Would love to have more videos from Paul and his wife on marriage, relationships, and even singlehood. I am a leader in a catholic youth group, my youth always have doubts about vocations to marriage, single life, and priesthood, nuns/consecrated life, etc. This video was something I really needed when I first saw this last year, would love to see more of him and his wife. Praying for their marriage and their family!
Yea go to the good God for that healing, guidance and strength to break some of those chains, and then make the serious attempts to overcome fears and insecurities in your romantic/professional life. Move your feet and with trust God will guide your steps :)
He left out flossing. Floss. Please. Never skip a day or a date without it. Also learn dad jokes, they're useful on dates. Also a job. You have got to be angled for a good one, period. Parochial school/homeschooling isn't free ;-)
Haha. Yep! Flossing, and learning some manly skills, like mechanic work and handyman skills definitely helps! Women definitely want a man who can fix things with clean teeth. :)
Although I applaud the spirit of what you are saying, I think you are underestimating the difficulty many men face in dealing with these issues. Saying "Just do it" or "Be confident", is simply not enough. The reasons why many men feel insecure, less than and are lacking confidence are as numerable and varied as the men themselves. These problems arise from abuse, neglect or years of bullying, as children and even adults, from both men and women. Sometimes it is the person`s own parents or family, who are responsible for these problems. I think you are oversimplifying this huge issue.However I agree and applaud your point that a man`s identity and dignity are found in God, his Creator. When men and women realise their dignity as children of God and as a human beings, then they can progress to deal with the more human problems of insecurity, low self esteem etc. God bless you all.
Hey Joe, there's really only so much you can say in a 3 minute video. Give me another 30 minutes and yes we can address all those topics. I have a degree in Marriage and Family Therapy, so I understand without a doubt there are systemic issues, baggage, and problems that people face on a myriad of levels. But the irony here is that regardless of treatment goals in therapy, or how long a person finds themselves going to counseling to process, heal, and grow themselves... At the end of the day, they do need to just "do it". They need to choose their attitudes. They need to choose to forgive. They need to function the best they can regardless of how they might feel or what kind of struggles weigh against them. So though I applaud your desire to get down to the nitty gritty of psychosis and family systems issues, the reality is that confidence is something that is learned by choosing to act against whatever insecurity the person is dealing with. In Christ.
***** Hey Paul. Thanks for your response. I appreciate it. I`m sure you`re a busy man. Although I agree with most of what you said in your response, I still feel that your are misunderstanding the origins of these problems to begin with. And I feel you are underestimating the effect they can have on a person. For example you say: "At the end of the day, they need to just do it" But what do you say to someone who has been "just doing it" for years and feel like they are not getting anywhere?! People are not born with low self esteem and no confidence. It is conditioned into them from years of abuse, neglect, being put down, rejection etc. Also I disagree that "confidence is something that is learned by choosing to act against whatever insecurity the person is dealing with" A person could be the most confident person in the world, but that confidence will be eroded over time and reduced to nothing if that confidence does not translate into results.
+Joe Murphy Viktor Frankl, a survivor of a Nazi concentration camp, wrote a famous memoir called Man search for Meaning. In the midst of constant torture, abuse, and despair within the camp, he reflected that: "Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms-to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way." I have to disagree with you and your opinions. I know many people who have been able to make a paradigm shift in their lives because they were able to let go of whatever negative attitudes and self esteem held them back. In every one of those stories, there was a turning point where they "did it". They made a choice. And they kept on repeating it no matter what the set backs. Even for people who have been stuck, change is possible, healing is possible, and confidence is possible. Everyone is free to choose their attitude. Even people stuck in the concentration camp of their minds. Best wishes to you, God bless.
+Joe Murphy I forgot to mention, people who find themselves in repeating cycles of negative behavior or attitudes cannot "deal" in the same ways and expect different results. As Catholics we believe in the grace of the sacraments, spiritual direction, and prayer. But there are situations where therapy or counseling will be helpful for people who need to process their deep seated issues. God's grace builds on human nature; but if our nature is wounded or our thoughts distorted, then even our understanding of God or His word might become skewed. Christ wants to heal the whole person. But once again, in the end they need to do it. To choose.
***** I think we may be debating two slightly different problems. Once again I understand what you are saying and agree with a lot of it. I wasn`t talking so much about a direct oppression such as in the Holocaust. I am talking more about the oppression of a parent to their child. If a child does not receive love, support, encouragement and validation from it`s parents as a child and young adult, the child will grow to be a insecure adult with low confidence and self esteem, having probably suffered years of rejection and bullying as a child and teenager. No amount of "Just do it" is going to solve that problem. Ultimately, it will take the love and support of someone or some people who can reach out to that person, thereby instilling in them a sense of worth and dignity, in which Christ, the Church and the Sacraments have a huge role. As St Pope JPII said "Man cannot live without love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible for himself, his life is senseless, if love is not revealed to him, if he does not encounter love, if he does not experience it and make it his own, if he does not participate intimately in it. This, as has already been said, is why Christ the Redeemer fully reveals man to himself" See the way it takes both sides to do the job! Something has to be revealed to a person and that person has to make the effort to "participate". On that point I agree, that we need to "Just do it".
one of my worst fears is listening to someone who think they have it all down...or at least listening to they who sound like it...sounds like his wife has shaped him up...Any credit given to her???.sounds like he is missing the whole point though..."do something with your life"???really ???!!! a Catholic man is correlated to St John the Baptist in spirit...how about "Go save souls for Christ and continue to grow in humility".... the message sounds masculine but its not based on the person Jesus the Christ...Christ is about saving souls...not "Go do something with your life"...therefore...its false masculinity. ...
+Daniel Alexander Ah I think you are being a bit harsh, although I understand where you`re coming from. I think he is trying to get men today, who have little or no notion on how to be a man, a gentleman, a boyfriend or husband, on the first step to Godliness. If you were to start preaching about "saving souls for God" to men who were formed by today`s culture, I suspect you would loose them by the end of that sentence.
yep I agree with you...I need to work on my approach but at the same time, call it for what it is...where is the balance??? I know that God will balance me out...thank you for your fraternal correction...it really means a lot to me! men respond differently to God's true calling for them ...but separating saving souls from calling men to God is like saying that men should get married just because it is something that helps them become manly...or something good that helps them put down the video games...the point of marriage is to help you and those around you go to heaven...the point for us being created is to go to heaven and helping those around us go to heaven...being a man just to "get up and become masculine" misses the purpose of being created in the first place..but thanks be to God that he draws straight with crooked lines....
Daniel Alexander Ah I know how you feel! The dilution of the Faith. The sense of loss to true vocations in life. The lack of leadership from our social, political, and most importantly, Church leaders. What is happening?!!! The very people who are entrusted with guiding us, are now leading us astray!!! What are we to do?! Keep fighting the good fight. Nothing lasts forever......thank God! God bless you!
So basically because God died for us, then we should be confident in ourselves. I fail to see what the rest of this video has to do with Catholicism. Confidence should be used for the greater glory of God whatever it may be. This guy seems to reduce the uses of confidence to self benefit i.e. getting a job, getting the girl.
Well, when you're making a RU-vid video, one thing you don't really want to do is to exclude a whole group of people(non-religious folk). So by keeping his examples very generic and easily relatable, he can still relate with people who aren't religious as well as people who do follow a religion.
Except that in trying to relate Christ's death to non-religious people, he completely changed the effect meaning of Christ's death according to the Church.
