Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E193: Is Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Un-Christian? w/Fr Ambrose

Transcript

E193: Is Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Un-Christian? w/Fr Ambrose · The Lila Rose Show

0:00
We're trying to play clean up. The problem is not today.
0:02
The problem was 40 years ago. The church in her mission is
0:07
duty bound to care for the poor. It's not the church's concern
0:10
whether that person is legal or illegal.
0:12
Pope Francis wrote a letter to the US bishops on this topic.
0:16
I don't want to be a Pope's planer.
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I have some problems with this statement from the Holy Father.
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I take issue with the word deportation.
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In the classic Christian sense, deportation has a very specific
0:26
meaning. It's about.
0:28
Hey, everyone, Welcome back to the Lila Roe show.
0:31
Today we're deep diving the question of immigration.
0:33
As you may know, there have been executive orders from the Trump
0:36
administration declaring more mass deportations, a policy
0:40
that's been much more tough on the border, tough on
0:42
immigration. In fact, border crossings are
0:45
down 94% right now year over year from last year under the
0:49
Biden administration. So the border is getting more
0:51
secure in that sense. But there are a lot of
0:53
humanitarian concerns about deportations, a lot of
0:56
questions. We're going to actually explore
0:57
this from the Christian perspective of what and how
1:00
should the Christian think when it comes to immigration,
1:03
deportations, and so many other questions about our immigration
1:06
policy. We will also be discussing the
1:08
exchange effectively that Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic
1:13
convert, had with Pope Francis. And I'm very excited to have on
1:17
a podcast OG that you guys may be familiar with and that I know
1:20
many of you love Father Ambrose Christ, Father Ambrose Christ of
1:24
the Evermode Institute, as well as St.
1:26
Michael's Abbey, who is a fantastic philosopher,
1:28
theologian, and can help us explore this very important
1:31
issue. And don't forget to subscribe to
1:33
the show if you're not already subscribed.
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Did you know that over 90% of our listeners, sometimes on
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So make sure that you hit that subscribe button.
1:42
Father Amber is welcome back to the podcast.
1:44
It's great to see you. Always great to see you too.
1:46
How? Have you been doing?
1:47
Busy and happy and trying to do God's holy will.
1:50
Thank you. Well, we are I, I know that we
1:53
just had it run into another mutual friend here recently.
1:56
And I know wherever you go, everyone loves, loves to see
1:59
Father Ambrose. And I know folks are very glad
2:01
that you're back on and thank you for being willing to wade
2:04
into this topic. OK, I'll do my best, Lila.
2:06
You do excellently as some of you guys might remember, Father
2:09
Ambrose first episode with us on exorcism.
2:12
So Father Ambrose as an exorcist and then he's been advising on
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all kinds of core moral and it's some political issues, so.
2:19
It's my joy to try to wade into the deep waters when when we
2:22
have the opportunity to do that. It's important that our holy
2:25
faith informs how we think about everything in our life,
2:29
politics, morality, obviously it's the most important thing,
2:33
our holy faith. And so we need to see how that
2:36
how that intersects with these other parts of our lives too.
2:38
Amen. Can you share briefly for folks
2:41
your background in terms of education?
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Because one of the things that maybe folks don't realize is the
2:46
intense philosophical theological formation that you
2:49
have to undergo in order to even be in the position that you're
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in. OK, sure, just briefly.
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I I entered religious life and Saint Michael's Abbey and
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started my pursuit of studies for the priesthood.
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After an undergraduate degree in classics, history, politics, I
3:03
was a bachelor's degree. Then I was on to Graduate School
3:08
for what was supposed to be a three-year stint at Oxford
3:11
University and I interrupted that to enter religious life.
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So a year of studies also in classical history and philosophy
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and languages. And then in pursuit of the
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priesthood, we have a very rigorous program of philosophy,
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Two years of philosophy, so basically the equivalent of a
3:28
bachelor's degree in philosophy and then a lot of theology.
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So I finished in Rome after five years studying in Rome, just
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just at the end of my seminary studies with Pontifical degrees
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from the University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the Angelicum in
3:44
theology, and then also a license in theology from the
3:47
Pontifical Gregorian University. So it's a lot of school.
3:51
So thank you, because I know this isn't, you know, the topic
3:53
of immigration and it's really connected to the question of
3:56
human dignity, national sovereignty, rule of law.
3:59
I mean, there's lots of these philosophical principles that
4:01
we're going to be exploring on the show today.
4:03
Your education on this theologically, philosophically
4:05
is extremely valuable. I want to start with what's been
4:09
in the news lately, which is the Trump executive order.
4:13
It says there are an estimated 11.7 million undocumented
4:17
immigrants in the US, according to July 2023 statistics from the
4:21
Center for Migration Studies. Trump has promised to deport all
4:24
migrants illegally in the country and so that the plan,
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which has been criticized as financially unfeasible, will
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have no price tag. So he's just saying or deporting
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everybody. What should be the Christian
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view of deportation? OK, so I think we should maybe
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first, well, let's have some big ideas first.
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The biblical message that we have received is that we are to
4:47
care for the poor. We are supposed to welcome those
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who are so-called aliens from the old covenant and certainly
4:56
in the Christian dispensation, the new covenant.
4:58
We are supposed to take care of those who are less needy than we
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are. In fact, it's one of the things
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that our blessed Lord Jesus says we will be judged on how we take
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care of the least of his brothers and sisters.
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We how we treat them is how we treat him.
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And in fact, he says that our judgment.
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You know, some of those amazing stories from his stories.
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Whatever you did for the least of my brothers, you did for me.
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You did it to me. So we know that we have to have
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a heart for the poor. That's very important as
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Christians, as believers, as people of the old and the new
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covenant. OK, that's a big idea.
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Now, the Catholic Church, which is the fullest representation of
5:44
of Christianity, has a couple of big ideas that we need to put
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together. 1 is that every human has dignity.
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Every human person has tremendous dignity, the dignity
5:57
of every human being from the moment of conception to the
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moment of natural death. That's a big important idea.
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Every human being has a right to migrate if they find themselves
6:08
in a political or economic situation where they are not
6:12
able to provide for themselves and their families.
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And every country has a right to protect its own borders and
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determine politically the movement of migration across its
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borders. Those are all true things.
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That alone is, I mean, I think that alone people listening, it
6:30
makes sense each of those things individually, yes and.
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So then it's just how where the rubber meets the road.
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How do we actually sort things out when it seems like some of
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these rights or truths come into conflict?
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So that's, those are big ideas. We, I, I take issue with the
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word deportation in in the classic Christian sense, a
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deportation. And also in this, in this
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documents of the Catholic Church speaking about these social
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justice issues for the last 150 years.
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Deportation has a very specific meaning.
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It's about oppressive governments sending away
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portions of people from their own citizenry, deporting this
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ethnic group, deporting this, I don't know, socio economic group
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out of their own country to another place.
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That's what deportation is. So people that had a right to be
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there in terms of their, they had citizenship and their.
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For whatever reason, and they're being sent out.
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Interesting. OK.
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That's what deportation means most, properly removed from
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one's own country. What the president here in this,
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and we speak about deportation in a much looser sense now,
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which we might call repatriation.
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Someone who is illegally in one country and is sent out of the
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country that they entered into, back to the country of their
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origin, that would be repatriation.
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So someone comes to the United States, they don't become
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citizens, they're not here legally.
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Maybe if we send them back to the place where they came from,
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that would be repatriation. OK.
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Again, using those terms properly, I think helps us to
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understand what's at stake here. So when we're reckoning the
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right of some person in some other country to migrate because
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they're oppressed, in danger or whatever reason, then the
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country where they're going to usually has some policy about
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what we do with people who approach our border and want
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entry. Now we are in a time now, Lila,
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as you well know, as everybody watching and listening knows
8:38
where we have lived with a very unregulated migration policy
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into the United States for the last 40 years or more.
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A long time where we have this issue now, political issue of
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10s of thousands, millions of people resident in our country
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who are not here legally. What are we supposed to do about
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people like that? That's the big question.
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What is a Christian supposed to do?
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I think well, so where do we go from there, Lila?
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I mean, first of all, great laying of the ground.
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And I I one more thing to kind of explore.
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I mean, there's so much to explore here is this idea of an
9:17
unregulated border, right? Like you were speaking to.
9:20
And the fact that our immigration policy in many ways
9:23
has not been, you know, batten down the hatches are not
9:25
battened down that we also have this thing of seeking asylum.
9:28
Like if you go to certain points of entrance on the border and
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you say you're seeking asylum, you do get you can get access to
9:35
the country until you can have the you can get into the country
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and you have a right to be into the country.
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And then you have this kind of court system that's you're
9:43
supposed to go through to determine if you actually are an
9:46
asylee and have can have that legal status.
9:48
If there's a sort of like temporary time where you can
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just sort of be waiting for that.
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And so I think a lot of immigrants who come here, those
9:58
that are maybe even crossing the border without these
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particularly similar points of entry that you're supposed to go
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to, to seek asylee status. You know, they would argue,
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well, we are desperate. We're just trying to get in.
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But we are asylees, you know, we really need, we know we're
10:11
seeking actual persecution or seeking, you know, severe
10:14
threats of violence to our life. Now, the asylee status
10:16
definition is very narrow. So it can't be my understanding
10:19
is it can't be even something like gang violence.
10:20
Even if, you know, there's a gang in your home country that
10:22
has a hit on you, that's not enough of a reason to get asylum
10:25
status here in the United States.
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But there are some reasons that you you can't get it.
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So I think that's, you know, I'm, I'm saying all of that
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because what ends up happening is you have many people here in
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this country now that effectively because of the
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porous border and because of, you know, our immigration
10:42
policy, let's blame it to some degree.
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I don't know. They are here, they were able to
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get here and so the the question is what?
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What is to be done? Right.
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That's a it's a very important. There's a prudential question
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that any government of any country has to face.
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How are we going to solve this issue, you know, or some other
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issue that's a big, huge nationwide problem.
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What do we do, especially when we are on the on the heels of
11:11
many decades of failure to regulate this well in a way
11:14
that's right for the for the national sovereignty, OK.
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today. Before we try to answer that
12:21
question, that's a very difficult question to answer,
12:24
there's another right I want to talk about or responsibility.
12:28
I'm I was listing responsibilities as the
12:30
Catechism of the Catholic Church lays them out with respect to
12:33
the question of immigration. There's another one, and that is
12:35
if someone is an asylum seeker or a refugee and immigrant into
12:40
a foreign country, they have a responsibility to be grateful to
12:45
the country that they're entering, to assimilate to the
12:48
culture of that country insofar as they're able to be a good
12:51
guest in somebody else's home who have welcomed them in.
12:55
And I think some of that idea, the language of family life and
12:58
the and the domicile 1's own home is a good analogy for us to
13:03
look at what we're supposed to do about the needy poor who come
13:07
to ask us for help. So I think you're right when you
13:12
said that we have the issue in our country of a whole wave of
13:15
people who have we, they find themselves in the United States
13:18
of America calling themselves a number of things.
13:21
They could be asylum seekers, they could be refugees.
13:24
They could be simply illegal aliens who are here and have
13:29
never sort of sorted out their legal status.
13:33
Many 10s of millions of people like this.
13:35
What is the country supposed to do to address that problem?
13:39
Can we legalize everybody who's here?
13:42
And of course, and the different, different sides of
13:43
the political aisle have different solutions to this or
13:45
attempts to to solve this problem mostly failed in the
13:49
last not just administration, but in the last several decades,
13:54
this has not been a problem that we've been able to solve.
13:56
OK, It seems to me that this is where we have to ask who is
14:01
close to me and whom is God asking me to love happily, maybe
14:07
happily for you and for me. Lila, we're not policy makers.
14:11
You're, you're a very strong voice in trying to move the
14:15
political needle for all the best things.
14:18
But we don't determine you and I don't determine what the
14:21
policies are. We can encourage our legislators
14:23
to craft just and charitable and even Christian laws about about
14:30
such things, but that doesn't mean that we can neglect the
14:34
poor on our doorstep. There's that horrible situation
14:38
a couple of years ago of, you know, I'll leave some political
14:41
language here of people on the far political left complaining
14:45
that we are being too draconian at our border.
14:48
And then a whole bus loader, several bus loads of immigrants
14:51
show up on Martha's Vineyard and those same loud leftist voices
14:55
will not keep them. They will not take care of them.
14:58
They send them away. That's not charitable.
15:01
It's not Christian, It's not, it's not care for the poor.
15:04
Basically, it's somebody else's problem.
15:06
I think most people in our country see it like that.
15:08
This is somebody else's problem. And I think Christians should
15:11
ask themselves, where can I feed the poor?
15:15
Where can I welcome the stranger?
15:17
Where can I do what I can to be the face of Christ for someone
15:20
who's in need and have right ideas about what the government
15:25
should do about that too? I think about too.
15:27
I mean, you're talking about kind of the far left person who
15:30
said, you know, open borders, open borders, and then they
15:33
don't want to contend with, you know, actually caring for the,
15:37
you know, immigrant. And there are some people who
15:39
are far left who do care for the immigrants.
15:41
So, you know, there's obviously always these mixed bags.
15:43
And then there's also the, you know, the kind of stereotype.
15:45
But this person definitely does exist who, you know, is very
15:48
much for maybe deportations or we can call them repatriations.
15:52
I like that distinction that you made.
15:53
I think it's a good one. But we're talking about people
15:57
that they were maybe, you know, employing under the table.
16:01
You know, these are maybe the nannies or the house cleaners or
16:04
they, you know, people working in agriculture who are not
16:07
documented, who are, you know, being employed.
16:10
And the employer doesn't have to pay, you know, employee, you
16:13
know, as Social Security, other taxes on some of these folks.
16:16
And so they're getting that advantage because it's under the
16:18
table. But at the same time,
16:20
politically they're like, you know, deport, deport again,
16:23
stereotypes. But I think your point is that
16:26
individually, you know, the response of Christian to the
16:29
immigration question is one of humility and love.
16:34
Like we want to love the person, especially in our immediate
16:37
vicinity. If if there is an immigrant in
16:38
our immediate vicinity, a response should be to care for
16:41
care for them. That's right.
16:42
Well, we have these bigger questions to resolve about
16:45
public policy is that is that I. Think that's, I think that's a
16:48
fair summary there, Lila, because we're talking about both
16:52
of the both of these two areas simultaneously.
16:55
We're talking about public policy and we're also talking
16:58
about the responsibility of every individual, in our case,
17:00
Christian citizen. What are we to do?
17:03
And I think this is where some of the conflict happens also the
17:05
conflict between like the bishops of the Catholic Church
17:08
in America or the Holy Father's statement there, you know,
17:12
encouraging the believers to love the poor and to care for
17:16
the poor. They're not wading into the
17:18
political so much as encouraging what's best in Christianity, in
17:24
God's call to us to take care of those who are needy in our
17:27
midst. So that comes into conflict when
17:30
when the policy is not, when public policy is not necessarily
17:34
thinking like that. Public policy is thinking we
17:37
have all of these people who are now inside our borders who are
17:41
not legally here. What are we going to do about
17:43
that? We need to do something about
17:45
that, which is a perfectly legitimate political question
17:48
for someone to try to solve. So based on what you're saying,
17:50
it sounds like it is not immoral per SE for a government to do
17:55
some expatriations or repatriations or deportations to
18:01
that is not inherently immoral to do a deportation.
18:05
But. The government has the right to,
18:08
if someone is not documented, if they came here illegally, the
18:11
government does have a right to, you know, repatriate them,
18:15
deport them. However, you say that being
18:19
said, that doesn't mean that all deportations would be just or
18:23
any deportations would be just or mass deportations.
18:25
What what do you think the Christian, how should the
18:27
Christian view this idea of mass deportations?
18:29
And maybe particularly getting into, let's just maybe agree for
18:33
the sake of this conversation. If the person has committed a
18:36
crime, you know, not just border crossing illegally, but in
18:39
addition there is, you know, some sort of, you know, theft or
18:42
violence or, you know, whatever it is.
18:44
And so they are actually, you know, criminal, you know, have
18:49
committed a crime, convicted criminals.
18:51
That seems like a no brainer. I think a lot of people can
18:53
agree, OK, that those people should not, you know, they
18:55
should be deported. I would agree that's a no
18:57
brainer because and certainly within the rights of the state
18:59
to say, like I said, there was that other feature, an
19:03
immigrant, someone in someone's not someone who is in another
19:09
country, not their own has a responsibility to be a good
19:12
guest in somebody else's home, right.
19:15
A government certainly has a right to attend to someone who
19:19
is behaving in a criminal manner as a guest in their nation,
19:23
right? That that's, I think you're
19:25
right. That's a no brainer that that
19:26
person is not a good guest. They need to be sent away.
19:29
They're a danger to the common good.
19:31
We have to think about the common good and that's what
19:33
governments are for. What about the other people who
19:37
aren't so clearly a reason there's not so clearly a reason
19:41
to deport them or repatriate them.
19:43
Then what? Again, it's about prudence and
19:47
the common good of a country. It should be the supreme
19:52
motivation for a political system.
19:54
What is the common good and how do we achieve a common good and
19:57
legislate so that we can do that, so that we can achieve
19:59
that to the best of our ability? It's going to It will always be
20:02
imperfect. Apparently this is from February
20:05
20th, 2025 S yesterday, it says illegal crossings at US Mexico
20:11
border down 94% from last year, Border Patrol chief says.
20:18
And I think a lot of people would immediately say it's
20:21
because, yes, clamp downs may be at the border, but in addition,
20:25
the threat of deportation, saying we're not tolerating this
20:28
action anymore as kind of a top down public policy around the
20:30
new administration is making people less likely to want to
20:33
take the risk of traveling, you know, and crossing the border
20:38
illegally. So, so that's kind of the
20:40
argument for, you know, a prudentially a public policy
20:43
that says we're going to do aggressive deportations because
20:46
this has gotten so out of control with border crossings
20:48
that are illegal. But then you kind of turn again
20:52
the other look on the other side and look at, you know, the human
20:55
toll potentially of deportations.
20:58
Let's say there's the person who came here, they have children
21:00
here. They're still not documented,
21:03
but they are, you know, they're law abiding, you know they're
21:06
productive members of society. What's the case for?
21:10
That. Deportation.
21:12
I think a case could be made that the government could try to
21:16
accommodate that person in some way.
21:18
And certainly that's what the church has been arguing, I think
21:20
for the Catholic Church has been arguing for a long time, for
21:22
many decades that and, and she should, the Catholic Church
21:26
should argue for a merciful stance towards someone who finds
21:30
him or herself, maybe with their family, maybe with their
21:32
children in our country illegally because of those
21:36
unregulated and not well maintained borders of previous
21:39
decades. I think that the strong border
21:42
that we see now with that, that statistic, I'd heard that
21:45
statistic already, the one that, you know, 94% fewer border
21:50
crossings. That is definitely going to be a
21:53
deterrent for people to want to find their way into our country
21:56
illegally without a good reason. It doesn't mean that someone who
22:00
has a good reason to ask entry into our country to ask for
22:03
asylum or refuge can't find a way to do that.
22:09
And I think that would be a very responsible and prudential way
22:12
for a government to vet, to control their border, protect
22:17
the nation's sovereignty, and to say, yes, here's someone who's
22:19
genuinely in need fleeing whatever kind of extreme poverty
22:24
or disease or governmental oppression or religious
22:27
oppression. It's precisely what we have
22:30
immigration and asylum seeking for so that they can benefit
22:35
from a safe and good way of life in our country.
22:39
So I would I would hope that we never say no one can come into
22:45
our country. I would hope that.
22:47
I don't think that's what the current administration wants
22:49
anyway. I don't think.
22:51
But you're right. What do we do about the someone
22:53
who has maybe a housekeeper or a Co worker or a student in school
22:58
or in the case of the church, parishioners in the parish?
23:02
I think that it's not the church's responsibility to
23:06
repatriate or deport parishioners.
23:08
It's not the job of the church to do that.
23:10
Meaning the government shouldn't in no way be compelling the
23:13
church to do their work of if they want to do these
23:15
deportations. It's not like you make the
23:17
church do it. That's right.
23:18
Has there been an attempt by the?
23:20
I don't think so. No, I don't think so.
23:22
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Join crowd health.com. There was a statement.
24:22
So this is from the USCCB Bishop Mark J Seats, who is one of the
24:27
heads of the USCCB, January 23rd.
24:30
So this is shortly, I think, after President Trump's
24:33
executive order on immigration. And it says the following
24:37
statement was issued in response to action taken by the Trump
24:40
administration rescinding guidance related to protected
24:42
areas in immigration enforcement.
24:45
It says Catholic Healthcare, Catholic Charities agencies and
24:47
the church's other social service ministries will work
24:50
daily to feed, house, heal, educate and meet other meet
24:53
people's needs in communities across our nation.
24:56
It talks about the dignity of the person.
24:58
Charity is not a welfare activity that can be left to
25:01
others, but it's part of the nature of the church, like the
25:03
church's job. Regardless of your immigration
25:05
status, I think they're saying is if you're here, you're
25:07
hungry, you need shelter, we're going to we're going to care for
25:10
you. Then it goes on to say we
25:12
recognize the need for just immigration enforcement and
25:16
affirm the government's obligation to carry it out in a
25:19
targeted, proportional and humane way.
25:21
So it's right there not saying we oppose deportation is
25:24
actually saying we support your right to do that as a
25:26
government, right. However, non-emergency
25:29
immigration for enforcement in schools, places of worship,
25:32
social service agencies, healthcare facilities or other
25:35
sensitive settings is contrary to the common good.
25:39
So they're basically saying if you want to do deportations that
25:42
fine, but I don't want you doing them at my school, my Catholic
25:45
school, my Catholic Church, my Catholic social service agency
25:49
or my Catholic hospital. That seems totally reasonable, I
25:52
would think, because precisely because the church in her
25:58
mission is duty bound to care for the poor, it's not the
26:03
church's concern whether that that person is legal or illegal.
26:07
Now, this gets complicated in our country, Lila, because many
26:11
of our church agencies, schools, missions, they, they receive
26:16
government funding for what they do.
26:17
And that's where it gets really complicated.
26:19
And and so it would be tidier if the church and her ministries
26:25
did not depend upon government funding to execute her
26:29
ministries, because then the government has every right to
26:31
say, well, we're giving you money to feed the poor, so why
26:35
don't you just tell us who's illegal and then we'll take care
26:37
of the problem for you. Well, they just lost a huge
26:40
government contract. Catholic Charities right now,
26:42
that's not run directly by the bishops, right?
26:44
Catholic Charities, that's independent, but they lost, I
26:47
think 10s of millions of dollars in taxpayer money by a Trump
26:50
executive order. And I think it was about the
26:52
immigration. Like this was like, I don't know
26:54
if it was refugee resettlement per SE exactly, but it was more
26:57
like you're helping illegals. And this is kind of the, you
27:00
know, the Trump administration. We're doing doge anyways.
27:03
We're slap, you know, we're trained sawing everything.
27:05
We're definitely chainsawing you.
27:07
But to your point, regardless of that matter, the church has the
27:11
right to care. That's its responsibility, a
27:14
duty to care. It goes on to say, this is
27:18
really interesting says with the mayor, rescission of the
27:20
protected areas guidance. We are already witnessing
27:23
reticence among immigrants to engage in daily life.
27:26
So basically, I, I, I misspoke a little bit.
27:29
The Trump, this Trump executive order, they're responding to us
27:31
early on was saying basically deport wherever you find them.
27:35
Like it wasn't like you, there's certain protocol for
27:37
deportation. It's basically go out and hunt
27:40
and and find them in the church is saying you can go deport if
27:42
you want, but don't do it at my school, et cetera.
27:46
All people have a right to fulfill their duty to God
27:48
without fear. Turning places of care, healing
27:51
and solace into places of fear and uncertainty endangers the
27:54
trust between, you know, the church and these people were
27:57
serving, et cetera, says our organizations.
28:00
Stand ready to work on a better path forward that protects the
28:02
dignity of all of those we serve, upholds the sacred
28:05
dignity of our providers, and ensures our borders and
28:08
immigration system are governed with mercy and justice.
28:12
So it sounds like they do want to play ball.
28:14
It's just there's certain parameters that they feel as
28:16
Christian. We as Christians should be, you
28:21
know, asking for. I think that, you know, we're
28:23
we're trying to play clean up for a situation that had the
28:26
problem is not today, the problem was 40 years ago when
28:30
the borders were not regulated. That was the that is the source
28:34
of the problem. And so I think the church in her
28:38
wisdom says, please don't ask us to solve the problem of 40 years
28:44
ago that we're facing today by way of forgetting mercy and only
28:51
focusing on justice. And I think that's right for the
28:54
church to say that. And I also think that the the
28:57
government who is concerned for a common good and for the
29:01
sovereignty of her, of her citizens and for the national
29:04
borders and so forth, I think that there that government is
29:10
more concerned about the justice than about the mercy.
29:12
So we need to find a way for these two important values,
29:16
justice and mercy to kiss, justice and peace to embrace.
29:22
And, and so the church will always stand up for her focus on
29:25
the mercy and the government on her focus on justice.
29:30
And hopefully we can find some kind of a resolution.
29:32
I used to think there was when I was an undergraduate student,
29:34
this is many decades ago now. My undergraduate college was in
29:38
a small city, 100,000 people in the city.
29:41
And there were many Christian and Catholic, different
29:44
denominations of Christianity churches.
29:47
And my, my buddies and I counted one time, we knew the statistics
29:50
about the number of homeless people in the city, you know,
29:53
several, whatever, a couple, maybe it was something unhoused
29:57
homeless people on the street, any given night, some hundreds
29:59
of people. And we thought that's less
30:03
people than there are Christian churches in this city.
30:06
If every church could just care for one, there would be no
30:09
homelessness. And of course that's probably
30:11
impossible for all kinds of reasons.
30:13
But I think about that with migration, with immigration and
30:16
deportation or repatriation, whatever we want to call it, if
30:20
we were to care for the really the needy among us, the
30:26
government wouldn't have quite so much to worry about.
30:30
And maybe we could also come up with plans of how to legalize
30:33
those who could be legalized, to deport those who need to be
30:36
deported because they're dangerous or for whatever
30:39
reason, and to sort out this big mess.
30:43
I think the kind of devil's advocate response to that as
30:45
well, the better you make the systems, the better the
30:48
healthcare, the better the economic opportunities, the
30:50
better the Catholic Charities welcoming you with open arms,
30:54
you know, the more you're incentivizing illegal border
30:56
crossing. So I think that's kind of this
30:58
other aspect that is so challenging.
31:02
And, you know, yeah, I've just seen, I've seen good Christians
31:06
that I know, Christians that I know that are authentic
31:09
Christians saying, you know, mass deportations is the only
31:12
way to undo this this mess. And then other Christians saying
31:15
no, no, no, you can do deportations, certainly of
31:17
criminals and then you can clamp down on border security.
31:21
But then don't RIP, you know, law abiding families apart,
31:24
right? So there's different prudential
31:26
ways to deal with the the. Pickle that were.
31:29
More go that route, by the way. It's, it seems, a more just and
31:34
humane response. It's again, you said that so
31:38
well, Lila, it's a prudential judgement and I think that the
31:42
church and good Christians should help guide the prudential
31:46
decision making of our legislators, help form it, help
31:50
shape it, but we can't. We are not the ones to make
31:53
those decisions. We inform those decisions.
31:56
So yes, it's a both of those solutions would be that is the
32:03
the draconian everybody out would be one way quickly to
32:08
solve the problem. But it could create a lot of
32:10
other problems, right? Certainly could, and that's
32:12
certainly that's right. But we also can't keep living
32:16
with the unregulated immigration situation that we've been living
32:19
in in our country for the last many decades now.
32:21
So where's the middle ground? This is precisely why these
32:25
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Use the code Lila. There's this clip I wanted to
33:32
get your thoughts on from our vice president.
33:34
So Vice President JD Vance is a Catholic convert.
33:37
I know, you know, and you know, he has, you know, folks on the
33:41
podcast know I'm really grateful for some of the things that he
33:44
said and done so far. I was really disappointed during
33:47
the campaign because he had this 100% pro-life record and it was
33:50
really great in the Senate. And then he started saying he
33:52
supports abortion pills alongside Trump and, you know,
33:56
making a very obvious compromises to stay in Trump's
34:00
good graces as VP. And then I had other people
34:02
saying, well, he's just trying to get in and then he's going to
34:04
do good work. You know, the jury's still out
34:06
on a lot of this, how it's all going to play out.
34:08
Obviously, we should pray for Vice President JD Van because he
34:11
has a huge, you know, both opportunity and responsibility.
34:15
But anyways, this is a statement that he made about the US
34:19
Conference of Catholic Bishop statement that we just read and
34:23
their criticism of the mass deportation policy executive
34:28
order that the Trump administration was pushing,
34:30
which included deportations at people's potential places of
34:35
worship, schools, basically anywhere.
34:37
Like you don't, there's not like a special, yeah, you can deport,
34:40
just go deport. There's a big job to do, you
34:43
know, government agents just go deport because it's a big job.
34:45
So that was kind of the government's approach, you know.
34:47
And so this is him responding to the US Catholic Conference of
34:51
Bishops saying, hey, hey, you're not allowed to deport on our
34:53
turf, basically. But we generally support your
34:56
right to do deportations, you know, in a in a reasonable way.
35:00
So this is what he said. This was on Face the Nation.
35:03
Let me just address this particular issue, Margaret,
35:06
because as a practicing Catholic, I was actually
35:09
heartbroken by that statement. And I think that the US
35:11
Conference of Catholic Bishops needs to actually look in the
35:14
mirror a little bit and recognize that when they receive
35:17
over $100 million to help resettle illegal immigrants, are
35:22
they worried about humanitarian concerns or are they actually
35:25
worried about their bottom line? We're going to enforce
35:28
immigration law. We're going to protect the
35:30
American people. Donald Trump promised to.
35:33
Do that, and I believe the US Conference of Catholic Bishops
35:36
if they're worried about the humanitarian costs.
35:38
Of immigration enforcement let them talk about the children who
35:41
have been sex trafficked because of the wide open border of.
35:44
Joe Biden, you. Let them talk about.
35:47
People like Lake and Riley, who were brutally.
35:49
Murdered, I support, kind of cut off.
35:51
Here. But so Margaret, the famous
35:54
Margaret pushes back and says, so you support going into
35:56
school. So she's basically trying to
35:57
address what the Catholic Bishops were specifically
35:59
speaking on. And he, you know, JD Vance,
36:01
president, vice President Vance kind of sidestepped that a
36:03
little bit and said, well, I support, you know, generally
36:05
speaking, immigration enforcement.
36:06
So he wasn't specifically doubling down and saying I
36:09
support deporting people at schools, but that was the policy
36:12
of his boss, you know, of the president.
36:14
So anyways, curious your take on on that.
36:17
I, I like president, Vice president and fans very much.
36:20
And I'm, I'm grateful for his strong voice and also his
36:23
courage in standing up for the president's agenda and policy.
36:28
I think he's doing it. He's doing the best job he can
36:31
possibly do given this very broken immigration system.
36:35
So he mentioned, he said something there about the fact
36:37
that they're, that the Catholic Charities and these institutions
36:41
are receiving government money, humanitarian support.
36:45
And this is where it gets complicated.
36:47
Once again. We, we, we mentioned this just a
36:49
few minutes ago. I think that in the history of
36:53
Christianity and in times of Christendom when, when whole
36:58
countries were Christian nations, the church was the
37:01
place where you could have refuge.
37:03
If you were in a feud with somebody and you made it to the
37:06
steps of the church, you could not be killed.
37:10
It was a safe place. Where then from that safe place,
37:14
then judicial arrangements could be made.
37:19
But the church has to be a safe place that cares for the poor.
37:23
And I think that the bishops are simply reminding us of that
37:27
truth, as is the Holy Father. And yet the government has a
37:31
right to enforce her laws. You can't just walk into our
37:34
nation, into our country across an open border and pretend that
37:38
you're a citizen here. You just can't do it.
37:40
So it is tough. And I do think, I do think that
37:45
it would be wrong for the government to infringe upon the
37:49
charitable sovereignty of churches as places where the
37:54
poor can find help and assistance.
37:56
That would be going too far, I think.
38:00
So I don't think the church should be required to report the
38:03
parishioners who are not legal citizens.
38:05
I don't think she should be required.
38:07
That should be required of her. But schools are also
38:10
governmental places. They are they factor into, and
38:13
this is one of those interceptions between church
38:15
organizations and the government.
38:17
The, the, the government is responsible for the education of
38:19
her citizens. And if it's a Catholic school,
38:22
well, then we're going to have some muddy water there.
38:24
What are we going to do? Can the government ask the
38:27
school? You may only teach citizens the
38:30
government has the right to do that if she wants.
38:32
To if it's receiving public funds.
38:34
If it's receiving public funds. But if it's a private Catholic
38:36
school then you have no right to do.
38:38
That we still have that freedom in this country, thanks be to
38:40
God. We still have the the freedom
38:43
for for religious organizations of whatever religion to exercise
38:48
this kind of autonomy. But then they can't take
38:50
government money then, you know, because that gets muddy.
38:53
And get some money. Pope Francis wrote a letter this
38:56
month to the US bishops on this topic.
38:59
I'm I know you're familiar with this.
39:00
I want to quote this and get your thoughts on it.
39:03
He compared migrants in the letter to hold a Holy Family,
39:06
one fleeing. This is raised a big and and
39:08
this isn't the first Christian person who's done this Pope
39:11
Francis doing that. There have been, you know,
39:13
evangelicals and others and certain folks in the left wing
39:16
certainly saying, you know, the Holy Family were refugees.
39:19
They were refugees. We need to, you know, respect
39:22
and care for refugees, which I fully agree with that.
39:25
And then there's a response of, well, someone just coming
39:28
undocumented here is a de facto a refugee.
39:31
But anyways, this is the excerpt I wanted to read, Pope Francis
39:36
writes. I have followed closely the
39:38
major crisis that is taking place in the United States with
39:41
the initiation of a program of mass deportations.
39:44
The rightly formed conscience cannot fail to make a critical
39:47
judgment and express its disagreement with any measure
39:49
that tacitly or explicitly identifies the illegal status of
39:53
some migrants with criminality. So that's a big point right
39:57
there he's making. What do you think about that?
39:59
So basically you if you have illegal status.
40:03
De facto, you're a criminal. And.
40:05
He's trying to make this distinction that no, you're not
40:08
de facto or criminal with illegal status.
40:09
And some people will say, well, of course you are.
40:11
Yeah, you've broken a law. But I think the point there, I'm
40:13
going to try to I don't want to be a Pope's planer, you know,
40:16
sort of because I think that there I have some problems with
40:19
this, with this statement from the Holy Father personally in
40:22
the sense that I don't know that it's the most helpful.
40:28
It's not so helpful actually for lay faithful to he wrote it to
40:32
bishops. It's a letter to bishops.
40:35
And I think he's trying there if I can try to defend his
40:39
statement there. Just because someone commits a
40:41
crime doesn't mean that they are a criminal in their essence.
40:46
You know, when you make a traffic violation, you know, a
40:49
misdemeanor crime, you know, you're we wouldn't say, oh,
40:52
there's a criminal. We would say there's someone who
40:54
broke a traffic law. So there's a difference.
40:57
He's saying there's a difference between someone who has broken
40:59
an immigration law by entering our country illegally versus
41:03
someone who is a real criminal because they committed homicide
41:06
or they, you know, were involved in human trafficking or
41:09
whatever, right. So those people, that's criminal
41:12
activity that we could say, yeah, that that there's a
41:14
difference to that kind of criminality.
41:16
That person person could be deported.
41:20
OK. So I I just think that there's a
41:22
there are more distinctions to be made there.
41:24
We have to ask Lila, when the Holy Father does something like
41:28
this, writes a letter like this, what is he trying to do?
41:30
You know, we Catholics, we owe the Holy Father religious
41:35
obedience of Sequim Religiosum is what the language of the
41:39
Church. And that a sort of respect, not
41:42
because he's should tell us how to govern our lives politically,
41:47
but because he's going to remind us of how we ought to think
41:50
about our lives as Christians. He's trying to remind the
41:53
bishops and through them to remind us we need to treat
41:57
people with dignity. They have human dignity.
42:00
Even the hardened criminal in prison on death row, they're
42:05
still worthy of our giving them dignity as a human person.
42:10
They're not just a group of people to be treated as such.
42:14
OK. So, yeah, this there's also part
42:19
of the problem with this kind of a letter is that it seems to
42:22
represent a certain political partisanship on the part of the
42:26
Holy Father. That's how it's interpreted.
42:28
And so I think that if there's some of that there, we can take
42:31
issue with that. Do you think that is the case,
42:34
that Pope Francis? And again, you're right, it's a
42:36
letter to bishops. It's not to lay people.
42:38
It's not to the. Public letter we can all
42:39
Republic. Do you think that he is taking a
42:42
political stance? Well, he seems to.
42:44
He seems to have JD Vance very much in the crosshairs there
42:46
toward the end of that letter where he he actually tries to
42:49
correct his interpretation of the Ordo Almoris, the order of
42:52
love that that JD Vance famously cited in in some of his
42:57
political statements about this. It's a ancient Christian
43:00
principle that comes really from the Gospel, but then also
43:03
through Saint Thomas Aquinas and Saint Augustine about we are
43:07
called to care for those who are closest to us and we're supposed
43:10
to love everybody. And that's what the Pope is
43:12
reminding of us out in this letter.
43:16
But the way that we love people outside of our own immediate
43:19
families depends on their proximity to us.
43:23
So that that part of this letter is I think the most partisan or
43:29
seems to be the most partisan in the way that it is taking issue
43:32
directly with a statement that Vice President Vance made.
43:36
I'd love to thank you for noting that, because I think that's a
43:39
very interesting exchange that happened.
43:41
And I want to pull up what JD Vance said.
43:43
And then this part of the letter where Pope Francis seemingly is
43:46
responding directly to JD Vance. So what is Ordo or Morris?
43:51
Vice President JD Vance invokes the medieval Catholic concept.
43:54
This is how The Associated Press Press is reporting this.
43:58
Love it. But he says JD Vance says just
44:01
Google Ordo or Morris. You love your family and then
44:05
you love your neighbor. And then this is JD Vance.
44:07
Then you love your neighbor and then you love your community and
44:09
then you love your fellow citizens in your own country.
44:11
And then after that, you can focus on and prioritize the rest
44:13
of the world. He claimed that the far left had
44:16
inverted that. He said this is basic common
44:19
sense because one's moral duties to one's children outweigh your
44:22
duties to a stranger who lives thousands of months away.
44:26
We that example again from the the Democrats and Martha's
44:29
Vineyard or leftist and Martha's Vineyard, they have great love
44:33
for the immigrant down on the border, the southern border.
44:36
But as soon as that immigrant shows up at Martha's Vineyard,
44:39
get out of my house. That's a perfect inversion of
44:42
the order of Amoris. They can love someone far away
44:44
because it's just an idea, not a real person.
44:47
So Pope Francis says in response, Christian love is not,
44:51
this is part of that larger letter to the bishops you were
44:53
just talking about, and you're talking about his part directly
44:56
to JD Vance. He says Christian love is not a
44:58
concentric expansion of interest that little by little extend to
45:01
other persons and groups. In other words, the human person
45:04
is not a mere individual, relatively expansive with some
45:07
philanthropic feelings. The true or to Amoris that must
45:10
be promoted is that which we discover by meditated constantly
45:14
on the parable of the Good Samaritan, that is, by
45:16
meditating and the love that builds a fraternity open to all
45:19
without exception. Right.
45:22
OK, so the charitable reading of this, a positive reading of
45:25
this, is that yes, we are called to love God first and love all
45:29
things in God. We have a certain respect and
45:33
love for the dignity of every human individual on the whole
45:36
face of the earth. We love them all because we love
45:40
God, who is their creator. That's true.
45:43
And yet God puts people into our orbit.
45:46
The Good Samaritan found a poor beggar on the street and he
45:50
cared for him. So you could say.
45:53
There were different socio economic and different religions
45:56
to our different ethnic backgrounds.
45:57
That's right. So I think what the Pope is
46:01
saying is that if our understanding of the order of
46:04
Morris means that I I love those closest to me, but the further
46:08
out you go, the less I even think about those people or care
46:11
for them or treat them like really human people in my
46:13
imagination or in my heart, then that's not the true Ordo Amoris.
46:18
OK. And I think that's a fairpoint.
46:20
We don't simply a person is not somebody else's problem.
46:25
A person is never somebody else's problem.
46:27
A person is always a person made in the image and likeness of
46:31
God. Now, it might be that I can do
46:33
nothing about the needy refugee who's living on the other side
46:38
of town. Maybe I don't have any contact
46:40
with them. Maybe there's no opportunity for
46:42
me to cross their path, but as soon as that person becomes the
46:45
poor beggar, I cross as a Samaritan, even if they are not
46:49
of my race, then I am called to love them in Christ.
46:53
So again, I'm trying to I'm trying to note how there's a
46:58
some political complexity to this letter and even
47:04
pointedness, and also try to give you a read that in
47:08
religious obedience to our Holy Father.
47:10
What is he trying to teach us or teach the bishops and through
47:13
them to teach us that we cannot simply categorize people in our
47:18
heart or in our imagination as a problem, somebody else's problem
47:21
to be solved? It's a kind of an
47:24
objectification of them to do it, to do that.
47:26
Correct. You know, Saint Augustine the
47:28
Great, the great Saint Augustine, he has a very clear
47:32
dichotid. He, he understood in his own
47:34
heart. In the confessions we read about
47:36
this, that there's this world of the fallen world of my fallen
47:42
nature that rests that wars against the life of grace within
47:47
me. And that's also a political and
47:50
global thing. He wrote about that later in his
47:52
in his life, much later in his life in the city of God, that
47:55
war between the Kingdom of Christ, the Kingdom of God, the
47:58
city of God at war with the city of man, which is the fallen
48:02
world. And we see this playing out in
48:04
these questions. Where can we bring Christ's
48:08
Kingdom more clearly to the fore and keep the fallen part of our
48:14
nature more at Bay? We can't think in worldly terms.
48:17
We have to think in evangelical terms.
48:21
And again, that doesn't solve the actual problem.
48:23
What do we do with millions upon millions of people who whose
48:28
situations need to be resolved? Somehow?
48:31
It keeps coming back to that dilemma, doesn't it Lila?
48:33
There, yes, it, I mean, I think the, I think often individuals
48:39
like to say it's black or white, you know, like this is
48:42
absolutely the way this should be or this is absolutely the way
48:44
that should be. And I think the nuance you're
48:46
providing of, you know, it depends on the person's
48:49
obligations and roles and responsibilities.
48:51
What's your job in this kind of whole orbit of what's happening?
48:55
And there is a prudential element here where there are
49:00
some clear right and wrongs, but they're also some areas that are
49:03
Gray. Right, there's a there's AI
49:05
think the church, despite her maybe some of her deficiencies
49:09
in cooperating with too much of the leftist agenda of politics
49:14
sometimes and then taking money from the government to execute
49:16
that. She's also done a that's a
49:19
Catholic Church in America at least has done a great job of
49:21
providing some concrete solutions.
49:23
It's a very not easy, but it's available for people who are
49:28
here illegally to reach out to either their parish or the the
49:33
diocesan headquarters and ask, do you have, can you help me
49:36
speak with an immigration lawyer who might be able to regularize
49:39
my situation? The church has done tremendous,
49:42
a tremendous amount and saying, yes, we'll do that out of the
49:46
goodness of our hearts. We'll do that for free.
49:48
You just have to ask so that someone is not afraid to go to
49:52
church because they're worried that the pastor is going to
49:54
think that, know that they're illegal here illegally and worry
49:59
that he's going to do something about it.
50:02
But maybe the pastor can say, OK, I know you're here
50:04
illegally. We can help you figure out the
50:06
situation. That goes back to kind of this
50:09
question about the path to citizenship, right?
50:11
And I think that's another hot debate of, you know, should
50:14
there be a path to citizenship for people who are undocumented?
50:17
And, you know, a lot of people I think do, you know, can achieve
50:21
citizenship maybe via marriage, although that can be very
50:24
painstaking or they have citizen children and then that process.
50:30
But yeah, it's all, it's all very challenging.
50:33
It's all very hard. And, and you know, especially if
50:35
you're at the child that's brought here or you were born
50:38
here and your parents aren't documented, that's another layer
50:42
of pain here. We have to figure, the
50:44
government is going to have to figure some way forward in all
50:46
of this. And right now, prudentially, the
50:48
current administration is saying we're going to do a little bit
50:52
of group slash and not slash and burn.
50:54
That's not the right way to say it, but we have to at least
50:57
solve the problem of hardened criminals who are freely
51:02
wandering within our borders. OK, That seems completely
51:05
reasonable. Now, how this is going to
51:07
trickle down as the months unfold, then I think the rubber
51:09
is going to meet the road. And we're going to see, are we
51:11
going to be witnessing the mass deportations or repatriations of
51:16
entire, you know, families? And I don't know.
51:20
The government has a right to regulate all of this.
51:23
And we have the responsibility to remind her of mercy and to
51:27
show show her that is our government, the Christian face
51:31
of care and concern for the poor and the needy.
51:34
Beautifully, beautifully said father.
51:36
There's this news article out today Trump deporting people at
51:39
a slower rate than Biden's last year in office.
51:43
So, you know, with all of the roar of the administration on
51:47
this issue, in actuality, what's happening right now, it looks a
51:50
little different I'd. Have to I'm not quite sure what
51:53
the I'd like to see the the I. Mean it says U.S.
51:56
President Donald Trump deported 37637 thousand 600, 160 people
52:01
during his first month in office, previously unpublished
52:04
U.S. Department of Homeland Security
52:05
data shows, far less than the monthly average of 57,000
52:09
removals and returns in the last full year of Joe Biden's
52:12
administration. Removals and returns.
52:13
Removals and returns. Fascinating information that
52:17
we're deporting at a slower rate right now anyways.
52:19
It might change next month, of course.
52:21
That's right. Well, and also the difference
52:23
there is that the removals and returns means that there are
52:25
people who are taken out of the country deported and they come
52:29
right back in. So I mean, that's certainly
52:31
going to be changing now. Our border is much harder to get
52:33
across now than it was. It's a good point, yeah, it
52:35
says. DHS spokesperson Trisha
52:37
McLaughlin said Biden era deportation numbers appeared
52:40
artificially high because of higher levels of illegal
52:43
immigration Trump campaigned for.
52:45
The White House promised to deport millions of illegal
52:48
immigrants in the largest deportation operation in
52:51
history. At initial, figures suggest
52:52
Trump could struggle to match these higher deportation
52:55
numbers. It actually makes sense doesn't
52:57
live because if, if as we've seen in the first month of the
53:01
administration, the border is much more secure, 94% more
53:05
secure, then of course there will be far fewer people coming
53:12
unannounced across our porous border who then need to be
53:15
deported. That's a great thing.
53:18
I don't, I don't that's a great thing.
53:19
It means that if someone is legitimately seeking asylum or a
53:23
real refugee who really needs help, there's a way that they
53:25
can present themselves at the border legally and be treated as
53:29
such. Someone who is legally asking to
53:31
enter into a foreign land, which is the way it ought to be.
53:35
Again, everyone has a right to migrate and every country has a
53:38
right to protect her borders and regulate the movement of people
53:41
across it. So I think that would be great
53:44
if we saw that it does look like less because there are fewer
53:49
people coming in illegally who need to be deported or
53:53
repatriated, which is the word I like better.
53:55
But. One more quote I want to read
53:59
here and get your thoughts on, and this is from Edward Fazer
54:04
who is a Canon lawyer philosopher.
54:08
I'm sure you're familiar with him.
54:09
He says scripture teaches. Do not neglect to show
54:12
hospitality to strangers. Hebrews 13 two.
54:15
But also not everyone should be brought into your house, for
54:18
many are the snares of the craft.
54:19
They admit strangers into your home and they will stir up
54:21
trouble. Syrac 11/20, 9:34.
54:24
This illustrates how the practical moral and political
54:27
questions often cannot be settled by appeal to simplistic
54:30
slogans and selective quotations from authorities.
54:33
They sometimes involve multiple considerations that have to be
54:36
carefully and calmly bound violence before making a
54:38
judgement about specific courses of action guided by the virtue
54:41
of prudence, which you've invoked many times.
54:44
Father, the Church herself teaches this.
54:46
It is quote up to the public powers who are responsible for
54:50
the common good to determine the number of refugees or immigrants
54:53
which their country can accept there.
54:55
You go. Well said, as I would expect
54:57
from Edward Fazer. So yeah, that's right.
55:00
It's a prudential decision here or determination, and people are
55:04
going to disagree about it. Let's be honest there.
55:08
There is a legitimate breadth of opinion about this from the
55:11
perspective of a Christian and of a Catholic Christian.
55:14
So there you go. There we go.
55:17
Well, thank you, Father, for wading into the waters.
55:20
I felt like we didn't really, of course, as usual with these
55:22
complex issues, Lila, we didn't have a kind of this is how it
55:26
should be. And here's the bottom line as
55:28
Edward Fraser there. Like you weren't telling people
55:30
exactly how to vote, You know, back we were that was a that was
55:33
a fun conversation. And thank you for doing that.
55:35
Father and I before the election, for those to remember,
55:38
I had him here and we were going back and forth.
55:40
You were a bit in the hot seat. I apologize.
55:41
But we were going back and forth about what do we do with this,
55:44
you know, this election. And obviously we both agreed
55:46
don't vote for Kamala. We were we were aligned on that.
55:49
But then there was folks knew my concerns with Trump at the time,
55:53
especially with his statements on on life.
55:55
Well, and I think that just even more, even more reason both with
55:58
a, a Catholic vice president now and an administration that that
56:02
seems to be really turning the tide of public sentiment about a
56:07
lot of very important things. I think you and I, Lila, and you
56:10
can do this much better than I can.
56:11
We need to keep pushing hard for the protection of human life in
56:17
with the president himself, with the vice president and with all
56:20
of these members of the new administration.
56:23
So don't give up your activism, Lila, because we, we can't give
56:26
up on the IVF stuff right now. We can't give up on there.
56:30
There's a lot of hope and there's a lot of room for
56:34
improvement, for even more hope. So I would love to see a vice
56:39
president or I would love to see President Trump's marriage
56:42
regularized. He's married to a Catholic
56:44
woman. Melania Trump is a baptized
56:47
Catholic from Slovenia. I would love to see RFK Junior
56:54
get back into a practice of his of his ancestral faith.
56:57
And become pro-life. Become pro-life and and be in a
57:01
in a marriage that is legitimate, a good Catholic
57:03
marriage and these things, all of these things are possible.
57:07
We have, you know, people who can have entrees to such to such
57:11
important figures in our in our land, and prayer really works.
57:15
It does and speaking the truth in another season.
57:18
Prayer and truth. I think a little bit of praise
57:22
about about the power of prayer. I don't know if you remember
57:25
this last, was it March or May, whatever, nine months from
57:29
December would have been, I guess, May Cardinal Burke, the
57:32
great Raymond Cardinal Burke, American Cardinal of the Church,
57:36
called a nine month novena to prepare for the feast of Our
57:41
Lady Guadalupe on December 12th. And people all around the world
57:45
in their hundreds of thousands were praying this nine month
57:48
novena. It's a strange kind of novena.
57:50
Usually not a novena is 9 days, but nine months of prayer for
57:55
especially for the Americas and especially for our own nation.
57:58
And I think that that prayer worked in the election in the
58:03
the way that public sentiment is turning toward things that are
58:06
much better than they were certainly six months ago.
58:10
And I think we have great 'cause for hope.
58:12
We have to keep praying. And Our Lady is, she loves us
58:16
and she's the Empress of our land and she will care for us if
58:19
we ask her to also about immigration.
58:22
Why not? I love that we're about to enter
58:26
Lent. I want to just ask you, I know
58:28
the Abbey always has things up its sleeve that their sleeves
58:31
that they're doing to help the, the, the faithful, you know, the
58:34
trying to be faithful. Can you just share what the
58:37
Abbey is working on in Ever Mode Institute with regard to Lent?
58:40
Yes, please join us for you. Thank you, thank you for asking.
58:43
Please join us for our Lenten program called the Great Fast.
58:47
Maybe you can put some of the that the links to it down in the
58:50
description below the great facets through the Abbott
58:52
circle. We had a, a similar program last
58:55
year and many 10s of thousands of people participated.
58:58
We're doing the great fast again this year and we're encouraging
59:02
people to fast every day of the 40 days of the holy season of
59:04
Lent with a, a real fast. So a serious approach to fasting
59:08
in the Lenten season. And it has also beautiful
59:11
meditations in the morning and table reading and some, some
59:15
beautiful, It's a beautiful program.
59:17
And I hope that people will join us in preparing well for Easter
59:21
by living Lent really, really well this year.
59:24
The great fast. I love it.
59:25
Thank you, Father. Thank you, Lila.
59:27
God bless you. So much for joining the podcast
59:29
again. It's always such a pleasure and
59:30
honor to happy life. It's my joy.
59:32
God bless you. A huge thank you to our partner.
59:35
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