The Journey Home: Fr. Donald Calloway

[Music] good evening and welcome to the journey home my name is Marcus Grodi your host for this program we're having a returning guest on tonight's program in some ways the reason I've asked father Donald Colin Calloway to come back is because he mentioned the last time he was on the journey on program he only just scratched the surface of his journey so it's great to have father Calloway back he also came out recently with a book on his journey no turning back which gives a little more detail of his story so maybe we'll talk a little bit about that later he's a former Episcopalian though it when you hear a story again you realize that that doesn't quite describe it either because he's got a lot more aspect to his journey later in the program we'll take some emails are the emails Marcus knows obscurely journey home at ewtn.com so let's invite you back father it's good to have you back thanks Marcus I appreciate it great to be back so much has happened since the last time I was on the program yeah and I know that what's a bit about five years or so five years I think and you had said that you had had which is always neat to hear the emails you get after being on the show but in a way the way that I'm describing tonight's episode with you back on the program is kind of the rest of the story right yeah because not only do I want you to fill in some of the gaps that you didn't mention last time which you you bring out in your book but also maybe a sense of what I found is that often after people have been in the church longer your new convert the last time a fairly recent night has been done longer have you come to appreciate certain aspects of the church that you didn't when you first came in but let me get out of the way sure and ask you let's start back with your journey again there may be somebody watching right now that didn't hear you at all last time yeah so once you give a gist of it yeah the nutshell version I can do this for hours I got travel across the world doing this all the time now and the nutshell of it is that I wasn't raised in any Christian faith whatsoever my parents were not Christian they didn't really even believe in God and had they been and rejected it had never been they never were my mother and my father now I was in my was in three different marriages so my third father my stepfather he was an Episcopalian but only nominally he didn't really practice so when he adopted me when I was nine years old I actually was baptized when I was ten into the Episcopalian Church in southern Virginia but once again it didn't really have an impact on the family they didn't even take any photos of the baptism it didn't really mean anything for them we never went to church after that and he was a military officer so we moved constantly if you know the military life is crazy every two to three years you're moving a bumping around somewhere so we were in southern Virginia then we were in Los Angeles San Diego and then we went to Japan and my life just became chaos I really as a young boy a teenager I really bit onto the culture and and all of its sensual gratifying things and really went down a bad path ended up running away in Japan causing an international scene grew my hair down to my waist had long hair when I was a teenager I think I saw a picture of that on your website yeah it's on their target right that's right that's right that's me my mom wishes that picture wasn't in existence but it is and I actually got deported from the country of Japan because of the criminal activity that I was doing there came back to the States went to a rehabilitation center that didn't help me out I actually ended up dropping out of school followed the Grateful Dead the old hippie band around for a while on a Volkswagen bus doing all kind of crazy immoral things ended up in another rehabilitation center and then ended up in jail in Louisiana just a horrible life but during that all that time that I was really am a product of the times which we live this culture of death and sensuality my mother my stepfather and my half-brother they all had a conversion to Catholicism and I joke around with my mother I tell her mom I drove you so nuts that you needed God and so you became Catholic you know she laughs at that but um they became Katherine they became very devout Catholics and interestingly enough the reason the way that they became Catholics was because my mother had a Filipino woman who was a very devout Catholic and you know I was joking around if there's one thing in life you don't mess with is a devout Filipino Catholic because they're God's little agents all over the world right now and she got my mom to go talk to a Catholic priest my mom loved what the priest had to say she brought her husband my stepfather they became Catholic and radically changed I mean it was a very apparent to me that my parents were different but I couldn't stand that because I was so selfish that I couldn't stand to be around that and I continued my crazy life until I was going on 20 years old rock bottom beyond I had lots of rock-bottom experiences and God came into my life in a powerful way in 1992 in March of 1992 sitting in my parents house I picked up a book on my parents bookshelf about these things called Marian apparitions had no idea what that was what what is a Marian apparition no idea and the book just radically changed my life and set me on a course of realizing that Jesus Christ is for real that there is a God and there's only one and he's Jesus Christ and that he loves me and that he died for me and then even at the crazy life that I lived and I lived a crazy life it's all in the book that he was willing to forgive me and to show me compassion and tenderness and forgiveness and that rocked my world it really changed everything for me and I ended up my journey to Catholicism which you know took some time and then obviously that journey led to something further yeah discerning the priesthood before we go there though I want to we didn't mention the title no turning back a witness to Mercy Donald H Calloway Marian Knights Marian's very immaculate conception I'm sorry Mary that works the conception I want to mention that because I'm sure someone watching was interested in but I don't want to talk about the book because you're going to do a bookmark with Doug Keck don't want to make sure the audience turns to that and here's some more details of your book before we talk about your call to priesthood I want to back up a little bit because it still amazes me that my guess is that a large number of Catholics and even a non-catholic Christians don't realize that there are still a fair number of people in America that have never had any faith oh yeah I have never had the gospel preached to them yet we've still got the great mandate to do yet but it also amazed me about your upbringing if you can think back put yourself in those shoes again [Music] how did you determine what was right or wrong back then right yeah I mean what were you thinking about I mean obviously when you got to Japan but it was there a sense of conscience a sense of guilt at all there was initially obviously I mean it's you know there's some anthropological foundation there that on some level you know what's right and what's wrong but as I went through and the world got a stronger chokehold on me that really deteriorated through my teenage years and so it became because all that I learned in my school system was that I was a monkey I come from monkeys I'm nothing but a monkey and so I know going anywhere yeah right this is cosmic goo that came out of existence through some chance fortuitous event there's no God who created it so it never crossed your mind that you one day would have to stand before anybody econo for anything you did in this life oh absolutely not that never could no no no way no how and so I only began to pursue those things that were sensually satisfying if it felt good you did it and that's how my friends acted and that's how actually the vast majority of people that I knew in my life acted tragically that's how the vast majority of adults that I knew in my life acted if they didn't like this particular marriage it didn't feel good anymore the wife wasn't as beautiful as she was when you were 18 and married her well then you get a new one that's the world that I grew up in and so standing and having some accountability at the end of my life before some deity oh no that didn't exist I lived like a monkey I pursued what felt good in the early church fathers and encouraged the audience to do this if you can that if you read first Clement mmm which would be one of the earliest documents at the same time as the New Testament right yeah the reason I mentioned that is if you look in that document every time there's any reference of what a parents should do for their children every time it says bring them up in the fear of the Lord right yeah the fear of God and you're one that was brought up all your life without any fear of God at all none whatsoever yeah which I do believe my point is that we do have a lot of people living around us in America in the world they do not have a good sense of the fear of God right or even what it means and maybe there's even a few Catholics around that don't oh yeah oh God oh it's quite a few I think I mean the first 10 years of my life I wasn't Christian at all when my mother remarried my stepfather was Episcopalian so I was baptized but that didn't put the fear of God in me because we never went to church after that it wasn't something that we practiced Jesus was as real to me as a 10 year old baptized Christian you know as Jesus was as real to me as the Easter Bunny or the tooth fairy he was a mythological character that people made up to get a day off of work on December 25th that was it there was no reality to it for me at all yeah and of course we live in a culture where a large part of psychology wants to say that fear is a bad thing anyway so I mean there's right no sense of standing before our Creator accountable for how we've lived our life right so in the midst of that you get zapped with a call to the priesthood oh yeah that was something I didn't see coming at all I don't think anybody did and guess what it was again you know I joke around with my mother it took her one Filipino Catholic lady to get her to come to the church it was five Filipino women for me it took it you know a special little unit and I ended up talking to these women and they could they saw me in church every day and I wasn't even Catholic yet I was just going to Mass every day and watching what was happening because I was so in awe of what I was seeing and they assumed that I was Catholic as I was there every day and they came up to me one of them are particularly she said you would make a very good priest you should think about becoming a priest and that's when I had to tell her it lady I'm not even Catholic you know I don't even know my background my litany of pasty indiscretions they wouldn't let me anywhere near a seminary but after I became Catholic and just kept praying Lord what do you want me to do with the life that you've given to me you given me my manhood back for one because I really messed it up what are you asking of me or do you want me to get married to have a beautiful wife have kids up be wonderful you know I'm a man very much drawn to that but I felt in my heart that he was saying I want you to be to go out into the world because you really came from it and I've drawn you out of it with so much mercy and to go back now with this message to you know the young people in particular to let them know that I'm for real because they don't know it just like you don't you didn't know it but now you do and I want to send you back to them and I want you to do that as a priest and I felt that call my heart responded to it prayed prayed prayed and was accepted to my religious community the Marian's of the Immaculate Conception study for ten years which was a long time for me to study I that community why were you drawn to there yeah that's a good question because of there's so many different Buddhist communities um well I had come to know Jesus Christ through the Virgin Mary you know I had a relationship with her as my spiritual mother and I figured you know if anybody really knows Jesus gosh you saw it would be his mom you know so Mary I really need you in my life in a special way to guide me through this so I don't mess it up and so I ended up wanting to be in a community that had Mary's name in it on some level so Marian's of the Immaculate Conception and they were I found out the promoters of the Divine Mercy message given to Saint Faustina you know polish nun in the 1930s which was a message of mercy and forgiveness for wounded weak souls I was the poster child for this you know God had mercy fired me and just blessed me with so many graces of His mercy so I wanted to be an apostle of mercy and this was the community that spread that devotion so it was a perfect fit I've I've heard some who are not that impressed with the whole mercy thing I mean Jesus saved us they say yeah but what your thought is sometimes I think that if we don't appreciate the mercy thing then maybe it's that we don't appreciate what's really been done for us yeah and I don't think we would really appreciate that he's our Father that's the whole point is that Jesus came to reveal the merciful face of the Father he is the father of mercies and you know in Hebrews he's our high priest you know Oh who is like us in all things with sin and you know underwent such excruciating agony and saving us and meriting those graces of our redemption which is mercy upon mercy upon mercy for us because God is our Father and He loves us he knows we're weakened wounded you know and and that's why I want to be a part of this movement as letting people know about His mercy that his fatherhood because who doesn't need it yeah I was going to say that to me that's the issue is that that we really haven't faced up to our sinfulness enough yet to realize and it's easy to recite the rubrics the ritual of the mass every Sunday and almost without thinking yeah lord I am not worthy to receive you but only say the word and I shall be healed you can say that without even right we think our football game this after that's right yeah right and I'm thinking that's kind of it if we don't appreciate the mercy thing it's because we aren't really listening Yeah right to how much we needed that mercy of God yeah and we're called to to be vessels of that mercy you know st. Paul says to go out and to be vessels instruments and letting the Lord work through us to bring others into that mystery of affiliation which is basically to come to the Father of mercies and to know that we need that and to be transmitters of that saving message that's at the core of the gospel the message of a father who's merciful you had mentioned to me and as you were thinking about this book that may be the first time you're on the show you hadn't mentioned as as significantly as your mother was in your journey and you brought it up more you might talk more about that because not only was it her conversion first but she saw you in your journey yeah it was her big change in her as you watch you go through this oh you bet yeah and part of the reason that I put such prominence in the book about my mother is because as I've gone out speaking everybody's like okay that's that's great that you converted but your mom's the real Saint in all of this you know you're you put your mom through a living nightmare right but she when she fell in love with God with our Lord Jesus Christ her life radically changed and she began to pray you know for the conversion of her son myself and when I had my conversion now my mother and I are like the best of friends I mean I love her so much we sit down we pray together you know we've traveled together now she doesn't like to speak publicly she's a little timid you know but when she gets up there and speaks the audience is captivated because you know so many mothers in our times are suffering for their children who have left the faith become lukewarm or live in immoral lives and they need a message of hope and a message of you know persevere keep at it you know God's going to listen to those tears of a mother just like God did with Saint Monica you know the mother of san agustin who was a bad boy in his day you know he was a little he raised Cain for his mother you know he put her through a nightmare experience but through those tears and prayers years of perseverance you know he had a huge conversion himself that clarify the timeline here your mother converts and your father right that's right a very very powerful conversion that's right the timeline where were you at in your spiritual journey when that happened to them well I wasn't in a spiritual journey at all I mean I I was completely I was a Deadhead I was following the Grateful Dead during that whole period so and this is a reason I mention this is I know that there are I know from emails Mother Angelica used to always receive emails from Catholics whose children had left the church and they had given up hope yeah so at that point when your mother and your father had this amazing conversion to Jesus Christ in his church they would had very little hope this is going to happen to you oh you betcha yeah my life actually got worse it was when my mom became Catholic that I got thrown in jail went to my second rehab and literally became homeless living at a Volkswagen bus and when that broke down I was on the streets it got worse when my mother became Catholic it didn't look like there was much hope at all but sometimes that's the mystery of how things you know operate if you want to make a field fruitful you put manure on it that's the mystery of how God works in his vineyard in his field and it's only the soul that really prays and persevere that you can penetrate through the winter for the springtime my mom did I was thinking about there's a verse in the beginning of second Corinthians that says that we are comforted that we might comfort and I've often looked in that verse as a reference to answer why it is that God would if his intent and the long big purpose was that you would be a priest why instead of a pristine childhood did he allow you to go as far away as possible right right it is a mystery it really is and I think that's part of God's providential plan it certainly he didn't take delight in the fact that I really did some bad things and hurt hurt people my family especially but I think in his plan he allowed it to happen so that in his time a greater good could come from that manure on the field so to speak because now with all of the technological things we have in the world I've actually found friends from my past and I've been able to spread the gospel to them but I mean this is the the mystery of God's plan being worked out here is that it's beyond our understanding what he's doing but yet so glorious I mentioned in the beginning the program that often the other thing I want you to talk about is okay you've been in Catholic Nahal Oh 1992 I converted okay so we're talking 18 years yeah all right well the last time that we were on the program you had just been a priest for two years looking back you talk about your conversion in the church what are some things both as a lay Catholic and then as a priest have you've come to discover and learn beauties of the church that maybe you didn't appreciate when you first came in that you've come to realize our great treasures now after you've seen the church face to face right oh gosh there's so many I could I could go into I think the one thing that probably ends up for me the most is because I'm still a sinner in need of conversion ongoing conversion you know the initial experience of God coming in and romancing my soul was it was a honeymoon it was sugar sweet it was wonderful but then you know the honeymoon goes away and you have to live the marriage you know and it sometimes it's tough and that's where I find now an appreciation for the sacrament of reconciliation for confession because it wasn't a one-shot deal God knows that I am going to stumble I'm going to make mistakes and because he's my father there's going to be an ocean of mercy you know he doesn't take delight in the fact that I mess up you know and and and do some stupid things but because he's my father he's willing to take me back every time when I have a humble heart and say father I did it again and I'm sorry and I need you you know that's the wonder of confession I love it I love it I love it and I love it till the day I die because it's it sets me free every single time with the realization that you're my father and you love me I was just thinking that probably an awful lot of people I have to come through that confessional to trump what you did think you have problem I make everybody else look good yeah it makes maybe comfortable to come in he's a man even on a whole hours and I didn't if he's been forgiven hey then right right then grace is coming my way yeah the confession line when I go to a conference is pretty long we'll take a break in a little bit before we go there talk more about your community the unique care ism of your community and there are so many communities out there I know you mentioned a little bit before but what would you say is the primary purpose of what your community is trying to accomplish in the kingdom of God well obviously first and foremost for every community is to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ and to save souls our particular aspects of doing that are to let other people know about the goodness of his mother the Virgin Mary and her role in the Christian life and being our mother in the order of grace the new Eve the mother of all the living so we seek to spread devotion to her and then also the divine mercy message as I alluded to earlier we our community is a founded was founded in Poland and so we have some polish roots there and this sister faustina was Polish and so our community was entrusted in a special way with spreading this message of divine mercy throughout the world and so we do that in a big way whether we we run parishes we have shrines we do missionary work in the Philippines Brazil Africa seek to spread you know those aspects there's a lot of other things as well but that's that's the correlate why don't we take a first email before we take a break because this it was in line with something that I was thinking about and asking anyway so I'll just go with your email this comes from George in Oklahoma father Callaway as a convert to the Catholic faith was there any particular Catholic doctrine that was difficult for you as you were considering becoming Catholic thank you joining yeah you know thinking back on it at the time Catholicism was so new to me I was just in all of it as I learned more about the teaching of the church contraception at first was a little shock because that was so contrary to my mentality growing up in the times in which we live contraception just seemed like a no-brainer that everybody did it of course this was fine I mean you know they told me we have overpopulation on the earth and all those kind of things you know and they throw statistics at you that you just think well these are the scientists the people who say it's true so I believed it so when I saw this teaching of the church that contraception is you know not good the the blocking of human life it took me really to look at that and to pray over that and then to see the beauty of it and the truth of it because it can't dawned upon me you know what what would it be like if Jesus on the cross said you know I love you but not that much I'm going to put a barrier between you and me and I'm going to block my seed from giving you the fullness of life because I don't love you that much he didn't do that he was stripped naked and poured out his blood that seminal blood that gives us life so that the church could be born because he's the bridegroom Messiah and gives to his bride all of himself and that's what spouses have to do and I see that in the beauty of this teaching in Catholicism of human life it's beautiful all right well let's take a break and we've got a couple more emails we'll look at when we come back in them so the scene a little bit [Music] [Music] [Music] welcome back to the journey home we're having a good time talking over all kinds of things that we could talk about in the program is never enough time I want to remind you that on Wednesdays 2 o'clock Eastern Standard Time EWTN allows me to have a radio program called deep in scripture and which each week I have a different gas Abnett father on yet you'll have to join talk about your favorite scripture usually focus on scriptures we never saw they were scriptures that awakened us to a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ in the church this coming Wednesday at 2 is a guide Dowd will join us so that's 2 o'clock Eastern Standard Time on EWTN radio please join us remind the audience again of your book no turning back a witness to mercy by our the guest Donald father Donald Calloway and we've got a number of emails before we get to the emails father though I want to make sure you talked about I mean your main focus of your your ministry that you became Catholic is in fact vocational yeah ministry is there a priest shortage well yes and no I mean we could certainly use more priests there's my question about that but is there a shortage of God calling men to the priesthood no it's just that men aren't hearing it because they're hearing other things that are out there in the culture culture taking their attention and getting them preoccupied with all of the things that are optional for them you know to choose out there and it's very distracting for men I'm the vocation director for my community and we're certainly not experiencing the shortage of vocations we right now have twenty seven men in formation we're going to accept another seven or eight later this year we're busting at the seams with vocations so it depends you know what how are you out there fishing for them you know we're casting the net and drawing these men in because you know we love the church we love the Holy Father we love the Eucharist and that's what these men are drawn to and they respond to that if you're out there saying some phony message lukewarm mediocre stuff it's not going to respond to that yeah what sets the Latin Rite apart from almost every other tradition is the expectation of celibacy and I'm wondering too questions one how was that in your own journey mm-hmm and it's one thing to think about those five Filipino ladies talking about the priesthood celibacy was right up front yeah a little bit contrary to your previous lifestyle you betcha but then second of all are you finding that a barrier even as you do your vocational work not at all I can honestly say to you I've been a vocation director since 2004 I have not had one single man come up to me and say you know I just don't think I can do this because I would like to get married and I say to them you know the men who come look if you feel called to marriage that's a beautiful thing but I don't haven't had any one man come to me and say you know what I just don't think that I could do that because I feel that I want to be a priest and be married at the same time you know in the Latin Rite that's that's not going to happen you know for and and so it's not a problem not a problem at all guys actually that are discerning right now have come out of that coat the culture you know that this sauce is sensual they know you know what that's like and yet they're willing to make that sacrifice you know as st. Paul says those who can do it do it you know if God's calling you to it you will be given the grace to be able to do that and they know that they know they're going to on occasion feel it in their bones where men you know and the feminine is what a mystery Wow you know women are phenomenal and yet when God calls a man to this way of life you can make this sacrifice in your own body because you're being called into this mission to do it God will give you the graces to be able to do it not one single man have I talked to who has really had a gripe about this not one if you were to look at it from your perspective of how long he being a priest now seven years seven years what would you say it was maybe the the number one reason of wisdom that the Holy Spirit has led the Latin Rite Church to emphasize celibacy as a necessity of priesthood from your experience sure would you say is the central reason why the wisdom of that well I think it's quite simple because you're going to be consumed every man is going to be given a beauty in his life to honor to defend protect and to die for the priest has given that as well it's the church it's the beauty of the church which really is you know the souls that he's been entrusted with and to have that passion in that drive and that commitment of all of your time and everything you have to be to go towards that it's so important if if you find yourself with a real physical wife and then you also have these souls you're in charge of you you're going to be divided I've talked to people who have become Catholic and we're married were clergy of a different you know Yeah right right been there done that yeah there you go right and there's going to be and they say and especially the wives say they feel neglected on some level because he does have to care for these Souls that has been entrusted with so having this celibate life is tough but at the same time I'm able to spend long hours at night in prayer doing research preparing homilies talking to souls in spiritual direction and so forth that if I had a wife and kids I would really my time should be with them right and so there's a need to be a real focus and that's the beauty of the Latin Rite is we have you know of Catholicism we have both sides of the coin we have the Latin Rite which you know celibate and we have all many of the other rites where you can get married have you ever seen a one sided coin you got to have both yeah there's the beauty of the wisdom of the different cultural issues let's we got an email from Anne in Florida and she writes as a cradle Catholic I've always been intrigued by the prophecy of Simeon and would be interested any thoughts father Callaway could share on this passage quote behold this child is set for the fall and rising of many in Israel and for a sign that is spoken against and a sword will pierce through your own soul also that thoughts out of many hearts may be revealed and the morrow and also she asks how did father Callaway be Mary as an Episcopalian first question the issue Simeon yeah oh that's loaded because there's the christological element they're dealing with Christ he's going to be a contradiction for many it's a scandal of the cross you know what is this God dying on a cross I mean why should this be you know and and many people have struggle with out throughout the ages how could God become incarnate become flesh and then allow us to kill them I mean this is a scandal for those who don't penetrate this through prayer so that's the christological element that is we could go on books have been written about this and then there's the Mary Mary an element the Mary logical element the her heart is pierced and there's a lot that's been written on that as well and I like to look at that passage like this Mary being like the the new Eve next standing by the new Adam she's our mother in the order of grace she only gave birth to one son in her body and that's Jesus Christ she is perpetual virgin and yet her heart as it were God used it like a spiritual womb and he put all of his children in there to be born and in giving birth to us spiritually it hurt her because she was at the foot of the cross and undergoing an agony and a torture as her son and her savior was crucified in her presence and God used her heart like a womb so that we could be born like we say in the church that the baptismal font is the womb of Christians well Mary's heart is like that as well and that's why from the cross we hear Jesus say woman behold your son there was a birthing event happening there the church is born through the new Eve and that womb is her heart come back to that verse a little bit because as the going back to the Christological side there's a sense in talk about this human father that the fall and rising of many in Israel kind of connects with the idea that often maybe through bad catechesis or other reasons we come up with our own idea what God is like yeah then when we encounter God and find out he's a whole lot different than we expect it's either going to convert us or drive us away which is what happened to you they had an image of what the Messiah will be like right and here comes a Jesus who isn't like they thought who dies on a cross and so it's either going to bring the conversion like Paul right right or the backing of a way I'm thinking as a priest you might deal with this all the time I do yeah the people in the pews right from the pulpit you're trying to convert them to Jesus yeah but you're running against oh yeah false ideas of what God expects of them what God's like oh yeah across the board on every level I mean I think nowadays a lot of what I encounter is a lot of people have created kind of a new age Jesus of some sort that he's a tree-hugging hippy who you know gazes at his navel to find inner freedom and he's trying to this is what they think Jesus is and so when I'm up there speaking about moral issues and you know this is writing this is where the black and white nosov Christianity Wow you know they really don't understand that and and yet they thought that they knew Jesus and yet they kind of made Jesus in their own image that's a big problem today on a lot of different levels people are doing that yeah the well this this particular issue of I look at where you came from and all of a sudden like you said God is asking you to live a moral life and do we want to this this of Jesus and people have this redefinition of good we have an email I know I wanted to try to the email that's why I was a bit distracted there I knew it this email comes from Ron from Ohio I'm a young man discerning my vocation what steps can I take to help me learn if the priesthood is where God is leading me oh it's great I'm delighted to hear that give me a call prayer is the foundation you just have to keep asking our Lord Lord what is what do you want me to do I'm willing to be of service to you I love you and spending that time with him reading over the scriptures speaking heart-to-heart with our Savior and letting him lead you and guide you that's the foundation you don't your if you're called you're called you're not going to be choosing this on your own it's me because you're accepting the initiation of our Lord inviting you to this particular vocation and then also you know you just want to be going deeper in your devotional life you want to make sure that you are tuning out some of these things from the world that can really distract you TV you know in some level you you if you're discerning it might be time to good time to turn off some of those programs used to watch not EWTN of course but a lot of other things that so you can really get focused quieted down and and learn from the Lord what it is that he's asking of you prayer without prayer it's not going to happen it's the foundation of it all because this issue of calling from a Catholic perspective might be a little different than where our non Catholic brothers and sisters sometimes think of calling from God and maybe you should talk about that because when you get away from the authority of the church sacred tradition you get into groups where it's Bible only their understanding of calling they'll take passages from Scripture you know st. Paul's knocked off his horse okay well okay God didn't knock me off a horse how do I know he's calling me do this or you know Isaiah Here I am send me well what is the uniqueness of God has a plan for my life to have to discover that do i spit my hand to figure out which way one's going to go i mean how does it right well i think that like if people have maybe not a clear interesting of what that call is just think of it in terms of mission you know the church the lord says go out to all nations and baptize the name of Father Son the Holy Spirit and he's speaking that to his church you know and if we love Jesus Christ we've all been entrusted with this mission to go out and the particulars of of it is that we're not all going to do it in the same way but at the same time you're going to have a particular area of work where you're going to live with your family the job that you have a particular location where you're going to be called to fulfill that mission that's your calling the mission to being sent out that you know that's what an apostle is to go forth as an ambassador of Christ and to fulfill the mission that you've been entrusted with which is a call to bring souls to Jesus Christ we have an email from John in New Jersey and he writes I have a non religious background and feel that God is drawing me to a closer relationship with him what practical advice would father Callaway have for me to deepen my relationship with God thank you John Wow okay well two things come to mind first and John that is that's right I love the question once again I just go back to the prayer you know if you want to know somebody you come from a non religious background if you want to get to know somebody you have to talk to them and that's what prayer is it's just talking to God and talk to them in open honest ways I like to say if you have to throw little spiritual temper tantrums you know for God and it when you're talking to him initially to get that conversation going go ahead you talk to him and tell them where you've struggled tell them your weaknesses the things that you've really misconceptions you've had about him that's okay you know he's your father and he wants to hear that and then from there you can actually hear him speaking to you when you take up the scriptures and read the Bible read what he say to you he loves you and he's written us in there because he wants you to hear his word and to be fed and nourished by that word and that word in fact when you pick it up every day and read it will nourish and feed your soul and you'll find yourself growing in that relationship and falling madly in love with this God that you never know what they discovered is in fact your father different traditions within the church have different spiritual piety Jesuits have their particular Jesuit exercises and and the Carmelites will have theirs you know different ones and from your background divine I'm assuming his Divine Mercy chaplet but yeah but talk about that to someone like him who's doesn't comfortable to just background you just ask him to pray mmm and he's wondering well what yeah what does that mean sure sure sure yeah that's true there's you're right there's different traditions of Prayer and all kinds of things that you can do with devotionals and so forth yeah one concrete thing that you can do rare on the Scriptures praying over the scriptures is a great way to grow in your relationship with God and in particular in Catholic tradition the Rosary is a very powerful way because you're praying over the scriptures these sanctified words you know that it brought us life and through praying the rosary you're actually praying over the saving mysteries of our faith you know the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary the the birth of the Messiah Jesus presented in the temple Jesus found in the temple all of these things these are wonderful ways through taking up a devotional like the Rosary grounded in Scripture and falling in love with Jesus Christ alright let's take a female from Carol from Michigan and looks like she's reflecting on part of your own journey father as a Protestant I never understood the Catholic Church's position on contraception is this a decision for each couple to make Thank You Carol well I mean yes but at the same time you know the the truthfulness of it is is that it's a teaching of the church church that like all the teachings of the church are meant to set us free so that we've we've been unshackled from these chains of the world and what the world would tell us that our choices can we can do with our choices everyone has the freedom to to make a choice but that doesn't mean that the choices that you're making are necessary the good ones we have freewill God doesn't come in and take away our freewill so every Catholic you know should surrender to this truth and adhere to this truth because the church is our mother and as our mother like a good mother she says to us you can play within these bounds this is for your goodness and your happiness and your freedom but if you go outside there's wolves out there and they'll attack you and they'll rip you apart these teachings are meant for our freedom now the children inside they can say well I'm going to run outside and play outside the pen well watch out what's going to happen you could find yourself you know outside of the household of God and then you're going to be in trouble these teachings of the church are meant for us to acknowledge the church in her wisdom changing body of Christ you know the the pillar and bulwark of the truth is the church and so when you listen to Holy Mother Church you find your freedom and when you give that assent to it what a joy what a delight you know to be able to say yes that is the truth I myself assent to it acknowledgement acknowledge it and I am free to live fully as a child of God I want to push you on that this issue a little bit not the issue of contraception but this issue of deciding right and wrong because if you come from a background where is just Bible only then you just you try and decide an issue a like let's say contraception well worth it where is that in the Bible right how do you decide that for sure well it depends on how you define whether abortions murder or not or whether it's a human person then you end up if you're going Bible only right so you need to teach your guided by the Holy Spirit yeah former Pisgah peléan and I know you weren't a card-carrying practicing right maybe the model of what a good Episcopalian was but I'd like you to give your thoughts on how is it that a denomination mmm can seemingly be itself moving in such a pro-choice direction on lifestyles that traditionally we're always recognized as immoral yet we find within and then taught we and we see this in a number of non Catholic denominations slowly defining things as good that we're always considered evil right right what's going on there from your perspective uh this is there's a spiritual battle going on here because to cave in on some of these issues is really to bow to you know the standards of the world and not the standards of Christ and ultimately you know it goes back to you know Matthew 16 you are Peter and on this rock I build my church and you you have the keys of the kingdom you know what you bind on earth it is bound in heaven and loosed on nurses loosed in heaven it comes back to that authority that's transmitted to us the authentic teaching of Jesus Christ here and you know the century in which we live because you're right there are certain issues that are not technically in the Bible abortion you're not going to find that technically in there nor contraception and there's some other issues very important issues so Jesus what did you mean what would you do today how do we know how what how would you interpret this and that goes back to he's speaking to us today through the teaching body of the church the Magisterium which means teaching and through the office of Peter so vitally important and when you don't have that you can find yourself winging it caving to the standards of the world and things that were taken for granted in days of old marriage between a man and a woman now you might find yourself questioning it and saying hmm well it's not technically in the Bible so maybe we can we came a little bit on that well it it you take three issues for example which really strike at America in many ways in our history you've got contraception yeah every church up to 1920 agreed on that it was the Pisgah peléan that the Anglicans that fudged on that and that land with conference on 1930 i think but it's not in scripture right you can go to the own an issue and you'll - but right what what is there okay almost sexuality I'm sorry but the Bible's all over about that yeah it's pretty clear it's pretty clear in there yeah all Christian groups were united on that and until well it's just been in the last 3040 years right we've ended movement on that slavery mm-hmm now the reason that the complicate is you is that there's a lot of verses in the Bible that seemed to say slavery's all right Paul doesn't challenge it Fijians and Colossians it's all over the place at first Peter master and slave it's just telling you how a master so again if it's Bible alone that's why we in America defended slavery even though and and I've even learned as geez even more and more the Catholic Church never defended slavery Catholics did honey right even Catholics own slaves to sad issue but the church didn't the Pope's all st. Peter always spoke out against slavery you know there's an example yeah sure of the authority of the church and not the Bible alone or conscience alone Yeah right that's right yeah what do you do with those issues unless you have a church you can trust yeah exactly well when I was becoming Catholic I had to take a hard look at that because you know almost all of my relatives are not Catholic and many of them are not even Christian at all and it baffled me that a lot of them were just Church hopping you know where they went wherever the the preaching seemed good until it ruffled him and challenged them then they didn't like what that pastor said so they went and found a new church to comfort them and I thought to myself you know if that's it I should just become my own pastor and start my own church and do my own thing but I said I want the real message not one that's just adapting to my likes and needs I need the real one even though it sting me you know because I look at it this way you're never going to catch a fish with a dull hook it's going to it's got to have a point in a barb to it and it's kind of get in and that's the mystery in the beauty of Catholicism is it comes with a sting but it's what really sets you free the most common a sincere though not right drive that I hear in all these new evangelical churches that are propping up everywhere is they look at everything and they say we're gonna do it right we're going to do Acts - hmm all over again write that over and over again it's as reinventing of the wheel they want to do what's right and they want to follow Jesus yeah yeah but immediately there's compromise on all different levels we have another email Kathleen in California as a former Episcopalian who has recently been received into the Catholic Church well you haven't recently been received but trying to remember back what is the best way for me to share my new faith with my family and friends who are still Episcopalian okay she's a she's a new convert to the church how do you share it back with your old Episcopalian family and friends yeah it can be challenging because a lot of people may not understand what why you've made the decision that you've made I can tell you what not to do I learned this the hard way when I you know became Catholic I was a little too overzealous initially and I tried to force it down people's throat you know this is Catholicism and you you know you got to accept it now and everything and I was a little too you know aggressive in my approach I had to learn you know how to do it tactfully how to do it with great love and care and concern for people a lot of people haven't known they've been misinformed about Catholicism they've heard about it on TV or they've read about it in Time magazine and their understandings are really off the best thing to do is to do not abandon them by any means love your family even though there's there's a difference here pray with them encourage them in their love for Jesus Christ and to pursue that relationship with him on a deeper level let your example shine forth in a brilliant way by you having your life changed by falling in love with Christ and becoming Catholic you know that's going to have an effect upon the things that you watch on TV the things that you listen to the way that you speak the words you use your language should be cleaned up you should be becoming a better person on so many different levels that that in and of itself should be something a draw to them like Saint Francis says preach the gospel all times if necessary use words you know it will show it will shine forth just try to live it that is so key because in that verse and for spinning first Peter 3:15 where it says be ready at all times to give a reason for the hope is in you it says but do it with gentleness yea their conscience yeah that's right because your words don't mean squat that's right if they don't match your life right that's right I mean that's that really the bottom-line issue um we're going to ask you to say a prayer for two things I'd like to do is to close the program one I'd like you to say a prayer for any people out there who are right now like where you were mmm if you could say a prayer for them you patch maybe a word in why they should come home but also a prayer for them and then up and close with a bus survive a Heavenly Father we thank you for the beauty of our faith and we ask you to touch the hearts of those watching who Lord want to go deeper and are experiencing the beauty of Catholicism maybe just need that push that guide to to help them to make that that decision to come over and to join this beautiful family of the Catholic Church Father we ask him to give you that to give them this special grace that courage to know that you are their father drawing them into this family that you have established and to help them to go deeper in their prayer through taking up the scriptures they're taking up into their hands even the Catechism of the Catholic Church and all of its beauty all of its richness the saints have died for father to give us this beauty that you desire through sending your son into the world to transmit to us the fullness of life and the beauty of Catholicism we ask for blessings upon all the viewers all the listeners all the people that they are praying for and for everyone that all people would come to know the wonder in the mystery of our Savior our Lord the Messiah Jesus Christ who is forever the light of the world and we ask this blessing in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit amen we got this a little bit of time father if you would recite to the audience the words of the divine chaplain just a little repetitive thing to help them understand whatever significance of the core of that Sheriff you sure the prayer goes like this Eternal Father I offer you the body and blood soul and divinity of your dearly beloved son our Lord Jesus Christ in atonement for our sins and those of the whole world for the sake of his sorrowful passion have mercy on us and on the whole world and that's basically acknowledging the the priestly character of the whole Christian people of God that we are all offering up to the Father that which saves us the flesh of the Messiah father for the sake of your son who died on the cross for us have mercy on us because he came to reveal your merciful face you are the more of a father there's a subtle theology in there that I think is uniquely Catholic and that it isn't for our sake mmm for the sake of the Isar that's right that's right this redemptive suffering that's offering it up that's right which is uniquely Catholic which I wanted for losing a little bit yeah and when the father looks upon us he looks upon us through the wounds of his son for the sake of your son and what he did for us father have mercy that's beautiful theology yeah yeah and so normally you it's prayed like the rose you're on the rosary beads that's right just in case someone takes about five minutes all right I'm sure if you want to know more about that you can go to ewtn.com on the website and find out all information about that you can listen to it prayed on EWTN that's right and so you can also contact father and his community to find out more about his wood work it's also book no turning back a witness to emergency by a father Donald Callaway father thank you for joining us thank you home program pleasure we'll get you back another time maybe another time on the program we can even have more time for phone calls and emails thank you you know it's just we've been through these days of preparation and it's a little bit more of Lent but if we haven't experienced the beauty and the surrender that we need to as we prepare for the celebration of you of Easter the Divine Mercy chaplet is a way to remember how much God has done for us in the life and death and resurrection of His Son Jesus our Lord let's make sure that we prepare ourselves by grace with a full reception of our Savior god bless you see you again next week [Music] [Music] [Music] you

Channel: EWTN

Views: 126,998

Rating: 4.8740377 out of 5

Keywords: EWTN, Journey Home, Marcus Grodi, Fr. Donald Calloway, Catholic

Id: jt9R2agiDAA

Length: 56min 20sec (3380 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 24 2010