The Daily Signal - INTERVIEW | Rev. Giacomo Capoverdi Rebukes School for Pornographic Books

Episode Date: October 24, 2022

When the public high school in Westerly, Rhode Island, made available to students two books with pornographic content, the Rev. Giacomo Capoverdi sprang into action with more than a dozen other clergy. The books—“Gender Queer” and “Fun Home”—are not appropriate for high school students, according to a letter 14 clergy wrote to The Westerly Sun. Despite facing a backlash from school officials and the LGBT movement, Capoverdi isn’t backing down. He joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to explain why he’s using his leadership position as a Catholic priest at Immaculate Conception Church in Westerly to speak out and take action. The full transcript is available at DailySignal.com. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This is the Daily Signal podcast for Monday, October 24th. I'm Ferdin Allen. And I'm Rob Blewey. On today's show, I speak with Father Giacomo Capaverdi of Immaculate Conception Church in Westerly, Rhode Island. When the public high school in Westerly made available to students two books with pornographic content, he sprung into action with more than a dozen other clergy. The books, genderqueer and fun home, are not appropriate for high school students.

Despite facing a backlash from some people at the school and LGBT movement, Father Kappaverdi isn't backing down. He joins the Daily Signal podcast today to explain why he's using his leadership position as a pastor to take action. Also on today's show, we read your letters to the editor and share a good news story about a simple way you can impact the life of a child in foster care today. Now stay tuned for today's show after this. As conservatives, sometimes it feels like we're constantly on defense against bad ideas. bad philosophy, revisionist history, junk science, and divisive politics. But here's something I've come to understand.

When faced with bad ideas, it's not enough to just defend. If we want to save this country, then it's time to go on offense. Conservative principles are ideas that work, individual responsibility, strong local communities, and belief in the American dream. As a former college professor and current president of the Heritage Foundation, my life's mission is to learn, educate, and take action. My podcast, The Kevin Roberts Show, is my opportunity to share that journey with you. I'll be diving into the critical issues that plague our nation, having deep conversations with high-profile guests, some of whom may surprise you.

And I want to ensure freedom for the next generation. Find the Kevin Roberts Show wherever you get your podcast. We are joined on the Daily Signal podcast today by Father Giacomo Kappaverdi, pastor of Immaculate Conception Church in Westerly, Rhode Island, in the Catholic Diogen. of Providence. Father, thanks so much for your leadership there in the Ocean State. It is great to have you on our show today. Thank you very much. It's really awesome to be here with you. Well, let's begin with the recent concerns that you've raised about two books with pornographic images and descriptions that can be found, surprisingly, in the Westerly High School Library.

You let a letter of 14 clergy who spoke out against the availability of the books. One of them is known as genderqueer. The other one is called Fun Home, which are available for students. What prompted you to speak out? Well, what prompted me to speak out was the desire and the fortitude of a gentleman in my town, Bob Chiardeo. And Bob is not my parishioner. He's a parishioner of a church that's closer to the beach from here because we're on the shore in westerly of Rhode Island. And I'm closer to the downtown. And he lives closer to the beach.

So he's in another parish, but someone known to me in town, and I was very impressed with his courage and his fortitude in wanting to expose these books to the school committee and read them out loud at school committee meetings, open forums where taxpayers can speak to the school committee in a certain amount of time they have. And he used his time to open up these books and to expose their content. and we were all shocked at the pornographic descriptions in the content of these books. And you would think it would be a no-brainer for the school committee to realize this and say, wow, you know, I didn't realize that these books are in there and want to eliminate them from the library and the ability, you know, the ability that kids have to check them out from there. So they weren't, though. They were very much insupportive of these books, but they didn't like Bob reading these books out loud in front of them. And the chairman of the school committee was banging on the gavel and telling Bob,

you're out of order. You can't read these books in, you know, in front of us. And Bob is saying, why can I? They're in the library. Our kids can read them in the library of the high school. And you're telling me it's inappropriate reading for me to read out loud in front of you. If I got a history book or a science book, could I read the content in front of you? And would there be a problem?

Why don't you want to hear out loud what your kids and our kids in the town are able to have access to? So when he was doing all of this, I was really impressed with him. And I thought he was a real great person for doing this and exposing this. And then he approached me. And he said, you know, Father, you know, I really need you help. And I was thinking, gee, you know, what kind of leader would I be if I'm always yelling charge, you know, from the – and I'm doing it on this issue from the back. Because really usually I'm doing it from the front. I'm usually in the front lines.

And I'm usually when it comes to pro life and when it comes to other issues, gender issues. I'm certainly not shy in wanting to speak about those things. And with this, I was thinking, well, you know, this. this is a perfect opportunity. But I didn't want to do it alone. I felt like, you know, I didn't want to be the heavy in town and the priest in town that was doing this alone. And people who are Catholic could, some of my parishioners who may have,

who may disagree with me, they could go to a neighboring parish and think that that pastor is, thinks differently than me. So they'll join there. I didn't want that to happen. I didn't want to split the town and have some priests for it and some priest quiet about it. So I asked the other priests, and I said, look, everyone can agree with this, I'm sure, right? Oh, yeah, of course.

Everyone was on board, including the Protestant ministers, were on board. And we had priests who signed it who were from the town originally, but are assigned in different other locations around the diocese. But they're known to the people in town because they grew up in the town and they signed it. So it wasn't just us priests and westerly or even the Protestant ministers in westerly. was any clergy who had a connection with Westley and wanted to put their need to this. And we got quite a few names. You certainly did, and we'll be sure to provide a link to your letter to the Westerly Sun in the transcript of this interview.

In it, you write about the dangers of pornography. And impressively, you cite a number of studies and other research that has been done on this topic, which I think underlines the concerns that you've just outlined. But I explained to our listeners why pornography is so dangerous and how it is harming America's youth. Well, you know, this is what our letter articulated very beautifully. And I didn't actually pen the letter. When we got together, we had a priest who was among us to do it. We chose him to do it.

And he represented us. And then he sent us the rough draft in the email. And we added to it. I had a paragraph to what other guys did as well. And what you're seeing is the finished product of all of us. But it was actually another priest in town who penned it. But we all, of course, signed it and agree with everything in it. And I think what was beautiful about it is that it really articulated the urgency, of course,

not to have pornography be exposed to youth, especially in the way it is in describing these books, because it could harm them in their own sexual health and life when it comes to their relationships with women, the way they respect women, the way they treat women, the way that they understand what their sexuality is actually for and the reason why God gave it to us. And nowadays, it's all over the place, there's no doubt about it. And as a matter of fact, one of the school committee members, which I was shocked because he's Catholic, and he was debating me on this, and he said, well, you know, father, you know, I don't understand why you're all upset about this, because the kids can go home and they can turn on the

TV at 2 o'clock in the afternoon, and the Godfather is on, or Goodfellas is on, and the kids are listening to bad language and seeing sexually explicit scenes in these movies. and my rebuttal to him was, well, that's the parent. That's their discretion. If they don't mind their children watching Goodfellers and Godfather or even other things that maybe are inappropriate, as much as I personally love those movies, but it may be inappropriate to younger children, then that really is their discretion. The parent is the one who should decide what his children.

her children are going to see and hear at home, but not the school. You know, their parents will not have any control over what's available in the school, and that's not fair, that a Catholic who does not want or anybody who does not want their children exposed to these kinds of books, maybe if their home, they may allow it in their household, but their neighbor doesn't allow those materials in their home, and they don't think that their children should be, it's acceptable for them to be available in the library the way they are just considering what they describe. So, you know, what I was feeling is, you know, that, and I think what the letter was articulating is that it's not because it's homosexual content. And it's not homosexual content.

We have to make sure that we are clear about that. Because I think this is kind of backed by the LBGTQ community. And I think a lot of the reasons why the – and I don't know this for certain, but my guess is that the reason why some of these people that you scratch your head and you think, how can they be for this? Like, who can be before this? You know, and the reason why they are is because I think there's an agenda of people that are prominent. I don't know if it's the state officials. or the government officials that want these books in these libraries, and maybe funding will be affected if they're not in the libraries.

So there's certainly, it's the LBGQ agenda that's pushing this, and a lot of these like dominoes, a lot of these people, even Catholics, on these committees are falling, like domino's supporting it. It's certainly troubling, and I think it's also ironic that some of these same individuals, are trying to ban the classics and the books that our kids should be reading, and then they're trying to promote other works like we're talking about here. You mentioned the role of parents. I think that that is so important.

What is your advice to parents who might be in a situation where they don't like something that they see in their public school library and want to do something about it? All right. I think there's three things they can do. The first thing they need to do is pray and fast. This is a battle that's a spiritual battle. And we're not going to conquer this battle here on earth without God's help. And so we have to pray to Saint-Maintly Archangel to defend us in battle.

We have to pray to the Blessed Virgin Mary through her prayers as our patroness in this battle, you know, like they did in liberating Spain, dedicating that battle to the – I'm drawing a blank on the name of it in the 16th century off the coast of Spain, the ships. So they, you know, we, you know, we can, we can win these victories by prayer and fasting because they're really demonic forces that we're battling. That's the first thing. The second thing I would recommend is, is to take your kids out of public school. I mean, I don't, I don't think, and as bad as Catholic schools can be it on, and it's problematic, especially some of the schools, like universities or colleges.

But still, though, I think if you find the right school, and usually parish schools are very good, and sometimes high schools are very good. So I would say to take them out of a public school and put them in a Catholic school. Because at a Catholic school, we have our issues, but they're not as anywhere near severe as these issues of having these kinds of books in these libraries. And the third thing I would recommend is run for office, you know, run for the school committee. We have a guy, his name is Seth Logan. And Seth Logan is from Westerly, and I knew him because I used to play on a softball team with him. He was a softball teammate, and he was the best kid on the team, and he was very athletic.

I think he was athletic in high school and everything. And he always reminded me of an athlete, like someone who I never realized he would ever get into politics, but he knocked on my door of the rectory. And I said, Seth. I mean, I haven't seen him in a while because I haven't been playing on that team. I said, Seth, I can't believe, you know, what are you doing here? You know, nice to see you. And he's like, father, I'm running for office.

Will you sign my papers, you know, to get signatures to be on the ballot? I said, Seth, you're running for office? You're a jock. You know, like, what do you? I didn't think you cared about politics. He's, well, I never really going to evolve too much in it. But, you know, when I'm fed up, I just can't believe what Bob is exposing. and I'm a guy in town who has values and who has beliefs.

And this is ridiculous what's going on. I'm not going to stand for it anymore. I'm running for office. The last guy in the world, not because of his abilities. I think he'd be very good in his abilities. But the last guy in the world I'd ever think would be involved in politics. But that's the kind of guys that we need. A guy like Seth Logan who wants to put himself out there and say, you know what, I'm fed up.

I'm running. And I think that's the third thing they could do is run for office. And especially if you live in a purple state, if you live in a blue state like ours in Rhode Island, it's a real uphill battle. I don't even trust the electoral process here and how they collect ballots and everything. I don't know. It's all democracy. Everything's controlled by Democrats in my state. We have no, we have like four Republicans in the Senate, Rhode Island Senate.

We have like eight out of 75 in the House. they have just no authority, they have no power. Every elected statewide official is a Democrat, our governor, our lieutenant governor. They all control the voting. They all can. So I don't know. I just don't trust the whole system on the state level. But I think the local level is really where a lot of people can make a big difference.

And I think school committee, I never thought I'd be saying this 10 years ago. It's school committee, really? I mean, you're dealing with pushing books around and I don't know, like all kinds of. To me, it didn't seem like it was that exciting. But now these are where the battlegrounds are. The battleground is on the town councils and the school committee, because they're starting to make big decision, moral decisions, not even the state is making.

It's the local level that these things are happening on. And that's where the fight and the battle is going to be in the neighborhoods. I absolutely agree. That is great advice, three steps that every parent can take. and listeners of this podcast know that I'm a big advocate for that role. I'm a parent myself and try to do what I can, including currently sitting on a book approval committee for my son's middle school. So it's been an enlightening and interesting experience. You know, one more question on this particular topic.

We've covered this at The Daily Signal. In fact, my colleague, Jay Green, has pushed back on the label that some on the left try to give those of us who are concerned about the subsistinging scene material, calling us book banners. And I wonder how you have responded to that either to folks in your community and recognizing still that the book you're talking about is not just an issue in Westerly High School. This is a book that has appeared in high schools all over the country. So for our listeners, I'd really encourage them to seek out and discover if it's in theirs. But how have you rebutted that charge that maybe some have thrown at you? Sure. The left are the King of Cancel. I mean, they're the whole, they're the Inquisition.

They're the new Inquisition. They have banned all kinds of things that have typically we've yawned about or have been even sacred to the United States. Like you mentioned earlier, cartoons. You know, Bugs Bunny is a great cartoon. And it's amazing that Bugs Bunny now is politically incorrect. But yet things like these other cartoons that are on like family guy, you know, that have incredibly explicit, sexually explicit material and extremely inappropriate humor for children. And that's acceptable.

But the Flintstones or, you know, or Bugs Bunny is a problem because of, you know, the aggression or something of the cartoon or whatever it is. So they are certainly no stranger to banning shows, people, books. you say one thing out of line that may not even have meant to be public and the person is disgraced and loses his job. And look at what happened to this poor kid, the Catholic kid at the pro-life march. He was from the high school there, you know, where he had a Trump hat on. And that guy with the drum came right in his face. And then, you know, all of a sudden this kid was the enemy. This poor little guy from a Catholic school was being canceled and being called an enemy.

So I think they have no, you know, when you live in a glass house, you can't throw stones. And if you want to take the speck out of your brother's eye, you better take the plank out of your own eye. And these people live in glass houses and they have a big plank in their eye. So they have no authority to tell us that there are things we deem inappropriate for kids when they are constantly deeming things inappropriate for kids. When it comes to things that they disagree with, like religion or mostly. morality or the values that we hold dear to us as Judeo-Christian people and believers. Well, well said, and as a follow-up to that question, I wanted to ask you about recent polls that we've seen that show fewer Americans believe in God today.

I believe Gallup put it at a new low of 81%. It's still a high number of Americans, but two questions, what is fueling that change in our society, and for those of us who are Christians and deeply care about this issue, how do we change it? Well, I think part of our problem is that parents used to have a lot of control over their kids' upbringing, and there wasn't many outside influences that affected them until television. And they could grow up in a small town, they could have small town values, even if it's big town. They could grow up with their family having most a lot of control over what they're going

to view, what they're going to see, and who's their friends are going to be. And then when television came into our living rooms, now all of a sudden, a lot of other influences were able to penetrate the household, Elvis, the Beatles, and then rock and roll. And as the world got smaller, And as communication became better, Satan used all of these tools that were invented that could be another influence rather than their parents. Also, too, kids have more and more young people are going to college, where they didn't used to go to college in these great numbers. And you go to college, and the professors there now have these children in their classrooms. I know because I was in a classroom in a college. I know how liberal the teachers are, how they're all members, most of them of the left,

at least where I come from and the college I went to. And you're considered somewhat of an outcast or some you don't really speak out if you have a difference of opinion because the people who say they're the most open-minded are the least open-minded. And they say that they want to listen to other people's opinions. They don't. They'll shut you down immediately. or you'll get a bad grade. So kids kind of realize that they're a punishment, you know,

for not going along with the Kool-Aid, drinking the Kool-Aid, and having the same ideology. So they either acquiesce and, you know, if you can't beat them, join them attitude. And I'd rather fight with my parents that I'm going to see only once in a while than my teachers that I'm going to be around all the time. Or they may be convincingly change and they become ideologically different because of, you know, they're only. hearing one side of the story. You know, so I can't be in the classroom, at every classroom,

refuting what they say about the church and what they say about priests and the history of the church and what happened in the middle ages. And, you know, so, so they have the, they hold the keys right now, these educators and, and, and influences on television. And I think that was a big reason. The other reason is that kids started to realize that, um, that they hold. the cards nowadays. Somehow in the 90s, I think it happened, things flipped, and parents ended up not

being the authority in the house, but the children are. And I think part of the reason is because parents are having less children, and they are more concerned about their survival, of course, because they only have one or two. You know, you have nine, or you have eight, or you have five, then they become one of the crowd.

It's like, all right, who are you now? Oh, yeah, that's right. You're the third one, right? down it, you know, where parents only have one or two. And they, and it ended up being, it ended up happening, I think, where a lot of parents are not worshiping God, but worshiping their children. And anything their children says, they think is okay and they want to do, they never do anything wrong. They're never wrong in school. They never lie. If the teacher says they did something and they come home and they said they did an opposite thing, then they always believe the kid over the student, over the teacher. When I was a kid, I went to an old boy's

Catholic high school, you know, if you're going to trouble in school, you didn't go home. It was stupid in the 80s or 70s to tell your parents you've got in trouble because you're getting more trouble at home. What did you do? And if you said nothing, he just picked on me, they didn't believe you. They were like, come on, don't give me that. You know, you had to do something. You know, and then the teacher would tell him what you did. Oh, you did that. See, you told me, no, I didn't. Oh, come on. You know, they didn't believe you. You know, so they always please the teacher. So, but now it's a complete opposite. And so now the kids are completely running the household and they're completely running schools. So now they're in charge of the schools, not the parents. A friend of mine works in an inner city school. He's a teacher in any sort of

school. He said, the kids wear their hoodies. They look on their phone all day and they swear. And I say, can't you do anything about this? I mean, he and I both went to the same Catholic high school. Those three things, you'd be killed. He said, no, we just thought, we just given up those battles. We no longer fight those battles. We no longer fight those battles. You don't fight the battle of them being on their phone and being and swearing in school and put their hoodie up all day. You know, those are battles. They don't want to fight. So they've completely, kids have, young people have completely taken control of society and parents are listening to them more than God.

So the parent, the kid comes home from college and says, I want to move in with my girlfriend. All right, we'll pay for the rent. No problem. There's not a fight. There's not, hey, listen, you're a Catholic. You know, you're a Christian. you're not supposed to live together before marriage. There's no fight anymore left in parents.

They've completely handed over the authority of decision-making to their children. And so as a result, kids today and younger people today don't want to follow rules. They'll follow rules enough not to be in jail, but they don't want to follow rules when it comes to morality or church's teaching. And it's easier for them to say, I'm spiritual, not religious because if I'm religious, it means that I'm going to have to follow these rules. I can't live together before marriage. I can't be with the other gender, with the same gender. I can't have children before marriage. I mean, I know people right in my town of Westally who have

four kids, three kids, and they've been with this, a girl for 12 years. And I say to them, when are you going to get married? Oh, father, I don't know if I want to get married. You know, because of the kids have completely, young people, have completely taken control of society. Well, you've given our parents a call to action, Father, and I hope that they heed your advice and step up. It is critically important for this next generation. I want to ask about your activity on social media. You have quite a popular following on Facebook, and you host a show called Cappuccino with Father Cappiartee. What prompted you to start sharing your thoughts on politics and our culture in such a public way? You know what prompted me, I think.

I have a parishioner who she's a really nice girl. She's married with a family. And she's like a health guru or somewhat of a like a exercise person, you know, and diet consultant. And she would go on every once in a while and talk about news. nutrition and talk about food and talk about diet and talk about exercise that people would write into her. And I thought, well, how great of her to do that. She has a passion about what she does, that she's willing to, you know, put herself out

there online and, you know, field questions. And I'm sure it helps her business. You know, I'm sure she's out there and people are watching her do something for free but want to hire her eventually because they like what she's saying and they think that she could, that this person could be good for them. So I thought, why don't I do that when it comes to my profession and my vocation? You know, I mean, if this woman is so passionate about diet and exercise and nutrition, you know, I mean, I'm passionate about my faith and about converting souls to Christ. So why don't I put myself out there and just talk about things?

Plus, it gives me the ability to say things that I can't say from the pulpit or maybe wouldn't want to say from the pulpit. You know, the pulpit is very sacred and I'm very careful about, I certainly, you know, I certainly, this church teaching, there's no doubt about it, but I, you know, I don't want to talk about just ranting about things that I'm upset about, you know, in the course of the day or the week. It's, I'm supposed to preach on the gospel, you know, and it's supposed to be theologically centered, you know, so, and succinct. I only have seven minutes. You know, I preach about seven minutes on a weekend. So this affords me the opportunity to kind of go on and on about things that I really think are important. And I think like-minded people need to listen to or maybe people who don't

agree with me can hopefully see why we have the opinions we do. And I think it's a great evangelization tool and a great opportunity, like I said, for me, to talk about things that maybe I don't have the opportunity to talk about when it comes to other forums I have as a priest. One thing that I've been really wanting to talk a lot about is clothing among kids nowadays. I'm just shocked. I was at a week, and a kid came in with a hoodie and sweatpants at a week. This is unbelievable. I was at the Capitol Grill, which is my favorite restaurant. I don't go there often because it's expensive. When I do go, it's a nice night out. I treat myself to a nice night out with a friend, a priest who and I see a kid on a date, and he has a hoodie on,

and he has jeans and sneakers, and he's sitting at the Capitol Grill in downtown Providence. with his hat on backwards. It's just shocking to me how casual. My sister said that she was in the market the other day, and a guy was there with a bath robe on, nothing else. His legs had nothing on them, and his chest looked like he had nothing on.

It looked like underneath he had nothing on from what she could see by what was exposed. And he had a bath robe on walking. with a shopping cart up and down the market picking things off the shelf. Like, what is going on with this dress? We don't see suit jackets. We don't see a button-down shirt anymore. We don't see slacks.

You know, so I think it's, that's something I could talk about on my streamcast that I'm not going to really maybe address from the pulpit. If I do, it's just a sentence or two that I'll mention it. if it relates to the scriptures. Well, thank you for sharing that. I encourage our listeners to certainly check out your work. And, Father, a final question for you. How can our listeners or the Daily Signal audience support the work that you're doing,

follow the social media postings or the live streams that you do? What's the best way for them to connect with you? Well, I think first thing is pray. Like anyone who's listening or wants to help me, please pray for priests. We're under attack, certainly. Satan is like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour, scripture says, especially priests. And we are under attack because he knows that if we go down, we bring a lot of people down with us. And if we go up, we bring a lot of people up with us.

So, you know, it's important for them to pray, especially devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. She is the way that we are really going to find the greatest possible relationship we could have with Christ, Christ is if we have a strong devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary. But also, too, I'm on Facebook. There's mostly what I post. I'm not really in Twitter and I don't do much anything else, but I'm on Facebook. A Giacomo Capoverty, you don't need to be friends with me to see my post, to see the streamcast I do.

And that really is the best way to reach me is through Facebook. We also have a YouTube channel that's called Immaculate Conception Parish. westerly and you hit subscribe and on that subscribe it has all our masses but my Facebook has all our masses too every mass we do if funerals when they when the family wants it or every scheduled masses or my homilies they're all on Facebook and they're all archived on Facebook plus on Thursdays as you know I have Capuchino with Father Capoevarty I sit there at 930 at the rectory kitchen table with a cappuccino and I talk about all kinds of

of issues like we're kind of talking about today. So that it's Facebook, my Facebook page going on to that and seeing my different posts of what's going on, I think is the best way to keep in touch with what I'm doing. And again, we'll be sure to provide links to

your Facebook page, YouTube, applaud you for putting those masses on your social media channels. So those who are far away from Rhode Island, like myself, have an opportunity to tune in and watch and see the work you're doing. you for your leadership there in Rhode Island. Thank you for speaking out on these important issues.

Those of us who need the encouragement, I think, turn to leaders like you in times like this. And we're just grateful that you would join the Daily Signal podcast and share a little bit of time with our listeners today. I really appreciate you inviting me and I bless you with your work. And please know you'll be in my prayers. Thanks so much, Father. You're very welcome. at the Heritage Foundation, we believe that every single policy issue discussed in D.C. tells a story. So we want to tell it well. On the Heritage Explains podcast, co-host Tim Decher and Michelle Cordero, take one policy issue a week, mix in a creative blend of clips, narration, and hard-hitting interviews

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Be decided, be fixed, be established. This will strengthen one's moral integrity and strengthen the will to do what is right, no matter the outcome. Throughout history, great women have paid the price of their personal freedom in the new. name of justice and conscience, and some broke the law and society's conventions, but they changed the world for the better. It takes moral courage under these circumstances. These young girls have this courage, and I admire them. Your letter could be featured on next week's show, so go ahead and send us an email at Letters at DailySignal.com. Americans use firearms to defend themselves between 500,000 and 2 million times every year. God forbid that my mother has ever faced with a scenario

where she has to stop a threat to her life. But if she is, I hope politicians protected by professional armed security didn't strip her of the right to use the firearms she can handle most competently. To watch the rest of Heritage expert Amy Swearer's testimony on assault weapons before the House Judiciary Committee head to the Heritage Foundation YouTube channel. There you'll find talks, events, and documentaries backed with the reputation of the nation's most broadly supported public policy research institute.

Start watching now at heritage.org slash YouTube. And don't forget to subscribe and share. Virginia, you have a good news story to share with us today. Over to you. Thanks so much, Rob. All of our parents listening know how many little extra costs are just part of having kids, from a new code in the wintertime to maybe the cost of piano lessons or a school trip. But for kids in the foster care system, that extra money is sometimes just not there.

Danielle Gletto and her husband became foster parents in 2006. They both had good jobs and providing for their foster child was not challenging for them. But they quickly began to realize that that was not the case for many foster families or for foster kids who lived in group homes. Things like swim lessons or a brand new pair of shoes just simply were not available to those kids. Now, not everyone can be a foster parent, and Danielle really, that, but she also realized that there was something everyone could do to help make the dreams of a foster child a reality. And that's when in 2008, Danielle founded the organization One Simple Wish. The goal of just giving people a glimpse into the life of a child that was experiencing

foster care or a young adult who had been through the system and sharing with our community one thing that would bring this person some joy. The concept is incredibly, simple. Foster parents, foster children, or young people who have recently aged out of the foster care system can submit a wish to the organization. Every wish is vetted before it's posted on the One Simple Wish website, and wishes can range from $10 to $500. Then those wishes are answered through everyday Americans who choose to grant a wish for a foster child. The website's search engine allows you to search for children in your own state who made a wish, or to sort for wishes made by kids of certain ages. Right now, there's a little girl in Georgia named Cassie.

She is six years old and her foster family is asking for help to buy her a purple coat this winter. Nick is seven and lives in Charlotte, North Carolina. He loves building things. He's asking for a new set of blocks. Through meeting the wishes of children like Cassie and Nick, Danielle says she wants foster children and their families to know they are seen and loved. I think that that is true across everything. I think at the core, we're all people who feel, and we are all people who have aspirations and insecurities. The fact that we have always looked at

our approach to this organization as we are a family first, and I tell people all the time before everything else, I'm a mom. And whether you hope to be a foster parent one day or not, or you have kids of your kids your own. One Simple Wish is a beautiful way to share hope and love with a child. You can visit One Simplewish.org to learn more and to select a wish that you have the power to grant to a child

today. Virginia, thanks so much for sharing that story after talking to Darcy Olson on last week's podcast about some of their issues and challenges with foster care. It's really refreshing and, as you said, a great idea. I love how simple it is. It really is, almost operates like a Google search engine, you can go in and kind of look at the various wishes and look by location and find something that fits your budget that's really simple. You've got to love the entrepreneurial spirit of our fellow Americans. Absolutely. Well, we're going to leave it there for today.

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