Happy First Friday in Lent . I hope you're doing well . Welcome to Claymore . This is part of the Become who you Are podcast , a production of the John Paul II Renewal Center . I'm Jack Riggert , your host . Claymore is exciting , a lot of good things happening . So again , I hope you guys have downloaded the Claymore Battle Plan .
Miletus Christi , claymore is that big Claymore sword ? Huh , you've heard me already . Go back and listen to the earlier ones because I have to keep moving forward a little bit . Soldiers for Christ , this really contains the whole battle plan for your spiritual formation and to understand the big story that we're in .
And so , just quickly , I just want to outline this whole battle plan . For those of you who are new , let me get my glasses on here . The key scripture here you then my son , be strong in the grace that is in jesus christ and what you have heard from me before many witnesses , and trust the faithful men who will be able to teach others also .
Take your share of suffering as a good soldier of Jesus Christ . That's 2 Timothy , chapter 2 from St Paul . What we're seeing , of course , is we've seen a breakdown in the cultures in Western civilization , in the human heart , marriage and the families coming apart . But then we see something in young men , especially Gen Z and a little bit older than that too .
So you know , all the way from high school through the early thirties . So we want to be there . We're doing a lot more talks . If you need us to come to your parish , if you want me to come to your parish , you know , just email .
We didn't get a lot of emails this week so I'm figuring you guys are settling into this , but we'd like to continue to communicate with you , bring up questions that might come in . The purpose of this , then . The purpose of this whole Claymore story is this is building up and this is in your battle plan .
This is on page six in your battle plan , the summary Purpose . The movement is for courageous young men and women too , if they want to join . But this is really focused on men who are committed to seeking and sharing the truth , building a brotherhood rooted in all that's true , good and beautiful , especially the beauty of love .
So , if you can be on this journey , remember in the battle plan there's that spiritual formation that we talk about a lot . This is more of the doctrinal , the whole story every Friday that we're going to bring out and continue to walk into that and we have a reality check here . We're born in a world at war . We don't realize it .
The enemy , satan , seeks the destruction of humanity and over the past decades the enemy has gained significant ground . This is a spiritual battle that begins in the human heart . This is the restlessness that so many young people that we're talking to today feel , but they're turning it around . It's amazing to me , it's toxic , as this got .
It's almost like at the abyss right now . It's not there yet , but getting close to the abyss and young people are waking up and saying something's wrong . Young people are naturally idealistic , but they've been indoctrinated so much , brainwashed so much , that it's exciting for me to see young people step up and exciting to be part of that journey with you guys .
So there's a call to action , a call to Miletus Christi , and it aims at reclaiming territory for Christ . And this is reclaiming territory for all of us . Right by what ? By building a culture of life , liberty and love through this three-step plan . So this battle plan , this three steps , restore the dignity of the human person , restore your heart , my heart .
We gotta be able to do that , understand the dignity of each human being , and that means you have to be pro-life , you have to be for young people , you have to be for the baby in the womb . You have to defend the marriage and the family . There's no way any civilization can uphold itself without being the Imago Dei . And again , we've unpacked this already .
So go back and listen to some of those early ones . Defend marriage and the family will link directly to Christ and the church , right . And then we have the number three we have to be engaged in social , political activism . You have to go out . Jesus always said go out , take that heart of yours , take that heart that's seeking what's true , good and beautiful .
Receive this grace from God . Make sure we build up our domestic home , our marriages , our families , be pro-life and love your neighbor , all that kind of things . But then we got to go out and bring this into the culture , bring this goodness into the culture , get rid of that deep state . I want to talk a little bit about that deep state a little bit .
So hey , review this . If you have any questions or if you just want me to uncrack it a little bit more , feel free . Today we're going to be talking about morality and conscience and this fall of man , to see how we got to where we're at . But I want to start out . Hopefully you've seen the Trump speech .
This was this Tuesday , so Ash Wednesday was yesterday . As I'm recording this . It'll come out on Friday , of course , but today is Thursday as I'm recording this , ash Wednesday , so I have my ashes . They came off already . Hopefully you got yours . The night before was Trump's speech . It's excellent .
Here's what I want you to keep in mind when we're talking about morality , conscience this first Friday in Lent , the fall of man , to understand our fall and where we're at right now in the story , and how to get out of this and create a better life for ourselves , our families . If you know , if you fall in love , you know how do you build that up right .
So we're asking all those questions . This is not a Democrat or a Republican battle when Trump was giving the speech . It's not about left to right . This is a populist counter-revolution to put all these things that I just talked about back into the culture . See , we got it from the top .
Now this is a window of opportunity , just like Trump said and I believe it's true that God saved him from that assassination attempt to make America great again . He's just a man , he's not Jesus Christ , so we have to be able to influence these decisions .
He's bringing a lot of good people in , but they're politicians and they're businessmen and they're not going to be perfect , they're all , but they're bringing prayer back in . We're back on a journey .
When God gives us a window like that , we have to take it , and I'm going to read you a little bit from scripture in just a little while , from today , from today , and I'll unpack this . That's why part of that spiritual formation for you is reading scripture every day . If you got to read , just follow the hollow app there , or the Magnificat .
That hollow map , I think for young men and women is even better because it's going to give you reminders , some bells and whistles on there . It really helps you out a little bit . So read that scripture every day . So important and because that's our story . You know we think , oh , that was a long time ago or whatever .
No , each generation comes in and we all stand at that tree of the knowledge of good and evil . You know , each generation needs to know . It's your turn to play out that storyline and we're heading someplace . We're heading to eternity . That's what Ash Wednesday was all about .
Right , that you are made from the clay , god breathes into us ruah and you receive this grace the spirit , right , reason , intellect , free will . When those things are taken , when God is taken out , these things crumble , and this is what I want to talk just briefly about right now .
When you saw President Trump give that speech , remember again , this is a populist movement . We're bringing God back in . We're bringing , then , what's true , good and beautiful , the logos , back in the wisdom of God , back into our own hearts and then back out into here . That's what happened . This just got sucked out .
God got sucked out , and everything starts to come in Marriage and the family gets attacked , because that's the Imago Dei , link directly to God and Christ and the church . This is the foundation . Remember the triangle Marriage and the family . Christ and the church holds this up . Then the beauty and power of this love story goes into the culture and we design .
America is unique and we're designed on that to be a moral and religious people . As John Adams and Madison said , if you don't have moral and religious people , people of virtue , this republic will never hold , and we see that happening right now .
So , again , the battle plan is what Satan doesn't have , his own clay , and you see , this many-headed hydra that got into our government made the government way too big . We got this deep state . And what is the deep state really ? Ultimately , it's the individual human hearts that are grasping and taking God out .
And you see what happens when these individual human beings at all these different levels . That's why you say , well , I don't get it . There's just so many people out there . The evil's coming in from all over . It is it's individual human hearts that get put into these different positions .
The only way to take this down now is to reduce the size of this deep state . It's just , evil is embedded in there , and that's what we're trying to do there . But it's also about reducing taxes . They're extorting money from us , ruining the middle class , the working poor it's amazing . And they're just wasting it . And you could see that .
Go watch Trump's speech if you didn't already . So we've got a lot there . And then in the audience , you've got these women and Democrats . Again , it's not about Democrats , but it is the Democratic Party . That is the party of death , promoting abortion , lbgtq , gender ideologies , twisting and distortion of marriage got out right and then distort public education .
Take the taxes , take it for myself , spend it on anything . You know it's amazing evil out there . And what they sat there in these pink ? They wore these pink outfits because they said Trump is against women . I mean , does anybody believe this hypocrisy anymore ?
These are total propagandists for the deep state , you know , for anti-God , anti-family , anti-everything that makes things true , good and beautiful . And they have the audacity it's just up to the hypocrite . But it's a joke now , and these are our brothers and sisters , so we got to keep them in prayer .
But at the end of the day , does anybody believe these people anymore ? Total propagandists that are looking for money , power and they'll do anything . So here's Trump talking about protecting women in sports . Right , that men got to stay out of their locker room . Men got to . You know , these are men . They can't be playing in women's sports .
That's why we have women's sports and these people are against it . And they're sitting there in their pink outfit . Abortion Well , how many young people women too are getting killed in there ?
Trans ideologies , telling a young girl that she could have her breasts removed and go on , these puberty blockers , and one thing after another , this depraved way to live , this darkness . And then they put pink on to stand for women . And it's good .
They do that because you can look out in the audience there and young women are looking at them and saying yeah , yeah , really right . So again , let me go on here . I wanted to read you just the passage from today just to show you how important this is when we talk about reading scripture every day .
This is from Deuteronomy , chapter 30 , verses 15 through 20 . This is kind of explained this . So this is Moses who led his people out of slavery . And again , you think about these things . This is in the book of Exodus , thousands of years before Jesus came into the story . And what is God doing ? He's taking .
When I say Jesus came into the story , I mean incarnation takes on a body and comes into the story . Jesus was always in the story . Right , we get that . So you know what I mean . So what happens is God's people are in slavery in Egypt . He's pulled them out of slavery . Slavery is an old story . It didn't start here in slavery in Egypt .
He's pulled them out of slavery . Slavery's an old story . It didn't start here in the United States . Again , you have to get your mind around these things . So when people talk about CRT and all this baloney in schools and stuff , we say , hey , have you ever read Exodus ?
Anyways , moses said to his people today I have listened to this and this is exactly what Trump was talking about here and again , he's not a perfect person . We're not going to agree with everything he says I don't want to go there right now but in general , he's given us a window . Now we have to fill it in . We have to fill in the story right Today .
I have set before you life and prosperity , death and doom . If you obey the commandments of the Lord , your God , which I enjoin on you today , loving him and walking in his ways and keeping his commandments , statues and decrees , you will live and grow numerous , and the Lord , your God , will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy .
If , however , you turn away your hearts and will not listen and are led astray and adore and serve other gods money , power , sex I tell you now that you will certainly perish . You will not have a long life on the land that you are crossing the Jordan to enter and occupy . This is the United States too . We were given this promised land .
So I call heaven and earth today to witness against you . I have set before you life and death . This is it life and death , the culture of life or the culture of death , the blessing or the curse ? How do we live ? Do we get a blessing on our lives , a blessing on our country , or do we get the curse ? Europe is gonna get the curse .
I'll talk about that in a minute . Choose life . He says then that you and your descendants may live by loving the Lord , your God , heeding his voice , holding fast to him , for that will mean life for you , a long life for you , to live on the land , on the land that the Lord swore he would give to your fathers , abraham , isaac and Jacob .
It's amazing , huh , it's amazing . So we're fighting the same story . You know , each generation again needs to hear the story , and you guys didn't all hear the story . That's why Claymore is here . That's why we're helping you do this . This is our battle . This is our time to come in .
And don't forget when we're doing good things in the world , we are working out our own salvation . When we do good things , we become good . I am good , or like those . Look , I don't want to judge all of them and throw them all under the bus , but it's a pro-death platform . That's obvious . Right ?
We can say that because it's obvious we're not judging every single human heart there . But when they fall for this hypocrisy , when they push these death things on us , I mean , how else are we supposed to judge them ? So we get to this talk today , or this session today . Let me grab a little coffee here .
We want to talk about the bigger story , morality and conscience , the fall of man . I just will add this that when you're looking at that spiritual formation right First thing in the morning , before you look at that phone , you're going to drop your knees , you open up your heart .
Huh , let it be done to me according to your word , you're asking God , you're kneeling with our blessed mother . Her fiat brings God and she's impregnated with God . We want to be impregnated with Jesus Christ , with those graces right , so that our graces fill our body , a body and a soul .
Those women , again , that I was just describing in pink , and the men holding up these childish signs Did you see this ? These are like little kids . Their brains have turned to mush or they just think everybody's just going to fall for this propaganda . We're over it . You know Too much evil out there right now .
So you fall to your knees , you open up your heart and then remember temptation's not a sin . So the temptations come , they're an invitation to prayer . Let Jesus come in and purify those and then remember temptation's not a sin . So the temptations come , they're an invitation to prayer .
Let Jesus come in and purify those and then , finally , you become a person of love so you have a body and a soul . Without this , the default position is sin and death . That's what the ashes show you . We came from this ruah and we're going to go back to ashes , but the soul goes on and we get a glorified body . We will have a body in heaven .
You know , at the last , at the second coming of Christ , he's going to restore our body . You saw this in the transfiguration , when Jesus has a glorified body right and just go out and love the next person you see . So this is very , very important . In order to do that , our body and soul has to be filled with grace . So this is the divine mercy right .
That's divine mercy picture . Right there , that divine mercy picture , sister Faustina , jesus gets hit with the lance in the heart as he's hanging on the cross . Blood and water come out . Water is baptism and confession . The blood is the blood that's going to nourish you . He gives us this in the Eucharist .
So confession and the Mass are so important for you guys to be . So the last thing I'll just tell you right now what I do on Wednesdays and Fridays I started yesterday and I feel great is just water and black coffee on Wednesdays and Fridays , nothing else and coffee till about noon or so . I keep sipping it a little bit , love it .
I'll have another sip Today's , thursday , though . I can eat today . That's easy for me . Wednesdays and Fridays makes you feel good . You get rid of the toxins in your body , but you do whatever you want , but fasting the reason I bring it up is very , very important . See a body and a soul right now .
We take our God out and so we're not informed with this grace , and so our body falls into materialism and lust and selfishness . And so we're embodied spirits . We are supposed to be a sacramental sign bringing God's life and love into the world . If we don't do that , it doesn't get in , and then the vacuum gets filled of evil . That's what you've seen .
That's what the difference is right now , with President Trump bringing good people in , that the top level right is no more going to be pushing evil down on us , but they're going to be fighting . We have to fight too , wherever we're at . He cannot do this alone . It takes millions and millions of lives .
The good news is , again , we work out our salvation when we do that . So prayer and fasting . So what I do is , when I'm fasting , my body right , my flesh is coming united with my soul , because I'm not worried about I'm going to drink , I'm going to eat , I'm going to do this or whatever .
Everything's being orientated to God , and so body and soul are being united and I'm open to grace . So body , soul plus grace gives me the potential for human flourishing , potential for human freedom not to be enslaved by any kind of these habits and stuff . Right , it's so beautiful . And then how do I do it ? I have to act . I have to act .
I have to be the good in the world . So body , soul plus grace gives me the potential to be free , potential to flourish . Now I have to take that into my family , right From my own heart . I received it . Now I have to be that in the world . All right , you got it . Email me if you have any questions .
So I want to talk about morality and conscience and the fall of man . We all stand , like I said , at that tree of the knowledge of good and evil . So take a deep breath , place yourself in this story .
You didn't create the universe , you didn't create the big story that you came into , but there was a moment in time that each of us were exploded onto the stage called life . And it's not to make it all up as we go , it's to figure out what is this plan ?
Gravity's already there , planets are already there , everything's moving already , everything's set up for us . We know this story . Again , go back and even on earlier this week I unpacked this in more depth , the politics of it , with Tom Hampson .
So , if you want to go in a little bit more , talk about this a little bit more , talk about this a little bit more . Get a little bit more understanding of our country and how it was founded . Earlier this week with Tom Hampson , or also earlier in this week with Linda Piper talking about the song of songs and the human heart . Right , the ache for love .
So that ache for love , how we live this out just go listen to those podcasts . That's why we do those supplemental podcasts earlier in the week . Right , it all comes together . It all comes together . I know it's time consuming and stuff , but at the end of the day this is Lent now . So let's put down the phone so much , let's get into the story more .
So you come into the story . And in the beginning there was no sin , right ? So now we're going to come into the serpent more . So you come into the story . And in the beginning there was no sin , right ? So now we're going to come into the serpent . So we stand at the tree and Eve is tempted , but the serpent said to the woman you certainly will not die .
No , god knows well that the moment you eat of that fruit your eyes will be open and you will be like God , who knows what is good and can decide what is evil . So you know what is good and evil , you can decide . You can decide . That's what those ladies in the pink are doing . Nope , throw out the commandments , throw out God , and we'll choose .
If that child lives or dies in my womb , we'll choose to take this poor , confused little girl in puberty or early adolescence and we'll choose to affirm her in her confusion and put her on puberty blockers and cut off her breasts . I mean , this is a sickness . And so this sickness infiltrated our whole country , our whole country was coming down .
This gives us a chance now . It gives you a chance to live out your life , to get married , possibly have families , whatever your plan . You gives you a chance to live out your life , to get married , possibly have families , whatever your plan . You know God's plan is for your life , but for right now we're opening our hearts to God's plan .
We're standing at the tree . I find more and more people who once called themselves atheists or agnostics now in your generation , sensing the weight of sin . Now in your generation , sensing the weight of sin , evil , death in the world , but also within them .
Right , these restless hearts that we've been talking about and the sense of evil , mysterium and equitatus , the mystery of evil all around us . Russell Brand you probably know Russell Brand . He wrote a great book on recovery , freedom and addictions , based on AA's 12-step program . He said I was addicted to everything .
It's really a good book if you're struggling with porn or alcohol or whatever addictions to get out of . He began his book this way here , in our glistening citadel of limitless reflecting screens , he's talking about these phones where we're on all day long . Right , he said we live on the outside of that larger story .
Instead of coming into the story , getting in a place , we got to make it up ourselves and so outside the story , outside of our hearts , are not connected to anything right ? So we're anxious , we're nervous , we're depressed . We should be , we're getting blown around by the spirits of the age . Here that restlessness leads you to god , so he says .
Today we may awaken and instantly and unthinkingly reach for the phone . This is why the three-step program we do right in the morning don't look at that phone before you go to your knees , it's glowing , he says reaches our eyes before the light of dawn .
Its bulletins dart into our minds for even a moment of acknowledgement of this unbending and unending fact you are going to die , he goes on . You and your children and everyone you love is hurtling toward the boneyard . I know , you know , he says , we all know it , because it yields so few likes on social media .
We purr on in blinkering compliance , filling our days with temporary fixes A Starbucks here , an Amazon purchase there , a half-hearted flirt , a few minutes watching a reel of porn , any glinting twitch of pleasure releasing a rush of dopamine like a silvery stitch on a cadaver to hold you and tide you over , and you're probably too clever to repose in god or go
pick up some dusty book . He's talking about the bible that has been outlawed in schools , where poetry creaks you are told with a loathing for women , that you're told that that book has a hatred of trans people .
Or someone perhaps taught CRT and I'm throwing this in unquote now that the main you know and that melatonin in people's skin is the cause of hatred in the world . What a bunch of baloney . Right ? It's the human heart that causes sin , not the color of my skin , right ?
Or that you may be a systemic racist on the day you were born for some obscure reason , right ? So maybe if science and quantum physics could come up with some force or web or string or something that tethers the mystery to something solid , something measurable , you'd think again .
But until then there's nothing but an empty grave , a blank tombstone and chisel poised waiting for you . So what's the story , right ? So no one's going to blame you .
Russell Brand said if you perch on a carousel of destructive relationships , unfulfilling work , whirling around , never holding still , never truly looking within , never really going home or thinking about where we're going . But because I had the gift of desperation , he said , because I effed up my life so royally . I had no option but to go to seek and accept help .
The young man comes to Jesus what must I do to inherit eternal life ? He asked Jesus . Well , jesus said you know the commandments . It will be repeated because the commandments formed . John Paul said the commandments form the covenant between God and humanity . So he comes up , he says to Jesus what must I do to inherit eternal life ?
And Jesus said you know the commandments . Did you do the commandments ? And why are they important ? Because , again , they form that covenant . If we kill , if we don't honor our parents , if we lie , steal , cheat , all these things of the deep state that we're talking about , they all start in the individual human heart .
That's why we got to get washed and we got to go to confession . We got to get rid of that stuff so that we can come back into union , body and soul , filled with grace once again . This is the covenant . Covenant is like a marriage . God doesn't want just a light relationship . I'm the God and you're the creature . He brings us into an intimacy with him .
It's almost too good to be true , but that's the logic of our faith . Jesus came into a world , took on our body to unite himself to us . He gives us this even in the Eucharist , all through time . There's power there . So the commandments determine the essential basis of behavior , john Paul said .
They decide the moral value of human acts and remain an organic relationship with man's meaning , men and women's vocation to eternal life , which the establishment of God's kingdom in people and among people . When we think of taking our nation back , this is about taking our nation back for God to establishing heaven on earth .
Right , this is beginning of going into eternal life . Eternity doesn't mean tomorrow , eternity means forever . We are eternal beings . If we reject this , this is our little window of opportunity and time to work out our eternal life . We're here to do that , to do good At the same time .
John Paul said this code of morality is written in another form , the natural law , inscribed in the moral conscience of humanity and written on our hearts . We know this . This is why we're restless .
It's good to be restless while you're searching , because God is calling you into himself in such a way that those that do not know the commandments , in other words the law revealed by God , are still a law unto themselves . St Paul would say , even if you don't know the Ten Commandments themselves . It's written into the human heart . You know right from wrong .
Thus St Paul writes in his letter to the Romans , and he immediately adds this after he says that they show that what the law requires , the Ten Commandments , is already written in their hearts , while their conscience also bears witness to this , we know in our restlessness that something is wrong . Unfortunately , man would fall from grace . Enter the tempter .
The mysterium in equitatis , the mystery of evil , comes in through Satan . Right , it's a Latin phrase , mysterium and equitatus , which literally means the mystery of evil , and this is what happens in our heart . Right , we stand before that tree . It's very powerful .
If those people , right , that are pushing abortion and all this trans stuff and sucking all the money that they can and putting it in their own pockets , starting wars all over , as much human destruction as possible , that's coming from Satan . But they allow that they don't realize that that's a powerful movement , satan trying to get into the human heart .
We have to make a choice here . Right , we know this already Now . The serpent was the most cunning of all the animals that the Lord God had made , smarter than me , smarter than you . The serpent said to the woman did God really tell you not to eat from any of the trees in the garden .
The woman answered the serpent we may eat from the fruit of the trees in the garden . It's only from the fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden that God said . You shall not eat of it or even touch it , lest you die . But the serpent said to the woman you certainly will not die .
God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be open and you will be like gods who know what is good and evil . Again , I repeat part of that . We all stand at the tree and God says you can have everything , but you can't change the truth . You can't change the plan .
I give you all this as a gift , but you can't call evil good and good evil . You cannot tell me that an abortion , killing a child , is good , and that's what we've done and that's the law of the land . That's why , when Trump was here in his first term , he moved Roe versus Wade , that stain on our whole country , back to the states .
That was a big movement . That was a big movement . Now it's our battle in our individual states to get that changed , that we just don't take human life . No , that's the fifth commandment thou shalt not kill . I'm sorry , I get that we've all been lied to but it's not true . It's important to pause and consider that Satan doesn't have his own clay .
He can only twist , distort and seek to destroy what God created good . Nothing is more important than Satan than to destroy humanity , the image and likeness of God . He does this directly in many ways to violence and war , greed , as seen in that push of the COVID vaccines . Remember that , you know .
In that push of the COVID vaccines , remember that you know everybody's got to get vaccinated with an experimental mRNA vaccine that wasn't even tested . And what happened ? We got pushed . A lot of people lost their jobs or couldn't , you know , had to take the jab in order to go to work or whatever . The military was forcing this , this evil permeate .
That's why this deep state's got to get twisted and distorted out of here . And also our human hearts have to , and we have to be with the claymore sword . We have to battle for what's true , good and beautiful . Just look at Europe right now . I will make a prediction that Europe is falling very , very quickly .
I said this on early podcasts many , many years ago that the decline was rapidly happening and that was going to happen here in the United States if we kept on this trajectory , if Kamala Harris and Joe Biden were still in power , that means the World Economic Forum would be in power , the world elites would be in power .
You know , kamala Harris didn't have the intelligence to run a country , and neither did Joe Biden , and so , at the end of the day , the ruler of the world , satan , was ruling the world , and he still has the power and principalities here . When Jesus came in , he was crucified and gave up his life .
You saw , the powers of the world came right after him , and they came after all of us . This is Miletus Christi soldiers for Christ . It's a battle , huh , between good and evil , but we know it .
It's important what we're talking about here , because when you see the evil around us , you know it , and so nothing more effectively destroys human life than the attack on the most innocent and defenseless among us , though children . This is what you're seeing the huge attack , marriage and the family and the children .
Children again on abortion , transing them , the education system that's ruining their hearts , stealing their innocence , and we have to help them too , as soon as you get on a solid footing , if you got younger brothers and sisters . You can help out in youth ministry and stuff . We need to do this .
And the act that brought them together , the marriage act between a man and a woman , that's being distorted and twisted . Marriage is meaningless . You've got the surrogacy . It's sickness to take this baby , but I better not go off track too much with that . Listen to some of the other podcasts .
Jesus comes to reset us and he's going to take us back to the beginning right here , before sin came into the world . So in Matthew 19 , verses 3 through eight , jesus won't limit his answer to the Pharisees , this line of questioning on divorcing their wives , and he points out that it's the hardness of hearts . So they ask him about divorce .
Right , and he says it's the hardness of hearts that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives , but from the beginning it was not . So he orders them and us in a sense , to pass beyond the boundary . John Paul said that runs between the first situation and the fall in the very beginning , before sin and death . And now we have the fall .
John Paul says Christ came into the world to lift us up again , that we can't recover our original innocence , but we have to know the story that we came into . You can't divorce your wives for any cause . He said . It's indissolubility because it represents Trinitarian love in the world and God will not walk away from you .
This means that although man has lost his primeval innocence from the very beginning , before sin , the force to overcome evil has been restored . Jesus came into the world not for sin management but for power . So when the young man in the gospel seeks out Christ , he says what must I do to inherit eternal life ? Once again , jesus won't limit himself .
He doesn't stop at the commandments . Even in this conversation with the young man , jesus always proposes that we go deeper , to the level of the heart . The story started before sin . Christ comes in to overpower your sin in your heart , to lead you to your destiny right . This is not a rule story . The rules are only guidelines .
The 10 commandments are guidelines on this narrow road that Jesus says I am the way , the truth and the life . And we discover that the larger story is a love story . All the things that I brought up right could sound negative . It's not negative .
The real story is a love story the God who loves you , who wants to fill your heart with love , love in the truth , the goodness , the beauty of love , and then we bring this out into the world . It's up to us to do that .
Most of the evil that you see out , there are people that are cooperating with Satan , with evil , and then they bring evil into the world . When I do evil , I become evil , I am evil and this is my eternal destiny . This is not good , but we're feeling it right here .
If you look at the faces of that Democratic audience there , they look I mean , they look demonic . Just look at it again . You know , look at those . You know . No life , just like that life is drained out of them . They're angry , mad , vitriol , hatred . It's really something right . In the Sermon on the Mount , jesus presses the whole crowd to go deeper .
He said this , you have heard it said you should not commit adultery . It's one of the 10 commandments . But I say to you go deeper . Whoever even looks at a woman with lust or in a reductive way has already committed adultery with her in his heart . See , jesus says not only shouldn't you cheat on your wife , he says you have to get to your heart .
You have to take that claymore sword to your heart . Just like Jesus got hit with the lance , blood and water came out . So this is why number two , when we go to our knees in the morning , is temptation's not a sin . You're going to get tempted , especially when you try to come back into God's grace , come back into the church , battle this stuff .
Temptation's not a sin . You got to open up those temptations and that's what Jesus is saying here . But if you look and you'd start to lust after that woman in your heart and this is a battle , this is the biggest battle that a man can do , and this battle will go on , and don't forget that . It will lessen as time goes on . But that little ooh , yeah .
See , the difference is , when I see a woman , I see the beauty of a woman . I'm not gonna bury that and I'm not gonna indulge Right away . I open it and say thank you , jesus , for the beauty of that woman . But I don't look at her like body parts . I look at her with this body and a soul infused with God .
I look at her as God does right , and in order to do that I have to open myself up to grace , right . So the romantic challenge is to true love . I'm going to go on a little bit long here because I want to connect this to your heart . You know the good thing about a podcast you can always go listen to part of it later on .
Right In the beginning , god created man in his image , in the divine image . He created them , male and female . He created them . This is from Genesis 1 , before sin .
See , the truth presents the creation of man as a special gift from the creator , containing not only the foundation and the source of the essential dignity of a human being , man and woman in the created world , but also the beginning of the call to both of them to share in the intimate life of God himself .
In the beginning , god flips the cell for remember from the earlier ones Trinitarian love . He flips it into the garden . He creates this male and female open to life to be a tiny reflection of Trinitarian love .
So while meditating on these words , I remember some years ago I had been at my desk writing for a long time and stretching my legs and I went downstairs to say hi to my wife . She said hello and she pointed to the television screen where Jennifer Lopez was describing her documentary on the Super Bowl halftime show .
So there was a documentary a couple of years before that a couple of years ago , I don't remember . At halftime she was pole dancing . This is a middle-aged woman in her 40s , she looks good , but she's pole dancing in front of the whole world , and so she had a documentary that came out , kind of explaining that , I guess , and she spoke .
A clip of her opening act came on , which , in essence , she was doing a theatrical pole dance for the single largest audience on earth . I saw parts of that documentary . I was busy and I said , honey , I'm going to go back upstairs and I wondered what would impel a fabulously rich and famous middle-aged woman to expose her body and act like that .
What impels them ? I have everything , I have all the money , I have all the fame , and yet something propels her to do a pole dance to make herself feel good . See , this is when we're disconnected from God , from God's plan , and , at the end of the day , what will the viewers , millions of viewers around the world what are they thinking ?
Does a show like that change the way men look ? At the end of the day , what will the viewers , millions of viewers around the world what are they thinking ? Does a show like that change the way men look at the women in their lives ? You know , here , it's Jesus telling us . If you even lust after a woman right in your heart , you've committed adultery .
But yet , look , this is the image . These are the temptations that Satan puts out all the time . This is a battle , isn't it ? But when I see them , I don't feel sorry for myself and my own battle . I feel sorry for that woman . I think Jennifer Lopez has been married what ? Maybe four times already in her young life . Just a disaster in her personal life .
If you don't connect your personal life , marriage and the family to Christ and the church , it's just a good example , and I bring it up again and not to berate Jennifer Lopez . We pray for her , right , she's our sister in Christ , but I don't want to see her as an object , even though she's putting it out there .
You know what if her parents , what if her children see in all that stuff ? Right , we have that Me Too movement that we had just a few years ago , where women were all black to the Academy Awards and stuff and they were protesting against men , right , that lost their hearts and were using them as objects . But what did they do ?
They wore all black and they exposed their bodies again . I mean , they hardly wore anything . I remember some of them wearing nothing . They didn't get the paradox that I'm wearing black to protest , which they had all the right to and they should . These men are disgusting some of them , but yet they went with no clothes on again .
Look at me , look at me , look at me as an object again . So the world has normalized the fall . This is a paradox we miss , while women rightly demand equality in the workplace and join the Me Too movement , and one of the most famous women in the world does a pole dance . In the beginning it was not so . Bishop Sheen stated this .
He said if you want to understand why Christians and Catholics right , why we get it . You know people that are actual Christians , not a Joe Biden or Nancy Pelosi or Dick Durbin here , that call themselves Catholic and try to kill as many children as they can in abortion and these trans ideologies .
But he said this only people who live by faith really know what's happening in the world . The great masses without faith are unconscious of the destructive processes going on because they've lost the vision of the heights from which they've fallen .
Jesus enters into this concrete and historical situation of men and women , a situation which is weighed down by all of us by original sin . We inherited the sin . It's not all our faults . The battle that we're in . Don't be down on yourself . Open yourself up . Say , hey , I'm a warrior , now I'm coming into the story .
I didn't create the sin , I didn't bring all this evil in , but I don't want to bring it into my own heart . I reject all of that and I want to bring the good back in . I unite myself with Christ . I'm a soldier of Christ because I need him . I need his grace redemption because we're fighting a battle that's much bigger than ourselves .
One of the ways in which this inheritance is expressed is habitual discrimination against women . You've seen this through history . Men have to step up to the plate and see our sisters and uphold them . See , in the beginning we didn't have this sin . We were complimentary , made for each other .
But on the other hand , you know , hand , remember Jesus , when that woman in the episode in the gospel it's John , chapter 8 , a woman caught in adultery . And Jesus said to her right , they're all going to stone her . And he says no , no , no , let those without sin pick up the first stone . Hey , you guys sin too . You're both culpable of that .
But then he said to her I'm not going to condemn you , but then go and sin no more . This is the difference we tell our poor brothers and sisters that are caught up with same-sex attractions and all this stuff . Hey , god calls you back into the story , but then go and sin no more . The truth is valid for the whole human race .
The attitude of Jesus in this verse that I just said John 8 , is significant . This is one of the few instances in which his power , the power of truth , is so clearly manifested with regard to human consciousness . When Jesus says that , go read that . John 8 , verses 3 to 11 .
Jesus is calm , he's collected , he's thoughtful , as in the conversation with the Pharisees in Matthew 19 I read earlier . He says in the beginning it was not so right . It's because of the hardness of your hearts that Moses allowed divorce . But I say in the beginning it was not so . Don't accept the fall . Don't accept the fall , don't accept the fall .
Jesus is aware , right of being in the beginning . He understands the beginning before sin , when we were created , male and female , and the woman was entrusted to the man with her feminine distinctiveness and with her potential . For what ? For motherhood . For motherhood , the man was also entrusted by the creator to the woman .
They were entrusted to each other as persons made in the image and likeness of God . This entrusting is a test of love , spousal love In order to become sincere love to one another . Each of them must feel responsible for the gift . The test is meant for both of them , male and female , from the beginning .
See , it's not about the woman is wrong , the man is wrong . This is what happened in the beginning . When sin came into the world . They hid from God . And God says Adam , where are you , eve , where are you ? And he's calling to them . And he said why are you hiding ? Why did you put loincloths on ? Something happened there .
Lust came into the situation and right away the blame game started . Adam says it's the woman who you put here with me . He blames God and the woman . The woman blames the serpent , right , evil . And so , at the end of the day , jesus says no , we got to stop the blame game . He says I will take it on . I will take sin and death on .
I will take all of that on and let the creature himself kill me . Deicide , it's the most disgusting thing in the world . We kill the creator , but he willingly does that , and then he rises from the dead . He takes on all of our human flesh . In a sense , he connects it to divinity . He offers it to the father . He kills sin and death within us .
If we say yes to him , that's what that blood and water , right , that's what that blood and water are offering us right now . Oops , that way . Water again , confession , baptism . The blood of Christ is the Eucharist , right ?
So , as I start to wind down here , right , the human body in its masculinity and femininity has almost lost the power , john Paul said , of expressing this love in the world . But we can regain that because it's not given up to us . It's about the human heart .
Our human heart has to be united to the heart of Christ and then shared with our brothers and sisters . You know , right now , today , when you get up off your knees , remember number three in the morning go love the next person . You see Our concupiscence . This dragging us down is part of who we are .
Even with grace , we feel this desire to have more , to grasp for more in our flesh , to use somebody as an object , the pornography , et cetera . This is dragging us down . Dragging us down . That's why the battlefield of the human heart , and what's the main thing ? It's number three . It's pride , concupiscence , the eyes and concupiscence of the flesh .
So the eyes meaning , ooh , we see the world around us , I want the car , I want this , I want that . It's not that all things are bad , but they got to be put in perspective . Material items are not bad . I have a house , right , I've got some pictures , I've got my sword , I've got my office . So we need certain things , but not to put them first .
And then the lust and selfishness . That's why fasting is so important , because fasting , I'm giving up all those other things on Wednesdays and Fridays and Lent . It resets my mind , resets my heart , right , and then walks away from that pride of life .
How can these women again , and these men you know sitting there when Trump was talking about these so many beautiful young people and how he was defending them , et cetera go watch that clip of Trump . And they didn't clap , they didn't care , they didn't want to celebrate anything , they're just . I mean , they've given themselves over to evil .
And again , we can pray for them . That's what we're called to do , but at the end of the day , you could see , when you choose , when you allow evil to come into your heart , when you choose to grasp for money , for power , when you use people as objects . And the third one is pride , pride of life . How could my point was going to be ?
How could this little speck me , you , everybody how could this little speck think that I can control all this thing ? I can be like God , who can decide what is good and what is evil ? This is the pride I mean . If you really think about it , I am going to be dust someday , and who knows how much longer I'm going to go back to being dust .
And I have the pride of life to say no , I'm going to decide all this stuff . This is amazing and this is how we bring evil in . This is what Jesus is saying . Keep your eye on eternity and bring it into your heart today , this eternal love story , and then become the person of love . That's how you become happy .
You love story and then become the person of love . That's how you become happy . You have the identity . Your identity is a beloved child of God . Your meaning and purpose is to be filled with divine life and love and then bring it into the world . You're created , male and female , as a sign of Trinitarian love in the world .
All civilizations are built on marriage and the family . Take that away or take God away , they're going to fall . And that's what you're seeing in Europe right now . You're seeing , you just mark my words . They've taken God out . They've internally inside the country , they've led all kinds of immigrants in that do not have the same Christian values . And why ?
Because the British people have rejected God Many , many years ago . They became anti-Christian . We were doing that in our country , here , until we finally woke up again and , by the grace of God , we started praying . It was the prayer that's turning back to God , just like I read in that first reading .
We turn back to God with a lot of us , and this is what we're calling all of us to do , all of you listening today , to turn our hearts back to God . This is the adventure . Remember three core things about a man the adventure it's going to be a battle . The battle starts on the battlefield of the human heart . And then beauty , beauty .
You go out and see the beauty of nature . Little bee beauty , little you know . Small bee beauty bringing you into big bee beauty , god himself . Allow your heart to soar . Nothing , nothing , nothing is going to do that . Like a woman , though for a man right . Ooh , the beauty of her right .
Allow God to take you to soar and say I see that woman , thank you for the beauty of that woman and I don't want to lust and take after her . I don't see her as body parts , I see her as a body and a soul filled with love .
The mystery right , the mysterium pietatis , the mystery of God himself , the mystery of Jesus Christ , his passion , death and resurrection and ascension into heaven , giving himself for us , the mystery of good and essence . That overcomes the mystery , mysterium equitatis , the mystery of evil , and it does it in our own hearts .
Jesus didn't come for sin management , he came with power . What must I do to inherit eternal life ? We ask Jesus . He says come and see , come with me , come and see . Hey , god bless you . Thank you guys .
I was gonna read you something from Bill W , who started AA , and and maybe I'll I'll do that in between , I'll do , I'll do an interim one during the week because it's such a beautiful story . Bill did the same thing . He fell on his knees , he accepted christ and it changed his whole life . I'll tell you that story as an interim .
So watch for an interim one next week . Hey , god bless you , good to be with you . Talk to you again soon . Email me or text me if you need something . Bye .