I think of Edith Stein,
St Teresa Benedict of the Cross.
She says that empathy is not thesame thing as love.
Empathy is not the same thingas love, and so when we love
(34:37):
somebody, the temptation isoftentimes well, don't say
anything, just live For years.
This can happen, and I thinkthere's something true about
just being yourself, living thetruth.
Sometimes it's enough to bepresent with that person, that
there's something convictingabout with the way you're living
.
So I would say be present, betheir friend.
You know, conversions oftentimeshappen, as many, maybe some of
(34:59):
us here today happen.
Not because somebody just cameup to us and started machine
gunning us with truth, right, Ifthat happened to you, you're a
weirdo, Just know that.
No, most of it is becausethere's a relationship that you
had with somebody that slowly,and then slowly still, I am
becoming to reckon with truth.
So I'm like I don't like thattruth, but I guess we'll do it.
(35:20):
So I'll have to say be present,be friendly.
And if it's a family member,right, you live that out.
Right, Because oftentimes we'relike well, they're the problem,
they're the problem.
No, well, like I have things Igot to work on too.
I don't know.
Those are some of the advicesthat I've had through life
myself, and sometimes you dohave to have those conversations
.
Sometimes it doesn't have to bein front of everybody.
(35:41):
Don't do it in a fit of rage.
Don't do it in a fit of rage.
Okay, Do it in a privateconversation and say hey look,
I've been thinking about thisfor a while and I want to share
this with you because I love you.
Speaker 3 (35:53):
Yeah, and if I could add something to that, um, or
two things to that.
It's a really good question.
It's super pertinent to all ofour lives.
Um, the one thing is toremember that, like even King
Herod was interested in thetruth, right?
So even somebody who's living alifestyle that is not
consistent with Catholicteaching or that you know is
harming them, ultimately thereis something within them, that
(36:14):
God placed in their hearts, thatknows deep, deep down, even if
they're not willing to admit it,even if they're rationalizing
it all these ways.
So you've got that kind of onyour side.
It's a question of awakeningthat desire for truth and
goodness and beauty within them,and to do that, it's like what
Deacon Max said you accompanythem as their friend, you love
(36:34):
them, and then I personally loveto wait until they ask a
question.
When they see you living yourCatholic faith, they see you
living the joy of loving Jesus,eventually they're going to get
curious, and for me that's themoment to maybe propose a truth
that is going to be palatable,at that moment when their
(36:54):
heart's ready to open it, readyto receive it.
Thank you so much for yourquestion.
Thank you Real quick.
I want to give a shout out tomy Columbus seminarians.
Dices of Columbus.
Really glad they're here.
Best Dices in the country byfar, bishop Fernandez, awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:10):
I want to give a shout out to my fans from
Alabama, where y'all at Takethat Columbus.
Speaker 3 (37:15):
Okay, we got a few more minutes, so we got a next
question hey guys, Just a quickquestion, like what do you guys
for anyone here that's adiscerning vocation to the
priesthood or maybe religiouslife do you have like any advice
, like maybe a piece of advice?
Speaker 2 (37:28):
to kind of help them along their discernment journey.
It's a great question, dude.
I always heard this when I wasdiscerning and I was like dude,
whatever, like, it's the samething, but I mean it.
Pray, like.
You have to pray.
The liturgy is beautiful, I'mpretty trad, I love philosophy,
I love all of these things, butyou have to pray because those
(37:56):
things will subside, evenfriendships will subside.
You have to pray, you have toread the Holy Scriptures and
then enter into a wholesomecommunity.
Find a local community orparish wherever, serve at the
altar, talk to local priests or,if you're a woman, certainly
religious life.
Talk to a religious sister.
Now is an opportune time to doit.
Stay close to the sacraments.
I would say start there.
Speaker 3 (38:13):
Yeah.
So those are like definitelythe fundamental non-negotiables
if you're going to know yourvocation.
But on top of those things, Iwould say two things.
First of all, act Like don'tjust sit around and wait for God
to reveal it to you Like govisit a seminary or ask the girl
on the date right, like dothose things and God will speak
to you, like in thoseexperiences.
(38:33):
And then the second thing is topay attention to your own
desires and like what you'redrawn to, because if you're
living a life of union with God,he's shaping your will and your
heart to make you desire whathe desires.
So after you're in union withhim, you can start to be like
what do I want to do?
Do I want to be a priest?
Okay, like I'm going to do it,and then pay attention to how
(38:56):
that happens.
One last quote.
Speaker 2 (38:57):
There's a quote that was very important to me when I
entered seminary.
It's still important to me now.
A priest said to me who wasvery important in my life said
to me the God who made you isthe God who saves you.
What Joey is saying tap intothe elementary loves of your
heart.
What is it that I love?
And follow those with our Lordand he'll make it clear.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
Okay, we probably have.
Thank you so much.
We probably have time for onemore question, one or two more.
Speaker 4 (39:18):
Hi, I was wondering if you guys could offer some
practical tips on how to live amagical life like a magi?
Speaker 3 (39:25):
That's a great question.
Okay, I would say I've got likethree things off the top of my
head.
Um, silence, spending time insilence, allowing, uh, being
more than doing, allowing, likeyourself, to receive reality.
Go outside, like look atcreation.
So many of us live like insideall the time on computers, in
(39:46):
man-made things.
Go on a hike, like spend timegazing upon reality and being
moved by it.
And then, thirdly, reading thescriptures daily and allowing
that to like soak in your heartand your mind so that you're
being formed in the truth.
Speaker 2 (40:03):
Yeah, I would say one of the things immerse yourself
in things sacred, right?
Maybe you don't like reading,maybe you don't like art, maybe
you don't like sacred music,maybe these things.
Maybe you don't like theliturgy, force yourself, wrestle
with it a little bit.
Part of the reason we don'tlike reading today is because we
don't like sitting withourselves, right?
So sit with yourself for alittle bit.
So I would say, surroundyourself with sacred, which
(40:23):
forces you to do that Would beone thing.
Another thing I would do isread.
Read a book.
I mean, read a freaking book.
Okay, please, like, that'ssuper important.
And don't just start the book.
Read it from the front to theend.
Okay, do that, please.
I would say those are a fewpractical things I would do, and
the only way that we get themagical vision of life is
(40:44):
through grace.
It's Christ's grace that allowsus to see.
So that's it maybe one more, onemore person.
Speaker 3 (40:52):
Hey, do we have time for one more?
Speaker 2 (40:53):
question.
Speaker 4 (40:54):
One more question yes , awesome hello, I love
listening to Logos podcast.
Thank you.
Speaker 5 (41:03):
I was just curious about what was your inspiration
for starting the podcast andwhat motivates you to continue
on with that mission.
Speaker 3 (41:10):
Okay, you talk about starting it.
I'll talk about continuing on.
Speaker 2 (41:14):
Starting it, I wanted to give a shout out to one of
my good Deacon brothers that'shere, deacon Sam, please stand
up.
Deacon Sam, give us a shout out.
So, deacon Sam, it started in aconversation between him and I
at the gym, getting yoked,pushing the rock, as he likes to
say, and we're like hey yo, welove YouTube, we love some of
these bloggers, we like similarthings, we love philosophy.
(41:35):
How about we start a podcast?
But who else would we bring on?
You know, that's at leastequally as intelligent as Sam
not as intelligent as I am, butsomewhere in the middle I was
like Deacon Sam or Deacon Joeycomes to mind, deacon Joseph
comes to mind.
So that's the way it startedSimple desires.
We liked philosophy, we lovetech, we believe in the church's
mission of new evangelization,and so we're a priest of the new
(41:56):
millennia, of the newestmillennia, and so we felt a
calling to do it and we knew howto work tech a little bit.
Calling to do it and we knewhow to work tech a little bit,
knew a little bit of the wholeYouTube and audio stuff and took
it off from there.
We were just audio at first,then we moved to video.
A little over two years ago.
This will be in March.
It'll be our fourth year ofdoing this podcast, and we've
(42:18):
recorded every week since then,and so that's some of it now,
but anyways.
Speaker 3 (42:27):
Yeah, and Deacon Sam shout out to him.
He was on the podcast for thefirst two years, so if you go
back and listen to our episodes,you can hear all of his wisdom.
Now it's just Deacon Max and Iwhy we continued it?
Because it's been amazing tosee that people, like all we're
doing is talking about JesusChrist and the Catholic faith
and people want to hear it, andthat's confirming our belief
that, like, the human heart ismade for truth and it's made for
him, and we want to share thatwith people as much as we
(42:49):
possibly can, and so that's kindof what's.
But, and also like my, Imentioned my vocation.
My faith journey was soimpacted by, like Father Mike
Schmitz, all these people BishopBarron, who were doing stuff on
social media and trying toevangelize, and so we figured,
if God's given us those giftsand talents and we can do that,
(43:10):
then let's do it.
So we're excited about thefuture.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
And we want to give a shout-out.
We're going to give one lastshout-out regarding that
question to Joshua Viola.
Joshua Viola, where are you at?
Our producer is somewhere here.
He's here somewhere.
There he is.
He's our newest producer and sohe's been helpful, so things
like that keep us motivated.
Then we also got Omar Camachoover here from Lux Mundi Studio,
just out there talking to hisfriends.
(43:33):
He's been helping us this weektrip.
So a team of people that havebeen influential to us, and
we've had a lot of mentors alongthe way.
We have not done this byourselves.
A lot of donors Some of you maybe here have you given us some
money and some efforts, soplease seriously thank you guys
for everything, and I thinkthat's where we're going to end
this podcast, but just thank you, guys, and thanking to our Lord
(43:54):
, jesus Christ, who has enabledthis project to flourish the way
that it has.
Dick and Joseph, any last words.
Speaker 3 (44:02):
No, thank you guys.
So much Praise be Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1 (44:04):
That's right, thank you guys, thanks for listening
to this episode recorded live atSeek Miss the conference, or
want to relive your favoritemoments?
Seek Replay has you coveredAccess, powerful keynotes,
inspiring talks and exclusivecontent to take your faith
deeper, anytime, anywhere.
(44:26):
Head to seekfocusorg backslashreplay to download now and don't
forget to join us for Seek 26.
Check out seekfocusorg for moreinformation and to register.
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