A Show of Faith
Millennial, Priest, Minister, and Rabbi walk into a radio station...
A Show of Faith
April 13, 2025 Spiritual Practices: Reshaping Your Soul Through Discipline
What does it take to transform ourselves spiritually? In this thought-provoking episode, we unpack how spiritual practices shape our souls like exercise shapes our bodies.
The conversation begins with a compelling analogy: a man in his 40s who decided to transform his physical appearance through disciplined diet, exercise, and sleep habits. Similarly, meaningful spiritual growth requires intentional practices that reshape us from the inside out. But as we discover, the motivation behind these practices matters profoundly.
"One of the greatest treasons is to do the right thing for the wrong reason," Father Mario observes, challenging us to examine why we engage in spiritual disciplines. Are we fasting during Lent out of mere tradition or seeking genuine transformation? Are we giving to others for public recognition, or from authentic compassion? These questions cut to the heart of spiritual authenticity.
We explore the value of sanctifying time through religious seasons like Advent, Lent, and Passover. While some find power in these dedicated periods of focus, others prefer consistency throughout the year. Both approaches have merit when driven by the right intentions—becoming the person God designed us to be.
Perhaps most revealing is our discussion of silence as a spiritual discipline. In our noise-filled world, many struggle—or even fear—being alone with their thoughts. Yet silence "exposes the soul" and creates space for divine connection. As Father Mario poignantly notes, we will all face death alone someday, making comfort with solitude an essential spiritual skill.
Whether well-established in your faith or just beginning to explore spiritual practices, this conversation offers practical wisdom for authentic spiritual formation. Start small, be consistent, and continually examine your motivations. The transformation you seek begins with these first steps.
There's something happening here what it is ain't exactly clear. There's a man with a gun over there.
Speaker 5:Telling me I've got to beware. I think it's time we stop.
Speaker 2:Children. What's that sound? Everybody, look what's going down. This battle line's been drawn.
Speaker 6:Nobody's right if everybody's wrong.
Speaker 1:Young people speak in their minds.
Speaker 7:Full of garbage like they are Welcome to the show of faith here on 1070.
Speaker 2:We stop and say what's that sound? Everybody look at what's going down.
Speaker 7:Welcome to the show of faith here on 1070 ANTH. So, you're ad-libbing now. Well, you know, when they start saying, the young people speak in their minds getting so much resistance from behind. The reason they're getting resistance from behind is because, they're full of garbage.
Speaker 3:Oh.
Speaker 7:But not all young people, not all all. Welcome to a show of faith here, where professor, priest, millennial and rabbi discuss theology and philosophy and anything else of interest in religion. If you have any response to our topics or any comments regarding what we say, we would love to hear from you, and you can hear our shows again and again by listening pretty much where every podcast are heard. Today we have with us our beautiful, wonderful professor, beautiful, wonderful professor David Capes, who is our Baptist minister. He is the director of academic programming at the Lanier Theological Library.
Speaker 3:Hey, it's great to be with you, Father Mario. We're missing Stuart tonight. We'll be missing him tonight because it's Passover.
Speaker 7:It's Passover. Yeah, we are passing him over. We are Our P, our P, our Piste, our.
Speaker 3:Piste.
Speaker 2:That's me.
Speaker 3:Piste de resistance.
Speaker 7:Rudy Kong is our millennial. He is a system engineer and has his master's degree in theology from the University of St Thomas. Hello, hello.
Speaker 3:Hey, Rudy.
Speaker 7:It says here Rudy says I sound so far away.
Speaker 3:You sound far away.
Speaker 7:Yeah, I mean, the microphone doesn't sound right, even in my earphones.
Speaker 3:It's because your ears are just on the wrong side of each other.
Speaker 7:All right and I'm.
Speaker 3:And you are.
Speaker 7:I'm Father Mario. I am the retired pastor of St Cyril of Alexandria Catholic Church in Houston, Texas.
Speaker 3:All right, okay, very good. Now let me say that Stuart, our rabbi, our resident rabbi, is at Passover this week. It's a big holy day for the Jewish folk. It's one of their main holidays and it commemorates the liberation from the Jews at the time of the Exodus. Why is this night different than any other night? Well, because on this night they remember what happened when they were slaves in Egypt and they were liberated by by Moses. So, uh, well, by the Lord, but Moses was the instrument of the Lord for that. So, anyway, that's what this holiday is about. It's one of the big Holy holidays, it's a pilgrimage festival. I had a friend who was here at the Lanier Theological Library, a Jewish guy who lives in Jerusalem, and he went back. Here we go. We're changing out microphones here. He went back to Israel because he wanted to be in Israel for Passover. So that's part of his religious obligation is to be in Israel itself and to be in the city of Jerusalem at the time of Passover. Now, I don't think Stuart went to Jerusalem.
Speaker 7:No, I think he's in Bel-Air.
Speaker 3:I think he is too. But if he could be in Jerusalem, he probably would, he probably would, he probably would. And Rudy, you're not in Jerusalem, I take it.
Speaker 8:I would love to go sometime, but I am not.
Speaker 3:Well, maybe we all should go. All four of us should go to Israel someday.
Speaker 8:That would be cool. I might have to bring my wife.
Speaker 3:Well, yeah, that would be a good thing. And I would probably bring mine as well.
Speaker 7:So there would be six of us. I can't bring mine, you can't bring your wife. Look, I don't have one.
Speaker 3:Well, that's true, I'm celibate, that's that.
Speaker 7:that's true, you know you can bring your dog there's a song about that.
Speaker 3:What's the song?
Speaker 7:celibate, celibate. Then to the music oh, I think that's celebrate. I think that's celebrate.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I thought it was celibate, yeah not everybody who is celibate wants to dance, I think. Or do they have anybody to dance with? I don't know. I don't know. But you love your dog, you could take your dog with you.
Speaker 7:Oh, no, no, no, thank you. My dog, I love my dog, is it Charlie? Charlie, charlie, okay, Charlie is a toy poodle and he is wonderful. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Keeps you company, doesn't he? Hey, tonight on the show we're going to be talking about spiritual practices, and let me set it up this way I have a friend who is in his mid-40s and he has never really worked out much in his life, but he just decided that he was going to change his body, his physique, his conditioning, Okay. So he has started a number of practices.
Speaker 3:Okay, they're not spiritual practices, necessarily, but they're practices, and these practices involve things like eating certain kinds of food and certain kinds of diet and not eating certain kinds of food and certain kinds of diet, of diet and not eating certain kinds of food and certain kinds of diet. They include giving up some time doing one thing that he might like to do in order to maybe work out one to two hours a day building upper body, lower body, that kind of thing. Now he's sculpting his body. He's changing his body significantly. He has a new practice now about sleep. Okay, what is it? Well, I mean, he sleeps more. Basically, he has a little bit more discipline when it comes to sleep.
Speaker 3:Now, my point in all this is to say that if you ever want to change something about yourself, you ever feel a sense of needing to change. It's going to take a new set of practices, a new set of habits, maybe a new diet, maybe a new, whatever it might be, to begin to shape yourself in a way that you so desire. And he's getting good results. I mean, he's getting good, good results. It's not without a lot of work. Now, here's the thing.
Speaker 3:The analogy I want to try to bring is that if we have certain goals that are spiritual goals, that are goals about righteousness and about self-integrity and about peace in your life and about being aware of kind of what you're doing and defining peace and meaning and satisfaction those kinds of things.
Speaker 3:It might well take a new set of practices in order for you to achieve that, and so there's this in all of our faiths, stewards as well, if you're here. There are certain practices that we follow in order to begin to shape ourselves spiritually, mentally, emotionally, into a different kind of person, a person like we would like to believe, and those practices involve a variety of things, and so what I wanted to do tonight is to spend a little bit of time talking about spiritual practices, the things that we do in order to bring out a different kind of outcome, a different kind of person, to be a person of more integrity, a person of more faith, a person who is more trustworthy, a person who maybe doesn't suffer from some of the kind of health and depressions and things like that that certain people have right. Okay, so I'd like to do that tonight, and I want to begin with where we all are right now. Stuart's at Passover, in a holiday, we are entering into Holy Week as Christians.
Speaker 7:First day is Passion Sunday.
Speaker 3:Today is Passion Sunday, so I want to talk a little bit about sanctifying time, setting aside time. About sanctifying time, setting aside time Because, as a child, you have all this time, but the older we get, the less and less time we have, right? So, as a result, what are we going to do with the time that we have, the little bit of time that we have, or, if we have? If you're a young man, young woman, you may have lots of time ahead of you. Yeah, but you may not.
Speaker 3:Yes, you never know, you don't know. So I want to talk initially about sanctifying time, I want to talk about seasons and I want to talk about the calendar, talk about day, maybe even daily prayer.
Speaker 7:Now I'm going to ask you to give me, because this is a very sensitive topic for me. Not how you might think it. Okay, but since you know the Bible much more than I do, Well, maybe I mean, you know I can give you a quote from the Bible and normally you can kind of steer me as to where it is. Where I would have to look it up. St Paul says something.
Speaker 3:This Some observe times and seasons kind of steer me as to where it is yeah, where I would have to look it up.
Speaker 7:All right, right, st paul says something this some observed times and seasons, and to to others one day is the same as the next yeah, yeah, romans, uh, 14 romans 14, 14 wow, okay, yeah, I happen to fall in the not the Catholic Church observes a lot of times and seasons. Okay, I have never found them profitable Myself, myself, to me. I have always felt that if something was worth doing, it was worth doing all the time.
Speaker 7:Okay. So you know, like, for example, when I was younger, like for example okay, we've been in Lent right now, and in Lent it's typical to perform. You know, catholics do little sacrifices and stuff like that, which I have disagreements in terms of the understanding that most Catholics have of practices of Lent, but, for example, when I was growing up, it was always, if you ask most Catholics, they'll say to you well, you've got to give something up for Lent. Giving something up for Lent, and I'll never forget it I used to give up my tremendously chocolate attic and I used to give up chocolate and I would suffer and suffer during Lanto and I'm sure God was looking at me and going oh, look at Mario, he is whining and pining for chocolate and he's offering the sufferings to me. And then on Easter Sunday I would go to CBS or Walgreens and I would find the largest solid chocolate bunny that I could find and then I would eat it and then I'd get sick and sometimes I'd even throw up.
Speaker 7:And I'm sure God was there saying, oh, look at Mario vomiting in my honor. So to me, once I understood that the purpose, see, there's a saying that I really enjoy, and that's called doing. One of the greatest treasons is to do the right thing for the wrong reason, and so, for me, lenten practices and all kinds of practices are excellent, unless you don't have the right reason for them.
Speaker 4:And if you don't?
Speaker 7:have the right reason for them, then you are literally subverting the faith, because ultimately, for example, the scribes and Pharisees in the Gospels were practicing the law, but they were doing so for the wrong reasons. And so and I'm always aware when Jesus says you scribes and Pharisees should travel land and sea to make a convert, and when you're done with them, they're twice as fit for hell as you are yourselves. So the spiritual practices, without doing them for the right reason, can actually do you harm.
Speaker 3:But as a 12-year-old boy. I mean, you're giving up chocolate, let's say for Lent. How could a 12-year-old boy sort of understand the ramifications? So you don't. But is there any value to it if? If you are not mature enough to sort of?
Speaker 7:I think it. I think it's the whole issue is being taught, not not with a lot of profundity as to the meaning of you know you should have the meaning of the sacrifice that you're doing behind it before you do the sacrifice.
Speaker 3:I see what you're saying.
Speaker 7:Yeah, I agree with you.
Speaker 3:And I think a part of this is the challenge of education. A part of it is to come back and to say look, let's talk about why we sanctify time. That's right. Why is it important to sanctify time in this way? Why is it important to spend some time in reflection and repentance? Yes, Before as we approach the season of the cross.
Speaker 7:I'm in agreement.
Speaker 3:When we come back— I want to hear from Rudy on this, because Rudy's the youngster, he's the one with all the time left.
Speaker 7:He's wet behind the ears.
Speaker 3:Yeah, what does he know?
Speaker 7:Okay, we will come back. This is KNTH 1070. You're listening to the Show of Faith and we'll be right back AM 1070, the answer.
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Speaker 1:My brother. Baby, let's do the twist.
Speaker 7:Take me by my little hand. It goes like this Welcome back here to the show of faith. Okay, Rudy. I love that, rudy, you want to get into this.
Speaker 8:Yeah, I'm reminded of a when I was in—a long time ago when I was doing my master's. We had to read early church followers and actually one of the things that struck me was we have actually pretty good records of St Bernard of Clairvaux, okay, and he has this kind of list of sermons that he wrote in the 11th century. I think I'm pretty sure I forget exactly what year. I think Dr Gibson can probably correct me if I'm wrong, but anyway, he gave this sermon. It's called On the Deceptions of this Life. And to sum it up and it's something I think that Dave was kind of alluding to before is that when we're young we take time for granted. We almost kind of see things web and kind of ebb and flow of time is so much different. It's almost like the dilation of it. Right, we haven't experienced much. When you talk now to a 15, a teenager, right, a 15, 16, 17 year old, and you talk about time and you tell them you know, I remember my grandpa used to tell me when I was in college he would say you know, it's just a few years, it'll fly by quick. I remember thinking, oh my God, a couple years, this is crazy, that's a crazy amount of time, right. But I mean, and I ask you guys this If I were to tell you, oh, that's going to be in three months, you know, to you and even now to me, that's nothing. Three months goes by in a snap of a finger. We're already in April. I mean it seems like yesterday that we were, you know, just kind of getting by Christmas.
Speaker 8:But anyway, the point of the sermon and why I brought it up is because there's this kind of deceit, right, that especially that I think, kind of gets to youth that we're sort of impermeable, that we're sort of, you know, immoral, that we're going to live 100 years. And when we think about 100 years it just seems like such a long time. So we take all these risks and we do all these things. And of course, sternard was writing in a time where the life expectancy I mean only about one out of four children ever made it past childbirth, right. So, um, and even then life expectancy was maybe 35. But young people still suffer from the same thing.
Speaker 8:And I think, you know, I have a couple gray hairs now and I tend to be a lot more purposeful, if you will, about my day. And what do I gauge in and I used to be a lot more careless, especially when it came to Dr Hiss was using the thing of the things that I would eat, of the things that I would watch, the things that I would put into my body, not just from a sort of physical perspective, you know, but sensory altogether. Right, I mean, these are the images that I would look at. So I definitely see myself being more and more and more careful because, you know, maybe it comes with age and it's just kind of one of these things, right, but I want to be way more careful in this.
Speaker 7:Do you yourself find because you heard me say that I kind of belong to the camp of to me, one day is the same as the next. I kind of belong to the camp of to me, one day is the same as the next? Do you find yourself, as David said, doing practices that sanctify and demarcate time into special times and stuff like that? Now that you have that awareness of time?
Speaker 8:Yes, I do, I definitely do. I'm definitely more purposeful. I do, I definitely do. I'm definitely more purposeful. For example, when I go to Mass, or during this time that we're preparing, while we're preparing for the Resurrection at 3 pm, with my wife, we say a rosary and we try to meditate and we try to think. It's a very guided and purposeful. And sometimes you know another thing, and I know I'm talking a lot, but we want to make all these changes physically, spiritually, but we don't want to be uncomfortable or we don't want to change really what we're doing. It's like we have all this hope. You know, I want to be in perfect shape, or I want to be this kind of holy person. I want to, okay, but that means that you have to stop doing the things that are preventing you from that right.
Speaker 3:Exactly yeah.
Speaker 8:Most often than not, it means you're going to be uncomfortable, like you have to go out and cut the forest and replant things if you want different fruit to grow, right, and I think a lot of people don't understand, especially young people. I think a lot of young people just want to complain about things, but even the older generations do right.
Speaker 3:Well, you know, I used to do a sermon and I'll be real quick about this, sorry, here we go A couple of minutes. We used to do a sermon where I would bring somebody up on the podium with me and I would say you know, I really want a chocolate cake. I mean, I've just had this h, I really want a chocolate cake. I mean, I've, I've got, I've got. I've just had this hankering for a chocolate cake all this time, and and I want to bake it. Can you help me bake a cake?
Speaker 3:I usually would choose a young lady with somebody that I thought had some, some knowledge of of food preparation, not some guy that's, you know, skate skater guy, but anyway, uh, would do that. And and then so I would begin to reach down to the bag and I'd pull out all the wrong ingredients, everything. So I just, oh, I just love these peanuts, these, these are some of my favorite things, and I pulled them out. And I would begin to pull other things out that I love, oh, I really love, you know this, uh, uh, these ice cream bars. I would, I would bring things out that I really love, but none of it were ingredients that would make a chocolate cake.
Speaker 3:The point of that was to say that you have to choose what kind of life that you want, but you have to fill the bag with the right ingredients in order to get there. You can't say I want a chocolate cake and not have any flour and any chocolate and any milk and any eggs and anything like that that goes in there. You've got to have all the right ingredients to put it together. So that's about what Lent is about. To me is putting together. It means, yeah, it means leaving off some things, but also taking on some things. I like to think of Lent not so much as what are you giving up for Lent, but what are you taking on for Lent that is going to bring you to the place that you need to be?
Speaker 7:But here my argument is still when we have 30 seconds, we'll talk about it more.
Speaker 3:It'll come back when we come back. Yeah.
Speaker 7:But the whole issue is if that is what you really want for your life, shouldn't you be doing that 24-7, 365?
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 7:So then, why a special? Every month, I mean every year, do this special time, and then you get the impression that when the time is over, then you quit and you don't have to go back to it again.
Speaker 3:What the hope is, I think, is that you develop new habits, new practices.
Speaker 7:I agree with you.
Speaker 3:The new practices are the things that you set in motion by doing them for the 40 days.
Speaker 7:That is correct, but it should be a continuing.
Speaker 3:It should go on Absolutely Well. We can't continue without going to a break. We've got to go to a break.
Speaker 7:This is 1070 KNDH and we'll be right back.
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Speaker 7:They don't make songs like that anymore.
Speaker 3:They don't, they really don't, they really don't.
Speaker 7:Miranda is just feeding us this 60s and 70s stuff. Okay, all right, we were talking about sanctifying time.
Speaker 3:We're talking about the practices that we do about sanctifying time. We're talking about the practices that we do.
Speaker 7:Oh, sanctifying time. I want to make sure you know I've been very heavily influenced by that saying that I mentioned. One of the great treasons is to do the right thing for the wrong reason, because it takes you to the wrong place. If you're doing it for the wrong reason, Now thinking, for example, I am thinking of, let's say, christmastime, advent and Christmas, and also the Lent and Easter season, the way that I would see doing it the correct way is not for me. Anyway I would want to.
Speaker 7:In the Catholic Church and in culture in general, those specially sanctified times are filled with symbols, especially, for example, christmas, with symbols especially, for example, christmas, whenever I am celebrating Christmas in the Catholic tradition, and not Christmas but Advent, because I'm a priest and I have to be at church all the time, but I have a real sense around me of the rescue mission of Christ coming in history and coming at the end of time and the incarnation and all of that. So it's not that I'm. I find that the sanctification of that season draws my focus so that my focus of my faith is actually focused on the history of salvation, on being rescued. Lent does another thing it focuses my attention on the paschal mystery, in other words the coming death and resurrection of Jesus. So to me, it's the public observance of those times and seasons, at least in the Catholic tradition, that draws my focus and it intensifies my focus on specific areas of my faith and I find that profitable. But just because, for example, it's Lent, oh, I've got to make a. It's lent, oh, I gotta make a sacrifice. I gotta make a sacrifice to me again if I'm doing it for the right reason, if I find, for example, let me give you a quick example.
Speaker 7:You know, I I have a very good friend who struggles a lot with food and she belongs to overeaters anonymous and I've gone to several overeaters anonymous meetings, especially online, and it really is interesting because it focuses on fasting and on eating well. But the reasoning is that you they force you to confront how you may be abusing food and you come to the understanding of how God wants you to use food and how God wants you to take care of your body. And there you use the OA method, overeaters Anonymous method, but I'm doing it not because I want to lose weight. I'm doing it because I really think I'm doing something right when I take care of my body, because I think it's wrong for me to misuse my body, and so it's a moral quality, and it's a moral quality that influences me my entire year. So, for example, I know that now, periodically, when I'm lonely, I may go to the refrigerator.
Speaker 3:And just eat.
Speaker 7:But now I'm aware that what I'm hungry for is not food my heart is hungry, that what I'm hungry for is not food, it's my heart is hungry. And so what OA has done and has helped me to understand much better my because I took that OA practice and I transferred it and linked it to my hunger for God and I finally figured out oh, the reason why I'm doing this is so that I can be truly what God wants me to be in terms of feeding my body, the way God wants me to feed my body. And the sin or the imperfection that I was committing was running away from God and going to the refrigerator. Yeah, so to me that's a purification of the motive for doing that, right? Anyway?
Speaker 3:Well, there's a lot of people who struggle with that, who abuse food or for whom food has become a substitute for other needs, necessities, relationships.
Speaker 7:If you're the kind of person who says well, I just want to lose weight because I want to look great, you know, and stuff like that. To me that's a very shallow motivation. It may be okay for a while, but it doesn't seem to be any kind of a transcendent motivation to be the person that God wants you to be.
Speaker 3:I mean God has given us food as a place of celebration.
Speaker 7:But you abuse it sometimes.
Speaker 4:That's exactly right, that's right, exactly right.
Speaker 3:So that's a great kind of lesson to think about why we do sometimes the things that we do and these spiritual disciplines providing a space and a time when we can refocus.
Speaker 7:I think the whole idea of refocus is really a good. At least for me, it is very to focus, because I try to do all things good all year long, but periodically culture ecclesial culture also can refocus your attention on something. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3:And I think you're right about the idea about the treason. I've never heard it put exactly that way, but I've described the teaching Jesus' teaching on righteousness, particularly in the Sermon on the Mount as that which is urging us to do the right thing for the right reason.
Speaker 3:In other words we can do the right thing for the right reason. In other words, we can do the right thing for the wrong reason and we end up getting tangled up and we don't end up getting the benefit. For example, we can and Jesus discussed this. He said practice your righteousness before God's eyes, and God's eyes only because if you do it for the praise of men and women and other people, that's a reward in itself, but that's not going to make its way to me. Do it for the right reason. The right reason to do it is because God wants us to do it.
Speaker 3:So, for example, the very first example was giving to the poor, and I describe that as sanctifying our resources. If we sanctify time, time is a resource, obviously, but sanctifying our resources is giving to the poor. But we don't do it because the IRS gives us a kickback, or we don't do it because somebody might think oh wow, he must have a lot of money or he's really generous. We do it because we do it for God's eyes, do it for god's pleasure and it's the right thing to do it's the right thing, it's just you do it you do it for the reason that it is right.
Speaker 7:Yeah, it is not to up to case any personal benefit. In fact, to my way of thinking, the personal benefit is doing the right thing and becoming the person that God wants you to be. That is the benefit. So, rudy, you want to get in on that?
Speaker 8:Yeah, I was thinking this quote the act of obedience forms the will. The repetition carves out a pathway for grace. Pathway for grace, and I'm thinking of this passage in Jeremiah woe to those who do the work of God negligently. And so there's a lot to be said about doing something. And I kind of go back to St Bernard here, but he says that many times people start something for the wrong reasons. Right, Now, the wrong reason isn't necessarily wrong in itself.
Speaker 8:It could be, Salmar, you could say you know what? I want to have a six-pack, and that's why I want to go to these things. And you want to look better Now, at a sort of how do I say, fundamental level. Right, the desire for you to look good isn't necessarily bad, right, it's not something that's kind of rooted in evil.
Speaker 8:Now, you could start something, maybe for the wrong reason, but if your heart is open, if you have this kind of type, what I say, this, this desire to do good, then god, through that path, is going to correct you and it's going to, it's going to kind of mold you into into the right path of love for him, if you will, to understand that, okay, I don't really care about having a six-pack. What I really care about is my body is a temple right, and I'm created in the image of life and self-go and I want to be better and I want to be healthy, maybe because when I feel good I can give better sermons, or I can give you know, or as a dad right, my brother tells me this all the time. He's like I used to work out, you know, because I wanted to be strong, but now what I really care about is I want to be able to throw, you know, a baseball with my kid when he's older.
Speaker 7:You know I want to be able to do active things with him when he's older.
Speaker 8:You know I want to be able to do active things with him when he's older, so I think sometimes we can start something for let's call them the wrong reasons, but God in his infinite mercy and grace can mold us, I agree.
Speaker 3:I think that's right.
Speaker 7:I think I agree with you. I find the example of the Pharisees some of the Pharisees not all but some of the.
Speaker 7:Pharisees so compelling because they were intensely doing the right thing. And Jesus said the Pharisees occupy the seat of Moses, so don't obey them but don't do what they do. So to me, it's the purification of the reasoning behind what you're doing and I think that you're right. God's grace can come in and purify the background of why you do what you do so the purifying of our resources, the giving that we give, the opportunities that we have.
Speaker 7:For example, we talked about the difference in compassion, compassion, sentimental compassion and effective compassion. Sentimental compassion is a very good thing. You can practice almsgiving to the poor, but you're doing it because it makes you feel good. Okay, that's nice.
Speaker 3:That's a pretty shallow reason.
Speaker 7:It's a shallow reason to do it.
Speaker 3:You do it for them, for their sake, for them.
Speaker 7:Effective compassion is you want to help that person to be what God wants them to be, to give them that chance. But it's that purification of that reason. A person who goes on a fast because they want to lose weight and they want to look great on the beach in a bikini well, you know that's nice. But I think that's even the wrong reason, because you shouldn't be having that much attention on your body, on how you look on your body, so I'm just focused very much on that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, all right, let's take a break, come back. I want to talk about a spiritual practice that some people don't even think is a spiritual practice.
Speaker 7:We shall come back after this message.
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Speaker 7:Now I want bring up that one that you wanted to bring up.
Speaker 3:Here's one that a lot of people may not be aware of.
Speaker 3:We're aware of prayer and going to worship maybe and celebrating holidays and holidays and this kind of thing, but talk about the spiritual discipline of silence, which is not one that people think too much about. Right Silence. There's a passage in the scripture, psalm 46, says be still and know that I'm God. A part of the challenge of modern life is the busyness that we fall into, the noise that's around us, and I think the challenge for us is to find that quiet place. We used to call it having a quiet time. That's one of the spiritual disciplines of being Protestant. Protestantism, having a quiet time meant that you would silence, you kind of get into a quiet place. You'd have a time of prayer and maybe a time of Bible reading and a time of journaling, and it could last five minutes, 15, 20, 30 minutes.
Speaker 3:Yes, those kind of things, having a quiet time and the whole idea of being quiet and the whole notion. The purpose of it is to reduce the external noise and the internal noise that begins to happen to us as people. I remember reading I think it was Martin Luther said that whenever I kneel to pray, it's as if 50 demons kneel around me to try to stop me in my prayer because all sorts of other ideas would rush in. He would try to preach what we would call silently, silent prayer, which means that it's sort of an internal thing. Yeah, right Now.
Speaker 3:Silence doesn't necessarily mean not having speaking at all, but it just means entering into a place where the connection with God can be deepened, assuming that there's a connection to God to begin with.
Speaker 3:But that connection can be deepened and we do so by silencing the outer noise. We do so by silencing the outer noise, we do so by silencing the inner noise and we do so by focusing in upon God, and it's a beautiful spiritual discipline that I think a lot of people struggle with today. One of my first encounters with this was through the Taizé movement. The Taizé movement is kind of almost like a Protestant monastic movement from France and a part of their services. They'll have services that are very quiet and contemplative and meditative, but almost always there's about a 15 to 20-minute period in that service when nothing is said, when no music is played. Maybe there's a focus you know, a cross to focus on, maybe there's a symbol to focus on, but it gives you an opportunity and I just think that's such an important discipline these days because there is so much distraction so much busyness so much noise.
Speaker 3:Rudy as a youngster as much busyness, so much noise.
Speaker 8:Rudy, as a youngster, as a millennial, does that ever resonate with you? Oh gosh, yeah, I feel one of the things that I struggle with the most is just being alone, not looking at my phone, not looking at something emails. You know, especially in the cities that I remember I used to be in the Boy Scouts and we would go camping and it's kind of this weird feeling. But I don't know if you guys have ever been kind of like in the forest at night when it's quiet, there's no cars, there's no. You know, it just feels awesome. It's just this kind of feeling of just kind of solemn silence.
Speaker 8:It just makes your thoughts louder, if that makes any sense at all. It just kind of emboldens whatever's kind of going on. And I found that the more, for example, I try to go at least once a week and a lot of churches they do or they'll have kind of like a holy hour of worship, adoration, eucharistic adoration, where they just kind of have most bombarded with all the sort of questions of the day of what's going on with the project and my dad and my wife and my family, and this person's sick, and this and that, and it just kind of turns into everything else, except for what I was there to do, which is just kind of adore, admiration, worship, right, and it's just so. I struggle with that a lot, a lot, a lot, a lot really. It's really one of the main things that I try to focus on and this is why I told my wife too.
Speaker 8:We have to pick a time Sometimes and it's going to be uncomfortable, right, and this is about building habits. Okay, every day at 3 o'clockclock, we're going to stop what we're doing and we're going to say a rosary. Okay, we're going to just take a little bit of time In the morning, as soon as I wake up, just take two or three minutes and just say thank you to God for another day and another opportunity.
Speaker 7:You know, the question that I have is and this is a related question is have you ever encountered people who cannot be alone, who cannot be alone and cannot be silent, because having somebody in your space constantly is an intrusion on silence to some degree and so there are people who are actually unable to be alone, and sometimes they are actually afraid of being alone, afraid of the quiet. Yeah, and the interesting thing is, you know how would you diagnose that, the fear of the solitude, because I think that that's a real spiritual condition.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it is a spiritual and I was reading today just some things from pastors about this discipline and one of them said I can't remember his name exactly but he said silence exposes the soul, that the idea that silence, when you seek silence, it reveals to you the state of your soul. And if you find yourself I've got to have that phone, I've got to have it, I've got to have it it just shows you into dependence or whatever. I've got to have a conversation, or I've got to turn on the television, or I've got to turn on the radio. If you do it should be K&TH right. But if you're going to do that, you better have the right radio station on. But there are folks, I know, that just can't be in silence.
Speaker 7:Yeah, especially silence and solitude. Right right, because I think it does expose your soul and when you are there it makes you focus on your internal. It's interesting, the word distraction, it takes you off track, distract, the word distraction, it takes you off track, distract and entertainment to be, uh, to be maintained in between that's what the background. Oh, I see, yeah, yeah to entertain and and it's it's interesting because that's what you're dealing with is people who are afraid to confront their own souls yeah and to enter into that, and it can be a terrifying experience for one of the first times you start doing it.
Speaker 3:Right and very unsettling, but it is something that can be a very good gift to the soul.
Speaker 7:Not only can be, it has to be. Let me tell you the day that you are going to die, you're going to do it alone and you have to be ready to be alone and face God. If you've not done that, you've got to get used to it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because that's a great word. Yeah, yeah, you've got to. You're not going to do that with a bunch of people. No, you know you're going to do that all by yourself.
Speaker 7:Yeah, All by yourself. You know you're going to do that all by yourself. All by yourself, so you might not get used to it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, so I mean this is a great spiritual discipline to find a space for God to speak to us. Yeah, no TV, no music, no radio, no expressive conversation, a quiet place. And what it does for you is it will begin to put your mind at rest.
Speaker 7:There might be a lot of struggle at first, but it will begin to put your mind in a place of rest and openness to God and reflecting on Scripture, Even if you can do it 15, 20 minutes at a time or something five minutes at a time, but do it yeah three minutes, four minutes, just build up a little time, just like you're going to run a marathon.
Speaker 3:You wouldn't do all that in one day. You would build your way up to it. Rudy, I wish we had time to kind of get you back in on this, but I know our time is slipping away.
Speaker 7:He's got 15 seconds. Our time is short.
Speaker 8:It is, it's good. Is it your turn next time Is?
Speaker 7:it my turn.
Speaker 3:I think it is.
Speaker 7:I think it is, I will be the show director and I will lead it in a direction.
Speaker 3:Without distraction.
Speaker 7:Without distraction.
Speaker 3:Will it be entertaining?
Speaker 7:though I know.
Speaker 3:It will be focused, it will be in between, all right, yeah.
Speaker 7:Well, thank you for listening to the show of faith here on 1070 KNTH. Please, during this week, keep us in your prayer. Go to church. This week it's Holy Week. Keep us in your prayers because you know what you are going to be in ours, happy Find us at am1070theanswercom.
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