Fr. Michael Scanlan, TOR: Sources of Courage

top of the mornin to you glory I know what glory is that's what happened last night that's called glory the power the Holy Spirit working and isn't it great that we don't have to be perfect to receive the Lord's glory that the power the Spirit can use is where we are that's tremendous tremendous blessing the course I always remember the old by the Gymboree phrase then he says you know the night of power is glory be to the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit and as you depart from the conference's as it was in the beginning is now and ever shall be and therefore my talk today is right on that point the thing that makes the difference between the glory continuing I'm not continuing his courage courage just before I get into that mm-hmm you want to respond to a couple of things few conversations I've had with people and I guess first of all what we're doing next year thought I'd tell you that right now she'll be a special conference next year it's gonna be healing and deliverance 20 years later 20 years ago in the Catholic Church in the first public platform healing and deliverance was announced as something that should be normal in the mainstream of Catholic life not reserved to a few holy people but in fact broadly shared throughout the body of Christ this was done at the National charismatic conference and Notre Dame one of the the main leader that night even though I presided over the session the main proclaimer and leader on that was Francis McNutt father Francis McNutt has this past year had gone through a full Catholic wedding ceremony and under the bishop of his diocese is fully operating in lay ministry with with his wife Judith and they can be back to co-chair and to lead this conference next year I'm bertolucci you'll be with us I'll be on stead and we'll be bringing in we've invited the chief healing ministers that we know over the past 20 years to come back and not just Minister but teach they wrote the books they proclaimed the statements 20 years ago now 20 years later from all the experience what really works how should you look at it how should it work out I think any charismatic leader needs to have that kind of perspective and it's gonna be a landmark conference and the third weekend of June next year so you'll be hearing more about it but I wanted to tell you right now that's where our charismatic leaders conference is going to be next year and you can bring along people who simply come for the healing and deliverance one of the simple thing on the Marion area a number of you talked to me after my homily on their lady yesterday we just got back from that pilgrimage of course lourdes fatima zahra ghosts in the rest but there's something very special that we're doing in August next year for those interested in a Marian pilgrimage we're going to Ireland where there are most reported contemporary apparitions of Our Lady and we bring you along the two experts that I know that are outstanding on it dr. Marc Mira Bali who writes the books and does the teachings from our faculty and Michael Brown who wrote the final hour and we're going to experience and teach on how do you discern how do you handle all reported apparitions and signs and wonders of God while also being at NOC and some of the shrines of past apparitions that's gonna happen next to August one of the simple thing in the Marian thing Jim Cowan and his music ministry have a rosary that for me is outstanding it has I keep it at all times in the player and the automobile I drive so that as I turn on the ignition the rosary starts and he sings it and they respond it is just so magnificent it's multiplied my rosaries I've got to tell you that don't miss that tape it is really a beautiful grace I'm also gonna hold up the little rosary companion book that I wrote because it made not just all the difference in my life in terms of focusing on the mysteries of God while praying the rosary by using only biblical passages and by really giving me the words of power under each mystery but many of you and charismatic groups have the struggle between Marian and charismatic and should marry and people who want to concentrate on the Word of God and it's saying what's in Scripture well I found many evangelical friends include some Catholic and some not Catholic to find that if they follow this approach to the Rosary just using the power words of Scripture they can fully accept the whole prayer and the whole approach so those are a couple of things that I wanted to mention to you before we get back to this business of living in God's glory you heard yesterday that we experience the glory we experience the cross but the end result should be embracing the glory of the cross and it's getting those two things together that isn't easy it requires courage simple courage as I've looked at the at renewal as I've looked at the foundation of every religious order as I have looked at the foundation of every movement lay movement I have not found one anywhere that doesn't go through strife that doesn't go through difficulty that doesn't go through purification it's just God's Way of dealing with a good old socks you know it's Sox's that's flesh you know what that means that means the flesh under original sin it means we've got to go through it if if the movements going to prevail if the religious order is going to be established it's just needed it doesn't happen any other way and frankly to put it as bluntly as I can the people who continue other people that decide to be courageous to use what God gives them to hang in to persevere to stay with the truth not in some braggadocio way but in a humble way of submission but nevertheless the hanging and to do it and where the hanging in doesn't happen the religious order disappears do you know that the overwhelming something like 90 percent of religious communities do not make it beyond the death of their founder when they start because that hanging in process is so difficult and that adjustment within the church is so difficult so are you surprised that you're having some difficulty in your prayer group or it's split or grown or went down and the rest that's just the way but the difference is courage it's not courage on your own it's courage rooted and founded in God and I want to speak to you today about seven basic sources foundation fonts of courage ease this isn't just theory this is the stuff I count on that I dig into in order to hold on and move on in God you might say well why is courage so important my dick CS Lewis explained it to us most clearly he said courage is not merely one of the virtues it's the form of every virtue exactly at its testing point which is the highest point of reality courage is not just one virtue like love joy peace patience all the rest of them kind of graces but it is the form of every virtue exactly at its testing point which is the highest point of reality what does that mean that means no matter what virtue you have or start to have at some point that virtue cannot mature without courage at some point even if you are the most patient person around it stuff starts getting home to you and it says and you'd want to say that's enough that's the limit I've been patient till now but you've done it that's where courage comes in to continue to be patient the log you say I just want to be a loving person and then you meet the person who you who your head tells you is the most unlovable thing you've run into you just can't believe that many unlovable qualities were put together that's where you decide to cross the line and to love you say you're going to pray every morning then you start having sleepless nights or you have all sorts of interruptions to a complete family crisis and that's where your pride about how faithful and prayerful you are comes into the testing point are you gonna be courageous to continue the prayer and continue in God and trust them when the circumstances got difficult you see what I mean you can take any virtue you want and at some point it will be tested and if you pass through the test it becomes truly a what a habitual virtue which is the definition of a true virtue or a mature virtue in your life so courage is is key in our lives you know I tell the students here as they're getting acclimated this Steubenville that we got one statue in town it's of Edwin Stanton it's down town in front of the courthouse mostly they have never heard of Edwin Stanton at all they even one time said that funny statue of downtown you know but Stanton was an opponent of Abraham Lincoln he was a politician he campaigned against Lincoln he he spoke against Lincoln but he did it in an unsavory way he's a brilliant man and but he called Lincoln about boom he said we don't we have better-looking animals in the circus than Abraham Lincoln he's the last one we want as president he ridiculed him Lincoln was elected president as the Civil War was beginning he appointed Edwin Stanton as his Secretary of War I guess he knew he was a fighter but you know imagine what that took he didn't appoint someone who'd been his friend he didn't point someone who'd been in his supporter he didn't separate points and when people said why did you do that he's your enemy he said he's the best man for the job and he turned out to be an outstanding Secretary of War when Lincoln was assassinated and they had his body laying in state Edwin Stanton spoke up the coffin he said here lies the greatest man in the history of this country Stanton went on to run for Congress and be appointed as Associate Justice of the Supreme Court but four days after his appointment he died Stanton and Lincoln were men of courage with the humility to persevere in what was right even when it was embarrassing to themselves that's in the natural realm we need courage as a foundation of our lives if we're gonna lead anybody or anything should pray for it but we ought to have a desire for it and a sense of where we can draw resources for this kind of courage Barnabas was called in the scripture the son of encouragement and in acts 11 23 he rejoiced and encouraged them all to remain faithful to the Lord and firmness of heart Paul and Silas when he left when they left prison what does it said the first thing they did they went to Lydia's house where they saw and encouraged the Brethren there are 23 other times just in the acts of apostles if you go back to the root meaning in Greek where it is said that they different disciples or the Holy Spirit himself encouraged the Christians we need a ministry of encouragement to one another not just be encouraged ourselves but if we are not into imparting courage to one another it's going to be very difficult in the times of testing courage comes from heart the French and it means acting out of the commitment of your heart acting out of the deepest commitments of your life that's basically what courage means and encouraging is saying those things doing those things to enable others to act out of their highest convertors their deepest commitment of the hearts the most meaningful parts of their lives okay seven seven resources seven foundations for the courage of your life first be who you are but understand who you are just simply being who you are and living out of who you are can make all the difference who are you you are baptized into Christ Jesus you are a new creation Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5 you have been given a new identity do you understand that you're very baptism renewed and confirmed and renewed and confirmed over and over as we did last night as you've been baptism of the Spirit is the foundation of your identity you are a Christ you took an Christian name and baptism name of a saint the reason you took that is not everybody could be called karte Jesus Christ you take the name of a saint who is in Jesus Christ but in fact your name is Christ that's why you call yourself Christian you now have an identity as a member of the body of Jesus and he will as part of the body has the name of the body this hand belongs to Mike you belong to Christ understanding that and then understand the deeper reality of how you were baptized do you realize you know the formula right I think everybody is John bertolucci says in many of his talks knows how to baptize somebody especially in extreme circumstances i baptize you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit he realized the church went through a great deal of struggle reflection before they came out with the decision that that was the formula for baptism in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit and this is extraordinary this means that what is now being done to you is being done in the name in the reality of God of gods family and when you are immersed well some of you are still poured over or sprinkled or whatever but when you're immersed which is the traditional and first form of baptism the ideas you immersed in water leaving the old person behind rising out of the water with the new name and new identity but it's not just the water that you've gone through you are now coming out in the identity of the life and the love of the Trinity now you got to hear this this is so important for you to understand you see the Trinity father God loving the son totally this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased the son saying I've come to only do the will of the father to glorify the father my his will is my meat indeed and the love of the Father and the son being so total and so committed to one another in every way that that creates from its from the beginning a third person called the Holy Spirit the Holy Spirit is that love it is so totally giving it is such a total submission of one to another it is such a total self-effacement of one giving to the other that it creates a third person the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit is this enormous dynamism of love an analogous situation as a husband and wife totally loving one another bringing forth a child from as the fruit of their love but this is a perfect situation now when you get baptized you get baptized into that into this tremendous dynamism of love as part of God's family you are incorporated right into the heart of the family of God your resources are unlimited unlimited love not easy but your resources are unlimited there's an old expression in chivalry called noblesse oblige which means that the children of the noble family must live nobly in other words if you're a son and daughter over of a knight or a king you're expected to live on this higher noble plane your son and daughters of God carrying the noble name of Jesus Christ noblesse oblige this is your fundamental identity it's a source of who you are and who you can draw from some of our earlier fire rallies and shields talked about a a black family moving into a white neighborhood back in some of the ferocious days of civil rights struggle and experiencing great dealer discrimination and until finally some friends of them urge them a why don't you move you're just being harassed in every way and this is this is just terrible why do you insist there and their response was these people don't know that they have nobility in their midst they really saw themselves as sons of the Kings they weren't put down by the discrimination they had such clear identity in God that they could withstand that kind of opposition in acts 943 we get the key line on the source of our courage it says then the church was strengthened and encouraged by the Holy Spirit the Holy Spirit is the source of our courage secondly be Church this is tough we grow up in the age of media commentary and criticism but there's a fundamental decision before everyone who would seriously serve in the church are you gonna embrace the church are you gonna love the church are you gonna treat the church's family just gonna put your arms around it and said it's my church you'll never bring forth good fruit in the church if you don't as long as you step back and do what most the media does and what you read say well let me take a look if another report card on the church today let me look at it and decide what I like and what I don't like what I do what I won't accept and what I will accept you won't have the sources you won't have the life that God wants to give it years ago there was a wonderful book called the splendor of the church it changed my life I decided simply to love the church when it did what I thought I should do when it didn't to love everyone who represented the church to simply be a lover of the church it'll make the difference it's a challenge recently John Paul the second came out with a parallel name his encyclical splendor veritatis the splendor of truth calls us simply to know that the truth will make us free not our opinions not our preferences not what public opinion polls say but the absolute truth is what liberate sand frees us and the absolute truth of living in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ and loving at his what will absolute what will free you grasping truth right inside yourself John Paul goes on to say you know living moral lives avoiding sexual immorality and other immoralities is not in one sense negative in any way in your life because by avoiding sin and choosing virtue you become freer and freer and freer because that's way God made you that right within your very being there's a freedom to be expressed by living good moral lives I preached to our students here chaste and sober the way to freedom the way to fullness of life the way to joy and peace don't believe the lies of the world John Paul said to the youth down in New Orleans everybody don't believe them don't let them deceive you don't let them tell you that drunkenness and sexual immorality and pornography and wrong kind of entertainment and shows that that's a way of freedom he says that isn't that's the way of death tell them no don't be used by them come forth in freedom in his letter to the families which is published released on February 2nd this year John Paul talks about two cultures two cultures in tension in conflict with one another throughout the world and he challenges the families to choose the culture of love with dignity to the person with family as the fundamental unit those three points and to say no to the ever growing culture of utilitarianism or what's useful a culture that just looks for individuals as rights and freedoms and not the person and a culture that makes the state the fundamental unit this is his battle cry of this year and I'm sure he's going to build on it when he comes to the United Nations this fall as we loved the church loves the teaching of the church make that fundamental decision you'd be surprised how much freedom there is in no longer having to be the judge and jury on the church learn to know that all of scriptural teaching applies equally to the church in Our Lady Mary in almost every passage and some would say every last passage that the word church is use or the word Our Lady is used you can substitute one for the other loving Our Lady is a key to loving the church to loving your family the Holy Spirit overshadowed Mary and Jesus came forth the Holy Spirit overshadowed the disciples on the day of Pentecost and the church came forth and the church and Our Lady operating in the Holy Spirit bring forth the good fruit Third Point having Eternals perspective so be who you are as a baptized Christ be a member of the church have an eternal perspective Jesus told us not to rejoice in the little victories of life demons a subject who did a healing you've got this this little thing because there'll be losses and failures too he said rejoice instead that your names have written in the book of life that your names are written in the book of life that's what's great you heard yesterday you're in the father's well praise God there was a well let me first say mother Teresa has a comment that she's made in many places she made it on the docks of the New York Harbor and she made it Chuck Colson and other people who visited her in India because they always ask the same question to this little nun and she was here delivering the commencement address at this University back in 1976 it was just great she was so simple she just read us a rule of life and our daily Harare airman says love the poor you know that in your midst but love Jesus first so that you can love the poor and they asked mother Teresa well how do you handle all this success I mean your name is known throughout the world now how do you handle this renown and all these people that want to come and touch you and visit you and our answer was the same and in all these other circumstances where she was confronted she said the gospel says nothing about success only faithfulness you're not called to succeed can you understand that you're called to be faithful and if you're faithful there'll be success but the object is always faithfulness don't do a report card on yourself don't give yourself a grade for past failures and successes look only to faithfulness to the Lord Jesus Christ let the success of failure and fruitfulness come through him so many of the Saints died as seemingly failures even founders of religious or communities died when it looked like their community was going out of existence but the their actual seeds they planted brought forth success Fort Worth new life as a sister I wrote written about in my book let the fire fall because she's the one who led me who first told me about being baptized in the Holy Spirit her name is sister Carolyn she was the superior of the Carmelite monastery in Loretto Pennsylvania and sister Carolyn was the one who told me when I said how can I lead this whole seminary into holiness she said well you need to be baptized in the Holy Spirit I remember her words so cut through to me that here I was rector of a seminary and supposedly over all these theological discourse is that my response was do it I can never understand why somebody doesn't want it and I can understand that they want to think about understanding it but how could somebody not want it I just said dude she said no no I've never you know you have to get a better expert or something so that the it was a couple of months later the father Jim ferry came in and I was speaking at our seminary in college and and that was just a marvelous day I want to say when the my understanding of the essence of the baptism of the Holy Spirit is that you come into a full leur experience direct personal relationship with Jesus Christ as risen lord and savior and experience living in Holy Trinity Father Son and Holy Spirit after I was baptized in the Holy Spirit I remember that night in prayer and it has affected my prayer ever since of actually experiencing the Father Son and Holy Spirit interacting in our prayer and that I'm just part of it I didn't have to do anything I just had to join in there's a sense in which our prayer it won't all work all the time but there's a sense in which there should be a dimension of our prayer we were just joining into the prayer of the heavenly family of God himself well sister Carolyn announced to me about this time last year that she was dying and that she had a terminal illness and that each day she could she was do it was something that she couldn't do that she had been doing the day before and she said I know my end is coming and I don't know how soon but each day is another step towards my debt and I had been our spiritual director and we'd been very good friends so we communicated many many times by letters by phone calls and the rest but you know when she finally came close in the final weeks she said to me Michael all his grace there's nothing else everything is Grace and the only thing that counts is salvation she said I don't just say that as a nice and holy thing to say I say it as the only reality in my life nothing else interests me or has meaning for me except grace and salvation that's an eternal perspective can't you be free can you rejoice if you're pursuing a life of grace and salvation for yourself and others can't you put up with the things that go wrong and fail forth be clear who's of respect and affirmation you want a this is a this is so freeing this is a delight you know you can be surprised you can find yourself concerned about the media and what they say about you the first time you read about yourself in the newspapers you go ah you know it's something like that or you can be concerned about the people of influence in your circle you can be concerned about the friends and the groups you belong to or what do they think about me in the parish council or you know different church leaders or even your family oh geez you know what they're looking at but here's the freedom whose respect do you want and the answer is Jesus that's whose respect you want you want to know what he thinks you want to know his perspective on your life because of final moments coming and in that final moment is just so magnificent I mean I live for that moment there is nothing in my life that is so glorious as looking ahead to the possibility of Jesus presenting me to the Father and saying this is my faithful disciple that's it there's nothing else that can equal it anywhere anytime and that's gonna happen that's gonna happen because that final precession wind up in the resurrection the dead Jesus takes the whole kingdom and he brings it and hands it over to the father in this grand procession I mean I can visualize her lady in Abraham and Isaac and Jacob I can visualize the prophets Jeremiah now Amos in the great women Judith and Ruth and the Apostles John the Baptist's and and the great mortise and found his waters they're all in great procession and I want to be there I want to be in that line I don't care where I am I want to be in that line when we give it to the Father that's what counts just say to yourself when things are tough does this affect where I am whether I'm gonna be in the lineup or not you just want it just want it so bad that you can hold on to that when everything else isn't there to get in line you gotta have humility to though you must learn of me because I am meek and humble of heart and as the car courage will only be courage and not brashness and arbitrariness if we are basically people of humans humans meaning dirt soil willing to be lowered willing to submit willing to be corrected I remember a great day I have I like Archbishop danielle's now Cardinal danielle's of Belgium I was with him when he first came to speak at a charismatic conference Gannet notre-dame and I was asking him about how he became Archbishop and he said when I was teaching at the seminary and I got a call to go down and see the Apostolic Nuncio he said I figured I been doing some bad teaching and I was gonna be corrected so he said I decided to repent regardless and I made a clear commitment that whatever the nun CEO told me I was gonna repent and he walked and ready to repent and anuncio said we'd like you to be Archbishop how about that for the lowly being exalted the humble being raised up that's the way it goes in God's kingdom number five live in the light of the communion of saints you know it was recently a sociological report out that said such things as people when faced with ethical decisions if it's totally done in the dark and they don't think anyone could see them that they're more likely to choose the immoral and the unethical than the moral that that's that was from a sociological point of view you're never alone heyyou not only is God looking at you but all the saints your patron saint your name saint the devotional saint and here's the clincher your relatives who are already up there you're never alone you know they're up there cheering you on to come home frequently at funerals I say this seems to be an experience of breaking up the family when in fact it's just preparing for a full family reunion ahead I know in my own case I've had a special grace I believe of God of knowing that my mother I believe I've heard our ladies say that my mother was there with her in heaven and I want to tell you now when I pray to the Saints and I think I mom looking down - you'd be surprised how that makes things clearer in terms of what I'm doing and what I'm not doing I mean I really know what mom thinks live in the communion of saints don't live in there in the junk around you you're part of the great martyrs the great Saints they were cheering crowd urging you on interceding for you oh there's so many uh you know perpetuo and Felicity I thought I'd mentioned them there in the Canada the mass the first Canon the names come up they had two lovely women who who were sisters in the Lord and they were devoured by beasts and they prayed so hard for one another and embraced one another at the time of execution so that the the crowd and the Roman Coliseum there stood up and applauded them they after the beasts first attacked one of them and they dragged her body to the side afterwards who she hadn't died she said well when are we going to be subject when of the residents the beasts gonna come they've been so in prayer that they were able to withstand that and so their names are in the Roman canon forever you know his two Saints that hardly anybody knows it was just wonderful women of God and I think of people like Paul Miki the Japanese Franciscan who who urged as he was going to death that to be martyred by the Emperor in Japan that our death may be acceptable to the majesty in God in heaven where God willing we hope to go and they asked him for his final words and he preached the Christian message of salvation again to them and he says you know that I wouldn't lie at this point just as you're about to kill me the Christian Way is the only way home to God these great we have all these great men and women around us Maximilian Kolbe you know can I take his place Oh glory to God oh ok number 6 oh yeah number six understand your future as God sees it understand your future as God sees it you know we're worried about what's gonna happen in the future how does God see you God sees you in terms of what you to become he sees you in terms of your full potential he sees you in terms of your path to glory he sees you as moving to your glorified state he sees you as being transformed into the image of Jesus Christ our scripture says that you will move from glory to glory you see the junk the struggle the circumstances the battle god sees the glory coming step-by-step-by-step god's patient and if some of us need a little glory purification and purgatory that's okay it's on the process I think the greatest example I know of this is the story of Michelangelo that Michelangelo was always looking for the best marble he tended to use Carrara marble the finest marble in Italy and this one day he was he was presented with a two-ton piece of marble the person presenting it mitad that they had just taken it to Donatelli another great sculptor and he had rejected it because he saw all the flaws in that two-ton piece of marble Michelangelo had a habit of being able to see into the marble one day going along the streets in Rome he saw a piece of marble he says I see an angel in there marble he quickly went in and bought it and carved out the angel this day on this particular piece of marble he saw all the flaws he saw all the reasons why Donatelli would reject it but he saw something in the marble he bought it and out of that marble he carved the most famous statue in the history of the world the Statue of David which you can see in Florence now what enabled him to do it one the insight to see what was there beyond all the flaws and all the problems oh all the scars - he actually used what Donatella thought were the flaws as to become the assets he saw he built the muscles in his statue of Michael around the flaws so he used the what was supposed to be the flaws he had a perspective to see through now that's how God sees you God sees a saint in you he's already taken up his residence in you he's already moving in you from glory to glory if you're saying yes to the Holy Spirit the Holy Spirit's only after that I mean the Holy Spirit will respond to a lot of other things you ask but the real consistent thing the Holy Spirit's gonna do to you from moment to moment day to day week to week month to month year to year is to make you over into the image of Jesus Christ to move you from glory to glory that's what the Holy Spirit's about the Holy Spirit's not gonna give out you give up you gotta kick them out if you want to stop this process you understand understand the beauty that is in you that God sees and you can't see not amazing you can say why will we blind so blind Lord Oh scales of the eyes okay number seven the last one understand it is the Lord's battle not yours you have your role you have your place but you want the world everybody you want the country to do away with abortion you want pornography to be gone you want your parish church vibrant faithful Orthodox you want to all these kind of things and they're good ones but if you take on the whole battle guess what you give up and you move out someday and say it's too much but what you have to ask every day Lord what's my role what's my jurisdiction what do you want me to care for and then you grab on and care for that we're part of a mighty force we're only given one roll one position just like a soldier in the army he's got one thing that he's supposed to do oh babe I understand vocations you have both your family and your job and parish ministry but it comes down to one jurisdiction that you can put together and when you fail at something when it doesn't work out you know I always like the story of Thomas Edison after he had I believe 27 failures in a row to establish electricity they asked him well what are you doing he said why she isn't it wonderful he said 27 times I've learned how not to do it I'm some such I'm in so much better position to do it right the 28th time then I was 27 ago see the whole thing doesn't depend on your success but it depends on your faithfulness of hanging in use the failures for your benefit ah you know John Paul - isn't he great gift to us I just love the Pope you know but the the story I love most about the Pope is actually not so much well I don't know let's let's see how it works out here father enero kantola Meza who's gonna be one of the preachers in the fire rally in Rome exaple ran arrows of Franciscan Marinero was teaching medieval history and church studies in University Milan and he was down visiting Rome just after john paul ii was elected pope and he went into st. peter's square which is really a circle I don't know why they call this square but anyhow he went into st. Peter's at night and he was all alone there and he looked up at the window he's told this story but it's such a great story he looked up at the window and suddenly he felt the prophetic Spirit of God come over him Venera leads a little charismatic prayer group he's as four years up and Melania maybe big by now I don't know and anyhow he looked up at the window and he said qiraji o John Paul Karachi Oh John Paul and he just kept screaming it he said he felt a little bit like a madman in the middle of the thing but he just felt God's Spirit coming up qiraji Oh Don Paul he went back to my land a few days later and there was a letter in the mail appointing him the papal preacher and we asked him well what do you preach to the Pope corragio John Paul you know and John Paul in all his talks particularly to the youth that's his message courage here's one quote have courage to commit yourself to the truth have courage to believe the good news take courage in the face of life's difficulties and in Justices every talk you'll see he's telling cards he's taking that message he's taking that prophecy and if is there uh what a man of courage what about occurred I mean when he took her men who had shot him the square and he went to the prison and embraced him I cried did you cry there's the Pope going to embrace these assassin ah he's come back every time we can learn our courage from John Paul the second all acknowledges as John Paul does that the source of his courage is certainly God Paul writes it was God who gave us the courage to proclaim his good news to you in the face of great opposition remember what I said yesterday it's so much better to limp along the way than to stride Oh off the way and be out of the area Cardinal O'Connor in a recent letter to his priests has urged them again saying no disciple is better than the master if they persecuted me they will persecute you he says don't be surprised about opposition don't this is the way of Jesus he then tells them Peter's statement that when you're all they gonna drag you where you don't want to go you gotta understand that this is the way this is the glory of the cross and I want to tell you that finally it take your worst fear one of my favorite books is the Red Badge of Courage they used to make that mandatory in every school when I went through and it has to do with the Civil War and it has to do with this soldier that wanted to be a hero in the Civil War but was scared to death and the first couple of times he got him battling the enemy came he turned around and ran they all did and finally in the last chapter the last part of it he stays through one battle and then comes the key line in the book it says he found out that the great death was only the great death whatever is your fear it's only that and in terms of understanding it's the Lord's battle understanding your future as God sees you live the light in the communion of saints having an eternal perspective being and loving the church and being who you are you can do it God has blessed you with the courage of the Holy Spirit let's go on with the Lord to victory and final triumph in the kingdom where we can reign forever praise the Lord Jesus [Applause]

Channel: Franciscan University of Steubenville

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Keywords: Franciscan University, Steubenville, Ohio, Catholic, college, Franciscan University of Steubenville, Franciscan University of Steubenville (College / University), Fr. Michael Scanlan TOR, Fr. Mike, courage, seven sources of courage, Charismatic Leaders Conference, conference, Steubenville Conferences, charismatic

Id: d14eqaxo434

Length: 53min 41sec (3221 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 07 2017