Ep77 Living Pro-Life Every Day

“This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
~ John 13:35

Am I really "pro-life"?
How does loving others impact my mental & spiritual health?
How am I supposed to treat the people who are hard to love?

In Episode 77 of This Whole Life, Pat Millea welcomes Fr. Nathan LaLiberte for a powerful conversation about living out the pro-life message in our daily interactions and relationships. Together, they go beyond the usual political rhetoric, exploring how being truly pro-life means acknowledging the dignity of every person—from the unborn and marginalized to the neighbor or cashier we encounter each day. Drawing on scripture, personal stories, and concepts from psychology, they discuss the challenges of loving those we might find difficult and the importance of moving past disgust and division. You'll hear thought-provoking reflections on boundaries, cancel culture, authentic Christian love, and the everyday choices that build a culture of life. Join this heartfelt and inspiring call for radical, incarnational pro-life living.

Episode 77 Show Notes

Chapters:

0:00: Introduction and Highs & Hards
8:55: The sanity of being fully pro-life
15:40: The anti-humanity of cancel culture
22:03: Being pro-life, not "pro-birth"
31:45: Refusing to turn away from a person
38:08: The temptations to villainize people & groups
45:05: Meditation on others' dignity & human solidarity
55:49: Challenge By Choice

Reflection Questions:

1. What is one specific thing that stuck with you from this conversation?
2. Father Nathan discusses the tendency to see “pro-life” purely through the lens of abortion. In what ways can a pro-life ethic broaden to include other aspects of human dignity and social justice?
3. What are practical ways, big or small, that you can affirm someone’s dignity on a daily basis, even if you don’t agree with them or find it inconvenient?
4. How do you navigate loving and maintaining relationships with people who hold vastly different beliefs or values than you?
5. The episode often returns to the idea that being fully pro-life requires acting with intentional love. What does that look like for you, especially in small, everyday encounters?

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Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction and Highs & Hards
• 8:55 The sanity of being fully pro-life
• 15:40 The anti-humanity of cancel culture
• 22:03 Being pro-life, not "pro-birth"
• 31:45 Refusing to turn away from a person
• 38:08 The temptations to villainize people & groups
• 45:05 Meditation on others' dignity & human solidarity
• 55:49 Challenge By Choice

Transcript

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:00:00]:
But instead, I had to do the incarnational thing. I had to enter into her world. I had to ask her questions. And my only regret about this situation is I didn't ask her name.

Pat Millea [00:00:17]:
Welcome to This Whole Life, a podcast for all of us, seeking sanity and sanctity and a place to find joy and meaning through the integration of faith and mental health. I'm Pat Millea, a Catholic speaker, musician, and leader. And I'm happy to bring you this podcast along with my bride, Kenna, a licensed marriage and family therapist. This is the stuff she and I talk about. All the doing dishes in the car on a date. We're excited to bring you this podcast for educational purposes. It's not therapy or a substitute for mental health care. So come on in, have a seat at our dining room table and join the conversation with us.

Pat Millea [00:00:55]:
We are so glad you're here. Well, it's a beautiful rainy Thursday in Minnesota and it is This Whole Life. We are back live and local. And by that I mean it's a podcast, so we're probably neither of those things.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:01:16]:
Well, now it's apparently more than a podcast because we are being seen.

Pat Millea [00:01:19]:
So it is a video podcast now? That's right. So you can, you can listen. You can also check in. Father Nathan LaLiberte, you are here with us again. How are you, brother?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:01:27]:
I'm very well, thank you. I think this is the closest we've sat together on a couch outside of like going to a Marvel movie. So it's a very intimate setting.

Pat Millea [00:01:35]:
You're welcome. Grace you with my presence.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:01:38]:
Thank you.

Pat Millea [00:01:39]:
I appreciate it.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:01:39]:
And everyone can see my reactions, which is great.

Pat Millea [00:01:41]:
That's true.

Pat Millea [00:01:42]:
Yep, yep.

Pat Millea [00:01:42]:
Just ignore. Ignore whatever you smell over there. If you're this close, great to be with you. I say you're with us, you're not with us at all. You're just with me. Because it's you and me today.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:01:51]:
The royal we for you.

Pat Millea [00:01:52]:
The royal we. That's right.

Pat Millea [00:01:54]:
Yep.

Pat Millea [00:01:55]:
Kenna is indisposed today. She is meeting with clients and this is a conversation that you and I get to have alone. We are not, to my knowledge, gonna talk exclusively about Marvel movies like the last time we got together on the podcast.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:02:07]:
Hey, you bait and switched. That's why I'm here. So that's okay.

Pat Millea [00:02:10]:
But they may sneak in there at some point. We'll have to wait and see. We're gonna have a great conversation today. I'm really excited. It's one that I am really passionate about. I think it has far reaching consequences for all of Our sanity and our connections to each other, our intrapersonal wellness. So I'm excited to get to it. Before we get down that road, though, how about a high and hard for you lately, Father?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:02:32]:
Okay. I gotta, you know, keep my track record going of both. And. And so my high and hard are school. So my high is. I am in school over the summer months as well, and. And taking some awesome classes. And I'm taking ethics, which has been fascinating because I took ethics, obviously, when I was going through my philosophy degree, and then also two in seminary formation.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:02:53]:
And the ethics of psychology are completely different, just like some of the standards that, you know, are set because the priest is much more like in a parish with a family kind of setting.

Pat Millea [00:03:06]:
Sure.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:03:07]:
It's a lot more messier. There's a lot of boundary blurring, or it's a. They. They call it boundary crossing versus boundary violations.

Pat Millea [00:03:15]:
Interesting.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:03:15]:
Whereas in, like, therapy, it's just. It's very, very clear, like, you're providing something for a client and you're not supposed to be, like, enmeshed in their families. And it's just been very, very fascinating. And then also, too, to see, like, how good boundaries create psychological health for people.

Pat Millea [00:03:33]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:03:34]:
It's just been. It's been really cool. And the rest of my classes have been great as well. I had to took a class on CBT, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which was just. Aw. Just to learn about some concepts of reframing and things like this.

Pat Millea [00:03:46]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:03:47]:
Then my hard is. I am in school over the summer. So I'm taking five classes over the summer months, which is not. I don't know why. I mean, it's just like this instinct that we are, like, it's not supposed to be in school over the summer.

Pat Millea [00:04:01]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:04:01]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:04:01]:
So it's kind of one of those things where, like, I love it, but it's also too, like, I want to break.

Pat Millea [00:04:05]:
Yep. Yep.

Pat Millea [00:04:06]:
Just rolling right from spring to summer.

Pat Millea [00:04:08]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:04:09]:
And yet I want to get done with the program. So I'm happy to. To keep on rolling over the summer months.

Pat Millea [00:04:13]:
Totally. I feel like in a prior episode, you had a hard once about how difficult it is to just work through the summer. That somehow you, like, in your brain and heart, even from childhood, you're programmed that, like, summer equals vacation. So.

Pat Millea [00:04:28]:
Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:04:29]:
I think.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:04:29]:
Do you have that?

Pat Millea [00:04:30]:
Oh, yeah. I think most adults probably feel that on some level, you know, And I think maybe it's just here in Minnesota, but I suspect it's other places too. There is that cultural shift of, like, it's summer it is for a lot of people. It's cabin season or it's. You take Fridays off or whatever. So I think it does make sense that maybe your hard is like, maybe.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:04:48]:
I'm glad to hear it's a little more ordered. I thought it was just like that part of me not wanting to mature.

Pat Millea [00:04:53]:
No, no. I mean, it may be that too.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:04:54]:
But we'll leave that conversation for Kenna.

Pat Millea [00:04:57]:
It's the classic vision, I'm envisioning Father Nathan sitting in a classroom, just head turned to the side, gazing at the beautiful day outside. Like, the sun is shining, the birds are chirping. It's like beautiful Park Avenue, Minneapolis. Yeah. Glorious, picturesque central Minneapolis.

Pat Millea [00:05:15]:
Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:05:16]:
Maybe not. Appreciate it. Thank you. I think my. My hard lately is that the summer is, like you said, it's. It's not a clean break. But the challenge during any summer for us is just. It's very unpredictable.

Pat Millea [00:05:34]:
So the school year for us and our kids, with all the stresses that come with it, is at least predictable. It's systematic. Yeah. You have to worry about uniforms and lunches and getting kids to and from school and activities, but you at least have the structure that you know what Tuesday looks like. For the most part, summer is just like, I don't know what tomorrow holds. I have a vague sense of what tomorrow looks like, but I'm not 100% sure because literally every day is different. And we've got a hilarious patchwork of wonderful nannies and babysitters who help us out during the days, and they're all terrific. But their schedules are kind of sporadic, too, because they go on vacation with their families, things like that.

Pat Millea [00:06:13]:
So just every single night, Kenna and I have not a big, but like a little mini family meeting every night of like, okay, the next 20 hours, what in the world are we doing? Who's coming? Where are we going? Who's leaving the house? It just.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:06:29]:
I love it.

Pat Millea [00:06:29]:
So it's like a constant check in to figure out which way we're going and to make sure kids don't get left at activities or balls get dropped or whatever. The high is that relative to this is just very summer focused high and hard for us. We, this past weekend got to go to Kenna's grandfather's cabin. Her, that side of the family owns a cabin up in Wisconsin a little ways from here. And it was just our family. And normally when we're at that cabin, we're with her extended family, which is super fun. That's a joy of its own. But this was Just a different version of joy.

Pat Millea [00:07:05]:
Because it was just us at the cabin and we had some friends come up on Saturday during the day to just like go out on the pontoon and have lunch on the boat and take the Jet Skis out and go fishing off the dock and have relaxed schedules and kids go to bed. It was just so much fun, so much joy. The beauty of creation, the beauty of family and friendship. I spent like eight hours on the Jet Skis between two days because I am the all time jet ski driver. I only. I only flipped a Jet Ski with children on it one time when we were out there. No injuries. It is okay.

Pat Millea [00:07:47]:
And it was just beautiful. It was great. It was a joy.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:07:50]:
Really happy.

Pat Millea [00:07:50]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Pat Millea [00:07:51]:
Back to normal now. But it was. It was a beautiful weekend. So, Father, today you and I have the great opportunity, the great blessing to talk through what it means to live as a pro life person, as a pro life Catholic in relationship with other people. And this is something that's been on your heart for a long time through some of the conversations and things that you've done. I know it's something that I've thought a lot about over the years. I think it's something that probably any Catholic, any American even considers, especially with a lot of the rhetoric around the term pro life in our culture, you know, and I think maybe if I can frame it this way, and then I'll let you kind of set the stage for where this conversation might go. I think, you know, a lot of the work that we do with This Whole Life and with the broader Martin Center for Integration that produces this podcast, we talk a lot about the glory of God being a human person fully alive, that God is glorified when his children respond to his love by using the gift of their life to the fullest, when they let his life flow through them.

Pat Millea [00:09:02]:
And so obviously, everything that we do in this podcast is related to helping people become fully alive, mentally alive, spiritually alive, emotionally alive. I would propose, and I know Kenna would agree, that one of the ways that we pursue a full life ourselves is to help other people live to the fullest themselves as well, to make a gift of self, to lift up the life of others, to give them the dignity, to acknowledge the dignity that God has given them. So I think there's a lot to be said about the way, the ways that our sanity and our integrity, our authenticity is connected to how we treat other people. When you have, you know, you've kind of thought through this idea of what it means to be truly pro life in all of its different expressions. Where have you seen the need for that and where have you identified that in our culture? Maybe even in our Church, we don't always have a great vision of what that looks like.

Pat Millea [00:10:04]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:10:04]:
So I think one of the first things to do is just reframing to use the CBT. But, like, I think a lot of people, when they hear pro life, they immediately go to the abortion issue.

Pat Millea [00:10:14]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:10:15]:
And which is completely understandable because you're. You're talking about literally, extermination of life.

Pat Millea [00:10:19]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:10:20]:
But the concept of pro life is actually so much broader than that. And as soon as we start to kind of look at it through a myopic lens, we lose a lot. And this was actually one of the things that happened when Roe vs. Wade was overturned is people were like, yes, you know, finally, it's. It's changed. And then it was kind of like, okay, so what are you going to do now that we're saving babies? Like, are you going to help the mom? Are you going to care for the child? Are you going to find adoptions places? Like, it's looking at the care for the entirety of the whole person. And so one of the things. Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:10:53]:
That this pro life lens is supposed to give us is how do we see our neighbor? And so pro life actually does encapsulate a lot of those social justice principles, which are fascinating. Right. Because I think sometimes we say, like, pro life is conservative, and then social justice is liberal. And it's like, actually that those categories don't work well because pro life is Christian. Because if what we want is to value what God wants us to value, we. We love the same things God loves. God loves life in all aspects. And so we don't have the luxury as human beings to pick what lives we like and what lives we don't.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:11:35]:
Is we really have to say, okay, I need to, as a Christian, see everyone as my brother and sister.

Pat Millea [00:11:41]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:11:42]:
And then how do I begin to do that? Because we as humans. And you go all the way back to, like, you know, the first conflict with Cain and Abel. Right. Is like, here you have. In a family system, like, Cain couldn't see his brother Abel. He just saw problems, and he's like, how am I gonna get rid of the problems?

Pat Millea [00:11:57]:
Yep.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:11:59]:
So I mean, this is what we just. We see. Like, we. We don't treat people dignity. We lose people. And then we also lose what it means to be human.

Pat Millea [00:12:07]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:12:09]:
What examples have you seen or evident in scripture of Jesus Doing exactly that. What are examples of Jesus seeing a person, and I would say maybe even a person who other people don't see as a full human being. How does he engage with people whose dignity are being offended and acknowledge and uplift the life in them?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:12:34]:
Yeah. I mean, and this is. Thanks for asking that question, especially because, like, it's Christ who shows us who we're. So what is humanity supposed to be? This is Gaudium et Spes 22. It's like Christ reveals to humanity what man was truly supposed to be before the fall.

Pat Millea [00:12:46]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:12:47]:
So how does he see things? And to the baffling perspective of the disciples who are like, why are you talking to these people? So, you know, of course, the, the, the woman at the well, when he's talking to the Samaritan woman, like, they're, they literally ask, like, why are you talking to this person? She says, why are you talking to me? Like, why do you see me?

Pat Millea [00:13:04]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:13:05]:
You have Jesus talking with the Roman centurion, when he comes to him and says, hey, will you heal my son? You have Christ talking with the Syrophoenician woman. You have Christ who the. I love. The scene is like, it's by the Passover time, and the Greeks come up to Jesus and, you know, he's talking with the Greeks. And, you know, then the disciples also want to make all these distinctions among the cleansing of the lepers.

Pat Millea [00:13:26]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:13:26]:
There was the one Samaritan that came back to give thanks. So Christ is interacting with them. And he also tells the disciples plainly, is like, I have other sheep that are not of this flock. So he's already prepping them to say, look, I need, I need you to have a broader view. And so we really can't be surprised that one of the first conflicts that arises in the Acts of the Apostles is the disciples are trying to not see the Gentiles.

Pat Millea [00:13:51]:
Sure.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:13:52]:
And Paul's like, actually God is seeing them and miracles are happening, so we have to too.

Pat Millea [00:13:58]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:13:59]:
And then you see people like Philip, you know, like, going with the Ethiopian eunuch.

Pat Millea [00:14:02]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:14:03]:
And doesn't once say, like, hey, you know, your lifestyle is kind of bizarre.

Pat Millea [00:14:07]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:14:08]:
He just says, like, what are you reading?

Pat Millea [00:14:10]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:14:10]:
And he starts there. So, like, we just see this perpetual seeing the other person, no matter the demographic that they come from. And Christ models that for us. And I think if we're honest with ourselves, we actually choose not to see people that we don't like to see.

Pat Millea [00:14:28]:
Sure.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:14:29]:
Or we hyper focus on them as the enemy.

Pat Millea [00:14:32]:
Yeah, yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:14:33]:
Versus what Christ does is sees every person as an opportunity to encounter something more.

Pat Millea [00:14:40]:
And at the limit, you know, that inability or lack of willingness to see another person or to exclude them at the limit that turns into stuff like Cancel Culture. And like, because I don't agree with you, I have to destroy you.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:14:55]:
Yes.

Pat Millea [00:14:56]:
I'm gonna shut you down. We're gonna take you out of society. You're going to go to a deserted island, take away your. Your job, your marriage, your platform, your whatever. Right. That. That you have to go away because you don't agree with us. Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:08]:
So glad you mentioned that.

Pat Millea [00:15:09]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:10]:
I think Cancel Culture is where we see it currently showing up. I mean, there's a. Have you ever seen the. The series Black Mirror?

Pat Millea [00:15:18]:
Yes.

Pat Millea [00:15:18]:
Oh, yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:19]:
Okay. So some of. Some of them are like, do not watch.

Pat Millea [00:15:22]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:22]:
But there's one but called Nose Dive.

Pat Millea [00:15:25]:
Yes.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:25]:
And it's all about like every time they see someone and they can kind of rate them.

Pat Millea [00:15:29]:
Yep.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:29]:
And they have to have so much of a rating to go into certain buildings, to be able to work at certain places, to live in certain places, to socialize with certain people, to go to certain ways.

Pat Millea [00:15:38]:
That's the first episode I ever watched of Black Mirror.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:40]:
Yeah. It's intense.

Pat Millea [00:15:41]:
It's terrifying and pretty prescient. I mean, it's pretty close to what we engage with now in terms of social media. It's fascinating.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:15:51]:
Well, because there's that one scene, Right. Where one of her co workers, like the relationship that he had, fell apart and so they sided with whoever his other significant other was.

Pat Millea [00:16:00]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:16:00]:
And so then, like, no one wanted to give him stars to keep his status, so they just basically canceled him.

Pat Millea [00:16:06]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:16:06]:
And then the next scene is he can't get into work.

Pat Millea [00:16:08]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:16:09]:
He can't get through the doors. He didn't have enough status.

Pat Millea [00:16:11]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:16:11]:
And I mean, I think that, I mean, obviously it's an over dramatization, but it's speaking to something where if we don't like what you say, you're canceled.

Pat Millea [00:16:19]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:16:20]:
And again, it doesn't matter if you're left or right on politics or on, you know, conservative or liberal or if you' you know, progressive or if you're traditional, at some point you're going to get canceled because you step out of line and then the goal of canceling is you just disappear.

Pat Millea [00:16:37]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:16:38]:
And that's not Christian.

Pat Millea [00:16:40]:
Right, right. And that, I mean, I think there you're bringing up some very helpful kind of like political awarenesses that's good for us to acknowledge. I think it's very clear that Abortion is a grave moral evil. No, neither political party in the United States is certainly not the Catholic political party. Neither party is in line with all the different expressions of Catholic social teaching around life. So one party is against abortion and assisted suicide. The other party, by and large, is against the death penalty.

Pat Millea [00:17:19]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:17:19]:
And against, like, you know, deportation.

Pat Millea [00:17:22]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:17:22]:
Immigration.

Pat Millea [00:17:23]:
Unjust immigration policies. Right, right, right. So. So all of us Catholics, all of us Christians, we all have to vote our conscience. This is not an episode about political issues or voting. What, what we do have to acknowledge, though, is that the nation, our government, and I would say no government will lead the way when it comes to being fully pro life.

Pat Millea [00:17:44]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:17:45]:
And I don't know that any government ever has because governments are just worldly organizations. You know, the church will last forever. The church is outside of space and time. A government is not. So we shouldn't look to any government or party.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:17:57]:
That's not who we're aligning with.

Pat Millea [00:17:58]:
Yes, right, right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:18:00]:
Change.

Pat Millea [00:18:00]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:18:01]:
So we do have to. We, we do have to, you know, make prudent and discerning choices around politics and government. We have to be involved with the political process in our nation, that's for sure. But we're not aligning ourselves and certainly not our hearts with any political party.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:18:18]:
I'd like to kind of actually just sort of. This is, for me, the point you just made hits home. When Christ says to his apostles at the Last Supper, they will know you are my disciples by how you love, love one another. Right.

Pat Millea [00:18:29]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:18:30]:
And this is honestly been one of the litmus tests to say, am I pro life? Is. Am I loving others? Because if I can say no, I can turn off my heart to that, to that, to that. There. Actually, the world is not seeing you as a Christian. And this is what Christ tells the disciples. He goes, what good is it if you only give to, you know, those who repay you? You know?

Pat Millea [00:18:54]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:18:54]:
What good is it if you only salute to those who know you? Like, even the pagans do that. And so what Christ is saying is like, you know, you're going to have to be different in how you approach the rest of humanity if you want to be my disciple. And I think this is where we actually have to be clear. So if you don't want to do that, then don't call yourself a Christian, because a Christian is someone who literally is seen as this radical pro life of seeing. I see the dignity and value of every person.

Pat Millea [00:19:25]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:19:26]:
So I went to a chiropractor recently to get adjusted, and it was interesting I said, you know, one of the sociological experiments I would love to do is to go around the Mall of America and just to ask random people, if you could give one word association to describe Christianity, what is the one word that you would use? And I asked the chiropractor, I said, what is the one word that you would use? And he says, hypocrisy. I'm like, because the one word should be love.

Pat Millea [00:20:01]:
Yeah, yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:03]:
Per Christ's admonition is we should be known by our love.

Pat Millea [00:20:07]:
And so God is love.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:08]:
And God is.

Pat Millea [00:20:09]:
So that would be the leader in the clubhouse.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:11]:
That would be the leader in the clubhouse. And. But this is where, like, I think that some of the words that would be used commonly would be critical, judgmental. I mean, hypocritical as well.

Pat Millea [00:20:21]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:22]:
And this is where, like, you really do see the issues, Right. Is when someone says, you know, I hate you and you and you, you're all like this demographic I don't like, and you're ruining society. But I love the little baby that you can't see. And so people hear that message and they're like, that's hypocritical.

Pat Millea [00:20:38]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:40]:
And there's that passage from First John, right. Is how can you say you love the God that you do not see and despise the brother that you do?

Pat Millea [00:20:46]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:47]:
And so it is a challenge. And, like, this is meant to make everyone feel uncomfortable. Do you mind if I keep going on a tangent or do you have.

Pat Millea [00:20:55]:
Please, no go.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:20:56]:
So you got me all fired up now. This is like my pulpit is now a very comfortable leather couch.

Pat Millea [00:21:03]:
Let me interrupt real quick because I. I think that is a beautiful principle and it's really challenging for me because I've been active in what you would probably call the pro life movement, quote, unquote, for like 30 years. Right. Playing out, excuse me, praying. Outside of Planned Parenthood in high school, taking high schoolers to the March for life for dozens of years to D.C. being active here, locally, in Minnesota outside of different abortion facilities, and working with the adoption process with different friends, things like that. So I've seen that from the inside. One of the most often and common criticisms of people who are against abortion is you're not pro life, you're just pro birth.

Pat Millea [00:21:47]:
And then going on to say you're against life in all these other different circumstances. Right. I would say there are two realities here. On one hand, I think that is a totally unfair and untrue criticism. The pro life, anti abortion people who I know are typically the most Charitable people out there and they are involved in ending poverty and homelessness and working in foster care and things like that.

Pat Millea [00:22:14]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:22:15]:
So I think that's an unjust criticism on one hand. On the other hand, though, I can understand how we Christians do not set the standard well enough to declare what pro life really means. I was talking to last week, I was speaking with a group called Catholic HEART Workcamp out in Michigan. And there was. Throughout the course I gave four talks, one each night for four nights. And I just referenced how abortion is a bad thing in two different talks. I did not give any talks about abortion at all. I just listed abortion in the litany of ways that the human race falls short.

Pat Millea [00:22:54]:
Basically just sins that we as humans commit. And this high school girl grabbed me the last day and said, hey, can we talk? Had no idea what she wanted to talk about. And she was wonderful in the sense that she was very kind, very gentle, very rational, but she was like, here's the deal, I don't think abortion is a bad thing. So when you say it's bad, I want to understand where you're coming from. We had a great two hour, very far reaching conversation. But it was wonderful. And what a beautiful way to approach that though. Yeah, she was, I really, I, I affirmed her courage, her charity, her reason, many times because I, you know, I don't know that I changed her mind.

Pat Millea [00:23:36]:
Hopefully I did. But at minimum, I think we were able to hear each other really well, which is a winning proposition in a dialogue like that, no matter what. But one of the things that she brought up is this exact issue. You know, people are against abortion, but they're not against poverty and they're not supporting mothers enough and things like that. Yeah, right. Yeah, exactly. And that's what I said to her. I said, you know, I don't speak for every person out there.

Pat Millea [00:24:01]:
I know for certain that there are ways that I do not set the standard well enough when it comes to love of neighbor. And I think all of us, you know, not all of us are called to be, to host or to run a homeless shelter in our home or something. Right. Not all of us are called to work in every specific kind of outreach that exists out there. But I think individually, personally, all of us have to ask the question, what are the ways that I am genuinely not supporting the lives of others in my circle?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:24:35]:
You know, so I mean, let me just kind of throw a flip on this too. I love that you brought that up. And I think it's, it's true that there's a. There's a heavy critique against pro life versus pro birth.

Pat Millea [00:24:43]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:24:44]:
But I do think so one of the things that people go after people who are pro choice. Right. Is that it's selfish.

Pat Millea [00:24:50]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:24:50]:
You're not caring about the baby. You just want what's good for you.

Pat Millea [00:24:54]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:24:56]:
However, people that hate a particular demographic are the same way is you just want to live the life you want to live with the conveniences that you have, and you want those other people to just go away. So it's so fascinating because we're pointing fingers at each other and we're both guilty of the same thing.

Pat Millea [00:25:16]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:25:17]:
And again, like, okay, sure, they're not murdering someone, but I mean, where is it that you create such unhospitality? You're so unhospitable that the person literally has to leave or evacuate or, you know, go away. And so I think that there, there is this challenge. Like, if we're not feeling challenged, it means that we are comfortable and probably blind to something. And can we expand the scope to say, yeah, I'm. I'm all for defense of the, you know, the child that you can't see. And yet not once have you tried to advocate for some demographic that you don't agree with. So this is where I was going to go on the pulpit.

Pat Millea [00:25:58]:
Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:25:58]:
Ready?

Pat Millea [00:25:59]:
Got it.

Pat Millea [00:25:59]:
Fired up.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:26:01]:
So there's an author named Arthur Brooks. Not David Brooks. Arthur Brooks.

Pat Millea [00:26:05]:
Okay.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:26:06]:
And he has written extensively on the political divide that exists in our country especially. And he's like, trying to desperately get people to the table to talk because per your, you know, cancel culture. Bring it up like, I don't want to talk. Just go away. Just go away.

Pat Millea [00:26:24]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:26:25]:
And Arthur Brooks is trying to keep the dialogue going. And he, he actually, he reflects on this fascinating concept I've never heard outside of him before. He said part of the reason why people respond so strongly to demographics they don't like is they're emanating and experiencing the disgust emotion. So, okay, you've watched Inside Out. Right.

Pat Millea [00:26:48]:
Both of them love them.

Pat Millea [00:26:49]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:26:49]:
So, like, the first one, like, it shows the primary emotions, and disgust is one of those primary emotions. And I don't know if you thought, like, I don't understand why that's one totally.

Pat Millea [00:26:58]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:26:58]:
It's not anger, sadness, fear, make perfect sense, but like, disgust, disgust, like.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:27:03]:
I don't really think that, but actually it's substantial for keeping us alive as a species. Because when we show disgust, it's saying, like, I have to avoid that. So, for example, let's say you pull something out of the fridge and you smell it and you're like, oh, this is gross.

Pat Millea [00:27:17]:
Like I did two days ago.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:27:18]:
And hopefully you didn't eat that.

Pat Millea [00:27:20]:
That is correct.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:27:20]:
Okay, good, good, good, good.

Pat Millea [00:27:21]:
I have been known to push an expiration date once in a while, but that I did not.

Pat Millea [00:27:25]:
No, you did not.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:27:25]:
Okay. But like disgust keeps us from doing things that are harmful to us. And so it's really important. And Arthur Brooks says what's happened is we have moved disgust to people. And so, for example, he says the tells and he's actually quoting a psychotherapist named Gabbard. And Gabbard, toward the end of his career was known to be so effective on knowing if a marriage was going to succeed or not, he could predict within 90% after a one hour meeting.

Pat Millea [00:27:55]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Pat Millea [00:27:56]:
John Gottman does stuff like that too. Yeah, it's amazing.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:27:59]:
Maybe it was Gottman. Is that the Four Horsemen?

Pat Millea [00:28:01]:
Yes. Yeah. Gottman.

Pat Millea [00:28:02]:
Yep.

Pat Millea [00:28:02]:
John Gottman.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:28:03]:
Cross Gabbard.

Pat Millea [00:28:03]:
It's Gottman.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:28:04]:
Yeah. Guess who's in college.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:28:09]:
But some other white guy. Like so.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:28:13]:
But the, the interesting thing about his theory is as soon as he was watch a couple and one of them would show signs of disgust, he would say that the relationship's not going to be feasible. And that looks like eye rolling, that looks like scoffing, that looks like turning away when the person's talking to you.

Pat Millea [00:28:31]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:28:32]:
And he says people subconsciously, their animal brain sees the signs of disgust and says, this is bad and dangerous. I have to move away.

Pat Millea [00:28:41]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:28:42]:
So this is Arthur Brooks challenge. He says, think back on the last time you eye rolled someone, you scoffed at someone, you turned your back to someone. And those are signs of disgust. And they are creating substantial divides among the human person.

Pat Millea [00:29:01]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:29:02]:
Christ saw this first. Do not say raqqa to your brothers. Do not say, you fool. You'll be, you know, liable to fiery gehenna.

Pat Millea [00:29:13]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:29:13]:
Is he saying like, don't scoff, don't show disgust towards your neighbor. And what comes right before that is reconcile with your brother at the altar.

Pat Millea [00:29:23]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:29:24]:
As he's talking about again, Christ is the model psychologist. So if you want another episode, I would love to talk about Christ the perfect, the psychologist.

Pat Millea [00:29:32]:
Oh my gosh, I'm enamored by it.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:29:35]:
But this is what's causing the anti pro life movement is we have disgust for things that we should actually not have discussed for. But love.

Pat Millea [00:29:46]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:29:46]:
And this is the challenge of the Christian is can you see love before you see disgust? And then this is Arthur Brooks. He pos. He's actually a devout Catholic. Is. He says, can you imagine what would happen as we. If we as a nation, drop disgust and move to dialogue? And so at some point, he says, we have to villainize someone else in order to feel good about our position.

Pat Millea [00:30:12]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:30:13]:
And dialogue does not mean agreement.

Pat Millea [00:30:17]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:30:17]:
Like, dialogue does not presuppose that we are going to end up on the same page. It presupposes that I treat you like a human being and that if I disagree with you, it's in a place of love and charity, like this girl did with me last week. It's a beautiful example.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:30:32]:
It's like you're like, I don't even know if she changed her mind.

Pat Millea [00:30:34]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:30:35]:
But we had a wonderful conversation. We both saw each other and heard each other.

Pat Millea [00:30:38]:
Yeah, totally.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:30:38]:
And I guarantee you she loved you more and you loved her more afterwards.

Pat Millea [00:30:42]:
Totally. 100%.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:30:44]:
Just because of the dialogue.

Pat Millea [00:30:45]:
Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:30:45]:
That turning away is a really fascinating, even, like, physical image, you know, and the image that always comes to mind for me is, you know, here in the Twin Cities, in lots of big metro areas, folks who are panhandling on an off ramp or something like that, asking for money.

Pat Millea [00:31:02]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:31:03]:
And I'm quick to say, you know, I don't know if there's any right or wrong practical way to handle that situation. I've heard great arguments on both sides. I've heard people say that's Christ is in that person. You give them money.

Pat Millea [00:31:17]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:31:18]:
And I love CS Lewis. One time when he was walking around Oxford, someone was begging for money, and he was walking with a buddy, and he gave him, you know, five pounds or whatever, gave him some money. And as they're walking away, his buddy said to him, what are you doing? He's just going to use that to go to the bar and buy a pint. And C.S. Lewis said, well, that's all I was going to do with it. That's such a good line, which is brilliant. So I love that line. So I think that the practical move of giving somebody money is a good and charitable thing, if that's what your conscience dictates.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:31:51]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:31:51]:
But I do acknowledge, and I can fully acknowledge that that's not an easy choice, and it shouldn't be an automatic choice because there are people who are asking for money who are really suffering with addiction, with mental illness. There are even systems of manipulation that use people asking for money. And there's someone like a boss who kind of collects that money and is using them. So there's a good friend of ours who's a social worker in Minneapolis who never gives anyone money on the streets because she wants them to go to the resources that are available that can really genuinely serve them in a more long term fashion.

Pat Millea [00:32:27]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:32:27]:
So whether or not you give someone $5, I don't think there's a right or wrong answer. What we as Catholics do not have the option of doing is nothing right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:32:37]:
You can't turn away.

Pat Millea [00:32:38]:
You can't turn away. And my human fallen heart is always tempted to that, to pretend like I don't see them because it's too embarrassing to look them in the eye and maybe choose to not give them anything and just say hello and give them a smile.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:32:55]:
I would, I would challenge, actually. So what you're giving them is their dignity.

Pat Millea [00:32:58]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:32:59]:
So I don't know if you, did you ever see The Human Experience?

Pat Millea [00:33:02]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:33:03]:
So there's, there's a dramatic scene and it like, oh, just rent me. I was sobbing after it. But they're interviewing people on the streets of New York and they're, they're asking them, what's your human experience? This is by like Grassroots, I think, Producer.

Pat Millea [00:33:14]:
Yes.

Pat Millea [00:33:14]:
Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:33:14]:
We'll put this in the show notes. It's a great, great video.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:33:17]:
And they're asking the homeless, you know what, what do you wish people knew about you? And they ask this one person and he just says, I wish people would treat me better than their dogs. And they're like, what are you talking about? And he says, well, I watch people and they will literally go up to a dog they never met. And they're like, hey, can I pet your dog? And like, hey, I have a little treat for your dog. And the dog's got little booties and it has like a, you know, a very nice knit wool sweater. And it's going into a house.

Pat Millea [00:33:47]:
And these days the dog might be in a stroller.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:33:49]:
That is correct, yes. And I've actually been surprised when you look. You're like, that is not a baby. Or like they're getting carried or like, you know, whole bunch of stuff. Everyone loves the dogs. He says, I. No one will even look at me.

Pat Millea [00:34:01]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:34:02]:
They won't give me food. I have no clothing. I live in a box. And I'm of the same species they are, and they would care for a dog over me on the streets. And he goes, all I want is someone to look at me. And it really, it taught me something because that's part of what we give to people when we see them. And this is part Again, the pro life thing is like, I see you and this is an act of profound love. And it will make you feel awkward, like, to the point.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:34:35]:
Like, I'm driving in Minneapolis all the time. And I remember there's this one time. Oh, my gosh, it actually scared the tar out of me. It was like seven in the morning. I was driving to the university and I stopped and there's like this homeless camp, and this woman literally ran out of the bushes up to my window, and she was clearly had been a meth addict. Like, her teeth were falling out and she looked crazed. And she's like pushing on my window like that. And she's like, open, open, open, open, open, open.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:34:59]:
I'm like, oh, my gosh, I just want to drive away. So I. I rolled down my window and I say, what do you need, ma'am? She's like, give me money. And I said, ma', am, I. I'm not going to give you any money. I'm sorry. And she's like. She, like, didn't know what to do with that.

Pat Millea [00:35:11]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:35:11]:
And I said, you know, here, I have my lunch packed for the day. I said, here, why don't you take this? And she like, just stared at it. And I said, you know, you can have that. And she's like, it was like a rapper. And her hands were shaking. She was probably going through withdrawal. She needed another fix.

Pat Millea [00:35:27]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:35:28]:
And she's like, can you open it for me? And this is like, traffic is now backing up. Right. And I know that people behind me were watching what was going on, and they were probably just grateful it wasn't them. Sure.

Pat Millea [00:35:38]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:35:39]:
But like, so I opened up the food for her and, you know, she then went away back into the bushes. But as I drove away, I was so shaken by that.

Pat Millea [00:35:50]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:35:51]:
And what would have been so much easier is if I wouldn't have rolled down my window, I would have looked away and then just driven off and never thought of her again. But instead, I had to do the incarnational thing. I had to enter into her world. I had to ask her questions. And my only regret about this situation is I didn't ask her name.

Pat Millea [00:36:12]:
Sure.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:36:13]:
I should have started with, you know, what is your name? And I think that this is again, one of the things, like, how do you show someone they have dignity? You call them by name.

Pat Millea [00:36:22]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:36:22]:
You're not, like, person. And this is again, one of the things that we did. Like, so are you familiar with Rachel's Vineyard retreats?

Pat Millea [00:36:30]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:36:30]:
So it's like a post abortive thing. And when I've worked with them, one of the most profound moments in the healing of these women and men who have had abortions or encouraged abortions is we have a funeral service. Funeral mass at the end of Rachel's Vineyard. Sorry if I'm spoiling the retreat, but, like, they have a funeral, the funeral for these children. And one of the things is they have to name their child. And part of the reason why this is healing is it actually makes it real.

Pat Millea [00:36:57]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:36:58]:
Acknowledges their personhood.

Pat Millea [00:36:59]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:37:00]:
So again, this is again with the pro life, the pro child, whatever. But we don't care about other people's names.

Pat Millea [00:37:08]:
And that comes up all the time in social settings and in political settings. Right. Where someone will villainize or at least maybe ostracize or exclude a group as a whole. Right. So the immigrants, the people say that about the Catholics. Right. The atheists, any racial group, gender, political group. But so not only that, but people.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:37:32]:
Generational groups.

Pat Millea [00:37:33]:
Generational. The elderly, the boomers. Yeah, right.

Pat Millea [00:37:37]:
Yeah.

Pat Millea [00:37:37]:
Okay, boomer.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:37:38]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:37:38]:
But people will do that even with. They'll exclude an entire political group. Right. Villainize. The Democrats always think this. The Republicans do that and forget about that. That is made up of people. All that is is a collection of individuals.

Pat Millea [00:37:55]:
And those individuals have names and they have stories. And yeah, you might disagree with them, but denying their personhood, labeling them as a group is a really effective way to deny their dignity life.

Pat Millea [00:38:09]:
Yeah, yeah.

Pat Millea [00:38:10]:
And that happens a lot. Even, I mean, to bring it back down maybe to the more personal, I would say, like day to day level for most of us. You know, all of us are active in this, like, social, political, cultural movement in the United States and beyond when it comes to the dignity of other people. But even just more relevant for most of us is the day to day personal stuff. Like when. When your mom, when. When the cashier talks too much, when the Uber driver talks at all, how do you relate to that person? Do you like, put your AirPods in and just pretend like you've got something more important to do, even if there's no music going? Or do you engage with that person even if it's inconvenient in the moment Right. When your sibling or your uncle or somebody goes off on this diatribe about something that you disagree with? Do you pretend like you have to use the restroom to get out of the situation and literally turn away to your point? Or do you engage with them even if you disagree, right?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:39:13]:
Do you want to hear, this is so profound. I was talking to one of my friends we went to a concert. And he was. We were. We were waiting to get into the concert, and he was talking about phone usage with his kids. And he's like, you know, read the anxious generation. He's like, I'm not going to give my kids phones. I don't want him to deal with that.

Pat Millea [00:39:29]:
Sure.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:39:30]:
And his son came up to him and said, dad, I want a phone. He said, you know, son, we've. We've already talked about this. You're not going to get one. He goes, well, I just want something that I can stare at, too. And he. The dad was just cut to the heart. And he's like, oh, man.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:39:46]:
That's what he sees. And I mean, like, this is where we really have to reflect on, like, why can we stare at the screen and be enamored by it? There are literally real people with lives past, future, eternal salvation at jeopardy. I don't really want to look at you. I'm going to turn away, but I would love to look at this screen.

Pat Millea [00:40:10]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:40:11]:
And when he shared that story, like, I just felt like chills go up my spine because I'm like, I can't think of how many times where I'm in between meetings, I've got to get back to texts or some, you know, emails, or I have to see, like, what is my next appointment.

Pat Millea [00:40:25]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:40:26]:
And someone's at my door, and I'm like, on my phone looking at it while they're talking.

Pat Millea [00:40:29]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:40:30]:
That's not pro life.

Pat Millea [00:40:31]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:40:32]:
I mean, and this is. This is, again, where I think it's just a challenge to say, are we behaving differently than the culture?

Pat Millea [00:40:38]:
Sure.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:40:39]:
And this is the thing that always makes me laugh is they're like, I'm countercultural because I march outside of abortion places and I'm against Planned Parenthood. It's like, great. How about you're countercultural when you put down the phone when the waitress comes, or you're not talking on the phone when you're going through the check out line. That's pro life. That's countercultural. That's valuing the other person. Like, we have to expand it.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:41:03]:
And if the gospel is not challenging but convenient for you, you're probably not doing it right.

Pat Millea [00:41:09]:
Yeah, yeah.

Pat Millea [00:41:10]:
I. There are. There's a group of guys from college that I'm still really good friends with. And this is, you know, more than 20 years now, which. It gets more depressing by the year. But that's the way life goes. It's how time works. So more than 20 years, I've been friends with these guys.

Pat Millea [00:41:25]:
We were. Wait for it. This is how cool we are. We were in the marching band together in college.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:41:29]:
That is cool.

Pat Millea [00:41:30]:
Which is way cooler in college than it is in high school. But even then, you know, it's kind of funny to people. We were in marching band in college. I love these guys. I love them just as brothers and friends, and they all. I have a different relationship with each of them. We connect in different ways, but they all are just really great guys, really close friends. We've been at each other's weddings and been in each other's weddings and talked about the difficulties of fatherhood and parenting and whatever, just all these different seasons.

Pat Millea [00:42:00]:
There is a pretty significant array of religious and political affiliations between the five of us. And it would be easy. Easier for any one of us to say, like, I'm out. It just. I can't associate with that kind of a person, you know, but because we care about each other, we can disagree about content and still see and engage with each other as a person. And I love these guys for many reasons, but one of the reasons that I really love and value them is because they are committed to that, too. You know, like, when we disagree, they don't walk away, and they don't just cut me out of their life, you know, that, I think is getting harder for us. And, you know, in that situation, I think I.

Pat Millea [00:42:49]:
And we have done a good job with it. But I know, at least for myself, there are a lot of situations where I have taken the easy way out and just decided it's not worth it to be in a relationship with someone because it's a relationship with complexity and texture and disagreement and challenge. And I think, you know, for all the ways that that makes things easier in the moment. I said at the beginning, we're in the business of being fully alive and helping others be fully alive. I think our sanity genuinely suffers over time. If we limit our circle down to people that only think like us and we villainize and attack the dignity. If we look at others with disgust, like you mentioned.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:43:30]:
And this is the interesting thing, right? Like, even as you said with the example with your friends, right. As they start to present ideas that are more and more challenging, I stop seeing them, and I only see their ideas. Right?

Pat Millea [00:43:44]:
Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:43:44]:
I only see what they're affiliated with, and I stop losing them or I start losing them. So I think that this is one of the things where we can kind of watch of. Okay, am I just seeing ideas, thoughts, parties, when I'm looking at a person, or am I actually seeing them as a human being that has a family, that has all these things? Like, can I. Like, this is like one of the activities that I've done sometimes. Yeah, I mean, I. I will find myself every so often being like hypercritical of people or judgmental. And when I am like going to confession and I'm like, okay, I need to confess these things, I need to stop. And as I'm preparing for the confession, this is what I'll do, is I'll close my eyes and I will just say, okay, I'm touching base with myself.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:44:33]:
I have a mother, I have a father, I have a brother. I have dreams, I have hopes. I have brother priests around me. I have good friends. This is what I'm carrying in my heart. Now. The next ring around me is in this room right now is you, Pat. In the room right next to us are psychotherapists.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:44:53]:
There are clients. Outside of that, there's a parish setting, there's a neighborhood. And all of these peoples have thoughts, feelings, desires, hopes, fears, expectations, disappointments. All of them are part of the human race. Then expand it again and say, okay, outside of this block, there's a city of Minneapolis that has how many hundreds of thousands of people? And all of them have the same thing. And then I expand beyond that and I say, okay, just this county of Hennepin county and all the people that exist into it, the people I'm passing on the freeway, walking by in the mall. All these people have thoughts, feelings, desires, hopes, family. And then I go even farther, the state of Minnesota than the country, and I just expand it.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:45:42]:
And as I'm doing this, I realize that's who I'm called to love, is all of these people and the complexity of it. And what I didn't touch on was how they live their life, what parties they're associated with or what camps they or how they spend their free time. Not interested. What I'm interested in is they are humans who have things going on. And I can't lose the value that I'm existing alongside of them. Because as soon as what I need to do becomes more important, I've lost something in the collective whole of part of humanity. And I'm not loving, I'll tell you that.

Pat Millea [00:46:24]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:46:25]:
Does that make sense?

Pat Millea [00:46:25]:
Oh, totally, yeah.

Pat Millea [00:46:27]:
And I mean, social justice was first and foremost a Catholic idea that American politics has co opted and oftentimes turned into something that it is not.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:46:39]:
Wasn't it Pope Leo that started it?

Pat Millea [00:46:40]:
I was just gonna say so, okay, Pope Leo, which one are we on?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:46:45]:
We're in the thir, no.

Pat Millea [00:46:47]:
Yep.

Pat Millea [00:46:47]:
The 14th. Now, Pope Leo the 14th now takes his namesake from Pope Leo XIII. And in the mid-1800s, one of his most like monumental acts as pope was writing an encyclical called Rerum Novarum, which was kind of one of the first ways that really codified what we now call Catholic social teaching. The Catholic truth about the human person has existed since Jesus. So these are not new ideas, but he really documented and laid out in a systematic way the ways that we treat other people, the ways that we treat workers, the ways that we relate to the social order and to the government, to the state, the rights and responsibilities that we have when it comes to capital and private property and the evils of socialism.

Pat Millea [00:47:31]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:47:31]:
Things like this. Just a real, ahead of his time, spiritual thinker, Pope Leo XIII. And so now, you know, 150 ish more than that, years later, we have these tenets that, that we would call Catholic social teaching. And one of them is this beautiful tenet, this, this facet called solidarity. And it's the idea that every human being is connected to every other human being.

Pat Millea [00:47:57]:
I love it.

Pat Millea [00:47:58]:
Not in some weird, mystical Eastern way.

Pat Millea [00:48:00]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:48:01]:
But in a way that we are all members of the common human family. We are all brothers and sisters, at minimum, because we're all made by God. We're all children of God. And again, even the people who are not Christian, even the people who are not believers, even the people who are outside of the moral order, that doesn't make them not human.

Pat Millea [00:48:21]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:48:22]:
So that kind of a meditation, that kind of a thought process is solidarity is solidarity. Solidarity in reflection, first of all. And then, God willing, that can lead to solidarity and action. That when I'm confronted with a person in my natural state, I have the reflex of disgust. How can I acknowledge that experience of disgust but make a different choice? How can I choose an action that is more in line with love? To your point earlier about what defines a Christian.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:48:54]:
Have you ever read Flannery O'Connor?

Pat Millea [00:48:56]:
I love Flannery O'Connor. She is just a beautiful, savage Catholic writer.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:49:04]:
Yeah. She would say, like, if they don't listen to you and you talk, then shout.

Pat Millea [00:49:09]:
Our daughter, who's 14, I was talking to her about Flannery O'Connor recently. And so she, she asked if she could read a couple of her short stories. And I told her up front. I was like, these are not for the faint of heart, dear child. Like, these are not sweet little. Oh, little, little Catholic saint of the week type stories. You know what I mean? Like, these are raw, and they dig deep into human frailty and brokenness, but there's so much beauty there. Anyway, she's gone.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:49:36]:
So do you. Do you remember? A good man is hard to find.

Pat Millea [00:49:39]:
That's one of my favorite ones.

Pat Millea [00:49:40]:
Yep.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:49:40]:
And so this is. It's, again, it's a very graphic story because Flannery O'Connor was trying to shake you up to see something. But, like, the whole story is about basically, a family trip.

Pat Millea [00:49:50]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:49:51]:
And they pick up a vagrant, and the vagrant is a bad person. And, you know, the grandmother who was complaining the entire time about everything was one of the people at the end of the story. I won't tell how it ends, but, like, who is able to see the vagrant in a way that no one else does?

Pat Millea [00:50:09]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:50:11]:
And I love what Flannery O'Connor did in that story because it does show, like, when we see a person as a person, it changes how we interact with them.

Pat Millea [00:50:23]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:50:24]:
And this is. We cannot engage love if we don't see the other, because otherwise love is social work.

Pat Millea [00:50:33]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:50:34]:
Because you're just trying to, like, you know, get. You know, get their needs met.

Pat Millea [00:50:38]:
Yeah.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:50:38]:
But, like, love is literally, like, I see you.

Pat Millea [00:50:45]:
I love two things about that short story. One of them is that vagrant. It's a escaped criminal, essentially, they call the Misfit. Right. That's his name. And he has an amazing insight when it comes to the connection, I think, between faith and the way that someone chooses to live their life. So it totally connected to what we're talking about, that our love of others, the way we treat others, is rooted in our understanding of Christ, who died and rose from the dead. And he literally says, if Jesus is who he says he is, then there's nothing to do but to drop everything and follow him.

Pat Millea [00:51:23]:
And if Jesus is not who he says he is, then there's nothing to do than to have a little fun while you can while you're alive, even if it means killing another person to have fun. And when it comes down to it, at the end of the day, I think those are the only two options we have. Like, to me, I've had a long and winding road of faith, and I've had friends who are Lutheran, and they thought I should be Lutheran, friends who were Baptist, they thought I should be Baptist. Friends who were Muslim, and they thought I should be Muslim. And what I've come down to is this grand. Either or. Either Jesus was telling the truth and I need to be Catholic forever or he wasn't telling the truth and I should be an abject nihilist, basically that there is nothing that matters. Right.

Pat Millea [00:52:04]:
I'm very convinced that Jesus is who he says he was. So that misfit declares this and he has chosen in the story that Jesus was not telling the truth. So he just does whatever he wants, whenever he wants. And as you said, the grandma, for all of her very obvious flaws and shortcomings, gets to the point where she sees that he is a person with a story. And maybe too little, too late for her, but she gets to the point of seeing his dignity against all of her own selfish reflexes. Yeah, it's amazing, man. This is so beautiful. And I think it just.

Pat Millea [00:52:39]:
I am convicted in a lot of ways about understanding the call of a pro life Catholic and Christian to genuinely look for ways to offer people a greater sense of their own value. You know, to look for ways to. To engage with somebody, to call them by name, to look them in the eye, to stay in relationship with people that are difficult for me to be in relationship with, to offer the love of Christ to people who are like the woman at the well and the Syrophoenician woman and the Gerasene demoniac and all these people that no one wanted anything to do with. How can we, you know, not. Not say that the sins are okay? Not say that.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:53:23]:
Something part of the dialogue.

Pat Millea [00:53:24]:
Exactly. But that's not part of the dialogue. Right.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:53:26]:
I mean, this is the. If you want to know how to move your life from being burden and you're just trying to get through and life is so gross right now. Right. Is we start seeing people because it actually takes less work to love than to hate. Because in order to hate someone or to reject someone or to cancel someone, it takes a ton of energy. But to literally just look and say I see you, it doesn't cost anything. And if you want to find new purpose in your life, stop being so angry all the time and start loving. Gosh, that sounds liberal.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:54:12]:
I hate that.

Pat Millea [00:54:13]:
I'm convinced that is not a liberal take.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:54:15]:
I know, but why does it sound like that? I just don't get it.

Pat Millea [00:54:19]:
I think there are lots of reasons and this is a separate episode that we're not going to get into. But I do think there are ways that, that the rhetoric has been co opted or kind of claimed by one side of the political aisle or another that certain words sound liberal and certain words sound conservative.

Pat Millea [00:54:35]:
Right.

Pat Millea [00:54:35]:
The moment you say the word traditional, that means one very specific thing. The moment you say the word empathy, that means something totally different. I am in favor of both of those things. Tradition and empathy you're trying to wrap up. Call me a rebel. Father, do you have a challenge by choice for us after this conversation?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:54:52]:
And so here. Here's my challenge by choice. All right? Because we are broken human beings. We have all at one time not been pro life to someone else. And we can't actually become better until we own up to where we haven't. And I would just encourage you, just think back, even if it's just like the last 24 hours, maybe the last week, when is a time where I did not see someone and either I, you know, turned away from them or I devalued them and how I spoke about them or even in, like, my mind, like, I just kind of characterized as, you'd say, like the whole group rather than the individual persons. And after you find that example, and you will find one if you look, repent of it and genuinely ask the Lord to help you become more pro life because you want to see as he sees and to love as he loves and to act as he acts. That's the challenge.

Pat Millea [00:55:49]:
I'll do that. Thank you for that.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:55:50]:
Yeah, you're welcome, brother.

Pat Millea [00:55:51]:
Do you mind praying for us?

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:55:52]:
I'll be honored.

Pat Millea [00:55:53]:
Thanks.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:55:53]:
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pat Millea [00:55:55]:
Amen.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:55:57]:
Heavenly Father, you have from the very beginning created man in your own image and likeness. And you have so fearfully and wonderfully made each person. It is you, O Lord, who have taken time to craft every human. We ask to share in this creative power that we may not devalue one of these little ones, but that we may have your broad and big heart that can see each person as something unrepeatable and precious. Please help us to see with the eyes of faith and to love in ways that we even surprise ourselves. For we offer all these prayers through Christ our Lord.

Pat Millea [00:56:42]:
Amen.

Pat Millea [00:56:42]:
Amen.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:56:43]:
Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Pat Millea [00:56:45]:
Amen.

Pat Millea [00:56:45]:
Amen, Father Nathan LaLiberte. I see you.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:56:48]:
I see you.

Pat Millea [00:56:49]:
I acknowledge your humanity.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:56:52]:
That's. I think it's Avatar. I see you. That's how they greet each other.

Pat Millea [00:56:54]:
People say that about 7,000 times a day, and sometimes it gets to be a little much. But I. I see you in a way that's not condescending at all.

Fr. Nathan LaLiberte [00:57:01]:
Thank you.

Pat Millea [00:57:01]:
Yep.

Pat Millea [00:57:01]:
Thank you for your personhood and for bringing it to this episode. You're a wonderful friend. You can follow along with This Whole Life. We would love to hear what your thoughts are about this. You can Follow us online at thiswholelifepodcast.com you can follow along on social media @thiswholelifepodcast on Instagram and Facebook. You can still offer your support for the mission of this Whole Life by going to ko-fi.com/thiswholelife and send us a note, Shoot us an email, shoot us a text. Let us know how you've seen the efforts of being fully pro life full in the true extent of that term, in your own life, in the lives of others. What ways have you been honored by other people, identifying your dignity and lifting you up? Until next time friends, we will see you.

Pat Millea [00:57:44]:
We will hear you next time.

Pat Millea [00:57:46]:
God bless you.

Kenna Millea [00:57:54]:
This Whole Life is a production of.

Kenna Millea [00:57:56]:
The Martin center for Integration.

Kenna Millea [00:57:58]:
Visit us online@thiswholelifepodcast.com.