Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: I'm not gonna lie. Today's probably the most fun episode I've ever filmed on the Chris Stefanick Show. We're gonna dive into a speed round Q and A with your questions for Christopher West, Theology, the body expert, theologian, culture expert, today on the Chris Stefanick Show.
Welcome to the Chris Stefanick Show. We're here every week to give you the tools and inspiration you need to live your everyday life with joy, even when life is really hard. I want to thank our missionaries of joy for making this work possible. If you're not one, become one. Click on the link below this video. Sign up to be a missionary of joy today to fund all this work to bring the gospel of Jesus and his joy and his hope to the world. Today, our daily anchor is available for free with no strings attached. Let us inspire you. Let's dive in.
Okay. We are here with the Catholic sexpert.
[00:00:58] Speaker B: Hey, hey, hey.
[00:00:59] Speaker A: Am I allowed to say that?
[00:01:00] Speaker B: You can, but I don't know that I would.
It's kind of funny.
[00:01:03] Speaker A: Hey, we redeemed the word.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: All right, since we've redeemed the word. But you have to watch those other episodes where we redeem the word.
[00:01:09] Speaker A: Yeah, that's right.
Thanks for clarifying. The links are below the video. No, but Jason Everett.
I love Jason. I love you, man. Just travels the world as a parent of teens now. I'm extra grateful that the Guy has spent 25 years giving one chastity assembly after another. Like, when I started speaking, that's how I, you know, cut my teeth on public speaking. Because chastity talks. Yes, you did. I did. I did not know I did because Jason wrote me into it. Awesome. Yeah.
And I learned through that, like, if you can keep the attention of a crowd.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: Who is praying you die on the way to the assembly. And if they hear he died, they're like, yay.
[00:01:51] Speaker B: It'll cut. You cut your teeth out pretty quick.
[00:01:53] Speaker A: It's like sheriff's having to do the prison system, and then they get to go on the streets. Like, this is, you know.
But Jason, he was given a bunch of chastity some ways. He walked into a restaurant, and some kid across the restaurant is eating dinner with his parents. Not trying to be like a smart aleck. Just sees Jason goes, it's the sex guy.
Jason's like, next restaurant, please.
You have an incredible. I mean, you've given your whole life to this ministry. I have. Obviously in a really different way than Jason with theology of the body. And links below the video to all Christopher west stuff. You are like, you're the guy carrying the message of Theology of the Body on at a time the world most needs it.
[00:02:31] Speaker B: You know what Scott Hahn said to me years ago that I carry with me what's up? It's very helpful for anybody involved in ministry. He said, christopher, just remember, you are nothing but the ass that Jesus rides into Jerusalem.
So if I'm the ass that Jesus rides into Jerusalem to talk about these issues, hallelujah, Let me be the ass.
[00:02:51] Speaker A: Hallelujah. What do we want to do right now? The people who have subscribed to our Daily Anchor, that's our daily email, sign on to that. It's daily inspiration for free. There's no strings attached whatsoever. We asked them. Do you have questions for the guy who's the expert on this? Because when you answer the questions and the pains of people through the lens of Theology of the Body, it doesn't come across as rules. No. Not that those things are inherently bad, but there's that.
[00:03:18] Speaker B: It's an invitation to freedom.
[00:03:19] Speaker A: Yeah, There you go. There's a Thomistic approach that's very clear on, and that is the framework wherein the other Catholic philosophies fit. Right. We can't jettison that.
[00:03:27] Speaker B: Right, right, right. No.
[00:03:28] Speaker A: So John Paul II builds on Thomas to give us a new light and takes that phenomenological approach that for a lot of people is going to sound to them like something more positive.
[00:03:39] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:03:40] Speaker A: And might be received better.
[00:03:42] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:03:42] Speaker A: So I want to hear the theology of the Body. The theology of the Body. Experts, answers to these questions and how it sounds in the hopes that we can kind of imitate you.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: Great.
[00:03:52] Speaker A: Before I dive into those real quick, I threw out some big philosophical terms. Thomist, phenomenological, John Paul ii, like, he brings them together.
Brings them together. Define those two approaches.
[00:04:05] Speaker B: Yeah, it would.
[00:04:06] Speaker A: And then I'm going to go through these questions and I'm going to. This is going to be fun. I'm going to give you two minutes and 45 seconds per question.
[00:04:12] Speaker B: I begged you for three minutes.
[00:04:14] Speaker A: I'll give you three minutes per question. All right, that's it. I'm cutting you off.
[00:04:18] Speaker B: Good.
[00:04:18] Speaker A: You're on an elevator. It's a long one, three minutes. And the kid comes in and asks you the question. That's all the time you got. Okay, so go ahead. First, the difference.
[00:04:24] Speaker B: Yeah. So Thomas's approach was more objective. He's looking at the objective reality of things. The modern world looks at things from a subjective perspective.
And understandably, the Church wants to safeguard the objective reality of things.
And when we look at the subjective reality without anchoring ourselves in the objective, you end in subjectivism.
Right? That might be true for you, but that's not true for me.
But what John Paul II has recognized is the focus on the objective reality without proper attention to the subjective reality has the opposite problem. You end up in an objectivism that doesn't do justice to the inner workings of the heart and the way we experience things. And when we're just looking at that, the law can feel imposed on us from the outside.
Here's my analogy.
If this is poison and I don't know it's poisonous and I drink it, have I committed suicide?
[00:05:35] Speaker A: No.
[00:05:35] Speaker B: No. But will it still kill me?
[00:05:37] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:05:37] Speaker B: Yes. Because whether I know it's poison or not or think it's poison or not has no bearing whatsoever on whether it is poison or not. Right?
So JP2 says we don't need to be afraid of our subjective experience of things. That's phenomenology, where we study subjectively the way we experience the world.
Right. If you know this is poison and I don't and you see me going to drink it, what's the loving thing to do?
[00:06:06] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:06:07] Speaker B: And I might say to you, stuck in a kind of objectivistic worldview, I might. Excuse me. Subjectivistic worldview. I would say to you, how dare you impose your morality on me?
Right? That might be poison for you, but that's not poison for me.
Okay? Drink it.
So JP2 would say, if I drink it now, initially, if I'm really thirsty, even the poison might feel good because it's liquid and it's moistening my tongue and moistening my palate and it feels good going down my dry, parched throat.
And for a time, based on my subjective experience, I could say, you're crazy. It's not poison. Tastes great.
JP2 just says, okay, wait, it'll hit the bloodstream.
And when it hits the bloodstream and I keel over.
[00:07:03] Speaker A: That was good. Do that again.
[00:07:06] Speaker B: I will now have a subjective confirmation of the objective reality that it's poison.
And when we have subjective confirmation of objective reality, the objective reality no longer feels imposed on us from the outside.
It wells up from my own experience. The objective truth of the Church's teaching is confirmed subjectively in the wounds of a culture that has rejected it.
Right?
[00:07:39] Speaker A: That's the proof.
[00:07:40] Speaker B: That's the proof.
[00:07:41] Speaker A: The proofs in the wounding.
[00:07:42] Speaker B: The proof is in the wounding.
[00:07:44] Speaker A: If you.
[00:07:45] Speaker B: If you brush your teeth with a chainsaw, there are going to be Some indications that you shouldn't have done that.
Right. If the message of the pornographic revolution brought better relationships, better happier lives, I would say let's keep going with that.
But the evidence of what the. I call it the pornographic revolution rather than the sexual revolution, the evidence of what the pornographic revolution did to us is in.
And it's been a wrecking ball.
[00:08:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:08:16] Speaker B: We don't even know what it means to be human anymore. That is subjective confirmation that the church's teaching is objectively correct. But you still have a lot of people who are just feeling the liquid going down their throat. And it still feels good.
Right.
[00:08:32] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:08:33] Speaker B: But we're getting to critical mass where the poison is hitting the bloodstream.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: I feel the turn. I think we all do.
[00:08:39] Speaker B: We're getting there.
[00:08:40] Speaker A: We're waking up.
[00:08:40] Speaker B: We're waking up. And there are enough people saying what went wrong.
[00:08:45] Speaker A: Yeah. I can't fight gravity and think I'll win.
[00:08:48] Speaker B: That's right. That's right.
[00:08:50] Speaker A: So the theology of the body approach, the phenomenological approach would say, here's the objective truth. Also pay attention to your heart.
[00:08:58] Speaker B: Pay attention to what's going on.
Pay attention to what's going on. Pay attention especially to your sufferings because they are telling you where something is off.
[00:09:09] Speaker A: Right.
[00:09:09] Speaker B: It's good that we suffer, that we have the capacity.
[00:09:12] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:09:13] Speaker B: Because it tells us where we're off.
[00:09:14] Speaker A: This is my timer.
[00:09:15] Speaker B: Yeah, let's do it.
[00:09:16] Speaker A: There will be no mercy.
What's up, you guys? I'm so glad you're watching. Would you please let us inspire you every single day? Click below this video and sign up for the Daily Anchor. And this is really cool, guys. When you sign up for the Daily Anchor, you're entered into a drawing. We're going to pick a name where you can bring a friend on the pilgrimage to beauty and to Kalaupapa, where St Damian of Molokai, Marian Cope and Joseph Dutton poured out their lives serving a leper colony.
Dude, this is going to be a mind blowing trip. You're going to be drawn to get a chance to win it for free.
What? So we'll put info about the whole trip if you just want to sign up below the video.
But the Daily Anchor, that's how you get daily inspiration and a chance to win that trip.
Okay, back to our video.
Question one.
Does being.
[00:10:04] Speaker B: Wait, wait, wait. You're gonna start the timer after you've read the question.
[00:10:07] Speaker A: I gotta fix this.
Does being interviewed by Chris Stefanick with his big muscles make your masculinity feel threatened?
[00:10:18] Speaker B: From the moment I walked in your office, I just went.
If I didn't have confidence in my identity, perhaps it would.
[00:10:26] Speaker A: What is.
What is Christopher's advice for teen dating? Many kids get into serious relationships years before they're ready for marriage and they go too far physically. Lack of prefrontal cortex development.
[00:10:39] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:10:40] Speaker A: And I love how this parent ends it, because who can only kiss for years.
That's a beautifully practical way of putting it. On your marks, get set, go.
[00:10:49] Speaker B: Advice for teen dating. We have to find the happy medium between being too heavy handed in, laying down the law and too loosey goosey. I mean, this is just common wisdom. But where is that middle ground?
If we are only saying no to our children and we're not educating them in the use of freedom, this is the key. We must educate them in a proper use of freedom. And that means giving them room enough to make mistakes and learn from them.
God, the Father said, do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. If you do, you will die.
But when they reached out for it, he didn't smack their hands and say, go to your room.
He let them eat it. He let them fall because he knew his love was great enough to contain and redeem that fall.
Sometimes we're like a tyrant with the law. You will do what I say, and this is the letter of the law. And there's a time and a place for that. There's a time and a place for that.
However, we must give our children enough freedom to make mistakes and learn from them. Otherwise, if all you've done, I assure you, I assure you, parents, if all you have done is lay down the law, what are they going to do when they go off to college or leave the house?
[00:12:12] Speaker A: Oh, we've seen it happen.
[00:12:13] Speaker B: They're going to break all the laws.
[00:12:15] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:12:16] Speaker B: We have to educate them to use their freedom rightly.
How do we do that? That is a challenge.
We need to teach discernment.
We need to teach them a healthy appreciation of Eros.
Right? How do we overcome bad Eros with good Eros and lots of it?
What do I mean by that?
Eros is not only sexual energy, it is that, but it's the love of the true, the good and the beautiful.
Train your children in love of the true, the good and the beautiful. Good music, good art, good stories. Do they love horseback riding? Well, give them horseback riding lessons. Do they love music? Give them music lessons. Do they love gardening? Give them plant a garden in the backyard. Healthy channels for Eros is Critical, healthy, good expressions of eros, male and female interaction. If you think the solution to bad interaction between male and female is no interaction between male and female, guess what you're setting them up for? Bad interaction between male and female. So healthy experiences, properly guided, properly guarded, that give young people enough freedom to make some mistakes from which they can learn. So they use their free will.
[00:13:39] Speaker A: I'm using the last five seconds. I let my kids start dating maybe when they're 16.
[00:13:42] Speaker B: Yeah, 16 is what we've done as well.
[00:13:44] Speaker A: Yeah. Before they start to tie their identity to the boyfriend. That's a disaster.
But even then I've told them, you know, if you want the excuse of I won't let you because you're enjoying the lack of pressure, I'll tell you you're not allowed to. And then you tell me when I should tell you you're allowed to. I've had some of my kids say, yeah, dad, tell me that I'm not allowed to have to say yes to this girl's pursuit of me. Yes, it's good.
Hey, I'm sorry I used 23 per seconds of your next question. I'm kidding. I won't take that away from you.
Here we go.
[00:14:13] Speaker B: I might be able to do some of these in under three. We'll see.
[00:14:15] Speaker A: Let's see what happens.
How does one go about telling an early 20 year old that pornography will do him more harm in the long run? I pray for him regularly. There are scales on his eyes when it comes to virtue. On your marks, get set. Deep breath, inhale. And go.
[00:14:31] Speaker B: God bless us all here. If. If somebody in his young, in his young twenties thinks pornography is a good idea, there's a lot of water under the bridge. A lot of water under the bridge.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:14:43] Speaker B: And we have to demonstrate that what God holds out to us is not just a no to something wrong.
Right? Pornography is a diabolic mockery of something gloriously beautiful. Right. It's a hellish imitation of a heavenly reality.
The only way we overcome a wrong use of freedom is if our freedom recognizes there's something far more fulfilling than this. Right. Put it this way, I said in another conversation, you and I have, we have three choices with our yearning, right? We can go the starvation approach, we can go the fast food approach, or we can go to the banquet.
If the contest is between starvation and fast food, what's going to win every time?
[00:15:38] Speaker A: Fast food.
[00:15:38] Speaker B: Fast food is going to win every time.
[00:15:41] Speaker A: This is beautifully said.
[00:15:42] Speaker B: If the contest is between the fast food and the banquet, which one's going to win. We want the banquet.
But if we're not unfolding the beauty and splendor and glory of the banquet, and people think the only two options are starve or greasy chicken nuggets, I'm going for the chicken nuggets. This young person doesn't know the banquet exists. He thinks when people say, you shouldn't be looking at porn, he thinks the only alternative is, I starve my hunger.
What do I do with my hunger? There's a banquet. There's a banquet. There's a banquet and Jesus says, go out into the main streets and invite everyone to the wedding feast. But we cannot witness to the banquet if we don't know how beautiful the banquet is.
[00:16:29] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:16:30] Speaker B: So we have to know the beauty, the splendor, the glory, the goodness of God's plan for sexuality if we are to witness to it to somebody else. If all we're doing is saying, no, don't do that, we lose, we lose.
[00:16:45] Speaker A: Boom. 2 minutes and 14 seconds.
[00:16:47] Speaker B: One more time.
[00:16:48] Speaker A: Yeah. That was the best one.
[00:16:49] Speaker B: That was the best one all day.
[00:16:50] Speaker A: When we first saw each other, it didn't work. That was Little Wick.
[00:16:53] Speaker B: That was the best one all day.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: We had two sardines slapping each other. That one was really good. Okay, next question.
My wife and I are incredibly happily married. Christ is the center of our life, but we're in our early 60s and one of us no longer feels the need for the physical intimacy in the marriage act that was once there.
What does the other spouse do with all those physical urges that, quote, cuddling does not address?
That's a great question.
These questions are coming from all sides of life and I love the multi generational nature of our audience. Okay, on your marks, get set. Take a deep breath.
Go.
[00:17:26] Speaker B: To answer this question, I am going to assume, and I don't know, but this is just the angle I'm going to take. I'm going to assume there's good reason to not challenge the one who prefers no longer to be sexually intimate. I think there could be good reason to challenge that. I think there could be good reason to say, why does this person not want that, that part of the marriage?
Maybe there's a wound that needs to be addressed. Maybe there's some really deep, painful, buried stuff that needs to be addressed. But to answer the question, I'm going to assume, let's say there's a health reason or a physical ailment that makes intercourse impossible in a marriage.
What should one do with the sexual energy?
Hopefully what you've been doing your whole life learning how to use it to become a true gift to the other. What do I mean?
Sexual intercourse is not the only way to be a true gift to the other.
It's one way to be a true gift to the other.
But in order to be that true gift, I have to be a master of my desires.
I'll often ask a room full of people. I'll say, ladies, how many of you want to be married to a man who cannot control his sexual desires? Please raise your hand.
Never has a hand gone up. Why has the hand not gone up? Because these women know that if men cannot control their sexual desires, their yes means nothing when they indulge in them. That's what they're doing. They're indulging, and she's an outlet.
I'm not accusing this man of being in that position, but what I'm saying is we need to be master of our desires so that we can put them at the service of loving.
If the loving thing to do is to have intercourse, I can put those energies at that service. If the loving thing to do is to refrain from intercourse, I can put the very same energies into offering the sacrifice of refraining.
It is so liberating for a man to be able to say to his wife, honey, I would love to make love to you tonight, but the loving thing to do is not to make love to you tonight. So I am going to use all of that same energy that I would use to make love to you. The very same energy is going to be put at the service of sacrificing that so I can love you in that way.
[00:19:57] Speaker A: Can we say the flip side is also true, that the person who doesn't want to, if their spouse desires it, if they're able. I mean, if there's not some emotional, serious baggage they have to work through that, they should also try to.
[00:20:10] Speaker B: And that would be another angle on the same question, which is what I wanted to address initially.
Sometimes we need to be called in the other direction, where out of love, I need to learn how to make love to my spouse and face whatever issues are in me that's preventing me from loving in that way. Yes. So it can go absolutely the other way.
[00:20:29] Speaker A: That was three minutes and three seconds.
[00:20:31] Speaker B: Very good.
[00:20:31] Speaker A: That's not bad. Even with my addition, we got a handful of questions, as you can imagine, about the LGBT issues.
I want to divide them into the LGB and the T, because that's even happening within the secular LGBT movement that the LG and B are saying look, that's not necessarily us. In fact, that's kind of hijacked the other part. Parts and radicalized in a way that, you know, we were skating under the radar here before, and then people come in and try to try to push things to kindergarteners that say, you know, you could discern your gender. So let's split these up. How do you respond to the LGB part? People hear the theology of the body. They think, I want to bodily express my love for someone.
[00:21:14] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:21:15] Speaker A: And I'm just a guy. I'm just attracted to guys. Or I'm a girl attracted to girls. Do I not ever get to experience that? Where am I in this equation? Am I just left out on the sidelines?
[00:21:24] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:21:24] Speaker A: On your marks. Are you ready?
[00:21:26] Speaker B: Hang on. I am looking for 10 extra seconds.
[00:21:28] Speaker A: 10 bonus seconds.
[00:21:31] Speaker B: Okay, here it is.
[00:21:32] Speaker A: Get set. And by the way, if that's you and you're watching, you're seen. I want to honor if you're trying to follow the Lord and live his teachings in chastity.
I know people like this. We'll link below this video to my interview with Kim Zember.
I think you literally, the Lord can use that to make you a literal saint, especially in this cultural context, when doing what's the base requirement in some circumstances, John Paul II wrote about this requires heroism to do that which is required. Sometimes it requires heroism, and heroic virtue is what makes you a saint.
So I want to honor you. If you're watching, that's your personal issue. On your marks. This is a heavy one. Get set.
Go.
[00:22:11] Speaker B: I want to address this overarching topic first with a quote from your friend and mine, Archbishop Chaput.
This was at his intervention in 2018 at the Synod in Rome. This is what he said the church holds to be. What the church holds to be true about sexuality is not a stumbling block.
It is the only real path to joy and wholeness.
There is no such thing as an LGBTQ Catholic or a transgender Catholic or a heterosexual Catholic, as if our sexual appetites defined who we are.
As if these designations described discrete communities of differing but equally equal integrity within the real church community. The body of Jesus Christ.
This has never been true in the life of the church, and it is not true now.
It follows that he puts this in quotes. LGBTQ and similar language should not be used in church documents because using it suggests that these are real, autonomous groups, and the church simply doesn't categorize people that way.
Explaining why Catholic teaching about human sexuality is true and why it's ennobling and merciful seems crucial to any discussions about what it means to be human.
[00:23:41] Speaker A: Boldly saying that Jesus is actually better than what the secular movements are proposing.
[00:23:45] Speaker B: Yes, And I won't use that language. I don't use those letters. I don't like them. Why? Because language shapes the way we see reality.
And the only thing that exists sexually, when I say exists, I mean ontologically written into the DNA of the universe is male and female. He created them.
We can cut through all of this confusion. All of these letters, this. This Alphabet soup that we are creating. Jesus cuts through all of it when he says, haven't you read that in the beginning God made them male and female?
Everything else is a twisting of the clay.
Everything else is the result of our fallen humanity.
Here's the good news of the gospel.
It's right in the catechism. I'm quoting the catechism directly. Christ came into the world to restore creation to the purity of its origins.
So we must first understand what's the original blueprint of our humanity. Where does my humanity express itself in a twisted or distorted way? I don't define myself with that twisting or distortion. I say this comes from the Fall, and I invite Christ into that.
And guess what Christ can do if I invite him into it? He can.
And I'm not saying. Just say this prayer and tomorrow you're going to be innocent like before the Fall.
Nobody is. You got your issues, I got my issues. Everybody's got his or her issues, right? We're all twisted. We're all. We are all, each and every one of us sexually disoriented.
Because in the beginning, God created sexual desire to be like a rocket that launches us to the stars. What happened with original sin? Those rocket engines got inverted. What does Christ want to do for each and every one of us? Redirect those rocket engines.
Every single one of us is in need of sexual redemption. There aren't people who are a particular kind of person who need a.
Some particular treatment. We all need to go through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to discover who we are. I'm not saying there aren't people with different particular struggles. That's obviously true.
[00:25:59] Speaker A: But how do they experience love for those for whom the desires are persistent and never go away?
[00:26:05] Speaker B: We have to know what love is.
And we must not confuse love with the exchange of orgasms.
[00:26:15] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:26:15] Speaker B: The only time the exchange of orgasms is loving is when that pleasure is experienced as the pleasure of loving, as Christ loves. And how does Christ love?
Freely, totally, faithfully, fruitfully only a husband and a wife can do that. A male and a female who are joining in one flesh.
This is where our bodies are meant to and have the opportunity to express through climactic sexual expression, the love of the Trinity. Any other expression of orgasmic activity is using the other for my pleasure and is not love and should not be called love.
[00:27:04] Speaker A: That's great, man, thank you. The next question is about the T, the T part of the lgbt.
[00:27:10] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:27:11] Speaker A: How do you respond to the idea that we can be gender fluid or change our gender, change our metaphysics by thinking about it, or as Demi Lovato said, talking to her friends in the fourth dimension. It's almost like a high priest of the sexual revolution, of the pornographic revolution, to say that I can do this just by my gnosis. It's the secret knowledge, right?
[00:27:32] Speaker B: Yes. Yes.
[00:27:33] Speaker A: From a theology of the body point of view.
[00:27:35] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:27:36] Speaker A: And this hits hard, man, because there's a lot of young people who are convinced that the Church is hateful and bigoted because we don't go along with this.
On your marks, get set, go.
[00:27:50] Speaker B: Yes. What both the Church and the secular world wants for those who struggle in a situation where it feels to them that what I feel on the inside does not match my body on the outside.
That is a very, very painful situation to live within. Excruciating.
The Church and the secular world would be in very close agreement that there is a problem here that needs attention, that needs to be healed, that needs, needs to be fixed. The inside and the outside should match.
The Church would say what needs to be changed is not the outside.
What needs to be changed is what's going on on the inside.
Right.
Because the body reveals the person.
The body reveals the inner mystery of the person.
If I am born with a male body, that tells me that I am male through and through, physically and spiritually.
The body tells the story. Here we're in full agreement. There is a rupture between the interior and the exterior. But the Church would say the true remedy is not to mutilate your body, and that's what you're doing. And let me point out how cunning the enemy is here.
You and I were talking earlier about how the enemy is after our ability to generate. He's after our gender, because that's what the word gender means. Gender gen means to produce or give birth to.
Gender means the manner in which you generate new life.
Do you know what the end goal of so called gender affirming surgeries are?
You are rendered unable to generate.
So what we Are calling gender affirming surgery is a direct frontal attack on what gender actually is.
[00:29:56] Speaker A: Etymologically the opposite thing.
[00:29:59] Speaker B: We are doing exact. We are gutting gender because gender means the manner in which you generate new life. Go through a so called gender affirming surgical procedure and your gender has been gutted because you are no longer able to generate new life. This is a world calling good evil and evil good.
Right.
We got it upside down. And we got it upside down because we're attacking the body which is healthy.
Instead of healing the soul which is ill, we are saying that this ill soul is healthy and the healthy body is ill.
Got the whole thing reversed. We have to turn the lights on so we can see reality as it really is.
[00:30:43] Speaker A: Now. One on one, 255. Well done. One on one that starts that knowledge is the framework for what starts as a long road of pastoral care.
[00:30:53] Speaker B: Long road of pastoral care for that person in the crisis.
[00:30:56] Speaker A: Right. I don't want to oversimplify the answers and say you can give this in 30 seconds to a kid who's in that crisis.
[00:31:00] Speaker B: Right? Right.
[00:31:01] Speaker A: Of course for some kids it's genuine agony and gender dysphoria.
But that framework would kick off how it forms you and pastorally walking with the kid that the end of the road is not mutilation.
[00:31:16] Speaker B: Yes. The end of the road cannot be bodily mutilation. Please read Jason Everett's book on this issue and please read my book, Good News about sex and Marriage. I have a whole chapter on it.
[00:31:26] Speaker A: Okay, so there's the pastoral care elder element, right?
[00:31:29] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:31:30] Speaker A: And then there's the very real culture war, which people hate the word culture war sometimes. Well, war is upon you whether you
[00:31:36] Speaker B: have it or not.
[00:31:37] Speaker A: Right. It's here.
[00:31:38] Speaker B: It's here.
[00:31:39] Speaker A: We make a mistake when we treat the culture war with the same soft gloves that we treat the personal pastoral experience pastorally. You got to walk with people.
[00:31:52] Speaker B: That's right. Well said. That's very well articulated. Yes.
[00:31:55] Speaker A: I think a lot of bishops make this mistake. A lot of pastors make this mistake that because they want the personal to always seem soft.
[00:32:02] Speaker B: Right.
[00:32:03] Speaker A: They treat everything with that same one.
[00:32:06] Speaker B: Yes. Keen insight.
[00:32:07] Speaker A: And what we're dealing with is there's seriously agenda driven people.
And by agenda I mean some hellish agendas who are targeting. Dude, I can't.
My granddaughter, four years old, she used to love going to the library and now there's. I'm not trying to like stereotype, but there's a green haired girl sitting behind the counter now. And tons of transgender books on the eye level of the four year old and why Johnny has two mommies. Whatever. I mean, these are things you could teach a kid when they're ready, that these are realities that they're facing in the world right now. But they're shoving them.
There's thousands of people pushing stuff in public schools, volunteers. They are motivated.
So there's dealing with it pastorally.
How do we enter the battle in a way that doesn't add to the brand that you guys are hateful bigots and enter the culture war in your school, in your library? How do you forcefully say no, we're drawing the line and you're watching it go, okay.
[00:33:06] Speaker B: You cannot fight a war and win it if you don't know who your enemy is and what he's after and how he's fighting. Right. If you want to know what is most sacred in this world, all you have to do is look to that which the enemy most violently attacks. And what the enemy in our day and age is violently attacking with all of his fury is male and female. He created them. That's what he's attacking.
Why is he attacking it?
Because male and female, he created them and he blessed them. And he called the two to become one flesh.
This is a mega mystery St. Paul tells us that reveals God's eternal plan for the universe, that Christ and the church would become one in the flesh.
Our creation as male and female reveals the eternal plan of God for the universe. That's why the enemy is after it.
How do we overcome evil? We overcome evil not by wagging fingers at evil. We overcome evil by turning the lights on and showing how beautiful it is that we're made male and female in the image and likeness of God.
[00:34:18] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:34:19] Speaker B: If the room is dark, turn the light on. Don't yell at the darkness. We overcome evil with good.
We have to restore it first in our own minds and hearts.
We have to restore a sense that there is nothing more beautiful in all of creation than man and woman naked without shame.
Nothing. And when we understand how beautiful that is and how that illuminates God's plan for the universe, we can march out into this world and invite people just to behold the beauty with us.
And then we meet them in the pain and tragedy where they are, where they've been lied to, lied to, lied to about the meaning of their bodies. Who told you you were naked? Who told you that your body's not beautiful as it is? And I'll say this other thing too, just to illuminate the war we're in when your frame for understanding what a man and a woman are is pornography and the hellish stuff that is available two clicks away.
If I were a teenage girl, seeing what men are doing to women on porn and then meeting boys my own age who want me to do that with them.
Yeah, I don't want to be a woman.
[00:35:41] Speaker A: I'll be asexual.
[00:35:43] Speaker B: Chop these breasts off if that's what you want to do. With my breasts. I'm chopping them off. I get it, I get it, I get it.
[00:35:51] Speaker A: If I could sum up the angle of all your answers, because this is great, not just for answering these tough questions, but for evangelization in general. It's blasting in with something that's so much better.
[00:36:02] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:36:03] Speaker A: Than exactly. It's. We have to bring him to the banquet.
[00:36:05] Speaker B: Bring him to the banquet.
[00:36:06] Speaker A: We have to stop being the church on the defense, Start being the church on the offense. I love Archbishop Chaput's answer to dare to say that. No, what we have in Jesus Christ is infinitely better than what the secular LGBT movement will offer you. Infinitely better than what porn will offer you. Better than what any pleasure will offer you. It's just better. So why are we being shy about
[00:36:26] Speaker B: it, Coy about it?
[00:36:28] Speaker A: I want to say just a little bit, just so gently, because someone might. Someone might be feeling awkward or accuse me of being bigoted. I'm not bigoted. And I'm not going to apologize anymore. It's just better. And you want the proof? It's in the pudding. It's not work, dude.
[00:36:41] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:36:42] Speaker A: That's right. You know you're bleeding to death on a battlefield, and I'm going to still walk on the battlefield and apologize that I have the cure. Come on. You fired me up, man. Thank you.
[00:36:51] Speaker B: Praise God. We have good, good news to proclaim.
[00:36:57] Speaker A: Amen.
[00:36:57] Speaker B: And we have to be bold in proclaiming.
[00:36:59] Speaker A: Can I. Can I pray for you with our viewers, please? Let's pray for you. I want to pray for you. I want to pray. I want to rope Jason Everett invisibly into this.
[00:37:06] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:37:07] Speaker A: All the people out there who are. Who are in this particular front line.
[00:37:10] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, It's. It's particularly right.
[00:37:13] Speaker A: And there's a lot of not as well known folks who are, like, in that same battle. No, less important because we gauge importance in the wrong way sometimes. Right. It's not all about signing a book, but let's pray. In the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Lord, thank you for Christopher West. Thank you for Jason, thank you for all the people who are giving their lives to this. Thank you for the parents who are in the trenches with their kid, battling through this issue. We ask you to continue to bless, sustain them, and give them the grace of having the joy of the battle and a love that never fails, so that as they proclaim truth, they always do it with love and protect them from all the attacks and snares and arrows of the evil one. We combine the total force of. Of all the prayers of the hundreds of thousands of people who will see this. And Lord, hear all our prayers for all of these people who are warriors, but especially for Christopher right now and his ministry of Theology of the body. If you can all join me in one Hail Mary, because if you get 50 people doing that, that's one instant rosary. And if we get 10,000 people or 100,000 people, how many rosaries did Christopher and his family and his ministry just get? That's how God intended for this social media to be used. So Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen. Did you feel the grace once?
[00:38:30] Speaker B: Thanks, everybody. And thank you, my brother.
[00:38:32] Speaker A: Oh, man. Thank you. And guys, Jesus, if you don't know how to. How to navigate all the particular answers, Jesus himself is the answer. So just stick to sharing him. He's the ultimate solution. He's the golden bullet in the end. We love you. Thanks for watching. I love you, man. I love you, bro. Thank you so much for this. What joy. What joy to be with you.
[00:38:52] Speaker B: Thanks.
[00:38:53] Speaker A: See you next time.
