Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey everybody. Welcome to the Immaculate Heart of Mary Parish podcast with Fr. Greg and jd. Each week, Father Greg and I connect on a variety of topics related to her faith and our parish in Winona, Ontario. We are here to spread the good news and further unite our parish community.
This is episode number 19 and we will be focusing again on the Easter season. We're still within St Francois de Laval and the diary of St Maria Faustina Kowalska.
We got a little bit of a bonus with some show and tell today as well and a few questions from our listening and viewing audience.
Remember, you can find us each week on the Spotify and the Apple podcasts and the YouTube every week. So please like or subscribe. Click the button and we will find your inbox every week.
So, you know, periodically, I wonder who are we reaching?
Are we reaching people? Are we hearing back? And. And I did have that thought again today.
Met up with some friends due to a mutual friend's retirement. And one of the. A few of the people said, hey, I see what you and Father are doing. Love it. It's great. So some kudos to you for all that great work and thank you for affirming our work and making us feel that we're reaching and we're providing a really great service here.
In particular, Friend Venturo had tuned in one time randomly and you talked about prayer and the importance of prayer. And at that moment, that's exactly the message he needed to hear.
[00:01:36] Speaker B: Praise the Lord.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: And so that, that timeliness, you never know who we're going to reach and when we're going to reach them, but we count on that it will happen at the right time.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: So thank you, Venturo, for that today. That was awesome.
I do have a quick question before we start.
[00:01:50] Speaker B: I'm ready.
[00:01:51] Speaker A: How could Jonah be in the belly of a whale for three days?
[00:01:56] Speaker B: I don't know. When I get to heaven, I'll ask him.
[00:01:59] Speaker A: What if he's not there?
[00:02:01] Speaker B: Then you ask him.
You told me to say that. I read. I read the script he gave me.
[00:02:06] Speaker A: I totally walked farther into that one.
Thanks for playing along.
May not be coming to a homily near you, but maybe something better with a bit. A bit punchier. Anyway, but after that, that's a good one. After that, you better start us off with a prayer.
[00:02:20] Speaker B: Sure. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. God, we thank you for this podcast. We thank you for our parish, we thank you for all our listeners. We just ask you pour out your Holy Spirit upon all of that and inspire us so that our conversations are fruitful and give you glory and help draw others into you, your love, your mercy, and the joy and the happiness that comes from being close to you. We pray all this in Jesus name, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
[00:02:46] Speaker A: I realized I just implied that Jonah might not be in heaven.
Is that a problem?
[00:02:53] Speaker B: Well, you'll figure it out.
[00:02:55] Speaker A: That's right.
Again, all I can ask.
Oh, gosh. All right, let's get to our Saint of the Week. Each week we do feature a saint and share some facts about their lives. As we strive to live out our mission as Catholics, we can always look to our saints for inspiration.
So this week, we are recognizing St Francois de Laval, who was born Francis Xavier de Montmorency Laval. He was a French Catholic prelate who served as Apostolic Vicar of New France from 1658 to 1674 and as Bishop of Quebec from its creation in 1674 until he retired in 1688. So all that to say, he was one of the founding members of the Catholic Church in Quebec.
[00:03:37] Speaker B: He's the first bishop of Canada.
Wow.
[00:03:40] Speaker A: He continued his work in new France until 1708, and again, he was a member of this powerful Montmorency family, but renounced his rights as heir so he could pursue his ecclesiastical career. So it's something that we have heard as a message quite often in reviewing the saints is that they have been born into privilege and have renounced that because they had a higher calling. So it's. It's incredibly common and very exciting and uplifting to hear.
So among his accomplishments was the founding of the Seminaire de Quebec in 1663. So he established a seminary to train priests, and that seminary later evolved into Laval University, one of Canada's leading university.
[00:04:23] Speaker B: Fascinating.
[00:04:24] Speaker A: So I don't have a direct quote from him, but he did believe that God's work was always useful, even if.
[00:04:32] Speaker B: Not immediately apparent, and that you could, like, trust in God and that you.
[00:04:36] Speaker A: Could trust in God.
[00:04:36] Speaker B: So what do you think? He probably prayed.
[00:04:39] Speaker A: Well, he probably also prayed to Jesus and said, I trust in you.
[00:04:42] Speaker B: Like, maybe he used those words, Jesus, I trust in you.
In en francais.
[00:04:48] Speaker A: En francais.
Ah, those.
Yikes.
My French roots are abandoning me right now because I was wanting to dive in with the translation, but. Sorry, sorry, everybody. We'll have to research that one and bring it back in another week. Yeah, one of another. One of his key messages was that the need to have a consistent life that aligned with One's words and actions and as you said, emphasize the importance of trusting God's will and his plan for us.
So as always, Jesus, I trust in you.
[00:05:20] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:05:22] Speaker A: All right. You ready for some show and tell?
[00:05:25] Speaker B: Yeah, show and tell is good.
[00:05:26] Speaker A: Show and tell. All right.
On odd weeks, we will do some show and tell. Father will have an item from his beautiful collection and. Wow. Oh, they're. Oh. Hidden behind planty.
[00:05:40] Speaker B: Show and tell. Show and tell. Show and tell. Show and tell. Show and tell. Whoa.
Who would have thought that Father would have had a crucifix for a show and tell?
What a surprise.
However, this actually is kind of a special crucifix for two main, maybe three main reasons. One is, as you can see, it has the Benedict. Saint Benedict medal on the front and back, which is a beautiful protective sacramental which has its own special blessing. Secondly, this is some. This is from the Holy Land. This is when I went to Israel. The first and only time I ever went to Israel was shortly after I joined the seminary.
I got this while I was there. So it has stray from the land of Jesus, we could say. I mean, everywhere is Jesus place, but you know what I mean?
And then I guess I'd say thirdly. Yeah, it's a personal reminder to me of that trip and of the Holy Land. So it kind of means something special to me. So I keep this in my office.
And if I think you need some extra protection while I'm praying with you in my office, I might put it closer to you.
So, yeah, crucifixes, St. Benedict medals, the Holy Land. Great things.
Thank you for tuning in for this show and tell. Show and tell. Show and tell. Show and tell. Show and tell. And we'll just put it somewhere. I don't know if we can put it somewhere.
[00:06:59] Speaker A: Right there. Yeah, there we go. Keep it present in us. All right. And maybe on another week, we can do a little bit of a walking tour around and just count the crucifixes in Father.
[00:07:08] Speaker B: Sounds like fun.
[00:07:09] Speaker A: All right, Excellent. I'm going to shift the order a little wee bit here today. And let's talk about our resource of the week for first.
[00:07:15] Speaker B: Resource, resource, resource, resource, resource.
[00:07:19] Speaker A: Based on your promptings at Divine Mercy Sunday, I picked up my copy of the diary of St. Faustina Kowalska off the shelf.
[00:07:29] Speaker B: Amazing book.
[00:07:30] Speaker A: I've started a new adventure into it.
So hold it up for all the people. Hold it up for all the people to see and see some tabs or some notable parts that are.
[00:07:41] Speaker B: It's amazing.
[00:07:41] Speaker A: Already marked.
[00:07:42] Speaker B: It's really deep stuff.
[00:07:43] Speaker A: It is super deep stuff.
Super hard to read in some parts, but I was guided to not approach it as a work of great literature or great writing.
[00:07:58] Speaker B: Right. Just to read it.
[00:07:59] Speaker A: Read it, absorb it, digest it, find elements that really resonate.
[00:08:04] Speaker B: Yeah. I think as you go on further, it's really deep because you get to hear what Jesus is saying to Saint Faustina, and those words are bolded. So it's like the bolded parts are the most important words. You get to hear Jesus speak, which.
That's really profound.
[00:08:17] Speaker A: Oh, yeah. Fascinating. And what has struck me at the very beginning are some of her struggles because we often think of. Of saints and. And great religious as having almost easy lives. You know, we think of the great things that they've done, and we just.
We can gloss over hardships that they've had. And she is very open with some of the hardships and some of the difficult questions that she's had.
[00:08:45] Speaker B: And.
[00:08:46] Speaker A: And some of them are, oh, wow, I had that same thought. So it kind of is very reassuring that she, early on is having, although she feels this very powerful call, is having incredible doubts. And do you, you know, Jesus, are you really calling me? Is this.
And the number of times that he responds to her to say, yep, this is. This is what I mean, this is what I want.
[00:09:10] Speaker B: So beautiful.
[00:09:12] Speaker A: So just, you know, again, at the beginning, still in Notebook 1, but. But super excited to. To be on that pursuit.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: So awesome.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: This will accompany me to Rome. That'll be my reading.
[00:09:21] Speaker B: It's one of my favorite books in the whole world.
[00:09:23] Speaker A: Well, what really, I think spurred me on was you talking about how transformational it was for you.
[00:09:29] Speaker B: Yeah, it really impacted my life in a huge way.
[00:09:31] Speaker A: And can you, like. Was there a moment during the reading that you said.
[00:09:35] Speaker B: I think the whole thing, but I think the key thing was, like, just.
I mean, first off, just how Jesus is so desperately longing to be merciful, to bless us, to reunite us with him if we've strayed, but also, like, his very explicit teachings about supernatural things. You know, he's very clear about the supernatural world and about God's desire to save us, but the fact that, like, she also talks about the times that, like, the devil attacks her, and, like, there's just a lot of, like, really real supernatural reality that helps bring the Scriptures to life even more.
[00:10:11] Speaker A: I think the beginning part is a little bit disjointed, and I was trying to find out.
[00:10:17] Speaker B: You know, it's a little biography. I think the first part is More of like a kind of biography type thing. And then it picks up with more like her stuff. But then as it goes on, it continues to build.
[00:10:28] Speaker A: So a plausible explanation I heard was that she was. Was wondering where this was going to be valuable and she burned what she had.
[00:10:36] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:10:37] Speaker A: And then she was urged by her confessor to rewrite from memory what she.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: Had done that might be the case.
[00:10:43] Speaker A: And saying the confessor was saying, you know, that was the devil trying to tempt you and to push you into doing harm instead of good.
[00:10:52] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:53] Speaker A: So that is a gentle slide into Ask Father Greg.
[00:10:57] Speaker B: Awesome.
[00:10:57] Speaker A: We do the resource first because the. The resource will come or the question comes from this.
[00:11:03] Speaker B: Great.
[00:11:03] Speaker A: So ask Father Gray. Each week we do respond to a question submitted by a listener or one I make up myself.
And so in St. Faustina's book, she talks often about hearing Jesus voice and feeling the tug.
And so she also talked about she got some other tugs that weren't Jesus. And so trying to now discern. So when we. When we get a hearing or a feeling or a tug, how can we discern that it's the voice of Jesus rather than a trick of the devil?
[00:11:34] Speaker B: Sure. Yeah. So it's a very common question, very important question is how do we know what's coming from God, ourselves or the devil? Basically, anything's coming from one of those usually. Right.
So there are. If something's from the Lord, there's a few kind of telltale signs. One is we have peace.
Right. In the Lord's will is our peace.
Jesus says, my peace. I give you Jesus, the Prince of peace. So if we're getting something that we think is from the Lord, but it's causing up a lot of agitation, a lot of inner disturbance that might not be from the Lord. Right. The evil one will try to act like. Try to give us a sense that we think it might be the Lord. That's part of how clever he is. Right.
St. Paul says in the Scriptures that the devil appears as an angel of light to deceive even God's elect. So he pretends to be good, pretends to be from the Lord's side, but he's not.
So peace. Also, is it in accord with church teaching? Is it in accordance with scripture? Like, obviously, any prompting from the Lord will be in alignment with Scripture and the teaching of the church. If it's against those, you know, it's not a good sign.
Also, the question is, is it reasonable? Just a very basic thing. Is this a reasonable decision to make?
If it's not reasonable. Keep praying about it. Keep praying about it. You know, the Lord understands that you want to do the right thing. So if you're a little bit more, hey, Lord, I think this might be you, but I'd rather just be on the safe side. You got to make it more clear to me.
That's a fine response. The Lord loves that realness in prayer that we just say. I don't know, Lord, is this you or not? I don't want to get it wrong, so you got to make it more clear to me. Perfect.
And also, it's in harmony with the authorities of the Church even now. Like, the Lord is a Lord of peace, unity, and harmony, Right? So the Lord is not going to prompt people to do things that create tension. Now, it could be like Jesus himself created tension because he was telling the truth. So it could be that sometimes we're called to do things that other people won't respond well to because they're not open to the work of the Lord. That can happen. But, like, if we're opposing, like, the leaders of the church or hierarchy, that's a sign that you maybe need to slow down, go in front of the Eucharist. And also, yeah, maybe holy people around you speak these things to you. Sometimes the Lord will give you a message through different people, too. Like when I was thinking about the priesthood, not only did I start to feel that more and more in my heart, the closest I was to God when I was praying in front of the Eucharist and so on, but also holy people that I bumped into would just randomly kind of say, have you thought about the priesthood? So the Lord speaks through others as well. So he speaks through all of that. And when we're not sure, my encouragement is go in front of the Eucharist, whether it's the tabernacle or our adoration chapel with the monstrance, and just pour out your heart to the Lord. Ask him for clarity. Don't be too hasty to act on these things. Sometimes it's just us, too. Sometimes it's our subconscious desires or drives or associations.
So. And sometimes you just don't know for sure. And so when in doubt, do what you think will most please God, giving it to the Lord, saying, lord, this is for you. I'm doing my best to serve you.
[00:14:41] Speaker A: And sometimes a gentle pause from a decision might be.
[00:14:45] Speaker B: Might be helpful more time sometimes just sleeping on things, waiting to make a decision before you've gone to the Eucharist. I go to the Eucharist first. Spend 20 minutes in front of the Eucharist sitting there talking to Jesus, you'll have much more clarity.
[00:14:57] Speaker A: Gosh, you thought. Talk about sleeping on things. And the kind of makes me think of the importance of dreams through St. Joseph in particular, and, you know, how much can be revealed to us.
[00:15:08] Speaker B: Yeah. There are dreams that are from the Lord, there are dreams that are from us, there are dreams from the evil ones. So same kind of discernment criteria applies. But, you know, if you feel like a certain dream is from the Lord, then bring that to prayer as well.
[00:15:19] Speaker A: Wow. You mentioned in accordance with church teachings, and I think that's something that I think over time, I'm really wanting us to drill down on because I think there's so much that we still that we don't know. I think that that maybe has been lost over.
In particular, I'll speak for myself that, you know, I've either forgotten or didn't learn the first place. And where.
Where can we learn these things and where can we, you know, find out the more detailed information about what acts and charity and peace. And I mentioned some of those things for this other resource that I found in the church on the free table. On the free table, the catechism for adults.
[00:16:04] Speaker B: It's honestly really good. I just looked at it. It's really cool. You said it was 1950 something, 58.
[00:16:10] Speaker A: Publication dates, and it did have a section. I just want to jump in real quick here.
It was about.
[00:16:23] Speaker B: You said it was about ember days.
[00:16:24] Speaker A: Well, that was another one. That was sort of the other question I was going to jump into.
Can I find this very quickly? Oh, it was about charity. Yeah, very simple one about charity and what the different acts of charity are. And we often think charity is really a financial gift or financial.
[00:16:41] Speaker B: Right, that's true.
[00:16:41] Speaker A: That.
[00:16:41] Speaker B: That's true. In today's society, the word charity is most often associated with just giving money to those in need.
[00:16:46] Speaker A: Yeah. And one of the lessons, lesson number 42, is all about charity. And it talks about what is charity and how to love our neighbor and all the different ways that we can.
[00:16:57] Speaker B: That's so cool.
[00:16:58] Speaker A: And show that love. So this is going to make a.
[00:17:01] Speaker B: Like, maybe like make excerpts of this or something. Like put some pieces or something. I think so These are honestly really, really good.
[00:17:08] Speaker A: And as I was going through, I was at a section about.
It talked about ember days. It was in a section on fasting, and then it talked about ember days.
That's a new word.
So what do you. What can you tell us about ember days?
[00:17:24] Speaker B: Well, very simply, Ember days there used to be based on the seasons, the four seasons, if I recall correctly. I'm not an expert on this, to be honest with you, but I think that this. They're very powerful and they're beautiful. Tradition, there would be a few days of extra prayer and fasting, particularly for vocations and also for maybe the needs of the church. And just kind of. It was just kind of a time to really hunker down, pray and fast extra for those things.
And those are powerful, prayer and fasting. I mean, Jesus even says on one occasion, like, this kind of demon can only be cast out by prayer and fasting.
So I mean, the. More prayer, not, not that we make an idol out of prayer or fasting, but that they are, you know, parts of Christian discipleship according to Jesus. And so to have some kind of intentional, seasonal way of. Of keeping them in our minds, I think was a great wisdom of the church.
[00:18:17] Speaker A: Okay, beautiful.
[00:18:18] Speaker B: They're not obligatory. They're not as talked about now. But I'm not aware. This is my own ignorance. So if someone finds, finds this out, please share with us. I'm not aware of any official, like what's called abrogation of them. I'm not aware of any kind of. Hey, we don't do that anymore. Anymore. So I think when in doubt, we assume things. Like if the church sets something in place, we assume it still wants it until it tells us otherwise. So therefore, there are many Catholics who still do observe ember days. But I just noticed they don't be. They're not as talked about as they used to be.
[00:18:49] Speaker A: And so it is on that list of things that. Oh, yeah, whatever happened to X?
[00:18:57] Speaker B: Right. We should bring that up at another time, get the summary on ember days from that book.
[00:19:01] Speaker A: Yeah, that would be very cool. Another quick question that came up today in conversation at home, but the Beatitudes, very first one, blessed are the poor in spirit.
And I thought, you know, I'm thinking, could I explain that in other words, like, you know, there are a lot of times.
[00:19:18] Speaker B: You mean, like, what does it mean?
[00:19:19] Speaker A: Yeah, like blessed. You know, I understand each of the individual words, but then we put them all together in that phrase. It's like, yeah, are we talking about here?
[00:19:28] Speaker B: Right. Poor in spirit commonly is a description of those who are not attached to the things of this world. Right.
It doesn't mean you're necessarily materially poor. Like, being materially poor does not necessarily mean you're blessed because it's true that those who are like on the streets sometimes you do. See, they have deep faith because they've kind of almost been forced to reflect on life and reflect on their need for God, and there's something beautiful there. However, like, there are also some people who live on the street that have no relationship with the Lord that they know of anyways.
So it's not just not having stuff that makes you blessed. It's poverty of spirit, which is an awareness of.
I know that I depend on God for everything. I'm humble, I trust in the Lord. I'm not attached to the things of this world, and therefore I'm free. My heart is free for the Lord. It's not kind of tied down. Imagine a bird tied down by whether it's a chain or a string, either way, it's tied down and it can't fly.
But if we can kind of eliminate those attachments. Not that the things of this earth are bad, but we can have unhealthy relationships with the things of this world. We can have desires that are not really the best for us. Right. And so the poor of spirit have hearts that are detached, that are free, that are humble, that are docile to the Lord. And there's a detachment from the things of this world in a way that actually makes them more free and appreciate the things of this world even more and see them more from God's eyes.
[00:20:55] Speaker A: Okay, all right, all right. Little explanation on poor in spirit. I've got another two words, Our Father, but I'm going to save that for another week because I got a bunch of questions about the Our Father.
[00:21:06] Speaker B: Okay, exciting.
[00:21:08] Speaker A: All right. On our calendar, we're into week three of Easter.
[00:21:14] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:21:14] Speaker A: Okay, so what's going down in the third week of Easter? More joy, more celebration.
[00:21:19] Speaker B: That's going up.
[00:21:20] Speaker A: That's going up. Okay.
[00:21:22] Speaker B: What's going down is time left in Easter.
Sorry. Sound fun, but some miscellaneous things to share. First off, James and I are going to Rome this Sunday.
So that's happening.
And several of our parishioners. Yeah, we're very excited. We're just less than a week away.
And maybe on that note, I'll just mention that there will be probably a little pause from the usual frequency of podcast posting. We'll see how it goes. We do intend to try to make some videos and something, but we're gonna let the Holy Spirit guide us and see how each day goes. But we are excited.
That's exciting. Tonight we have our last RCIA night. So for those who just became Catholic, this is our last night. Of official rcia and, and then we're going to continue to probably get together with them, but then we'll have that start up again the fall.
We're also doing something right now where we're training some people in our parish to lead faith studies.
And from cco, maybe you know about CCO and their faith studies. That's an exciting thing that the whole parish will hear more about as we offer those faith studies, those ways to learn more about your faith and grow to the whole parish.
And Friday is monthly youth night, Saturday is monthly young adults night. And Father Mark Morley will be here preaching all the masses this weekend because I can't be at all the masses this weekend because of the Rome trip.
And that's a quick summary.
Always lots of cool stuff. Check out our bulletin for our list of events. And there is no shortage of opportunities to get closer to Jesus and some other real cool people.
[00:22:52] Speaker A: Excellent. Exciting to hear about the faith studies. You know, getting that launch. So, so important. It's so helpful to reconnect so many.
[00:23:00] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:23:01] Speaker A: Wonderful.
Well, with all this happening, it's all incredible, but it doesn't happen by itself.
Our pressure, it always takes great volunteers.
[00:23:12] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:23:12] Speaker A: Kind of lost my place here, but all this stuff that, that is going on is the work of tireless volunteers who are really helping you do God's work. And who would you like to recognize this week?
[00:23:27] Speaker B: Yeah, I should think about this more often beforehand.
Come, Holy Spirit.
You know, I can't remember if we gave them a shout out or not, to be honest with you. But there's a young lady named Marianne and she is helping us as we revamp our website. It's going to still take a little bit longer, but you're going to love it when it's done and we'll continue to make it even better then. But Marianne is helping with that and she's helped with some other graphics art stuff. And so Marianne is very faith filled and generous young lady. So shout out goes to her.
[00:24:00] Speaker A: Excellent. Thank you very much, Marianne. It's incredible. The vision that you have will really help move our parish forward and help us achieve our goals. That's wonderful. Thank you, Marianne.
Well, that is just about all the time we have for today, Father. Thank you for your insights as always. Let's close with a prayer.
[00:24:17] Speaker B: Sure. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. God, I thank you again for this day and all your blessings to us. And help us to never take your countless blessings for granted. Help us to remember how how blessed we are and how we can learn from St Francois de Laval, St Faustina and so many saints to to respond to your call as we discern your will in our lives and strive to to live in a way that helps ourselves and others draw ever closer to you. Bless our listeners, bless our parish, and help us to continue to grow in the faith, hope and love that you know will bring us to not only eternal life, but even greater happiness in this life. And we pray all this in Jesus. Name the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
[00:24:58] Speaker A: Well, thank you for that, Father. And thank you for continuing to remind us that in prayer don't give God instructions, just report for duty.
[00:25:06] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:25:06] Speaker A: All right, thanks also to our fans and friends and odds and ends for joining us again this week through the Immaculate Heart of Mary social media channels, the Apple podcasts, the Spotify or the YouTube. As father mentioned, maybe a couple of pauses for the next couple of weeks, but you'll see us some way, shape or form.
You can't get away from us that easily.
And if you like our show, please subscribe and tell your friends. And if you don't like our show, tell your friends anyway and let them discern for themselves. Have a great week everyone. We are Father Greg and JD Leaving you smarter, happier and more blessed than you were yesterday.
