Love Much, Forgive Much

0:00Welcome to Catholic Stuff You Should Know, the J10 Initiative. Hello all, welcome to Catholic Stuff You Should Know, coming in hot on the mic. We are here, Father Sean and I, how you doing, Father Sean? Oh, this is Father Sean. Great to be with you, Father Jake. I'm doing great. To me, I change up the intro every day that I can, hopefully maybe a little bit. You shall wait for this time. I didn't. I support it. Happy Sunday, happy day, the resurrection. Happy getting through all your masses and liturgies and you're going to a gallow later tonight. I've got family dinner on camp and then hosting a movie night. So we're really busy. What movie? Emper's New Groove. We're doing something light and fun because and something not very long. We just finished our first week of outdoor lab, so kind of the first fall programming week

1:03and next week we got a double back to back after lab groups coming in the first three days and the last three days of the week. And then so I wanted to get together celebrate this week but not keep us up super late. So Emper's New Groove it is. Awesome. Yeah, congrats on finishing kind of the family programming for the summer, summer camp and then kind of the last week is Labor Day Week and all the family camp. Congrats on finishing that. Yeah, we're through. We did it. Good work team. I think my school. Different busy. My school heads up to outdoor lab in the spring. We just do an eighth grade trip in the spring. Are you coming up with them or are you sending one of your vickers? I don't know yet. I don't even know the dates. I haven't even looked that far ahead. Well, about a month and a half, I'll have all those dates in order for the spring and I'll be emailing you requesting you to come. Oh, you will. Because the kids love when their priest comes with him. So consider this your first invite.

2:03Do you want me to go as pastor or should I send your classmate, Father Zach? You can send whoever you like. I would just love and assist. Great. We can make that happen. No, I think some of the parishes send only have one priest and it's hard for them to get away. They might come for a little bit of time. But especially if there's a vicar, one of the big feedbacks we got from schools the last couple of years was that they really enjoyed being out at outdoor lab with their priest and just kind of at the adventure course stuff as well. Or actually, I don't even know if we do adventure course stuff. I think we do. But just being at the classes, being at the courses, doing the hikes and then doing the holy hour kind of out somewhere special. The eighth grade does their holy hour over at Molo. So it's a cool night. I just looked it up. It's April 21 through April 23. Wednesday through Friday, 2027. That might be a problem, Father Sean. You're out of town, let me guess. You are too. Where am I?

3:04That's the convocation week. Really? No. I'm sure. I am. Oh, you're right. I'm pretty good. It does overlap. Yep. I guess I'll leave convocation early. If you want, I'll let you make that decision. Maybe I could just come up Thursday after convocation, stay the night. That'd be cool. You do master one on Friday morning. Yeah, and then leave after that. Yeah. I would be happy with that. And then I have a wedding rehearsal that night. It looks like. See, this is why people listen to Catholic stuff you should know. They want to hear, please, scheduling five months in advance with each other over internet while they're recording a podcast. That is. Yikes. I think that is peak podcast. I think everybody loves what we're doing. So I think with that, I don't think we need more in the episode. Great. We're. Catholic stuff podcast at gmail.com.

4:06What are you drinking there? I have a hazy boy IPA. So we were just joking because it's like companions don't drink alone, but we're technically not alone even though we are alone. We're alone in presence, in location, but we're together over the internet and we're looking at each other. So I have a dragon's milk or dragon's blood. I can't remember what it is. Darkstout in my cartausen brow mug, one of my, I'm probably too attached to this mug. I don't use it a lot, but the cartausa in gomming is where we're going. Where we study abroad and we stay and live during our semester with studentville at the cartausen. This is the cartausen brow from their local brew at the hotel there. So I love this mug and it reminds me of 2010 when I was in Europe for three months. When you climbed a castle wall. I did. Have I told that story on the podcast? I don't think on the podcast, but before you do, can I just ask a question about the

5:08joke on this podcast? Please. Well, here's my question. Should priests move with coffee mugs, beer mugs, glasses, things like that? The only reason why I ask not to throw a brother under the bus, but someone who lives with me currently. When he moved, he brought all this different glassware because like eating a certain glass for like lemon cello, you need a certain glass for this. He needs a certain glass and it's just funny because I'm like, okay, when you move out of this rectory, all those glasses are going with you. Like, I don't need 10 different sets of glasses. Like, I want to live somewhat simplistically, but now our cupboard is full of like all these random glasses. I mean, if he moves in with him, he can move out with him. I have a few I carry. I've got a sentimental one. I've got a Polish pottery mug for my tea because my mom loves Polish pottery. So I got a Polish pottery mug, handful of years ago. That one's gone with me. I've got my Yeti mug that has a good lid on it. It's kind of my travel mug. That one will go with me.

6:09I've got my cartels of brown ones. But other than that, yeah, I think it's better principle to get, receive what is already in your rectory and get something new if needed and then probably leave it for the next guy. And if you need it at the next one, you can get it there. But then you get the opposite thing where sometimes guys will buy multiple things at the rectory and they maybe start somewhere and then somebody brings one in or doesn't realize there's one there and then they buy it. And then you're looking through stuff in the storage and you find like four different of the same measuring cups or something. Yeah, I just think. I think whenever there's a pasture change, it's good just to go through inventory. What do we need? What do we don't need? Because things just stack up. But I think the coffee cup or mug question really has to do with most of these either have sentimental value to your point or they have your name on it. Like I was given a coffee mug that says Father Sean, St. Thomas Moore on it and it's like,

7:09well, I'm not going to leave that in my room for Father Joe who's then just going to be like, I'm not Father Sean. So I don't know. Well, if you find any, if you find any Father Brian, mugs or cups, I'll take them up here and I'll gladly use them. You know, that guy loves his coffee. So I think he took a lot of coffee mugs with them. But if I find any of them, I will surely pass them along. Because I have the photo, I think his, did you give it to me or did Father CJ give it to me? I have a photo of Father Brian, like a young Father Brian somewhere. Maybe his Father CJ found it in, he found it when he was moving out or maybe a Jonah Mark, but now it's sitting in my car waiting to be handed to Father Brian. Like to give back to him is what you're saying? Yeah. I think it was from 411. I think CJ found it in his room in 411. Gotcha. I didn't know what it was. He thought it was somebody else.

8:12And then we actually, we took it out of the frame and there's like Father Brian, just Brian Larkin and like the date. It's like ancient of days. He's old. So it's like 50, 60 years old. Oh, funny. Right. Precisely. Yeah. No, I think. Do we know how a Father Brian is? We don't publicly admit this. I think he's aging like three years per one year. I think that's the problem. Well I know how old he is because all his passwords were his birth year, 1980. It's like his phone code 1980. You just let it out of the bag. We want to do that. I know. And now when his passwords, we really shouldn't do that. I might have to edit this. No, I'm only teasing. It's only like four of the 20 digits to his past code. Good cover. Good cover. All right. Anywho. Well, I thought you were talking about, I thought you were talking about Father Brian's photo because you're going to prank him. You got to do something with that photo. Yeah. He's in my dinner right now. Or I'm in his dinner. I don't know how that works.

9:12So, but you're in two dineries, aren't you? I straddle the line. I live in one and work in both. But you're like the vice secretary or something? And the vice chair of the Presbyteral Council, a glorified admin position. Well, I told Father David Hall, who is the vice chancellor that he had too much vice and he needed to share it. Yes. And Father used him in the vice rector. Yeah. He's also sharing the load, I guess. All the companions, all this vice. Yeah. I, in three weeks, was told that I was in the Fort Collins Deenery, not the Boulder Deenery. Got elected to the Presbyteral Council for the Fort Collins Deenery and then elected to vice chair of the Presbyteral Council. So, don't know how that happened. Father Daniel Cheuchy nominated me as vice chair amongst others that were nominated. And then I nominated him back and he said, I respectfully decline. And I said, you can do that?

10:13So, here we are. Bummer. Well, I think you're the right man for the job. Well, at least we say that because all the other guys are, well, yeah, the Holy Spirit chose it. But all the other guys are like pastors. I'm like, yeah, I can send some emails from my cabin. Fair. Yeah. That's what it comes down to. I'm still the secretary for the companions, which is mostly just sending emails of like, hey, we have association Lord's Day coming up. Hey, we have Lord's Day. Hey, we have this coming up. Be aware. Which like, I'm fine to do, but I also get a little annoyed. I'm like, does any guy like regularly check their calendars of like, oh, next Friday, this is on the calendar. Maybe I should clear my schedule so I can be present at it. Maybe I don't need an email from Father Sean. I get your emails. You're doing a good job. You are. Staying on top of it. Thanks, Father Jake. I appreciate that. I don't sign up for Lord's Day because I'm so far away and I've had Saturday events at the camp, but I get your emails. Well, now I'm having Darcy. Now I'm having Darcy send out the Lord's Day emails.

11:16So that takes one thing off my to-do list. Secretary to the secretary. I love it. I had, I wasn't able to go to Lord's Day, but I went up last Sunday night and hung out with Father Joseph Lujois, Sam Munson, and Jason Dorito. Pris of God. Where was Father Brian? I don't know. I don't know. We don't know. Okay. No, I think, I mean, there was no. He actually might have been down in Denver for something. But so I was, yeah, I was down in Longmont earlier that day and so I just drove up to Fort Collins to see Lujois and then the other guys came over too. So it was good. Some patio time hanging out with the brothers. But I'm doing like these loops, man. It's like if I'm not going to Denver and back, now I'm going to Fort Collins and back. It was all good. I did dinner with Father Ryan O'Neil last night. He was the previous camp chaplain here. He's now down in Longmont, so we met in Lions for dinner and he caught up.

12:18That was good. Earlier that day I had a lunch down in Estus Park with Father Fustinus, who's the pastor down at Arleady the Mountain. So you know Sean, just live in that priestly fraternity. I love it. It's important. You got to make sacrifices. It's also hard because to your point, you're driving a lot. I'll be honest. I don't like to drive to neighboring rectories and I think that it's just easier when people come to your own rectory. It's something I need to grow in. I mean, I say that in all the more. It comes to me. No, I know. I get it. There's a million things on the calendar and then it's just like I could go visit this brother that's 20 minutes away and then I'll stay an hour in a half or whatever. It's like a two hour round trip thing. It's just, I don't know. And certainly okay if I meet halfway, I don't know. I'm just getting, I'm just a homebody. What do you want me to say? All allow it. Pastors, all pastors become homebodies.

13:18I don't know if that's true, but it sounds like a strong axiom. Yeah. I mean, we always make fun of Father Brian when he was pastor here before me. It was like he's never been west of Santa Fe meeting up to the mountains since he became pastor, which is kind of true. And I hope I don't become that. I hope I still get out. But I will say like my rectory is pretty essentially located, which is nice. But yeah, I could do a better job of visiting brothers. All that to say, Jake, I will come visit you someday. Someday. That is so nebulous that it's an easy promise to make. So I commend you. I promise to visit you before you get a new assignment. All right. It's going to be the last day. I'll be moving out. I'll help put a box in your car, I guess. Precisely. Well, Jake, I have an announcement to make.

14:20Oh, no. My car. You're doing a podcast. Oh, no. My car. My car. My car has treated you so well for so long. But what finally did it in? It's still under diagnostics, but I was up trying to climb some peaks. Here's a crazy thing. I was with four Dominican sisters. And we were all crammed in my car. We're driving up to go hike around to Calabron, so Democrat Lincoln, Brost, 314ers. And there's a Buckskin peak right there, which is Centennial. Pretty easy peak in the grand scheme of things. And we get up to the parking lot. And about 100 yards before the parking lot, my car just dies. I'm like, oh, it's just a manual. So I'm probably just messed up or whatever. I try to restart. It's not starting. It's not starting. It's not starting. And four Dominican sisters in their habits.

15:20And it was quite the sight, let me tell you. But a good service up there. I saw some others up there. There wasn't service up there. Yeah. It was wild. So a good Samaritan Patrick had to drive us down into town. And I mean, long story short, he actually drove us all the way to Father Peter's house, parents' house, and Silverthorn all the way from fair play, essentially. And then Peter took us back down to Denver. We went for just a simple hike instead up near Silverthorn. So no stomachs. Is your car just still up there? 100 yards from the parking lot? Well, I had to get a towed, which apparently to get a tow truck on dirt roads, it's $300 per hour as soon as they touch gravel. So it was like a $700, just a tow just to get back down to fair play to the shop. And it's been the shop for a week. So there's still diagnosing it.

16:21I got to figure that out. Yeah, might be time for a new car. That was a great car. But like three years ago, you were saying this car might be wearing out. So it's 27 years old, 1999 Toyota Form Runner, 5-speed manual. It's the greatest car I've ever had. It will probably be the greatest car I've ever owned. I love that thing. And whenever you love things, more than God takes them from you. You do. And that's our lesson for today. Thanks for listening. Oh, I've been so crushed, though. No, your car is super cool. I kind of hope that the diagnosis is like, hey, you could do this and we'll fix your whole engine. And then you'll have it for another 200,000 miles. That's what I hope happens. Well, see, that could be nice. But yeah, I was a whole fiasco. It was Labor Day. And then they're not open on Labor Day. And then the mechanic who specializes in Toyota's wasn't there in Tuesday. So they couldn't even get to it till Wednesday. Then the part didn't come in. So then they didn't even start working on it till Friday.

17:22And so hopefully I can get it back Monday, but TBD. Welcome to the world outside of Denver. Dude, adulting is hard. I'm like, why did this have to happen? I was just like, can I just call my mom and dad? And like, it's just so different. Yeah, can you fix my car for me? Totally. Well, speaking of adulting, I was up at camp today. And I had, I normally scheduled masks. And we had a young adult retreat. So I had masks for them right after that over at the Molo Chapel St. Catharines. And then I'm over at a coffee shop hanging out with people. It's like a super busy line. So I jump behind the bar to start taking orders so that the bristas can kind of kick through the orders quicker. That's fun. I enjoy doing that. And then finally get my coffee and I'm chatting with somebody. And one of our missionaries comes up and she just kind of like stands next to me really quietly. So we caught a pack rat in the trap. Can you take care of it? So I had to go be dad and take care of it, which in the long term

18:24actually was the boyfriend of the missionary who's not visiting, came over and helped me take care of this pack rat. We relocated it. And you can interpret that euphemism however you would like. Yes, I understand what you're trying to say, brother. But pack rats are tough because they're really cute. Pack rats are actually a cute animal. You look at them and you're like, you kind of might be a fun pet. And then you see what they do when they get into stuff. They just rip. Oh, it's gross. They rip your patio furniture up and steal all the padding. They build these nests and they just stay. And you can drop them off miles away and they'll find their way back to their nest. So they're not like their city rat. They're like a country rat, they're mountain rat. They are kind of cute. Do you have any possums up there? I'm sure we do. I haven't seen any. I don't even know if we have possums in Colorado. But I think those are super cute animals.

19:25But they're like kind of frightening looking too because they're not turnal, right? So like you like shine your headlights or spotlight on them and you just see like these big old bug eyes and you're like, whoa. Yeah. No, we just have we got pack rats. We got ground squirrels. We've got mountain lions. We've got bears. Moose. We got elk. We got moose. We got deer. It's the elk rat. I was over a molo two nights ago. I did mass over there just at night because I hadn't done my mass for the day yet. And the elk herd was like in the meadow area and they were just bugling back and forth. Like, whoa. However, no, that's not how it sounds. But it's the best I can do. And it was kind of majestic and kind of scary, especially knowing like, mountain lions could be stalking them right now. And I'm like, I'm here alone. I don't know. So I'm more scared of mountain lions than I am of bears. If a bear comes by, I'm like, I think I could tame a bear. I think I could have a pet bear. I don't think I could have a pet mountain lion.

20:28Well, I don't know what St. Francis of a CC would say about that. But I would probably be holding there. To be holy there. Yeah. I would agree that I'm more afraid of mountain lions. Mountain lions are freaky. Like, they're really freaky and they'll attack you. They'll stalk you and you won't even know that they're following you. Apparently one of our, one of the camp moms here, she's like, why don't we, like, we're going to go for an antistyle. If you see one like, preach to it. See if you can tame it. Be like the wolf of, is it, subiako or? Subiako, yeah. That's right. It's the 800th anniversary of the death of St. Francis this year. So Father Zach, one of my PBs, your classmate, he just, he just got to Rome today or maybe yesterday. And he's not a weak one. Yeah, Francis, we're going. Not directly, I think it's Rome and a CC. So yeah, St. Francis, but Rome as well, he's with Deacon Steve Valero or, I don't know what, his title is, but he's, he does a lot.

21:29He works with an I.C. Yeah. Yeah, he's in the liquor for clergy's office, right? So any who, all right, we've bantered for 21 minutes and people love it. But I've got to give you some content. So I'm going to show on, I'm going to give you a Choose Your Own Adventure podcast. We can go in one of two directions. We can talk about Anselm's ontological proof and Godel's kind of like furtherance of it. He's a mathematician, logician later on, more contemporary. Or we can talk about today's readings with the wicked servant and the forgiveness of God and the many, many talents that he owed in debt. I'm happy to go either way. If you choose the readings from this week, we can just riff from what we've already preached. If we choose the ontological proof, I think it'd be good.

22:31But if not, I could bring it back later with a little more prep possibly. So I'm just going to throw it into your court and see where we go with this one. Let's go with the latter, because I would actually love to do a podcast on Anselm's proof for the existence of God at different time. Okay, so I'm going to do a quick little teaser. We're going to prep this and I'm actually going to do some more reading. I need to read Thomas on Anselm's proof a little more so that I've got the counterpoint. And then Godel brings in like a very formula, formulaic logic, expression of the ontological proof that is actually really sound and can be plugged into computing and proves itself to be true. So that's a really interesting thing to look at that I am glad we're pushing off, because I was ready to go with it. That was what I hope to talk about today and then I just didn't have time to finish it. But stay tuned, listener land. Saint Anselm's ontological proof coming to a podcast near you soon. All right, so today's topic.

23:34What were our readings today, Father Shen? Well, I've mostly only been to Godel. So we're recording on Sunday, September 13th. So you're getting this podcast a week after this or six days after the reading. So we're looking back at last week's reading and you preach on the gospel. Yeah, I preach mostly on the gospel. I quoted just one line from Ciroch. It was at 27 and 28. And but yeah, I preach mostly about the gospel. So Matthew 18, the gospel, the parable of the unmerciful servant and you know, I actually be honest. It's one of my favorite gospels, but I did not love my homily this weekend, particularly last night. I reworked it a little bit this morning, but I think sometimes when you love something so much, it's hard to convey like why you love this. And I realized, and this is what I said in my homily this morning, is like in order for us to really feel the weight of what's going on in this gospel and this parable,

24:35you just have to meditate on it. You have to pray with it. It's about forgiveness. All the readings this Sunday were about forgiveness. And if you meditate on just the power of it, I think that's actually going to be more helpful than a homily telling you, you need to forgive your brother. What you do, and I did say that in my homily, but I talked about it at a deeper level. The Ciroch reading really struck me. I don't know what the kids today are saying, but what I would have said is a millennial is Ciroch went hard in the paint. I don't know if you agree with that. What's really cool is Ciroch, the name for Ciroch is also, who's writing this, his name is Jesus. Jesus Ben Ciro, Jesus the son of Ciroch. Yes, sure. Which is Ben Ciroch. Yeah, which is interesting, because it's a prefigurement. So the commentary I was reading was just like, in the first reading we hear from the words of the old Jesus, and then the gospel we hear

25:37from the words of the new Jesus. New Jesus. So I'm just going to read you the first lines from Ciroch just like hit, wrath and anger are hateful things yet the sinner hugs them tight. The vengeful will suffer the Lord's vengeance for he remembers their sins in detail. Forgive your neighbors in justice. Then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven. Could anyone nourish anger against another and expect healing from the Lord? Could anyone refuse mercy to another like himself? Can he seek pardon for his own sins? And then we go on if one is, but flesh, cherishes wrath who will forgive his sins. Remember your last days set enmity aside. Remember death and decay and cease from sin. I went longer because I wanted to get to that end point of remember the last days set enmity aside. Remember death and decay and cease from your sin. When I read that, I thought of the carthusians, the phrase fratte and momentum, mori, brother, remember your death, right?

26:38In remembering our death, remembering we'll meet Jesus. And we don't know the time or the hour. How will we live? How will we live our life? So Ciroch is giving us that wind system. But those first wrath and anger are hateful things yet the sinner clings to them. The vengeful will suffer the Lord's vengeance for he remembers his sins in detail. And then we're told to forgive our brothers so that the Lord God might forgive us, which is obviously what Jesus gives us in the Lord's prayer. We are asked, or when he is asked how to pray, he tells us pray like this. And of course that line, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. So we're already seeing Ciroch being repeated and amplified by Christ, which I thought was super powerful, especially within this context of the Matthew readings, where we're establishing the church, we're establishing the authority of the church, we're now teaching Peter and the apostles how to forgive. And then they ask, how many times should I forgive? And then we get into the parable of the merciful, or the wicked steward and the merciful master here.

27:38Yeah, and what's really cool, oh, I love this. Again, this is like one of my all time favorite gospels because it's just so powerful. But I would say it's really the commentary to your point on that one line from the our Father. But it's so cool, at least in Luke's rendition of the our Father, which is the one that we typically pray at mass. Forgive us our trespasses. The Greek word there is actually debts. So more properly, it should be read, forgive us our debts as we forgive those who are indebted to us, and that's why the gospel ties it in well. But yeah, like, and Ciroch mentions this, like if you forgive your brother, then God will be able to forgive you. There's something really, really deep and profound that not that God's forgiveness and mercy is conditional. But there almost seems to be something there that it is conditional that if I don't forgive my brother, God's not really able to forgive me. And again, like, that's not completely true,

28:39but I think subjectively there is something true there that if I'm unable to forgive, I don't receive God's forgiveness as deep within me or inside of me. Yeah, I think unforgiveness is actually a prison that we place ourselves in. And I think there's a lot of reasons why, when we unpack the rest of this gospel, give my thoughts around that. But if you look at the amount of times where forgiveness of sins and healing happened together in the gospels, there's this tying together of forgiveness and healing. And then we get this line from Ciroch that could anyone nourish anger against brother and expect healing from the Lord. I mean, he's, give this was to harbor anger against a brother and expect healing, blessing from the Lord, it seems to be contradictory claims right now that Ciroch is giving us. And then in Jesus is like, there's hardness of heart that turns people away. And if we don't experience this healing, have we not received his mercy and forgiveness?

29:41Have we not forgiven others? And so oftentimes kind of in healing ministry, deliverance ministry, a lot of the initial work is actually the work of forgiveness, leading people to with the help of the Holy Spirit in the name of Jesus, forgive those who have sinned against them. Why do we forgive something? Because an evil was done, right? We forgive, we wouldn't need to forgive a good done to me. I don't forgive Father Sean for giving me $100. But I do forgive him from stealing $100 from me, right? Because an evil has been done. And when I forgive, I'm not validating what they did. I'm not saying, yeah, what you did was actually good. And I think that's a lie we get into sometimes. Well, if I forgive them, I'm validating what they did. No, no, I don't forgive something unless it was actually harmful, sinful, right? So I forgive because there was an evil done. But then if I'm holding on to that vengeance, that wrath as Siric is talking about, the sinner clings hugged tight vengeance, wrath, anger.

30:45If I'm holding onto that, I think I'm going to be getting revenge on you, Father Sean, by holding this vengeance against you, this anger, this resentment. It doesn't change you. It doesn't affect you. But it keeps me locked and paralyzed in this mode of anger and vengeance where then I don't actually receive the healing grace of God, the mercy of God, to come and heal myself. And to redeem what was maybe done to me. So I think that's a profound part of this gospel and this reading from Siric. Yeah. Yeah, and I mean, oftentimes it'll tell people in confession is like forgiveness is different from reconciliation. God demands our forgiveness. We're called to forgive others. Reconciliation may not always be possible, but God always moves us towards reconciliation. And what I find is if I'm unwilling to reconcile with someone, it's probably because I haven't fully forgiven that in my heart, meaning like I'm still holding on to something

31:45that I don't want to look at that person in the eye. I don't want to be in the same room as that person. I don't want to talk to that person. You know, maybe it's just as simple as they annoy me or maybe there's something deeper going on. Forgiveness might start externally with like I forgive you, but it really should move us towards the reconciliation. And God will always move us in that direction. Yeah, and I think that's a good distinction between forgiveness and kind of reconciliation restoration, because that reconciliation restoration is kind of a two-way street. I can forgive somebody and maybe they're still holding on to something or holding something against me, or maybe they're still holding that they were justified and righteous in what they were doing, which was actually an affront or a sin against me. And if they remain in that place, like there might not actually be reunification reconciliation between the two people, but I can still forgive them. I think what's interesting about the reading from last week

32:47or two weeks ago, I can't remember, it's just last week when we're being told how to go and reconcile the brother. We go to him, we go to him who is sinned against us, and we tell him what's happened and invite him to repentance, right? So there's a mode of forgiveness. I'm forgiving the other, but I'm going to them to tell them what happened. So often we're waiting for the other person to say, like come to their own recognition of, oh, I sinned against you, I need to go apologize to you. Like, I'll forgive them once they actually asked for forgiveness. And it's like, no, I can actually initiate that. I can begin that. And now sometimes the relationship is such that there's distance or there's maybe even risk or abuse or something and like going into the vicinity of the person actually isn't possible, but the forgiveness from my heart can still take place. Right. So thanks for that insight. Yeah, no, I think it's good. And I think it's good to remember because we often equate reconciliation forgiveness as the same,

33:49primarily because we experience it the same in God. Like when I go to, when I go to the sacrament of reconciliation, God doesn't just forgive me, he also reconciles me to himself. But for the human, human relationships, it takes two to be reconciled. So I can forgive someone, I can try to reconcile. But that person might not want to reconcile with me, but I can still forgive them. So yeah, spot on. Yeah. So we move into the gospel. And I don't know if you talked about this in your homily, but I kind of hammered the economics of the situation that we're looking at here. And our translation that we got in our reading, if you're in America, the United States of America, English-speaking world, the wicked servant comes in. And so the king begins the accounting, a debtor was brought before him who owed him a huge amount.

34:49Bad translation, F-minus. What's the better translation for this, Sean? Well, the Greek literally says 10,000 talents. But the reason why the NAB doesn't translate that way is because someone in the pew's probably doesn't know what 10,000 talents are. They're probably just like, oh, is that just $10,000? And here's me. I don't even like the 10,000 translation of it. It's fitting. But it's the word myrion, which we get the word myriad from. So the myrion talenti is the Greek. Myrion is in my little study here. And yeah, Father, my crap can come and correct me on my Greek and everything. But it would appear that the Greek accounting system, I do merit numbers up to 10,000. And once we got to 10,000, 10,000 is the last thing we're going to care to count. Anything beyond that is uncountable.

35:51It's not worth counting. There's reasons for this. The citizenry of a city wasn't more than 10,000. Their armies were divided in groupings of 10,000 or less. And so there's nothing worth counting beyond 10,000 for them. And so you count up. Or if there were, I think they would say, like myriads upon myriads. Yeah, 10,000 upon 10,000 or whatever. So the myriad is kind of like, well, beyond this number, at this number or beyond, the uncountable. It's not worth counting. It's huge. And so I actually like the translation of an uncountable sum, an uncountable number of talents. So at bare minimum, it's 10,000. It could be more. It could be even more. So then I did some math. What is a talent? A talent is a measurement of gold or silver. The stuff I was reading in commentaries was anywhere from 60 to 100 pounds of silver was one talent. And then if I extrapolated the math of 10,000,

36:52we're looking at 100 pounds of silver, 10,000, we're at a million pounds of silver. And then at our going rate of silver right now today in 2026, it'd be about a billion dollars if we're just talking today's money. And whatever helpful that is, a billion, like we have billionaires, and we talk about billionaires and trillionaires. And we talk about it like we grasp these numbers. These numbers are insurmountable. Like we don't even understand how big of a billion is. Like a million, we can kind of get, but a billion is so big of a number that I actually don't think we can really grasp our minds around it. So what we're talking about, there's an uncountable debt at bare minimum of billion dollars, right? And think of you, how long would it take you for others to shine to pay off a billion dollars debt? Yeah, I would never be able to. Ever in my lifetime. It would take lifetimes. It would take lifetimes. And we think, oh, a billion, yeah, that's just one after a million. And like I could grasp like getting a million. Like, okay, I make $100,000 a year.

37:52I don't. I'm a priest. I don't make $100,000 a year. But you think, okay, I make $100,000 a year. If I paid nothing, okay, in 10 years, I could have a million dollars. And then that's, but then we think about the just astronomical number of a billion. That just the powers of 10 that happened when we hit into billions and trillions and beyond is we don't actually grasp. So you think, oh, I could do a billion. No, like it would take lifetimes. Lifetimes to pay off a billion dollars. And so what does the King say? Okay, I'm gonna sell you, your wife, your kids, all your property. And that won't even actually pay me back. But you're in such a debt that like your entire livelihood is the cost of this. And what's the, what's the we can serve it to? The master? No, the we can serve it. What's the we can serve it to first? Well, he begs for forgiveness. He says, please set me free. That this is impossible to pay.

38:53No, that's not what he says. Do you mean later? I don't know what you're asking. So the we could serve it to the King. He falls down on his knees and he says, give me more time and I will pay you back and full. Is what he doesn't recognize that this is insurmountable and unpayable. He says, give me more time and I'll pay it off. And I think there's a nation pride here where we're seeing a pride in this man that he thinks he can save himself from this insurmountable debt. They would take lifetimes to repay. So just give me more time. Like he doesn't even realize the debt that he's in. Just give me more time and I'll pay it off. And then the King, the Lord recognizes with mercy, the need for forgiveness here. And so he then, the King repays the whole debt. He says, he releases the whole debt. I forgive this debt from you. Go for it. You're free. And then he goes out. And again, the translation here, we get,

39:58when the servant had left, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a much smaller amount. Again, F minus translation, sorry. It says, you owed him 100 denari. There's about 6,000 denari in one talent. So this is like a tiny, tiny percentage of the 10,000 talents, the million pounds of silver. This is a minuscule amount of money compared to the debt. But he goes and finds him and he says, you have to pay me back. The master, the other servant probably doesn't even know he was just forgiven of this huge debt. But he goes, you have to pay me back this little debt. It wouldn't even scratch the surface of the debt that he was just forgiven. And then he can't pay him off. He asks for forgiveness. He asks for mercy. And he chokes him and then throws him into prison and says, you're in prison until you pay back this debt. So I want to let you jump in before I kind of give my reflections.

40:59Oh no, it's super interesting. The two servants, I think what Jesus is wanting us to understand though is that the servant number one has this impossible debt that has now been forgiven. And then servant one who's just been given this forgiveness does not offer that to servant number two. That actually has a debt that he could pay back in this lifetime. And so again, it's just this commentary on forgive us our debts. Like God, you forgive me, my debts. Servant one whose debts were forgiven. Forgive us our debts as we forgive those who are indebted to us. But servant number one is willing to beg for forgiveness but he's not willing to offer that forgiveness of the debts that other people owe him. And it's just again, a commentary on that, which is so profound and so beautiful. Like you got to read through this and pray through it and be like, man, where am I holding onto things? And where do I fail to forgive my brother?

42:00But I think what Jesus is really wanting us to reflect on is the complete and absolute mercy of the king of the master to that first debtor, this impossible sum that he owes. Yeah. And the key to this is we're just coming off of Jesus teaching us how to forgive. And then Peter comes and says, how many times should I forgive? Seven times? That seems like a lot. And we are coming back to the, if somebody were to kill Cain, there'd be a sevenfold curse against him. And so then we've got this, well, if there's gonna be this sevenfold curse on Cain after all the sin and whatever that kind of means, then Peter's saying, well, mercifully sevenfold would be like really good, right? And Jesus says no, 70 times seven or 77 times, depending on how you wanna translate that. That this impetus to forgiveness is actually not limited

43:00itself because God's forgiveness is not limited. And that's what we're getting to is, we have a kind of economic situation that we can look at and you can see this, okay, incredible sum that could never be repaid, little sum that could be repaid, three to six months of somebody's salary. Yeah, I could pay that off in a couple years, we take on those types of debts all the time. This debt, billion plus dollars, could never repay in this lifetime or many lifetimes over. And yet one is forgiven and then I hold the other accountable. But then I talk about actual forgiveness of sin, that God is gonna come and redeem us, offering his forgiveness. We talk about how even one sin against God merits eternal punishment. Why? The analogy I gave for, during my homily this morning was when we look at like an evil done to somebody, the evil is increased the more innocent the victim, right?

44:04So when we look at an evil done to a child, we're more appalled than an evil done to an adult because there's more innocence, right? And then much like an evil done to pick your warlord or drug lord or somebody that you're like, yeah, he's terrible, he probably deserves that. We can kind of draw our own delineation. But the more innocent the victim is, the more evil we think the sin is. Well, God is perfectly good. He is goodness, perfectly loving, he is love, perfectly good, powerful, omnipotent. He is the perfection, he is the unlimited one. And he is the source of truth, goodness and beauty. So the sin against him, against the infinity that is God, is itself infinite, right? And that's the sin that we're talking about is unforgivable. And so I said like, oh, father, I haven't murdered anybody this week, right? Good, but have you sinned? And a sin against God is still infinite in nature

45:06and we can't free ourselves from that. We need God to redeem us from that. We need God's forgiveness through the means of the sacrament. Through our contrition, through baptism, through confession, venial sin, through mass and the reception of the Eucharist, God forgives these sins, but these sins are all infinite and scope because they're against God who is the infinite goodness. And so that's the degree of the wickedness of any sin. And knowing that, well, my concupacence is still disordered and I still make sinful decisions. And then I humbly come and I beg the Lord for forgiveness. But if I'm begging the Lord for forgiveness, but then I'm looking at my brother and not recognizing that he's in the exact same situation as me. And so I should be merciful on him as I'm asking for God's mercy, then something's broken in me. And I'm not going to be able to receive the mercy. So powerful. I love it. Absolutely love it. I've got more. I just wanted to leave you some openings. Well, I mean, I think I said, again,

46:08I think this is so worth meditating on. Are you going to go into the Greek on the 70 times seven? I wasn't planning on it, but you're welcome to. Well, I would just say that I've got it here if you want. No, I would just say that the Greek is, you can translate it either way, but I think what makes more sense and what most, what every scripture scholar today, I mean, unanimously, this is a bad translation from the NAB, but unanimously, every scripture scholar will translate it as 70 times seven. How many times must I forgive my brother? I say to you not seven times, but 70 times seven, which is an allusion to Jubilee. It's an allusion to Daniel seven, Daniel nine, that you will be, and then Leviticus 26, which is about if you are unfaithful to the Lord, then when you're an exile, it'll be multiplied by seven. So instead of just 49 years, or 70 years in exile, you will now spend 490 years in exile.

47:10So it's from Daniel. 70 weeks of years, 70 times seven. Which is Daniel seven and Daniel. Daniel seven and Daniel nine, essentially they knew that 490 years that the Messiah would come, which is why Jesus picks up the scroll and says, this passage has now been fulfilled in your hearing. Like I am the fulfillment of those 490 years of exile. I have come to set this people free and to set release to the captives. Like it's so beautiful and profound to pray with and think about, but I'll let to say God's forgiveness is so powerful. It's eternal, it's infinite, but in order to receive His forgiveness, like we got to go to Him and say, Father, forgive me, I have sinned. It's been, you know, a month, it's been five years, it's been 50 years since my last confession. Like confession is the normative way that God forgives our sins. Yeah. The Greek lege auto ho Jesu,

48:12u lego su eos aptakis. So Jesus says to Him, not I say to you seven, Allah ho s heb dome, heb dome kong takis hepta. Which is, but 70 times hepta seven, 70 times seven, right? And it's the 70 times seven, which is just even more kind of huge number, but it ties into Daniel where there's going to be a punishment for sin, but then the mercy of God comes in, you know, the 490th year. So there's just a tying to the mercy of God that even though there is this punishment, there is going to be redemption. And that in the 70 times seven, the fulfillment Jesus comes to show His mercy to us that the egg's isle shows us the consequence of our idolatry, our sin, our wandering. The separation from God, which is ultimately what hell is, is the separation from God that I willfully choose.

49:13The punishment of sin is first and foremost, my willful choice to separate myself from God, and then I suffer that separation. It's not God hitting a gavel and saying, you are away from me. It's like, no, I do that by my sin, right? And then I come back, like the man, crucified next to Christ, forgive me. I deserve this death, but remember me when you come into your kingdom. I say to you today, you'll be with me in paradise, right? So that humility is the main point here. I just want to close reflecting on two possible psychological explanations of why this wicked servant did what he did. And I think we can find ourselves in that and then repent from that. So it's interesting, you just think, this guy just got the biggest gift. He basically won the lottery in reverse. It's like, instead of having nothing and getting all the money, he was in such debt that it was just wiped away. But in a real sense, he just won the lottery and he should be so over the moon and just so generous. And yet he goes and seeks out this other servant

50:16who owes him a much smaller 100 denari amount. Why? I mean, that just seems strange. Why would somebody do that? Do you have thoughts on that or do you want me to just launch in? I mean, my quick thought would be that he's unwilling to forgive himself. And because he's unwilling to forgive himself, like self-hatric can come, I can't believe I got myself into this situation. It's almost like a rejection of God's mercy. And then to say, oh, I'm just going to hold this over to someone else's head. And he's greedy. He still wants more money. I think that's the most likely is this inability to actually receive the mercy of God, which is from a place of humility. I have to actually recognize that I can't do this. And I need somebody else. The other one would just be out of sheer greed. You think of how does somebody get into a billion dollars of debt? They have to have some insatiable appetites for something that they're just spending and spending and spending

51:16because they want more and more and more. And they don't care about the consequence. And they're going into debt and into debt and into debt. And it's all about gaining and gaining and consuming and consuming. And all of a sudden, they're in debt. And they're like, whatever, I'm in such debt, I'm just going to keep consuming, you know, because at least I can get some pleasure out of it. And then that debt's forgiven. But the greed, the averse that's still in the heart, hasn't been healed. And so he's like, even though my debts are forgiven, that insatiable hunger for more is still there. And so I'm going to now punish somebody else because of what I want, my selfishness, my need to consume. So I think that's one possibility. But I think the more the more profound one is actually, he's incapable of receiving the mercy of God of the King. Because he said, give me more time. And I will repay the debt going back to that. I will repay the debt. Let me do this. I can do this in my power. Give me time. I just need the time. And God knows it's unpayable. The Lord, the King, and the parable. Knows it's unpayable. So he forgives it.

52:17And even though he's forgiven, he hasn't accepted that forgiveness. His life hasn't changed because he hasn't actually accepted the forgiveness. And so he's still, as actually going back saying, I know he forgave me the debt, but for my own pride's sake, I need to actually pay it back. And so he looks at the person who is 100 denari, that's not even going to move the needle on the ledger of 10,000 talents. And he says, you need to give me back this 100 denari because I need to pay back the master because I haven't actually received his forgiveness. I haven't actually accepted it. I haven't accepted my need for it. I will still be the one who saves me from this debt. Even though he gave me the forgiveness of the debt, I'm going to find a way to pay it back. I think that's a mode that we can get into psychologically. Right now, it's just receiving the mercy of God. Precisely. It's a lack of recognition and a stubbornness to think that I actually need a savior. It's to focus so much on the pride, the ego, as opposed to, I'm poor. I didn't create myself.

53:17I can't save myself. I'm in need of a savior. I'm in need of someone to set me free from my debts. It's just this type of control of I can pay back my debts and I will figure it out. And this is the American dream. I can create myself. I can be whoever I want. If I want to be a billionaire, then I'm going to find a way to become a billionaire. And that's, yeah, I mean, I think that's the American dream in some sense and capitalism. And there's something good there. I don't want to deny that. But when it becomes this egotistical project, we lose sight of what actually is important. And that God is actually God and that I am creature. Amen, brother. So we're called to humility. We're called to forgiveness to recognize that I have been forgiven many times over an uncountable debt. And so just as Jesus with the woman washing his feet with her tears in the Pharisees says, why are you allowing her here?

54:18Why are you allowing her to do this? And Jesus response right is, since you welcome me here for dinner, but since I came in, she hasn't stopped anointing my feet and washing them with her tears. She who has been forgiven much loves much. And she's been forgiven. He who has been forgiven little, little, and what this parable today is revealing to us is that all of us, all of us, whatever the sin may be, has been forgiven an uncountable amount of debt. And so then we, what is our response to love much and to go and sin no more? It's hard. When we fall, go on repent again. Be humble. That's all I got. Well done, fellow Jake. Thank you, Father Sean. I look forward to the end-some ontological proof with Godel's later edition. Yeah, that'll be another time.

55:18But do you have any shout outs? We did some math today. So I look forward to some more math next time. We'd actually learn math better before I make a fool of myself on the podcast. And if there's any mathematician who listens, it wants to correct me. Come on the podcast with us and talk about these things. Give me a shout. Who wouldn't be opposed? Well, I'd like to shout out DJ and Victoria Jackson. Apparently, last time I shouted to the man, I gave them the wrong last name, which I don't know how that happened, but I'd like to shout out DJ. David Jackson, he is a great cyclist. And we've been cycling a few times together, and we should go again. Yeah, you should shout out how I do. Hey, that person that I met at the one person at time, you know who you are. Like you told me the thing about your life and how the podcast affected you. I want to shout you out. I know, you are the master at that.

56:19Did you shout out the text you said enough to be shouted out those people yet? I have not. All right. So we want to shout out Phil Lucata. And we want to shout out Laura McCarty. And we want to shout out Kenneth and Katie Unra for their generous letters and gifts to the podcast. Thanks for reaching out and letting us know how the podcast has affected you and helped you and encouraged you, and especially for your words of consolation for my mom and some of this time. So thank you all for those letters. Hey, man, beautiful. Well, Cadillac Stuffed Podcast at gmail.com.