Mm.

I think he was teaching a course at Fairfield or Fairfield Prep.

And I thought, "Oh, okay, fine." So I drove up.

I made an appointment to see some Jesuit, and he gave me this vocational literature, these pamphlets, you know, what it means to be a Jesuit.

And I remember thinking, "Oh, my gosh, this is crazy.

I could never do this." And I, I actually threw them out, and the Jesuits would continue to send me sort of recruiting literature.

And I would stand outside, uh, near the mailbox on, gosh, Rock Spring Road in Stamford, where we were, I was living with, uh, two roommates, and I would tear up the, uh, vocational stuff that they would send me.

Mm

As we're talking about the advent of particularly generative artificial intelligence, are we in a similar moment?

What a great question.

You know a lot about Jesuit history.

Interestingly, you know, I would say that in addition to him responding to a certain time, He's also responding to just people's natural desire for God, right? And this is one of the main reasons he creates what's called the spiritual exercises, which is a four-week plan for retreat.

But I would say that Ignatius was very intent on responding to what was going on, right? One of the reasons that Jesuits founded schools was because they needed schools.

People needed schools at the time.

They needed regular schooling, which wasn't happening at the time.

How should we think about outsourcing things to AI and what we lose?

High openness

... major ci- high openness in major cities.

Um, it seems like they have very much rejected the like, "Oh, because I, uh, like I might be queer in some way, that I there- therefore must fall into like these political camps, these ideological camps," this or that.

And, um, yeah, just these, these barriers seem to be coming down, and they're very willing to like...

Like, and, and there's a lot less sensitivity, I think is the other thing.

Like, you can have conversations and be like, "Yeah, like I really disagree with any choice to act on certain inclinations, but we're gonna like have this really interesting conversation about it," and they can be like, "Yeah, well, I disagree," and, "Well, I disagree," you know? [laughs] I think you're right.

I think a lot of those ba- I think a lot of those sort of barriers and lanes in New York, you know-

... whatever

I don't get it.

The business model was this.

It was one of these small papers that existed all over the suburbs, at least in Philadelphia, I'm sure all over the country.

It was called The Recorder, and it was basically just very local news.

Plymouth Meeting, Conchahok, and White Marsh.

These are towns that I grew up near.

You know, maybe like 10 or 15 pages, you know, every week.

Yes, it's a delightful

You did learn something along the way.

Yeah, I learned a lot about, uh, hard work first of all, but also, uh, being kind to people.

Uh, because when you're humiliated as a busboy or a dishwasher or a caddy, uh, you know, you learn how not to humiliate people.

It was as effective as a year's worth of homilies on being kind.

[laughs]

Uh, so we considered ourselves very cool.

You know, that playlist actually is from the book.

Uh, and in each chapter I mention, you know, a, a song or two that was popular during the summer.

... almost got me fired"?

Yeah, I was, uh...

It was the summer of 1976, 50 years ago, and I was working as a busboy dishwasher at a place called the Ice Cream Inn in Plymouth Meeting, Pennsylvania, where I grew up.

And to make a long story short, the Bicentennial Wagon Train, I just love that phrase, was coming through our town.

It was a kind of cavalcade of, uh, covered wagons for the bicentennial.

And, uh, one afternoon at the Ice Cream Inn, I sort of looked outside the kitchen and noticed that everyone had left their tables, and I thought, "Well, it's time to bus all their tables." And I thought it was a little odd that everyone would leave at the same time, but I very diligently bussed all the tables and washed all the dishes, and suddenly I hear this great commotion from inside, and, uh, the manager sort of burst into the kitchen and said, "What did you do?" And he was followed by a patron who started screaming at me.

Well, all the patrons had leapt up from their tables and went outside to watch the Bicentennial Wagon Train pass by, and, uh [laughs], you know, I had taken all their food, you know, before they were finished.

... faith leaders, one of the things we have to do is also, like, examine, um, what others around us are also encountering or enduring.

What's your revelation?

Well, you know, Tim, it's great to hear you talk about the spiritual warfare, too, because that's a very Jesuit concept.

It's Christian concept as well.

But that idea of the good spirits and the bad spirits, I think you're absolutely right.

I think people don't get that.

And when it's pointed out to them, sometimes it can be frightening.

And I said, that doesn't mean you're possessed.

And how do you see him navigating these waters?

I will ask you, because you've written so many books, is this particular book, Work in Progress, your favorite? I'm wondering.

Do you know, it's funny you should say that.

It is.

It feels like it.

Yeah, Work in Progress is a very personal book.

It's a memoir.

It's lighthearted.

Tell me.

He would not be cool with the poor, the impoverished, the destitute"?

Well, let's take away from Donald Trump.

Let's say what would, uh, enable a person, anyone, to say that Jesus is not in favor of the poor and the marginalized? I would say a person who is fundamentally misreading the Gospels or not reading the Gospels or deciding that, uh, it's just too hard.

I mean, Jesus says in-The Gospel of Matthew in chapter 25, as you know, right? The, if you do it to the least of my brothers and sisters, right? And he talks about people who are poor and sick and struggling and hungry and imprisoned and strangers, right? This is widely understood to be, you know, refugees, aliens, migrants, right? Depending on what word you wanna use.

Then you do it to me, right? So as you treat these people, as Bishop Buddy was saying, you know, who are poor and marginalized, you do it to me.

You do it to Jesus.

In addition to that, as she was saying, in Exodus, God says to the people of Israel, "You shall not oppress the alien, for you were aliens yourself once in the land of Egypt." In other words, when the, when the, the Jewish people were in exile, right, they were aliens, right? And so God's saying to them, you know, "You were that yourself, so don't mistreat people who are refugees and migrants." So to say that Jesus is not interested in the poor and the struggling and the sick and the marginalized is to say that you know very little about the Gospels.

How have you made sense of that? Why is there suffering?

What changed when y- your friend Brad was in a car wreck? Tell me a little bit about, about him and, and w- what you went through given his experience.

Yeah.

So Brad was my freshman year roommate at Penn.

We were very close.

And, uh, between junior and senior years he was killed in a car crash with another friend.

And I remember at his funeral, uh, in Potomac, Maryland sitting in the pew thinking, "I'm done with God.

That's it.

H- how do you, how do you not fall prey to that?

What, what, what do you think?

Yeah, I mean, I think that that is an essential part of any solution to the problem we've got.

The illicit tobacco market is absolutely massive in Australia now.

We're talking a, a seven billion dollar market and growing, which means that expenditure on illicit tobacco is worth more than cannabis, cocaine, heroin, and ecstasy combined.

So, you know, it's absolutely massive.

Um, so lowering the tax is, uh, I think just a, a common sense, you know, really basic way of reducing the appeal, um, of illicit tobacco.

It's not like most of the, the consumers of tobacco want to be breaking the law, but with price differential as massive as it is-

I mean, I'm sure all of those are worthy activities, but I just don't think, you know, even if all those things double, I don't think it's gonna make this illicit market go away.

Well, I thought it was slightly different what, uh, Francis in his somewhat famous remarks would say, like, "We don't have to bring this up all the time." Leo actually said, "It's less important [laughs] than issues of justice."

Yeah, which is a big deal, and I think it was important for him to say that because for most Catholics, uh, for many Catholics, and I think for many people looking at the Church, they think this is the only thing that the Church is interested in.

Um, but the second thing he said was, you know, "We're not going further," and the Holy See, um, opposes the moves by the German Bishops' Conference.

So it was done very politely, right? Uh, and then the third thing was this risked unity, right? So if we go further, and I have to say, you know, having been at the synod and talked to these bishops, it does risk unity.

I mean, if they went any further than Fiducia Supplicans, which already had stirred up controversy in Africa, there was a bishops conference there that refused to implement it, right? And the Vatican had to determine how to respond to that, and they basically accepted it, um, would mean real disunity.

And so, you know what Leo is trying to do is to balance this sense of, um, sort of fidelity to Fiducia Supplicans, and not wanting to break the Church over it, uh, over this.

And I would say, even as someone who works for LGBT, with LGBTQ people, rather sort of particular issue.

Mm.

... you're spending your last moments with a person or with, in her case, a burrito.

Yeah, I don't wanna trivialize what she's talking about because it, you know, like Proust's madeleine, right? It can kind of stir up memories.

And as I said, it does sound like she might be grieving the last 10 years.

You know, I lost my mom a couple weeks ago, and I was actually with her on the last day of her life, so I was able to say goodbye.

But for people, like, letting go of people, I think, you know, as a Christian, I believe, you know, they're in heaven, and we can say goodbye to them in our prayer.

One of the things that we can do to sort of help us say goodbye to something was something that was recommen- recommended to me by a, a Trappist spiritual director.

Uh, my mom had moved out of her house, and he said, as a meditation, "Why don't you imagine yourself going through the rooms with God," or if you're not a believer, just kind of going through those rooms, "and, uh, remembering all the things that happened in those rooms and letting it go?"

Hmm.

Please.

So a couple of years ago, I was on a retreat.

I was dealing with a Jesuit in my community who couldn't stand me, and I mean really couldn't stand me.

And my retreat director asked me to pray over what's called the Rejection at Nazareth, and that's the story of Jesus standing up in the synagogue in his hometown and basically just declaring himself as the Messiah, in so many words.

And people reject him, and they try to throw him off a hill.

It's, it's pretty dramatic.

And I remember asking Jesus in my imagination, "How could you do this?" Right? I mean, how could, [laughs] how could...

Can you maybe articulate to the listeners your viewpoint on that and sort of where you stand in that advocacy?

You did learn something along the way.

Yeah, I learned a lot about, uh, hard work, first of all, but also, uh, being kind to people.

Uh, because when you're humiliated as a busboy or a dishwasher or a caddy, uh, you know, you learn how not to humiliate people.

It was as effective as a year's worth of homilies on being kind.

[laughs]

Uh, so we considered ourselves very cool.

You know, that playlist actually is from the book.

Uh, and in each chapter, I mention, you know, a, a song or two that was popular during the summer.

What do you believe was the underlying message, and, and who do you think it's meant for?

for?It's meant fir- first of all for the people of Cameroon, you know, who are suffering.

Uh, but it's meant for everybody really.

Uh, when the Pope speaks, uh, he's speaking in the most general terms possible.

Uh, you know, unless he's naming somebody or unless, uh, he's naming a country.

But again, he's, he's talking about Jesus's message, "Blessed are the peacemakers," not, "Blessed are the warmongers." And, uh, after the resurrection, Jesus's message to the disciples is, "Peace be with you," not, "Vengeance is mine." So he's being consistent and preaching what all popes have preached in the same way, which is not only peace, but Jesus's message of love and mercy and compassion.

What is your reaction to even that comparison or Hegseth invoking the Bible to condemn the media?

I think you have to be very careful when you're using, uh, the Pharisees.

D- were you struck by it as well?

I was struck more by the specter of the vice president lecturing, uh, Pope Leo, who is an Augustinian, uh, who was visiting the home of Saint Augustine about just war theory, which originates with Saint Augustine.

Uh, I think the pope has probably forgotten more about, uh, just war theory and theology than most of us will ever know.

I mean, he's a very bright guy.

He has a, a master's in divinity, uh, a doctorate in canon law from a pontifical university.

Uh, by the same token, I think it was good that the US bishops, uh, clarified things to remind people that this is what just war theory is and this is what it isn't.

But again, the specter of someone lecturing the pope on needing to know more theology was really a kind of, a sort of unprecedented moment, I think, in our country's history.

Do you think, um, do you think this changes the way that Americans view the Church or American Catholics particularly? I have to say that in the circles I travel in, which is a high quotient of what we might call lapsed Catholics who are libs, [laughs] liberal lapsed Catholics, there, there really is this thing happening where people really like this pope and are, are kind of, I don't know, uh, it drawing some people back in the Church maybe?

Father Martin, this idea of just war, what should we understand about that?

Well, it's an ancient concept, uh, in the Catholic Church, uh, and in the Christian Church more broadly, that talks about, uh, the types of requirements, um, that are needed for a war to be considered just.

Uh, and people can go online and find them all.

For example, there has to be a proportionate response, it's usually in defense.

And pretty much every theologian, including, uh, Cardinal Robert McElroy, who's a doctorate in theology and political science, Archbishop Timothy Broglio, former head of the USCCB, have concluded this is not a just war in Iran.

So it's a certain, uh, number of qualifications that are needed to consider a war to be just.

What are you hearing from members of the Catholic community at this time about all of these headlines about the Pope's leadership and these public feuds that we're seeing?

seeing?Well, I would say Catholics from traditional Catholics to progressive Catholics were really pretty appalled.

So that's J.D. Vance, if you can respond to that, and also the AI image Trump posted of himself as Jesus Christ, but start with Vance.

Vance.Yeah, uh, he said the Catholic Church should stick to matters of morality.

Uh, I don't know any other more pressing moral issues than war and peace, than taking care of the poor, the sick, uh, the homeless, the stranger.

These are moral issues, right? And so that is exactly what Pope Leo has been doing.

He has been talking about these moral issues.

And so I don't understand how Pres- Vice President Vance can not see that war, uh, is a moral issue.

Uh, secondly, this idea of President Trump posting a, a picture of himself as Jesus, you know, some have called it blasphemous, which is, you know, speaking ill words a- against God, but I- I think it's more idolatry.

And he- his spiritual advisor, Paula White-Cain, has declared that, quote, "To say no to President Trump would be to say no to God." Uh, what do you say to that and the, the evangelicals around him, uh, that, uh, uh, that promote this, these views?

So that's J.D. Vance, if you can respond to that, and also the AI image Trump posted of himself as Jesus Christ, but start with Vance.

Vance.Yeah, uh, he said the Catholic Church should stick to matters of morality.

Uh, I don't know any other more pressing moral issues than war and peace, than taking care of the poor, the sick, uh, the homeless, the stranger.

These are moral issues, right? And so that is exactly what Pope Leo has been doing.

He has been talking about these moral issues.

And so I don't understand how Pres- Vice President Vance can not see that war, uh, is a moral issue.

Uh, secondly, this idea of President Trump posting a, a picture of himself as Jesus, you know, some have called it blasphemous, which is, you know, speaking ill words a- against God, but I- I think it's more idolatry.

And he- his spiritual advisor, Paula White-Cain, has declared that, quote, "To say no to President Trump would be to say no to God." Uh, what do you say to that and the, the evangelicals around him, uh, that, uh, uh, that promote this, these views?

So that's JD Vance, if you can respond to that, and also the AI image Trump posted of himself as Jesus Christ, but start with Vance.

Vance.Yeah, uh, he said the Catholic Church should stick to matters of morality.

Uh, I don't know any other more pressing moral issues than war and peace, than taking care of the poor, the sick, uh, the homeless, the stranger.

These are moral issues, right? And so that is exactly what Pope Leo has been doing.

He has been talking about these moral issues.

And so I don't understand how Pres- Vice President Vance can not see that war, uh, is a moral issue.

Uh, secondly, this idea of President Trump posting a, a picture of himself as Jesus, you know, some have called it blasphemous, which is, you know, speaking ill words a- against God, but I- I think it's more idolatry.

And he- his spiritual advisor, Paula White-Cain, has declared that, quote, "To say no to President Trump would be to say no to God." Uh, what do you say to that and the, the evangelicals around him, uh, that, uh, uh, that promote this, these views?

Mm-hmm.

And you can't get any clearer than that.

Not, "Blessed are the warmongers." And, uh, you know, standing up for migrants and refugees.

Jesus says, "Welcome the stranger." So, you know, Leo, he only-- notice, he only uses President Trump's name when people ask him specifically, but otherwise, in his prayer for peace, uh, a couple of days ago, um, he just talked about peace and reconciliation in general.

So he's, he's trying to make it nonpartisan.

He's trying to make it religious.

Christ.To put my message on the same plane as what the president has attempted to do here, I think is not understanding what the message of the gospel is.

The Pope is, of course, very reserved.

What changed when your friend Brad was in a car wreck? Tell me a little bit about, about him and, and w- what you went through given his experience.

Yeah.

So Brad was my freshman year roommate at Penn.

We were very close.

And, uh, between junior and senior years, he was killed in a car crash with another friend.

And I remember at his funeral, uh, in Potomac, Maryland, sitting in the pew thinking, "I'm done with God.

That's it." You know, "I, I don't believe in a God that, mm, you know, kills my friends, or I don't wanna believe in a God that kills my friends." And I persisted in that unbelief or sort of atheistic or agnostic state for a couple of months until a friend of mine really brought me up short.

How, how do you, how do you not fall prey to that?

Why is it that it just can't get on top of it?

Uh, well, I think the problem at the moment really stems from a, a lack of appreciation of what the limits of enforcement are in this space.

Um, so enforcement can work in illicit markets.

So, um, you know, that's everything from seizures at the border or even, you know, beyond the border, working with international partners, all the way down through, you know, to the retail level, trying to close stores and so on.

You know, you'll hear the government talking about seizures and raids.

Um, but those things actually don't produce any meaningful impacts on the market themselves.

And that's because when a market gets beyond a certain point, while you can, you know, severely impact or disrupt individual criminal networksThere are so many other players in the space that they don't interpret, you know, some other rival being shut down as a deterrent.

What is it that they wanna do?

What changed when your friend Brad was in a car wreck? Tell me a little bit about, about him and, and w- what you went through given his experience.

Yeah.

So Brad was my freshman year roommate at Penn.

We were very close and, uh, between junior and senior years, he was killed in a car crash with another friend.

And I remember at his funeral, uh, in Potomac, Maryland, sitting in the pew thinking, "I'm done with God.

That's it.

You know, I, I don't believe in a God that m- you know, kills my friends, or I don't wanna believe in a God that kills my friends." And I persisted in that unbelief or sort of atheistic or agnostic state for a couple of months until a friend of mine really brought me up short.

How, how do you, how do you not fall prey to that?