WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.031 --> 00:00:18.745 The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist. I didn't know this was a fight. That's why you're losing. Today we are beginning either to domesticate the devil or else to deny him. He is most powerful when he is denied. 2 00:00:21.007 --> 00:00:46.117 Welcome to The Devil's in the Details. The Devil may be in the details, but God is on the throne. We are continuing The Devil in the Castle, the book that you wrote, St. Teresa of Avila, Spiritual Warfare and the Progress of the Soul. This is part four, just on Mansion 3. Mansion 3 or Chapter 3? Well, it's on the third mansion, but what I've done in the book is 3 00:00:46.876 --> 00:01:11.007 taken the the third the opportunity at the third mansion to help the reader understand a broader context of the progress of the soul and so the it's it's broken out in three you know basic phases if you will the purgative the illuminative and the unitive and then underneath that there are sub phases if you will 4 00:01:11.497 --> 00:01:23.123 and let's just call them that for sake of conversation that help the reader understand what does it mean to make progress and, and, 5 00:01:23.326 --> 00:01:47.575 And it's generally accurate. It's not, you know, it isn't, the sole isn't a mechanism like with gears and like a transmission. So you're in first gear and you know you're in first gear because it says one and you're in your first gear has a range. That's true. That's a comparison. There is a range. But then when you shift, you know you're in second gear and there's no question about second gear. 6 00:01:47.575 --> 00:01:54.173 In the three ways, it is fairly true that there were distinguishing 7 00:01:54.562 --> 00:02:24.093 or demarcations, if you will, that help you to know you're in one and not another, but they're not as clean as a transmission shifting. So these are just ways to help you generally understand what it means to have progress. So before you go in, this show is sponsored by Holy Habits app. If you haven't checked out that app and you're trying to grow in holiness, a lot of the wisdom, I was the primary subject manager, 8 00:02:24.093 --> 00:02:53.877 subject matter expert behind the app and just go check that out in the Apple or Google app stores. And what I was going to say was that this being part four of Mansion 3, I think it's really important to go back and listen from the beginning if you are just jumping in now. Yeah, it'd be helpful. Yeah, because anyone can listen to these episodes out of order and take something from them because of the way that you wrote the book. 9 00:02:53.877 --> 00:03:19.747 However, to understand the context of the entire conversation, you really should go back from the beginning. And with that, please, you know, rate us five stars, comment, all that stuff really helps get the show spread. But that was a light ask right there. Well, nothing helps more than, you know, you sharing it with someone and telling them to listen. Yeah, we need that because we don't have a million dollars to promote the show. And if it's a blessing to you, tell others about it. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. 10 00:03:20.118 --> 00:03:35.812 So we're moving on to last show we covered mediocre piety, which is on page 44. If you wanted to follow along in the book. And now we're moving on to stage two. Yeah. Which is intermittent piety. Yeah. Sub phase. Yeah. Two intermittent piety. Yeah. 11 00:03:35.812 --> 00:04:01.124 So do you want to read mortal sin? So mortal sin, loyal resistance against mortal sin, habitually avoids the near occasion of sin, deeply regrets sin when recognized, does penance to make reparation, makes adequate confessions with some contrition and purpose of amendment. So we're in the first, you know, first through the third mansions. We're in the purgative way. 12 00:04:01.613 --> 00:04:31.448 And what it happens is the soul begins, as they're going from good to better, they just become more and more aware of their sin. As you said in the last show where we talked about, the more you pray, the more you pay attention to the sacraments, the more you engage fully, the more awake you become. In terms of spiritual warfare, the—let me see if I believe this is true. I'll say it and we'll test it. The biggest issue is a lack of awareness. 13 00:04:31.904 --> 00:04:43.126 Because if you're not aware, you don't know how to fight. You don't know how to work it. You don't know how to make progress. So that awareness is because you're drawing nearer to God 14 00:04:43.379 --> 00:05:06.852 He opened your eyes more to things he wants you to see, to fight or to engage with or to embrace like virtue, that sort of thing. So you're more and more concerned about mortal sin. In this case, you're regularly avoiding it, deeply regret it. 15 00:05:07.274 --> 00:05:29.498 because you recognize how you're participating in the suffering of jesus in terms of what he suffered in our in his passion uh you don't want to hurt other people you don't want to hurt yourself you want to go to heaven so it's just increasing at this stage okay venial sin out of curiosity when did that happen to you 16 00:05:30.764 --> 00:05:57.022 I remember many instances where I had, where I experienced this, but I, in terms of, I guess it all kind of comes back to my reversion, the time of my reversion. It was probably all around that time. But you didn't, you didn't experience anything like this before your reverse. Well, I mean, I may have, but you'd call yourself a nominal Catholic before that. Barely. Yeah. Well, I say that now knowing what that actually means. I, you know, I don't want to, 17 00:05:58.793 --> 00:06:25.591 I don't want to scare anyone or make anyone feel disheartened, but most people who consider themselves nominal Catholics, in my opinion, you can tell me if you think I'm wrong, are fairly nominal, if that. Yeah, I mean, this could sound harsh, and I don't mean it to. But I think, you know, if you saw a little kid 18 00:06:26.637 --> 00:06:41.150 drinking out of a can that you knew had Coke in it, but you would also put turpentine in it and you, cause you were doing some funky test, make sure to get some, you know, something off of brass or something like that. Um, um, 19 00:06:42.550 --> 00:07:07.373 you would, you would be kind of harsh and urgent in messaging. What I'm speaking from my own experience and people may say, well, that was just you. And, but my response would be, well, now you're connected to way more people than I am. You know, I have 35,000 people on Instagram, something like that. Do the harder thing. A lot of conversations with a lot of folks and the people I meet at seek in Congress and all these other events. Yeah. 20 00:07:07.525 --> 00:07:29.007 And it's not hard to see the same patterns in other people that I went through, or they say the same things that I said, or live the way that I lived. And we're not judging here. No, no, no. I'm just using it to say it's not strictly, you know, it's not like I've done a survey, but it's not hard to, when you go to a parish and... 21 00:07:30.661 --> 00:07:56.615 I'm trying to think of a way to say this very carefully. We've talked about it before, but how many people go up to receive and how many people are in line for confession prior. The problem is there's not enough people in line for confession and everybody goes forward. And that's one metric, and it's one that you can't even necessarily quantify because maybe everyone went the night before, right? Or they're crossing their arms. The current parish we go to, on Sunday at least, I sit in the front row 22 00:07:57.323 --> 00:08:05.643 And a lot of people go forward with their arms crossed. It's hard for you to tell. Yeah. So my point is... 23 00:08:06.233 --> 00:08:34.685 I think a lot more people are there than they might realize, you know, and as you said, we're not condemning anybody, but there is a reality to folks needing to wake up as I needed to wake up and knowing it's like we talked about firm purpose of amendment on the last show. If you're not, if you don't have a firm purpose of amendment, what are you doing? You know, contrition is tough because there's levels of contrition and mortal sin can affect your ability to be truly contrite. Would that be the proper reason? 24 00:08:34.685 --> 00:08:43.882 Yeah. You know, so anyway, maybe that was a rabbit hole. We didn't need to go down, but. No, I don't think it's a rabbit hole. I think it's just, we're just struggling with being gentle. 25 00:08:44.371 --> 00:09:11.438 And I don't know that it's warranted because, look, you know, even Lumen Gentium, I think it's 14, in the documents of the Second Vatican Council, which is supposed to be, if you listen to a lot of traditional folks, you know, stuff that's watered down or problematic or whatever, even out of the Second Vatican Council, it says that if you don't adhere to all the teachings of the Church, 26 00:09:12.181 --> 00:09:37.544 and you don't do so and persevere in them until you die, not only are you going to be judged, it means going to hell, but you're going to incur a stricter judgment, which means it's going to be worse for you. So that's a modern church document. Now you go pre-conciliar, things get a lot more blunt and harsh and clear, I think. I think our modern times, we're actually doing it right now 27 00:09:38.776 --> 00:10:02.603 because we're part of the culture, which is, you know, just say it. Yeah. There's an apostolic letter that came out recently or a document from the Vatican. I'm not criticizing the document, but I'm just making a reflect 22,000 words. Yeah. So that's like the length of this book. 28 00:10:04.038 --> 00:10:28.793 And I think we're stuck in this hypersensitive culture where we want to just be so relational and careful that the language is too relational and obscures the truth. So can I just say it really harshly? Sure. Friends, if you're playing Catholic to make yourself feel better, you go to Mass on Sunday or you go to Mass Christmas and Easter, you're... 29 00:10:29.030 --> 00:10:51.642 you know, you're in trouble spiritually. I mean, because if you look at Scripture, you know, what Jesus says you must do is take up your cross daily. Matthew 7, which we talk about a lot, which says you're going to, in your judgment, you're going to call me Lord. You're going to say I did all these things in your name, blah, blah, blah. And you're not going to make, you're going to go to hell, basically. 30 00:10:51.963 --> 00:11:11.048 You know, 1 Corinthians 11, 27 says that if you go forward and you receive the Eucharist in a state of mortal sin, we have unconfessed mortal sin, you're eating and drinking damnation. So I don't think it's loving sin. 31 00:11:11.977 --> 00:11:32.497 to be soft on all that and the real but and to be soft on us right the reason i think we're struggling is because we understand the difficulty of speaking publicly proclaiming publicly in doing it in a way that both resounds the truth but also um 32 00:11:32.497 --> 00:11:57.573 does it in such a way that for most people it doesn't close them off right right because you you always talk about the difference between relational language and doctrine or doctrinal language and the rule is when you're speaking publicly it's doctrinal yeah and someone has an issue with it you use you use privately yeah mercy goes way up and gentleness and private conversation yeah 33 00:11:57.573 --> 00:12:15.157 It's harder in this context because we don't know who's listening. Yeah. Usually I'm trying to anticipate the question because I deal with all the comments on all of our different things. And so I've seen how people think. I've been doing it for years. By the way, do they think we're harsh on the show? No. Well, not that I've seen. Okay. People have... 34 00:12:15.157 --> 00:12:43.878 thank you again for all the comments. They're all usually very, actually, I don't think of, there's only one, but the guy was clearly a communist. And I'm not saying that flippantly. I mean, it was, it was very clear. Weird. Why would he, it was very odd. So. And you're not calling, it's just, I'm sorry, just because somebody's going to get distracted by that. Yeah. You're not calling them as a communist, as a pejorative. No, no, no. He, he, that's what I'm saying. He literally was saying, we, you said something about communism. He was like, communism was, 35 00:12:43.878 --> 00:13:10.203 the greatest thing okay so you're you know so he adheres to communist ideology good we weren't going to win him over no matter why is he in our comments so i mean i hope he's right so so the point is uh it's a little bit different in this context where we do want and need to proclaim the truth you know but we're also trying to anticipate different questions and so we're adding in a little bit of that relational nature as we're talking which may come across 36 00:13:11.063 --> 00:13:23.585 It requires more words, I guess is what I'm saying. Which is not a bad thing. So, anyway. Good. So, I think we've covered mortal sin. Adequate confessions, although that's part of it, 37 00:13:24.698 --> 00:13:47.851 So regrets sin, does penance to make reparation. Can I say one thing real quick? Oh, yeah. Back to nominal Catholics and following what the church teaches. What popped in my head as you were saying that was we have a lot of people who want to pick and choose what the faith is and what it means and what they should and shouldn't do. 38 00:13:47.851 --> 00:14:13.400 Real basics, you said, the church says, what, twice a year per confession? Yeah, it's minimum. Which is ridiculous. It should be way more than that. Because here's a wake-up call. You have mortal sin, you die, you go to hell. Right, period. Right, so once a year is not going to cut it. Right. Especially if you're in the purgative way. Right. Not going to cut it. 39 00:14:13.400 --> 00:14:31.557 going to Mass every Sunday. Well, that goes back to the first one. If you're not going to Mass every Sunday, you're in mortal sin. Right. Well, and then we recently, we've had a number of Holy Days of Obligation. Yes, Holy Days of Obligation. If you miss Holy Days of Obligation, and then you go to Mass on Sunday and receive, and you didn't go to Confession, 40 00:14:31.557 --> 00:14:55.081 We're committing the moral dissent of missing a holy day of obligation, as you said. And again, here's the relational point, because I'm just anticipating comments, because this happens every single time I talk about a holy day of obligation. If you're sick, if your kids are sick, if there's proper extenuating circumstances that have already been defined by the church, you're okay. You don't need to leave us a comment. Everyone knows. Right. Yeah. 41 00:14:55.081 --> 00:15:13.795 please stop I don't even respond to those anymore that goes without saying you don't need to justify yourself I know you feel guilty that's probably okay because you had to take an aspirin you shouldn't be commenting about your freedom to stay home right 42 00:15:13.795 --> 00:15:34.518 Um, abstaining from eat on Fridays is another big one that so many people miss. Yeah. So I said, why do I say all that? Well, we know a really good priest who in his homily, awesome. He was talking about this very thing, picking and choosing what you want to do and believe. And he read something from the catechism. 43 00:15:34.518 --> 00:15:59.240 And said, no, I don't want to do that. And tore the page out of the catechism and the homily. And threw it away right in front of everybody. In front of everybody. And this is a big, quite large parish. Read another one. No, I don't think I want to do that. Threw it away. We're not Protestants. You don't get to do that. You don't get to pick and choose. Okay. So that's the image I wanted to kind of leave that on before we go to what you were saying with adequate confession. Mm-hmm. 44 00:15:59.948 --> 00:16:24.046 Yeah, and what's interesting about all this and difficult is so many of these comments have background of theology and church teaching that's a mile deep. And one of the problems with people in terms of mortal sin and when should I go receive or not is they actually don't even know what's a mortal sin. One of the biggest ones is... 45 00:16:24.552 --> 00:16:42.608 One of the biggest ones is contraception. You know, people using contraception. That is a mortal sin that needs to be confessed, and you need to stop doing it. But how do folks know? I have a strong recommendation for you. If you wonder, am I... 46 00:16:43.013 --> 00:17:04.934 is read Dr. Kevin Vose's God Rest His Soul, The Seven Deadly Sins, and How to Overcome Them. Most Catholics don't really even know what sin is, what mortal sin is, or what venial sin is. If you hang out with us, you'll get clarity on that. Yeah, and I'll also say one of our top posts for the last several months, 47 00:17:05.069 --> 00:17:31.867 on spiritualdirection.com is something regarding a list of mortal sins. I can't remember the title of the post, but if you go to spiritualdirection.com, you type in mortal sins in the search, you'll find it. I guarantee you will be one of the first things that pops up. So adequate confessions means that you actually follow the teaching of the church. And just briefly, if you go to confession and you're not sorry, it's not valid. If you go to confession, you don't have a firm... 48 00:17:32.238 --> 00:17:56.622 purpose of amendment, which means you don't have a plan and you know, you're going to go right back to the sin. It's not a valid confession. You are not absolved. Even if the priest says it because he's poorly formed. Yeah. Whatever. Okay. Can I throw one thing in there? Yeah. Uh, just a resource for people, because I know that there, there's a lot of nuance to that. And I found this really helpful. If you have the IPA to app there, I P I E T A. 49 00:17:56.622 --> 00:18:21.412 If you search, it's somewhere in the prayers area, confession. There's culpability in mortal sin, prayer before confession, prayer after confession, frequent confession, and four parts of a confession. And it's very good. And it helps you understand, because there are also, you never teach the scrupulous, right? But there are so many scrupulous people out there. 50 00:18:21.412 --> 00:18:43.855 who will worry about, well, am I truly sorry? I find that their teaching on contrition is very helpful to navigate those. I've actually found also Ripperger has been very good on that as well. All right, next one, next category under intermittent piety. We're still in phase one. 51 00:18:44.395 --> 00:19:05.438 The purgative way. Venial sin, sometimes deliberate, puts up a weak fight. Sorrow is only superficial, makes an examination of conscience, but without any method, preparation, or tangible plan of mitigation. So you're becoming more and more awake. The big rocks, the big problems are clear to you. 52 00:19:05.995 --> 00:19:21.824 but you're not yet cleared out enough of those to begin to see the important but less serious. I like the way I said that. Important but less serious. They don't send you to hell as... 53 00:19:21.824 --> 00:19:38.969 Well, what's interesting about that, I can't remember which church father taught this. It was probably several of them. I want to say it was St. Gregory the Great that I read it from last. But the uncommon understanding is that gluttony leads to lust. 54 00:19:39.087 --> 00:19:59.725 Meaning, gluttony obviously can be moral, but let's just say that you're overeating as a norm, that is a venial sin, intemperance in food and drink. That, according to the Church Fathers, is a precursor to any sort of mortal, lustful action. Isn't that wild? Interestingly enough. Yeah. But that's why... 55 00:19:59.725 --> 00:20:15.503 understanding the venial sin is so important because they're almost always precursors to something more serious. It's great that you said that and people might say well why is that and the reason is is because when you give in to one aspect of your lower nature 56 00:20:16.027 --> 00:20:34.623 your will is orienting to sin, which means it's weakening in terms of its orientation to God. When you choose God, your will gets stronger toward God. When you choose sin, it gets weaker, and it gets more and more used for sin. So in this particular case, those two sins... 57 00:20:34.623 --> 00:20:50.502 the fathers have determined, have a relationship of, that's more closely tied in terms of menial to mortal. And practically it's the flesh, right? Those are two very flesh oriented things. Whereas some of these other things could be more in your mind and, 58 00:20:50.992 --> 00:21:17.603 all that all right so puts up a weak fight sorrow is weak shallow make an examine but without any method meaning at this stage we're not pursuing venial sense in a structured way pursuing combating videos yeah right yeah so you're going to and you're you're doing your examine you're realizing oh i bad mouthed so-and-so and then you just kind of move on without any 59 00:21:17.603 --> 00:21:41.178 any thought to you know how do i avoid that situation in the future i'm curious with you because it has happened to me even recently do you remember the moment when you realized that you had confessed a sin in the past and but you had a deeper realization of how how 60 00:21:41.617 --> 00:21:54.374 problematic and destructive it was. Yeah. That's when that Irish priest cussed me out. Don't condemn all Irish priests, but what happened was Jordan came out of rehab and, 61 00:21:54.813 --> 00:22:17.257 And I don't know if you have what you want to call it, but it's a good descriptor of it, I guess. And he went to confession for the first time after coming out. Yeah. And just I had a deeper exactly how you described it. It was, well, one, I remembered things that I haven't previously confessed. And what was interesting was many of them were venial. Mm hmm. 62 00:22:17.257 --> 00:22:42.805 but I had remembered them. So technically under confession, even though I didn't remember them, they were covered by the nature of the Bible. Right. And also by the penitential right of the mass. If you're saying I confess my sins and I know, you know. Right. However, because I remembered them, I knew that I should go take them on their own with whatever else I was confessing. 63 00:22:42.805 --> 00:22:47.480 And I really had a desire to just get it all done.