https://youtubetranscript.com/?v=f0FQRvO04Kw
Hello, everyone. It is Thanksgiving Eve and if you’re here, you’re probably somewhat like me avoiding work. So here I am at the office and there’s really not much more to do for me this week. So Thanksgiving is kind of nice if you’re a priest because most other holidays means work because holidays are holy days, but this being a secular celebration and a secular holiday, it is not a lot of work for us. So I actually get to relax a little bit. And as you can see by the ticker down underneath here, I’m going to talk about Advent because Thanksgiving always means that Advent is just around the corner. And I want to tell you about the best chili dog I ever had in my life. There I was, imagine me about 20 years ago, 100 pounds lighter, quite a few inches shorter, fifth grader, going to a Cub Scout camp out with my dad. And they were living in Norway at the time. And you may think that the weather in Norway should be extremely exciting, but the weather in Norway is, at least in the part of Norway that we were living in, was extremely disappointing. It was always raining in between about 40 and 60 degrees. So we go on this boys Cub Scout camp out and it’s like raining and 40 degrees. It was just an absolutely miserable experience freezing that whole time there. So we’re going around, we’re doing all this, you know, Cub Scout stuff. I don’t even remember what we did that day, but it was outdoors in the rain and the wind and the cold all day. Then we get to supper time. My dad pulls out a can of chili and a couple of hot dogs, gets the hot dogs and the chili hot, and we eat those. And it was just absolutely, absolutely the most fantastic chili dogs I had ever had in my life. Now, it’s not like we were using especially high grade hot dogs for this experience. And the chili was literally prepackaged from a can. What made this the most memorable chili dog of my life was the fact that I was cold and tired and hungry the entire time that I was eating it. And when I had finally got to the feast, it just magnified the experience of the feast. And wrong here has got the right idea. The worst camping makes the best memories. So what does this have to do with Advent? Well, if this principle, which was true on one day, can be stretched out across time, what that means is that if you decide that you’re going to deny yourself during the three weeks leading up to Advent, you’re going to practice asceticism and fasting, your experience of the Christmas holiday will be that much better. This is actually what the church proposes for us. This is actually what the church provides for us if we had the wisdom to use it. And I’m just going to be hardcore here, you know? What if you decided that you weren’t going to have alcohol and sweets during the entirety of the Advent season? I think that would make your Christmas celebrations that much more joyful and sweet. And what if you were to practice abstinence even with your eyes for not decorating your home or at least not turning on the lights of your decoration until our Lord is born in Bethlehem? See, I think that right there would make for a better Advent and Christmas experience. I think the way that we practice Advent in our secular culture doesn’t actually come from the church. It comes from Walmart. Walmart wants to keep you fat and dumb and happy so that you’ll spend more money at them. The church wants you to practice asceticism on your way into the Advent season to make you strong and holy and happy. And I have a very hard time convincing anybody of this. So we’ll see if I’ve convinced Emma and Colin. How are you guys doing? Hello. We’re good. You guys are now live here. You are on another road trip, huh? Yeah. Once again. We’re on our way to my parents’ house for Thanksgiving. So Michigan should be quite a bit closer now. Oh yeah. Yeah. It’s cold and drizzling. We are, as a matter of fact. We’re about 90 miles into 200. What? Yeah. I just remembered hating driving I-94 on either side of Chicago because it’s just semis in the left lane, cats and dogs living together. Yeah. We’re through that part now, thankfully. We’re in the drive across all of Michigan part. So we just spent like 200 miles on 94 until we get to Ann Arbor. Yep. Alrighty. But, well, did I sell you on my Advent plans? Mostly. Oh, mostly. Well, it’s not like it’s a new concept for me. Oh, that’s cheap. It’s something I whine at myself about every year. Yeah? I’m getting used to the season. With the exception of Christmas parties. Yeah. Because it’s the chance to celebrate with people here before we leave again to visit family. That one is a much harder one for me to get on board with. What if you celebrated with a can of La Croix? It’s not the alcohol, it’s the sugar. It’s the sugar. If I’m going to a cookie swap, I’m not going to not eat any of the cookies. That’s a good point. You do run into the, whatever scripture there is about, if someone offers you food, don’t say no. What if Father Eric offers you an opportunity for an apostolic witness? That’s actually a good question. What piece apart that situation? I think the most common one that people you hear about is someone, you go to someone’s house and they offer you food and it has meat in it and it’s Friday. What do you do? We’re to up the stakes, it’s Friday. Well, not, okay, fine. You know what? That’s a reasonable upping the stakes. You know what? Exactly. Go to the extreme first and then figure out the border and then we’ll move from there. What do you do in that situation? Friday, when you’re at someone’s house and they offer you meat for dinner. Well, you can always plan ahead. True. You already made the mistake of not letting them know. Remember, I’m a Catholic now, Auntie. We don’t do meat on Fridays during Lent. I don’t know. I think you should try and make a witness there instead of hiding your light underneath the bushel basket. I can see it. But you might have to judge the situation. There remains a question of possibility. Yeah. You might have to judge the situation in that relationship too. The true answer, which is usually the correct answer, is to keep these important concepts in mind and don’t let one of them go. And like, does it suck? Exactly. That is the exact point. You should feel uncomfortable with our decision you make. Yeah, if you can figure out a way to get through life without discomfort, let me know about it. Now, I’m pretty sure most people can do pretty well with that. That’s the problem. We have gotten really effective with some discomfort, but again, by the grace of God, thank goodness. Without any discomfort that they’ll admit to themselves. My point is, at least when it comes to, I have a conception of tensions, and you are not supposed to be comfortable with your faith or with your kind of your general religious practices because they’re not meant to be easy. If ever at some point you’re comfortable with something, there’s most likely some sort of tension you’re not picking up on. The tension is what brings you closer to God. That’s what I would argue. Yes. Thank you. I do appreciate the play on play. Yeah. I appreciate you not looking over at the camera and crashing the car. Yeah, I’m not supposed to do that. That was my metrics here on YouTube. Yeah. I appreciate it as well. It would ruin a lot more for me. Yeah. I kind of like this car. Yeah. People like to bandy around the supposed phrase of St. Francis of Assisi that you must preach the gospel at all times and if necessary use words. Whether or not St. Francis actually said that, I’ll just let you know that we are now in a situation where it is necessary to use words. Like in the world? In the world. We now have to use words. That would have actually been a really revolutionary thing in medieval Italy where everybody was Catholic. Now we’ve got to let that light shine forth. Anyway, to your question, Colin, in the situation that you painted with the Friday and Lent and you’re over at somebody’s house, I think we should just err on the side of being bold rather than err on the side of not doing anything. If you’ll remember last weekend’s gospel. Oh, shoot. The towns. Oh, that is the one. That was a week ago. Oh my gosh, that’s weird. That was half a week ago. That was like four days ago. That’s weirder. You made it harder. Now, gentlemen, after Exodus 9, the Advent and Lent are not as difficult. You can do some of that spiritual muscle man stuff. Exodus 90. Yeah. Apparently there’s a secular version that our chiropractor was telling us about. That’s right. That’s right. Like 70 days of like working out at least doing at least like two active things a day and not eating any sugar or alcohol and like cold showers. And I’m like, this is just secular Exodus 90 for your health. Rather than spiritual. Does it have Eucharistic adoration? No. Does it have 20 minutes of of of mental prayer a day? If it had TV and yoga, does that count? TV and yoga? I think I was going for meditation, but yeah, right. Oh goodness. Yeah. Shout out to that guy though. That’s that is the right point of considering Exodus 90. It makes it easy to fast. Makes it easy to fast and fasting is good. Fasting is good. I wish I did it more, but I’m too much of a muppet. Because it’s hard to not fulfill that fault. The temptation that what Exodus 90 does is it makes you in better shape because no one cares about that. That is a nice side note. But what it does is it helps it easy to be a skin. A skin. You do it right. Did I do it right? I just said it. Okay, you don’t pronounce the first C. Okay, I accept. Yeah, that’s what happens when you marry an expert in classical languages. Oh, you have no idea. See, I can’t pronounce these words in English. I don’t know how the pronunciations change for English. It would be just eschesis, right? You would actually say it in Greek. But English is lazy. And frankly, most languages are lazy. Yeah, everything softens. I mean, modern Greek is also lazier than ancient Greek. All the vowels have sort of flattened out so that where there were like eight different vowels, now there are like three. Like they’re all spelled the same still, but just a bunch of them you all pronounce the same sound. On the way of the French. No, the French have a lot of weirdly specific vowel sounds actually. See, and I will at least, I don’t know if I’m getting away with something. I think I would disagree with you on the two things that you expect to do. But again, I appreciate the fact that again, you should be considering that you might be wrong. Like, so for instance, your point of the talents that really makes it more difficult for my point. Yeah, and I have to try and consider whether I’m wrong. And I think at the very minimum, that is the right attitude to have. Is it not lose sight of the fact that like you were, you are called to find moments, is this a moment? I could see it. Yeah. I’d be very concerned about hospitality and cultural norms. Although in America, those are barely matter at these points. Yeah, this is a place to do whatever you want. Do whatever you want that doesn’t make other people feel judged. Exactly. Right. I feel judged all the time. And like you go to a stake in Walmart and people look at you like you got two heads. Oh, gosh. I just like go ahead and look. Go ahead and look. I did this to myself. Walk around with a little color on. Yeah. Yeah. But I’ve got a question. How long does it take blessings to wear off? You think the Lord revokes his blessings? No, like, like traveling blessings, for example, are they like specific to a particular like amount of time? Or are they just like in general? Because I’m a little bit convinced that you helped us avoid two accidents on Sunday because we showed up like 10 minutes after they happened each time. I look, you can’t really treat it as if it’s something that would be mathematically describable in physics. Yeah, true. Right. So that’s why, you know, ultimately, while you can have fun with them, your average RPG isn’t going to be able to give you an accurate view into the spiritual life because it all has to be reduced to numbers. And this isn’t reducible to numbers. It’s all in the realm of quality, intention and persons. So under the frame of quality intentions and persons, what do you think happens with a travel blessing? It hangs around. Have faith in it. Probably for the length of the trip that you got blessed for. Yeah. Yeah. That just seems like the regular old human way of intending these things. So, yeah. Yeah. So even if you’re, even if your trip had been half as long, or if it had been twice as long. Yeah. But they only apply to a particular trip. Right. I didn’t bless you for all trips ever. Can we get one of those next time? Because people are driving like idiots today. I was going to say, it’s good that you didn’t because that’s, what’s the word I’m looking for? That’s inhuman? A little much. No, there’s something that feels abstract, maybe. Yeah, that’s true. It is. I’m guessing if the blessing of prayer feels abstract, and not like in a sense of like, make me holier. That’s technically abstract, but that’s not the same thing. My guess is like, it’s not as good, or not as beneficial, not as something. It looks like he’s googling something. I just told the chat that they all need to pray for you guys to drive safely. Yeah. And I also typed really badly. But it’s okay. Look, Philip’s got some of that new convert prayer, you know. He’s still got the new convert smell on his forehead. So his prayers will be really good. It’s so true, though. It is. Like I’m finally getting a little bit out of the new convert feel. I don’t know. Does it last longer than the honeymoon phase of a marriage? I wouldn’t know. Have you been to the person? Yeah, me neither. I’ve never converted, but I’ve never been married. Oh, goodness. We finally got to the part where people aren’t being so stupid, so I can just like, set the cruise control. That’d be good. So I’ve been doing a lot without being able to set the cruise control. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully you don’t get a traffic force in your foot. Oh, right. There were a lot of people like, we’ve been through traffic and like, cutting in front of semi trucks and stuff. Yeah, that’s dumb. That was not good. I think you’re back. Cool. Yeah, crazy drivers, Illinois and Michigan. Yeah, imagine that. Also, weird billboards as per standard. The timing was great. We just passed one that said, got faith in the same style as got milk. And it was a picture, like next to it was a picture of a faucet pouring water into a wine glass. And I have no idea why. Like it’s an old like metal faucet with a little turning handle. It’s like, what? Why? Why is that? It’s the idea that you can do the like water into wine thing, or that you should believe. Oh, you know, that’s kind of smart. I don’t know. I’m sure it has something to do with Jesus turning water into wine. I think it was a wine glass. Maybe in certain cities you can get a wine faucet now. We just got a pressurized wine spigot. Oh my gosh. That’s even better than the Italian sparkling water taps. Oh, that’s right. Some European countries have those. I think they actually have the bottle of CO2 right there. I think they’ve actually got the bottle of CO2 right there. I mean, that makes sense. I hope they pipe that in through central plumbing. Well, the funny thing is, it’s in me. I believe that it is. Hold on. They’re in the piazzas. They’re just like water fountains, and they’ll have one tap for regular water and one tap for sparkling water. They are probably making it sparkle right there. Yeah. Well, now I’ll push against this. I love this. Well, so I was told the story that in Germany you do actually have a sparkling water tap. Citywide, just like a tap water. And the reason for this, I might be getting things confused, but the reason for this, I believe, was that the Germans, understandably, were very concerned about the water quality after everything got bombed. And there was all these different issues with it. And so they only trusted sparkling water. That was the indication that it actually was not bad. I might be getting things kind of confused, but the moral of the story is that they call it sprudel, and it’s my favorite German word. Just sprudel. Sprudel. Sounds amazing. In Germany. I should get a sparkling water tap. And if sparkling water was right. That’s probably an idea. Now, of course, Emma would hate that. But. Yeah, I don’t really do sparkling. No, no, it’s no for you. Sure. Yeah, it’s really just because in that area, my taste never developed beyond those of toddler. You just have to drink the sparkling water until you enjoy it. I know that’s what I did with coffee, but I think one vice is enough. What is vicious about sparkling water? It gives you pleasure. Acid. There’s no acid in it. It’s just carbon dioxide. Yeah, which combines with the water to make acid. Sad. Carbonic acid, which is why soda is bad for your teeth. Yeah, that’s why I said, you know, I have to say she’s right. There’s travel. Love it. Yeah. Fun fact that actually got me to drink water as a normal human being because I like sparkling water and I kept buying sparkling water all the time to try and get myself to be hydrated. And then I didn’t like the price of it. So I just started getting normal bottle of water. And I didn’t like the idea of buying water when I have a tap and like a filter system thing. And so I finally got a water bottle. And it’s like for a reason I had to thank you. Twins. I had to go through the entire process of this in order to get myself to actually like drink water. Actually, Father Erickson literally looks like the other one from the set with water Costco. Hey. Is it gray or blue? It’s gray. It is the other one from the set with water Costco. I bet. I bet it was. I, last year I taught seventh grade religious education and had to call a few parents. And this is my reward for that. All right. They bought me a nice water bottle. There you go. So worth it, I guess. I don’t have to worry about the kid anymore. So. That’s good. There you go. Now, Philip brought up an interesting point here that just the sight of you guys traveling makes him want to grab a road dog at a gas station. And Mick Mosaave says his wife and him call them emergency hot dogs. Nice. Do you guys have any opinions? I did feel weird because I went to Redestop to get, use the restroom at one point. I had to get snacks. I was getting a little grumpy at the idea of not having lunch or dinner because this one wanted to get home so badly. Which immediately got us to get home at like 8 PM. So any later than that, I would have died. As Jake was well aware. Yeah, after being an hour delayed because of traffic from accidents. But I had a weird case because I was wearing my Sunday vest. And I just walk into a motel with like, no, those are my nicest station. That’s right. Gas station. Oh yeah. Okay. I went to a place and I’m just like, you know, dress shoes, button up shirt. What are my nicest button up shirts the whole night? I’m just like, do I look like a like a jerk to everyone here? I feel like it’s one of those like reverse judgment things where people are just like, look at this high and mighty son of a gun. Big most of us is perfect time for an emergency hot dog. Right. Well, so it made it worse because it’s like, I just kind of looked at all the snacks and was like, disgusting. You don’t do hot dogs, do you? No, I’m frizzy. That’s the problem here. So I’m just like, oh, I am what I think I am. What you imagined other people’s judgment of you was, was actually your own negative assessment of yourself. Yes. Father Eric pulling out the therapist things on you. It sounds like you’re rejecting on to other. Therapist tricks are basically the same thing. Oh yeah. It’s the line is very blurred between how many things we gave you and how many things we sold from you. You know, the very careful use of words. Yeah. One thing that we have not given you is the ability to absolve sins. So yeah, that one’s a hard one. So what did you end up eating, Colin? You’re leaving me hanging in suspense. Oh, I chickened out and just got a an entire tube of the barbecue Pringles. I just destroyed that thing. That matter of minutes. Solid. I love that kid. Can you get Pearson salted nut rolls in your part of the country? I’m pretty sure. No. What is it? I’ve never heard of it. So I’m going to say no. A Pearson salted nut roll is the best gas station snack you can get. Oh, inexpensive. They taste good and they fill you up right. All right. I want everybody who can to stop and put their favorite gas station snack in the chat so we can compare notes here. I love it. Well, William Brantz is talking about three qualities. The fourth quality is can you eat it while driving? Oh, yeah, no, it’s a candy bar. You can totally eat that. You’re going to keep peanuts on the ground. Dodd’s pretzels. Oh, Chad, the alcoholic knows what’s up with Dodd’s pretzels there. That’s a Midwest staple. That’s a it’s from North Dakota. That’s a North Dakota thing. Yeah. Well, but it’s spread over to Wisconsin and around. Andrew Kelly is apparently an alien who’s never snacked at a gas station before. And Chad drops the perfectly legitimate point that also all things quick trip. And unfortunately, quick trip doesn’t make it this far west, Chad. So thanks for making me feel envious again. My favorite road snack has always been combos, the pretzels with the cheese in the middle. Those are good. Hey, Chad. German pretzel. Hey, there. Pringles. The Dodd’s pretzels, I think they’re like, I don’t know, they’re like cinnamon and sugar ones during the holidays. Oh, amazing. Hi, Mark. It’s not like a weird German churro. Basically, sure. It’s yeah, it’s one of those pluralistic American monstrosities that are so yummy. I love a good cinnamon sugar pretzel. Cinnamon sugar pita chips are also good, actually. I actually had a cinnamon and sugar croissant this morning. Have you guys ever done this? I put butter on the croissant. I put butter on the croissant and then I toasted it. And then yeah, buttered it again. Double butter. Got to put the butter on your butter. And there’s all the butter that’s in a croissant. I know, I’ll probably not live super long, but I really, you know, I’ve enjoyed life. That’s okay, I think. Are you going to die? Are you afraid you’re going to die? And I always get the story that my grandfather. What did you say? I said, no, I’m not afraid of that happening. I don’t think it means. Probably not yet. I do always make fun of my grandfather because that man is known for his love of butter so much. Admittedly, the one I always make fun of him for the most, I’ve kind of recognized that it’s kind of right. But famously, we went, we had dinner one night and he just starts taking scoops of butter and buttering his steak. Until it’s just utterly covered. He doesn’t for any, if you can. Depends on the steak. That’s true. If you’ve got a very lean steak, you want to put some butter on that. But if he was doing that to a ribeye, that’s just overkill right there. Yeah, we like it. Well, regardless, though, it wasn’t like he took some butter and spread it over. He went back. He kept going for it. Oh, you should bust out the blowtorch and then like caramel. Oh, that sounds amazing. But what I so what I how I like I was just talking to somebody about this. When I make steak, I like to make sauteed mushrooms. What I like to do is get some mushrooms and I just put them in the pan with butter and then I put some salt and pepper, a little bit of soy sauce and then some brown sugar. That sounds good. Colin doesn’t like mushrooms, so he wouldn’t like that. But I would like that. I think I like sugar on almost everything. Understand. Well, how are you? How’s everybody doing? How was the event? I don’t have a lot of time. I’m great. But I thought it was great. The retreat was great. Yeah. You know, at the end of it, you know, Ted was advertising it as a conference. And I’m like, Ted, this was a retreat that you put on. Which is fine. But we just need to get the marketing straight for it. You know, when we do it again next year, when we do it again next year and we get Richard Rowland and Anthony Esselstyn out there, wouldn’t that be a match made in heaven right there? You know, Anthony’s got put the pressure on Ted. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, anyway, yeah. And it had a nice, relaxed pace to it. So it didn’t feel like it was like Thunder Bay and Chino felt like we were just trying to cram in, you know, everybody’s ideas. And this was just sort of like, you know, like my talk was about 30 minutes long. Like I didn’t I didn’t have that much to say, and I wasn’t going to take too much time to say it. And then. Your talk is really good. Yeah. Yeah. Praise the Lord. And then Ted and Dr. Jim and I had a real good opportunity just to get into the groove of things. Yeah. Nice. Get some DL logos. I know. Getting some some of that some of that DL logos. And then, you know, bringing in Jess with the Book of Job was just it’s just fabulous. So sounds wonderful. Maybe next year I’ll go. Yeah. I’ll try and make it next year. Are we back? I think so. And do it with the try and do because I think I want to do the dinner thing again next year, but. So we’ll see. It might have been one or the other. I spent spent a lot of money to do the dinner, but it’s totally worth it. I how many people did you get to show up? Eleven. All right. Nice. Yeah, it was it was really just a wonderful it was like it was like just a fellowship weekend. They are. Yeah. Basically, I mean, a couple of people stayed for the weekend, but it’s just really good. I mean, it’s really, really. Yeah. Sounds great. Now my wife is talking my YouTube channel. Uh oh. The one thing, though, is I need to convince Ted to move it to a different weekend because if it’s not the weekend before Thanksgiving, my friend says she’ll come and I think she’d really enjoy it. But apparently, Thanksgiving week is the second worst scheduling week when you work in an elementary school. Yeah, I’d love to do something up here in North Dakota, but the only good time to be here is the summer and I’ve got to be in Washington, D.C. for the next three summers. So yeah, you can always do Super Bowl weekend. That would that would totally be on brand for me. Have you guys ever heard my favorite sports joke? I don’t think so. You know, guys, I watch football religiously twice a year when something important is going on. I love it. I use that joke so much. I love using it in like a wedding reception when I’m sitting with a bunch of people who don’t know how to talk to a priest. Yeah, that was a good icebreaker. You can see that. Yeah. But yeah, that’d be a fun weekend for it. Isn’t that like the depths of winter? In North Dakota? The sun started to come back by February. Oh, OK. Really missing the sun now. I like the idea of like treacherous places for retreats. I’m serious. Not the rest of getting fully snowed in and the retreat lasting like three days longer than it was meant to. Well, so we have our men’s retreat every year for like the AA guys that I’m with. You know, like so like we’re going to have a meeting tonight about our next one. And some of these guys are like, we should make it more comfortable. And I’m like, why, dude? Like, why do you why does it have to be really super comfortable? It’s like, haven’t you ever been camping? This is better. I mean, more comfortable than camping. You know, it’s like I think a little bit of suffering is good for the fellowship. You could go sledding if we did in the winter in North Dakota. No, you couldn’t. There’s no place. You can’t. Actually, if we did it at the location, I envisioning that would be one of the few places in eastern North Dakota that actually has topography. So we’d be in Valley City. You don’t need topography for sledding. You just need a four wheeler and a rope. I love it. Are you bringing the four wheeler? No, I could get I could get a four wheeler. I get a four wheeler tomorrow. I’ve got friends. I’ll bring a butter in the cigarettes. Nice. All right. I get a three wheeler too, but those ones are a little too exciting. Always want to tip. All right. I’m going to go to listening, guys. Have a good one. All right. Hi, John. Good to see you. Oh, here you are. I’m looking that way. That’s true. Andrew, what’s your story? Hey. Not much. I’m just finishing up my rough draft for my portfolio right now. What are you designing? Is this the train station? No, now I’m designing basically my architecture resume. I’m taking all those projects I did and putting them into one book. So yeah. Gonna go sell yourself to corporate America then. Oh, yeah. Start designing McDonald’s or, you know, mini malls or something. Can’t wait. Prefabricated tree houses. Oh, man. Yeah. Prisons, maybe. Prisons. You’re lucky. I’m lucky. Oh, man. Well, I have to go through more school first. So this is more for the next school I go to. Oh, okay. You’re two years in? I am two years in, yeah. Okay. But you already have to start thinking about your next school. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Fun times. Did you say something? Are they back? You guys are back. Oh, sorry. There we go. Some of that. It’s okay. Yeah, it’s a lot of fun. So. When, uh- That’s what I’m working on. When Cory and I move out to the wilderness of Wyoming and found a monastery, will you design our church for us? I thought it was gonna be in Wisconsin. He’s been saying Wisconsin. You know, a lot of pathetic stuff happens in Wyoming, though. For whatever reason. I know, but Wisconsin is like theoretical driving distance for my family, so I am partial to it. And also, things that happen in Wyoming appear to always be weird. And we don’t need any more weirdness. That would be our interest. We already have flexing. It would be on brand for us. True, but we do have to like scale it back a little bit. I don’t know. Did I tell you Hannah’s gonna join us in the monastery village? Oh, yes, you did. Who’s gonna join us in the monastery village? Of course. My little sister. The one at Steepinville right now. Good, good. Yeah. The one we’re going to praise and worship at a ration tonight with. Yeah, she’s singing at it. Oh, that’s why she’s doing it. It’s presence night at Christ the King. Yes, we’re gonna get another vocation tonight, huh? Potentially. Oh, man. Yeah. Oh, that’s good. That’s good. I was bold to do it on a Wednesday before Thanksgiving, but. Well, I think it’s specifically because all the kids who went to college are back right now. They can go to confession. Okay. They can go to confession. They can go to adoration and they have singing talent that they usually can’t draw on available right now. True. Okay. Have you given the joke about the three types of Catholics? I think so. Okay. My mom likes to say that all three Catholic personalities are represented among her children. Which are? Trad Cat, Social Justice Warrior, and Praise and Worship Leader. That about covers it, huh? Seems to. There you go. I can never come up with another one. Now, can you guess which one Emma is? Oh, a Social Justice Warrior. Yeah, I couldn’t hear what Father Erick said either. Oh, you’re a social justice warrior. You’re like two months away from dying. They both made the same joke. Now we’re breaking up. Look at that. They’re both joking around. Catholic Power Rangers. Oh, absolutely. Come up with just different ones and we’ll get costumes for them and we’ll be the Catholic Power Rangers. Yeah. Okay. The one problem is that we would need… We only have five of us. Do I not count? Okay, you can give us six. Woo! The fuck are we doing? Sorry, sorry Swain. It’s not about that. I gotta be careful. You gotta shut down the stream, Father. Yeah. I didn’t really hear it, so I’m gonna pretend it didn’t happen. Sounds good. Oh, I gotta be careful with that. Yeah. I have a bit of… I’m known for a bit of road rage here and there. I have to be a little bit more careful on the stream. Okay. Although I used to… I’ve left it and I gotta pick it back up again. But what I used to do is being like, that is not very nice, Mr. Carr. Mr. Carr, that’s what we call stupid. Talking like a kindergarten teacher. Exactly. It helps with road rage. Then you can’t… Be refreshed again. That’s how they’re gonna act. It makes it easier. You could always do the… That’s talking like a kindergarten teacher. The super Midwestern… Oh, hey there, buddy. Yeah, I would’ve let you in there if you just turned on your blinker. I’m a pretty polite driver, you know. Yeah, I’ve done it a couple times where they just slam it through and it’s like… It wasn’t really necessary, but you know how about it? Yeah. 23 got so much worse during the pandemic. Like nobody ever really let you in, but now really nobody lets you in. And it’s just a nightmare. Oh yeah, they become Massachusetts. You need to fight for every… No, actually that’s right. Massachusetts is actually really nice about this. I give them a lot of crap for a lot of things, but they’re actually pretty reasonable at letting you in and recognizing… Yeah, because their arms are two feet long. That’s true. No, Michigan, you have to fight. I’ve had situations where I’ve had the blinker on and they will literally take up that space. They don’t have to lose it to you. Like you have to take every inch. What’d you say? Wow. Yeah, sometimes you have to do that. Yeah. It was fun when they drive so close to you, they could like start picking things out of your trunk. We’re good. We’re making progress. That’s right. What’s that? Oh, what was it? There was one time where… So I have the unfortunate knack of… I don’t use cruise control, which means it’s one time where someone’s like just on my butt and then just slams around and like speeds past me. I’m like, jeez, I’m not going slow. I look down and I’m going 90. Like I’m not going slow. This guy’s going like 100, 110. Oh wow. Just slam it on the road. It’s like you can’t be annoyed at me. You’re the one who’s choosing to do this. Yeah. What? Gosh, everybody’s just driving today. Hello. Mark, if you’re wondering, we can’t hear you. So… Oh, do we have a friend? I can’t… I can’t confirm everything. Everything you guys said about Massachusetts, I can’t confirm while I’m driving in Massachusetts right now. All right. Good. Very good. I’m glad you made it up. While you’re driving without crashing. No crashing. I’ve got a passenger holding the phone and everything. So I’m good. I’m good. We’ll refrain from asking who the passenger is. That’s fine. Some people for some reason want to have privacy. Yeah, weird. Yeah, weird. It’s like a mini reunion from Arkansas now. All right. I’m trying to figure out where the echo’s coming from. Not coming from Mark. Is it coming from Andrew? I can hear it. It might be Emma. Emma, I muted you guys because you’re echoing really badly. So anyway, figure that out. Mark, you’ve got a little bit of a challenge here. Passengers is a funny word for hostage, says McMozav. Oh, off they go. Off they go. Emma, you’re still echoing. Can you hear that, Andrew? Yeah. Okay. I don’t want an echoey stream, Emma, but it’s really bad. So looks like it’s just you and me. Are you going to make it home for Thanksgiving, Andrew? I am home. You am home. Well, I guess it’s a question of whether I spend all night in the studio if we party too hard and can’t get up the next day and drive home. It’s probably not going to happen. Probably, but that’s the problem with drinking is by the time you need to have all of your faculties available to you to stop and make a good decision, you might have already had your faculties taken from you. Indeed. Bit of a catch-22 there. That’s why I wish I could walk to school. Yeah, I used to be able to walk to work and then I got a new job. Philip’s work day is nearly done. This is work, Philip, huh? I wasn’t even going to pretend today. I did a little work. Not much, though. I answered the phone. Yeah, I answered the phone. Let’s see. Been a long day, huh? Yeah. One phone call. We’re about at half power right now on the electronic in and out board. All right, Emma, I’m going to give you another chance here. Hey, Echo’s gone. Yeah, my ear was decided to just give up for a moment. So I had to put them back in the case and take them out again so that they just started up. Huh. Isn’t that special? Weird. It must have defaulted to the speaker input. Yeah, and then it went to my phone speaker. Of course that’s going to be a no. No, I had to give up. I was trying to figure out a way to connect. Have you tried turning it off and turning it back on again? And making a Christian joke, but I can’t figure it out. Have you tried dying and rising from the dead again? Yeah, exactly. Wow, that was fast. I mean, the priest did his job. You got to find the puns. Yeah, true. If we didn’t have puns, how else would we start out our homilies with a polite priest joke followed by a polite priest laugh? I do love the like, systematic. If you’re traveling, you can always use the. Wow, trees, something we don’t have back in North Dakota. Yeah, right. Trees and topography, those are two things that we’re missing here. Yeah, up in the icy north. Oh, yeah. I’m surprised it’s warm up here in Michigan. Well, soon will be. Well, true, but there’s no snow. Now it’s a little. Really, at least for a sticker. Supposed to be an El Nino this year means it won’t be quite as horrifyingly cold in North Dakota in theory. In theory. Hopefully, that also applies to. By this point last year, we had already had snow cover for two weeks, so. Oh, yeah. Yeah, actually, last winter was really tough. It about wiped. I think it cut the deer population in North Dakota in half. Oh, yeah. It was just. You know, I remember my grandmother saying something about there being a lot of snow last year. And it didn’t melt until the end of April. Yeah. Yikes. It was brutal. What do you do? Is there a season for that? It’s fall. Fall. Deer season? Yeah. Yeah, it’s the fall because if you shoot a doe at that time, the fawns are usually old enough to survive on their own at that point. That’s why. OK. I never gone hunting before. Despite the jacket. Oh, yes, I got this from Bumpo’s friend who does go hunting. Really? Yeah. And then your mom bought you a hat that matches it. Yeah, yeah, that’s correct. Oh, I forgot to bring the Elmer Fudd hat. That’s OK. You can borrow a Michigan hat. That was a very quick that’s OK. Well, they’re there. They must be between towers again. I think that’s how it happens. Every time they pass between cell towers, we just completely use the signal. But out of all the frames you could get stuck on, that one’s not bad. Yeah. Well, or maybe they’re turning to go get the Elmer Fudd hat. Turning around to go get the Elmer Fudd hat. There is a tower. That’s a good point. OK, they not see the cell tower. No. Now they can see us. I’m not sure that’s a cell tower. Oh, what else is that? It could be a radio tower. Well, it’s a tower. It’s got thingies on it. It is ironic that you said that because we’re driving by a very large tower. With thingies on it. With an all-seeing eye on top? Exactly. Nice flame. It’s an all-seeing eye, but only for the radio spectrum. Yeah. We just talked about panoptics in history class. Are you going to build a panoptician prison? I don’t think they ever actually built one. It was a really insane idea to begin with. Wait, what now? This is a thing? It might have been more of a sociology thought experience than anything else. Never let them have thought experiments. I, listen, man, this was a 19th century Britishman. Like, anything’s possible. Yeah. They were getting so weird in those days. Oh, it was, wasn’t it, um, what was his name? It was some utilitarian poser. Was it? It wasn’t Hume. It was. Oh, boy. Are you sure? I’m not sure. I’m not looking up now. Oh, gosh. We should be able to get some visuals with this, though. Panoptician. Well, you could look at, um, I think that there’s a prison in Pennsylvania that’s panoptic. Jeremy Bentham. It was Jeremy Bentham. Oh, yeah. Avertable. Yeah, that is a British house. Yeah, absolutely. I’m going to share. Yeah, that’s right. What is a panopticon? It’s a prison. Panopticon. There’s a big guard tower in the middle. They can see into the hole of the prison. There’s no, oh, there’s like no roof or something. Uh, it’s like it has to do with the angles. It can see every bit of the yard and into all the cells and everything. Yeah. So that’s the panoptician right there. So you’ve got a guard tower that the, uh, the prisoners in the cells can’t see properly. And then, uh, but he can see into all of their cells. And so the prisoners never know if they’re being watched or not. Yeah. Pretty cool. The eyes of God staring at them. If by God you mean Sauron, then yes. Yeah, uh, yeah, close enough. Isn’t there someone on this channel who was like, said something about this saying that it was designed after a monastery? Yeah. Like they’re like, oh, it’s the eye of God in the middle and they’d see everyone and. That sounds like an awfully optimistic approach to that. I, uh, I feel like I heard somebody say that. I don’t remember who or what. Yeah, I’m not buying it. Me neither. Yeah, Kevin Palmer’s got it. Satan’s Throne Loom is like a panopticon. Hmm. Interesting. But now our panopticons are digital, so we don’t notice them. Yeah. Do we use up cameras? Well, except for humans. That’s true. We talk about it both times. Like the birds. You guys should come to my history class. What kind of history class? History of architecture? Yeah. Oh, that’d be so much fun. It would be fun up until 1910. That’s kind of where we’re getting to. We’re done with the churches now. Victorian architecture. Yeah. But they’re not going to talk about Victorian architecture in 1910. There’s going to be like, oh, this guy made a concrete monstrosity. Yeah, now 1910 is what Victorian architecture is. Everybody decided that having a pre-molded concrete house would be the best thing ever, except for the people who actually lived there. They thought it was awful. Yeah, that’s pretty much how it goes. That’s also where you get things like flat iron building. Just iron monstrosities. I don’t know why you build a building with a flat roof where it snows. Right? You got to send someone up there to shovel it off. In a dry climate, flat roof, fine. You’re not going to have much trouble with it. It increases your acreage, your square feet that you could use. Man, when the snow just keeps on coming down, that pitched roof, there’s nothing like it. Yeah. It’s got gravity to do its job. For sure. I’ve thought about this interesting conundrum because next to our nice little neighborhood is this little suburbia area. Oh, do we have an echo again? I can hear something. No, no, no, no, no. You’re doing just fine. No? Doing great. Okay. Where we have this nice little suburban area, and it’s a bit odd because the rest of the neighborhood is just your basic neighborhood called the Saxon Charter. You get to here and all of the houses are exactly the same. That’s right. Exactly. It’s the part you don’t want to walk through because it’s just so uneasy. The question I always have to ask because I’m insufferable and a former economist kind of idea is how do you deal with the compromise between needing to help people with lower incomes? The whole point there exactly the same is because people have beautiful things even though they can’t normally afford it. The cost is that everyone has to have the exact same beautiful thing. Yeah. It’s a hard thing because it’s like they just made technology where you can 3D print using concrete a house and that will make everything much cheaper or even the storage container houses. And yet it doesn’t feel right. It’s not natural. Always that fun conversation. One thing you can always do is build beautiful churches. You could do that. For an hour a week they can get away from four dirty walls in a bed into something beautiful. It’s like a free public art gallery if we’re doing our jobs properly. Yeah true. So again it doesn’t quite matter as long as you have pretty church nearby which they do. You know having a beautiful house. I live in a very beautiful Victorian house right now. Nice. That’s pretty nice. We’ve got a bunch of hand carved oak statues in our chapel. It’s pretty fabulous. So I would like to be able to provide that for everybody but the world puts limitations on it. Yeah. Sometimes Gavin sometimes people do manage to dodge the lock up and spend the night in the church. I know here in the Fargo area there’s this program called Churches United for the Homeless. But that’s usually you know it goes from church to church from week to week and that’s usually in the basements or the social halls or some other non-sacred space to have the people sleep there. Which is more fitting I think than sleeping in the church. But you know sometimes people might just sleep through my sermon so. Providing them good rest. Yeah yeah if that’s I guess if that’s what you really needed that day then there we are. So anyway Collin that doesn’t really solve your problem. But it helps. It does help. In the end of the day it doesn’t you can be a little bit more utilitarian in your accommodations. As long as they do still have access to a free church. That is at least a compromise. That is at least a compromise that I did not consider. Now if all they have is brutalistic communist style apartments. That’s a bit of a different story. That’s how you get Russia. Bingo. Russia has some pretty churches though. Yeah I think we’ll go to them. So they may as well not have pretty churches. Oh check it out it’s Adam. Hi Adam. Hello. Hi how’s it going. I need a bomb on the Thanksgiving stream. I never get to come on these streams anymore because they’re so late for me. Happy Thanksgiving. Happy American Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving. Happy American Thanksgiving. There will be Thanksgiving theme tomorrow at work I think because I work for American opening. Okay so they’re bringing in turkey and cranberries and. Probably yeah I might get the lunch tomorrow. All right all right. It won’t be made with love the way my mom does it but you’ll make do. It’ll it’ll be made with all the fervor of a catering company hired in Ireland to do American food for Thanksgiving. The economic ability. The only thing I noticed about the food in Ireland was that it always came out absolutely piping hot. Yeah yeah it’s there’s no there’s no halfway. I like I think is that just something to do with the climate you think. It’s like I think it needs to be wet and so your food will come out very very hot. Yeah yeah I mean when it gets cold here even though temperature wise it might feel that cold because of the humidity it feels colder so to balance that out you have all your food. You’re like that’s why that’s why tea is such a big thing here as well it’s just anything to keep you warm. So yeah. We got fun guys over here. No so thanks so just Thanksgiving is tomorrow right. Yes that’s why that’s why I’m talking about it being all thanks eve. Oh that’s what I should have called this all thanks eve. That’s good thanks. Now the Eucharist means Thanksgiving right. Yeah yeah you could do American Eucharist eve. Nah it doesn’t go off the tongue of the slightest. Also it’s like edging edging towards blasphemy. Uh true. Gotta be careful when throwing around words to be funny. I guess you know this whole Thanksgiving thing I’m not sold on it I’m not sold on it. There’s a lot of only thing I hear about Thanksgiving is like fam interfamilial conflict although to be fair you hear the same about Christmas. So maybe yeah well that maybe you guys have a point. It comes from people who abandoned the faith of their fathers. Guess what I’ve held on to the faith of my fathers and we don’t have any of that interfamiliar conflict so I don’t know what to tell you. Yeah I mean we have a little bit of interfamilial conflicts out there. I was gonna say I don’t have too much interfamiliar conflict but I definitely did leave the faith okay well technically I didn’t leave the faith of my father but my mother and the rest of my family I’m better for it. I think there’d be a bit of a difference between an inter-Christian fight you know. It’s true. Versus like I don’t believe that there should be any rules ever. Yeah I mean there’s also a difference between like people being generally bad tempered toward each other and actual like intense conflict. We get some like bad tempers every so often because you’ve just got a lot of people who don’t interact with each other often interacting with each other but they usually blow over. Yeah I just don’t engage in any verbal combat. Never. She usually doesn’t produce anything worthwhile. I don’t literally mean anything worthwhile. So we’ll see how tomorrow goes. So my house is kind of the the island of misfit toys on big holidays. Oh. Because my parents just invite over all sorts of people don’t have anywhere else to go you know. So an old priest some of the friends who never married that sort of thing. And when it’s more than just a little bit of family around you tend to be better behaved. Yeah that sounds like a great time to be honest. It is it is they’re real fine folks. Some yeah yeah look forward to look forward to seeing the the regular holiday crew. Yeah yeah. So how’s work been Adam. Oh I’m I’m quitting my job. Oh I’m getting a better one. Yeah is this the big announcement or does your supervisor already know. Our supervisor already knows the supervisor is never going to find this stream. So you know so it’s grand. Yeah they already know. So I’ll be moving on to another company which will be which will be nice. Be working a shift pattern but I’m getting compensated a lot more for it. So you know it’s a little bit it’s a little bit stressful but then it’s also like look you do. You know what you have to do to to increase one’s one’s income for the sake of future family. So that’s kind of where that’s at at the moment. In terms of kind of day to day stuff it’s just same old same old like putting machines together. It’s very mechanical it’s just like you put the machines together you try and make it work. Today I am fixed something by so one of my colleagues unplugged something and then plugged it back in. And it wasn’t working like it was it wasn’t just that it was off it was like sporadically on and off. And then I just come along and plug it out plug it back in. Guess what just decided to work just decides to work. Now in Ireland do they have those goofy light power switches with the switches on them. Like the wall sockets the wall sockets yeah yes of course. I feel like that would trip me up nine times out of ten it’s like why won’t this work. Oh oh the wall socket was off yeah it that that does happen sometimes. But you know once you’re used to it you just that’s the first thing you’ll check. Yeah yeah so I do I do acknowledge that American power plugs are pretty daggone unsafe. I think I think it’s hard to beat the kind of the let’s say the UK and Ireland standard of plugs. Because it’s just so it’s so robust but it’s also like it’s also a weapon you know. What could I say that that massive ground you know the three pins and then you’ve got the massive ground on top that’s just. It’s like souped up Lego you know if you step on it it’s it’s going to be more than that. It’s going to be more than an exclamation of ow. Yeah yeah no it could it could it could drop blood no doubt. Yeah that’s pretty intense. All right well I hope the the new job works out for you and you know shift work can. Can kind of stink but you just you put up with it. Yeah it’s a factory so you have to have people on all the time that it depends on the company you work for some companies will only do day shift. And a shift is still a long time but like it’s 7am to 7pm that’s like. But because you’re on shift you’re going to be working was it. Four days on three days off or something like that right so you know shift work can kind of stink but you just you put up with it. Four days off or something like that right so you’re it’s it’s not too bad you know if I could get into a shift pattern like that rather than having to alternate between days and nights I’d be pretty happy with that. But it’s only really it’s a holdover for now so you just kind of that’s kind of that’s that’s the way I’m viewing it because I never I never I never wanted to work shift kind of as a general rule it’s just not it’s not healthy. And and no amount of money could make me do that let’s say for any extended period of time but like for what the next year yeah I could do that. Yeah. My dad apparently his first job in the Air Force was repairing the avionics systems of F1 11 bombers and for a while he was doing the night shift. Oh yeah. kind of like Sunday night to Thursday night into Friday morning and he said he would always like just muscle through Friday morning and then go to sleep when it got dark on Friday night so he could have a normal weekend and then go back to it. Yes, yeah that’s that’s something I’m trying to kind of figure out because I don’t want to I don’t want to kind of change my sleep schedule or cycle that much, but I mean. You don’t want to turn into a vampire. I think I already I think I you know, in some sense, I already have the skin pallor of a vampire I would also not like to actually be living the hours of a vampire too much you know I’m trying to bulk at the same time I’m on bit of a D supplements so we’ll see. Emma you’re really quiet. Yeah, I can’t hear you unfortunately. Not really. That’s that’s very strange. Yeah, you guys need to you just having all sorts of technical problems today so. I had technical problems during a job job interview. That was fun straight out of the gate it was a zoom call. It was a zoom call. Well, okay like you you should expect that interviewing on a zoom it’s like it’s amazing any of this stuff works ever. Yeah, yeah. Like Emma and Colin are flying down a highway at 75 miles an hour. streaming video and audio like. Yeah. The jet. This is a. Your sound is now really, really bad. I love it. Like it’s too we can hear you now, but we’re hearing everything like we’re hearing the car. We’re hearing the state your engines in. Oh man. Yeah, you. You need to look at the serpentine belt. That doesn’t sound. Yeah, timing belt. That’s that’s fine that’s fine. I guess I guess this this Thanksgiving thing it’s kind of a bit of a blip if you take the whole liturgical year because it’s not part of the Catholic liturgical year it’s just kind of like. Nestles between. All hallow tide. An advent. Which actually makes it like a nice relaxing holiday. Yeah, because at your average parish you just you do a simple mass at about nine a.m. And then you’re done. Oh right yeah yeah of course yeah because then there’s yeah. You don’t have to you don’t have to do like five Christmas masses you don’t have to set out extra seats you don’t have to deal with a whole bunch of extra music you don’t have to decorate the church. All the moving parts. Just just a regular old mass. Gartham’s got a question hey father Eric how often do you perform the anointing of the sick I just learned about it a few weeks ago that depends on your assignment really. So right now with my current assignment as director of liturgy and. Bishop secretary I don’t do it very often because I don’t currently have care of souls right now. So it’s just kind of friends and family that I might run across who who wanted to or just sort of an occasional thing. When I was at Holy Cross in West Fargo we do that fairly frequently there was a big hospital nearby and the priests from our parish would carry the pager around. And so I would get to do it usually at least once a week if not more often than that so it depends on what kind of ministry you’re doing how often you perform it. Something to let the pious Catholics know is don’t wait until you’re on death’s door to call the priest like call the priest early. Because the last rites is in plural and the last rites is actually more than one thing it’s confession anointing of the sick receiving viaticum and the apostolic pardon and the commendation of the dying. And if you’re intubated let’s say you can no longer do confession or viaticum and those are actually the two most important I think because those two are the sacraments the other three are. Our sacramentals so yeah that was a homily I meant to give at Holy Cross and never had the time waiting for the right we’re reading to come up but I think I’m going to write an article in our diocesan magazine. Yes and it’s going to explicitly say tell your children not to wait but instead to call the priest right away. Yes that’ll that’ll hit my my demographic that I’m looking for exactly. Yeah that’s something I I. I ended up trying to look into a little bit in the sense of like that’s it’s you know extreme unction not just the last rites because which is which is more than that obviously we’re just extreme unction. Which is part of that is like yes so ideally it’s meant to be administered once and only once right. But nope. So yeah that’s you’re trying to predict when somebody’s going to die and it’s like that you just can’t do that. And I think you know if we go back to the scripture. The gospels record that the disciples went out and anointed people who were sick with oil. And then St. James also says that if somebody’s sick they should call a priest and have them come in and do the anointing doesn’t say extremely ill on death storm. Which is regular old illness there so I think I actually I actually think that the language evolution that we’ve had since the Second Vatican Council gives a better idea of what the second Vatican Council is. I actually think that the language evolution that we’ve had since the Second Vatican Council gives a better idea of what the sacrament is for. Yeah versus extreme unction. Because it’s it’s for more than just when you’re in extremis. So once again showing my credentials as a genuine Vatican to fan. Yeah I just. What. So there’s a lot of fuzz coming in addition to your voice. Very difficult to understand you. It’s good to have you on. Happy Thanksgiving everybody. See ya. God bless. Oh I don’t like that. That’s the thing about extreme unction I guess in the sense even even if it were only to be administered ideally once or whatever like last rites includes more than that and on that basis you should just like. You know not not wait not wait until the very last moment to do anything like that yeah no that makes sense. Yeah I know the you know I mean look at the symbolism that we’re using there. Yeah right what is what would oil be thought of as a as it in the ancient world. You just you just slather yourself in it I don’t know. Yeah yeah so do you recall the story of the good Samaritan. Yes. What did he bathe the man. Did he bathe him in oil is that right? Bathe did him wine and oil. Oh. So at least in the in the minds of ancient people bathing a wound in oil would be like us putting Neosporin on it. So it has the symbolism built into it of healing. Yes. Unlike something like the apostolic pardon which is like yeah you’re going to die here’s an indulgence. Yeah. So yeah I think the Vatican too is recovering a more ancient tradition so. Yeah yeah. Sometimes sometimes that’s that’s useful you know just got to be careful. So then doing these sacraments if we did them today like if maybe if they started today or something it would be like if you did the whole right using Neosporin. I think the Lord came at the time he came in order to prevent modern cringe from infecting his sacraments. Well I just mean like you know. Nobody thinks of. Would have used oil the way we use Neosporin that was the point I was trying to make. Yeah but the interesting part is like if today we use something that we know to be medicinal it would be like oh you’re putting medicine on instead of oh it’s oil. Okay. Like they would have seen that as oh you’re you’re putting like it’s like a medicine that you’re applying even though I don’t really have an open wound right now. So it is interesting to think like what if you use soap or something. In the older rite you would also anoint whatever was wounded. Well yeah that’s probably a smart idea. Yeah yeah. You’d anoint everything in the old rite you’d like the forehead the eyelids the nose the mouth the ears the hands the feet. The whole thing you know plus whatever was wounded and now it’s just the forehead and the hands the principal parts of man. Yeah the older rite is anointing all the senses basically is attempting to heal essentially like the. It’s showing that there’s healing going on all throughout right it’s pointing to it all very explicitly. So yeah anointing early and often. Okay. Don’t especially if you’re going in for surgery it’s a good thing to get anointed the day before. Yeah that was something that was something I was thinking of actually in regards to that that would be people people worried about surgeries and whether they’d go well or not. I was like well if there’s a possibility you might come come out the other side like why wouldn’t why wouldn’t you. This isn’t something that I was thinking of for myself because I’m not going to be but yeah that’s. In our in our ritual book we literally have a prayer at the end of the anointing ceremony for somebody before surgery. It’s like it’s specifically held up is is not only can you do this you should do this so. Because you know anytime you’re going under general anesthesia there’s there’s always a chance that the anesthesiologist is just going to overdo it. Right it’s not it’s and as far as I’m aware at least with with anesthesia it’s not an exact science there’s just stuff that they just it just kind of. Yeah you can react poorly with a kind of anesthesia that you’ve never had before and and that’s it. So so yeah confession always. Go at least once a month there’s there’s my my advice for you. That’s a good idea. Yeah. Once a month is nice it’s often enough to let you know that you’re taking it seriously not too often to get you scrupulous. Yeah I. I like I do like the sweater that’s a good sweater yeah. That’s preparing the way for the Christmas sweaters like this is. It’s paving the way. How’s that yeah how’s that how’s the whole master of ceremonies and stuff going for you now Father Eric. Is it pretty good going up right so it’s going to get busy. Well I don’t think so actually I think Christmas is going to be like we’re going to have the big Christmas Eve mass. So yeah I’ll be I’ll be moderately busy but no more probably slightly less busy than your average parish priest. Because guess what I’m not. Not in charge of I’m not in charge of decorating anything. You’re in charge of what is decorated. Yeah I’m in charge of somebody else’s and this is actually kind of a nightmare year for priests because you know Sunday morning we’ve got the fourth Sunday of Advent. And then Sunday evening we have Christmas Eve masses. Oh oh right yeah bang bang. And so it’s always whenever Christmas falls on a Monday like that it really but I don’t have to worry about any of that. It’s not a problem. I just show up and I’m going to emcee the bishops midnight mass. And the next day I’m going to have the Latin mass. And then after that I’m going to rest. Cool. Because that’ll be that’ll be enough. I’m you know Advent’s got the purple color and stuff. I feel I’m thinking I’m going to do something for that. You missed the beginning of my stream didn’t you. I did. Yeah no no the beginning of my stream was. Advent you mope it. I’m thinking about it. It’s up it’s in it’s in that it’s in my prefrontal cortex like Advent’s coming dude and not long after Advent is lent. This is the shortest Advent possible. Right yeah because it’s not that you’re missing the fourth Sunday of Advent but like it’s you know yeah very short. Yeah the whole fourth week of Advent takes about 12 hours so. Great. Yeah I just there’s something there’s something that could be done for that you know. Yeah. Even just a kind of small thing because you know Advent’s not as big as lent in terms of kind of penances and stuff like that. And I need to do something for lent. Like I needed to last year I was just did not do anything so I was like it’s time to get serious. It’s time to lean into lent. We’ll do it do it with a few of the lads. Yeah. With a few of the lads get together and then lent it up real right. Okay yeah. Okay. Okay boys what are we gonna do. Sit down and actually discuss it yeah because that’s I don’t leaving it leaving it until it’s too late it’s like. See in the old calendar the old calendar had a tool for this was set to a Jesumah Sunday. Yes. That came three Sundays before Ash Wednesday so you would see the purple and the hallelujah go away and you’d be like oh Ash Wednesday’s coming. Yes yeah. It’s just like oh they think they understand me. Because Ash Wednesday now sneaks up on me every year. Right yeah. All of a sudden it’s lent. Yeah that’s right because you’ve got all those except to a Jesumah sex a Jesumah quinquad Jesumah and then Ash Wednesday and then somewhere in there is Mardi Gras. Tuesday before Ash Wednesday yeah. Oh yeah. Fat Tuesday. That’s when you have your carnival you say goodbye to meat. Right. Oh oh yeah. I’m trying to bulk. Listen all you have to do is overcook your chicken breast every every night. Yeah yeah there’s something that can be I can I can bulk I can yeah I can bulk and do pennants maybe not exactly fast in the way that I’m going on a calorie deficit but. I want to I want to lean into both. 100% intentionally overcooking your chicken breast counts as pennants. Okay. I had this idea for years now. I haven’t had the guts to implement it but like. Yeah just turn it. How about I trial that during Advent. I’ll do that during Advent. How about that. There you go. See we’re solving problems here. Not big problems but. Yeah it’s helpful. They’re not they’re not zero problems. Yeah. Are you are you hitting the weights too. Yeah so I’m going to order a barbell. I’m going to have my weights in here so that every time so I get I mean even on a non shift pattern I get home at around 6 p.m. So that gives me very little time to go out to a gym and do prep work and all that. So what I’m going to do is on the weekend I might go to a gym. And then two times during the week I’ll do some barbell. Oh you know deadlift and overhead press. And. Other stuff like that deadlift overhead press. I’ve got a plan or something like that. That’s I went to the gym pretty regularly after finishing my. With school so the kind of discipline of getting into that routine is too bad. It’s just like the plan for it. So I just picked up a plan from barbell medicine. Their beginners program and that’s that’s supposed to help with like building up muscle and stuff. And alongside that I’m trying to get into a kind of calorie surplus which for somebody like me is actually hard because I get sated quite quickly. So I kind of have to not overeat to the point of being sick but like over like a little bit more on top of when I feel full. Yeah that’s not a problem for me. We had a we had a dinner last night for young men who are open to the possibility of considering priesthood. Yes. And this was down in a little town Wapatim where I was assigned for two years and. They got the food from the local Mexican restaurant which was just top notch. Oh I went back for seconds all right. And the thing is is that they always give you a tortilla and I just don’t bother with the tortillas anymore. No. Like they just get in the way I just make a pile of rice a pile of beans put the meat on top of that and then salsa cheese whatever else I want on top of that. And I just just have a pile. That’s the American way of doing it because the tortillas. If you get a proper American portion you’re going to have a huge tortilla you know. Yes yes. Wow cool. And how did that dinner go? Did you get many guys? Fine I mean so these these are these dinners are very wide net. Yes. You know so we had eight guys which for a town of that size with the little university they have there. That’s great. That’s great numbers. Not too worried about that. You know most of them were students at the at the technical school there. There was one high schooler and one gentleman who was a little bit older. And you know basically we had a number of priests there and after eating we just kind of told our stories of how we got into this. If they had any questions they were allowed to ask that. The main question was for the bishop how did you become a bishop? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Bishop full the nose what his big priorities are. And if you’re not prioritizing vocations then you’re a bad bishop. Because it’s like we need priests you know. It’s essentially looking after your successor to being a bishop right effectively. Yeah yeah no. Not just your successor you know it’s like you need to fill slots too. More than that I know. I’m thinking even just bare bare minimum like lowest shortest shortest perspective. And so you know with something like this where it’s just a dinner that’s kind of low commitment. Lots of guys will come to that just to hear them out. In the spring we’ve got a weekend retreat that we make available and also a visit to the seminary in Nebraska. Okay. So those are and then you know personal conversations and those sorts of things. Oh great. So by the time you get somebody going to their seminary in Nebraska it’s like okay now we’re starting to get kind of serious here. But come to a dinner. Right. Dinner. Hear them out. Yeah. So anyway basically every young homeschool gentleman I’ve ever met has told me that they’re thinking about it. And then like you know three months later they’ll have a girlfriend and then a year later they’ll be married. Which is fine you know but like every homeschooler will tell me that they’re thinking about it. And then the lady runs along and I’m not thinking about it anymore. Yeah. So anyway just because somebody says they’re thinking about it doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. Right. Yeah. I think there’s yeah it’s strange how that all plays out. I mean I know a guy who’s kind of actually looking into it and considering it at the moment. But I think yeah I don’t know. There seems to be you know there seems to be this kind of trend of like no like if you’re like a if you’re a real Catholic guy you’re going to go and like discern the priesthood. And it’s like yeah no not in a bad way. Like the priesthood is a very noble endeavor like and it’s essential. But it’s kind of because I remember talking to a couple of guys who I know a couple of guys actually for former seminarians right. Some of them left like first year second third year. Right. And it’s like I remember one of them was this is very strange at a college scenario. It’s like yeah well I went you know I went and tried it out. And it’s like yeah but dude like that’s a major financial commitment. And like if you don’t follow through with it like you’ve like let’s say for instance right me it’s like you start the process and it’s like well you’ve got to balance work and then that as well. And it’s like these eventually if you’re pursuing it to the end it’s like one of these gives up which is work. Right. Like I’m no longer working in a factory. All during that time where you’re even figuring out whether you have the kind of capabilities to to follow through with this and then you know Father Eric you talk about all the psych assessments and stuff like that. It’s not easy. It’s not an easy process. Right. And then even then you’re in seminary. And how long does it take to get ordained something like eight years. Yeah. Now it’s when I started it was six to eight and because of recent general executory decrees from the Vatican it’s now seven to nine. Yeah right. So like that’s a really long process. So you know most guys figure out if they’re not going to do it though within a year or two. Yes right right. But even that year or two is like that’s actually a big that’s a big front front load of kind of. And in the case of like you know any sort of like hands on work like that’s a lot of time that you’re spending. And it’s a lot of time you’re dividing up as well. Yeah. And it also to tell you what man at least in my area former seminarians are a hot commodity. That’s another thing. Yeah that’s another thing entirely. Like that’s yeah right. I’m like all these guys from from from the seminary because like it reminds me of what I would expect the military to be in the sense of like the camaraderie between the guys who were there. I remember I was having breakfast at Sunday with them some guys I knew one was a former seminarian with the Institute of Christ the King and then another guy unfortunately going to the SSPX. So you know yeah seriously like. They they they went to the same seminary because they were both they both went when they were one of them was a little bit older so when he was younger he went to the Institute of Christ the King and they were talking about their professors with the guys that they had there. And it was like that’s kind of cool. That’s kind of cool. And it obviously does like there’s a discipline that’s kind of. There’s a lot there’s a lot that goes on there right. It’s a bit of a pressure cooker and also a fish bowl. Yeah. You know a fish bowl you know it’s like yeah people can just see me you know. It’s not like you have zero privacy but it’s like oh Andrew didn’t come to morning prayer today. Oh. You know it’s like do we really want to recommend this guy to the bishop if he can’t get out of bed in the morning. Yeah. That sort of thing or it’s like oh you really lost your temper at lunch you know that’s that’s not a great look right. We want guys who just fly off the handle constantly. Right. So there’s a lot of there’s a lot of trial and you’re living with your you’re living with your formators you know kind of in the same dormitory you eat meals with them. So it’s just a little little extra evaluation. Yeah. So yeah no nobody has a vocation to the seminary. It’s not supposed to be fun. But you know it’s a you can really really focus in. It’s a it’s a great great setting to focus in on discipleship growth and virtue. Yeah. Prayer learning how to do that well. You make some great friends along the way and right. You know I think if you’re actually following the Lord there you can’t possibly lose. Right. Like if it’s an impulse of grace that’s leading you there. Yeah right. And I like a lot of these guys that I talk to you like they are I think even just the way they talk about they were clearly benefited from from going to the seminary and it wasn’t a case. When they were doing it of I’m going to go to the seminary because I don’t know what to do or something like that. But in some cases like afterwards it’s like dude you don’t you don’t send the wrong message here like you should only go to seminary if you’re like. If you have at least an idea. Right. If you have at least an idea I might be called to be a prayer. I need to go check this out. Right. It’s not it’s not like it’s not like a well you need to know with absolute certainty at the same time it’s like you don’t want to go in and just for the hell of it. Hey why not. It’s like you think I think this is the direction I’m going. Yeah. Yeah. That’s a that’s the right attitude and that’s what I told the guys. You know I told my story and like my two biggest pieces of advice are you don’t have to know for certain to go. Yeah. And God’s not trying to trick you. Man. That’s that’s a lot of there’s a lot of like weird stuff going on in terms of like that. So Father I think I might have I might have posted this in one of the other BOM or something like that. I posted Father Andrew Yunnan and he’s a Chaldean Catholic priest and he’s giving a talk on vocations and he’s like he just he’s great because he’s I think he’s from Michigan. You know he lives in Michigan but he but he’s like from a Chaldean family so this kind of like a so I knew a lot of Chaldean Catholic seminarians because they went to the seminary in Detroit. Oh right. OK. And so and so you kind of you know the sorts of guys there and he’s just he’s a real he’s not intense but he’s just got that kind of like Middle Eastern just I’m just going to tell you like this is this is how it is. And he said and he’s in a room full of full of I think American Catholics right in the Michigan area probably. So a lot of you guys are asking me you know ask me questions and you’re kind of describing yourself you know and describing yourselves as perpetually confused which actually is what you call discernment you know because it’s just like it’s a complete because what you’ll hear in some cases is like people just not understanding that discernment is actually like seeing things that kind of divide like the category of things. You know the generalization or the way things end up parsing out seeing distinctions and yeah he’s just going into like guys if you if you have a vocation to the priesthood it’s not her just just you know go ahead do it. And I’ve got a bit of a hot take here. Yeah. I think a result of giving people the rules of discernment of spirits from St. Ignatius of Loyola who won’t benefit from them. Yeah I’ve never even read any of that but I’ve heard of it which is like maybe that’s a bad time. It’s like the standard it’s the standard at least in the United States right. Now let me be clear I’m not saying they’re bad. No. They’re very much for St. Ignatius and the sort of gentleman he attracted. Those are men of action. Those are men who don’t sit still. Right. Very energetic and ambitious and not very fearful. Yes. So the rules of discernment of spirits that St. Ignatius gave like he gave to himself those are ways of you know really energetic and fearless people stopping and saying OK what am I doing right now. And am I following the right spirit right now. Yeah. If you have an anxious temperament. You’re just going to be stuck in an action. Right. You’re just going to be sitting there wondering what spirit am I. But how do I know that I’m following the right. Well how do I know that I know I’m following the right spirit right now. And they just get caught in a discernment loop because. Yeah. And it’s like for them you just be a little bit more Dominican. Just be a little bit more analytic. Because some people need to see things from the beginning. Right. Right. It’s like oh OK. Tell me why you’re thinking about the priesthood. OK. I did a prayer and I had this thought that I should be a priest. OK. What did you do. Well I said no. OK. And then how did you feel after that. I felt pretty pretty disturbed and then next week when I was praying the same thing happened again. Man you just tell me that. Go to the seminary right. That happened twice that you had this this is impulse there versus being like oh oh you know. Was I actually under the influence of the good spirit. You know it’s just like. Yeah. Some people really benefit from that but not everybody. And I think this this one size fits all solution to vocational discernment doesn’t help. It can’t work. Like it’ll never work because it’s a Procrustian bed. You’re trying to stretch people out to fit the the this kind of size rather than like course people being people like you need to tailor it to the sorts of people that they are. And yeah. And so I mean just the. Yeah it was kind of just the simple things that Father Andrew Unahan was kind of saying and it’s like and the thing the funny the funny the kind of slightly funny thing to me about it is like when you when you end up like kind of worrying so much about it that it’s like and it’s kind of inaction if you just say like well you know like what’s the worst case scenario. Oh no. You know like you don’t decide to or you just don’t pursue the priesthood is like oh well look look here we’ve got another another major. Fine vocation for you. Yeah yeah we’ve got holy matrimony right. And it’s like there you go. And you know even if that like is not because like look I mean it’s hard it’s hard out there right for young guys young Catholic men. And you know like another thing is like lay lay celibacy right because because celibacy in and of itself is kind of part of the vocation priesthood right or at least like in the Latin right it is in the last. Yeah and it’s a gift of you know like it’s a sort of gift that like if you have it you know and you can’t like what for whatever reason because like you know marriage is kind of the default kind of thing for being a human being but like you know life happens and unfortunately maybe something like okay well then like lay celibate you know like go live in a monastery or become an oblate you know there’s there’s loads of. It’s it’s a sort of thing where you have to consecrate yourself to something. Yes. Yes. Not not having a direction and just amusing yourself is not an option. No. You’ve got to have a purpose direction you’re going that sort of thing. Life in Christ right. Yeah. That’s that’s and that’s so it’s in some sense it’s kind of like I get I get that people are kind of they want to they want to live it. Live well and they want to live in Christ but if it’s not priesthood like then holy matrimony is another way to live in Christ it’s these there is a Christ is sending many invitations you know it’s it’s it’s like you know the options are there and like you know part of part of cooperation with grace is like you have the choice to do so you know. Yeah I don’t know there’s a kind of maybe it’s maybe it’s particularly in the West it’s and maybe it’s kind of a leftover like good fervors zeal for like yes many many holy priests please you know. Kind of. Being anxious over over well what if I don’t have the call to the priesthood it’s like well maybe you don’t. Or maybe you do well like you’ve got to just move on you know you can’t you can’t get stuck. And one of the one piece that was really helpful for me when I was in seminary was this notion that the church was also discerning along with me. Like it wasn’t just my decision. Yes yeah because that it makes it very like intense so intensely individualistic it doesn’t kind of make sense right. Yeah and once that got through my thick skull it was like oh that’s actually deeply comforting right there. I don’t have to figure this out all on my own we’ve got you know half a dozen priests on faculty here we’re going to be like yeah I think this guy’s got it. And sometimes they were like I don’t think this guy’s got it. Right. So it was just like oh this wasn’t up to me ever really. Right yes partially has to be but yeah. It needs your cooperation but like that you don’t you don’t get to decide the final kind of and it’s kind of an image of just kind of life in general right. It’s look you you can you can cooperate you know and be along for the ride and kind of help out with with where things may may go but you’re not in the driver’s seat. Yeah yeah and the Lord was very merciful with me you know because I remember being a senior in high school you know like any senior in high school I don’t really know anything. So I was just like praying and like insisting just tell me just tell me and I looking back on it I now know for a fact that if the Lord had answered the prayer the way I wanted him to I would have said no I’m not doing that and gone the other direction. Yes yes yeah. It was you know and so it’s like you know my senior year of high school I start really thinking about this start praying about it wasn’t until four years into the seminary that he actually just told me guess what those four years were important. Those four years changed me into the sort of person that could actually say yes to God. Yes yeah and that’s that’s a big that’s another big thing is like there’s a there’s a there’s a patience aspect I guess as well and just to kind of like look just you don’t need to you don’t need to figure it all out like right now this this instant. Because yeah that’s it that’s God’s I mean this is this is something again I think some of the guys I know it’s like they kind of need to hear this it’s kind of it’s step one for me it’s like yeah God has your back right. And it’s like not that was the big thing yeah it was the big thing was like oh yeah he this isn’t like some kind of game this isn’t a trick this isn’t a puzzle I need to figure out just yeah just show up do what you’re told and God’s will become apparent and yeah off you go. Jesus loves you and he wants what’s best for you and like you know for the guys it’s like he wants you to be like a real man right. He wants you to be like Leonidas and 300 right it’s like it’s like doing like you know defending the good doing what is what is you know most appropriate to you as a man fulfilling your your mind and like. He’s got your back dude you don’t need you don’t need to like yeah yeah okay you’ve got responsibilities you need you need to make sure you know like clean your room right you know lift lift weights grow in virtue and like just be a fun guy to be around right and then. You know like that’s that’s enough like I have a so my mother’s been very gracious enough to get me a watch a pocket watch for. For Christmas. And I mentioned I want to do an inscription on it and I was like oh now I have to come up with an inscription. And it was I decided what would be the best inscription for specifically a pocket watch and and I think I came up with them. What’s what’s the quote is from Matthew I think is sufficient sufficient is the evil of the day right. It’s Matthew 634 that’s right and because that would be the you know I got it in Latin sufficient. And it’s like. Yeah it’s it’s just. Yeah you don’t you don’t have to worry too much like about things like so it’s like you know. It’s like yeah but it’s the day man you’ve got you just get through today and that’s it all. You don’t have to be the supreme lord of history in charge of the rise and fall of civilizations and the salvation of man and creation alike you know you just just got to get through today. That’s why I like history because it’s just like I’m not in the driver’s seat of the world. I’m not in the driver’s seat and neither are any of the people involved in this even even the ones who rise to the greatest heights and in a particular time period. Was Napoleon was Napoleon really a free man. No not even slightly. Yeah I don’t think so I don’t think so I think the humblest peasant and even the French countryside was a freer man than Napoleon. And I’m going to use my freedom to end this stream because we’ve been going for about two hours now and I think anything more would be in temperance. Yeah okay. So Adam delightful to have you on. I’m not able to do this regularly but day before Thanksgiving we can do it. So I’m just really happy to have been able to be on to be honest it’s been ages. Yeah it’s good catching up with you. Thank you. Always solid to hear about your your architecture adventures. Thank you. Have a blessed and happy Thanksgiving to all my American listeners to all my non-American listeners. Turkey is one of the great gifts of America to the world so maybe you just have some tomorrow anyway. I will. Yeah but God bless you all. You too father. See you.