Healing In Men (Part 3) w/ Devin Schadt

Just y you've been a prolific writer, uh, Devin. And uh I've wa also watched you s on some episodes of The Catholic Gentleman. And uh we've had maybe a handful of interactions but they've been really deep and beautiful and uh You know, when I see a man who has gone through a lot and has only grown in love for Jesus through it all. I uh it just gives me a lot of respect. And so I have a lot of respect for what I know about you, Devin. And so welcome.

But it's very wonderful. Uh so I'm also a grandfather now of I think five and one on the w two on the way. So yeah. So we're growing, you know. But um yeah, so it's good. But just a little bit about my background. Um So I had a rough childhood. I lived in a volatile, kind of vociferous kind of environment. Just from day one, I was at odds with my mom. I d I don't understand why or what was going on in her. We've had conversations about that, but

It it was just very difficult. So when I mean difficult, I mean it was like a war zone. Uh every day I wasn't sure what was going to happen. I wasn't sure how my mom was going to react to me. I was a very hyper, high strung kid, very active. Um and because of that, um I suffered a lot of insecurity. So you know, we talk about the father wound.

And I believe it is a father wound because it's from the father of lies. And the way the father of lies generally works is he as you as you gentlemen know, he takes a person of authority in our lives, a person who subconsciously represents God the Father. or God in general. And we cling to that person because we want that love. We want that affection. We want that affirmation.

And then that person does something to betray us or wound us deeply. And then subconsciously we think not only can that person be tr not be trusted, neither can God. And so that's what happened to me. My my childhood environment was violent, uh, a lot of corporal punishment on both sides for my mother and my father. And just a just a caveat there and a qualifier, my parents are saints today.

My parents are wonderful human beings who I love and respect and still uh return to for advice. They're just amazing, holy people. So when I say these things, it's not at all uh as uh uh uh like a black eye, painting a black eye in their life. No, we've all grown immensely and found healing in the Lord who alone can provide it. But that said, what happened was I grew up with this feminine wound, a maternal wound, also had a father wound, but

that the maternal wound ran deeper. And what I noticed as a kid was I had a tremendous longing for female affirmation and female attention. And that became disordered very quickly. But that also drove me to Doing things, what I call the six P's of the world. So what happens is when we don't have our identity in the Father, when I don't believe that God the Father has chosen me and God the Father desires me and actually delights in me.

Then I turn to the world, and the world offers its maxims and its promises. So prestige, prominence, power, profit, possessions, and pleasure. And we look to get our fill and our identity and our peace in these things. But no matter how much of prestige and prominence and power and profit and possessions and pleasure we have, it will never be enough. Like for example, my

my wife's sister was married to a multi multimillionaire billionaire almost who he was probably embarking on his eightieth year of life. He was literally he should have been cramming for the final exam, you know, and and he decided to build uh a resort on a obscure Caribbean island, not Epstein Island, but on a some you know, some obscure island. And I asked him, I said, why are you doing this? I mean, you should be spending time with your family and your kids and just kind of preparing

for the next step, heaven, you know, or your your judgment. And he said, because my friend is wealthier than I am and it burns me and I want to beat him. And so it just it demonstrates no matter how much we have of the six P's of the world, it will never be enough. And so That's w the way I was. I became a thief very quickly. By the time I was in fifth grade, I was stealing things from

you know, department stores and grocery stores and and one moment, one a very pivotal moment was when my brother had a job as a paper boy and he was able to buy baseball cards. I was lazy, I didn't wanna work and yet I wanted baseball cards. And so I just loaded my pants full of baseball cards at Alton drugstore and I drove on my bike home and I had this pile of baseball cards and my dad and mom were like, Where did you get those? And I'm like, Oh, I bought them at Alton drugstore and

You need to return those baseball cards. Good. I think that's great. And uh so the next day I went to Alton drugstore and I was nervous as nervous. Little fourth grade or third grade, I can't remember fourth grade. And I went into the Alton drugstore and instead of going the right way, I went to the left way, which was the liquor department.

And I got the salty old liquor department, you know, manager. And I'm looking up over the counter, you know, and I'm here he is, he's bigger than life and he's just as old as old and, you know, you know, and then and uh I was like, I took these baseball cars and I set'em on the counter and I said, I'm sorry for doing this He says, Are you ever gonna do it again? I'm like, No and he's like, Get outta here. So I rode my bike home and my mom was

at the door with her arms like, you know, braced against the door. We're like, You're not getting in here and she said, Did you return the baseball cards? I said, Yeah, I returned the baseball cards. I should say, no, you didn't. And that's and then in a sense the physical punishment of you know began and pr progressed. And uh and so anyway, that was a moment where I I intuited that you're not rewarded for doing the right thing.

And so then that kinda that escalated. So I became a major thief where I was stealing money out of the cash register at this restaurant I was working at. I when I went to college, I went to commercial arts school and ended up thieving from the storeroom. I mean, tens of thousands of dollars worth of material and resources and uh

And yeah, and so and then on top of that, then I was appealing to women. So I was doing it to you know, buy clothes and to, you know, look the man and get the women and and so that was my road. And In the process, we moved to I know I I'm just like scooting by a lot of this.

And um my last two years of high school, I joined this Catholic school. And I met this woman, this young woman, her name is Kim, and she was wonderful. And we fell in love and but I was using her. I was using her to feed that wound to get that male affirm that affirmation for the female that I needed to feel like I was a man. And it never went anywhere. It was just constant battling, constant strife.

And finally we we get back together on and off, on and off. And I went to art school and we were still dated then. You know how it goes. I mean, maybe you don't, but I was licentious, I was partying around, I was seeing other gals and she'd finally said, I'd had enough. I I can't take it anymore and she left me. And that was the first time in my life where I realized, like, man, I'm I'm really a bad guy. The one woman, the one person in my life who's loved me.

Like she loved me unconditionally. Even with my asinine behavior and my evil tendencies, she still loved me and she's very sweet. And I destroyed that.

Kim had broken up with me, I decided I need to get my life together. And I worked at a clothing store and instead of washing my clothes, I would purchase clothes'cause I got a discount. And so I had two rooms full of all these dirty clothes that I needed to wash and I was like, okay, I'm gonna go late to the laundromat when I would have access to all the washers and all the dryers and do it all at once, right?

And so fourteen hefty bags of dirty laundry. And it's four it's like wind chill, like thirty or forty degrees below. And I'm walking down three flights of stair, two bags a time, stuffing them in my cart and this special needs guy He stared at me the whole time through my window, through the windows in the stairwell, as I'm walking at the car and I'm aggravated that not only have to do laundry, not only is cold, but this guy is staring me down.

And so after the seventh trip, I I load those last two bags in. I there's barely room in there for me to drive. And I look at him and I just give him the bird. And I get in the car and I drive off. And I did my laundry and that was that. Well about four months later, it was a beautiful spring day and I was heading to work and I was walking out my apartment complex and there he was.

And he was staring out the window. It was one of those vertical windows that is partially open. And I'm like, please don't talk to me. Please don't talk to me. I just need to get to work. And I went to open up the car door and he said, Hey, buddy, sorry about the other day. And that rocked my world.

Because up to this point I was just arrogant and selfish and partying and just thieving. And when he said that, I got I I I just was like, it's okay, it's okay. And I got in the car and I sat for a moment

And it just like something hit me where I realized my whole life, this is what I've done to people. Sorry about the other day. What was what was four months ago to him was yesterday. The pain was with him. And that's what I'd done to everyone in my life. And so I would go out to this place, St. Edward's Church, to shoot hoops just to get my mind off Kim because I was very suicidal at the time, feeling like there was nothing to live for, and the ball carmed off the basketball hoop.

And I grabbed the ball and I was looking at St. Edward's church and I was like, huh. I haven't been in a church I don't I don't know how long. And so I put down the basketball and I walk in this Catholic church. It's dark back in the days in medieval a ye ages when the churches were open, you know, and it's dark and I walk in.

And I just start walking up the aisle. I don't know what I'm doing. And this heavy weight, a good weight, comes down on me. And literally I was just driven to my knees. And I just began to pour myself out to God. I didn't know who he was anything. I just begged for my life to change because I knew I was on the edge of disaster and it was over.

And just then this uh glorious music kicks on and I'm like, Oh my gosh, is this a sign from heaven? You know? And but it was like this hundred and twenty year old lady, this organist up in the loft practicing, right? And But anyway, I c I crawled into the pew and I continued to just say, please, you've got to help me. You've got to take over. Even though I didn't realize it, that was the moment that I turned my life over to Jesus Christ.

And then I returned home and I went to confession. Somebody suggests I go to confession and I went to the priest, the Catholic priest, who was the pastor of our school. And I was con I was just he goes, Why don't we make a general confession? I'm like, Oh, okay. So my sins don't have to be specif specific, right? And he's like, No, that means your whole life. And I'm like, Oh boy, great. So I'm pouring my sins out and when he Goes to absolve me.

And he's making that the the the words of absolution, suddenly that weight came off of me. And I had to stop and I said, stop, stop. Something's happening. And he said, that is Jesus taking your sins upon himself. And so I returned back to Waterloo. That was where I had that kind of that s unreal supernatural event where I gave my life to Christ.

And I went to Mass at that church and I call it my first Holy Communion, even though I'd received communion as a kid. Um, it was my first holy communion I in a sense because that at that moment I received our Lord and it was like this burning sensation from my head down into my heart. I could barely get around the first pew without breaking down. I knew something was very real in this, what I just received. And it was like God was doing miraculous things just to bring me to his heart.

And then it was amazing because that gal who broke up with me, I was I was moving. I graduated, I was going back home and She called me up and said, Hey, I hear you're moving back home. Um, I would like to just have some closure and can we meet again? And she had no intention of getting back together with me, but I'm thinking, I hope we can get back together, right?

And uh so I take her out, we have a great time, good conversation, and then I drop her off her apartment and she goes to get out the car door and she begins to open it up. And she starts crying. And she said, What's happened to you? You're you're so different.

And I said, I've I've given my life to Jesus Christ. And she said, I want that too. And then she closed the door and left. I was like, Okay, great. And and then I didn't hear from her for another four months. And then she called me. She said I'd really like to try to work this out and and now she's my wife and uh

And so with her, you know, like they say with uh every blessing there's a curse and every curse there's a blessing. And so with my wife, it was the greatest of all blessings. She was impossible like for a guy like me to have. And the fact that she came back to me. It was absolutely gosh, I'm so sorry, miraculous. I didn't expect this at all. Sorry about this. But then it was like we got into marriage and then

I brought my lusts into marriage. I brought all that need for female affirmation into marriage. I had repented of my sins, in fact. I wrote a check to the woman I stole for who owned the restaurant, a cashier's check for the money I stole, just signing it, Jesus Christ. I I t my friend who who's now a priest, Father Bruce, we went up back to the s the school where I stole all the goods from. We packed them all up. We brought'em back there. It's early in the morning and

One of the teachers, Mrs. Willoughby, she shows up and she's seen us unload all this stuff in the driveway there in front of us. She goes, What are you doing? I said, I've stolen all this. You can call the police. I'm ready to go to jail. And she says, say no more. Just bring it in. And that was just like the beginning of like God just transforming me and working my heart and inviting me to trust him. And and so my wife and I

that trust would need to go deeper. And that test the test would become more severe with our third pregnancy. Her third pregnancy, our daughter Anna Marie, was born at twenty eight weeks premature. And so she was small. She was like, you know, yay, big. Her finger or her leg was the size of my index finger. She's very small. And she spent a month in the neonatal intensive care unit where they were allowing her digestive system and her lungs to function properly.

And then after that month she came home and we had our little perfect Anna Marie. And but then within five days she spiked the fever. She was having respiratory issues. So we took her back to the hospital, but we couldn't readmit her to the neonatal intensive care unit for fear of infecting the other babies.

So we admitted the pediatric unit, but they weren't prepared to take care of a baby that small. They're like, We've never seen a baby that small before and and w all the red flags were going, you know, there, all the alarms, but we were too young. We were too stupid. We didn't understand. And so there was

eleven hours of apnea, not enough oxygen, was transmitted to her brain. Um there was nurse neglect. She suffered a hypoxic event and by the time the Medevac Team got her manual life support, rolled her across the tarmac and got her on that Metabac helicopter.

Uh, they flew out two two hours away to a children's hospital. She suffered three clinical death experiences and permanent brain injury. And then from that point on, she's been confined to a wheelchair where we do everything for her. And that's been twenty five years now. And it was in that time there's a couple of things that happened.

One, the OB told my wife that because it was an emergency C section to get Anna Marie out, that my wife was not to get pregnant for at least a year. And fear really set in my wife so that I became the enemy. I was the weapon.

And so intercourse was, you know, out of the question, especially because we were trying to abide by the church's teaching on contraception. And then the friction and the friction, because here I was a man bound by lust, thinking that marriage was an outlet for lust, not a remedy for it. And so I was objectifying my wife. My wife, I felt wasn't loving me, therefore I was wounded in respect. I felt like I wasn't respected. I was rejected.

And then that escalated to two years. And we'd try things. We'd, you know, we try to be intimate and and you know, and then I'm going to confession'cause we're doing it all wrong. And then, you know, this extended into a three year period. And finally I'd had enough and I said, uh I I can't you know well actually what happened was my wife

My wife left with the three children at the time. We have five now, but went to the grocery store and shamefully I have you know, I admit that I decided I was leaving. I couldn't take it anymore. And um So I packed my bag. She was at the grocery store or going there and I was leaving the front door and she happened to forget her grocery list before we had cellphones and all that. And it and she said, What are you doing? I said, I can't take it anymore. I just

You know, she goes, Okay, well let's see a priest. Let's see a priest. And um So that priest came over that night and we explained to him our situation. And then he said, Oh, this is so easy. Humanimite makes a provision for couples like you that you've given God three beautiful children. You can use contraception. My wife and I, we looked at each other because like

We we hadn't agreed on anything basically in three years. And we looked at each other, this is the first time we agreed on anything, is to disagree with this priest. And we're like, sorry, that's that's not right. And And uh so he started backpedaling and I was going to daily mass at the time and that was all that was keeping me above water and And there's this guy, Tim Teg. I f I learned later who he was, but I was walking into the church. He says, Hey, you come here. He's over by the street.

And and I thought it was like, you know, is this guy trying to give me drugs or what's going on here? And uh so I go to the car and he has this tape set back in the day of cassette tapes. And it was naked without shame. And I'm like, oh great, pornography, you know, that's all I need, you know? But it was Christopher West's, you know, interpretation of theology body. And those tapes began to change my life because I began to realize what it means to be a man.

And in in my own language, it was to set the pace of self giving love, you know, and and and sacrificial responsibility. And so it was in that time of both with Kim, it seemed like the worst case scenario where we weren't having intercourse And yet that was the beginning of purifying me, of id idolizing woman and lust and sex and actually becoming a man of self giving loving, loving her for her own sake and s you know, setting the pace of self giving love. And then Anna Marie

She's the anchor. I mean She has taught us so much about self giving love. And that her calling us out of ourselves to serve her, to sacrifice for. My wife and I would often get in disputes about who would get Anna Marie up. No, I got her. No, I got her. No, let me get her, you know, kind of thing. Outdo one another in generosity, right? Even though it's like you're s you know inside you're like, I don't wanna do it, you know, and uh who wants to change a grown up stiper, you know and

And well, we were doing this when Anna Marie was about ten, I think, and Anna Marie had to give go to school very early and we're, you know, I'll do it, I'll do it. And one morning we get up And our ten year old daughter I think Anna Marie was actually actually twelve or something. I can't remember no, our and our ten year old daughter was getting her ready. And I thought

And so b when she said that and because of Anna Marie, I stopped all of that. But that's when I went through that pride detox and it was a very lonely and and painful place. I'm sorry I rambled way too long.

in all of that. And it's it's just like first of all the grace of God to to intervene in so many places. I mean it's like I know you have no doubt in God's grace being the initiator, you know? Like like every movement was him first. Mm-hmm, it seems like. Mm-hmm. And then, you know, just yeah, I can identify with pieces in childhood about

stealing, you know, I I stole probably about fourth grade and, you know, just the integrity of going and bringing those back. You know, I've I've often thought about, you know, how could I 'Cause you know, I've I've been I've been focusing on restitution. How could I bring back to a store that's now doesn't exist anymore? And how do how do or how do I make restitution there just to think about those events? What's the name of the movie of of the boxer where his son is

But I think about that with you and those scenes, you know, and your mom responded in completely the opposite way. You know, your mom and dad and and uh just the got it the pain in your heart. of being missed again, being missed again, being missed again, you know.

you know, to ransom us, what more wouldn't he give to us? And I thought Is that me? And still I wasn't convinced, you know, and and I and this is the problem. This is what I see in my own self and I see in a lot of ministry and evangelization is we bring that hunger for validation, that need to be affirmed, that need to be recognized and respected, and we bring that wound into ministry.

And then we we expect that the ministry is gonna it's it's not for God. It's a vehicle we're using to try to fill ourselves full of affirmation. And I Bob, that's when I reached out to you because that was a huge epiphany in my life because of course, you know, I mean like ministry for me is just at times it's pitiful and you know, and I'm like, oh, nobody's listening and nobody cares and I'm such a failure. And I I I called Greg Schleter and I was

pouring out in my heart to him. He's like, and I said, you know Bob Schutz, right? And he's like, Yeah. And I'm like, Do you think you think you would reach out to him, see if he could talk to me? And this is typical Bob Schutz. Right gets home and says, Yeah, he's willing to talk to you tomorrow morning at eight. And I'm like, Oh my gosh, that's crazy. So we had that conversation and that's when you uh that beautiful conversation, which was healing in itself. I mean, it was so incredible.

But then you introduced me to Christopher, Christopher Lafitte and who's another price oriented therapist, amazing young man, gifted young man. And but his waiting list was like a year and a half. And I waited and I waited and I waited and I went down to there for that uh intensive And I'm bringing all the baggage of usurping God's glory and ministry or attempting to do so, not knowing that's what I'm doing, self-idolatry, the pain of being a failure, and I bring this to Christopher's feet.

And that was the beginning of truly recognizing that I have a father. that God Abba is my father and that He didn't just create me for nothing. He had a purpose just like he has for every one of us and it's to be with him and to share in his glory to receive him and And I realized to the level that I'm not secure in my identity as a son of God, that he loves me just because I'm his, if I don't believe that truth, that's when I appeal to the world and using ministry to usurp

uh his glory. And I I I've come to realize there's two types of men in this world. There are men who use God for their glory, and there are men who use themselves for God's glory. And in meeting with Christopher what was of huge, huge, huge epiphany in my life was I hated the little guy. When I was when I was a kid I was fat and I had buck teeth, the kind of buck teeth you could eat corn through a picket fence, you know, full haircut, beat up all the time, and just a loser in

That loser pained me. I was running away from that loser. Like in the kid, you ever see the movie Bruce Wills, the kid? That's the guy. I was running away from that fat kid. And and it was like Christopher was like You're running away from the wrong guy. That's the guy you need to embrace. And that before that I had this vision, I I'm not a mystic, but I was at a conference where I was giving a talk

And I was so plagued by my self-doubt and just by not being secure in the father's love and just looking for validation. And I went up for Holy Communion and I came back to pray. I was on my knees. And I saw Jesus and he's very serious. And he's looking right at me and he's got his right arm out and it's kinda like going down. And so I followed from his face down

And when you know it, right there was that seven year old fat buck toothed bull hair kid, Devin, and he's holding him and I knew what he was saying to me. He was saying, Will you love him too? And so the breakthrough moment with Christopher was I was talking about like

I struggle with this, I fail at this, I fail at that, and I feel like, you know, I'm so little, but God's against me. And he said, That's not that's not Teresian. And I love St. Therese. And he's like, That's not Teresian. And I'm like Uh-oh, what does that mean? He said, No, no, no. She embraced her littleness on one hand, but she always believed that God could make her great, make her a saint. And she held those in attention basically is that's what I got out of it.

And so I went to her. I I went back to her writings, reading and and and she gave me a love for the little, helpless, pathetic, fat kid. And I began to love him because that what she teaches me and what Christopher taught me is that God doesn't need my greatness or my glory. He's got enough of that.

What he needs is my littleness and my patheticness because that's what he loves. He loves that about me because when God does something with our littleness and our helplessness, our patheticness, everybody looks at God and says, That can't be you. That has to be God. You know? And'cause you're so dang little. And and it's been this process and it's hard sometimes, but to embrace the littleness and the patheticness and and just sit in there and realize'cause it's

The pain is there for a reason. The pain is not going away. God allows the pain in our life. That's the first P, so we can embrace our personal poverty. That's the second P. And by embracing that personal poverty, we start to learn to love that poverty in patience, waiting on God to do something with us, and in perseverance, praying and sacrificing and serving. And it's in that patience and perseverance that God then gives us this purity of heart.

pure motivation. So then we when we see someone else struggling like we do, we don't judge them or criticize them. We have compassion on them because we know our littleness and our patheticness too. And then that's where all the power comes from. That's the ultimate thing. That's the last P, right? Pain, personal poverty, patience and perseverance, and then that purity to love. And then that's where all the power comes from to convert people and draw them into the love of God and you have peace.

And that's what I never had. And I have this peace now that Abba is my father. Every day it's like Abba, Father, I surrender everything to you because I know Even if it feels bad, even if it's painful, even if it's suffering, even if it's evil, I know that you have a good purpose in your heart for this. I know you're gonna do something great because it's in my weakness you are strong.

And I praise God. Praise the Father that he can take someone as broken and licentious and lustful and just ignorant as I was and am at times, and just reveal his father's heart to me. It's everything.

And I can't help but hear that as you're talking, you're describing in in m my life and I think in so many men's lives, the ingredients of that way. of becoming a man. You know, I I you know, you're using the the the catchy ways of the the bad peas and the redemptive peas, you know, and But those basic ingredients I think are are s it's really beautiful to hear you describe them. Like for example

uh woundedness is is part of the stuff that a man has to face. It's it's s the the things he'll encounter along the way of becoming who God made him to be. And and then suffering, the need for fathering, the role that unexpected people play along the way. Like the scene that maybe captures me more than any is you looking across at the ab other apartment complex of this man who's, you know, by all standards, you know, nobody.

And you've got fourteen bags full of clothes because of you you're like, why do I need to wash them? I'll just buy a new you know, it's just like what a comparison. And it was beautiful like that image just strikes me that uh there's a man who m maybe doesn't even have the capacity to move beyond his littleness, but he was a champion for you in that scene. And in some ways it almost feels like he was a mirror to you.

And we started, we developed a friendship. And he worked at the recycling center and he would tell me how many cans he counted that day. Devin, I I had one thousand eleven cans, you know, or whatever it was, you know, and and and it was like in that moment I discovered a part of me that could embrace the littleness, even though I didn't know that's what was happening. And I think that Your anatomy of the wound series? That was like Bob, that's what you recommended to me when we first met and

I listened to that time after time. Was it episodes thirteen through eighteen? I recommend it to everybody. Like where am I giving talks and conferences? Anatomy of the wounds, restore the glory, episodes thirteen through eighteen, if I'm getting it right. And I just recommend to everybody because like I started just to peel back and I would find myself so angry. I build boulder walls in my yard and I'm like digging and building I'm like

What's the wound? What's the wound? You know, and I got tens of them. Just like getting the shit in the bottom. And then this then the series on Peter after that. And Jake, you're like. J Bob says, What's your name? And you're like, I am Goliath or I'm David, Goliath Slayer and and Bob's like, I'm I'm John the blood disciple. I'm like, Who am I? God I'm like, You know, it's like crying, you know, so upset, you know, and you know, just angry. But but I discovered that the devil plays.

The devil's hand always begins, it's like the six D's, the six starts of the devil, but the deception always begins with the seat of doubt. God doesn't approve you. You're not his chosen son. He's got a a whole bunch of other chosen sons. You're not good enough.

You're not gonna measure about and then from there, that's where the dis the dou the doubt leads to discouragement, anti-courage. I'm not going forward with God. I'm gonna do it my own way. And then that discouragement leads to disobedience. I'm gonna

Pornography, whatever, six P's of the world. I'm gonna fill myself with something else. And then we wake up from that disobedience and Satan is there to rub our noses in our sinful poop. And he's like, see, you did it again. He can never forgive you. You're a terrible son. And then that leads to despair.

But God is like, man, all you have to do is just trust. And it's like at Jesus' baptism. I think you guys have talked about this, like when Jesus is baptizing, God the Father says, You are my beloved son, with you I'm well pleased.

We have to pause and ask ourselves, why was God the Father pleased with Jesus? Up to this point, he performed no miracles, nothing astounding. But he didn't raise the dead, he didn't heal the lepers, he didn't feed the multitudes. Why was God the Father pleased with him? For one reason. Because Jesus was his. And Jesus knew that he belonged to the Father, and the Father had his back. And that's why the devil says,

You know, turn these stones into bread. Do this, do that. Jesus says, I don't have to prove myself to anyone, especially you, because I know my identity. I am a s I am the the son of God the Father. And so that to me, that's everything. It's the battle between doubt and trust. Am I a true son of God the Father or am I a slave? Am I a slave to this world and a slave to Satan, a slave to doubt? So they now did me the wound and I gotta give you guys credit.

This was so healing. Um Bob, you said something. You and Jake were talking about forgiveness. It was in your forgiveness series. And Bob, you said forgiveness to have that totality. Sometimes we need to go to the person who has sinned against us and we actually need to bring it out and tell them we forgive them.

And I was like, Oh, my mom? There's no way. I hadn't forgiven her like decade before at least. I'd forgiven her from the heart. But I was like, I could never do that. And one day I was in town by their house. I was running an error and it was a cold winter day. And I'm like, I'm just gonna go over there.

And so it's like the things that you think are gonna bring you the most pain and and and I went in there expecting nothing from them. Nothing. And that's the key. In forgiveness, you can expect nothing from the person who's wounded you. And and in fact I expect nothing from them still to this day. Like things haven't like changed. They don't call me all the time or even call me or, you know, really text me for out of the booth for any reason.

But as one person said to me, they cannot love you in the way that you need. And so when I release that, then I could love them in the way I think they need, in a sense being a gift without being attached to what I get from it. And they feel loved and I feel loved. And then there's tremendous healing in that.

So in your ministry, where have you found things that maybe you experienced, you know, all a lot of the typical things that a man experiences? Like what are some of the things that you notice in men? where men are wounded, you know, what are you finding out there and what are you finding are, you know, are are kind of critical remedies?

um two talks and I after I got done I was in my pew just thanking God, you know, that was over. Usually that's the way it works. Thank God it's over. And uh and you know how you notice when uh you feel that sense when somebody's staring at you? It's like really odd. And so I open my eyes and there's this guy who's scooting down, middle aged guy, maybe his thirty, scooting down toward me. And he got really close and he he kind of looked around and under his breath he said, What you said about

the serpent coming through Eve is so true. He said, When I was fourteen I w I got addicted to pornography. I I didn't think I was hurting anybody, or especially myself. And in fact I thought it was making me a man. And I brought it into my marriage. My wife didn't know. And then then when she couldn't satisfy me, then it was prostitutes and then it was Yeah, prostitutes and AI bots and and then just just and then he said

I'm getting help. And I said, tell me what you're doing. I've got an accountability partner that I meet with twice a week. I go to confession. I go to mass twice a week. I uh I I've cut out social. And then there were, oh, I fast. And he said, but I'm still haunted by it and I still struggle. And I said, what's your relationship with God the Father like?

And that's the big question almost whether it's an affair with the wife or whether their marriage is crumbling or whether workaholic or whether it's struggle with addiction, what's your relation with God the Father like? That's a ten million dollar question. And he said, I don't have one.

I was at a conference with fifteen hundred men uh last a week and a half ago and I asked the men, I said, How many of you have a relation with God the Father and you spend time with him every day? I don't know if I saw a hand in that audience.

This is the Achilles heel of our nation, of our, of our men in our world, of our time, is that we distrust God the Father. We're distant from him because we think he's distant. We're we disapprove of him because we think we're unapproved. And when I asked him that, Wouldn't you know it? It was adopted. And when he tried to make a connection with his parents again, both of them died. And then his his his adopted mom died and he felt abandoned. And so that's why he keeps going back and back to it.

That's why we keep going back to whatever it is, is because we don't sense that the Abba, Abba Father See what's Jesus what I'm sorry, but what's the point of Jesus' incarnation? What's the point about him becoming man? What's the point of him becoming one of us? Is he wants us to have what he has with the Father. He wants his spirit to live in us, his sonship.

so that we have this incredible relationship with Abba Father, so that we can do the things that Christ did, because that glorifies God the Father. He wants us to have that relationship with God the Father. That's the whole purpose of everything. And to the level that we have that, we have everything. And to the level we don't have that, we have nothing. And that's the Achilles heel, that's where I go. I and I never used to go there.

because I wasn't healed in this area. And now this is exactly where I go because this is where I've experienced the most healing and the most strength and the the ability to embrace the little pathetic Devin who fails all the time and just say God, I know you got this, father. It's okay.

So I I love what I just watched there, uh, you know, the beginning and continuing of the redemption of your given name.'Cause I always thought mine like, get rid of it. But the father has very much redeemed Jacob. As well for me.

Heather, right? And and and how that past was brought into your present. And then how you and Heather, though, dealing with the past in the present come to end up healing or helping to heal all these other people, that's Jacob. That's Jacob. Jacob he he he has the past, the present. It kinda plagues him, but at the same time it brings about a great nation. You know, it brings about Heritage, you know, God, God's people. And yeah, that's you. That's you. So it's beautiful.

And there I met our pilgrimage guide, Nancy, who's the interpreter of Father Yoza. And I was saying, I feel like God's got a design in my life, but I don't know what it is. And she said, Are you married? And I said, Yep. And she says, Are you a father? Yes, I have three kids. Go home and be Saint Joseph. And I didn't know who Saint Joseph was. And so I asked Our Lady to reveal Joseph to me, and then I ended up writing a letter to myself called Joseph's Way,

And I shared it with a friend who shared it with a publicist without me knowing. The publicist shared it with Ignatius without me knowing. And then Joseph Way became published by Ignatius. And that was the beginning of the apostolate. But so I believe that the human father the husband, the father, he has a spirituality. Like the Benedictines, the the Carmelites, the Norbatines, they all have a rule of life, a way of life that allows them to God

uses that to allow them to achieve sanctity or give them sanctity or sanctify them. I believe that the human father has a spirituality based off of St. Joseph's four pillars of embracing silence. embracing the woman, embracing child, embracing charitable authority. And by building our life on those foundational pillars, we can begin to live his spirituality

And then we can become hagios. You know, this is God's will for you, your sanctification. That root word in sanctification, the Greek is hagios, which yes, it means holy and sacred, but it actually means different and other. The temple was Hagios in Jerusalem because it was different than any other building. God wants us sons of God to be so different than the world that we're hagios set apart. And so by living St. Joseph's spirituality, I believe that we can become hagio, sanctified, set apart.

and shining lights to this world because I believe that society goes by way of the family and the family goes by way the father. If we want to change the world, that father must be changed to become a father on earth like the father in heaven, like St. Joseph. And all the stats prove this hands down that if we get him, we get his marriage, basically. If we get his marriage, we get the family. If we get the family, we get the parish. If we get the parish, we begin to get the world.

Another one is called The Rule, which uh is kinda like the uh religious order of Saint Joseph's rule of life. Yes. And what I loved in the book is you talked about what it means to be a son. A husband, a father, and a worker. and the battle against each identity. Like like how Satan what what God's call is and then how Satan comes against that and then how that gets resolved. Uh just really loved that. I gave it to my brother Wayne uh as a book.

The one that's coming out. When's it gonna come out? Do you have an idea?

of what I needed as a man and what my wife needed as a woman. And it was affirming of the things that we did right, but it was also really convicting of the places it's like I could rehear our history

in light of, oh man, I missed that one. I I I I didn't give her that in the way that she needed that and you know, she didn't give me this in the way that I needed this and you know, just it so it was both an affirmation of the good, but an exposure of The brokenness and and so I just really strongly recommend it.

And, you know, you're tested to be perfected. A good father tests his son, you know. That's what God the Father did after the baptism of Jesus, is he brought him out to the desert to be tested so that he could become sacrificially perfected in marriage. It has a funny way of perfecting you and testing you, man. And uh but what Kim and I realize is just so beautiful is that

Well we our wires were constantly getting crossed because communication leads to communion. And A we weren't communicating. B when we were communicating, we weren't communicating properly. And what we discovered was The communication first, the communication leads to communion, but what are we communicating? We need to communicate our authentic, God given core needs, which means I have to understand my core needs as a man.

She needs to understand her core needs as a woman and then we communicate those core needs to one another. Then without blame, shame, guilting the other, without accusing the other, in a safe environment, which takes a lot of practice, right? But then after communicating those needs, then we give the other the ability to on their own, creatively address our needs without coercion or manipulation or seduction.

And that's when all the magic happens. And so when I began to address creatively on my own my wife's core needs. And not expecting anything back. And also one other caveat is that I can address them. I can't fulfill her needs. Only God can. But this is the art behind it. By addressing the need that your wife has expressed. She says, wow, he sees me again. He loves me. He notices me. I am important to him. And her love tank in a sense is being filled.

And that's when it comes together. So it's communication of needs, un well, understanding your needs, communicating them, and allowing the other to address them. And that's when the love builds. And so these four needs, his and her complementary needs. You know, obviously not everybody has them perfectly across the board, but it's really a great framework to to work within to be able to begin that process of communication.