Visitation Sessions (A Podcast)
Voting in 2024
who you are as a person is not simply determined by who you vote for, but how you treat all of the other people in your life. And that's the more enduring legacy for each of us after the election. Yay, you voted. It's great that you voted. And then I walk out feeling really confused about whether or not it's great. Yeah, like a certain local politician came to Emily's door. He came in hot, pro-choice, wanted to kill all the babies, but he found himself on Emily's steps. I married a lion. [music] You are listening to visitation sessions, your weekly conversation about the sacred, the profane, and everything in between. Hosted by me, Emily Chapman, my husband, Christopher Chapman, our friends Kate and Casey Stapleton. And today, we are going to talk about the election, sort of, kind of. Not really. We're not going to talk about candidates. After 45 minutes, we'll have 10 minutes. We'll have 10 minutes. We're not going to talk about candidates, but we want to talk about the broader aspects. Like, how much does the church influence who we vote for, can a Catholic vote for a candidate whose pro-abortion? How do we, like, can you vote for a third party? Are you morally responsible for a problematic person being elected if you vote third party and not for the person who is opposed to the problematic person? We're not even going to talk about who the problematic people are. Because we're going to try to thread a needle that we probably cannot thread and alienate as many of you as possible. It's terrifying. We were scared to do this episode. We felt like it was important. I'm not scared. You should be. You should be. I mean, I think that we -- Emily and I talked earlier this week about whether or not to do this episode. And we're doing it for the same reason that we're scared, which is that -- I'm not scared. Please stop saying -- please stop saying we're scared. I am not scared. Casey is not afraid. Casey also wants to talk about candidates. So, we're not going to do that. It's a pity. No, I can't. What? This is a crazy, polarizing conversation. The election is making everyone crazy. It's getting closer and closer. Many people, not everyone. We watched the vice presidential debate and we were impressed by the fact that it was a conversation. So, setting aside everything else, it was a civil conversation. And there were many moments within that conversation where people -- they turned to each other and said, "I think that we have some common ground here. There's something that we could build on." And one candidate expressed -- they expressed human sympathy towards each other. And that was startling. And that's why we wanted to record a podcast about it. Because we've lost all of those things in this election. I think most of us, Casey -- Most of not all of us. So, civility, in-depth conversations, ability to build common ground. Kate and I were talking because we both have the same reaction. I was like, "Oh, man, the last time I heard such a reasonable, intelligent conversation in a presidential debate was Dick Cheney and Joe Lieberman back in -- That was -- I mean, I don't know when it was an amazing debate. So, we were we young things back then. But we both have that same -- It was fascinating. I remember that conversation. I remember the debate that they had and how watching it. I was like, "Wow, I feel like right now watching this debate, I'm having -- with the Lieberman one. I'm having more of a window into how politics actually works." Because I think, you know, it's not necessarily the top of the debate. So, Kate, what do politics concern? What are politics? I feel like we need, like, new-quality people in here right now. We can teleport mark bars. I'm not going to rob this one over to Chris. I feel like this is a Chris. What are politics? Oh, geez. Well, I mean, I'm hardly an expert on such things, too. But, you know, the polis is the city. And politics is about the art of running the city, right? And what makes for -- I mean, at the heart of that is a question of what is the good, which is why everybody gets very excited and anxious and angry. And because we have very definite views of what the good is, because that also pertains to what a human being is and what we're made for and how we get there. So, you know, depending on maybe we could be talking about taxing the rich, we could be talking about, you know, feeding the poor and the immigration. But all these are questions about what it means to be a human being. Like, how do you comport yourself as a society? And so, you know, with the kids, if I remember Father Connolly, my dear friend and very holy wise priest, he had a homily one time about this. When I first met him, he said, "Look, you cannot avoid politics. People talk about office politics and, you know, school politics and, you know, federal -- you know, whatever, you know, we stick it in there and we use it in a negative way. And clearly, there are negative things attached to it. But he said, "You can't escape it because it's what it means to be a human being. You have to order -- you have to attempt to order society and make it run, which means there are people who are in charge. And you're making decisions about important things and about how to do them. And so, inevitably, especially when we're talking, you know, higher up the food chain, we're talking about very important things. And so, people get heated about them. And that is not necessarily a bad thing in itself. Yeah, while you were talking, Chris, there's actually a police siren. I don't know if you guys could hear it in the background. But, I mean, to me, that's an expression of, like, politics done right. You have these institutions created for the common good. You know, like you have fire departments, police departments, blah, blah, blah. And obviously, there's not everything that works perfectly. There's scandalous behavior occasionally in these things. But really, you know, that's an expression. You're, you're tilling the garden, like, the primordial command to Adam. You're tilling the garden, granted it's a fallen world. But there's a lot of good that can come from managing, you know, creation of that. So, politics is a great thing. We need it. We do. I mean, it's awkward, though, because even Pontius Pilate gets a shout out in the creed. But, like, you know, he was the governor. But I'll say, you know, Aristotle somewhere, I should look this up. But it always struck me, he says, the politician must have God-like abilities. Because to order society means you have to understand lots of things, right? You have to understand how things work together. And honestly, I mean, this is maybe even bears upon our conversation we're going to have and we're already having before we tape this. I am a bit bemused at times how passionate people get about certain things. Because I think of Aristotle. I mean, there are things to be passionate about, no doubt. But how you get to the good, you know, takes God-like abilities. And if we're all going to hang our hats on how we would run the country if we were there, you know, we'd probably make a hash of it, many of us. And maybe not everybody listening, they're wiser and more virtuous and people. But there are a lot of complex issues, you know? And so, you know, some of them are simple in their essence and yet still in a society of, you know, what are we, 340 million people, 50 states, you know, layers of government. There are a lot of complex questions that go with it. I personally am not going to hang my hat on my understanding of every issue, you know, about why, you know, I'm not going to talk to Kate anymore because we disagree about whether there should be a wall or not on the Mexican border, you know, whatever, you know, like really do we really both? I mean, first of all, we live in Pennsylvania. So anyway, I mean, so we get heated about a lot of things that we have no control over, which maybe is one of the reasons we get heated about it too. It's like armchair quarterbacking. It is exactly. I've always been struck by that. I mean, I think because I remember, you know, I was in high school and Rush Limbaugh became just super dominant on the radio and I had relatives who were adored Rush Limbaugh. So whenever I was riding with my like dearly loved, amazing aunt, my aunt Cecile, she would just crank up Rush Limbaugh. And the level of just how loud everything got and the conversation got really felt. So I was someone who grew up in, grew up in Wisconsin and now I live in Pittsburgh and I don't care about football, which is, that's an achievement. Like, I mean, because I remember when the Packers went to the Super Bowl and every single, like every convenience store, every single store that had a sign board out in front in the entire state, I happened to like cross the state a couple of times, had a go pack, you know, it was everything. The whole state was united. It's like Pittsburgh. You can feel it. You can feel what's happening through the game. Except for you, you were not. I don't care. I don't care at all. But except I kind of like the Packers. I mean, I like them like theoretically, but I don't, you know, anyway, I think it's great to be a football fan. But what is interesting to me as a person who kind of stands outside of that is that a lot of people almost have heart attacks, you know, they're, you know, on their knees in front of the TV being like, "What? You did? I would have!" As though like they knew better. They would have done it better than these athletes who are in so insanely highly trained who dedicate their entire life to nonstop working and people call them idiots all the time. Also, it's really hilarious. I mean, I've never played football at any high level at all, but it seems really hard to catch a ball with a helmet on while grown men are trying to like basically take your head off. Yeah, put your body in the car crash and break your spine. And you're like, "You didn't catch that?" And they move like the lead dancers. Yeah. And they, their whole life is like, I mean, my kids have done flag football drills and I'm like, "This is amazing. You're, you're incredible." So to see people watching football, you know, I think somehow as humans our default tends to be like, "You idiot. I would have done way better than that." And I think a lot of that happens with politics too where it gets simplified. There's really hard work to be done. So I think for me, I don't feel like I understand politics very well. I don't think my civic knowledge is great. I feel, I've always felt like my personal ability to impact the world, whether I vote or not, you know, I do go vote. I've always voted, but I feel like my ability to change the world happens in the sphere that I impact. So it's the elderly lady that I'm taking care of or, you know, whether, what do I do when there's somebody who needs help in front of me so that the homeless person who's crying on the street in front of us, do we go buy her food in the bottle of water? We're the guy who has to use the bathroom and climb some of our steps with that look of pained panic. This is amazing, by the way. They live on this very busy thoroughfare and we just heard this anecdote the other day, but they let this person who is stuck in traffic who clearly had to go to the bathroom come into our first episode of Shake It Up. You haven't heard it? Oh, I don't know. Was it? Okay. Well, no, it's worth it. Like we have been listening. Emily has been a member. Emily has been a member. We love our steps and use our bathroom. It was very, very grateful and... That's 25. That's about fine. But these things... Oh, we've also... Okay. So I think during a last election cycle... No, but when you say that's that's subsidiarity, right? Yes. And that's... You're solving problems at a local level before they float to the hiring... Which is kind of like social teaching. Yeah. Teachers are both teaching there right now. But during the last election cycle, I was so aware of that because we had a single mom living in our attic, we had a Chinese Communist living with us. Okay. She was a teacher just so we're clear. Yeah. But she was Chinese if she was a Communist. Yeah. They all... So we had a series of Chinese teachers live with us for three years as exchange teams who were teaching at the Catholic school. Why did we do that? Why did we do that, Kate? The Catholic school that... Because nobody wanted to host them and the principal was desperate. So the Catholic school... They were teaching at the Catholic school that Casey taught at. And one of them... Casey found one of them crying, one of the girls crying because she was living in a basement. And the people she was living with, the host who we were being... The host were abusing her, forced her to live in a moldy basement with a cat... Not feeding her. Feeding her food on a tray and just like leaving it there like it's prison. And so she'd come to school every day just like sobbing and like, "What's going on dude?" Yeah. So that wasn't... That happened the year before. And then Casey as a joke got the email that was like, "Oh they're looking for hosts. Do you want to do it?" And I was like, "Sure. We have an extra bedroom." Yeah. Like... I mean, it's not the four seasons at our house. Let's be real. We don't really have air conditioning or quiet. It sounds like a big improvement of what we do. But we'll feed you. Yeah. We had a really great experience having those three young women stay with us. And so I remember, I was taking care of a woman who was dying during the actual election cycle last time. So I was walking every night to sit with her and figure out whether that was going to be the last night. She was alive. And I had an infant. Sitting with a dying person, had an pregnant person in my attic, had a Chinese comedy teacher. And I was... So people were getting really heated up about the issues. And I was like, "I feel like my sphere of influence is what I can do." And this is... I'm pretty maxed out. So I mean, that's very specific to me. But I do think that we can put a lot of effort into what's in front of us. Which might be different depending on who you are. Some people are politicians. And that's really important for them. Yeah. Well, the counter-argument, and I am a huge fan of subsidiaries, it's not that I disagree with you, but the counter-argument is that as the federal government starts to exercise more control over our everyday lives, as the federal government has assumed more power that was not necessarily there a hundred years ago, 150 years ago, that what happens at the federal level does have an impact on our day-to-day lives in a greater way than it would have before. And so there's greater obligation to pay attention to and engage in politics at the federal level. And I think that... I don't know if I agree with that argument, but that's definitely an argument that would be that we made in context. I think it does jibe with what Kate's saying, because the people who are in those positions have a grave obligation to serve the common good, the good that's common at all. And this is something I've kind of rested in the last few years. It doesn't matter who gets elected. They have the same obligation to the good that anybody has. And they assume it themselves, like they have put themselves forward saying, "I am going to lead you." Well, you have now taken all that responsibility on yourself and those around you before God. Whether they believe in God or not, they have taken on themselves. And they have a grave obligation to live it out. So their sphere of influence has become much greater. You know, their lack of virtue or ill or their virtue has a much greater play and influence. And so they should feel the gravity of what they're doing. So you know, if you're just going into it for self-enggrandizement and it makes you feel good about yourself because you're powerful, well, you're full because you've taken on a lot of responsibility. And someday you're going to have to answer to God because you were the mayor of the city. You know, you're the congresswoman, the congressman, you know, whatever, at the various levels and said, "You put yourself forward as an authority to lead these people towards a good and you did not, you didn't do it well." And that's on you. But I think that sometimes people, it's easy to assume, and there's so much cynicism right now where people look at the government and, you know, assume that all of the people working in it are corrupted, that the whole everyone in D.C. is corrupted and everyone's terrible. And I don't think everyone, I don't think everyone there is acting as an authority. I think there are people there acting as servants. You know, I have a sister who works in the senate. Oh, yeah. Chuck Grassley? Yeah. Are we allowed to say his name? Yeah. Yeah. So, Senator Chuck Grassley is so inspirational. He's like 90 or something? He's 90 years old. He runs every morning. He drives his track. Just kettlebell. He does squats when he's at like rest stops. He's just popping squats. Definitely follow him on Instagram. You will feel better about the world. I think there's one take away from the action. So, that's my point. Like, he is taking it seriously. But here's why. Yeah. So, it's K.C. You tell him. No, your sister was saying that, like, wherever he goes, she noticed wherever he goes. If he sees a piece of trash on the ground, whether he's in D.C. or like Nebraska or some rest stop or a bathroom, he'll pick it up and he throws it away. The guy's 90. And he gathers trash everywhere he goes every single day and just is like, I can do this to make the world better. Yeah. And I think your sister was like, why do you do that or something? And he's like, this is my country, you know, or something like that. Yeah. Like, we met him this summer and I asked him what made him get into politics and he was like, I want to make the world a better place. And like, he spent his whole career doing that. I find it very helpful and inspirational. Well, whether we know like his heart or not, I mean, the exterior actions remain, like, that is, that's caring for the environment, which is another principle of Catholic social teaching. No. So when I worked in politics, I worked for some very good men, like they were absolutely saw themselves as public servants. They were both Christians. They were committed to trying to serve the Lord, to serve the common good. And they were kind, humble. I was very proud to work for them. I had nothing but good experiences working in politics for them. But for as much as I admired them, they still only knew what they were doing about maybe 30% of the time. And they were really smart, you know, but, but it's like Kate was saying, nobody really knows how to solve these big, huge, intractable problems. We think we have an idea, like we need this tariff, we need this tax, we need this wall, we need this credit, we need this law. And we keep passing these things and we keep like, like the problems don't get solved. The problems don't get solved because what we're trying to solve is the human condition, like fallenness, like that there's poverty and there's sin and there's despair and there's pain and there's oppression and you can't solve these problems, you can't solve poverty, you can't solve oppression. Certainly not politically. Not politically. She said the poor you'll always have with me. The poor you'll always have with me. Which is why I left politics. Like I decided that it was better to go and try and form people's understanding of who they were as human persons and what the common good is than it was to keep trying to pass legislation that half the time never got out of the house or the Senate that if it got out of the house it didn't get out of the Senate and if it got out of there it got vetoed and it got gutted and amended so many times that it was just loaded up and not the bill that it was supposed to be in the beginning. It all seems fruitless. I was like, well, you know, if I can help five people think more clearly about who they are and who God is then I'm probably going to do something more effective than what I'm doing on Capitol Hill. But I think that has helped me over the past 15, 20 years. I have very strong opinions about politics but I'm also very detached from a lot of the candidates because I know for as much as they're going to promise they, you know, there's a thousand obstacles to whatever they want. There's only so much they can do. I think I think Aristotle says in the rhetoric somewhere in one of his books, the rhetoric politics is one of those fears where, you know, you're speaking of things in the future of things that you get to come and so there's no actual certitude whether or not these things will pass. And more interestingly, I don't know if he mentions this or someone else, but you know, there generally are not repercussions if what is promised does not come to pass. So it doesn't seem worthwhile to completely lose your mind over something that may or not pass. And also like even in the Middle Ages, if you had a monarchy, everybody understood like the king was the king, but for something to get done, it all sorts of secondary levels of causality, the nobility, you know, all kinds of people, your parish priest. And so really the king was just one part in this whole mechanism, you know, which goes back to subsidiarity. You know, the real change really happens at the local level. Right. And I would say one thing that's different now is because of the prevalence of executive orders and amidst like agencies being able to issue orders, there are things that people are doing now that you wouldn't have been able to do 20 or 30 years ago. So it's, you know, Chris and I has adopted parents like I know there are adopted parents who are out there worried that they're going to have to pass some sort of test. Like you say, you will always accept your, you will affirm your child's gender no matter how contrary that is to biological sex or not, or that you will affirm their attractions and there's people who want you to say that and I know if there's couples in a Massachusetts that have not been able to adopt because of that. So people have, there are ways that the king can infringe upon us now that he might not have been able to infringe upon us so directly 800 years ago. So we're Catholics then, right? So I keep thinking about that during, I, I, we're going to talk about, you know, the Catholic vote and what are, you know, what, what are we supposed to do as Catholics? And one thing that I keep thinking about the Catholic vote where people, a lot of people seem to have really strong opinions about what it means and what it is. So Catholics have existed in all kinds of different political situations, right? I mean, like our primary goal as Catholics is not to vote correctly in a democracy, right? For most of history, we couldn't vote. No one voted. Right. So when I think that, and we're in a very bizarre place now where we're like, Oh, this is democracy and your vote is going to make, make the difference. So Emily, you got asked a question recently that was really clear about that, but what was that question? We've had two questions. So I mean, there was one, are you thinking about what are Catholics responsibilities in terms of voting? Like, do we have to vote? Do we have to vote for a certain, can we vote Democrat? Can we vote for pro-abortion candidate? I've got a lot of questions. Which one are you thinking about? I mean, I'm open to... How much can the faith, how much is the faith supposed to flop our vote? Yeah, and what are our responsibilities when it comes to voting that we, what do, what does the church tell us about voting? Well, there's, they say we're supposed to form our conscience well. So, and the church is there to help us form our conscience. The church does not tell us how to vote. The church does not tell us who to vote for. The church says, we are, I'm here to help you understand what, who you are and what the common good is and what your obligations are to the common good. And then you are to vote in accordance with your well-formed conscience. And yet voting is a very blunt instrument. This is another thing over the years. I mean, I'm all for voting. I voted in most elections. I think I missed one or somewhere in there, but when I was moving or something. But it's a blunt instrument. You know, I think to Kate's, you know, an initial story about your lives together, how you are, you know, you're participating in society and dynamic and vibrant ways and voting. Really, I mean, again, like, I go through this in my mind. Like, I could have a PhD. I could just spend 10 hours every day studying all these issues and have really keen understanding of all these things. And if I'm not running, my vote is the same as, you know, some 20-year-old that shows up and votes for the other candidate. Like, my knowledge about the thing and the vote, there's hardly any connection between those two things at all. And you're voting for a living person too. Like, you know, maybe to your point, Casey, and Aristotle is about the future. Like, okay, you know, George W. Bush got elected. You know, what was it? 2000, I guess. Nobody knew about 9/11 was going to happen, right? And all of a sudden, he's the guy that's handling that. Like, he couldn't even run on the thing that was really going to define him because he didn't know what was going to happen. I mean, you're just voting for the person and you're like, well, I don't know what's going to happen if Kamala Harris is, you know, elected to the presidency. I mean, you know, what if she, you know, has a heart attack three months in and, you know, Tim Waltz, I mean, that's obviously why you have a vice president. You just don't know. You don't know. And so you're like, you do all this, I'm going to, you know, this person, I'm going to really form my conscience and stuff. And even then, though, I mean, form your conscience and your mind to understand the world that you live in as best you can. But when it comes to voting, you, for the most part, we just get two candidates who are somewhat foisted upon us, you know, and they're like, oh, these are my two choices. Like my PhD and, you know, my understanding, you know, like, it's just, I guess I'll vote for this person and hope for the best. I don't know. This might be a hot take, but if politics concerns the future of things yet to be, you know, seen, developed, whatever, is it reasonable that people with children, see, you just said, like, you're vote as smart as you could be or as dumb as you could be, like your vote counts. It's the same. It's like mathematically the same. But if you have, in a sense, more stake in the future of the policy of the civilization, if you have a bunch of kids, you know, that are dependents or whatever, like, should your vote count more? Heck yeah. No, I'm joking. No, I mean, no, because honestly, when I was a single woman for most of my adult life, yeah, I certainly had a better understanding of the common good and the human person and politics and policy and just overall, like, a better understanding of what was at stake than plenty of married people. I know that with kids, like it comes back down to just because you have kids, doesn't mean you're thinking clearly about these things, just because you're in my, it might be the opposite. You might be like, I want the biggest tax credit for me. But I think I've always felt, felt reticent about voting. I do it, but I feel reticent about it on the opposite side. So, I mean, I feel like I wait till the very last minute and then cram and read, you know, a bunch of stuff about about the down ballot people, especially, right? I like watching politics from afar. I like the game of it. I enjoy the debates. I enjoy seeing what happened. We have day nights, wherever it's a debate, we have a day like game of thrones. Like, yeah, it's like kind of, because you're watching two people in their supposed prime just to go at it. You know, yeah, it's fascinating. So, I, but I tend to, so I know a fair amount about the main players, right? And this is why the vice presidential debate was where they were able to have a less heated conversation because it's, it's less of a heated thing. Like there's less eyes on them. Now you go further down the ballot and you keep voting. And I'm always voting for people. I have no idea who they are. I really feel like I'm taking a test. I'm blind one hand time to have my back. I'm just kind of randomly filling in boxes like, oh, I should just make an even and at that point, it's like does this? How does it really, you know, how do my, my, you know, pro life? How does that play? And I have no, I mean, I read the thing, but I just, I really am just randomly filling in holes. And I hate that. I feel like I should, those are the people who are actually impacting my local community. So I have this guilty, subsidiary voice in the back of my head being like, why don't you know about the people who are literally in your community as much as you know about this thing that you have much less to do with and why are you not better informed? And actually, why do you even get to vote at all? I don't feel like I'm, I feel ignorant. It's a huge problem in the way that our system is set up. We hear all the focuses on the national candidates and not on the local candidates. And I think the local ones are important and I, and I read the newspaper every time. They're certainly more important for the local people. I mean, those, those decisions have more impact on a day to day basis than, you know, what the president is doing. I mean, obviously that has bearing on to you, but yeah, I don't ignore it. I actually do try to seek it out. I read voting guides. I read the newspaper. I read, but I still just feel really ignorant when I vote. And I hate that. It always makes me feel guilty when I vote. And then also everyone's like, yay, you voted. It was, it's great that you voted. And then I walk out feeling really confused about whether or not it's great. Yeah, in that case, you know, did I vote well? And like, it was last six categories. I have no idea who those people were. I really like sickers of my game. You did lose your temper. Yay. You didn't complain today. Like those are more heroic acts usually than voting. I love voting booths though. I was, I would love not voting booths, but voting, I have always been inspired. Every single time that I've gone to a polling, yeah, polling place, I in my entire life, anywhere I've been. So like up in the mountains in North Carolina in Wisconsin, in the farmlands, an old school house or in our library. I do love the people working there and the camaraderie. And the, that makes me feel hopeful. I always feel hopeful. You're so funny. When I had to vote in Pennsylvania, I was like, Oh my gosh, I'm living in a banana republic. Get me back to Ohio now. What was banana republic? Because they weren't, they weren't checking IDs. Yeah, we don't check IDs here. Pennsylvania, it's very ordered. Oh, in Pennsylvania, you just walk in off the street. They actually almost, they almost forced our communist, their communist teacher friend, vote. They're like, come on, vote. She's like, I'm not from here. She came over to see because she was Chinese, right? She was like, oh, she was in action. And they were like, come on, come on, come on. And she was like, no, no, no. It's like, you know, it's like encouraging somebody to take communion and vote. But before you cast your ballot, you get a chance to see the print out, like everything's very clear. When I voted in Pennsylvania in 2020, I guess was the first election I voted there. And it was like, nothing was working and they're having you punch, I don't know, you know, you're filling in with a pencil. Yeah, then someone takes your folder and books at it. And then they say, no, yeah, it's like, are you seriously asking me why I thought it was a banana republic. You're telling everybody why it is. It is. Yeah, they're like, there aren't any weird things. It is an interesting. I am 100% saying nothing about election fraud or election, but that's what it's actually like to vote that. Well, I could see how there could be elections. You don't need a, you don't need a very vibrant imagination. But we are back in Ohio, the land of order and regulations. Emily, to what extent should we listen to the bishops or what almost, what must we, what must we take away from them when they speak on matters of voting? You know, it's so the bishops, they, well, they themselves say, like we're not here to tell you how to vote. We're here. US bishops, right? The US bishops. Because historically, wasn't there a lot of concern about Catholics because they were supposed, hasn't that always been an issue in America where they were like, Catholics have to do what the pope says. Yes. So the pope tells you to vote for someone you all have to vote for him. And that was a problem and made people question whether or not Catholics voting at all. The church does because the church doesn't say you have to vote for Canada. So that is probably very specifically why they're like, we're here to inform your conscience, not tell you who to vote for. Yeah, we're not here to tell you to vote for. So I mean, the church, I have a couple of quotes I can pull up. Yeah, we love quotes. Like here is, if you know, if you say is it a sin to vote for someone who's pro-abortion, for example, what the church's response would be according to the US Catholic bishops is a Catholic cannot vote for a candidate who favors a policy promoting an intrinsically evil act such as abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, deliberately subjecting workers of the poor to subhuman living conditions, redefining marriage in ways that violate its essential meaning or racist behavior if the voters intent is to support that position. In such cases, a Catholic would be guilty of formal cooperation in grave evil. Now, that means you're voting for them because of their support for that. So that's a problem that you can't vote for them because they support those things. Because that would mean you're supporting those. Right, but it doesn't say you can't vote for anyone who supports those things. That's why it contradicts. So it says, you know, they're all over the map. That's the problem when you try to go here. They're trying to paint too broadly. So it's like, well, you can't vote for any of these things. Abortion is the preeminent issue. So that's supposed to be the deciding factor. But if both candidates are pro-abortion, then you have to look at do they, you know, will somebody more pro-life in other ways as someone more less pro-abortion? They say, well, sometimes there might be a case where there's one candidate who's pro-abortion and one who is anti-abortion. But the one who is anti-abortion is for Jim Crow laws or programs for the Jews. And so then you have to make that case. All right, well, I'm going to vote for the person who is. Emily, it's very confusing. Hey guys, this is Emily interrupting the conversation. If the past two minutes were clear as mud to you, we apologize. I have written out an answer to the question sort of explaining the church's teachings about whether or not we can vote for pro-abortion politicians under what circumstances and what might be the mitigating factors that would lead us to choose someone who is pro-abortion over pro-life. So that is written out below along with all of the appropriate church documents. Definitely check it out if the past two minutes left you scratching your head. And now we're going to go back to the podcast because Casey has a question for Emily from last week. Real quick on the subject of abortion. To be clear, like if a woman has an ectopic pregnancy, that's not an abortion, but no matter what the news anchor on Channel Forces. Right, but like the news, which is often secular, categorizes that procedure as an abortion. Am I correct here? The medical term for a miscarriage is an abortion. Right. So, you know, I wrote a whole Q&A 25 questions and answers on this. The problem is the media has grossly misrepresented the whole landscape of what abortion law is right now. So it is actively, willfully misrepresenting, confusing people, confusing doctors in order to make people think that if they're having a miscarriage, they will be arrested and to make doctors think that they're not free to treat women who are being who are miscarrying. So, but you know, that's like a whole, that's a whole another issue. The problem is, is that the church is pretty ambiguous about it. About voting. About voting. Who to vote for in the case of. Like if policy issues. If there is a generally decent pro-life person running and a generally decent pro-abortion person running, the church says you need to vote for the generally decent pro-life person. Like abortion is the preeminent issue upon which we are to make our decisions. But, you know, that's not always the case. Sometimes you have two pro-abortion candidates running or you have a really problematic pro-life person running against a not so problematic pro-abortion person, and that's where it starts to get confusing. And that's where the church calls us to really form our conscience as well and vote according to those consciences. And the problem, yeah, it's just, it's not simple and clear cut. And there's some disagreement right now between Pope Francis and the US bishops because the US bishops have always taught that, you know, in some cases you may decide that you can't vote for either candidate. Like your conscience will not permit you to vote for either one of the two major party candidates for you that you need to vote for third party. And what Pope Francis say? Well, he didn't interview on a plane, which is always. He does a lot of those. I know whatever. He does. He did the airport in Charlotte last year. And I saw Pope Francis gives air interview on plane. I was like, oh no, what did it say? It's like, it would be fairly drops. Isn't that like more fun? He helps you pass the time. You get out of your seat. Don't have to wear a seat belt. He gets to give a name. Maybe he does. Like, what if we did a podcast on an airplane? How fun would that be? Not fun because I would do so many Xanax. That's true. She might fall asleep or be very in her questions. I'd probably be sleeping anyhow. Maybe fun. No, so Pope Francis recently said that we're obligated to vote for the lesser two evils. But that's an interview on a plane. So teaching wise that US bishops and their official teaching capacity, that probably has more weight than a people interview on a plane. I question that too. I mean, because, well, we're at it again, like, we're, we're obligated to vote for the lesser of two evils and don't have any other option. Like that is he, how, that means that we cannot ethically make a third party decision or not. But does that not assume that your vote, like, I mean, maybe we cut this part up, but like, if you're obligated to vote for lesser two evils, which you said, but the bishops don't say that, is it not assuming that your vote is necessary to affect some outcome? Like, it's showing that your vote has a, as a direct causality to the outcome. Maybe this is too much. But no, because, because politics, precisely because politics is the art of the future, I think that's one of the reasons that makes this election particularly hard to, to make a decision about because there's so many factors of where the, we don't know what the future will hold and we don't really know what our vote will actually do. You're making the best educated guess that you can. You don't, you don't know. You don't know what a person will do. You don't know how they'll govern. You can make an educated guess about what they will do. It's like a teenage show. It's like falling in love. It's like a speed date. You know, and it's not just that person. That's the problem too, because the, the government is so huge that it's who, who do they appoint? Who, who are they, who is making decisions underneath them? It's not just the president. It's who are the cabinet officials and who are all of the political appointees underneath the cabinet officials. I mean, you're really voting for a whole administration when you vote for a person. And I think that's hard for people to get their heads around because we see the person, we see the figurehead of the administration. But yeah, I would say it's, it's not just a person you're voting for. Right. You're voting for it. But personnel is policy. I mean, that's, I mean, I think that, you know, you are voting for the person and their judgment. So the judgment of the kinds of people they're going to surround themselves with. Again, you know, but being realistic, like, too, we're following you and beings. There are only so many wise, virtuous people to go around. I mean, in that sense. So I mean, if you're, you know, have to fill judges and, you know, your administrative positions, I don't know, you know, you worked on Capitol Hill, but it must just be dizzying, like the number of people that you need to put in these positions, you're going to get some clunkers. You're going to get some people that aren't doing what they need to do. And you're probably going to bury some people that are really strong to, you know, so I think, again, maybe back to the point about we get so upset about these things. And it's really a complex dynamic world. And there are lots of things going on. So I mean, you are improving the world by being calm and peaceful and respectful with the people you're dealing with, you know, and maybe, you know, the time to get heated is if you're actually talking to somebody who has real authority in the government who actually has real, you say, like, look, you have a responsibility to work for these things and you're not doing it, you know, as opposed to your neighbor, you know, who you're just arguing about stuff that neither of you have any control over. And you're like, well, we're not having them over to the barbecue anymore. Because it's like, why? I mean, you disagree on things, of course, well, it's true. You want to talk about my little conversation with yeah, like a certain local politician came to our door trying to woo her with his vote. And he did win a seat in Congress. He did win. But no, you didn't know who you're dealing with. He came in hot pro choice wanted to kill all the babies. What do you found yourself on Emily steps? No, and I mean, he wanted me to vote for him. I said, no, I can't vote for you. And I talked about and I brought up his pro. It is Catholic. So he's a Catholic politician. He was a graduate of Catholic high school. And I, you know, very kindly and politely said, I am worried about your soul. And he said, well, you know, the electorate, I have to represent people. I said, you don't have to answer to people at the end of your days. You have to answer to God. And that's what I'm worried about. You have to. And I have little Toby in my arms at that point. And I told him about Toby. And I was like, these are the children that you're saying it's okay to kill. That's these are the children who are going to be greeting you at the end of your days and who you're going to have to look in the face and say, I made a political calculation that it was okay to to expend these little lives. And, um, I'm not that bold in conversation with people on the regular basis, but it felt like it was worried about his soul. It wasn't like this is the bigger thing than how Catholics vote. It's Catholics who take positions of power and authority. Like the church was founded by Jesus Christ, who is the son of God. And you say that you believe that. But on these issues, and here it's faith and reason. Faith illuminates our reason. So knows the list of, you know, of intrinsic evils, abortion, contraception, redefining marriage. I mean, I would also throw in there, although maybe it's more prudential, you know, we know the love of money is the root of all evil, you know, so just, you know, unbridled capitalism and things that go with that. Like Catholics in our country, Democrat or Republican should be united on those intrinsically evil things that they are both against those. And yet we have capitulated on these things, and we are not being solid to the earth. We are not living out our baptism. We are not living out our conformational graces to be witnesses to the truth and taking the heat that comes with that, because either people will be won over and that's great, or they're going to reject you. And the thing is the higher you go in politics, the more, you know, temptation there is for you to sell your soul to advance and compromise on these issues, which when it comes to intrinsically evil things, shouldn't be compromised on. And, you know, I will say, like, you know, we'll talk about abortion, there should probably be lots of things that we're spending money on in a, you know, decadent society where women get pregnant out of wedlock, you know, because of men, you know, we should be spending money on, you know, lots of things to try to change the culture and make that less prevalent, you know, so I'm totally open to that. But these intrinsically evil things never, ever promote the common good of human beings. And so, you know, there are all kinds of prudential decisions about, you know, that we can actually probably disagree on, you know, you know, again, like something like the border. Tariffs, no tariffs. I mean, there are those are things that really are open to argumentation. And that's maybe where the Democrats and Republicans, at least for the Catholic ones, there would be legitimate differences, you know, where you think, oh, I think we should do it this way. I said, I think we should do it that way. But they should be bipartisan and they should be united on those intrinsically evil things and they are not. And that's, you know, that's across both aisles. And that is, you know, to your point, I worry about their souls because they have put themselves forward to be leaders, to say that I'm wise that, you know, we, I have some kind of plan for society that's going to help make the world a better place. And so, well, actually, those things are not going to make the world a better place. So I think there's lots of room for growth in how we talk about the life issues, how we talk about the common good. One, one in my newsletter recently, I shared an article from Ryan Anderson that was the first thing about where we are post-ops because lots of people who thought they were pro-life, when it was just an abstract concept, suddenly when it's becomes very real, like, oh, if my daughter gets pregnant, she may not be able to have an abortion. And then everyone at the high school know that she got pregnant. Oh, he made it. Yeah, he said there were, yeah, now we're going deep into this issue now. There were four, it turns out that a lot of people had four exceptions to, yeah, their pro-life, except in the case of rape, incest, or my life. Right, incest, life of the mother, or me, me or my daughter. So, like, or it's in my, yeah, my, yeah, and suddenly, so there is, we have not, and I wrote a sub-stack after the job's decision that said, I don't think, I mean, I was happy with the job's decision. I think the law as a teacher, like Aristotle says, and it's important for the law to form us, but the law has so badly misformed us for 50 years now. And we as a people were not in a position to receive jobs. So, you have these panicked responses of, you know, Ohio, as you were like, whoo, abortion now, it gets, they passed a law that allows pretty much unchecked, unlimited abortion. In the wake of stops, like many other places did. And you have this sort of misinformation campaigns thinking that if you have an ectopic pregnancy, or that if you're miscarrying, the doctors can't treat you. And there have been doctors who have not treated women who are in those situations because they too, they've become victims of the misinformation campaign, not because the bills at all say that, but because they don't understand what the bills say because they've been deliberately misled. We're not in a position to receive what Dobbs has given us, and we have to find a new way to talking about these issues and the underlying root causes of abortion. And so, I appreciated, I know we're not supposed to talk about candidates. You know, I, I don't think it was a perfect response, but JD Vance's response during the vice presidential debate, where he was able to say like, okay, I, he addressed, so a friend he had, who had an abortion, it's like, I love you. Like, I love you. Yeah, I, I was, there's lots of questions that we could ask about Republicans and their pro-life platform right now. But I, I did, I called you to talk about that. I think that kicked off this conversation. And you can argue about whether or not it's a rhetorical moment or not. But, he also, I will say he does have a broad, he has had a broad friendship, right? So he's friends with people across a spectrum. And he did, you know, he was talking about abortion, pointed at the screen and said, I love you. As a pro-life man, pointed at the screen and specifically called out someone who he loved, like that just noted that he loved someone and who had had an abortion and spoke about it with great compassion, that she felt like she, her life would be ruined if it hadn't happened. And that we needed to do a better job responding to that. And that's what, like, even if he didn't do a perfect job in responding or how I necessarily would have done it, I appreciate that he's trying to find a new way to talk about this issue. Because there are these intractable issues of the common good that we're adding, we're adding impasse over. And people are like, well, I want, I used to get so angry when people would, I do not, I don't identify as a Republican at this point. I don't, I certainly don't, I don't identify as a Democrat. I'm just like my own Catholic in person here. But for a long time, I did identify as a Republican. I worked for only Republicans, you know, on Capitol Hill and I worked at the Heritage Foundation. And I would get so upset when people would say Republicans don't care about the poor. And I was like, I care deeply about the poor. Like, that's why I want to pursue limited government. That's why I want to pursue, you know, school choice. Like, I think these are ways that are going to empower the poor. And whether or not I was making good prudential decisions, I had a real heart for the common good. I still think I have a heart for the common good. But I was also able to recognize, okay, there's people over on the other side of the political aisle than me, they have the same goal. Like, what we're talking about is prudential decisions. Not are you supporting evil and I, or am I supporting evil? But we both want the same good. And how do we reach that? That's real. I mean, in Pittsburgh, there's, you know, the Fedamans are literally just all Fedamans is distributing food to people, distributing clothes and food to people. She brought us baby clothes for one of her kids. They gave us baby clothes. They have they operate a free store where they're she's at it all the time, giving flowers and food and clothing away to people. And she's firefighting at night. I mean, there's not not this black and white. These people are evil. These people are good. I mean, we happen to know them through the dance community, the Brazilian Samba dance community. But in Pittsburgh, yes. He always has an exotic, you know, some kind of exotic connection. But there's not, I mean, I think it's easy to say there's been so many articles about them where people were painting her specifically in horrendous terms as like an evil witch manipulating her husband. And I, she was a dance mom with me. Our daughters were in dance class together, you know, and I've, I've spent time at their house and they're, they're doing tremendous social justice work on a moment to moment basis, you know, they'll like go pick you up off of a bridge when you're homeless and find you a place to stay for the night. That's true. That's true about them. Also, they're very pro-choice. There's, it's a complex world. I think when I lived in Asheville, North Carolina, so I think Asheville has been on everyone's minds, obviously in the past couple this week and month. And when I lived there, I worked for Crisis Pregnancy Center and volunteered with it. And in Asheville, I've never heard of this anywhere else. If there, it's happening, I would love to hear about it. I don't know if it's still going on. But they had a group called the Blue Moon Group, where the abortion clinic and the super Baptist women who ran the Crisis Pregnancy Center and some people from the hospital, I think, met like once a month for coffee to talk about how they could support women. And like that is, those are such polarized positions. And I don't think that that conversational space exists that, and I would love to see that happen. I don't know how to make it happen, but I, I would love to bring together these totally polarized issues in some way. Like on a, on a person to person basis, like in our daily life, in our community, and have some conversations that are civil conversations. Right. And I think that's what we, the top, the dial has just gone up and up and up over the past several years to the point where when someone disagrees with us about who they're going to vote for, you know, I've known many people are like, well, my niece is no longer talking to my parent, you know, my parents and me and my other brother and sister, because we're voting for X and Y person. And so instead of seeing it always as black and white looking for in these conversations, as we're talking, like what are, assuming that there's good intent on the other person, even if they're supporting something absolutely morally abhorrent, like, well, why are they supporting that? Like, what is their desire? And how do you find common ground on that desire? Like, okay, you want to affirm kids who are, you know, you're worried they're lost and they're confused. And you think this is what they need to find their way out of that, that confusion. Like, all right, I think that's the wrong way. But that's a good thing that you want to help kids who are, who are isolated and depressed and anxious. Like, that's good. It's good. You want to help women who are in crisis. It's good. You want to help the poor. It's good. You want to help the immigrant. Like, looking for that good desire that is at the root of most people. Is that impossible though? That's the opposite of what we do right now is just assume that the other is evil. Yes, that's what we do. Forever. And never assume that the other has a good intent and try to meet at that place. That's never the starting point. We assume the worst. Which is a sin. It's called the sin of rush judgment. And it's, yeah. Well, you can know that certain things aren't evil. I mean, that word is hard to deal with. But all of us have been for evil things in our life at different ways, different times. So there should be a kind of solidarity in that. Like, well, for a while I was misled on this thing, but now I see it differently. So why can't this person, why can't I spend some time with this person and explain why this particular issue, the desire is good. You want to help somebody, but you seem to be overlooking this important element that blinds you to this because there is good and evil. Especially when we're talking about the intrinsically evil things, those especially are clear in the mind. But I guess like when you talk about the culture of the 50 years, this is something we have to reckon with. I mean, abortion is not an abstraction to 60 million women. It's not abstraction and the men who participate in those abortions too. They're not abstractions. One family is coming to mind. I want to say how the relationship, but many, many years ago, but Catholic family, I know there were two abortions in that family at least. They're not living out their ideals. And if somebody is saying abortion is evil, then this is why I think it gets difficult because that conversation almost has to happen at a personal level where there's the possibility of forgiveness. And there are women who go around talking about their abortions and how they're repented and regret them and things like that. So it's also not the best. There's got to be a hard way to live. I mean, just to continually tell people of your moral failure, whatever you want to say. But the personal good is caught up into the political realm of the ideas. And the ideas are about reality. This is a bad thing. And we as a country, we, and I think this is where it has to be solidarity. We have done this together. It's not you or a bad person. No, we together. It's our culture. I have contributed to the abortion culture in different ways, even though I have never taken a person to get an abortion personally. But there are all kinds of things where I can look back and say, "I'm part of that culture." What's his name? Peter Wolfgang on Catholic Crisis said, "Look, abortion is front and center, but it's really about the way we live our sexual lives as a culture. It's the sexual revolution." So abortion is necessary by the way we live our lives in many ways. And I have contributed to that. So I think how do we talk about it? We together need to solve the issue. The common good is good for all of us. And so the accusatory element, I mean, how do we talk about evil? And this is something I probably have to learn too, because I do get heated. But I mean, just because I see with clarity some of these issues, but there's still real human beings. And I'm one of those real human beings. And so we as a culture have to come together, maybe it is over coffee or beer, one to one and three to three and five to five and talking, but... There's a philosopher, I forget the name, but he said, "The duty of the wise is to unite what is contrary." And so unity, one is one of the transcendentals. God is one. And the more Jesus says, in one translation, if your eye be simple, it will be full of light. Another is like a third translate. But I mean, I think the more... You were talking last podcast about the unit of way. And in its spiritual life, there's levels to the game, like just belts and martial arts, whatever. And the more you advance, the more you become like the thing you love, which is hopefully why sometimes people say to Kate and I, like, are you guys related? And not some... You're watching, we get tired. But given that... We have to press some things like that. Brothers and sisters. We have problematic amount. We're both tall and that's okay. No, I think that's the idea. Like we're talking about, here are politicians that on the one hand have some ostensible viewpoint that is inherently against our faith. But on the other, they're embodying the corporal works of mercy. And so I think our duty, maybe I'm wrong, is to converse with them. I would do it over coffee. I would rather stand up like Pope Francis. I would not want to sit down for an extended period of time at a restaurant. I don't know if he's standing up on the plane, Casey. He's probably leaning against something. Like that one scene. He's not an American. He doesn't lean? Oh, yeah. He doesn't lean. American. I know Kate called me out for leaning on something. I just brought that up earlier. So I... Hold on, hold on. Saint Peregrine, correct me if I'm wrong. Was he the guy that like never slept for 20 years, whatever? We had one leg. What? Different person. No, he would lean against the thing when he slept. Patient's saying of cancer. Yeah, also he has some varicose veins. So like, but I guess he like offered up. He's leaning against the wall, standing up, he'd sleep like that. And then he got these like incredible varicose veins. And I guess eventually he offered it up. And like he's walking to the countryside and the kids are horrified whenever gust of wind would blow up his, his casket. They'd see these like spider legs and they'd run away. And so he prayed to God is like, God, if you don't want me to sleep, standing up. Or if you want me to stop sleeping, standing up, whatever. So he's like, God, please take away a varicose veins. And God took away his varicose veins. So he just kept sleeping, standing up for the rest of his life. How many there's more moms who'd want to know about Saint Peregrine? Dude, they will have this podcast. But you're... But this is getting at something like the limits of politics, right? I mean, we're talking about people who need to be forgiven, people, you know, conversions, you know, a different, you know, sanctity. So, I mean, ideally, this is what we get in politicians. And, you know, we had had this idea for the podcast because of JD Vance and Tim Walts that we thought there were some seeds of, you know, civility and intelligence there. And that's the important thing. Like, I mean, to feel solidarity, I mean, you know, politicians say, you know, I'm one of you and I'm here for you. But that's to be true. And especially, like, this is why politicians should be better than the people next door. You know, like, if you're going to put yourself forward, and it doesn't mean that you have to have lived a perfect life, but you have to be mature to say, like, hey, I don't know everything, you know, I will represent you as well as I can. But be like, the things that I am, that I'm saying we're going to uphold, like, I'm going to strive to uphold them. You know, so I've heard conversations about, you know, in this case, Republicans, you know, who ostensibly were conservative, ostensibly for, you know, family values and all these kinds of things, talking about these parties in DC, where everybody's sleeping together. It's like, well, those things don't go together. Like, you can't say on the, on the stump, oh, we're, we're the family party that, but you're sleeping around, you know, and you're doing the kinds of things that might lead to an abortion or lead somebody to be tempted to have an abortion, you can't do those things. And, you know, and, but politics can't make that come true. You know, that ultimately is God's grace. You know, that's living to something that is deeper and more pervasive than politics as important as politics are because politics and culture go together. You know, we get the laws that we want, you know, so your point, I mean, we have laws that have formed us for 50 years and, you know, longer for other laws, but the ones, you know, the main ones we're talking about, you're not going to change those overnight, but somebody has to start changing, you know, how we live. And it really should start with your own tribe. I mean, it's so easy to call out the other tribe. Oh, the Democrat, you know, or the whoever you're against. The green party. Yeah, green party. No, but that's where I disagree with Ronald Reagan. I mean, you know, he said what you don't shoot your own or you don't criticize another Republican. Yeah, see, I don't, I totally disagree with that. I mean, I think that's where it should start. You should always be calling yourselves. It's fraternal correction. Yeah, fraternal correction to your principles. Your lives more like, look, like Emily with Connor Lamb, Connor Lamb shows up to sell his little cookies and get a vote only to get scolded by Mama Chapman. That's Hobie and Tope. I married a horse, where's 20 minutes of his life? No, I mean, I think so there was a well-known Catholic person recently who said that if you, he was sort of criticizing people who might vote third party, saying if you vote third party and not for candidate A, then you are responsible if candidate B wins, which is a logical fallacy. That's not true. Like you are, you are responsible to vote your conscience and the people who are responsible for candidate A or B winning are the people who vote for candidate A or B. Yeah, so, but ultimately what we're most responsible for is how we engage with the people in our real lives. So you can vote for the person who you think is the better candidate, the more virtuous candidate. But if you are not acting virtuously towards the people who disagree with you, if you're not honoring your parents, if you're not loving your grandparents, if you're not treating your sister with kindness, even if she disagrees with you politically, like you're responsible for that and you will have to answer for that. Like that, that's where the moral failure comes in. And so whatever happens on the other side of the next election, you want to make like your, your merit, your who you are as a person is not simply determined by who you vote for, but how you treat all of the other people in your life. And that's the more enduring legacy for each of us after the election. And yeah, I wish people were more concerned with how can they, how they can act with integrity in every part of their life and not just at the voting booth, because it will have more impact on your life, how you treat your parents and your sisters and your cousins and the person across the street who likes the other political candidate that it will have on who you vote for. Like that's the more immediate and profound impact. Amen. Amen. All right. So we are going to wrap this up a little bit early. So if you are still with us and you liked this episode, we know you did. We know you are. And if you didn't, the next one. Yeah, we would appreciate a lovely five star review and a comment on Apple, not just because we read them and it makes us feel good when people say nice things, although it does make us feel good when people say nice things, but because it helps more people find this podcast. So the more reviews we have, the more, the more stars we have, the more searchable we become, and people who are hanging out in other corners of the internet, then we are can find us and hopefully find some intelligent Catholic conversation. We think it's fairly intelligent. Maybe you'll meet your mortal political enemy in the comments. We are striving down intelligent, but we're not, we're not rabbit George here. We're just, there's, I don't know, whatever we are. Who's rabbit George? Robbie George. Oh, Robbie, you Princeton. They said rabbit George. He's different. I think we're just excited to have other people join in this conversation. Yeah, we like to hear your, we enjoy your comments and your thoughts on things. We're not dealing with dropout. I am not stewing. I'm zero percent stirring. What do you mean over a couple within me? No, no stew. Say nice things about Kate. Just everyone say nice things about Kate. She needs to hear nice things. All right, so you're hearing nice things. Our children probably need to hear our voices. So thank you all for listening next time. [Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]