The John-Henry Westen Show - May 02, 2023


Forgotten Virtue： Fr. Chris Alar Reveals Secrets Of Avoiding Hell


Episode Stats


Length

34 minutes

Words per minute

154.60147

Word count

5,369

Sentence count

374

Harmful content

Misogyny

25

sentences flagged

Toxicity

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

18

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode, Father Chris Alar talks about modesty and what it means to be a priest in the modern world, and why it is so important to be modest in public in order to be holy and holy in private.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 This is why the priest has to be a man.
00:00:02.220 It's not chauvinism. It's not sexism.
00:00:04.920 This has been the teaching of the church for centuries
00:00:07.460 about that nuptial relationship, the union of man and woman.
00:00:11.640 And that's what Christ is wed to his church, the bride. 0.81
00:00:15.060 She's the feminine. He is the masculine. 0.77
00:00:18.360 He gives the seed. The priest is in persona Christi.
00:00:21.280 The church receives it, and from it, she gives life.
00:00:30.000 We have arrived at summertime, and of course, that comes with a bunch of challenges.
00:00:36.100 I'm speaking naturally about modesty.
00:00:39.860 Now, it comes in two forms, the challenge.
00:00:42.640 And that is for men, principally anyway, cuss through the eyes. 0.55
00:00:47.460 How do we do that? How do we look away?
00:00:50.180 How do we avoid this kind of temptation?
00:00:52.960 Do we avoid the beach altogether?
00:00:54.400 What do we do? It's impossible.
00:00:57.560 You have the same problem from your TV or your device all the time during the year,
00:01:02.240 but summertime brings it out into the streets,
00:01:05.160 so there's nowhere you can look.
00:01:06.800 What do you do?
00:01:07.840 Not only that, on the other end of the spectrum, for women principally again,
00:01:12.440 the issue of dress.
00:01:14.560 How do I dress properly?
00:01:16.760 What is immodesty?
00:01:18.500 How do I know if I'm offending against purity?
00:01:22.260 Tough questions.
00:01:23.200 Tough questions we don't hear much about from our pulpits or anywhere else.
00:01:28.260 So, we brought on for you someone who is used to answering hard questions.
00:01:33.020 His name is Father Chris Alar, and I'm sure you remember him from before here at LifeSite News.
00:01:38.000 He is the provincial superior of the Marians of the Immaculate Conception.
00:01:43.100 You know his order.
00:01:44.300 Father Don Calloway, who wrote the great book on St. Joseph, consecration of St. Joseph.
00:01:49.480 Father Michael Gately, who did the great work that flows from St. Louis de Montfort's great work
00:01:55.340 of True Devotional Mary.
00:01:56.140 His was 33 Days to Morning Glory.
00:01:58.460 That's the same order of priests, and he's their superior.
00:02:01.980 Stay tuned for this episode on Modesty with Father Chris Alar.
00:02:08.120 Hey friends, before we continue, you need to know of a crazy new development.
00:02:13.600 Some of the largest stores in the world are now sending opt-out messages ahead of Mother's Day.
00:02:19.580 Allowing consumers the opportunity to ignore Mother's Day and to avoid honoring their own
00:02:24.800 mothers during the month of May.
00:02:26.140 I'm not even kidding.
00:02:27.880 The month of May is especially sacred as we set May apart to honor not only all mothers,
00:02:34.000 but also the Mother of God, Mary Most Holy, and our own mothers too, obviously.
00:02:38.760 Therefore, in ignoring Mother's Day in May, it's a scandal.
00:02:43.520 And my pledge to you, from all of us here at LifeSite, is that we will never stop honoring
00:02:49.660 the unique role of motherhood as woke elites reduce all mothers to birthing persons.
00:02:56.720 If you agree that motherhood is sacred, empower us at LifeSite to proclaim the value of motherhood
00:03:02.160 this month with renewed force and faithfulness.
00:03:05.240 Big tech and mainstream media believe themselves powerful enough to ignore the very base that
00:03:11.900 supports them.
00:03:12.880 But unlike them, we at LifeSite honor you.
00:03:15.300 We pray for you.
00:03:16.020 We celebrate motherhood in our mission to build a pro-life generation for our children and grandchildren.
00:03:21.600 During the month of May, donate to LifeSite News in the honored memory of your mother,
00:03:27.920 living or deceased, knowing that LifeSite will pray for you and your mother.
00:03:32.280 And if you'd like, we will send you a card telling your mom of your donation in her honor.
00:03:37.980 So please be sure to leave your name and your mother's name in the donation form in the link
00:03:43.660 below.
00:03:44.540 Thank you for choosing LifeSite.
00:03:46.220 And may we honor all of our mothers during the month of May, especially our Heavenly Mother.
00:03:51.600 One of the things that we are dealing with, especially today, we're entered right into
00:03:56.660 summertime, is modesty.
00:03:59.700 And it's tough because, well, for the woman's part, well, I'm going to the beach, I'm going 1.00
00:04:05.080 swimming, what am I going to dress in?
00:04:06.660 And when I'm walking around on the street, when I'm going to church, those are all different
00:04:11.500 places.
00:04:12.020 There's different modesty for those places.
00:04:14.240 What is it?
00:04:14.740 And what should it be?
00:04:16.140 What do I do to, if they're thinking really as Catholics, it's what do I do to protect
00:04:20.220 my brothers in the faith from impurity?
00:04:23.380 And that's tough.
00:04:24.780 Who knows what that is today?
00:04:26.600 So all very tough questions.
00:04:29.560 What's the teaching of the church?
00:04:31.060 What should we really do?
00:04:32.880 It's a very confusing thing.
00:04:34.080 And I thank you, Father, for being willing to answer it.
00:04:36.220 It's a topic that few are discussing, but mostly so important today because it affects
00:04:41.860 all of us.
00:04:42.520 All of us leave the house.
00:04:44.640 We're all in clothing.
00:04:45.980 And so we have to think about this issue.
00:04:50.300 And as with everything else, we need to base this on church teaching and, of course, the
00:04:55.540 teachings of the scriptures and whatnot.
00:04:57.100 In fact, this is in scripture.
00:04:58.880 People don't think it is, but actually it's 1 Timothy 2.9.
00:05:03.440 And, you know, this is the letter from St. Paul who wrote that women, and it really applies
00:05:08.480 to men just as much, should dress themselves modestly and decently in suitable clothing.
00:05:16.460 And so we know it's right there in scripture as an important topic.
00:05:19.960 And why?
00:05:20.880 Because modesty is one of the 12 fruits of the Holy Spirit.
00:05:25.660 And those, the fruits of the Holy Spirit are important for eternal glory.
00:05:30.720 It's such a part of our faith.
00:05:32.780 Modesty itself to, I think the best way to explain it is to dress modestly is to really
00:05:39.940 avoid causing sexual excitement in another person, and surprisingly, even yourself.
00:05:47.420 I, you know, I always point out that the doctor's always trying to yell at me to get into the
00:05:53.280 gym more because I have a heart condition, and he's always threatening me that I need to
00:05:57.360 get some more exercise.
00:05:59.120 And it's funny because when you go there, you do see a lot of idol worship of ourselves,
00:06:05.320 male and female, in front of the mirror, very obviously worshiping the body.
00:06:11.280 And so we have to be very careful here because this is one vice that can, immodesty, that can
00:06:17.320 lead to a lot of other reduction of other virtues, such as temperance, you know, such as
00:06:24.020 gluttony because we want more of something.
00:06:26.780 And of course, lust, when we're invoking it in ourselves or another.
00:06:31.360 So very important that we be careful of this.
00:06:34.240 Break this down for us, Father, because a lot of this is very difficult to discern.
00:06:38.700 There used to be a saying about custody of the eyes.
00:06:42.320 Nobody even has heard of that anymore.
00:06:44.540 What does that mean?
00:06:45.840 And what does that mean in specific for guys when they're trying to practice purity?
00:06:51.980 Custody of the eyes is something that was a regular part of my confession, still is,
00:06:56.160 unfortunately, from time to time because, you know, we're still males.
00:06:59.940 We're still biologically being, you know, God created us as sexual beings.
00:07:05.880 The key is to rightly order those sexual and natural instincts that we have in us.
00:07:12.760 I know for sure that it can be done.
00:07:14.960 We can live chaste lives.
00:07:16.980 I delayed my priesthood for years thinking I could not be celibate.
00:07:20.780 But, well, with the grace of God, everything is possible.
00:07:24.580 And so what we have to do is order it rightly.
00:07:27.240 Now, you mentioned how do we do it when the summer's coming up and, you know, we have invitations
00:07:32.500 to the beach.
00:07:33.460 Are we, first of all, keeping custody of our own eyes?
00:07:36.640 Because it can be very challenging at places like the beach.
00:07:39.360 But it's also the eyes of others that we can invoke.
00:07:45.300 You mentioned the swimsuits.
00:07:46.540 There's a great quote from John Paul that he wrote.
00:07:50.360 Now, if I may read this quote to you, I think it's very powerful.
00:07:53.920 He says,
00:07:54.260 There is nothing immodest about the use of a bathing suit at a bathing place like a swimming
00:08:01.640 pool.
00:08:01.960 He went on to say that it would be wrong not to refer here, if only in curiosity, to another
00:08:08.420 problem, pornography. 0.99
00:08:10.760 And he linked the two.
00:08:13.060 And he says, this is shamelessness in art.
00:08:17.200 That's how John Paul described pornography was shamelessness in art.
00:08:23.800 Now, he said it's very broad.
00:08:25.920 It's a very broad problem and extremely complex.
00:08:28.700 But he said, because there's a lot of different kind of art.
00:08:32.700 And I thought this was very fascinating.
00:08:34.720 And he said, I'm concerned for the present only to define the gist of the problem.
00:08:40.300 But basically means we don't even know how to define the problem.
00:08:44.500 And if I may, John Henry, I pulled up from my seminary notes, Aristotle.
00:08:49.780 We studied a lot in our philosophy courses.
00:08:53.040 I went to Franciscan University for philosophy.
00:08:56.140 But here's what I found interesting when I went back to my seminary notes.
00:09:00.560 He would talk about the spheres of action.
00:09:04.340 This was Aristotle.
00:09:06.020 And he put modesty under shame.
00:09:10.080 Because here's what Aristotle said.
00:09:13.140 Regarding shame, if we have too much of it, it's shyness.
00:09:20.700 If we do not have enough of it, it's shamelessness.
00:09:26.720 And isn't that funny?
00:09:27.480 That's how John Paul just described pornography.
00:09:30.960 Shamelessness.
00:09:31.980 That means we have a deficiency.
00:09:34.260 But the mean is modesty.
00:09:37.080 So we have to find that middle road, the modesty.
00:09:41.000 If we have too much of it, we're shy.
00:09:44.140 If we don't have enough, we're shameless.
00:09:46.320 And so John Paul did a great connection there, saying there's a right time and a right place
00:09:51.980 of how we dress ourselves and what's appropriate.
00:09:55.800 One of the things is, I think, a discerning factor.
00:09:59.720 And you said it already, Father.
00:10:01.000 I think it's beautiful.
00:10:01.920 It's probably the most sure guide it is to dress, to sexually arouse or not.
00:10:10.200 That's probably one of the greatest guides because you're able to, I think most people
00:10:17.340 are able to see that.
00:10:19.360 Now, things change.
00:10:21.020 I mean, some people think, oh, no, this is nothing.
00:10:24.720 This is totally modest when it's like a crop top and a miniskirt that's not too, too mini.
00:10:32.780 And it sounds ridiculous, but that's the calculus nowadays.
00:10:38.620 Is there some kind of guideline that the church has given or anything like that that basically
00:10:46.640 says, OK, here's something minimum, like a minimum basis?
00:10:51.200 Is there something like that?
00:10:52.240 In fact, the church keeps going back to modesty.
00:10:55.400 In fact, Mother Angelica was a good example. 0.99
00:10:57.940 We were talking about EWTN a second ago earlier off the air.
00:11:01.800 You know what?
00:11:02.220 Mother Angelica's shrine, they would have a box of sweatpants and long sleeve shirts. 0.79
00:11:08.060 Um, for people who would come in, um, that may be what she would define as immodestly dressed.
00:11:16.080 Um, you know, obviously, uh, shorts, uh, too, too tight, um, skirts, too short, um, men in tank tops.
00:11:24.920 But she made it very clear that you were going to have to put on, um, these additional pieces,
00:11:32.220 articles of clothing to be able to enter into the place of worship.
00:11:35.980 Because she said, this is offensive to God.
00:11:39.080 And, and why would we say this is offensive to God?
00:11:42.240 Well, you know, one of the favorite apparitions that I've always read about was Our Lady of Good
00:11:47.020 Success.
00:11:47.420 And this is a powerful apparition that really tells us a lot about the future.
00:11:53.640 This was back in 1610.
00:11:56.640 So over 400 years ago.
00:11:58.760 And Our Lady warned about immodesty and dress. 1.00
00:12:02.500 This was 400 years ago in Ecuador.
00:12:05.180 You know, how many problems of immodesty and dress did they have in Ecuador 400 years ago?
00:12:09.480 But she said there will be almost no innocence left in children.
00:12:16.580 She said there will be almost no modesty left in women. 1.00
00:12:21.820 She said this extreme time of need in the church, they will shut down one who seeks to oppose this.
00:12:31.780 And we've also talked, John Henry, about the cancel culture.
00:12:35.300 Um, you know, we speak the truth and we're canceled.
00:12:38.660 Isn't this interesting that Our Lady said 400 years ago in Ecuador that those who will speak up
00:12:44.620 will be shut down?
00:12:46.460 She used the word shut down.
00:12:48.440 And then she talked about a time in the middle of the 20, just after the middle of the 20th century.
00:12:54.400 Well, what happened?
00:12:55.740 The 60s, the sexual revolution, the, um, the extreme, you know, birth control, pornography,
00:13:02.440 abortion being legalized.
00:13:04.060 All of this, under the guise of freedom, really was a rebellion against God's purity,
00:13:11.720 not restrictions, but God's guidance of purity for us.
00:13:15.340 So Our Lady went on to say that these days, talking about shortly after the middle of the 20th century,
00:13:21.220 the atmosphere, she said, will be saturated with the spirit of impurity,
00:13:28.960 which as a filthy sea runs through the streets, squares, and public places with an astonishing freedom.
00:13:40.380 Freedom is the ability to do what you ought to do, like see modesty around you.
00:13:44.660 Without your children, you bring your teenage boy to mass and you have to worry about him
00:13:49.620 focusing on anything but the mass because, uh, you know, girl next to him is dressed
00:13:55.980 very modestly and it works both ways.
00:13:58.320 Uh, you know, uh, a male can do the same thing to a female. 0.67
00:14:01.660 So Our Lady warned us of this in, uh, Our Lady of Good Success.
00:14:05.260 Yeah, so, in fact, Fatima, too, John Henry, she mentioned this.
00:14:08.900 She said, more souls go to hell for sins of the flesh than any other reason. 0.60
00:14:15.620 And she told this to Jacinta, I think it was.
00:14:18.720 And she said, quote, that certain fashions will be introduced that will offend our Lord very much.
00:14:27.640 And so, we know, back to your original question, how do we know a guideline or a barometer here?
00:14:36.040 Well, we know that if it incites sexual disordered excitement in another,
00:14:42.920 or you're, worse, trying to incite sexual lust in another.
00:14:48.800 This can be, John, um, I think it was Father Harden said, uh, it's a mortal sin.
00:14:54.320 And so, we have to be aware of this, because Our Lady also said in Fatima,
00:14:58.640 she said a warning to the women there. 1.00
00:15:01.760 She said that, woe to women lacking in modesty. 0.98
00:15:06.580 And she said, let men, she didn't let men off either.
00:15:10.440 She said, let men avoid greed, lies, envy, blasphemy, and most of all, impurity.
00:15:17.780 So, we have Our Lady giving us, uh, definitely the barometer 1.00
00:15:22.240 by which to try to, uh, to, uh, to adhere to.
00:15:27.060 Just a quick note before we return.
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00:15:49.520 And now, back to the video.
00:15:52.240 And this is a really tough thing because, I mean, God created woman and created woman beautiful.
00:16:00.460 Like, you would say the most beautiful thing on earth.
00:16:03.280 And so, this is tough.
00:16:05.480 This is not something that, you know, we're not naturally inclined to.
00:16:09.700 We are naturally inclined to it.
00:16:11.460 It's for a reason.
00:16:12.620 If you can unpack a little bit of that for us, because I think that's very confusing for people
00:16:16.380 because the human body is beautiful.
00:16:19.360 God created the beauty.
00:16:21.240 But how are we supposed to figure this out?
00:16:24.880 It all goes back to John Paul's dignity of the human person.
00:16:28.400 And it's, you know, pornography.
00:16:32.080 Being a priest, I've been hearing confessions for nine years.
00:16:35.860 I've been ordained for nine years.
00:16:37.580 And it is probably the most prevalent confession, especially among men.
00:16:41.700 But surprisingly, we're hearing a lot of females confessing this now in the confessional. 0.76
00:16:48.040 It is probably the most confessed sin that I at least personally have heard over the last nine years.
00:16:58.240 Why?
00:16:58.680 Because it's so easily accessible.
00:17:01.240 And what John Paul II said was that when we engage in pornography, we're violating the dignity of the human person
00:17:10.120 because we've objectified them.
00:17:12.840 And the demons love this.
00:17:15.200 In fact, I forget which saint or blessed it was that said this,
00:17:20.240 but they said every time you view an image to objectify it,
00:17:25.780 especially a man viewing an impure image of a woman,
00:17:31.100 it is said that there's a demon behind every one of those images.
00:17:36.420 So in other words, every time we choose willfully to look at these images and indulge in this,
00:17:45.200 that there is a demon behind each of those images that is trying to find that portal into our soul.
00:17:54.860 And remember, the eyes are the windows to the soul.
00:17:57.460 We know this.
00:17:59.180 And that's why we have to have custody of the eyes, as we mentioned.
00:18:02.300 Because if we don't have custody of the eyes, you might as well open your door wide open
00:18:07.620 and in allowing portals to be open for these demons to take over.
00:18:12.000 And that's why the catechism warns this.
00:18:15.600 What is the church teaching?
00:18:16.820 Okay.
00:18:17.740 In the catechism 2521, it's very clear.
00:18:23.080 It says, modesty protects the intimate center of the person.
00:18:30.600 And what is it?
00:18:32.240 It means it's a refusing to unveil what should remain hidden.
00:18:38.620 And I thought that was a very well choice of words.
00:18:42.560 It says that it's ordered to chastity.
00:18:45.320 So modesty leads to chastity, which means keeping your physical body pure.
00:18:50.580 And we can't do that without a spirit of modesty.
00:18:53.760 The catechism says it guides how we look at others and how we behave toward them.
00:19:01.840 And here's the key, in conformity with the dignity of the human person.
00:19:08.000 So we are to love God and love our neighbor.
00:19:11.320 When we violate this, we have violated the second greatest commandment.
00:19:15.960 We have not loved our neighbor.
00:19:17.720 In fact, we violated them.
00:19:19.180 And in many senses, we committed adultery with them.
00:19:24.360 If we've engaged in pornography or leaving custody of the eyes as an important guide,
00:19:32.740 we can fall into adultery, as Jesus said, just in our mind.
00:19:37.860 So we're talking something very important here.
00:19:40.600 This is actually very interesting, too, because priests like you
00:19:43.400 give up the opportunity to be with a woman and see her in that way that is for husband and wife only. 0.87
00:19:54.320 And when we are asked to practice custody of the eyes, we make a similar offering, all men do, 0.99
00:20:01.120 in that we are not engaging in this, which is proper to husband and wife only,
00:20:06.960 because that's someone else's wife or to be someone else's wife or whomever. 0.99
00:20:11.440 And so we have this opportunity to all men to unite ourselves with what the priest does,
00:20:18.100 except the priest, of course, does that perpetually and gives himself over to that as a sacrifice.
00:20:24.180 But the priest is not going to miss out, and all men aren't going to miss out on the beauty of the female,
00:20:33.060 because heaven is going to have the perfect beauty, the beauty of God,
00:20:38.120 which supersedes all human beauty, all created beauty.
00:20:42.460 And so there is much more fulfillment in heaven, is there not, than what we will get on earth
00:20:49.140 with any of the beauty we can experience here.
00:20:52.440 Undoubtedly.
00:20:53.240 I told you before the show began that I delayed my vocation for years,
00:20:57.600 thinking I could never live a fully celibate life.
00:21:01.280 And it delayed me.
00:21:03.240 Well, that was just the evil one, because with God's grace, we can.
00:21:06.940 But you know what is fascinating, John Henry, to me?
00:21:09.760 I'm not stifling.
00:21:13.240 What is the whole purpose of the male in the marital act is to give that life-giving seed.
00:21:20.940 It is to share that love with another and to give that life-giving seed.
00:21:26.880 Now, what does a priest do at the altar?
00:21:29.060 The priest is in persona Christi, and he gives that life-giving seed from the altar,
00:21:35.380 that seed of life that comes from the sacraments, that comes from the altar,
00:21:41.720 and he gives it to the church.
00:21:44.480 And that's why we call the church feminine, 0.88
00:21:46.500 because the church receives that seed from the priest.
00:21:50.760 This is why the priest has to be a man.
00:21:52.880 It's not chauvinism.
00:21:54.300 It's not sexism.
00:21:55.920 But the church is the feminine, mother church. 0.82
00:21:58.980 She receives that seed that the priest, in persona Christi, who Christ was a man, we can't change that.
00:22:07.860 And it's not that man is greater than woman.
00:22:10.240 No, no.
00:22:10.680 Men and women are completely equal.
00:22:12.220 It's just they're different, and they have different capacities.
00:22:15.680 Like, you know, you always heard that the highest calling in the church is a cloistered nun,
00:22:19.820 you know, even higher than a diocesan priest because of the way of life that they're devoted to.
00:22:25.800 So it's not about chauvinism, but that priest at the altar in confecting the Eucharist gives that life-giving seed.
00:22:34.260 The church is the feminine, receives it. 1.00
00:22:37.540 She then places that, if you will, in like a womb, and then gives birth to life. 0.90
00:22:45.360 Now, people always say, well, the priest should or can be a woman. 0.96
00:22:49.100 Well, actually, if that was the case, knowing the nuptial relationship of the mass, if the priest was a woman, you would have, excuse me, people are going to be offended by this, but lesbianism is because you can't have the female giving the seed and then another female receiving the seed. 0.94
00:23:10.220 And that's where the nuptial relationship between the man and the woman come into play.
00:23:17.040 And this has been the teaching of the church for centuries about that nuptial relationship.
00:23:22.720 And it does involve the union of man and woman.
00:23:26.340 And that's what Christ is wed to his church, the bride. 0.81
00:23:29.740 She's the feminine. 1.00
00:23:31.220 He is the masculine. 0.67
00:23:33.000 He gives the seed.
00:23:34.220 The priest is in persona Christi.
00:23:35.580 The church receives it, and from it, she gives life.
00:23:39.700 And, you know, that's why, John Henry, in the catechism, it talks about the importance of this because, you know, modesty protects the mystery of the people.
00:23:50.520 You know, you mentioned, you know, husband, wife.
00:23:52.500 If for me as a priest, my spouse is the church.
00:23:56.440 Oh, the church needs to let priests marry. 1.00
00:23:58.060 You know, I used to think that, and I always wanted the church to be able to allow us to marry.
00:24:03.780 Now that I've been a priest for nine years, I will be the number one advocate for not allowing priests to marry. 1.00
00:24:11.740 It's not because the church or God is punishing us.
00:24:15.380 It's because I have to give my 100% to my spouse.
00:24:22.540 And if I'm married in a civil sense or even in the church to a female spouse, I have two spouses.
00:24:31.180 I have the church, and I have the beautiful woman.
00:24:35.720 I can't share myself.
00:24:38.460 The church in her infinite wisdom has made it very clear why a priest isn't married.
00:24:44.400 Even though it's a matter of discipline, it's not a matter of dogmatic revelation.
00:24:48.960 The priest can marry.
00:24:50.500 That could be something that's changed.
00:24:52.360 Now, a woman being ordained a priest, that cannot change. 0.99
00:24:57.680 But a priest being married can.
00:25:00.100 I'm an advocate that they don't because either the spouse or the church is only going to get half of my attention.
00:25:05.940 And it's not fair to the other.
00:25:07.840 So, the church has said that this modesty protects the persons and their love for each other.
00:25:15.040 It's decency.
00:25:17.060 Catechism 25-22 talks about this, saying it inspires us, not just in our love emotions, but in our choice of clothing.
00:25:28.040 It says this in the catechism.
00:25:29.840 It says it keeps silent what should be kept silent.
00:25:34.580 It reserves the person's dignity where there's a risk of unhealthy curiosity.
00:25:42.660 And so, keep that intimacy sacred between the husband and the wife, just like between the priest and the church.
00:25:52.520 It's funny because this is an area where women, you might say, have the greater power. 1.00
00:25:57.460 So, in the normal sphere, men are more powerful and stronger and whatnot.
00:26:03.940 That's why you have the weightlifting competitions all won by these trans women, the men who call themselves women, and in swimming and in running and in boxing and wrestling. 0.90
00:26:17.300 Well, because God has ordained it that men are stronger than women. 0.99
00:26:22.680 It's just physically the way it is.
00:26:24.160 It's a physical difference, right?
00:26:25.720 Absolutely.
00:26:26.160 But in this sphere of purity and modesty, it's the women who need to protect the men because they are given in their bodies this beauty which can lead men astray. 0.81
00:26:42.240 And so, there's an opportunity for a woman to literally protect a man in that way that you're normally used to men have to protect women.
00:26:50.540 God's greatest creation is the female, I mean, the Blessed Virgin Mary.
00:26:56.400 The greatest act of His creation is the Blessed Mother.
00:27:00.360 And in her feminine beauty, you know, you look at, I was, like I said, I've dealt with heart problems.
00:27:06.620 I was in the doctor's office and I just happened to be looking up on the wall at the two charts of the male body and the female body.
00:27:13.500 And you can see quite a difference.
00:27:16.400 The man's body is pretty straightforward.
00:27:19.060 He's got the typical intestines to process food, to dispose of it properly, to heartbeat, pump blood, and be able with the skeleton structure to exist day to day.
00:27:32.800 But the female, just the design, if you look at the inner workings and the anatomy of the female body and you don't acknowledge an intelligent designer, I don't know where you can come up with that argument against an intelligent designer. 1.00
00:27:51.200 It is incredible.
00:27:53.600 The amazing structure that God used, the intelligent design in the female. 1.00
00:27:59.580 Now, but then the outer beauty, why is the art throughout the centuries been the female body? 0.76
00:28:04.920 It is because of the beauty of the female body. 1.00
00:28:07.440 So you are right.
00:28:08.440 With that beauty, as with anything, could come a distorted use of it.
00:28:13.360 What is pornography?
00:28:14.720 Just as we read earlier from John Paul, nothing more than a distortion of art.
00:28:20.560 The art of the female body has been distorted.
00:28:23.080 And that's why the catechism, or I should say, John Henry, the USCCB surprisingly actually talked about this too.
00:28:29.580 This was back about 15 years ago.
00:28:33.120 And the USCCB said that modesty is so important because it leads to purity.
00:28:40.380 And purity is something we must follow.
00:28:43.300 Remember, nothing impure will enter heaven.
00:28:45.780 So in other words, this all ties back to our ability to enter heaven or not, is if we're pure or not.
00:28:52.200 And the USCCB says it flows from the virtues of temperance, chastity, and self-control.
00:29:00.440 Those are big virtues.
00:29:02.120 The USCCB said that a modest person dresses, speaks, and acts all in a manner that supports and encourages purity and chastity.
00:29:16.300 And not in a manner that would tempt or encourage sin.
00:29:21.360 Father, I think you hit on there some of the advice that priests give in the confessional that is most central to this.
00:29:28.860 Because it's related to modesty, it's related also to other areas of modesty,
00:29:34.140 which, from a psychological perspective, feed right into impurity and the struggle with trying to maintain custody of the eyes.
00:29:45.640 And that refers to eating, to excess, and fasting.
00:29:51.020 If you could go into that, please.
00:29:52.100 This is why the church is always taught, well, based on Scripture, that we have to be in a state where the Spirit controls the flesh,
00:29:59.220 not the flesh controlling the Spirit.
00:30:01.420 I mean, this is the basics of our faith right from Scripture.
00:30:03.800 St. Paul tells us this.
00:30:06.000 And the problem is that people don't understand the meaning of fasting, for instance,
00:30:09.900 or gluttony being one of the seven deadly sins.
00:30:13.280 Well, what does it hurt to enjoy a big, thick steak?
00:30:15.680 Sometimes, no, anything in moderation is okay.
00:30:18.840 But when we take it to the extreme, and we can have gluttony not just in food.
00:30:22.880 We can have gluttony in the Internet, our use of time.
00:30:27.360 And in, for instance, wanting to see more impure images.
00:30:30.680 One of the dangers of pornography is you can never get your fault.
00:30:36.280 You never become full.
00:30:38.240 You always need more and more and more.
00:30:41.640 And the danger of that is it then goes into areas that you can't get satisfied anymore.
00:30:49.940 And just, let's say, a beautiful artistic view of a lady without clothes then becomes her doing something in an act.
00:31:00.040 Then all of a sudden it becomes her doing something in a really unnatural act.
00:31:05.200 And then it becomes something really perverted.
00:31:07.820 Now we get into bestiality. 0.94
00:31:09.560 Now we get into pedophilia.
00:31:12.380 So the danger of pornography is it's a slope that just keeps getting deeper and deeper and deeper.
00:31:19.980 And so we have to head that off at the past.
00:31:24.000 Fasting is a beautiful way to do that because it puts the spirit in control of the flesh,
00:31:28.220 not the flesh in control of the spirit.
00:31:30.760 And we have to realize that when we deny our flesh, we become spiritually in control.
00:31:39.000 Whereas when our flesh controls the spirit, that's why our faith teaches us that the three evils out there
00:31:45.160 are the flesh, the world, and the devil.
00:31:48.400 Yourself, others, and the evil one.
00:31:51.380 And it starts with the flesh because our concupiscence leads us to want to be slothful rather than diligent,
00:32:00.140 prideful rather than humble, and lustful rather than chaste.
00:32:05.320 These are the reasons why we have to put that spirit more in control of the flesh.
00:32:10.620 A great, great way to do that is through temperance and things like fasting.
00:32:14.580 Awesome, Father.
00:32:15.720 You know, we don't normally end off with a prayer, but if you wouldn't mind, this is a topic, as you said,
00:32:20.400 Our Lady said, more souls go to hell for sins of the flesh of impurity than for any other reason. 0.98
00:32:26.100 If you could pray for all the viewers that we might strive for purity.
00:32:31.340 Men in terms of cuss of the eyes and remaining pure in their hearts,
00:32:34.820 and women in terms of being able to dress modestly to look out for their brothers in this very real war,
00:32:41.300 the war where Satan wields most of his power.
00:32:44.620 Absolutely.
00:32:45.460 Let us pray.
00:32:47.260 In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
00:32:50.780 Amen.
00:32:52.560 Lord Jesus, we ask you for the continuous grace in this world that is so eroticized,
00:32:59.960 in this world that is so over-sexualized,
00:33:03.380 in this world that is so unchaste and has lost its sense of sin.
00:33:08.520 We beg and implore you to have mercy on us and for the sake of your sorrowful passion
00:33:15.600 to be able to forgive us, but most of all to enlighten us, to lead us.
00:33:23.320 We ask for your mercy and forgiveness on those who are acting in an impure manner,
00:33:29.520 either through dress or actions or words.
00:33:32.760 We are asking that you help us to find purity in every word, deed, and action.
00:33:41.280 We ask that you help us to live pure and chaste lives,
00:33:45.220 to be examples of Christ and the purity of our Mother Mary.
00:33:50.780 And we ask St. Faustina that you intercede for us,
00:33:53.840 and Mother Mary, that you show us and lead us to your Son,
00:33:58.640 through your humility and purity.
00:34:01.380 And we ask all this through Christ our Lord.
00:34:05.300 Amen.
00:34:06.360 In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
00:34:10.200 Amen.
00:34:10.700 Amen.
00:34:11.360 God bless you, Father, and thank you.
00:34:13.160 And God bless all of you.
00:34:15.660 And we'll see you next time.
00:34:16.440 Hi everyone, this is John Henry Weston.
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