The Catechism in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - BONUS: Why Scripture and Tradition? (with Jeff Cavins)

Episode Date: November 8, 2022

In this bonus episode of The Catechism in a Year, Jeff Cavins joins Fr. Mike to share the connection between Scripture and Tradition, and provide the background on the origin, development, and structure of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/ciy or text "CIY" to 33-777.

I'm your name's Father Mike Schmitz and you're listening to the Catechism in a year podcast. So between now and January 1st, we'll be releasing special bonus like pre-launch episodes that will help us get ready for this journey of the Catechism next year. Today is our kind of our first major, I think I've got for a significant pre-launch episode that we have, and with me is Jeff Kavins, who is gonna be our special guest, that introduces not only kind of the whole catacasem, and the foundation of the faith approach,

but also this first pillar of the catacasem later on, when we officially begin our journey. So, you know, as you probably know, the catacasem has four pillars, and so each one of those pillars gives me a special conversation with someone special, helping us to understand, like, scripture and tradition tradition and how those are inextricably connected, you know, that connection between Scripture and tradition. And again, without anything further,

I'm just so excited to have him on the beginning of this new podcast. Jeff, welcome. Hey, it's good to be with your father. Here we go again. It's fun. No, back again. How good is this? So, you know, as we're starting, we thought, you know, the best thing to start this new podcast is with the two original people from the previous podcast and to be able to have just your words. I mean, I know that you and I had had filmed all those introductions through the different time periods. Every time we had a new time period for the Bible in year, but you also were guiding so many people on almost a daily, if not weekly basis, and

just like your daily contact, points of contact with the people who are the Bible and a year listeners, I think translates into you being essential for this beginning of the Catechism in year. Well, I appreciate that. Yeah, we had a great relationship and continue on with that relationship with hungry people out in the world who got a hold of the word of God and they're making that a regular discipline in their life now and we're hearing wonderful things about the Bible in a year. And the next step is the catechism in a year, something that people probably never thought they would go through or never heard of. Yeah, yeah.

I think something really powerful and beautiful for me at least personally is this second year of the Bible in a year. I've been listening myself and it's been just really helpful for me to just be able to take in. You know, it's one thing to read out loud scripture. That's powerful. That's remarkable. But there's also something about taking it in and just allowing it to form my heart and form my mind

by just receiving Scripture. But as you said, the next step seems to be that here's the Catechism because the New Testament and the letters of Paul and the Acts of the Apostles is here's the age of the church. And so I guess I would have maybe a kind of ask you, how connected would you say this Catechism in here is is or how important is it to have the catacombs in the year after the Bible in year?

Well, I think it's incredibly important. Not only is it incredibly important for the lives of the faithful and growing in the faith, but even the way that we're presenting it mirrors the logic of the church. And that is that there's a primacy to Scripture, and it's God's Word, it's inspired, it's inherent. And over the last year, for many people, they have been going through the entire story in chronological order as a complete story. So God's plan of sheer goodness is out there. And then now comes the catechism, which really completes this fullness of God's revelation, the word of God.

And as Catholics and the catechism actually says, we're not people of the book, we're people of the word. And specifically the word, the living word, Jesus Christ. And so one of the first things that we learn in the Catechism is that the revelation of God, divine revelation, comes to us in sacred scripture and sacred tradition. And the question always comes up, well, I get the sacred

scripture, but Jeff, is there something I could read about this sacred tradition, you know, a tradition with a big tea, not a small tea like we open presents on Christmas Eve, that's our tradition, you know, a tradition with a big tea, not a small tea like we open presents on Christmas Eve, that's our tradition, you know, but the big tradition, Jesus is God, Mary is the mother of God. And the answer is, yep, it's called the catechism, you know. Right. And so the two compliment each other really, really well. And then you add in the magisterium, which is the Holy Father and union with the bishops. And you got a tripod.

And on a tripod, you can sit, you can rest. You can depend on that. It's not a one-legged stool, it's a three-legged stool. And so we're completing that sense of revelation for people with real certitude. It gives them a foundation to live on. And I'm really, really excited about bringing them together. Well, I think, you know, even you're saying that

the reality that we have, the deposit of faith, you know, divine revelation is sacred scripture, sacred tradition, and the Magisterium that for some people that might be kind of a big surprise just to hear us talk about it like that and recognize that, oh, so divine revelation. Yes, of course it's sacred scripture and sacred tradition and the Magisterium.

If someone's hearing that for the first time and they went through the Bible in a year and they would say, wait a second, I'm comfortable with the sacred scripture being divine revelation. What would be even though it's just a minute or maybe a apologetic or explanation of why we need those three legs of that stool

to be able to sit upon? Sure. Well, you know, when we look at the New Testament and we read it, we realized that nobody was really told to write even though people wrote and that was the word of God, it's the inspired word of God. But Paul even says that to follow the traditions that was the word of God. It's the inspired word of God. But Paul even says that

to follow the traditions that he has handed on to you. And so from the very early points of the church, there has been this sense of the faith, the definite article, the faith, as you said, the deposit of faith. And those are really, really important because not only do we have now the story, the basic story of salvation history, but we want to turn our attention to, well, how do we live in this story? What does the church really look like? What are the people in the church do and what's permitted? What's not permitted?

What's holy? What's not holy? How do we actually worship God? And everything that happened in that early church, if they did not pass it on to the next generation, then it would be gone. It would be anybody's guess, a hundred years from then, what do we do now? I don't know, what should we do? We got iPhones now, what should we do?

And so the beautiful thing about the tradition is that apostolic tradition, which is in the first pillar, talks to us about how this depositor faith is passed on to modern man and even to all of our friends watching right now, from Jesus to you, and that is this sacred tradition. And so the Catechism becomes a literally a gold mine of the minds and the hearts of all of these saints in the past.

And to know that, man, I can hear this deposit of faith as all the generations before me heard it. That is golden. Yeah, that makes so much sense of the way you're describing it like that. There's that sense of like you've mentioned, we had the story. We have the story, right? We have the story in sacred scripture And almost it's like this kind of sense of

So who did we just hear about like what did God what had he revealed about himself? And what had he revealed about the relationship he wants with us and what had he had revealed about how we're called to live with each other Like all of those things are it would it be proper to to say kind of the synthesized and communicated to us through sacred tradition, among other things. Yeah, I think so. And the two work with each other. Right. Scripture works with the tradition, sacred tradition, sacred tradition is mixed in with the word of God and the story. I guess the best way I could say it is in Japan, in all places, they make these knives. And these knives are called Damascus steel lives,

interestingly enough, Damascus steel, live knives. And what they do is they take many kinds of different steels, like a couple of them. They mix them together, they press them, they twist them, they press them, they bend them over, they press them, and they come out with they bend them over, they press them,

and they come out with this amazing kitchen knife. But it's actually one knife, but it's made out of two steels that have been brought together in such a way that you really can't separate them. And I think that's the Bible. That's the sacred tradition that we read about in the Catechism. That's awesome. And it's stronger than it would be on its own. Exactly.

Yeah. And even kind of in some ways, you mentioned practical. Like, this is how we live. All the ways that Christians had lived from the very beginning, how they worshipped from their beginning, that would be lost because it's not all detailed in sacred scripture. And so. So, if I could ask, what do you think people can expect? Like if they were, if they were, okay, I press play

on this first pre-launch episode, I'm waiting for January 1st. What can they expect from this journey? Like what would you say is the purpose of doing this next year on the Catechism in the year? Well, I would say first of all, that the way you approach the Catechism, you have to look at that.

You have to do a little bit of bit of a pre-flight check here. Before you get into the catacism, you have to ask yourself, well, what is the catacism? And how do I approach it? Because I think a lot of people will look at that big book, whether they have the beautiful new ascension catacism or the green one or the brown one from the past. They'll look at it and they'll say to themselves, well, man, that looks like an encyclopedia. Now I have a source that I can just look up topics

and read a little bit about, you know, transubstantiation or theotocos, marries the mother of God and I can look these up and that's gonna be a really good help on my desk. That's not the way we approach the Catechism. The way we approach the Catechism is not like an encyclopedia, but it's an invitation to a journey

into intimacy with God. And it's carefully laid out that way. In fact, Pope Benedict, before he was Pope, Cardinal Ratsinger, he spoke about this and how just the way it's even organized is a teaching tool in itself and that God has this amazing story in the first pillar, the Creed. And then in the second pillar, the sacraments and liturgy, which Bishop Cousins is going

to be helping you with, that is really this invite to get into it. And then the third pillar is the life of Jesus, the moral law. It's your script, if you will, and how to live it, or what we'd say, you know, how to live the faith and then prayer in the fourth one. So it's more than a encyclopedia or a dictionary. It is a roadmap to intimacy with God. And that's the way you have to approach this, is that you're going to meet someone, and you're going to meet all of his family, and you're going to go, you're going to have dinner with them and you're going to hear what he wants you to do and how you're empowered. And so it's like taking the story of the Bible and then it's almost like 2.0. It's like, whoa, this is really coming into full focus now

and it's very, very exciting. Yeah, I mean, one of the things you had mentioned there is our approach, like how we see this next step of pressing play, this next step, which January 1st and just kind of listening, is gonna really dictate a lot. And I like how you mentioned that this is gonna be, it's very different. You know, one of the things I've discovered,

it's not like I discovered it, I learned for myself is when going through the Bible, there's the story. And I know that you've been so critically, I honestly just helpful, helpful, is too small. You've been so critical in helping us understand, here's the story. And so, you know, you press play on any given day and you might miss some details, you might miss whatever the nuance is, but you know you're part of the story. And the catacasme is slightly different in that sense that there's not a narrative. But there is a person.

And I think that that might be some difference here is that, okay, so I'm not going to be invited into a narrative. I'm not necessarily invited into just listen to someone else's story. But there is, I love that use the term invitation rather than a psycholopedia, that that that sense of its invitation to, here's who God is. Here's what faith is and here's the relationship he wants to have with you. And also here's how he want, he's calling us to live. And so maybe that invitation yet to to living the story of invitation to being a part of the story in these four pillars. Right. Just like scripture, you can read scripture from the, like a stadium, you can read scripture from the stands and have your popcorn and something to drink. You know, you can follow

along or you can be on the field and you can be a part of this amazing plan of sheer goodness. And the same with the catechism, you can set up in the stands and kind of observe and so forth. And there will be people that do that because they're curious and they haven't made a commitment yet, but it's a good thing that they're in the stands and they're watching and listening. But there will be a lot of people who say, you know what, I want to get in this. They want to get on the field and they want to go on this journey. And as they go on the journey, they will understand more and more about the full deposit of faith. And dare I say, there's going to be probably a hundred times over the next year where they get just downright giddy over. Yeah. This is, this is so cool. And I would

have never, never understood all of this had I just Red books and things you know this is a tool and it's an invitation as as we were as we were talking about and It's going to be so exciting because God thirsts that you would thirst for him and as you take that step January 1st hit play, you know And you you start to engage yourself. God is saying, this is what I wanted. This is really what I wanted for you. I wanted you to be in this because I've got so much to show you. You've already gone through the plan, you know, of sheer goodness in terms of the Bible, but now I'm going to bring you into another chamber and disclose myself in a beautiful way to you so that you not only will be closer to me, but you'll be like me, but you'll be more equipped to

to go out and do the work that I'm doing. Yeah, one of the things that I keep coming back to is how you know, whenever I teach RCIA or people coming in, could be coming Catholic, or they're getting baptized, is those classes is, we're gonna go over a lot of information, like we're gonna go over a lot of data, but the point isn't just, it's not to stop at the information, it's transformation, I like the, the point isn't to stop it, I know a lot of new things,

it's, God's inviting us to become a new kind of thing, a new kind of being, a new kind of creature within a new relationship, and I think, you know, as we know, we can't love what we don't know. And so one of the things that Catechism is such a gift is that, well, the Bible, of course, is God revealing Himself here in Scripture in that, in, of course, that story. But here in the Catechism also is through the church. Here is this revelation of who, here's who God is. Here's how He's calling us to follow him in a complicated world.

And that's, you know, this catacasem, it's not small. I mean, it's a good chunk of change, because this world is pretty complicated. So here's a kind of a question is, and I don't know, I don't know if you want to get two in the weeds on this one, but so this is the most recent published edition of the catacasem. What's the history of this coming to us as it is now? Sure. Well, it was back, I believe in the late 80s, and that John Paul II, he had this idea that the people of God need to go deeper in knowing God and started to put together the plans for developing that first modern

catacasem that we have. And when he put it together, a lot of people were thinking, well, you know, this could be for the bishops and the priests, deacons too, in religious. And he made it very clear, this is for everybody. It is absolutely for everybody. I think it became one of the greatest gifts in modern history to give this to us. If you look at the background on it a little bit, there's a backstory to this. That is that this cardinal, Carol Whiteia from Poland, when he was a cardinal there, he came up with this idea about this new evangelization, you know, and he didn't launch it at that point. He waited till he was the Pope, which he didn't know he was going to be, but he became the Pope.

And now this is the time that we're going to launch this. But while he was in working in Vatican II, he was responsible for working with a document called Gaudium It's Pes. And Gaudium It's Pes is the church in the modern world, the first of its kind. And he had a vision for the church and teaching the church and how the church will live and how the church will survive in the modern world, how the church will permeate society. And he wrote that wonderful, I worked on that with that wonderful document. And then now he finds himself as Pope

and he gives us this incredible gift of really a synopsis of the faith that is written in a way that it's accessible to everybody, not just PhDs and theology and moral theology, but for me, you know, I'm not brilliant, but I can read it and I can understand it. And so my wife and I talk about, you know, we're stranded on an island. What two books would you bring? Well, Bible and the cat kiss. Yeah, those are the two. And it's a continuation, you know, you know, how

you had developed the Gritive Intervival timeline and we had the handout for the Bible timeline and it was so helpful to be able to see, okay, here's where people have earned the North, here's where they're in the South, here's what was happening in the world at the time outside of that revelation. On the back of this, this kind of fold out, there is the Catechism. And it talks about the different professions of faith, the ecumenical councils, the church documents, the people documents, our pentifical documents. And it's just kind of, we realize that this isn't the first time

the church has given us, here's a summary, or here is some kind of way in which you can kind of hold in your hands in some ways what we believe. And so there's all these different church councils that we've experienced throughout the course of history in this fold out. And it's just this whole category is the result of thousands of years of people praying and reflecting and understanding the Lord. The fold out you're referring to for all of our wonderful friends is going to be one of the

greatest gifts that ascension worked very, very hard on this fold out. And it's very similar. Same size as the the great adventure Bible timeline, which you know, you pull that open. Wow, there's the whole story. That is amazing. In the same way, what you're saying Father is there is a kind of timeline chart for the Catechism in a year and it goes through the entire history of the church and the key on the left hand side is what we believe how we worship, how we live, how we pray, which we can talk about in a moment and it goes all the way from Jesus to today so that you can see the entire history of theology, but the whole history of God's family growing and evolving and becoming what it is today. And then on the other side, you have color coded. I was kidding you before father. I thought it looks like the

baby brother of the Bible. I was timeline. And the baby brother here. And it goes through all four pillars in a glance. And I've already showed this to people. And they're like, they look at it. You know what's beautiful about it? Is all I got to do is open it like that, you know what they say? They don't say to me, what is this? How do I do it? They look at and go, oh wow. Oh wow, there it is, you know. And so that's what I like about it.

You know, early church a lot of times people couldn't read so they had these frescoes and pictures on the walls and people walked in and went, all right, I got this story. I think this same thing is going to happen here. And that's, I love the, you know, the whole over at the course of these four sections. There's this line from Catechism 1721 that says, we are made to know, love, and serve God in this world and to be happy with them forever in heaven. But it's over those four parts of the Catechism. And so, Jeff, if you don't mind, people, some people might know, yeah, of course, I know the four pillars of the Catechism. And so, Jeff, if you don't mind, some people might know, yeah, of course, I know the four pillars of the catacasem.

You mentioned them already, because there's the foundations of faith approach that again, ascension has developed to be able to communicate what is at the heart of these four different pillars that, yeah, maybe someone might have heard, like, oh, yeah, pillars, the catacasem, I get it. But what are they, and how do we go through them?

Yeah, I'll just grab this right here and kind of go through that with you. You mentioned that the catechism is divided up into four pillars. And taking something that we were bringing over from the Bible timeline in the Bible in a year, is that when people approach the Scripture, it looks like just a big pile of names and places and valleys and mountains and sacrifices and You know law and it's like a big pile and as Frank Sheet said great Polly just from England and he said that's one of the problems we have is that it's just a big pile

And we dealt with that in scripture and you went through the Bible in a year and in the same in the order Same thing with the Catechism and everything that we believe. You're 13 years old, you walk into the church, there's an altar, there's a nun, there's candles, there, whoa, there's the priest. And what's he doing up there? And bells are ringing and you know, and everything else. What do we do with all this? Yeah.

Well, the Catechism takes all of that. And this is going to be a great tool, mom and dad, great tool for your kids. Trust me. Is it a breaks it down into those four pillars? And so the first one, which is this beautiful kind of a marine blue, it's what we believe. It's the creed. It's the largest section. We're going to be going through that in just days, you know, from now. And it's what we believe. It's the creed. It's the story and miniature.

And we'll get into that more when you and I get together and really kind of, you know, introduce that. But it's what we believe. And then you move on to the second pillar. And it's how we worship. It's when we get into God's amazing plan of sheer goodness, how we worship. That's the second pillar. That's a beautiful burgundy color. And then green, how we live. You see the progression there? It's what we believe, how we worship, how we live, and that is the life of Christ. And then the

fourth one is how we pray. That's the kind of a beautiful light purple, how we pray. So those are the four pillars. And the foundation for living is, it's worded in such a way as to where it's very practical, you know, it's very doable. And even the titles here are like a beautiful invitation to every one of, of, hey, this is what we believe. Hey, this is how we worship God and this is how we live. And this is how prayer is brought into it. And when you take those four pillars, then that becomes a real foundation for you to live your life.

And, you know, you've been a priest for a long time now. Yeah, almost 20 years. I know. And you know how many people have come up to you saying, is there anything for our children? Is there anything for our children? This is going to be a beautiful tool in the hands of parents, as well as anybody, to talk to their kids about,

you know, mom, why do they do that in mass? What is that? What's that all about? Glad you asked. Let's talk about that, but let's talk about it in the context of the whole faith. Yeah. Well, you know, even you're saying that in the context

of the whole faith, going back to the pillars, sometimes you mentioned the Asaglapedia. So sometimes it's just the reference book. Mom and dad, why do we do that? And then, or maybe even a the reference book. Mom and dad, why do we do that? And then, or maybe even a person in individual even has that question, why do we do this? And so I can go to the Catechism. And yes, of course, I can flip open to, you know,

go back to the table of contents. And I go to that paragraph. But then the way in which the Catechism was even given to us originally is in the margins. You know, there's these small numbers in the margins, and those are meant to, well, they're not just meant to, they are references to other parts of the catacas and other parts of the faith that deals with this particular topic that's being dealt with in each individual paragraph. And it highlights the fact that it's not just a reference book. Here's

one answer. It's a unity, right? It's comprehensive. It's got this synthesis and harmony to it that is remarkable. And that's one of the reasons I love the Ascension Edition has, again, not a commercial, but this ascension just having the colored code is that those numbers in the margins are also colored coded. So, right now, I'm in the the Creed and I can stick in the Creed and I realize, oh, this reference here, this is from the prayer section and I can go over to prayer and say,

that's how the, that's how this is maybe lived out in my prayer life or this is how it's lived out in the moral life or in the sacramental life. And so, it's just that highlights the fact that, while there are four pillars, they're not distinct in the sense of just a reference book. But it is now has a, again, a synthesis, a harmony, a unity to it that is communicated to us so beautifully here. You know, over the, or the last 15 years or so, I was the director of the Catechetical Institute at the St. Paul Seminary. And during that time, we had so many people go through the entire catacism. And at the beginning of the course, we'd always have to explain the parts, you know, of the catacism, the apparatuses, we call it, so that they could navigate more easily and

see all of the treasures in there. And this new ascension catacism has done an incredible job with it. You mentioned color coding, and you can see there, the color, every pillar has that color of the chart. And then in the back, it's kind of a gold color, all the different helps to have indexes and the glossary and all the church fathers and so forth. And so just looking at it as a elect the Bible timeline in the Bible, you can look at any period real quickly. It's the same here. You can look at any pillar real quickly. And one of the additions that I thought, I know it's not a commercial,

but I got it a little bit. And that is, they've got a ribbon for every period. I know whenever I show people this, they're like, oh, the ribbons. Exactly. Exactly. That's what I did. I was teaching seminary class the other day

and I showed them and they said are there ribbons? And I said, for, they're like, ch-ching. They love that. Jeff, I know that we, you know, we're coming to the end of our time, but a quick, you just mentioned that for years you've been teaching the catechism to ordinary people, not just to seminarians, and not just to, you know, ordainedarians, and not just to ordained people, not just for people working in the church, but also for anyone who just wants to know more. And so I'm guessing you probably have some practical tips,

maybe some practical advice for people who are like, okay, I think I'm gonna do this. What would you say? What are the practical advice? Maybe also what are some of the stumbling blocks people might need to be aware of before they start? No, those are all good questions. They're vital. I think what I would say before you press the button, January 1st, and you go on this incredible journey of intimacy with God, you

have to, number one, realize that this is a learning process. Don't be hard on yourself. You know, if you don't understand a word that Father. If you don't understand a word that father says or you don't understand a concept, that's okay. This is a learning process. And we're going to work through that. And so go into it with a hungry heart. Go into it as a son, as a daughter of God. And your heart is set up to learn. And so as you're going through it, think of a journey, think of a journey. And when you do run into a word or a concept, it's kind of, wow, I don't know what that is, write it down, just write it down and you know, then you have a place to come back and learn a little more about it. That's really, really

important. I would also encourage you to get your own copy of a catechism. And the reason for that is that, as you know, father, both you and I are big markers. We mark our Bibles and we mark our books. I encourage our students at the seminary, and we've had over 6,500 graduates who went two years, you know, through the catacism is to begin to mark your catacism if you would like. And I use colored pencils. You can use other kinds of markers, but you can come up with your own submarking system, if you will, of paragraphs that are, wow, that's really comfort.

Maybe it's blue. Green, I need to grow in this. This is really good. Or yellow, parenting. You can come up with anything that you want. But be free to highlight, to write in it, and because it is a journey. But most of all, I would say, don't be discouraged when you run into words and things

that are kind of out there. It's a learning process. You're not going to get it all in one, just like the Bible timeline. You didn't get it all in one, one go through, but you're in the story. You know, it's like our family, when we were kids, we went to Black Hills in South Dakota for a vacation a couple of times. And I have some memories of it, but just a couple of years ago, our family went back there all grown up now. And I saw things that I saw when I was 10, but I

don't remember. And now, wow, you know, now I get it, you know, and that's the way it is with the Catechism too. Think journey, not in cyclopidia, think invitation, not I have to, and think of inheritance, not just knowledge. And I think those three things are really important as you go into it. In addition, I would just say that ascension is doing something else too, and that is I'll be starting a national show on YouTube for Bible in a year where we're going to be talking to some of the best scholars in the world about the concepts of Bible in a year and Catechism in a year. So if there are concepts that it's hard for you to understand, well, Father, you're going to be giving those to us. You know, and we'll say, okay, let's go deeper on that. Let's unwrap that a little bit more. So we got your back and we're going to go through it. But that's just some advice that I would give. That's awesome.

I really appreciate not only the, even that word, you've mentioned invitation before, but inheritance, I just love that sense of, you don't have to unpack it all at once. That sense of like not being hard on yourself, but just like just receive this. And that thinks sometimes that's one of the reasons why I do audio stuff, why I take in information, you know, audio books, podcasts, this kind of thing. And one of the reasons why I love the idea of the Bible in the year, Catechism in the

Year, is because I sometimes get hung up on, as I'm reading with my eyeballs, I'm reading, and I think I don't get that yet, so I have to stop. As opposed to this, nope, just keep moving, let it keep washing over you, and it's gonna permeate. It's like that rain. It's going to make its way through all the layers of Earth. It's gonna go, but you just have to be patient with yourself.

I love that piece of advice. And also, I love the fact that you guys are gonna be having that show that takes a deeper dive. Because, you know, some days when we're recording the catacasum, there's four paragraphs. And so it's just, here's these four more or less bullet points, there's four kind of things to hinge on. And yet, other days, there's more than that. And every day, it's like, oh shoot,

I can't get all the way diving deep into this. So the fact that you and other experts are gonna be doing that. I just think it's just, the word robust comes to mind. It's gonna be a very robust year to be able to just kind of just walk through and look forward to lead us. Yeah.

If I could say one more thing, first, if people are wondering, well, would non-Catholics be interested in this? Yeah. And to that, I would say, yeah, well, you said, yes. No, I mean, like, yeah, good question. Yeah. They would answer your question. And you know why?

Because I was. When I was a Protestant pastor in Dayton, Ohio, I was starting to be drawn to the early church fathers. I snuck into a Catholic bookstore called Saint Marks for all my people in Ohio and incognito sunglasses and a hat. And I went in there and there was this great big pile of this green book, as yellow book I think it was back then. And I looked at it and I thought, what's this? And I opened it up to paragraph 133, listen to what it said, the church forcefully and specifically

exhorts all the Christian faithful to learn the surpassing knowledge of Jesus Christ by frequent reading of the divine scriptures. Ignorance of the scriptures is ignorance of Christ. And I'm like, what? What is this? Is a Catholic? And I went up and I bought it. And I went home.

And that catechism was the fuel literally for my preaching for the next six months or so. And it was, you know, it was amazing. But what I would recommend, and something you and I both worked on, and if people are interested in, is that you and I did put together a insight journal, simply a simple journal for writing down the gold, the insights in your life. And as you're going through the catacism in a year, if there are insights that you receive, that the father people gain from what you're saying, write it down, keep it. Because those are important. You don't want to lose them. And maybe you can pass it on to the next generation once you're done. So I thought I would throw that in and people can get that at a sentient press. It's just a place

where you can put some gold for the future. Start up your gold. That's it. That passing it on to other people. That insight journal is so, so helpful. Jeff, this has been incredibly helpful as well for me. Even just talking with you right now gets me more and more excited to keep going with the catacombs. And so, yeah, thank you for your time. Oh, my pleasure. For those listening, if you want to get your reading plan, you can download the reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash C-I-Y.

That's for catacombs. Just go to ascensionpress.com slash C-I-Y. Or if you like texting, you can text the letters C-I-Y to the number of 3, 3, 7, 7, 7, 7. So again, go to ascensionpress. the letters C-I-Y to the number 333-777. So again, go to ascensionpress.com slash C-I-Y or text the letters C-I-Y to 333-777. And also, you can already subscribe. You can already follow whatever podcast, even though day one hasn't yet dropped. As of today, you can already start following and subscribing so that when it does drop on January 1st, you are ready to go.

I think we just be able to close in prayer right now, Jeff, but that's okay with you. Let's do it. Father in heaven will give you praise. We thank you for this time. Thank you for everyone who's been able to join us today and listen to this prelong episode. This first one is we just kind of just begin to open our hearts, open our minds so that you can fill our hearts with your love with the truth of who you are.

It's a touch our minds and transform them so that we can live as your sons and daughters, live as the people you have called us and redeemed us and created us to be. May God be glorified, as we pray, our glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end, amen. Name of the Father, and Son, the Holy Spirit, amen. So again, once again, on behalf of Jeff Kivins, my name is Father Mike. I am praying for you. Please pray for me. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless. you