- Welcome back everyone to the front line with Joe and Joe. Joe Bessilow and Joe Ressinull, you're exactly right, Joe. - We work for the man upstairs as you do. - You're setting me up quite well. You just gave me an alley youth. - The greatest revolutionary act to commit right now is to open your mouth and speak the truth. - Whether you're an academic or you're a regular guy, you have to be fearless. - And once more, dear brothers and sisters, let us go into the breach. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Welcome back everyone to the front line with Joe and Joe. Joe Bessilow, as always joined by Joe Ressinullo. And once more, dear brothers and sisters, let us go into the breach of the Veritas Catholic Radio Network, 1350 on your AM dial, 103.9 on your FM dial, spreading the truth of the Catholic faith in the New York City metropolitan area. Two things you know what I'm about to say. Download the app, the Veritas app share it with your friends, you'll have access to all of our station's content. Joe and I, our audience, thank the Lord is growing, particularly on Rumble, because I just, Joe, I just found out today, somebody who did just like a regular interview with I think Vivik Remiswami, just got banned permanently from Twitter. So you can work for years. Oh no, it's not Twitter, excuse me, I probably, YouTube. So that means you can work for years, building up an audience, building a show, and YouTube in the drop of a hat. And it doesn't really matter what you're talking about. I mean, if you're even counter-cultural a little bit, if you go against a narrative a little bit, some little dweeb at YouTube is gonna send you an email saying you're taking off. So why am I saying that? We encourage everyone, number one, whoever you like on social media, follow them on alternative social media, like Rumble, which is growing, like X, which I think Elon Musk is gonna turn into a trillion dollar company, 'cause people wanna be able to speak freely, okay? So today, we're gonna be Marines, okay? Today, we're gonna be Marines. And I'm gonna tell you where I'm going with that, okay? Joe and I, and our guest, Mark Midendorf, who's the president of Abbe Maria University, we have a profound respect for the military, okay? You talk to any Marine, if you met any Marine, you know, there's something special about these people, okay? But today, we're gonna be talking about Mary's Marines, okay? And Joe and I, as you all know, our show is in the hands of our lady, wherever it goes, we give it to her, all right? So Mark has Mary's Marines at Abbe Maria University, and that's gonna be the topic of conversation. Many of you remember we interviewed Mark before several months ago. He was named Abbe Maria's fourth president, his journey to Abbe Maria comes from the business world where he worked at such companies like Westinghouse. He left all that behind to devote himself to the world of faith, bounding lighthouse Catholic media, which became the largest producer of Catholic audio talks in the world. He and his wife, Christine, have four children. Mark Midendorf, welcome back to the Frontline with Joe and Joe, brother. - Thank you so much, it's just an honor to be on the show again, so. - Absolutely, and seriously, this is a great topic. We're gonna have a lot of fun over the next hour. Please everybody, wherever, if you are watching this on social media, please share it, if you're listening to it on the podcast on Veritas, please share that also. So with that, Joe, normally we start with the prayer to our lady, which Joe leads, we're gonna hand it over to Mark. He's got Mary's Marines, he's gonna lead us in a prayer to our lady. - Great, thank you. In the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, amen. - Amen. - Dear Lord, we ask that you send your Holy Spirit, give us wisdom and prudence and understanding. We consecrate and entrust this show to your blessed mother under her mantle of protection. And if we could ask the audience and all of us to just join me in their hearts as we pray Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed are thou among woman and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, amen. In the name of the Father, the Son, Holy Spirit, amen. - Thanks, Mark, and with that, I'm gonna hand it over to Joe Russinello, we're gonna have a fantastic conversation. - Mark, you are spot on with this idea, and that's why we wanted you on the show. This is what Catholic universities need to do. This is what Catholics need to do. I'm gonna be honest with you. Avi Marie of Phenomenal University, more people need to know about it. I have five children, they're young. I would be proud to send them all there. If I can afford it, we'll see as God, as God, and not that it's that expensive, but I have five kids. So God will provide. However, the reason why I bring that up is this, prayer is vital to a Catholic university. I went to a Catholic university. When the students call me to solicit money, I swear. They tell me they're building this, they're telling me they're building that, I swear. This is what I say. Are you building a chapel? I wanna hear that. This is what I wanna hear from my Catholic university. And that's what you're doing. Tell us what's going on at Avi Marie University. People need to know about it. - Yeah, I'll start with kind of just from our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, in his document, it's basically the magna carder for all Catholic universities, and it's called Ex-Chorda Ecclesiae. And it was written, he wrote it on August 15th, 1990. And in that, and we have a book, we'd be happy to send any listeners with their interest in reading this document. You can find it online as well, but that is the magna carder for all Catholic universities to follow. And he lays out in there what we should be doing, and why, and he says in this document, these are his words, not mine. He says, Catholic universities are essential, essential for the growth of the church. And he asks yourself, well, why? Why are they so essential in these other things don't maybe get the mentions? You know, there's some great causes out there. And I think it's because the unique position that we are in at the stage of life that our students find themselves in when they come to college, to really discern their God-given gifts and talents to change the world. You know, St. Catherine of Cienas, there's a great quote I use in a lot of my talks that she said, and she, of course, is one of the doctors of the church. She died when she was 33 years old. Her birthday, by the way, is the same birthday as our founder, Tom Monahan, March 25th, feast of the nonceation. And she says, be who God wants you to be, be who God wants you to be, and you will set the world on fire. Well, I think that's why Pope John Paul II wrote this document, this Magna Carter. And today of the 221 Catholic universities in the country, only 15 of them adhere to those principles in that document. That's it, 15. And of those 15, only eight of them are universities, which means they have a master's program and above, we're one of those, we're blessed to be one of those, and only two offer a doctoral program in theology. So we're one of two universities in the country that are in that group that are abiding by this. And by the way, we not only abide by this, but it's in our seal. And not only it's in our seal, in this document, Pope John Paul II has three rally cries for the laity. The first is to support Catholic universities. So the second is to defend their civil liberties. Well, we founded a law school that's associated with our university. And that's Tom Monahan founded that. And then the third is where there are no Catholic universities that do this to build it. And since 1990, there's been some small colleges, but since 1990, there's only one man that responded to Pope John Paul II's call. And that was Tom Monahan, when he founded Aubrey University 25 years ago, where the only university since 1990, Catholic university that's on that list. And I think it's because of the special calling God has for us. And our devotion to his mother, our blessed lady, we're fully consecrated to her. We promote marrying consecration every semester to our students, staff, faculty. So that's kind of who we are at a high level from a church perspective. But what's going on with the university, more practically speaking, I would say, this past fall, we had our, and how is God blessing us? And it's all his blessing. We had our record enrollment. We've never had more students. We had our record retention for students coming back. We had the highest GPA incoming GPA in the history of the university. The average student was 3.7, 20% of our incoming students were in the top 7% nationally. We do an interview where we screen for different things and because of that, the on-mission part of it is just outstanding. The students can go to eight daily masses today, Wednesday. There are eight choices for masses for the students to go to. We do confession, spiritual direction every day. I mean, we have some of the best priests, I think, in the country. And so we're just blessed like that. In the students, the Lord is sending us. In some of those records, we had four new faculty that joined us last fall that gave up full tenure. And some at other Catholic universities, what you would-- that secular world would perceive as very prestigious universities to come teach at ours. So that's what's going on. That's kind of a little history on Avi. We're really excited this weekend. By the way, you mentioned your five kids. We have what's called a presidential scholarship, which is a full ride. We've got 70-some students, 79 students coming this weekend to compete for that. But then we added in a Kwanis scholarship this past fall, which is like a $10,000 a year scholarship. And it's for the best and brightest out there that are on mission. So they don't lose their faith. I think focus in Curtis, Martin, and some others, they did some research. It's like 85% of practicing Catholics when they leave for college lose their faith. In our case, it's the opposite. We're-- they're grown in the faith. We actually-- you know, we're 90% Catholics. We're not 100%. But we have seven students coming into the church this Easter. So that's a little background, probably more than you wanted, but-- No, it's good. It's good, Joe. I just want to just piggyback on that. Yes, Bishop Strickland on talking about Catholic education, his school in Tyler is Newman School. And that's why I bring him up, only reason. Catholic education is vital. I send my kids to Catholic school, four of the five ones young, because it's vital. The culture is indoctrinating our children. To deny that is to deny reality. As Catholics, if you care about having your kids practice the faith, it's reality. Now, I understand the cost. I get it. I work at a bank. I know how money works. You know, I get it. With that said, though, that is a priority for me and my wife. We send our kids to Catholic school. This has to be a priority of the church, because we are to protect our children from wolves and the wolves are there. They are there. And we have to accept that reality, acknowledge that reality, and take action. And you have. You have. And more parents have to open. You know, I respect Orthodox Jews. I live near them. They don't send their kids into the wolf den. Why do we? Why? We have to be real, because it's real. I'm interested in both your comments, because I think as a whole, and I'm not going to point fingers, I'm not going to name names. That's not what I'm here to do. I'm here to talk about solutions. Ave Maria is a solution. We have to face this reality, because our children are getting eaten alive. It's interesting when Tom Monahan founded this university, he sold Domino's pizza in 1998, so many years ago, for over $1 billion. And he, at that time, I think he was the largest Catholic funder of Catholic causes in the country. So everybody's knocking on his door, asking for support money. And he had to decide what he's going to do with his money. And he has put in over $500 million into this university. And not just that, though, he spent the first nine years-- how many donors do this? He spent the first nine years every week traveling back to the university while it was being built. And I remember making my first donation. I was still in the corporate world back then. It was in 2002, my youngest son, or at that time, my oldest son, was only four years old. And in 2002, I got a solicitation. This was just a tomato field. It was a vision. But I loved that vision so much. I donated back then. And I remember distinctly when I made that donation, well, maybe someday my son will go there. And he graduated at Ave Maria University in 2020 with a theology major. He now works for one of the largest Catholic apostles of the country doing computer programming. And it's just amazing what God's done. And through one man's fiat, through one man's yes, and constant sacrifice. And Tom will be 87 this year, this March 25th. He still is down here. He is still working full time for this mission and this vision that God put on his heart 25 years ago. And Fulton Sheen, here at Ave, the one thing that we do, and that separates us, and along with the other Newman Guide schools that you talked about, they do this as well. But it's really tied to this. And that is we have to form the whole person. You have to form the intellect, the love of truth. We have 35 majors, 31 minors we're looking at. We just added a computer science major. I mean, in these types of things. And then you have to form the will, the love of God, the virtues. And we feel the best way. We kind of agree with St. John Henry Newman in the idea of the university where he talks about the virtues are best formed for him. It was-- they were called the colleges. It's where you live. And so we require our students. I think one of the few places in the world that require their students to live on campus for all four years. Why? We could make a lot more money if we allowed juniors and seniors to live off campus. But why do we require that? We require that because your best formed students, your juniors and seniors, are helping to form the virtues of the incoming freshmen and sophomore. And when you allow them to live off campus, you lose all that. And so for us, we also have what they call these faith-based households, which are unbelievable. It's peer-to-peer. And so forming the intellect and the will, and Fulton Sheen said-- and I love this quote. He says, "If education is not grounded in the truth, if education is not grounded in the truth, forming the whole person, then it is worthless. If it does not form the whole person, then you're basically paying full price for half an education." Would you mean? I think you're actually Mark Mendendorf's joining us here at the front line with Joe and Joe. Joe Piscilla, Joe Riss, and L.O. way in the breach with discussing Avi Marie University, where Mark Mendendorf has been named the fourth president. We're discussing Mary's Marines, which we're going to get into in a couple of minutes. What they call universities now, Mark, they're hollow buildings. They don't teach anything. They claim to teach things. They claim that they're enlightened. It's always funny, if you want to know that someone's not enlightened, that's the person that tells you they are enlightened. See, Joe and I are a couple of jimokes. We admit it, OK? So we don't pretend to know things that we don't know. That's why we have people on like you. So you educate us, but let's talk about a little quickly before we get into Mary's Marines, OK? Please educate our audience. The university, the idea of the university, was a Catholic project. I tell that to atheists. I tell them the Protestants. Anybody who I talk to, the university itself is a Catholic project, did not exist before the Catholic Church created it. Part of what impresses me when you know anything about Catholic universities was that they were communities. It wasn't just the school. It was like Steubenville's doing. And I believe you guys have the-- well, you do it with the students. I don't know if you have that surrounding kind of community outside of the university. I know in Steubenville, there's a lot of Catholics that live in the town also. In other words, the university is the center of the town, OK? And I'm glad that you mentioned that people say, well, the Catholic Church, they just want to teach Catholic teaching. You said you have 35 majors and 31 minors. That means that your students are exposed to everything, everything. And I'll guarantee one of them's not gender studies, OK? So please do me a favor. Just a quick minute before we get into Mary's Marines, OK? Please dispel this idea that the university was created somehow outside of the Catholic Church. It is a-- and it was and is a Catholic project. Yeah, there is a phenomenal book that Ignatius Press publishes. It was written by this great Jesuit in 1961. And he goes through the whole history of higher education back starting in Europe. So before Harvard or Georgetown were even existed, and he traces that history, and you're absolutely right. I mean, that is what you find as far as the-- when you really look at the science of in the history of it. And even saying, John Henry Newman, when he built the first Catholic university really in Ireland, in that sense, it was a community. It was about that, you know, that whole thing. If you go back to even-- it was called the University of Accala in Spain. And this goes back to-- when Queen Isabella was there, and Christopher Columbus was coming to her, he, his name is Cardinal Cisneros, was her spiritual director. That university that he built produced the book that St. Ignatius La Biola read when he was held up in the castle that changed his whole life. I mean, it's-- in his whole idea back then was to bring in all these different religious orders, form them up, and so he did all that. And so within-- by the time the Protestant Reformation happened, one of the few countries not to fall was Spain. Why? Most people attribute that to Accala, that university, because the formation that it was bringing-- so yeah, the history is deep, and it would really behoove your listeners to read that-- to read up on that, because it is fascinating when you do that in. And I think the other thing that's changed a lot is a lot of universities have-- they have colleges, colleges of engineering, or whatever it might be. But the core classes for a lot of universities have gone by the wayside. At our university, all students take the same core curriculum. In that core curriculum, we have three theology, three philosophy courses, metaphysics as one. So they're getting a base formation that everyone at the university is getting. And I think in a lot of places, they've jettisoned those types of core curriculums to just focus on a particular science. And as you and I both know, who is the queen of all the sciences and her handmade? Theology is the queen, her handmade as philosophy. And to jettisoned those, it's-- But that's-- Mark Medendorf isn't that the modern world, though. I mean, Richard Dawkins goes out there and says, well, we don't need physics, because then we don't need-- or we don't need metaphysics, because we have physics. No, no, no. You actually, Richard, you're the smartest guy in the room, so you like to tell everybody. No, you actually need the metaphysics before you get to the physics. I'm going to throw it over to Jayo and make one comment. And I think it says a lot. Correct me if I'm wrong, Mark Medendorf. Oxford University's found that it's a Catholic university, OK? Found that a long time before the Protestant revolt in England. Remember, a few years ago, there was two prominent British Catholics on one side and Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Friday, the actor on the other, OK? And they were arguing whether the Catholic Church contributed-- this is how extreme it was. Ever contributed anything to Western civilization. And I believe that debate was at Oxford. And all you had to do to win that debate was look at where you're sitting and then ask yourself whether or not the Catholic Church contributed anything to Western civilization. You're in Oxford University. Wasn't founded as an atheist university. Wasn't founded as a Protestant university. Was founded as a Catholic university. That's my two cents in my rant. Mark Medendorf's joining us here at the front line with Joe and Joe. We're going to get into it. Mark, thank you for all of that about Avi Maria. And obviously, Joe and I would encourage all of our listeners. And you have children. You really need to look at the Newman List. You really need to look at Avi Maria University because our kids need to be, as Mark mentioned, formed. Which I don't think I need to tell you. Just go look at what's going on out there. Kids are not getting formed. Joe Ressinello. Let's talk about Mary's Marines. The few and the proud. We know what Marines are. You're forming Mary's Marines. Tell us about the program. All right, the name Mary's Marines. Just because we're out of university, we have to have full disclosure here because that is not our original name. We did not come up with that name. I heard that name from a Father Michael Gaitley. Father Michael Gaitley wrote the book 33 Days to Morning Glory. He wrote a number of other books, but that was one particular book that he wrote on marrying consecration. And he talks about Mary's Marines himself being like one of Mary's Marines. So that's where the name came from. Now, obviously Tom Monahan joined the Marine Corps. Tom, a lot of your listeners may not be aware of this. His dad died when he was four and a half years old. He was put in an orphanage raised by Catholic nuns, the Felician sisters. When he reached a certain age, he had to leave the orphanage. He had, I think, six different foster homes he was in. And he had a tough life growing up, no doubt about it. But the Catholic faith permeated everything because of that formation he got from those nuns. And one really holy priest that helped him. Well, he joins the Marines at the age of 19. He comes up with his five priorities of life at the top of that is spiritual, social, physical, mental, and financial. And the spiritual was a key part. So we have, like, for our board members, they all take what's called the Trace Magnum. That's from Tom, daily mass, daily rosary, monthly confession. If you're on our board, you're doing that. Tom, I mean, Mark, let me just stop you there. That's the key to heaven. That is something, I'll be honest with you. I say that constantly. You do that, you're going to heaven. You're not going to be perfect. You're going to heaven. It's that simple, Mark. I'll be honest with you. I'm a dummy, and I know that. It's that simple, we make things so complicated. I had to interject. I love it. Please go on. - So that's Mary's Marine. So that's kind of the root of the words, okay. But then the concept, what's the foundation of the program? The foundation of the program is really simple. I love Archbishop Fulton Sheen, venerable Fulton Sheen. I was at his grave site, where his body is six months ago. And he has been a personal hero of mine. I love his life is worth living talks and their time was, in my opinion. But in there, he talks about making the daily holy hour. He himself personally never missed it. Never missed it. Started it before he was a priest. And he gives all some great reasons why, and I'll share those with you in a moment. But a little over two years ago, I decided after hearing him say that time and time again, 'cause I've listened to his talks a number of times, I just thought, you know, I'm gonna just do something. I knew I was gonna be coming to Aave. I knew I was gonna need that kind of additional support in my role here. And so it was a little bit reckless, like some people might say, but I committed to our Lord to making that daily holy hour every day and Fulton Sheen talks about the mass doesn't count. It's, you know, you wanna go to mass every day, but the holy hour is on top of that. And so it totally transformed my spiritual life. I mean, I can't even imagine starting my day without that time in front of the Blessed Sacrament. Now we're really blessed here. We've got eight chapels. I get, you know, there's a 24/7 adoration chapel. I'm an instituted acolyte, so I can expose and repose our Lord, you know, based on what, that role, that what being an institute acolyte. But so it's easier for me here than a lot of your listeners, but in so far our students, we basically, for Mary's Marines, the one thing we want them to do, it's very simple. Every day while they're on this campus to make a daily visit to the adoration chapel, we encourage it to be for an hour, but for some they may only be able to give 15 minutes or 30 minutes or 45 minutes. So it's, but it's a daily visit. And that's really comes from Fulton Sheen. So that's the foundation. And then we feel like we should give back to the students that are going to make that commitment. And we have right now hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of students making that commitment. And so what do we do in return? We give them, when I was at Augustine Institute, we came out with this is really Tim Gray's brainchild, Dr. Tim Gray, the Bible in a year. And so we give them a beautiful leather Bible in a year. So when they're in the chapel, they can read, it takes about 20 minutes a day, and spend time with our Lord and Scripture. 'Cause I think the Scripture is the normative way God speaks to us. So they get that. We also had student workers this past summer call every poor clerk hoister in the country and about 40 other religious orders. And we asked for specific names of sisters and nuns that would spiritually adopt by name that one student that would commit to be in one of Mary's brains. And we would send that sister that nun, a postcard of that student, a little bio on him, that student gets the name of that sister nun so they can write each other. They can't talk on the phone a lot of these sisters 'cause they're cloistered. But they're praying for that student every day. And that idea comes from this book, Shadow of His Wings, which is this German seminary and drafted into Hitler's army. It's the most amazing life story of this nun that's spiritually adopted him in the power of prayer. So those are some things we do for the students as part of the framework of the program. But the one thing we ask them to do is make, spend time with our Lord friends, spend time with friends. - Mark, I'm sorry to cut you off. We gotta take a quick break. If you're just joining us at the front line with Joe and Joe, stick around for another great segment. We're with Mark Menendorf, the president of Albany and Marie University. In the first segment, we discussed the university. Now, we're talking about Mary's Marines, and we're gonna keep that conversation going. Don't go anywhere. - Catholic radio works. And now we have it here in Connecticut and New York. It's been seen around the country that there's no better tool for evangelization. Where there's Catholic radio, the folks who listen deep in their faith, families are strengthened, parishes and communities flourish. So, let people know you're listening to Veritas. Tell your friends to tune in, and let's make an impact here for Jesus and his church. This is Steve Lee for Veritas Catholic Network. - Welcome back everyone to the front line with Joe and Joe, Joe Pacillo, Joe Rosinello, we're away in the breach with Mark Menendorf, the president of Albany and Marie University. We're discussing the university, and also Mary's Marines. I'll tell you this Mark about adoration. Joe literally does say it every show. No, he will come up in every show talking about the need for adoration. Quick, quick, little quick anecdote. You know, I'm in the restaurant business, I've been in a restaurant business since 2008. You don't work in the restaurant industry without working nights and weekends. Okay, it's just the way it is, okay? Except for very few roles. And by the grace of God and a lot of prayers, okay? And I mean this, I got one of those roles. So, I don't have to work nights or weekends anymore, all right, in the industry, I'm in. And why am I bringing that up? Because my wife and our foster son, please pray for us soon, he's gonna be our adopted son. Hopefully, the state of New Jersey gets their head out of there, but they go to adoration. While I was working on Saturdays, they went, they would go to adoration, confession and adoration at a local parish here. Well, by the grace of God, now I'm able to go every week. And to sit in the church and pray a rosary, 'cause you know there's a line to go to confession. So, we get there early, and I have time to pray to rosary, to buy mercy. And I always look for the seat that the candle's on. You always look at the candle's lit in the front, and then there's an adoration chapel right on the right. So, as soon as I go out and leave confession, I go right in there, and why am I saying this? Because this is not a feeling. It's not something that I feel. There's a difference when you know something. I know that I'm sitting with Jesus. I know that he's telling me, all right, you didn't have a great week, all right, but you came back to me, you went to give that. I know it like I know my own name, the importance of adoration. Now, especially that I could actually get there a lot more often. So, I'm glad Joe brought it up, and I'm glad you were talking about it. Again, if Marines got to wake up, and the first thing you'd do is to even before they eat, is they have to do push-ups, okay? Or something, shouldn't I? (laughing) Things that I can't do. But the idea that every day adoration is just fantastic. That's my little rant. I'm gonna throw it over to Joe. We'll keep the conversation going. Mary's Marines, Joe, where are we going? Well, Mark, on the other side of the break, you laid out what the Marines are doing. You give them a Bible. That's very similar to the Marines in America. You make them or ask them to, they're required to pray. There's a lot there, but first comment, these are first principles of the church. You're not making things up. This is what we have to go back to, 'cause the first principles work. Why is adoration efficacious? Because the Lord, and I prescribe to it, I go once a week for an hour, so does my wife. Because the Lord knows us better than we know ourselves. You know, I could talk about the faith. I've read some books. I listen to people like you. But I don't know the hearts of man, but Jesus does. You see, this is my bet, Mark. Any soul that goes in front of the Blessed Sacrament, the hardest atheist, a Muslim, a Jew, first of all, you're all welcome. There is no requirement. Anyone can go. It's open to you. That's number one. Number two, say this prayer. I don't believe in you, but I want to. And then just sit there. Do that for five minutes a week. My bet is after a short period of time, you will believe in God because he knows you. God knows and loves everyone. You see, I can't touch people with my words 'cause I don't know their heart, but Jesus can, and he's real. And that is why that is such an efficacious prayer. And it is my belief, Mark, that if the Catholic world did that, the world changes tomorrow. And you're starting that on your campus. This has to spread. If you ask me, every parish should have adoration chapels. Every university should be doing this, and you're doing it. Have other universities caught on, because if you ask me, this is a spark that needs to spread. - I'm not aware of that, but that doesn't mean it's not spreading. Often the Holy Spirit works undercover and there are seeds being planted, but that's definitely our prayer. When Tom built this university, he built it to be a beacon of light to all other Catholic universities. And we can all learn from each other. There's things that, like our households, where did the household concept come from? Well, that's Father Scanlon. That was his baby, he started it. And now you look at how many different universities have taken that baton and developed it internally within their own universities and campuses. And it's transformational. And I love the fact when you say it's not something new, it really, Fulton Sheen, and I tend to quote him a lot, just 'cause my love for him, it says, "The reason above all reasons "to make the daily holy hour, "to spend time and adoration, "the reason above all reasons, "is because our Lord asked for it." On the night before, you know, he didn't ask us to spend 40 days in the desert. He didn't ask us to spend all night on a mountaintop and prayer. He didn't ask us to share in his agony on the cross, but he did ask us. On the night before he's gonna be crucified to Peter, James, and John to watch with him, one hour. And why? 'Cause Jesus was lonely? No, because we need it. We need it, you know, there's often, there's some theologians that think if Peter had stayed awake in that holy hour with Jesus, right? You know, Jesus was right there in the garden with him. Maybe he wouldn't have denied him. Who knows? But the point is, it's the one thing Jesus asked his apostles to do, to watch with him, to spend time with him. And I think, you know, in this sea of chaos, this sea of spiritual chaos, the holy hour can be an anchor for all of your listeners, for all of our students. You know, how many people lived 20, 40, 60, 80 years and never discern what God's called them to be. What are their unique God-given gifts that only they were given, and they never discerned that. And so I think the best place to discern that, though, is in adoration. God can touch you in all sorts of ways and you can discern that in other ways. I'm not saying that's the only way, but I think it's a very efficacious way. And I think you couple that with not doing it alone. Don't go on this journey alone. Take our blessed mother with you. Make the marrying consecration. You do those two things. And especially at their age, you're gonna know what God's calling you to do. You're gonna know your unique gifts. - Joe, I just want to touch on one more thing, 'cause it's so important. You mentioned that the Marines, Mary's Marines, ask for a religious sister to pray for them. That is vital. People can laugh at that. They'll say, "Oh, prayers, that prayer is what I value." You hear that? No. Mother Teresa, for her sisters, would have handicapped people. They would say, "You are assigned to this sister because your prayers are powerful, rare and fasting. You want to change the world, rare and fasting, particularly the prayers of a father. You have a wayward child, get up in the middle of the night and pray for your family. Pray in front of the blessed sacrament. In time, God will change the heart of that child. The power of prayer and fasting, Christ. You mentioned Christ in the garden. Well, He also said this to His people, the 12th. I'm from New Jersey, Tom, I call them His people. That's just me. - Just guys. - Just guys. - Just guys, forgive me, forgive me. But His people, He says, "Prayer and fasting. That's why you couldn't do it. If we pray and we fast, and that's what these nuns are doing for these children, young children, talk about that because it could be glossed over. No. John, I want to throw it. And Mark, please address that. But also one thing, 'cause Joe's talking about prayer, you're talking about prayer, and you mentioned Fulton Sheen. If I remember correctly, Bolton Sheen also said, "When you pray, pray big. Don't be afraid to pray." And I was taught that by the Sisters of Life. He mentioned to my wife, "Why are you only praying for small things? God could do whatever He wants. Go when you pray, go big." So I wanted to just throw that in there too. - Yeah, well, I think it goes back to St. Catherine of Siena. I mean, she doesn't say when she says, "Be who God wants you to be, and you will set the world on fire." She doesn't say, "Well, not everyone's called to set the world on fire." Or, you know, that be who God wants you to be, whatever that to be is limited. You know, the ones that are going to be truly giants are only this small group. No, I think every single person God has given certain unique gifts to that one person, that if they don't fulfill that mission, nobody is. They're uniquely qualified and equipped to do it, but they have to know what it is. And they have to know it. It's like in the reading today, right with Samuel, you know, God's calling him, but he doesn't hear. He doesn't know who it is. And then he says, "Speak, Lord, your servant is listening. Speak, Lord, your servant is listening." You know, I think when you're an adoration in the face of absolute truth, when you're facing absolute truth in the Eucharist, and the Blessed Sacrament, violence is the soul's language. And we can truly listen and hear his voice, his, what he's going to call us to do, be if we ask, if we spend time. And, you know, and it's, Fulton Sheen talks about, you're going to be tempted to quit a thousand times. And it's going to be hard in some times, like one time he shares a story where he fell asleep. Got there right at three o'clock hour. He fell asleep for an hour. He woke up and he's like, "Well, did I make my holy hour?" And he says, "Well, that's how the apostles started their first one." So I guess it counts. And he went on, you know, but that's a, I think it's just time, just spending time with our Lord and let him work on us over that period of time. - I'm glad you mentioned silence. And I think it's what I guess you'd call the classroom of silence, okay? We're distracted, Mark, by so many, they're like, "Don't get me wrong. "I want everybody to listen to the front line "with Joe and Joe, okay?" But, and Joe and I both listen to radio shows, podcast. I'm sure you do the same thing. But there's such, there comes a point where even the things that are good for us can become distracting. The greatest good for us is to listen to God. So when you're talking about, let's say, going to adoration, sitting there and just shutting up, shutting up and tuning out and tune into God. You know, people think that that's just, I don't know what they would call it. I mean, I know, I know that things that have happened in my life are a direct result of sitting in front of the Lord. 'Cause I didn't come up with it. I didn't think about it, it popped into my head, but God's the one who put it there. I just wanna throw that in. Let me, let's talk for a minute. 'Cause we're talking, if you're just joining us with Mark Medendorf, the president of Ave Marie University, we're talking about Mary's Marines. Let's talk about another aspect of Marines, okay? Service, okay? A lot of people throw that word around and I quite frankly don't think they know what service is, okay? Let me give you an example and I'm gonna throw it over to you, Mark. The modern world, the secularist, the atheist, when Catholics say that the meaning of purpose of my life is to know God, to love God and to serve God and to live with Him forever in eternity, okay? They don't like to serve part. They say, "Well, why do you need?" I thought about this a lot, talk about adoration. I think this idea came to me in adoration, okay? I do want to serve God because He serves me infinitely more than I could ever serve Him. Do you remember? It's not a quid pro quo, but it is a relationship, okay? God serves me, God gives me everything. My service to Him is nothing compared to what He does for me. Yet, I want to serve Him. I wanna serve Him in this life. I wanna serve Him in the next. Marines serve, okay, in the greatest way too, because anybody who becomes a Marine knows that they could die tomorrow like that, it could be an accident in boot camp, it could be getting blown up in the Middle East, okay? They know they're risking their lives. Talk about the service aspect of Mary's Marines and how that mirrors, let's say the United States Marine Corps. - Yeah, so on campus, our students, we have, it's called the Mother Teresa Project here, and we were very blessed. Jim Tui brought it here. He was her lawyer, and we have a beautiful Mother Teresa Museum here, but the biggest thing is we do these service projects. So we go out to herd different orders all over the United States, and we spend time with those sisters in service, helping, working, things like that. We do a broad things. One of our priests is from Uganda. There's an orphanage in Uganda. A bunch of our students will go there and spend a week there helping in service there. So our students are spending thousands and thousands and thousands of hours in service. And then even just within the university itself, like you have the true, the good, the beautiful. Here at the campus, a lot of our students will do beautification projects and just volunteer work and service hours in the form of work and physical work. So it's a combination of an organized, structured event, which is our Mother Teresa program, which it exists to serve the poor, but also these other projects as well. And I think just building on what you had said earlier, and it was saying Augustine that said it, our hearts were made for him, and they are restless till they rest in him. And I think that's just so true. And so when you're serving our Lord, when you're spending time with our Lord in a comprehensive way, across these different types of opportunities that we have here at Aave, you are gonna be at peace. They called Aave Joy. And we're really blessed. I mean, we're in a town called Aave Maria. It was voted one of the top 10 best Catholic communities in the country. We have, they're building 600, 700 new homes a year. We have Catholics moving in from all over the country that have five, 10, 15 kids. My daughter was a junior here. Her roommate has 20 siblings. 10 adopted, 10 biological. Our champ, our one of our priests here, Father Joseph, is one of 23 siblings. I mean, we have a lot of large families. So, but it's a community. And really, the people in the town, they come to our events. It's a beautiful, it's really truly beautiful, what our Lord's built. And the church, this giant oratory is in the center of it all. - Mark Mendendorf, a quick question for our audience. Where is Aave Maria geographically located? - Southwest Florida. So I'm looking outside right now. And I don't know, it's probably 75, sunny. It's beautiful. I feel bad for all the rest of the country that is dealing with blizzards and snow storm. And the temperature is beautiful. I mean, there's no humidity this time of the year. It's just, it's really, when you talk about the true, the good and the beautiful. We, the beautiful you will see here. You know, and we have this, yeah, and you have the Gulf side. And, you know, on both sides of the coast are about an hour, hour and 15 minutes away. And there's just so much to do. - I'm glad you mentioned, and I'm gonna throw it over to Joe Mark Mendendorf. I'm glad you mentioned the restlessness that Augustine talks about. 'Cause I think about that a lot. Is that, you know, one of the things that I think it was St. Paul who said, or in his description of, of heaven was that you're, and correct me if I'm wrong, you achieve a level of peace that passes all understanding. I think that that's what people don't actually realize. We're restless, even secularists, even people who don't believe in God. I don't know how they could deny that as human, we're restless, we're reaching for, Eve reached for the apple, because it's always this, this restlessness, this reaching for this, this reaching for that. I don't care what it is. That's how people become addicted. That's how people die, right? Because, you know, again, I'm not judging, because we all have it, we've all had problems in our lives and things that we reach for, and that peace just helps us to put those things down. No, it was a, you know, go ahead, Mark. You know where I was going with that. - Yeah, yeah, I mean, there's a famous quote, you know, every man walking into a brothel, I mean, it's a, really a stark statement, is searching for God. In other words, you know, when we, we will be restless until we rest in him and that restlessness will come out because through, you know, a lot of addictions, I think, a lot of other types of activities to try to fill that void, to try to get satisfaction and joy from it, but none of it's gonna fulfill it. And, unless we're with him and I just think, you know, and I think also our blessed mother is a big part of that, right? Like making the marrying consecration, even if you don't really understand it. Mark, Dr. Mark Mervolly does a couple courses for us here on Mariology that are just beautiful on why make the marrying consecration. And yeah, so, and you know, if you look at the scriptures, especially in Luke, where, or in John two, where Jesus is at the cross and he says, you know, woman behold, they son, you know, it was at that moment that right, we all became, she became our spiritual mother for the whole world. And so I think she is waiting for us too to help guide us to her son. - I'm gonna hand it over to Joe, the best way I heard it put, I think it was Dante when he was in the purgatorial, is that the bottom of the mountain is where you, that's when you have all the weight, like the heaviness, the burden of your sins, the guilt just weighs down on you. By the time you get to the top, your light is a feather, you just fly away. Joe Rasinello. - Mark, young people wanna be challenged, Mary's Marine just putting that challenge out there. They gotta pray, you give them a Bible, you got the service aspect, that is wonderful. And it's counter-cultural. With that said, to be counter-cultural in the world, you have four kids, I have five, you worked in, you know, the private sector, I work in the private sector, we don't get paid to do this. I gotta put food on the table, diapers cost $50 a box. - In the last three years in particular. - It might even be more. But my point is this, there is a price to be counter-cultural, you know that, so do I. How are we preparing Mary's Marines for that? Because ultimately, I went to Catholic school, you know, mom and dad, sacrificed, they sent me, you know, then I came out, cold bucket of water thrown in my face, had to work, went to graduate school at night, had to live home to save, to buy a house, preparing one day thinking I'm gonna get married, a lot of sacrifice. You're Catholic, some people aren't too happy about that. You're not on the campus anymore. Real counter-cultural sacrifice, how are we preparing these students for that? Because that's where the rubber meets the road, for all of us as Catholics. - Well, I think first off at the, at the heart of it all, this is a spiritual battle. So we need to use spiritual weapons to fight the spiritual battle. So by equipping ourselves with those types of spiritual weapons, we will fortify ourselves to be strong, to have those cardinal virtues, to have the other virtues that really give us perseverance and stuff, you know, and you think about it, you know, in some ways, we were made to walk uphill, to swim upstream, you know, dead bodies float downstream. There's no effort. Anybody can do that, but that's not what we were made for. We were made, you know, in the Marines, you know, they are paying the price. It is no cakewalk. Even today, I, Tom Monahan, to this day, 87 years old, 19 years old when he became a Marine, at his peak he could do 400 consecutive push-ups. I'll guarantee you, if I talk to him today, at 80, well, it'll be 87 this March, he can probably do nearly 100 push-ups. Why? 'Cause he does them every day. He never stopped doing them since he was 19. And I think, you know, it's hard work. It requires discipline. But God will help fortify us. We can't do it alone. We do it through his grace. And if we ask for that grace, if we ask for that help, he will fortify us and equip us and bring other people along in our lives that we can be in fellowship with. So we're not, we're with them as well, where there's an accountability there. And like, for instance, my son, when he graduated in his wedding party, five of his groomsmen were faith-wholes brothers of his from Avi Maria. These guys are all gonna help get each other to heaven. They're all full, when I met them for the first time, I thought, boy, if my daughters are called to be to the married life, these are the types of guys I want them to meet. Because they truly respect women, they respect themselves. And understand that meaning and purpose of life and are living it and they hold each other accountable. So I think that's how to be counter-cultural. One, don't do it alone. 'Cause Satan, it's easier for him to pick one person off than an army and find friends and relationships that will join you in it. - Tom had those qualities he learned in the Marines and Mary's Marines, you're teaching them, you're giving them tools. I'm gonna be bold and I'm gonna say this. The church gives us tools. You're giving your students tools for life. We need those tools and we develop them through habit. And you are instilling habit in these young men and women to succeed. You see, we're only people and I work in a bank. I know how that works. They disregard these tools. These are fundamental tools to succeed in this life, to have a successful life, to live with dignity, to be a good father, to take care of your children, to meet your responsibilities, to get strength and ground your life on a strong foundation. That's what these young men and women are learning. And you don't learn that in a book. You could read all the books you want. You could sit through all the lectures. It's habit, it's day in, it's day out, rain or shine and that's what they're learning and that's valuable. You see, a lot of secular people, this is gonna be played in the New York Metropolitan area. People have a lot of money, they disregard this. Wrong, wrong, it's about grit and you can't teach grit. And prayer warriors have grit your thoughts. - Well, I think our model, right, is Jesus Christ and who was Jesus Christ? He is the suffering servant and I think when we follow Jesus, you should be prepared for the cross. But it's a gift, it's a gift, you know, to carry the cross with our Lord, you know, to carry our crosses because He's gonna be helping us carry it. But we're only on this earth for a short period of time and eternity is forever. And I think that's, if we keep our eye on the prize, it will help sustain us to make those sacrifices. But I do think the accountability is a big thing to make sure you have others with you in the battle. So you're not alone and the most important person to ask the join, I think, is to that through the marrying consecration, you know, 'cause nobody wants us closer to her son than she does. - Now I'll tell you something, I mean, and one of the things I do, I pray for our Protestant brothers and sisters that don't take that view of Mary and I mean that respectfully, of course. I pray for them because I have told them something, you don't know what you're missing. You don't know what you're missing. Okay, I'm not taking anything away from Jesus. Mary's drawing me closer to Jesus 'cause that's what she wants me to be closer to Jesus. What's, like to me, it's like you mentioned earlier about Christ from the cross, said, you know, "Woman behold your son." That's right, she's my mother. Jesus gave her to us as our mother. Go to her, she ain't gonna let you down. Mark Benadour, where could our audience members find out more about Avi Maria, what you got going on, Mary's, Marines, anything you wanna let us know? Sure, our website is aviemeria.edu. And if you've got juniors or seniors in high school that are, you're trying to discern what, where they're gonna go to school, college afterwards, I would really encourage you to come to our website, come down and make what we call an Avi experience weekend. So we have students that will come this week and we've got 71 students, or 79 students total coming. They're gonna be here for the week and they'll spend the night in the dorm with other students to really get a sense of what this campus is about and what it's like and to make that journey, it's worth it. And for some of your listeners, they may be coming from the other side of the country. They may be coming from Washington State or Oregon, from Canada. We've got students, I just had a student that just came this past semester from Brazil. So don't let distance be the reason you don't come and look into this and don't just assume I can't afford it. You know, there's lots of scholarship opportunities and things like that. So I think the big, most important thing is that and then if your listeners are in a situation to support Catholic universities like our Holy Father said, obviously we have a monthly giving society and we have these things called short courses. They're free, they're totally Catholic on all sorts of different topics and you can check that out too. So that's a different area but I'm just grateful for the time you guys have given me on your show. Thank you. - No, Mark, we're the ones who are grateful. I mean, like I said, you know, you're president of Avi Marie University, Avi Marie University, you're very busy, but this is an important topic. Mary's, Marines, all you parents out there with college age children are about to be college age children. You know, check out Avi Marie University in five years. I will be for my little guy. I promise I might be your neighbor, Mark. You better watch. All right, but thank you all out there for joining us here at the Frontline with Joe and Joe in the Veritas Catholic Radio Network. And remember, until the next time that our conversation is your conversation and that conversation is going on everywhere. We'll talk to you soon. (upbeat music) [MUSIC PLAYING]
