[Music] when I look around in our society today I see a need for men to discover who they are the average boy will spend more time watching television by the time he turns 6 years old than he will spend talking to his father over the course of his entire Earthly life the responsibility that is really the man's responsibility to be the spiritual leader of the family has been abdicated we tend not to fulfill our roles as Christian men and it's affecting our families our communities never in the history of humanity has there been so many
wives without husbands and children without dads all because of broken masculinity what we find ourselves into right now is a vicious circle many men have grown without a father and they don't know how to be father to their children so of course these children their children are growing up not knowing how to be good husbands and fathers themselves it feels as if the culture was designed to attack the family there's a tremendous need in the church for men to know their role and to know their identity we've got this crisis and we need men strong
Catholic men to fill the [Music] [Music] breach I think to be a man in short is to lay down our lives man's willing to die to protect the family willing to protect what is precious to him I think a man first loves selfs sacrificially by giving by serving by protecting there's that part of us that wants to be a brave heart but in reality it looks kind of different it's the daily deaths uh the daily opportunities to put the other first even at the expense of self which is the true authentic meaning of love love
is sacrifice if you want to know if I love you try to see my [Music] sacrifice a man loves by making a gift of himself every day each one of us are called to sanctify ourselves in the midst of our daily [Music] work work which is human can meet the Divine but as we do it with love striving for Perfection and offering it up to God from the cross Christ reveals man to himself he shows us how to love he shows us how to die to ourselves so that others might have life men can realize
that that he is the quintessential man who laid down his life for those he loved that's inspiring to love like a Catholic man is to love with all the being of who we are as Christ Jesus did and it's a lifegiving love his greatest call is a call of fraternity whether he's a biological father or not of caregiving and protection and defense and rearing of New Life at the core of being a Catholic man is to Aspire to fatherhood fatherhood isn't so much what we're supposed to do it's what we are even if we're single
or if we're celibate we are set getting a fatherly example we have to hold up the vision of heroic sacrifice and men are called To Love concretely by protecting and concretely by [Music] sacrificing authentic love requires that we have self-mastery we own ourselves so as to be able to give ourselves away authentic love is this is my body given up for you what makes a man a man and what separates him from all the other animals in the world is that he can order his passions so man is always called to have self-mastery men are
constantly tempted to turn to pornography for when they're faced with loneliness when they're faced with anxiety or stress and men just don't find fulfillment in that and when a guy gets hooked on this stuff and his passions take dominion over him he ceases to be the spiritual head of his family because if he can't guard his own soul and Lead that soul to Heaven how is he going to guard the innocence of the family that's been entrusted to him and so the man's work of selfmaster that is the foundational work for being able to give
himself away we live in a country where we have so much food and so much entertainment we need to say no if you train yourself now to say no to the little things as time goes on you learn to say no to the bigger Temptations in [Music] light the spiritual practice that Jesus showed us in the desert that fasting that Mastery over ourselves is the key to the man being able to love because he cannot love if he is a slave it becomes training ground it's not just a question of saying no but it's harnessing
their power uh for Christ we're going to fail that's what we do but we get up and a man gets up a lot of times I can't get up I need my brothers to help me up and the same brother that's helping me up a week later I'm helping him up I think our society today is one that's built around individualism and isolation which leaves the heart empty and so we need bands of Brothers we need really good [Music] friends as men we need other men cuz it it's hard to live the Christian Life we
don't learn manhood from books and we learn it from men from being in their presence iron sharpens iron we need men to call us to account to hold us to the promises we've made and to live lives of heroic virtue there's a man that will say to you are you being honorable are you being chased are you being respectful you always have those people to back you up when you're struggling you always have those friends uh to lift you up when you're falling down when a man has a bond of Brotherhood with another man he
prays more he goes to confession more he goes to mass more regularly he reads scripture more often he's more active in the faith we sharpen each other and we encourage each other and we understand that I'm not alone you know we can't leave one thing out we have to get in our prayer closet by oursel we have to meditate on the word we have to meet with our our brothers on a weekly basis we have to do all those things to help us it's important for guys to be seeking the face of the father on
her own to kind of carve out that morning prayer time and to go into the silence daily prayer with honest and frequent confession that is the place where we receive so much grace I stay connected to the one of love and he starts to to heal me and fill me and then I'm able to go out and pour that love out to my wife to my children to my people I'm around I can't give what I don't [Music] have it's awesome to see men leading their family to Mass on Sunday yes but as men going
even further daily if possible to be have this contact with Christ to receive him be transformed this will be the center of the man's conversion how much could we bless our family by doing little things like going to daily mass the church has given us so many weapons to defend ourselves and to defend our families but we have to use it it is a battle and if we do all those things we'll be the men we're called to be there are lots of Catholic men who simply waiting to be challenged they're waiting to be called
this movement is to go to the heart of where the problems really are a fatherless world that longs for the father's stable love the father's presence needs Christian men to look to Christ and in Christ reveal God the Father when Jesus Christ is the operating principle in the man he works through them and he can penetrate hearts and souls and influence in a way that we cannot do on our own I hope that men will read into the breach so that they will discover the battle that we are engaged in we need men to embrace
the Lord and believe and act on that belief in a powerful way look around wives daughters Sons grandchildren they're waiting waiting for us to be the men God has has called us to be [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] [Applause]
