S1 Ep12: "The Gentle Art" - Ministry & Jiu Jitsu w Fr. Ryan Hallford

[Music] Welcome to the Fighting Priests, a podcast exploring orthodoxy and jujitsu, two paths, one struggle. Father Ted Pursch of Opolis and Father Thomas Sandberg are two orthodox Christian priests who also happen to be practitioners of jujitsu. Together, they explore how these two unique worlds intersect and what it means for our spirituality. Here's Father Ted and Father Thomas. [Music] Welcome everybody, again to the Fighting Priests. I am one of your hosts, Father Ted Pursch of Opolis here in Toronto. And with me is my co-host, Father Thomas Sandberg, up in Niverville, Manitoba. Father Thomas, welcome. Good morning. Well, as usual, the one sentence to answer from Father Thomas. [Laughs] How are you doing? Okay. [Laughs] And with us today in our 12th episode today is a very special guest and actually something different. Again, in the last episode, we actually interviewed our first female orthodox mom. And that was the first for us. And today we have another first. We are interviewing Father Ryan Halford, who is a Roman Catholic priest, based out of Louisiana. So he's our first non-orthodox guest. And also he is our first non-orthodox clergy. And he's also a BJJ practitioner. And I came across Father Ryan on YouTube, watching a really, really nice video interviewing him about Jiu Jitsu as well, kind of the same topic. And he was very, very kind enough to respond and to come on our show. So I do welcome him. Father Ryan, welcome to the Fighting Priests. Hello, thank you for having me and I look forward to the interview. Wonderful. So we're just speaking with Father Thomas, you know, up here in Canada. You know, by the time this air is, which will be probably near the end of the summer, even though we're recording it now in July, you know, we've had this long lockdown. And we keep talking about it. I don't know if it's just the default thing we talked about. And hearing Canada, things are opening up. Father Thomas is already training in Manitoba, which is nice here in Toronto, not so much. Unfortunately, we're still in our, what is called your phase two. So we're not gyms are not open yet. And we can't roll. We can't have contact. Things like that. So how are things down in Louisiana, Father? Likewise, we are in extended phase two as well. Our gyms, some of our gyms are opened. And so people kind of go at their own risk. I don't know if they're wearing masks or not as required. But I like to think that they are. And it'd be really ridiculous to watch them roll. But yeah, I unfortunately haven't gone back because just as a priest, I know if I'm out for 14 days and just the nature of the ministry, some of the people who are minister to being more vulnerable, I just, in right now, good conscience can't bring myself to the gym. Although I am sad not to be there. And I'm feeling it in terms of my health, my overall just endurance has definitely taken a hit. I may have gained a few pounds too. So it's going to be fun to hit the gym once again and then and kind of get back into where I want to be. And that's one of the Corona pounds. Everybody's a little bit rounder, I think, after the lockdown. Well, except for the Thomas, he seems to be getting thinner. I don't know. Well, just running and working out. I go to the beach. Everything I do, I do when it's hot, right? Like I cut the grass when it's hot. Some boys, boys, boys, uh, sweating everything out, I guess. And you're also out in the middle of the prairie. So it's like there's not much people around. So you can do anything you want, really, right? Without a mask. Yeah, I don't know. In the gyms down there in Louisiana, Father, do you know, are they allowed to rule or are they only allowed to do kind of like drilling and things like that in their own little boxes? Like, spaced out. I'm not sure what they're allowed to do. I know what they are doing. They are. But I guess. Well, uh, I do think they're trying to limit the number of partners they roll with in terms of, I think there are some measures there. But there's a certain sense of your, if you think you're sick and stay home, and obviously that's only so effective. Sure. Yeah, I know our club here in Toronto. It's going to be opening by the time this episode airs is going to be open for a while. So hopefully we'll be back normal by this time. But as of now, it's going to be opening, I think next week, but it's, there won't be any rolling. Unfortunately, everything is part of it off into little squares like on the mats. And there'll be live classes, but it will be just basically drilling. It will be dummies. They'll have, they'll be sparring dummies, especially for the junior kids as well. My kids, my kids are in the junior programs. And it's going to be, uh, so it won't be great, but it'll be better than staying home or, or, or doing zoom classes, which is what my, uh, gym does just for technique, you know, just repeating a technique. So we'll see what happens. I'm good. I've got the itch as well. You know, I've got to go back. It's been four months. All right, Father Ryan. Thanks for, uh, thanks for being here. It's really interesting to have, uh, it'll be, it'll be really interesting to hear your perspective. So, once you, uh, tell me and tell our audience, uh, first of all, first of all, how you became a Catholic priest. Were you a Catholic your whole life? Well, yeah. So I was born, um, in Sada, Louisiana, which is, uh, about an hour and a half where I live now. It's so different dioceses, but I, I was baptized as a child. And, um, my parents kind of went off and on. And by the time I got to high school, even junior high, they had stopped really going to church. So I had actually left the church, the Catholic church for a little while, um, dabbled with some different Protestant groups and church services. Um, I learned to love God and scripture through those, those avenues. So very thankful and eternally grateful, be grateful for that. Um, so I actually went to appear to being anti-Catholic, um, as it were. But I, through the course of high school for my junior year, um, really became convicted of the Catholic church through reading scripture and the church fathers and those things. And so came into the, the Catholic church. And, um, and from there, I went to seminary after my freshman year in college and didn't really know much about it because I didn't really grow up with some of the culture and traditions of practices as my other seminarians, uh, fellow seminarians did. But it was kind of a culture shock. Like, I didn't know we'd be praying, um, five times a day. I didn't know we'd be going to mass every day. I thought maybe that would be like a once or twice a week kind of thing. I learned a lot about the church and the priesthood. Uh, and then I left with the intention of never returning. And, uh, you know, went out and had a few relationships, uh, started working. They came a high school teacher, um, and the course of that became my sister's legal guardian. And, um, by the time she graduated her first year out of college, I, you know, went back to seminary. And, um, I've now been a priest for three years. So just finished my third year of priesthood, May 27th of this year. So, uh, what age were you ordained at? 33. 33. Is there like an age requirement in the Catholic church for, for being a deacon and being a priest like a New Orthodox church? Hmm. I think it's one of the 25 for being a deacon, 30 for being a priest and then for a bishop, whatever is there something like that in the Catholic? Yeah. Yeah, I think you have to be at least 10 before your deacon. I'm joking. Um, so I think it's 20. I want to see the 25 or 26 or 27 somewhere in there. I mean, I knew the number at some point, but I guess not that relevant to me. I don't know. Well, even in the Orthodox church, we don't exactly stick to those canons very much. That's right. Yeah, you make the rules and then you dispense them accordingly. I was ordained, yeah, I was ordained at 26. Okay. Old, right? As a priest. Actually, no, no, that's not true. I'm sorry. I was ordained as a deacon at 25. And then I was, which is technically canonical, but then I was ordained as a priest at 27. So yeah, earlier, a lot of times when there's a need, this is the case, right? But yeah, generally speaking, you're usually a 30, but 33, you were on your Jesus year. So, you're prediction year. Yeah. So what, what was your journey to the priesthood? How did you discern that calling? You know, I, um, leaving. I never thought I would return. I think a part of it was, um, you know, I kind of came to a point in college where I knew the Lord was calling me to serve. Not sure how, you know, I kind of came up a mindset just given the nature of marriage and family that I didn't want to get made for the wrong reasons. I'd rather remain single for my entire life than, you know, getting made for the wrong reasons. And a part of that was my own parents' program relationship. And a lot of the brokenness I see in family. And so I think I was really trying to become content in my singleness, which that in itself is a really difficult thing. I think to do it in high school and going in first year, if you use a college. But I came to a point, I was like, yeah, maybe, you know, I know if I become a priest, I could, you know, I remain celibate, but I also can serve the church. And so let me give that a go. And so I learned a lot, but at that certain point, I was like, I don't know if I really want to do this. And so I left. I'm good terms never regretted it, even to the same glad I left. And I needed to learn a lot more about myself. But in the process of teaching high school, I thought I was going to be a university professor. But I want to go back and teach high school for a few years. So I wanted to serve. And I like education. And I like, you know, basically pouring myself out into youth ministry and things like that. And so for a while, I thought that's kind of going to be my focus. And as I was teaching and not making much money, but also becoming my sister's legal guardian, my life plans became very simple But I know when it's been the rest of my life serving the church Really investing myself into relationships and forming people and I wanted to Basically serve the Lord growing my building to be faithful and die like that was my life plan and in the process of that I met a lot of really awesome families I had some really great friendships and that really felt Compelt and invited once again to consider the priesthood and so I went on a pilgrimage to Santiago Camino de Santiago in Spain Did a walking pilgrimage there the last few hundred miles and during that time just reflecting on the graces of that I really felt the Lord calling me to trust him more and in that process Really discerned a calling to the priest that and went back to seminary within two years of that I guess I had to wait for my sister who was responsible for the time to get out of high school and have in at least some transition I'll outside of that That's a beautiful story and how do you found the first three years of your priesthood to be? It's been wonderful. I mean, I really Believe that as a priest we have a unique World bearing, you know, the divine meaning of life in terms of the family the church I'm a very firm believer that everything about the church can and all to be understood in the context of family It's a spiritual fathers right our our desire To be fathers is not diminished but but elevated and unique way in terms of the family the church And so you know even when I get to spend time with people, you know with baptisms and weddings doing that, you know confirmation celebrations Being there for for funerals being there for when people are sick on our deathbed Whenever people come to receive confession. I believe as a priest we get a have a unique role and being able to enter into those Moments of people's lives those ups and those downs the joys and the sorrows and really Bareforth the meaning of God's grace and God's healing presence and and really just is Is it his desire to love his children? And so I really enjoy that about the sacramental life and how we get to participate in the family the church in a very unique way Yeah, I think that even me. I'm a really new priest and I don't have a parish yet But I'm already seeing that myself the way people approach you and the way you're interacting with families and I I'm already seeing how important and how I don't know how precious that role is it's it's it's it's it's very special and it's it's unique to the priesthood I think it's really and it's really important So at what point did you get into Brazilian Jitsu? Before you were priest or after you were priest I? had wrestled in high school and really enjoyed it placed in state my Self-meritimus year year actually had a few wrestling scholarships offered to me But I decided not to pursue that because I was kind of burned out Yeah, and I really enjoyed grappling my freshman year in college before I went to seminary the first time I did You know some some MMA training. I did a few like Fights and well at the time in these bars. We just signed a waiver you show up and you know that was back in two Yeah, yeah, but I mean I wasn't I wasn't an amateur fighter I just showed up. Hey, you show up. You signed this waiver had had get in the ring and go at it like you know And you can either box or you know do some form of grappling or MMA And so I wasn't proficient or anything at all I mean I was mostly just going out there doing my wrestling moves. Yeah, which has Certain advantages and disadvantages as you know training But for a while I kind of when I went to seminary didn't really train at all I would go help out at local wrestling clubs and then whenever I Whenever I taught I would you know be a assistant coach for the wrestling team and work out with them But by and large as I was preparing to the priest that I really allowed my health to get away from me and there's certain point I was weighing you know 340 pounds and I was I got diagnosed with diabetes and you know I started changing my diet. I've also over a hundred pounds, but I was like there's something I needed I need to do something active to engage Have a proper amount of leisure and exercise and I've always enjoyed grappling Something that kept me from the gym and from doing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu was a certain perception of the MMA community and even when I was doing that kind of cut throat like I just want to hurt someone and so I you know I was really kind of said of wanting to find a gym that really Nourish the community that nourished the art of it and that was and so I mean while I still think those types of Maintalities exist within certain pockets. I was really blessed to have a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu community that was really just there To help each other improve and there's a certain sense of us being in this together, which I really appreciate And so so going in you know Of course, I went in just trying to do my wrestling moves which you know helped I had good pressure But there's you know I was being choked out a lot and I was a fun transition as well And I really enjoyed the art of it. You know I enjoy it's like playing chess with your body And there's just something I hate working out I hate running. You know you talk about running. Oh, yeah I can run if I'm preparing for something else You know so I was running pretty consistently whenever I was doing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and training for tournaments But now that all the tournaments are canceled I can't have started and now that I'm not able to train as much as harder to get the motive you know just out of my own I'm ready to go right. I understand that people say it's middle-time when they ask me about like how How fast they run the time wise. I'm like I don't run for time I don't say I love running enough. I run so even when I do it I have to have certain music or I'm not in the world this even when I go running when I'm camping. It's beautiful It's different but when you're like wherever you live and you're running you've got to find the motivation to run I'm not yeah, I agree. I don't well. I used to not like running When I used to do it, you know with the mentality that everybody says, you know You got to go fast you try to like you know keep track of your time and things like that But then it's like now during the lockdown The quarantine and everything I've actually been running a lot. I've actually lost weight which is great And I was like you father Ryan is like when I started Jiu-Jitsu back in November So, you know, I don't even know how many months I did right now maybe eight and nine months I weighed 350 pounds I'm taller than you like I'm 64 but still that's a lot right and now I'm down to 303 So, you know, and it's all been running and of course died and training but especially last four months There's no Jiu-Jitsu right so what are you gonna do you gonna run but I'm running like an old man like I don't run fast I run almost I run almost as slow as speed walking right because you got to protect your knees Right because in Jiu-Jitsu you need your knees right and if you're running really hard you're gonna hurt your knees And you're gonna wear them out especially when you're heavy like us right and you're not gonna be able to do You know, you're not gonna be able to train when you go back to the mat So it's more just the enjoyment like slowing things down and enjoying nature and just kind of like yeah I did 5k yesterday took me like host hours like really slow, right really slow, but it was really enjoyable You know you run through the forest you run fall the Thomas has to run through like the prairies which I know because I used to live there My first cherish was in it was in Winnipeg, Manitoba and it's not a fun place to run because you just the same thing for like miles and miles and miles right Clouds can be nice when it's hot applied that's nice All right father Ryan, so um What are you uh What rank are you blue belt or white belt? Blue belt. Yes, blue belt. Okay So you obviously I think I've seen You competed before yes, that tournament that you you watched was in June of last year so most a year ago and and that was uh, we had a yeah the IB uh International Virginia and J2 Federation did their first tournament in New Orleans So that was that tournament. So it was good because they're gonna plan on coming back every year now So we have one of their tournaments local But yeah, that was their first one and I I got my blue belt right after that tournament. Yeah I have one um All my matches there Both the open is what was my weight and yeah, that was a fun time Was that your only tournament you competed in or have you done? No, I that was my fourth one I went out that because having a wrestling background. I've always enjoyed tournaments I know there's a good to that and you know I've always done well in that tournament mentality of how do you conserve the energy so that's something I do have as a background if so going in um knowing I wouldn't do well But there's there's just a good putting yourself out there. I did my first tournament after um just a month of doing Brazilian shit to the next tournament. Yeah, and uh and then um Yeah, so I did I did pretty much five tournaments my first year I was gearing up to do some this this summer and I wanted to do master's world and a few things I was gonna be at the end of this month. I was actually going to Brazil to train I was excited about that. I was gonna get down to 205 and and try to but that's where I'm gonna have to readjust some of those goals I work Work father Ryan, how do you how would you say that Brazilian Jiu Jitsu compliments um Your ministry as a priest and also your I guess your spirituality as as a Catholic Christian yourself personally I think there's a number of ways that probably manifests itself One is it is personally there is there's something good about discipline right? I mean as you read the desert fathers and you know a lot of a lot of the spiritual life begins with self knowledge and humility and understanding our limitations and our need for god and making room for god in our lives and You know Brazilian Jiu Jitsu is very humbling. We are out there on the the mat and you're trying to learn how to use your body. You know, some this body that I've had for my entire life and, you know, you're trying to unlock its mobility, its skill set, you know, and so there's a great humility in that learning process. There's a lot of discipline that goes, which is, you know, obviously extremely important in the spiritual life. There's a lot of humility in terms of recognizing personal weakness and being resilient and overcoming failure and being okay with that, right, that you put yourself out there. And so in ministry likewise, we always want to have strength to serve the people that the Lord has entrusted to us. You know, this needs to be built upon the discipline of our own spiritual practices and our ability to say no to pleasure so that we're free to say yes to love, that we have that freedom. You know, so just as we want to have that physical and mental freedom in Brusy and Jiu-Jitsu to move and know the moves and kind of learn them, that we want to have that mental, physical and spiritual freedom in our ministry to be able to respond to the spirit and lead regardless of just taking us. I think also in a sense that when you go into the gym, you meet people from all walks of life with all different types of ideology and so forth. And so it becomes a, you know, microcosm of society of our world that we live in and the people that the Lord loves. You know, these are the people who long to see your face. And so there's a certain sense of being able to sometimes, sometimes our ministry can be a bubble where we're only seeing or experiencing a certain type of people. And obviously there's a lot of diversity within that. But even with people who maybe agree with the teachings of the Orthodox faith or agree with the teachings of the Catholic faith, and you know, obviously we're called to minister to more than that. And so I really also love the fact that I'm able to build friendships and commodities and common ground with people who, you know, may not agree with the church and even the least bit, but I get to be a sign of, you know, a communion, a sign of God reaching out. And just by treating people with respect and dignity and really caring about them and being invested in their lives as well. It also introduces me to a bunch of people that otherwise I wouldn't encounter. So I think there's a good there as well. I think, yeah, that's a very important insight that I even, I discovered myself too, right? Being in the Greek Orthodox church, but not being Greek, right? You can see if you are Greek and you know, we're a liturgy, heavy church, we have a full cycle like so you can find yourself in that bubble, right? And if you don't go outside of it or if you just do soccer, because you know, a lot of Greeks like soccer. So once you go out of those things where you're not going to find as many Greek people, you're going to find a whole different area of people to expose whether the church to or Christian or another way of looking at Christianity after that's in our Orthodox, right? I find a lot of people when I train, there are a lot of Jewish people, some Protestants. And so in that way, you get to meet people like you're saying who, and you can be a witness of Christ to them in a positive way. Yeah, and it's important for all of us to love people who don't, this is a showy agree with us, right? I mean, there's just something about our priestly heart, you know, that because I mean, that's what God does. He draws a people who are foreign to himself, you know, and offers himself. And so I think there's something beautiful to that. It's just a basic virtue of friendship that we're called to exercise as well. And Father, you may not know it, but speaking about ministry, today's episode is called the Gentle Art, which we know is a loose translation of Jujitsu in Japanese. And you know, we were talking about ministry in Jujitsu. And you know, your talk that I saw on YouTube actually inspired this title and also inspired a couple of episodes ago, which we did a whole episode dedicated to blessed are the meek and the few attitudes because you touched on it. And I thought there was just a wonderful take on the attitudes and how they relate to the life in Jujitsu and how they interact with one another. And you know, we're talking about ministry today. And one of the things that I wanted to ask you about is, you know, you're, how do you understand and how does it affect your perception of power? Because you know, the reality is is that all three of us are priests, right? And in our parishes, we are placed in a position of power. It's not our power. It's more, and I would say actually I would revise my statement and say that it's not so much power, but more so authority. It's authority is given to us by the church, by Christ, to carry out the ministry. But we are in a position, you know, where we influence other people and people look to us. And that is a great, great responsibility. And I find that what you were saying earlier about how Jujitsu teaches you discipline, but also teaches you restraint. And I want maybe you could expand a little more on that and how do you find that Jujitsu has helped you in your approach to ministry and especially in kind of using that power that is given to you for good and perhaps sometimes not using it, depending on your discernment or the situation. I think that's exactly right. Is that when we talk about hierarchy, and I mean in the terms of order, right, we have to order our lives properly in order to be holy. And so yeah, power is meant to be ordered towards love, right? Authorities meant to be ordered towards love. And we see this within the Trinity, right, the divine persons are all ordered towards a community of relationship. And so I think the same is true is that when we think about our spiritual lives, the power that we, by which we serve, by which we exercise our authority, if it's not used towards love, if it's used towards selfishness, our own ends, really, I mean this is being saying Augustine. I know there's some contention about saying Augustine sometimes between Western and Asian circles. But I mean, but no, but I mean, I think this is a point that we're agreement is that really as sin is a disordering of our will, right? It's an improper ordering of the power by which we do something. And so virtue, which means power, right, it's ordering our will towards the good. And so I think this is so true on the mat is that you're trying to learn how to use a proportionate amount of power in order to exercise the move, right? You don't want to use too much to be excessive. We don't want to be too little and not be able to get it done, but this certain sense of balance that's so important in the spiritual lives. And so as priest, we are ordered towards the good of the people, right? And this is something I like to expound upon because something that we know by virtue of our theology is that who's a priest? Where the reality is every baptized person is a priest, right? That's the common priesthood where everyone is baptized, priest, prophet, and king and king. And share your own peace of God. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. And so our ministerial priesthood is really ordered, it exists for the sake of serving the royal priesthood. It exists for the sake of serving the common priesthood. And so I'm ordained. I am ordered towards the good of the people, towards the good of the church. And so that's why my priesthood exists. Their priesthood doesn't exist for my sake. Their priesthood exists for the sake of bringing the gospel to all the nations of sanctifying the world, right? That's the role of the people of God's church. And so then when we are ordained, we have the power to infect the eucharist, you know, to participate, to bring forth the sacraments in order to serve the people so that the people can take the grace they receive and they go out and sanctify the world. They are the light of the world. They are the salt of the earth. And so our position as priest is that our power is never meant for the sake of ourselves. There's always meant for the sake of loving the people, beating them Christ. Or as I like to say, I consecrate the eucharist so that the laity could go out and consecrate the world and exercise their priesthood. And so I think that's so true. Power is not meant for selfishness. Power is given and authority is given in order to serve. And so this is related to Brazilian jiu-jitsu because, you know, as we talk about, you know, the gentle art, there's a certain sense of, if you know how to do something, if you know how to defend yourself, if you know, if you are strong enough to do what you're called to do, then your responsibility is that I need to, I need to proportionally defend myself. You know, whenever I need to diffuse a situation, I don't want to make it worse. You know, I don't want to use less power, but I want to use just a proper amount of force or the proper amount of energy or the proper amount of movement that I can keep a balance not only within myself, but also in the situation of the interaction. And so I think there's that certain sense built into it is how do we live the balanced life in terms of ministry? How do we make sure we're not distorting power by using our priesthood to serve our own interest, but rather we see ourselves as a servant of the people? Yeah, that's great, Father. And you know, two things that come to mind when we were saying those words. One is, A, we like Augustine. He's one of our saints as well. And I know you're right that sometimes in the Eastern circles he's not read often, but I find that in modern times there's a little bit of more of a rehabilitation, but a much resurgence of reading St. Augustine even in the East. And I agree with you like what you said about the idea of, you know, conforming our will and our power and the gifts that God has given us are harismat as we say the carisms to the will of God and also to the service of the people. You know, another word that came to mind was what we say in Greek, the Greek word for sin is not, is Amartia. And Amartia basically means missing the mark, right? So if you're playing cards, right, you want to hit the bullseye, the bullseye is God, you and just like playing with you. darks the further away you hit from the bullseye the less points you get. And really that's how we approach like in confession, that's how we approach this kind of emphasis on the medicinal healing aspect which is very very prevalent in orthodox theology when it comes to confession and repentance that you're always trying to you know train your will, your free will, to be in line and to conform to the will of God which is very hard because it requires humility. And so you're always trying to do that. Jiu Jitsu I find really helps because the humility that you acquire there like you said on the mats is something that puts things into perspective. The second thought that I had was is that and you were saying that you need to be able to know exactly how much power or ability you need to use in every specific situation. And I would say that it's very much because we use a lot of medicinal terms in the orthodox church, you know the church is the hospital, the priest if you're a doctor who diagnosis he doesn't punish, he doesn't you know judge, we don't have really a kind of punitive approach to it. At least that language is not so much not not as prevalent. So I would say that it's like doing surgery. Like from this spiritual point of view you need a scalpel, you don't need a hammer. And that's very much what Jiu Jitsu for me reminds me of that you know when I you're in a fight let's say you're you're battling an opponent whether it's in a competition or whether it's in real life somebody's threatening you. I need a scalpel. I need to know exactly what technique to use to be able to subdue the opponent at the appropriate time without hurting them without doing more damage. Just like the surgeon is going to go specifically to the place they need to go to fix what they need to do without hurting other organs or making the disease or the the element worse. And that's a very very good skill to have in life. Yeah. I'm thinking back to you know read in Genesis and you read the line of Kane right and you you get this certain sense of this excessiveness right and it talks about Lemek and he he mentions like I have killed a man for wounding me right a young man for for bruising me right and there's that certain sense of Kane is is a is avenged seven times then Lemek me I'm avenged 77 times right so this is it's illusion of excessive force right so when punches me right if you insult me I'm going to punch you and right and if you punch me I'm going to you know I'm going to break your arm right and so this is what we see the way of the world is these escalating cycles of violence right and so then how does Jesus come and um it show a different way he basically says like look if if someone like how many times should we forgive well 70 times seven right as excessively vengeful as Lemek is that's how excessively merciful our Lord is and so there's that sense of proportionality is that um if we want to overcome the violence in the evil of the world we can't play a game where we engage in violence and evil rather there has to be a proportionate um responsive love and portioned responsive mercy that invites us into a different way and so then I'm not trying to hurt you more than you're hurting me I'm just trying to neutralize this situation I'm trying to find a better way where we could be um we could have the opportunity of of showing forth a different response and and if you're strong and you know you're strong and you know you could defend yourself there should be a certain sense of responsibility of like I don't have to hurt you I can protect myself without hurting you and if I'm going to take seriously your dignity and the fact that you are creating the image of God then you know why would I want to unnecessarily hurt you when when I can protect myself without doing this. Thank you for that father that's um you know I really like your insights you know all of us being clergy I think we can all identify with it and I think even our listeners and most of them being lay people whether they be Catholics or Orthodox or Protestants or non-religious um because I know everybody all different types listen to this particular podcast I think they can identify with that because everybody can identify with people with authority over them doesn't have to be clergy can be professors it can be you know first responders it can be a government anybody right and I think everybody can take away the exact same message right that if you have been blessed with you know authority that had been given to you and I prefer the word authority over power because you know authority is usually something that's given to you that you wield in a way to for the good of others whereas power you know it kind of almost take away their way yeah yeah it implies you know force you know you're forcing someone you're trying to bend somebody you will right um you know it's uh I think everybody can I uh those who are were wielding such authority and exercising such authority and also those who are under such authority uh if the goal is the good of the other and the love of the other then both benefit it's not a power it's not a power struggle between the one who is who is in authority and the one who is under authority uh you know just like in our parishes if the priest is loving if he's a good shepherd if he if he's willing to give his life up for the sheep as Christ says in gospel john uh then the sheep will love the shepherd they will not resent the shepherd they will not be afraid of the shepherd they will not think if I do something wrong the shepherd's going to kill me or punish me just like some people some people have this kind of idea of God you know it's going to come after you's going to smite you uh but rather it's this loving relationship where I appreciate and I and I'm grateful for the shepherd because the shepherd is going to take care I mean the shepherd is going to give up everything for me and and the other way around of course the shepherd is is proud and is willing to give his life up because he loves the sheep and he loves those around him so I don't know what you're both father Thomas father Ryan you maybe your final thoughts on this those are those are my final thoughts my kind of you know what I'm kind of taking from this and uh you guys can tell me what you think um my final thoughts I just feel really inspired by everything father Ryan said and I can't wait to listen to this episode back again to hear it again that's that's all that's all that for me father Ryan do we exercise our authority in a way that makes it easier for the people around us to be good right I think that's one of the things that you know even as being a good teammate am I being a teammate in such a way that when we practice you just do together I'm helping you get better I'm not just trying to dominate or punish you but really I want what's good for you and I think that's what makes for really good teammate but I think this is true of society is you know we think about civil servants right our political leaders you think about the people that we elect and we give authority over us so that they can service right that's so that they can service same in the Old Testament why do they uh put forth a key the King was meant to be the first servant of the people but how often does that power become distorted when we use our positions rather than serving others to be served and so I think this is just really our everyone's responsibility is how do we discern what gifts the Lord has given us and how do we make sure that we're not using those gifts just for ourselves but in order to will the good of the other and in doing so we make it easier for them to to act out our our vocation our mission to love others as Christ has loved us so you know I think really that is do we exercise our our authority in a way that makes it easier for the people around us to be good very well said and on that note I think we're gonna our time is up here on our podcast and I really I really appreciate your words father this is like this has been a wonderful wonderful experience talking with you today I know Father Thomas has appreciated it and I know that our listeners are gonna appreciate it and we hope that maybe in the future we'll have you back maybe on another episode and on another topic this was very enjoyable I think what you two guys are doing is great for for a church or for society and you're you're bringing together two of my favorite passions which is Brazilian Jiu Jitsu as well as just a love for the faith and you know as the priesthood that we share of being mindful of how we're called to to take seriously our role in our authority so I really appreciate what you're doing thank you so much well thank you you have been listening to the fighting priests an independent podcast please follow us on Facebook and Instagram and let us know your thoughts we'd love to hear from you till next time keep training the body and the soul god bless [BLANK_AUDIO]