 you this morning. Have you had a good week? Yes. Are you ready to go home? Ah, no, yes. We have had a good week. And no, I don't think we're ready to go home. In fact, I think many of us are like Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration. It's like, Lord, can we just stay here a bit longer? Let's build a tent. And one for you and Moses and Elijah. We're just going to hang out here for some time. And boy, that's what I would love to do. I'm just, as Bob is leading and you're all singing and we're singing and praising. I'm just like, Lord, man, this is a good place to be. And I hope you've been being rejuvenated and strengthened and encouraged this week. And we're going to do a little more business this morning as we prepare to go home today. And so a little bit about myself for those that don't know me. So again, Father Drake McAllister, I've been a part of the Bosco Conference since 2007. So I've been coming for a lot of years. And many of you knew me for many years while I was just regular strength, Drake. And then then one day I appeared at the conference in 2019 as Deacon Drake. And then I appear back at this conference to the surprise of many as Father Drake. And why that's a surprise to many is because I'm one of those rare married priests. So oh, oh, oh, I don't want to hear what he has to say. I'm out of here. No. So I long story super short, I've told the story many times over the years of the conference. Yeah, I didn't grow up in the Catholic Church. I was a Protestant minister for 13 years, California, a decade in Seattle, entered the church in Seattle in 2004. And it was such a profound gift. And when we came into the church, we pretty much knew saying yes to the Lord might mean just an interim ministry. And the Lord said, no, get equipped for future ministry, whatever that may be. And it wasn't until many years later that I knocked on the door of the bishop and said, is it possible that I could qualify for the dispensation? So if some of you may or may not know that many times it's most common, same within Anglican ministers, I'm just hitting this up front because people usually have questions. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it. But but maybe you've heard more like an Anglican priest who is outside the Catholic Church, but never left the Catholic Church, eventually, his heart gets changed and opened up and he wants to come into full communion. And then he enters the Catholic Church, he can apply to receive a dispensation from the discipline of celibacy, not the doctrine. Doctrines don't change, disciplines can. And he's allowed to continue in that priesthood. So I'm one of those guys, and ever since the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI got distorted, Pope JP II expanded it, Pope Benedict XVI expanded it even further. And I wasn't Anglican, I was actually a Pentecostal was my background. So they're letting anybody in these days is what that means. And but actually that's that's not the case. When if you're Anglican or Episcopalian is super easy, I mean, just the process is pretty kind of dry. Every other any of the denomination, it's a case by case basis that has to be submitted on a one on a one-off case to Rome and personally improved by Rome. So it was about a 10-year journey from start to finish. But with time I knocked on the door of the bishops' residence and said, let me in and till the time that I finally restored nation. And so yeah, so the last time I was here I was just on the in my diaconate. So it's a joy to be here. And I was ordained in December of 2019. So that meant I was ordained and the like two months later it's like BAM COVID and it's me alone in the church celebrating Mass and my first year priesthood to an iPhone and and the mysterious myriads watching online. I do have a website that I don't really maintain and keep up but I did put a little bit of this papal paper trail on and I actually don't have it on the screen but it's just from John 17 Jesus' Prayer for Unity and the website is thattheymaybeone.org. That they may be one.org. If you're curious to the papal paper trail on how the dispensation works you can get a little info there. And so I am married. I've got a fantastic mission-minded wife and who was in the trenches with me for many years in ministry heading into our Catholic Church and is still in the trenches with me in ministry. I'm the father of five daughters so it's all girls all the time in my place three out of college through Franciscan and then two more at home. So I've got you know the the the 15 year old should be 16 here this next week and then the 12 year old and the 16 year old's like I get a text yesterday. Dad she doesn't have a phone by the way just in case you got parents that are sorting out. She actually doesn't have a phone to text on because we don't get phones in the home. All right she's like dad can you get a picture with Father Mike. A prophet has no honor in its hometown I'm telling you that is never more real for parents. I was like no he's gone I didn't even know what he was gone I was like forget it I'm not getting to selfie with Father Mike. No but he was actually gone. So one other fun thing about being a priest in Steubenville and it's just so great to hear from so many people come from different places that so at our parish the Holy Family we've got we've got three deacons and just because you're in Steubenville strange things happen so we've got three deacons along with myself we're all Protestant converts to the faith our three deacons also all have PhDs you know one in business one as a theologian and another in computer science and two of them are black belts so you know when it's like they say guard the doors you know our deacons are ready are ready to act and so it's it's it's an amazing place to be here and it is even more amazing to get to serve you as you come year in and year out and and it's really our joy is the office of Kettichetics and the Kettichetical Institute it's our joy and our privilege absolutely to serve you. So where have we been this week? Bishop Hyang got us started with the karygma and reminding us of these four fundamental aspects of the gospel and that we are ordered towards mission and we should be on mission. Father Mike then reminded us what are those idols what are those good things that were turning into the ultimate things he's putting his finger and the Holy Spirit is putting his finger on things for us. Dr. Carol Brown invited us to a deeper trust in Jesus and it takes more and more trust these days to be doing what God is calling us to do and and today I want to talk a bit about the Eucharist and really it's in the context that these Eucharist are revival I want to talk a little bit about the current culture in which we live and some of the things that the Lord is needing from us as we go home so that we can be more effective in what he's calling us to do and I just want to read a scripture as we get started and this has really been my prayer for the last many years as I was approaching priesthood so let's pray with this together the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Heavenly Father open our hearts this morning to receive you to receive you even in a more full and deep way even as we prepare for the sacred liturgy to which we will worship draw us near in this moment Holy Spirit speak to our hearts open our ears. This is Paul to the Corinthians when I came to you brethren I did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God in lofty words or wisdom for I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified and I was with you in weakness and in much fear and trembling and my speech and my message were not implausible words of wisdom but in demonstration of the Spirit and a power that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God and Heavenly Father I pray as we have this final talk and as we enter the sacred liturgy that you would be making this a reality for us fill us with the Holy Spirit and the power of God that we might go home and have words to say that aren't just from us but it's you Lord speaking through us that those we listen to they're not resting in our wisdom they're not trusting in us but in in you Lord God and Lord you know we have to proclaim we must open our mouth and teach and speak and preach but Lord we need you teaching speaking preaching through us so come Holy Spirit in this moment now begin to move our hearts for the things you want to do in us as we prepare to go home today Jesus name I pray amen all right so a quick survey the crowd who here is under 40 let's see okay under 40s alright over 40s I think the over 40s are winning but I think the over 40s are winning that means they're still doing in fact I got to talk to her brother from where was it Wisconsin Michigan I forget where he said he was and I said what do you do he says I'm just retired I get to serve the Lord do whatever the church needs and do some CCD and I just I just I was almost in tears listening to him saying thank you for not being done yet thank you for saying yes to the Lord until your very last moment and so the reality is the world has changed around us and often we hear people say well the world is changing the world is changing we stop saying it is changing because it has in fact changed the world you grew up in if you're in the over 40s is not present here anymore and even the under 40s you've seen and noticed it over the last 10 15 years the world has changed so what do I mean well I mean you're never gonna get an actual phone book again ah you know there's somebody out there right now going man I missed that phone book you just flipped to the page go find the hair salon go get my hair set and it was just easy to find you know you can flip to ace hardware there it is in the phone book call the number and talk to a person yeah you're never gonna get a phone book again that's never coming back you're never gonna get buttons in your car get its touch screens forever you're just gonna be oh man this is just ridiculous your kids are never gonna know a time when they couldn't get instant answers to everything and anything and they feel like geniuses because they can do that right I mean when I was a kid and I wanted to spell the word hamster is like hamster I just got to be a pee in that word like you write it like doesn't have that word doesn't have a pee in the dad how do you spell hamster so what would he do he would hand me a dictionary and say look it up and I'd be like look it up and those well because I had no other option if dad's not gonna tell me my small get the dictionary flip to it get to the answer hand oh man there's no P in it okay in fact my 12 year old my youngest who is still mostly homeschooled now she's still homeschooled she tells her friends horror stories one day my dad made me look up the word in the dictionary can you believe it that is not an exaggerated story did not make that up she has actually shared that story that's the kind of abuse we have in the McAllister household so but today what do we do we've got this here you want to learn how to spell hamster spell hamster there you go and and and there's there's there's no level of resistance to getting the information and no level of ability to keep the information so we've got smarter phones and dumber kids these days I think the threshold is is is low on so many things but the world has changed and in a more serious note when we look at how the culture has changed around us so things like the internet and we still get people talking about the internet as if it's a new thing like oh on that internet you know like it's not a new thing it's not going away this is the way the world operates now one of our roller coaster parks here nearby you know officially said we're never taking cash again it's credit only you can't use any cash in the park social media is a reality all of the ways that people communicate with one another and have the perception of friends the perception of relationships and instant access to everyone's immediate thought anybody who has watched kids use social media and texting you just think what a bad idea man nobody when I was in junior high needed to know my instant thought in that irrational moment like stupid girl Felicia I can't believe she you know you post it it's like no junior higher needs an outlet for unfiltered thoughts in the privacy of their own bedroom so they can communicate all their dysfunctions this is the reality though it's not going away the reality that each person has in their pocket a device that connects them to the most vile foul evil pornography language debauchery that I would have had to work really hard and be really sneaky as a kid to go find and it's just right here you could pull it up within two seconds I could ask Siri to look for the same thing in every image video of the most vile things are just right here a culture doesn't stay the same with that kind of access a culture doesn't cease to change with that kind of access how else is our things changed we live in a time when you can change your gender that this is a settled discussion if you are biologically male you can go get a surgery become female and vice versa June is pride month and it's not about treating people of dignity because we're all in for that as Christians everyone gets treated with dignity and respect period we want to help all people least of these the most of these and everybody in between but pride month is about calling objectively good things that are objectively not good and our culture has moved on that most recent Supreme Court justice in her confirmation hearing is asked can you define what a woman is and she says no I am not qualified to define what a woman is and this is one who is going to sit on the highest court of the land and make decisions on consequential life altering things for our nation and we realize in these moments I think we've entered the rabbit hole we live in a world now if we say we want babies to live in the womb it's called violence against women and it is hate speech for wanting babies to live it's it's hostile it could kill your career if you say men cannot get pregnant and these are all recent stories you can pull up I've got sources for all these that are just happening in the last several weeks because it's a constant conversation I talked to a friend yesterday who was teaching at a private school not a Catholic school but a private school and in the diversity training they were told explicitly when you see a group of girls in the hall don't say hello girls because that's presuming their gender you have to say something neutral like hello students or something this is common this is not fringe this is not just in some sectors some states now are just having open drug use of all kinds of drugs even hard drugs just open in public in the streets and not just on the edges of town we don't live in a nation that is being governed by a Christian worldview anymore the world has changed and these things that I just went through this is just the last 10 to 15 years that all of these things have really come to a head and beyond that there's been things that have been around for a long time that have really already transformed our culture but things like you can you can tell we've set aside our Christian underpinnings a long time ago because if you're a teacher in the public school you have not been able to publicly talk about Jesus as a public school teacher for a long time that is a fast road to get fired what that means is the government is openly and directly hostile to the Christian faith and as long as you keep it in your building we're happy for you to do your thing but do not bring that into the public square we live in the world where the prevailing reason of why we're here is scientific materialism that nothing nothing managed to create everything and along with that the prevailing worldview of the day is atheistic evolution that since nothing created everything there is no reason for you to be here you're here but it's just biological accident you don't need to be here and our young are hearing that you don't need to be here you don't need to be you there is nothing objectively good about who you are what you are why you are and when they jump on the internet they're happy to find lots of people that are willing to answer that question of what they should be why they should be and what their worth is or isn't we need to stop saying the world is changing it's it's changed the question is have you changed have you changed what I mean by that I'm not talking about have you become like the culture you wouldn't be at the Bosco conference if if you were trying to be like the culture there's a lot of other places you could be have you changed your methods have you changed your program have you changed how you were going about the ministry of the gospel to meet the needs of the present day which was the chief purpose of the Second Vatican Council we don't change the content the content does not change but how we engage with the culture absolutely must change I'm here today as a Catholic because one day in Seattle Washington I turned on the radio and caught EWTN radio and which happened to be Catholic answers there was a new method and a way to engage the world and I stand here today as a priest because of that one show I turned on one day what a random encounter and I've never met any of those people in person how have you changed and what is God asking you this week I know he's been putting his finger on some aspects of you and your program same when you go home boy don't go back to business as usual so when I moved to Seattle years ago before I was Catholic and we were pastoring a church there I knew Seattle was gonna be a very relativistic city and I wanted to get better equipped to have conversations in that city so I bought a book on relativism it said okay I want to want to read up on this how can I engage and understand the culture in which I live and so when we finally established our church down there we are in the University District of Washington there next to the University of Washington and every Friday night we'd go out on the street and take clothes and food to some of the street teens that were there there was kind of a trendy street teen population that they would come and hang out down there and so we would go and do this social ministry and then have a chance to evangelize as we had opportunity and so one night this this guy Brian came by Brian the Buddhist and and I'd been reading this book on relativism so that I just made it my mission I want to try and find as many people who don't think like me that I can have conversations with so that I can get better at articulating what needs to be articulated so Brian the Buddhist came by and he was intrigued by our social ministry he was about 21 22 sharp guy studying Greek reading the New Testament in Greek but he's Buddhist so he would come and help us in our clothes distribution and ministry to the kids every week he would come and help because he was drawn in by that and then he and I would talk theology or philosophy or parenting or whatever while we're doing stuff and so one night you know or as we would talk he would be articulating well listen you know I do believe in reincarnation you're gonna die and then you're gonna come back to something else and and then at another time we're talking he said yes and I and I believe that all roads lead to heaven listen you know it doesn't matter which path you pick they all get there so one night I looked at him and said well if all roads lead to heaven why not choose Jesus and Christianity because you only have to go once and it was it was the most surreal moment because you could just see it just stopped for like a solid 20 seconds which seemed like an eternity while the gears twisted in his head and he's just realized my philosophical philosophical and theological presuppositions have just been exploded that those two things actually can't exist or if they do exist that all roads lead to heaven doesn't matter and he's and we just kind of went on and he came back for another couple of weeks and then and then stopped coming but before he left he gave me a book it was called living Buddha living Christ and I don't know where he is today and what he's doing but in there he just wrote a really nice note saying I really have appreciated getting to know you all you are truly living the gospel and thank you for befriending me it was just a beautiful a beautiful note my hope is some something of that conversation settled in with him and stuck but here's what I know we can't keep doing business as usual the Lord is needing us to change not the content but how we're reaching the world in which we're living as priests man we got to stop debating the seven-minute homily come on people I mean you've got people that are surrounded in the world by six days and 23 hours a week and they're gonna come for one hour at mass if it's a long mass and we're gonna think seven minutes of preaching is enough to inform the mind move the heart and lead people to a responsive faith that will change their life that is not reasonable that is not reasonable yeah you're clapping because i'm talking about the priests let's talk about let's talk about ccd uh we've got to have a ccd that is evangelizing and not just taking kids through workbooks and actions not the workbooks are bad but that is engaging them where they are and leading them to responses of faith confirmation programs that aren't just running kids through the sacraments but making a bold attempt to engage them with the Holy Spirit that this becomes a transformative experience every now and then i run into a student here at the university that said tell me about your conversion to the Lord and they said in my confirmation class i met jesus i said tell me more about that because that's pretty rare and it's so amazing when you see those that are willing to retool up end how can we do this and it's a church we got to be people that aren't just growing spiritually fat by taking more and more in and never serving we got to be people who are going to the margins serving the least of these so the culture in which we live it's changed have we changed are we adapting so millennials gen z's when you when you break it down and the ages are all fluid and i'm not super into like pegging people in those particular generations but it's helpful for the sake of discussion this is kind of your age ranges and the reality is this world today 74 percent are going to get their news and information on their phones and and 60 percent or more they don't want to read they just want to watch a video just talk to me just tell me what i need to know so what does this mean this means that they're not reading your church bulletin they don't care what's in your church bulletin um that's the 40 and over crowd and probably really the 60 and over crowd maybe i don't know now my wife's the reason bulletin all right so and tiktok as a social media platform boy you want to know what is really impacting this gen z it's the tiktok generation it's once covid hit tiktok increased 475 percent 69 of gen z is on tiktok and what is tiktok for those of you if you're not on tiktok it's just what this young man here is doing you can get a video and it's it is ultimate path of least resistance let's get a stupid video a funny video a meaningful video and you watch it until you're bored and then we're done you swipe and just next video swipe next video swipe next video you can go to categories animals whatever hot girls whatever it is you know what people are looking for um because they're not going there really to be edified and there's really great things on there there's good stuff but there's loads of just foul stuff now there's no porn on tiktok thankfully but um but it's just ultimate path of least resistance that is just giving kids a a perception of joy a perception of meaningfulness and it's nothing but vapid how do we take people from that to this they get in front of the Blessed Sacrament they're like wait a minute the picture hasn't changed how do i swipe it's it's it's the same thing for like the last 32 seconds like well no we're gonna spend an hour in that area an hour what the heck are we gonna do for an hour we're gonna listen to what there's nothing happening here how are we taking people to this Eucharistic revival how are we taking people here and the reality is all the over 40s you're gonna be in charge for the next 20 years and you can't just complain that the world isn't the way it used to be we've got to stop complaining we've got to engage and we're not going to be like the world we're not going to reach the world by being like the world we're not going to just reach them by just doing more transient stuff that doesn't matter we need to take them to the substance that's the Eucharist and most powerfully in the mass so i want to talk about three things briefly this morning purpose problem pathway and then i want to have a prayer time i should have put that on there as a fourth p purpose of this Eucharistic revival a lot of the conversation here about this is reverence for the Eucharist reverence for the Eucharist yes we want more reverence for the Eucharist we want greater attendance at mass more adoration but none of that is the purpose of the Eucharist revival the purpose of the Eucharist revival is mission it's to engage with the world when you go to the U.S. bishops site here's what it says what is the revival to inspire prepare the people of God to be formed healed converted united and send out to a hurting and hungry world through a renewed encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist the source and summit of our face can i get an amen i'm looking for a little more we got one more paragraph all right but this is what we're to be sent out or what is the fruit of the renewal what is once renewed what should this fruit be to form inspire and launch missionary disciples filled with the love of God and neighbor that comes from an encounter with Jesus in the Eucharist to the margins of the church and the world can i get an amen yes this is the purpose of the Eucharistic revival what that means for us is that if we do not have a greater zeal for souls at the end of this revival we will have missed the point if all we do is have a better time gathering together in the building we have missed the point it's all about mission it's all about mission so how often do we get opportunities to have conversations with maybe dissenting Catholics maybe those who don't believe maybe our Protestant brothers and sisters maybe somebody who's not a Christian are we looking for those conversations are we reading up and being aware of the culture in which we live or the people you're serving how many of you i'm curious have seen there's uh i think it's a netflix documentary social dilemma how many have seen that all right we need a lot more hands going up in the room write down social dilemma if you if you didn't raise your hand or somebody next to you didn't raise your hand write it down for them text it to them and you need to go watch that because it's a really profound documentary on all the creators of the social media google and facebook and twitter and all of these things and the creators saying we didn't fully realize what we were creating when we created it and we realized we've kind of created a monster and it's really balanced then none of them say we hate technology but many of them are like that by the end of the documentary they're like we don't give our kids any of this stuff because it's bad news and these are all like young hip cool atheist secular kind of people you know they're not like a bunch of church ladies just complaining about the internet these are the people who created it sorry church ladies you're really making things happen you're making things happen there's lots of things we need to be reading and keeping our pulse on the hand of culture but most of all we need that holy spirit empowered encounter with what we're doing so how how have we changed have we changed are we changing the purpose of this Eucharistic revival is mission that's why it's here so the problem what has led to the need for this revival well fundamentally it's a lack of understanding and personal conversion to Jesus and adherence to doctrine it's all of these pieces when these things are lacking there's no way people are going to have reverence for the Eucharist and a lot of this came from this pure research study that said 31 percent of Catholics don't believe in the royal presence at the Eucharist and which is kind of like half true it's actually not as accurate of a stat as one might say so when you look at the actual study what you see is from weekly mass goers from weekly mass goers it's a it's over 60 percent now it's not a hundred percent so we wish it was more but it's not 63 percent either so there's a lot of work to be done but it's not quite as bad as the study makes it sound but this kind of put things on the radar and the bishops amongst many other things are saying listen we we need to get back to focusing on the Eucharist and focusing on mission now the challenge with this generation is it's often said they're low commitment that they're not invested under achievers you know we live in the no contract generation everything cancel anytime um but that's not really it this generation that they're not motivated by institutions they're motivated by issues they're not motivated by just things that are good for the sake of just simply being good because you tell me it's good they're motivated by things that change things they're not gonna come to a deep understanding of the Eucharist because the church says so but they're needing to come to a personal deep belief in the Lord and I had sometime back a young man in this age range coming in through rca and he got down to the end and stopped short of saying yes to the Lord of the church and he says I believe everything I I just don't want to be associated with the Catholic Church and there was a real obstacle with the institution and he was one of the most sincere Jesus loving practical guys I'd ever met and he's still gonna make his way in but he's having a slow landing so how have we changed are we prepared to meet the needs of our day we got to help people grow and understanding in that personal conversion to Jesus so they can adhere to the teaching of the faith so what's the pathway thanks be to God pathway forward is you you're thinking oh man we're we're in a world of hurt now yeah we are God's evangelization plan and it's a bad plan right we we are it we are it if Jesus had submitted a business plan you know with the 12 samples reached the world it would have been kicked out of business school like this is a bad plan but you're the answer namely the catechist needs to be the one to teach to proclaim the vocation of a catechist there's two things we hear from the directory of catechesis to do what transmit the teaching and the content of the faith and not just to transmit the content lead them into the mysteries lead them into the mysteries and what father mike said though the night is absolutely true he said he gets to go put on a little video and it looks really great and big and reaches lots of people and he says but what makes the difference is you day in and day out in the trenches doing that one thing that nobody will ever know like the story dr carol brown told of barbara morgan's mother sitting down praying with her to be intentional about her faith we don't even know barbara morgan's mother's name but we're all here because of barbara morgan's mother what a gift so for us the pathway is to teach and i'll invite bob if he's up if he's nearby make his way on up it's for us to teach i just want to give you one scripture here there's a lot more like to say but i want i want to get to the time we can spend some time with the lord here second timothy this is our battle cry this is paul to timothy i charge you in the presence of god in christ jesus who is the judge at living the dead preach the word be urgent in season and out of season convince rebuke exhort be unfailing in patience and in teaching man that sounds exhausting yes and you know it's exhausting in season and out of season with patience for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching but have itching ears that they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own likings and will turn away from listening to the truth and wondering to miss as for you always be ready to endure suffering do the work of an evangelist and fulfill your ministry this is what the lord is saying through the apostle paul to me and to you we're gonna go home from this conference and we're gonna persevere we're gonna get back in and ask the question lord what are you asking me to change and and you can do it and and there is no shortcut and you've been doing it thanks me to god and you're gonna continue to do it and jesus needs you to do it and so i want to pause on the teaching here and want to go with this question how was god asking you to change you've been in workshops general sessions mass adoration and i know the lord is putting something on your heart and i want to lead us to just a a prayer ministry time right now and i want to give you two things i'm going to ask you to pray about and it wants you to write these things down this isn't just i just want to do this man i want this to be concrete and intentional when you go home the first question is lord what do i need to change in my program and lord jesus what in my program do i need to surrender to you what do i need to change in my program what do i need to surrender to you i want to take the next 60 seconds here i just want to let you sit with the holy spirit and want you to reflect on this question and write down what the lord has already been putting on your heart this week that you know you need to go home and do second thing i want you to take a moment and ask the lord this is the more difficult thing what do i need to change in my life what do i need to surrender to the lord in my life and know the lord he he has for me this week and i know he's doing it for you he's asking you to surrender something i have no idea what that is and i don't need to know because the holy spirit knows but we're here this morning to make some commitments flowing out of this retreat we've been on so let's take another 60 seconds and let's listen to the holy spirit and i want you to write down what the holy spirit is asking you to not the world it's easy to look at the world and say this needs to change he's asking us what do i need to change