January 23, 2025 • 45 mins
In this episode of All Things Catholic, we sit down with Father Mike Schmitz at SEEK 25 in Salt Lake City, recorded live from the Max Studios podcast stage.
Father Mike delves into the pivotal role of the Catechism of the Catholic Church in bridging the vast expanse between humanity and the divine. Drawing from his profound keynote speech, he illustrates our spiritual journey using the vivid analogy of floating in space, emphasizing our dependency on Christ to anchor us. We also discusses its practical impact on everyday faith and its historical context.
Check out SEEK Replay for Fr. Mike's Keynote
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
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 (00:21):
All right, welcome to the All Things Catholic podcast
.
I'm your host, Edward Sri, herein Salt Lake City at the SEEK
25 conference.
This is amazing.
We've got over 17,000 peoplegathered here, We've got 3,000
people in DC and several hundredin Cologne, Germany.
(00:41):
It's the largest SEEK eventwe've ever had and on the show
today we're very blessed to havea special guest, Father Mike
Schmesch.
Father, thanks for being withus again.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Dr Sri, thank you very much.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Great, everyone who loved the keynote from Father
Mike last night.
I just got to say I love thatimage of just floating in space.
I just, I mean that has stuckwith me of like whoa, we're just
, we are lost completely withoutour Lord.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah, it's one of those where I mean I'm sure
you've all heard about like theunbridgeable gap between us and
God because of sin, and when myfriend Nick did it, he's like an
actor so he can like really getinto it.
And whenever I think about thatand that sense of being
(01:28):
completely, when it comes to ourown salvation, we're completely
helpless unless Jesus launchedhimself and throws us back to
the Father.
Just say I love that as well.
I'm so grateful to Jesus andalso there's my friend Nick for
giving me that image.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah, and we're thankful for you sharing that
with us.
And one of the things Jesusgives us actually actually to
hold on to in a world where youjust can feel really lost is
what we're going to talk abouttoday, and it's the great gift
that he's given us through thechurch, the catechism of the
Catholic church.
Now, how many of you havelistened to the catechism in the
year that Father Mike did?
Okay, so I want to ask aboutthe catechism a little bit here,
(02:05):
Father.
So why the catechism?
I mean, it feels like atextbook that maybe you'd assign
in a classroom and maybe like areference book you keep on your
shelf.
Why do we need the catechism?
How does it enrich my ownpersonal relationship with
Christ?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Well, I think, well, I want to back up a little bit
or like come up from a differentangle.
So one of the things that in2020 had this notion of we
should have a podcast where wedo the entire Bible and
catechism in one year and sothat was the original proposal
to Ascension was like, can Ijust do this, like read the
(02:41):
Bible, read the catechism, bothin one year?
And because actually, the focus, I mean many reasons.
I mean there's other factorstoo, but I don't know if you
know this about FocusMissionaries the Focus
Missionaries, over the course oftheir time being the two-year
missionaries, they're expectedto read all 16 narrative books
of the Bible, as well as theentire Catechism of the Catholic
Church, and they have stats onthe number of missionaries who
(03:01):
actually do that, and thesestatistics, I think, are in the
single digits of the number ofmissionaries who actually do the
reading plan.
I mean, they're goodmissionaries, they're busy,
they're talking with you guys,but they weren't actually
reading the Bible or catechismin the way that they should, and
so it was like I want to helpour missionaries and so how
about we do this Bible andcatechism in here?
Ascension was wise and theysaid how about do the Bible
(03:22):
first, catechism later.
So that's how we started thecatechism and the reason why
Focus says missionaries shouldread the catechism.
I think there's so manydifferent levels, but one is
here.
We have God's Word in the Bible, right.
We have God's revelation ofhimself to us through Scripture
and the written Word.
But God has so much more thathe has said and so much more
(03:46):
that he's revealed about himselfthrough the teaching of the
church that, if you want tothink about this and you have,
like Acts, chapter 28, right,and that's the last chapter of
the early church in the sense Imean there's obviously the
letters of Paul and there's thebook of Revelation and
everything like this and otherletters.
But the last glimpse we have inthe Bible of the church is, in
(04:07):
some ways, you know, acts 28.
But the church didn't end withActs 28.
The church has continued for2,000 years and the church has
continued to think big thoughtsand pray big prayers and has
asked big questions, and theanswers are summarized in the
catechism.
And so if I didn't have thecatechism, I would have an
incredible.
I could have God's word writtenform, amazing.
(04:28):
But the catechism is what youmight say a synthesis and a
summary of the writtenrevelation and the oral
tradition or the tradition ofthe church brought together, and
so we recognize that theBible's never dead, but God has
actively been teaching hispeople.
That has not stopped for 2,000years.
(04:48):
He continues to teach us, andso if I want to know what he's
taught, I probably should crackopen the Catechism.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
But it's an intimidating book.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
I mean it has almost 3,000 paragraphs.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
It has a lot of theological language in it.
Is it something I can reallyuse for my own life, my prayer
life, my growing in myrelationship with Christ?
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Yes.
Well, absolutely, I would saythe only intimidating thing
about the catechism is it's justbig, that's all.
Because if you broke it downinto the paragraphs, I don't
know.
Again, some of you said youalready have listened to the
podcast or you've read thecatechism, that you know this,
you know that when you startreading it, you realize, yeah,
(05:29):
there's sometimes there's bigwords and sometimes it's complex
word terms like hypostatic,union or whatever the thing is.
But when you start reading ityou realize, oh my gosh, someone
, a human being, a couple ofhuman beings, have synthesized
the beauty and complexity of thechurch in a very simple and
accessible way.
If you actually just focus onone paragraph, there's so much
beauty.
In fact, I recommend one of thefirst times I was introduced to
the catechism as a priest, itwas from a man who was an expert
(05:52):
in the catechism and he saidthat he often uses it as a
source of prayer that he justactually says, okay, God, this
is what you revealed aboutyourself, about us, about
humanity, about salvation, aboutfaith to the world, picks a
paragraph and says I'm justgoing to read this and then do
Lectio Divina with the catechismand I don't know, have you ever
(06:12):
done that?
Have you ever done?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Lectio with the catechism.
I have Not often, but I havedone it.
It is so powerful.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Like I don't know if you guys have read the section
on the Our Father or the onprayer.
When it comes to the catechism,it's one of those things that
just it has revolutionized truly.
It sounds like a commercial.
It has revolutionized the way Ipray the Our Father, pray the
Lord's Prayer, because everysingle article of the Lord's
Prayer there's a massivereflection and like, well, this
is how the church sees thisgreat prayer given to us by
(06:39):
Jesus, and so that's how Ishould see this prayer given to
us by Jesus.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
And it's changed the way I pray.
So the catechism I think aboutit also as a great place to go
when you've got those questionsabout the faith you want to know
why do we believe this, what'sthe importance of holy water, or
why do we believe in purgatory,or why does the church teach
this, about this moral issue andwhat's wrong with in vitro
fertilization or abortion orwhatever the issue is like,
there's a great place to go.
(07:06):
That's not just about what thechurch is teaching today, but is
actually giving you a gift of2,000 years of a rich tradition
of great holy men and women andhuge thinkers that have been
thinking about these issues fora long, long time.
That it's not like I have tojust go and find the answer all
by myself.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
Well, here's a question for you, because this
is one of the things that Ithink sometimes is news to
people who are reading theCatechism for the first time
that it's not a book ofapologetics, right, in the sense
of it, doesn't?
It often teaches us what thechurch teaches, right, it's a
presentation of, here's asummary of what the church
teaches, but the why is actually, in some ways and again, this
is just what I think.
But what do you think?
The why seems to be implicitrather than explicit in some
(07:56):
ways.
Right, so you have teachingslike in vitro fertilization,
whatnot, and it's not kind oflike a point by point.
Here are the reasons why thisis to be avoided as much as it
is situated in the context oflife, a context of human dignity
, a context of the meaning ofthe sexual union, as opposed to.
These are the five points why,I mean, would you agree?
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Oh no, it's not an apologetic book.
There's elements of apologeticsin it of course right.
So the catechism we think of it,you know it comes from the word
catechane, which means to echo,and the idea is that, as you
see it in the scriptures in theearly church, that the idea is
that it's the proclamation ofthe gospel, the proclamation of
the fullness of God's revelationto us, that we want to re-echo
in our own hearts, and so thatfaith was being passed on,
(08:37):
originally just for theproclamation of the gospel, and
then it was summarized in creeds, little creedal statements the
early church fathers used, andthen eventually they started
writing more systematic works tobring converts into the faith,
and then eventually you getthese larger catechisms that
have come together over thecenturies and this is the one we
have now.
But yeah, it's meant to be anencounter with all that Jesus
(08:57):
has revealed to us through hischurch, through sacred scripture
, through the tradition, throughthe magisterial teachings, and
so I like what you're sayingthere, that it's not an explicit
apologetics, although youcertainly can find oh, here's a
good reason why to believe inthe real presence of the
Eucharist here.
But it might not be the fullexplanation on that front.
It's more of the presentationsthat you can encounter Jesus in
(09:19):
his truth.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
Yeah, I'm glad you think that, because that's what
I thought.
I wasn't sure I need to asksomeone smarter than me, because
I think a lot of times, evenwhen the Catechism talks about
faith and doubt and I don't knowif you guys have come across
this part in the Catechism whereit talks about the differences
between difficulty and doubt soin fact there's a quote by John
(09:42):
Henry Newman, who you know ourNewman centers are named after.
But John Henry Newman said thishe said 10,000 difficulties do
not add up to one single doubt.
And that's so important for usbecause I think a lot of times
we have questions and ourquestions take a number of
different forms.
Right, I think we ask typicallylike three questions.
One is I'll say what does thechurch teach?
Like, so, what does the churchteach?
(10:03):
That's the what?
Question.
The next one is okay, I knowwhat the church teaches, but why
?
Why does the church teach thisthat church teaches?
And then the third question ishow, in the sense of like, how
am I supposed to live this?
I think any of us could findourselves in a position where we
could be asking anyone or allof those questions at once, like
when it comes to any teachingof the church, like well,
everyone knows what the churchteaches.
(10:23):
When it comes to this, in fact,fulton Sheen said years and
years ago right, he said thereare not 100 people in America
who hate the Catholic church, hesaid, but there are thousands
upon thousands who hate whatthey mistakenly believe the
Catholic church is.
And so a lot of us.
We have the question okay, sowhat does the church teach?
And catechism explains thosethings.
But then there's the next level.
It's like go get in and listen.
(10:44):
Father I, or Dr Sri, I knowwhat the church teaches.
I want to know why, like, whydo we, are we for this?
Why are we against that?
Why do we believe this?
And the catechism does afantastic job of situating that,
why.
And sometimes we come to seek,and that's the big question.
It's like, okay, I haveencountered Jesus and I know
(11:13):
what the church teaches and Iknow why the church teaches it.
I've been studying, but then Imet my own heart, and my own
heart gives me an even moredifficult question than what and
why.
My own heart raises thequestion how, in the sense of
okay, I see this ideal.
I see the call of Jesus on mylife, I see the call to have
radical discipleship and followhim and to love my neighbor as
(11:34):
myself.
I don't know how, because Iknow my own heart, I know my own
self.
And that's where I think thechurch needs to come alongside
of us in that living way, inthat discipleship way, in that
friendship way, and is able tosay okay, yep, here's the
teacher who says what and how,but here's the friend who what
(11:55):
and why, the friend who showsyou how Does that make sense?
Oh, totally.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Let me ask you a personal question, then.
As you've been praying with thecatechism and doing catechism
of the year, how have youencountered Jesus more
profoundly, personally, likethrough these questions of what?
Okay, clarification, and thisis actually what the church
teaches, the why, but then mostimportantly that how.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
Yeah, I think it's a great question.
I have a couple of favoritesections of the catechism.
Whatever one I'm reading at thetime is my favorite section,
but one of the ones that risesto the top, especially when it
comes to working with ourcollege students, is on prayer,
and one of my favorite sections.
(12:35):
So I don't know if you guysknow this, but the catechism is
built around four pillars, right.
So there's the creed what webelieve.
There is sacraments, or how weworship.
There is morality how we liveand then there's prayer how we
pray, how we talk to God.
One of the subsections of theCatechism on Prayer is called
(12:57):
the Battle of Prayer and I'm sograteful to the person who wrote
this.
So the primary.
I don't know if you know this,oh yeah we talked about this on
that program.
You shared a bit about theorigin of.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
I think you should share that with them.
Speaker 3 (13:11):
So I think a lot of times we approach the catechism
and like, okay, there's thesepeople in like ivory towers who
are writing about these loftyideas of like following Jesus
and here's who God is and here'show you pray.
The individual who was theprimary author of that fourth
pillar on prayer was a priest,is a priest who, at the time he
was writing this section onprayer, wrote most of it in a
(13:35):
bunker in Beirut while the cityaround him was being bombed out,
and he was writing about howyou can deeply radically trust
in God, no matter what situation, no matter what season, no
matter what you're going through.
And so, again, it's easy for usto be like here we're
air-conditioned or heated orwhatever we're at.
You know, we're comfortableright now with these nice cushy
chairs.
Talk about guys trust God more.
(13:55):
Well, the guy who wrote abouthow we can deeply radically
trust God in our prayer andeverything, wrote that as bombs
are falling all around him,literally falling around him,
and that's one of the reasonswhy I love that section of the
battle of prayer Because, okay,my experience, here's my
(14:16):
experience of prayer.
When I was in high school, I hada first encounter with the Lord
and first conversion.
I would read stories aboutsaints and their saints would
talk about how they go toadoration.
So, like, I went to adorationbecause the saints went there.
I want to be a saint, ergo goto adoration.
So I'd ride my bike over to theCatholic church and park myself
in front of the tabernacle,like Jesus go On.
Because I would read storiesabout saints who would go in
(14:36):
front of Jesus in the Eucharistand it would describe.
It said hours would feel likeminutes.
Just time would just go awayand I'd be kneeling there and
minutes would feel like hoursand I'd be like, am I doing
something wrong?
And then I read the Catechismin 1992 or 93, when I first read
it in graduating high school,and it said the first thing we
(14:58):
need to realize is that prayeris a battle.
And that was so freeing for meto be able to realize.
Oh, the first thing we need torealize, that prayer is a battle
, it always presupposes effort.
Because I always thought thatprayer would be like slipping
into a hot tub, like legit, likeit would be like one of those
like because, again, people whodescribe prayer are like oh, I'm
(15:19):
just going to settle in in mycozy cup of coffee and in my
journal.
I mean, yes, that's Instagramprayer, like that is hot tub
prayer.
To be able to hear the Catechismsay no, no, no, it always
presupposes effort, that it's abattle.
And then it says a battleagainst two, and the first you
(15:43):
guys know this the catechismsays the first battle of prayer
is against ourselves, because Idon't know if this is your story
today or a story always, butthis is my.
Even this morning, this was thestory.
Okay, I need to pray morningprayer.
I need to do this.
All of the things that demandedmy attention, unimportant things
, you guys, I needed to checkInstagram before anything else,
so but that's the thing, abattle against ourselves.
That there's always somethingelse to do other than spend time
(16:08):
with the Lord and to know thatthat's just normal was so
freeing, because it's like oh,this is going to take the effort
.
I'm going to have to fightagainst myself every single day.
Even if I want to pray, I'mstill going to have to fight,
and I think that's somethingthat has really profoundly
impacted the way I approachprayer, because I think it helps
me give myself more grace, asopposed to like what's wrong
(16:31):
with me, oh my gosh, I shouldlove the Lord more, like, yeah,
I love him a lot, but this isgoing to fight.
I have to fight to make time.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
So what advice would you have for all these young
people here if they wanted toget started in making the
catechism not just a book on theshelf or something they pull up
on their phone just as areference book, but to make it a
part of their daily lives.
A part of their daily lives, apart of their formation of their
own mind, their soul, theirheart?
Speaker 3 (16:55):
Well, have you heard of podcasts?
Legitimately?
It's only the 3rd of January.
There's a podcast called theCatechism in the Air.
Download the Ascension app andit pops up.
It's great, it's wonderful.
But that's really what I mean inthat sense of it's kind of like
the Bible in that reality, thatsometimes I would approach the
Bible and I would expect to beoverwhelmed by God's truth and
(17:18):
God's power and like this isamazing, massive reality and
love, and sometimes it's justlike, no, I'm just taking it in
and I think the catechism issimilar.
A couple different ways to readthe catechism.
One is just take it in like letit wash over you by letting
someone read it to you andexplain it to you.
The other is the fact that Ithink this is I don't think this
(17:40):
is inaccurate, but Dr Sri cancorrect me the Catechism is a
reference book.
It still is a book that I don'tknow that it was written to be
read from paragraph one toparagraph last.
I think it was meant to be readlike I have a question about
faith.
Okay, so look in the table ofcontents or the back and say
okay, paragraph on faith and gofind that.
(18:01):
I think that that's reallyhelpful.
I remember one of my spiritual,my spiritual director.
At one point I was talking tohim about all the books I had to
read on my shelf.
I just wanted to get throughthis and and he was like oh, was
like oh, no, I rarely readbooks cover to cover.
I was like what, he's a reallysmart guy, he's a hermit who
lives up in Northern Minnesota,just this phenomenally
intelligent and holy man.
I'm like really, he's like ohyeah, I just read what I like
(18:24):
and I put it down.
I'm like no, no, you have tolike read from cover to cover.
And he's like, no, you don'tJust read it.
Open the chapter that you'reinterested in, read it and then,
if you're done, put it down.
You did it.
I think a lot of us have thisself-imposed burden on ourselves
that we have to like readeverything we have access to,
and especially with thecatechism, I think there's a
truth that it is a referencebook Read what parts you're
(18:47):
interested in, knowing that theday is going to come when you
get to come back to it.
But the day is going to comewhen you get to come back to it,
and if you learn how to gothrough the catechism today, you
will know how to go through thecatechism tomorrow.
So, whatever question you haveor the thing you want to learn
more about, go there today andthen, when you want to learn
more tomorrow, go to the otherplace tomorrow.
I don't know, what do you think?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Yeah, I think it's both.
And I think there's I meanobviously there's program where
you are going throughsystematically and there is a
certain order in which thecatechism is written, in the
sense that the first part is allabout.
Here's the big picture of thestory of God's amazing love for
us, that he created us and wedidn't have to exist.
He created us because he wanteda relationship with us and we
(19:26):
turned away from Him in sin andhe sent His Son to die for us
and he rises to fill us with Hislife, in His Spirit, into our
hearts and he gives us thechurch.
So that's the first story.
And then you can look at thenext pillar, on the sacraments,
on the liturgy is how we enterthat story of God's love, first
through baptism, and then wereceive that life of God that we
profess in the creed, and thenthe moral life is really our
(19:47):
response, now that I have thelife of Christ dwelling within
me.
Christian, live up to yourdignity, as Leo the Great says
at the beginning of that pillaron the catechism.
Now I want to imitate Jesus andshare his love in the world
around me.
And then, finally, you know thelast part you can think of the
last pillar is like how thatstory of God's love that we
receive in the sacraments and wetry to live out the best we can
(20:09):
in our fellowship together inthe moral life, now that story
is really written in our hearts.
It's a story of a soul, like StTherese would say, in prayer.
So there is an order to it, butat the same time so if you're
doing RCIA, ocia class, you'representing in a certain order,
usually At the same time it is areference book.
It is something that you canpull off the shelf.
I just want to understandbetter why we do this in the
(20:32):
liturgy.
I want to understand better whythe church teaches this about
Jesus and you can pull it offand go there.
There's great references in theback that you can turn to you
go.
The Ascension Catechism isamazing.
It's beautifully laid out butit's color-coded and has all
these little guides to help youenter into the catechism.
So we're at this, the All ThingsCatholic podcast.
(20:52):
I'm your host, edward Stree.
We're on location here at Seek25 in Salt Lake City.
I have my special guest, fatherMike Schmitz, with us.
If you want to get the shownotes for this podcast, you want
to just get this.
You can go to 33777 and justtype in All Things Catholic just
one word.
You can type that in All ThingsCatholic one word to 33777, and
you can get the podcast intoyour inbox each week.
(21:15):
But, father, you and I wereblessed to get to work on
another project related to thecatechism and it's a program
coming out just in a little bitof time.
Here it's with Ascension, it'scalled Foundations of Faith,
where it kind of goes a littledeeper into the catechism, if
you think of.
I was just talking with ourfriend Marisa.
She had this wonderful analogyabout how you know when you read
(21:37):
the catechism, you just, youknow, have it out there.
It's kind of like thetwo-dimensional view.
It's like when you get onGoogle Maps and you kind of see
the roads, you see the map, butthen this program is kind of
like the 3D view.
This is like the street view.
You kind of get in becausethere's so much to the catechism
that it comes together.
It's not just somebody who'swriting it down, it comes from
scripture, it's drawing on somany wonderful saints, it's
(21:59):
drawing on the church, fathers,church councils, encyclicals,
and it's kind of like weavingtogether this beautiful tapestry
.
But you don't often catch itunless you're actually really
going through and looking up allthose footnotes.
And so we developed a programthat's coming out where we
filmed in so many countries allover France.
We went to Turkey, we got to goto the sites where Nicaea,
(22:20):
where the Blessed Virgin Marylived, and with St John, we got
to go to the Holy Land, up toRome, spain, just all over,
looking at the walking in thefootsteps of St Therese of the
Seals, st John of the Cross,really pulling together those
sources that are behind thecatechism.
And so I'd like to just ask you, like in terms of your own
again prayerful reading and theteaching on the Catechism, tell
(22:43):
us about the background, thesources and why those are so
important from just bringingtogether this beautiful work
called the Catechism of theCatholic Church.
Well, I think one thing thatstrikes me when it comes to the
Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
Well, I think one thing that strikes me when it
comes to the catechism is thatit is a I don't think it's
inaccurate to say again you cancorrect me on this it's a purely
human work.
In many ways, right, we don'tbelieve it's divinely inspired
as much as other than any morethan this conversation could be
divinely inspired Like, in thatsense, God's grace is always
present and as a purely humanwork, like Michelangelo's, David
(23:17):
is a purely human work.
It is beautiful, it is soprofound.
I would get done reading aparagraph and think who was it
(23:39):
that was able to use sucheconomy of words to describe
this complex and profound truthof the faith in this particular
way.
It's just phenomenal Becausethey took, like you said,
they're taking from scripture,they're taking from different
church councils, they're takingfrom 2,000 years of history and
they're consolidating this intothese clear and concise
paragraphs and sets ofparagraphs and chapters and all
these things, because it's notthe work of one person and even
(23:59):
the author who is writing it orediting it.
This is the work of 2,000 plusyears.
And there's something I'm inawe of this, because I know how
hard it is to even just sit downto say, okay, we're going to
write a thing or give a talk onone topic, but to be
comprehensive and realize youhave to include all the church
(24:21):
councils and all the thingsscripture says about this and
not leave something out, not bemisconstrued, and be completely,
very clear it is.
I can't imagine the dauntingtask that that was yeah it is a
human writing and yet it is.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
It's not inspired by God in the way the sacred
scriptures are God's words andthe words of men, god breathing
forth his divine word in thehuman language.
It's not that, but we believethat the tradition of the church
is animated, guided by the HolySpirit, and you can totally see
the Holy Spirit working throughthe saints that are a part of
this, the councils, the churchfathers, and pulling together
(24:56):
the official teachings of thechurch.
Let me ask you know, when itcomes to the different sections
of the catechism, is there acouple sections or even
paragraphs where you find, wow,the way the catechism explains
this point?
I find this just so helpful.
It just makes sense out of ourfaith so much.
It helps me when you'repreaching or for me when I'm
(25:19):
teaching.
It helps me to be able toexplain why we believe what we
believe.
Could you share a couplemoments like that in the
catechism for me?
Speaker 3 (25:26):
Well, I had the one on battle of prayer.
That's clearly there, the OurFather clearly there.
One that was really personal tome was so I was confirmed in
high school.
I was confirmed the year beforethe catechism was promulgated,
so I didn't have it.
And I remember being in thecatechism classes or religious
ed classes, you know, gettingready for confirmation, and they
(25:49):
would say, okay, I'm like whatam I praying for?
The gifts of the Holy Spirit?
Like great, what are they?
Here's the seven gifts of theHoly Spirit.
And I'd be.
They'd say, well, which one doyou want?
You know, do you want wisdom,understanding, counsel,
knowledge, piety, fear of theLord, fortitude?
And I remember going like, ah,I kind of want all of them.
Is that a thing when I say all,I choose all?
(26:09):
But I didn't know which.
I didn't know what to expect tohappen to me.
We heard that you know they'dexplained.
We read through Acts, chaptertwo, about the first Pentecost,
the Holy Spirit coming upon theapostles and they speak
different languages and allthese things.
They had courage in a new way.
But I didn't know what wouldhappen.
(26:30):
And then, the year or two afterI was confirmed, I look at the
catechism and it was this reallysmall section.
There's one paragraph and itsays the five effects of
confirmation, meaning like hereare the five things that happen
when you get confirmed.
And the first is we become moredeeply rooted as sons and
daughters of God.
So, made sons and daughters ofGod in our baptism, confirmation
(26:51):
roots us even more deeply.
As God's sons and daughters,we're united more closely to
Christ.
So we're Christ's brothers andsisters.
We're united even more closelyto Christ.
Third, the gifts of the HolySpirit, those wisdom,
understanding, counsel, piety,fear, etc.
They're given to us in baptism.
So if you're baptized you havethose gifts.
If you're confirmed you havethose gifts.
But it amplifies those gifts.
(27:13):
The fourth effect ofconfirmation is it renders our
bond with the church moreperfect.
And so that's why sometimespeople will say that if you're
confirmed now you're an adult inthe church.
It's fine, but what it means isthere's no more sacraments of
initiation, like you're as fullyCatholic as the Pope is, you're
in, not you're in, but you'rein.
And fourth, that renders theproblem with the church.
(27:37):
The fifth effect is the thing Ithink.
Oh my gosh, the fifth effect ofconfirmation.
The fifth thing confirmationdoes is it gives us a special
strength of the Holy Spirit tospread and defend the faith in
word and deed, to proclaim thename of Jesus Christ boldly and
to never be ashamed of the cross.
And as a senior in high schoolreading that, then a freshman in
(27:59):
college reading that and likeoh my gosh, that's what happened
.
I was given the specialstrength of the Holy Spirit to
spread and defend the faith bywhat I said and by what I did,
to proclaim the name of JesusChrist boldly and to never be
ashamed of the cross.
I'm like that's what I want.
That's what I wanted and toknow that that's what I wanted
to ask for, but I didn't knowthat's what I was given, but I
(28:25):
didn't know, that's what I had,but I didn't know.
It changed everything.
I go back to that again andagain and again, especially when
talking to people aboutconfirmation, especially when
looking at my own life andsaying God, what are the gifts
you want for me?
Especially when even justasking for those gifts of the
Holy Spirit, that specialstrength of the Holy Spirit to
spread and defend the faith byword and deed, to proclaim the
name of Jesus Christ boldly andto never be ashamed of the cross
, is everything.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
And that's one of the great things that even if we
didn't learn it initially whenwe were confirmed or we were
growing up, when you learn aboutthe faith now, you can still
draw upon and go wow, I can drawupon that grace to be more
courageous and bold in sharingthe faith because it's there.
I just wasn't calling upon it.
I love the sections when we gothrough the sacraments on the
effects.
There's always every sacramentthat the catechism goes through
(29:06):
has a section on the effects ofthe sacrament.
I would just encourage you gothere.
That would be a great time totake to prayer and go back.
You can think about yourbaptism for those.
Anyone getting married, Anyengaged folks here, Go read
about the effects of thesacrament of marriage and what
marriage really does.
The holy sacrament of matrimony.
Speaker 3 (29:27):
Yeah, those words are powerful.
They'll really.
Those words will really holdspace, I think, for a lot of
people in their life.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
Yeah, Confession, the one on confession.
You know, we think we go toconfession simply to get our
sins forgiven, and that's hugeright.
But when you read the effectsof what confession really does,
it's really only half the storyof God's mercy.
I mean a huge half.
It is really important that Godis going to forgive me, but he
wants to do so much more, andthe catechism describes that
when we go to confession, weactually are strengthened, we're
(30:01):
receiving graces to help usovercome the faults, the
weaknesses that we typicallystruggle with.
So why do I want to go toconfession regularly?
Well, yes, because I sin allthe time and I need to be
forgiven.
But I also want to go becauseI'm receiving grace to be
strengthened to be a betterhusband, to be a better dad, to
be a better friend, to be abetter son of God, and I need
(30:22):
that.
You know one of my favorite.
Can I jump to another?
Speaker 3 (30:24):
Yeah, absolutely, it's your podcast.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
The moral.
On the moral pillar, there'sone of my favorite quotes and
it's very simple and I bet manyof you have heard it before.
But I can't tell you how thislittle line from the catechism,
quoting St Thomas Aquinas, isjust so helpful in just
transforming people's vision forlife.
It's the definition of love.
When it explains what love is,it quotes the great St Thomas
(30:50):
Aquinas and explains that loveisn't just a feeling, an emotion
, a desire, romantic, no, no,love is a decision.
Love is to will the good of theother.
Can you all say that?
What is love To will the goodof the other?
Because we live in such aculture that we think, you know,
love is more about what someonedoes for me.
You know I don't get thosefeelings, you know, from this
(31:11):
person.
Do I, you make me feel notalone?
Or you know I get the sexualattraction Like it's all about
what you do for me.
But that's a very self-centeredview of love and we're made
actually to be more outwardright, to be more like God
himself, who gives of himself,to be thinking what's best for
the other person.
And do I have the innercharacter, the life of Christ in
(31:32):
me, to love and live for othersand not for myself.
I just find that as one of myfavorite little quotes, just one
little gem, but can really just.
I've seen marriages.
Married couples have told meI've never thought of that as
love.
And they've been married,they're Catholic, they go to
mass every Sunday but like, thatvision of what real love is
transforms them and realizewe've been struggling so much in
(31:55):
our marriage because it waslike you're frustrating me right
now or you're not doing what Iwant and you're not making me
feel good right now, and it'slike, well, hey, that's just
what married life is and you gotto get out of yourself.
And it's actually when youlearn to love like Jesus that
the real joy and the blessingscome.
Speaker 3 (32:09):
That's so funny.
So love is to will to go to theother.
I have a friend his name isNick who has a lot of good
teachings, insights named NickDavidson.
He's a missionary.
My friend Nick is a missionaryin Cambodia with his wife.
She's a doctor and they havetheir five kids and they moved
to Cambodia a couple of yearsago just to bring the gospel
there, and so his wife servesthe people there in Cambodia for
(32:31):
free and they just try to relyupon people supporting them so
they can stay in Cambodia andbring the gospel to the people
of Cambodia.
But Nick says this he says loveis a one-way street, that if
Thomas Gwyneth's line is trueabout love is willing to go to
the other.
He says, therefore, love is aone-way street.
And he says caveatrelationships are a two-way
(32:52):
street.
But love is a one-way street.
And he says caveat,relationships are a two-way
street, but love is a one-waystreet in the sense that it
doesn't matter what you do.
I mean, obviously with healthand with proper boundaries.
This is important to understand, right, boundaries are good and
being in places of danger isnot always great.
So if you need to removeyourself from that kind of
situation, obviously doing this.
But, all things being equal andhealthy, my job is just to love
(33:18):
, regardless of whether someoneloves me back.
Again, with that caveat beingthis is a healthy relationship
because I can only control whatI can control, and that sense of
like.
That's one of the reasons.
Well, when we've talked beforeabout marriage, that sense of
the myth that marriage is 50-50.
No, it's not.
(33:38):
It is 100%.
100% that even if that person Icovenant to myself with offers
nothing back, I said everythingand that is what I have to do.
Because they're not doing whatthey said they would do doesn't
mean I don't have to do what Ihave to do.
Because they're not doing whatthey said they would do doesn't
mean I don't have to do what Isaid I was going to do, and vice
versa.
And so just love is a one-waystreet.
Relationships are two-waystreets, but love is a one-way
(33:59):
street.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Yeah, I hope you're all getting a sense.
The catechism is filled with somany gems that can just make
such a difference in your lifeand we just want to get that
full revelation, filling ourmind with it and filling our
souls with it on a regular basis.
I want to turn to anothersection.
This is from the first pillar,on the profession of faith and
the creed, and I'm going toshare a story with everybody
here from the early days ofFocus.
I still remember it was maybelike the second or third summer
(34:22):
training and we were sittingaround it was Curtis, me and my
good friend Tim Gray, sean Ennisfrom the Augustan Institute,
and we were just kicking aroundsome things about the catechism
and the Bible.
And this really relates to whatyou were talking about last
night in your keynote about whenwe sin.
That sin is, you know, not justI disagree with you, god, I
(34:42):
don't trust you at the end and Ilove this line from the
catechism it's article number397 that says that first sin
ultimately was a lack of trustin God's goodness, and all
subsequent sin involves thislack of trust.
Now we often hear that pride isthe source of sin and that is,
that's the tradition, but theCatechism says it's not just
(35:04):
pride.
There is this element of a lackof trust and I think you were
kind of pointing us that waylast night in your keynote.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
Yeah, that is.
I mean, that's, I think,another part of the catechism.
That same section actually sayswith that first sin, trust in
God died in the human heart.
The trust we have for God diedin the human heart.
And so the whole rest of thestory is a lot of things, but
one of the things that really isis God's winning our trust back
(35:31):
.
Not that he lost it, not thathe didn't do anything to lose it
, but we lost it.
And so what does he do?
I mean, you know, this isfascinating to me.
I don't know if you guys realizethis, but for all of
Christianity, basically evenbefore Christianity, the idea is
here's humanity and werecognize something about
ourselves.
The image is of a courtroom,and this is an image that was
(35:52):
used for hundreds and hundredsof years.
The image of a courtroombecause we find ourselves guilty
.
We find ourselves guilty andwe're accused of what we're
guilty of.
And so God comes into thecourtroom and he says what,
what's God's answer to our guilt?
God's answer to our guilt isthe cross.
God's answer to our guilt, insome mysterious way, is he takes
all that we have and he takesit on himself.
(36:13):
Something happened in the last50 to 150 years, it's still a
courtroom, but we're not theones who are accused of being
guilty.
Like postmodern man, we look atGod and what do we say?
We say God, you're guilty, god,it's your fault.
We look at the evil in theworld and we say we don't say
(36:35):
this was us, this is humanitychoosing evil.
We say God, you're the one whomade this world, you're the one
who lets us be in this brokenplace.
God, you're the guilty one.
What's your answer?
And I think this is absolutelyfascinating, because for
thousands of years, we're guiltyand God's answer is the cross.
Now, with us.
(36:59):
Right, our big thing is wedon't trust God.
So, god, you're guilty.
What's his answer?
The answer is the cross, thathis answer for our guilt is.
He's like I'll take your sinupon me.
And his answer for us, accusinghim of being guilty, is I'll
take your distrust upon me andI'll do everything I possibly
can to win your trust back.
So you know that I'm not goingto spare myself from what you've
(37:21):
experienced.
I'm not going to spare myselffrom your suffering.
I'm not going to spare myselffrom evil.
I'm not going to even sparemyself from betrayal and
heartbreak and death.
I'll take that all upon me sothat you can trust me.
And I think this is incrediblethe genius of God who, when
we're guilty, his answer is thecross, and when he's quote
unquote accused of being guilty,his answer is the cross.
(37:42):
Because he wants to win backour hearts to trust him, or else
I'm going to keep running.
I'm going to keep running Sayleave me alone.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
Yeah, so all sin in the end, it does involve this
lack of trust.
I think that, well, I knowbetter.
This is what's going to bringme happiness, this is the
shortcut, and this is not justfor the sin in the world, this
is just.
You know when we're sinning.
This is what we do all the time, and I think there's just a
great lens to see, yeah, theheart of what sin really is.
Speaker 3 (38:15):
Well, I would even say you know that all sin is an
attempt to be happy apart fromGod.
I heard that last night.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, I think I heard that on a great talk.
Yeah, well, we're about to wrapup here, but let me ask one
last thing related to thecatechism here.
So again, I'm looking outseeing so many young people
gathered here.
They're growing in their faith,they want to love Jesus, they
want to go back to theircampuses and share Christ.
So any last words ofencouragement for them, as
(38:44):
they're just getting started intheir journey with the catechism
.
Speaker 3 (38:48):
I think a lot of times, when it comes to being
sent out or when it comes tobeing missionaries or disciples
of Jesus, there are typicallyand I could be wrong about this,
but there are typically threethings that get in our way.
Sometimes it's a lack ofknowledge, sometimes it's that
sense of like I got in thesituation and these, you know,
(39:10):
my friends brought up this likedoes the church really teach
this or what would you say aboutthis kind of situation, and I
just don't know what to say.
And sometimes that's reality.
Sometimes the reality is Idon't know what to say, and you
could leave that conversationlater on and you're like oh man,
I totally nosedived, I froze, Ididn't speak up because I had a
lack of knowledge.
Sometimes that's real, andthat's why we go back to the
(39:31):
catechism and say, okay, godteach me, we'll go back to
scripture and God teach me, wecan learn more.
Sometimes that's our excuse,though, because sometimes it's
not really a matter of I didn'thave knowledge, sometimes it's
one of two other things.
Sometimes it's not I didn'thave knowledge, it's I didn't
have courage and that sense ofas you go back to campuses, you
(39:53):
go back to relationships andfriendships and are called to be
witnesses of Jesus.
Sometimes it's like I don'thave courage, and the courage
doesn't mean like necessarily,like I'm not willing to do hard
things or I'm not willing toface what I'm afraid of.
Sometimes it's something assimple as I don't have the
courage to enter a conversationthat I don't know where it will
end.
I don't know if you have evernot evangelized or not shared
(40:14):
your faith with someone, becauseyou're like I don't know.
If I bring it up, who knows,it's going to be out of my
control.
And I heard this yesterday.
It was this you can have growthor you can have control.
You can't have both.
And so that sense of being ableto enter into a conversation, I
don't know where it's going togo.
I can't control it.
Well, maybe I just need courage.
(40:36):
I don't have all the answers.
Maybe I just need courageBecause we're all going back to
our friendships, we're all goingback to relationships.
We all know people in our liveswho God has called us to love,
who don't know who Jesus is yet.
So, knowledge or a lack ofcourage, or the last one is
sometimes I just have a lack oflove, and what I mean by that is
(40:57):
sometimes it's a lack of caring.
I don't love someone enough tosay the hard thing.
Sometimes that's the reality,but sometimes it's more like
this, and this is the image.
I don't mean to take up yourtime, but I think the images um,
I used this like a couple ofyears ago it cause so I really
like sushi a lot.
I mean, I know I'm unusual inthat, because everyone loves
sushi Um, and then I realized,oh, I really like Chinese food
(41:19):
too, and they're like well, Ireally like Thai food as well.
And then I realized this oh, Ireally just like soy sauce, like
that's my favorite food.
My favorite Chinese food is soysauce, my favorite Japanese
food is soy sauce.
And so there is this grocerystore near campus that has
actually pretty good grocerystore sushi.
So I go there occasionally andI'll get the little packet of
(41:39):
things and they have the freesoy sauce packets and I'm like
this is awesome.
And then two years ago they gotnew soy sauce packets that were
like even fuller, like youcould.
You know, sometimes soy saucepackets are like they're only a
little bit of soy sauce in there.
This had.
This was like plump.
It was pumped up with soy sauce.
I'm like, yes, a lot of soysauce.
(42:00):
But if you've ever opened apacket like that, what happens?
You lose it all because there'stoo much soy sauce.
And I was.
I remember opening a packet andlike ah, and thinking like, oh,
this will preach, because why?
Because this thing was full ofwhat I wanted, like it was full
of good stuff.
It was full of soy sauce.
It was, it was and it wasexactly what I wanted.
It was packed full of soy sauce, but that was the problem.
(42:21):
Packed full of soy sauce, butthat was the problem.
It was too full.
And I think about our lives andthink about okay, we're going to
be sent back in a couple ofdays, back to our relations,
back to our friendships, back toour campuses, with a message to
give.
And sometimes it's no, I didn'thave enough knowledge,
sometimes it's I didn't haveenough courage and sometimes
it's actually I didn't haveenough love.
Not because I didn't care, butbecause my life was just too
full for anyone else.
(42:42):
It's full of good stuff, but isthere any room for time with
someone who needed time?
No, it's just too full.
Is there any room for someonewho actually let me enter that
conversation with them?
No, it's just too full.
It's not like your lives arefull of bad things.
It's probably full of a lot ofgood stuff, but because maybe,
maybe it's over full with somany good things that there's
(43:06):
just no room for love.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
I love those three things and so I'm going to
summarize them again.
So maybe we need to know more,we need to understand our faith
better.
That's where the catechismcomes in.
I love what Frank Sheed said.
Do you ever hear that quote?
He Frank Sheed said Do you everhear that quote?
He says that every time youlearn something new about their
Catholic faith, it gives youanother reason to love Jesus,
and we all want to fall in lovewith Jesus more.
So read the catechism so youcan learn all that Jesus wants
(43:30):
to give us.
But maybe you need to pray forcourage.
That's the second point FatherMike said.
But the last one and this isreally the heart of focus is do
we prioritize sharing the onething that makes the greatest
difference in our lives, thething that matters the most?
That's Jesus Christ and ourfriendship with Him.
Do we prioritize or do we haveso many other things that our
(43:50):
packet is just too full of soysauce?
Do we really have that time andreally prioritize loving Jesus
so much that we want to love Himin our neighbor, in our family
member, our roommate, ourteammate, our classmate, that
we're going to make it apriority to go back and witness
the gospel to them.
So well, father, it's been sogreat having you, and let's give
it up for Father Mike.
Speaker 3 (44:11):
Thanks you guys.
Thanks Dr Sreen.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
And, as he said, you can get started.
It's not too late to getstarted on Catechism.
In a Year you can go and findthat podcast and start walking
through the catechism as you'rewalking on campus and driving
back to your campuses.
And if you want to check outthis show, this comes out every
Tuesday, it's All ThingsCatholic.
I give some advice here.
If you were to pull out youriPhones and you're searching
under podcasts there on yourApple podcast, don't put in my
(44:38):
last name, sri S-R-I.
Don't do that.
It's dangerous.
You'll get an Indian Hindu guruand you don't want the Indian
Hindu guru guy.
You put in Edward S-R-I.
You can find it.
Or simply, you could justsimply text allthingscatholic
one word to 33777.
That's allthingscatholic, oneword to 33777.
Thanks so much for being here.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
Our prayers are for all of you as you continue your
journey.
Head to seekfocusorg backslashreplay to download now, and
don't forget to join us for Seek26.
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 (00:21):
All right, welcome to the All Things Catholic podcast
.
I'm your host, Edward Sri, herein Salt Lake City at the SEEK
25 conference.
This is amazing.
We've got over 17,000 peoplegathered here, We've got 3,000
people in DC and several hundredin Cologne, Germany.
(00:41):
It's the largest SEEK eventwe've ever had and on the show
today we're very blessed to havea special guest, Father Mike
Schmesch.
Father, thanks for being withus again.
Speaker 3 (00:50):
Dr Sri, thank you very much.
Speaker 2 (00:53):
Great, everyone who loved the keynote from Father
Mike last night.
I just got to say I love thatimage of just floating in space.
I just, I mean that has stuckwith me of like whoa, we're just
, we are lost completely withoutour Lord.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
Yeah, it's one of those where I mean I'm sure
you've all heard about like theunbridgeable gap between us and
God because of sin, and when myfriend Nick did it, he's like an
actor so he can like really getinto it.
And whenever I think about thatand that sense of being
(01:28):
completely, when it comes to ourown salvation, we're completely
helpless unless Jesus launchedhimself and throws us back to
the Father.
Just say I love that as well.
I'm so grateful to Jesus andalso there's my friend Nick for
giving me that image.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah, and we're thankful for you sharing that
with us.
And one of the things Jesusgives us actually actually to
hold on to in a world where youjust can feel really lost is
what we're going to talk abouttoday, and it's the great gift
that he's given us through thechurch, the catechism of the
Catholic church.
Now, how many of you havelistened to the catechism in the
year that Father Mike did?
Okay, so I want to ask aboutthe catechism a little bit here,
(02:05):
Father.
So why the catechism?
I mean, it feels like atextbook that maybe you'd assign
in a classroom and maybe like areference book you keep on your
shelf.
Why do we need the catechism?
How does it enrich my ownpersonal relationship with
Christ?
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Well, I think, well, I want to back up a little bit
or like come up from a differentangle.
So one of the things that in2020 had this notion of we
should have a podcast where wedo the entire Bible and
catechism in one year and sothat was the original proposal
to Ascension was like, can Ijust do this, like read the
(02:41):
Bible, read the catechism, bothin one year?
And because actually, the focus, I mean many reasons.
I mean there's other factorstoo, but I don't know if you
know this about FocusMissionaries the Focus
Missionaries, over the course oftheir time being the two-year
missionaries, they're expectedto read all 16 narrative books
of the Bible, as well as theentire Catechism of the Catholic
Church, and they have stats onthe number of missionaries who
(03:01):
actually do that, and thesestatistics, I think, are in the
single digits of the number ofmissionaries who actually do the
reading plan.
I mean, they're goodmissionaries, they're busy,
they're talking with you guys,but they weren't actually
reading the Bible or catechismin the way that they should, and
so it was like I want to helpour missionaries and so how
about we do this Bible andcatechism in here?
Ascension was wise and theysaid how about do the Bible
(03:22):
first, catechism later.
So that's how we started thecatechism and the reason why
Focus says missionaries shouldread the catechism.
I think there's so manydifferent levels, but one is
here.
We have God's Word in the Bible, right.
We have God's revelation ofhimself to us through Scripture
and the written Word.
But God has so much more thathe has said and so much more
(03:46):
that he's revealed about himselfthrough the teaching of the
church that, if you want tothink about this and you have,
like Acts, chapter 28, right,and that's the last chapter of
the early church in the sense Imean there's obviously the
letters of Paul and there's thebook of Revelation and
everything like this and otherletters.
But the last glimpse we have inthe Bible of the church is, in
(04:07):
some ways, you know, acts 28.
But the church didn't end withActs 28.
The church has continued for2,000 years and the church has
continued to think big thoughtsand pray big prayers and has
asked big questions, and theanswers are summarized in the
catechism.
And so if I didn't have thecatechism, I would have an
incredible.
I could have God's word writtenform, amazing.
(04:28):
But the catechism is what youmight say a synthesis and a
summary of the writtenrevelation and the oral
tradition or the tradition ofthe church brought together, and
so we recognize that theBible's never dead, but God has
actively been teaching hispeople.
That has not stopped for 2,000years.
(04:48):
He continues to teach us, andso if I want to know what he's
taught, I probably should crackopen the Catechism.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
But it's an intimidating book.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
I mean it has almost 3,000 paragraphs.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
It has a lot of theological language in it.
Is it something I can reallyuse for my own life, my prayer
life, my growing in myrelationship with Christ?
Speaker 3 (05:09):
Yes.
Well, absolutely, I would saythe only intimidating thing
about the catechism is it's justbig, that's all.
Because if you broke it downinto the paragraphs, I don't
know.
Again, some of you said youalready have listened to the
podcast or you've read thecatechism, that you know this,
you know that when you startreading it, you realize, yeah,
(05:29):
there's sometimes there's bigwords and sometimes it's complex
word terms like hypostatic,union or whatever the thing is.
But when you start reading ityou realize, oh my gosh, someone
, a human being, a couple ofhuman beings, have synthesized
the beauty and complexity of thechurch in a very simple and
accessible way.
If you actually just focus onone paragraph, there's so much
beauty.
In fact, I recommend one of thefirst times I was introduced to
the catechism as a priest, itwas from a man who was an expert
(05:52):
in the catechism and he saidthat he often uses it as a
source of prayer that he justactually says, okay, God, this
is what you revealed aboutyourself, about us, about
humanity, about salvation, aboutfaith to the world, picks a
paragraph and says I'm justgoing to read this and then do
Lectio Divina with the catechismand I don't know, have you ever
(06:12):
done that?
Have you ever done?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
Lectio with the catechism.
I have Not often, but I havedone it.
It is so powerful.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
Like I don't know if you guys have read the section
on the Our Father or the onprayer.
When it comes to the catechism,it's one of those things that
just it has revolutionized truly.
It sounds like a commercial.
It has revolutionized the way Ipray the Our Father, pray the
Lord's Prayer, because everysingle article of the Lord's
Prayer there's a massivereflection and like, well, this
is how the church sees thisgreat prayer given to us by
(06:39):
Jesus, and so that's how Ishould see this prayer given to
us by Jesus.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
And it's changed the way I pray.
So the catechism I think aboutit also as a great place to go
when you've got those questionsabout the faith you want to know
why do we believe this, what'sthe importance of holy water, or
why do we believe in purgatory,or why does the church teach
this, about this moral issue andwhat's wrong with in vitro
fertilization or abortion orwhatever the issue is like,
there's a great place to go.
(07:06):
That's not just about what thechurch is teaching today, but is
actually giving you a gift of2,000 years of a rich tradition
of great holy men and women andhuge thinkers that have been
thinking about these issues fora long, long time.
That it's not like I have tojust go and find the answer all
by myself.
Speaker 3 (07:28):
Well, here's a question for you, because this
is one of the things that Ithink sometimes is news to
people who are reading theCatechism for the first time
that it's not a book ofapologetics, right, in the sense
of it, doesn't?
It often teaches us what thechurch teaches, right, it's a
presentation of, here's asummary of what the church
teaches, but the why is actually, in some ways and again, this
is just what I think.
But what do you think?
The why seems to be implicitrather than explicit in some
(07:56):
ways.
Right, so you have teachingslike in vitro fertilization,
whatnot, and it's not kind oflike a point by point.
Here are the reasons why thisis to be avoided as much as it
is situated in the context oflife, a context of human dignity
, a context of the meaning ofthe sexual union, as opposed to.
These are the five points why,I mean, would you agree?
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Oh no, it's not an apologetic book.
There's elements of apologeticsin it of course right.
So the catechism we think of it,you know it comes from the word
catechane, which means to echo,and the idea is that, as you
see it in the scriptures in theearly church, that the idea is
that it's the proclamation ofthe gospel, the proclamation of
the fullness of God's revelationto us, that we want to re-echo
in our own hearts, and so thatfaith was being passed on,
(08:37):
originally just for theproclamation of the gospel, and
then it was summarized in creeds, little creedal statements the
early church fathers used, andthen eventually they started
writing more systematic works tobring converts into the faith,
and then eventually you getthese larger catechisms that
have come together over thecenturies and this is the one we
have now.
But yeah, it's meant to be anencounter with all that Jesus
(08:57):
has revealed to us through hischurch, through sacred scripture
, through the tradition, throughthe magisterial teachings, and
so I like what you're sayingthere, that it's not an explicit
apologetics, although youcertainly can find oh, here's a
good reason why to believe inthe real presence of the
Eucharist here.
But it might not be the fullexplanation on that front.
It's more of the presentationsthat you can encounter Jesus in
(09:19):
his truth.
Speaker 3 (09:20):
Yeah, I'm glad you think that, because that's what
I thought.
I wasn't sure I need to asksomeone smarter than me, because
I think a lot of times, evenwhen the Catechism talks about
faith and doubt and I don't knowif you guys have come across
this part in the Catechism whereit talks about the differences
between difficulty and doubt soin fact there's a quote by John
(09:42):
Henry Newman, who you know ourNewman centers are named after.
But John Henry Newman said thishe said 10,000 difficulties do
not add up to one single doubt.
And that's so important for usbecause I think a lot of times
we have questions and ourquestions take a number of
different forms.
Right, I think we ask typicallylike three questions.
One is I'll say what does thechurch teach?
Like, so, what does the churchteach?
(10:03):
That's the what?
Question.
The next one is okay, I knowwhat the church teaches, but why
?
Why does the church teach thisthat church teaches?
And then the third question ishow, in the sense of like, how
am I supposed to live this?
I think any of us could findourselves in a position where we
could be asking anyone or allof those questions at once, like
when it comes to any teachingof the church, like well,
everyone knows what the churchteaches.
(10:23):
When it comes to this, in fact,fulton Sheen said years and
years ago right, he said thereare not 100 people in America
who hate the Catholic church, hesaid, but there are thousands
upon thousands who hate whatthey mistakenly believe the
Catholic church is.
And so a lot of us.
We have the question okay, sowhat does the church teach?
And catechism explains thosethings.
But then there's the next level.
It's like go get in and listen.
(10:44):
Father I, or Dr Sri, I knowwhat the church teaches.
I want to know why, like, whydo we, are we for this?
Why are we against that?
Why do we believe this?
And the catechism does afantastic job of situating that,
why.
And sometimes we come to seek,and that's the big question.
It's like, okay, I haveencountered Jesus and I know
(11:13):
what the church teaches and Iknow why the church teaches it.
I've been studying, but then Imet my own heart, and my own
heart gives me an even moredifficult question than what and
why.
My own heart raises thequestion how, in the sense of
okay, I see this ideal.
I see the call of Jesus on mylife, I see the call to have
radical discipleship and followhim and to love my neighbor as
(11:34):
myself.
I don't know how, because Iknow my own heart, I know my own
self.
And that's where I think thechurch needs to come alongside
of us in that living way, inthat discipleship way, in that
friendship way, and is able tosay okay, yep, here's the
teacher who says what and how,but here's the friend who what
(11:55):
and why, the friend who showsyou how Does that make sense?
Oh, totally.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Let me ask you a personal question, then.
As you've been praying with thecatechism and doing catechism
of the year, how have youencountered Jesus more
profoundly, personally, likethrough these questions of what?
Okay, clarification, and thisis actually what the church
teaches, the why, but then mostimportantly that how.
Speaker 3 (12:15):
Yeah, I think it's a great question.
I have a couple of favoritesections of the catechism.
Whatever one I'm reading at thetime is my favorite section,
but one of the ones that risesto the top, especially when it
comes to working with ourcollege students, is on prayer,
and one of my favorite sections.
(12:35):
So I don't know if you guysknow this, but the catechism is
built around four pillars, right.
So there's the creed what webelieve.
There is sacraments, or how weworship.
There is morality how we liveand then there's prayer how we
pray, how we talk to God.
One of the subsections of theCatechism on Prayer is called
(12:57):
the Battle of Prayer and I'm sograteful to the person who wrote
this.
So the primary.
I don't know if you know this,oh yeah we talked about this on
that program.
You shared a bit about theorigin of.
Speaker 2 (13:09):
I think you should share that with them.
Speaker 3 (13:11):
So I think a lot of times we approach the catechism
and like, okay, there's thesepeople in like ivory towers who
are writing about these loftyideas of like following Jesus
and here's who God is and here'show you pray.
The individual who was theprimary author of that fourth
pillar on prayer was a priest,is a priest who, at the time he
was writing this section onprayer, wrote most of it in a
(13:35):
bunker in Beirut while the cityaround him was being bombed out,
and he was writing about howyou can deeply radically trust
in God, no matter what situation, no matter what season, no
matter what you're going through.
And so, again, it's easy for usto be like here we're
air-conditioned or heated orwhatever we're at.
You know, we're comfortableright now with these nice cushy
chairs.
Talk about guys trust God more.
(13:55):
Well, the guy who wrote abouthow we can deeply radically
trust God in our prayer andeverything, wrote that as bombs
are falling all around him,literally falling around him,
and that's one of the reasonswhy I love that section of the
battle of prayer Because, okay,my experience, here's my
(14:16):
experience of prayer.
When I was in high school, I hada first encounter with the Lord
and first conversion.
I would read stories aboutsaints and their saints would
talk about how they go toadoration.
So, like, I went to adorationbecause the saints went there.
I want to be a saint, ergo goto adoration.
So I'd ride my bike over to theCatholic church and park myself
in front of the tabernacle,like Jesus go On.
Because I would read storiesabout saints who would go in
(14:36):
front of Jesus in the Eucharistand it would describe.
It said hours would feel likeminutes.
Just time would just go awayand I'd be kneeling there and
minutes would feel like hoursand I'd be like, am I doing
something wrong?
And then I read the Catechismin 1992 or 93, when I first read
it in graduating high school,and it said the first thing we
(14:58):
need to realize is that prayeris a battle.
And that was so freeing for meto be able to realize.
Oh, the first thing we need torealize, that prayer is a battle
, it always presupposes effort.
Because I always thought thatprayer would be like slipping
into a hot tub, like legit, likeit would be like one of those
like because, again, people whodescribe prayer are like oh, I'm
(15:19):
just going to settle in in mycozy cup of coffee and in my
journal.
I mean, yes, that's Instagramprayer, like that is hot tub
prayer.
To be able to hear the Catechismsay no, no, no, it always
presupposes effort, that it's abattle.
And then it says a battleagainst two, and the first you
(15:43):
guys know this the catechismsays the first battle of prayer
is against ourselves, because Idon't know if this is your story
today or a story always, butthis is my.
Even this morning, this was thestory.
Okay, I need to pray morningprayer.
I need to do this.
All of the things that demandedmy attention, unimportant things
, you guys, I needed to checkInstagram before anything else,
so but that's the thing, abattle against ourselves.
That there's always somethingelse to do other than spend time
(16:08):
with the Lord and to know thatthat's just normal was so
freeing, because it's like oh,this is going to take the effort
.
I'm going to have to fightagainst myself every single day.
Even if I want to pray, I'mstill going to have to fight,
and I think that's somethingthat has really profoundly
impacted the way I approachprayer, because I think it helps
me give myself more grace, asopposed to like what's wrong
(16:31):
with me, oh my gosh, I shouldlove the Lord more, like, yeah,
I love him a lot, but this isgoing to fight.
I have to fight to make time.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
So what advice would you have for all these young
people here if they wanted toget started in making the
catechism not just a book on theshelf or something they pull up
on their phone just as areference book, but to make it a
part of their daily lives.
A part of their daily lives, apart of their formation of their
own mind, their soul, theirheart?
Speaker 3 (16:55):
Well, have you heard of podcasts?
Legitimately?
It's only the 3rd of January.
There's a podcast called theCatechism in the Air.
Download the Ascension app andit pops up.
It's great, it's wonderful.
But that's really what I mean inthat sense of it's kind of like
the Bible in that reality, thatsometimes I would approach the
Bible and I would expect to beoverwhelmed by God's truth and
(17:18):
God's power and like this isamazing, massive reality and
love, and sometimes it's justlike, no, I'm just taking it in
and I think the catechism issimilar.
A couple different ways to readthe catechism.
One is just take it in like letit wash over you by letting
someone read it to you andexplain it to you.
The other is the fact that Ithink this is I don't think this
(17:40):
is inaccurate, but Dr Sri cancorrect me the Catechism is a
reference book.
It still is a book that I don'tknow that it was written to be
read from paragraph one toparagraph last.
I think it was meant to be readlike I have a question about
faith.
Okay, so look in the table ofcontents or the back and say
okay, paragraph on faith and gofind that.
(18:01):
I think that that's reallyhelpful.
I remember one of my spiritual,my spiritual director.
At one point I was talking tohim about all the books I had to
read on my shelf.
I just wanted to get throughthis and and he was like oh, was
like oh, no, I rarely readbooks cover to cover.
I was like what, he's a reallysmart guy, he's a hermit who
lives up in Northern Minnesota,just this phenomenally
intelligent and holy man.
I'm like really, he's like ohyeah, I just read what I like
(18:24):
and I put it down.
I'm like no, no, you have tolike read from cover to cover.
And he's like, no, you don'tJust read it.
Open the chapter that you'reinterested in, read it and then,
if you're done, put it down.
You did it.
I think a lot of us have thisself-imposed burden on ourselves
that we have to like readeverything we have access to,
and especially with thecatechism, I think there's a
truth that it is a referencebook Read what parts you're
(18:47):
interested in, knowing that theday is going to come when you
get to come back to it.
But the day is going to comewhen you get to come back to it,
and if you learn how to gothrough the catechism today, you
will know how to go through thecatechism tomorrow.
So, whatever question you haveor the thing you want to learn
more about, go there today andthen, when you want to learn
more tomorrow, go to the otherplace tomorrow.
I don't know, what do you think?
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Yeah, I think it's both.
And I think there's I meanobviously there's program where
you are going throughsystematically and there is a
certain order in which thecatechism is written, in the
sense that the first part is allabout.
Here's the big picture of thestory of God's amazing love for
us, that he created us and wedidn't have to exist.
He created us because he wanteda relationship with us and we
(19:26):
turned away from Him in sin andhe sent His Son to die for us
and he rises to fill us with Hislife, in His Spirit, into our
hearts and he gives us thechurch.
So that's the first story.
And then you can look at thenext pillar, on the sacraments,
on the liturgy is how we enterthat story of God's love, first
through baptism, and then wereceive that life of God that we
profess in the creed, and thenthe moral life is really our
(19:47):
response, now that I have thelife of Christ dwelling within
me.
Christian, live up to yourdignity, as Leo the Great says
at the beginning of that pillaron the catechism.
Now I want to imitate Jesus andshare his love in the world
around me.
And then, finally, you know thelast part you can think of the
last pillar is like how thatstory of God's love that we
receive in the sacraments and wetry to live out the best we can
(20:09):
in our fellowship together inthe moral life, now that story
is really written in our hearts.
It's a story of a soul, like StTherese would say, in prayer.
So there is an order to it, butat the same time so if you're
doing RCIA, ocia class, you'representing in a certain order,
usually At the same time it is areference book.
It is something that you canpull off the shelf.
I just want to understandbetter why we do this in the
(20:32):
liturgy.
I want to understand better whythe church teaches this about
Jesus and you can pull it offand go there.
There's great references in theback that you can turn to you
go.
The Ascension Catechism isamazing.
It's beautifully laid out butit's color-coded and has all
these little guides to help youenter into the catechism.
So we're at this, the All ThingsCatholic podcast.
(20:52):
I'm your host, edward Stree.
We're on location here at Seek25 in Salt Lake City.
I have my special guest, fatherMike Schmitz, with us.
If you want to get the shownotes for this podcast, you want
to just get this.
You can go to 33777 and justtype in All Things Catholic just
one word.
You can type that in All ThingsCatholic one word to 33777, and
you can get the podcast intoyour inbox each week.
(21:15):
But, father, you and I wereblessed to get to work on
another project related to thecatechism and it's a program
coming out just in a little bitof time.
Here it's with Ascension, it'scalled Foundations of Faith,
where it kind of goes a littledeeper into the catechism, if
you think of.
I was just talking with ourfriend Marisa.
She had this wonderful analogyabout how you know when you read
(21:37):
the catechism, you just, youknow, have it out there.
It's kind of like thetwo-dimensional view.
It's like when you get onGoogle Maps and you kind of see
the roads, you see the map, butthen this program is kind of
like the 3D view.
This is like the street view.
You kind of get in becausethere's so much to the catechism
that it comes together.
It's not just somebody who'swriting it down, it comes from
scripture, it's drawing on somany wonderful saints, it's
(21:59):
drawing on the church, fathers,church councils, encyclicals,
and it's kind of like weavingtogether this beautiful tapestry
.
But you don't often catch itunless you're actually really
going through and looking up allthose footnotes.
And so we developed a programthat's coming out where we
filmed in so many countries allover France.
We went to Turkey, we got to goto the sites where Nicaea,
(22:20):
where the Blessed Virgin Marylived, and with St John, we got
to go to the Holy Land, up toRome, spain, just all over,
looking at the walking in thefootsteps of St Therese of the
Seals, st John of the Cross,really pulling together those
sources that are behind thecatechism.
And so I'd like to just ask you, like in terms of your own
again prayerful reading and theteaching on the Catechism, tell
(22:43):
us about the background, thesources and why those are so
important from just bringingtogether this beautiful work
called the Catechism of theCatholic Church.
Well, I think one thing thatstrikes me when it comes to the
Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
Well, I think one thing that strikes me when it
comes to the catechism is thatit is a I don't think it's
inaccurate to say again you cancorrect me on this it's a purely
human work.
In many ways, right, we don'tbelieve it's divinely inspired
as much as other than any morethan this conversation could be
divinely inspired Like, in thatsense, God's grace is always
present and as a purely humanwork, like Michelangelo's, David
(23:17):
is a purely human work.
It is beautiful, it is soprofound.
I would get done reading aparagraph and think who was it
(23:39):
that was able to use sucheconomy of words to describe
this complex and profound truthof the faith in this particular
way.
It's just phenomenal Becausethey took, like you said,
they're taking from scripture,they're taking from different
church councils, they're takingfrom 2,000 years of history and
they're consolidating this intothese clear and concise
paragraphs and sets ofparagraphs and chapters and all
these things, because it's notthe work of one person and even
(23:59):
the author who is writing it orediting it.
This is the work of 2,000 plusyears.
And there's something I'm inawe of this, because I know how
hard it is to even just sit downto say, okay, we're going to
write a thing or give a talk onone topic, but to be
comprehensive and realize youhave to include all the church
(24:21):
councils and all the thingsscripture says about this and
not leave something out, not bemisconstrued, and be completely,
very clear it is.
I can't imagine the dauntingtask that that was yeah it is a
human writing and yet it is.
Speaker 2 (24:35):
It's not inspired by God in the way the sacred
scriptures are God's words andthe words of men, god breathing
forth his divine word in thehuman language.
It's not that, but we believethat the tradition of the church
is animated, guided by the HolySpirit, and you can totally see
the Holy Spirit working throughthe saints that are a part of
this, the councils, the churchfathers, and pulling together
(24:56):
the official teachings of thechurch.
Let me ask you know, when itcomes to the different sections
of the catechism, is there acouple sections or even
paragraphs where you find, wow,the way the catechism explains
this point?
I find this just so helpful.
It just makes sense out of ourfaith so much.
It helps me when you'repreaching or for me when I'm
(25:19):
teaching.
It helps me to be able toexplain why we believe what we
believe.
Could you share a couplemoments like that in the
catechism for me?
Speaker 3 (25:26):
Well, I had the one on battle of prayer.
That's clearly there, the OurFather clearly there.
One that was really personal tome was so I was confirmed in
high school.
I was confirmed the year beforethe catechism was promulgated,
so I didn't have it.
And I remember being in thecatechism classes or religious
ed classes, you know, gettingready for confirmation, and they
(25:49):
would say, okay, I'm like whatam I praying for?
The gifts of the Holy Spirit?
Like great, what are they?
Here's the seven gifts of theHoly Spirit.
And I'd be.
They'd say, well, which one doyou want?
You know, do you want wisdom,understanding, counsel,
knowledge, piety, fear of theLord, fortitude?
And I remember going like, ah,I kind of want all of them.
Is that a thing when I say all,I choose all?
(26:09):
But I didn't know which.
I didn't know what to expect tohappen to me.
We heard that you know they'dexplained.
We read through Acts, chaptertwo, about the first Pentecost,
the Holy Spirit coming upon theapostles and they speak
different languages and allthese things.
They had courage in a new way.
But I didn't know what wouldhappen.
(26:30):
And then, the year or two afterI was confirmed, I look at the
catechism and it was this reallysmall section.
There's one paragraph and itsays the five effects of
confirmation, meaning like hereare the five things that happen
when you get confirmed.
And the first is we become moredeeply rooted as sons and
daughters of God.
So, made sons and daughters ofGod in our baptism, confirmation
(26:51):
roots us even more deeply.
As God's sons and daughters,we're united more closely to
Christ.
So we're Christ's brothers andsisters.
We're united even more closelyto Christ.
Third, the gifts of the HolySpirit, those wisdom,
understanding, counsel, piety,fear, etc.
They're given to us in baptism.
So if you're baptized you havethose gifts.
If you're confirmed you havethose gifts.
But it amplifies those gifts.
(27:13):
The fourth effect ofconfirmation is it renders our
bond with the church moreperfect.
And so that's why sometimespeople will say that if you're
confirmed now you're an adult inthe church.
It's fine, but what it means isthere's no more sacraments of
initiation, like you're as fullyCatholic as the Pope is, you're
in, not you're in, but you'rein.
And fourth, that renders theproblem with the church.
(27:37):
The fifth effect is the thing Ithink.
Oh my gosh, the fifth effect ofconfirmation.
The fifth thing confirmationdoes is it gives us a special
strength of the Holy Spirit tospread and defend the faith in
word and deed, to proclaim thename of Jesus Christ boldly and
to never be ashamed of the cross.
And as a senior in high schoolreading that, then a freshman in
(27:59):
college reading that and likeoh my gosh, that's what happened
.
I was given the specialstrength of the Holy Spirit to
spread and defend the faith bywhat I said and by what I did,
to proclaim the name of JesusChrist boldly and to never be
ashamed of the cross.
I'm like that's what I want.
That's what I wanted and toknow that that's what I wanted
to ask for, but I didn't knowthat's what I was given, but I
(28:25):
didn't know, that's what I had,but I didn't know.
It changed everything.
I go back to that again andagain and again, especially when
talking to people aboutconfirmation, especially when
looking at my own life andsaying God, what are the gifts
you want for me?
Especially when even justasking for those gifts of the
Holy Spirit, that specialstrength of the Holy Spirit to
spread and defend the faith byword and deed, to proclaim the
name of Jesus Christ boldly andto never be ashamed of the cross
, is everything.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
And that's one of the great things that even if we
didn't learn it initially whenwe were confirmed or we were
growing up, when you learn aboutthe faith now, you can still
draw upon and go wow, I can drawupon that grace to be more
courageous and bold in sharingthe faith because it's there.
I just wasn't calling upon it.
I love the sections when we gothrough the sacraments on the
effects.
There's always every sacramentthat the catechism goes through
(29:06):
has a section on the effects ofthe sacrament.
I would just encourage you gothere.
That would be a great time totake to prayer and go back.
You can think about yourbaptism for those.
Anyone getting married, Anyengaged folks here, Go read
about the effects of thesacrament of marriage and what
marriage really does.
The holy sacrament of matrimony.
Speaker 3 (29:27):
Yeah, those words are powerful.
They'll really.
Those words will really holdspace, I think, for a lot of
people in their life.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
Yeah, Confession, the one on confession.
You know, we think we go toconfession simply to get our
sins forgiven, and that's hugeright.
But when you read the effectsof what confession really does,
it's really only half the storyof God's mercy.
I mean a huge half.
It is really important that Godis going to forgive me, but he
wants to do so much more, andthe catechism describes that
when we go to confession, weactually are strengthened, we're
(30:01):
receiving graces to help usovercome the faults, the
weaknesses that we typicallystruggle with.
So why do I want to go toconfession regularly?
Well, yes, because I sin allthe time and I need to be
forgiven.
But I also want to go becauseI'm receiving grace to be
strengthened to be a betterhusband, to be a better dad, to
be a better friend, to be abetter son of God, and I need
(30:22):
that.
You know one of my favorite.
Can I jump to another?
Speaker 3 (30:24):
Yeah, absolutely, it's your podcast.
Speaker 2 (30:28):
The moral.
On the moral pillar, there'sone of my favorite quotes and
it's very simple and I bet manyof you have heard it before.
But I can't tell you how thislittle line from the catechism,
quoting St Thomas Aquinas, isjust so helpful in just
transforming people's vision forlife.
It's the definition of love.
When it explains what love is,it quotes the great St Thomas
(30:50):
Aquinas and explains that loveisn't just a feeling, an emotion
, a desire, romantic, no, no,love is a decision.
Love is to will the good of theother.
Can you all say that?
What is love To will the goodof the other?
Because we live in such aculture that we think, you know,
love is more about what someonedoes for me.
You know I don't get thosefeelings, you know, from this
(31:11):
person.
Do I, you make me feel notalone?
Or you know I get the sexualattraction Like it's all about
what you do for me.
But that's a very self-centeredview of love and we're made
actually to be more outwardright, to be more like God
himself, who gives of himself,to be thinking what's best for
the other person.
And do I have the innercharacter, the life of Christ in
(31:32):
me, to love and live for othersand not for myself.
I just find that as one of myfavorite little quotes, just one
little gem, but can really just.
I've seen marriages.
Married couples have told meI've never thought of that as
love.
And they've been married,they're Catholic, they go to
mass every Sunday but like, thatvision of what real love is
transforms them and realizewe've been struggling so much in
(31:55):
our marriage because it waslike you're frustrating me right
now or you're not doing what Iwant and you're not making me
feel good right now, and it'slike, well, hey, that's just
what married life is and you gotto get out of yourself.
And it's actually when youlearn to love like Jesus that
the real joy and the blessingscome.
Speaker 3 (32:09):
That's so funny.
So love is to will to go to theother.
I have a friend his name isNick who has a lot of good
teachings, insights named NickDavidson.
He's a missionary.
My friend Nick is a missionaryin Cambodia with his wife.
She's a doctor and they havetheir five kids and they moved
to Cambodia a couple of yearsago just to bring the gospel
there, and so his wife servesthe people there in Cambodia for
(32:31):
free and they just try to relyupon people supporting them so
they can stay in Cambodia andbring the gospel to the people
of Cambodia.
But Nick says this he says loveis a one-way street, that if
Thomas Gwyneth's line is trueabout love is willing to go to
the other.
He says, therefore, love is aone-way street.
And he says caveatrelationships are a two-way
(32:52):
street.
But love is a one-way street.
And he says caveat,relationships are a two-way
street, but love is a one-waystreet in the sense that it
doesn't matter what you do.
I mean, obviously with healthand with proper boundaries.
This is important to understand, right, boundaries are good and
being in places of danger isnot always great.
So if you need to removeyourself from that kind of
situation, obviously doing this.
But, all things being equal andhealthy, my job is just to love
(33:18):
, regardless of whether someoneloves me back.
Again, with that caveat beingthis is a healthy relationship
because I can only control whatI can control, and that sense of
like.
That's one of the reasons.
Well, when we've talked beforeabout marriage, that sense of
the myth that marriage is 50-50.
No, it's not.
(33:38):
It is 100%.
100% that even if that person Icovenant to myself with offers
nothing back, I said everythingand that is what I have to do.
Because they're not doing whatthey said they would do doesn't
mean I don't have to do what Ihave to do.
Because they're not doing whatthey said they would do doesn't
mean I don't have to do what Isaid I was going to do, and vice
versa.
And so just love is a one-waystreet.
Relationships are two-waystreets, but love is a one-way
(33:59):
street.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
Yeah, I hope you're all getting a sense.
The catechism is filled with somany gems that can just make
such a difference in your lifeand we just want to get that
full revelation, filling ourmind with it and filling our
souls with it on a regular basis.
I want to turn to anothersection.
This is from the first pillar,on the profession of faith and
the creed, and I'm going toshare a story with everybody
here from the early days ofFocus.
I still remember it was maybelike the second or third summer
(34:22):
training and we were sittingaround it was Curtis, me and my
good friend Tim Gray, sean Ennisfrom the Augustan Institute,
and we were just kicking aroundsome things about the catechism
and the Bible.
And this really relates to whatyou were talking about last
night in your keynote about whenwe sin.
That sin is, you know, not justI disagree with you, god, I
(34:42):
don't trust you at the end and Ilove this line from the
catechism it's article number397 that says that first sin
ultimately was a lack of trustin God's goodness, and all
subsequent sin involves thislack of trust.
Now we often hear that pride isthe source of sin and that is,
that's the tradition, but theCatechism says it's not just
(35:04):
pride.
There is this element of a lackof trust and I think you were
kind of pointing us that waylast night in your keynote.
Speaker 3 (35:10):
Yeah, that is.
I mean, that's, I think,another part of the catechism.
That same section actually sayswith that first sin, trust in
God died in the human heart.
The trust we have for God diedin the human heart.
And so the whole rest of thestory is a lot of things, but
one of the things that really isis God's winning our trust back
(35:31):
.
Not that he lost it, not thathe didn't do anything to lose it
, but we lost it.
And so what does he do?
I mean, you know, this isfascinating to me.
I don't know if you guys realizethis, but for all of
Christianity, basically evenbefore Christianity, the idea is
here's humanity and werecognize something about
ourselves.
The image is of a courtroom,and this is an image that was
(35:52):
used for hundreds and hundredsof years.
The image of a courtroombecause we find ourselves guilty
.
We find ourselves guilty andwe're accused of what we're
guilty of.
And so God comes into thecourtroom and he says what,
what's God's answer to our guilt?
God's answer to our guilt isthe cross.
God's answer to our guilt, insome mysterious way, is he takes
all that we have and he takesit on himself.
(36:13):
Something happened in the last50 to 150 years, it's still a
courtroom, but we're not theones who are accused of being
guilty.
Like postmodern man, we look atGod and what do we say?
We say God, you're guilty, god,it's your fault.
We look at the evil in theworld and we say we don't say
(36:35):
this was us, this is humanitychoosing evil.
We say God, you're the one whomade this world, you're the one
who lets us be in this brokenplace.
God, you're the guilty one.
What's your answer?
And I think this is absolutelyfascinating, because for
thousands of years, we're guiltyand God's answer is the cross.
Now, with us.
(36:59):
Right, our big thing is wedon't trust God.
So, god, you're guilty.
What's his answer?
The answer is the cross, thathis answer for our guilt is.
He's like I'll take your sinupon me.
And his answer for us, accusinghim of being guilty, is I'll
take your distrust upon me andI'll do everything I possibly
can to win your trust back.
So you know that I'm not goingto spare myself from what you've
(37:21):
experienced.
I'm not going to spare myselffrom your suffering.
I'm not going to spare myselffrom evil.
I'm not going to even sparemyself from betrayal and
heartbreak and death.
I'll take that all upon me sothat you can trust me.
And I think this is incrediblethe genius of God who, when
we're guilty, his answer is thecross, and when he's quote
unquote accused of being guilty,his answer is the cross.
(37:42):
Because he wants to win backour hearts to trust him, or else
I'm going to keep running.
I'm going to keep running Sayleave me alone.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
Yeah, so all sin in the end, it does involve this
lack of trust.
I think that, well, I knowbetter.
This is what's going to bringme happiness, this is the
shortcut, and this is not justfor the sin in the world, this
is just.
You know when we're sinning.
This is what we do all the time, and I think there's just a
great lens to see, yeah, theheart of what sin really is.
Speaker 3 (38:15):
Well, I would even say you know that all sin is an
attempt to be happy apart fromGod.
I heard that last night.
Speaker 2 (38:21):
Yeah, I think I heard that on a great talk.
Yeah, well, we're about to wrapup here, but let me ask one
last thing related to thecatechism here.
So again, I'm looking outseeing so many young people
gathered here.
They're growing in their faith,they want to love Jesus, they
want to go back to theircampuses and share Christ.
So any last words ofencouragement for them, as
(38:44):
they're just getting started intheir journey with the catechism
.
Speaker 3 (38:48):
I think a lot of times, when it comes to being
sent out or when it comes tobeing missionaries or disciples
of Jesus, there are typicallyand I could be wrong about this,
but there are typically threethings that get in our way.
Sometimes it's a lack ofknowledge, sometimes it's that
sense of like I got in thesituation and these, you know,
(39:10):
my friends brought up this likedoes the church really teach
this or what would you say aboutthis kind of situation, and I
just don't know what to say.
And sometimes that's reality.
Sometimes the reality is Idon't know what to say, and you
could leave that conversationlater on and you're like oh man,
I totally nosedived, I froze, Ididn't speak up because I had a
lack of knowledge.
Sometimes that's real, andthat's why we go back to the
(39:31):
catechism and say, okay, godteach me, we'll go back to
scripture and God teach me, wecan learn more.
Sometimes that's our excuse,though, because sometimes it's
not really a matter of I didn'thave knowledge, sometimes it's
one of two other things.
Sometimes it's not I didn'thave knowledge, it's I didn't
have courage and that sense ofas you go back to campuses, you
(39:53):
go back to relationships andfriendships and are called to be
witnesses of Jesus.
Sometimes it's like I don'thave courage, and the courage
doesn't mean like necessarily,like I'm not willing to do hard
things or I'm not willing toface what I'm afraid of.
Sometimes it's something assimple as I don't have the
courage to enter a conversationthat I don't know where it will
end.
I don't know if you have evernot evangelized or not shared
(40:14):
your faith with someone, becauseyou're like I don't know.
If I bring it up, who knows,it's going to be out of my
control.
And I heard this yesterday.
It was this you can have growthor you can have control.
You can't have both.
And so that sense of being ableto enter into a conversation, I
don't know where it's going togo.
I can't control it.
Well, maybe I just need courage.
(40:36):
I don't have all the answers.
Maybe I just need courageBecause we're all going back to
our friendships, we're all goingback to relationships.
We all know people in our liveswho God has called us to love,
who don't know who Jesus is yet.
So, knowledge or a lack ofcourage, or the last one is
sometimes I just have a lack oflove, and what I mean by that is
(40:57):
sometimes it's a lack of caring.
I don't love someone enough tosay the hard thing.
Sometimes that's the reality,but sometimes it's more like
this, and this is the image.
I don't mean to take up yourtime, but I think the images um,
I used this like a couple ofyears ago it cause so I really
like sushi a lot.
I mean, I know I'm unusual inthat, because everyone loves
sushi Um, and then I realized,oh, I really like Chinese food
(41:19):
too, and they're like well, Ireally like Thai food as well.
And then I realized this oh, Ireally just like soy sauce, like
that's my favorite food.
My favorite Chinese food is soysauce, my favorite Japanese
food is soy sauce.
And so there is this grocerystore near campus that has
actually pretty good grocerystore sushi.
So I go there occasionally andI'll get the little packet of
(41:39):
things and they have the freesoy sauce packets and I'm like
this is awesome.
And then two years ago they gotnew soy sauce packets that were
like even fuller, like youcould.
You know, sometimes soy saucepackets are like they're only a
little bit of soy sauce in there.
This had.
This was like plump.
It was pumped up with soy sauce.
I'm like, yes, a lot of soysauce.
(42:00):
But if you've ever opened apacket like that, what happens?
You lose it all because there'stoo much soy sauce.
And I was.
I remember opening a packet andlike ah, and thinking like, oh,
this will preach, because why?
Because this thing was full ofwhat I wanted, like it was full
of good stuff.
It was full of soy sauce.
It was, it was and it wasexactly what I wanted.
It was packed full of soy sauce, but that was the problem.
(42:21):
Packed full of soy sauce, butthat was the problem.
It was too full.
And I think about our lives andthink about okay, we're going to
be sent back in a couple ofdays, back to our relations,
back to our friendships, back toour campuses, with a message to
give.
And sometimes it's no, I didn'thave enough knowledge,
sometimes it's I didn't haveenough courage and sometimes
it's actually I didn't haveenough love.
Not because I didn't care, butbecause my life was just too
full for anyone else.
(42:42):
It's full of good stuff, but isthere any room for time with
someone who needed time?
No, it's just too full.
Is there any room for someonewho actually let me enter that
conversation with them?
No, it's just too full.
It's not like your lives arefull of bad things.
It's probably full of a lot ofgood stuff, but because maybe,
maybe it's over full with somany good things that there's
(43:06):
just no room for love.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
I love those three things and so I'm going to
summarize them again.
So maybe we need to know more,we need to understand our faith
better.
That's where the catechismcomes in.
I love what Frank Sheed said.
Do you ever hear that quote?
He Frank Sheed said Do you everhear that quote?
He says that every time youlearn something new about their
Catholic faith, it gives youanother reason to love Jesus,
and we all want to fall in lovewith Jesus more.
So read the catechism so youcan learn all that Jesus wants
(43:30):
to give us.
But maybe you need to pray forcourage.
That's the second point FatherMike said.
But the last one and this isreally the heart of focus is do
we prioritize sharing the onething that makes the greatest
difference in our lives, thething that matters the most?
That's Jesus Christ and ourfriendship with Him.
Do we prioritize or do we haveso many other things that our
(43:50):
packet is just too full of soysauce?
Do we really have that time andreally prioritize loving Jesus
so much that we want to love Himin our neighbor, in our family
member, our roommate, ourteammate, our classmate, that
we're going to make it apriority to go back and witness
the gospel to them.
So well, father, it's been sogreat having you, and let's give
it up for Father Mike.
Speaker 3 (44:11):
Thanks you guys.
Thanks Dr Sreen.
Speaker 2 (44:15):
And, as he said, you can get started.
It's not too late to getstarted on Catechism.
In a Year you can go and findthat podcast and start walking
through the catechism as you'rewalking on campus and driving
back to your campuses.
And if you want to check outthis show, this comes out every
Tuesday, it's All ThingsCatholic.
I give some advice here.
If you were to pull out youriPhones and you're searching
under podcasts there on yourApple podcast, don't put in my
(44:38):
last name, sri S-R-I.
Don't do that.
It's dangerous.
You'll get an Indian Hindu guruand you don't want the Indian
Hindu guru guy.
You put in Edward S-R-I.
You can find it.
Or simply, you could justsimply text allthingscatholic
one word to 33777.
That's allthingscatholic, oneword to 33777.
Thanks so much for being here.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
Our prayers are for all of you as you continue your
journey.
Head to seekfocusorg backslashreplay to download now, and
don't forget to join us for Seek26.
Check out seekfocusorg for moreinformation and to register.
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