 The book of Daniels starts off, so I'm gonna raise it, walk through Daniels chapter one through three, and this is how I came up with this talk. During the pandemic when I was home and couldn't travel, like everybody else, I started spending more time in books of the Bible that I normally didn't spend a lot of time in. One of them was the book of Daniel. So as I was reading through Daniel, I noticed, holy cow, the stuff that happened back then during the reign of King Nebuchadnezzar, the Babylonian exile, are the same things that are happening in our culture today. And I started seeing parallels. So that's what this talk is about, looking at what happened back then and what's happening now and what happened then and how we can learn and benefit from what those three young men did today in our culture. So it starts off, in the third year of the reign of Jehoakim, King of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came to Jerusalem and besieged it and the Lord gave Jehoakim, King of Judah, into his hand. Now, why would God do that? The Israelites are the chosen people. They were the ones that were handpicked, selected by God to be the witnesses and example of God's love to all the other pagan nations around them. So when the pagan nations saw the Israelites, ah, that's God's people. That was the idea, but here's the problem. The Israelites got a little bit too comfortable with the other pagan nations around them. They started adopting pagan ways of thinking and pagan ways of worshiping. And so we look at our culture today, right? We know that the Catholic Church is the church founded by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We all know that's true. In fact, if you don't believe me, ask Siri. Siri will tell you. Seriously, I did that once at an airport and I freaked the person out. But the problem is we have become too comfortable with all the pagan ideas and the pagan nations around us. And so what God is saying is this, well, if you don't want me to rule over you, then Babylon will. And that's what's happening on our culture today. You don't want me to be your God. You don't want to be my people. Let me be your God, fine. You have free will, I love you. You're free to say yes or you're free to say no. And if you don't want me to rule over you fine, then Babylon will. And what's the problem with that today? For far too long, we Catholics have been filled with a spirit of apathy and embarrassment about sharing our faith. We keep the faith to ourselves and keep it contained within the walls of the church. And that's why when we're challenged by our friends and loved ones about why we are Catholic, we cower like frightened children that pull the covers over their head because they're scared of the dark. And we wonder why before the pandemic 69% of Catholics did not believe that Jesus was present, body, blood, soul, divinity, and the Eucharist. 69% before the pandemic. That means it's worse now when the culture tries to shove subjective truth down our throats. We worry about being politically correct and hurting people's feelings. And then we wonder why more than half of the people that joined the church through RCIA leave after five years. When unborn children are slaughtered and marriage and gender are so-called redefined, we remain silent. All right, I wanna talk about that. That's too hard. It's too difficult. As long as it doesn't affect me, we turn the other way and we're silent. We keep our mouths shut. And then we wonder why the median age when a young person decides, makes the intellectual decision, I am no longer Catholic, it's 13 years old. They've effectively left the church before they even left your house. And what do we do? We're left standing there going, what? What happened, my son? He doesn't practice the faith anymore. I don't understand. He went to Catholic school. He got confirmed. He was in youth group. He went to Mass with us every Sunday. I don't know what happened. Well, so many of our young people are fans of Jesus and not followers. They say that Mass is boring because they have no idea why they're there. They're there because we drag them there every Sunday. But there's a serious disconnect between the faith and their everyday lived experience. My friends, it's not enough just to believe in God, we must believe God. It continues, with some of the vessels of the house of God, he, Nebuchadnezzar, brought them to the land of Shinar, to the house of his God and placed the vessels in the treasury of his God. So King Nebuchadnezzar took what belonged to the true God, the sacred vessels that were used in the worship of the Lord and offered it to the false gods. So these vessels that were once meaningful have now become meaningless. So what else in our culture that used to mean something has now become meaningless? Well, disdain for the human person created in the image and likeness of God. So for example, one thing I did for my son, I took him on guy's night out, right? So for example, my daughters, people keep asking me, oh, your children, are they married yet? I got daughter 25 and 23 and twins that are 20 and one of them is a girl. So three girls, are they married yet? Nope, why? Because their first dates were with me. When I took them, when I took them on a date, because when they turn 16, I said I'm gonna take them on a date because I want them to see how to be treated by a man, not a boy, by a man. So we dressed up, took them to a nice dinner, flowers, the car door, treat them like women, like queens, huh? Because the culture, the bar starts here. Well, don't really hurt them, don't really hit them, it's stupid. Like that stupid Gillette commercial, best a man can get, what is that? I want the bar to start here. Don't settle for anything less than this. And that's why they ain't married yet. They're so weighty, huh? And that's good. Now with my son, I took him on guy's night out. So what is guy's night out? Now, I didn't have a good relation with my father at all. In fact, I think the last time I was here, I talked about my dad. I didn't speak to him for 18 years. At one point we had a really terrible relationship. So I never had a model of how I was supposed to be a father to my son. And so I invented guy's night out. So basically what I would do was when he turned 13, I would take him out and we'd have, go to dinner like chicken wings and fries or something like that and we'd talk about stuff. Now at first it was like, you got enough underwear, son? He's the only boy, right? And son, this is stuff called deodorant. You probably should start using it now because you're humming a little bit, buddy. But then as he got older, the conversations turned to son. They're trying to tell you that boys can be girls and girls can be boys. That's a lie, son. Let me tell you the truth. Son, they're trying to tell you that marriage is something else other than a man and a woman. That's a lie, son. Let me tell you the truth. Son, they're trying to tell you that old people are worthless. When you're old and you're sick, you're burned on your family, you're burned on the healthcare system, you're burned off society. We'll give you two choices. We'll kill you, euthanasia, or we'll give you medication to kill yourself, assisted suicide. That's a lie, son. Let me tell you the truth. And so we'd have these conversations. Now why did I do that? Because I don't want my son learning about life from some YouTube influencer or from some TikToker or some Instagrammer. I want him to be able to be comfortable coming to his father to talk about difficult issues. And I did it over dinner. It's just conversation. I'm not grilling him. I'm not beating him over the head with a catechism. We're sitting down and we're eating and we're having a conversation. You got a chance to ask questions even on uncomfortable ones. I was there for him to answer them. And then after we finish, we go see Thor or the Avengers or Black Panther because we're men. One time we went to the movies after part of God and I went to the movie and we walked in and there was a guy in there that had devil horns coming out of his head. He had his eyebrows protruding out like an inch and a half from his forehead. His jawline was kind of, he had fangs like a vampire. And I'm like, oh, this must be a new movie, must be premiering here. And he's like dressed up to play, to advertise the movie. He had himself surgically altered to look like a demon. And I'm like, oh wow, here we go. Same thing like if you want to get a tattoo, whatever. I mean, I've seen people go to the Holy Land and get those Holy Land. That's fine. But when you cover your whole body with tattoos and you can't even tell what color you are, why do people do that? See, here's the thing. When you don't have God in your life, you're gonna try to find meaning in your life by doing something. Some people cover their whole bodies with tattoos. And I was at the gym and there was a guy that walked in that was covered. He even had someone on his neck and everything. So I went up to him and said, hey, that's some interesting ink you have on your body there. What does that mean? So he was more than happy to explain like when this certain thing happened in his life, he got a tattoo to remind himself and this and there was one on his arm with a name. It was his sister who was killed in a car accident. And so he wanted to remember his sister by tattooing her name on his arm. And I said, wow, that's pretty cool, but I wouldn't do that. He said, really, what would you do? I said, well, if it were my sister, I'd go to the local college university. I talked to them and started scholarship fund. I go to my parish or maybe like go to one of those fundraising website things. I raise money for a scholarship for a needy student in her name. Why would I do that? Simply this, when my mother dies, my father dies, when I die, when you die, your sister's name is gonna rot in the ground with your arm. No one's gonna remember her. With the scholarship fund, everyone's gonna remember her. And her name is always going to be associated with someone who helped someone else and gave them an opportunity that they wouldn't have had before. That's a legacy that's gonna last long past you and your parents. He said, wow, I never thought about it like that. I said, yeah, man, think about that, bye, you know? What else? The human body has been transformed into an object of pleasure and commerce. Pornography and human trafficking. You know, we spend $3,000 a second on pornography in this country. $3,000 every second of every day. And that fuels human trafficking, a multi-billion dollar industry, the exploitation of young girls and boys. Now, when I was in law enforcement, I talked to women who came out of human trafficking. Their stories were horrific. The things that were done to them. Now, why is human trafficking so popular? Think about it. Even drug dealers now are moving from dealing drugs to human trafficking. Think about it. You sell a drug, that drug is gone. You sell, in order to sell, you have to get more drug and sell it. Get another drug and sell it. Well, the woman, sell her again and again and again and again. You're making all kinds of money every day, five, six, eight, 10 times a day. She's a commodity. She's a thing. She's a non-person. But that's what happens in our culture today when we don't see the image and likeness of God and the person standing in front of us. I already talked about embryonic stem cells, in vitro fertilization, so-called redefinition of marriage. And notice a lot of these things are assaults on women. Now, why is that? In Genesis chapter three, no, why does Satan go after the woman first? You know, we know that the man and the woman are both created in God's image and likeness. He goes after the woman first, although she's created last. Notice that in the order of creation, in Genesis one, right, you have all the, I wouldn't have time to go through Jewish cosmology, but they have the universe and then male and female. So she's not created second, she's created last. Genesis two, the man and then all the animals, then the woman from his side, last, not second. Why last? Very simply this. God saved his best work for last, okay? I know, okay. I'm not just saying that to appease the women, okay? Here's the deal. Women have a special intimacy with the Holy Spirit. Right? Every, every Sunday we pray, Kredo, Espiritus, Sanctus, Dominum, and VVC content. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of, and a woman participates in the life-giving power of the Holy Spirit in a way that we man can't. So every woman by the very nature of how God created her is a life giver and a life bearer, even if she never has a child. She becomes like the sister sitting back here. You know, like, look, like first of all, look at the sister side of it. First of all, look how beautiful they are. Stand up for a second, sisters. Let me show, hold on, hold on. Let me show you something. No, stay standing for a second. Let me show you something. Look how they're dressed. Why are they wearing a habit? Right? Revelation 19 verse nine. Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding feast of the Lamb, where Christ the eternal bride groom will give love, life, intimacy, and communion to his bride, the church for ever in heaven. Earthly marriage anticipates that and so does being a sister. What they're wearing is their wedding dress. So when we see them in their habit, we are seeing, we are seeing the heavenly expression on earth of the bride of Christ the church. Beautiful, thank you. And that's why Satan goes after the woman first. He's the author of death. So he goes after the one who gives life. That's why he goes, not because she's weaker than he is. Wrong. The one who is the author of death goes after the one who gives life. Look at all these attacks on our culture today. Why is Satan doing this? Very simple. He's trying to destroy one of the most creative forces in the entire universe, motherhood. It continues. Then the king commanded Ashfinaz, his chief eunuch, to bring some of the people of Israel. Really, who are these some? Yults, without blemish, handsome and skillful in all wisdom and dealt with knowledge, understanding, and learning. And teach them the letters and the language of the Chaldeans. So Nebuchadnezzar begins the process of brainwashing the best and the brightest of Israel's youth. You can't tell me that in our culture today, they're not trying to brainwash our young people. They're being indoctrinated into the secular culture. Look, look, and how they're doing it's happening in two ways, digital and mobile phones, social media and video games. Now, in and of themselves, there's nothing wrong with any of those. But when that becomes your life, then it becomes your God and then it becomes your problem. For example, teenagers crave silence, but they don't know how to be silent because they're constantly surrounded by noise and distractions. Like, for example, my wife, when I don't walk around my house with my phone in my hand, because I'm home, I leave it in the office. I might be going down to the kitchen, might be doing something, my wife's like, she comes home, where were y'all texting you? My phone's in the office. How can we look at it? Because I'm not in my office. Some teenagers, right, when you're taking an adoration, they're like a little bit freaked out at first because they're like, what? I mean, I can't have my phone in my hand for an hour. I promise you, your hand will not fall off if it's separated from your phone. I promise you. But once they get an adoration, then they begin to get it. We think, oh, they're not ready for adoration. Oh, yes they are because that's where God speaks to them in the depths of their heart. And why is adoration so important? Because you can pray anywhere. You can pray right now. You can pray in your car, you can pray in your house. Why does praying before our Lord in adoration, and why is always that piece such a powerful part of the Stubbornville Conference experience? Why is that? Very simply this. I was just overseas, I spent three weeks on a tour in New Zealand, Papua New Guinea and Australia. And when I was gone, I called my wife. But also I liked to FaceTime or Skype so I could see her when I talked to her. But I'd rather be with her. Isn't it always better to be in the presence of the person that you love when you're talking to them? That's what adoration is. We say, Jesus, I love you. You're the center and the heart of my life. But you don't want to spend any time with them. We heard the talk yesterday. No, yeah, Dr. Shree said, well, one of the excuses for praying when we don't have time, we don't have time. I've been translating some words for you today. Let me translate, I don't have time. I don't have time means it's not important to me. Because whatever else you're doing, instead of praying, that's what's important to you. Stop kidding yourself. Oh, we all have time. And young people, they want to listen to God speaking in their hearts. But God speaks to us in what's called, let's say, Benedict called the RM Cortes, the ear of the heart, not here, here. But video games, social media, self, they all become distractions. And that's what the devil, I'm not saying that they're from the devil not demonic, I'm saying, when you become so overwhelmed by the tech and it become not just a tool, but becomes your life, that's when it's a problem. That's what Satan's saying, don't listen to God. Listen to what this says instead. That's a problem. So many young people being caught up in that. So that's one way they're being brainwashed. What's the other way? The Babylonian system is called 16 years of education. Eight years of grade school, four years of high school, four years of college. Now, educational institutions are supposed to be places that teach young people how to think, but they've become places that teach young people what to think. Many of our young people cannot think for themselves because they're being brainwashed, even in Catholic schools. That's what I don't understand. Why would you send your kid to Catholic school when they're not teaching the Catholic faith? They gotta understand, I am a product of Catholic education. My mom, single mom raising us, she was a cardiac caretner, she worked graveyard shift, she worked overtime to make sure she made enough money to send us kids to Catholic school. She was very committed to Catholic education. Me, Catholic grade school, high school, college and graduate school, all at Catholic institutions. So I'm a proponent of Catholic education, but here's the thing, if they're not teaching the Catholic faith, don't send them there! Cause look, why? And it hurts my heart to have to say that, but here's the reality. All you're paying for is a very expensive public school. Think about this for a second. I've been to 31 countries, including Muslim countries under Sharia law. Do you think that if you decide to send your kid to a Muslim school and enough Christians started sending their kids that they would say, oh, wait a minute, the Christians are coming now. Let's stop praying the Quran. Let's stop praying five times a day. Let's dumb down our faith because the Christians are here. They won't do that. You think the Protestants would dumb down their faith when a bunch of Catholics start showing up to their schools? They won't do that. Why do we do it? I don't understand that. Why do we do it? I was just in Australia. They're having huge issues in their Catholic schools. Part of the reason is because they take money from the government. Now, if they don't do that, the Catholic schools will cost twice as much, right? So they, but when you take the 30 pieces of silver, you're gonna have problems. Right now in my Archdiocese, my Archbishop Alexander Sample, an outstanding leader in our Archdiocese is getting hammered by the media because he put out a very clear, very beautiful, very pastoral, very well-written document on transgender and kids in school. Beautiful document. And he's getting hammered by because teachers are leaving and people are pulling their kids out of school. His response is, bye. If we don't stand up against this culture, they're gonna continue to run roughshod over us. At some point, we have to say enough is enough. Young children, as children as young as five years old are being desensitized and exposed to transgender ideology. In many school systems, in kindergarten and first grade, they're teaching the gender unicorn. If you don't believe me, I saw a presentation, Ryan Anderson, who's the head of the Ethics and Public Policy Think Tank in Washington, D.C., who Noel is working with them now. I did a presentation in Orlando with Ryan and my jaw hit the ground when I saw his presentation about what they're teaching in schools now. I, in fact, I took pictures of it on my phone from his PowerPoint presentations. I said, this can't be real. And I found out, oh, it's very real. They're being indoctrinated into this as young as five years old. Then, see, notice what Nebuchadnezzar's doing. He keeps ramping it up, right? Because what happens? I'll do this. Yeah, they may get a little bit upset, but they'll get used to it. Then I'll ramp it up a little bit. Oh, they're gonna be upset. Oh, but they'll get used to it. Now he ramps it up again. Among these, the young men that he was brainwashing, Daniel, Hananiah, Michelle, and Azariah of the tribe of Judah, and the chief unit gave them names. Daniel became Bilteshizar, Hananiah became Sharrat, Meshal became Meshat, and Azariah became Abednego. Why? He changed their names. Why? When you change your name, you change your identity. Doesn't that sound familiar? This is like 3,000 years ago. And look at the parallels now. Change your name, change your identity. Now, why did he change their names? Those young men had godly names. All right, let's, all those names in the Bible mean something, by the way. For example, let's take the archangels, Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael. The El, at the end of their names, are Sharfa Elohim, which is one of the spoken names of God. So Michael, or Michail, means who is like God. Gebra El means the strength of God, but Raphael means the remedy of God. So take these guys' names. Daniel means God is judge. Meshal is the same thing as Michail, who is like God. Hananiah and Azariah, the IAH, at the end of their names, is short for, you can't say the name Yahweh, so you have to put parts of it, like the Tetragrammaton type of thing. So that's what they did at the end of their names. So Hananiah means God protects, and Azariah means God will help. Beautiful, godly names. But he changed their names to the names of pagan, Chaldean gods. Because he wants to change their identity. So what's being redefined? Oh, let's talk about names, for example. You know what I noticed when I was home during the pandemic? Like I said, I don't watch a lot of television, but I admit, during the pandemic, I watched a little more television that I would normally watch. And I noticed two things. I don't know why I didn't pick up on this before from television. First of all, there are tons of shows about vampires and zombies. You ever noticed that? I'm like every time walking dead, waking dead, living dead, this zombie, this, and then vampire, twilight, traffic light, stop light. I don't, like, oh, I'm like, why are we so obsessed with these malevolent creatures of folklore and legend? Then it hit me. What do vampires and zombies have in common? They're dead! But yet they're alive, huh? Now, what's a vampire that's dead have to do to stay alive? Drink blood. What's a zombie that's dead have to do to stay alive? Eat flesh. See, what we're craving is flesh and blood. But because we don't know who's in the tabernacle, because we don't know who's in the monster to the adoration, because we don't know what's happening at that altar to the holy sacrifice of the mass, and there's no connection between what happens at mass and the everyday lived experience, our young people are trying to find flesh and blood in creatures that are dead! That can't give them nothing, except take their money. When for free and why is it free? He already paid the price. They can come to the altar of the living God and receive the true flesh and blood of Jesus that will give them life forever. Vampires and zombies? Vampires and zombies make beliefs. What happens at the altar at every mass is the really real. That's the first thing I noticed. The second thing is this. I don't know why I didn't see this before. You ever notice when they curse God? It's always Jesus. Jesus Christ! God! Why is it not Buddha damn? I'm not trying to mock or anybody else is God. Instead of Jesus, how come it's not Mohammed? Why is it always Jesus? Even this warped, twisted, perverted, depraved generation knows who the real God is. That's the God that they mock. That's the God that they ridicule. The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. The God whose name is above every other name and at the name of Jesus, every knee must bend. And the heavens on the earth and under the earth and every tongue proclaim to the glory of God the Father. Jesus Christ is Lord. So what's your name? Parked in front of the television? Never pray with my spouse? Call of duty or Mario Kart? What is your name? Because it's not just about your name. You have to ask yourself, what is my divine identity? Who am I in God? Now, what do I mean by that? Some people, for example, say to me, Deacon, you're a black Catholic. I'm like, no, I'm not. I'm a Catholic who's black. What do you mean? You're denying your black identity? No, because when I die and stand before Almighty God to be judged, he's not gonna ask me how black I am. Did you pick up your cross and follow me? I gave you talents. Where's my 30-fold, 60-fold, 100-fold return on the investment I made in you? My identity has nothing to do with my skin color or my race. My identity is a loyal son of the living God. That is my identity. Sometimes I meet Hispanic men or sometimes some Asian men and they treat their women a certain way. And you don't understand our culture. I may not understand your culture. I understand the Bible. I understand Ephesians chapter five. Husbands love Ephesians 5, 25. Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church. How did Christ show his love for the church? He died for her. He gave his life for her. That transcends culture. No excuses yet now. I was born of Barbados. I love my Caribbean heritage. I love our food. I love our culture. I love our music. I still speak our dialect. I love everything about being black. I thank God I'm black every day. But that is not who I am. I am a child of God first. That is who I am. So what is our Daivon identity? As for me and my house, Joshua says, we will serve the Lord. My identity is we must obey God rather than men. That's who we are. Then Daniel said, okay, look, you wanna send me to your schools? Fine. I'll take your money. I'll take your little job. You're gonna give me in the kingdom. That's fine. But when they told us that we're gonna change what you eat, he said, oh, no, hard stop. I'm not doing that. So he said, okay, I'll do these other things, but I will not put in my body what pollutes and makes me unclean. That's where he drew the line. He will not defile himself by drinking the culture of the Kool-Aid of the culture. That's where he drew the line. So you gotta ask yourself, where are we gonna draw the line? When are we gonna look this culture in the face and say enough, I'll give you an example. I'll give you an example. Oregon, the governor tried to make the mask mandate permanent. Oh yeah, remember, landed the fruits in the nuts? The governor tried to make the mask mandate permanent. The Catholics said, oh no, Protestants, oh, we with you. Muslims, we with you. We stood up and say, no, we push back. And her own party said, okay, okay, okay, okay, we're gonna do that. And they backed down because we stood up. Imagine if more of us stood up against what's going on in the culture. They would have no choice. And we're gonna see that in spades at the end of this talk. Now, as for the fore use, God gave them learning and skill and letters in all wisdom. So even though they were in the midst of all of this going on, God was still with them. The spirit of God was still with them. And sometimes we have to remember that that no matter what's going on around us, we still can cooperate with the grace of the sacraments. The power of the sacraments is when we respond by saying yes to the grace that God wants to do in our lives through those sacraments. Those sacraments empower us to live our faith with passion and conviction. We have the saints and the examples of the saints. We have incredible, amazing podcasts, all kinds of way to learn about our faith. There's no excuse. Yes, in the midst of the culture, everything going on, it's a time for us to grow in our faith. What I like to do is fill what I call gap time. Those gaps and spaces in your day, what are you filling them with? So for example, how many of you drive in your car every day, like 10 minutes, 20 minutes in your car? Oh, a lot of us. Wonderful. What are you listening to? Again, hopefully not political talk radio. All those people just, eh, eh, eh, all the time. No. How about this instead? You know what? I was, you know, someone was asking me, a friend of mine was asking about indulgences. Isn't that the thing that Martin Luther got all upset about? And didn't the church sell indulgences? Which it never did, by the way, that's a myth. But you know, I should probably learn a little bit more about that. So why about listening to something on Catholic radio or putting in a USB in your car and listening to some Catholic teaching? Spending that 15 to 20 minutes learning something about the faith you didn't know before. I do that all the time. I have a ton of podcasts. I'm listening to Bible in the Year and Catechism in the Year too. Right? You know, why? I'm on planes every week. Right, and again, listen to the announcement, put your tray table up again and again and again. I'm listening. Know what I'm realizing? The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don't know. There's so much to learn and grow from our beautiful Catholic faith. Oh, okay, okay, Nebuchadnezzar, here we go. Remember, every time he does something, he ramps it up. Here we go. Now, he wants to finish it off. I've brainwashed you. I changed your names. I'm forcing my teachings into your bodies down your throats. Now I'm going to finish you off. I'm going to create a golden image and I'm going to walk through every Israelite town and all of you will bow down before this golden image. If you don't, I'm going to burn you alive. And so what do they do? They bow down, huh? Just like a lot of us Catholics today are bowing down what's going on in the culture today. So here's what he says. He finds out the three young men, because Daniel's already working in the court, these other three young men, Hananiah, Azariah, and Mishiah, were put out in separate different cities and they found out that they refused to bow down to the golden image. So Nebuchadnezzar says this, if you do not worship, you shall immediately be cast into the burning fiery furnace. And who is the God that will deliver you out of my hands? You hear what he's doing? Nebuchadnezzar's basically saying, I'm your daddy now. I'm your God. What God is going to save you from me? He's calling them out. He's putting himself equal to God and I love these three God. Look at their answer to Nebuchadnezzar. If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from this burning fiery furnace and he will deliver us out of your hands. Nebuchadnezzar, we have a God, the one God, the God who can save and we believe with all our heart if we are faithful, he will save us. Then they add this, but if not, in other words, even if the God that we know can save, if his holy will that we will die, be it known to you okay that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image which you have set up. Even if it cost us our lives, we will not give in. Nebuchadnezzar's trying to cancel them. He's trying to de-platform them, right? He's basically acting like the Borg resists his futile. You will be assimilated just like the martyrs. The ones who we heard in the Roman Canon at mass this morning who'd rather die and did die rather than deny their faith in Jesus. And we all said, oh yeah, if that was me, I would have died for Jesus. Really? Hmm, what if a group of terrorists came in this arena, locked all the doors and said the only way you can get out of here alive, you take the host that's reserved, every each way everyone has to take a host spit on it, throw it on the ground and step on it and curse Jesus, then you can leave. If not, we'll kill you. Ooh, not so easy now, huh? Because you're thinking, wait a minute, got my grandkids, I got my job, I have to get back to my life. And then some of you may even say, well, I'll do it, but God knows I really don't believe that. I'm just doing this so I can get, is that what the martyrs did? When they went to Felicity, from Patriot Lucy, Agnes, Cecilia, Anastasia, did they say, well, we'll just say we denied Jesus, but we know in our heart, no! They were witnesses to God's love, no, we'd rather die. And we say that, but are we willing to do it? I'm not asking for an answer, think about it for yourself. What's interesting to me is who is not canceled in our culture today. For example, Planned Parenthood. Now, when I was doing research for my book on racism and actually my book on Father Tolton, that Kimberly Hahn talked about earlier today, I did my own research. I didn't want to see what this person said, Margaret Sanger said, or this person. So I went to the Library of Congress to the Margaret Sanger Collection and I read for myself her own writings. Here's what she says. She had, now before Planned Parenthood, it was called the Negro Project. Yeah, there you go. She was talking about the usefulness of ministers, black ministers in her project. She said, the minister's work is also important and he should be trained as to our ideals and the goal that we hope to reach. We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population. Exterminate the Negro population, like we were rats or vermin. That woman was a racist and a eugenicist and she's being held up by our country as an ideal. As an example, they're tearing down statues of the founding fathers, but they're holding her up. What else does she say? Those of us who believe that the benefits of the Negro Project is a vital key to the elimination of human waste. Why is it that canceled in our culture today? Pornography, which I talked about a little bit already. Pornography is a drug. It doesn't enter through the skin, it enters through the eyes and through the ears. And it has the same effects like if you take cocaine. It releases the same neurochemicals in your body, dopamine, serotonin, and nefinefine. And again, in order to get the same effect, you have to consume more. In Arizona, pornography has become a public health emergency. Why isn't that canceled in our culture? Transgenderism. Now, I want to preface my comments by saying this, and I said this a little earlier before. We are called by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to love all of our brothers and sisters, no matter what state in life they may be in. If they're same sex attracted, if they're transgender, it doesn't matter. They are our brothers and sisters. And we must love all of our brothers and sisters the love and the heart of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. If you don't, you're not Catholic. But what's the Catholic principle? We love everyone. We always don't love their actions. And we judge actions, we never judge people. We have to love and accept, but we cannot tolerate certain behaviors. Again, why? Because the way you act defines who you are. No, it doesn't. No, it doesn't. Who you are in Christ defines who you are, not your actions. In fall of 2019, the American Journal of Psychiatry had to retract a study that they did that where they concluded that there are, that people who do gender reassignment surgeries improve the patient's mental health. They had to retract that after the largest transgender study ever done came out and said that the biggest data set shows that there is no psychological benefits to paces of hormonal or surgical transition. No psychological benefits. Now you ask yourself, why are so many transgender people committing suicide? The suicide rates are extremely high. Why? And this should hurt us as Catholics. Because what they say is that well, we're not being accepted. That's why we're, no, that's not true. Here's what's happening. They have an issue where they're confused. All of us are confused. That's what sin does. It confuses us. Some people are confused about sexuality. So look at pornography or they have sex outside of marriage or they do other things that are sinful. We're all sinful. We're all sinners in need of God's mercy. That's why he did that. That's why he died on the cross. So we're all sinners. So stop, we can't be pointing fingers, right? So they have an issue where they're confused about their gender. So instead of getting help, psychological help, the coach is, no, just do the surgery. Start taking this medication. They're doing these surgeries and they go through this life altering, irreversible surgery. No, you can't take it back once you do it. And once they make this transition, they realize that the problem they had before didn't go away. And now, look what happened. That's why they kill themselves. We need to be compassionate. We need to be merciful. We need to be understanding and respectful, but we also need to be truthful. Ephesians 4.15 says, priest to truth and love, we also have to love the truth. So in research in this, I came across an article by a very confused woman, young woman, who thinks she's a man. Here's what she said. I didn't believe that having periods would be a part of my lived experience. I felt isolated. Everything about periods was tailored toward girls, yet me, a boy, was experiencing this and nothing in the world documented that. That's because guys don't have periods. It is literally impossible for a male to have a menstrual cycle. Impossible. Only women have that. But again, this confused generation. So the study I'm talking about, by the way, is called transsexuality among twins. Identity, concordance, transition, rearing, and orientation, Dr. Milton Diamond, International Journal of Transgenderism, Volume 14, Issue Number One. They did the largest study ever done on transgender twins, a set of twins. Same hormones, same food sources, all of that. And they did thousands, but let's, for the sake of number, say, 100. The 28% of the twins identified as transgender. Of the 28%, 70% of the 28% said that their transgender had nothing to do with biology. And here's the scary part, my friends. After puberty, after the normal process that God has placed in every man and woman, once that puberty kicks in, 75 to 95% of young children who express confusion about their biological sex outgrew it. In other words, they did nothing except allow the natural process to take place and they became unconfused about their gender. That's the reality. Dr. Michelle Crotella, who is not a friend of the church, she was the executive director of the American College of Pediatrics. She wrote an article called Genesisphoria in Children and Suppression of Debate, a peer-reviewed article. Here's what she concluded. There is no rigorous scientific evidence that Genesisphoria is an innate trait. In other words, there's no gender gene. Moreover, 80% to 95% of children with Genesisphoria accept the reality of their biological sex and achieve emotional health by late adolescence. The treatment of Genesisphoria in childhood, with hormones, effectively amounts to mass experimentation on and sterilization of youth who are cognitively incapable of providing informed consent. There is a serious ethical problem with allowing irreversible life-changing procedures to be performed on minors who are too young to give valid consent themselves. And she got fired for telling the truth. Romans chapter one, verse 19, Paul nails it, claiming to be wise they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man. Therefore, God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worship and serve the creature rather than the creator. So now the three young men get thrown into the furnace. The furnace was stoked up seven times hotter than it normally is. The furnace was so hot that the soldiers that threw the guys in there, they burned up from the heat coming out of that furnace. But yet when they were to miss the flames, what were they doing? They were praising God. Blessed are you, O Lord, God of our fathers and worthy of praise. And your name is glorified forever. For you are just in all that you have done to us. All your works are true. All your ways are right. All your judgments are truth. In the midst of the flames, they were praising and honoring God. My brothers and sisters in Christ, in the midst of the flames that we find ourselves in today, are we honoring God? Or are we whining and complaining? How come the bishops aren't doing this? How come the pubs not doing this? How come the, what are we whining about? Are we praising God? Yes, there's problems in your marriage. Your children may be turning away from the faith to atheism. They're confused about their identity and their gender. We're continually giving in the temptations of the flesh. What are we doing in the midst of those flames? We have to honor God. I've stopped listening to podcasts where Catholics, all they do is whine and complain about problems in the church. When, I asked myself, when is the last time that this person actually spoke about a deep intimate relation with Jesus Christ? That's why I don't go down rabbit holes. We gotta stay focused on who we are in Christ. That's how we witness to the power of in the midst of this culture today. So the three young men, they're not burning. So Nebuchadnezzar says, dudes, come out. So they came out. Not only did they, were they not at any signs that they were even in the fire, they didn't even smell like they were in the flames. Now come on now, you've all been camping or you got the barbecue, you know, you smell that steak and your clothes smell like steak and you're like, mm, mm. Come on now. They didn't even smell like that. So check this out. Now watch Nebuchadnezzar. When he saw the courage of these young men, what did that do to Nebuchadnezzar's heart? Check him out now. Blessed be the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego who has set his angel and delivered his servants who trusted in him and set at not the king's command and yielded up their bodies rather than serve and worship any God except their own God. Therefore I make this decree. Any people, nation or language that speaks anything against the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego shall be torn from limb to limb and their houses laid in ruins for there is no other God. There is no other God who was able to save in this way. Nebuchadnezzar is testifying to the Lord. Why? He's now woke. We're not asleep. They are. We don't need to be woken up. They do. We're the ones who are awake. We're not the ones that need to be woke. This culture needs to be woke. And look what happened. When Nebuchadnezzar saw the witness, look, we only have 1% of Catholics. 1% of Catholics who are living their faith, I'm not just about showing off the mass. You can go to mass every day and go to hell. That's not who, I'm talking about living faith with passion and conviction and the rosary and doing corporal works of mercy. I mean really living a Catholic life, 1%. Imagine if that was only 10%. What would our cultural landscape look like? What if we voted like Catholics? What if we put people in our schools who are Catholics? What would it look like? The culture cannot stand up when we say enough, no more, we're pushing back. When this culture sees more Catholics living like those young men, they have no choice but to recognize the power of God, working in a people who are faithful, working in a people who love and trust God more than anything this world has to give. Remember my friends, we are on pilgrimage. This is not our home. Our home is with God in heaven and we're trying to get there. And God gives us everything we need in word and sacrament to nourish us and strengthen us on that journey. The devil does not want us to go home. He wants us to go to hell with him. And he's putting all kinds of roadblocks up in this culture to try to prevent us from seeing our ultimate goal, our ultimate purpose, the ultimate meaning in life, a deep intimate relation with Jesus Christ. The sunum bonum, St. Thomas Aquinas said, the greatest good, life with God forever. But the culture cannot stand when we stand against the culture. Why? God is with us. David wrote in Psalm 124, if the Lord had not been on our side, when men rose against us, if the Lord had not been on our side, then they would have swallowed us alive when their anger was kindled. So my friends, I end now I'll take some questions with part of Psalm 27 that I call the woke Psalm. The Lord is my light and my help. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life before whom shall I shrink? When those who do evil draw near to devour my flesh, it is they my enemies and foes who stumble and fall. Though an army and camp against me, my heart would not fear. Though war break out against me, even then would I trust. There is one thing I ask of the Lord for this I seek, to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to savor the sweetness of the Lord, to behold his temple. I believe I shall see the Lord's goodness in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord, be strong, beast outhearted and wait for the Lord. My friends, the great American writer Mark Twain once said the two greatest days of your life for the day you were born and the day you find out why. I want to challenge each and every one of you to live your faith with hope, with passion and with deep love so that God can reveal to you your why. Amen, God bless you. Okay, thank you. Right, so it looks like they're set up some microphones for some questions, which I'll be happy to take. During all of your research with transgender, what is your conclusion that the end game is of why this is happening? Yeah, so the thing is when we remove God from society, people are trying to find meaning in different things. And so that's why they're trying to redefine everything in order to have it mean something else, right? So it's a cultural construct. So they're allowing the culture to dictate who they are. And if I don't feel like this, we'll just wait five minutes and then I'll be something else. You know, like in Oregon, you can go back and change your birth certificate to say, okay, it says male, but now it says now I could change it to female or neuter or whatever I want to call myself. I think it's, well, first of all, I think it's demonic, quite frankly. And second of all, when you turn away from God, you're trying to find meaning. And when you try to find meaning on your own is chaos. It's the Tower of Babel all over again. They tried to build a tower to God, right? Well, we're gonna try to be God. And what happened? Chaos. That's exactly what's happening in our culture today. Thank you. Hi, how would you respond to if somebody wants to be called Chi and you know it's a he? No, now here's what I would do. Here's what I would do. I said, I will call you whatever name you want to be called. So if you're a guy you want me to call you Michelle, I'll call you Michelle. Why? Why would I do that? Because think about it. Think of the M-F-V-A-Fries-E-W-T-N. Father Joseph Mary, right? So, right? I know girls who take male saints confirmation names and men who take women, that's fine. That's not right with that. So I'll call you whatever name you want, but I will not lie to you and tell you that you're a gender when you're not. So I will respect you by calling you whatever name you want to be called, but I will not lie to you. And think about this for a second. The penis and the vagina, what is it for? No, think about it. I don't need you to breathe. I don't need you to think. My brain does that. My lungs do that. I don't need you to have my heart beat. I don't need you to feel pain, right? The only, we're a self-contained system except the reproductive organ needs the other in order to fulfill its purpose and design, right? In order for, there's an intimacy and that's why in theology, the body is so important. There's an understanding of what that relationship is. It's not just a physical thing, like we're not just animals. We're manning God's image and likeness. And there's a purpose and a meaning for that act. Think about it like this. In Genesis chapter two, it says, therefore a man leaves his father, mother, and cleaves to his wife and they become one flesh, right? Think about what's the deepest form of intimacy we could have with God on earth? That has been in life. No, no, it's Eucharist, right? I mean, the deepest form of intimacy with God is the Eucharist, although your wife would love that answer, right? No, I mean, what about like, you know, it hurts my, what if you say it hurts my feelings? You won't respect, how do you respond to that? Well, no, I am respecting you by telling you the truth. I will call you whatever name you wanna be called, but I will not lie to you and call you a gender that you're not. And you say, all right, God says, male and female, he created them. Was God lying? Was God not woke? When that scripture is... So there's, oh, we know something that God didn't know back then? So either God is wrong or we're wrong, right? So, but just to finish my thought, so the deepest form of intimacy we have with God is the Eucharist, but in Genesis too, there's no Eucharist, that one flesh. So in other words, in a sense that the conjugal act is a Eucharistic act, in a sense, right? Because there's no Jesus or Eucharist back in Genesis. That means that act is sacred and holy because it's a participation in God's life. The more you separate from that, the more you begin to lose yourself in the culture. So it's not a matter of, I am respecting you by telling you the truth. I'm respecting you by telling you the truth in love if he's a 415. So if I can't be responsible for someone's feelings. You know? So that's, you know, again, our whole goal is, how do I get this person in front of me to want to listen to more of what I have to say? But I will not lie to a person. I respect you by calling me, but I won't lie to you. Thank you. You and a couple other speakers have suggested shutting off all political and podcasts. Do you have anything specific that you can recommend suggesting to somebody who listens to this political junk all the time as an alternative? Well, there's tons of great Catholic podcasts out there. You know, I think Trent Horne does a marvelous job at the Council of Trent. I have a bunch on my phone, the ones that I listen to. But I mean, people ask me, how come, you know, Pope Francis and the extraordinary forum, why did he take that? I mean, see, the thing is, I have opinions about all that stuff, okay? But the thing is, my job is not politics. Here's what I do. I can't change what's going on in Rome. What I can do for them is pray and fast. That's what I can do. What I can do is control what comes out of my mouth. And my job, when I left my career, 23 year law enforcement career, police chief, all that, to do this, God said I need, and at a racist, I need you, I was a threat assessment expert, Andy Terrorism. He said, I need you to do a different type of threat assessment for souls. So the more I get away from that and go down a rabbit hole, the less effective I'm gonna be in helping to bring people to a deeper love and intimacy with Jesus Christ. That's what I am staying focused on, not that other stuff. Because I, on the surface, not gonna get people to heaven. So there's a ton of other amazing podcasts and radio shows that people can listen to that will help actually build their faith and draw them closer to Jesus. Thank you. I'm actually the gentleman who was, just before that lady stole my question, but I wanted to actually expound on it because I work, she work in healthcare. And you would think that an institution that deals with science would believe that there are only males and females. And that's not the case. And it's getting worse in healthcare when it comes to the transgender issue. And I guess I just wanted to make the comment that you, for your talk previous to this, where you talked about chatting with that waitress. Yes. Restaurant. The way you brought that topic up, you were calm, you were deliberate and everything, I think that's what we need to do as Catholics in the secular world, especially in healthcare. Because like I said, it's amazing what is happening in our hospitals that you would think, wait a minute, we're all about science. And this has nothing to do with science. So I just wanted to applaud you. Well, yeah, and you're right. Cause even in European countries now that were the first ones pushing all this, they're actually pulling back now and say, well, hold on, pump the brakes here. Something's wrong. Like for example, I would ask a physician. So a woman comes in and says, she's a guy. And she says, I don't understand why I'm bleeding every month. So as a physician who studied physiology, biology, neuroscience, all this stuff, what, how can you treat her like a guy? How do you do that? That's, I just want to ask questions. Cause often what I do is I ask questions to make people think. Not emotion, no, no. It's time to stop emoting and it's time to start thinking. Absolutely. Cause I mean, think of all the things that women have had to really push like with cardiac health and different issues because men and women are different. And so, you know, a lot of the research was done with males versus women. A lot of medications have to be dosed differently and things like that. And so, yeah, I just wanted to give you some kudos on that. And it's gonna inspire me when I have to deal with this. Well, think about this, when contraception is being developed, why don't you think there's a male pill? You know, when they were developing it, they found that the male pill killed the sperm. So they stopped, let's do one for the women. Yeah. That's how that happened, by the way. So, you know, you're most welcome. If I can reach it. Hi, I just wondered what you would say to someone, particularly the youth, someone who's contemplating suicide, because it's a wide, widespread problem right now among the youth and they're getting younger and younger and we're hearing so much death rates due to suicide. Yeah, they don't have hope. They don't have hope. And this has accelerated the depression and suicide rates have escalated since the pandemic, you know, isolated. And here's the thing, my wife could probably give a better answer, she's a shrink, right, so not me. But I would say this, are young people need to have a sense, a real true sense of community, right? Young people are isolated, you know, they're on their phones, they're on, it's like them and the computer, them and the phone, them. Like, I meet young people now and I go like I shake a young man's hand, he can't look me in the eye, he's a little wimpy, little wimpy hand shakey cat. There's no human interaction there, right? And so that isolation and that desolation, it gets to you. And so what are they turning to? And I talk to, trust me, I talk to exorcists all the time. Ouija boards, seances, Charlie Charlie, Bloody Mary, pornography, all of these are portals for demons to enter into your life. This is real, this is not just some movie Hollywood thing, this is real. The way, it's not like the movies where you're walking down the street and the devil jumps in you. The way that the devil enters your life, you have to invite them in, right? So without a deep intimate faith in God, without adoration, without them really getting to understand who Jesus is and what he means in their life, they're, again, trying to find meaning in these other things which are opening doors to demonic. As a cop, you walk into a house where there's a suicide and not every time, when you're looking for a suicide note or some clue what was going on in that kid's life and you find pornography on their computer, you find Ouija board in the closet, you find tarot cards and all this new agey stuff and they're trying to find meaning and what their heart is truly desiring is a deep interrelation with Jesus Christ. We have to model that for them, not just teach them about it, we have to model that for them. And that is gonna give them hope. That a lot of kids, they don't think there's anything more than this life. They don't have in that, to them that's like what? Cause they're listening to Sam Harris, like Patrick Madrid talked about, Sam Harris, Daniel Day, Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins. They're listening to all these atheists and they're hopeless. There's nothing beyond here. So their mind is, what's the point then? There's a point. I think too, they're being bullied and the high school life, they can't see anything past that. Exactly. And they need to see that this is not the end. That's why he said, even death, Jesus had to die because death, remember Mavik cuts you off from God's life? He showed that not even the worst effect of sin, which is death is more powerful than God's love. That's what they need to see and understand. I've been to Australia eight times. I spoke to youth groups, I mean literally standing room only packed. And the parents are like, well, we've never had this kind of response to you. You've been here eight times. Why? Because when they say, who do you want? Come back to speak to us. They say that God, because he tells us the truth. I'm telling you every country I've been to, the young people, I spoke to over 2,000 kids at a youth rally in Papua New Guinea. And the questions they asked, they were deep and they were serious. The organizers of the event were shocked at the questions these young people were asking. They didn't shock me because they are thinking deeply and seriously. And they know it and tell me, we want to hear the truth and we're not hearing it. All the time, I hear that from young people because we're afraid. So you got a choice. You speak the truth in love and tell them who Jesus is or they kill themselves because they have no hope. We have no, that, he is our hope. He is our life. And they need to understand what it means to be in a deep relationship with Jesus. And so when I talk to young people, I'll just talk to them about the faith. That's why I share stories and experiences that connect the faith to the everyday lived experience. Okay, check this out. I spoke in a parish. I was speaking in a parish in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. I was not supposed to speak at the school. I was not, right? So the principal, I preached at all the masses that weekend. The principal hears me at one of the masses. Hey, wait a minute. You're the guy from Chosen, that confirmation program. You're just gonna talk to our kids. I'm like, okay, cool, I'll do that. So he called a specialist, he canceled all the classes for the morning so the kids could hear me. Seven, 800 kids. He didn't ask me what I was gonna talk about. So here, I mean, auditorium packed with kids. And the principal says, okay, what are you gonna talk about, Deacon? I said, the holy sacrifice of the mass. He went, what? He's always gonna talk about something cool, like the object of the body, you know? I said, no, I'll talk about the mass. And his face was like, I just made the biggest mistake of my life. So he made a nice introduction. At the end, he said, and the Deacon is here to talk to us about the holy sacrifice of the mass. Literally, you heard, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Eyes were rolling, arms were crossed. The looks on some of those kids' face, I'd rather be in physics right now than listen to this. I spoke for an hour and a half without stopping, connecting every part of the mass to their everyday life. After I spent 45 minutes while kids lined up around that order to him to thank me for coming. I, then I checked my Twitter feed after, within two hours, 300 kids followed my Twitter feed. That next week, I got a Facebook post from a parent. What did you tell my kid? During mass, my son is telling me who never wants to go to church. Mom, you see when the priest breaks off the hosts and drops into chalice, let me tell you what that means and what it means for my life every day. The mother's like, I don't know that. Why don't I know that? I've been counting my whole life. Once, in fact, go to my Facebook page. I just spoke to 1,300 kids in Paramatta school district in a suburb of Sydney. Those kids went nuts. The priest was like, holy cow, we've never had the kids around. And what I talk about again, the mass. There was two classes, six, seven and eight, then nine, 10 and 11, two separate, 701 class, 600 in the other class. They freaked, they loved it. I spent another almost hour taking pictures with the kids afterwards. They loved it because they want to hear truth, not fluff, that's what they want. Right, wrap it up. God bless you. Well, thank you. One more. They're giving me the hook here, so one more question. Yes, please. Okay, so two separate times in the past six months, a female childhood friend of 20 years put me on the questioning block if I would come to a gay marriage in the future if they married a woman. When I told them I would not be able to attend and explain why, they both completely closed off communication with me and threw away 20 years of deep friendship because of my answer. The biggest hurt is I don't think they're mad at me personally, but can't dare to associate with me because I remind them of Catholicism, which they would both say is an institution that has hurt them. So how can I be a friend to them when they have closed me off if that's even possible? And secondly, how do I remain hopeful when I have so many other Catholic friends that would go to the union and then I look like the bad guy? If it was my own children, I wouldn't go. Because look, here's the thing. God defines what marriage is, not a culture. Your friends are confused, but you love them. You say, look, I love you. I respect you, I support you, but what you're doing is not marriage. And I explain marriage literally means literally the state or condition of motherhood. So you're trying to enter into something that's not actually marriage. So I love you, I respect you. I'm gonna keep the door of communication open to you. My door is always open to you. My heart is always open to you, but I can't go to something that's trying to simulate what a marriage is. And I mean, you know, you talk about being tolerant, I hope you can tolerate this. Because I think people who are playing tolerance are the most intolerant people you ever wanna meet. Because they only tolerate if you agree with them. That's not intolerant, that's agreement, right? So that's the thing. We have to draw the line. If it were my own child, I would not go. Even if my wife was upset, I would not go. Because look, we have to stand in the truth. God defines what marriage is. And yes, that's hard. This is the hard stuff of life. This is hard stuff. And you're not going because you don't love them, that's what they need to understand. You're standing by your principle, biblical principle, not a cultural construct. You're standing by the word of God, right? And so yes, always keep that door of communication open to them all the time. Look, I have people who are same-sex attracted who come to see me all the time. A lot of people don't know that. Because they think, oh, Deacon Harold, he's a hard ass. You know? But I'm telling you, know why they come to me, they hear me talk and they're like, I could talk to that guy. And I sit down with them and we have amazing conversations. I wanna hear their stories. I wanna enter into their experience. I want to get to know them as a person. So I love them as a brother in Christ. And we have amazing friendships, you know? And they, we still disagree, right? But they see that I don't hate them. And if this was not being filmed, I'd actually share an experience that happened back in December, but I can't because I don't have permission from the person to share this. And if it was not being recorded, I would share it. But it would really drive the point home to how do you balance the truth in love with the truth of our faith? But that's what I would say. Thank you. Yeah, thank you guys very much. Appreciate it. God bless you.