Jason Evert - No Man is an Island - 2015 Steubenville Main Campus 3

what I want to look at today a little bit off-topic from this but is about the virtue of friendship and the Steubenville conferences have given us a passage of scripture to really break into and so I want to take some time read this passage of scripture with you now when you hear this I know what it's like to listen the gospel whatever and some it's so easy to get checked out I want you when you listen to the Word of God to pretend as if during Mass that the priests are about to call you up to explain that scripture passage would you be ready to explain it sometimes like I wake up in Mass I'm like dude where have I been the last 20 minutes I'm checked out so during these few verses try to hone in on what the Word of God is saying to you so let's begin in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit amen a reading from the book of Sirach a pleasant voice multiplies friends and softens enemies and gracious tongue multiplies courtesies let those were at peace with you be many but let your advisers be one in a thousand when you gain a friend gain him through testing and do not trust him instantly and hastily for there's a friend who is such at his own convenience but will not stand by you in your day of trouble and there is a friend who changes into an enemy and he will disclose a quarrel to your disgrace and there is a friend who is a table companion but will not stand by you in your day of trouble and prosperity he will make himself your equal and be bold with your servants but if you are brought low he will turn against you and he will hide himself in your presence keep yourself far from your enemies enemies and be on guard toward your friends a faithful friend is a sturdy shelter he that has found one has found a treasure there's nothing so precious as a faithful friend no scales can measure his excellence a faithful friend is an elixir of life those who fear the Lord will find him whoever fears the Lord directs his friendship aright for as he is so is his neighbor also and the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit amen when I read that they had given us this passage a smile came to my face because I actually used this Bible passage when I proposed to my wife my wife and I travel a lot we speak on chasity and so I decided I would propose to her during a high school assembly because I figured she can't really say no in front of 800 people so it's kind of a safe bet for me and so what I did is no one knew was going to happen except for 12 seniors sitting in the front row at the end of the talk I kind of gave him a wink and they got up and left I said today we're going to talk a little bit differently and they went behind the bleachers where I had stuff back there three dozen roses a dozen red for love white for purity and yellow for friendship and these seniors start coming forward processing with the Rose and they start giving them to my wife Kristalina and I explained to her that this friendship you know that the white roses represent our purity that's like a super glue this this the yellow roses represent our friendship I said you're my best friend and the Bible says he who has found a friend has found a treasure a sturdy shelter and I said this red represents our love and I want to love you for life and I just drop down on one knee and I opened up the ring the whole student body stands up they start screaming I'm like shut up so I can ask her and they got really quiet I see no Kristalina will you be my bride for life and then she said yes and then afterwards a guy came up to me from the school he's like so do you guys do this at every assembly oh my god that was it like that was the real thing and the fact is like we're made for relationship we're made for this intimate communion friendship but let's be honest how are relationships going in your life what's the most important relationship you should witness the love between your mother and your father how's it going at home for Lottie it's like well I wish I know but I haven't seen my dad since I was three years old one high school boy said me I know what you mean about divorce Jason my dad's on his ninth marriage 16 years old he's watches dad divorce eight women I'm from originally San Diego of Poquoson LA they have jewelry stores in LA where you can now rent wedding rings that's how bad it's gotten the most fundamental relationship and in society is just falling apart the greatest attacks on marriage are not from outside marriage they're from within the marriages themselves got to be healed so you've got that break down you've got this disconnect largely I think because of social media we think we have all these friends but do they really know us on ESPN about a month ago they had this special on this beautiful college athlete all star athlete incredible scholar absolutely beautiful girl and she committed suicide and they interviewed her friends and her friends like I just didn't see it we saw her on her Instagram and she looks so happy she had everything you could ever want but they didn't realize they were looking at their friend through the lens of an internet filter they didn't know what was really going on in their life and so today what I want to break open is a couple things one how will you know in your life if this is a true friendship or a false one I will secondly look at how can you be that good friend thirdly let's take a peek at how can you help your friends and then fourthly where can you find these decent friends and the reason we want to dig into this is because you'll become like them think what are the top five talks that have changed your life I don't know you're like well that one was good but okay what are the top five books that have changed your life movies that have changed your life led you closer to God you're like I don't know this one was good that was good okay try this well what are the top five people that have led you closest to God you're able to say one two three four five because that is the most effective means of evangelization is another human person your friends will become like you you'll become like them Saint Ignatius of Loyola who can tell me who his college roommate was st. Francis Xavier give yourself $20 good job now um now how sweet would that be to get a canonized saint for a college roommate but their iron was sharpening iron and so we want to focus on the stuff because you're going to become like your friends now there's a saint in the church named st. Francis DeSales and he's kind of the patron saint for kind of just spiritual direction for you and may that the lady and he wrote a chapter in his book introduction to devout life on friendship and listen to what he says about discerning friendships he's pretty Stern on this he says if we are to be judged for every useless word we say how much more severely we'll be be punished for all of these useless improper foolish and pernicious friendships he's telling us you got to discern your friendships you can't just take what you get and say oh you know that they're fun to hang out with we've got to discern this thing and so I've written down a little chart of four ways to know if you got a true or false friendship the first one is that they look at mutual perfection is a sign of true friendship listen to what the sail says love your neighbor dear reader with a great and charitable love but befriend only those whom you can be mutually supportive in virtue the higher the level of virtues that you put into these relationships the more perfect your friendship will be and so what this means is if you're not perfecting your friend growing closer to God it's not an authentic friendship you might have stuff in common but it's not the true meaning of friendship you got to be accountable to each other when I was in college here one day I was living off campus and I was think I was in the master's program I came down to the campus and as I walked out of our house my roommates watching TV I'm like I'm see you later man go to class I came back from class he's still watching TV I go up with room do a little homework came downstairs hey I'm gonna go hit the gym you want to come like I'm watching TV I'm like okay I go to the gym come back from the gym he's still watching TV he was Italian and he was watching like the World Cup so they watched it for like 97 hours in a row just what Italians do and at some point I'm like you know Dario I'm like you gotta get up man you got to go do something you're gonna be an idol and he didn't understand Idol he's like Idol cuz he's from Italy's like you mean like TV is my idol I'm like no what kind of but you know I'm just saying you're sitting around too much you got to get up and go and he thought about it and God convicted him that he felt like he was guilty of idolatry you know sit in front of TV so he goes to confession about this to a priest in downtown Steubenville who had a hearing problem okay and he said hey yo father you know forgive me if I saying you know I'm guilty of adultery huh please excuse me yeah you know adultery and he's trying to say idolatry but that sounds a lot like adultery and so the priest is like you did what he said yeah you know adultery and the priest like this is really serious and well dar is like well you know it's just kind of something to do you know it after school you know you're kind of sitting around and the briefs like no no this is a mortal sin it Derby's like a mortal sin well I mean my roommate told me to stop he walked in on me and he kind of told me the kind of dug the breeze like ah no no Dario's like chill out sometimes friends even come over ah yeah and they never resolve this discrepancy he got a massive penance for not taking adultery seriously enough you know but the moral of the story being we had this friendship there was accountability I was able to call him on we're able to help perfect each other in so many different ways the Saints have done this back in the early church I think it's about the fourth century there was an emperor by the name of licinia's now in the western part of the Roman Empire Christianity was gaining acceptance but in the eastern part of the Roman Empire it was not emperor licinia's was a hardcore pagan and he commanded his Roman legionaries soldiers to burn incense to the pagan god that he worshiped now 40 of his Roman legionary soldiers would not do this now keep in mind legionaries those are your top men those the Navy SEALs the Green Berets the Army Rangers those the top-notch guys the Emperor pleaded with them look just burn incense I don't care if you're Christian just burn incense otherwise we have to kill you it's it's law and the men said no we're not going to burn incense we're Christians - your pagan God and since it final I'll put you in prison I'll try to scare you into this the 40 Legionnaires just kind of stood side by said no we're not going to we're not going to buckle we're not going to give up our faith we're not going to apostatize and so they were handed over to the governor to be tortured and with the governor did his pagan governor took all 40 of those men to a frozen lake and was now modern-day Armenia kind of around turkey took him out to a frozen lake and gave him one last chance just burn incense or tonight you die none of the guys did side by side no not not given up on Christ so I said okay and there they were all stripped completely naked they were marched out to the middle of the ice on this frozen lake completely naked and he just said stand there until you're dead and the lake was guarded around the edges with the soldiers for their pagan soldiers under the emperor they lit fires they even lit they had warm baths of warm water by hot springs said hey at any moment you can come to the shore warm yourself by the fire to bathe in these warm baths just burn incense the pagan gods and those forty men huddled together and just they started praying together then they said Lord it was your destiny to bring us together in this life and I know it's your destiny to bring us into heaven Heather may our sacred number of 40 not be broken and you could imagine he's 40 soldiers huddled together naked prang imagine their breath the frost of their breath rising up in the winter air kind of like incense rising up to the throne of God as they're praying together one of the guys lost his mind he couldn't take it anymore the pain was so too severe suffering from hypothermia he just gave up he broke ranks and he ran to the shore and he said fine give me the incense and he jumped into this hot bath and the shock from going to hypothermia to such a hot temperature gave him he went into shock I had some kind of heart attack or something and he died instantly one of the pagan soldiers on the shore was so inspired by the courage of the 39 that he tore off his clothing declared himself a Christian on the spot he walked out that night and that night he died with the other 40 soldiers in the morning the Emperor wanted no memory of these men to pass on so he cut up their bodies he burned them and he sent their ashes down the river and nowadays this Emperor is long and forgotten and these 40 Saints the 40 40 martyrs of sebast II are honoured throughout the Eastern Catholic Church and so how did they stay this strong they didn't break rank they were there with their brothers and then so this is what we need is friendships where you're mutually perfecting each other now the opposite side of this is friendships that would basically tear you down st. Paul says this bad company corrupts good morals this was me in high school my friends in high school were terrible best friend and I Drive home for school he pulls his car into the parking lot of a pornographic adult bookstore like what are you doing he's like I want to go in the nudie book store I'm fine don't go with some nudie book store you filthy little pervert and he's like he's like well I'm going in there I'm like I'm not going in there I'm not some perv my porns at home you know I was there like 15 minutes 20 minutes I'm like what is he doing I look at my watch oops yeah I had a confirmation class if you had a church soon I'm sitting the parking lot of some filthy bookstore waiting for the best friend to get out Donna me Jason you have chosen a stupid girl you've done me a stupid choice of friends you might have a lot of good friends but Jason you don't even have friends that are good but then I found friends who were good campus ministry youth group life team is a lot easier to live a virtuous life because your head when you're hanging out with guys like dad you're like mad that guy's into such terrible stuff his girlfriend he's taking drugs and like dude I drink a little but I don't drink as much as him you think you're in pretty good shape it's like if you go to the gym and you go to some like you know some CrossFit you know inner city tuff gym and these guys just ripped and shredded you're like oh man I got I do a couple extra sets here I got to catch up now imagine go to a gym it like some nursing home and you West Palm Beach Florida and you walk in there there's like 80 year old people there walkers and you're like I am swole like I am ripped I am so buff compared to all of you it's like what do you compare yourself to and so it's the same thing with friendships and virtue if you're surrounding yourself with people are advancing in the virtuous life you're gonna make so much more progress it's like if you play a sport if you play pick-up basketball and you're playing a pickup game with guys were a lot better than you man you get perfect so much faster you get so much better it's kills your game when you're playing with people below you and so first thing authentic friendship there's a mutual perfection second thing in a true friendship is you're building each other up there's affirmation of each other in a bad or a false friendship I think in a guy's friendship what do we have a lot of negative humor we're kind of cutting into each other oh I'm just kidding but stab got pokum about cut the cut them down this way that way oh but I'm just kidding dude instead of insulting me and telling me you're kidding how come you can't compliment me and tell me that you're serious and so there's got to be this building up in fact a priest at our College right here we told the guys about of the mail session guy's name his father Gus he was awesome but in 80 90 years old he's got four and a half feet tall he was as holy as you could be and his homilies were super short they're about as long as he was you know and I remember I remember I was over Christ the King chapel and he came up and give a homily he walks up to the Ambo the pulpit you could see his eyes kind of staring out and all the student body and he only said this to us negative humor is from the pits of hell leave it there anyone back okay father Gus you got it there but you know man it's been like years and I've never forgot a single word of that man's homily negative humors from the pits of hell leave it there only speak what's good for praise and building and affirmation so guys I think struggle out with negative humor guys and girls struggle with gossip but keep this in mind whoever gossips to you will gossip about you always keep this in mind one Saint said that the holy person is known not so much by the kindness of his speech but more so by the kindness of his silence the kindness of what he chooses not to say it was marks a true Saint guys and girls struggle with gossip but I think what girls struggle with if guys is negative humor girls typically I think there's a lot of competing in comparisons going on and I think girls struggle with this in private more than anything where they're scrolling through their phone at night scrolling through their iPad and they're looking at other girls and in couples her hair is better than mine she looks prettier than me her dress looks nicer than me her boyfriends more handsome than my imaginary boyfriend like I don't have this out you know and you're like her you know my nose is not as good as her nose like you just start tearing ourselves down and so when you're in the real world and you come face-to-face with somebody you know there's this internal competition that sometimes going play go on like imagine two girls show up at a dance or a party and they are wearing the exact same dress did you guys just hear that did you men just hear that oh it's going down yeah it's like so cuz what happens you walk in you see hearing like I hate you you know I look better than you she looks better than me like it's just this going on what happens if two guys walk into a party or dance and they're wearing the exact same outfit throw oh we're twins York Oh chest bump oh yeah she's like what's going on here you know and I found it was really interesting is with this competing competition thing you ever notice when guys get in a fight like typically like a physical fight they usually become best friends afterwards have you ever noticed how this has happened amongst your friends you watch this in boxing before a boxing or an MMA fight they're staring each other down spitting each other say I hit you you know I I hate you kids I hate your family I hate your goldfish like I hate everything about I'll kill you and then after the fight that I bet I love you so much I love your family we got to have a barbecue together they're kissing each other so it's like the fight starts with spewing all this hatred and then it ends with hugs and kisses now with the women it typically works in the opposite fashion where things begin with the hugs and kisses and then it ends up pretty ugly and when my wife and I um you know when I was in college here I saw this take place I'm in the dorm we lived in a dorm over there and I was hanging out with some friends and one night my roommate Jason comes in to this other guy's room Rafael and Rafael was like totally stressed out he's immersed in his studies and Jason walks up and he's feeling pretty frisky you know and he walks up with his long like eat antenna like some old TV antenna it comes up on Raphael he just whack and he hits him on the head rah feels like and he just keeps writing and Jason's like oh he's not willing to play whack whack it Ralph is like cut it out man and Jason's like whack whack whack I'm serious man I'm trying to study back back back back back back at all boom he gets up boom bust his chair against the wall stares down Jason he starts yelling at each other these are physically fighting in the room now shooting was very peaceful place when guys are on a fistfight in the dorm everybody like looks out of the room and they see my roommate Jason fly across the hallway without touching the carpet at all into his own room across the hall he forgot that Raphael has a black belt in jujitsu and he he told me later that he learned that particular kick to the torso from Bruce Lee movie and sent Jason in his room now Jason realized I am outmatched here so he starts cussing at him he's throwing stuff out of the refrigerator Adam he's throwing mayonnaise Adam he threw the TV antenna Adam you know but I'll tell you by midnight that same night those guys were having pepperoni pizza together and they were just laughing it up and they were best friends for the rest of college now with the women this typically doesn't happen and this thing with girls transcends species I was writing a book with my wife on is how to find your soulmate book thing and what they found this guy is a Dutch primatologist he studies monkeys apes all that stuff and what he found is that when male chimpanzees and apes get into a violent skirmish he says within hours the two are reconciled they're embracing and grooming each other like picking ticks off each other like best friends again but he says now the females on the other hand tend to simmer for years after crossing one another after they fight the friendship is history the researcher described them as vindictive and irreconcilable and they might shove or slap the other monkey and refuse to come to their friends aid their animosity can be triggered by things like a rivalry over a particular relationship sound familiar or if a single treat is thrown into the habitat and one only one monkey gets out gets the treat now I mean thank goodness they don't know what don't know how to use Facebook or who knows what they would do to each other in there but what's going on here is we've got to rise above our faults whether it's a man with this negative humor vice that he's needs overcome or girl and when she's tempted to compare herself and criticize maybe I should affirm maybe I should praise and build up my sister in Christ to build up this healthy sisterhood so an authentic friendship there's this building up I found another trait authentic friendship you're honest with the person there's a verse from the passage onn Proverbs faithful are the wounds of a friend think about this if somebody sticks a knife in you do they care about you what if that person is a surgeon and you have a cancerous tumor does that person who stuck a knife and you care about you he absolutely does she absolutely does and it's because they care about you that they're open to inflicting this wound upon you and so what this means proverbs 27 is that if you really love somebody sometimes you're gonna need to speak the truth to them it's not always going to be pleasurable to them to hear in fact I read about a girl this boy was trying to hit on her and so he sends her a text message and he's like hey why don't you send me a picture of yourself and she knew what he wanted so she's like okay here we go took a selfie of her face and said I'm mad he gets it he's completely disappointed and he texts her back he said I didn't mean a picture of your face she said okay took a selfie of her foot and sent him that picture instead and so this would have obviously disappointed the young gentleman but she actually loved him enough to know that if I send you this sure I'm leading you away from God I'm drawing you away from virtue even though you're not a true friend to me at least I can be one to you by not giving in to your desires and so authentic friendship you're willing to speak listen what's the sale said here st. Francis DeSales it is the mark of a feeble and warped friendship to see a friend perishing without helping him or watch him suffer from him an abscess or like a boiler of sickness without attempting to Lancet with a reprimand that would save him true and vibrant friendship cannot subsist in sin and I think this is what's going on our culture we got a lot of false compassion hey if you want to live that way I'm just happy for you you just be yourself this is false compassion are we wanting to help them grow in perfection or we don't have the backbone to actually tell these people what is true fourth element that I found of an authentic friendship is just love you will the good of the other the opposite of it isn't just hate it's using the other person we do this in friendships imagine if someone calls you let's say it's Tuesday morning hey do you want to hang out on Saturday and let's say you kind of like this person but you want to keep your options open what do you say well um you know I don't know let me get back to you and why are you saying that you know you don't have any plans on Saturday we say that because what if something comes up that I'm going to enjoy more than I'm gonna enjoy this person so I'm gonna kind of put them on the back burner and kind of use them if I need them and nothing better comes along without even realizing it we're using each other I found I do this with God that I got a stupid bill conference coming up I got a pray extra I got to go to the adoration Chapel I got to get content for my talk I got to listen to God and when I'm in there God's like hey I want to talk to you I'm far more interested Jason in your conversion than in trying to use you to convert other people so we can fall into this utilitarian relationship with God and with each other and so if you want a good friendship how do you live this out which is point number two look at how you live this out and dating relationships imagine if you started all dating relationships with a virtuous friendship man think of the benefits I mean life will be so different because you know what's sad no one even tells us what to do like how to be a friend to a girl without jumping right into romance people say oh if you like her she's cute she likes you date and then what ends up happening like for one I'm speaking at Catholic University Washington DC 400 college students I said hey guys and girls tell me when was the last movie you saw that portrayed masculine friendship you know a guy can be a friend to a woman without implying something sexual tell me the last movie you saw that portrayed masculine friendship raise your hand do you know not a single college student out of 400 could think of a single movie that showed him that one guy raised his hand he's like I know Mike with that he said Finding Nemo okay Mike you got me there okay but I said it's a cartoon there fish that doesn't count but what we're told is just kind of jump right into it and I think because girls do this a lot a lot of girls end up getting burned cuz they're so ready to give their heart away and so what happens she meets a cute guy they started hanging out they start flirting they start texting and hanging out and hooking up and making out then three weeks into it dude she's like she's emotionally married to the guy she's like stalking him on Facebook she's like dude she's picking out her wedding shoes on Pinterest and she's only known the guy for three weeks and then like one month into it man it hits her it hits her hard ooh I didn't know he looks at porn I didn't know he drinks I didn't know he flirts other girls I didn't know he builds a methamphetamine lab in his closet with his friends on Wednesdays I didn't know that it's like sweetheart that's the point you got to take your time and find yourself then love will find you and if you begin with this kind of season of a friendship look at the advantages you women get from this if you kind of hold back and just be friends because you got to hold back a little bit if you want to kite to go up you don't run with it you pull back a little bit and that tension gives it the opportunity to rise to the peak it's the same thing with the human relationship hold back a little bit and then start asking yourself some questions who is this charming guy who really is he and you ask yourself this how does he treat his mother and his sisters because that is exactly how he will treat you when you are the woman that he lives with step back what do his ex-girlfriend's think about him can he actually maintain a friendship with a woman after a breakup or has it all been a bunch of emotional divorces step back and say okay how does he treat girls he's not attracted to it'll tell you a lot about a guy how does it who does he hang out with that'll tell you almost everything you need to know about a guy and you step back you start to gather some answers the boy can step back and ask himself why am I so drawn to this girl is it because she's just so cute she's so beautiful she's so attractive but am i attracted to anything else than her body am i attracted to her personality her spirituality her intelligence her virtue who she is as a human being who she is when she's 80 years old will I still be drawn to this woman and by focusing on the friendship you have the advantage to step back a little bit and so in relationships you get that benefit how do you live it out in day to day life I would say the step number one this thing everyone take out your phone right now we're just gonna do a little exercise don't turn it on don't turn on don't check emails take it out we're just gonna extra take out your phone okay if you don't have a phone pretend you have a phone okay yes thank you good shopper owns um so Terry from we're gonna do an exercise here ready okay try this ready okay take it put it down okay very good let's try that again pick it up okay now put it down very good okay now we're gonna try to do that in the real world okay you go to buy something in McDonald's there's some lady who's been busting her butt all day long to take care of her kids at home serving you some McMicken nugget whatever thing and you walk in you walked up their face and now you basically think okay I want to those one of those one of this okay thanks boom goodbye you're gone here she is Buster but okay yeah like you you think of me like this cash register I'm like basically some machine for you to use to get the thing that you want how about we put the stupid thing down we read the lady's name tag how are you today have a good day yeah I want you like a human being for 30 seconds because that's what you deserve that's what the greeter at Walmart deserves that's what your boyfriend deserves that's what your parents deserve I was on a date with my wife last Monday we're sitting this nice fancy restaurant oh honey check out the table behind me and she's like what I could just just listen to what's going on there was two parents and they had like a sixteen year old boy and a fifteen year old girl and they the kids kept taking the phones during dinner and there's sneaking out and they're looking under the table and I can't like that it's like oxygen like they can't unplug for more than 45 seconds my buddy Matt friend my parents are chewing out the kids over this my buddy Matt Fred flying an airplane Southwest Airlines and they'll you know that pilot or whatever announces now as we're leaving please turn off your cell phones and Matt is sitting next to a college girl and she pulls out her iPhone and she's like and Matt's watching she doesn't know how to turn it off she's never turned it off in her life and that's like a that top one you kind of got to hold that down and then okay think I did never done that before and so in the human relationships do you realize man believe me this is awesome you know I love it at all but sometimes I got to just put it in check cuz like it's sad I can't walk from one room in my house to the X without pointing out oh what's going on what's oh look at this look at that did I get an email together and it's like I'm disconnecting from my own family and what is happening to single people is don't even have known how to interact with each other guys don't even know how to ask a girl out anymore face to face he needs a stupid app to get the job done for him you know and so and so if you got tinder on your phone kill that app today okay because you think it's all fun and games what happens there is a um there's a professor right now she's teaching at Boston University and she's teaching a sociology course they are Boston bu and she said to her college students I will offer you extra credit to your grade this semester if you go out on a date with somebody but here's what you got to do you have to ask him out face to face you may not drink with them and you may not have sex with them that is a date if you even do it once I will give you extra credit and the the guys and everybody was intrigued by this like wow it's really old-fashioned and that's kind of cool retro you know and then one of the guys one of the guys raised his hand and he actually asked the professor he said well um if you ask a girl out he said what would you say he's like he said like the actual words like what would you say like the poor dude had no concept and so what's happening nowadays he said look to get drunk and hook up with a girl in some dark room who you just met and barely know just comes naturally for us but to ask somebody out face to face and broad daylight when you could be rejected he's like that that's really scary and that's what the phones are doing to us it's putting us in this little hole instead of learning to interact with our siblings with their parents with people we don't even know even with them our spouses and our girlfriends or whatever and so we've just got to learn to tame this thing and I'm not saying it's horrible but if you ever ask out somebody please do it face-to-face and if you ever break up with somebody please do it face-to-face unless it's some dangerous relationship okay you know it just I mean I mean doesn't that person deserve the courtesy of just you being able to explain face-to-face why this relationship just working it isn't working out you know and so these simple things that we can pick up so there you go dating friendship here's how else you can apply this in your house when I was in high school my life teen group took us on a retreat the priest who I grew up with said I want you all he said I want you to kind of close your eyes for man he said I want you to imagine and you don't need to close your eyes you can keep moping what I don't care but he said I want you to pretend right now like I'm the voice of your parents I'm like okay he's voice of mom dad okay here we go here and he said I'm sorry I like I'm really sorry I was not brought up with a lot of affection and I don't know sometimes how to express affection to you I'm sorry that I'm sometimes way too critical of you I'm sorry that I'm sometimes too absent physically absent emotionally absent checked out whatever look I'm sorry I'm still trying to figure out how to be a decent parent I'm afraid you're gonna reject me I'm afraid you don't love me I know sometimes you don't think I even love you could you give me another chance could you just forgive me I'm sorry and within a few minutes do you rise every one of us in our youth group we just lost it all of us bawling crying we all had issues in our families you know some are intact marriages somewhere but it's all mess at home and he said when the priest concludes meditation he said I don't want you guys going home feeling sorry about yourself if you got a messed-up family sometimes it's really sad it's really tragic he said maybe God put you in that family because that family actually needed you to bring an element of peace of that family if you have been lying and deceiving your parents go ask their forgiveness you know and if you have been a source of strife and your family go bring peace there and he said I want to challenge you go home and tell your family that you love them and I will have to retreat I'm like I've never done that nobody in my family says I love you we do love each other but we just never say it and so I went home I say okay I'm gonna go for this and it took me several days but I said okay I'm gonna start with the easiest person my little sister Kelly and so she was like I don't know she's like five years old the time you know and so I'm leaving for the gym one day or the baseball practice I'm like okay see you later Kelly love you and she's like what love me whoa and she just ran and she hugged my leg I'm like okay too much human affection okay that's enough you know and but she was like I heard it he said he loved me and then we just started saying it kind of regularly I said okay who's next who's next to check off okay mom I can do mom mom's okay and so I got mom off the board I said I love you is fine and I'm like okay was next Mike dad dad I love you I'm like am I gonna pull this off something I know I'm gonna do it right as he's walking out the door for the office so we can't lick her around in this awkward moment so I'm sitting there just eating my cereal getting ready for high school one morning and he's getting ready to kind of grab his keys gone they're on bye dad have a good day at work love you my dad's like huh huh he's like huh any girls like to do you to you to you to and he's just bolted out the door I could tell me I just made the guy's day and then and then who was last my big brother ha ha ha do I tell my babe I love you man you know I'm like yeah you know and it took months I mean it took months you know and it ended up working out of this you know church function thing and they you know he wasn't in the church hall and I still isn't please pray for him you know but I was able to tell my love him before I know he was in tears and I was in tears and now everybody in my family every time you hang up with the phone everybody says I love you and where to come from that blessed priest on that retreat who said you bring it into your fan you don't complain if you got some issues at home what are you doing to heal those issues and you can't fix everything but you can do your part and so friendship begins at home Jesus says love your neighbor you know what that's a piece of cake I don't even live my neighbor's over there I can shut the door see you later have a good day loving the people you live with man if you can love them you can love anybody on the face of the earth it's not like it's gonna get any more difficult than that and one way to love them is like say hey why don't we go to confession together as a family on Saturday if you can drag some of them go bug your dad hey Dad when was the last time you went to confession your dad like I was seven like okay dad you gotta go for me it's a great time to go because if you don't think you send a lot that month man you have five people standing next to you that will give you a litany of your imperfections for the last 30 days without missing one of them and so to try to perfect the family from bringing it in the inside so so first thing what's not finding friendship second thing how can you be that a friend if entik friend third thing I would say is like how do you help a friend maybe your friends into some bad stuff because you might think okay Jason you said real friends are rooted in God what does that mean like I got to go home and dump all my buddies like not answer their text messages hang up on their calls just leave everybody and delete them off my phone am I just supposed to abandon everybody you know remember what st. Francis DeSales said love your neighbor dear reader with a great love but befriend only those who be mutually supportive in virtue what this means you need to continue loving those people but you got to step back and think what are you really doing to help them the first thing you got to do I think is to set that authentic example to live it out you know my wife when she was in high school she had choosing real bad situation and one night she was at a party she's drinking and she's smoked and stuff and you know hooking up with guys driving home from the party and she's driving home and she passes near a Catholic Church and she's driving by on the way home she kind of feels this tug of God saying come to me tonight and she's like ah no huh you know I can't come I've been drinking I've been smoking I do it I don't belong in your church but he feels like this Doug like the Holy Spirit just drawing her to him and she kept fighting it no no but she kept hearing come just come as you are so she's like alright fine she pulls the car over into the parking lot of the church and she's arguing with herself in her car I can't go in I should go in honey and she's like fine I'm just going in I don't belong there but I'm going in and she walked into the Eucharistic Adoration chapel and she knelt down before the man monstrance she couldn't even look up and there's nobody in the chapel except for a little grandma sit in the corner praying the rosary and she's like I wonder if she can smell the marijuana on me like she probably don't even know marijuana smells like oh and she's sitting there and she's like all worried Nehring and she's kind of stops and she just puts her head up and she looks to the Eucharist she says Here I am God in my sin help me and then she said I gotta get out of here and she laughed but she said that night was such a turning point because she that was the first time actually realized God wanted me in my ugly he wanted me in the mess where I was I always thought I had become like this perfect little Saint then God is gonna love me and he said I realized that night in my drunken mess that God desired me exactly as I was but wanted so much more for me and so she said okay I gotta quit this out I got quit clubbing wearing these tiny little skirts drinking all hooking up with boys I'm insecure and don't have a dad like no I gotta get my junk together so next Friday night here come the girls down you know up to her house hey come on ska ring on the bell a little and she's like guys I'm I'm just gonna stay home tonight like what like your shirt why are you staying home come on he's gonna be there's gonna be no guys just kind of no IIIi think I've had enough and they all of her all of them to the one dropped her made fun of her and she listened them laughing at her as they were walking away from the house and she's I had never felt so alone in my life and all these people I thought my friends this was an authentic friendship it was just partying in common and so she wrestle with this like okay now how do I live this out and it took some time and some people think we'll look I want to take the stupid whole conference home and I'm gonna you know I'll still drinking everything get drunk but I'm not gonna drink and drive anymore and some people know I'm gonna I'm gonna get drunk you know I'm gonna go to the parties and drink but I won't get drunk and some people say no I'm gonna go to the party but I'll drink water and instead of beer you know and all this all these justifications and if I drink water I'll being an example to all of my friends I'm sure they're all going to become priests and nuns because you're having Avion instead of Budweiser you know it is going to happen the example that you need to set is much deeper than just showing up at a party and not doing the worst thing that other people are doing what they need for their conversion ultimately is your holiness is what they need so first is set the example second thing if you got a friend who's got some serious issues please don't treat them like a project please treat them like a person one of my buddies used to run the Steubenville conferences and I were talking he does ministry and gay and lesbian bars in downtown Chicago and I'm like so you evangelize and gay and lesbian bars he's like yeah like I'm like what's that like like how do you kind of bring up the Catechism you know in the you know in God and all the stuff these are all typically we don't I'm like what kind of how do you bring God in there like how did how you evangelize and he said in what is basically saying it's like look Jesus and you have one mouth but two ears you don't always have to be the mouth of Christ sometimes you can just be his ears so he said we go on the bars and we just listen and we just love and that's it we have no agenda whatsoever but to love and to listen and he said we form friendships with these people and we just get to know each other's friends he said you know what I have gay male prostitutes calling my cell phone at 3 o'clock in the morning crying to me on a Saturday night because they know that I'll listen to them this is evangelization I'm walking with these men I'm not treating them like some project that has to get solved because we are a lot more than our problems everyone in this room has vices what if your friends targeted that vice you you haven't patients let me think of ways I can fix your own patients and I could change your impatience and I mean you'll be like dude I don't want to want to hang out with you you're treating like a project not a person and so you think when the Columbine shootings happen in Colorado there's one man who's asked if you could tell those teenage murderers anything who shot their friends what would you tell them he said uh I wouldn't tell him anything I'd listen to them because that's the one thing apparently nobody bothered to do the wisdom of simply listening as a form of evangelization but ultimately needs to go beyond that praying for this person fasting for this person if you're just praying for somebody and you're not fasting it's like you're boxing with an arm tied behind your back Jesus said that some demons are only cast out by both prayer joined to fasting praying fast for your friends and if it's tough having a conversation with them give the resources say oh you don't agree the church on this hey just read this thing listen to this thing then so over the bookstore they've got tons of it and they handed me this bag just to show you some of the resources they've got all these CDs or different CDs my wife and I have done these things are also free to you know they're free to burn if you get one you can burn as many copies as you want I think they're only five bucks to begin with but different chastity talks on contraception pornography so if you know someone needs the porn one just kind of put it in his locker be like I'm not judging but you better listen to that one 305 yeah so different ones to help people break free this one you know my wife and I wrote how to find your soulmate without losing your soul it's a book just for girls anywhere from 15 to 35 years old they help to find the love that you want some people like where's the book for guys well guys don't read okay so here's the book for the man it's like 40 pages larger print there's pictures so that's for the guys but you know yeah give it up for literacy I'm by reading is good and so we've just got there's just a ton of stuff theology of the body newest one I wrote is st. John Paul the grade is five loves different biography of my hero John Paul but just tons of different books on the way out also these little postcards this has all of my wife and our social media our Pinterest Instagram all that stuff Facebook Twitter and then on the back free talks of ours that can just download and my wife's website is here women made new calm but she's a Jason I want to launch a website only for the girls who kind of just feel broken because she said Jason would you like to know a little secret about women she said Jason women women are masters at stuffing their stuff she said Jason stuff happens to girls you know Jason really serious stuff happens girls you know they do it they stuff their stuff they put their makeup on their hair looks great they got some new clothes but she said inside for so many of us it is just this absolute mess and we are so afraid to even start crying because they were afraid never gonna stop crying so we just numb ourselves with false consolations hooking up smoking some weed indeed is eating disorder cutting myself diet pills whatever it is to numb the wound that isn't being healed she said I want to show these girls you can face it you can own it and you can heal it launched the website women made new calm

Channel: Steubenville Youth Conferences

Views: 23,214

Rating: 4.9416909 out of 5

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

Id: 6Bt3znPiUG0

Length: 44min 25sec (2665 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 21 2015