Fr. Mike Schmitz | Real Prayer | 2021 Steubenville Main Campus Youth Conference

[Music] [Music] um i don't know if you know this but there is this this is divided up into two parts the first part is me takitaki the second part is you having cues and i having a's hopefully um so if you have any questions like the whole more than just the second half of this is an opportunity for you to ask questions and me to try to do my best to answer them but as you saw in the game show thing we did here not super good under pressure because i'm still a little bit salty about losing i really wanted to choose superheroes and katie said i wouldn't know anything about superheroes and she said well i know all those superheroes i'm like well it's fine it's fine i'm over it i'll be over tomorrow it'll be fine i'll be over when i get home i don't i'm not over it yet um so this is a this is um a workshop on um prayer okay i have to say this next thing too before we start one of the things that happens is uh so some of the other team were like so is it did get overwhelming like when people still want to say hi and everything like i said i'm like well hey normally that's not how i live like back home no one wants to talk to me so this is really nice i appreciate it on campus they're like on campus can you walk through campus without people being swarming you i'm like yes because i'm just a priest i'm like literally i'm just a priest um so that's one thing i don't live in the place where people want to talk to me i have to go to them and they're like do we have to talk i'm like yes please come talk with me that's number one number two is um how many of you have ever watched like accenture presents videos okay okay okay okay how many of you have ever watched them on your own without anyone else telling you have to oh baloney that's the thing that's like it's always it's always the humble part of like we watch you all the time in school and then it's like did you ever look it up on your own like if we have an assignment yeah maybe so i know the truth just use me and my and my youtube channel okay so this is i'm really grateful for all to be here because you know as as katie was talking all about praying the rosary and learning how to trust jesus not only just okay trust him more like go ahead but like trust him by entrusting ourselves to our lady and really praying prayer is one of those things we're going to talk about today and prayer is one of those things that it's a lot like um have eating well it's a lot like a lot like exercising every one of us knows we need to do it but when it comes down to it we just a lot of times don't end up doing it sometimes we think like well yeah if i really when i really want to knuckle down and when they want to have a good relationship with the lord then i'm going to start praying we have to realize that for those of us who want to follow the lord eating a salad versus eating a cheeseburger optional whatever do your best getting up at five and working out versus sleeping in until noon optional those are options when it comes to prayer it's not an option so question i have a question for y'all what's the first commandment like the ten commandments what's the first commandment i'm guessing you all just said i am the lord your god you shall know that god's before me right that's what you just said yeah that's the thing you got it you nailed it perfect 1000 um what is the great commandment jesus says he's asked what's the great he what's what's the greatest commandment a lot of catholic school people here yes you shall love the lord your god with all your heart mind soul and strength so the first commandment i'm the lord god lord alone no other gods before me the great commandment love the lord your god with all your heart mind soul and strength love the lord your god with everything you've got one of the things that happens is we look at that we can look at that maybe maybe not you but a lot of us can look at that we can think um yeah that's a good suggestion love god with everything yeah of course no problem next because we ex we we don't make that practical we don't make it like an objective thing we think that love is a subjective thing it's like it's just affective right or affection for the lord but this love has to be effective and what that means about that it has to be practical meaning has to be measurable meaning it has to be i don't know if you know this but love can be measured in many ways whether you and i love the lord with all our heart mind soul and strength that's not a it's not a matter of do you really feel it i mean no no do you really feel it okay now you love the lord the lord your god with everything i cannot love the lord my god with all my heart mind soul and strength if i don't actually spend time with him so on any given day if i haven't prayed i have not fulfilled the great commandment on any even day that i haven't prayed i have not i've broken the first commandment does that make sense i wanted to start out really negative i thought that would be a really good way to start it's like make everyone feel bad like well so i broke all the commandments yeah basically i don't get over it but but that's the truth the truth of the matter is and so so uh years ago there's a priest father larry richards i don't know if any any of you know who father larry richards is he's from uh pennsylvania i think yeah you go pennsylvania and um at one point he was at a superville conference and they had a thing for the youth ministers so the people who had brought all the youth to the conference and it was just like an hour just with youth ministers and he was going to give a whole talk an hour-long talk to all youth ministers but things were running behind it wasn't as the efficient well-oiled machine that did this right now and so running behind he only had five minutes and so he went and he said what am i going to tell these youth ministers if i only have five minutes with these youth ministers what's my message i'm going to give to them and uh he says okay i got it no keep in mind this is what fatherly he's he is a he's a tough like kind of an ironworker type guy like i would never say with this ever to anyone but father larry said this so don't get mad at me if you hear this and you don't like it don't come out of me this is i'm just saying what father larry said basically here's the father larry said he said if you are in youth ministry and you are not spending at least an hour a day in prayer then get the hell out of youth ministry no listen that's not what i said i didn't say that father larry said that so don't get mad at me about this but father larry said if you're not if you're in youth ministry if you're doing ministry for the lord and you're not spending an hour a day get the hell out of youth ministry or any kind of ministry now 60 minutes is there anything special about 60 minutes i mean it's a nice little show on sunday nights but no there's nothing special as sacred about 60 minutes but what we're trying to say is if i don't spend any time with the lord i have just revealed how much of my heart that he has there's a reason why in the old testament the lord god said okay out of all of the fruits of your field i want the first fruits out of your flock whatever first born you have of the cattle or of sheep or of goats or any of these things i want the firstborn i want the first fruits of your life because i don't know if you have sheep if you have goats or cows or crops but every one of us every morning wakes up and there are 24 hours that we've been given by the lord and what he asks for he says okay give me the first fruits of what you have you say i don't have a lot of money yes but you do have 24 hours every single day and so whether or not we love god is not subjective it's not a feeling it's objective it is completely based in you can measure it you can measure it did i give him any time or did i not give him any time if i didn't give him any time no here's the thing i ask my students all the time hey um do you do you pray and then oh yeah totally pray like often yeah every day wow that's awesome what do you do well usually like i don't know but um now i lead me down to sleep i pray the lord and soul to keep like okay so that's great i mean if that's what you got and that's where you're going to start because there are good night prayers that's wonderful but i'm i'm talking about pray pray because here's one of the pray pray pray here's one of the things that um i remember a friend of mine his name is mike gormley one of the things he said was he said as catholics we're not really taught how to pray not really taught how to pray he says we're taught how to repeat not really taught how to pray we're taught how to repeat now listen i have i have nothing there's nothing nothing against memorized prayers in fact memorized prayers are really really important memorized prayers are good for a number of reasons one is they help us start they help us start how to pray i don't know if you ever walked in the prayer like okay i don't know what do i do so when i was a kid i first encountered the lord jesus and he just changed my heart and and i started reading these stories of these saints and so what i would do is um i read the stories of saints who would go and they spend time in front of the blessed sacrament in front of jesus in the eucharist and so i would ride my bike over to the local church and i made a decision of okay i'm going to spend at least one hour a week in prayer in a whole holy hour adoration in front of jesus we didn't have like adoration adoration like where you can see him we had adoration behind the closed door so um see jesus not see jesus i had to not see jesus so i made a decision i'll spend at least one hour usually bike my bike over to the church on a saturday and i'd kneel down and now i had read all the about all these saints and these saints they would describe their prayer like this they would say you know saint so and so he would kneel down in front of the lord in the sacrament and hours would seem like mere minutes like time would just fly by and so i'm like that's what i'm expecting i don't know if you've ever expected something like this because i would kneel down and mere minutes would seem like hours it was the exact opposite experience because i was like i have no idea hey what i'm doing and b what i'm supposed to be doing i have no idea what to expect at all so i would just kneel down like okay jesus go i'm waiting to be raptured like when do i start levitating i want to let's let's get to that point here i didn't know what to do so memorized prayers are really good because they help us start sometimes you don't i mean honestly gosh i don't know if you've ever ever worked with a template versus having to create it on your own they have to write a paper and it's like you know where like you start writing a paper and pops up like hey you want help writing this paper okay here's have a body have an outline have a thing the wrote prayers the memorized prayers they give us some structure they help us start secondly thing second thing that the memorized prayers help us do memorize parents are like what what's an example of a memorized prayer that you've memorized the hail mary exactly or the our father right or the glory be to the father all those things those are all great now i lead me down to sleep one thing that's really funny is if someone's in confession and i say you can make an act of contrition and they say bless us o lord and these thy gifts which are close i mean you know sometimes memorized prayers are good because they help us start another thing that memorized prayers do is they they give us a clear picture of who god is i'm gonna i'm gonna sit on this for just a second okay so memorize spirits can be really good because they give us a clearer picture of who god is we're not approaching god as if like he has he's never revealed anything about himself in fact in the gospels there's a moment where jesus disciples go to jesus and they say master teach us how to pray like john taught his disciples and so jesus says something very very incredible remember that one time jesus said something wasn't incredible yeah i know right jesus says something as usual that's incredible he says okay here's the deal when you pray here's how i don't want you to pray when you pray do not babble like the pagans you ever heard that in the gospels jesus said when you pray don't babble like the pagans who repeat themselves now sometimes people say you catholics you repeat yourselves you catholics you repeat yourselves you catholics you repeat so because why because we do what katie had told us to do which is hail mary full of grace hail mary full of grace like you're doing exactly what jesus said not to do false a jesus repeated himself in prayer i don't know if you remember the garden of gethsemane when jesus goes into the garden he says father let this cup pastor me but not my will yours be done and then he goes and wakes up the disciples and goes back and says the exact same thing jesus repeated himself you can repeat yourself it's gonna be okay it doesn't mean don't repeat yourself jesus said when you pray do not babble like the pagans finish the sentence who believe that because of their many words they'll be heard this is the key difference when we have memorized prayers jesus is trying to reveal to god is trying to reveal to us the church is trying to reveal to us who god is he says when you pray do not babble like the pagans who think that because of their many words they'll be heard so the pagans they believed in what they believed so there's like greek roman gods if you're like a percy jackson you know all of them so listen okay percy jackson fans okay great so you know that the gods in those books um based off of the gods of the ancient greco-roman world camp half-blood camp jupiter the whole thing i have a niece who loves him so i've been reading all the books because i try to relate to the children so um we know that they're powerful we know that um they're immortal we know that they can be wise but you also know what they're not good they're they're not just they don't care they don't they don't even care about their kids apparently in these books they don't love you and so in the ancient world the pagans would pray in a certain way why because they know the gods aren't good the gods aren't just the gods don't even necessarily know you the gods definitely don't love you and every time you call out to one of those false gods you're risking taking your life into your hands because they could just as easily curse you as bless you so you have to approach the gods in a very particular way you must need something so badly that you're willing to risk being cursed in order to reach out to them which i think is interesting because that's a lot of the ways a lot of the reasons why catholics pray sometimes right again the ancient pagans that jesus was talking about they would only pray in order to do two things one is they were so desperate for something they're willing to risk everything to call upon the god or they prayed because they wanted to keep the god out of their life how many times is that how we go to prayer how many times is that how we go to mass i'm gonna ask because i'm so desperate for god for something from god like okay god please here i am i want this thing or because we go to mass on sunday okay god i'll give you this one hour on sunday now you can stay out of the rest of my life but jesus says when you pray don't do that you don't have to fight for the god's attention you don't have to risk everything to call upon the god basically he says when you pray this when you pray say this what's the next word jesus says but don't babble like the pagans we think because of the many words that we heard but when you pray say our father what's that word what's that how do you say that word in aramaic or in hebrew abba and when i you ever heard the word abba right what's abba mean yeah people like daddy daddy that's what it means yeah i was like when someone told me that when i was a kid they're like yeah you can call daddy go call goddaddy i'm like i am not calling god daddy like like a southern bell a little debutant like oh daddy in heaven like no i that's not how i'm going down that's not and so at one point there was a there's this nun she's in louisiana and she was um she calls god papa she said papa you know and i was like that's great i like papa you know but then i thought about it and i was like i'm not fivel you guys know american tale that cartoon where it rivals his little mouse he's like papa i'm like yeah i'm not gonna do that one either but then i remember being in israel i was in israel in the holy land and there was this little i don't know maybe it was five years old a little jewish boy and he had this you know starched white shirt on black pants and he had this in the keeper the yamaka on little curls on the side of his head he was chasing after this young man who was his dad and he just cried out abba abba and his dad turned around and he ran to him and he jumped in his arms and he carried him into jerusalem and i just like that's it when jesus said call god abba he's saying call god what you call your dad and i'm like what do i call my dad i call my dad dad and so that's what i've been doing ever since maybe five six years ago now in prayer jesus says say our father or abba i'm like okay i'm going to call goddad so i don't know if you guys try this i don't know if you've ever tried this before but when i started doing this it like flicked a switch in how i prayed it was just a simple thing i i've always known god as my father but to be able to hear jesus say that actually you know what god is your dad when you've been baptized you've been made into his daughter you've made it to his son and you get to call god dad so don't babble like the pagans who think because of their many words they'll be heard why because those gods aren't good they don't they're not just they don't care about you they don't love you he says but when you pray realize who you're talking to you're talking to your dad now so much so i've had some students who say father i can't i don't i don't want to call him daddy because my dad is not good but when i think of the father i think he is good though and so some people just based off your past she said i remember this she's such a good young woman she said i can't call god dad because my dad is has been cruel to me he's been cruel to my mom cruel to my siblings but when i think of the father and i say father in heaven i'm thinking of who my dad should be and who my real dad in heaven really is that makes sense so whatever that is because we know that that what jesus is trying to say is okay when you have these memorized prayers these memorize prayers reminding us of who god really is that he is your dad and you don't have to fight for his attention i want to say it like this he's always watching you but then people are like that's weird he's always watching like that's that kind of situation i remember when i was growing up i have a great dad and i remember being so annoyed by him because i'm not a great son he's a great dad i'm not a great son and i'd be sitting you know at the table like reading something or be watching even worse i'd be watching tv or watching a movie and i'd be sitting here watching the thing and my dad would be over here and he'd be watching me watch the thing this is creepy and annoying and i'd be like what an ebook center like nothing i just like watching you i'm like don't ever say that to anybody no he's like because he he liked he he loved just watching me enjoy something he loved watching me enjoy a tv he loved watching what made me laugh i had his attention now at the time i didn't i don't didn't want his attention that's a whole nother story but here's when it comes to your dad in heaven you have his attention you don't have to fight for his attention you don't have to prove that you're worthy of his attention and that's one of the reasons why the memorized prayers are so so helpful because they remind us oh wait a second not only do i have a place to start have a template right but also it reminds us like this is who god really is that he's your dad and he loves you already one of the another reason why i love memorized prayers are um i don't know if you've ever been in a situation where you just you don't have the words the situation where you're just kind of like i don't know i don't even know where not i don't not just i don't even know where to start but sometimes i don't even know what to say i'm this way whenever it comes to writing a letter to somebody like ah i get email no problem cause you d you know delete delete delete both a pen i'm like writing this i have no idea what to say it's gotta be profound gotta be deep and i don't have profound and deep words and that's where memorized prayers help us because sometimes we don't have the words in fact that's one of the reasons why i love praying the liturgy of the hours like praying the psalms and the canticles from scripture because you're praying scripture back to god you're praying you're praying the words of god back to god and it's one of the things there's 150 psalms in the book of psalms i guarantee you there is a psalm for everything you're going through there's a psalm for everything you might possibly want to say to god or everything that god might possibly want to say to you and sometimes it's incredible to be able to have god's word at your fingertips and on your tongue those memorized prayers can be so incredibly helpful but i want to talk today in just well for the next four minutes about a thing called mental prayer because memorized prayers are really really good they provide a framework they help us get started they remind us who god is they they succeed when our words fail but mental prayer is when we just like actually get to have a heart to heart with the lord now i'm gonna i'm gonna kind of map out here's a three-step kind of mental prayer you don't have to do it in three steps but just kind of three hinges or three kind of movements of the heart and it's really simple it's just god is not just our buddy god is god right so he is so far beyond but he's also a pal and so the acronym is pal i just made that up um i didn't make it up but i made up the thing about anyways p-a-l so your prayer could have three components to it there are many different ways to pray but here's one way p-a-l when you under prayer let part of your prayer be praised that's the p part of your prayer be praised the second is ask and the third is listen is it so simple it doesn't have to last for an hour it doesn't have to last for for that doesn't have to be okay if i gave god 10 minutes of praise i need 10 minutes of asking and 10 minutes of no just free flow hover it you you know you know how to have a conversation right yes thank you very much from the front row the person next is like no i have no idea you tell us father how do you have a conversation well first you say hey hey who are you i'm fine anyways um we all know that in the conversation you don't say okay this is the part where we greet each other and see how we're doing now we're moving on to the next part which is what's your plans for the day then we work more on the next part which is what do you want from me like that's not how conversation unless you are that robotic kind of person but these are free-flowing kind of things but if i have these hinges praise ask and listen i've at least got some idea of where to start and we start with praise in so many ways what's what's praise appraise can be really defined really really simply just one sentence um praises gratitude for who god is he's just saying that out loud gratitude for who god is now we praise god first because for many reasons one is because he's the he's the i don't know if you know this but he's the focal point of our prayer sometimes people go into prayer and they're like i don't really feel anything like so but no i don't like like i was at stupid conference and like one day in adoration i've like felt so much and that was great and then i went adoration in my church and i didn't feel anything like again so like who's prayer about right is prayer about you no you know what is love baby don't hurt me what does anyone know um what's what's the classical definition of love i am so proud i've ever been prouder in my life yes willing the good of the other choosing the good of who the other so is love about you love is about thee same thing when it comes to praise praise is not about us it's about him and this is the best thing that's one of the reasons why i love the beginning of mass at least tomorrow we'll do this on sundays we do this on big holy days first we have the the lord i'm sorry you know lord have mercy and then we go into the gloria i mean the borea i mean the gloria um so cause the gloria right so like one of the most boring prayers the entire mass is like okay glory to god in the highest i'm facing unless you have like a band that's like the glory to god because that's kind of fun but otherwise the gloria is kind of like the borea why because it's all about god but i want to think about me and how i'm feeling i praise you lord because i'm feeling this way no you guys the glory is awesome because it's like look god we praise you we glorify you we adore you we worship you we praise your great name it's so good because that gloria as much with our praise gets to be about someone other than ourselves this is one of the great freedoms of going to going to mass and worshiping a mass you get to spend an hour or over an hour if you're at my mass an hour and you'd only have to think about yourself once you get to spend an hour and you get to just let your mind belong to him and your time belonged to him so praise is gratitude for who god is and it's one it's a great way to start you know in the old testament um there's the uh how many how many sons did jacob have 12 sons one of his son's name was judah judah was the fourth son and yet when the people of israel the tribe of jacob tribes of the 12 tribes of jacob would go up into battle or go into the desert go into the promised land the scripture says let judah go up first the name judah means praise so this is a great way for all of us like in our prayers to be able to say okay what should i do first how about praise let praise go up first let judah go up first which is gratitude for who god is and this is so it's so good because it makes us kind of put some effort into prayer again when i go into prayer i just like i want to sit down gosh we'll talk about this in a second but like i used to think prayer be like a hot tub just gonna sit in like okay good yeah this is good it's good god go go god go as opposed to saying okay no the first thing i'm gonna do is i'm gonna praise god which means i have to think who is god so here's a question shout him out what is either a name or an attribute of god that you say this is this is a an attribute or a name of god that i'd praise yeah god you are love yep that's praise god you are love god you are mercy god you are life your truth god your peace you're the prince of peace god your wisdom itself god you're a reason the logos right the word the reason became flesh the logos became flesh and both among us you were just you died for us yes oh my gosh the son of man you're the prince of peace you're the great i am you are all these things you guys you guys are ready to praise like are you ready to praise because that's what praise looks like and praise looks like at this it's just saying god i'm being reminded of who you are and i'm going to remind you of who you are not that he's forgotten but i'm going to remind you of who you are and i'm going to give you thanks for who you are you are justice you are mercy you are peace in all these other names of god you're el shaddai you're the one who draws near to us you're emmanuel you're the one who dwells among us god you are here this is praise and it's why it's so good and when when we read our scriptures when we read the bible and you come across one of the attributes of god or one of the names of god it's so good to be able to have like another thing next to it this thing just keeps getting shorter and shorter um like a journal like this or even in your bible to write down oh this is one of the names of god this is one of the attributes of god i want to bring this into my prayer you're going to have an opportunity to do this tonight in adoration because again adoration who's it about it's about god we don't adore ourselves although sometimes people seem to adore themselves in adoration so we're not it's not like a mirror on the monster and that's me in there i see it hi no it is looking at the lord and saying god you so i don't tonight when it comes to adoration like who cares how you feel because it's just like i can give you praise tonight no matter what i feel and i can give gratitude for who you are and for what you've done so p stands for praise um and then a stands for ask and asking is where we basically petition petition god on behalf of ourselves or other people just ask means ask wow father no way um i think that uh it's one of those things we're asking can some of the people like oh no i don't want to ask because i don't want to you know make prayer about me i'd say right prayer doesn't have to be about you but here's something really interesting um here's a question what is one thing that we are doing every time we ask anyone for anything what's one thing we're doing anytime we ask anyone for anything i would say this one thing we're doing anytime we ask anyone for anything is we are revealing to them the desires of our heart anytime you ask someone for something i don't know if you've ever done this so so i have this this saying this phrase that i i base my life on used my uncle taunt once told it to me and i was like yes this is it he said to me young as young michael he said mike here's what you need to know sometimes it's better to ask beg forgiveness and ask permission so thanks uncle tim i will live my life by that and get in a lot of trouble so i'm not recommending this i'm trying to mature and learn grow from this but sometimes we don't want to ask sometimes sometimes you don't don't want to ask because i don't want to get an answer i don't want to hear no but sometimes i don't want to ask you because if i ask you then you know what i actually want if i ask you what i want ask you for what i want i'm making myself vulnerable to you which is one of the reasons why we need to have ask as part of our prayer because when we ask the lord we're revealing the deepest desires of our hearts even though the deepest of your heart might be really it's just it's shallow the two foot kiddie pool but like that's my heart that's as deep as it goes lord and that means being vulnerable every time we ask the lord for something we're making ourselves vulnerable and what that means is we need to trust him to not ask is not to trust to not ask is not to trust to not ask is to not reveal our heart to our dad does that make sense so um i know some people would say something like this well yeah but god knows everything father so like i don't need to ask because he knows it's fine we're good which yes he does god is what what's the fancy word for god knowing everything catholic schools go yes exactly or maybe just aft really just said omniscient he's omniscient he knows everything well done um he knows everything i don't need to tell him anything he knows everything i don't need to tell him anything so i remember hearing this this example this analogy uh from a priest from south dakota and he once said he said okay imagine here is uh in this case it's a young man and he has his dad and his uh dad's best friend is this young man's basketball coach so imagine they have an away game and the dad can't go but the last two minutes of the game this kid just lights it up you know just incredible defense incredible offense and just says incredible job and on the way home on the bus ride home the dad's best friend the coach calls the dad and says you have no idea this is what your son did and gives him a play-by-play of the last two minutes tells him everything and the kid you know he's sitting in the back of the bus and he can hear like his coach telling his dad on the phone all about what he did he comes home the kid comes and walks in the kitchen walks in the in the door and the dad says oh my gosh tell me about the game and the kid says you already know no big deal you don't need you don't need me to tell you i heard the coach tell you the whole thing you already know what happened now any dad every dad would say i already know the details i want you to tell me i already know all about this but i want i want to hear it from you why because when you share with me what happened it's a whole different level i know the details but i want your heart we when we tell the lord what's going on in our hearts we tell the lord what's going on in our lives when we tell the lord what we desire we're not telling him something he doesn't know but we're giving him access access to something he doesn't have we're making ourselves vulnerable to him we're trusting him so p stands for a stands for make sure that k is in there and l stands for listen exactly and because a lot of times we're like god never talks to me god never says anything god god is so silent because maybe because you're the chatterbox in prayer like right come say you kneel down i'm like okay praise praise please pray faith ask peace out like that's that's as fast as it goes god is always speaking he might just not be speaking how we want him to speak god is always speaking he might not just be speaking how we want him to speak i know this is true for myself and in so many parts of my life i'm like okay god go just go just tell me whatever it is you need to tell me and i i don't know i think so many times i can imagine god saying okay so um i like wrote a book a lot of what i want to say to you is in here i don't want to be redundant and repeat myself like that kind of a sense of being able to say god is always speaking to us his word is living and active this the bible is god constantly speaking to us not only that he's left us the catholic church he's given us the church and the church continues to speak to us all of the time not only that he's raised up saints i mean how many quotes do we have just in the last 20 hours of a gajillion saints and every time you come across one of those quotes from a saint you're like oh my gosh god you're speaking even more clearly to me not only that here's the question i want you to turn to someone sitting next to you and answer this question um what is one movie or tv show clarify what is one non-religious movie or tv show that always makes you think about god what's one non-religious movie or tv show the people weren't christian they're not making a christian movie you're not making a christian tv show what's one movie or tv show non-religious that always reminds you of god ready go with each other okay if anyone wanna how about this let's let's do like a raising hand kind of thing anyone want to go like what's an example yeah yeah so the example polar express about believing in santa but it talks a lot about faith and belief and whatnot can you translate that into belief about god yeah in the back white shirt cap i think black shirt grey's anatomy tell me more meredith awesome meredith gray saves lives so does jesus i'm just some set to summarize um yes blue was it narnia how it is that's a stretch that's a stretch you guys that's a stretch how does that one make you think about god but aslan could be maybe a figure for jesus yeah i i could see that i mean if you squint and cocky hair to the side a little bit but yeah yeah white shirt white sweatshirt up okay up is the movie why how does that make you think about god yeah kind of like a father and a son the old old man and what's his name george russell george is the dog maybe there's nice on the dog okay one more one more green shirt star wars okay tell me more the forces nice force he said with his the holy spirit and binds with everything is everything permeates everything you can move stuff with your mind yes great no here's the thing about this um i i love so shawshank redemption for me is like one of those ones that i'm i forrest gump for me can be a movie where i i watch it and i think about the lord jesus and just so here's the thing god speaks to us always through his word god speaks to us always through the church god speaks to us through the saints but god speaks to us even through things that like we never would anticipate like i wouldn't have chosen grey's anatomy i mean i'm not nothing against anyone i just never would have thought of that but if the lord speaks you realize okay that just drew my mind to the lord that just drew my mind to god god is constantly trying to knock on the door of our heart he's trying to get our attention all the time now obviously we can i saw this i'm trying to think of like a really scary movie that i could reference it yeah um it i really i watch it and just pray lexia davina like no maybe not there might be some things that are a little overboard but we'd recognize that god is constantly trying to make himself known when you pray do not babble like the pagans because you're just desperate to get their attention but here is god who is constantly constantly trying to get our attention he's constantly trying to just say even through tv shows even through movies even through songs even through knucklehead friends like this kind of thing like sometimes god is still knocking at the door of our heart trying to help us open our eyes and open our hearts to him he's constantly speaking to us which is why we not only praise we not only ask we take a time in that prayer and just listen and say speak lord your servant is listening pause okay we have seven minutes for questions and that means seven minutes for answers and that means um to anyone who has any questions there are two people with microphones and they will do something if you raise your hand they might come to you and they get to be they'll point out someone will point and they'll go there's martin he's going to someone right now okay so um so you were talking about praying to god and stuff using pal should we pray to mary and joseph and all the other saints in the same way phenomenal question good round of [Applause] applause there could be an element of that obviously so i'm saying ignatius he had a way of entering into prayer that was very it was kind of a combination of all these so what he would do is he would um in his imaginative prayer he would go to mary first and he would honor her again not worship different thing to worship and honor he'd honor her kind of like praise a little bit and then he would ask her mary please take me to your son jesus and so he would envision himself in his prayer of being brought by mary to jesus and he come before jesus and then he would worship and he'd praise jesus and and and um ask jesus jesus take me to your fa take me to the father and he envisioned mary and jesus taking him to the father and in front of the father he would praise the father and then ask the father um for is you know all the good things ask thing so yes there can be an element of bringing all these things together um keeping in mind obviously we love mary we adore mary we don't worship mary um so it'd just be slightly different but we all know that i think that's one of the things like if someone isn't catholic they have a hard time wrapping their minds around like how do you honor mary but not worshipper and you honor you worship god but you know it's like first catholics were like oh we get it kind of like in our bones already we just realized i'm not worshiping here i'm just honoring someone um but good question next person uh so earlier you said that prayer is for god and not yourself so how do i ensure i'm living this retreat for god's benefit and not my own awesome such great random applause such a good question now i'm really glad you asked that because we need to clarify this distinction because here's the thing we come before god and give him praise and give him glory and give him all these whatever give him our hearts but god loves you so much that he wants to give himself to you and that's the thing is like even when it comes to the mass what we're doing at the mass is some people say go to the mass because you get to receive jesus and that's awesome you get to receive jesus in his word we get to see jesus in the eucharist but at the heart of it the mass is meant to be an offering of the sacrifice of worship to the father but even in that when the whole point of the mass is the worship of the father he keeps giving us stuff like he keeps giving us himself he keeps giving us the word he keeps giving us a church and so god is so good that even when our hearts are oriented towards god i want to give you this he's like yeah yeah i want to give you two like you know like i want god i just want to love you he's like listen i've already been loving you and so i would never ever be afraid of receiving from the lord because because that's a way that so many people can ignore the gifts of god he wants to love you in fact i would say that more than anything god is just waiting for us to give him permission to love you and one of the ways we can honor him and worship him is by letting him love us and so i wouldn't like if you start feeling something i shouldn't be feeling anything because this is for you jesus like i might have made a little too hard of a point there so i'm really glad that she clarified um because this is a relationship i mean think about this um here's jack and jill jack and jill get get married because jack says jack's like i don't really get anything from you joe like i don't really i'm not really attracted to you i don't really like i'm not like in love with you but i just want to be a good guy i want to give you a lot if you were jill would you be like awesome that's fantastic if you were julie you'd say yeah but i love you back let me love you back and that's a lot of what god wants to see this is a real relationship where we get to love god and actually sorry he loves us and we get to love him back so hopefully that clarified a little bit um if if you find yourself tonight or any time of prayer having emotions awesome that's a gift from the lord tears a gift from the lord laughter gift from the lord boredom a gift from the lord not feeling anything that's some of the best time to pray because you get so here's a little quick story a quick story um it was christmas eve the year i got ordained at deacon and so i got to go back to my home parish and i got to preach at the christmas eve and christmas day masses so christmas eve i get to preach and my whole family's there all these people i knew from high school and my whatever and it was i was like afterwards they were like hey you did a really good job you're really in your vocation and this is exactly what jesus has called you to do i'm like yeah awesome i love jesus and so that night we go back to my parents place and and we had some hors d'oeuvres and we were opening presents and at one point i needed to leave the room um and went to the other another room and there's that photo album sitting there and i opened the photo i'll open up the photo album and there on the pages were these pictures of the exact same scene that i had just left from years before and in those pictures was this woman who i just i thought i was gonna marry her name was mel melissa i remember seeing these pictures of her and just being like hit like just struck and i not to be melodramatic like literally fell to the ground it fell to my knees not like holding my knees that's hilarious just pictured it i fell to my knees and i was just praying and i was like oh my gosh i started crying i'm like oh god this hurts wow because i knew if only one thing was different i would walk out into the other room and she'd be sitting there maybe even with our children and so like you know i stopped crying made myself resent a bull and i went back out and you know finished the night and and my my sister walk you know she goes up to her room with her husband and my brother goes to his room with his wife and and i go to the room with my sweaters and and i knelt down and prayed and it was one of those situations where i was like okay god ow what is going on like this a couple hours ago i was like yes this is awesome and i love you jesus and i'm so grateful for this calling you calling me to this and right now i just this just really hurts and it was one of the top five moments of grace in my life because in that i just heard him invite me to take this step step and what i heard and sends to him inviting me to do is he's like it was really great of you to say you love me when you felt so good it was great of you to choose me when you felt so close but now you have the opportunity to love me when it hurts now you have the opportunity to choose me when it doesn't feel good and yes that was real earlier tonight but this is also more powerful i remember just thinking god thank you so much thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to love you when i don't feel like it and to choose you when it hurts so we get to choose god when we're feeling awesome we also get to choose god when we're not feeling awesome one more question how about one more question um someone okay great um what do you recommend for someone who like wants to start prank more consistently like daily like what's the best method whether it's a book or a prayer or whatever round of applause phenomenal question okay a couple things keep in mind that's such a great question because how do you even start um so i'm doing this i don't know i started this podcast at the beginning of the year uh it's like i read the bible i don't know if you've heard of it anyways no so here's the thing here's what happened is that the student school year ended and i was like here's what i'm gonna do i'm gonna like do five a day like you know students are off campus i'm just gonna crank out and do the rest of the year right now like in one week and that has not happened what happened was i was like i'm gonna do five a day and then what happens i did none i don't know i don't know if any of you have been like runners or training you're like okay i'm gonna run 15 miles every day and then you don't run at all because it's just the goal you have is just two it's too much so that's what happened for two weeks i was like i can do like maybe one every three days because because my goal i bid off more than i was able to handle but then i realized okay if i just do this i take these steps that'll be that's 100 doable 100 possible so i two things make it something that costs you what i mean by that is make it something you have to choose to do not just not let me know how to sleep like that or people say father i have always fall asleep praying what do you do well get in my bed start praying the rosary and i'm asleep before like okay i think i'm onto something here um so make sure it's something that cost you what i mean by that not over the top not 50 miles a day but something you have to intentionally choose to do first fruits but secondly make it something that you can and will actually do not on your best day but on your average day not on your best day but on your average day so to that end um here's three options number one the rosary it's really simple it's already pre-packaged it is contained you can pray the rosary fast and thoughtlessly you can pray the rosalie rosary um uh meditatively and deeply you can pray the rosary quickly and meditatively you can pray the rosary in so many different ways so that's one option number two an option is the gospels or even just the daily mass readings because they are also pre-packaged they're already selected for you you don't have to like figure out what am i going to pray today it's like okay flip open the book that's the prayer of the day they'll be so so good so good but a third way is the way that like i had to grow into it and it was praying what they call the liturgy of the hours so literally the hours there's every priest deacon every religious sister religious brother a lot of lay people made a promise to pray these on a regular basis on every day so there's five different quote unquote hours of the day in each one of those hours there's roughly three psalms a couple different readings or reading and then some prayers it's relatively simple if you rush you can get it done in five minutes if you take your time you can get it done in ten but one of the reasons i love the liturgy of the hours is because because of the fact that it's five times a day you can say oh i miss morning prayer but i can do evening prayer because the hardest time to pray is the last thing the hardest time to pray is the day after the day you don't pray whatever it is you decide to do the hardest day to pray is the day after the day you don't pray or it's the day after the day you fall into sin some of the hardest times to pray is the day or the time after you've either neglected to pray or you've fallen into sin people say like well i've already screwed up why god doesn't want to hear from me now that's one of the reasons i even wrote this in my notes i'm so glad you asked this because that's one of the great things about having literally the hours or evening prayer or night prayer which is even shorter in the moment where you're most discouraged that is the moment where either christ wins or the enemy wins i'm so discouraged i fell into sin and it's time to go to bed now i could pray oh forget it or it could be i fell into sin it's time to go to bed you know what before i go to bed i'm just going to pray this this one psalm i'm just going to pray night prayer i'm going to let jesus claim me again before i go to bed remember remember that you don't have to fight for god's attention you have to fight for your dad's attention he's the one fighting for our attention every time we pray it's a response to god's invitation so if at any given moment you think like well i i want to pray but like no i'm too fond too far into sin i want to pray but i've made a wreck of my life today or i want to pray but i just did something awful even the little spark that says i want to pray that was god saying no no no listen you're mine your prayer would be a response to his invitation last thing the real last thing those of you who know who jesus is you know that jesus founded a church that you belong in you know that jesus gave us the sacrament sacrament of reconciliation to heal you to heal us to forgive us no matter what we've done if you know that that jesus really is who he says he is that he'd really establish a church and that he really really wants to give us his mercy when we need it the most the only way satan will ever win the only way he'll ever win in your life is if he can get you to the point where you're so discouraged that you don't ask for help the only way he can ever win is you get so discouraged you say no i'm not going to pray if it gets you so discouraged you say now i'm not going to go to confession if he can get you so discouraged that you say that's it i'm disqualified but jesus has won the victory and it's never too late

Channel: Steubenville Youth Conferences

Views: 108,418

Keywords: Catholic, Charismatic, Youth Conference, Youth, Conference, Evangelization, Steubenville Conferences, Steubenville

Id: 6BnwC5JRu3s

Length: 51min 46sec (3106 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 18 2021