In today’s episode I begin a new season and welcome you all back to renewing our journey together. I have been reading Pope Benedict’s Jesus of Nazareth and a single line really jumped out at me that I want to share with you. It’s a great reminder of the ultimate goal and purpose of our lives and also of the work we undertake in our vocations.
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Transcript
Hey everybody.
Speaker:Jonathan Doyle with you.
Speaker:Welcome to the Catholic teacher, somewhat daily podcast, regular listeners.
Speaker:Hello.
Speaker:I know it's been a long time.
Speaker:It's been a few months since the last episode, and let's
Speaker:just see what God's going to do.
Speaker:In the year ahead, I have been on quite a journey.
Speaker:Nothing too crazy.
Speaker:Just a.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Taking a long break and having some time.
Speaker:With family and friends and COVID is obviously affected all
Speaker:the travel and the speaking.
Speaker:But my heart remains committed to trying to support Catholic teachers
Speaker:around the world on a daily basis.
Speaker:There's a reason that I called the website one Catholic teacher.
Speaker:Because I truly believe that one Catholic teacher.
Speaker:Can make an extraordinary difference in the lives of.
Speaker:Young people.
Speaker:So lately.
Speaker:As I take my life of prayer, the interior life pretty seriously.
Speaker:And I've been heading into the cathedral each morning and just
Speaker:having time there for mass and prayer.
Speaker:And today I write in my journal, these words, all that ultimately matters.
Speaker:Is getting home to heaven.
Speaker:My whole life story is ultimately about responding to the free
Speaker:gift of grace in Christ.
Speaker:D, can you agree with me that we live in an extremely complex world?
Speaker:One of the reasons I slowly deleted all social media accounts
Speaker:over the last few years was.
Speaker:The level of complexity, the level of stuff, just coming at us all the time.
Speaker:And.
Speaker:We can lose the one great thing, right?
Speaker:We can lose sight of the one thing that truly matters.
Speaker:Which is getting home to heaven.
Speaker:Think about it think about what it's going to be like.
Speaker:To finally be in heaven.
Speaker:Often think every time you have.
Speaker:Celebration with friends or family, it's always interesting how we gather around
Speaker:a table together and there's always food and just the joy of each other's company.
Speaker:And it's it's so obvious that.
Speaker:That revelation really talks about that.
Speaker:That heavenly banquet, that coming together.
Speaker:With the people that we love.
Speaker:In the presence of God for eternity.
Speaker:What else matters?
Speaker:What else matters?
Speaker:We get so easily bogged down in the complexity of daily life.
Speaker:Understandably.
Speaker:What's this got to do with Catholic teachers as well.
Speaker:Keep in mind that your vocation.
Speaker:This work that you participate in.
Speaker:Is the way in which Christ is sanctifying.
Speaker:You.
Speaker:So it's crucial to understand that our daily work as Catholic educators is part
Speaker:of how we're getting home to heaven.
Speaker:And what we bring to that and the experiences and the encounters
Speaker:that we have on a daily basis.
Speaker:Are a huge part of how we get home to heaven.
Speaker:Last thing for me today is I've been reading since the death of Pope Benedict.
Speaker:I've been starting to reread.
Speaker:His writing, because I just think he's the most extraordinary.
Speaker:Theologian and what makes him so magnificent is not just his depth of
Speaker:intellect and insight, but he writes in an incredibly accessible form.
Speaker:There are many theologians that will take you into the deep
Speaker:swamp of theological complexity.
Speaker:But Benedict just seems to have it's like, there's just no.
Speaker:Theo speak really?
Speaker:There's just this accessible.
Speaker:Clarity.
Speaker:So I'm starting to reread Jesus of Nazareth, his book, because
Speaker:he's such a great theologian.
Speaker:And I want to know more about Jesus.
Speaker:I started to reread it.
Speaker:And it opens with a kind of a meditation on.
Speaker:How.
Speaker:Israel in the old Testament was really hooked on.
Speaker:Prophecy.
Speaker:But the prophecy they wanted was the prophecy that kind of foretold the future.
Speaker:The kind of prophecy that we'd like, which is like the lottery numbers the
Speaker:day before the lottery gets drawn, right?
Speaker:Th the Israelites had fallen into this pattern where they.
Speaker:They went to the profits because they wanted to know the future.
Speaker:They wanted to know if they were going to win.
Speaker:And then the opening of this book Benedict begins to.
Speaker:Delineate just how radically different Christ is.
Speaker:He's not into.
Speaker:Low grade prophecy he's in fact, the new Moses and just like
Speaker:Moses led the Israelites out of bondage Christ leads all of us.
Speaker:On an Exodus as well.
Speaker:And this line really stuck out to me.
Speaker:It says this.
Speaker:Among all the parts of history.
Speaker:The path to God.
Speaker:Is the true direction that we must seek.
Speaker:And find.
Speaker:Among all the paths of history, the path to God is the true direction
Speaker:that we must seek and find.
Speaker:I think it's important because as we go about the work of Catholic
Speaker:education, we are educating at a time in history with great.
Speaker:Complex claims made upon the human person.
Speaker:I think particularly at this moment of.
Speaker:The claim and power of technocracy that has reached into every area of life,
Speaker:particularly through the COVID moment.
Speaker:The kind of belief that the why out of everything is more or
Speaker:authoritarianism and more technocratic control and more surveillance.
Speaker:And then you can go to other paths of history.
Speaker:You can go to Marxism, you can go.
Speaker:All throughout history, you can find these different paths that
Speaker:people have been trying to take.
Speaker:To get to where they want to be.
Speaker:And if you take the wrong path, It's very possible to walk off the edge of a cliff.
Speaker:If you take the wrong path, it's very possible to end up somewhere.
Speaker:You don't want to be.
Speaker:So Benedict says he, once again is among all the parts of history.
Speaker:The path to God is the true direction.
Speaker:That we must seek.
Speaker:And fine.
Speaker:The direction of our lives.
Speaker:The path of our life is the path home to heaven.
Speaker:And what I want to encourage you with today is that being a Catholic educator
Speaker:or a Catholic leader in education.
Speaker:Your task is to bring young people to understand this path.
Speaker:That the path of their life is not necessarily the path of.
Speaker:Incredible financial riches there.
Speaker:That can be an impact.
Speaker:That's fine.
Speaker:There's no problem with that.
Speaker:If.
Speaker:If it, young person has great academic gifts and goes on to do
Speaker:well financially, that's fine.
Speaker:It's, we don't want to get into that kind of, we all need to be
Speaker:miserable and suffering and pole.
Speaker:But.
Speaker:We need to get them on the path.
Speaker:We need to bring them.
Speaker:To know, and to love Christ, who is the way and the truth and the life.
Speaker:So in my first podcast back for a while, all I want to do is say to you that.
Speaker:Let's keep the goal in mind here.
Speaker:The goal is not test scores.
Speaker:The goal is not.
Speaker:Parental approval and things though.
Speaker:Those are good things.
Speaker:There.
Speaker:They're important things.
Speaker:But the true goal is the path.
Speaker:And of all the parts of history, the path home to God is the
Speaker:direction that we want to take.
Speaker:And that each day in each conversation, each lesson, each
Speaker:moment you're bringing young people.
Speaker:On that journey with you.
Speaker:And that's a great thing to be doing with your life.
Speaker:God bless you everybody.
Speaker:Let's just probably for me, probably that I've God wants me to keep
Speaker:doing this keeps happening and my go bless should a very special work.
Speaker:My name's Jonathan Doyle.
Speaker:This has been the Catholic teacher daily podcast.
Speaker:Do me a favor.
Speaker:If you like, what you hear, send me an email Jonathan at one Catholic
Speaker:teacher, O N E one Catholic teacher.com.
Speaker:And just let me know.
Speaker:The podcast is useful.
Speaker:And interestingly, I think what I'd like to do is I'd like to start.
Speaker:Doing some more interviews with interesting Catholic.
Speaker:Educators.
Speaker:All the way from just really good Catholic teachers who you think are great teachers.
Speaker:All the way to, major Catholic leaders in the education space.
Speaker:Who do you think could be interesting to hear from?
Speaker:So I'd like, I liked doing those, let me know jonathan@onecatholicteacher.com.
Speaker:God bless everybody Look forward to talking with you again tomorrow
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