Pints With Aquinas - Surviving Cancer and Finding God (Tammy Peterson) | Ep. 531

Episode Date: July 2, 2025

Tammy Peterson, wife of clinical psychologist and cultural commentator Jordan Peterson, is a Canadian podcast host and speaker known for her inspiring personal journey. After surviving a rare and fatal cancer diagnosis, Tammy experienced a profound spiritual transformation, ultimately converting to Catholicism in 2023. Her story of faith, resilience, and renewal has resonated with audiences around the world. 🍺 Want to Support Pints With Aquinas? 🍺 Get episodes a week early, score a free PWA beer stein, and join exclusive live streams with me! Become an annual supporter at 👉 https://mattfradd.locals.com/support 💵 Show Sponsors:  👉 Seven Weeks Coffee – Use promo code MATT for up to 25% of your first subscription order + claim your free gift: https://sevenweekscoffee.com/matt 👉  Exodus 90 – Join Exodus 90 on August 15 for St. Michael's Lent: https://exodus90.com/matt 👉  Truthly – The Catholic faith at your fingertips: https://www.truthly.ai/ 👉 Hallow – The #1 Catholic prayer app: https://hallow.com/mattfradd  💻 Follow Me on Social Media: 📌 Facebook: https://facebook.com/mattfradd 📸 Instagram: https://instagram.com/mattfradd 𝕏 Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/Pints_W_Aquinas 🎵 TikTok: https://tiktok.com/@pintswithaquinas 👕 PWA Merch – Wear the Faith! Grab your favorite PWA gear here: https://shop.pintswithaquinas.com

Pines with Aquinas is brought to you by Truthly, which is a ground-breaking Catholic AI app built to help you know, live and defend the Catholic faith. Start your seven-day free trial today when you download Truthly on the App Store. I went to church when I was a little girl. There was something in me even from the time I was young of a yearning for a relationship with Mother Mary. But I became jaded. We use every excuse we can to leave the church and that was enough for me. You were diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. Jordan and I went, sat down

and I noticed he seemed very nervous. And he said that we found out that actually you only have 10 months to live. God's like, okay, you haven't been loving yourself the way you might. I'm going to give you cancer. I said, if you see it in your heart to have me live again, I promise I'll speak publicly. So, when I went first into the Protestant church, I looked for Mother Mary there and she wasn't there. Mother Mary, she sustains me. I didn't know that I was always praying to her, but now I do know.

So I'm grateful that he gave me cancer to wake me up. Thank you so much for watching Pines with Aquinas. Before we get into the interview, I'd like to ask you to please consider subscribing. Over 58% of people who watch this show regularly are still not subscribed, so please do it. It's a quick, free, easy way to support the channel. We really appreciate it. Tammy Peterson, thank you so much for coming all the way out here. Hey, it's my pleasure. Do you travel a lot?

Yes. Pretty constantly. I don't know if I ever want to travel again, but it might be just because I have young kids, maybe when they're older, my wife. Yeah, I'm right. I'm a grandmother. So, and I have young kids, maybe when they're older, my wife. Yeah, right. I'm a grandmother, so, and I trust my kids to take care of their kids as long as I go to see them regularly. When I was probably 15 to 18 years old, I had this dream of having a baby and traveling around in a van with my baby.

I guess my husband's my baby. We should point out, just so it's not awkward, that my wife and your husband are sitting behind you. And they're welcome to do this whenever you make a salient point that they would like to congratulate. Yeah. Yeah, but it's really lovely to have you. Have you ever seen the show before? Do you know what Pines for the Aquinas is? Kind of. Okay. So it's really casual. I just wanted to chat with you.

I heard you give very challenging questions. Yeah, not really. Not really. If I did that, if I did that people would be on the defensive and we wouldn't be able to get to the heart of things. That's right. But one thing I know a lot of people have been fascinated by and I don't know if you're sick to death of talking about it or not is you were diagnosed with a rare form of cancer and which you were given 10 months to live. Mm-hmm. That was a surprise. Yeah. Do you mind talking about that? No, I don't. I've talked about it enough that I understand it more,

I can explain it better, so it probably won't take the whole time to talk about it. I'd be okay if it did, but how did, I guess, what symptoms were you seeing and what was it like being given? I hardly had any symptoms, in fact. They had first diagnosed me with renal cell carcinoma. And that was just, I had been traveling with my sister to Croatia to walk. And so I walked for 10 days. And when I came back, two weeks later, I had a terrible fever and my digestion just went wild and my fever went away but the digestion never

got better. So I thought, well, I guess I always had trouble with my digestion, but this was even more so I thought I'd better go to the doctor. So he went and he said, you probably have a parasite. And I thought, of course, that's what I have. It's a parasite. So he gave me an ultrasound and saw a shadow on my kidney. So I had no symptoms that I know of before this. I had picked up a bacterial infection on the plane, which I ended up being treated for, but it was the shadow on the kidney that I needed to have biopsied. And then they found out that I had what they thought was renal cell carcinoma. And they said it was okay. I could travel as long as I wanted, come back whenever I

wanted, because it only grows a millimeter a year, and it doesn't kill anybody. So we finished our tour, we went to Australia, we ended up in Santa Barbara, and then I went home in March of 2019 for surgery. And so I had surgery and Jordan's family came, his mother came to take care of me, his sister came to take care of me, my sister, my brother, it went for a long time but all our family members came to take care of me. It was very good, it was very good. It was surprising that I can say that, but it was very good. But I was about probably almost six weeks after the surgery, I started getting a pain

in my back, just kind of in my flank, kind of in my lower back onto my hip. And I told the surgeon that and he looked at the biopsy again and realized that they had ignored the idea that I might have something called a Bellini tumor, which kills everybody, which kills everybody so fast it's usually diagnosed after they die. And so he called me back in for the six week checkup. Jordan and I went, sat down and I noticed he seemed very nervous and he started handing me papers and I could see his hand was shaking. He was asking me to sign them. He said, you're going to need another surgery and I need you. And pretty quickly too, you need to sign these

waivers. And he said, we found out that actually you only have 10 months to live. And I thought, first thing I thought was, you know, my mom died of dementia by the time she was 20 or 74. She had 20 years of it. So really she died in a way when she was in her 50s because she lost her ability to speak very early on. Her sister died of lung cancer earlier than her and so did her brother. And then her other sister died of Lou Gehrig's about the same time, so they're all dead really by the time they were 70.

I was 55 and I thought, well, maybe that's me too. And that must be because we all wonder how we might react in a situation like that, but you don't know. No, and my dad, he's a very calm person. I never ever saw him upset about anything, really. He was a very calm person. And so I was lucky I have that kind of nature that is also very calm. But it was maybe in retrospect not the right response. So when I went home to see my son, who lived at the end of our street,

I had to tell him what happened at the doctor's office, so I invited him outside and told him that it wasn't a good prognosis what they gave me and that I only had what they thought was about 10 months to live. And he looked at me and there was really horror on his face, you know, and deep grief on his face that I had never seen from him to me, you know. All the love, I feel now that all the love that I had given to him through his life and we'd always had a very good relationship, Julien and I. We never had any trouble in our relationship. There was no, I was pretty rebellious to my parents. There was none of that from him. So, it was a pretty easy flow of love between the two of us. And when he looked back at me with such loss in his eyes, I felt worthy

that like I'd never felt before. So I thought, well, that's pretty amazing when you have a child. So I thought, well, that's pretty amazing when you have a child. That love that they give you comes back to you. It does come back to you. Whether you have the moment that I had or not, that love is there, coming back to you all the time. If you can be aware of it, it's there. And I was acutely aware of it then, and I felt whatever was holding me down, I felt it leave. So I really had a physical sensation of

something lifting from me. And I read for months after that, and I guess I described it as doubt and cynicism. That seemed to really say, describe what it was that I thought had left my shoulders. And I had reason for cynicism. When I was about 17, I was the supervisor of the swimming pool. My brother had been the supervisor, and my sisters had been lifeguards, and now I, eight years later, they were all gone to university, I was the supervisor of the pool, you know? And it was, it was, I was following in the footsteps of my older siblings and feeling, my brother had taught me to swim when I was

nine. It was a big deal for me to be in that position at 17. And the school brought their school kids, six years old, to swim in the swimming pool. When they got them in the pool, they were too short. So I was pointing to kids who were underneath the water, looking up at me through the water, and I was going, oh, grab that one, grab that one, grab... And at the end of that, I said to the teachers, I said, you got to bring more people with you next time and have them in the water. Oh, gotcha, gotcha.

So that if anybody is under the water, you can just grab them and play with them and just be right there with them and I'll make sure nobody's under the water. But I said that was way too scary, you know? So the next week they showed up and they didn't bring anybody, so I locked the door. I said, no, you really can't come in, it's not safe. So then the town council, the mayor and the town council called me to a meeting and they told me, like, what do you think you're doing, kid? You can't close the swimming pool. Who do you think you are? And I was like, well, I couldn't see any other way to deal with

that except for to ask for more help. And when they didn't bring help, I didn't feel it was safe. And I thought it was my decision to make. And they said, well, we'd like you to just run the pool and to let the people come in the pool who want to come in the pool. And I said, well, if you write that down for me and sign it, then I can rest assured that it's your responsibility and not my responsibility. That'll work. And one of them, who was a farmer whose farm my mom and I went out to pluck chickens from, and he was on my dad's curling team sometimes. This is a tiny little town where everybody knows everybody. The mayor was the plumber in town, and my dad knew him too. And so, I knew all of these people. They were friends and of the family. I knew their families. I knew their children and everything. And he said that

I would let a kid drown to spite him. And I was 17. I was shocked. In this meeting, he said that. Yeah, in the meeting. I was so shocked. And I said, well, I quit. I can't work for somebody who thinks that. I was, I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what I might have done was just stood my ground and said, you know, that first of all, that's ridiculous. And I'm going to run it the way I think I should run it. And you can decide what to do with that. You know, if I would have had maybe more support on my end, but I didn't. So in my 17-year-old wisdom, I just quit my job. And then very soon after that, the college hired me to water plants in the greenhouse, which was way less troublesome and just as wonderful because plants are happy for the sun and I was happy to give them.

If you drown them, it's not as bad. That's right. So I ended up having cynicism for authority after that. I see. Yeah. Any negative beliefs about yourself through that experience? That's a pretty bold thing, actually, for a 17-year-old to do. I mean, you could have cried, you could have run away, you could have cowered, but the fact that you could say, no, I quit shows some kind of backbone, but...

Maybe, yeah. Yeah, in one way or another, right? Now in my older years, I think, no, you stand your ground. So even more, I think, now you stand your ground. If you feel that what you're doing is right, then you just, you hold still. You hold still and see what happens. All right, so this is really interesting because you're saying 17 is kind of when this cynicism maybe rushed in, and then how how did that develop and what was it about Julian's look that had

it lift? Right, right. Well, I didn't vote for quite a few years. I really put a damper on my authority figures. I didn't have a lot of hope for the politicians to set things right or anything. I was really jaded. I became jaded and it showed in my civic duty. I was not answering to my civic duty for quite a long time. And how did that, so how did, you know, it's little by little I understand what happened at that moment.

You know, I went to church when I was a little girl. Went Sunday school. My older siblings, mostly, I remember going with them. And when I was in junior high, in the Protestant church, you go to Christian Girls in Training, I went through that. It was Explorers, and then in high school it's Christian Girls in Training. And my sister was above, she was four years older than me. So when she was finishing and graduating from her Christian Girls in Training program, I was just beginning. And she was 17 when she left home, because

she was a December baby. And when we left home, because she was a December baby. And when we left home, we went 350 miles away, because we were in a tiny little town in northern Alberta, and we had to go to Edmonton, which was a six-hour drive south. So when you left home, you left home. And so my brother and sister had left home, and now my last sister was at the end of her last semester in high school. And the CGIT leader didn't

want to let her graduate because she had finished her work early and got a summer job instead of going to CGIT right to the moment of graduation. She was thinking it was questionable whether my sister should graduate or not, and my mother was completely incensed. She just was so outraged that that wasn't happening. There was a mother-daughter dinner and she sent me as the mother. Instead of her, she wouldn't go. So I was only about 12 or 13 and I was pretty confused by all of the trouble. And when my sister left home and my mother was so incensed with the church, I stopped going.

As all of us do, or some of us do, we use every excuse we can to leave the church and that was enough for me. And plus I was 13 and 13 year olds can be pretty skeptical of things, authority for one thing. So I already had that authority, you know, kind of hit against authority when I was 13 and then again at 17.

So it did make me kind of jaded. I was definitely kind of jaded and doubt. Well, everybody I think is wondering. Sorry to cut you off. When you say cynicism and doubt, do, everybody, I think, is wondering. Sorry to cut you off. When you say cynicism and doubt, do you just mean in general or do you mean towards something? Well, I mean authority in terms of cynicism, but doubt, that could have been, that was probably more in the religious realm that I was doubtful. My dad had taught me when I was a little kid to, if he tickled my feet not to laugh, to

have willpower, which I could do, so I wasn't ticklish. Impressive. Yeah, right. I could not do that now. Well, he taught me. I don't think you got taught that early enough. No, that's true. Yeah. No, that's true. Early enough. But it also taught me to be very sure of my own control of my life, taking control of

my life. I broadened that philosophy that He gave me about being strong-willed, and I took that into my own life. So, when I left home, I went to university, but I was a pretty creative person, so everything looked good. And I went to university and I studied sciences, you know, drama and English and French and philosophy. That all looked good to me. But then I was taking care of myself because I just got some suitcases when I left home. So I had to work in the summer and so I went back to Alberta to

work in the summer and I decided I didn't want to go back to Montreal. I'd left 3,000 miles and driven all the way to Montreal. So then I flew back to Ottawa, which is just a two-hour drive from Montreal, but it's not quite as French, so it's easier to get a job. So I lived in Ottawa and I worked for a year as a swimming instructor. And at the end of that, I read a book called What Colors Your Parachute? And that is a career finding book. So I narrowed down what I might do. I went to the counselor at the university and I said, I like art, education, I like to teach. I'm very interested in health, in medicine. And they said kinesiology.

And I said, OK, whatever that is, I'll study it, which is really a philosophy of the body degree. You're studying psychology, physiology, biomechanics, physics of the body, exercise. And I was a baseball player, a swimmer, a lifeguard, a volleyball player. Those were my main sports, but I took sports very seriously and so did my family. We didn't take... My brother was a very avid reader. He got the Governor General's Award in Alberta when he was in high school, which is the top marks in the whole province.

So he was a very studious person. I was eight years younger than him and I was totally an athlete. So everything that had to do with sports, I had a hand in that. Reading wasn't something that my parents... They were very conscientious people, very conservative people. They worked every day, kept a very clean house. Mom cooked all our meals, she sewed all our clothes, that kind of... But religion wasn't really part of our existence, and sitting down to read was really kind of a waste of time. So that wasn't, you know, what I grew up with.

So, you know, what happened with Julian? You know, I'd been married to Jordan by that time for 25 years, because Julian was, or even closer to 30, because Julian was 25 when I got sick. And when Jordan and I first got married, he told me if I told the truth, we could be married. If I wasn't going to tell the truth, it wouldn't work. And I took what he said seriously, and I thought about that for a number of months while I finished my university degree, and came back and I said I decided that I was going to

tell the complete honest truth as far as I could and that we could get married and so we did and we got married. Yeah I just want to see how this happened. So he didn't, when did he tell this to you and when did he propose to you because presumably it wasn't on the at the same moment. Will you marry me also? You're going to need to Well, he asked me to marry me a couple of times. Cool. And I said, well, you know, I don't think you're ready and neither am I, kind of thing. But I didn't say no, because I did, I really thought he was one of the smartest people in town, one of the most interesting people. I guess I didn't know how smart he was, but he was interesting.

He was an interesting kid, a year younger than me, but he was interesting. He was an interesting kid. A year younger than me, but in my class, because he skipped grade one. His father taught him to read when he was a little guy. And he taught me to play chess. He taught me to play chess. We played with his science set. And I didn't have any siblings near to me, so he was a good friend and introduced me to his family and his family. He had a good father, you know, and a good mother,

a very attentive father and mother, you know, and he was at home when he was a little guy and his dad was at work, he would wait in anticipation for his dad to get there because when he got there, he'd lay down on the rug and put his arm around him and read to him. Yeah. Yeah, so he had, so, and I got, so then, so in that family I could see there was something good there.

I could definitely knew there was something good there. So even over the years when I left home, went out and I lived with another guy and decided that he wasn't the guy. I waited for Jordan in Ottawa, but he didn't show up, so I ended up living with another guy for a couple of years until I found Jordan finally came out to Montreal and he called me. And then he said, I'm in Montreal, which is a two-hour drive, do you want to come for

Thanksgiving? And I went to see him and his house was clean and seemed to be have some friends and he'd made dinner and he was at the university getting his PhD and writing a book. I thought, yeah, yeah, definitely it's time to get married. So then I went back, finished my degree and I came to Montreal. And he had asked me two or three times by then, once in a letter and once at a playground at New Year's Eve. He asked me again and I just, he was very much a person who was enjoying his time with his friends and learning at the same time.

He was... I wasn't sure if he was the father of my children or not yet. When I saw him in Montreal and he had his house clean and he had friends and he knew how to cook and he was getting his PhD and writing a book. Then I had enough indication that he had got his life together, and it was time to marry him. I think women were starting to get interested in him, and I thought I'd better marry him quick. And so I managed that. I asked him actually to marry him on Sadie Hawkins' day, which is... Hang on, you asked him? Yeah, I asked him.

So did he say yes? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. February 29th. February 29th is Sadie Hawkins day. It's the day that women can ask men to marry. I've learned that since moving here.

I didn't know that. I didn't know that. It just happened to be the day. Is that a Canadian thing as well? Yeah. Oh, sorry. I see what you mean. When you say you didn't know that, what you mean is you didn't realize it happened to

be that day when he asked you. Yeah, that's right. So it was legitimate as far as I'm concerned. Yeah, I think so. Well, he also asked you a few times. So really happened to be that day when that's right. So it was legitimate as far as I'm concerned. Yeah, I think so. Well, he also asked you a few times. So really, this was just you. Yeah, I pretty much said yes. That was what I was saying. Yes. Could you can you think of a time that you're able to share of when it was very difficult to be honest? Oh, yeah.

We had our challenges, you know, there's no doubt about it. Michaela was very sick, and we had differing opinions of how she might be treated medically. That was hard. We had to make a deal that we wouldn't talk about her health after nine at night so that we could sleep, because she was pretty sick. And that can take over your marriage completely. So we managed to skate by that, because we weren't always in agreement.

There was a lot to discuss, and what had happened was so catastrophic. She was diagnosed with 38 affected joints. Everywhere except her spine was affected by arthritis. happened was so catastrophic. She was diagnosed with 38 affected joints, everywhere except her spine was affected by arthritis. And she was just this little kid. She was only seven, eight years old, you know. When she was diagnosed with arthritis, first of all, I had taken her to a number of different doctors saying, what do you think of this ankle? It doesn't seem, you know, something wrong with her feet or she's not keeping up when we walk.

Like what's going on? And she had a very dry arthritis. It wasn't obvious that there was swelling. So people had to know quite a bit about arthritis to diagnose it. And I went to University of Toronto's athletic department one day, probably had the kids in swimming or something, and I took her to the physiotherapist at the university. I also had shoulder problems that I used to go to the physios at all the universities we went to to see if I could get some help. So it wasn't that I was, this was a new idea. I'd been to physio

myself quite a bit since I was 17. So now I was in my thirties. I was pretty used to finding answers from physiotherapy or from massage therapy. And so I asked this physiotherapist and she tried to wiggle her heel. There was no weakling her heel. She said, your daughter has rheumatoid arthritis. And I was like, oh my, oh my, oh my. Because I had, my older sister had a friend whose younger sister had rheumatoid. So I was just, wow, when this girl told me that, I was taken aback, to say the least. And my mother at that time had dementia and she wasn't doing well and she died in 2007. By then, Michaela had been on biologics and her arthritis had been controlled for a few years,

but then her joints started to disintegrate when she was about 17. And my mom had died by then and I used to pray to my mother all the time to help Michaela, to help Michaela find health. And now I realize I was praying to what was best in my mother, which was Mother Mary. So I've been praying to Mother Mary for a very long time. When I went first into the Protestant church, I looked for Mother Mary there, and she wasn't there. So there was something in me, even from the time I was young, of a yearning for a relationship

with Mother Mary. Partly it might have been I came from a family of feminists, so part of my yearning might have been a feminist observation that there were no women in the church. Some of it might have been that, and probably was some of that, but that wasn't everything. That definitely wasn't everything, and I think that's what the feminists are after, too, probably as a relationship with Mother Mary. They just don't know it. I heard recently that Cosmopolitan magazine, there was two types of women that they weren't interested in capturing, virgins andopolitan magazine, there was two types of women that they weren't interested in capturing.

Virgins and mothers. So in the Blessed Virgin Mary, we have the Virgin Mother. The kind of antidote to modern, well, to all feminism. That magazine isn't going to be around much longer, I would think. Please God. That's for sure. Please God, what poison. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so, my aunt, my grandmother, they had some feminism learning. My aunt is who taught me

yoga, who introduced me to yoga. And she was a school teacher. She taught math to grade 9s and had two daughters of her own. She was kind of, she married an older man who never ever thought he'd have children, but she had children and he was a lovely, playful father. I really loved my uncle Roli. He was Swedish. He was a lot of fun. I loved him a lot. But my aunt and my mother suffered from resentment and I didn't know why. But they were kind of resentful. So, resentment kind of goes along with distrust. Okay. Right? So, as a little kid, it seemed like my mom didn't really trust my dad. Okay. And I didn't know why I loved my dad.

She couldn't give herself over to him. And resentment is... what is that? Well, that's a self-serving sin, that one. I mean, they all are, right? But resentment is as well, what about me? What about me? You know, everything that you're doing is not helpful to me. So it's all a reflection back to yourself, which is really hard on a person to always be reflecting back to themselves, because it causes a lot of anxiety and depression to always be thinking

of yourself. I was just in confession this morning repenting of resentment, so it's interesting to have this conversation. And it has to do with a certain level of suffering in our life. And suffering sucks, and resenting is a great way to make it worse. Yes, that's right. Resentment. When George was sick, you know, when we were sick, and Jordan was away, he was in another country and I had just got out of the hospital.

So I didn't go, I was at home and my daughter had taken him. My daughter and her husband had taken him for treatment and I was finding I was resentful towards my daughter and I did not want to be resentful towards my daughter. So I was spending every day walking and asking God to take this resentment from me. But I was also reading, doing a lot of self-reflection, and I read something of, look for a personality trait that is 30 words long and describe everything that is positive about your daughter.

So I wrote down every positive personality trait she had, and she had many. And my resentment was just one thing, and it was just a, it was so small an issue, and that's the thing about resentment. It's a very specific thing. It's not, it's not a broad look at a whole person. It's a very narrow look at a person. And so with outlining who she was in a more broad sense, made me realize what a tiny bit of reality I was focusing on. And then after that, not too long, I was able to

not have resentful thoughts about it. and when everybody was back together again, my relationship with her disflawished more and more and more. And so, I was able to overcome that, thank the Lord, because I had enough trouble going on. You know, I'd nearly died, my husband was nearly dying, and now I was going to be resentful to my daughter? Well, so that was going to... you know, it was like, I didn't need that. I didn't need that. I needed support and I needed to support because we needed to support one another to get through this. So yeah, it was a, not a good choice, that resentment. And it is a choice. It's just hard to understand.

I think it's helpful too to sort of be curious about why it is you feel the way that you do as opposed to immediately scolding yourself for it, which is I'm sure what you did. Yeah, like awareness, right? What is this? Awareness. Where is this coming from? What is this part of me?

That's a beautiful thing, awareness. To be aware of, and you're in an argument with your husband and you say something and you know it's to hurt the other person. 100%. And to become aware of that. And then to sit there and say, oh, I said something that wasn't right. I don't understand why I said it. But just admitting that you're aware of it is the first. I remember saying that to someone once. I'm like, you know how you say something to your wife and

you do it to hurt her? And he's like, why would you do that? I'm like, oh, now I feel very alone. But then I thought you mustn't be either a saint or you're not very self reflective. Because I don't know any human being who doesn't understand that experience of trying to hurt someone you love and not knowing why you're trying to do that. Oh, yeah, for sure. Getting one up on them. And we call it that too. One of the things I think people have benefited so much from you and Jordan McKayla is your

your willingness to be vulnerable, which must be brutal, especially as more and more people get to know you, because it turns out that if people online have a choice between sympathy and driving the knife in, they almost always choose that. There are those that drive the knife in, that's for sure. But I think they suffer more than I do for that. Yes. You know, because I don't, I kind of try to look at, like turn it around, turn it around to see where they're suffering.

Like, why would you say something like that? You must be hurting terribly to say something like that. Has that been a conscious choice for all y'all to be vulnerable about your struggles and yeah yeah i want to tell you about some amazing coffee we were sent recently it was from seven weeks coffee which is america's pro-life coffee company they are on a mission to fund the pro-life movement one cup of coffee at a time the reason they're called seven weeks coffee is because it's at seven weeks that a baby is the size of a coffee bean. And it's the same time a heartbeat is clearly detected

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hey, let's just go easy? There's moments. So, when I was very sick, I prayed to God that if He saw it in His heart that I was going to live, I promised I'd speak publicly. So, that was when I said that and I lived. I didn't really have much choice in the matter after that. But Jordan had already been in the public sphere and he had come home to me one day and said, you know, they're making people at university take DEI tests and my clients are getting, having politically correct overlords that are running their lives, and this is getting very bad, I have to say something publicly,

and I said, well, you've been talking to me about this stuff for 30 years, why don't you just, let's see what happens? What's the worst thing that could happen? That's what I said. Yeah. And actually, it was stressful at the beginning that I thought maybe somebody might break my windows or something, but nobody did. They tipped over my garbage cans, you know, but that was just some, you know, teenager, some lost teenager. I ran out on the

sidewalk, walked and yelled, God be with you! I don't know what she thought of that, but luckily... Well, that was nice, that was kind. I was sitting on the porch praying, so... Yeah, you could have said something much worse. I was in the right frame of mind. So, when you're talking about resentment, you're talking, when you say, this lifted, when Julian looked at you, resentment towards people in general, or just this spirit of resentment that permeated like the clouds sort of lifted?

Whatever was holding me down, whatever was holding me down lifted off and then I was absolutely filled with gratitude. Wow! Yeah, and I said to him, you know, Julian, the doctor doesn't know when I'm going to die. What an idiot! God knows when I'm going to die. And I said, it's not up to me, because I also thought I could decide if I was going to … I accepted it in the office, like it was up to me to accept. Like it's not up to me. It's up to God. You can give me whatever information you want, but it's not up to me to have judgment on it.

Yeah. So, okay, so then how did you go about living the next 10 months of your life? Well, I was very fortunate. My Catholic friend brought me a rosary in the hospital. Had you ever seen one or prayed one before? No, no, I'd seen them before. I don't know where. But after I was sick and better, my cousin, who doesn't talk to me because of our travelling around and what we're talking about now, she's suffering from some misapprehension about what we're talking about, probably. But anyway, she sent me a rosary that had belonged to my great-grandmother, because we were Catholic.

Okay. In Poland. Oh, I see. And so your parents... My grandmother married a Protestant, and she gave up being Catholic to marry him. But I didn't know that. So I didn't know that. In fact, my parents didn't baptize us. My grandmother did. I think she came to visit and saw, being a Catholic, even though she'd changed her religion, she was a Catholic, she saw all four of these kids not baptized at all, and she took us to church, the Protestant church, and had us all baptized. I think when my parents

were golfing or something. Let's get it done quick. Let's get it done while they're not around. So I knew I was baptized, but I was the youngest, so I didn't know that story until after I was sick. My brother and sister told me that my grandmother had baptized us, and I thought, oh wow, like that's news to me. I had no idea. And then when I hurt my back and I couldn't come here last May, I'd been talking to the priest who had taken me through the catechism, and I told him that my back was out, I didn't

know why, I couldn't walk or anything, my daughter was having some relationship trouble, and my husband was on tour and feeling very sick. He said, why don't you call my priest friend in Newfoundland? He said he's a good friend of mine, why don't you call him? So I call him, he's this Mexican priest in Newfoundland wearing his like priest outfit and a down-filled jacket over top. And he says, God sent me here. I don't know for how long, it's very cold. Very funny. But he started to pray in Spanish. I couldn't understand what he was saying, but I was listening to him and then he said to me, your grandmother's with

you. He said, are you close to your grandmother? I said, well, I'm close to both my grandmothers. My dad's mom played the organ in the church and my other grandmother sung in the choir in church. They were both in Protestant churches, and I loved them both, you know, and he said, well, she had short hair, and I'm like, well, they both had short hair, but thank you for that. But then I called my sister and I said, who baptized us? And she said, my mother's mom, and I'm like,

oh yeah, the one who left Catholicism is with me now that I've become a Catholic. Isn't that cool? It's like I've mended a past and I find that very helpful because I did love my grandmothers and I think there's power in that healing. If you can heal things, family,

if you can heal family troubles, if you can heal resentment, that what might have been something in your family. I found out my mom died in 2007. My grandmother died at 98, sometime after that. And when she died, she said, you know, you have to protect the children. And we thought, what does that mean? Turned out that my grandfather, who died at 56 from colon cancer,

so he wasn't a healthy guy. He was a farmer, but not a very good one. He was more of an artist. But they were in poverty. So he was just not in a situation that he could handle. And I've heard since that he was abusive to my grandmother and to the girls and so she said she came, my grandma said she came home one day and my mom was on the back quarter in the forest. So something had happened at home and she'd kind of run away and was hiding.

I'm sorry. Yeah and so that's why she didn't trust men, probably. And that's why they both had resentment towards men, but I had no idea of that. None of us did. And so there's going to be these kind of things that happen in our histories that we're not aware of, and it took me till I was 60 to find out what that was, and it was worth finding out, but... And I think God just allowed that to happen, that I was able to... I wanted, I guess, to know. I wanted to heal from that. And so then the story put itself together, bit by bit, so that I could understand and forgive, right?

My poor mum. Yeah. Yeah. You know, part of our own healing journey is understanding our own story and the sort of lies maybe we believed about ourselves or the sins we committed and what we did to other people and understanding that and asking for healing of that. And I remember someone once saying to me like, she said it to a group, so she wasn't saying it to me specifically, but like, your mum has a story. Your dad has a story. And we contend to maybe fall into

the trap of objectifying our parents in a way, not realizing that they've actually been through their own stuff and they're trying to process their own stuff as well. And that can help us have compassion. That's right. You know, when my dad died, I had a dream a few months later of him as a high school, just leaving high school. And you don't know your dad when he's 17, right? Nobody knows their dad when they're 17. So we don't know who those people are that are our parents and our grandparents largely

because we only get to know them. Most people get to know their parents when they're about, what, 40? That's quite a bit of time has gone by. Anyway, I had this dream that my dad was walking towards me and he was putting on different hats, and then he put on this hat he's no longer a boy. He's a man who has offered himself to society. And as a father, he's become a father and a member of society, who,

a man who is caring for his children. And he's put himself in that position and he is let go of his childhood. He's no longer a child. So I was able to thank him. And then I thought of my children who are in their 30s and are married and are having children, and I could thank them too, because realizing my kids are no longer children either. They're mothers and fathers, and they're providing for their children and loving their children, making a house for their children and a home for them, and I can be grateful to them.

So I called them both and told them how grateful I am for them taking on the role of adult. Because when does a young man and a young woman, they say, oh, there's no good men out there. And I think, what do young women mean by that? We just went to see Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs last night. What was that like? Well, they had the dwarfs in it because they weren't going to. So they had the dwarfs in it, which is the best part.

Hi-ho, hi-ho has got to be the best song ever. They added a bunch of songs that weren't very memorable, but they had a couple of the old songs that we knew from when we were children and the movie just came out. But I was reading the Brother Grimm's Snow White story afterwards just to see how much of the story they adhered to. And in the Grimm's fairy tale, the Wicked Queen, because she's the stepmother, and the king goes off and she's in control and she wants to kill Snow White because she's second fairest in the land now and she wants to be first fairest in the land, so she's going to kill Snow White and so the huntsman takes her out and they had that in there and he, but it was also kind of, takes her out and they had that in there and he but it was also kind of the whole movie was

easy to watch. It wasn't scary like I remember the story when I was a little kid so they they smoothed it over so that no one would be scared which is not the story. That's not the story and And the other thing that was very interesting is they did portray the dwarves and she did go out and find the house and make friends with the dwarves and all of that was the same. But at the very end, the prince is supposed to come and they're supposed to get married and live happily ever after. That's what it's like in the Grimms fairy tale. But this one, it was interesting. So Snow White comes back to the castle and faces the Queen.

It's not the Prince, it's her, right? So she faces the Queen. The Prince-like character is actually one of the bandits in the forest who runs a coterie of diverse merry men. So he is supposed to be the protagonist, but he's not given a complete role. So it's very interesting because at the end, when Snow White meets the queen, the dwarves are there

and they're not supposed to be there. They wouldn't have been there. They would have been left in the forest. So the dwarves are there, and they're not supposed to be there. They wouldn't have been there. They would have been left in the forest. The dwarves are there, and so is this bandit who isn't... He's up on the table dancing with her, and they're all wearing white, and it looks like confetti. So, there's some... Something about marriage was trying to be done, but people were unaware that that's what they were doing, because it's only about Snow White, it's not about Him. So when she goes out and she meets the dwarves, like any young women, when she meets men, they're all dwarves.

None of them are the prince, unless they are the prince, right? So all young women meet dwarves until they meet the one who captures their heart, right? And so, that's what those dwarves are. Those dwarves are the potential men. And it's also interesting because all the dwarves are called happy and grumpy and dopey and dock, right? They all have these kind of individual attributes of a man, but not all put together. Right? So, they're a man in process.

It's a man in process, but it's not complete. And that's who she first, when she escapes the Queen and is starting to wake up to her reality, she meets all these dwarves. Well, of course she does, because she's also not very well-formed in her understanding of what a mature woman is, and they are not a mature man either. But it's a start. It's a start. She has to make friends with those guys, and she has to serve them before the prince arrives. Well, in this story it's not a prince, it's just a bandit, and he's only, and he's not, they don't ever finish the protagonist and there is no prince, right? So they leave him in the end as dwarves and this bandit, so they don't develop the male

properly. So they don't develop the male properly, which is a sign of our times, because women think, young women, they have this thought, I think, that there should be a prince that just appears, that's like, well, you have to do the work. You have to serve your fellow man to find the prince. You have to put yourself out there as a person who is in service to make things better and to help anybody who needs, who's lost to find their way. I mean, that's what it's all about. And if you're not doing that, you're not going to find the Prince. I recently had a wonderful woman on my show named Carrie Gress.

I know Carrie. Yeah, she's terrific. She's one of my favorite people. Written a couple of books on feminism, as you know. It actually changed my wife and I's opinion completely on feminism after we read it. Oh, good. You know how people are always saying, what's an important idea you've changed your mind on?

I always want to find one so I can seem intellectually open. Well, this is one. Oh, yes. The feminism idea. But she I said to her, what should a fellow look for in a in a woman? And he said, she said, you know, someone who's more interested in the things and people around her than in ideologies. And that's kind of like what you're saying about going outside of yourself,

not this sort of solipsistic enclosed self where you think about ideologies and congratulate yourself for being enlightened. But you're actually interested in the children at the restaurant and the barista and like someone like that, that's someone, a fella, that's at least a start. Yes, that's a start. That's a start. And how do you make a, what, where do you find a prince? A prince appears when you marry him, and he takes on the responsibility of a husband and then a father. Now there's a man, right? There's a man. And that's when you find your man. You don't find a fully developed, perfect man until you've put yourself out there and been, you know, done what you need to do to feel like you have given enough,

have given enough. You have to be offering and giving before you're going to get anything back that's worth having. That's just how it works. And that's how it works in the fairy tales. It works like that in reality. Maybe I'm thinking of the wrong brother Grims, but is this the one where the wicked queen had to dance in those slippers until she died? Jordan's nodding.

Jordan would know, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I love the brother Grims. I read those to my kids and they love them so much. She has a, in the Grims, she has three problems. She has a comb. That's right. Right? Poison comb. She ties her bodice way too tight until she can't breathe, which is what a terrible mother would do, because she doesn't want her daughter

outshining her. She'd definitely tie her, her bodice too tight. And also, she doesn't want her to be beautiful, so she'd put poison in her comb, for sure. But in the movie, it's just a poison apple. So it's simplified. So if you had to give it a rating out of 10? Well, I'd say they didn't make, it's not a, it didn't get my back up. It was just kind of not all that interesting. Yeah. Yeah. But that's the ideology, right?

It's just kind of, well, before they started all this gender surgery, butchery stuff, it was kind of just, you could kind of just ignore it. Now it's gone much further than that, and now it's absolutely horrific, but it is the same thing. It's just gone way too far, way too far. When this lovely woman came to you and gave you a rosary, how did you begin to learn how to pray it?

I told her I didn't know how to pray it, and so she offered to teach me. And so she came every day for a couple hours for five weeks while I was in the hospital. Okay, so you were diagnosed, and how long after you were diagnosed were you in hospital? I was diagnosed, oh, you know, a couple of weeks. They did the surgery, and then I went home, but then I had a leak in the lymph, because they took all my lymph out from this side. Okay. So the surgery went, oh, they got the cancer out. I was on a carnivore diet, so actually the cancer didn't progress like it would for most

people. That's why they caught it, I think, because it was growing slowly. Because cancer is a metabolic disease. It grows and it has to have plants to survive. The cancer cells grow on plants. They don't grow on fat. So if anybody has had cancer, it's best to stay away from plants. And well, it's better for most people, but it's definitely good for people who have had cancer. Are you still doing the carnival thing? Yes, completely. And well, it's better for most people, but it's definitely good for people who have had cancer. Are you still doing the carnivore thing? Yes, completely.

Yeah. I cheat. I drink some bourbon at night. Well, bourbon, Michaela drinks some bourbon. Because the bourbon doesn't have any dyes in it. It doesn't have any coloring in it. And besides, I'm actually quite healthy. And I'm not trying to win a contest or be carnivore, man. I don't be carnivore man. I was thinking I'd like to have some peaty scotch of some

sort like mezcal or something. Yeah. Well that's yeah. Mezcal is like a peaty tequila, but like a Lagervullen. I don't know that. It's a great scotch. Yeah. See, I would, I'd like that. That'd be good. Just a little, just to, just to swish, just to swish in my mouth would be good. Do you want some? Just to swish in my mouth would be good. Do you want some? Just to swish in my mouth. Would something bad happen if you had it? I don't want you.

No, I don't think so. Okay, let's do it. I thought we were supposed to have a pint, but we're not going to have a pint of bourbon, are we? Bullet, 95. This is great. Yeah. You're welcome to the solutions. Where did you get this from? Yep, that's enough. So I'm Scottish in part, you see, from the lowlands in Scott Scott.

So we like PD Scotch. Yeah, this is sweet. This is bourbon. It's not sweetened. It is just but bourbon is naturally sweet because of the corn. But yeah. Oh, yeah, that's really lovely. So my wife was, I'm glad you like it. My wife was, she still suffers with sick. She's still sick, but I mean, she was really sick, almost bedridden. And she heard about Michaela. So thank you to Michaela. Oh, good.

It's amazing how many people your daughter has helped. She's helped lots of people. Yeah. And at the time we were living in Guatemala, we've just done a big vacation, a couple of month vacation. And so we tried her doing it there, but there wasn't a lot of steak. So she was eating chicken and things like this. And she was just losing weight and it wasn't happening. Oh yeah, not enough fat. So she starts doing the carnivore thing. And before that she was eating very clean, like paleo type stuff. We're talking about you. And we're drinking bourbon.

Oh nice, good for you. Cheers. Thank you my love. Sláinte, yes, cheers to you. And anyway, so she started to lose weight, which was not good, because she's already thin. I don't need to lose weight.

And I was afraid. Right. But she kept eating meat. And then within about two months, I remembered laying with her in the bed and I put my hand on her leg and I went, bloody hell, you're getting muscle somehow. And she wasn't working out.

Isn't that wild? Yeah, it is wild. And so, was it, I think two months and you were off all, three months off all of her medication and she had like these giant thick pill boxes. And I don't want to overstate it. It's not like you're tremendous now, but she was dislocating.

When she would kneel to receive the Eucharist, her knee would dislocate. Yeah, she said. That's not good. No, it's not good! Not your first choice. You don't want that. No, but you know, I've been on this diet for nearly eight years.

Wow. And … You're not dead. And I'm not dead. First of all, I'm not dead. Plus, I'm better than I was. But it's taken this eight years to figure it all out. So don't give up.

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world and enter into the reality of the spiritual battle we're living in. So men, if you've been feeling the call to go deeper, to live with greater freedom, discipline, and purpose, join Father Innocent and Father Angelus of the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal as they lead us through St. Michael's Lent starting August 15th. Be a part of reviving this ancient tradition in the church and rally with brothers from around the world to follow the example of St. Francis and St. Michael. Go to Exodus90.com slash Matt to find out more information. Join us on August 15th for St. Michael's Lent and get ready to fight the good fight. That's Exodus90. com slash Matt. There's more to figure out still. There's there's other things like parasites.

Yeah. And amoebas. And I just think it's over. Those are only in Africa. Yeah, no, we have them too. We have them too. And and you have to you have to get rid of them one at a time in a certain order. You have to have somebody to deal. Well, if you know, so it's how to do that.

Let her know. Yeah. I'm going to hook her up with those people. But it's funny, like when we were dating, my wife and I, I'm sure same thing with you and Jordan, if someone had said one day, like all you'll eat is steak and you'd be like, and vegetables. You're like, no, no, no, vitamins. No, no, no, just steak. I'm going to die. Yeah. Isn't that wild? But you know, when I was a teenager, if my mom and dad went away for the weekend, I would

just eat steak the whole time they were gone. Would you? Okay. Yeah. So I liked meat. And Michaela, she used to just, when she was a little kid, we were in a restaurant, we'd just give her a bone. She'd just chew on the bone. Come on. While we were sitting in the restaurant, we should, we could have just given her meat. You know, that's what she gives her little kids and they're as dynamic as any other child. So, it does seem that we have, over the last 10,000 years, lost our way.

It's a long time, so it was hard to realize. But I took her to lots of naturopaths trying to figure out her problems. We gave her a panel, you can get a panel done, of IgG food sensitivity testing and everything looked red. And we thought everything? Did we do that to you? Everything's red? Yeah, good. We've got to get her and Michaela in touch because Cameron is a specimen, all to herself, all the stuff she's dealt with. Yeah.

Well, there are thousands of people on Michaela's Lion Diet website with testimonials, all kinds of people. What's so hard is there's not one story. There's a bazillion stories and they all seem so different and complicated. So you'll read someone's story and you go, it's not exactly like me. It's not exactly what I'm struggling with. Yeah, but we never thought, so first of all, it was, I had arthritis in my hands and in my knees

so I couldn't go up and downstairs and I couldn't even put barrettes in or hold my husband's hand. I was not able to do things or go anywhere. I was really in a rough spot when I went on the carnivore diet. But that's not all the problem I had, right? I had irritable bowel.

Yup. I had this arm when I did back crawl, I'd swim like this and like this, because I couldn't lift this arm anymore. So I couldn't ride my bike or throw a ball or swim front crawl or back crawl. I practically not even swim, just swim in circles because this arm wasn't working anymore and like not long after that it was fine and I'd had the bicep, what they told me was bicep

tendonitis which I was always going to the physiotherapists and all the universities for. It's gone. So, whatever inflammation I had in this shoulder, no matter what exercises I did, I gave up sugar for a while, that didn't work. I gave up meat for a while, that didn't work. It was only when I gave up all the plants that it healed. So, I had quite a few different things going on, which I never even thought it would... I wasn't even worried about those things. So, I had quite a few different things going on, which I never even thought it would.

I wasn't even worried about those things. I was more worried that I couldn't get around, so I went on the diet. What's your arthritis like? It's gone, as long as I don't cheat. My knees hardly ever hurt, ever, ever, no matter what I do, but my thumbs, because they're such little joints, I think, if I eat something I shouldn't, they'll tell me. So I'm, I can't really cheat. Yeah. No, not, no, I didn't be comfortable. I can cheat, but I won't be comfortable. Yeah. Do you miss anything?

Well, I've started drinking espresso. Yeah. That's a nice thing to have. I like, you know, like peaty scotch. I like things that have a very distinct flavor. I like that. So I miss those kinds of things. But no, not really, cause you start, you stop craving them. So the missing is more maybe context related. So much of it's routine. If you wake up every morning and have a muffin say, then the idea of not having a muffin in the morning.

Oh, I think cinnamon buns. I liked cinnamon buns. I like cinnamon, but my daughter is developing honey taffy. It's only made of honey and salt. And they're thinking maybe they might put cinnamon in it. And I thought, well, that would be good. And would you have that? Yeah, I could have that. I seem to be able to eat sugar, but I shouldn't eat chocolate. There's, I think, too many. There can be mold in chocolate. There can be mold in coffee, too.

So it's a bit tricky. I'm not as sensitive as some people, though, but some people are so sensitive that even that amount of mold will, you know, cause them grief. And it's good to know that anyway. How did you finally, or maybe you're not finally healed. I don't really know your story, but was there- Pretty healed, pretty healed. With the leak, that stuff is what I mean. Oh yeah, no, I was starting to think,

you know, they'll put me back together. They'll put a shunt like from my belly up to my heart or something and they'll, you know, I'll be put, I said to Jordan, because I was not well, and I was really down to 80 pounds, like I had no bum, no breasts, my shoulder blades just stuck straight out, I could see all my ribs. I was like, oh, this is what starving to death looks like. And that was pretty distressing, but I just prayed all the time and I didn't worry. So, nobody has to worry about how wife is feeling about it, because I was just praying constantly.

How were you praying? What does that mean? Really, mostly our Father. I was just praying our Father all the time, and then I would pray the rosary in the morning and pray our Father through the night. And actually, the prayers, you know, I had very, very painful scans. They were looking... They'd fill my body up with dye, they'd fill my lymph up with dye and look for this leak, and some of the things they did were kind of painful. But I would pray, I would just pray so hard, I wouldn't feel the pain. I would just put myself in God's hands and just stay there,

just stay there and not come back until it was over. And then I'd be, oh, well, that wasn't so bad. Well, I think Padre Pio is said to have had a hernia worked on and refused anesthesia. And just prayed. Maybe he was doing what you were doing. Well, I think I did a lot of meditation because when I learned yoga, I learned to meditate and so I meditated from 13 till I was 55 every day in all different kinds of ways with all

different kinds of purposes. But what I didn't understand in terms of meditation, especially Eastern meditation, until I started to pray, I was reading Thomas Merton and I can't remember which book it was. Seven Story Mansion was one of them? Anyway, in it he says that meditation is to be done with scripture. But I don't know the quote. Sure. I could probably put it into Grok. Grok would tell me what the quote was.

I should do that, I guess, because I like to talk about this. Because I could clear my mind in a yoga meditation way. I could imagine that I was surrounded in green colours of light for healing and this kind of thing. So you can do that, but I still had trouble after that. It was never replaced with what was best. OK. You ought to replace it with what is best. Meditation has to be augmented with scripture. And then it works very, very well. So I was very good at... I have a very good visual

imagination and I think maybe meditation, all those years of meditation might have been helpful, so that I can really see things really clearly in my head. But now I have scripture, and that is like having a race car with me. It just gets me where I need to go very well. I think when I was about 17, I decided God probably, well, as before that, God probably didn't exist, that this was a story that someone somewhere invented to make people behave and I wasn't sure people had any good reason to think it was true anyway.

And isn't this just sort of Santa Claus, but for adults and that kind of thing? When I was 17, I had a, I had a, did you find the quote? What is it? Come on, let's see it. Let's see if this this, alright, let's see. Is it a quote? Yeah. Meditation is not so much a looking at something as looking or seeking of someone. That's not it, is it? Yeah, it had to do with scripture.

Medi-, okay. Alright, Cameron. Keep looking. Keep looking. It's got, you gotta have scripture in there. Keep looking. Yeah looking. You've got to have scripture in there. Keep looking. I know I read that. But I had a lot of creative ways that I thought were really kind of philosophically sophisticated

at the time. You know, when you're young and you say, well, what is truth? And you're like, I am brilliant. But I came to Christ at the age of 17 at a big thing called World Youth Day in Rome. There was 2.7 million young people, and the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II. Wow! And I'm meeting young people who love Jesus, who are normal, good looking, you know? Like, didn't...

Didn't look like they needed it? Yeah, that's good! I like that! Yeah! And I just started to be like, all right, maybe it's true. Did you find it? Round two, Let's see. Scripture is a witness to the fact that God has spoken to man and the word of God in scripture seeks to tell us something that concerns not only us but the whole world. It is in meditation with the scripture that God's word becomes a living person. There you go. There you go.

People should go download Truthly. So if you've not heard of Truthly, Truthly is like Chat GPT went to OCIA, got baptized and now is an apologist. And how is it formed? Truthly? What's in the large language model? It's based on open AI. And then there's just a ton.

This is my understanding of it. And that's just been a year of work giving it instructions such that it doesn't say anything that's contrary to the Catholic faith. I see, oh, that's good. So if you tell Chet, GPT, I'm thinking of transitioning, you'll get a very different answer on truthfully. Right.

So that's it. But anyway, I became one of those very happy Christians. So happy it would make you nauseous. Right, a guy that didn't need it. I was like that. One of those guys that doesn't need it. Yeah, or shouldn't have had it. I think my mom was, I think, more worried after my conversion than when I would dress in black and pretend to be depressed. Right.

Maybe I was. Yeah. But alright. You know, when I was, I had a number of things that happened, obviously, where God was trying to wake me up, where I stubbornly did not pay any attention. I... I had a very good girlfriend. Her dad was a high school teacher, quite an alcoholic,

and her mother was a nurse, lovely person, and she had quite a few siblings, and she lived on the other side of the playground, and I used to go over there all the time. Her older brother was a musician, and he had a band, and we'd sit on the swings in the playground and listen to the rock music, and it was just fun, right? And then when I was about 15, her older brother started hanging around and he took me for a drive one night and we went to the college and he spun donuts in the parking lot until I was moved over beside him and thought, oh, what are you doing here?

You know, I hadn't even noticed him before. This was not his first time. No, that's right. He was four years older than me. Anyway, so I went out with him for quite a while and he was a motorcycle mechanic. So he had a good motorcycle and we used to go on his motorcycle quite often. And he also had a car that he used to drive me around in all the time. And we were from a very rural place, so you had to drive around. To get to parties, you had to drive around. That was me too.

Anyway, we were coming back one afternoon, probably from Dunvegan, which was a... There's a market garden and there's the Maples was a place where the... There was a church there, so the missionaries would have been down there years and years past. Anyway, we'd go down there all the time to play frisbee. And one day we were coming back and we were driving into town and the entrance to town was, you know, another 500 feet. And there was a big semi-trailer truck.

And really where I'm from was a lot of oil and gas. So mostly that's what was on the highway where these oil and gas trucks. And right before, right before he flew by going at least 60 miles an hour, my boyfriend turned into town right in front of it, right in front of it. Like really, I don't know, it was, I had seconds, and we made it, and that wasn't enough for me. Yeah. And another time, another time. So the Northern Alberta Railway was ended 30 miles north of where we grew up.

We were as far north as you could get on the railway, so it was very northern. We had midnight sun in the summer, you could take a picture without a flash at midnight outside in the summer. Anyway, it was summer and I had been at this little town, Hines Creek, that's 30 miles, and I was coming back by myself in a car down a country road, not really knowing the roads that well. And I was driving and it was still light, but it was evening light, which is a different kind of light than daylight. It's not dark though. Anyway, all of a sudden, the car goes up like this over the approach. I hadn't seen the approach and there was a car

lights right here. Like right here. I went up and over and I pinched myself. Oh my goodness! I was like, wow! And then I drove home. That wasn't enough for me. Yeah. That wasn't enough for me. You know, I had these kinds of experiences and those aren't the only ones until finally

when I'm … God's like, okay, you haven't been loving yourself the way you might. I'm going to give you cancer. Like, why should I pay attention to you if you're going to ignore how beautiful and wonderful you are? I don't know what God thinks, but I wonder. Anyway, He gave me cancer to wake me up. So I'm grateful that He gave me cancer to wake me up. So I'm grateful that He gave me cancer to wake me up, because otherwise I'd still be full of cynicism and doubt, and that's boring. And it's not as fulfilling, you know? Once I got a personal relationship, sent me on mission, I'm busy and challenged

every day. It's not easy. It's not easy. And it's, I definitely have to get rest when I can because there isn't much many days of rest, but that's all good, right? It's all good. It's better than it's ever been. And I have virtues that have changed. Just a minute. I have to get my, I have a list of- Do it. I want to see it. Take your time. I have a list of- Do it, I wanna see it, take your time. So, since I went into the Catholic church- Yep.

Say that again, since you came to the Catholic church. Since I went into the Catholic church, Jordan and I decided one day to just write down all the things that have changed about me. And we have quite a long list. And, well, I think it's worth going. Absolutely. Rejoicing in. Yeah. Yeah. Let's see. Where are they here? Reborn. Reborn. 30 virtues.

So we could talk about. So I'm more like I was when I was a little kid. Now Jordan knows that because he met me when I was eight years old. So he sees that little kid again in me since my conversion. Yeah, and one thing kids aren't a cynical, doubtful and resentful, hopefully. Yeah, no, they shouldn't be. Right? When I say to my kid, hey, we're gonna go to the beach tomorrow, he doesn't go, well, we should check the weather. Is it going to rain? How do you know that? I say that. He's

like, yes! Yeah, that's right. He's like, yes, that's right. And so that's more, you know, when Jordan, when our agent calls and says, you've just done nine months of tour on this book, We Who Wrestle with God. Now, here's the routing for Europe. Do you want to go? And I say, yes. And Jordan thinks, you're crazy! Why would you say yes to that? But the day before we got the routing, we had been talking about Europe and how lost Europe is,

and then the next day we got routing for May and June. It was like, well, yes then, I guess, because that's... We're already recognizing there's trouble there. And now we get the routing for the tour. Well, if that isn't an answer right away, what is? So, yeah. So what's the next one? More playful. Yeah, more playful. Yeah, there's, there's just a renewed spirit of play. And it doesn't just come from nothing. You have to negotiate, right? You have to with each other if you're, if you're with your wife, and you have something to discuss,

because you don't see eye to eye on something, in good faith, if you negotiate back and forth to find common ground until you feel like it's easy again, then you're in the spirit of play. And you know you've negotiated enough to move on. If one person leaves kind of putting up with it, then that's not enough negotiation. You have not done... you have not told the truth as deeply as you have to, because you have to try to get to that spirit of play. And you need humility to do that, because you can't hold on to anything. Your way of seeing something, right? You have to try to see it their way

and get back and forth till it's easy. Once easy, play is easy. And play is one of these virtues that it is for its own sake. Most things we do, we do for some other thing. But play is not that. Play, we play for the sake of play. Yes. And if you're cynical, if I'm cynical and everything's just gonna frigging suck anyway, and what's the point? If I've got that attitude, which sometimes I do, then there's no play possible,

because play is at heart optimistic. It's like this, it's free, free. It doesn't, it's not controlling, is it? No, not a bit. And so I find that when I'm pissed off and controlling, I'm certainly not in the mood for play, but when I'm well, then I'm a little bit more. You know, how do kids play? When kids learn to play, when they're about three year older and they learn to be able

to play, they give up exactly what they want. And so does the other person, they find what they will do in common, and then they play. How do you play as an adult? How do you play? Well you make love. Yeah, that's a good way to play. That's how you play. He has that in here.

Sexier. Okay, why are you sexier? It's a question I never thought I'd ask. Maybe that's for Jordan. But I am maybe less likely to hide. Probably. That's probably part of it. Less likely to hide, probably. That's probably part of it, less likely to hide. More willing to offer myself.

Yes, I hear that. And also, what did he tell me just last night? He said, I feel more loved, he said, because I've understood something recently that I didn't know, was that I have to say to him, see, we're together. See, we have a night and we're together. You don't have to worry that this isn't going to happen, because sometimes we're so busy and we've been on the road for so long that he might start to think that we're not going to have this special time together, but it's not true.

Right? It's not true. But I took the time to tell him, look, let's look at what's happening right now. Let's see. See? It's good. So he didn't have to worry at all about anything, because here it is again, and it's good.

I like that. Yeah. And so, and he said, I feel more loved. And I said, why? And he said, I guess because I've told him that, and I didn't even realize that I wasn't doing that for him. I wasn't reassuring him. I didn't know I had to reassure him. But of course, you need to reassure one another. Anyway, the things we know that's beautiful. Yeah, you if I'm cynical and guarded, I can't be open to the other. I can't give of myself freely to the other. Right. And I think I think that's kind of maybe what we mean by sexy, where it's like, I'm all yours and you're all mine

and I'm not holding anything back. And I'm not afraid of you. And I'm afraid to give all, I'm not afraid to give all of myself to you. There's an openness. And really, yeah, and to say what you need, or even to show what you need as well. And be open to that,

not thinking that you're gonna get slapped for it. We scandalized some university students, my wife and I recently, because we talked about how important it was to be like very, very honest with each other about what you want. And well, you can imagine maybe some of the things I said, here's what I need when I get home from this long trip. I need you to look good and I need the kids to be put away. And I need us to be together. That's what I need. What do you need? And when you can say that in love and in kindness and not just saying it when she's exhausted and it's not a possibility, but that's

actually helpful because otherwise I'm not communicating myself and so I'm not getting what I feel like I need and then I might become resentful and it's not her fault, it's my fault because I'm not being honest. You might become's right. And bitter. You might become bitter. Yes. Yeah, so that's no good. No. No, so you don't want that. So, patience. So I've, is the patience in here? Yep, more patient. That's the patience, right? To know that there will be time where you will be together with your loved one and to have the patience

to see it happen rather than being controlling and trying to twist things to make it happen. What a grasp. Because it never ends up as good. No, 100%, yeah. It's not, yeah. I wanna receive my wife as a free gift. I don't wanna manipulate and grasp at her. I want to receive my wife as a free gift. I don't want

to manipulate and grasp at her. I've done that and she presumably knows what it's like to have that. And that's not how you probably close yourself off to that. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because you're a threat. You rightly close yourself off towards something you perceive as a threat. Yeah. You know, we can also and that happens plenty of times where... how about now? No, not now, I'm tired. How about now? Well, we have to leave in like 15 minutes, you know, bug off. So there's those times too.

But to think... but not think that that is something that you have to get me back for, or anything like that. It's just, no, not now. That's okay. Now isn't the time. Then there'll be another time and just look forward to the time, rather than lamenting the fact that this isn't the time. How dare it not be when I want it? It's like, yeah, that's not going to end well. That's not sexy. That's not sexy. That's not sexy. That's right.

My husband likes to come up and touch me when I'm doing the dishes, oh, I hate that. I love that he doesn't mind you sitting here saying this. My mom used to not hate it, I think it's a habit. What I would do with my wife is I'd come home and she'd be exhausted and I'm like, go have a bath. And then I'd get everyone in order and get the house together. Oh, that's smart. Well, it's smart. Yeah, it is smart.

It is. Yeah, it's a lot easier to be open. Oh, yeah. Not exhausted and frazzled. Well, you know, we have always planned dates. Ever since I had my first baby and I was way too busy with my baby and George came home and said, you know what, I'm not getting any attention. And he said that we need a date. And I thought, oh my goodness, I don't need a date. I'm tired and I have this baby. That's all I need. So I said, maybe we should

plan dates. And he said, that doesn't sound very spontaneous. And I said, well, you know, before we were married, we had dates, we planned them. So he said, okay, he trusted me. So he said, okay. And then he said, how many times a week? You know, what time of day? What are you gonna be responsible for?

And what am I gonna be responsible for? And we really outlined the whole thing that he was going to fluff the pillows in the living room and put on some music, make sure that the environment was set up properly, that I would go have a bath with candles, put on something nice, and then come down and we'd dance together. And you know, when I was very sick and Jordan was very sick, we hadn't seen each other for three years. And I'd been through a huge conversion. Okay, what does that mean, didn't see each other for three years?

He was living other places without me. Would you see him every few months? I would see him... Golly! Well, when he was in Russia and Serbia, I didn't see much of him at all, and that was during COVID. So, I went to Serbia to see him. Yeah. I got there, and the doctor said,

the... Serbia is going to close down in 24 hours, and you have to leave, because if you get sick again, you'll end up in a public hospital, and you've been way too sick to go back into a public hospital. So, he said, you have to go. So I got there, I went there and we went to a monastery that afternoon and then I left. So I hadn't seen, we hadn't seen each other for a very long time. Were you able, because of your illnesses, to try to keep up lines of communication through email or something or FaceTime or nothing?

Not very much. Wow, that's got to be it. So what was that like after three years of not really seeing each other? Well, we wondered, is there anything left of our relationship? Once he came home, and he still was not well when he finally came home. I was pretty much well, but he wasn't. And we were sitting in the living room by ourselves. It's like, here we are together.

Hi. I said, do you want to have a date? And he thought, oh my God, because he could, he was, had a lot of neurological pain, right? And he thought, yeah, okay. So he, but we didn't have to discuss what we, what, how we were going to do this. We knew how to do it, because we'd had all these years of practice. So he fluffed up the pillows and everything, and I put on something nice and we danced together and it was there. What we had lost was there again and we didn't know whether it would be there or not, but because we had practiced that, and I had no idea this would happen,

we had practiced that twice, once or twice or three times a week through our whole marriage, twice or three times a week through our whole marriage. Really pretty much through our whole marriage. The first time we had a date, we just slept because we had a little baby. But, and sometimes you'd go out to a movie or out to dinner, but most of the times we'd have a romantic evening together. And when we danced together, we came together and we danced together and we were like,

yep, that's you and this is me and here we are. And it's still us and here we are. And so that, we were very grateful for that, like very grateful for that. And so that's not the only practice, right? I have a prayer practice. And it's the same thing. I was going to make an analogy. Yeah.

It's the same thing. You pray the rosary your whole life, and then you feel distant from God. Well, how do we do this? It's like, well, I know. It sort of gets embedded. And that's the same thing about going to church. You go to church every day. You're perfectly fine. Everything's good. But one day it's not, and you know your way to church, and you know who's there,

and they will support you and everything. So you don't go to church every Sunday because of what you need precisely. It is what you need, but it might not be really in your day-to-day life that you understand that you need it. So it's something like a practice of dating that you do in your marriage, and then one day, just everything falls apart, and your husband is gone, gone, and then one day he's back, and it's been so long, and you've had months and months and months of not being with him, and you've changed dramatically and you wonder, is this still somebody I can relate to? And so then you do what you used to do and see if it's still there. Oh look at that, the Spirit is there.

Oh wow, it's the same in prayer. Well the analogy I was thinking of is, what's lovely about being Catholic and having our little rituals is that I don't have to wait for a burst of inspiration to pray to God in my own creative words and feel any certain way. I can just like pick up the beads and meditate on the scripture. I don't have to feel happy. I don't have to feel anything. I don't have to be poetic or creative. You

know, I love that. I love that too. I walked on a beach today. Yeah. We were staying right on the beach. So nice here. The sand is white. It's beautiful. So beautiful. Anyway, I prayed the rosary on the beach. I have something for you. Oh, yeah. And, and then you can decide who to give the other one to. So there's a group, I'm not affiliated with them or anything, but they're called Theotokos Rosaries. Uh huh. And they make rosaries. Okay.

And I think they're beautiful. And I said, they said they would love to give you one. Oh, isn't that nice? So I said, well, send them to me. I'll give them to her. Oh wow, that's nice, isn't it? And if you like it, you can keep it. Oh boy, it's pretty nice.

I really like rosaries. Yeah. So for those- That's a very beautiful- I'm sure you've been given a million. Are they the same? No, I think the other one's different. So you choose which you like.

Okay. People can go check them out at Theotokos Rosaries. Yeah. Oh gee, I don't know if I can choose. They're both very nice. I just have them both. No, I can choose. I'll choose. No, I just have them both. No, I can choose. I'll choose.

No, they're both for you. Give the other one to Michaela or someone. Oh, is that right? Yeah. Oh, well, her little girl knows how to pray the Rosary in Russian, so I'm going to teach her in English. Come on. That's a goal.

Right? Yeah. Yeah. That's beautiful. Oh, those are really nice. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Oh, it's got Mother Mary there. Yeah, very nice. What was it like getting, oh, you didn't get baptized, I guess. You just got confirmed.

I was already baptized. Although that day, there were a lot of young men getting baptized in the church the day I got confirmed. Yeah. And not children, but men. There were men being baptized when I got confirmed, which was good to see. Yeah, we're seeing a big resurgence of that, aren't we? Yes, we are. And what do you think? Do you think the women will come after that? Because they're not, so far. That's a question for my wife. I don't know we do set tints and always seem to be seeing this trend of young men Becoming more conservative and desire us to take on the role of traditional masculinity Yeah, George said it isn't a matter of the left versus the right in politics Now it's women on the left and men on the right

Isn't that wild? That you know, that's a whole different conversation but Isn't that wild? You know, that's a whole different conversation. I don't know. But... You know, when people say, you know, we're all the good men and we go back and forth blaming men and women, I don't know, it feels like we've had a number done on both of us. Yeah, well, feminism was a very bad... It was a very...

Keri Grass, she taught me and so did Janice Fiamengo. She's another one. she's a Canadian. I think she may have written before Keri wrote. She writes Sons of Feminism, I think is her book. She has a YouTube channel as well. But they told me that you go back to the first feminists, and who were they? If you think about who were they, they were wealthy. Right.

Right? So they had the time to talk and to write, and they were wealthy and they were not pleased with their situation. And so they complained through their writing, and we call them the mothers of feminism. You know, that's pretty brutal Yeah, I think for me in the beginning before I even really thought much about feminism I thought of course I'm for feminism because I thought that feminism meant meant being for women and who wouldn't want to do that Yeah, but it seems like really what it is is Looking at a woman and saying you're not actually sufficient. We need to make you more

like a man. There's something deficient about you. And so you need to catch up. Whereas I think the proper approach, the Christian approach is to say, your vulnerability is part of your genius. Be like, if you looked at a kid and said, you're deficient because you are the way you are. And so you have to be different than the way you are and start acting the way adults act or something, but you would do damage to the child. I think you do damage to women when you tell them to act like men. The other thing Carrie said that I really loved is she said that feminism is, it tries to isolate women from, from being a wife and mother.

Mm hmm. Yes, it turns them away from that. But I think what's interesting is I think pornography does that to men. And I know women look at pornography too, but it's not really not compared to predominantly a male thing. I think women read and men look at pictures. I think there's been an uptick in women looking at porn just because it's so pervasive. Yeah, it's everywhere. But again, like the man who looks at porn is somehow isolating himself from marriage and fatherhood. Those are the two kind of grotesque

things to him. He doesn't want the marriage, he wants the immediate pleasure and children are the furthest thing from his mind while he's engaging in that self-abuse. It's all a hedonistic pleasure. Yeah. You know, it's for me and me now, as a I used to, this is not, I'm not proud of this. I'm smiling cause it ends well. When I was 17 years old, my mates and I would go to the big city cause I grew up in a small country town in South Australia and we'd go to strip clubs cause we thought that was cool.

And I remember one of our mates would never come with us. And I said to him, you know, you think you're better than us? And he should have said, yes, actually, and I am. He didn't though. I remember he said, I just don't think it's really manly to have to pay women money to pretend to like you, but whatever. He won that debate. Yeah.

Because it is, it's shameful. It's shameful. It has the, yeah, almost like the accidents of masculinity without the substance or something like that. So my dad used to read Playboy magazines. And he left them around. And so before I could read, I saw pictures of naked women, which was hard on me. People don't talk about this very much.

I don't think in our culture about what happens at home when you're a little kid. But the women were beautiful in those magazines. So there was that. But then there was all of the information that I got there, which sexualized me way too young. Way too young. And so that was unfortunate. But that was just a Playboy magazine. Now there are so many things. It's terrible. It's very destructive. It confused me about my own sexuality, confused me about how, whether I was supposed to stay a virgin or not. Right? That was confusing. Yeah, it's not good. Very confusing. Actually, because I actually wrote a lot on pornography at a certain point in my life, and I back ordered the very first Playboy magazine, because I actually wrote a lot on pornography at a certain point in my life and I back ordered the very first Playboy magazine

Because I knew that there was an article in there that I wanted to include in the books I gave it to my good wife and she kind of Mark, you know sharpie market or some some very modest stresses on these unfortunate women. Yeah, but there was an article in there It was horrific. It says don't worry about non-virgins And it was this whole article about, yeah, going after virgins. But it was so gross. It was so gross. I don't know.

I feel like the tide's turning a little bit now. It's got to turn at some point. I don't know too many men who are like, porn's great. It's just, it's like, it's an activity that would make a monkey blush, I think. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah.

It's like, well, what does it do? It makes you feel powerful. So hedonistic. Good. Makes you feel attractive, right? But these people don't know you. They don't care about you. Yeah.

And it ruins you for the delight of a real woman. Yes. Which is really unfortunate. Yeah, it emasculates men, robs them of the ability to be masculine. So if Christ says, this is my body given up for you, and that's what we mean by masculinity, then pornography trains a man to say, this is your body taken by me. Yeah, right. It's the flip side of the, yeah, not bloody good.

So I've been grateful to see more and more people turn against it. Less concerned with control and power. That was another one of my virtues. How did that happen? Oh, well, I think that my, cause I was pretty, had a pretty strong self will. So I pretty much knew who I was and what was right and what was wrong, what was good for me, what was bad for me.

I'd made those distinctions myself without any... I mean, I had probably done a lot of meditating on it and listening to my intuition and not knowing that the decisions I was making were from God. But I was looking, I was pretty concerned with other people's behavior and how I had a better story for them than they did. Yeah, that was also not helpful. Because it takes away who, if it works and I've told them how to do it, then they don't get any joy out of that. They don't get it at their back. How did I do? Yeah.

That's not good. So I had to give that all up, and it seemed obvious, right? It just went away. The whole idea of controlling somebody just kind of repulsed me after that. Are these virtues the result of sort of escaping death, or are these a result of coming to faith? I think coming to faith. Yeah, I think replacing this kind of empty meditation that I did with scripture and being very careful in my thoughts. So the other thing that it does is I was very good at taking unwanted thoughts and not allowing them. I was very good at that, but they always would come back. But once I put scripture there, then they didn't come back.

So now, with scripture there, I can be present in the moment, because there isn't anything whirling around in my head telling me what to do. I'm not obsessed with any thought of making a change or a shift in something that I have to figure out or something. I'm not concerned with those things anymore at all. So I'm present, and I can see what the next right thing is going to be in front of me and then be useful in the real world, right in front of me, which is the most meaningful place you can be. And so that came from giving up control and power.

Didn't want it anymore. I found a different way of relating to the world, of what I can do for others, really. Even though that's one of the Ten Commandments, I just wasn't aware. I didn't want to be aware, I guess. I didn't want to take the time to become aware. Anyway, I had the time. Well, you know, I think if we can come to believe that God the Father exists and loves us and is actually guiding the events of history and even willing the things that take place in our lives, then we can surrender to Him. And that frees us from the need to control everything, including our own growth in holiness. We can just sort of place ourselves before the good Jesus. Yeah.

Say, well, you've told me to put up with everyone, and that must include me, so I'll do that as well. Right. And just entrust ourselves to Him. But if we live in a godless universe, then all we have is trying to control reality so that it can be the way we think it ought to be. Otherwise, or at least maybe you surrender to other people around you because you trust in their intentions.

But the more I can believe that the Father is good and can be trusted, then I can surrender to Him. Yeah. I had a good father. I had a good father, so I could believe that the Heavenly Father was good. I never had any problem with that, thank goodness. You know, I used to do yoga on the living room rug while he was watching TV, just because I was doing yoga all the time, and it never occurred to me that he might even watch me. It never even occurred to me because he was not that kind

of man. He was a good man. I love my kids so much and my youngest son, Peter Fradd, you'd really like Peter. I say to my wife that the only times I get frustrated with Peter is when I realize we're living in two different stories. My story is get your socks on and get in the car. He's living in the Lord of the Rings. He's hunting squirrels. And we had this example I've used before. He was jumping off our front stoop

into where we had just freshly mulched the garden. And I had explicitly told him not to do this. And I'm upstairs and I'm looking out of my window and he's jumping and kind of flapping his arms. And thankfully I didn't get upset with him. I said, buddy, what are you doing? And then I realized he had found an injured bird and he had it next to him and he was teaching it how to fly. That's the best story I've ever heard, you know? But that's what I think when I get start to get frustrated with him. I'm like, okay, he's in a different story. His story doesn't make sense to my stupid story. It's way better.

What's he doing? And if I can get inside of his head, I realize, oh, that's beautiful. It's lovely. I never wanted my kids to know what hurry meant, you know, because kids don't know what hurry means. They have no reason to hurry. They don't get it. And I think, yeah, let's just keep that going as long as we can. So you, I think you said to our Lord, I heard this in a video, you can tell me what you said, that you, you know, if you were healed, you would begin to speak, that you would take more of a role in Jordan's lectures and things like that. So I just said I'd speak publicly. I said, if you see it in your heart to have me

live again, I promise I'll speak publicly. So I was admitting that I was really not doing my duty and taking on my responsibility properly. I knew somewhere inside me that I was, but it didn't come around that way, you know, because when we went back on tour, Michaela was opening for Jordan and I was still sitting in the audience. But then Michaela had a for Jordan, and I was still sitting in the audience, but then Michaela had a baby and she said to her dad, this is real fun and everything, but I have a baby and I need to go home. And so then he turned around and looked at me and said, well, do you want to get up on

stage? And I had never been on stage, but I had had this prayer that I had said, I promised that I would speak publicly, so I had to say yes. So that's what happened. So I had really nothing to say that was already ready, so I had to read a chapter in this book, and then I had to meditate on it and see how it applied to my life, and then I would get up on stage and I'd say, George is going to talk about this rule, and this is how it applies to me.

And so that's how I started by telling how it applied to me. And so then I had about 12 stories, because there were 12 rules. So then I had about 12 stories, and so then I could start comparing rules. So then my talks, even though they were no longer than that, started to take on a different flavour, because I was starting to compare, maybe I was comparing suffering, with taking on responsibility or, petting your cat or whatever it was

that he was talking about. So I compare them. And then I would have a little chat with the audience about that. And that was good. Was it difficult at first, or did you just take to it like a natural... I had to learn how to do it, and I think it was somewhat stressful, but I never read.

I just got up and talked, and I would pray before I got on stage, and I'd say, God, give me courage and strength to say something that might be useful and helpful to some of these people, and I would just get up on stage and talk. So, it didn't really matter how much I'd prepared, I wouldn't look at it when I got up on stage. And so, whatever I stay on stage is only what I know. I don't say anything that I would like to say. There's nothing in it. Because I've got lots of reams of stuff that I'd like to say, but I don't remember it. So, that's not what I'm supposed to say. I want to tell you about Hello, which is the number one downloaded prayer app in the world.

It's outstanding. Hello.com slash Matt Fradd. Sign up over there right now and you will get the first three months for free. That's like a lot of time. You can decide whether it's useful to you or not, whether it's helpful. If you don't like it, you can always quit. Hello.com slash Matt Fradd. I use it, my family uses it, it's fantastic. There are over 10,000 audio guided prayers, meditations and music, including my Lo-Fi. Hello has been downloaded over 15 million times in 150 different countries.

It helps you pray, helps you meditate, helps you sleep better. It helps you build a daily routine and a habit of prayer. There's honestly so much excellent stuff on this app that it's difficult to get through it all. Just go check it out. Hello.com slash Matt Fradd. The link is in the description below. It even has an entire section for kids. So if you're a parent, you could play little Bible stories for them at night. It'll help them pray. Fantastic. Hello.com slash Matt Fradd. So that's a challenge and it's also rewarding.

It's rewarding too, because sometimes, like the other night, and he sometimes only tells me what he's going to talk about an hour before, so I don't have much time to think about it, but this day he told me in the morning, Jonathan Pagio was with us, so I think he kind of, he gave both of us, He told us what he was going to talk about. He was going to talk about voluntary... He was going to talk about... No, he was going to talk about psychopathy and belief. So psychopaths and belief. And I thought, Oh God, I don't know anything about psychopaths. So I had this big long thing

where I'd looked at a large language model and I had all this stuff about psychopathy, but I had really nothing to say. And I was like, I don't think I'm going to say anything tonight. I'll just thank everybody. I'm not saying anything tonight. But then I'm sitting there listening to David Cotter, because he's playing the guitar, beautifully playing the guitar. And I'm sitting there, and then I thought of these virtues. And I thought, oh, I can tell them that you're going to talk about psychopathy and belief, and that I know nothing about that, but I can tell you what happened to me and my belief. And so then I just listed out all these virtues to them and then got off the stage.

But it felt like I never thought that up, because it was only maybe a song left in his thing before I came up with an idea. So, God gave me something to say, and I was very grateful. What's it been like having people approach you? I'm sure all the time... They're all very, very respectful. They're all very respectful and they're very humble. You know, they come up, they say, I'm sorry to bother you.

They always start that way. Sorry to bother you. Especially, mostly it's men who stop, you know, and I've really gotten to know what men are like through this because so many men stop Jordan. They say, I'm so sorry to bother you. I hope I'm not bothering you. It's like, no, no, you're not bothering me. But what you've done has really helped me.

And then Jordan will say, Hi, what's your name? So then they, because they're kind of nervous usually, so they can say their name. And so I do the same thing. I ask people for their name and I ask them how what I've said has been helpful. And so then they tell me a story. And then I tell them how happy I am that they stopped. And that's very good to talk to them and that I hope they continue to learn and benefit from what we're doing. And I really help ask them for the... Or I thank them for the encouragement, because everybody who stops us encourages us to keep on.

That's nice. Yeah. Yeah. That's what those things do. What do you think of the idea that your husband has been a gateway drug out of the new atheism into Christianity of some stripe? Well, I think that that's, I can't think of anything better to do. Have you heard of that? Surely. It felt like the new atheists were picking up steam, picking up steam, and then Jordan

Peterson happened, and then all of a sudden people started getting interested in religion, not mocking it as much as they used to. No, I haven't really heard that. And it feels like this whole revolution taking place. You even have people like Joe Rogan, who used to be quite cynical and critical of religion, now open to people of Christian faith. I.N. Hercie Ali, Neil Ferguson. Yep.

Like that's interesting. Russell Brand. Yeah, come on. Yeah, wow. Yeah. Yeah. And do you see that as from Jordan? Yes. I think everyone I on. Yeah, wow. Yeah. Yeah. And do you see that as from Jordan's work? Yes.

Oh, that's really good. I think everyone I know credits this to Jordan. Yeah. They think. Well, I didn't want to credit him without knowing that everybody else is crediting. That's what I hear. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I mean, I listen to him a lot. I mean, there's a lot of excellent sort of Christian apologists like Dr. William Lane Craig and Ed Faeser, and there's really brilliant people who are laying out arguments, right, for the truth claims of Christianity. But there was something about Jordan, he was able to kind of get into that space as one of them, that is to say, you know, not like I died in the war Christian. Right. And he could sort of show, this isn't ridiculous. And don't laugh at it. And a lot of people go, okay, maybe we went too far.

And they started to listen to the OK, maybe we went too far, and they started to listen to the Scriptures, listen to His lectures, and become increasingly... I think as soon as you become non-hostile towards Christianity, you start drifting towards it. Yes, that's for sure. And the hostility... there is a lot of hostility right now all over the world, so... Yeah.

That's partly why we're going to Europe and we're going to Australia and we're going to South Africa. And thank you. Yeah. Yeah. We'll be in Austria for two months this year. We're going to go in June. I love it. Love it. Love it. Love it. Love it. Thanks for going to Australia. Have you been to Heligenkreis? Have we? I don't think so. Oh, you have to go there. We lived in Garming for six months in lower Austria by Salzburg was it? I don't know. It's like it's in the Alps. We just for six months in Lower Austria by Salzburg, was it? I don't know. It's in the Alps. We just spent six months there. Yeah. Hellegenkreuz is only about half an hour outside of Vienna.

Oh, yes. Is this the... Is that a monastery? Yeah. We stayed there for five weeks. God bless you. Yeah, we liked it there. Went to Mass five times a day, I think. That'll do. Five times a day. And we were there over Easter. Yeah. Oh, it was really nice. We'd like to go back there. And we also like to go to St. Michael's

Abbey in California. Okay. We've been there. We'd like to go there for a while, maybe sometime. Yeah. It's a good place to write. Yeah. You're pretty, you're living a pretty hardcore fun life, traveling around, doing lectures, changing lives. Do you do that for a while and then say, all right, I need like a month just to...

We have the summer. Yeah. We have the summer. That's nice. And we have July, August, September, October, really four months. And I told Joy, actually, it doesn't really matter what you get invited to do during that four months, I'm not going to go. I really could use a break.

I could have used a break in January. And we got a little bit of a break in January because for some reason, maybe it was just after the election, people weren't buying theater tickets. And so then our agent got antsy and he moved the shows. And so we kind of got a break in January because he took all the shows that were supposed to be in January and put them in April.

But that just means we have to do them all in April. So what does a boring recreational day look like for you? Walking on the beach, I guess, if you call that boring. That's my wife. She loves the beach. And I like going, if there's a boat, if I can take a, if we can go in a boat, we'll go in a boat.

We like that too. And yeah, going in a boat, going for a walk. Those are our activities. We actually went to see Snow White last night, but mostly we wanted to see what Disney was doing. Were you expected expecting to be more offended than you were? Oh yeah. No, they, it was very innocuous.

Yeah. Yeah. Wasn't great. Wasn't terrible. That's right. But it really wasn't, you know, it should be gripping. Yeah. That's a gripping story.

There was none of that. No, no, you didn't want to, you didn't want to get anybody in a fluff. Yeah. Right. Didn't want to scare the little kids or anything or even make men feel good about themselves. There wasn't any of that. Yeah. I have, I have asked some of my local members if they have questions for you. Would you mind if I threw them at you? I'm sure you're used to that, being up on stage. I love seeing the two of you together on stage, by the way. That's like my favorite thing

when you're kind of reading the questions, but then you're commenting on them as well. That took us by surprise. Yeah, thank you for being a beautiful witness to marriage. Even just that there, like two people who can still stand each other and don't hate each other. Oh, we love each other.

We're best friends. We have a good time together. Praise God. That's for sure. Daniel S says, who is the blessed mother to you and why? Who is the blessed mother to me? Oh my goodness. Mother Mary, she sustains me Mary, she sustains me when I have doubts and when I'm in a bad way. I didn't know that I was always praying to her, but now I do know. I didn't know that praying to my mother was the best, was Mary the best of my mother was the best, was Mary, the best of my mother. Any kind of female, looking for any kind of female help, that's Mother Mary. And so for some reason, she is important

to me and was given to me. I don't know how that happened. That was a gift for sure, because I was not taught that in any way, shape or form. So I pray the Rosary. I get up in the morning, and pretty quickly I go out on the porch and I pray the Rosary. And what do I do when I'm out there? Oh, if there's anything, you know, that I've been mulling over or trying to understand, but, or worrying about or afraid of, I can take that to prayer, to the rosary, to Mother Mary. And usually if I think of, if I'm afraid of something, I pray for that person. I just pray for that person through the rosary every day, and that helps to lift my fear from whatever preoccupation I have. Or if I worry about somebody, I just pray the rosary every day with that intention.

And over time, that much prayer lifts my worry. And the other thing it does is it allows me to be patient until I can see something that I can do for them. So, for instance, I was worrying about, I don't know why, because I don't see him often enough. I was worrying about my son and his wife and his kids. I think because I'm so separate, so far away, that I'm... What Jordan told me, and I still don't really understand this, and maybe it's true, but

he thought maybe that because I'm so far away from him, that I start to think that they're not worthy in some way so that I can be away? I'm not quite sure how this works, but I'm not willing to think he's wrong. I'm willing to think this through, that do I actually diminish my son and his wife and his children so that I can tolerate being away? Because that's not a good practice. So, I pray for them instead. I pray for them. So, I was praying for them like for months, trying to pray for them, and then I figured out, oh, I could buy them their meat every month.

I could just give the butcher my credit card, and then, and I didn't know whether they would accept that or not, but they did. And so then, they could get their meat always, and then I'd be sure that they were eating enough meat, because, you know, mothers, they worry about things like that. And so, but I wouldn't have come to that if I hadn't, you know, if I kept trying to do things for them, or, and not just calming myself with the prayer, with the rosary, you know, with Mother Mary. And then this came to me. Oh, I could buy them their meat! And then I asked them and they said yes, and so I gave them credit card and they still get their meat

monthly. And so then I know they're eating more meats and it makes me happy and I feel like, I don't know, so then I don't worry so much. Isn't that good? It's good. Yes, that sounds good. Yeah, that's good. So yes, Mother Mary, she makes a big difference to me. Really organizes my brain every day. Cedric says, any practical advice for people with a heavy schedule in regards to the rosary and your prayer?

Well, I don't know what he means by heavy schedule. That means he has no time, but I would sometimes, I sometimes, you know, I want to pray, but maybe I'm feeling like there's too many other things going on. I can go to Bishop Baron and I can pray the rosary him, and that way I'll pray the rosary. How do you do that? Sometimes I need help. How do you? Is it YouTube or his Word on Fire app?

YouTube. Well, I just look on YouTube. I just put in, Monday, Rosary, Baron, and it comes up. It's amazing how many people he has helped. I'm so grateful to his ministry. Yeah. Yeah, that's for sure. No, that's a good point, right?

Don't let the enemy be, what is it, don't let the great be the enemy of the good. I like how Jordan says it even better. He says, what's something you would do that you could do that would make your life better? Yeah, that's right. You know, if you need help, get help. You do that. Yeah, so that's one thing you could do. You could pray one decade.

I'm putting the rosary out on YouTube and I'm going to put them out one decade at a time. That's lovely. So that if people only have a time for a decade, then... So I put the intention and I got the intention from a large language model that is based on Jordan's work and the King James Bible. Lovely. And so, it's very... I love it, you know, I also use it, because I pray a chapter in the Bible every morning and pray the Rosary.

And sometimes there's something in it that I think, ooh, there's something there that I don't quite get. I can put it in this large language model and it'll tell me psychologically and philosophically what it means. Yeah. Oh, man. That's lovely.

That's like magic. I've put a few of those things on X, because I... Well, on days that I think, yeah, I need to share this. Like Luke, I was reading Luke this morning when I was walking on the beach. I was listening to Luke, because I have a Bible app on my phone, and I put something on X. I put on, let me see, because I liked it. Luke.

Ah. And when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say. And so then there's a passage from Lyo Logos that explains what that means, so I put it on X and, you know, I just thought I'd do my part. Yeah, that's great. Thank you for doing that with the rosary on YouTube. That's really beautiful.

So far, I just have the entire rosary, each of the rosary mysteries in full. Okay. But I didn't put large intent, all I did was say, the fruit of this mystery is faith or something. But I decided that I'd say something more on the individual ones. Lovely. And actually, you know, now when I've... More recently when I've been praying the rosary, I've been looking at those intentions, because they are... They're pretty good.

I like them. They say what I need to hear before I decide who I'm going to pray for and how this is going to go. I heard someone once say that, when we say, I don't have time to pray, it's like, no, you don't have love to pray, because man always finds time for that which he loves. So I have time for my coffee in the morning and I have time to do the things, the many things that I do. Yeah, I love that. So maybe it's like, Lord, kind of like, they have no wine, yeah, in John chapter 2, it's like, I have no love, so you're going to have to

give it to me so that I can find time to pray. Did you want to say something? Okay, you were just looking at me all beautifully over there, not you, my wife, you too. Okay, this person says, as a new convert and someone with influence, how do you handle the inevitable and spiritual attack? So we thought much about... There isn't much there. You know, I think it's amplified. It's amplified for people on social media. We virtually never meet anybody who isn't respectful and grateful.

So it's all, it's pretty much all good. Yeah. Like really. Yeah, I believe you. Yeah. I don't know the social media because there's no limitation on what people can say. It's a wild place. Yeah.

Yeah. We got to do something about that. You know, we, on Peterson Academy, they have a social media app that is only for the people who are subscribers to Peterson Academy. Yeah. And so they have something like, I can't remember, 50,000 students and they have a small percentage that are on this social media and things were starting to get a little dicey. There was a little bit of bullying and backbiting and that kind of stuff on there.

And they identified 15 people. This took months of, they didn't wanna disrupt things and they didn't want to have a heavy hand or anything, so they were trying to figure out what to do. But they found 15 people and they gave them their money back and told them no more, they couldn't be on the social media. And things have gone way better. And there were thousands of people on there. There were only 15 people causing trouble. And now it's much better.

I'm increasingly just blocking people who choose to be jerks. Right. I think that's probably, you know, I try to say something and then they just say something nitty gritty. but I think, yeah, sorry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like you're poisoning this environment and there's a lot of good willed people who are just trying to share how they feel or experience things or offer their advice. And when people come in all looking down their nose and other people, it just ruins everything for everyone else.

Yeah, it does. Yeah, yeah. No, that doesn't have to happen. I don't think. All right. Last book you've read? The Bible. Good.

Someone asked me what my favorite book was. The Bible. Tim Paul says, what's your favorite movie? What's my favorite movie? Oh, there's been some good movies, but I was... What's a good movie? I was thinking... Snow White.

Oh, what's that one from Babette's Feast? That's a very good movie. I was thinking... Snow White. Oh, what's that one from Babette's Feast? That's a very good movie. Is it? Write that down, mama. Babette's Feast. That's a good... There's this Parisian woman who goes to work in Finland, I think it's Finland, as a chef. And they're all very pious, right? They're very pious and very regimented

and nothing extra, you know, like minimalist and everything. And she comes in and she wants to have some, have a good feast, a good feast. And so she, it's a very good movie, it's a very good movie. We'll have to watch it. Thank you for taking the time to come here. My pleasure. I dislike travel immensely. So how do I travel? How do you travel?

How do I travel? Well, first of all, we negotiate. Who's we? Jordan and I. We negotiate how much I'm going to travel. I say yes to what I'm willing to do. And if he has things that he has to do, I don't have to go along. I can if I'm willing to do. And if He has things that He has to do, I don't have to go along. I can if I want, but I don't if I don't want. What does your routine look like?

We have our own hotel rooms. And that was God too, right? I went home from the tour when Jordan wasn't feeling well, because I couldn't figure out what was wrong with him. And we were in Detroit, really close to Toronto, and I just said, I'm going home. I'd like to be here, but I just can't understand what's going on. It's making me very uncomfortable because you're so sick and I don't know what to do about it. So I went home and I was in my house and I said kind of to myself, but it was a prayer, I want to go. I love to be with him and I want to go, but I don't know what to do. What do I do?" And I heard, get your own hotel room. And I thought, oh, He'd be angry if I got my own hotel room. Wouldn't He be angry? So I called my friend, a friend I trust, and I said,

I heard, when I prayed, I heard, get your own hotel room. She said, good idea! Do that! So I called our secretary and I said, book all my own rooms. And I went back and we didn't have a show. We were together that night, watched a movie or something. And then I said, okay, good night. And he goes, what do you mean good night? We don't have a show. I said, I have my own room. And he was like, what does this mean? What does this mean? But he trusted me and he put up with it for a while, and then we both realized that I wasn't doing my podcast. We were in one room together. He was doing his podcast and I was sitting over at the side. And I had just decided to start a podcast and I wasn't doing it. And that was probably part of my frustration is that I wasn't doing what I said I would do. I was doing yoga like in the bath or Pilates in the bathroom on the

porcelain floor. It was ridiculous. We were trying to share this little room while we were on tour. We were living on the road. There wasn't enough space there. There wasn't enough space. So I got my own hotel room. That way when I finish the evening, I go to bed and he comes later because he has a meet and greet, so he's in another hour. And when he gets home, he's kind of revved up because he's been speaking to people all night. So he doesn't have to like tiptoe around because his wife is sleeping. So he gets to be comfortable in his room and have his bathroom to himself. And we like that anyway, because we're fairly private, both of us. So then I have my room, he has his room, and when we want to be together, we have to ask.

It isn't just your wife gets into bed and you're in bed and you think, are we going to make love? All of a sudden there's this moment of wondering, is she too tired or is she interested in me? But if you have different rooms, then you say, tonight? Well, tomorrow we don't have a show. Yeah, that'd be a good night. Okay, then you're both, you've negotiated it to a sense of play, and then you make sure that you prepare yourself in the day, so you're not too tired, and then you have a date, and then you say good night.

He goes back to his room and I go to my room, and it's good. And so, how do we travel? We have our own hotel rooms. And we also have our own rooms at home now, too, because it's just... I don't know, you know, especially when you're older and you're spending so much time together, how much time can you spend together? Really? Really? Like really? He's great. He's great. But how great? Yeah. Jordan's series on and we can we can wrap up here, but his series on marriage was excellent. I didn't watch it. Why? Ah, I don't know.

I should watch it. Yeah, you can't watch everything he does. There's a lot out there. No, but that is, I could watch that. My wife and I watched it and we really appreciated it. Oh yeah, oh that's good. He was very honest. I was like, ah, thank God. What I said earlier about like, what if you were just honest with each other and told each other what you needed? Well, we have really negotiated everything since we were married.

And sometimes, the first year we were married, we fought, every fight was three days long and we fought every week for a whole year. It's an exhausting year. Yeah, it was an exhausting year. But we fought until we understood what was going on and then negotiated about it and came to an understanding and then we never fought about that anymore. And so, we've gotten through all our fights. We still have to negotiate, but we don't have any, we just don't have any trouble anymore at all. We've been married now, what, 36 years or

something. I got an idea for you. Date night with the Petersons, where you go sit on a stage, everyone comes in, brings a glass of wine, sits around, y'all just talk about the beauty of marriage, sex and friendship. Yeah, that'd be fun. That sounds good. You never know. Yeah. Thanks very much for coming on.

My pleasure.