To Err is Human

Welcome to Catholic Stuff You Should Know, the J10 Initiative. Hello, welcome to Catholic Stuff You Should Know. Was that a pause? Is that a dramatic pause?

Well, here's the thing. This is Father Sean. Hey, this is Father Mike. Welcome to Catholic Stuff You Should Know.

Here's the thing. Remember, Katie told us to take a pause at the beginning because it's easier to edit. Oh, is it like if you, is it like a verbal pause where you've already cued? We've already, I know, man.

I got this. I got my cords all mixed up. I brought a weird energy today because I had a busy morning. You had a busy morning.

It's Sunday. I'm getting a little coffee here. Sunday service. A little Coke Zero.

Feeling up, baby. Zero what? Happy Sunday. Zero caffeine?

I think it's a zero caffeine thing. Zero sugar. No, there's definitely caffeine in that. Cheers.

Happy Sunday. Hey, cheers. Ting. Water and Coke.

The elixirs of life. I don't know if, what's the difference between a Diet Coke and a Coke Zero? Diet Coke is, oh, that's a good point. What is the difference?

I don't know. Is one less chemically or? I think they're conceptually about the same. Well, how's your Sunday going, brother?

Do you like the day of the resurrection today? Day of the resurrection. It's been a great day. I slept in till 6:45 today, which doesn't sound like sleeping in, but for a priest on a Sunday, that's kind of sleeping in, I would say.

Yeah, I dig it. Because I already had my homily prep, so I was able to sleep in a little bit. What's your routine like? On a Sunday?

Roll over. You used to hit the snooze. You say a little prayer when you wake up. Hit that coffee.

My alarm clock is... Cold press or whatever they do. I do, yeah, cold plunge. Cold plunge.

Or the AeroPress. Yeah, either one. The AeroPress is the type of coffee maker. No, in the morning on Sundays, well, every day, my alarm clock's across the room, so I have to get out of bed, turn off my alarm clock, and then that hopefully forces me.

It's pretty rare that I hit snooze these days, but... That makes one of us. I try not to. So then I turn on the light.

When I turn on the light, then, like, if I do get back in bed, I'm just like, oh, force yourself to get up. And then it's a great day after that. Oh, really? It's that simple for you?

It's not that simple, but today it was. Joy, young man. I had a lot of energy when I woke up this morning. Right on.

Which I think is because I only got, like, six hours of sleep last night, so I'm kind of burning the candle at both ends. I was ready to go. We finished Lords Day early, and then half the guys left because I'm like, what is wrong with you guys? I shouldn't be so rude.

But, like, Father John took his dad home. Deacon Daryl came, and he needed to go to bed, which was fair. Yeah. So they left early.

And then one of the other brothers apparently was sick. But I'm like, if you were sick, why did you come to Lords Day? Oh, boy. Now you're going to be sick.

Don't pass it to me. And then so... It's not the time. Father Jason and I did dishes for six people, just the two of us.

I'm like, come on, guys. And then the guy who cooked destroyed the kitchen. So we're just, like, cleaning and cleaning and cleaning. We finally get done around 9:30.

I'm exhausted. I'm ready for bed. And then Father Jason's still in a party. So we were up to like 11:30 talking.

Well, there you go. Wow, that's nice of you for Father Jay. I don't know. I kind of feel conflicted.

What do you think about this? This is a Companions Insider question. The original vision included a team of cooks, okay? So maybe there was a main cook and a backup cook.

That's like arbitrary. The point was that you always did it in pairs because the preparation of the meal was just as important. It was like a communal activity that is encounter of brothers. Interesting.

They'd have everybody there cooking at the same time if that was possible. So then we've kind of switched, I think, just out of like utility or whatever, do you think? So there's a priest who's going to cook, and then if you can help, you can come by and help. And then a lot of the communal work is the dishes stuff that comes afterward.

But there's times when I think, like, man, this is getting so stressful for the one guy who wants to cook that it's not even enjoyable. That wasn't the point. The original point was you can step away from life and you can justify relaxing and doing something edifying and cultural and slow and in that with a brother, right? So this is a communal activity where you can stop all of the demands and the emails and the worries.

Sure. So you get it, right? I do get it. I agree and disagree at the same time.

I'm not trying to judge or make a statement either. No, you're not. No, I get it. Well, I think, well, so here's where I agree.

I agree with everything you said in the sense that it can be exhausting to cook and whatnot. But I think part of the reason why is, like, at least in Denver, I don't know, it's like a, you know, Joliet diocese when they cook for each other. Or Minnesota. But we've turned Lords Day into like this contest of who can cook the best meal.

I think that's half the battle. And so when I cook a meal and then you have the jerk of a guy who's just like, oh, I give you like a 7 out of 10 on this. I'm like, that's not helpful. Because then, like, next time you cook, you're like, oh, I got to like worry and make sure I do a good job and da-da-da-da.

It took me a while to kind of get over that just to realize, you can just do a simple meal and cook simply. I'm still not over that. Most families... It does bother me.

Most families are cooking pretty simple meals most of the nights of the week. Right. And they might do something a little bit more fancy one night, you know, on a Sunday. Or, you know, if they're having guests or whatever.

When the priest comes over, for instance, right? So I just think, like, we don't have to go all out every single Saturday night. And I felt like that's what kind of happens is guys start to, you know, who can do the best... It's like cook-offs.

Like, who can do the best thing? So I agree. Or maybe like just, like, trying to get your brothers to justify they're going out of the way to Lords Day. Like, at least I got a good meal.

It's pretty pathetic, but... Yeah, I mean... Do you think that's part of it? Probably.

Just the competitiveness and the... Part of the competition. I also think, like, there's something good about doing a good job and cooking a good meal. But I've gotten to a place where I'm like, I'm not going to stress over it.

And I kind of have like five or six meals that I rotate through. And I think that's enough and I think it's fine. And so I've kind of mastered those meals. I mean, yeah.

I just think it's a different culture when you have... This is a habit that we want to cultivate within the companion priests. Sure. That is the ability to host.

The ability to cook. That kind of generosity. Right. The value of stopping and taking his time to pursue this particular kind of hobby and to excel at it.

And that is its own thing. And then this, we want to do things together. The point of companions is spend our time together, spend our free time, spend our interest as much as we can. And this was a unique kind of experience of that.

So I don't know. I'm not trying to change the world right now. I was just curious about that experience. I didn't go last night to Lord's Day.

I had a wedding that Dylan and Edie... What's up? Congratulations, y'all. But they were married at the cathedral at 6.30 p.m.

Imagine that. It's one of those late, late ones. But I had been walking with them for a few years and walked her through RCIA and through their kind of discerning engagement. And they're just, they're great.

But their families aren't terribly practicing. Yeah. And so it was important for them to have priests come around. And I was wondering, I was kind of, you know, sad to miss the Lord today and maybe reflective a little bit about, like, how does this work?

And I've had felt, I felt a little bit of a frustration with, I'm just signing up and not looking forward to it at all. I'm just signing up because I ought to and carry my weight as a cook for the companions. And there was a time once upon a time when I looked forward to it. And part of that was because I get to work with this other guy.

Not just I get to cook, you know. Which, fine, it can be fun if I feel like I have enough time. Right. So that's the second half of the point, right?

Is like, I think where it's actually nice to cook with someone is when we do I don't know how to say it without all this detail. Okay, the great elderly parishioner was so kind to me. She kind of adopted me to pray for me as a seminarian and everything. So that's been 20 years I've known her since one of my assignments in seminary.

And her daughter gave me a chasuble that she had sewn for her mother because she wants her mother to be honored as a priest and ordained before she dies. Okay, because she was like her hero as a Catholic leader and everything. Well, mom, that's the one I know, she doesn't want anything to do with women's priesthood or whatever. She was happy being a catechist in the parish and an intellectual leader that she was, you know, mother and everything.

But then I was gifted this chasuble as a reminder of Father, you know, you better promote women's ordination and all this stuff. And I'm not gonna fight about it. I don't wanna make a big deal about it. I just, okay, well, thank you.

God bless you. You know, love your mom. So is that the topic for today is women's ordination? No, no.

Okay. I just, it's one of those things that every day brings a new kind of twist and turn and kind of strange circumstance. We can make it the topic. We kind of have to just drift into one now.

That's fair. Well, I already hinted. See the concern on your face. So I have no concern with the face.

I already hinted at the topic. I want to tell a story, though, when I was in seminary and I had, we had a project to do, a paper, I think is what it was. And for whatever reason, it was due on a Thursday, not a Friday, even though I was like 99% sure it was due on Friday. And then so I show up to class.

It was for a midterm. So we had half the midterm in person and the other half was like, you know, like a three-page reflection paper. It was a very simple project. But even at the beginning of the week, I knew the midterm was on Thursday and I thought the paper was due Friday.

And so I come in, at the beginning of the week, I had blocked off time on that Thursday afternoon to write the paper. Like, I was sure this is what was supposed to happen. And then I go into class to take the midterm and I'm studied and I was so ready for it, but I didn't have the paper. And then, you know, it's a priest actually, was going around the classroom collecting everyone's paper and I was like, wait, that was due today.

So they're due at the same time. They're due at the same time. Because we didn't have class Friday, at least the professor was out of town for whatever reason. Okay, go on.

And I was just like mortified, absolutely mortified because like I'd been in seminary, this was like I think my fifth year of seminary, fifth of nine. And I'm like, I know the rules. It's also like, you're a professor, so you know how frustrating it is when like your student doesn't do the work or whatever. And then they make up excuses or whatever it is.

And I'm like, I was mortified. I'm just like, how, like what am I supposed to say? And so I just look at the priest. I'm like, Father, I honestly thought this was due tomorrow.

And he just like kind of gets frustrated. He like turns red, honestly. He's just like, doesn't know what to say. And I say, I'll get it to you this evening.

I blocked off time this afternoon to do it. I messed up. I'm so sorry. And he had no idea what to say to me.

I think he was pretty frustrated and he just goes, okay. And then just walks, like moves on to the next guy. So then I email him later after class and I just like explain the situation more in detail. Like, I'm sorry, I don't know what happened.

I literally marked off time this afternoon. I was planning to do this afternoon so I get it to you tomorrow. And then he emails back and he says, don't worry about it. In fact, I'm probably not even going to look at these till Monday.

If you want a couple extra days to work on it, feel free. I'm like, you are so merciful. But then he signs. So this is good?

This is bad? This is... Well, this is... So this is the point.

He wrote a Latin phrase I've never heard of before where he just said, he said, erare human est. And then he just put dot, dot, dot. I'm like, what does that mean? It's like, to err is human.

And so the full quote... To forgive, right? Isn't that Shakespeare? No, this comes from...

maybe Shakespeare quotes it. This comes from Seneca, who's a Roman philosopher. So he says, erare humanum est, perseverare diabolicum. So to err is human, but to persevere in error is diabolical.

And so I love that. He just put erare humanum est. Like, to err is human. And then he put dot, dot, dot.

So it forced me to go look it up and I was just like, oh. So he's having mercy on me, recognizing, like, to make a mistake is human, but don't persevere in your mistakes. That's just always stuck with me. So the topic today is perseverance, which we can get to more in a minute.

But any thoughts on that story, especially as a professor? Well, as a professor, it's so mixed, you know. Like, I've been there, so I understand. Things get mixed up.

You know, timing gets mixed up. Life gets busy. All best intentions. There were probably a few semesters where I was so on top of things that I had a project well underway by the time that, you know, due date was coming up.

But most, by far, most of my assignments were turned in on time. So if there was something that went wrong, I appreciated a little grace and, you know, wiggle room. Yeah, from the professor side, I mean, sometimes if somebody very, like, powerfully underperforms. I gave it an exam recently and sometimes, you know, a couple of the guys will just bomb it.

And so I'll talk to them, but my approach, I guess, I do feel the frustration of how did you get this, you know, are you paying any attention? Am I wasting my time trying to teach you? Are you wasting the time for your fellow students by making me do remedial things? Are, you know, do you just not care?

And is there a system? I get paranoid. Is there a system that's promoting your lack of care? Like, you know, you're being told that academics are not that important.

Just pray harder or something. And then this, like, recently there was an example where I gave a guy a break and I said, all right, you really blew that. And I don't know what happened, man, but I'm just going to give you, I'm going to give you another chance, which I don't typically do. I want them to learn, you know, that this isn't, you don't get chances forever, really.

I mean, it's important for discipline and that doesn't mean that they don't deserve love or mercy or whatever. But in terms of, we have a goal. This guy did great. Second time around, I could tell he worked hard and I appreciated that.

You know, he needed a couple extra days or whatever. Maybe he needed a little, you know, kick in the pants. Sure. Yeah.

I love that attitude and I think it's true. I appreciate that. You know, we make mistakes, but don't make it a habit, I guess. Yeah, don't persevere in them.

Yeah, don't make it a habit. And I think, yeah, and I appreciate it too because I was really grateful that he had mercy on me in the sense that, like, he didn't count it late. And, you know, maybe he believed me, maybe he didn't. Hopefully he believed me because it was true.

But he didn't make it to be like, I'm going to hold this over your head, but don't let it happen again kind of thing is the way I received it. Not as like a threat, but just as like, I know you can do better and, you know, I expect you to do better next time. And that's like, that's how we're often called is, like, called to live a better life, a higher life is when someone says, like, hey, I know you can do better, like, strive for that. Yeah.

There's something about, yeah, I guess two thoughts that are kind of evasive in my head right now. One is that there's some line in the companions thing about we correct each other for mistakes made, not... Oh, shoot, I thought you would have... All right, no, well, forget that reference then because I'd have to look it up too.

And I think there is a question for me of, like, ultimately, is the concept of Christian mercy, like confession and all this stuff, is it counterintuitive? Is it actually not... I mean, is it too soft and we'd be better off if we just disciplined people in a harder way? You can't have forgiveness until you do this penance, then you come and ask for that.

That's the old church. I mean, that's really church, right? Did it work like that? I'm not sure.

I knew there was an order of penitence. It did, yeah, it did for a little bit. And then you couldn't even receive Athletes are like people, like pro cyclists and pro runners. They were able to endure much more pain than the average person.

It goes into like VO2 max and like whatnot. So is it, is the theory that they take to endurance athletics because they have a high pain tolerance and then like other people give up or is it the other way? Is it they train their body to be able to take pain? They've trained their bodies to take pain and they've trained their body to endure longer bouts of not needing as much hydration and salt intake, right?

And so it goes through a couple times of just like, how do we push those human limits further and further? And so it's actually centered around the breaking two. So the sub two hour marathon with Elliot Kipchoge. Do you remember that?

You're a runner. Yeah, I remember it. Running behind cars that have a slipstream and all that. Yeah, I remember some of this stuff.

Yeah, so they're trying to break two hour mark. Right. What's the natural or like during a race record for a marathon? It's like 201 or 202.

Okay, so it's close anyway. Yeah, it's a couple minutes off. I want to say it's like, it's like either, yeah, it doesn't matter. I don't know what it is, but.

Yeah, for people who don't know this running as an art. I mean, you've gone from running as fast as a person possibly can to now we're strategizing the very small techniques of nutrition, how much water to take in every whatever, five miles and how much sugar to take in. And then you're doing like tweaks on gear so that everything is slipstreamed so that even, you know, what you're, the shirt you're wearing, the shorts you're wearing, the shoes, milliseconds are being taken off of, off of the weight and the gear and the wind resistance. And then you're, you're working with a pack of runners so that you can slipstream and you can run behind another runner so that the air will go around you and you're not being, so it's being refined and refined and refined and refined, not just the really awesome strong runners, but it takes like, if there's 10 awesome, strong runners out there that are better than anybody else in the world, then you're going to take it up just, can we squeeze out another 10 seconds?

Totally. Yeah, it was so fascinating because one of the theories about the human body has been like the human machine, as he calls it. The body is the human machine that if we just figure out how this machine works, then we'll be able to use it or manipulate it or, or feed the right algorithm. If you will, the right fuel, the right hydration to get the best possible outcome.

The problem is what he concludes is like, it's not that simple. Like the human body is not a machine. There's aspects that it functions like a machine, but it's not a machine. And so like he goes into some really interesting examples and data where you could have the same person with all the same variables and like a blind study or whatever who runs, you know, on, on this week, like a sub five minute mile.

But then on race day, he saw, he runs like a four 30 mile or whatever. It's just like, how does that work? Like, but it's just like, he goes into like, well, the human brain gets involved then. And we know very little about the human brain in totality of how it works.

And when you're racing someone, you're more likely to perform better, which is why he said pretty much every world record that's ever been set is always in live competition. It's never during a training block because he said, you're actually gonna perform better when you have the person next to you that you're racing. So his point is like, and this is why it's interesting. Elliot Kipchoge, he did the sub two hour marathon, but he did it in a controlled environment, um, in like 2020, 2021, something like that, where there wasn't, um, where it's not actually considered a world record.

Um, so it's not the official marathon, fastest marathon time because it wasn't in a controlled environment. It wasn't in competition. And so we'll see if it's ever broken in competition. We're getting closer and closer, but it's just, it was a fascinating book of just like, how do you push your body?

How do you train your body to go further? I think motivation, like what was that? What was that guy's motivation? What was in his head?

Because when competition is such an obvious, simple, immediate motivation, I beat you. That guy in front of me, I will get ahead of that. And that's how it works for me, at least in the races. Who's next.

You know, can I get that next guy or can I avoid this, this one behind me catching up to me, you know? Right. And it pushes you to like what in cycling, we'll call it the pain cave, right? It pushes you to the deeper pain cave because you don't want to be passed or you want to pass that next person.

Like it forces you into the pain that he goes into. And it, it just, the mind will like play tricks on itself. This is actually really interesting too. How far into the pain cave you've ever been.

Oh man, deep. I mean, I don't know how to measure it. I imagine because you're serious. You're serious with, I mean, yeah, there's like endurance.

And then, so endurance is like long hours, which is a length of keeping your, um, your body moving hard. BPM side, you know, uh, beats per minute, heart rate, heart rate. Then there's like really physical exertion, like hard and fast, like aggressive workout. And that's your specialty.

I love that. Sprinting up a mountain and getting your heartbeat. See, I can't do this, but I can do 140 beats per minute for 12 hours. But to do a 200 beats per minute will break me in a minute and a half.

I mean, I will have a heart attack, but some people, that's their, their jam. But that's a different kind of pain cave, right? I think so. And then there's just the psychological, like, can I go on anymore?

Whether it's because it's freezing cold or it's hot, or you hate the people next to you, or you've got a sore or something's really seriously wrong physically. You know what I'm saying? What's the, give me a pain cave experience. Oh man.

Probably one of the deepest I've been in the pain. Well, there's different types of pain caves, as you said, but one of the deepest times I've ever been in the pain cave was when I did the triple bypass this summer, which is the, uh, they call it the triple bypass because it goes over three mountain passes here in Colorado. So, so bicycling. So it starts in evergreen and goes all the way to Vail.

So it's 137 miles total or whatever. Well, it's 117 miles total. Father John and I decided to start in golden. So we did the quadruple bypass.

We went over a lookout mountain, then squat pass, then Loveland pass, then Vail pass because why not? You know, if it's there, you got to do it. And the reason why that was so hard for me this year, which I'd never done it before. Two reasons why it was really hard.

One, I'd done very little cycling training because I did the Camino this summer. So I was doing tons of walking, but it's just different muscles then. And then being in the saddle for so long, being on the bike for so long, my body wasn't used to that. So I got saddle sore.

My shoulders were hurting. My knees were hurting. Like I just hadn't been on the bike enough. Yeah.

So that's why that was so hard for me, but I pushed through deep in the pain cave. Dude, it's the worst. I love it. But it's so fun, right?

No, I mean, so what? Like, is it, is it the reward of having finished it? Why do we keep going after stuff like that? I mean, I think because I, I mean, it's, it's miserable.

Well, this is why then you look back and it feels glorious. Totally. This is, I mean, he, he goes into like the chemical releases of the endorphins into the serotonin and dopamine, which is, which is part of it. But this is why like, um, uh, cold plunges are so popular right now.

There's an immediate suffering that happens, but then you, your baseline happiness, your baseline dopamine actually goes up after that. And that's like, that's why they call it the runner's high. Like you feel better when you go run and then it stays up high for quite some time. Right.

And then he goes into this as well. Like, that's the, almost the exact opposite with uh drugs, drugs. Like you get that immediate high from the dopamine hit and everything, but then you actually go below baseline before you come back up again. Whereas running, exercise and cold plunging, it never dips below baseline.

It's a slow decline until you get back to baseline. So you feel good for hours afterwards. So I think that's why people love it. Like you suffer through, but then once you push through, you have that runner's high, the workout high, the perseverance.

Even long-term, it's just, it's an achievement of sorts having suffered something. Even if you don't like achieve anything, that's the, that's the fun part. I think in my mind is for people who have survived something, for example, they can, can remember with a sort of triumphant delight, even like the worst of the pain. And I think with the stations of the crossfit I want to pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet, or I want to pray, you know, I want to read a half an hour of scripture every day, or I want to go to a daily Mass, or I want to go to a adoration of the Blessed Sacrament twice a week, whatever it is.

And then you just stick to it. You just stick to it. That's the key, though. What happens is people say, well, I really should work out more.

Nothing ever happens. Right. Oh, I really should pray more. I would really love to.

You can have the best will, like genuinely say, tomorrow I'm going to have the best prayer day I ever have, and then not do anything because you got to be specific. And to build the habits, they have to be really practical and immediate. Just like, that's what I'm going to do. That's what I have to do.

I'm going to force myself to do that. Yeah. I mean, there's something that makes me uncomfortable about the whole thought, as if it's like our work that builds these sort of... That's fair.

...fortress of temple of prayer around my life. Mm-hmm. But it's just true. You know, it's just true.

If you don't have the habits, if you don't make the sacrifices, and you don't have that built into your life. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, this is why St. Ignatius calls it the spiritual exercises, right?

That's his first paragraph in there is like, just as, you know, I can't remember quite how he phrases it, but just as someone needs to exercise for, you know, healthy reasons or dieting or whatever. Like so too, to be spiritually alert and aware, like it takes practice and exercising and you have to exercise the habits around prayer in order to persevere. Right. To err is human.

Yeah. But to persevere in error. But it brings a lot of challenges too, of all kinds of all kinds. So I'm imagining like, you're out there on your bike, and this, say this one race or whatever you do, comes from a whole history leading up to it.

And I can imagine young Shani riding on his Strider bike. They didn't have Striders when I was a kid, but they don't have pedals and kids just pedal with their feet and everything, riding around learning balance and then get some training wheels. And then, you know, bonks his knee and doesn't want to ride anymore. I'm never going to ride again.

And then, you know, they get out there and his, his bike tire suffers a flat and he's got to learn how to change that and walk home from school. And, and out in the, you know, become this excellent rider and everything, but you get caught in a rainstorm and it's, you know, hide under a bush and hope that lunch doesn't, you know, talk your ear off. So it's just like the adventure, you're going to persevere through an adventure of adversity that comes from all kinds of different angles you never expected and new things and old things. And with time, you get more resilient to them where you don't even think about that.

Right. Like, you know, somebody who goes out with you for the first time, even if they're strong, they might get sunburned and you never expected that. And you don't even think about it because you have the habits of, you know, preparing for everything. And I think that happens with prayer too.

It's just, if you're steady, you do it for a long time. You develop those habits. You be patient with yourself when it happens and when it doesn't, you get fat for a little while and then you get fit again. And then Thanksgiving comes and you have too much pumpkin pie.

I love how you use the word resilience because resilience, uh, race the Lira literally means like spring back again, right? It's, it's, think of a slinky. I was thinking of Salini, like that reset yourself. Reset yourself.

That's right. To jump back. Yeah, to jump back. And it's like, I think that's such a beautiful image of like, I get reverse, um, I hit adversity and I jump back.

I spring back. I'm just like, can I rebound? Do I have the resilience to, to persevere, honestly, to keep going through? And I also like how it's like, it's a plethora of different types of adversities.

It's not just like, it's only going to be this. It's like, but that's, that's what makes it fun. That's what makes prayer an adventure. That's what makes working out an adventure of like, and you're training for a triathlon.

So there's three different events for me. Like I love cycling, but I also get bored of it. And like, I like to do other things as well to, to round it out. Right.

It's ski season is on the verge of starting here pretty soon. So has fallen. You getting excited? Oh yeah.

Even on retreat, I was doing some cross-country skiing around the property. So pumped. Where did you go? I didn't ask about your retreat.

I went up to Patris Cordero. I don't know if we have all the time in the world. It's like, we're just rambling or whatever. I am.

We could, we could listen up. I have myself and I am interested in Patris Cordero, which is that hermitage. Up there. No, no, no, no.

You're talking about on the top of the mountain with that Minnesota family. Yeah. The Ryans. Yeah.

Patris Cordero. It's going to be fully open to the public next fall is what they're hoping. They're going to have five hermitages in phase one and then they'll commence phase two and phase three. There's still rocking too.

There's two right now. The next four are built, but, um, and they, they need to finish the inside of them and then they get some permitting and insurance and whatever else. Did you skin around up there? Yeah.

So they have a cat snow cat that they're going to keep, um, grooming the trails. They they're not grooming them yet, but they're going to groom the trails and then you can cross country ski or walk around or whatever. There's a, I saw some mountain lion tracks and I got a little nervous. So I saw two moose there.

I went on a retreat up there. I think the new year's week before last and it was awesome. I am so grateful for them. Thank you guys.

And, uh, it, I saw a moose, two moose, big one, little one right outside the window. No kidding. My window like looked out toward something of a swampy. Yeah, that's what I was in.

And oh, it was so cool. And then I would go, yeah, I saw some skin around doing some skin and cross country skiing. No, uh, no moose for me, just some elk and a mountain lion. I didn't see the mountain lion.

I saw tracks. Um, I don't want to get political. I'll save that for the next one. I was gonna ask you about the new, the laws we just voted on in, in Colorado.

Next time. Um, they might be controversial, but I'm glad that you had a nice retreat. It was great. Does snow feature in your meditations?

I don't think so. Like a metaphor? No. It's so, I have such a complex relationship to the metaphor of snow because it's so perfect as a metaphor for grace.

But Martin Luther used it and ruined it. That's fair. And it's hard for me to use because my mind will automatically go there and then be like, no, there's so much more use for it. It shines, comes out of nowhere.

It's unique. Every little bit is unique. It gives life. It's water.

Oh man. So anyway, I love it. All right, we should wrap this up, but, um, perseverance, endurance, uh, which part of it's just the outpush in your body to new limits, pushing your spiritual life to new limits. Love it.

Got any shout outs for the mic? Oh, I'm just Dylan and Edie Craig had their wedding. the wedding today or yesterday. And uh father John James, Archdiacono, he's, he's uh, presided.

I, I preached and we had both worked with them for marriage prep and RCIA and they're the best. I really am um motivated by them. They've persevered through all kinds of, you know, challenges, secular, familial, personal, and uh to, to really fight for their faith and explore it and watch them grow. And it's beautiful.

And I'm so grateful. They taught me a lot and I look forward to their life as a family. So it's going to be fantastic. And I beat father John James in chess yesterday.

So I thought I'd take this opportunity to congratulate him on losing for the first time in a while. He beats me in tennis though. I'd like to shout out Evan and Kristen Olson. Uh, I thought I got this book from Evan Olson.

I swear he gave this to me. And then I asked him, I saw him at mass today, uh, or in the parking lot after mass. And I was like, Hey, I finally read that book. He was just like, I did not give you that book.

I'm like who gave me this book? I can't remember. So if you gave me this book by Alex Hutchinson and doer, uh, let me know. But uh.

I bet it was Evan. I bet he forgot. He said it maybe. He's a physical specimen.

He is a physical specimen. Anyways, shout out to him. And uh, last but not least, uh, you probably saw on Instagram if you follow us on Instagram. Uh, I, for the Michael O