From the Kitchen Table: The Duffys - The Habsburg Way: 7 Royal Secrets To A Successful & Happy Family

Episode Date: July 27, 2023

Sean and Rachel are joined by the Hungarian Ambassador to the Holy See Archduke Eduard Habsburg to discuss his book The Habsburg Way: 7 Rules for Turbulent Times, as he shares the lessons his family taught him about sustaining a prosperous and faithful family. The Archduke explains how his family's royal history has shaped his life, talks about policies that have been enacted in Hungary that incentivize citizens to start large families, and discusses why faith is the most important factor in living a fulfilled life. Follow Sean and Rachel on Twitter: @SeanDuffyWI & @RCamposDuffy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey everyone, welcome to From the Kitchen Table. I'm Sean Duffy along with my co-host for the podcast, my partner in life and my wife, Rachel Campos Duffy. It's so great to be back and I am so excited about our next guest because as you all know, the Hapsburg family has been a prominent part of European history, I don't know, since like 1273, when our next guest's ancestor, Rudolf Hapsburg, became the first Holy Roman Emperor. And our next guest can trace his family back 800 years.

and traced his family back 800 years. And he has a lot of great lessons because this family still stands as an example, as a model of what a large, successful family looks like. And so, boy, what an amazing opportunity for us to introduce to all of our listeners, Edward Habsburg, who by the way, has a book out right now talking about the seven rules.

He calls it the Habsburg way, the seven rules for turbulent times. But really, as I read it, Sean, it's really about how to hold a family together through whatever happens. And boy, 800 years of it for them. So with no further ado, Edward, welcome to From the Kitchen Table. Thank you for having me as a guest.

Of course. So now we want to talk about this family thing. At this podcast, Edward, we talk all the time about love and marriage and keeping families together, how faith and all of these values come together. But I can't have you on this podcast without asking you a few royal questions, because I, I should say more so than my husband, I'm a little obsessed with everything that's happening over in England with the royal family. They're just wondering what your thoughts are on the whole drama surrounding Prince Harry, Kate, and of course, Meghan Markle and Charles, etc. Rachel, you can't ask a diplomat

and a member of a royal family to comment on what's going on in other countries. I wouldn't know anything. I think I get my information from the same sources that you get them. And we, you know, we're Catholic, the Habsburgs, they are Protestants. So we don't have that much interaction. And we never got married over the last century. So no no you have

to ask other other royals on that all right edward edward well played throwing i am an ambassador to the holy see in the sovereign order of malta i cannot answer that question politics and the royal royal lineage have a lot in common well done i get I get not wanting to comment on, you know, what's happening in England, but we know, you know, we actually have a prince and princess in Montecito. So is that still part, you know, part of the whole diplomatic immunity you have there talking about it? I, you know, when they asked me, when they asked me to become an ambassador for Hungary, I told them I am not an ambassador type. I can't be diplomatic.

I spent my last eight years learning how to be diplomatic and how to walk through very complicated topics without stepping on minds as much as possible. So I'll continue doing this, I think. All right. So that's the thorniest thing that you've ever, we've ever been asked? But Rachel tried to roll a little grenade

right in front of you, Edward, and you didn't step on it. Well done. Well, thank you very much. Thank you very much. All right. So, Edward, I knew I was going to love your book and the seven rules

because the first rule is get married and have lots of children. Why is that so important? I believe that it is important for every couple. I also believe that it's important for every country. I think that a society with families with lots of children is a better society. And I think that a couple with lots of children is a better society. And I think that a couple with lots of children are happy spouses. Having lots of children is the greatest gift you can make to yourself, to each other, and to the children. Children that grow up in a family with lots of

siblings will be happier, will be sure of themselves, will know that someone always has their back. And what I also say to political leaders, families with lots of children will teach their children all the values you need to build a good society. The example I always give is the dinner table. When you sit around the dinner table, you learn all the virtues you need to know if you have lots of siblings. For instance, in our family, there was the rule that the youngest and weakest of the family always got

their food first. Now, the elder siblings very often were very hungry and very grumpy, but they had to learn that the youngest gets first. And then when, you know, I have five daughters and one son. So the conversation around the table was always very intense and very vivid. Everybody spoke at the same time very loudly, but still understood each other, which was a miracle. And then sometimes the younger siblings couldn't get a word in, cried and ran out. And the siblings had to get them back and you learn to give voice to the weaker voices.

So it's even good for society, not just for you, for husband and wife and for the children, but also for society. This is quite a lot of reasons why it's really worthwhile to fight for big families. And Edward, I love that messaging because in America today, I think we have a movement,

whether it's with our political leaders or our just social influencers that send a message that live for yourself, live for your bank account, live for your career, don't necessarily get married, don't necessarily have kids. And I think you make a really good point. It's good for society, but you'll be happier. The kids will be happier with a lot of brothers and sisters. And one of the things that

troubles me today, especially in America, is you, I think what you're saying too, is you get to instill your values in your children, whether it's around the dinner table and what they learn around the dinner table with regard to, you know, caring for the younger children, giving them a chance to eat first, bringing them back to the table. So often, I think right now, at least in America, they don't want families and parents to instill their values in their children. They, through the education system, want to instill a different set of values in young Americans. And they're not the values that I think your family has lived by, which has made them so successful for hundreds of years, but has made America successful. And it's a really troubling trend. Sean, I couldn't agree more with you. In fact, the family is the strongest countermeasure against globalism, against the technocratic forces that try to put their wires in the brains of our children, and against bad influence in education.

Around the dinner table, you have a safe space. You have a fortress. You have a place where your children will learn your values and not the values that TikTok or other things teach them. And as you said before, we live in a world where people tell them having more than one and a half kids is madness. I don't even want to add that I think Harry and Meghan at some point said the same thing, that it's good, I think, for the climate to have less children, if I remember correctly.

They promised to have only two as their offering to the climate gods, I suppose. Poor them. I can only say poor them. They're missing out on such a great time, really. They really are. But yeah, but that's the sort of thing that we see. You know, I will say this. We're doing better here in the United States and in Europe when it comes to that.

Wouldn't you say, Edward? Yes. When I arrived in Rome as ambassador, I began driving around in the city with a car. And I love driving in Rome. It's a bit crazy. It's a bit crazy. It's a bit crazy. The rules are not rules, but suggestions. You redefine everything in front of every traffic light.

But it works. It works. And I remember after three or four years, one day I stopped in front of a traffic light and a pregnant woman crossed the road and I was happy. And I said, wow, that's a pregnant woman. And a pregnant woman crossed the road, and I was happy, and I said, wow, that's a pregnant woman. And then I hesitated, and I said, that's the first time in three or four years that I've seen a pregnant woman crossing the road. And that is really a problem in Europe.

We live in a cemetery family-wise. When we walk through the streets of Rome with six children, people are shocked. with six children, people are shocked. Now, they would be even more shocked if they saw with what kind of families American Catholics walk around. I understand you have more than six children. Is that correct? Nine. We have nine, Edward. Yes.

God bless you for that. God bless you for that. So I'm not even allowed to speak about big families when I speak with your family. But you know, it's a natural topic for my book because the Habsburgs always had lots of children because they were Catholic. And because they believe that family is the nucleus of society and that the imperial family should teach other people how to live family life. And that's why it's the first rule in my book. Absolutely. You know, kind of thing that I learned in reading your book that I thought was really interesting was, you know, sometimes we have a negative idea of, you know, obviously in your family history, there was a lot of marrying babies, you know, even babies off, like they

were betrothed sometimes in utero to another family. And there's sort of this sense of, you know, because we don't do that anymore and we don't have arranged marriages. But in many ways, that was a much more civil way of sort of joining kingdoms and say conquering, which is much more violent. So can you talk just a teeny bit about that? Because I thought that was, it was such an interesting look at how marriage at that sort of Hatsburg level was a peaceful act versus a violent that was. Yes. I mean, I'm on very thin ice here because I'm getting very close into the marrying cousins territory here. close into the marrying cousins territory here. And Americans love that. Whenever someone attacks me on Twitter, they always throw a marry your cousins messages at me. But yes, what I'm trying to say in my book is that though most of the Habsburg female members of the family were married off over the centuries in order to join neighboring

countries, to forge peaceful alliances with neighbors. Surprisingly, quite a large number of these marriages were happy marriages. And the reason was not because they married cousins, but the reason was because you often married people who had the same background as you, the same set of values, the same ideas of family, the same education, the same faith, mostly the same faith, the same idea of sacrifice and of reaching heaven one day. All of that was common to you. That's why we never married Protestants after the Reformation, because with Catholics you were sure that even if you never met your spouse

before the day of the marriage, or even if you were already married off while you were still in utero, you had a certain guarantee that your life would be a good one, your relationship would be a good one, and your marriage would be a peaceful and fulfilling one. So there is a Habsburg lesson here for today too. And that's something that Rachel talks about a lot, and I agree with her. One, it's a great act to get married and to have kids. It's going to bring you more happiness and more joy in your life.

But to almost guarantee a successful marriage, find someone that you share values with, that you share faith with. Some, I mean, you have a shared world perspective in some ways. Don't try to find someone that is the opposite of you. Try to find someone who you have shared traits and values. And I think that's a really important message in your book. And it's one that Rachel has echoed. Well, we both have on our podcast. Yeah, well, we both have.

We've kind of we've had a lot of young people come to us and talk to us, you know, ask us questions. We actually did a podcast, Edward, on, you know, finding finding love because a lot of young people, you know, are having trouble finding true love. And we say opposites don't attract. We were asked, should should Republicans and Democrats get married? We said no. So we're with you on that.

We think that, you know, value politics equals values. And those shared values, as you see in your own family history, make sense. So the next rule you had is be Catholic. And what you really mean in a more general sense is to practice your faith, whatever. If you're Protestant, you're Muslim, if you're Jewish, it doesn't matter. The point is, whatever you are, be good at that in terms of your faith. And so talk to us about how Catholicity, but more importantly, just having faith at the center of your life has been the key to the longevity of the Hasburg family?

Yes. Well, I would say one of the core and I think the most important, even more important than romantic attraction of any kind is that you share the faith of your spouse. Because life will throw so many curveballs at you. There will be really tough moments. There will be difficulties. There will be nights when you don't sleep or weeks where you don't sleep. And all of this is very tough. If you have the faith in common, you have the strongest thing in common. If you can pray together, as Mother Teresa always said, family that prays together stays together. If you can pray together, you will find a way through the difficulties.

If you can pray together, you will find a way through the difficulties. And if you don't have that, man and woman are so different to begin with. Your biographies are so different. Your entire interest, if you don't have faith in common, there is very little left that you have in common. If you have faith, you have everything and you have a little place in your everyday life where you can meet and where you can face the problems of your life together. And that's why I believe you create a difficult situation if you marry someone with a different faith and you give the greatest chances for a successful marriage if you marry someone of your faith. And probably in disagreements of marriage, which there's always going to be some, this is one place you will always go where you have agreement, and you'll always see eye to eye if you share your faith together in your marriage.

Wonderful advice. And as you said, don't be a Christmas and Easter Catholic. Be a Catholic that practices your faith, which means go to church on Sunday, practice the sacraments, all really important for someone not just to be a Catholic in name, but to be a Catholic in practice. Yes, and can I add something from my experience in our 28 years of marriage now? There are moments when you are grumpy with the other person or when you don't really know how to speak about the problem. One of the two always gets the grace to drag the other one in front of a crucifix, a cross, a candle, an image of the Lord,

and sit them down and you pray together. This is an incredible superpower, but you have to work on it because you won't manage to do it if you don't practice in everyday life. It's like, if you don't try to pray the rosary every day, you won't be able to pray the rosary when you lay dying or when you supper. You have to practice, practice, practice.

Marriage, love, a family, it's practicing every day. It's everyday work and it's absolutely wonderful. You know, Edward, one of the things that Sean and I say is the benefit of having nine kids, because I agree with you. I think raising kids, first of all, having a good marriage takes a lot of practice, but having kids is also practice. And one of the great things about having nine kids is you get a lot of do-overs, you know, you make a lot of mistakes as you know, with the first or kid and, you know, by the, by the ninth, you've kind of figured it out. And, and, and we actually, Edward have exit interviews with our, our children as they leave the house. We ask them, did we do well? What could we improve on?

What things do you wish we hadn't done? And hopefully we can apply some of those lessons and at least somebody can benefit from the mistakes we made in the first go around. But if you only have one or two, that's how you get to practice with, that's it. That's how you get to practice with, you know, that's it. Yes. Let's move to the third, which is believe in the empire. And you talk about this very Catholic principle of subsidiarity. Explain subsidiarity and explain how that applies to the family. I think that subsidiarity, the third point in my book, a complicated word, is probably one of the most important and core points, apart from family and faith. What I believe is that subsidiarity is the Catholic principle,

but also a Christian principle of respecting the lower level, letting the lower level do what the lower level does. The United States of America are built that way. You are built from the grassroots up. You haven't been installed hierarchically like most places in Europe, but you began from the homestead, the township, the county, the state, and the federal level was always rather weak. This is a very human and very normal way of building the world because it fits with us humans. We are local. We are family people.

We are, you know, everything that goes above state level and to federal level is already very far away from us. Politics works best locally. So this thinking in the way of subsidiarity is the ultimate antidote against globalism, is the ultimate antidote against technocracy, against international corporations trying to take over your life through media. And that's something the Habsburgs did. And it's so interesting because I often compare the European Union that we have in Europe right now, which is a great thing. It's a great project to keep Europe together. But we sometimes feel that Brussels, the center of the European

Union, is trying to interfere far too much with things that should be handled on the local level. And if you translate that to the family, to get back to your question, Rachel, it means to let your children do what they can do on their own without interfering in order to get back to your question, Rachel, it means to let your children do what they can do on their own without interfering in order to teach them to handle their own affairs, their own rooms, and not to do everything for them. This is a lesson that is applicable in the family. I think I'm sure you'll agree with me, Sean and Rachel, right? Yes, absolutely. And sometimes navigate their own fights too. You can't be the judge and the jury in every disagreement because your deal will be consumed with that with your children, especially young children.

But, Edward, I spent nine years in Congress. I was a congressman from northern Wisconsin in Washington. And what I noticed was that I had more power to change the world in my family than I did in the U.S. Congress. If I raised good kids and sent those good kids out into the world. And what we now see happening in America is the growth of our government and the influence that our federal government has in our everyday lives. And people don't have any control over that. They can't influence it. They can't move it, which is why it does make sense. You do want to have the decisions that can be made at the most local level, the idea of subsidiarity,

should be made there because I have more control, more influence, more impact with those decisions than I do from the decisions that come from Washington, D.C. or Brussels. And it's why the idea of conservatism, of limited government, giving more power back to states and municipalities and their families has been the best form of government. Can I say, Sean, it was the last two or three years where you realized the strength that is still present and underlying in the United States. You are a nation that is built from the bottom up, as I said before. And some states simply decided to go against things that were wished for on the federal level, showing that you are still United States.

You are not a centralized government. You are United States. And the single a centralized government. You are United States and the single states still have a say. I think that's a hopeful sign for many people around the world. Watching the states was a hopeful sign over the very difficult last two or three years. So the states are built in a way that they can be a sign of hope and a ray of hope for the world, that they can be a sign of hope and a ray of hope for the world, especially today, if you don't lose what the states are by giving too much power to the central government and taking away from the local level. We'll have more of this conversation after this.

From the Fox News Podcast Network, subscribe and listen to the Trey Gowdy Podcast. Former federal prosecutor and four-term U.S. congressman from South Carolina, brings you a one-of-a-kind podcast. Subscribe and listen now by going to foxnewspodcast.com. So you also say in number three, and we talked about subsidiary, but you say believe in the empire. What do you mean by that? Well, that's, of course, a bit of a provocation because I say in my book that the Empire has gotten a bit of a bad rap in the last years, and I blame Star Wars. Because our idea of Empire is one very evil old man ruling with terror over a uniformed galaxy where stormtroopers on every planet. But the Habsburg empire was something very different

it was something that embodied subsidiarity the way we just talked about and for instance in the austro-hungarian empire every single nation could use their languages in the parliament which led to very long sessions but you had to do this to respect every single nation. And whenever the Habsburgs tried to respect every single nation within the empire, the empire went well. And whenever they tried to centralize control from Vienna, everything that happened in every single country, it went badly. And that's the Habsburg lesson.

Let's believe in the empire. It went badly. And that's the Habsburg lesson. Let's believe in the empire. The Habsburgs believed in an empire of respect, of respecting the single nation with a common idea, with a common value, with a common family ruling on top of that, but not like autocratic, crazy Star Wars emperors, but like a different kind of empire. And that's the one I advocate for in my book. I love that. And, you know, let's go to rule number four, because rule number four is

stand for law and justice and for your own subjects. What does that mean? Well, if you watch A Man for All Seasons, the film about Thomas More, the famous film about Thomas More. At some point, he teaches a lesson to his son-in-law by saying, you cannot throw law away. If it pleases you, you have to respect the law. Now, we seem to live in a time where people have lost the trust in the lawfulness of the laws of our political leaders. The Habsburgs were meticulously law-abiding. The Habsburg rulers tried to abide by the law,

be good law-givers and good lawmakers from the beginning to the end, and be just and good rulers. And at the same time, they really tried to stand for their subjects. Now, this was more the case after enlightenment came along, and Habsburgs even more tried to be people's emperors. Before that, in the time of absolutism and before,

this was not an idea that was present. But the Habsburgs from the beginning tried to be good emperors. There is a reason why our family is universally liked. I can tell that on Twitter when people talk about the Habsburgs. Everybody likes them because they never were a family of ruthless expansion attacking our neighboring countries, but trying to bring people of different nations, different races, different languages together in one harmonious empire.

And therefore, I think they stood for their subjects very strongly. I give you one example. My great, great, great grandfather, Archduke Joseph, he was sent to Hungary by the emperor in order to be the palatine, which was something like the go-between between the emperor and the Hungarian people. And he arrived in Hungary. He fell in love with Hungarian language, with Hungarian country, with the people. And he began to build up this country to better the situation, to build hospitals, to build

all of the infrastructure to make this country to better the situation, to build hospitals, to build all of the infrastructure to make this country a good place. This is what the Habsburgs stood for. And we sometimes have the impression, perhaps today, that our political leaders don't have the real interest of their subjects, not the subjects, the voters at heart. The Habsburgs were an example for that. So I write about this. It's interesting because, again, if you make laws by which we all live and you have the power to

make the law, but you don't follow those laws, that creates animosity, that creates anger, and that creates a lot of pushback and it creates chaos in society. Even today, and that creates a lot of pushback and it creates chaos in society. Even today, with the globalists who are pushing climate change, they'll tell us to get rid of our gas stoves and maybe our water heaters. They want to get rid of our cars. All the while, they fly around on private jets or they're saying the sea levels are going to rise, but they're buying oceanfront properties. And so, again, that creates a lot of discontent within society. And I think you're absolutely right. And if you actually make laws or advocate for laws and also then live by them, that makes people buy into the concept of, yes, we should

all live by this same set of rules because our leaders, our rulers live by those same set of rules. We sometimes have the impression that those rules don't apply. Those laws don't apply for the powerful in our society. And the Habsburgs were the contrary. Leopold II once said to the Hungarian magnates, to the princes, he said, I am your emperor, but if I touch any of the laws that are your rights, I give you the permission

to take up arms against me. Can you imagine that kind of thinking nowadays? I love that kind of thinking today. Well, let's talk about the next the next rule because it's it's know who you are and live accordingly i want you to explain this rule what you mean by it how it relates to aspers and also if you wouldn't mind at some point in this because i feel like the story about the horse um and you're a family member of yours

giving away a horse. I want you to tell the whole story because it's so beautiful but that's somebody who they are. So why don't we why don't you maybe just tell that story and then get into lesson number five.

I'll begin with the first know who you are. We live lesson number five. I'll begin with the first, with the first, with know who you are. We live in a time where we are being told mostly by TikTok and by everyone else

that we can change who we are, what we are, which sex we are, and what we stand for every five minutes. In fact, we should change it all the times

because if we don't, we're not free. And the Habsburgs are the absolute opposite. They teach you that you should learn who you are, learn where you come from, learn what your family traditions are, because it will make you happy to be what you are and where you come from. And the Habsburgs did that very strongly. They had a few very core principles in their lives. And one of them, of course, is the Catholic faith. And there was one gesture, one grand gesture of the first Habsburg emperor, Rudolf of Habsburg in 12, I would say around 1260, before he became emperor. He once rode on his horse and he went hunting in his forests somewhere between Switzerland and Germany and France in that corner.

And he came to a river and there was a priest trying to cross the river, bringing the viatic, the body of our Lord, to a dying man. And the river was swollen and he couldn't cross over. So, Rudolf gave him his horse and told him, take this horse to get to the dying man and bring him the sacrament. And the priest rode away with the horse and the sacrament. He came back a few hours later to Rudolf's place to give back the horse. And Rudolf said, far be it from me to ever ride on a horse again

that carried our Lord. Please keep it. And, you know, the people in the area said, this good deed will bring good fortune to the Habsburg family. And it did. And the Habsburgs remained faithful to their roots, to what they were, up until the year 1918, up until to our last emperor, blessed Emperor Karl, who was a blessed, the first blessed in our family, who is a saint in my heart, but up to our

Habsburg family today, even a hundred years later, we are still Catholic. We have a few priest vocations in our family. We still feel connected to the roots of our family over the centuries. We fiercely embrace our traditions. This is, of course, a very unusual thing today, but I want to encourage every family to do that, to strongly embrace your traditions, your values, what your grandparents told you, and not to listen to those voices from your phones. Yes, and that reason I wanted you to tell that story is because that story is so powerful.

But can you imagine having, and by the way, there are famous paintings, you know, of this scene around the world. And I just think a story like that passed through the generations must tell you who you are. And yes, I agree. I'll let you go, Shai. I think tradition, the lesson for me in that story

and in this rule, this fifth rule you have is, yes, embrace your traditions and pass those traditions and those oral stories on to your children and your grandchildren, and they will know who they are. And Rachel and I have talked about this a lot because I'm an Irish Catholic. She's Spanish-Mexican Catholic. We share our Catholicity. But we came with very similar traditions and very different traditions. And we kind of took the best of our traditions and made them our own.

So we have a family history and our traditions. And there's some new ones that we've brought into our family, but our children know the traditions that we have at Thanksgiving, the traditions that we have at Christmas, the traditions we have at Easter or the 4th of July. There's things that we do as a family that I think are really important, but they also bind us together because, in essence, those traditions are who we are as a family. It's the meaning of some of the fabric of who we are, some of the DNA of who we are as a family, and so important for kids to have that. Absolutely agree. And, you know, why should you do this? Because you might just now be funding a dynasty like the Habsburgs were. Your family traditions will be passed on. I mean, you have nine children. Can you imagine what will happen in two generations? How many people are touched by your family traditions?

family traditions. One of the members of my family, which was Archduke John, he lived around the year 1810, 1820, 1830s. And he got married and he only had one or two children from his wife, but their children

had lots of children. And today his descendants, the so-called Maran family, every few years they meet at the pilgrimage place in austria and it's hundreds if not thousands that meet there so you don't know what you can what sort of avalanche you start by passing on family traditions to just to your children because it will continue yeah i love that and you know, if you only have two kids, by the way, going back to your first one, you know, one may decide not to get married,

maybe another one, you know, there's a lot of low testosterone in the world today. So, you know, you might not get a grandkid. The more children you have, the more likely you're going to have those two convenience that you just talked about. And the more children you have, the more likely your children will experience having lots of siblings as a good experience and will decide themselves to have lots of children. Agreed. It's really like that.

You say to be brave in battle. Boy, that's so important. But you also say as an addendum to that, to being brave in battle, that we need great generals. Explain. Well, what I say in this point is I don't want everybody to become a soldier. I just needed one chapter where I could speak about those Habsburgs that were brave in battle and were good soldiers.

And we had some of those over the centuries, even if the Habsburgs were a very peaceful family. There were moments where you had to step on your horse, take out your sword and fight for what you stood for. So what I mean, of course, for every one of us in the family is be brave in all the situations that life throws in your way. Be brave, be courageous. But what I mean by have a great general is sometimes it's difficult for you to be brave for instance

leopold i uh he had to he had to confront in vienna the turks in 1683 he wasn't the general he wasn't a soldier he wanted to become a priest before becoming emperor so he knew his strength was diplomacy he knew he couldn't sit on the horse and fight the Turks. He got Jan Sobieski, the Polish king, as an ally, and he beat the Turks. And so the Habsburgs sometimes had to rely on good generals when they were not themselves the personality to fight a battle. So if you are not as courageous as you sometimes would wish to be, So if you are not as courageous as you sometimes would wish to be, you need a good general on your side, and it may be your spouse. So sometimes you need to lean on someone on your side.

The Habsburgs did that, but the same goes for every family father or family mother. You know, Edward, we're in a time where, yes, we don't have to get on our horses. Oftentimes, we don't have to grab our swords, or many of us aren't called in to battles that exist now in the world today. But there are battles that are happening. And what you talk about globalism, I think there's a movement to take away people's freedom and take away people's rights and centralize those in an elite few.

And those are battles worth fighting for. Just like 300 years ago, the who won and lost battles would dictate what kind of society your children lived in. So too, these battles are important to how our children and grandchildren will live. And you can outsource that to someone else or try to, but everyone, I think, has to be engaged in the fight for some common principles by which we want to live. Like in America, the freedom of speech is under attack. People are being silenced because some elites disagree with their point of view, and that has never been the case. This is a fundamental tenet of democracy is people being able to express themselves. And I think it applies today that, yes, you need good generals.

Yes, you need good leaders. But you also need people to get in line and say, you know what, this is worth fighting for. I will engage and lend my voice, lend my Twitter account, lend my Facebook account to this fight. Because if we lose that, we kind of lose who we are in the kind of democracy that we've had in America for the last almost 250 years. Yes. And we are all watching the cultural battles that are taking place in the United States. I will give you one example from my country, Hungary.

You know, Hungary just made a law one and a half years ago where you're not allowed to do gender ideology influencing around schools for minors. You're not allowed to teach gender ideology to minors around schools. You should have heard the yell of horror that went through Europe when we did that. And they not only tried to interfere to put us under pressure, but Brussels simply began cutting off funds from Hungary to punish us for speaking up for the right of parents to teach their children these topics and nobody else. And this takes courage for a small country. We have not even 10 million inhabitants, citizens. And my prime minister is very courageous in these topics.

And that encourages me as a father to stand up for things like for life and for other topics, even if it's unpopular, because this is the courage that my ancestors had in many other situations. I agree with you. We'll have more of this conversation after this. Yeah, and courage begets courage. When you see someone stand up courageously in these fights, it inspires something within us to say,

you know what, I can and should join the fight as well. I think you're right. I'm curious, Edward, too. You know, Victor Orban is certainly a general, if you will, in this battle against globalism. Are you seeing in Europe that his I mean, obviously he's inspiring his citizens. And I love that you talk about how it just inspires parents to do their part as they see their leader do his part. But are you seeing other countries, you know, turning away from, say, what Brussels is doing and looking at Viktor Orban and what's happening in Hungary and saying, maybe we want to run things our way. Maybe we want to return to our traditional roots.

And are you seeing any of that? Well, I wouldn't say that. I would say that you can see the first signs of a sort of conservative swinging around in Europe. Several countries in Europe are turning around to conservative values. I see it happening in Italy. I have a vague feeling that Austria is going that direction and several other places too. But the main echo comes from the United States. Orban is very popular in the United States.

And when I wrote my book, I asked the publisher who should write the foreword. They asked me to ask Viktor Orban to write it. And I said, I don't even know whether he will do that. But they told me in the United States, many people look at Orban and look to Orban for values. And I told that to Orban when I told him that they wanted the book to be written, the foreword to be written by him. And I said, the Americans love you. And he said, yes, because I'm last man standing. And that is in a way true.

Hungary is quite alone in that battle. But I see a new trend in Europe slowly coming, very slowly. I also see when I look at what's happening in Hungary, and you are right, it does feel like last man standing, just how important Catholicity is and has been to the sort of Hungarian experiment, if you will, experience, if you will. to the sort of Hungarian experiment, if you will, experience, if you will. Yes, I mean, we are a Catholic country, and 62% Catholics and about 15% Calvinists. However, Orban is a Calvinist. He's a Calvinist, but a very outspoken, very devout Calvinist, with a great respect for the Catholic faith.

His wife is Catholic. I've accompanied him to the Pope. That was incredible. And when he is in a Catholic mass, he will kneel down during consecration because he respects what the Catholics believe in. So yes, Catholic faith in Hungary is important. Christian faith is important. Hungary is a very small country

that tries to engage for persecuted Christians all over the world since about six, seven years. We've been helping everywhere. We're batting above our, I don't know how you say that. Your average. Thank you. Batting above our average. Yes, absolutely. No, but it's cool to be ambassador for this very extraordinary country in Europe right now. Edward, kind of on that point, I hear a lot of people talk about places, if they were not going to live in America, where would they want to live? And you hear a lot of people, to migrate to Hungary who are of like mind, that see Hungary as a refuge for freedom and catholicity and a way of life that fits what people actually want for themselves and their families?

I feel that many people see Central Europe as a place where the European values are still alive strongly. Pope Francis said that very strongly when he came to Hungary. He said, Hungary is really a place where you can still see the European values, the European heart beating. And very often when I tell people about our family program, you know, Hungary has a very strong program to encourage families who have lots of children.

They usually say, how can I sign up? How can I become Hungarian? How can I move to Hungary? It's mostly in joke, but there is a feeling of that. Can you tell, I'm so sorry to interrupt, but I just want our listeners to understand, what is Hungary doing to encourage family policy? Oh, you can't imagine such fantastic things. So I'll just give you, well, it's a mixture of incentives and financial incentives and also speaking a lot about family in public, having posters everywhere, encouraging people to have big families, having your leaders speak up about families, having a prime minister that shows himself with his children and grandchildren regularly, having a president that is a family mother with children, showing herself to be a family mother with children. Look around Europe. You don't see leaders, political leaders in Europe, showing themselves to be family people.

If they even are married or have children, if they have that, you never see that. And many of them are singles. So one thing is you need a country that tells you it's not only okay to have a family, it is something desirable to have a family. And the other thing is, of course, financial incentives. I will give you four or five little examples. So if you get married or if you're expecting your first child, you can apply for a grant of $30,000 more or less, which is a lot of money in Central Europe. And you, after the first child, you only pay back one third. If you have two children, you only have to pay back one. Well, in the end, after the third child child you don't have to pay back anything of it

which encourages you to say yes to children so that grant you don't have to pay it back if you have three children after you if you have three children you're you basically pay next to no income tax and if you have four children as a woman you never pay any taxes again in your life oh my god wow we've been yes we've been doing well edward wait wait until you hear wait until you hear the other the other things um you get financial help for building a house financial help for taking apartments you get financial help for buying a family van. The state, I think, pays half of the price of a family van if it has more than seven seats. And what we also have is financial aid for grandparents that want to look after the children so you don't have to send them to a kindergarten or to another place. So all of this is very encouraging.

Still, it's a very, very hard path. And we are slowly turning around the birth rate in Hungary. We have the divorces have gone down 40%. Abortions are going down steeply and marriages are going up 40%. So something is happening in Hungary, but it's a very, very long way to Tipperary, as they say in Ireland. Well, it would be really hard for, I think, the EU to look at those numbers and or citizens of the EU and not see them as a positive. I mean, I just, I'm amazed. Divorce rate down, marriage rates up, engaging grandparents and caring for children.

All of this sounds so amazing. You would say so, Rachel, but then these are not the values that Europe is right now trying to encourage. Because as you realize, this is the traditional idea of family. And Hungary is strongly standing for the traditional idea of family. This is not what people in the rest of europe seem to think that is desirable and therefore we don't get lots of applause for doing this kind of family politics well happiness matters so it sounds like a very happy place to live we we we applaud it as well let's move to number

seven your final rule which is die well and have a memorable funeral which I love this talk about that for us Edward okay the memorable funeral part of course mostly was for me

to talk about the incredible things that the Habsburgs did around their funerals, but they never did it for vanity. They did it to teach their subjects how to die well as a Christian. And the image, you know, Rachel probably too, me too, we were all watching the funeral of Queen Elizabeth, mostly in tears and very moved by an entire country paying tribute to this wonderful woman. And there was a moment at her funeral, one of the last moments when she was buried,

when her coffin went down into the crypt of her ancestors. And a trumpet was playing a beautiful melody, and they read out her titles. The Master, and they read out her titles. The Master of Ceremony read out the titles. And I said, on the one hand, I'm touched. On the other hand, the Habsburgs did that better. I didn't say it loudly, very quietly to myself. Because their Habsburg ritual at the funeral is magnificent. And I experienced it twice

when the last Empress of Austria, Zizia, died in 89. I was present at the last funeral and I saw that ritual. That ritual is a message and is a lesson in humility that you cannot imagine. It's so strong. So the coffin arrives in the center of vienna at the church with a capuchin crypt you know where all the habsburg emperors are buried and the master of

ceremony knocks three times at the door that leads down to the crypt and the voice of a capuchin monk from inside um says who is there and then he reads out z Zeta, Empress of Austria, Queen of Hungary, of Croatia, of Bohemia, and so on for about 30 seconds with all the titles. And the voice from inside says, we don't know her. And then he knocks again. And the voice again says, who is there? And he replies and he reads out all the achievements of that emperor over the decades of his reign. The peace treaties, the marriages, the everything. And again, the voice says, we don't know her.

And then he knocks a third time and the voice says, who goes there? And the master of ceremony says, Zita, a poor, sinful woman. And then the door opens. Oh, my goodness. Yes. My arm just stood up. Wow. I want to be buried that way.

You can watch that on YouTube. You go on YouTube and you type in Habsburg knocking ritual. And this is so touching. And this is so judging. And so through the centuries, the Habsburgs not only knew that God would ask them to render accountability for their lives the moment they die. So they prepared for that moment with prayer, with trying to achieve graces and to die well as a Christian. But they also knew that their subjects were watching them. So their death and their funeral was a lesson in humility and Christian death

to their subjects. One example that I like to give here is Maximilian, Emperor Maximilian, not the one who died in Mexico, but the last knight who died around 1509. And when he died, he gave three instructions what should be done. First of all, this is very medieval piety, but a strong lesson. He told them to have his hair cut, his teeth broken out, and his body flayed like Christ after his death.

his teeth broken out and his body flayed like Christ after his death, and his body to be exposed like that for three days on the coffin to show what a miserable sinner the emperor was. Wow. And he did that. And they painted a portrait of his torn body and sent it around the whole empire to teach people that he was a miserable sinner. Then the second thing was that he asked that his favorite armor that he wore in battle would be put in front of a blessed sacrament for all eternity in kneeling posture. Now this is a grand gesture to have your splendid, beautiful armor put in a chapel in front of the Blessed Sacrament with hands folded.

And it is still there. It is still in Innsbruck. You can watch it there. It's a lesson. It's a lesson he teaches his subjects. The third thing he did was that his coffin was buried under the steps of the altar with no beauty, no statues, no great inscriptions, just a single word, Maximilian, on the steps under the altar. So the priest would say mass above his body and pray for his soul. This is such a strong sermon to your subjects, telling them what's really important in life is prepare for death, prepare for eternity, make your peace with God. And we should think

about death a lot in our lives because it's the only security we have in our lives. We are going to die and we're going to meet God. So better be prepared for that. Wow. I mean, first of all, just such beautiful stories to pass down through your family, but such lessons for us as well as parents to, well, you know what, our children are watching what we do probably more than what we say, just as the subjects that the Hasberg family were trying to impress upon. But also, you know, just that these symbols matter. Tradition matters. I just love your book.

I really encourage all of our listeners to get this book, to, you know, maybe to gift it to a young couple who was just married or about to get married. What a wonderful way to think of your family. As you said, the Duffy dynasty, I'm going to be using this term more often because it shouldn't be reserved just for you regal, royal people. Family is royal, right? All of our families in so many ways that the Jews really emphasize the importance of it and that we should look at all of these different ways

that we can make our families better. I love the book as well. And just one last point on your last rule is again, we're all going to die and our life should be about our death because that determines where we go after our death. And Rachel's motto that she says frequently is, my job is not to get my children into Harvard, it's to get them into heaven. And I do think that a lot of people think about it, I want to get them into

the best school. That's not it. It's about raising good kids. And you want them to go to heaven. So we can all be together. I agree. I agree. When you stand in front of God, God will not ask you which schools did your children go to. He will ask you, did you try to get your soul into heaven, the soul of your spouse, He will ask you, did you try to get your soul into heaven, the soul of your spouse, and if possible for you, the souls of your children? Did you do everything you can for that? That's the only question. You know, for us, sometimes we suffer because we think the church is in crisis and we're living in difficult times.

Yes, it is. But the point to save the church is in your own family. And God will not ask you, what did you do to save the church? God will ask you, what did you do with the little garden that I put you in? Your vocation is spouses, mothers, fathers. This is to try to bring your spouse and as if possible, all your children across the finishing line, which is eternal life. But that's also very relaxing because it's something we can do in everyday life. We don't have to be heroic. We don't have to have the solution for all the problems in the world.

We have to work our little garden. And that's what I encourage all the families to do. And also what my family tried to do over the centuries. Work our little garden. Work our little garden. Work our little garden. We need to encourage more people to create little gardens and then to take care of them. And the Hasbro family has been an incredible example. What a journey for me to read your book, to learn more about your family and what a great example they are to the world.

What a joy to meet you in this way. And Edward, just good luck to you. I hope that many people are blessed by what you've decided to put on paper for all of us to learn from. Thank you very much. And in our family, the adventure continues. My first of my daughters got married and I'm now a grandfather since about four weeks. So I don't know whether you already have that step. No, but my daughter, we married, our first daughter was married last summer. And just yesterday, she said to me, I have some news. And I was like, so excited. I thought this was it, but it was something else.

So it'll happen. It'll happen. Congratulations to you. What a wonderful, wonderful thing. And you know what, I want to say thank you as well. I mean, you're a beacon of light because you come from a family that has been looked up to, and you're an example. And to share that example and the lessons that we can all in our families take from your own long lineage of family history is really important and especially today. And I'm grateful that you would put it on paper, as Rachel said, and share it with others and inspire others to, in their own way, live like this great family has lived over the course of centuries. So thank you for that.

We appreciate it. Thank you, Edward. God bless. I hope I'm going to meet the members of the Duffy dynasty in person at some point in the future. Maybe at the Holy See, maybe we can meet up. Hopefully we're going to be there at some point in the not too distant future. Please come and visit.

We would love that. We would absolutely love that. Thank you, Edward. Really appreciate it. Thank you and see you soon. God bless, Edward. Listen, Rachel, what a fascinating conversation. This is one of the books that you came across.

You're like, this is amazing. It's like so many of these things are the very things we're trying to do and that we talk about. But it's a royal way of doing it, Sean. It's regal. Of course. But you're right. The same, so many of the lessons are the same things we're talking about, but he has 800 years of evidence that this works.

Yes. And it actually, it has worked. And again, there's people who will criticize his family, but listen, they've kept their family together. They've kept their faith and their tradition alive for. And the last rule is great. It's like, it's dying. And our life is, in the end, we're going to die. And where are we going to go? It brings it all full circle in his book. And I'm so happy he put it down on paper

and shared those principles with the rest of us. Yeah, you know, he's officially, his official title, and I probably should have used it, Sean, and I didn't. He's an Archduke, Archduke, I guess is what you call him. I didn't use his title. But I think for me, what really hit home, if I had to say, of all the amazing lessons he had, the most important, important was just tend to your little garden. And he said, if you think about it that way,

these, because, you know, the subtitle for his book is, you know, how to, you know, do this in tumultuous times, seven rules for turbulent times, I should say. You know, the times are turbulent and it can seem, you know, just daunting. Daunting. You know, difficult. And like he said,

it's so relaxing to just think that our only, our only and most important job is just to tend to our little garden. That doesn't mean that we can't, you know, we need people to run for school board and run for office and, and, and, and, you know, run charities and do all this other stuff. But just to remember that our primary thing is our little family, our little garden and tending to that. And that, that, there is something very de-stressing relaxing, as he said about that.

Because you know what, you can actually, you can actually tend to that garden. It's not so big that you don't know how, you know, how do you navigate national politics? How do you navigate all politics? How do you navigate all these crazy things that are happening? You can navigate your little family with your children, your little garden. That was a wonderful moment. But I got to tell you, a lot of great, you know, insights and comments from Edward. But one of my favorites was you tried to get him to engage on the royal family,

and he's like, I'm a diplomat. I'm not going to go there, Rachel, but nice try, which I love the way he brushed that aside. He's going to be in New York, and he's extended an invitation for us to meet up with him if and when we go to Rome, which we plan to. So maybe over some pasta in Rome, I'll get the real scoop on what he thinks about Protestants over in England and their drama that's now spilled over into California. So you know I'm not going to have dinner with the Archduke of the Habsburg family without getting that information. Yes, that cancer has spread to America in California where a lot of cancer grows. So, yeah, hopefully one day we'll be able to stuff that out.

But listen, Rachel, great, great idea to bring Edward on. Wonderful book and an excellent conversation and lessons that we can all learn from, again, from a successful family that some of those we're already doing in our own family, but we can improve upon. And I think that this is inspiring for us to do better and be better in our own little garden.

So listen, I want to thank you all for joining us at The Kitchen Table. It was a wonderful conversation. If you like our podcast, you can rate, review, subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts. You can get us at foxnewspodcast.com. If you're not getting us on Apple or Spotify

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And Amazon Prime members can listen to the show ad-free on the Amazon Music app. From the Fox News Podcast Network. I'm Janice Dean, Fox News Senior Meteorologist. Be sure to subscribe to the Janice Dean Podcast at foxnewspodcast.com or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And don't forget to spread the sunshine.