SPEAKER_01: Welcome everyone to Heart of the Homily Podcast.
SPEAKER_01: My name is Michelle Lopez, and I'm here with Father Vigova.
SPEAKER_00: How's it going, Michelle?
SPEAKER_01: Doing good.
SPEAKER_01: Happy Monday.
SPEAKER_00: Another Monday.
SPEAKER_01: Another Monday.
SPEAKER_01: Another Monday in ordinary time.
SPEAKER_01: And the gospel this weekend was real beautiful, Father.
SPEAKER_01: And again, I feel like I was called out a couple times in your homily, which was great.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm really excited to look at it and read it.
SPEAKER_00: We're in good company, you know.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so so good.
SPEAKER_00: Um these hom uh these gospels in uh ordinary time are powerful.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, nothing ordinary, you know.
SPEAKER_01: Nothing ordinary.
SPEAKER_01: Watch out.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and it's one of those things like I like to remind people, I think it's in ordinary time where we really have to uh bear down and get back to basics.
SPEAKER_00: School is back in session, time to do some hard lifting.
SPEAKER_00: What does it mean to be a Christian?
SPEAKER_00: It just it's not just by name.
SPEAKER_00: It's it's you gotta do the work.
SPEAKER_00: And what I love about these gospels is that it's it's a come to Jesus moment.
SPEAKER_00: It should be holding a mirror up to your face.
SPEAKER_00: And this weekend was that.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, it definitely was.
SPEAKER_01: And I like that we're talking about ordinary time being about discipleship.
SPEAKER_01: And I know you've you've said that a number of times, being able to really um allow ordinary time to not be where we coast, but where we like press in.
SPEAKER_01: And I think that makes sense.
SPEAKER_01: It prepares us to then appreciate these these high these high moments of the church where the church zones in on certain things like Lent and Advent and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_01: So, okay, well, let's hop into it.
SPEAKER_01: We're looking at the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 16, verses 13 to 20.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus went into the region as Caesarai Philip um Philippi, Philippi, and he asked his disciples, Who do you say that the Son of Man is?
SPEAKER_01: They replied, Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.
SPEAKER_01: He said to them, But who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_01: Simon Peter said in reply, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus said to him in reply, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.
SPEAKER_01: And I say to you, You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the nether world shall not prevail against it.
SPEAKER_01: I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you lose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so Father, your your homily really begins um recognizing that it was such a personal indeed question that Jesus asked his disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_01: And it's something that um we have to answer for ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: And I I love how you opened up that because it is so it's it's personal for Jesus to say that.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know, it's very vernable for him to kind of propose that question to his disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Because I think also it's there's um a moment where he could be, I don't know, disappointed, or I don't know, it's a heavy question.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I think this this gospel really opens up how um beautiful Peter answers.
SPEAKER_01: But maybe let's go back to the first who is Jesus to me?
SPEAKER_01: Um, you talked a lot about knowing Jesus, but actually or actually knowing him.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because we know we can know about Jesus, we can know about God, and a lot of people are good at that.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but we're talking, do you know Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Like, do you know God intimately in your life?
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_00: And just to go back a little bit, I was thinking when I was writing this homily, I was thinking about our time when we were in Israel.
SPEAKER_00: And do you remember when we visited Caesarea Philippi that we were in the ruins of that uh that huge temple of uh Caesar Augustus, how um how important that that whole seaport city is, and those ruins are still there.
SPEAKER_00: And I love that Jesus goes to that region and it's in the middle of all that chaos, all that crowds, the busyness, all the noise.
SPEAKER_00: And if you think about it really carefully, um with all those gods and all just like what I'm talking about, all these distractions, and he's standing there and he wants to drive the point home.
SPEAKER_00: And and he he circles them and says, Let me ask you guys who do people say that the Son of Man is?
SPEAKER_00: And I would have loved to have seen Jesus or been a fly on the wall.
SPEAKER_00: It's just just uh his enjoyment of trying to get out of them where he ultimately wanted to lead them, right?
SPEAKER_00: And because he ultimately wanted to get to the point to say, Well, who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_00: Because they weren't they weren't they were not insulting Jesus, they were actually paying him high compliment.
SPEAKER_00: Um oh, oh, you know, some people say that you're John the Baptist, some people say that you're this great prophet, all very complimentary because these were giants in the history of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but but it that what I was trying to say in the homily is that we do that too, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because in knowing about Jesus is oh, Jesus was a great man.
SPEAKER_00: He did a lot of great things.
SPEAKER_00: And you may not be in your faith, not even know your faith, not practice a faith, but you know that Jesus was a good man.
SPEAKER_00: He went around doing nice things, uh a good social reformer.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Jesus, the communist, the socialist.
SPEAKER_00: There's people I've heard people say this.
SPEAKER_00: Oh kind of crazy, right?
SPEAKER_00: But it's knowing about some of the things that Jesus has said, some of his teachings that appeal to someone.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's in this context of being in all of that noise, all of those distractions that he wants to know.
SPEAKER_00: Do you but who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: And and something that ran through all of my homily was that's the question that's gonna come to you over and over in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's gonna come to you when everything's going great, your life is wonderful, and uh God maybe is in the peripheries, maybe he's on the sidelines, maybe it's okay, you know, I I love you, Jesus, but I I don't need you right now.
SPEAKER_00: Or it's gonna be in those very difficult moments when you do not understand life, when you are bankrupt, when you are are just in a place where it hurts and kind of maybe mad at God and not want to think about God.
SPEAKER_00: And it's in those very precise moments that he's gonna ask you, wait a minute, in this moment right now, who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: Who are who are you putting all of your um you're putting all of your efforts who into what?
SPEAKER_00: Like into medicine, into um this person or that person or this resolution or this conflict or whatever it is, who are you putting all your efforts into?
SPEAKER_00: Or is it me?
SPEAKER_00: Who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: Am I really truly your redeemer, your savior, um your God?
SPEAKER_01: Um, so Father, kind of two big things sticking out to me.
SPEAKER_01: One is the location where Jesus said this question is in the middle of chaos, but in the middle of like other other gods or other things that people could cling to to make gods in their own life.
SPEAKER_01: And so Jesus kind of sets up the stage of really, I'm sure them looking around at different um, again, gods of other religions and the chaos of just the busyness and the culture.
SPEAKER_01: Um, I just find that really powerful because Jesus isn't going to a quiet place where they can just see him.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's in the midst of everything else asking them these things.
SPEAKER_00: Because this is how your life is gonna be.
SPEAKER_00: Your life is not gonna be spent in the temple in quiet time all the time.
SPEAKER_01: No, it's gonna be plain and simple.
SPEAKER_01: Right.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be persecution, it's gonna be craziness, it's gonna be, I want to give up.
SPEAKER_00: Why did I get involved in this?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, this is crazy.
SPEAKER_00: And so over and over again, and because again, it what what strikes me about this gospel is that Jesus does not ask Peter this question once and then considers the matters the matter settled.
SPEAKER_00: In a sense, Peter will spend the rest of his life, just like what we're talking about, just like what how we will spend the rest of our lives answering that question.
SPEAKER_00: And and he answers it at Caesarea Philippi when everything seems clear.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yes, Jesus, you are the Christ, you're the Son of the Living God.
SPEAKER_00: But he's gonna have to answer that again when Jesus begins talking about the cross, right?
SPEAKER_00: And he's gonna have to answer it in Gethsemane.
SPEAKER_00: Um, in in even in that courtyard when he denies him.
SPEAKER_00: That's so that lady, remember that lady says to him, Wait a minute, weren't you with this Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: And Peter has a temporary collapse.
SPEAKER_00: He's not able to answer that question.
SPEAKER_00: Who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: He he he's he what does he say?
SPEAKER_00: He says, I don't know that man.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's so And then he's gonna have to answer that again after the resurrection on the shores of the of Galilee when Jesus asks him three times, do you love me?
SPEAKER_00: Sign uh Peter, son of Jonah.
SPEAKER_00: And then ultimately he's gonna have to answer again in Rome, not with words, but it when his own life when he's hanging upside down on a cross.
SPEAKER_00: So that I think that that's why this com this question is so important.
SPEAKER_00: Who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: Because it's not just a question we answer once, it's the question that life is gonna keep asking you to reflect on.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and even in the witness of Peter, we might have a poor moment where we we flake out, you know, we flake out.
SPEAKER_01: But Peter's example, I think it helps us to have even an increase in faith to be like, okay, I know that I'm gonna be tempted to not say that Jesus is Lord, you know, but in those moments, that's where I need to press in the most to be able to really um answer that question.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because the thing is that when life is easy and makes sense, Jesus is Lord.
SPEAKER_00: I love you, Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: But who do you say that he is when that diagnosis comes?
SPEAKER_00: When there's a difficulty in your family, when your marriage is on the threads, when your child is is going through a very difficult moment, when life just does not make sense.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It I think that that's it's gonna be hard.
SPEAKER_01: I think even what what you're saying to fathers, you're really pointing, you're actually like pointing us into like how to how to pray in those moments is to really cling to that truth of like, Jesus, you are Lord, like help me through this, you know, to really I don't know.
SPEAKER_01: I feel like in what you're sharing, it's a it's a it's also teaching us how to pray in those moments to press in to say, like, Jesus, you say, like, I know who you are.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Like, I give you this problem.
SPEAKER_01: I know who you are, I trust you, to really increase our trust and faith and abandonment to his will.
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's the thing: faith does not mean having an explanation for everything.
SPEAKER_00: Because there's going to be parts of your life that hurt.
SPEAKER_00: And and faith is not pretending that it doesn't hurt.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the most profound profession of faith can be when it's, Lord, I do not understand.
SPEAKER_00: I am on the rock bottom, and and but I still know who you are.
SPEAKER_00: And that's different from saying, I understand what God is doing.
SPEAKER_00: Because sometimes I don't.
SPEAKER_00: I don't understand why this person died.
SPEAKER_00: I don't understand why this prayer wasn't answered the way I begged God to answer it.
SPEAKER_00: I don't understand why this door, this opportunity closed.
SPEAKER_00: I don't understand why God permitted me to have all this suffering.
SPEAKER_00: But Christianity does not ultimately rest upon my ability to explain it all.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Because it rests upon whether I trust who God has revealed Himself to be.
SPEAKER_00: Because that's why Peter's answer matters.
SPEAKER_00: You are the Christ.
SPEAKER_00: You are the Son of the living God.
SPEAKER_00: Not you are the Christ when I understand you.
SPEAKER_00: Um you know, not when you are the Christ when my prayers are answered or when life is going well.
SPEAKER_00: No, you are the Christ, my Lord, my savior, my redeemer.
SPEAKER_00: Period.
SPEAKER_00: End of story right there.
SPEAKER_00: That's who I know who you are.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that kind of makes me think of um kind of this the next step in your homic brought it to um identity.
SPEAKER_01: Like Peter receives from Christ his identity next.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: By answering that question, um, like Peter's response to Jesus' question reveals who Jesus is in a fuller way, but then it reveals who he is in return.
SPEAKER_01: And I I found that a real beautiful um point that um was very powerful in your Homli Father, where Peter tells again Jesus who he is, and then Jesus tells Peter who he is.
SPEAKER_01: Um would love for you to you know expand a little bit because you a few lines it says Peter tells Jesus who Jesus is, and Jesus tells Peter who Peter is.
SPEAKER_01: And we'll never fully understand who we are until we understand who Christ is, which I loved that line, Father, because I feel like I I myself have I've encountered that deeply where I thought I knew who I was and kind of made myself out to be, but it was only in really seeking Christ that I began to discover the truth, the truth and also like the beauty and the dignity that Christ made me to be that I could not find anywhere else or understand it through any other means except through Jesus' lens.
SPEAKER_00: Which I think it's very important to touch upon this because that is the backbone of discipleship, of apostolate, of how you really people see how you see people growing in the faith, coming, uh awakening to the faith and being a new person.
SPEAKER_00: Like when they say, Oh, that person's a new person, yeah, they're a new person because they have come to know Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: They have come to know truth with a capital T, a truth that lies outside of themselves, and because they now know that they cannot invent their lives, they cannot not invent their identity or their mission, because only their creator who made them can create that for them.
SPEAKER_00: So when that person sits with that and comes to almost a come to Jesus moment where they're, whoa, it's like a light turns on.
SPEAKER_00: Look, I remember that um I had, I was, I was working at the Archdiocese of Miami, and this girl came to see me and she was saying, she was in college, and she said that she was reading an encyclical by the why one of the popes.
SPEAKER_00: I don't remember which one it was, but but those were her words.
SPEAKER_00: She said, I came to know a truth that lies outside of me, this truth that I cannot invent, this truth that I cannot come up with.
SPEAKER_00: And then when I started to wrestle with that, I knew that it was Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so what I was trying to say in the homily is that we will only know ourselves when we really truly know Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Because then when I know Christ, I know who I am, what my gifts are.
SPEAKER_00: I come to find out, and through wrestling and through discernment, well, what is my mission?
SPEAKER_00: Because when you saw Peter, he was Simon, a fisherman, comes to Peter come to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus changes his name to Peter, but then gives him his mission and identity.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And so he came to know Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And I see it all the time.
SPEAKER_00: You see it all the time at OCIA.
SPEAKER_00: How many people have you seen that have gone through this beautiful journey that at the end of the journey they're saying, Wow, I am a new person?
SPEAKER_01: And I think that's the beautiful part, is um, even when you think you know yourself or you've gone through different things in life and you think you have made yourself to be someone, but then you encounter Christ and you find a deeper reality that not you couldn't be, it could not have been discovered any other way.
SPEAKER_01: But then there's just freedom and joy that comes from knowing um like who you are because it's in Christ that we discover like the truth of how we've been created.
SPEAKER_01: And then, and then I I think the one thing I've I've seen so much in OCIA is um as people encounter Jesus and his love for them, that there's this freedom that comes to live more peaceful because they're not trying to like make themselves like create they're they're they're they're receiving the gift of who they are instead of trying to like make themselves and create themselves in other ways, if that makes sense.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense.
SPEAKER_00: And and here's that's where depression comes in.
SPEAKER_00: It's not that you're depressed, it's like that I I was listening to a podcast the other day by Arthur Miller, and he talks about happiness, and it's like it's what what's the situation?
SPEAKER_00: And very powerful, but but it's exactly what you're saying is they're coming to know themselves in a completely different way.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: And it it's all based on this new relationship that they have with Jesus, which then changes the whole course of your life because it's either you go with it and you do change, or you stay in the same old, same old, but you're not the same person anymore.
SPEAKER_00: It's like that beautiful saying by um Archbishop Fulton Sheen.
SPEAKER_00: Um in uh when the magi go to see the Christ child, and they go back home by a different way.
SPEAKER_00: Because Herod, remember, Herod says to to the magi, say, well, come back and tell me where he is, so that I too may pay him homage.
SPEAKER_00: And they're like, No way, man.
SPEAKER_00: But what what what the magi what Fulton Sheen was saying is, of course the magi went home by a different way.
SPEAKER_00: No one has an encounter with Jesus Christ and goes back the same way they were.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we're talking about here.
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why your discipleship is different, that's why when you're you're working in an apostolate, when you're when you're really involved in your faith and you're studying the the scriptures and you're wanting to make a difference in the sense that you will testify and and to what God has done in my life.
SPEAKER_00: You've heard me say this a million times.
SPEAKER_00: You know how the early church grew?
SPEAKER_00: You heard me say this 10,000 times.
SPEAKER_00: The early church grew.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because people were very good at being able to say, This is this Jesus, let me tell you what He did, what He has done in my life.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: So powerful, so incredible.
SPEAKER_01: And Father, while we have some time, I wanted to make sure we got to uh an a part of your homily that um I found very insightful, which was um every life is building something.
SPEAKER_01: He talked about it being either a monument to ourselves or something God can use for others, like a temple.
SPEAKER_01: Um, would love to hear like what the inspiration of going deeply into this.
SPEAKER_01: I know the first reading kind of um was talking about it, was the example that you used.
SPEAKER_01: Um, but you're really talking about the tomb or the temple.
SPEAKER_01: And I I found that very striking.
SPEAKER_00: Um so we'd love to hear kind of what what was um I'm glad you're bringing that up because I had two people, one after Mass and the other one wrote me an email about um how how that if I could explain a little bit more about the tomb, the monument, and the temple.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm glad, well, maybe we can talk about a little bit a bit.
SPEAKER_00: But what I was trying to say is that the distinction is really about what happens to the gifts God has entrusted us.
SPEAKER_00: Because a tomb ultimately points back toward the person buried inside it.
SPEAKER_00: And a temple points beyond itself towards God.
SPEAKER_00: And that there's the spiritual contrast.
SPEAKER_00: Now, uh, you just mentioned the first reading, and I wanted to, I brought it in specifically, and yeah, you have to read a couple passages before the first reading uh uh this Sunday to kind of get the full context.
SPEAKER_00: But this guy Shevnah, who was this royal steward, he has a lot of authority, a lot of influence, position, opportunity.
SPEAKER_00: But instead of allowing the gifts that God gave him to be instruments of service, what does he do?
SPEAKER_00: He he uses all those gifts to establish himself.
SPEAKER_00: Isaiah's image of him carving an impressive tomb out of a rock is almost a physical manifestation of um, you know, like the human eagle saying, Well, I was here.
SPEAKER_00: Look at me, look what I accomplished.
SPEAKER_00: I did all this great stuff.
SPEAKER_00: I am a very important person.
SPEAKER_00: And if you think about today, there's a lot of people like that.
SPEAKER_00: No judgment, but it's it's almost this world uh wants to train us in thinking that you gotta leave a legacy.
SPEAKER_00: You what are you doing right now?
SPEAKER_00: How are you gonna leave your mark?
SPEAKER_00: Because that temptation is not ancient.
SPEAKER_00: We have that in very sophisticated ways.
SPEAKER_00: We build careers that become tombs.
SPEAKER_00: Uh you know, even how we try to protect our reputation so that they become tombs.
SPEAKER_00: We can build houses, organizations, ministries, even parishes that become tombs if ultimately they exist to preserve our importance.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing the problem is not building something beautiful, the problem is building something whose final destination is for us, the me, me, me.
SPEAKER_00: Because a temple works in the opposite direction.
SPEAKER_00: A temple says, Come through me so that you may encounter the living Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Because if you're living your apostolate, you're you're living your ministry, you're a good husband, a good wife, and you really truly are sacrificing, giving up yourself for your other, using your gifts and your talents for the sake of others.
SPEAKER_00: If you're really doing that, people are gonna know Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna walk away and say, Wow, this person really loves Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: This person is a faithful person, this person practices the faith.
SPEAKER_00: You know?
SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's what people.
SPEAKER_00: Peter is being called to become.
SPEAKER_00: Christ does not say to Peter, Peter, build something impressive so everyone becomes, so everybody can remember you as the first pope.
SPEAKER_00: No, he's essentially saying, I'm going to build something through you, Peter.
SPEAKER_00: And so that distinction could generate a great, a great meditation for you to really sit back and say, Well, how do how do I see my life the way I'm what I'm building?
SPEAKER_00: Because everybody, like I said in the Hama, everybody's building something.
SPEAKER_00: What are you building?
SPEAKER_00: Are you building a temple, a monument?
SPEAKER_00: Or is it, I mean, a monument, a tomb, or a temple?
SPEAKER_00: Because when people encounter my life, do they leave impressed with me?
SPEAKER_00: Oh, wow, that's a that's a very impressive person.
SPEAKER_00: Or do they leave that encounter with an awareness that God is indwelling in your heart?
SPEAKER_00: And that applies to everybody.
SPEAKER_00: It applies to priests, parents, teachers, and it applies to everybody.
SPEAKER_00: What are you building?
SPEAKER_00: And are you building a tomb or a temple?
SPEAKER_00: And I think it's a good uh a good question.
SPEAKER_01: I think it's a great, it's great imagery too, because um a tomb is where dead people go.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00: Dead bones.
SPEAKER_01: That sounds like ultimately, right?
SPEAKER_01: It can look really nice on the outside, but dead bones inside.
SPEAKER_01: And I don't know.
SPEAKER_01: I I love that imagery because that was very um as beautiful as you're gonna make that tomb look, if there's only death inside, what is the point?
SPEAKER_01: You know, and I think the temple, like you were saying, is so beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: Like, yes, it could be very beautiful on the outside, but the inside is an encounter with God Himself and with the divine.
SPEAKER_01: And so, like, what are what are we building?
SPEAKER_01: And really, like who are we becoming?
SPEAKER_01: Because ultimately it's it's it's us, right?
SPEAKER_01: Like the are we we have a tomb inside or a temple?
SPEAKER_00: Um, and it's yeah, it's and I think that um every Christian leader, anyone who's involved in ministry, who one anyone who's really taking it serious needs to uh be able to say, I am temporary.
SPEAKER_00: Um I uh the mission is not, but I am.
SPEAKER_01: Right.
SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's enormously freeing.
SPEAKER_01: It is.
SPEAKER_01: I appreciate what you said in your homely father.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I it was funny.
SPEAKER_00: I was like, I don't want to depress you, you know.
SPEAKER_00: But I think there's something freeing about that.
SPEAKER_01: I I think it needed to be it's a blunt truth that needs to be said, and no one likes to talk about it.
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_00: Someone's gonna live in your house.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: When you're gone, they're gonna live in your house.
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna live in, they're gonna have your job, they're gonna drive your car, they're gonna have, you know, and that's the reality.
SPEAKER_00: And pee and with time, people will say your name less and less.
SPEAKER_01: Unless, Father, you become a saint.
SPEAKER_00: Unless you become a saint.
SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly right.
SPEAKER_00: Because look, today we're celebrating the feast of St.
SPEAKER_00: Bartholomew.
SPEAKER_00: Really, we don't know much about him.
SPEAKER_00: He kind of disappears from the biblical story, but he did do a lot of great good.
SPEAKER_00: And um, and I love that it's not about doing extraordinary things and being named and being famous, it's about being a foundation and and let others and and and be that rock where a gr just greatness can can stand on you, you know.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and being a part of the mission of Christ, which is uh like an eternal mission.
SPEAKER_01: And I love that that's I mean, that's like living the best adventure, anyways.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, because I think that the moment I believe that God's work cannot continue without me, I may already have stopped building a temple and started carving out a tomb.
SPEAKER_00: Um you know, and I think that that is true to a lot of people, depends on your job.
SPEAKER_00: Like if you think that you're indispensable, I got news for you.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not to depress us, it's not to uh it this is a good kind of reality check to say it's not about you, it's never about you.
SPEAKER_00: And it's we gotta get away from the me, me, me.
SPEAKER_00: And really focusing on what's your will, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: What it what is it that you want me to do with my life, my gifts, all that you have given me, right?
SPEAKER_01: It makes me think of uh you talked about the world telling us to find yourself, but Jesus saying to follow me.
SPEAKER_00: What's that?
SPEAKER_01: Um and your how many you talked about the world tells us to find yourself, but Jesus says follow me.
SPEAKER_01: And I think kind of what you're what you're sharing right here is yeah, the me culture stepping back and and follow and follow more deeply to press into who is Jesus, or who do you say that Jesus is, and being able to really allow him to give identity and from that mission and to allow yourself to become a temple that um participates in Christ's mission.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and you know, and it goes back to what are you building, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because when somebody returns to confession after 20 years, when someone teaches a little kid to pray and to make Jesus the important part of your life.
SPEAKER_00: Look, how how many little kids love Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: That it's so beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: Like I see your daughter, I see the Cactioni little girl, Chichilia.
SPEAKER_00: I saw her uh a video of her genuflecting into the pew.
SPEAKER_00: She was watching her parents and she's doing it herself.
SPEAKER_00: How many cute things does your daughter say?
SPEAKER_00: The way that she prays, and you know, it's it is it's it's it's in in what are we building, guys?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Because these it when a Catholic refuses to hide his faith simply because the room has become uncomfortable, then things rarely get monuments.
SPEAKER_00: They build the kingdom of God, and that's the paradox.
SPEAKER_01: Well, Father, thank you for this conversation.
SPEAKER_01: And maybe as we wrap up, um, what would be an encouraging word for for someone that might be caught in the the me thing, you know, when they think about um who they are?
SPEAKER_01: Like how can they switch from being cons consumed by trying to build a legacy here to focusing back on like Christ and the basics?
SPEAKER_00: Well, what I would say is as we wrap up here, I would say that um we have to go back to the question that we started with.
SPEAKER_00: Um, who do you say that I am?
SPEAKER_00: And that's a question that's gonna be asked.
SPEAKER_00: You're you're gonna be asked that question over and over and over again.
SPEAKER_00: Because if you're gonna say that um maybe your answer is Jesus is uh an inspirational figure, um, well then I can fit him somewhere into my life uh when I need him or when it's convenient or when it sounds nice.
SPEAKER_00: And that's dangerous because um to have Jesus on the side or to reduce Jesus um is is not where you want to be.
SPEAKER_00: Because if Peter is right, if he truly is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, behold the Lamb of God.
SPEAKER_00: If if this little white host that I that I hold up in adoration, if if you're looking upon that that Jesus and you're not able to say, You are Jesus, you are the Christ, you are the Son of the Living God, you are my savior, you my my redeemer, you are the one that I love, well then there's a lot of work to be done because that's the question that's gonna come up over and over again.
SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna have to be able to say it in very difficult moments, um, because in those difficult moments is when you want to run, you want to just even a lot of people could have anger or not in the mood to talk about Jesus or or to deal with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's that can be a very dangerous place because you can condition yourself and having uh asking that question in good times and in bad times will help you stay centered because if you know Christ, you will know yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Love it.
SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you, Father, so much to take into the week.
SPEAKER_01: So we hope you enjoy this homily uh this podcast on the homily and um and share with someone that might find inspiration and um and challenge to live deeper their discipleship.
SPEAKER_01: And we look forward to tuning in next time.
SPEAKER_00: Well, next time is gonna be on the road.
SPEAKER_00: Michelle and I are gonna head to Poland on Thursday.
SPEAKER_00: We ask for all your prayers.
SPEAKER_00: We're heading to Poland.
SPEAKER_00: We're leading a parish pilgrimage to Krakow and all the surrounding areas, walking in the footsteps of St.
SPEAKER_00: John Paul II.
SPEAKER_00: And so we uh ask for your prayers as we head over to Poland with the parish and listen to the podcast.
SPEAKER_00: It'll be a special edition on Monday.
SPEAKER_00: We'll be talking about everything Krakow, Poland, and just how what we're doing and and what's going on and how we made it over there.
SPEAKER_00: So I hope you can and join us and please share, as Michelle just said, share our podcast.
SPEAKER_00: We want to get this uh heart of the hominy to grow in people's hearts and and pass along so that we can build a big community and build up the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: We'll see you next week.
SPEAKER_00: God bless.