Pints With Aquinas - Mother Natalia & Mother Gabriella

Episode Date: September 14, 2022

Matt chats with Mr. Natalia and Mr Gabriella from Christ the Bridegroom Monastery. Learn more: http://www.christthebridegroom.org Mother Natalia's Podcast!: https://whatgodisnot.com Our Thoughts Determine Our Lives Book: https://amzn.to/3QHuUL0 Ask your questions here: https://mattfradd.locals.com/post/2730627/questions-for-these-nuns?aid=4604960 Best rosaries ever: https://catholicwoodworker.com/collections/best-sellers?utm_source=MATTFRADD&utm_medium=YOUTUBE&utm_campaign=sept-22 OUR COMMUNITY Locals: https://mattfradd.locals.com/support Special thanks to all our supporters for your continued support! You don't have to give anything, yet you do. THANK YOU! SPONSORS Hallow: https://hallow.com/matt Exodus90: https://exodus90.com/matt-home/ MERCH PWA Swag: https://shop.pintswithaquinas.com SOCIAL Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/pintswithaquinas Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/mattfradd Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/mattfradd Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mattfradd Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/312eXMI31liKUHSx6U5p1H Parler: https://parler.com/mattfradd Website: https://www.pintswithaquinas.com

G'day, welcome to Pints with Aquinas. Today I'm going to be interviewing Mother Gabriella and Mother Natalia. But before I do that, I want to give away 50 rosaries from the Catholic woodworker. In my opinion, these guys make the best rosaries out there. They're not dainty so that they'll break in your pocket. They're not so huge that, you know, I don't know, you need a backpack to carry around your rosary. They're really great. We want to give 50 of these away. The way you get this is by becoming an annual supporter of ours at matfrad.locals.com. matfrad.locals.com.

First 50 of you who become annual supporters, you will get this rosary for free. All you gotta do is pay shipping. I think it's like a $50 rosary. So that's what we're doing, starting now, go. Also, when you become an annual supporter over at matphred.locals.com, you get a bunch of other free things in return.

So we have a new newspaper called The Jill, which we send out quarterly. We pay for shipping, no matter where in the world you are. We're really excited about this. People who have been receiving it said they also really enjoy it. Also starting next week, we're going to be beginning a seven part video series from Dr. Ed Faizer

on Thomas Aquinas' five proofs for God's existence. And this is only available over at matfrad.locals.com. Dr. Faizer was kind enough to do that just for us. So you get a bunch of free things in return. So go to matfrad.locals.com right now when you become an annual supporter, you get all that stuff. And if you're one of the first 50,

I don't even know if we'll get 50. That's my hope. Maybe over the next few days or week, you will also get that rosary and we'll reach out to you to let you know that you've, you've won it. So thanks so much. Neil's a person too. You know, I love me. I like Neil. I didn't say anything bad about Neil. Now you're getting offended. All the teasing coming this way. Yeah, but now we're on air, so I'm going to be nice.

Well, it's lovely to have Mother Gabriella, Mother Natalia on the show. Why are you laughing? That's funny. Why? Because she said now that we're alive, she's going to be famous. But lovely to have you both. Now, is it necessary that you hold crucifix while you talk? But lovely to have you both in now. Is it necessary that you hold crucifix while you talk?

No, I guess it's not. I ever since my life profession, I have so this is my hand cross that I got at life profession. So I promise this wasn't planned. We weren't like just plain anyway. When I give talks or when I give spiritual direction or things like that, then I usually hold. It's a great idea. The crucifix. I usually hold it in my right hand,

but that's for my coffee today. Very good. I do the same thing, but this is a hand cross that I got from, excuse me, there's an Orthodox monastery in Warren, Ohio, the St. Mary and St. John the beloved, and they sell these like little crucifixes. Someone gave one of those to my son. Was that you?

It was me. At the life profession? Well, it was the day before the life profession because it was his birthday. Yeah. At the time he was like collecting Jesus's. He still is. Did you ever see his chapel in his room? Yeah, he did. He's such a good boy.

Yeah. So do you ever look at a dress in a shop window and think, I wish I could wear that, but I can't. Yes. Do you really? I mean, maybe it's more in my head. I wish I would have worn more formal wear. I really liked less pajamas to the grocery store. I mean, I also miss sweat bands. We could do sweat pants behind closed doors, can't you? Don't you have like cells and things or whatever?

Sure. Is cell a kind of nice name for just like a random room? Like cell sounds really kind of austere. But is it just like a I mean, it probably should be room in a bad. Yes. I mean, it's just the name that it's the name for our for our bedroom. Good. I don't miss wearing dresses. I miss jeans. I loved wearing jeans. I don't miss wearing dresses. I miss jeans.

I loved wearing jeans. I do miss jeans too. So what do you do when you got to work in the garden or work out or? We have these things called cool lots. They're like flowy pant short things that we wear with like a t-shirt and like a head scarf. One of our priest friends says that we put the cool in cool lots. Thanks for the laugh, Neil.

Oh, I'm funny? Yeah, you are funny. That's good. Now I do find them funny. So the exercise habit you were describing. Yes. So we wear that. Is that like a Ukrainian, Russian, something over there word?

I think it's like an 80s term. But like it could be confused for other Russian terms, other Russian terms we use or, you know, things. Mother Gabriella, did you join Mother Theodora when she started the monastery? Were you at the beginning or? I was number three. So Mother Cecilia and Mother Theodora moved in, moved in together in April 2009. And then I moved in two years later in May 2011. Why she's, I don't know why she's laughing. It's hilarious. Did you go to any other monasteries before this?

I visited two other communities because I was Roman Catholic. And so monasteries. Is that how I say it? That's offending you. Is that what that is? No, let's have it out right now. Monasteries.

It's not offensive. It's delightful. How do you say it? Monastery. Oh, yeah. Monastery. Monasteries. Yeah, fair enough. That was fair. So you were Roman Catholic. OK.

Yes, I grew up Roman Catholic. And so when I started discerning, I felt like I need to go visit some of the Roman communities that I was really attracted to. But what happened was I was like Mother Cecilia and I were friends from college. And so she had taken me to lots of Byzantine things. And I started to fall in love with the Byzantine church. And I made a New Year's resolution to do more things Byzantine.

And in the context, in the course of that year, the Lord kind of moved me into discernment. And I realized the more I discerned, the more I hadn't been familiar with the Roman office, and I had been really familiar with the Byzantine office, and that had just kind of started to form my heart at that really like crucial junction of my discernment. So I really enjoyed the Byzantine, or I'm sorry, the Roman communities I went to, but they, I just kept being like, but why I missed 45 minute Vespers? Like, like I missed the, just the richness of our liturgical life. And that's kind of how I knew that my heart was being drawn more to the East than to them.

Even though I enjoyed their fraternal life, I enjoyed lots of things, their service, all those things. But I was just drawn, kept being drawn back to this new monastery that was forming. Can you share, sorry, I just took your role. Can you share, not sorry enough to stop. Can you share what that priest said to you when you were trying to figure out which community you were most serious about? Do you know what I'm talking about?

Yeah, so I had visited, I visited one community, they were passing through Columbus, which was not close to Akron where I lived at the time, but I told them it was totally fine. I was like, yeah, I can totally come to Columbus for dinner, which is like two hours. That's Ohio, right? Yeah, it's like the same. I'm like, yeah, it's totally fine. And so I drove down, it was a crazy, there ended up being like a tornado. We had to have adoration in the basement of this convent.

It was kind of crazy. But on the way home, after we figured out I wouldn't die from a tornado, I called a friend who was a seminarian at the time. And I said, I'm like, I don't know what to do. These sisters are so beautiful, but I don't know. I'm also still drawn to this, like, the Byzantine monastic thing. And he was like, well, when you go to date, you look to the person

who you spend the most time with. And who are you spending the most time with? And I'm like, spend a lot of time at the monastery. And so that I kind of just filed that away as I was continuing. And that was, that was like probably in the middle of my discernment process before the Lord had kind of confirmed that, yes, I was supposed to enter somewhere. Yes, I should like apply. But it was like that reminder that like what we're naturally drawn to is part of the whole discernment process. And so that where I spent my most time, I needed to consider that because that's where I was naturally inclined to go. One thing a friend told me as I was discerning marriage with Cameron was

the Lord isn't going to speak to you in a way that you won't understand. And I think sometimes we feel like there's some code is going to issue that we won't be able to crack and we'll be screwed or something. But I like what you had to say there. Yeah. What you're most drawn to. So you one of the three founding sisters then or the first reason one of the first three. How many of your sisters were Roman? About half. Yeah, probably about half.

And I suppose for most of you, you were kind of being drawn to Byzantine spirituality before joining the monastery. It wasn't like you were Roman, saw the monastery, loved it and then made the switch. I would say there's one that that happened with. Yeah. The latter. I think there's one that the latter happened with. Most of us, it was drawn to the Byzantine.

Like I had already switched rights and everything before I was really discerning with the monastery. So. Yeah, that's more the outlier. And that's kind of what we try to help people do is fall in love with the Eastern Church before. Like you can encounter us, that's beautiful, but you need to go be a part of a parish so that you can actually know what our church is like and know what our liturgical life is like. Because that's what I mean, you're saying yes to us, but

you're also saying yes to this way of life. And that's what I mean, the Eastern Church is very much a way of life when it's lived to its fullest. So. And that sister, that sister would agree with us that we've kind of learned from the process with her to realize that you're right. Coffee with the milk was a bad idea before coming on to exactly what Mother Gabrielle is saying of to have an experience of Eastern spirituality and not just our monastery, because it's, you know, we're like the cool Byzantine monastery that's so unique and so different

and oh, the nuns are so fun and oh, they've been on MaFAD. And so- Who says this? They're so fun, they're so attractive. So, you know. Neil, isn't he so mean? Like, is he allowed to talk to me like that? Like, who's saying that?

So anyways, so, but like the newness and all of that wears off eventually. And then you have to have the foundation, right? And then so you have to really at some point like it's not about the community and it's about really the The life of prayer and the spirituality and when you get down to that like it is a different life of prayer and a different Spirituality than it is in the West and so you have to do the best analogy I share when I'm telling people about the differences, it feels like you're being enculturated into something different.

Like if you lived your whole life in the United States and then you went and lived in Guatemala. It's like it's just a different way of life. I would agree, especially when it's lived, when the Byzantine liturgical life is lived to its fullest, it really is immersive. Like, it's not like. It's not it really can't be lived well just on Sunday.

Like there's a real like rich rhythm between like the daily prayers, but then also the fasting and the feasting. And you can't really have one without the other. Like fasting without feasting is just kind of joyless, but feasting without fasting is just- Gluttonous. It's also joyless in a way, isn't it?

If you're just feasting continually. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. When did you make your final? What do you got life profession? When did you do that? November 8th, 2015. OK, so what's it like when you change from being sister and Natalia or Gabriella to mother, sister or mother, Gabriella and mother?

Natalie, is it is that the biggest point for you all? from being sister, Natalia or Gabriella to mother sister or mother Gabriella and mother Natalia. Is it, is that the biggest point for y'all or is it when she've made your first, what, the tonsure or the first promises or? There are big deals in very different ways because when you're a tonsured, that's when you receive a new name, right? So practically speaking, that's kind of the most difficult transition, I think, for people of like remembering to call you by your new name. But receiving the title sister wasn't so strange because so many people, when you enter the monastery, they start calling you sister right away, not realizing that there's a difference. So being called sister and getting the new name. and getting the new name. But there's really, I experienced the deepest interior change at my life profession more so than my tantra. But I don't know if that's the case across the board,

but that was very much the case for me. Tell me about it. Well, I should have known that would be the question. So there's been a very lived experience of motherhood for me. I know that, like when I would hear people talk about, you know, priests talk about spiritual fatherhood or nuns talk about spiritual motherhood, you know, I was like, I think externally I agreed with them and said I understood, but internally, even sometimes subconsciously, I was just like, that's a load of crap. You know, like they're just saying that to feel better about not having kids. I see, yeah. But it really has been extremely fulfilling and extremely tangible, the motherhood, in ways that I didn't expect.

And it's fulfilling in a different way, right? Of course, like I'm not saying that it's the same experience as biological motherhood. It's definitely a different thing, but there's so much grace. And I just, I remember getting to the point before I made my life profession of feeling confident that this vocation would be fulfilling for me. And I felt like, yes, the Lord has given me the graces that I need and I will be happy in this life. And as you're about to make your profession, about to make my life profession. Is it one of those things where if you left prior to your life profession, that would be no foul. Yeah. And then I made my life profession and it was just like,

I was overwhelmed by how much grace, how much more grace the Lord poured into my life. Like what I thought was a fruitfulness, he was like, oh, that's just the beginning. And it was just a really beautiful experience of the Lord can't be outdone in generosity. And so we give him such little. We think we're giving him a lot, but we're really giving him just such a little amount. And then he just expands it so much, just like he did with the loaves and the fish. And yeah, like that's what he says. You know, I heard a homily recently.

My spiritual father was giving a homily about the multiplication of the loaves and fish and and just how he when Jesus says to the disciples, what do we have? And they say we have nothing. They don't say the number, they say we have nothing. And then when it's followed up, they say, all we have is this. And, and Jesus says, then give them that, you know? But it's like, so frequently, we just think that we have nothing to give and really like, all he's asked,

all he's asking is for this, this little amount. And I feel like that's what happened with my life profession. I felt like I had nothing. And he said, you have a little more than nothing. And then when I gave that, he just like, yeah. Do you find that you have a natural affection for those that you're coming into contact with as your spiritual children?

Oh, very much so, yeah. Or supernatural affection, I suppose. I mean, both. Yeah. We need mothers. We need, we need mothers. We've kind of lost that in the church. Maybe we have the blessed Virgin Mary, but I love that y'all take the title mother. Yeah. And, and it's so, you know, there's, there's such an uproar in the church at points of like, people wanting women to have the same roles as men, but it's like, we're just totally neglecting this role of women and have been for so many years. And what we really need, I think like the devil's really been at work in this, you know, like he's using

this, this desire. He's like fostering this desire in people for sameness instead of, and in doing so he's distracting us and where we're totally neglecting this part of that's like Nobility of motherhood. It's like why would you be a mother and have children and raise them and even homeschool them when you could? Scrape plaque off strangers teeth Today we were literally talking about dentistry Yeah, that's that's fascinating sorry,. Sorry. What was it like for you? It's interesting. So for me, I feel like every step leading up to profession, everything, it was like going from the exterior to the interior for me. Like I had a distinct moment

when I became a docomos, which is our first, first stage of formation. And I remember clearly the first two weeks I was there, I couldn't drive cause I wasn't on the insurance yet. And so I was like, and this is like, you know, your freedom gets taken away. You're at the monastery. You're like, Oh, and so as soon as I got on, I was like, can I, I need to go to the, can I go to the store for something? Like, I mentioned that. And so like drive to something to like, you know, buy some groceries. And so, but I had this distinct memory of like walking through the store

and people like looking at me and I'm like, it's really weird, why are people staring at me? Like I, and I realized like my exterior has changed, but it matches now my interior. Like it's now made manifest. Like I felt more myself at that point. And now other people can see what it is that I already feel. And so and then moving through like to being tonsured for me,

it was very much like the verse that the Lord gave me was song of song, song of songs for 12. You're an enclosed garden, my sister, my bride. And so it was this like coming even more to be His and to be this, which is like to be this closed place for Him. Which is funny because like I'm very extroverted, right? But He wanted to emphasize that like, but that all that has to be fed by us, by our relationship. And then when I moved towards my life profession, I was praying again, because we're able to

put a verse inside of our ring. And I was like, I mean, do I do the same thing again? Do I like, Lord, what is it? And I received somebody sent in an RSVP for our profession, and they had written this St. Francis de Sales quote about each soul being a place that the Lord wants to come and repose as this like spiritual garden. And I was like, all right, okay, you're very clear. Thank you. And so I knew that, so I was like persisting in that. And so that's 412, as long as song is 412 is what's in my ring. And so, and as I was preparing

for my profession, I really was intent. I wanted to prepare myself, not just for the wedding, but for the marriage. And I had focused very much on being his bride. And I think motherhood was like the great gift and surprise, which I think it probably often is for people entering into their vocation, right? That they're even in marriage, like you think about motherhood, but until you are a mother,

you don't really know what that's like. And so in the same way, like preparing for that profession day, I was preparing to be his, his bride while also knowing that like the sacrament or, you know, the profession itself provides the grace to be able to make that happen. But then I was immediately like, I realized so on my profession day, I realized like, oh my gosh, I didn't even prepare myself to receive communion for the first time, like as his. And so I was like, oh, and so as I was like preparing myself during the profession after like between when it happened and then communion, I just

entered into this place. And it was like, I knew after I received the Eucharist that like, we had been like, we had been united and that it was fruitful. And one of the most like important parts for me was when the bishop put, put the ring on my finger, which is something particular to our monastery. We wear a wedding band. And like, I knew myself to be espoused and I knew that that we had been united in that communion and that it was fruitful.

But I didn't think I'd ever see the fruit of that, like kind of in the same way of like, oh, people just talk about that. But then like that same evening, friends of ours. And you were OK with that. I was in that at the time. Yeah, I was like, I was totally OK with not knowing what the fruit.

I like I knew that it was fruitful. Like, and I knew that my life with him was fruitful, regardless of I ever saw it. But the Lord's never outdone in generosity. And so like a few hours later, at the end of the reception, friends came up and asked if I would be the godmother to their son, who they struggled for three years to conceive. And I'm just like weeping and they have no idea why. And I was like, well, I can be a spiritual god because we don't we're not godparents. But but the more I reflected on it, I was like, Lord, like you're never outdone in generosity.

Like immediately you showed me that our union is fruitful. Like I already have a spiritual son who you who you like have conceived in my heart in this very moment. And you've shown him to me immediately. And it was just like just to see that fruitfulness immediately. And it's like only grown since then, right? That was just like the first tangible fruit. But there are so many ways that people are conceived and born from the suffering that we experience in monastic life that we'll never see until heaven. But we trust because of those little fruits that he gives us that we know that it is there. Yeah, because I can't imagine what that's like. I mean, I can see practically as a seminarian

becomes a priest, he's now preparing for a whole lot of external duties, celebrating the sacraments, etc., and also his spiritual fatherhood. But I would imagine, at least from the outside, I would have seen that there's more emphasis placed on the external duties. Whereas for yourself, you know, how do you prepare for something when, correct me if I'm wrong, your day to day life doesn't look much different? Is that right? It's not like you start doing a specific thing once you make your life profession. Yeah, the only thing that changes, practically speaking, in our schedule

is that we're at some point after a period of time, we're allowed to give spiritual direction formally. But that's the only thing that changes, practically speaking, other than being involved in like the synaxis and like certain voting things and stuff. But yeah, the daily life is difficult to fully invest in a sister before she's made her life profession? I'm here in Steubenville, right? And if I get the feeling that someone's here for a year, maybe they tell me that they're here on work. It's like, well, I'm happy to be a friend and I'm happy to help, but I'm not going to invest my life into you because you may leave. What's that like as a as a nun? I don't find I don't find it difficult, I think just because. There's so, so much profound work that happens in someone's heart

at the monastery, regardless of the length of time, you know, even when we've had observers, like we've had women come for a three to six week visit and which is the last stage of discernment before you would choose to apply, like it's the last formal stage of discernment before you would apply. And even with them, it's, I feel pretty invested because I know for myself, I'm sure I've said this on past interviews, but I know for myself that if I had been at the monastery for three years and then discerned out, I wouldn't have felt like it was a waste of time because I just

spent three years learning to live in community, learning to die to myself, learning how to pray, like all of these things that would just form me into being a better spouse and a better mother. And so, in the literal worldly sense, right? And so I guess I feel the same way about women who are discerning with us. Like if they're a year, if they're only at the monastery for a year, but that year is to help them to be a better spouse and mother, then I wanna be invested in that.

Like I just wanna be invested in the goodness of someone's vocation, regardless of whether or not that vocation is with us. I mean, I suppose that the goal, you correct me if I'm wrong, is as a nun, you're supposed to be like in for God and God alone. And there's supposed to be a level of detachment, I imagine, with those who live with you. Sure.

And yet it must bring you a great deal of human comfort, you know, to know that y'all are going to be under the same roof. Mm-hmm. For ever. Yeah, well, that's not always comfort. Maybe that's something that, that has been a struggle for me. Is that, and that's probably why I'm fully invested. Even when people are there for such a short time is because

I'm not good at detachment and the Lord is working on that. But, you know, I've thought before about like, we want our monastery to always be small, so we'll never have more than 15 or 20 nuns at our monastery at any one time. And so once we get enough nuns, which won't be too far in the future, like we'll have to start a second monastery somewhere. And I had never really thought about that. I was just like, oh yeah, that's, that's I was just thinking like, oh, some of the women will go and they'll start this new monastery. But I wasn't thinking about the particular women that I'm already

living with, which clearly it would be some of us because it's not just going to be the one who... The new people. Yeah, exactly. And then once I realized that, I was like, wait, some of the ones here right now are going to go start a monastery across the country. I don't know. I'm not as OK with that. So probably my investment is more so a lack of virtue than. Well, and I think I think it's a both and right. There's a there's also different level.

Like. I was I've been thinking about it as she's been talking like. Yes, there's a there's there's a reservation of your heart because not everyone has access to the garden like. So like someone who comes as an observer isn't going to like I'm not going to like display all the things right. But at the same time, they do deserve as as I think every person does, deserves the fullness of my love, whether or not I share the depths of everything. And so I think

my desire is to be conformed to Christ and be able to be available to anyone who comes to me. Like, I think that's part of our motherhood is to be like, just as I talked about as being a sister, but like this is the invitation that says like, you're welcome here, like you're welcome to come to me. And so that's from the person that we meet at the coffee shop to the person who's coming to live and discern their vocation. Like that's what my desire is.

I fail at that every day because I'm human and still learning how to love and receive love. But that's what my true desire is, is to to offer that and then to offer that place in my heart more and more as they're brought into our communal life as is appropriate. Which I think is I think a large part of it is just learning the process of discernment, like our own personal discernment. I don't mean like discernment of vocations because if we're,

if we're spending our day in prayer, liturgical and private prayer as we should be, then ideally we're learning to be more attentive to the Lord's will. Right. So especially as like brides of Christ, like if Cameron's going to go to the coffee shop and pick something up for you. She knows what you like She doesn't have to call you and say and so similarly like in spending our like day in and day out with the Lord Then ideally we're learning what kind of coffee he likes and so the reason I think that's important beverages are my love language

Was like I just realized something today and I said, what? And she said, beverages are your love language. And I was like, they are. Anyways, so as we're learning what kind of coffee Jesus likes, then that applies to the daily situations. And so what I mean by that is when a woman is at the monastery in whatever stage of discernment she's in, it's not so much, I think, in my mind a matter of like, how much do I share with observers? How much do I share with docomos? How much do I share with racifors?

How much do I, you know, it's like, how much do I share with this person in front of me that the Lord is asking me to share? And so I think it has to be very much a discernment in the moment of what the Lord is asking us to give, because he asks us to give different things and different depths in different areas to different people. You ever read Thomas at campus? Imitation of Christ. Yeah, I think it's the first or second chapter. He talks about how we always keep thinking that holiness is somewhere other than where we are and what we're doing. So he says, you know, the married man, which is he were a priest and the priest wishes he were a monk and the monk wishes he were a hermit and just think of all the good I

could do if only that, you know. But I mean, the fact is that holiness is to be found in our mundane day to day lives. And I wonder what it was like for you thinking of the monastery and like what that might be like. And then you confront reality like it's it's kind of a glorified house in Ohio and like, what was that like? And with everything, you know, it's like, yeah. Well, I mean, once I take the name or once I take the veil, once I do this,

it's like, you know, it's to be found here, not there. Right. I love there was an article that written by a priest from the Diocese of Cleveland that's called The Grass is Brown on both sides. Yes, staying inference, right? Yeah. Thanks Father. Shout out Father Damien.

But like, and I think that that title alone just kind of captures the, there's, yeah, the magicalness, like the magic of it, right, the magic of, you know, being a newlywed, those kind of things, like there's a beauty there and there's a great giftedness to be in community life, but also it does happen again and again every day and you have to say yes every day. And yeah, precisely what you're saying that we think holiness is being someone else, not only being somewhere else, but being someone else. If I could just be like that sister, if I could just look as holy as she looks. Or if I could just sand down these parts of my personality that seem to me to be like embarrassing or an obstacle to holiness as opposed to accepting who I am before our father.

Right. And that's precisely my spiritual father was like, do you realize that, like, if God didn't want you to have one of those imperfections, he could take it away like that. He's like, so like he's actually allowing those to stay for your like, and he loves them. Yeah. My spiritual father once said to me, Matthew, if God wanted you to be Padre Pio, he would have made you Padre Pio. Yeah, precisely. And that's and we spend so much time just trying to be anyone but ourselves. Oh, one. And so as we I think and that's the journey, right? Like just as just say that again, would you? Let's just dwell. Let's dwell here. This is a beautiful place. Yeah, we spend so much time trying to be anyone

but ourselves. And I think that's the great journey. And that's why monastic life's important, right? Like people always ask us like, what do you do? It's like, it's not about what we do, it's about who we are. And so as we journey, like we don't actually understand, like as Christians, how much our individual healing is actually necessary for the whole world. And so, as monastics, we say, I'm going to

go to the monastery and I'm going to conform myself to Christ. And I'm going to trust that even though I have no idea how that affects anything in the whole world, I trust that it is effective because it's united to Him. And I'm going to persist in this in this very small little place and trust that the more that I allow him to make me who he created me to be, and I stop rejecting who he created me to be, that like that's actually the most effective thing I can do. Even more than whatever job I could do and to be a doctor and go all these places, you know, like or to do all these different things, which those are all necessary, but like, that's not what he called me to do. And if I reject what he called me to do, then I'm not,

I'm not pouring forth the grace that I could, um, because that's how I, what I was created to do. I want to take another swipe at this. Why is it that we seek to be anyone other than ourselves? What is that about? Cause we're not just talking about overcoming vice in our life, so as to be more virtuous, we're talking about overcoming vice in our life, so as to be more virtuous. We're talking about something deeper. There's an acceptance of ourselves that is appropriate for a Christian, because I've

been made by the Father who loves me and I'm not an accident. Why is it that you think that we seek to be people other than ourselves? That's interesting. I read, it's reminding me of, um, Father Walter Chisik has a book called, um, well he has, he leadeth me, but there's another book called, um, with God, with God in America actually. Um, and there's a talk, um, he gave to apostolic sisters called Patience with Ourselves. And it talks about how we sometimes wrangle against this. We wrangle against, like, we are here and called to love a God who's intangible, untouchable, all these things outside of us, and we're very human, tangible, like, sensible creatures. And so when we come up against his intangibility and all we can sense as our own weakness,

of course we're going to rebel against that. Of course we're going to, because all we can touch are the ways that we're imperfect. But we were, so what we're called to do is open those places and trust that even though we don't feel it, he fills in those in like he comes and resides in those, those places if we open them to him. But the devil convinces us that we should keep them closed and hidden cause they're, cause they're terrible. But actually those are the places of, of union, those places of struggle with loving ourselves.

What do you think? I think a lot of it comes down as well to our lack of interior peace. So. I think we we trick ourselves into thinking that if the if the externals were different, then I'd be happy. And if the externals were different, then I'd be happy. And if the externals were different, then I'd be at peace.

And whether those externals are a different job, a different vocation, a different living situation, a different friend, a different whatever it is, i.e. being someone other than myself, if those things were different, then my life would be easier and and I would be happier. But. But really, I think that's just indicative of a lack of interior peace. You know, my favorite quote right now is by Saint Seraphim of Sarov, and there's like different variations of it, but something along the lines of acquire interior peace and thousands around you will be saved. And so it's not do the things,

peace and thousands around you will be saved. And so it's not do the things. It's acquire interior peace and thousands around you will be saved. Like what's happening inside of me becoming more unified to the Lord. Like that's what's saving people around me. It's not the things that I'm doing. And so that's why like it's not about the externals, right? Like Father Walter Tisich, who you're talking about, was like in camps for 15 years. Yeah. And and he acquired interior peace. You know, Mother Mother Teresa, Saint Mother Teresa acquired interior peace. Like if if if it's dependent upon the exteriors, then those people don't make sense. And I think that this is a great cause for hope.

And I think this is the difference between what Christians view as hope and what the secular world views as hope. Like, as hope, we have a different definition, because when someone in the world says that they hope for something, what they mean is we're hoping the exteriors are going to change. Like we hope the pandemic is going to end. We hope politics are going to get better. We hope this, we hope that, right? It's all about the future. It's all about something that will change in the future that will make the now better. But the Christian idea of hope, as far as I can understand, is that whatever the suffering is, whatever the exterior is, there's meaning to it. And it has an eternal meaning.

And I think that that's actually a much more joyful idea of hope, because we can't change the externals often, almost ever, you know? And so, why are we going to depend upon the things that we can't change? And the other beautiful thing about it is it's not dependent upon what's happening in the future, like it is in that first idea of hope. Like it means that my life, my interior, my joy can change right now. I don't have to wait until tomorrow when things are different. Like I can be happy now. And I just think that like that's that's. Yeah. I think and to piggyback off what you're saying, as you're saying that it's coming. I realize I wasn't actually fully answering your question,

but I think the reason why we move like we reject ourselves is because of a chadea, because of this, which is the Greek term that means like despondency, like not being in the, we don't want to be in the present moment because it's so uncomfortable, because the place that we meet God is within us right now. And the devil is constantly drawing us like you're talking about hope, like he's trying to, he's trying to move hope to be either something of I need to, I need to fix this thing from the past, or I need to worry about this thing in the future. None of that is being with God right now. And I can only be with God right now in me as I am.

With and from there, I can hope for the things that will change. But like, with and from there I can hope for the things that will change. But like this is where I experienced God. And so that's the devil's greatest place of attack is at the very core of who I am and taking me out of the place where I can actually be in communion. I think the reason I spend so much time trying to be anything other than myself. I'm going to remember this conversation forever, mother, is it comes out of a self-hatred.

And that comes out of a shame. And I think that shame is probably rooted in lies that I believed about myself at an early age. And I don't think I'm unique in this. I think all of us are like this. In Revelation chapter 12 verse 10, Satan is called the accuser of our brethren. And just like the Holy Spirit uses people in our lives to speak His truth to us, even when they're unaware of it, I think that the demonic uses those in our lives

to speak lies to us, even though they're not intending it and they're not aware of it. And if we agree to those falsehoods that are being aimed at us, then I think shame can result, aimed at us, then I think shame can result. And then a deep hatred of our ourselves and this just shame. And so I need to be something other than I am because I'm not lovable as I am. That's why love is such a medicine, because if someone knows me and they love me, I might be wrong.

Yeah. And that's a really lovely thing to think. I remember just having that experience so many times with my wife. Like my wife really knows me. I mean, she sees when I'm good. She sees when I'm chaotic and she loves me. Wow. Like that's beautiful. Yeah. Yeah, that's a great gift of vocation is that you make that yes so that every day you can make that yes to to the person who's before you. And that that's a gift of community in the same way you're talking about Cameron accepting

and loving you in that. That's that's part of what we receive in community is that unconditional yes and love. Can you imagine I imagine just for a moment if my children were kind of neurotic and shame filled and were constantly trying to edit their personalities. And if I had noticed it, I would be so sad. I would want to like get down on the level and say like you are one of my favorite human beings in the world. Please don't be anything other than you are.

And by that I don't mean sin and be selfish because that's not who you are. There's a great thing about kids is that they don't seem to be too worried about changing themselves for others. Yeah. And then we were at the monastery last week and I shared with you that Peter Francis, my youngest, was walking around the room for a solid 10 seconds. I'm like, what are you doing? And he said, I'm trying to look at my face through my eyeballs.

It's like being with drunk people. He was like, correct me if I'm wrong, but it was something like, no matter how hard I look, I can't see it. It's like, you can kind of see my nose. I often think my children are reminding me how to be human because so often we just, we dismiss them, we shut them up. We want to put them away. And that's, we live in a society like that, right? I often think my children are reminding me how to be human because so often we just we dismiss them. We shut them up.

We want to put them away. And that's we live in a society like that, right? Like we don't want kids at these restaurants and please keep them quiet at mass and please just please just don't let them be themselves basically. Like act like an adult is what we're saying to children. Have you ever seen Christopher Robin? I haven't. Oh yeah.

You got tell me about it. It'll make you weep. Yeah. Oh it's so good. It's so good. But anyways, it's a it's Christopher Robin. It's right. The fellow who wrote Winnie the Pooh. Yeah. He's the little boy who is friends with Winnie the Pooh. Oh, I'm sorry. That's A.M. Aline who wrote it. But yeah, thanks. That's how you say the last name. I don't know.

That's OK. Well, that's how I say it. Now how thousands of people are going to think you say it. So the anyways, at one point he's like talking to poo and poo bear and Christopher says something like he's telling Winnie the poo. Oh, basically they're in public. So he's telling he's telling poo to, not act like himself because other people are going to think it's strange if this stuffed animal was talking. Right. And so, um, so Poo says something like,

so you want me to be someone other than me? And what is it? Do you remember what Christopher says? It's like, no, no, no, I want you to be a less exuberant version of yourself. You want me to be less exuberant? It's real cute, but it's also worth watching. Huh? Speaks to what we're talking about. Absolutely. Yeah. It's oh, yes.

There's so many, so many moments in there where it's like Pooh, Pooh is like this very childlike prophetic character who's calling Christopher back to who he really is, not who the world has, like, he's told he's had, like, he went to war and he is trying to, yeah, cut people from his luggage operation in the name of efficiency. And Poo's trying to call him back to who he really is, like this beautiful boy who just delighted in the world around him. And I think that's, yeah, that's very much, when we, what you were saying about,

like we try to shut kids up, it's actually part of, the reason why we're doing that is because we're trying to shut up the kid who's inside of me, who got shut up many years ago and wasn't allowed to just express how they were feeling or to get out, yeah, or to express their delight. Like how many times do we like shut down the delight that we have in something because it's not socially acceptable? I want to, in addition to that movie, which I can't wait to watch with my kids, for bringing it up I want to encourage that people check out this the 2000 film the kid with Bruce Willis yes because this is exactly what you're talking about this he's trying to shut down

the kid within himself and this kid shows up in his life and it's him and there's this one scene where the older Bruce Willis is with this woman who I think he's beginning to fall in love with and the older Bruce Willis is looking at the younger Bruce Willis who's chubby and drinking out of a soda bottle or something watching the movie watching some movie and. The woman says you're adorable he's adorable and Bruce Willis is like he's disgusting and so there's that idea of reconciling ourself to that which We've rejected. Mm-hmm The other the other thing I was thinking of as mother Gabriela was do you want to share something? No, I was just looking that I want to make sure I got the kid movie, right? when mother Gabriela was talking about this this concept of it being about

The interior and and what's happening in our prayer as opposed to just what we're doing. You know, it reminded me very much what you were saying at the, when you're at the monastery, Matt, you were remarking to me about how, when you asked mother Gabriela how, how she's been the past year, because you haven't seen her in a year and you're like, you know, how's,

what's, what's been going on? Let's like catch me up. And and because if you ask me that, I would say, well, Peter's doing this and my wife's doing this and, you know, we just bought a cigar lounge in Steubenville and I've got this person on the show. And then it occurred to me like you probably don't have external things like that to say your life is just kind of in one sense, externally the same. But but then what? But then when you ask that question to Mother Gabriela, like what she shared was what Jesus has been doing in her heart, you know?

And you were just commenting on how that's such a marked difference in asking someone at the monastery versus asking someone in the world, like what's going on in their life is just where your mind first goes to. And I don't think that has to do only with being a monastic. I have friends in the world who would respond in the same way as Mother Gabriella. But I think it's very much a matter of, it's kind of like what the priest said to you at the time seminarian of like, where do you spend your time? Where do you spend the most of your time? You know, like, if that's where we're spending most of our time is just reflecting upon what God is doing in our

lives, which is what all of the Holy Fathers would say, you know, like, spend your day praying the Psalms, reflecting on the goodness of the Lord in your life and in what He's doing in this work of gardening, what He's doing in this work and like communicating with people on email. Like that's not what the Holy Fathers would say, but you know what I mean? And. Then that's just like what's on your mind when someone asks what's going on in your life, you know, and so I think that's what we should all be striving for, regardless of whether or not you're a monastic. And yeah, I think that's right. I think there's levels of intimacy like like you shared earlier, that are appropriate for different relationships.

And so it's kind of it's it's nice to have a bunch of sort of superficial things I can say to somebody who asks who I am or how I'm doing. And then if I can tell that they're serious, then maybe I can get down to the more media stuff. Yeah. But certainly that's true. Like with with profound relationships, I would have with good people like Christopher West or others if they say, well, Sister Miriam James, who I call Mother Miriam because she's my mother and I love her.

How are you doing? I I'd go straight to the to the that stuff. Yeah. This book, I'd like you to talk about it. I love the title. Our thoughts determine our lives by a beautiful orthodox monk by the name of Elder Thaddeus. Elder Thaddeus. Tell us about that book. Vitevnica.

Because I feel in a way that this is getting to some of the things we've already touched upon. Absolutely. This yeah, this book, it's been passed around the monastery. Some of us have been assigned it from spiritual direction. We've been reading at dinner like there's all kinds of. But it's the kinds of, but it's the story of a modern day elder from Serbia, Elder Thaddeus, and kind of his struggles and also his, the first half is like a biography type thing, and the second half are like his

words of wisdom and a lot of it having to do with our thoughts coming out of it, both the monastic tradition but also like the Serbian mentality, Serbian Orthodox Church, but then also his own just spirituality in the way he would counsel people who came to him. But again, lots of it having to do with the things that have the things that we think are very are important and they affect what's happening around us as much as what we actually say and do. It's kind of like a... It's such a beautiful, obvious thing. Mm-hmm. And you think if I spend my whole day just clicking through news like outrage media like as if that doesn't do anything to me. That doesn't

affect how my parent or how I'm married or how I do my job or encounter people, you know. You know, we were talking again at the monastery about how much I love Star Trek and how I think that they're just all of these really profound moral teachings in Star Trek. I don't agree with all of them, but but I think that they at least address some really great issues. And there's one episode in Star Trek Voyager. Have you seen Voyager? No, I haven't seen hardly any Star Trek. Oh, that's so sad. I still love you. So in Voyager, Mother Gabriela hasn't seen many either, but I love her too.

Anyways, in this Voyager episode, there's this particular planet in which the there's the whole penal system is revolves, like people are responsible for their thoughts because it's a telepathic world. And so you're just as culpable for violent thoughts as you are for violent actions. And it seems like really outrageous played out to this extreme. But as you sit with it, you realize that there's a lot of truth to this, right? Like you're saying, there's there's no way that that these things aren't affecting me, that it's coming in. And we clearly believe this because we oftentimes won't allow our children to listen to or to watch these things. So why do we think that it's

affecting them and it's not affecting us, right? Yeah. I like that, cause we say you are what you eat, but you are what you think in a way. Well, and I've even found that in my own life prior to reading this, but I feel even more convicted of it. Like not letting pass through my lips,

things about myself that I wouldn't want someone else to say, or I would like so I someone says something you know I go to apologize for for having done something like oh I'm so sorry I didn't do that email my next response would usually be like I'm the worst you know and it's like I'm not the worst I did something that was not you know like I'm sorry I did that let's move on like I don't need to denigrate myself and realizing how much I'm doing that in here. But at least if I stop it from coming out, I've stopped one step and then before it's like, I need to retrace and get rid of those thought processes

because that's pouring out. Like he talks about in here, like, you can think a thought about your neighbor. It's like you've already punched them. Like, literally, it's, it's as if you've already hurt them without ever having interacted with them. Which Jesus says, like, if you look at a woman with lust, you've already committed adultery. Yeah, it's very from the gospel, but it's just like, we don't think about that. Because I think there's this external part, right? Like, Christian society set, like, well, Christian culture at this point is like, okay, we need to make sure that the outside looks pristine, the outside looks good, right?

Whitewashed tombs. Yeah, exactly. And that's what we become are these whitewashed tombs that look like all the right things, but we're dying inside. We're tombs. Like, we're literally dead because we've allowed this just like real of all kinds of terrible things to be going on inside of us without realizing that it actually affects us. And yeah, in the same way of like not taking those things in. It's like I need to not be thinking these things about myself or about anyone else, because it is a poison that's being poured out.

How does it get, I mean, because at this point I can imagine somebody hearing and saying, well, this just kind of sounds like psychobabble, like how we should be careful with our thoughts and think nice things and that that helps our lives. But clearly it's a lot. I mean, I mean, that could be just because something sounds like, so it doesn't mean it's false. Number one, but number two, like tell us how, how more of what he says. I'm sure he goes a lot deeper than that.

Sure. I mean, like every, he has different chapters on all kinds of different, um, different topics. I mean, like every he has different chapters on all kinds of different. Different topics. The first one was kind of the came up a lot of my retreat. And. I'm trying to see. I like, well, while you're looking for that, I love in the our father, you know, the in Latin Fiat Voluntas to I will be done. And that's something I try to say throughout the day as I encountered difficulties

or disappointments or things I didn't think would happen. You know, I abandoned myself to your will, Lord. And even when things happen that I find like really emotionally overwhelming and don't know how to abandon it, I say to my Lord, I don't know how to abandon it, Lord. So I abandon all of it. I abandon my not being able to abandon it and I give you everything. And this is great line that I like to repeat from Julian of Norwich,

who says all things will be well and all manner of things will be well. And all will be well. I like to remind myself of that. I had this I had a really, really beautiful prayer experience about the the prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane, let this cup pass and not my will but yours be done. Because, you know, when I was on last year, that was last year, yeah, it was like right before my life profession, it was a few weeks before. And by that point, my life profession had been delayed a year and a half because of COVID. And by that point, my life profession had been delayed a year and a half because of COVID, right?

And there were multiple, like, deaths in that year and a half of the delays, like every time that was really painful, but then also just the other things that had to happen because of the delays are like things that had to change in the service because there were still certain precautions because of COVID and things like that. And, um, and with each of those, it was like this whole process of having to die, um, to it and like then accepting it and then eventually embracing it. But it's like, you would think that I would learn that cycle quicker, but I had to go through it every time. But the, there was one time in particular,

I think it was on, um, I think it was around the time that my life profession was supposed to be, which was in May of 2020. And it was Mother's Day. My life profession was supposed to be on Mother's Day. And so like as that day passed, and I knew that this was just like another Mother's Day in which I was still not called mother.

And I was having to abandon that. I was trying to battle between like, you know, we talk about dispassion and we talk about, um, like, um, apotheia and all of these things in the East. And, but like I still have these feelings. And so what do I do with them when I have them? And, um, I decided to pray with the prayer in the garden of Gethsemane because I'm like, this is what I have to do.

I have to say not my will, but yours be done. And like, I want my life profession now. But if that's not your will, then then your will be done. And when I went to pray with that, I like I couldn't even say the words. And I was like, Jesus, I don't even I don't even believe this. Like, I want to believe this. I want to mean these words, but I can't even say it. And his response was, then let me say it for you.

And so I knelt with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and allowed him to pray the prayer that I couldn't pray. And he wept with me because when we have to go through suffering and we have to go through pain, Jesus weeps with us. He doesn't want us to suffer for the sake of suffering. And like, the delay of the profession was because of COVID, right? Which is just an objective evil. It's not like, like, it was something that the Lord allowed to happen, but it wasn't something that He actively desired. And so, I realized that there's something about like in kneeling in the garden with him and praying with him and allowing him to say the words that I couldn't in weeping with him.

There's something about like our tears together falling onto the soil. And like that's what makes the soil fruitful. And yeah, so that's just the- Thank you. That's my, I will be done, but- That's beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. What'd you find in the book?

There's so many, I was having trouble because there's so many good things, but this one I think is a good, it's two short paragraphs. He says, our starting point is always wrong. Instead of beginning with ourselves, we always want to change others first and ourselves last. If everyone were to begin first with themselves, then there would be peace all around. St. John Christam said that no one can

harm the man who does not injure himself, not even the devil. You see, we are the sole architects of our future. And then he goes on to say, by his thoughts, man often disturbs the order of creation. That is how the first people were destroyed in a flood because of their evil thoughts and intentions. This is true even today. Our thoughts are evil and therefore we do not bear good fruit. We must change. Each individual must change. But it is unfortunate that we do not have examples to guide us either in our families or in society. And I think it's, yeah, it's, it's not addressing what you're saying. It just sounds like new age, whatever. But the thing is that he connects all of it with the cross and all of

it with this, the self emptying to be filled by Christ. And so like, we don't, that's the difference between like a new age spirituality that just says, I empty myself to be empty. It's like, no, we go through kenosis so that we can have more of Christ, so that we can be more of Christ in the world and more united to Him. First for our own salvation, and then so that that, like, overflows to others. St. Bernard of Clairvaux in one of his sermons on the Song of Songs talks about being like a cistern versus a canal, right? So overflowing, allowing ourselves to be fully filled with the Lord and then overflowing rather than just being this canal that passes things through. And I think that's kind of a lot of what he's talking about is this like getting down deeper and deeper into the very place inside of us

where we allow so much to happen and so much. And that, I mean, it's really going back to the Garden of Eden, right? Like Eve allowed her thoughts to turn from the Lord into dialogue with the devil. Like that's where that first pride started, right? Was in this conversation that began in her thoughts that then led to action. And so Christ had to come and re-enter that situation. And so to the extent that we enter into his self-emptying on the cross and allow those things to be purified from the inside out, because that's where the Kingdom of Heaven dwells is within us.

I'm thinking of two verses from scripture. The one is from James that says that the tongue is a tiny member and he also compares it to a rudder which steers the whole ship. And I'm also thinking of our Lord's words where he says, out of the heart, out of the fullness of the heart, the mouth speaks. And in a way, those kind of sound like they're in conflict. Is it the tongue that leads the person or is it out of the depths of the person that the tongue speaks? And in a way, I wonder if it's both. And sometimes, as you said,

if I can't change my thoughts, I can at least change my speech. And I found that in marriage, that if I find myself complaining about my kids, I'll just get into this rot of, oh gosh, I'm always picking up after you. Maybe we've had experiences from our past where our parents said things like that to us, but that really does affect like your thoughts and it affects how you relate to your children. Um, one thing I've just been saying more and more, not because it's difficult to say, but it's also true is just like, I love my kids. Like my kids are terrific.

I'm so grateful to God for my wife and my job. And like, I do think these things. And if you ask me, are you thankful for them? I would say yes. But I'm trying to do a better job at like just verbalizing it. And I think that that affects how I then relate to my wife and my kids, too. And I think that like you were saying that just just because it sounds like psychobabble doesn't mean that it needs to be discounted because like the Lord also like God made us with a certain

psychology. Right. And so it's not like just because, um, it's a psychological thing that means that it doesn't apply. And, you know, I'm thinking of a study that was done where, um, everyone was made to, to have on headphones and listen to this talk. And some percentage of the people were told to move their head up and down as they listened to the talk. And then the others were told to move their head side to side as they listened to the talk. And then when they asked people afterwards, when they surveyed them to find out whether or not they agreed with what was being said on the talk, those who are moving their head up and down,

it was like an outrageous difference of how much more agreeable they were with. And so there is something of like our bodies and the way that we use our bodies, the way that we use our thoughts, like all of these things matter because we're not. We're not pure souls, right? Like that's heresy, actually. Like we have a body and a soul. We have mind and heart and all of these things. And like they all matter. Yeah. Amen.

Yeah, that's really interesting. I've also heard that if someone's feeling sad, there's been, I don't know if it was a study or if it was just a kind of anecdotal thing where if people made themselves smile, they would actually feel happier. Yeah, our body is equally a part of who we are. Right. You know, yeah.

Well, and I think that's the beauty of like the desert fathers, right? Like a vagary and the eight evil thoughts, right? Like, yes, we, they understood way before modern psychology, the psychology of the human person in a much more rudimentary way, but like the seed, like they were far advanced for, for the time, for how he developed the evil thoughts and how, and the things that afflict someone who's entering into that very intense Christian life, especially in the desert.

But like, it's not like that only applied to them and doesn't apply to us. In fact, it informs how, it needs to be translated, but it also informs how our psychology works now. And given that we are in a spiritual battle, you think, okay, well, what would Satan have to do to us for us to abandon hope, to abandon our Christian faith, right? And like you said earlier, it's not our externals, because if that were the case, then people like Mother Teresa and others wouldn't make any sense. You know, like if the Lord allowed my family to die and my job to be taken away and for me to be destitute. And yet throughout that entire- Changed your name to Job.

Changed my name to Job. I had to sit on a dung hill. If throughout that time I believed in His goodness and His plan for me, like I would not resist. It's in the thoughts because you could have a beautiful wife and a job and a family and become hateful. It's like Satan has to have us believe, like he had Eve believe, that God is holding out on us, that he's not for our good, you know.

I was reading The Hobbit to my kids the other night and there's towards the end, I don't know if you've ever read it, where Smaug is talking to Bilbo and he's placing doubts in Bilbo's mind about the dwarves' intentions toward him. You know, well, where are the wheelbarrows? How are you going to get all this gold out? Surely they don't plan on giving you anything and he feels very uncomfortable as he goes back to the dwarves and his distrust has been planted in his heart. And that's what it seems to me that the enemy has to do to us in relation to God and others. Do you remember how much have you read for book clubs so far?

Okay. Well, shame, shame club. It was, I wasn't shaming you. There's something that Schmemann, father Alexander Schmemann says in for the life of the world. And he's talking about the sin of Eve in particular and he says something along the lines of like it wasn't a sin of disobedience primarily, like that wasn't what made it such a big deal, that it was a sin of desiring something other than and above the Lord or something like that, but like it was much more about the thought than the action, Right. Like it was was his point. Yeah. So. Yeah.

I love a vagary as of Pontus is talking back is for those at home who are watching he. Well, do you want to tell us about it? Or I felt well. So it's a collection of scripture scriptures that he pairs with thoughts that would have afflicted monks in the desert, especially under the headings of the eight evil thoughts that he outlined. And they're so specific. Yes, they're oddly specific.

You're like, this man has clearly lived in community. Yeah, there's even lines like, you know, when the demon of lust says that you need to be talking with this woman for her spiritual benefit or something like that, then you say, and it's always a scriptural response. But the one I think of to say out loud, because I'm not great at memorizing all those things, is there is a way that seems right to man and in the end leads to death from Sirac or something, I forget. or something, I forget. But that's a great line for any temptation, because I feel like in order to give into a temptation, it often very much feels like just a warm bath, just like warm water rolling over you and you're sleepily kind of consenting to this thing

that in the moment just seems like a really great idea. So I like that line. There's a way that seems right to man, in the end leads to death. It's a fascinating book. The Antoretikos is what it's called. And it's fascinating, though, because for

me, a lot of the a lot of the scriptures that he used. By the way, that's what I was looking up when you were talking about. OK, I was like what Kashin says, who is a disciple of Avogadrius, what Kashin says about the eight evil thoughts and

specifically about Acadia. But it was just interesting. But the in the Antoretikos, I feel like a lot of the scripture he uses, sometimes I would read it and be like, that's a stretch, you know? I'm like, that's kind of, that's taken that particular verse way out of context. And so, it was somewhat helpful for me to have the scripture to combat the thoughts, but what I found so much more helpful about that book, and I would give this, um, kind of as the disclaimer in case anyone listening to this then reads the book is like what I found even more

helpful was simply naming the thoughts. Uh, because there were, there were plenty of things that I read in there that I was like, I didn't even realize this was the devil working against me. Like I thought that this was just, I don't know, I thought that this was just normal life and this was just, and then when I read it, I was like, wow, that's absolutely the evil one. And so to be able to articulate those things, um, because whenever we're able to name something or shed light on something, we have power over it. Right. And so that's what I found most helpful about it.

Um, very similar to, uh similar to screw tape letters, right? Oh, yeah. CS Lewis, like you're reading screw tape letters and you're like, I don't understand how CS Lewis knows exactly how the devil works in my life. And then it's like, oh, because he's not very original. He just does the same thing for everyone because we're fools and it works on all of us. And or every Michael D. O'Brien novel. Every Michael D. O'Brien.

Like, how does he know how I pray? How does he know what the Michael D. O'Brien novel every Michael D. O'Brien. Like, how does he know how I pray? How does he know what Michael D. O'Brien? Thank you. Seriously, Michael O'Brien, if you're listening to this and you ever want to come visit our monastery, you would just make the life of seven monastics. Here's an example of his icons that he writes are beautiful. Most kind of modern attempts on art, I just find a little banal, but his are exceptional.

They're so moving. Yeah, they're beautiful. Yeah, I did ask him to be on the show. I'm not sure if he travels anymore. Well, I mean, oftentimes people who don't travel still need to go on retreat. And that's right. Yeah. Do you hear that? Michael O'Brien? I can hook you up if you come on my show That's not what I meant. I mean you could just come on retreat at my monastery

No, no, he has to be on my show Ross. He's not allowed to go to your monastery. Yes. That's the deal we're coming up with How it works very good. Oh Yeah, yeah, I mean Oh, people paid us questions. So make sure your answers are good, depending on how much they paid is how good your answer ought to be. Just real quick. So we're going to take. Don't actually announce the amount that they paid. We can. They're so kind to do that.

There's just so many people in the chat. Right. So talking about shaming people. Like right now, we have like six hundred and sixty seven people watching. How do you feel? You feel mother? What did I say before we started? Do not tell me how many people. But that's a great shot of you.

I mean, that that's your icon right there. Yeah, we're going to take we'll take questions. If you are a supporter on locals, click the link in the description and send your questions in that way. Otherwise, we'll take questions from Super Chatters. Yeah, but go for it, Neil. Yeah, I mean, they're not really questions. I'm gonna have to talk loud too,

because my mic's not set up. So Jordan Christman says, as an Anglican who loves Eastern Christianity, I'd love to offer this as buying you beautiful people a virtual coffee. So the coffee is on Jordan today. See, I already bought you ladies a coffee. You're getting nothing else.

You donated like, well, it was $10. She donated 10 bucks. What a kind man. Symbolically paid for you guys' coffee. We covered our coffee. That's very sweet. Thank you, Jordan. Thank you, Jordan.

It is beverages are my love language. You must have known. And then we have Gwendolyn Husseretti says, y'all are amazing. Thanks so much for doing the Lord's work. Please, if you can pray for my husband, he had surgery today. Yeah. Did she give a name?

No, she did not. Gwendolyn's husband. We will pray for Gwendolyn's husband. That's a great name by the way, Gwendolyn. I like it. It sounds like something from Lord of the Rings. Yes. Gwendolyn. Lady Gwendolyn's husband. That's a great name, by the way, Gwendolyn. I like it. It sounds like something from Lord of the Rings. Yes. Gwendolyn.

Lady Gwendolyn. Also, I want to say thanks because later she says that they are supporting on locals. Oh, gosh. So hopefully they get one of the Roshans. I don't know if you know this, but people who support us on locals tend to be more attractive and intelligent

than those who don't. It's a true story. This next question comes from local supporter Al Fenner. She says, I would love to hear more about Knossos. And then she said, these are two of the most beautiful women. I think she was referring to you. Of course she was. I was going to say something referring to you in your little. I thought you were going to do that in our talk. It's just, I'm so disappointed. You forgot your veil, Matt. Yeah. I didn't think of this ahead of time. You know referring to you in your law

Yeah, I didn't think of this ahead of time I don't know if people saw that post if you go to the community section and YouTube or check out Instagram or wherever I YouTube YouTube YouTube People said look like Beavis and butthead, do you ever watch that? I thought it when I saw yeah, yeah, I didn't think about I didn't see it. But now I do I'm sorry. Well, I didn't think about that. I didn't see it, but now I do. I'm sorry. Let me try that again. What I was shocked about. Yeah, let's start again. I cannot have that in the stream. That's the that's the bad thing about doing it live is how many people watched Beavis and

Butthead because there was like eight thousand comments and all of them were like, I need Teepee for my whatever. I didn't realize how many people watched it. Um, mother. Gabriela. What would you like say about Knows this? Wow, did you see that bus just right drive? Was that a bus or was that a really smooth train? You were the one who said Knows this and I almost interrupted at that point and said Can you explain what Knows this is and I didn't and now I'm doing and now're on Beavis and Butthead and it's because you didn't intervene earlier. So we're trying to salvage this. Kenosis, what is it? Kenosis.

Kenosis. So kenosis is the Greek term for self emptying. And what would you say is the greatest image of this? Would be the cross. The cross, the crucifix. So Jesus on the cross, this great. Why, why is it? As soon as you answer clearly have.

John. You threw me a bass, John, the Baptist. I think, you know, I must decrease so he may increase. John, 330. I must decrease. Yes, increase. Mm hmm. John 3 30. I must decrease. Yes, you said that right. I thought I swapped it and I was like, that's my Freudian slip. Yeah.

So anyways, the point, the concept of kenosis, it's this again, the Greek word for self emptying and it just means to to empty ourselves of any part of us that is not Christ in order to fill us with Christ. That's the, those who have been baptized in Christ are clothed in Christ and so on and so forth. And it's part, it's often talked about, I think with like theosis, which is like our journey in becoming more God-like, Christ-like. And so we have to be emptied in order to be filled is the point. And that's a lot. That's the point of our eschesis is to empty ourselves of your what? Eschesis. So like, we're practice of asceticism. Yeah, practice of asceticism. Sorry, I'm using words. That's okay. Let me just throw around inside terms. Yep. Very good. Well, Heidi says, amazing

interview. Thank you. Question in the West. It doesn't seem like the church. Has maintained a particular place for widows to serve in a vocation. Does the East have more of a place for widows to serve in a more formal or even informal sense? What does the East teach about the role of older women who no longer have a husband and whose children, if they are blessed to have any, are grown and busy with their own families. You know, I do know. Do you have any immediate thoughts? OK, I do know some older women who are working towards having some sort of like. Lay association, not anything vowed or anything like that, but just like for for women in general, but particularly widows who, um,

who want to have some sort of like association with monasteries. Um, and I don't think that that's formalized yet, but I don't know if. The only thing that was coming to mind for me, um, and it's, it's a both and, um, I have, one of my spiritual daughters has a ministry called Hope's Garden, which is for people who are suffering from like betrayal trauma and like different tragedies in marriage. But through that they have a couple of different levels to the ministry, but one of them is a consecration to Christ the Bridegroom.

Oh yes, I've heard of this. And so that's one thing, I mean, and that's not just for people, not just for widows, but I think it's a beautiful ministry that they have, and they have classes on like the Song of Songs, learning more about, yeah, learning more about the Song of Songs and loving Christ as our bridegroom. And they actually just recently had some betrothal promises and also private vows of spiritual marriage that they're kind of like working on that through what they call the sisterhood of Mary the mystical rose.

Hope I said that right. But you can find them at Hope's Garden. But that's the first thing that kind of came to mind. Not that many people are listening, so if you said it wrong, it's okay. I think that there's also something thing that kind of came to mind. Not that many people are listening, so if you said it wrong, it's okay. I think that there's also something that this isn't particular to widows. I just think it's something for each person to consider, especially lay people. But when I was at my parish in Denver before I entered the monastery, my pastor there did something that I thought was really brilliant.

When he gave one of his talks about tithing and almsgiving. He mentioned that our almsgiving is supposed to be about time, treasure, and talent, right? It's not just we usually think of almsgiving as giving money, but there's also the time and the talent. So he he made an announcement to the parish about this and asked all of us to to like submit any quote unquote talents that we felt we could contribute to the parish. So that's a bit of a whole pair. I'm a great painter. Yeah. I mean, you're really like the parish had this.

The parish had this this list of all of these things. And so, for instance, like I said, I was a college student at the time. Right. And I'm like, I I'm a broke college student. I don't have like money really to offer to the parish. But but I could tutor any kids in the parish in math or science and and do that for free. And like tutoring is a really expensive thing. And so we just had kind of this like collaborative thing

that happened in our parish where like the person who does plumbing can come do some work for free. And I tutored kids from the parish for free. And so that's something I would consider people, you know, to get creative with what your parish could maybe use from you or your community and talk to your pastor about that. I don't mean just like go to the parish and say, I'm doing this. I imagine if you approach your pastor with an idea of something you can do

that he doesn't have to, he'll love you for it. And I would encourage like priest who are listening to do something like this. And you're like, you know, I like that. But I imagine like it, the idea of just accepting anybody into religious life at an older age. I can see why a lot of religious orders have cut off ages because it feels like we're a little bit like cement and once we've set, it's really difficult to.

Yeah, it's harder once you reach a certain age just because of where, yeah, we're much more pliable the younger we are and able to kind of adapt. And that's just, that's a human nature. I mean, we saw this. He was doing like back flips in our living room. So much more pliable. So much more pliable. Way more.

Yeah. Yeah. Have you ever read In This House of Breed? Rumor got it. In this house. Is that rumor gotten? In this house of breed, B-R-E-D-E. No.

It's a story about a- A Benedictine monastery in England. Yeah, but a woman who has entered after already having like a full career. And it's a really, really beautiful, beautiful novel. But you see this, like you see just the struggle of having to. Yeah, I know someone actually who she's single, but she lives intentionally with a roommate, even though she could afford not to because she's single and she's in her thirties, but she's like, I don't want to just become comfortable. I don't want to just become like unable to adapt to the people

around me and just like have my own way in my own house and things like that, because that's what happens as we like like we get set in our ways. What do you think is some of the most common or what in your experience the most common misconceptions people have nuns about nuns when you encounter them and they talk to you? What is it that you like? You don't understand this. So many. I know. Like I would imagine one to kind of get you started. And I think this would be helpful to young women who might be watching.

This is like in order to be a nun, like you have to have a really pure past and you kind of sin certainly not sexually that sort of thing Yeah, that's definitely one of them and in fact like to to amplify that even um like that we don't even have like Attraction to men or that we don't want that's a question. I mean I talked a lot about that on our first interview I'm sure but like that's a question that we often get at the end of talks, especially with teenagers. They're like, why didn't you want to get married? Or why don't you want kids? And it's like, well, absolutely, we want those things. Yeah, still do. You know, I really, I really like to emphasize that the like the call to celibacy, you know, I heard a priest give a homily one time about how he really believes

that we all have, this could get broken, this could get disordered, so I want to give that nuance first, but like we all have a natural call to marriage and that some have a supernatural call to celibacy. So it's not that the call to celibacy replaces the call to marriage. I think it transcends it. And so I think that's a common misconception as well. It's like, if I'm not, if I'm attracted to men, then I'm clearly not called to be a nun. Yeah. Yeah. Well, vice versa for the young men out there who are descending priests. So I'm attracted to women and I want to have kids like, good. If you weren't, you shouldn't be a priest.

Right. Yeah, precisely. I think that we like stop being a person, like that we assume some kind of like holy personality. And like, I no longer have likes and dislikes and I just kind of. Oh, my gosh. Now, did you have that thought about yourself or was there a sense in which you thought you would have to become less like you in order to be a good nun?

I mean, we've already talked about this, right? I think so. I think there was a sense of like. Because one of the just real quick, one of the things I love about your monastery is just how individual each of you all are like you all are so beautiful. And each of you are so different. And I knew you two and I knew I liked you all. And then I showed up at the monastery and who is that beautiful sister

who has the braces? What's her name? Mother Eliana. I love that woman. She's like really funny. Even though she's a woman, even though she's a woman. That's really funny. Like that. Yeah. Quoting Princess Bride and oh, my gosh. But I love how unique each of you are.

Yeah. And I think I think the evil one attacks that more than I. It's like the suggestion that I need to be like sister so-and-so or mother so-and-so or like, don't you see? I absolutely have fought, I mean, I'm constantly fighting that, but that was a temptation early on is that I need to be more like this other person in the community than myself because she seems holier and people want to have holy conversations with her and all they want

to do is laugh with me. So that, and laughing is clearly unholy. And so therefore I should get that get rid of that. I love how honest that you are. Thank you. That's so helpful. Yeah. Yeah. I've got the question I asked. Oh, yeah.

How individual you are. So and but I think misconceptions was. Yeah. Misconceptions like what some other misconceived. I would have just people in the world when you're walking through the airport or going to a coffee shop like what kind of I guess a lot of them probably like what are you yeah oh yeah Muslims are you a human being what are you a rude human being yeah do they really start speaking to an Arabic I've had that happen a couple that's amazing. I'd like some water

It's usually like a gas station. Sorry, and when you wear a mask or back when we had oh my gosh Oh, did you wear a black mask? Did you look like a ninja? Oh, absolutely look so cool Yeah, and then you'd have to put the mask on and then the head thing on I think that's what's called the head thing The head thing those Typically what we do with the at least this is what I would do, is I'd put the mask here and then I'd put this hand under and grab the mask and put it over my ear. Where would you put your samurai sword?

Just next to the truck. Nice, nice. Actually, it's really, it is beautiful. We've encountered people who thank us for our modesty, like Muslims who will. That man at the airport. It was like, thank you. Thank you. You are so beautiful. We've encountered people who thank us for our modesty, like Muslims who will... That man at the airport. It was like, thank you. Thank you. You are so beautiful. Like, thank you for dressing so modestly. And it was just, that was really, that was just a beautiful encounter. It was a Muslim man at the...

Security at the airport. He was like working the security or something and he called us aside and he just said, he was like, too many people today have forgotten that modesty is a beautiful thing and you women are so beautiful. It really is. Yeah. It was very touching. Yeah. And do you think he thought you were Muslim or that?

No, he didn't know. No. Yeah, I think I think he knew. Yeah. Trying to think if there's anything else that jumps. Do you ever feel self-conscious in public, like you just would rather be wearing something that people didn't have to stare at you. Mostly when people get up and need to make a panorama of the whole room when you walk in. Oh, yeah. Like, there was one time. It's like, oh, I'm just going to I'm just going to take a panorama.

We were. And they just. Have you ever done this where you pretend you want to take a photo, but you don't want them to know, so you pretend you're texting, but you end up texting like this. Yeah. Literally, we were on an airplane one time in the sky, just like, from the top.

From the sea in front of us. Come on. So we just see the phone come up. At least try harder. Man, tell us about how you met that bike again. No. No. No.

No. No. Well. So we were going, we were going kayaking. I'm sorry. We were going kayaking for my birthday. And the fact that none's kayak. Yeah.

Something that surprises people. That's how I bet it does. That we go running. Yeah. Yeah. Physical fitness, those kinds of things. That some of us like to climb trees. Weightlifting.

But so we were going kayaking, a couple of us, and two of us were in coolouts, so the workout habit too were in habits, and we show up at this place near, not like, probably like eight minutes from us, and it's- That was an oddly specific number. Probably approximately eight minutes. But it's like right on route 422. And again, nobody knows where that is. It's fine. Move on, MG.

So great. So it's like next to the. Anyways, we show up. We're trying to. You know, it's next to the. Oh, stop. Go. You can do this. I believe we can get through this. So we're. I'm renting the kayak.

You're renting the kayak. Mother Natalia notices that these guys behind the kayak rental place are staring at us, trying to take clandestine photos, as we just mentioned. And so she just yells, do you guys want to take a picture with us? And half the group goes, yeah. And the other half goes, no.

And so we run around and take a picture with us and half the group goes, yeah. And the other half goes, no. And so we run around and take a picture with them and- Shout out to the Grey Riders. Yeah. Shout out to the Grey Riders. Did you get to sit on their Harleys or something? Yeah. They asked us to sit on their Harleys and yeah, it was just a delightful experience. And mother Petra was talking to one of them and he just says, today the church came to us. And that was just like a really powerful line. He said that?

Yeah. It was. It was, yeah. So it was like a really, really beautiful experience because then we like exchanged information and they ended up reaching out to us and they were like, we want you to come to our picnic. And so they're called the gray riders because you have to be over 50 to be. And so, so I think it was mother Petra, Mother Ileana and myself. No just you and Mother Ileana. Just Mother Ileana and I. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

So we go to their picnic that they have like the next year, like we stay in contact over a year. They like did a fundraiser and sent in some money to the monastery and all of it from this one encounter, right? And we're at the picnic and they show us, they're like, look what we had made last year. And they pull out this blanket, which you maybe saw anyways, they pull out this blanket and it's pictures of us with them like on their bikes and the group photo and all of this.

And like they made it into a blanket with the center square saying, family is everything. And they were like, you became our family that day and then and then mother Ileana Just goes like Blanket and she's like it's so wonderful and then George the leader of the great writers It says hold on a second and then they back up and they get into a huddle and then he turns around he says We want to give you the blanket And then he turns around and he says, we want to give you the blanket. And so they give us this blanket. So it's on our couch at the monastery.

And then maybe a year after that, they reach out to us because one of them, he and his wife were in a motorcycle accident and he, Jeff, eternal memory, pray for their oppose of the soul of Jeff. He died. And she was in the hospital for months. And so we were praying for them, but we also like went and visited her in the hospital a few times and were able to just. So it's like all from this chance encounter at like while we were kayaking. Right. So that's amazing. No, it's a beautiful story. I'm glad you told it like that. Yeah. It's almost like we you know, we have this temptation to kind of sanitize our personalities and shave off all the bits we don't like. But then what you're left with is something that's very unappealing and which wouldn't have

moved these bikers so much and it wouldn't have moved me and my family, you know, I don't know what it is about the Byzantines. Is that because I'm thinking of the the fellas in Wisconsin. Yeah, they're the best. They're quite. Shout out to holy resurrection. Y'all like, I don't know. Is it? Is it? Is it something to do with your spirituality that just seems to make you really, really

human in the most beautiful way? Like even the way the brothers kind of make fun of the Abbott, the poor old Abbott, the Aussie, Jesus Christ pray for his wonderful accent. And I love how you're imitating. I know. I know. The Australian. Lord Jesus Christ. Yeah, but there's just something so human about that. Do you hear him do it at the monastery? Can you just do the whole Jesus prayer? Because you have his cadence down. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. I don't know. This is the Abbot I'm talking about.

What a man. But he's so playful and. So but then have you encountered other kind of Byzantine communities in the United States where it's not like that? That's a good I don't I don't think so. Like, I've also been to holy transfiguration in California. I haven't been there. We're all quirky.

Yeah, yeah, I think that's there. We're all quirky. Yeah, I think that's a holy quirkiness. And Father Damien is wonderful. He's an iconographer. But again, yeah, a collection. We're a collection of individuals, but communal. If you've met one, you've met one. That's what it's like. Yeah. But it's very much one. You've met one. Yeah. Yeah. But it's very much like people experience our community and they see what you're what you're seeing of just like we're so individual. But there is like a unified spirit and I don't know how to describe it. So there is. And part of that, I think, might just come from the difference in formation. And also, it also does feel like it's tied to your.

What do you call her? Not the mother superior. What do you mean? Hegumenna. Hegumenna. Is that right? It feels like it's tied to her. It is. She's the mother. She's the mother. She's been adamant since the beginning of the monastery that she like, she is not about cookie cutter nuns.

Praise God, like neither of us would be there. Absolutely. What I loved the other day is when we went to the monastery, I said, she mentioned wine and said, well's Wednesday or Friday I forget. Friday so we don't have we don't have wine today and unless I mean unless you unless you would like it I get would you should be I don't she got it and I said okay I don't I mean yeah if you want and then I said well if you're if you're asking I said and then I said actually we have some wine in the car.

Let me bring it in. She went, you found the secret. If you bring us wine, we have to drink it. She was so lovely. Charity above piety. You know, honest to God, I think that people could save a ton of money on therapy and just allow that woman to hug you for five minutes. I mean, she is so beautiful. I love her. Yeah. Good. All right. This feels like a good time to take a break. Great. And then we're going to come back and we're going to take some more

questions. So if you're watching right now, send us a super chat if you want to make sure we answer your question. Only nice things. Please don't say any mean things. We won't read them and you waste your money and you're pouring out poison. Yeah. And who would that too? But who would pay money? Be like, hey, I just want to let you know that you suck. OK, well, thanks for your five dollars.

Put that towards therapy or click the link in the description, ask a question on locals. Be sure to like this video if you're really enjoying it. Help us out by sharing it on Facebook. Let's take that break. All right. So before we go back to the interview, I want to tell you about two of our sponsors that are really amazing. The first is HelloHallow.com. Click the link in the description to head over there.

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So you can try it out for three months to decide whether or not you think it's worth investing in I have it My wife has it we sometimes play stories for our children at night as they go to sleep. It's really great Hello.com slash Matt check them out. You have a you have a is it a sleep? I do have a sleep story. I Don't ever listen to myself though. So you've never listened to it to try to fall asleep? Never, it would just terrify me. Also, I wanna tell people about Exodus 90. Exodus 90 is a 90 day ascetical program for men.

It really helps kind of boost your spiritual life. You gotta give up alcohol, give up snacks in between meals, give up warm showers, give up happiness. I'm only joking, but not really. People who've done it say, and I've done it more or less successfully. Not terribly successfully, but it's really difficult. But those who stick through it say it's really excellent. One of the things that's great about Exodus 90 is you do it with a group of men. So it's not a solo activity. They also have an excellent app that will help you along that you

can check out. They also have shorter courses, so less than 90 days that you can try out. It's really great at helping you stay accountable. So go check them out, exodus90.com. Again, there is a link in the description below, so go sign up there so that they know that we sent you. Exodus90.com. Matt, thanks so much. So do So So so

So So So Now, before everybody gets been out of shape and super upset, what is on your head? This is I was thinking, is our habit funny to you? No, it's not. It's not that it's funny. I just thought that if the church weren't so sexist, you might take me. You know, if the habit fits, let us in, let

us in. It is ironic that you don't hear men asking to be nuns, except for right now. That would be right now to be just everybody knows. I'm going to tell you gave me this and told me to do it. I cannot deal with any more accusations this week. No, that would be a funny Babylon B article, wouldn't it?

Just this man out the front of a convent saying, let us in. I had I had a really strange experience. So most of the. Most of the people who. Staring at you. I know. Like most people that we know. Seriously.

Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh, you spaz. Wow, you guys are mean. When people ask us like, well, Byzantine priests can be married. Why can't Byzantine nuns be married? And then I have to explain that nuns aren't the nuns aren't the equivalent of like the female equivalent of priests. Nuns are the female equivalent of monks, male.

Yeah. You know, male monastics. And then they say, well, why aren't they the female equivalent of parish priests? And so we have that conversation. And then but recently, don't even care. A little kid asked me, I don't even care. A little kid asked me, you're ruining my story. A little kid asked me why, why boys can't be nuns.

And I was like, well, she asked why women can't be priests and why boys can't be nuns. And I addressed the first question simply for the sake of the fact that she was like five, four or five. And then for the second question of why boys can't be nuns, I was like, we've never had this question. And it was a strange experience in which like this family is very familiar with us, the nuns, but they don't know monks. Whereas most people, it's like they've heard of monks, they've heard of Franciscans, they've heard of whatever, but they don't necessarily know about nuns. And so I found myself saying, instead of saying like nuns are female monks, I found myself

saying, well, there are boy nuns and they're called monks. That's a weird thing to say. It just seems weird that way. It's not to say female monks. It's weird to say boy nuns. Yeah. Well, I see. I'm so thrilled that you're I mean, my son today said, I said, what day is it? Tuesday? He went, oh, the nuns are coming today. Yay. No, it's such a blessing.

I was like that excited, but with that little affect. No, but that's that's what Peter does. That's when he's really excited. Yeah. Thank you so much. Yeah, that's true. When you give him a gift, he's like, thank you so much. This is wonderful. I got to tell the story about how he was killing mother's caterpillars.

Oh, it's amazing. That was amazing. Story actually, like, melts my heart. Yeah. Well, it's so beautiful. Who wants to tell it? So apparently, well, Peter was very enthralled with the gardens that mother like mother's vegetable gardens and stuff. And he's going around and saying, sorry.

And that's, that's elder Fabius. And yeah, let's cleanse those thoughts. Uh, so he was enthralled and just like running around the outside, um, looking at all kinds of stuff. And he, he kept looking for caterpillars. We have to tell Peter that the butterfly came out. Oh, he'll be so excited. He didn't find a cocoon. I know. But he found this little teeny caterpillar that was fuzzy, with all these little things. And he was fascinated, right? Utterly fascinated.

And this is the most beautiful thing. And what is it? Whatever. And then Mother Theodora. Look how beautiful it is. It's so big. Mother Theodora was like, oh, that's a bad caterpillar. It's going to turn into, I don't't know what it was going to turn into,

but something that would be an enemy to the garden. And Peter's like, you don't want this? This is bad. OK. And he went immediately from that to he threw it on the ground and stomped on it. And let me find more of those. Yeah, it was like this beautiful masculine heart. Yeah, just like respond destroying this. This is a danger to you. I will get rid of it. Yeah, it was awesome.

It's so beautiful. But no, y'all are such a blessing. It's so good and so important that we have nuns and monks and priests in our lives. So it can be like this is a real possibility for you, you know. All right. Let's see if you if y'all are watching right now and now and you'll send a super chat or ask us over locals. Oh, yeah, let's do that. Oh, yeah. All right.

So we have from Davidson. Can you comment on navigating relationships with secular people? How to be a minister of the Lord without overt preaching, but not betraying your faith. My intuitive response to this is that the most important thing is just being a joyful Christian. It's like that Seraphim quote again of, it's our interior peace is what saves the people around us. And that's not, I didn't say this before, but like, that's not the intention of the interior peace, right? Like, the interior peace is for the sake of our own salvation,

but what God uses for the good of one person, he uses for the good of all. And so, I think it's acquiring the interior peace and maintaining our Christian joy. Like, what first brought me back to the church when I was very, very much immersed in the world and, like, trying all of the things that the world said would make me happy, I was miserable. And I encountered Christians who were very joyful. And so, that was like, I was like, whatever they have, and the only common denominator was Christ. Like, they were very different in all of the ways. Like, the common denominator was Christ. And they had something that was giving them joy.

And I wanted that for myself. And I think it's important to remember that joy does not mean that life is easy and it doesn't mean that you're happy all the time, but it means that there's something deeper beneath the time. But it means that there's something deeper beneath the struggle. You know, I was reflecting recently on the passage of the houses built on the different foundations and the storm comes and the one falls down and the storm comes and the other falls down. But the the the storm, the house that was built on stone, stone, rock, rock, stayed standing.

And as I was reflecting on that, I was like, the storm came to all of them, right? And so it's like when we have that solid foundation, we still go through the storm and there's still pain and there's still suffering and there's still sorrow. But in the midst of that, we stand with Christ. And so I think that's the important thing is to be able to acquire interior peace so that we can stand strong with Christ. And like, just that witness is what other people need. It doesn't need to be a preaching. Who is the, is Augustine the one, Francis? Francis never said this, but he's often quoted as saying-

So do you know who actually said it? I don't think anybody said it. I mean, I've said it. I think a 20th century, like liberal Catholic probably said it. Preach the gospel at all times. There's truth in it. Well, I think there's truth in it. Preach the gospel at all times and when necessary, use words. He's just a funny guy because he uses lots of words.

No, but we should all. It also seems it can also have the effect of sort of freeing us from the obligation to use words, which I don't like. I think also I would say the biggest thing is to keep your eyes, yeah, like you were saying, to keep your eyes fixed on Christ and in your own interior garden and making sure that you are, you are walking with Christ. And when others come, regardless if they're Christian or not Christian, like, that you're a consistent example of Christ. And I would say also that you're, yeah, focused more on your relationship with Him and being who you were created to be rather than trying

to help them see how they're wrong. Just trying to share that witness of like, well, this is what I, and sometimes that's going to come up and be uncomfortable, right? Because it's going to be like, I don't know how that works if you don't have Jesus. And it's okay to say that because it's like, well, this is what I would do. Like, I can only offer you what I have and that's Jesus. And so, and that's not preachy. It's just, it is what it is. Like, and we're able, it's interesting. Like I'm, there's, I'm thinking of there, there's a woman who, um, who has done seem just work for us, who's an atheist. Um, but she's moved by us, right? Like, and she's always,

she's always asking questions and things, but it's like asking for prayers and asking for prayers. And like, it's a really, exactly. Right. But it's like this beautiful witness of like how we can't stop being who we are. But that that is effective. Just yeah, our relationship with Christ is effective just just as we're walking in that walk without trying to be preachy or anything like that. And you have to resist the temptation to lower your standards or to to yeah, to come down to a lower level. Right. like when st. Paul says that he's all things to all people

or You know that like we can Drink poison and not be harmed and all of this like we also have to be self-aware of What we can handle without being drawn away from Christ. Like, if our gaze is ever coming off of Christ, it's just bad news. Like, one of my, probably some of my most life-changing prayer that happened in the Holy Land, sorry if I've shared it on the show before, I don't remember. But several years ago, someone paid for the whole community to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land for about two weeks.

And we were there, we were out on the Sea of Galilee. And I had come on this pilgrimage with like something going on in my family that was just like giving me a just a really, really heavy heart. And I was having a hard time letting go because I like this, this family member that I love deeply was just struggling so much and so immersed in sin. And it was just very difficult. And, and like, I wanted to save her

and I didn't know how. And we're out on the sea of Galilee and they turned off the boat. And so we're just floating on the sea. And I was laying on my back and had my eyes closed. And we had just read the gospel of Peter walking on the water. And so I was praying with that, and I was imagining that I was walking on the water to Jesus.

And I saw the waves like Peter did. But instead of the waves being caused by the wind, when I looked over, I saw that it was this family member who was drowning. And so she's thrashing about and she's causing all these waves. And my instinct was to turn and help her as you do when someone's drowning. And so I put out my hand and as drowning people do, she takes my hand and she starts to pull me under. And so now I'm sinking with her. Um, and I cry out to the Lord for help, just like Peter did. And, um, when he helps me, his words were, you cannot save her by taking your

gaze off of me. If you keep your gaze on me, then you'll walk on water and seeing you walk on water is what can save her. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. My response would be that if you do get to the point where you're called to share the gospel, not to be tricky about it, not to be clever about it. There's nothing so annoying as when people are trying to convert you in a way that they think is suave and hidden. You know, it's like if a Mormon comes to my door, hey, I just want to chat. Like, no,

I know what you want. So just, I just find it much more helpful to be like, yes, I do want you to become Catholic. I think this is what Christ wants for Christians and that you should be that. That is what I think. I just find that that's a great way to, you know, that's that's that's been my approach with people who are online like Cameron Batusi and I when we chat. Like, yes, of course, you should become Catholic. And then it's like, well, now let's talk

about it. Obviously, you don't have to have to agree with me. But this is what I I don't know. I find that the next super chat. Yeah, no, you go for it. My super chat is from the Bratnik production. Do you know who that is? OK, for it. Super chat is from the Bratnik production.

Do you know who that is? OK, I got to say, is this the guy who did your video? Yeah. You are a very, very talented videographer. I want this fellow to know that. Don't ever stop what you do in the world. Very good. Everyone. Matt Fadge said David Bratnik is an amazing videographer. He's very amazing human being.

That's true, too. Oh, yeah. So I didn't care for him when I met him, but an amazing videographer. He's very gifted. And he's an amazing human being. That's true too. Oh yeah, so good. Like heart and gold. I didn't care for him when I met him, but a great videographer. You didn't hit me? I've never met him, I'm only joking. Actually no, you probably did. You probably did in my life profession.

Have I? Yeah. I'm sure he's terrific, I'm only joking. Okay, what's his question? No question, he just says John the Blaptist. That's a mother Natalia quote. I actually whispered it to her earlier. You said John the Baptist once?

You heard it. Oh, Neil. David, whom I affectionately call Brett Nikki, was recording one time and I misspoke on the video and called John the Baptist, John the Baptist. And then she goes, he goes, blah, blah, blah. Well, I wasn blah well I wasn't gonna share that well there was other things I wasn't gonna share okay okay we have a super chat here from Gabriel Tubman thank you so much for your super chat he says I want to propose to my girlfriend but she's a nun no he didn't say that he says I want to propose to my girlfriend but her and her family are Sorry, I was trying to be funny. This is very bad. Well, Fabriel.

He says, I want to propose to my girlfriend, but her and her family are against the Catholic Church. She does come to Mass occasionally, but I have been praying about this for two years now and seem to be getting nowhere. Help! Whew. That's a... I can speak if neither of you have something immediately to say. But. Well, I mean, he says that her family, let's see her and her family. Yeah, that's tough. One of the most beautiful things about marriage is sharing my faith with my wife. Yeah. And I. Yeah. Even though technically you can marry a non-baptized person and I'm fine, but I'm so glad that I didn't. And I'm just so glad that my wife and I get to sit now a little chairs every

night and say our little prayers. And I know that when my kids come to her and have questions, that what she's saying is something I would want her to say. And there's no kind of contradiction or conflict there. I'll, um, I'll share just a personal anecdote. Um, and because I think that this is something, honestly, it's this is such an individually discerned question that I don't think that we can just speak to it not knowing the person.

So my advice would be talk to your spiritual director about it. If you don't have a spiritual director, talk to your pastor about it. Or if you have any monasteries or religious nearby, talk to them or something like that, get a spiritual director. But the personal anecdote, I've shared with the nuns before that the man that I dated that I thought was the holiest, like the most naturally virtuous man that I dated was an agnostic and very beautiful man. And like really he was, he accompanied me in my faith journey in the sense of like, he supported anything I believed.

He even like held me to my own standards when I didn't want to and things like that. And so just really, really good man. And ultimately what it came down to to me, cause he was even like, you know, if we get married, like I'm fine with you raising the kids Catholic. And then I just kind of jumped forward in my head and I was like, how am I going to explain to my kids

10 years from now, why they have to go to mass on Sunday and daddy doesn't? And how am I going to explain that inconsistency to them and explain why I'm saying this is the most important thing in your life. This is the thing that you need to live your entire life for and mom or dad isn't living it. that's what it came down to me. That was true. It wasn't about him. It was it was it was the case of like, how do I explain

this to my kids? That was true in my family. My dad would say at home and kind of watch recaps of the football or those kind of morning Sunday shows. And I'm sure he very much appreciated his two hours of peace and quiet on Sunday mornings. And good for him. But it's difficult to say this is a very important thing when someone is doing it. I think if it was if this person were my brother and I could speak to him with a certain level of audacity or audaciousness, I would say you should probably tell her that this is is she open to becoming Catholic? Because if she isn't and you were my brother and again,

this is not like a universal general statement, just like if you were that close, I would say you might want to you might want to break. You might want to break up. Because there's also something about like, yes, you can hope for their conversion. Yes, you can hope that one day they'll they'll come to the church. But at the same time, like it's really unfair to your spouse to enter into marriage, expecting them to change. Yeah. Right. And I mean, that's what my wife did and jokes on her. You know what I'm saying?

I understand. That's seriously, no. Matthew, you're too old and you're too ugly. It doesn't work anymore. Maybe he'll become really handsome and kind. No, stand up women. I was just quoting Matt for the record. But I'm not realist, I have something to say.

Oh, I'm sorry. No, I was just gonna say, I think it's very much an individual discernment, but it's knowing that- I'll have some of that. There's any left. I don't care. Shut up. Don't you? Remember when you had three roles at the base? Gabriella has something to say.

Give me some of your scone. It's yeah, it's it's very much like knowing that you, it is absolutely a decision that the Lord will allow you to make, but it's, I think the discernment has to be, like Mother Natalia was saying, like with someone who's close to you and knows the situation much better. But it's gonna be, first of all, it's gonna be across,

and there's no guarantee that anything would be different than it is now. And so that doesn't mean you can't make that decision. But it does mean that you have to willingly accept that as you move into it and know that it will be difficult. So that's just what I want to say. Thank you. Elizabeth says, oh, what a beautiful thing to say. I'm terrible at thinking up good questions, but God bless you all. It's beautiful.

It's really sweet. Thanks, Matt, says I'm a prod. The theme is a Protestant in RCA. I'm still getting used to seeing vestments and habits. I'm used to seeing preachers in holy jeans and Air Jordans. How can I agree to understand and appreciate Catholic dress norms more fully? You've never been asked that question before. I bet you've got no.

What's that? Adopting the. Yeah, you could wear a weird habit or buy a sick dressing gown and tie three knots in the rope and tell your wife, no, you're not trying to live like anyway. Yeah, I don't know. Getting used to seeing best. Right. Right. They could be same. I understand. Well, I think something that it took me a while to realize is that was condescending.

I think it's important to realize that like our dress affects us. Like you would never really trust a doctor who was about to do heart surgery on your wife or father if he was dressed like a slum. There's something about the stethoscope and the white dress and all that that leads you to trust them. And that's not just like an accidental thing that we can dispose with. And that's why I think it is important when we go to Holy Mass or Divine Liturgy that we do dress up, or at least we dress in a way that befits the occasion. I wasn't always of this opinion.

Maybe I don't know why. Maybe I grew up in a country town in South Australia where it wasn't that way. But I think there's something I can speak from the monastic guard perspective. Part of it for us, when we receive all the pieces of the habit, like it's part of the armor, like it's quoting St. Paul talking about putting on the armor to go into battle against the devil. And so, like, we're putting these pieces of our habit on in order to step into the chapel, which is the ultimate spiritual battle, right? For, for ourselves and for the world. And so there's something of that. And then with the priest,

with vestments and things, the vestments are a reminder that we're transcending the earth, right? Like he, he is putting on Christ to step into this, into this place, this holiest of place to stand before the living God and to offer the sacrifice with us and for us. And so, like, he becomes different in that, I mean, he becomes more fully who he is at that moment before the Father. And so, we need these, because we're human, we need these external signs.

Like, I need my habit as much as you need my habit. Like, I need to remember when I put this on that, like, I am, like, we veil things that are sacred. So, I wear a veil because I've been consecrated to the Lord and I need to remember that as much as you. Just like we veil the chalice and we veil, you know, the discos or the patent. Like, those things need to be covered in a particular way to remind us of their sacredness and their holiness. Heather Tabisola And our, in the service at which we receive the habit, the bishop or the priest monk who's doing the tauntering says he calls our habit a sermon to the people.

And so there's very much that. But I think that there's something different about a priest's vestments than there are about habits. And something about the vestments is this place is meant to be holy right and holy literally means set apart like you want to walk into a church and Not just feel like you're still in the world like they're neat there You want something that's going to convey that this is otherworldly and so I think this is the same reason that we should dress up for Not we I'm a nun. I wear well. We actually do we put on it. We put on extra

Clothing that's a habit. Yeah extra pieces of the habit when we go to to liturgy Not we, I'm a nun, I wear, well, we actually do. We put on extra clothing. That's a weird thing. Yeah, extra pieces of the habit when we go to liturgy. And, but there's something also really beautiful I think about like having beautiful vestments for your priest. And so to answer your question of how do I more fully appreciate this?

I would say like, maybe you make a donation to your parish specifically for a new vestment for your priest. Like, vestments are expensive, but to have a beautiful, to have beautiful vestments for your priest, beautiful cloths for the altar, there's something, you know, people get it. People accuse the church of, like, not living poverty because we have these beautiful churches. But I think when they do that, they're not remembering that in a lot of places, like there are villages where the people are so poor and they can't afford any beautiful thing in their own home by themselves. But if the community comes together and they buy this beautiful thing and then they keep it in the church for the whole village to experience,

they can afford that collectively. And so the parish, what the priest is wearing, what's on the altar, like this is for the entire community to experience the grandeur of the Lord. Also, it's probably important to remember, since this person's a Protestant, that the idea of priestly vestments was God's. And so if you want to read about that, check out Exodus 28 verses two through four, where God lays out exactly how he wants the vestments of the high priest exodus 28 exactly what I think that's that's where I was thinking.

Armand says hello. I'm discerning man, nasty system currently in the Eastern, right? Can you say that again? Man, nasty system. Okay. I give up. You know what? I, that's just it. OK, I give up. You know what?

Are you done with this interview? You go, I can stay. Hello. I am the setting the nasty system. Is that better? Monasticism, monasticism. That's my American. OK, currently in the Eastern right, and have been told getting a degree in theology or philosophy is probably a good idea. What's your opinion on this?

My opinion is that. Would you do that anyway when you joined? No, no, no, no, no. I wouldn't just say not necessarily. I would say probably not unless you're going to be ordained a priest. I would say it depends on. Like if the monastery is suggesting it, particularly if it's the superior or your spiritual father within the monastery

or something like that, then I think that you should do what they say because obedience is objectively fruitful and obedience is the most important part of monasticism. Like it is the most difficult and also the most important part of the monastic life. And so if you want to discern monasticism, you should discern obedience.

You know, I mean, we're all called to obedience, but yeah, like when, when, correct me if I'm wrong on this, Mother Gabriella, but like when I read the Desert Fathers, it seems like they talk about the monks who have been disobedient much more strongly than the monks who have like fornicated like obedience is. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So anyways, that's just my. There's nothing like submitting to somebody else's will to crush your pride, which is the capital sin.

Absolutely. 100%. That's why it's the top one. No. Yeah. But I also would to to balance that out. I think something to consider is that and they might be saying this to this. This patron is what they're called a local supporter, local supporter, because they see a pressure here with gifted you and that they think that this is something that could be a good contribution to the to the community.

And so that could be why I think in general, it doesn't it's not true of everyone. And of August has this quote. I received great consolation from this because I studied engineering and I've never studied philosophy or theology. But Avagrius says that one who truly prays is a theologian and a theologian is one who truly prays. And so, like, we also don't want to be like the Pharisees who know a lot about God without knowing God. Yeah, I would say there's a, it depends on the motivation. So if it's out of obedience,

like absolutely do everything out of obedience. If it's out of a desire to somehow be worthy or to somehow be prepared for monastic life, nothing is going to prepare you for monastic life. Just get in there and start living it. Like that's that, cause I think sometimes that, where were we that there was a family life, right? It's like, good luck. Yeah. There was a quote of like,

you can't read enough books to prepare yourself with this. There's a quote about how, um, like once discernment became a, became a thing, everyone stopped making decisions. I forget where I heard that recently. I was quoting Father Bob Bedard, if you like, the companions of the cross. It's absolutely true. Like, and so, so it's beautiful. Idiot was saying. That was me. How was I said that?

It's beautiful to to to study theology and philosophy. My accounting degree is helpful in the monastery because I do the books. But but also, I think it also helps me to be an apostar of poverty that says like the Lord has to make up for what's lacking. And he teaches me everything that I need to know. Except QuickBooks. He didn't teach you QuickBooks. He did not teach me QuickBooks.

I had to take a seminar. I want to give a quick shout out to people who are talking about the rosaries. So I said at the beginning those become annual supporters on locals. The first 50 would. a free rosary. So go back to the start. If you miss that, just everybody knows we've had like three people sign up. So maybe over the next year, if you're one of those first 50, we'll send you one. Maybe you should sign up and I'll give you a rosary.

Anyway, that was a nasty look. Anyway, but people have been asking what if they just want to buy a rosary. Anyway. That was a nasty look. That was a nasty look. Anyway, but people have been asking, what if they just want to buy a rosary? So there's a link in the description to Catholic Woodworker below. His rosaries are the best. Check them out by clicking that link below for those of you who are asking.

Okay, Mike Irish. Mike Irish. That's a great name. I hope that's his real name. He says, how do I encourage discernment for religious life for my daughter without pushing it on her? Here's what great name. I hope that's his real name. He says, how do I encourage a sermon for religious life for my daughter without pushing it on her?

Here's what you say. You say you are welcome to marry a man if you can find one that loves you more than Jesus Christ. That's what you say. What would you say? Not that. Well, I know that this isn't possible for everyone, but, um, if you could just like expose your girls to meeting nuns, right.

Or sisters, because I think that's the biggest thing is like, I was so not open to it for a long time because I just hadn't met any nuns. And I just assumed, um, because I'm an extrovert, because I'm like all of these things that we had all the misconceptions, right? Like that, oh, clearly I'm not called to be a nun. Like there are nuns like me. And so to just get your girls to realize that nuns are normal people. Yeah. Normal is a strong word. But that they're like that we're real people. Yeah, I guess I think I'll show them interviews like this.

Yeah, encouraging also. Maybe not this one. The biggest thing is to teach your children how to pray because that's the most important thing because the Lord's gonna draw them to their vocation. So if you're having a strong, as well as I think visiting communities, but like fostering a family prayer life,

but an individual prayer life, like take her to adoration, take her to teach her how to sit in silence and listen to the Lord. Like that's who's going to woo her heart if she's meant to be a religious. So. And it takes a great amount of trust that like, yes, you can foster it, you can encourage it, you can expose her to it, but like ultimately it's not you, it's Jesus. And so, yeah. I mean, we have a local support who asked a similar question, Joshua James King. He says, how do we get more parents to see becoming a religious is a glorious life path?

So many Catholics today oppose their kids from doing it. And I'll say something about that and I'd love your take on that. But you know, whenever I say to my daughters, like, yeah, maybe our Lord is calling you to be a nun. And wouldn't that be beautiful? I don't want to do that. Okay, well, then you don't have to do that. Like the father wants you to have life and life to the full.

And he knows where that is. And so you make a beautiful wife as well. I think certainly just keeping just reminding them they have this this option at this point is is a good idea. I also took this from Christopher West when he would pray with his children at night. He would say something like the following. So if I'm to pray with Peter, I might say, Father, I thank you for making Peter a boy. May he grow up to be a strong man to give his life away as a priest or a husband.

And then I say the equivalent for my daughters. And I just like that, that reinforcement that your life is to be given away. And here's two beautiful ways in which you could do that. But how, what's your opinion? How do we get more parents to see becoming religious as a glorious life path? I think, I think actually it's mother Gabriella's answer for the parents is like, y'all need to pray. Um, because if you're not actually seeing the scope of eternity and you're not

actually seeing like the profundity of what is happening here and you're not seeing the scope of eternity and you're not actually seeing like the profundity of what is happening here and you're not seeing the eternal rewards for this. It kind of doesn't make sense, right? Yeah, absolutely. You know, my mom would say to me when I said I wanted to be a priest, why don't you just become a social worker? Yeah. Because to her, a priest is a social worker who can have kids.

Bless her. And I think that like, you know, this isn't, I'm not just trying to have a shameless plug here, but like Father Michael Lachlan and I do this podcast, What God is Not, and we've done two episodes, one on which we interviewed his parents, I interviewed his parents, and then one in which he interviewed my parents. And I think it was really, really beautiful to see kind of the differences, especially because my mom was very open with sharing like her struggles about when I was discerning. And I, you know, I think that when when parents find out that their their child is discerning celibacy in particular, right? Like, we have, in the East, we have married priests and like, that's not as much of a struggle for people. Like, what they really mean is you're gonna be celibate. It's not really about like, you're being a priest. It's like, you're gonna

be celibate. And when they find out that their kid is discerning celibacy, there's often struggle and pain that comes from that. And I had always thought of it as like, well, sure, it's gotta be hard to know that like, your kid is never like never going to live near you unless you move there and you're not going to have grandkids from at least that child and so on and so forth. And like, yes, that's hard. But what I realized even more recently, I think the the greater thing with my own mom, I mean, there were the things of like, I'm now calling a new woman mother, right? I now have, I'm given a new name and like, my mom is the one who named me.

And like, those were the things I didn't consider. And so we have to be sensitive to that. But also, like the thing that I didn't think about is like, parents want their kids to be happy. And if this isn't the most important thing to you, if you're not praying as a parent and you're not seeing the gravity of all of this, like, then you can't imagine your kid being happy in this vocation. And that's what it was like for my mom. She knows I love children. She knows how happy she is to be a mom.

And she couldn't imagine, like, my happiness without those things. And so it was like there was some of it that was about herself and her own happiness and her own struggles, but I realized much more of it was about like her wanting me to be happy and fearing that I wouldn't be. Yes. And so like if you're not praying and you're not realizing, like if you're not actually trusting that these vocations are fulfilling, that needs to be the step before anything else. Like you need to trust that like these vocations do

fulfill. Mm-hmm. Yeah and to know that like it's not just if everybody just says somebody else's parent needs to be the one to give up a child then great. Like it's like oh the Lord's asking something of me. Like but it's also to be gentle with yourself. I think there there was a really, really profound and beautiful advice. Someone gave me like, just as you've been like me, as the child has been called to be a nun, like my parents have been called to be the parents of a nun. And so like they have to grow in their vocation as much as I have to grow in mine.

And so to be gentle with yourself, that like, even if you're not immediately excited, there's probably other decisions that you weren't excited about for your kid, but that the Lord's not asking you to say, like, all the yeses in once, but to say, like, yes, I'll walk with you in this. Like, yes, I will. And allow yourself to be transformed with your son or daughter as they discern this and be open to God's will for you as much as for them in that vocational discernment. Especially because we, like as the children, I have to remember that, like, I had a long time discerning before I told my parents I was

discerning. Right. And so like, Precisely. They have to also be granted that period to also like, accept that, you know? So, yeah. Well, this question goes along with this. This comes from Tracy K.D. on local. She says, as the mother of two young girls and another girl do any day now, I wonder what your parents did to inspire or encourage you to choose your vocations

as you were growing up. And my follow up to that would be if they didn't do much to inspire and encourage you, maybe since you started discerning or since you joined the convent, they did some things that were helpful. Yeah. Yeah I think. My parents have been a great support in anything that I desired to do. My mom always said you can do you can do anything.

Like she was always like, I would be like, mom, what should I be when I grow up? And she's like, you can be whatever it is that you like, you can do anything. She was always supportive. And so I think that open, and she also maybe she had a lot of nicknames for me as a kid. One of them was Sister Mary Holywater. I don't think that actually had an effect, but it was cute. It's a cute antidote, but I think just that complete openness to allowing me to explore whatever I would desire or whatever I felt God was calling me to, which I don't think they had an intuition that it would be religious life, monastic life. that it would be religious life, monastic life. But that really, that really helped. It wasn't like I was pigeonholed into like, I have to be a doctor, I have to be an engineer, I have to do this. It was like, no, what, like pursue what you desire. And that really, I think that was a real, like fertile soil for that, for that vocation to grow. And since then it's been just embracing,

embracing my community. Like my mom has just very much jumped in and she's just become a mom to all of the sisters. And she even, she went with us to the Holy Land and we were there and the, we visited this other monastery, like every monastery needs a Cathy, like, and she, her name's Cathy. And so it it's and it's just beautiful to watch her grow And give the gift of herself to all my sisters as well as to me and to love them

And I think that that's also helped me to grow in my vocation to know that my mom my mom's love my parents Love, you know is is really being poured out to my whole community I mom, my mom's love, my parents love, you know, is is really being poured out to my whole community. I have to read this little comment that came up on YouTube because this feels like one of those things we shouldn't be saying out loud to ourselves. Teresa says none of my children have been interested in religious life. Clearly I'm doing something wrong. Now she might be, but there's probably other options.

Yes, that could be an attack from the evil one. They're like Mother Natalia said, it's a supernatural vocation. And so they're. I would say the first thing to do is to pray and ask the Lord, what voice is that? And then to also just to pray for your kids, discernment and be supportive of of however, however that takes place without expectation. Yeah, I mean, I have amazing parents and I was not interested in religious life until like towards the end of college was really my first interest. And. And and my parents are amazing. So to to add on to what

Mother Garello is saying, like something that my parents, I think, did really well is I wasn't really catechized growing up. I wasn't well catechized. And I don't fault my parents for that because, like, they weren't well catechized. Like they couldn't give

what they didn't have. But I was very much like I had very much a lived catechesis in my life. So really helping and volunteering, especially with the church, but also like with the homeless and things like that was very much emphasized in my family. And so especially by my mom, like my dad was, my dad was in the military and so he was often deployed. My dad was in the military and so he was often deployed. And so in those times, like my mom was really emphasizing the volunteer work. And then when my dad was home from deployment,

he did that stuff together with us, but also like there was just a lot of togetherness as the family. Like my dad, you know, I think with a lot of military families that can drive people apart, but for my dad, it was very much like when I'm here, I'm gonna be here. And so I think those were two things.

Like I learned the importance of community and giving to the community, which fostered within me a desire to always be giving of myself for others. And when I realized how radically that's lived out in monasticism, those two things kind of went hand in hand for me. And with my dad really helping foster that importance of family and being together as a family, that gave me like, I think a good and beautiful view of what the family should be. Because that's something that it's really, really dangerous to discern a vocation to celibacy, because you're running away from brokenness within family or brokenness within marriage.

In fact, that's like a really bad reason to discern celibacy. And so I think those are things that my parents did well, was to like teach me the importance of community, starting with the importance of family and supporting each other. Also my similar to what mother Gabriella said, my parents have always been very supportive of whatever it is that I choose to do as long as they don't see this as like something just like objectively harmful. They're very supportive in whatever I want to study or whatever job I want to do or the friends that I have or things like that. And also jumping into

like my mom sends birthday cards and feast day cards to all the nuns and that she makes from thy hand. Which are incredible. She's got this cricket that just makes these like pop up cards. It's insane. Yeah. They're gorgeous. Thanks Barb. Yeah. And my dad just like, just makes all the dad jokes. I almost just said one of them, but you're welcome. I really want to hear it now.

I don't think we do. Later on. We've had a super chat before. Someone who wants us to read someone else's chat, which is Julia Kobe. I don't know if you're taking super you're but looking back now, were there any signs that you were called to be a sister before you discerned your vocations?

I don't know. I don't have anything good for that. I think that's a great question. I just. I get nervous like I don't like a lot of the things that are written about st. Therese because she's just made out to be this like really oh from it, yes, um and

I read one book about her that I found very refreshing and In it they were like talking about how people say that when Therese was a child, she like really liked to look at the Bible with the color, with the pictures in it. And like they knew that she was a saint because of all these things. And they're like, any kid likes to look at pictures, pictures, like, you know, and it's like, and I think in hindsight, we can project these things onto it. And so I'm nervous to do something like that.

Um, yeah, I think rather than see things that, um, that would have quote unquote proved in advance my religious, my monastic vocation, I can see things that prepared me for it. Right. Like, and I know this isn't a thing in the, in the East, um, having, and contested in some Roman places, like Roman churches, but at my home parish, Roman Catholic, like female altarservers were a thing. And I'm not going to say here, there, anywhere, but it was a beautiful experience for me to

be that close to the Lord, to be like for the consecration, like it just fostered a love for daily mass for me and of the Eucharist and of adoration and just I think was a real seedbed for further discernment. And I can just see that love grow from a very early age. And I don't think that meant I was supposed to be, but I think that was some of the fertile ground. And I was supposed to be, but I think that that was that was some of the fertile ground. And I was obviously very supported in that in grade school and high school by by my grandfather and by my parents to pursue that and to be close to the Lord in that way. So I don't know, that's just one thing that kind of comes to mind. I think the reason it's difficult is because the things that I find to be an affirmation of my vocation now are the same things that I think

would have been the best qualities of me as a biological mother or a spouse. And so I think that's why it's hard. It's like the fact that I feel like a great tender. Like I wanted to adopt. I always wanted to, when I got married to adopt kids, I also wanted biological kids, but like I really wanted to adopt because just my heart ached for all of these like parentless children. And I think that means that like I could have been a really good mom and adopted lots of kids. But it also means that I have this natural affection for children who aren't my own biologically. And so, like, I think that I think that it's that's why it's hard to pinpoint. Yeah. D Friis 957 says, What makes you all angry? And how do you pray when you get angry? You'll never get angry with each other in the monastery. That's really funny

because I didn't hear the question as like, what makes you all angry? I heard it as what makes you all angry? I didn't know my anger came across. Text is tone deaf. Maybe he meant that. I don't know. That was my Freudian hearing of it. Or maybe not. Um... Oh. Um... Yeah. Anger is really hard.

Um... I've realized in the past few years in particular that I'm a very angry person and it comes out in different ways than some people. Um. When I get angry, I feel like it's, um, it's, it comes usually from fear. And for me personally, if I get angry, it's like this fear that I'm out of control or that things are out of my control and I need to get them back under

my control. So I think that's what anger is supposed to do, right? It's supposed to propel us to correct an injustice. But since we're not like the Lord and very often our anger isn't righteous, it tends to yeah. So for me, for me lately is sorry, real quick is like with my my kids if I find myself getting angry at them I try to sort of submit to the chaos as it were like I just gentle gentle gentle I made the joke the other day that I need to record my voice saying gentle

and play it over a speaker throughout my house gentle gentle because my kids are just wild and beautiful but uh yeah no just trying to submit to that chaos. Thank you for this, Lord. Like this all as well. You know, I don't need to control everything. And yeah, it's a it's a very similar thing for me when you said injustice that really that really triggered it for me was. I like justice and truth have always been very important to me. So, um, I'm going to throw my parents under the bus right now, but they, they tell this

story a lot too. They just don't quite tell it as publicly as this, but, um, uh, I was like really small as a child. I'm still a pretty small person. Um, despite anyways, um, I'm still a pretty small person and I ate like a bird, right? So like we would go out to dinner as a family and I'd have one bite off of every person's plate And then I'm full like I don't want anymore Because of this so like spirit of the law right because of this when we would go to a buffet And all you can eat buffet

My parents tried to lie about my age and they'd say like, you know, if it's, if it's nine and older or whatever, they'd say, oh, she's eight. Um, and I would get so angry at this. And so I would just cross my arms and say, I am not, I'm 10. And, um, and I would just tell the person and like, my parents are a little embarrassed. And so they learned to just not do this because I will correct them in front of the, so like from an early age, um, truth and justice has been very important to me. And so I see this coming out in little and big ways in my life. Of like, I get very angry when there's an injustice or a perceived injustice. And it's very difficult for me. I think part of this is just like, I'm a very socially awkward person. And so I think part of this is like,

I don't see that at all. Well, maybe you're also very socially awkward person. And so I think part of this is like, no, it's not. I didn't see that at all. Well, maybe you're also just socially awkward. No. No, I don't think you're like that. So it's like, it's difficult for me to see gray areas. Like this is a place I've really grown over the past several years, is things are black and white.

And so it's hard for me to see spirit of the law instead of the letter of the law. And so I'm often getting angry about the letter of the law or like no This doesn't match this equally and so there's this isn't fair Basically like that's what it comes down to is I get angry when I'm throwing a four-year-old temper tantrum and saying it's not fair Yeah, so and what do you do when you feel that way? You just sounded so much like a therapist

What do you do with your anger? Yeah what do you do with your anger? Yeah. What do you do with your anger? What does it say about your relationship with your father? So I've learned that when I get angry, I mean, this is true of any sin, but when I get angry, it's much more telling about myself than it is about the things around me. And so I try to take those things to prayer and then in hindsight, learn something and try to grow because of that. So, yeah. I think I agree as you were articulated, I was like, wow, are you inside of my experience

in life? Thank you, Matt. But also as your name, Michael O'Brien? Is that your pet name? He's texting me right now. But also I realized two things. Neil, if Michael O'Brien comments, you just cut in at any point. At any point, yeah. Two things, one, dealing with consistency. Like if something is inconsistent, that makes me so angry. Like, which it has to do with justice.

But the other thing I realized, and I don't know if this because I'm color, but I tend to and I don't realize this until after it's happened. I get angry that people aren't me. Like, I get angry. Why are you? Why don't you see that the way that I see this is the perfect way to do it? Why are you questioning why I've completely thought of this? So it went from trying to be anyone other than yourself to why isn't everybody me? That's kind of what we fluctuate between all the time. Basically, which is like why there's the like evil twins of self condemnation and self reliance, right? And so like I kind of ping pong between, between those two, cause they go together. But yeah, absolutely.

But there's also the, that anger comes out of a, when I look at it, like that, those are actually coming out of a fear, right? Because like, if you don't see things the way that I see them, then clearly there's something inadequate about me. Or there's something, like it all comes back to, there's something wrong with me ultimately. And so, and in the best way, if I can open that in prayer to the Lord, that anger can

become a place of of receptivity. If not, it just becomes my own personal hell until I'm able to open that to the Lord because I get closed in on it. So I think it's also important to ask in our anger, what is the Lord asking me to do with this? And what can be the good in this for me? Because I'm just thinking of like the times that I am perceiving some sort of injustice. Sometimes Jesus is actually like asking me to do something about it, right? Like if you're in the presence of a child who's being abused and like you're feeling angry, like that's that's normal.

That's natural. And in fact, you might be like being asked to do something in that moment. But then also I'm thinking of just like the inconsistency thing, like, yes, so much. And I'm just like, in those moments of inconsistency, say something especially with like the Hege Manner, right? Like she makes one decision and then for one, none. And then she makes a different one for me. And I feel like it's inconsistent.

And so I'm angry. But then actually I need to be asking like, again, obedience is the most important thing. And so what is the good that the Lord wants in this for me? Like what's being purged in me by following through on this decision, by being obedient to this decision. And oftentimes, like it's exactly what you were saying of the like people can be miserable with a good marriage and a good family, like a beautiful marriage and a beautiful family, and they can still be miserable. And it's our thoughts determine our lives with elder Thaddeus. You know, it's like, am I seeing the good in this?

Am I seeing the hope in this or am I focusing only on the negative? How do you all have conflict resolutions in the monastery? Depends on the nun. We don't we just brush it aside and we don't have very deep We have pretty regular meetings about like how to have better communication and better resolution and conflict resolution and things like that in our in our community. I feel like over the years we've really been. Yeah, I think the biggest the biggest like helpful thing for me was learning learning one particular like conflict resolution style, which was like a way in which you like someone comes to you and they're hurt by something that you said or did, and you're able to sit and listen to them and you almost set the thing aside

and look at it together with them and you empathize. Like I set aside my reaction, like I've hurt mother in Italian this way and I'm like, wow, if I'm able, and I set aside how I feel about it and I just listen and receive her and receive her pain. Almost like somebody else did it to her. Correct. Yeah, exactly. Like it's not like almost as if it has nothing to do with me and I receive her pain. Almost like somebody else did it to her when you were able to. Yeah, exactly. Like it's not, like almost as if it has nothing to do

with me and I receive her and then I respond to her. Even if we never resolved the issue, we've become closer because of it, because I've actually received her and she's actually heard me. And that's actually what's more important than maybe necessarily resolving the issue is that in relationship, we both feel safe

and encountered and heard and received. And so that I don't know that that for me and like it sometimes it's formal and you have to sit down and do it. And other times it's it's in a much more informal way. But I think that for me has been the greatest, like tangible example of conflict resolution in that in that particular time at which we were like learning that technique, the retreat director that we were with at the time had said It's not about being right. It's about being real and that really stuck with me

Like it's not about like and and we do this all the time, right? Like it's it's not about We go into some sort of conflict and we have our mental list or our written list of like all the points we want to make and So we're like I'm gonna get through all of these points and no matter what they say. These are the points I'm gonna make well, if you're halfway through that list in the conversation and You guys have realized that you love each other and that there was a misunderstanding Like there's something in us that still wants to finish the list and like, I still want to make all my points. And but that's not that's not it. Like it's not about being right. It's not about listing off all the things. It's not about getting out everything that I like.

If the reason that this is needs to be resolved is because we want to have a solid relationship, then why do those things matter? I think we're often missing the. But something we also come back to as a community is like we really love each other like you see this when you visit our our community and and it's not something that you can fake right like we had someone from another community visiting us one time and they were like you all really love each other and we're like yeah and they're like no like you like spending time together and we're like but yeah yeah and and they're like, no, like you like spending time together. And we're like, yeah.

And they're like, not all communities are like that. And I was shocked to hear that. But like, as I've experienced more communities, like I've seen the truth of it, you know, like not all communities are like that. And so something that we come back to often is just we have to remember that we have a common goal and we have to remember that we all love each other. And so then we can have the conversations about conflict and realize that like we're all trying to grow in holiness. We're not trying to hurt each other. It's not done out of malice.

It's like our hooks getting caught on each other. Oh, that's a great way to put it. That was from your spiritual father. Our hooks getting caught on each other and it's the the rocks in the rock tumbler and it's all of those things, you know, it's like we're rubbing up on each other. But it's just because like what'd you say about you and Cameron? Like your wound is... We just say our wounds are rubbing up against each other. Our wounds are rubbing up against each other. Yeah. Like it's not like I'm out to get you. It's like I'm hurting and my hurting is bleeding all over your hurting.

Yeah. And when we can finally like like, have that perspective, we can you take your claws out of a little bit more, right? Like you're it takes the wind out of your sails and you're like, oh, this person's hurting just as much as I am. And that that takes grace and prayer and and growth to set yourself aside. Yeah, to set that aside and to see that person and encounter them. It's very simple.

But my wife, from the very beginning, because we both served with net ministries and this is how they do conflict resolutions is, you know, we were taught from the very beginning, like if somebody says, you know, I'm sorry, I did that. You don't say it's fine. Cause it's not fine, which is why they are right to apologize. And so using the language of I forgive you or please forgive me. I forgive you. As we found really important in our own life. Yeah, we do, too. Yeah, man.

Are you both extroverted? Yeah. Oh, yes. You both cleric. Oh, yes. I'm sanguine. Yes. It's amazing. Yeah, my wife is is textbook cleric. I just she's wonderful. And her first go to is anger. Yep. It's it's a wild ride Lobster Johnson Matt never shave your beard again, it's a sin

Yeah, what did she call me Neil do you remember I don't we don't even need to say it Yeah, what did she call me Neil? Do you remember? I don't we don't even need to say it It might get shaved again, we'll see what happens lobster Johnson says it is so I see yeah So this is this is the only time I was willing to have her on I couldn't do it again I couldn't face down more mockery Lobster Johnson says it is said that monasticism is a reference point for the faithful. JP too. That sounds nice, but is hard to implement in practice with young children without becoming frustrated.

What are some practical things families can learn from the monastic style? And for Mother Gabriella, when is theology on tap coming back? Well I think so I think something that you could do, this is something I've encouraged all of my spiritual children to do who are married with children, is I would encourage you to go to our website, ChristtheBideGroom.org and look at our Tippicon. It's on the About Us page on our website. So the Tippicon is our rule of life. And pray with that and ask the Lord, like pay attention to the places that your heart is really moved as you're praying with it

and ask the Lord how this can be implemented in your family. So one of my spiritual daughters, I won't say her name because maybe she wouldn't want that, but she has this like really brilliant, she really wants to have like monasticism to some degree in her family. And John Klimakis talks about this, by the way, in the Ladder of Divine Ascent about how all are called to monasticism to the degree appropriate in their life. And anyway, so something that she's doing is like having a time set aside each day. That's the quiet time. And what that means is like, she will pray or have spiritual reading or something like that.

And her kids can do whatever, like, quietly, right? Like appropriate to their age, the one kid can color the one kid can. Um, so it's not like they all have to sit and be quiet and pray the rosary to themselves or something like that, but like appropriate to their age. And I think that's really, really, really important because like we are so uncomfortable with silence today and like we can't be alone with ourselves.

And so to teach kids that from an early age and for them to build up the expectation of this is part of our daily routine. And what I've emphasized with her is like, it's so important that she does that even when she's busy or even when she doesn't feel like it because kids need the consistency. And and they need to see that like mom is taking this 30 minutes of quiet or whatever it is Even when she has so much work to do mom is taking this quiet Even when she just wants to hang out with so-and-so who's visiting or you know to see that consistency and to have that witness to them so so things like that like I Don't encourage people to just like force things on your kids that are like not age appropriate.

Like, no, the two year old's not going to sit in silence on your lap for 40 minutes while you do these devotions. Like, yeah. But whatever. Yeah. Is appropriate. Yeah, I would say just because it's difficult doesn't mean it's not worth it. And I think what's beautiful, I really appreciate that quote from, it's from Oriental Illumin by Pope John Paul II, an apostolic letter about, about the beauty of monasticism in the Eastern churches. Well, that's like a major part of it. But we really see our, our aesthetic life, the works that we do. How else would you describe aesthetic? Like the like spiritual practices that we have in the monastery

and in the Eastern Church is like on a scale, right? Like it's not, we're not a separate category of Christians that we just do this holy life and then everybody else just lives their life. And it's really on this scale and we're all called to live it like John Christom said to the... Climacus. Climacus, sorry. So many of them. To some degree. Could have been Cashing, could have been, I don't know. One of the Johnse degree. One of the Johnseys. One of the Johnseys.

But it's how we get creative to do that. And I think I find it really beautiful. And it's like body, mind and soul, right? Like there has to be a reminder that like fasting and feasting, I think is a beautiful way to do that, to have a regular family prayer time. Like these are things that should be a part of everyone's family regardless. And, and, and starting to see what works for your family, but trying something, like to do nothing means that to give into what the world says is that it's not possible to live this life. It's like, no, we have to, we have to incorporate something

we could, because the domestic church is domestic church is the first place where, you know, kids encounter God. And so, tapping into what the church is already doing and incorporating that throughout our family prayer time or throughout our, what we eat as a family. So, that could be like making sure that, you know, during fasting periods we don't have dessert or we don't, you know, whatever that's appropriate to your house. Like you're not going to make your kids, you know, may necessarily be vegan, but like to do something that reminds them, reminds them physically of where we are as a church is important. And I think actually it's interesting. We were with,

at this retreat this summer with, with a beautiful group of Coptic Orthodox women and they're, I feel like they witnessed to us very beautifully how that's lived out. And their church follows the fasting periods of the church, like everybody does it. It's like, oh, it's a fasting time. So we don't eat meat or dairy, but we do have fish.

Like they follow the monastic fast. Their life revolves around church and it's very, very beautiful, the witness that they gave us of like what that could look like in the lay life. And that it's, yeah, it's very much, they were just like, it's so similar. Like we're doing the same thing. It's like, yeah. And it's possible in that it's to the level at which God's calling you to. The other thing I would say, so that's prayer and fasting. But like another really important aspect of monasticism is hospitality. Right. And so I'm just thinking of like when I when I went to visit Kyle and his family in Wyoming, you know,

shout out to the wash. It's like I got there and the kids had like wrote out, welcome mother Natalia on the chalkboard outside. And like one of them found out that it was my birthday in a week. And so they like, when I woke up in the morning, they had colored a birthday card for me and like they had made sure all the coffee was, you know, and so it's like, get your kids involved in welcoming guests to your house.

Like if you have several kids and you know there's a single person at your parish who like doesn't necessarily have community, doesn't have family who lives in town, maybe you invite them over for every first Monday of the month. And like you have your kids help, like this kid goes and picks flowers for a vase.

This kid makes a card for them when they come, you know, like, and and and the last thing I would say is invite your kids into the process of discernment for what your family can be doing. Like ask your kids, hey, how do you think what do you think we can do for this person who's coming to visit? And like, if they have some crazy idea of like, we should make a statue out of macaroni and rocks, then you'd be like, that's a great idea.

Let's do it and encourage them to like, you know, yeah, like I feel like you would encourage your kids to do something like that. Yeah, I have a few thoughts. First is we can get stuck in the trap of all or nothing. So it's like, unless I'm doing it every single day perfectly, then I may as well just not do it. I mean, I've had that when I've tried to say committed to praying the rosary with the kids, you know, it's like, we'll miss a few nights. Like, you know what?

Like, this is better. We don't do it. That's clearly not the case. And so just because you can't do everything doesn't mean you can't do something sometimes. And that's okay. Second thing is I'm reminded of some advice my wife gave to a young mother who was bemoaning the fact that she can no longer take a holy hour. And she reminded her that, well, you breastfeed your child at night, right? That's your holy hour, you know? So, things appropriate to your state in life. Like it might feel a lot holier to be kneeling in adoration, but perhaps sitting with your

child at three in the morning and feeding your child and being with our Lord in that is a beautiful thing. And Jose Maria Escrava has said something to the effect of, let your family rosary be more like a warm fire that the kids want to draw near to. That's some advice that I've been learning these last few years. So as opposed to sit down and we're going to bloody pray this well. Like, who wants to be with anybody who's talking to him like that? Well, and yeah, and to be it's it's again about the consistency rather than the like

what like my best friend and her her five soon to be six kids pray, pray some kind of evening prayer together every night. And sometimes it's a it's a freak show of just like people are running around. Weren't they like praying evening prayer in one of the videos we did and one of them had a little Lego person? Yeah, it was just like playing. Yeah, it's like, get out, yeah, be okay with kids being kids and you just keep consistently showing up. Yeah. And it's okay that like, yeah, that they're coloring during quiet time. Like they're still being quiet. They're learning.

They're they learn in a different way and at an appropriate way. And they're being immersed in something that's beautiful. And like that's forming their heart more than you know. Yeah. Having dad consistently pray with the family while he's at peace, you know, is much better than like flash in the pan prayers where they get super frustrated and we didn't pray for another week or two and then we tried it again and he yelled at me, you know? Yeah, absolutely.

You know, I'm not trying to shame anybody for doing that. It can be a very frustrating experience trying to pray with your family, but it's probably frustrating because your expectations are way too high or unrealistic, you know, lower those expectations and be consistent. Let's see. Joel Jolisse says on the anger topic, what about the opposite problem? I have mild paranoia and confrontation makes me afraid. How do I have patience with myself without becoming a good man that does nothing in the face of evil?

Well, I mean, first thought that comes to mind is just to do it poorly, like have confrontations and do it poorly. You can do that. Start there and err on the side of being charitable as opposed to like blowing up and saying, well, I gave it my best shot. You don't want to do that because it's difficult to kind of mend a bridge if you've blown up at somebody, even though of course you can. But I would say just to just to go ahead and do it poorly. This happened to me recently. I had an awkward

encounter with somebody who I know I offended. And this was about three months ago. Well, two months ago. And no, I offended them because somebody told me and I was like, I could call this person and confront them, but I don't really want to. And maybe they should have been offended. Like, maybe that's what I don't really want to. And maybe they should have been offended. Like, maybe that's what the Lord wanted to teach them. And that might be the case. But it kept coming back to me, you know, it keeps coming back to you like, OK, at this point, I'm being a cow if I don't address it.

So I called this person up and we had a conversation and it was really great. It went really well. But even if it hadn't have gone well, I felt I think I would have felt better about the fact that I had responded to that kind of inner prompting So maybe my advice to this person is if there's something in particular That you did on your heart right now that you think you need to reconcile with somebody just to go ahead Pray and then do that as charitable as you can and even if it's done poorly. Thank God that you did it What do you all think? I?

would say. In the midst of that, like before those confrontations or or in the midst of them, as you realize it's happening, then ask the Lord for a spirit of discernment to hold fast to the things that are of him, the things that are true and to discard anything else, because, you know, I struggled for a long time to receive any sort of criticism. And it wasn't because of the problem that a lot of people have where it's like someone's criticizing me and they're wrong and I'm whatever. It's like, anytime someone said anything critical

of me, my immediate assumption was they're right and I need to change everything right now. And that's a problem because, first of all, they might just not even be right. Yeah. Second of all, just because they are, it doesn't mean that the Lord is asking you to change that right now. Like, there could be much bigger fish to fry, and Jesus is wanting you to focus on those, and because you're focused on this little thing, you're missing the plank, you know? And so, we really need a spirit of discernment, I think, to kind of sift through those things.

And if we have that, then what people say to us in confrontation, we don't have to take as personally, and we can be more receptive to the things that are true. Instead of just being so overwhelmed by all of it that we discard all of it or we receive all of it as opposed to like just taking on the things the Lord is asking us to take on. And I think a lot of that comes from finding our identity and our confidence in our identity as daughters or sons, as brides of Christ, daughters or sons of the Father as brides of Christ, because we're all called to see Christ as bridegroom, male and female. And yeah, and I say that, like, please understand, I say that as someone who's,

I'm speaking to myself as I say that, you know, I was just talking to you, Matt, on, myself as I say that. You know, I was just talking to you, Matt, on, I think we talked about this on my podcast last week, about how, like, I needed to read through my comments on my other two videos with you. I needed to read through the comments because someone was asking for something particular from them. And between the two videos, there's like, I don't know, 500 comments or something like that. And maybe like five or 10 of them were negative. And like, those are the only ones that I remember. Right. Because we're so much quicker to receive those negative things than the positive. And I think I think part of that, Mother Gabriel and I were talking about

that on the way here. Like, I think that comes from a place of it's funny. I already believe these things about myself, whether or not I'm saying them. And so we think that people are BSing us when they say something kind about us, but when they criticize us, they're infallible. Yes. And even if we don't acknowledge it, like our reaction to seeing a negative comment or criticism of some kind, our reaction might be to defend it. But even then I think we're often believing it. It's just that like we're being overly defensive because we want to convince

ourselves that it's not true. Not because we're often believing it. It's just that like we're being overly defensive because we want to convince ourselves that it's not true. Not because we need to convince them. So I fall into this trap as well. I think I, I, when people would criticize me, I would err to the side of you must be right. Like I'm so sorry. Like I need to change this. Like that's always where I go when somebody criticizes me and I'm not saying that's a

virtuous thing. It might just be, I want to show you how humble I am. So I'm going to receive this as best as best as I could. This is why you grew the beard back. It's exactly why. That's what I'm trying to get at. Yeah, no. But but I've just realized that lately, like receiving some criticism, people have been emailing me. I'm like, yeah, I think you're wrong. Like I'm right and you're wrong.

And just because you criticize me, it doesn't make you wise and it doesn't make you right. You might be and I have to discern that. And I think it's probably a good human reaction to reflect and say, well, did I screw up there? Maybe I did. Maybe I didn't. Maybe I did, but not to the degree that I'm being accused of. But it might even be an act of humility to say, yeah, no, I didn't. I disagree with you. I think you're wrong. I think just the word that came to me as you read that question, Matt, was just

like gentleness with yourself, like have a great gentleness and know like when you, when you're experiencing some kind of, you mentioned like paranoia or fear around conflict, know that that like the Lord wants to come to you there and he wants you to be rooted in him. Like Mother Natalia was saying, be rooted in your sonship. Go and sit before him before you enter into any conflict and that will help you determine whether or not you should.

Always run to him as your father rather than trying to figure it out on your own. And I think that's kind of what's happening. I like I need I'm I'm an orphan and I need to go figure this out and I'm doing it wrong. No, I need to go to my father and I need to receive his love. And from there, I'll be able to discern the next step, which may not be how to, how to fix this thing. But, but this is the next place to go. Yeah. I think Christopher West has said never go within without him.

Something to that effect. Yeah. It gets to your point. Beautiful. You've mentioned the podcast twice. I want to let people know to go check out your excellent podcast. What God is not dot com. What God is not dot com.

It's an excellent podcast with you. You're just saying that because you came on it. Father of Michael O'Loughlin. So it's still a shout out. Take what you can get. came on it. Father of Michael O'Loughlin. So it's still a shout out. Take what you can get. I would say, though, I think your logo is even better than the Pines with Aquinas logo. It's amazing.

It is the best podcast logo out there. Did you have someone who worked for Disney come up with that? I thought Father Michael said that. Yeah, yeah. It's really Mike Schwalm. Yeah. Tell us a bit about that podcast. Is it weekly? I thought you were going to say about Mike Schw Schwalm and I was like, I don't know the guy

He's really good at designing our logo Yeah, so um, it's a Byzantine Catholic podcast father Michael is a Byzantine priest, um, and We When we talk about I would say most of our listeners not I would say most of our listeners, not I would say most of our listeners are Roman Catholic, who a lot of Protestants who listen as well, but then the minority is probably Byzantine Catholics. And so we just address kind of like whatever's been on our heart in prayer and talk about like what the fathers would say about it and what the Lord

has told us about those things and so on and so forth. And yeah. And then Christ the bridegroom.com. Org. Sorry. Org. We have a link in the description below if people want to check out your monastery, they might even want to what would they do if there's a young woman out there who's like, well,

maybe I'd like to come and visit them. Just contact you all through that. So we have we have Pustinja's, which Pustinja is the the Russian word for desert. And so it's our retreat houses where people can can go to to be on retreat, to be alone with the Lord in the desert. And there's so you can come out, Pustinja, you can come on retreat at the monastery, men and women.

I will say those book very far in advance and so we're booking mostly in February and March at this point but for discernment visits we can sometimes there are other places for you to stay and there's a vocation tab on our page as well or something like that. Vocation in prayer form. And yeah, so if you're discerning a vocation, but yeah. I was thinking it would be cool if we maybe spent a couple of minutes praying the Jesus prayer together. Sure. Especially for those who are unfamiliar or they have heard of it. And I mean, this could be like the weirdest thing to do on YouTube is to explain the Jesus prayer. And then let's take like a couple of minutes

in silence praying it and inviting those who are watching to do the same thing. Sure. Who would you like to explain it? What is the Jesus prayer and how can we pray it together? Yeah, the Jesus prayer is simply Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner. And we consider it like the most condensed version of the Gospel. It says everything that we need to know about everything, like Lord Jesus. It says who Jesus is, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, is a statement of faith in who He is. Have mercy on me, a sinner,

and what I'm asking of Him and who I am before God. And that's just really the central part of, of the gospel. It was, there's a, there's a video on YouTube called mysteries of the Jesus prayer, which I think is a very beautiful like following of the Jesus prayer from the desert in Egypt and moving through all the different places where monasticism has gone in Europe, in Eastern Europe and Western Europe. But it really started in the desert as a way because they didn't have like Bibles and they didn't have they didn't have a lot of things that they were like studying. So they would learn they'd learn the Psalms and they'd learn the Jesus prayer

as a way of emptying themselves and coming into communion with with God. Canosis, if you will. Canosis, I don't know if you've heard that term previously. But yeah, so it started in Egypt with the desert, with the monks as a way of of emptying themselves. I don't know. What else would you add to that? I would just say, you know, it's often, you know, people will say, oh, so it's kind of like a centering prayer or something like that.

And I would say that I think the main difference is kind of what Mother Gabriela was talking about earlier of new agey things of like, the the idea is not to be emptying of our empty ourselves for the sake of being empty. It's to empty ourselves, to focus on Christ. And so, you know, people will often also say like, oh, so it's like the Eastern version of the rosary. But it's very different because in the Rosary, Matt, you can correct me if I'm wrong on this. But like with the Rosary, you're you're praying these prayers, but you're trying to not focus on the words.

Like you're meditating on the particular mysteries of the Rosary. Whereas with the Jesus prayer, you're not supposed to be meditating on anything. Like you're really focusing on the words and trying to to get everything out of your mind except for the Lord and His forgiveness and His mercy. And yeah, and so often people will pray with their breathing. I like to pray it very slowly and to breathe in Lord Jesus Christ, breathe out Son of God, breathe in, have mercy on me, and breathe out a sinner. And I like that in particular because in the second part, not only do I think of breathing

in His mercy and breathing out the sin, but I think the order is very important of breathing in His mercy first and then breathing out the sin, because I think we have this misconception of like, I need to be perfect, I need to fix myself in order to then get breathing out the sin, because I think we have this misconception of like, I need to be perfect. I need to fix myself in order to then get close to the Lord. But actually, like the closeness can't happen until we first receive his mercy. And his mercy is what even draws us into that. We love because he loved us first. His mercy precedes our repentance. And yeah, when I first started learning this, my wife and I would pray it in bed together. And it would people had this experience of shared it like what it's a strange thing to wake up and discover yourself praying, not realizing that you are and then doing

it. My wife had surgery a couple of years ago and as she came out of the anesthesia, the doctors told her that she was praying the Jesus prayer on her conscience. So, OK, so how how can we do this this exercise together? Would you want me to tell you? And that's up to you. OK, well, don't we take a couple of minutes? Maybe you could sort of just lead us in how to do. You've done that done that. Maybe we just take a couple of minutes and and pray together. And I would just echo what you said.

It's obviously the breath is not necessary, but to breathe in as you said, Lord Jesus Christ, and people have different ways of doing it. I tend to breathe Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, and then breathe out, have mercy upon me a sinner. And I try to breathe quite deeply and just sort of like hold the words in my mind as I say it. And so. I think just a word of as you as you start to do this, don't be like disconcerted if you're flooded with other thoughts, because that's normal. One, it's a very natural thing, right? When we go to be silent, all those things,

the busyness of our exterior life and our interior life kind of come to the surface. But also like the evil one could be doing that as a, as a disturbance. And so just to be mindful as those things come to, to try to maintain that like interior peace, um, and to slowly just push the thoughts away. Like you don't need to be violent against these thoughts. It's like, they exist, but I'm still just going to continue. I'll push it away and continue to pray the Jesus prayer.

Yeah. It's like, Oh, I'm, I'm thinking about lunch today. No, no. Or Jesus. Yeah. Well, tell me what you think about this. When I have a thought that intrudes, when I become aware of it, whatever that is, whether it be lunch or what I'm doing later on, I like, I bring that to our Lord and let it go. Just surrender it gently. Okay. Well, maybe you could lead us and then we'll take a couple of minutes of silence and then would you mind closing us as well? Sure. And then we just invite people who are doing this right now, maybe turn your phone off, close the other tabs

and sit down and, and mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner......... Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us and on the whole world. Amen. Thank you very much. We'll wrap it up there. Thanks kindly.