#450 What is the #1 Crisis? Climate? C*vid? Border? Gender? WWIII? Child S*x Trafficking? Or is it???

Is it the climate crisis , the clove it crisis , the gender crisis , the border crisis , world war three crisis , child sex trafficking crisis , the fentanyl crisis , the violence in the street crisis , or is it something else ? Is it the crisis within the individual human heart ?

It's an amazing thing , I think about the climate crisis and this crazy John Kerry and this world economic forum and all these people , even in the Vatican , you know , pushing this climate crisis , climate crisis down . And I'm an old tree hugger . I love the environment .

I'm the guy that backpacks up in the mountains and sees a you know a plastic bag blown around and run after it and put it in my pocket . But at the end of the day , if some man thinks because a cow is letting off a little gas out in the field , bill Gates , you know the methane going into the ear , I mean these people are totally insane .

It is , or it has been , below zero here in Chicago for the last few days and it's it's amazingly cold and I'm going to go out on a limb here .

I'm going to predict something , though we're going to go from below zero to this freezing weather and in about oh , let's say , eight weeks let's call it the middle of March we're going to see some global warming coming . It's I just predicted .

I know I'm going on on a limb here , take a little chance , but but by the time springtime comes , it's going to start getting warmer and we're going to have global climate change . Isn't it amazing ? It happens .

It happens , you know , on a fairly regular basis , these insane people , the border crisis , just opening the borders , and you know one thing after another .

But what do you do when , when you go out into the world and and I see this disconnection , especially with young people , and I just want to spend time with them , I want to talk to them and really what happens ? You know the kind of the goal of my conversations is is what do you seek ?

You know this is the question that Jesus asks all of us what do you seek ? It's such a beautiful thing if you think about it . You know it doesn't come in and just start , you know , with a philosophy lesson or a theology lesson , or , you know , moral issue lesson Doesn't talk about the border crisis , the gender crisis . He says what do you seek ? And so ?

So everything that you see out there , all this dysfunction , that's that is manmade . In so many cases , everything that I mentioned there , at the end of the day is some manmade crisis , either made up or or actually a crisis . I mean , think about gender crisis and the COVID crisis .

The COVID crisis you know , we actually weaponized , you know , a virus , gain , a function and sent it out into the world , and we then we put the people in charge of it that actually created it and put them in charge of the vaccines . It's insanity , right ? The climate crisis is it real ? You know , climate's always going to be changing back and forth .

World War III it could really start a gender crisis . I mean , this is something that's just an insanity that's going through that . A man could become a woman , a woman could become a man . Yeah , I mean you can't make all this stuff up , so , anyway .

So I want to come out with a message of hope , but I want to go down , get down to the basis , let's get down to the basis of our hearts . So let's , let's start to unwind this buckle up and get ready for the rest of today's episode .

So I would say to young people and the young at heart that are listening to this imagine you live circa 1890 in a wild west town . That was really not so long ago . My own grandfather was a toddler that year , in 1890 . Consider that people actually live without smartphones and there was no inter internet connection .

Even if they had a smartphone , it was a good thing because the road to town wasn't paved and you had to watch where you're going . You couldn't stare at a screen . You could easily trip or step into horse piles if you weren't looking down , if you were looking down at a little screen .

As you strolled down to the , say , the only store at the end of town to pick up a newspaper , to see what was going on , and since the town was not filled with screen addicts looking for their minute by minute dopamine fixes on the way , you actually stopped and chat it with your neighbor who seemed happy to see you .

What else could you do for entertainment ? Well , for one . Every now and then a wagon would come to town selling something , selling a medicine Tonic of sorts that promise to cure whatever ails you . They came to be known as snake oil salesman .

You know the name originally came from an actual snake oil salesman , the so-called rattlesnake king , a former cowboy who got tired of being a cowboy and turned salesman by the name of Clark Stanley . Actually , guy actually existed who patented snake oil tonic .

He's called it good for man and beast and it said on the bottom the most remarkable curative discovery ever made in any age or country . Amazing , right , clark Stanley dreamed of becoming rich . The problem was Clark snake oil didn't contain any snake oil , but was a concoction of mineral oil , red pepper , turpentine and cow fat .

By the time he went on trial for fraud , he'd been selling snake oil for over 20 years . He was convicted and charged the fine of $20 . Now , $20 was worth a lot more back then , but it was still a slap on the wrist . Buyer , beware . Buyer , beware . Young people , my heart goes out to . You're growing up in a world filled with snake oil salesmen .

Buyer , beware . Only this time around it's different . You are an easy sell because the snake oil salesmen and women are in control of the mass media , the government at the highest levels and then permeating all the way through the deep state diddle for various parts of the church .

In addition , the fact that the marketing geniuses out of the in the world , all over the world . They know you better than you know yourself and have you addicted to your little screens , glued to TikTok , instagram , video games , pornography . You become a consumer of whatever it is that the world elites want to sell you , which is a lot of baloney too .

It's all about control and money and all those things , but I want to move off of that . I want to move to the point where you know what do you see ? Get to your own hearts . We got to get away from these screens and these addictions . That doesn't mean to throw out your iPhone . I mean I use it . I'm going to be traveling . I use it for GPS .

I use it , you know , to catch up with the news . I use it for a lot of things , but you got to stop looking at it every two seconds . You got to start to get a little deeper into the heart . We don't know what to do with ourselves . We're living on the surface of things . You know who am I ? What's the meaning of purpose of my life ?

So let me throw a phrase out to you from Godia Mespeze , number 36 . When God is forgotten , however , the creature itself grows unintelligible . When God is forgotten , however , the creature itself grows unintelligible .

We no longer know who we are , we no longer have an anchor and again , all of those crises that I mentioned in the beginning of the show , those things all come out of this .

When God is forgotten and we have to sit on that look around , because we can get so overwhelmed with all this craziness and dysfunction that that we don't know what to do or where to start . So we just keep clicking on that phone , kind of just sailing through life . But that's not why we're created .

A friend of mine had some visitors staying at his lake home , including a young woman who was home from college who's a friend of his daughter , and his daughter later related to him that this girl confided to her that she had lost her identity . She no longer knew who she was . Jack , he said . My friend said to me it's a confusing time for so many .

And then he asked me what's that Vatican II expression that you like so much ? And I replied when God is forgotten , however , the creature grows unintelligible , isn't it true ? Amazing . But just look around the world spinning out of control , circling kind of the drain .

In so many ways God has been systematically taken out of our country , our culture , our marriages and families . And here's where it all starts . Who is taken out of the individual human heart ? Jesus said what do you seek ? What does he know ? He knows within that human heart is a search for the truth . It's a search for authentic love .

It's a search to know what is good and do the good , to know how to live your life and , at the end , it's a search for eternal love . It's a search for God himself . I am the way , the truth and the life , and he knows this .

He knows that's why the gospel is so powerful , because if you sit on it , if you listen to it and you sit on it , it moves your heart , it's got power . But we don't do that anymore . We walk around with these screens . And again , if we were in that wild West town , we'd be walking through ruts and tripping over ourselves .

So if that's true , if God was forgotten , what would we expect if we threw out God out of our hearts ? Marriages , then culture , country , would we not expect that the creature , human beings for us to grow unintelligible ? We would lose our identity , we would no longer know who we are , we would no longer live with meaning and purpose .

Isn't that what we see in the world today , and it should actually bring hope and a deepening of faith for those of us who are followers of Jesus Christ the way , the truth and the life . Why is that ? Think about it . Let's go back to that statement . When God has forgotten , however , the creature itself grows unintelligible .

By our faith , we come to know that we are created in love , by love and for love , in the image and likeness of God himself . We live out the two great commandments , open ourselves to God . Why ? Because we are filled with divine life and love .

We have the source , like a spring , and if we're not tapped into that spring , we become like cut flowers and we have nothing to give . You can't give what you don't have . But now we're filled and then we turn and we become that divine life and love in the world .

We find the truth of God himself , we're filled with love , grace , and then we become that love , that light in the world . This changes everything , it changes our hearts and then it changes the world . That's who we are Sons and daughters of God , and our meaning and purpose is to give ourselves away as a sincere gift of self to others .

Can you see the opposite of this happening ? Everybody's on the phone , taking selfies , selfies , selfies . It's that 3S highway about myself , about sex , Not with meaning and purpose , but just as a pleasure-based thing , someone to use . We're using another person in the power of this , and then we give our lives away . To what ?

To the state , and this is the end of the day . This is what the state is creating all these crises for . It just wants to keep you busy , keep you scared , keep you nervous , and then they become God . They become the solution , instead of God becoming the solution . But tic-tac , tic-tac , this is all sailing away . This universe is exploding out .

The earth is just a tiny kind of a speck , really , if you look at the whole universe and billions of stars , and yet we think we're going to control the planet . You know the temperature on the planet . I mean , we're insane . Do we clean it up ? Yes , yes , yes , of course , of course , of course . Stop with all the landfill stuff .

Stop walking around with plastic bottles . You know I get young people talking to me about the climate and they're walking around with plastic bottles , you know . So if you want to know what the truth looks like , the way the truth and the life , just kneel down and look up at a crucifix . Open up your heart , just ask for Matthew 7.7 .

Ask , seek , knock , because the God of the universe is asking , seeking and knocking for you . And then all that does is that's what prayer is . We meet there in the middle , jesus Christ , who climbs the marriage better than the cross . To do what ? To give his life away to his bride , the church . Well , who's the bride ?

We are , we are , and he pours out everything , every last drop of blood , and he says no greater love is this to give up one's life . For what ? For a friend ? For a friend . The God of the universe wants to call your friend . Well , how do we know this ? We only know this in our hearts when we stay in prayer . That's what prayer is all about .

That's what the sacrament's about . So we do something and God does something , but we are free . We have to say yes , we have to open ourselves up . God will never barge in . He's not a rapist and he's not full of this violent urge to use you . He wants to do the opposite . You see what's happening on the cross . He's doing the opposite of that .

The opposite of love is not hatred . It doesn't start out with hatred . The opposite of love is lust . It's using someone . This is what we're doing in the world . We're using one another . God this is from Acts 17, . Verse say 26 . Somewhere around there , god , who is this fatherly God , who is this fatherly concern for everyone ?

Has willed that all human beings should constitute one family and treat each other in the spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood . One family , for having been created in the image of God , who here's from Acts from one man , has created the whole human race and made them live all over the face of the earth .

You see that we were created in the beginning all the way from just Adam and Eve , and God starts to impart this . He wants everything to grow out of this oneness with Him and with our first parents . All men and women are called , then , right now , to that one and same goal , which is God Himself .

If we don't open ourselves up and come back to that union and communion and see each other as brothers and sisters , nothing is going to change . For this reason , love for God and neighbor is the first and greatest commandment . So Jesus again puts those two great commandments into one love God and one neighbor . It's just a big flow , isn't it ?

Good Scripture , however , teaches us that the love of God cannot be separated from the love of neighbor . If there is any other commandment , it's summed up in this saying Thou shalt love thy neighbor as they self . Love , therefore , is the fulfillment of the law . You see this in Romans , in the first chapter of John , etc . Etc .

To men and women growing daily more dependent on one another , and to a world becoming more unified every day , this power proves to be of paramount importance . John Paul II he was getting older already . He had later stages of Parkinson's in 2002 . Yet he came out to the 17th World Youth Day . It's amazing . It was in Toronto on July 28 , 2002 .

And he says this . He opens this up now again . He could have handed this off to someone else , but he wanted to show people that he was pouring himself out , this weak body . John Paul was a good looking , incredibly intelligent man . Can you imagine when you're crippled , basically , and you can hardly speak ?

And he's trying , he's putting this huge effort in and people are looking at him , and yet they came out . These young people came out by the thousands and thousands and he said you didn't come out to see an old man , you came out to see Jesus Christ , so beautiful . And he said to them in one of the talks that he gave , to kind of open this up .

You , young people , are the salt of the earth . You are the light of the world . From Matthew , chapter 5 , verses 13 and 14 . Let me read that again you are the salt of the earth , you are the light of the world . Dear young people of the 17th World Youth Day , he starts on a hillside near the lake of Galilee .

Jesus' disciples , listen to his gentle and urgent voice , as gentle as the landscape of Galilee itself , as urgent as a call between life and death , between truth and falsehood . The Lord spoke words of life that would echo forever in the hearts of his followers .

Today he's speaking the same words to you , the young people of Toronto and Ontario , of the whole of Canada , of the United States , of the Caribbean , of the Spanish speaking America , the Portuguese speaking America , of Europe , africa , asia , oceania . Listen to the voice of Jesus in the depths of your hearts . His words tell you who you are as Christians .

They tell you what you must do to remain in His love . But Jesus offers one thing and the spirit of the world offers another . See , this is the battle , this is the crisis . So I'm looking back at my title again . You know what are .

The crisis , all these different crises is made up Gender ideologies and the border crisis , and abortions and climate change and etc . Etc . Etc . What is this ? This is the spirit of the world . You're not going to find yourself in political activism alone unless you're connected to God Himself . Then you go out in the world because you're bringing truth .

I am the way , the truth and the life . The solution always starts in the individual human heart . Then we go out in the world and we bring love into the world . Otherwise , we'll get caught up in these ideologies and we live for an ideology Again . Jesus offers one thing and the spirit of the world offers another .

When you move to Jesus Christ , it's amazing how things start to clear up for you . It's work , it's work , but this is what we were made for . You'll feel joy in your heart , john Paul said . In today's readings from the letter of the Ephesians , saint Paul tells us that Jesus leads us from darkness into light . Ephesians 5 , verse 8, .

Perhaps the great apostle is thinking of the light that blinded him . He was the persecutor of Christians on the road to Damascus . When later he recovered his sight , nothing was as before . He had been born anew and nothing would ever take his newfound joy away from him . Young people , you too are called to be transformed .

From Ephesians 5 , verse 14 , awake , o sleeper , arise from the dead and Christ will give you light , says Saint Paul . But the spirit of the world offers many false illusions and periodies of happiness . There is perhaps no darkness deeper than the darkness that enters young people's souls when false prophets extinguish in them the light of faith and hope and love .

The greatest deception and the deepest source of unhappiness is the illusion of finding life by excluding God , of finding freedom by excluding moral truths and personal responsibility . The Lord is calling you to choose between these two voices competing in your souls . That decision is the substance and challenge of World Youth Day .

Why have you come together from all parts of the world to say in your hearts Lord , to whom shall we go ? Who has the words of eternal life ? You have the words of eternal life from John 6 , 68 . Jesus , the intimate friend of every young person , has the words of life .

The world you are inheriting is a world which desperately needs a new sense of brotherhood and human solidarity . It's a world which needs to be touched and healed by the beauty and richness of God's love . It needs witnesses to that love . The world needs salt . It needs you to be the salt of the earth and the light of the world .

Salt is used to preserve and keep . As the apostles for the third millennium , your task is to preserve and keep alive the awareness of the presence of our Savior , jesus Christ , especially in the celebration of the Eucharist , the memorial of His saving death and glorious resurrection .

You must keep alive the memory of the words of life which he spoke , the marvelous works of mercy and goodness which he performed . You must constantly remind the world of the power of the gospel to save . From Romans 1 , verse 16 . Jesus didn't come for sin management . Jesus came with power . See , this is the difference .

This isn't more information , this isn't like just reading a book . When you speak the words of Jesus , you're speaking the words of power and the power that he brings in . How do I know ? I've got to step into the story . I've got to do those things that we talked about , the two great commandments . I have to open myself up to receive .

I have to ask , just ask , to say here is where I'm at , here's what I'm feeling . He already knows . John Paul went on . Salt seasons and improves the flavor of food . Following Jesus , you have to change and improve the taste of human history . With your faith , hope and love , with your intelligence , courage and perseverance .

You have to humanize the world we live in in the way that today's reading from Isaiah indicates , where he says this Loose the bonds of injustice . Shear your bread with the hungry . Remove the pointing of the finger , the speaking of evil , then your light shall rise in the darkness . Isaiah 58 , verses 6 and onward . He went on to finish this way .

He said you are young and the pope is old . 82 or 83 years of age is not the same as 22 or 23 . But the pope still fully identifies with your hopes and aspirations .

Although I have lived through much darkness , he said , under harsh totalitarian regimes , I have seen enough evidence to be unshakably convinced that no difficulty , no fear is so great that it can completely suffocate the hope that springs eternal in the hearts of the young . You are our hope . The young are our hope . Do not let that hope die .

Strike and stake your lives on it . We are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures . We are the sum of the Father's love for us and our real capacity to become the images of his Son , john Paul said I will finish this with a prayer . Everybody bow their heads huh . Name the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit .

O Lord , jesus Christ , keep these young people in your love . Let them hear your voice and believe what you say , for you alone have the words of life . Teach them how to profess their faith , bestow their love and impart their hope to others . Make them convincing witnesses to your gospel in a world that is in so much of a need of your saving grace .

Make them the new people of the Beatitudes , that they may be the salt of the earth and the light of the world at the beginning of the third Christian millennium . Mary , mother of the church , protect and guide these young people and women of the twenty-first century . Keep all close to your material heart . Amen . Name the Father and the Son , holy Spirit . Amen .

How beautiful isn't it ? Hey , god bless you . Thanks for being with me . Talk to you soon , everybody .