Pints With Aquinas - When Did the Michael Knowles Show Become a Catholic Apologetics Channel? (Michael Knowles) | Ep. 540

Episode Date: September 10, 2025

In this episode, Matt visits Michael Knowles in his Nashville studio to smoke cigars (and talk about cigars), discuss how absolutely CATHOLIC Knowles' show has become, the state of the world and young people today, plus details around his new documentary on Hitler and Pope Pius XII. 🍺 Want to Support Pints With Aquinas? 🍺 Get episodes a week early 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 👉  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

So I want to know when the Michael Knoll Show Yes. Became a Catholic Apologetics and Evangelization podcast. You know, I appreciate. I'm flattered by that description. When you and Jeremy and Clavin and Ben were starting this, did you ever think that you could get to a point where your podcast could be as on the nose about Catholicism as it's become?

No. Because. Not because of even our view of political media. I don't know that anybody anticipated that Catholicism would come roaring back into vogue as it has. Gooday, everybody. Matt Frad here. I am here today in not my studio, but Michael Knowles' studio. I happened to be in Nashville, so we thought we would sit down and record an interview with him for the Pines with Aquinas Channel. Enjoy. Michael Knowles. Marvelous to see you, sir.

What a pleasure. Thank you for coming to my studio. This is the best way to be on Pines or the Quineas. You come to me, you bring me a cigar, and then we get to just hang out in my studio. Yeah. I'm thrilled to have done it. So I want to know when the Michael Knoll Show became a Catholic Apologetics and Evangelization podcast. You know, I appreciate it.

I'm flattered by that description. It's a political show. It's a show about daily politics. It's a daily show. We hit the news. But I try, I've thought about it this way for a very long time. The politics is the sugar that makes the medicine go down. Also because all politics ultimately is religious, as Cardinal Manning says.

So in my view, you really can't speak about politics without getting to religion. And so if you have firm views on religion, it's going to come out. But we want to make sure we don't alienate. are Protestant friends or Jewish friends or this or that or the other. We just kind of bring, oh, yes, let's talk about Trump. Oh, yeah, okay, let's talk about whatever, you know, the immigration and, oh, and maybe check out the beautiful mass. When you, yeah, when you and Jeremy and Clavin and Ben were starting this, did you ever think that you could get to a point where your podcast could be as on the nose

about Catholicism as it's become? No. because, not because of even our view of political media necessarily. I don't know that anybody anticipated that Catholicism would come roaring back into vogue as it has. I mean, it's, even if you look at, there's a chart I just saw this morning of the adult conversions. And it, you know, for decades, it was just and then turns around and it's on, it's kind of this rocket ship right now. So I actually have an excuse. I would always kind of try to get it in. there, at least in a somewhat subtle way.

But now you really cannot speak about American politics or Western politics generally without speaking about faith and specifically about Catholicism. No coincidence, we now have the first ever practicing Catholic vice president in America's history. We had a nominal one before and we had a nominal Catholic president, but we have a guy who really takes it seriously now.

That's pretty jarring in a country that Schlesinger said had as its deepest prejudice, anti-Catholicism. Yeah. It seems like we have a pope who takes the papacy seriously, too. Did you get that sense when he walked out in the balcony after you saw him a few days? It just seemed to me that he is a man who seems like he feels the weight of the papacy. The motsepto was a real cause for relief. And I'll tell you something else. We were sitting in my office here when the white smoke came up.

And I had a bunch of people in my office. We were looking at it. And I said, you know, the name that I'm hoping for is Leo. I want Leo the 14th. Come on. Yes. This was right before I said, and I actually, I tweeted it because I wanted it to be known that this was the name I was calling. But I wasn't even predicting it so much as that's what I wanted to say. Yes, yes. Specifically because of Leo the 13th, though there were other great Leo's too, including Leo the great. But I said, this next pontificate, I think if it were a Leonine pontificate, that would be a really good sign. And sure enough, they're reading it in Latin and you hear, you hear Leo. Then they named the guy. I didn't know anything. about the guy. You know, I didn't know anything about the cardinal, but I did know about the name, and I said, this is a very good sign. Then he walks out in the Mozart, I said, this is a very good sign. Then he, you know, speaks a little Latin, Salvei, Regino, this is a very good sign. And the fact that he's American, I said, that's the only downside. I don't know if I trust an American Pope, but, but I thought that's kind of cool too. It seems to me the most notable thing

is that he's a normal Pope. He's, and it kind of calls into stark relief. how strange the past, the most recent pontificate was. But before we get on the Francis hate and everything, I've been... I like, you just assume that we're going to go there? Yes, before we get to back. Naturally, it's inevitable. But the thing I have to say about the Francis pontificate,

I reverted during the Francis pontificate. And I know a lot of people reverted during the Francis pontificate. And the turnaround in conversions did happen at the end of the Francis pontificate. Whether that was because of something Pope Francis was doing, Whether that was in reaction to something that Pope Francis was doing. I have to be grateful to the man for that. Yeah. I want to take a pause and compliment you on your cigar.

So I do like a Maduro, and this is a double Maduro. Yes. I like the kind of nice, vinegory, harsh taste. It's beautiful. Some people are, they just smoke Maduro's. They just love them. And a Maduro for the audience that doesn't know, it's a very dark wrapper, more mature rapper.

This is a double, so it's got a Pennsylvania Broadleaf wrapper, very, very hard to get these days. And I knew when I started the company, I wanted a broadleaf wrapper because it's American, and it's just a beautiful, beautiful kind of tobacco. The rapper is a Maduro San Andres

rapper from Mexico, and then it's a Nicaraguan blend of fillers. It was very hard to source. We couldn't do it for a while. Finally, we're able to come out with it. So now we have the dawn, dusk, and dream. Beautiful.

And I've run out of times of the day. So the trilogy is completed. There's a lot of Christian imagery, including the Trinity there. And so now we'll move on to some other one for our next release. But it's great. And now, for the Pines with Aquinas Cigar, I'm not blowing smoke. I think I've told you this before. Yeah. And you don't have to blow smoke. You can just say it's... I love it. When you sent me the samples, I said, look, I'll smoke. I'll smoke a free cigar. That's my favorite kind of cigar. It's a free cigar. I thought it was terrific. The thing that you did very,

very well, too, the ring gauge is perfect. Yeah. People these days want to smoke like a big baseball bat. In fact, I put out a Gordo cigar because the market loves it. Yeah. I can't, I don't know. I can't do it. I like a wide Churchill. I like something bigger than that.

Yeah, yeah. People, look, it's very, very popular. Ask me about my cigar because I've obviously memorized everything about it. Yeah. Hold on. Let me see, can I tell you what's in, it's Nicaraguan, right? Nicaraguan manufacturer. I'll tell you.

What is it? The Pines of Aquinas Toro features a rich, toothy Mexican San Andreas Maduro rapper. which veils a Caroho 99 binder and long filler from Jalapa. Is that you say it? Halapa. I like your property. I got that so wrong. Jalepa and estal, that one.

Esteli? Yep. Expertly crafted at Aga Norse Leaf, the Pines of the Quina Storo. Anyway. I love it. Aganorsal Leaf has great tobacco. This is great. Now, but I wanted to ask you since I know that you would know the answer of this,

how do I promote the cigar without promoting the cigar? Because if I tell people right now on our YouTube channel, which I would never do it. Yeah. So don't even say that. Very tricky. Don't even say don't do that. It's very tricky. I, now, you know, now that I've been in the cigar industry for 24 months or whatever. So cool. I, I, you're not allowed to promote it on YouTube. Now, if you and I were dealing the devil's lettuce, you know, a little sin spinach, the Peruvian parsley, you know what I'm talking about? Haitian oregano, okay, if we were selling that, I'm sure we could take out big ads on YouTube, there'd be no problem. All right, well, you, you pitch the Pints of the Quina cigar in the way that won't get us banned. Oh, yeah. Well, tell me so I know what to say. I think this is an absolutely marvelous cigar mat.

You know the Pints with Aquinas Cigar. I think it's absolutely marvelous. That's it? And do you have a, you own a Cigar Lounge. Oh, I do have a lounge, and that lounge does have a website. Can I say that? It has, that does. Oh, interesting.

Yeah. Because this is a great cigar. Great. And you made it kind of out of your lounge. It's like the house cigar, yeah. And it's the Pines with Aquinas Cigar. That's very good. And the lounge is called Chesterton's.

Is it? And not that I want anyone to buy it, But 100% of the money goes to the brick and mortar lounge. That's really good to Chesterton's. Yeah. Pines with Aquinas cigar. I see. That's how you do it. That's cool. Yeah, well done.

Well, just make sure you don't tell anyone to go buy it. I would never. Okay, good. No. I'm glad we agree. Were you shocked at how much... By the way, I will never be a competitor of yours, which is why it's safe for you to promote my cigar.

But were you shocked at how the demand was? I was, actually. And I had high expectations for the demand. So we released the cigar October, end of October. 2023. And I had been working on this for about a year at this point. It was providential the way the whole thing came about. And we blended it for a long time. And I was, I was so obsessive. It was so awful to deal with to actually blend it. But I felt we dialed in the blends. Just right. So it's okay, we're ready to launch. We had 57,000 cigars, I think, day one, which should have

gotten us at least through Christmas and New Year's. And then in Q1 of the next year, we would have had deal with restocking. But we were planning on about a four-month supply. One day. There's one day, all gone. Now you say great problem to have, right? Yeah, but then you've got a lot of angry people wondering where they? A lot of angry people missed Black Friday, missed Christmas. Now, was that your fault or was that Daily Wire's fault for not believing in Michael? I want to blame Daily Wire for everything, but it, no, we were, look, you know, Daily Wire and I are partners on the cigar and they really gave me carte launch. They let me do whatever I wanted. Our manufacturer is Oliva, in Est, really wonderful, wonderful partners who put up with all of my little tasting notes and they blended beautiful blends for us. But, you know, if you launch a cigar and you are insanely successful,

you sell 100,000 cigars in a year. That is like, you're hitting the record books for launching a boutique cigar. So to sell 57,000 in a day. Come on. He's crazy. Congrats. Thank you. The problem is, it's not like a cigarette.

I can't just go roll another one and sell it tomorrow. You know, for it, I guess I could, but for it to not reek of ammonia and for it to have a proper taste, you have to, one, you have to make sure you have the crop and the supplies, then you, you know, 300 hands touch a premium cigar from seed to smoking. Yeah. And then you have to age it. You have to age a tobacco. You have to age the rolled cigars. You have to ship them from Nicaragua into America to Pennsylvania to ship out. So you're talking about this is a month's long process. And I can't rush it because for the people who are just trying my cigar,

if the second batch is a rushed product, that kills my company. And I've sold them a, defective product. So we were not back in stock. We had maybe a tiny little supply, but then we weren't back in stock for months and months and months. Sell that again. Okay. Now again, this is great stuff and we ended up selling almost half a million cigars first year. This was when I revealed my lack of business acumen, but I still stand by my decision. I said, okay, we got to go into brick and mortar. I want to be in the brick and mortar shops. And they said, um, don't. Everyone in the cigar industry said, do not go to brick and mortar because your margins are decent. You know, I think my margins could have been much higher, but I said this should be accessible luxury. I

don't want to gouge people on the price. I want it to be the kind of cigar you can smoke regularly. And so I said, your margins are good because you don't have a retail middleman. Dealing with the representatives and the retail shops and the physical states, so are the licenses are impossible. I said, why would you do it? I said, because the cigar culture is in the shops. The whole point of the cigar, look, I like to smoke cigars alone and read a book. I enjoy that a lot of days. But I also like going to the shop, having a 45-minute conversation with somebody is one of the few things. It slows men down so they can actually, you know, speak to one of them.

You speak in my language. Yes. Yeah. So I said, we're going to the shops. It was such a headache for other people mostly, not really for me. And we finally were, I wasn't even licensed in my own state to sell cigars for a while. I think now we're in about 100 shops, maybe a little bit more than that, in a, a ton of states, I don't have the exact number.

Certain states are still impossible, California. I have so many shops that want it in California. It's just the regulations are so hard. It's, again, I guess I got to get into like the marijuana or crack business. And I could sell where, I could sell a gas station. Yeah. Well, as you can tell, I didn't do the deep research that you did. I don't even, you know, but I just said, I want to kind of dock cigar that's kind

of like this. And then my general manager did all the research and they sent us several bags and we tried them all out. No, I'm really happy with it. And, you know, there's something to that too. I mean, look, there's a level where you get so obsessive. I've smoked cigars since I was 15. I wrote my college admissions essay, but, oh, yeah,

a little old for New York Italian standards. That's nuts. I wrote my college admissions essay about how much I love cigars. I got my show at The Daily Wire because I wrote an unsolicited cigar review. I love cigars. So there's an obsessive focus there. But when someone says, what kind of cigar should I like? What's the best cigar?

What's this? And I'm talking to a casual cigar smoker. Whatever you like, man. Yeah. That's the best cigar. People, some places now will sell cigars for $40-50 a stick. There are good $40-50 cigars. They're good $500 cigars.

They're few and far between. And if you're smoking a stick that's $8, the harder to find these things. And you're happy? And you're happy? That's the best cigar. That's the one you, you know, so the fact that you said, look, I want this to my taste. Oh, yeah, this is good. Yeah, there's something too.

Your taste is going to be your best advisor on that. I smoke them in the morning over coffee. That's my favorite time, sometimes before the sun's even risen. I'm out the back on my third cappuccino and lighten a cigar. What about you? Yeah, I am generally an evening cigar smoker. Since my third kid, my evening, I'm just too exhausted by the end of the day, and I've been traveling a lot for work, and so I have moved it up a little bit.

And I will sometimes have a cigar during the day here at Daily Wire. Oh, nice. Because what's nice too is, then I leave my office and people stop bothering me, because they don't know where to find me. And then I get, so even, I'll smoke a cigar while I'm doing work. Or, you know, if I go out with the fellows, have a couple of Coca-Cola. I have very little time for that now, but that's a great time. Have you noticed, though, these days, all the Utes, they're doing those nicotine pouches?

Yeah, yeah, I tried it, hate it. I want to like it. It seems cool. Yeah. But just that spicy feeling in my gum. Yeah, burns your gums a little. Look, I'm not going to say I hate it. I've had it, I've kept it quite everywhere.

I was just in Europe for three months, everywhere I went. they're being advertised everywhere. They now have these caffeine, caffeine patches. The caffeine, that's a little, that's the kind of chiller. That's the, you know, introduction to it. That's right. I've done them, especially if I'm really exhausted, I need to focus. I'll toss one.

It's kind of a nice little after dinner, man. But it's a totally different experience. Yeah. Well, I was going to ask you, right, because I get a lot of people who are very upset that I smoke cigars and the wives will write to me and say how angry they are because their husbands are now smoking cigars. I'm like, well, leave him alone and maybe he'll stop.

but if you keep bugging to me, might smoke more. What's your general apologetic for cigars when people harass you about it? One, name the most famous cigar smokers. Winston Churchill, it pretty long-lived. And he was like a big fat guy. And he, like, won a war, you know, he was pretty stressed. Who else?

George Burns, he lived to be like 150. Who else? Not Carl Marx, Groucho Marx. Who else? a lot of the, a lot of very famous cigar smokers are quite long-lived. So I'm convinced, and I'm not the first to observe it, that I've taken more out of cigars

than cigars have taken out of me. The point on the nicotine batches is apt because the first time I tried one of those things, it was not a huge dosage. So look, I've smoked cigars for 15 years. I'm sure I can handle it. I pop one in, I go green in the face. You don't really get a lot of nicotine.

It's not like a cigarette where you have all kinds of crazy chemicals sprayed on it. Do you know, my wife is now, I guess this is the new thing that women are doing. They used to be into essential oils. I don't know if this is, my wife now does nicotine patches. Does you? Have you heard of this? No.

Or her health. She's never smoked a day in her life and she's now doing nicotine patches. And she only eats meat. Yep. Right. And that's, that's something we're all aware of now. People are doing that, I get it. But what's so funny is if you have told me we got married just over 19 years ago,

your wife will one day only eat meat and wear nicotine. I would have been terrified. What's next? I know. She's a dull. You know, look, nicotine's in tomatoes. Yeah. Now that's a little bit of a misdirection because it's, you know, like one zillionth of the amount that's in a single cigarette. It's a, it's to deter pests eating it, right? Or bugs? Yes, that's why. Yeah, yeah. And people say nicotine is a neotropic. Natural insecticide is what I meant to say. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think, look, Mike Foley, the the theologian, convinced me of why cigars are superior to all these other types. I smoke a pipe once a year on Thanksgiving. I'll do a little nasal snuff, just to be whimsical.

But the occasional... When you want to run through a wool? You're right, yes. Good enough for St. Philip Nere, good enough for me. But he said the three tobaccos relate to the tripartite soul. The pipe to the logical part, the cigarette to the appetitive part, and the cigar to the thumotic part, the spirited part of the soul. And that's how I feel about it.

It's just a totally different experience. So while the scientists debate the neotropic effects of nicotine, I just think I'm going to stick with the old cigar. I'm gonna keep it. Yes. Yeah, good. Yeah. Congratulations on your new documentary, again. Another example of Michael Knowles being the internet's top Catholic apologist. This is something of course we spoke about a lot at Catholic Answers where I used to work there,

about Pope Pius the 12th and why he wasn't in fact in Hitler's pocket. But you've just put a documentary together and I told you before the show, I was telling my wife last night. And my kids were very disappointed because they heard, it's a movie night, we call it Frad Family Movie Night. call it Fred Family Move at night, right? They were all pumped, and they had to sit down and watch a show with subtitles. Four-part series on Aogenio Pachelli and Hitler.

Yeah, I, but I really liked it. Thank you. And I, this is me trying to show you that I mean this. I said this to Matt Walsh, I interviewed him about, am I racist? I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it. Yeah. Like, I didn't like your Daily Wires thing with a transgender basketball team. Lady baller.

Yeah, I hated it. You only liked my scenes. I was in like two scenes, those were, yes. Wanted to like it? Didn't, right? Terror on the Perry didn't like it at all. So I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it. It's actually really excellent.

Thank you very much. I can't wait to watch the extra three episodes. And I want to say thank you to helping all of these Catholic homeschools throughout the country get a better education when it comes to history. I appreciate it because I loved the project. It was already in development when it came to us. Some of the interviews, some of the, and we came in, did a heavy rewrite, did film some new interviewing, you know, that kind of thing. But I thought the story is very important because I said,

And to your point on, you know, being a sort of surreptitious promoter of Catholicism and evangelist, you think, well, look, when else are we going to put out a series about the Pope that will interest people? You know, we have a new pontificate, we have the first ever American Pope, people are jazzed, we have mass conversions going on in America and France and the UK all over. This would seem to be the moment. There's also a critical reexamination of our understanding of our own history. So you're seeing this, you know, the crackup of the post-war consensus. That has many very good qualities to it. It's got some bad qualities, too. You know, I mean, they've kind of the same lies that you've heard for years, you know,

that the lie about Pope Pius the 12th is that he was a collaborator with Hitler. But there are other lies that, oh, Hitler was amenable to Christianity or something. And you think, well, look, just because the communists were bad doesn't mean the Nazis were good. And the historical fact is Pope Pius XIII and Hitler were enemies. I mean, Hitler wrote in a letter to Franco that he considered Pius. the 12th, his personal enemy. Yes. He said that it was reported by, I think it was in Goebbels' diary,

that after the war, he intended to destroy all of the Christian churches, including Protestant churches. We know that Hitler constructed a kind of positive Christianity, which was just Nazi Christianity to, you know, after his own image. So these things are all real. I mean, there were distinctions between Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco, of course. But we had the opening of the Vatican Secret Archive, now renamed the Vatican Apostolic Archive.

And so we can read a lot of documents that we previously didn't read. We can see a lot of letters from Jews, for instance, who were saved, many, many Jews who were saved by the intervention of Popeius XVI, thanking him immediately after the war. So the notion that he's Hitler's Pope is a preposterous calumny.

And we also know that the man, his job before he was Pope, was that he was a diplomat. He was the Vatican's top. diplomat. Before that, he was the diplomat in Germany. So he was, he was intimately involved with the lead up to the war. It was the KGB, I think, who helped fund that play. What was it called the deputy? Mm-hmm. To try to discredit the largest, most organized vocal opponent to communism. And I think that's how it began to spread. But listen to this. I found this quote, you remember Jack Chick infamous for his anti-Catholic tracks?

Sure. Listen to this. He said, when World War II ended, the Vatican had egg all over its face. Pope Pius X 12th, after building the Nazi war machine, saw Hitler losing his battle against Russia, and he immediately jumped to the other side when he saw the handwriting on the wall. Pope Pius the 12th should have stood before the judges in Nuremberg. His war crimes were worthy of death. I mean, this is bananas. So I think, you know, yeah, you do have the kind of KGB pushing the narrative, and then that's picked up by anyone else who might be anti-Cathlethal.

With enemies of the church, which is everyone. I mean, you have to remember. 43, 44, Pius the 12th is a man alone. I mean, this is a man standing alone. He's the only guy who didn't leave Rome. He's the only major leader who didn't leave Rome. Mussolini was out. The king of Italy was out.

Hitler was good evidence, I think. Hitler was trying to kidnap the Pope and take him to Switzerland or Liechtenstein, probably execute him. Pias the 12th was prepared for that. He had a resignation letter in his desk, such that had he actually been kidnapped by the Nazis, he would have immediately renounced the papacy.

there would have been a new pope. They would have just had a simple priest on their hands. Wow. Yes, yes. I didn't know that. But he's standing there and he refused to leave for the Orby at Orby, you know, for his own people and for what that means for the faith around the world. And ultimately the Nazis don't go through with the plan.

Some have cast doubts on how serious Hitler was about it. But we do know one consistent perspective, which is that Hitler was out to get this guy from the very beginning. That never changed. We know, of course, that Pius the 12th was working in silence and underground to save many, many thousands of lives, open up convents to Jews in particular, but people who were being persecuted by the Nazis. He actually sheltered Jews in the Vatican. And Castelgandolphus, yes, yeah. Some 800 Jews were being put up at Castel Gandalfa, like in the Pope's bedroom. Okay, so, and these aren't which generally would be a lovely place to vacation.

under certain circumstances it's not so great yeah yeah so it's you know and he's he's you know as the vicar of christ he's got so many layers of responsibility he's he was protecting jews in particular around rome you know when when during the roman deportations uh was was you know passing false documents and things like that to help to help them escape but you're in pious's position it's what do his critics want They want him to get up there and say, you know, I oppose the furor or something. You give some, look, he was actually... Look, what happened in the Netherlands after that happened, right? Yes, yes.

Which archbishop was that, I forget, it was an archbishop in the Netherlands. They were told secretly by the Nazis not to publicly oppose the masturbation of Jews. Yeah. That didn't, they didn't go along with that. It was read in every parish. And then Jews started getting arrested and getting shipped off to gas camps, like Edith Stein was one of them. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So that's what happens when you stood up and spoke publicly. And by the way, in the lead-up to the war, there were ample public statements, you know, criticizing Nazi ideology, not the least of which is Mitt Bernando Sogha, by the encyclical in German, a rare encyclical.

By Pope Pius the 11th, while Pope Pius the 12th is the Vatican Secretary of State, one of the top advisors. Tell us about that. It was written in German. Yes, because it, had to be smuggled around in order to have wide reach. But this was not, you know, merely an encyclical for the ages,

like all the rest of them, you know, in Latin. This was meeting the urgency of the moment. You can read it right now online if people are interested. Yes, yes, it's right. It's right on the Vatican's website. And so I think when you see this sort of nonsense, there are kind of two calumnies of Pius the 12th, one that he was the silent pope and the harder one,

like that nonsense you just read, which is, you know, Hitler's collaborator or something. there are very few things that Pope Pius the 12th, Adolf Hitler, Francisco Franco, all of these people agree on. One thing they all agreed on is the Pope and Hitler hated each other. They were enemies. So that's ridiculous. That's almost not worth even acknowledging. But then you have the question of silence. Yes. And this brings us back to Aristotle, which is what is the chief political virtue? It's prudence. Prudence is the chief political virtue. And so there's always this question,

well, could Pius the 12th have done more? And actually one of the great men who we interview in our series won't try not to spoil too much of the series but says no. Emphatically no. I mean this is, because we're sitting here in our arms we say, well, if only in 42 he had done this.

Oh, if only in 44 you had done this. I think the simple answer is no. He could not have done more. This man is a hero. He's venerable for a reason. His cause of sainthood should be advanced. You know, not that anyone asks my opinion, but he really demonstrated extraordinary heroic virtue,

and he's one of the best men of the 20th century. And were there notable Jews who converted to Catholicism? Oh, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, including the chief rabbi of Rome or something, didn't he? He took the name Eugene, I think. Yeah, yeah, that's right, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's remarkable. I mean, do you think this is, I know,

this would be interesting to see who gets excited about this docu-series, because I'm sure you've got a large Jewish audience because of Ben. Yeah, you've got a large Catholic audience, because everyone I meet in the hallways here is Catholic. So somehow it happened. And then, of course, Hitler. Huge Hitler.

Huge Hitler. Nazi audience. Yeah, huge. Right. It's funny you mentioned that though about DW because, you know, because Ben was the first show and he's, you know, one of the founders of the company. And so everyone assumes like the company is like teaming with Hibad Labavich or rabbis or something like that.

And then the other founders were Protestant, super duper Protestant, as you know them. But the funny thing is, is this company like two-thirds Catholic or so, three-quarters Catholic? Everyone I meet is saying, hey, I love pints. Hey, I converted pints, helped. Hi.

You show up to the Trad Parish on Sundays. It's the daily wire at prayer. And you think even of the daily hosts is Ben, Orthodox Jew, obviously. Me, Catholic, Walsh, Catholic. We're bringing on a new show in September, Isabel Brown, Catholic. You think, we're going to be sued for anti-Protestant discrimination or anti-Jewish discrimination.

Yeah, was that even, and then of course, Candace became Catholic. Candice became Catholic. And so Renee, no, sorry, who's the lovely new lady who's coming on in the full? Isabel. Isabel, that's her name. When they, I wonder when they hired her, were they thinking, okay, this is another Catholic. I mean, calm down. I know, even I had to mention, I said, you know, look, I love Isabel Brown.

I think she's absolutely terrific. I was very encouraging of DW. bringing her on if she if she would come and uh but i did say it was like no you guys i have to tell you i just in full disclosure you're getting a little lopsie yeah that's fine i got to tell you a text message i got from andrew claven this morning because i asked him if he was here he isn't of course i want to say a big thanks to the college of st joseph the worker based in stubonville ohio you'll recognize many of their faculty and fellows from the show people like dr andrew jones dr jacob imam dr mark barnes dr alex plato listen to this their program

combines the rigor of an elite bachelor's degree with the practicality of training in the skilled trades, and their tuition model is structured so that students graduate without crippling debt. If you're a bright young man thinking about what college to go to, apply to a place where you not only learn the good, but gain the power to do it. Apply to the College of St. Joseph the Worker. If you're a parent, look into this college for your children. And if you're not in either category, just consider supporting the mission. Go to College of St.Joseph.com slash Matt Frad to learn more. That's College of St.Josef.com slash Matt Frad to learn more.

There will be a link below. Thanks. He said, oh yes, I keep seeing pictures of Hitler, the Pope, and Knowles. I keep thinking the Pope should keep better company. I love that even his text messages. One time I texted him and he texted me back a couple days later. He says, hey, I haven't forgotten about you, but God only knows why. And, you know, it's, look, the man, he's a great writer.

Do you know he started praying the rosary after I gave him one on my set? He told me that. We were having a drink and smoke, not that longer. He was, hey, buddy Fred gave me a rosary. And I said, oh, no, what's next? What's he going to say, you Catholic? He says, and I've been praying it, and it's just wonderful.

I just love it. And I said, well, now, Drew, you know, I've been friends with Drew for a very long time. I should have given him a rosary. Oh, that's kind of on me, isn't it? That's, well, you. You know, YouTube's a crazy place. The internet's a crazy place

where people prefer, what would you say, heat to light. They would rather conflict. And by they would rather, what I mean is it gets more clicks. Yes, yes. Like if I had Andrew Cleveland on my show and yelled at him like an idiot, which I would never do. But if I did, you get a lot more clicks for that.

Yes. But if I sit down with someone who I agree with in many respects and disagree with him in others and like just gently hand him a rosary and not be a jerk to the guy, and then he texts me saying, I regret not telling you. Like, this has become part of my prayer life.

Rosary is very very powerful. It's my favorite daily prayer, as it is for most people, probably, many Catholics, at least. And it's the thing that a lot of Protestants worry about with the rosary is that it's going to be vain repetition. Or at least that it'll get boring after a while. You're praying the same three or four mysteries on a cycle. And when I'm praying, when I'm really seriously praying and I'm not distracted or something, the craziest part is all these years later, you see. see different things. You see new things on each mystery. New insights hit you. New, new,

it's endless, you know, it's limitless. And so I'm not surprised that Drew loved it. You're seeing, Charlie the other day, Charlie Kirk said, Protestants don't venerate Mary enough. And I've, I've long been thinking that Charlie's on the road. I don't want to. Yeah. But this is, to your point on, you know, heat gets more attention on the internet. I bet my numbers would be a lot higher if I were more pugilistic with our friends. Obviously, we're all pugilistic with the left and the atheists and the commies and everything. But I think people love all that kind of conflict,

but I look around, and especially being friends with a lot of these people offline, I think something's kind of happening. I don't want to disturb that too much. I want to kind of gently, just sort of gently push a little and in the right directions, because the wind at the moment is at our backs.

The spirit appears to be on the move. Hmm. Yeah. It reminds me the conservative movement. I like to kind of analogize to the trad movement in the Catholic Church. And I wonder what would happen if the trads, I don't say that disparagingly. I would like to be a trad. I'm a trad in good standing.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm an aspiring trad. But I wonder what would happen if we finally got what we want. Because it felt like before Trump's re-election, everyone was on the same team. Yes. And shortly after, it feels like everybody's at everybody's throat. And that one question that was never really answered sufficiently, like what is a conservative, what does that even mean?

Yes. I wonder if a question like that would have to be grappled with if the Latin Mass was let out of its cage, what is a trad? Yeah, what is it? That can be my version of Matt's movie. You know, he does what is a woman, I do what is a trad. Because there are a lot of mad trads, you know, and look, I'm joking about this a little bit, but I did have a priest friend of mine say, you know, it's very important, when good things are happening, when people are defending you and the old mass and all this,

it's important to let people see the glad trads as well. You know, you don't want to get a bad reputation and you don't want to alienate potential allies. And so, you know, the first thing you see when you go to a trad parish is, one, the abundance of children. There are just a zillion kids everywhere, and it's generally, even you take the kids out as a younger median age, and people are very excited, standing room only. That's the way it is. But there can be, It's the same thing as the conservative movement. There can be this kind of curmudgeonly attitude of it's never good enough and we're never far enough and we should go back to the 50s.

No, we should go to the 1850s. No, we should go to the 1250s. No, we should, you know, certain point you're back at the Tower Babel or something like that. We can take yes for an answer. We can take yes for an answer. What would you, I ask this of conservatives in the political sphere and I ask this of my fellow trads, you know, in the religious sphere. How could things be going better right now in a way that is not utopian, in a way that

is it all realistic? Sure, I could tell you. How? The church could take its knee off the Latin Mass. Is that not happening? You're saying a full repeal of traditionus custodos. I'd like that. I would like that too.

It seems to me all the signals coming, what do I know? Sure. You know, again, I'm not really like a Catholic, I'm certainly not a trained Catholic apologist by any stretch, and I'm not, you know, I host a political show. What do I know? I'm a cigar salesman. But the signals that I see coming out of Rome are... At least, we're not going...

Not as hostile. No, not at all. At the very least. Yeah, there's a lot of Latin coming out of Rome, you know? And so some bishops have responded to that to double down. You know, there was that ridiculous nonsense in Charlotte. He seems to have walked that back. Yes, somewhat.

Yes. And look, this is how I felt... The situation has not gotten worse for the Latin Mass in the last hundred days. The situation, I think, has gotten much better. I anticipate hopefully good things to come. and if the bishops and the Holy Father have to be have to engage in a version of prudence as they understand it to get that done I just want the end result yeah this is how I felt with Trump Trump came out on the campaign trail he said I'm going to be the IVF president I want to be the president no he's got J.D. Vance as a Catholic convert is his vice president got tons of Catholics all over the president's team and he says this I want to be the IVF president I said and I know why he said it because it's a very very popular issue most people don't don't see the ethical problems with it recently the baptists sudden baptists have come in and said we're opposed to IVF good on them a good on them great on them but you know

this is something where for most people they say well you know I wouldn't have my nephew with that IVF so I support it yeah God can't be against any means of conception which is obviously yeah think about that for five seconds five seconds you realize oh hold on that we don't we don't justify immoral means but Trump said that on the trail and they said oh we got to pull support from Trump, you can't vote for Trump in good conscience, blah, blah, blah. I said, you know, guys, the guy has a pretty good record. He's the first president to attend the March for Life in person ever. He is the guy who appointed the judges that actually got Roe v. Wade overruled. He let the pro-life prisoners, political prisoners, that Biden had imprisoned out of jail. He, I think he's got

a good record, and I just think he deserves a little grace on this, and he's speaking in strange ways, but I'm kind of a plan truster on this issue. And then what happens? Trump releases his guidance on insurance guidelines and that IVF mandate is gone. So some people would rather have the big showy speech about how IVF is a great evil. It is a great evil. Some people want the big showy speech and the memes and the fiery rhetoric. I want the results. I'm much happier with the results.

That's how I feel with the liturgy wars as well. Yeah. Increasingly, I can understand why traditional Catholics are angry. I became canonically a Greek Catholic a few years ago. That's always, it's always in the back of our minds. Are we going to become bizcats? In part, because I was surrounded by a plethora of banal litigies. And, you know, the Latin Mass was a long way away.

We started attending the Byzantine church, fell in love with the divine liturgy and praying in that way. And anyway, the point is I went to an eight-day silent retreat at a Byzantine monastery that was founded by a German Catholic. And on the last day of the retreat, one of the monks took me to the local museum. He had the key to it. And I was in there and I saw all of the Catholic regalia, all the things that I don't even know the names to. That's how Novus Ordo I was all the way growing up.

You know, the beautiful canopy for the Eucharistic processions and beautiful and serious-looking rosary beads and vestments. And I was sitting there and I felt angry because this, and I don't mean to belabor it. but it was taken from us. We didn't have a say in it. And then we see it and we say how beautiful it is and then we're told that we're very rigid. So I, and then I think the other thing too is sometimes you can explain something again and again and again

and it feels like people aren't listening and then you start getting angry. Yeah. And so I'm kind of sympathetic to the mad trad, I think. Yeah, look. But I also agree that it's probably not the most effective to bring in outsiders. Yeah, I'm not saying that there are never moments

in my private study alone with my thought, where I'm, I'm not angry about what happened. I grew, you know, I grew up in the 90s. I thought felt banners were the most deeply traditional aspect of the liturgy. I thought that, who's that awful, Dan Schueter, the guy who Don Eagles, did he do, or no, he did the other one. I don't know what he did.

Here I am, Lord. And those, I mean, I think. That was the stuff we were raised with. At least life imprisonment for anyone who performs those songs, at least. Maybe Pius the Ninth style. Was he Catholic? I don't even know if.

I don't know if he was Catholic. I don't know. Who knows? You should have been excommunicated if he was. But I don't know if you had this song. We are companions on the journey. Mercifully. Breaking bread and sharing life.

How can you listen to that and respect it? Yeah. And it's like that anyway. That was my whole upbringing as a Catholic. And I remember I was in, after Samorum Pontificum, I was in Rome. I was studying in Siena and I went down to Rome for a day. I said, I was an atheist at this point. at this point, but I said, okay, well, I at least want to check out the mass. I go in,

and I got the time wrong, so I was there for an Italian Mass. And I said, this isn't that different. This is just an Italian. And, but then I waited a little bit, and then the extraordinary form started. And I said, this is completely foreign. I know nothing about this. So it was back to back. It was a, back to back. Yeah. Yeah. I forget where we were. And it might have been St. Peter's? I don't know, wherever it was. And so I went up for communion. I was not in a state of grace. I really didn't know anything about the faith. but I said, well, I'm here. Might as well get, receive communion, you know.

I hope I've confessed that since then. And I think it was a cardinal who, you know, and I go up and I had my hands. I had my hands like this. That's all, I was told that is how one receives the Eucharist. Yeah. I didn't know. And he just wait, he's looking at me and waiting.

And I went to ask him what I was supposed to do. He goes, bloop. Oh. And I said, oh, okay. So that's what I'm supposed to do. That was probably the first time I'd ever received our Lord on the tongue. And I didn't think, I didn't think all that much about it.

I said, that was a weird, that was a weird thing, huh? And then when I reverted, which was about three, four years later, then I started to go to kind of more traddy novice ordo parishes with some chanting, with Aderiantum, okay, this is nice. And then I, only, after that, did I discover the traditional Latin mass. It was so hard, you know, it was so hard to find. And I thought, you got to be kidding me. You got to be kidding me.

But so this is also part of why, I'm feeling pretty good because then there was then it did start to explode and look it was so small it was so restricted but it did start to explode and it's you know people would would go to fraternity parishes and institute Christ the king and dioces and TLM if you could find it and it was younger and younger people who were reverting converting it was really and then there was a reaction to that it was too successful and to restrict it and certain bishops you know were confused by the language of this strange letter and kind of didn't pay attention to it. And some took it as an excuse to punish the rigid, awful, terrible trads.

I thought they were going to accompany. I just wanted accompaniment. I wanted adjournamento to the felt banners. I wanted a little adjournament, but anyway, they didn't like the spirit of participation in that way. And so they tried to restrict it some more. I think the cat's out of the bag, though. And if you talk to young Catholics, the ones who are having a lot of kids are the trads. And if you talk to seminarians, they're alt-rad.

If you talk to seminarians, I look like Hillary Clinton or something. I mean, you know, it is so it just seems to me the traditional mass or something approximating it is the future of the Latin right. And it's just as simple as that. Yeah, there's a fellow named Dr. Peter Kwasnevsky, a fantastic author. He wrote a book called Turning Around. I may have got his last name wrong, actually. But he's terrific.

And he's got a book called Turning Around and it's responding to Conner. to the Latin Mass and he's of the opinion that the new mass can't be fixed. Yeah. And the old mass didn't need fixing. Yeah. But okay, set that aside. It's been interesting to see that even within the Novus Auto, if you think this, I would think of the revolution that took place after the council is a sort of wound to the church. You think of all the craziness that went on with that kind of music, the felt banners. I played Metallica at two different masses growing up as it was before my conversion and I didn't I and part of me feels ashamed but then I know it wasn't my fault I don't know anything I'm supposed to be

taught you're not supposed to let me do this you know the point is that it feels like in in every aspect in the Nova Soto it there's this healing to that wound right back in the 90s no one was to where I was there was no incense right there was no Latin people weren't no chanting there was so It feels like, yeah, there's like a, there's a healing to the, to, anyway. You know, just between us, gals, I tend to agree with your friend, which is, look, obviously I think the Novosurdo Misei is valid and I have attended many Novosurdo masses and I think it can be done in a rather reverent way. And I agree with all of that.

And it can be legitimately quite beautiful when, when, though rarely, when it is celebrated in a very reverent way. Of course, yeah, yeah. But it didn't improve anything. It didn't make anything better. There's no difference between the old mass and the new mass, where you would point to it and say, well, the new mass really helped out. It really improved.

It didn't. There are ways to make the new mass closer in beauty to the old mass, closer in reverence, closer in liturgical richness. but it's, look, would I be thrilled if the new mass were, if the liturgy were overhauled again? And, you know, these are just liturgical reforms you can have, though. You don't need an acumenical counsel for that. I would be thrilled if there were ways to improve that and get it closer.

But, you know, we did have this mass for like 1,400 years substantially in almost its exact form, and since Gregory the Great. And it seemed to serve things pretty well. And there are other rights and there are, that's, like, Byzantine Catholics, but like, what, we can't, that's the one we can't have. That's the one that we can't have? I think the reason people get frustrated with these sorts of things

that we're saying and they will get frustrated is that they think it's an attack on them. They feel like I'm looking down my nose or that you might be looking at the nose to them and saying that you're not a real Catholic, you're a sub-Catholic, and that's just not at all the case. What I'm saying is, Like, we're brothers and sisters, and how sad is it that our,

what did our parents do with the inheritance? Like, wouldn't it be beautiful to have this thing? And there are many, I mean, this is not false modesty by any stretch. There are many people who are much further advanced in the spiritual life than I am. I would agree. There are people who are daily communicants, who live out their faith in immensely more beautiful ways than I do. How come I get to have the beautiful liturgy and they don't?

in a way it's in a way it's kind of an injustice in the other direction. It's not that one looks down one's nose that that person isn't pious enough or that you just say, what about all these pious people who could be so aided in their faith who could receive such succor

from this beautiful mass of the ages? And I just happen, I'm lucky, you know, I live in Nashville, I get to have a good mass. I get to have a really beautiful liturgy. And why can't, you know, I was with my family in Italy for a week this summer. We go, got to land,

on a Sunday, went straight to the Duomo or Vietto. And it was great, nice Mass, new Mass, but it was very nice. Go up, and we're in Tuscany, I go back to Rome. And it wasn't close enough to the Vatican or to the church that I'd wanted to go to. So we were very, very close to Santa Maria Maggiore, the resting place of Papa Francesco. So we'd go, I'd get all the, I'd do this.

I had a very short period of time. I'd take the kids to all the sites, and we rush back, we get to Santa Maria Maggiore, and we go, that's a very nice mass. beautiful church, very nice mass. Obviously, Novos Ordo in Italian. I thought, you know, I speak Italian. So I could understand it.

My wife doesn't speak Italian. My kids don't speak Italian. Many of the people who were there don't speak Italian. And I thought, how ironic, you know, the whole point of the widespread use of the vernacular was to make it more accessible to everyone. I said, 60 years ago, people who came to Rome, who went to a papal basilica, would be able to experience the mass, even right by the Vatican. And it would be substantially the same mass that they have in their home parish, maybe a little more ornamented, maybe a little bit,

but they would feel an immediate recognition of the church universal. And now that we're apparently allowing encouraging participation and welcoming people and all this, now most people who attend that mass have no idea what's going on. I happen to speak Italian. I thought, what a, what a pity, you know, what an injury, really, that was done to the laity, not to mention the clergy. If you are a Catholic and tired of dating apps that feel, well, not very Catholic, there is a better way. It's called Catholic Chemistry. It's a dating site and app for intentional Catholic dating, made for Catholics by Catholics, designed for real intentional Catholic dating.

Go to Catholicchemistry.com slash mat, and if you love it, use the promo code Matt for 20% off optional upgrades. Yeah, now, so what do you think the future is? I know you said you're a cigar salesman, but let's speculate. I once had a FSSP priest chatting with him over coffee. He said he would hate for the novice order to be done away with in the way the Latin Mass was done away with after the council because he thinks it would damage the faith of people who grew up with this.

He's not saying he doesn't think the Latin Mass is superior. He's not saying he wouldn't like there to be a day where it was the mass celebrated, but if overnight you've grown up, this is your tradition, and then you walk into a master so long as there. So suppose Pope Leo gives you a call. He says, you know, your boss gave me that lovely baseball. And so I'll hear you out.

Was that the most wholesome picture. That was so lovely. Ben Shios. Yeah, so lovely. Orthodox Jew in the Vatican, like a kid on, you know, the first day of school. Hey, I got you this World Series baseball. Yeah. So suppose he calls you up.

It's like, tell me what to do, Michael. Counsel me. Well, obviously, it'd be great. And, you know, I don't give advice to the Holy Father, but it would be great. No, he's asking you. If he's asking me, then I have to. Do you reject him?

I would not reject him. I would say, this tradition is custodos would seem to have been ill-advised. So get rid of that, certainly. Um, sumorum pontificum, I think was great. And look, the, you say that this fraternity priest suggested, well, you wouldn't want to get rid of the Novosurdo in the way that the mass of the ages was done away with.

I say, yeah, well, maybe, maybe not. Maybe not. You know, was it Lewis or Chesterton who said when you're going down the wrong path, the most progressive man is the man who turns around goes in the other direction? I just, it didn't, that liturgical reform, which is not intrinsic to, the way the liturgical reform was done is not intrinsic to the Second Vatican Council. You don't need to say much of anything about the Second Vatican Council. Plenty things called for by the Second Vatican Council that were completely ignored by the so-called reformers.

You could, you just say, well, look, it didn't work. It was a fine idea. They tried it. They thought it was going to increase all these wonderful things. And it just didn't happen. So get rid of it. You know, I mean, the Holy Father has a lot of authority here. Yeah, but how many priests in the world now have to learn the Latin Mass?

There's got to be some kind of. No, they should learn it. They should learn it. They should learn it. They had to do it the first time. They had to do it in the 70s. No, I'm saying overnight. That's the thing.

If you just said the Latin Mass starts tomorrow at 12 and that's it. That's what they did with the Nova Sordo, isn't it? I mean, when they say, how could we expect? people. Well, it's a lot easier for a priest who celebrates the Tridentine Mass to then learn the Novus Order. That's true. Although, if you look at the seminarians coming up, I don't know, their Latin's probably as good as their English, a lot of them. I've been really, I've been really heartened by the seminarians I've been meeting. I was at the knack in Rome and just good normal man. Yeah. Good jaw-lined man. Yes. You know, just normal.

With cigar smoking. Cigar smoking. Old book reading. Also talking about intimacy with our blessed Lord and, yeah, mature, serious, I'm excited. And look, the idea of Samoramodivocum was we're going to open up, I mean, look, I love Pope Benedict and I think he has a profoundly deep understanding of, forget about the church, even just of conservatism in public life, like how a conservative disposition person interacts with the world, and there's a lot of insight about human nature, just in that. And he said, look, we're going to open up the mass. It was never abrogated, really.

These were mistaken interpretations. We have a hermeneidic of continuity, and we're just going to open it up a little bit. And then Nova Sordo will benefit from exposure to the old mass, which it unquestionably has, unquestionably all the things that you were saying that you didn't have as a kid. We do have now in the Nova Sordo. And maybe there will be a renewed interest in the old mass. Maybe the old mass could benefit from not any liturgical aspects of the new mass, but just the way that we approach the mass as modern people, that can breathe some freshness.

Sure, maybe that. So I agree that that's true. But I don't want there to be some kind of synthesis where merely you get, you know, the Dan shoot, you know, twaddle for, you know, the offeratory, but then you get solvary. It's a great way to upset everybody. Yes, yes. Yeah, that's not what, you don't want that,

because that would be so contrived. Yeah, yeah. I don't think it would be contrived to just bring back the old mass. Do you think if the moduproprio was overturned and then the Latin mass left alone and priests allowed to celebrate it without the permission of their bishops

that in 20 years, where would you see the Latin mass in America? Would you think it would be, I mean, I can't tell if I'm in an echo chamber or not, because if you ask me right now, oh yeah, the light mass would definitely be the predominant, but I'm not sure if that's true or not, but I don't know if it would be the predominant form of liturgy in America in exactly 20 years,

but the trend lines would be quite good. The trend lines would be quite good. You know, the trads are the ones who have the kids. The trads are the ones who care about the liturgy. You mentioned at the beginning of the show that so many people seem to be converting to Catholicism right now, which is so wild. Yeah. I was Catholic before it was cool. Yes.

I was preaching Christ in the Catholic Church. I feel actually that I was kind of in the first wave of these big convert. Now, I was a cradle Catholic, but I reverted. I was an atheist for 10 years. And I do think something was in the air that maybe I sensed a little on the early side. But I kind of consider myself as having, now I've been reverted for whatever,

like 12 years or something, to 13 years. But I do think it was this thing. I think it was this thing that was happening, you know. And what is this thing? With the Holy Spirit, really. But a dissatisfaction with a new atheist. which by that time was played out. Yeah.

It only came about because of 9-11 and because of the church sex scandal. And it was cynics basically took that as an opportunity to make claims that they could never back up. So that was totally played out. The materialism was leading people to do a bunch of depression drugs and kill themselves and the ideology of the spirit of the age

was leading people to castrate themselves and do all sorts of weird sex stuff and kill their babies and all the rest. led led to a state of profound despair. And so, you know, then the gods of the copy book headings come back. And then the actual god, who rules above them all, you know, is recognizable again. And so that was all building. I mean, Obama was kind of peak in millennial liberalism. And when that, after his time was over, you really can't separate what happened in the political sphere with the rise of Trump and Brexit and Orban and Maloney and all of this kind of and migration

restriction, you know, the recognition the nations can and should in fact have some borders. You can't totally divorce that from the recognition of spiritual and anthropological realities. So when you say that people are, by the way, I'm just dropping ash all over your chair. I do it all the time. I mean, look, we have one ash tray over there. It's far too far. No, it's too far. I'm better on the carpet.

We'll set the whole street on fire. That's what CS Lewis used to do. He used to, if you ever tour the kilns, he and his brother would smoke pipes and they just ash him on the carpet and grind it in with their feet. That's a little too bad. He was a bachelor for quite a while.

Yeah. Maybe he was married soon and he wouldn't have done that. Yeah, so we said that a lot of young people are converting to Catholicism. So what is it about Catholicism that you think people are turning to then? I have an answer, but I'd love to hear yours.

Yeah, because I actually love how you phrased that because we all know anecdotally people, maybe ourselves, who hit a point of despair and we ran out of runway and we turn to God and we say, have mercy on me a sinner and our life changes. So what you're saying it sounds like is large swaths or maybe not large, but significant portions of the culture have done this as a culture

would become more and more despairing. So what is it about Catholicism then? Do you think people are learning to? Or are we overplaying that? No, we're not. We're not overplaying that. I mean, it's primarily these reverendums these reversions are a Catholic phenomenon.

And there are some, Eastern Orthodoxy, some of the mainline Protestant churches have, have, basically we're about to shut their doors and now they have a few people coming in. And so, but it's happening broadly, but it is chiefly Catholic. There was a paradox of error that took over, probably peaking about five, ten years ago,

which is an extreme materialism and an extreme Gnosticism. And the extreme materialism said, we're just meat puppets, you know, we're just our joys and our loves and our desires are just synapses firing off randomly, a story told by a fool, signifying nothing. And then the Gnostic error said,

actually, also your bodies don't matter at all. And you can be whatever you think that you are, and that was the transgender ideology, and end the obsession, the fetishization of technology and the virtual world. And that reached its apotheosis during transing the kids and COVID when we were all living on Zoom. And we found out that, you know,

hugging grandma as she died through a Zoom computer wasn't really going to satisfy the longings of the human soul. And so we realized, okay, well, materialism is not the whole answer because I still have longings, I still have desires. I have a sense of eternity. So it's not just my body. And just pleasing my body isn't actually making me happy. And then we found out the Gnostic thing is wrong

because we found out, no, we actually have bodies, bodily needs. We can't just live in computers. So the Catholic Church and the fullness of truth recognizes, no, it's like we're body. and we're soul. And we're both of those things. And we're like the beasts and that we're bodies and we're like the angels and that we're intellect.

And our faith is incarnational. So I remember I was talking a friend of mine during COVID. He said, Michael, actually, I kind of like COVID because the churches are closed, but you know, that means we're just all watching the church, so he's Baptist. It says, we're watching the church surface at home. And it's really nice.

You know, a church isn't a place. And I said, well, it's also kind of a place. Like it's not a place, but it's kind of a place, right? And it's kind of, and so I think the fact that Catholicism is sacramental and is the fullness of sacramental theology is attractive because we're starting to recognize now, you know, I need to, I need to be in the physical world. I started a cigar company in part because people need to be in the physical world. And I think that answered some of those errors. I think modernity in its constant innovation and denigration of the past, tearing down statues, has been found wanting. I think people want a connection with their past. I think we live in a direct. Rassinated time and people want some roots. I want to know what that word means. It's a great word. I mean uprooted You know an uprooted time. Yeah, that's excellent. Yeah, that's right. It's a great one if you say it at a cocktail party that people think you're very, very smart. I'm going to forget it in about five minutes right now But we're living in that that rootless time as a matter of ideology. We have been cheering that. You know,

I'm a citizen of the world. I'm whatever, you know, screw you dad. I don't I don't have any connection to I'm just a radical individual. I think individualism has been found wanting, especially the kind that came out of the enlightenment, and I think we have to acknowledge that came as a consequence of the Protestant Revolution, the notion that we're primarily individuals with entitlements and rights. I think that's been found wanting. I think we recognize, as Aristotle did,

we're the social creature, we're a political animal, and we primarily were born to families. As the great philosopher Kamala Harris said, we're not fallen out of a coconut tree, we're born to families, and we have duties, and we have obligations, and we have limits on ourselves. That limitless utopia, shattered. And Catholicism is a religion that recognizes natural limits and recognizes

apostolic succession and has authority. And it just recognizes all the things that are intrinsic to human life. And it perfects them in grace. During the 90s, there was a surge of Protestant converts. Yeah. You know, Dr. Scott Hahn. Jeff Kavins was a Protestant pastor, even though he was baptized Catholic, we could go on and on. But a lot of them talked about the shock they felt when stepping into a Catholic parish. They had read their way into the faith and they get to the church and they're wondering, you know, why isn't this the way I had envisioned it? And maybe for them, it had to do more with how scripture led them into the church. But I wonder today, the Gen Z folks who may have been, what was that word?

Deracinated. Deracinated. When they come into a Catholic church today, what do you think they're expecting, I presume it's whatever they see on Instagram, all those glorious photos that look nothing at all like the parish. They show up to some suburban octagon. Well, that's my fear, right? But have you heard from Jen Ziers who try to go to the Catholic Church and then they're confronted with something and they're not sure how to reconcile it? 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 Frad. 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,

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Matt Frad. No, you know, I meet a lot of them because they'll meet them at church, people who are traveling, who are interested in converting. And maybe it was something they saw on Instagram or a podcast or, you know, there's something going on. And they'll, they'll say, yeah, I was raised Baptist. I was raised Presbyterian. Often I was raised with nothing. That's really what you get. And I've, I mean, I have a friend of mine, a great, great guy, evangelical, Protestant, pastor, his kids are converting, you know, to Catholicism. I mean, it's just how, and he's cool with it, it's happening. And no, I find it's not that they're disappointed. Well, especially, as you say, if they're coming from nothing, yeah, then even the

the standard novice order might be very impressive to them with its structure and ritual. And might serve a purpose, actually, too. You know, and this is one of the nice things I'll say about our Protestant friends is people can blame a lot of modernity on the Protestant revolution. And I think a lot of that is fair. But given that, given that now we've reached this point in modernity where people don't know anything anymore and we're, you know, we've given up all the great treasures of our cultural patrimony. sometimes to get back, you kind of need, you need those guys as a bridge. I mean, there were a lot of Protestants that I liked reading and listening to in my reversion that I was more compelled by than some Catholic theologians

who I just couldn't quite get there yet. You know, I stumbled over Marion, you know, Marian dogmas and things like that, as a lot of people do. And so for the same way, if someone comes in and I say jump into the deep end of, you know, a really full, you know, hi, Misa Cantata and just go for it, you know, you're going to get the full thing. But maybe for some people going from nothing to a really well-preached and reverently celebrated Novosurdo Mass, even if it's at some ugly suburban monstrosity church from the 70s, maybe that's going to be a little more familiar and it can lead you into other things.

Beautiful. Yeah. Yeah, it is really, I feel really old. I think it's partly because I I am. Increasingly, I'm noticing it's because of the reality. It's wild. Yeah, 42, man. Because you don't look at day over 41. Thank you very much for saying that. Because when I converted, I was 17 years old and I was agnostic. The new atheism hadn't hit yet. So I was just trying to sound spiritual but not religious by saying those sorts of things. You know, dabbled in Buddhism. Dabbled in anything that smacked of spirituality that didn't require anything morally, at least that had to do with sexuality. That's really what I was after.

Yeah, I'm down on insider trading and racism, but if I can please be a sexual deviant and also feel spiritual, that's the religion I'm after. Well, this is a big part. You know, the millennials were probably the height of hookup culture. Maybe some zoomers.

100. Yeah, no, I think you're right. I'm millennial. What are you? I'm millennial, yeah. I'm like on the upper. I'm in, I realize. One of these cigars.

I realize that I'm old because, and which one are you going for the dawn? You like the dawn. That's great. I love this one. Yeah, yeah. That's our bestseller. Do you remember what I said?

You probably don't. I'll just tell you, when I first smoked this, because you sent me a pack, very kindly. You know, people are always telling you what notes they're getting and what they, and I got lemon pie. Yes, I do remember. Isn't that wild?

Yeah, yeah. But I stand by that. I totally get it. I totally get it. I know that one, that's kind of, and it used to be, but talk about trends changing, used to be that cigar smokers wanted mild, lighter body, creamy,

which is totally what you're getting. there. Then somewhere in the 90s, everyone wanted this, like, punch you in the face. Well, see, I'm a, I'm a Cuban guy. Yes. That's much more like that. Yes. They don't ferment them as long, I suppose. Or at a higher, higher temperature. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I wish I didn't like Cubans because of the price. I really don't. Especially now. Yeah. Yeah. Well, now I can't afford it, but I still have some left in the humidor and it's just such a delight. I know it's a good cigar. Sorry, we're going back to cigars. When I exhale and then I want to breathe even in the exhale. Yep. I just wanted to happen to me once. I had a, it was a, it was a, it was a

It was an old Cuban this many years ago. And it was so good that I'd blow it out. Or I'd even put the foot of the cigar to my nose. My buddy and I, these were like really high-end cigars. It was just smelling it. It was great. But sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. So getting back to sex stuff.

You know, the millennials really fell into hookup culture, and that was to rigor, and everyone did it. Think of the series friends that our parents all let us watch. What absolute trashy. Don't get me wrong. Funny. Yeah, it was funny. At the time, it doesn't hold up.

I find that well. But I remember it at the time. And I do wonder, not to blame everyone else for my problems, but, you know, in my, here we go. In my single days, I enjoyed the girls. You know, I, but I wonder, is that because I'm Italian, maybe? Is it because I grew up watching every episode of Friends? And it was just, this was the behavior that was normal and was encouraged.

This was the New American Dream. Yes. Find an apartment in New York City and porn accounts. date yes yeah date as many women as possible and yeah and you think you know now that's really looked on is very cringe and so this is something that for the millennials the sex especially because millennials came of age when porn you know really became a big thing on the internet and so and and you had all all of the cultural institutions saying foreign okay do the LGBT do the I guess IVF was being normalized at that point like and every trans wasn't quite a thing yet but it was like every

was pushing kind of crazy, yeah, crazy sex stuff. And, you know, I mean, it was the most like conservative version of it was just like fornicating all the time. You know, that was like the most right wing version. And I don't know, with Zoomers now, there was a real push against that. So I don't know that sexual issues are the impediment to Zoomers. So I hope you're right.

I really do. You know, you said that hooking up and stuff is considered quite cringe. Yeah. Is that because people are just committing, self-abuse to pornography and they could but don't have an option so therefore they pretend it's cringe. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like Nietzsche's resent him all where you demonize that which you feel yourself impotent to attain. Is that what it is? Or is there's some real virtue? Well, because

you know, people are drinking a lot less. And Republicans are leading the charge. It's something like less than half of Americans this year have had a drink, a single drink, American adults. How much, what's the marijuana thing called? T.H. CBD, but the other thing? Yeah, how much of that? Yeah, right, because some people are reading that. Sorry, I don't mean to, I don't mean to be a downer. No, but I agree. Someone said to me the other day,

I said, is it a good thing that Americans are drinking unless? I said, what could be if they had a problem? I guess it's a good thing. But I said, no, maybe that's a bad thing though, because it means they're turning down the social lubricant, you know, it's the sociable intoxicant that is actually the material effect of our Lord's first public miracle.

They're turning away from that towards something that's even worse for their spirit and for society. And so maybe you're right, maybe they're hooking up less because they're looking porn or something. Yeah, I don't know. You probably talk to younger people more than I do. I mean, is that your experience or? I mean, there's probably, even if it's not coming from a place of virtue

and true chastity, even if that's not the case, there might be a desire for it. Yeah, look, La Roche Fouca says hypocrisy is the tribute vice based of virtue. And I always love that line. It's a little bit self-selecting. The zoomers that I talk to are a pretty hardcore, you know, so I don't think they're looking at a lot of porn.

I was shocked at this Amfest thing that you and I were both at last year. How immodest the women were dressed. It was really disappointing, actually. And then I'm also kind of a little disappointed, and I'd love you to push back on me here, if you want, with the sort of the fascination with UFC in conservative culture. I find that really distasteful.

Yeah, I've attended two UFC things. I want to like it. Don't get me wrong. I'd love to like it. In fact, if I watch it, I would like it. But if I watch porn, I'd probably like that too. Right, right. I don't think we should be watching UFC.

No, I mean, look, I'm torn on it. I've never, I wouldn't like choose to. I mean, I, so you're torn on it. So give me the reason you might. I'm open to changing my mind. No, no, no, I don't know that you should, but can I give you my basic argument? Yes. And I don't know if it's a good argument, but I find it convincing even when smarter people show me why it's wrong.

Yeah, okay? And that's happened. Okay. And it's something like this. In order to inflict serious damage on another individual, I have to have a good reason. Yeah, like self-defense or something. But sport, money, entertainment are not good enough reasons.

Sure. So what about, do you like boxing? But see, no, I think the argument would hold for that. Of course, I like it. Yes, I'd love to watch it. It seems great. But it would be the same thing. But wouldn't you say with boxing,

okay, they've got bigger gloves. Sometimes they have headgear or not. I don't know, but people tell me that the injuries that result from boxing are far worse than UFC. I've heard that. I don't know if I... So I don't know if I... This is the, you know, the, what do they call it, the fallacy of the beard

where you're not sure when a beard becomes a beard, but it doesn't know you know what, you know, you know. It's like, because the next thing is, what about football? And at that point, I'm like, I got no idea. But what about baseball? You can get dinged in the head of the peace? I got no idea. It's not intentional, I get it.

I mean, I get some answers, but I don't think they're terribly compelling. But I also think there's this second argument where, you know, the reason back in the day, bear baiting and cockfighting were banned wasn't just because of concern for the animals. It was because of the understanding that it would, in some way, vulgarize the masses. Well, and indeed, the primary reason to ban cockfighting is because of what it does to people.

Because people are really the moral agents here. We're not to, so, I mean, C.S. Lewis says this in, I think in mere Christianity. This is delicious. Thank you. I'm honored. But on UFC, I've gone a couple times for business, whereas, you know, there's like a business reason to go to it. And I think the way it's done, one could defend it as not being completely barbaric. They're not throwing these guys to lions or something. And these are trained athletes who are very skilled, who are engaging in a very technical art

rather than merely bludging each other with hammers. 100%. The part that I have to walk out for, and I've done it now twice, the two times I've been there, when the girls fight. I hate that so much. I can't. I can't. I can't do it. That's clearly evil.

Yeah. And I don't know. How do we become a culture that celebrates women by watching them pummel each other? Yeah, I don't think women should be police officers, much less being, you know, fighting in a sport. So I think, you know, there's a fear of getting a little too prissy about everything.

You know, I don't think we're calling to ban football. Although maybe, I don't know, dude. Do you think you should get rid of football? No, I don't think that. No, but in football, I mean, you can have just as many head injuries, if not more than you could in the UFC or boxing. Yeah, yeah.

But in fact, one of my favorite priests is a boxer himself, you know, it's good, It's good to be tough. I think it's really cool. And I would love to learn boxing. And I'm open to martial arts. I'm open to self-defense. And I love my son does Jiu-Jitsu.

I'm all about this. A friend of mine invited me once. I trained a little bit at it to do Krav Maga, which I call Jiu-Jitsu. It's the Israeli Jiu-Jitsu. I tried it a little. Krav Maga, I called it too. But I tried, I don't think I've ever tried boxing.

It's funny how that kind of got eclips by Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, isn't it? I think it was because of the UFC. Yeah. When Jiu-Jitsu quickly rose as the promise. the prominent martial law. It's because I was getting too good at the other ones. So we got to do it.

But, you know, you want tough guys. I mean, there are too many pacifists in the church militant, as many a priest has pointed out. Anyway, something to keep thinking about. I don't think there's, I don't think there's nothing to my argument. When it gets dismissed like it's the stupidest thing ever, I'm like, it seems quite reasonable. Look, the only sport that I really like is baseball,

which is the only sport you can get fatter while playing, you know. And bowling. And bowling. I guess, yeah. But then when I look at, so if you say, okay, look, football is not really much less dangerous than any of these actual, you know, fighting sports or hockey, I don't know, you can get serious injuries in hockey. And then I look at the makeup of the spectators and of the athletes. I say, well, UFC, I agree with these guys on a lot of stuff. And I don't want that to be misinterpreted. It's not that one would just instrumentally say, well, I'll just go where my fellow travelers are or I'll put up with some bad thing in order in a utilitarian calculation to get some good thing.

But there is a good rule of thumb, which is that if the people that you generally agree with on generally important things all gravitate towards something, there might be a reason for it. You know, this is my defense of political parties. It's very fashionable to say, oh, I'm, you know, I'm not really a Republican. I'm not really a Democrat. Oh, no, me. I'm Mr. Special. I'm just my own political. No one's good enough for me. I think, you know, politics is a team sport. It's like when you're a teenager and people ask you what music you're into, like you wouldn't know. You wouldn't know. And then as soon as that band becomes popular, excuse me, you no longer listen. You wouldn't know because if you knew, I would have to stop listening to that band. Yeah, that's it with political parties. I think, no, it's a politics is a team sport. You have to, in fact, it's very childish, I think. I'm so good for this. I'm, oh, I'm the most pure. I won't vote for this candidate or that. I sort of think. I sort of think. that seems sophisticated and then you realize, oh, it's actually just this arrogant move. It's terribly immature and arrogant.

Yes, yeah, naval. I wonder if that is, what are your take on this, if that's in part happening to Daily Wire. My sense, someone who knows nothing or very little. They tell me nothing around here anyway. Is that when Daily Wire came bursting out of the gates, everyone was cheering Daily Wire.

Now Daily Wire has become such this big juggernaut. Yeah, yeah. I wonder if that's partly why people are very critical, or can be very critical of Daily Wire. I mean, it could just be that they're critical of certain takes that certain hosts have. Yeah, Ben. Like, yeah, right.

Well, I've been critical of Ben's take since, you know, or the Daily Wire existed. Or whatever. Sometimes people hit me for something or Drew or Matt or whatever. But, yeah, so I don't mean to, there are plenty of reasons to disagree with individuals. Sure. But yes, I think you're right.

When people go after the Daily Wire as an entity in itself, It's kind of disingenuous for people to say, well, I hate the Daily Wire because Matt said this one thing that all the other guys publicly disagreed with. Or Ben said this one thing that all the other guys publicly disagreed with. You know, to me that seems kind of silly. I do think it's a little bit Fox News syndrome when you become the big player in the space, when you disrupt things, when you grow to be just a massive company that has a fair bit of influence, people start taking pot shots.

competitors start taking pot shots out of competition. And I don't even begrudge them that. You know, that's what happens. But I think some of that is egged on by people who wanted supplant the Daily Wire. Even if they don't disagree ideologically or something. I often wonder, too, again, I'm not really in the political space and I don't follow it, but I've heard people say the word

conservative ink. And maybe there's something they're trying to say there. I wonder if it's more just a matter of envy, that I'm not as big as you. So I'm probably not as good as you, but if I can pretend that I'm the pure one and you're the corrupted one by just labeling you conservative ink, then I win. Well, that's the ink part, tackling your argument. I mean, the ink part, you know, represents a big, established corporate, meaning involving lots of people, like, you know, corpus entity. And so it's funny that now, talk about feeling old.

I'm 35. I am now where Dante was when the Divine Comedy opens up, which is in the middle of his life's journey, very scary. And I thought, wow, I remember when we were attacking conservative ink, and now we're being attacked as conservative ink. And that, to me, is, it's kind of cheap because it's papering over the actual divisions that are ideological and philosophical or what have you. And so then I have to ask, okay, well, what's the disagreement over? Yeah. Is it over Trump? Trump is the big political figure of our era.

Well, from the beginning of the Daily Wire, half of us hated Trump and half of us loved Trump. I was on the pro-Trump side, but that was a debate from within the Daily Wire. Is it because the Daily Wire is neo-conservative? It's kind of hard to even quite pin down what that means because it's meant different things from Norman Puthoritz and Irving Crystal all the way to the present. But I don't think I would qualify as a neo-conservative. I don't think Matt would qualify that way. Again, you'd have to even define it.

Is it because the Daily Wire is a libertarian? People can accuse me of a lot of things. They could not call me a libertarian. Is it because it's too authoritarian? I don't, gosh, good luck calling Ben Shapiro an authoritarian or so, you know. So, you know, if people were making ideological claims, is because the Daily Wire is too Protestant

or too Jewish or too Muslim or too Catholic, the only thing we might be is too Catholic, you know, but that's not usually the argument. I think, okay, well, maybe it's just, we don't like that these guys are really big, But that's natural. I don't lose sleep over that because, you know, I guess that means you've had some success. And I'm very thankful.

I'm very grateful that we've had success. But I don't, when we try to drill down on the, what exactly are we talking about here? What's the, we don't like Trump now. We do like, what's the issue? Even, you know, what are the big, the Ukraine war, we have a diversity of opinions on the Ukraine war. The Israel war, we have a diversity of opinions on Israel. I don't... I think people would accuse or suspect that you aren't as free to express your opinions on Israel as other outlets might be because of Shapiro and what happened with you?

Yeah, no, that's what they said. I mean, the funny thing about that. Truthfully is a groundbreaking Catholic AI app built to help you know, live and defend the Catholic faith with clarity and confidence. Whether you're navigating a tough conversation, deepening your understanding, or looking for daily spiritual guidance, Truthly is your companion or your companion. on the journey. It's like if chat GPT went through OCIA, got baptized and made it its mission to proclaim the truth of the Catholic Church. But Truthly is more than just a Q&A tool, its formation in your pocket. Take audio courses on topics like the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Eucharist, purgatory, and why the Catholic Church is the one founded by Jesus Christ. Each course is designed

to be accessible, engaging, and deeply rooted in the teachings of the church. You'll also receive daily audio reflections, short, powerful meditations to help you grow in prayer and stay grounded in your spiritual life. Already downloaded by thousands of people worldwide, Truthly is transforming the way we learn, share and live our faith. One question, one course, and one prayer at a time. Start your seven-day free trial today. Download Truthly on the app store. Look, if people's argument as well, I would like Michael a lot. more. If he said the things I secretly know he wants to say, then I'm not going to dissuade them from listening to the show or if they're reading into my mind something, you know, but I just think

it's kind of funny. They have this idea that all the hosts are like watching each other's shows and we're getting, we, the hosts don't know what are going to be on the shows until the airtime, basically. We all write our own stuff. I don't, I have no input basically from anybody. I write every word of my own show. And I think, like on the Israel, I'm basically supportive of the nation state of Israel, in part because it's so fashionable now to oppose Israel that the contrarian enemy says, I don't know, I can't march with Greta Thunberg, sorry. Talk about a rule of thumb. If Greta Thunberg, Ivy League professors, the entire Democrat party are on one side of an issue, I'm probably not going to be all the way on that side

of the issue. But I've also criticized the state of Israel plenty of times. I've observed that the rational grand strategy for both the state of Israel and the Palestinian authorities, including Hamas, is the ethnic cleansing of the other. And when it comes to Hamas, it's the genocide of the state of Israel. So I mean, I've openly described these proposals and actions as an ethnic cleansing. I criticized the state of Israel

for hitting the only Catholic church in Gaza, which may have been accidental, but nevertheless, it raises one to say, well, what is the end of this war? I've openly said that I think the conduct of the war at this point is likely fallen into injustice. Rostout had made much the same point at the New York Times. Matt wants to defund every country in terms of foreign aid.

I disagree with that on imperial grounds, but that's another conversation. So then I think, well, what's really the issue? You know, is it just, you know, and part of it, as I say, I've been friends with Ben for a very, very long time. He's a wonderful guy, really. But I've disagreed with him on plenty of things going back over a decade. But one does have the impression that some people,

I'm not saying most, some people don't like that he's the kind of guy who wears a Yamika. I think there is that. Really? And I don't, you know, there are plenty of reasons to attack Ben, and I'd like him to come over to the true church. But I do, I think there's more than a whiff of that.

Okay, yeah. Do you disagree? Oh, I don't, I don't, I know it sounds like a cop out, but I don't know. I'm not sure how, I'm not sure what, not that I'm ever on Twitter,

but those sorts of platforms, I'm not sure what they say about what the average person believes. Of course. Well, a lot of things, and you do hear a lot of that stuff and you start to think, is this what everyone thinks?

And I'm not sure. No, there are, I mean, I know with a high degree of certainty from many sources who would know that there are a lot of bots and or, organized efforts to portray, you know, public opinion on Twitter, which naturally you would imagine there's an information war on any platform like that. And now with what we've seen with AI,

it's going to be really interesting to see how that changes everything. How frustrated, I'm so frustrated when I might see a YouTube video and I might click on it and I realize, oh, it's all AI. The script is AI, the voice is AI, the images are AI. So just maybe switch subjects a little bit. Like, where do you see the end game? Maybe not the end game. Let's just say the next 10 years, where things are going with AI.

And how that, I guess, and how that influences commentary, social media. What's going to happen? I talked to my wife about this. And she said, what's going to happen is, you know, you get an email now. And it suggests what your response should be based on it. And you click the button, and it responds that way. And then the other person receives that response. And it'll generate.

And basically, we're all just computers are just going to be talking to each other. And then you go on, say, chat, GBT. And now the key to composition is you have to figure out what to prompt the GPT to tell you to say. And so soon enough, we're just going to say, like, me like show, me do, me talk immigration, and then it'll write a show or something, and then I'll have AI, you know, animate my voice and then, okay, then it'll do it.

But pretty soon you won't even know what to ask. And this is scriptural, which is why we're not supposed to worship dumb idols. why aren't we supposed to worship dumb idols? Well, because there's a true God, but also because we will become dumb like the idols. And that is what happens. But this goes way back.

I mean, this goes back to Plato in like the Fedris. It's like, Socrates is relaying a story, a conversation of a king talking to the god of the arts who gives mankind written speech. And he says, this is very bad. This won't make written speech, books and things, won't make mankind smarter. The written words will make mankind much dumber.

It will destroy wisdom because you're going to have all of this information readily available to you, so you're not going to memorize anything. And you're not going to internalize it. By heart. Yes, I remember when I was in school, taking it kind of full circle back to when we were students, I was told, you know, you have more information available to you

than Socrates did. You're smarter than Aristotle. But you haven't digested it. And furthermore, you don't know how to digest it. You actually don't even know, you don't even know the questions to ask the GPT. You don't even know the things that you should be wondering about, that you would then ask the GPT to spit out to you. And that's pretty dangerous, you know, because because it plays to our pride,

and so it grows our pride and it makes us much, much dumber. Okay, final thing I want to talk to you about is your, I want to ask you, what would your ideal week look like? And then I want to ask you about your schedule because I get the sense that you're quite extroverted. Yeah, a little bit. I'm not at all. And I'm really impressed.

And I think you obviously put in a ton of work. Just the idea of getting up every day, doing a show every day exhausts me. You know, look, I do hear of it. I work. I do technically work all the time. I wake up early and I go to work and I stay long hours and I travel all over and I stay up late.

I don't sleep that much. That's all technically true. But, I don't have a real job. I don't, what is my job? I get to state my opinion. I get to debate people. I get to write.

I get to, I smoke cigars for a living. You know, but you, you're a smart fellow, and you do your homework, and you're articulate, and you give thought out. So, okay, so what does your week look like? When do you wake up? What's a typical day look like? So I'll wake up like, I don't know, 645 or something, stumble into the shower, have breakfast with the kids, have some espresso, So, sweet little Elisa, my wife makes beautiful, nice meal. And then go to work, be here until whenever.

You know, I try to be back loosely around dinner time, if that's possible. And then play with the kids, put them to bed, and then I'll work until 11 or midnight or something like that. Cricy. And then I'll... When do you stop drinking coffee? I do three cups a day, double shot in the morning, single shots, one at about 11, one at about two. and then occasional nicotine breaks. I do six shots in the morning.

Do you? Maybe I should start doing that because I'm looking a little haggard. And it, the other thing is, though, I travel a lot. I travel internationally. I travel all over the country. I give a lot of speeches,

do a lot of debates, do some stuff with the government, do some stuff with schools, do some stuff with think tanks, do some stuff. And that is what's exhausting. Traveling a lot does kind of wear you down. But it gets back to my

theory of politics, which is that it's all about people. It's all about people and being in real spaces with people and, you know, shaking hands and learning, seeing things for yourself, not just reading about it on social media platforms, which can be extremely dishonest and are just propaganda, you know, hubs. And so I think it's really important. And I, so I don't really cut back on the travel. Okay. So, but when do you spend time with Elisa? Yes. I saw her back in June. So I'm hoping maybe by September. Because I mean, my favorite part of my day. And I'm going on walks with my wife every day,

just be in with her hanging out, talk. I just love it. And I, you know, you're saying you're working all day. You see her in the morning and then you have dinner and then you work all night. So do you guys have a date night once a week? Yeah, we try. Look, I try to, we have breakfast and dinner together,

which is good. Occasionally, we'll watch a little show or something or all, before she goes to bed for like half an hour or something, I'll leave my office and we'll just kind of like hang out a little bit. I try to travel with her if I can, though it's hard with three kids. I have since made a point to start having a vacation again.

I didn't do a vacation really for a long time. Okay. Vacation, very, very important. Do you have a rest day? Do you have like Sunday? Do you spend? I try Sunday because it's a commandment. It's like a moral obligation. Now the way I've Jesuitically gotten out of it,

sometimes I have to write because I have a show on Monday. And it's a news show, so it, you know, news happens on Sunday and so sometimes I do a little bit of writing I've heard that if it's not physical labor you're you can sort of get out of it in a very sure this is something the Catholics and the Jews have very in common is figuring out ways around you know but I try to have that day to you know we go to wake up we go to our nice very lengthy liturgy and then have lunch and that's kind of a fuller day with the family I try to be very intentional about travel such

that I'll always take the red eye just about if it means I can wake up at home. I'll do the day in, day out. I really try to minimize that stuff. And it means I have to be even more intentional when I see my friends. Because it's not the family that gets totally squeezed in this. It's the friends that get.

I know they say it. It's about this age that you start. Yes. Friends get cut. Yes, because you just are saying. But men have to have friends. men have to have friends. There's this idea in our culture.

It's so perverse that women have friends. First of all, women don't really have friends. But that's maybe a conversation for another time. But maybe if a husband has a social event, it's because the wife gets it together with some. Bad idea, bad idea, I think. A man needs a friend. And some guys say, well, I married my best friend.

Sweet little Elise and I are, you know, like two halves of the same person. We're very, we have as much of a friendship as a man and woman could possibly have. But I don't like that phrase, I married my best friend. I have my best friend. I don't want to marry him. I have two feelings on that.

One, Aquinas says that marriage is the, what does he say, the greatest of all friendships? I don't like that phrase, my wife's my best friend. If by that you mean, my wife is the person I come to for my emotional means, and I dump all my stuff on her and have her make me feel better. Yeah. I don't think she needs that. No.

Yeah, I got a friend, I got a fella who I can do that to. I would like, I'm not saying I succeeded this, but I would like to be the kind of man who comes home and offers my strength to my wife, which isn't to say that I don't share intimately with her about what's going on. I just don't want to be a drain on her. Yes, and like, you know, good old Aristotle,

points out there are different kinds of friendships. And another symptom of modernity is we have friendships that are going to help us do business. You know, like I hate this. Look, I do have a bunch of side businesses, obviously, and I work a lot, but like this notion, We've got to be on my grind. I'm on my hustle all the time or something.

I think, no, no, no, I also need leisure because this is for leisure, because leisure is like what education is all for, right? And I need to think about things that are not merely commercial. And so I don't want my friendships to be transactional. I work in politics and media. That's an occupational hazard. And I really make a point not to have transactional friendships. Because it's ugly, it's nasty, it does, it's a Faustian bargain.

You don't even really get stuff in the end of it. There's the friendship of pleasure. There's something to that. There's a transactional friendship. But what's the highest friendship? Virtue. Yes, friendship of the good. And that, you know, I find, even when I'm really tired, I have to carve out.

Maybe not every week now, but I don't know, every few weeks at least. I'm going to go see the guys and we're going to have a cigar night. And we're not like sitting back watching the game. we are we're having very rich conversation always over cigars maybe over a steak and a drink but i find when i have that and i stay stay six hours i spend a nice good long time and i barely sleep that night and i feel more refreshed the next day and i you just have to have it's like it's like someone who doesn't read you i'm not i don't have a lot of time for reading either and it's part of my job but if i don't read i feel my mind just shriveling up

you know, and when you spend those two hours at night that you could be sleeping, reading, you'll wake up more refreshed. And I just think that this is another, this is another thing. The Zoomers give me a lot of hope because they're kind of rediscovering that. They're rediscovering the men and women are different.

They're rediscovering that God, in fact, exists. They're rediscovering that religion is not primarily about you. It's about God. And he wants to be worshipped in a certain way and there's certain things that are true of him. And so they're recognizing all, and they're recognizing, you know, we actually... There's such a thing as the good life.

And it doesn't involve scrolling TikTok on the toilet. Yeah. And look, I'm, I scroll as much as anybody. But I think, I end scrolling and I'm tired. And you catch yourself. Oh, I don't want to become this person. So what if I'm, it's like, I'm so far down on memes at this point. I, I'm like so, I don't need, I couldn't convey this to another human being.

I just, it would be incommunicable, you know. And, and you put that down and you just read like five pages of a book. Yeah. You say, or, you know, when it's an author like a Chesterton or a Lewis or a John Henry Newman or like some of these particular guys, when you really, you can put the book down at the end of the night, you say, wow, I just had a marvelous evening. Yeah. With Chesterton. Yeah. Oh, I just, wow. Hanging out with Jack Newman tonight, that really, I hadn't caught up with Jack in a while. Wow. That, oh, okay, that gives me. And by the way, that will help you in your professional life and that will help you in all of the public sort of things you do. But it also just really nourishes your soul. Final question. What is the name of this documentary? Where can people find it and why should they want to?

Most important. Most important thing because I was saying nice things about Ben. It kills me. Nice things about Matt. But over the years, Matt and Ben have put out projects. Matt in particular. Right. It's two little movies.

I don't know if you heard, What is a woman? And they bring in a lot of people to subscribe to the platform. Because you watch it on the platform. The Pope and the Fuhrer is available only on the platform. And then here I am. I don't bring in people to these big tent pole things. I, one, want to rub it in their faces

that people have come over to subscribe to Daily Wire Plus for the Pope and the Furer. But two, here, another Ben example. Ben wrote like a thousand books, and then I did a blank book called Reasons to Vote for Democrats, and I sold more copies, you know, than like all of those books. And I love that, and I continue to rub it in his face today.

And I would love the idea that after all the big projects they've done, a four-part docu-series on the venerable Pope Pius the 12th just like blows them out of the water on Daily Wire subscriptions. I really love that idea. And this is the sort of thing where it's important to put our money and our eyeballs where our mouths are, you know? And if you're, we're kind of going out on a limb

doing a docu-series on Pope Pius the 12th. This is obviously something near and dear to my heart. But it's signs of the times that encourage other people. One, it's a great story. It'll help you to fight back against the anti-Catholic bigots who spread a bunch of nonsense and calumny because they're enemies of the church. But two, if Pope Pius X.12th is the next big hit on new media,

you're going to get more of that stuff. And not just for much, you're going to get it from everywhere. And I love that idea. The big pop figures of 2025, Sidney Sweeney and Pope Pius the 12th. Sign me up. Very good. Great jeans and great Saternos, I don't know.

Well, thanks for putting it together. And as I say, thanks on behalf of all of us homeschoolers, because now we've got something quite beautiful to be able to educate our kids with. Well, thank you, sir, and thank you for your delicious cigar. You're welcome. Which I wouldn't ever tell anyone where to get it. No.

You said the lounge is Chestertons. It is Chestertons. If we ever had a website, I think we do have a website. You do? We'd name it after the... We'd definitely name it after the lounge of the lounge. you wouldn't name it after some other lounge and cigars that it's a pints with aquinas cigar right interesting