Online Catholicism and the Rise of the Influencers

[00:00:00] Foreign influencers have impacted our society, but they've also impacted the church. And when they have, and there are scandals with those influencers that can impact souls. How should Catholic, how should Catholics navigate these waters? Hello, I'm Eric Sammons, your host editor chief of Crisis magazine. That's what we're going to talk about today. Before we get started, just want to encourage people to smash that like button, subscribe to the channel, let other people know about it. I really appreciate everybody who does do that, especially those who subscribe to the channel and like it because that does tell the algorithm, the almighty algorithm, that other people would be interested in watching this. So please do that. I do appreciate that also those who are joining us in the live chat, I always appreciate, appreciate that when you join us live here on Tuesday afternoons, feel free to make your comments and I will try to address them at the end of the program. [00:01:02] Okay, so today I want to talk about, it's kind of actually a number of related topics that all kind of came together and it all started because there was a controversy, a scandal that broke this, this past weekend in kind of the Catholic online, Catholic influencer, Catholic world. [00:01:20] And that was an apologist, a young apologist who goes by Voice of Reason. His name is Alex Jurado. I think, I'm not 100% sure how to pronounce that. [00:01:31] There was some accusations against him that he was sending inappropriate texts to young women. [00:01:38] One was even accusation that he was doing this to a 14 year old girl. I believe he's in his early 20s. [00:01:44] And now I just want to make it very clear he has come out, Alex has come out and denied, basically denied them. He has said that at least he said that the, the accusations about him Texting with a 14 year old girl are not true and that just in general he seemed to deny them. So I want to make sure that's very clear. These are allegations, these are not. These haven't been proven any court of law or anything like that. There were posted screenshots of these texts with photos and things like that. So it was pretty damning. But again, I, I don't want to say he is definitely guilty of this stuff, but it does bring up a lot of issues involved with, with him, but also with the wider kind of online Catholic culture of which obviously I'm a part of as well. [00:02:31] Now I will admit I never even heard a voice of reason until relatively recently. But then I found out he's actually not been around very long. He's kind of have a media media meter Meteoric, Okay. You know what I mean? A fast rise kind of in the Catholic world, and especially in the Catholic apologetics world, Catholic online world. [00:02:51] And so. And I'll be honest, the first I heard of him was when I saw a video of him talking to look like a. Maybe teaching a catechism class. Teaching. It was some small classroom type setting. [00:03:05] And he was railing on Taylor Marshall. [00:03:08] And he specifically said, Taylor Marshall is garbage. And then when he basically said, anybody who follows Taylor Marshall will eventually leave the church. And he talks about how he used to, but I guess he didn't leave the church, you know, he said he used to. But I will just say this. I try to be generous and charitable with everybody as much as I can, but when he said Taylor Marshall is garbage, I honestly will just say this. I wrote him off. I think I said, okay, this is not somebody who should be taken seriously, who should be considered like a leader, a public figure in the church, as an apologist, anything like that. [00:03:47] Not because Taylor Marshall isn't wrong at times. Taylor and I, we know each other. He knows I disagree with him at times. He disagrees with me at times. I don't think everything he does is like, golden or something like that. [00:04:00] That being said, you don't. You just don't call somebody else garbage. That's just not what we do as Catholics. Even if you disagree with them, like I have many disagreements with somebody, like, for example, Father James Martin or Mike Lewis or something like that, I don't call them garbage. [00:04:16] I mean, that. That is just. It just shows a complete disconnection from how we should act as Catholics. When you do that, you can say his teachings are false. His teachings lead people away from the church. You could probably even say his teachings are garbage. Yeah, you could say that. [00:04:34] But he called Taylor Marshall garbage. He called another a fellow Catholic garbage. Now, I'll be very clear. [00:04:41] I defend Taylor Marshall as one of our best as far as. And I say that from just simply the fact that I have more people come to me saying that Taylor Marshall helped them with their faith than anybody else other than I hear Scott Hahn's name more. I hear Taylor Marshall's name second behind Scott Hahn as far as people just coming up to me, talking to me, saying, Taylor Marshall really helped me grow my faith. So. But whether you like him or not, you just don't do that. And so I was very upset. Upset, it's not the word, because this stuff doesn't really bother me that much. But I was very concerned, though, when I saw other Catholic figures really start to promote this guy. I mean, he became one of the. You know, he was kind of embraced by Catholic Answers, which. I like Catholic Answers. I've defended them in the past. He had a whole podcast with Matt Frad where. And honestly, that was just cringe. I'm friends with Matt as well. I think he does a lot of great work. I mean, the truth is, I like most of these people who are online. I'm not like, I'm not one of these people who's like, okay, this. This guy's dead to me because I disagree with him on this issue, whatever the case may be. [00:05:47] You know, I just don't think that's. There's much purpose in that. But the. I saw the clips from the Matt Frad show where he was. They were just railing on tradition and traditional Latin mass in a really uncharitable way. [00:06:01] And. But the fact is, is that, like, you took a guy who literally just last week, it feels like, started being a public figure in the Catholic Church. He's very young. [00:06:12] He has very low life experience. He. He's calling Taylor Marshall garbage, like, kind of in a. In a private setting almost. I don't even know if he knew that was being videoed and that would get out because it didn't look like it was a conference or a YouTube video. It was just simply a. Like he was teaching a class, I think. [00:06:31] And so if you do that, I just don't see how you. You. You. [00:06:36] You kind of help that guy and consider him somebody that we should look towards, that we should consider even. I'm saying if all the allegations against him about the texting stuff are completely false, even assuming that I still thought that was a mistake, and I think it kind of brings up a lot of the issues that have kind of arisen in this Catholic kind of online world with influencers, professional Catholics, all the kind of term Conserv. Catholic Inc. Trading. You see these terms thrown around all the time online. [00:07:11] And I do think there's issues involved, but I think a lot of people get wrong, to be honest. Now, I know people say, well, yeah, Eric, you're one of them. Of course you're going to defend the industry. You're. You're part of the industry, after all. Okay, fine. If you don't want to listen to my opinion, I don't know why you are. [00:07:26] Because the fact is, you know, I have my opinions about this, and they are based upon the fact that I am part of it. I am part of this industry. [00:07:36] I think one problem we have is we're too quick to exalt somebody very kind of as the new person because we want. I think a lot of us is trying to attract young people so we make a big deal at person when they first kind of come onto the scene. And I do think we should go a little slower. [00:07:53] I mean I. Everybody knows my five year rule about converts. Somebody has to be converted to Catholicism for five years before I really think we should be giving them a platform. I hate that word by the way, because the whole platforming thing is kind of. I don't. Because we, you know, the whole like, oh, we can't give him a platform is usually used. That phrase is using a dumb sense. But I'm just trying to say that let somebody kind of marinate for a while in the church, learn what it means to be Catholic, live as a Catholic. I mean I've been a Catholic for 32 years now and I know the first couple years after I became, became Catholic, I didn't know what I didn't know. [00:08:32] And it was only through years of living as a Catholic, living with my then living with my wife who was a cradle Catholic and learning a lot of the traditions of the church, seeing other Catholic families, how they lived. That's what allowed me to understand Catholicism more. I don't claim to be the foremost expert, I just know what I know and I don't know a lot. But the fact is I have that rule for a reason because I really just think that we should go slow and I think it's true. Also, even for a cradle Catholic who kind of very young, I do think there should be some seasoning involved. Okay, yes. Maybe this is just my old fart nature. I don't know. I'm Gen X. I'm not a boomer for those who want to call me a boomer. But the point is that like I do think there's something to be said for maybe let somebody have a little life experience for a while. [00:09:21] They've been around for a few days, maybe they're at least 30, you know, something like that before we, we exalt them as, as the next coming of Scott Hahn or whoever. And speaking of which, the. That's the first thing I thought of when this scandal because there was another person as well along with voice of reason who had accusations against him. I can't remember now what his handle was. Depraved, sane or something like that. I can't remember now. [00:09:46] Now also accusation. Another young person, single person. [00:09:49] Well, look at the OGs of the Catholic apologetics world. I mentioned this on X yesterday. You got Scott Hahn, you got Patrick Madrid, you got Carl Keating, you have others. I don't. People some people didn't like. I didn't mention every single one. But there's others. Clearly these guys have been doing it for 30 plus years and not a hint of scandal is associated with them. Why? [00:10:10] And here's what I want to say, that maybe they won't like this, maybe they won't. Why? Because each of them is extremely boring in their lifestyle. [00:10:21] They're married, they have kids, they don't do crazy things, they just simply are. They're not all, they haven't spent their whole life online. [00:10:30] They're just regular people who are trying to do the Lord's work. And I think they're doing, they've done a very good job. And there's others, like I said. [00:10:38] But the fact is, is that sometimes boring is good. [00:10:44] I mean, you know, we don't have to always say the person that we put out at the next conference is the former porn star or the onlyfans or whatever, or somebody had some dramatic thing. I mean, I understand those stories can be powerful at times and I'm not discounting those people because I think it's beautiful what God has done for them. [00:11:04] What I am saying though is putting them on a pedestal on day one again, let them marinate as Catholics for a while before we, we just throw them on all our programs and talk to them all the time, you know, about like used to them as examples. I mean it was pretty clear that voice of reason, Alex just did not have the seasoning he needed to be a public, you know, figure in the Catholic Church to be an effective one. I mean, just the way he talked about traditional showed a fundamental misunderstanding, a lack of knowledge. I mean, this isn't like him being dumb. This is just an ignorance. He clearly had not really grappled with the issues and looked at the, at tradition, the arguments from traditionalist things like that before he mentioned them. And again, I'm not saying you don't have. You have to agree with the arguments of traditionalists, but at least show, show you have given them the effort to understand them before you go out there. And I think that's something for all of us. I point most of these things I say here, I'm pulling it myself as well. I just want to make that clear. [00:12:05] But when we go up there, if you're going to go up there and you're going to rail on your fellow Catholics, at least Understand why they believe what they believe, why they say what they say, and don't call people garbage. [00:12:18] Now, I also want to talk about. This is related to this whole issue, like the whole thing about influencers and. And professional Catholics. I see a lot online people like to kind of disparage, oh, he's an influencer. He's a professional Catholic. [00:12:32] I'll be Honest, I'm not 100% sure exactly at what point you become an influencer. And here I'm just going to use my own personal story here. [00:12:41] So, you know, I wrote my first Catholic book that was published 2010, so 15 years ago. [00:12:48] So it's not like it was a gangbuster. I mean, I had a blog. Some people knew about it, but I was at most a very minor person in the kind of Catholic online world. [00:13:00] And then, like in 2014, I think it was, I started posting on X. [00:13:04] And just over time, more and more people started following me on X. [00:13:09] And it just. All I was doing on X, there was never any idea of, okay, let's try to build a brand on X. Let's try to, you know, try to make myself an influencer. That never crossed my mind, simply was like, hey, this is the public square. There's a good. There's a good case to be made that we need to be there. Catherine need to be there, defending the faith, talking about the faith, challenging those who are against the faith. I'm going to do this because that's kind of my personality. I like to do that. So I was like, I feel like God has given me some gifts in that area, so I'm going to do that. [00:13:42] So I just started doing it and my audience grew. And I noticed at some point, I'm not sure when it was, people started kind of talk, call me like an influencer, usually disparagingly, but even sometimes as a positive thing, like, you're an influencer. I'm like, I don't know what point I crossed over into an influencer. All I did was just kept on tweeting. That's all it was. I kept on spouting my opinions on X, Twitter than X. [00:14:09] And then, you know, more and more people started to follow me. And so. And I'm not even that big of a figure. I mean, by X terms, I mean you have to have, you know, a couple hundred thousand followers. And I have maybe 40 or something like that. [00:14:20] And so it's not like. So I'm not quite sure. I think, honestly, I think a lot of times people will tag others as Influencers just simply to try to diminish what they say, that, oh, he's just trying to get influence. He's trying to. He's making a business. And just so you know, full disclosure here. Last summer, I did apply to for the blue check mark because I felt like that would allow me to write more because I got frustrated with the 280 character limit. It would allow my post not to be basically lost in the shuffle. [00:14:54] And then so I did start getting paid. And I get paid. So I get paid to tweet. You know how much I get paid on average, I probably make a couple hundred dollars, maybe $300 in a month. [00:15:07] So with my 40 some thousand followers and my, you know, I tweet a couple times, a few times a day, you know, it's not, it's not sure I'll take it. But I don't like, I don't make tweets based upon, okay, this is going to make me more money because it's just not that much money. It's not like it's my, it's not like it's my livelihood or something like that. So the point though of all this is that, like, I really think that, like, I do know there are people out there who are probably trying to be influencers, but I honestly think a lot of the people out there that you call influencers are just simply people out in the public square who've been more successful than others, like Taylor Marshall. I know just to go back to him, he did not try to be an influencer. He's not like, oh, I want to be a Catholic influencer one day. No, he just said, I'm going to share my faith in the public square. And people thought, hey, I like what you say. I'm going to follow it. Scott Hahn never tried to be a Catholic influencer, even though he was before the day we called it that. Clearly, Scott Hahn has more influence on the Catholic world than almost any other layperson. [00:16:09] And so I just think that it becomes like a term that we use to try to knock somebody down because we don't like what they're saying. And the same thing is true of professional Catholics. Now, here's an argument, like some people say you should never work for the church. Basically, you should never. A layperson should never get paid for doing things for the church or promoting the faith. Obviously, you're, you can imagine I disagree with that because, yes, I get paid by Crisis magazine to run Crisis magazine, so I get paid for what I do. [00:16:41] But I think that's okay to get paid? Because I think, honestly, what you have to do is you have to judge somebody based upon their words and their actions, not upon whether or not they get paid to do it. If somebody looks like they are trying to be like clickbaity and trying to get people, you know, just trying to generate engagement farm, as they say in content farm, just trying to get more followers wherever they can, and they're not really concerned about the faith, sure, criticize them, but that's not like a. Every professional Catholic. There are tons and tons of professional Catholics who simply work at their parish, work at a diocese, work for an apostolate. Behind the scenes, are they all doing something wrong? [00:17:21] It just seems like the fingers are pointed at the front men, the people out front who are. Who are more public. But. But are you saying somebody who's the accountant for Catholic Answers is doing something wrong because he's getting paid to work for an apostolate? It's just kind of silly, you know, basically this. I mean, priests get paid. You know that, right? Priests get paid to work for the church. [00:17:42] You know, Catholic teachers get paid to work for the church. So I. I just think that the whole professional Catholic thing is kind of silly. Judge people based upon their content, about what they're saying, what they're doing. [00:17:54] If that looks like. [00:17:56] If it looks like they're constantly just trying to generate clicks, engagement, and not really trying to further the gospel, sure. I'm totally on board with criticism towards them. I mean, personally, to be honest, I think the bigger problem in the Catholic online world isn't the professional Catholics out there publicly, but I would say it's the anonymous Catholics. [00:18:22] Now, I have always been supportive of the right for somebody to create an anonymous account. Anonymous account, synonymous is probably more accurate because I do know there are real situations, especially in other countries, where Christians can be persecuted, like really persecuted and things like that. I get. I get it. [00:18:43] I'm not saying that's not a good thing. I would say, though, that people need to recognize the dangers that are associated with being an anonymous account. [00:18:53] There are real dangers to your soul of being an anonymous account, because what happens is you become somewhat disconnected from what you say. [00:19:02] You're willing to say things that you would never say to somebody in person, that you would never say in public under your own name. [00:19:12] And so you go further than you would normally. If somebody feels like if I just say what I normally would say, I could get fired from my job. I couldn't support my family. Okay, I'm gonna grant I'm gonna say, fine, you can do it. Now, just to be clear, you don't have to be online saying anything. It's not like you have some duty to say something. [00:19:29] But if it becomes a way in which you now say things that are, that are uncharitable, that are, that are attacking people that are nasty, that are frankly anti Catholic because they're, they're, they're attacking, you know, races or religions or something like that outside, you know, beyond the pale of Catholic charity, then your soul is in danger and you need to just stop doing that and maybe drop your anonymous account. I mean, the fact is, is because my, my perspective is I see a flood of anonymous accounts that comment on my post, for example, in X, and a large majority of them are just, they're, they're trash. They're, they're, they're. Now again, I'm not calling them trash. [00:20:18] I'm not calling them garbage. I'm saying the content, what they're writing is basically trash. It just is. [00:20:23] It's not even worth repeating most of it. And so I see all the time, and I'm like, now some of it's probably AI generated bots, things like that. Some of it aren't even Catholic. People claim they're Catholic, but they're not really Catholic. [00:20:35] They're just faking it. But if you're really Catholic and you're doing that and you're hiding behind this, remember, God hears and sees every single thing you do. And you, there will be an accounting for every single thing you hear and do. I mean, the fact that I've said so much online makes me a little bit concerned, I mean, a lot concerned, because I know I will be judged for it. The more I say online, the more I say publicly, the more things I will be judged for at the final judgment. So I have to be very careful. And I know that. But having my name publicly associated does help me because I don't want other people to be like, oh my gosh, you said that. I can't believe you said that. I mean, I already have that a little bit, but like, you know, because I have some check in what I say. And that's a good thing. I mean, that's not a bad thing because we shouldn't just say whatever comes into our minds because we're fallen creatures. Some of the things that fall in our mind are things that shouldn't be said, frankly. So I would just argue that a bigger danger in the online Catholic world is being an anonymous account rather than being an outfront. Public professional account. [00:21:40] Another thing I saw kind of in response to this is some people are saying we should just not have lay apologists. It really should be bishops and priests who are the ones who are defending the faith. Now, perhaps in an ideal, perfect world, that might be the case. But let's be honest, it's not like our bishops and priests have been moral exemplars over the past few decades. [00:22:01] I mean, really, that's where most of the scandals come, hasn't been from lay apologists like Scott Hahn or Patrick Magear or Carl Keating. It's been from bishops like Cardinal McCarrick and people like that. That's where our real scandal has come from. [00:22:15] And so I don't really get that. And the truth is I just don't accept the premise at all. I think it's a clericalist premise that isn't really in keeping with the whole of Catholic tradition. [00:22:26] Lay people have, from the beginning, defended the faith and explained the faith to others. In fact, it's our duty to go into the public square and to defend the faith and to practice the faith and to bring people, others to the faith. That's what we're all called to do. You don't have to be a priest or a bishop to do that. We're all called to do that. Yes. I would love to see good bishops and priests engaged in the online world. I will be honest, and this is just my opinion out there, but I have found the vast, vast, vast majority of online priests I see are just. It's cringe, it's awful. [00:23:02] They really are demeaning their office, their high dignity as priests in what they post about and what they say. There are exceptions. I'm not claiming there aren't. There are priests and bishops, not very many bishops, but there are priests especially, who do some good work online. I'm not claiming that doesn't happen. I'm just saying the vast majority of them don't. So lay people are definitely much better at this than priests are in general. [00:23:26] In fact, I found that priests are probably some of the most touchy people and most sensitive to criticism that you'll find online. [00:23:34] The fact is, is that we're all called to sanctify the world and we all have our missions. I'm not called to bring the sacraments to people, to celebrate Mass, to offer the divine sacrifice or anything like that, but I can be called to simply share the faith with others in the world. [00:23:54] And the truth is one of the things like, okay, there was some talk also about, like, what we really need is if we do have lay apologists, they need to have some type of oversight from the hierarchy. And the fact is, the massive failure of the hierarchy over the past few decades is a major problem. [00:24:19] It is a major problem in the fact that they have not done their duty to really defend the faith and to call out those who are outside of the faith or who are in the faith, who are, who are heretics or leading people astray. And they really should do that. [00:24:36] I mean, the problem is, of course, is you'll get some examples like where a bishop will come down hard on like somebody, like a Father James Altman, but then won't say a word about Father James Martin. [00:24:48] That's what we've seen. And so it's very difficult for us to wrap our heads around a situation in which the hierarchy does actually kind of have some oversight on what lay people are doing out in the public square online. [00:25:03] Personally, I think every single person who publicly presents himself as Catholic, kind of representing the Catholic faith in some way, shape or form, people like me and others, I do think they should be, they should have a priest who basically knows what they're saying in general online and keeps them in check. [00:25:23] Somebody who could say, yeah, you know, you can't say that. You, you have to, you have to go confession for that, or you have to delete that or whatever the case may be. And they need to, they need to follow that person and basically follow what they, their direction. I really do think that is. [00:25:39] I know a lot of situations, we just don't have that many priests that are willing to do something like that. But just, even if your pastor knows that you're online a lot and you kind of, and he, he knows basically what you're saying and doing, I think that's a good thing because you should, all of us lay people should be under some authority of the church. Doesn't necessarily have to be an official bishop or, or anything like that or a chaplain of the apostle or whatever, but it needs to be somebody, some clergy member, a priest or a bishop who will keep you in check in case you get out of control. [00:26:12] So I do think that's, that's something. And you know, I know it's almost impossible these days get spiritual direction, but having a spiritual director is even better where you can actually talk to them about what you're doing online, your activities online, things of that nature. [00:26:27] So let me kind of, I want to finish this up by talking about kind of what, what do we need? [00:26:33] What is the way forward? What do I think is the way that we keep the Catholic online world in check. I mean, some people want to kind of throw it all away and say, okay, we just need to go back to our farm, something like that. I'm totally on board. People go back to their farms. But the fact is, is that the people, the world is out there and we need to be engaged with the world. So there has to be some apostolate of the church to the online world. That's just the reality that we have to have. So if we're going to do that, how do we do that? The first thing I would say is, and something I've talked about a decent amount in the past is I think each one of us have to create controls on our online activity. I mean, I've explained mine before and I try to keep to them all the time and I'm usually pretty good. Sometimes they fall. But what I do is I have my social media on my computer in my office. [00:27:23] And so if I'm out my home office, if I'm outside of my office, in my, even in my home or anywhere else, I cannot access social media. So it's not on my phone. [00:27:34] And so I just simply, it becomes something I only do in that one space. That way when I leave my office, I'm not controlled by it. I'm not like thinking, oh, what is people saying about this? What are people saying about that? [00:27:46] We need to have these controls, we need to have limits. And the other thing I do, for example, I don't go on social media on Sundays. I just simply, I'm off social media no matter what. I mean, there's been some big stories that broke on Sundays. [00:27:56] Just like, nope, I'm not going to, I'm not going to go on social media because it's Sunday. I want it to be a day of rest, a day that I'm focused on the worship of God and following him and resting. And so we have to have that. I also think, and this is something more connected to some of the allegations against Voice of Reason against Alex, that I think this is something we need to make sure we mention. You need to have controls in your real life too, not just your online life. [00:28:22] I remember early in my marriage I was talking to my father in law and he was a good holy Catholic man. [00:28:29] And I remember him telling me, I mean he said very matter of factly, but what I thought at the time were very extreme measures he took in the public, in his work environment and the public with women. [00:28:43] He, for example, if he was on an elevator going up, and a woman. And he stopped at a floor, not the one he's going to, and a woman got on to the elevator with him. He would simply get off. He wouldn't say anything, you know, wouldn't make a scene, just simply step off, wait for the next elevator. He did not want to be alone in an elevator with another woman. [00:29:05] And it's because he knew the scandal that could be caused by just anything could be said, the potential for scandal. He knew also he could be falsely accused of something. He didn't want that to happen. But he was very reserved with women who were not his wife and of course, his daughters. [00:29:22] And I thought, that makes sense. I mean, Mike Pence got ridiculed for that back in the day. And Mike Pence was a smart man for doing that. I mean, I don't. You don't agree with all his politics, but you got to admit, I think that's smart. We need to have a certain distance. [00:29:37] Men. I'm talking to men right now. With women. You need to have a certain distance with women. And by that, I don't mean you're not friendly with women. I have friends at my parish, for example, women friends, and they're great. [00:29:50] But I'm not going to do something, for example, where I am alone with them or I get too friendly with them. There needs to be certain controls, because you just don't want to, first of all, give the appearance of scandal or lead somebody to scandal or lead yourself in a scandal. I mean, don't ever count on your human strength. [00:30:10] Don't ever put yourself in a situation that even appears to be a temptation, even if it's not a temptation for you. [00:30:17] And so we really do need to be smart about that, because, I mean, just texting people, women, inappropriate things. It started with the fact that you were texting these women and you shouldn't have been. [00:30:33] And so I think we need to be more strict about these rules that we place on ourselves. Obviously. Another one. No porn. I mean, let's be honest. I'm not accusing. [00:30:43] Voice of reason specifically of this. What I am saying, though, is the reason there is this disgusting texting going on between men and women who are not married to each other and they shouldn't be doing even if they're married, is because of porn. [00:30:55] And not just porn. Here's what I got hammered for a couple years ago. I still don't understand why, when I said that Catholics should not watch a movie that has two people nude, engaged in simulated actions, I'm Trying to keep this a family friendly podcast. And I apologize if you're listening with your kids. [00:31:14] I'm just trying to say, though, we need to be extremely vigilant, us men in particular, about having any connection, any connection whatsoever to this immoral, awful activity, because it just deadens your senses, it leads you astray. [00:31:35] Everything about it is destructive and demonic. [00:31:38] And so men do everything you can. I know porn is incredibly powerful, can be incredibly addictive, but do everything, make that your top priority in your life. If you're addicted to porn, men make it your top priority in life to stop it. If that means you have to get offline completely, get offline completely. That means you have to quit your job and go become a plumber. Quit your job and go become a plumber. Whatever it takes. You just can't be addicted to porn. You have to do everything you can to stop that. And so I think that is part of this whole thing and what it also does, it disconnects you from reality. [00:32:12] You live in a fantasy world when you start to engage in porn more and more and more, because then you start to see when you get some influence. And all of a sudden, maybe some young women say to you, like, you know, they compliment you because you did a good job. They appreciate what you're doing wherever that stuff like that. If your brain has been wired, rewired, damaged by porn, your thoughts are not going to be the ones they should be when that happens. It should just be of like, oh, but thank you very much. It's all, it's all due to the glory of God. It's all because of God. It should not be, oh, look at how special I am. And maybe there's something here. Maybe this person likes me in a certain way. That's where the dangers lie. I mean, I'm not saying women don't have these dangers as well, but I am saying men, that's where it primarily is going to happen. That's where the focus is going to be. So obviously stay away from that. Also, another thing I would just say is spend more time reading books. [00:33:07] Actual physical books. Not Kindle, not ebooks, but actual physical books. Go read them. Particularly read Catholic books published before 1960. I'm not somebody who thinks everything published as your 1960 is worthless. There's a lot of great books. I personally have loved the writings, for example, of Joseph Ratzinger, who was all after the 1960s. There's other many other great books that have been written. That being said, I do think it helps us if we place Ourselves in a whole different way of thinking. [00:33:42] If we read people who see the world in a Catholic way, that we don't see it today. [00:33:48] And so I'm talking about Catholic writers from the 19th century, 18th century, and even before the Church Fathers. [00:33:55] Read books, actual physical books, not online, because you get too distracted. You won't really get into it, but really read physical books. Also. The whole touch grass thing. Yeah. Go out in the real world, take hikes, be physically active. That will also help you in all of these temptations and dangers of the online world. The more active you are, the better you can resist the temptations and dangers of the online world. [00:34:21] I mean, I just think this is important. [00:34:24] I think it's something we can never act like. It's not a real temptation and danger for all of us. If you're on the online world, whether you are a professional Catholic, an influencer, whatever you want to call it, or you're just some small non account with 20 followers online, God looks at all of us the same, and we all have the same dangers and temptations. And we need to do everything we can to be. Be the representative of Christ. That's the first thing. Personal witness is more important than anything. It's more important. Anything you say, your personal witness comes first. So really work on that. Work on that. [00:35:00] I'm trying to have a. Trying to organize a podcast episode in a few weeks. [00:35:05] I want to talk about some of these practical ways in which men in particular can live more orderly, disciplined life that prevents us from falling into these dangers and temptations. [00:35:15] Okay, let me jump to the. The live chat. First one is Anna Kate. [00:35:20] I know what it is, Anna Kate. I just can't pronounce it. Me. [00:35:24] Oric. Miyorg. Oh, my gosh. I'm just. Okay, just everybody laugh. This is what keeps me humble, men and women. [00:35:32] Okay. Harold says, I have been through the trenches with my faith. I really hate when people who just got here are smashing trads. Very uncharitable. It points to an emotional immaturity, in my opinion. I can't disagree, Harold, but I do always question when somebody jumps on board in the Catholic faith. I mean, God bless them. I'm not saying their faith isn't sincere, but when they jump immediately to let's blame the triads for everything, I mean, it's not. The trads aren't beyond criticism. I've criticized our, you know, the trads as well, including myself. I'm not claiming that, but at the same time, I just think that I. I'm like Go. Like I said, go marinate for a little longer before you start railing on people you don't follow. [00:36:13] Okay. Jason Watley says first show. Followed you on Twitter recently. Enjoyed your takes. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. See, I'm such an influencer. Jason follows me. No, I do appreciate that. I appreciate that. [00:36:25] Okay, Anna Kate says Crisis Magazine. Eric, where my Taylor Marshall, Scott, Hans Cath helped me get my footing as a new Catholic. I'm very happy to hear that, Anna Kate. I appreciate that and I pray for you and for everybody that you know. Just always remember, our focus is on Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the way, the truth and the life. [00:36:44] And he is the model which everybody falls short of, but everybody should be compared to. And so whenever somebody falls short, whether it's in some scandal like what happened this weekend or just because they said something boneheaded and stupid like I do most of the time, our model is always Jesus Christ. But I do appreciate that. Anarchate B. BP Koch says, my wife and I are making make a siphon working with engaged trouble their diet. Yeah. I mean, are you a professional Catholic? No. I mean, yeah, you are technically, because you're getting paid for that. But you're doing the Lord's work and it's good and it's okay to be paid for it. The key is make sure you're focused on serving God and basically not doing it for the money, but because you want to serve God. [00:37:33] Taylor Marshall and Tim Gordon got me in tlm. Yep. I know a lot of people like that. Absolutely. [00:37:39] BP Kai said I probably troll too much in Facebook comments. Well, you know, it's funny. We all have that challenge that we want to troll sometimes. James is better for Catholic society, faith themselves and rely on Internet theologians, influencers, etc. God reveals in prayer. Yes, that is true. [00:37:56] It is true. I also would say, though Catholics never study alone, we're not Protestants. [00:38:02] We always look to others. I mean, are the saints in our. The saints should be our influencers. You know, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine, people like that. Those are our true influencers. And so absolutely, we should be reading when we. And when you read a book, it's. That's your influencer. Right. If I'm reading a book by some Catholic author, I'm reading a Scott Hahn book. He's my influencer at that moment. If I'm reading something by a great Catholic from the 19th century, that's my influencer. So we all have influences. We all have influencers who impact our lives. The key is to always make sure we're always taking them back to the church, to Christ, making sure they're always conformed with Christ and conform to the church. As long as that happens, it's okay to be influenced by other people. [00:38:48] Okay. Ian? Chris says we as Catholics need to remember the essentials. A lot of people just discuss clickbaity topics, but the best defenders of Catholicism mainly discuss the Trinity, marrying dogmas, life issues, etc. Yes, and that's a great. You know, I'm glad you brought that up because I actually was hesitant to do this because I don't. If you look at my history, I don't like talking about other personalities on the Internet. And I didn't want to make this about voice or reason. I wanted to make this more about a general topic of just being careful on the Internet. But definitely. But here's the reality. I'll tell you this, as somebody who has run a channel for a while now, a podcast, and that is the fact that, hey, we're, we're. [00:39:29] I got distracted by something. Sorry about that. [00:39:32] The fact is, the ones that are clickbaity do get more traffic, and it had to be clickbaity. But when they talk about things going on right now, they get more traffic than if I just talk about the, the, the, the, the, the, you know, the Trinity. Okay, here we go, baby. Dr. Taylor Marshall with the, with the super chat. What did I miss? [00:39:51] Taylor, you're gonna make me blush. I said nice things about you at the beginning, so don't listen to it. It'll get it. Get your. It'll get your head all big. Okay. [00:39:59] Okay. [00:40:01] Nathan Roberts, we were just talking about you behind your back. [00:40:04] Okay. [00:40:06] Jason Watley says, me, me. Okay, here we go. Meteoric. Meteor. Meteoric, meteoric. Okay, thank you, Jason. Okay, I know. I'm. I was gonna say a word. Okay. Dr. Taylor Marshall says the apologetic moves in the 1990s initiated by Scott Han was root in academia. That has changed because of Internet. And now the years of training can be omitted. We need more gray hairs. Taylor, this is, you know, great. Thank you very much for the super chat. First of all, I really appreciate it, but. Absolutely. If you look at people like Scott Hahn, he's an academic and he got into the popular world to help Catholics. Even somebody like Patrick Maggier, Carl Keating, who aren't doctorates, they were very seeped in a real deep knowledge and study of the faith over many years. And it was really focused on that it wasn't folk. And because they didn't have the Internet when they got Started they were writing books, writing long magazine articles to doing things like giving talks of a long form nature. [00:41:04] And there was no way ability to do clickbaity stuff. And so I think Taylor's got a great point here about just the fact that the years of training seem to be omitted. I mean, we need more gray hairs. I mean, this is a. You know, Taylor, you probably saw from his photo, has gray hairs. I have gray hairs. So maybe we're just talking about ourselves, but really the point is like St. Paul, you need time. You need time. And really we should not jump too quickly to follow Internet personalities and Catholic personalities at all until they've really kind of paid their dues. And I don't mean that like in a punishment way. I just mean that in a sense of they need to take time to live as a Catholic. Like I said, I know that's the case for me. I needed time as a Catholic. I didn't really start publicly talking about the faith. I mean, I did some things at my parish early on and now I kind of wish I hadn't. Like, I remember one of the first parishes I joined after got married. This was two years after I converted. The pastor, kind of, I talked to him, he heard, he knew about me, he wanted me to teach a class or two, and I did. And actually, I don't think I should have. I think I was too new as a Catholic. I'd been Catholic for two years. Why am I teaching other Catholics the faith? So I actually think that was a mistake on my part. I think really I should have been many more years. And I really. Then I kind of pulled back. I didn't really start doing anything publicly until about. I'd been Catholic about 12 or 13 years. So I really think we need more of that. Just kind of take your time, learn the faith, live the faith, and then you can talk to other people and maybe, maybe God is calling you to be out there and talk about the faith. [00:42:36] Well, thank you everybody for the live chat. It was. It was great to get Taylor to jump in himself again. Like I said, Taylor, don't listen to the beginning because I said nice things about you and we don't want that to go to your head. So just keep kidding. Okay, everybody? Until next time, God love you.