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Big Catholic Families, Homesteading, Parenting and More with Mike and Frances
240 Plays1 year ago
Welcome to another episode of the Little Way Farm and Homestead Podcast! Today we are honored to have a genuine conversation between close friends of ours - Mike and Frances.
Mike and Frances are one of the first families to welcome us into the homesteading lifestyle. It was at their house that we learned how to process chickens. I still remember running around the front yard trying to catch those Cornish cross. Not only that, but Mike and Frances continue to inspire us in their commitment to live a life characterized by the Catholic Faith, even when times are challenging.
Together they have seven children and live a homesteading lifestyle. Their home is surrounded by goats, chickens, rabbits and a garden. And it is clear that they are committed to growing in holiness and building a homestead where the Catholic Faith is evident.
This recording was conducted months prior to its release, at Little Way Farm and Homestead when both of our families spent time with one another. You will hear the sounds of children playing in the background and the general chatter of many people gathered under one roof. This is a unique insight, via the podcast, into the joy and realties of bringing together growing Catholic families.
We hope this conversation is inspiring to you. We love our Catholic faith. Its place within our farm and homestead is foundational as we hope it is in yours. Let's get into the episode.
Timestamps:
02:15: Introduction to Mike and Frances. Living in 800 square foot and a barn!
03:00: More about Building in and living in a Post-Frame building
04:30: Talking about the Catholic Faith in the home
07:50: Inviting a priest to dinner
09:25: Discussing religious life with your children.
11:55: How do you promote the joy of the Catholic faith in the home?
14:35: Promoting peace, joy and happiness in the home
19:00 Mercy & Justice
20:25: Traditions, Saints and More - The Catholic Faith in the Home
22:32: Real Estate for Life - Realestateforlife.org - let them Little Way Farm and Homestead sent you!
23:18: Catholic Faith and the Land - Homesteading
24:23: Catholic Homesteading - What is different than just homesteading?
29:18: Weaknesses
30:45: Community, supporting on another on the journey to Heaven
33:15: How to get started building a homestead inspired by the Catholic faith
36:35: Happy Thoughts and Encouraged about Marriage
Show Notes:
Real Estate for Life is a real estate brokerage with over 1,400 Prolife Real Estate Agents worldwide. They have completed over 10,000 real estate transactions and they report 65% of their revenue goes to a Prolife or Catholic Apostolate. You can quickly find an agent near you through their website at Realestateforlife.org And if you let them know that you learned about Real Estate for Life from Little Way Farm and Homestead, that helps support our family in continuing the work of Little Way Farm and Homestead. Now, back to the episode.
Link: Realestateforlife.org
For more information about Little Way Farm and Homestead, including the farm, podcast, and upcoming projects, check out LittleWayHomestead.com.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Little Way Farm Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to the Little Way Farm and Homestead Podcast. Little Way Farm and Homestead is a regenerative and educational farm in southeastern Indiana. Motivated by the Catholic faith, we strive to inspire, encourage, and support the development of homesteads and small-scale farms in faith and virtue. I'm Matthew. And I'm Karissa. We're excited for you to join us on the podcast.
Meet the Mentors: Mike and Francis
00:00:24
Speaker
Welcome to another episode of the Little Way Farm and Homestead Podcast. Today, we are honored to have a genuine conversation between close friends of ours, Mike and Francis. Mike and Francis are one of the first families to welcome us into the homesteading lifestyle. It was at their house that we learned how to process chickens. I still remember running around the front yard trying to catch those Cornish cross. Not only that, but Mike and Francis continue to inspire us in their commitment to live a life characterized by the Catholic faith, even when times are challenging.
00:00:53
Speaker
Together, they have seven children and live a homesteading lifestyle. Their home is surrounded by goats, chickens, rabbits, and a garden, and it is clear that they are committed to growing in holiness and building a homestead where the Catholic faith is evident.
00:01:08
Speaker
This recording was conducted months prior to its release at Little Way Farm and Homestead when both of our families spent time with one another. You will hear the sounds of children playing in the background and the general chatter of many people gathered under one roof. This is a unique insight via the podcast into the joy and realities of bringing together growing Catholic families.
00:01:29
Speaker
We hope this conversation is inspiring to you. We love our Catholic faith. Its place within our farm and homestead is foundational as we hope it is in yours. Let's get into the podcast.
Living in a Barn: Challenges and Plans
00:01:53
Speaker
Today we have Mike and Francis joining us. We're extremely excited to have Mike and Francis. They're very good friends of ours that we know through our church communities and our faith communities. And we're extremely excited and honored to have them in our house, recording locally. Welcome Mike, welcome Francis. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Thank you. So to kind of start off, why don't you tell us a little bit about yourselves, your family, what does life look like for you all right now, where do you live, et cetera? So we just had our seventh baby and we live in a small little barn.
00:02:22
Speaker
Why we wait to build a house? Yeah, we we homeschool most of our children like you said we're in a barn We finished 800 square feet of the barn So it's very very tight and cozy with nine people you mentioned a few times So obviously we know a little bit of the backstory on the barn, but you mentioned a few times So that's obviously super interesting because a lot of people it'll probably get over to the homestead portion in a minute but a lot of people may be interested in that because
00:02:48
Speaker
Some people who may be listening to this, ourselves included, have considered actually building out a post frame or a barn environment and framing it out and living in it. Maybe talk to us just a little bit about that. That's unique, that's interesting. It wasn't really our plan for it to happen that way. We kind of were praying about it because we had the property and we wanted to sell our house at the high market. And then we both woke up one morning and we're like, let's just start with a barn.
00:03:15
Speaker
Yeah, we're trying to figure out how to get onto the property as quickly as possible. And building a post-frame barn was, seems like the fastest way of going about it. And that has turned into our permanent residence. So you all live there right now? Well, I guess it's not. Yes, it's been our permanent. Where else are you living?
00:03:37
Speaker
I mean the plan is to build a house. Well we're gonna add on to the barn. It's not fully framed out though, right? Or is it fully framed out? The 800 square foot is fully finished, yeah. But there's one bathroom which is really difficult.
00:03:56
Speaker
It's quite often that we have more than one person waiting in line for the bathroom. It's a good discipline to be creative about lining up. The boys go outside.
00:04:07
Speaker
Well, it's there.
Raising Children with Faith and Openness
00:04:09
Speaker
So one of the focus of the podcast really is effectively about talking about the Catholic faith in the home and specifically around children are being raised in the home and how the Catholic faith is being supported in the home and culture is being developed. What does that look like in your household? Where is the Catholic faith evident in the home?
00:04:28
Speaker
My mind goes like 50 different directions. I think the most important thing that we try to do is, and this wasn't, this isn't how we've always done it. Well, to be honest with you, I haven't been as intentional early on in the marriage versus recently, but it's always, it's an open dialogue home. So if the kids have questions about anything or if there's current events, I try to talk to the kids about what's going on in the world.
00:04:55
Speaker
to their level that they can understand and that they're not shaded or anything like that. But having just open dialogue where they can ask questions and not feel stupid. And we talk about all kinds of different things. Yeah, I was gonna say more often is what they're experiencing. It's not like we're purposely sharing world issues, but everything's in your face nowadays, so.
00:05:17
Speaker
And on top of it, since we are in a small space, everything is heard if even Mike and I are talking. So we have to explain things again to them that they overhear at their level in the light of the faith as well.
00:05:33
Speaker
Yeah, so a couple of things we do is we try to have priests religious over for dinner just to that they see that this is normal. I know when I grew up, I used to think priests were these holier than now people and that I that wasn't something I could be or could do. I think it's important for them to see these are normal people with normal flaws, normal interest, and they're they call to a different path than mom and dad are called to. Another thing that we try to do
00:06:03
Speaker
Especially I've seen this with large families some of the kids get kind of lost in the shuffle So being able to give that attention to all of your children is it's not possible
00:06:15
Speaker
So, one of the things that we've tried to do is I... Mainly me, you've done it a little bit, do date nights, so... It started out with just like an hour once a week, I would take one of the kids and play games, or go outside and talk, whoever, whatever kid I gave them, here, you got an hour of my attention.
00:06:34
Speaker
for sure it's sometimes be longer and you get to pick what we do or what we talk about sometimes it was just plain Legos or reading a book and then as they get older there's more and more things we do and then lately I've been trying to get out of the home because when you're in the home there's still so many distractions and the kids are coming up and
00:06:52
Speaker
distracting you from the other child that's supposedly having the date. That's been one area too to kind of like really focus on getting to know their interests, what they're interested in, what their passions are, what they what they want to do in life. That's I think another intentional thing we've been really trying to do to kind of foster
00:07:10
Speaker
that relationship, that open dialogue that they can come to us and talk to us about anything. So four different points off of that that we could go and I think I want to explore all of them. Let's start with religious in the household. So you mentioned inviting religious and when we say religious for those who may not be familiar probably refers to like an ordained priest.
00:07:31
Speaker
of the Catholic faith or maybe a religious sister, maybe a brother, someone in religious life in that way. So basically not a lay person, someone who's married or a single person. So how do you get a priest to dinner? What does that look like? It used to be easier, especially now we're in the country. So it's further away from our priest.
00:07:54
Speaker
We have a really good friend of ours that was out our two parishes ago. I think it was two parishes ago. We used to have him over all the time, but we were like five minutes away. He would always come over for dinner. So it was a nice way for him to get out, eat a home cooked meal that he didn't have to prepare himself. And that was pretty easy. And then now that we're further
Religious Vocations and Family Life
00:08:16
Speaker
out, it just takes more and our priest are more
00:08:19
Speaker
Stretched. Stretched, yeah. And now they have more and more parishes that they have to go to. They're just, they're just, they're busier it seems. And also religious, like there are sisters we've tried, we've actually tried to have the sisters out from. We tried for months and they never made it. Yeah, and it's been really hard to get them out. But you just, you kind of just, we've seen it work where, here, here's a few dates, what works best for you. And then kind of put it in their court because
00:08:48
Speaker
That seems to have worth the best for us and then they come over for dinner and the kids get crazy and Embarrass you half the time and it's great
00:08:59
Speaker
Yeah, something we've talked about a lot is trying to make sure that our kids know that they have options when looking at their vocation in life. And the open dialogue thing is what comes up with us, I think, a lot in trying to encourage the idea of thinking about the option of religious life. So I just wanted to know, is there any ways that you guys try to open that conversation up with your kids?
00:09:26
Speaker
I don't think we've had two as much if you have the sisters at the parish. Because the sisters at the parish, they are just so dynamic and lively and wonderful that that's an attraction on its own. I think it's a little harder if you don't have that example. So I don't know because we've never had... I mean from the beginning
00:09:51
Speaker
since my oldest was a little girl I would be like you're gonna be a nun right like I would try to trick her into being like to committing to something on video I would have video running it's kind of funny the fewer parishes that we had there were no sisters and that was like I always got the like heck no dad I don't want to do that I
00:10:09
Speaker
like that was not something they were even interested in and then the you know the last pair so we went to there's a vibrant community of sisters and they're beautiful and they're engaging and they are joyful and it's like i want to be around them i can i be a sister
00:10:27
Speaker
Like, they're just amazing and it's attractive. And the girls, I mean, they're not like, oh yeah, I want to be a sister, but they're very open to the idea. That's what God's calling them to do. So having those examples, having those dynamic priests that, like, love God, love Jesus, love their, love their parish, love their family, like, those are the people that are gonna try, they don't have to use words to, like, try to trick you into doing something. Like, you're just gonna be naturally attracted to that.
00:10:55
Speaker
So having those examples, I think is important. Just same with married couples, like having good married couples as friends. Yeah, that's I think we've kind of thought the same thing, though, where obviously we're at church and we celebrate the sacraments. Having the visibility of the sisters there is a particularly powerful message because it shows a real option, I think. And oftentimes that idea of vocation is almost veiled behind these old ideas and people don't
00:11:23
Speaker
maybe realize that there actually still are religious in the world and that there are sisters or our brothers, there are young men pursuing the priesthood because it's just not often it's not very visible, at least where we are in the world. So we talked about religious and then we talked about
00:11:39
Speaker
Considering the idea that the children see the world and hear parts of the world and things that are going on in the world and maybe you live in a smaller space and so you have to talk about that. How do you handle tactfully conversations around the world in the home and continue to promote the joy of the faith at the same time? I think it's pretty interrelated.
00:12:01
Speaker
in the fact that these people are actually causing their own suffering and how much God actually truly loves them. I mean, if you can keep that perspective, it really can help you understand these very distorted situations because that's what it can look like superficially sometimes. I want to be honest with my children and there are things that I think I can share the beauty and the truth and show like,
00:12:32
Speaker
Hey, this is like very sinful, but look what the devil has taken that God had created that's so beautiful and he's distorted. That's all he does is distort and tries to pervert the beautiful. And so trying to come from that lens from a Catholic perspective, I think is important. If you're just talking about current events or the craziness that's going on in the world, it's kind of depressing and it's
00:12:59
Speaker
It's not very helpful to their salvation, but coming from the spiritual perspective where like, hey, this, what God's created here is beautiful and good and let's keep, let's keep our eyes on that and not worry about all the stuff that's going around in our world. Let's keep the peace in our home, the things that we can control, how our holiness, the things that we can do to, to show God that we love him and then worry about everything else is, it's just, it's just noise, it's distractions.
00:13:29
Speaker
So talking about current events, I think it's important, but not dwelling on them or dwelling on the negativity, I think, is what we try to do. I like that a lot. I think that's probably one of the biggest. I don't want to call it a problem anymore because I think if you call it a problem, it suggests that there is a cure necessarily. I think of it more as a challenge and something that we can rise to the occasion to and overcome, which is that
00:13:56
Speaker
No matter how much we talk about how great the Catholic faith is, how beautiful it is, how much God loves us, we still live in a fallen world and that fact isn't going to change. It's going to be there no matter what we do. So effectively, there's nothing that we can do while on earth to cure that or solve that. It's going to be here with us. We all have our own concupiscence and we have our own struggles and challenges and imperfections and things we struggle with, but we can overcome them with God's grace and we can work arduously in life to overcome them.
00:14:26
Speaker
So I wonder, you know, in the home, though, is there something or anything that you do as a family, maybe culturally, even in the house that you do to promote peace and joy, excitement, happiness?
Maintaining Joy and Peace at Home
00:14:40
Speaker
These are aspirations, Matt. Well, I think they are, though. I think that's honest. I think that's good. OK, let me back up. If I were I would say the same thing. If someone asked me, do you proactively build joy in the house?
00:14:56
Speaker
Honestly, probably not. I think I'm too focused on producing, providing, and keeping things out. Was it? Protecting. Protecting. I think I'm so focused on protecting the house that I'm probably, I probably really, you know, and not even probably, I really miss. I miss the mark entirely right now on building out joy in the house. We have fun. We have lots of wrestling matches.
00:15:25
Speaker
Lots of wrestling matches mainly because I'll just be walking and I feel like people want to fight me in the house My children are just like lurking in the corners like waiting for me to like come around and jump me and Specifically the youngest like she just she's it's always something but I guess that's something that I'm thinking on and maybe it's similar to you But maybe even if it's an aspiration, what would that look like? I mean, I think
00:15:55
Speaker
To your point, playing with your kids, wrestling with your kids, spending time with your kids actually does promote peace and they're happy. I think a lot of the times we have difficulties with our kids whether we say they're going through a tough time or they're the terrible twos or they're lashing out. It's usually because they're not getting our attention.
00:16:17
Speaker
and that goes back to the whole big family issue is where some of the kids that depending on if they're more reserved versus other ones that are more outgoing and are not afraid to get mom and dad's attention they can kind of get left out and then the way they get their mom and dad's attention is by lashing out
00:16:36
Speaker
So instead of giving them the 20% discipline 80% love I end up doing the 80% discipline 20% love and I feel like I'm a failure and so To me I feel like it all comes down to like I can tell the piece in the home is based on
00:16:53
Speaker
Specifically for me, how much time I'm spending with my kids or how much am I veg'd out on the couch just exhausted or looking at my stupid phone. The piece has a lot to do with my prayer life, the relationship between me and Francis, and then each relationship between each one of my kids.
00:17:10
Speaker
And I'm a perfectionist so it's really like you were just talking about the things that you feel like you're failing at I do the same thing over and over again I don't look at the good things that are happening I look at the things that I'm falling short and it's exhausting and it's depressing at times because I'm like I'm not I'm not the father I need to be I'm not the husband I need to be I'm failing miserably my kids are going to hell because I'm horrible like I had those thoughts I know we're laughing at them but I do like I think that way and it's
00:17:40
Speaker
I only chuckle because I feel the same way times where I'm like, no one's making it because I can't figure this boat out. I am personally driving this boat into the ground. And I think it's good to have that sense of responsibility, but we also need to know that that's a lack of trust in God. When I have those fears, it's the prayer of the pig and not the prayer of a saint. That's what's happening. And so it's good reminders to have that because then it's like, OK, I need to get back to prayer.
00:18:08
Speaker
that
00:18:22
Speaker
the attention often comes from discipline and situations of that where we have to step in as guide or protector, et cetera, and offer that because that's proper. We have to do that. But it's also a reality that maybe that's the only time that the attention comes through. I wonder now if that unfortunately or at times conveys a sense of justice that's disproportional to the behavior without communicating the mercy.
00:18:52
Speaker
And I don't know how to strike that balance exactly. Obviously God does that. I don't know. I'm interested. I don't know, Frances, what do you think about that? I was just thinking about this and raising all the different personalities as they grow up. And we had our, we had three girls first and they all just worked together well. And now we have two boys at a rambunctious age. They're driving us crazy. But we have,
00:19:22
Speaker
I was just thinking like the expectations can really portray how you react to things and I need to change my expectations for them so I can discipline maybe less or more appropriately or they just learn so differently and they are so different.
00:19:40
Speaker
I think part of the reason it's so interesting is because it's extraordinarily real and when we really look at the way that a house is run and we consider the structure of a house everything from the providing of you know warmth in the wintertime and cool in the summertime to good nourishing food
00:20:00
Speaker
to relative comforts and needs is that the things that ultimately are the most difficult are often the things that are the most necessary.
Integrating Faith in Daily Life
00:20:10
Speaker
And of course, what is the most necessary is the Catholic faith in the household.
00:20:15
Speaker
Maybe that's an easy segue into another chapter in this conversation. What does the Catholic faith look like as expressed through the family? Are there traditions? Do you have specific mottos that you try to follow, particular saints that are important to you all in the household?
00:20:31
Speaker
I guess we could start just by homeschooling. I don't know if you call that a tradition, but Mike was homeschooled. So trying to use his family's experience homeschooling, we're doing it a little different, but I think that's a good way to just have flexibility living a more Catholic life.
00:20:51
Speaker
I think we do a lot of education around learning about our faith and then trying to share that with each other and have open conversations. I know I'm doing religion with my oldest daughter this year and she's going to be a freshman in high school. So it's getting a little bit more serious, a little bit more
00:21:12
Speaker
topics that she hasn't learned about and I'm trying to kind of have more of a discussion with her and have this kind of like dialogue like if she's if she's learned about something and she's got a question like to come to me we'll just have it to be able to have the patience
00:21:29
Speaker
to be able to like drop what I'm doing and have that conversation with her and give her the time that she needs to digest what we're talking about. It's important. We do bedtime prayers every night. It's and then we physically bless our children. What is that? What does that mean? Like giving us making a sign on the cross on the forehead. If we have holy water, we'll sometimes do holy water blessing.
00:21:52
Speaker
trying to engage with the traditions of the church that have happened for many years like the the epiphany blessing of the house and the the writing the chalk over the doorways getting into certain feast days uh i have a special devotion to saint joseph and i keep coming back to this open dialogue you gotta have open dialogue with your kids your kids have to trust you and if they do they'll come to you about every anything and everything and
00:22:22
Speaker
It may hurt you, it may not hurt you, but at least you have the opportunity to show them that you love them and that you're there for them regardless. Hey there! We hope the first half of this interview has been edifying to you. We will get right back to the second half, where we will hear more about homesteading in the Catholic faith, but before that, we did want to encourage anyone listening who might be considering moving to land or buying property to check out Real Estate for Life.
00:22:47
Speaker
Real Estate for Life is a real estate brokerage with over 1,400 pro-life real estate agents worldwide. They have completed over 10,000 real estate transactions and they report 65% of their revenue goes to a pro-life or Catholic apostolate. You can quickly find an agent near you through their website at realestateforlife.org. And if you let them know that you learned about Real Estate for Life from Little Way Farm and Homestead, that helps support our family in continuing the work of Little Way Farm and Homestead. Now, back to the episode.
00:23:18
Speaker
I am just curious how you guys have woven into your Catholic life living on the land and raising your family this way. How do you think that has enhanced or fed into your children's spiritual life in your own? Well, I mean, just one example I think of is our 14-year-old, she will get up every morning, milk the goats, and pray her rosary. And I think that speaks enough that she wants to do that.
00:23:47
Speaker
For Lent, all the older children were trying to pray daily rosaries by themselves and then with the family. We suggest that the idea of the Catholic homestead is not one that is firstly defined by a number of acres or an amount of animals or anything like that, but is firstly guided by a home that orients itself or builds itself on the Catholic faith.
00:24:11
Speaker
How does the Catholic faith sit at the center of it? What's different about your homestead versus a homestead where there is no Catholic faith inside of it? Yeah, I think it goes back to understanding that first of all, this is a gift from God that first that we're able to have land. We have 40 acres and just having the gratefulness that we have this opportunity to raise our own food.
00:24:41
Speaker
Like Frances and I, she had dogs and cats growing up. I had zero animals. Suburban, completely suburban. I didn't even have a pet dog. And to go to now we have pigs, goats, chickens. We're talking about getting rabbits.
00:25:00
Speaker
possibly a cow. Like, if you would have told me this 10 years ago, I would have been like, you're out of your, you lost your mind. Or I lost my mind. I talked him into getting chickens when we had like a 20 by 30 backyard. You know, like it was a tiny backyard. We were known as the chicken people in our neighborhood. It was quite, quite funny.
00:25:22
Speaker
But like I think just so having that mindset of being grateful what God's given us and then treating like we really try to like the kids are It's kind of I tell them not to get attached to the animals because they're food
00:25:35
Speaker
But it's also great because they they love these animals. They take care of these animals have a great life. Like we take care of them. They have plenty of food. They have plenty of space to run. We make sure they're protected and we try to work along with God and
00:25:53
Speaker
The environment that we have and try to respect what God's given us You know, I think there are a lot of secular farmers out there that had that mentality so I don't know if it's they might not realize it's a greater power that is letting you know allowing them to to do this or giving them the the idea to do it because not everybody does it not everybody wants to do it and
00:26:19
Speaker
We try to bring people in to show them what we're doing to attract people to do it. This is important. This is our health. We are temples of the Holy Spirit. And we've seen the fruits in our children's lives, in our lives.
00:26:39
Speaker
Like I said Francis like we got into this originally because she was super sick and We wanted we did want to go down the medical route We tried it for a little bit and they couldn't tell us anything and it was this She's just what was it? You're chronically ill
00:26:59
Speaker
And we're like, this is not acceptable. She's not gonna live the rest of her life taking medication for something we don't even know what is chronically ill. What does that mean? So that was the impetus for us to get into this. And now we've seen all the fruits from it. And trust me, it's overwhelming at times. I'm like, man, is there a way to dial us back? But our goal is to, we have these many goals of we want to be
00:27:25
Speaker
We want to grow our own meat, like all
Homesteading Challenges and Spiritual Growth
00:27:27
Speaker
of our own meat. We want to eventually get to the point where we're growing all our own meat and do baby steps. Like it would be great to just be like, poof, we're growing all our own food and we don't never have to go to the grocery store, but that's not realistic. And maybe someday it will be, but now it's just, it's having those little goals.
00:27:44
Speaker
and enjoying the process. It's really hard for me to say that because I I'm very goal oriented and I want to get to the end. I like I want to just be self sufficient, not eat anybody else. And like that's it. But learning to enjoy the putting up fencing or moving the chickens. Moving fences was pleasant in the beginning.
00:28:09
Speaker
For whatever reason, I would be like, oh, this is great. I'm going outside. I'm going to move around these fences real quick. And then after two or three months, I was like, ah, they can sit for another day. We might need to invest in permanent fencing and gates. Permanent fencing sounds really good. I know it's very expensive, but I wouldn't have to go move it.
00:28:33
Speaker
I think all those points are, I mean, those are really good points. And I think it ultimately probably points to the fact that many people listening to this, including ourselves, often are simply looking for reassurance that we're maybe struggling, but we're at least struggling in the right direction. I would be suspicious of
00:28:55
Speaker
anyone who is attempting to live a healthy, faithful, honorable, spiritually focused marriage while raising children. And if they looked at me and were like, we are totally fine. I'd be very suspicious. I'm not saying you're not telling the truth. I just.
00:29:13
Speaker
Could you share a little wisdom about it? Or like, show a little weakness? Do you have any problems? Like just let me know you're human, please. Well, because that's what we do as humans, right? We compare our insights to everybody's outside. So we look like we look at everybody else and be like, they've all got it together. I think it's important to show people your weaknesses and to show things like, okay, they may have the same weaknesses.
00:29:37
Speaker
Okay, what do you use to help you overcome that weakness? Maybe I can try the same things. That's why the saints stories are amazing because all the saints are sinners. They just keep getting up. It kind of brings me back to the thought that you said at the beginning about bringing
00:29:53
Speaker
people in the religious life around our families and making it normalized and bringing it back down like they're just like you and I think that's part of our hopes and intentions with sharing on this podcast and the families that we bring on and whatever we're able to share from our own lives is just reminding other Catholics that we're all in the same boat and that it it's a hard journey but we can do it and
00:30:20
Speaker
just having other families to look at and seeing ourselves in them like we do with the saints. Just seeing that their journey wasn't perfect, but the ways that they relied on God and His grace to get them through and to make it to heaven. It's inspirational and encouraging to see other families that we can relate to.
00:30:44
Speaker
I think that's it. That's a great point. Like that's literally like this is this is biblical. This is what the early apostles, the early church did was you were you lived in community.
Community Influence on Faith
00:30:54
Speaker
You had people that are like minded, especially in today's society when like it's crazy out there. And I'll be honest with you, I've had many moments where like I start to wonder, am I the crazy one? Because everybody else around me is normalizing evil. And I'm not trying to be negative here, but like
00:31:12
Speaker
I need people around me that believe the same things I believe I'm not as having like an echo chamber because we still need to be challenged but having people that are trying that we're on the same path we're trying to get to heaven trying to get families or spouses to heaven and we're trying to get each other to have it like our friends and so I think it's important to have male like really good male friendships really good for the women to have good female friendships and then to have
00:31:37
Speaker
good family friendships for your kids to know like, oh, there's other kids out there that are praying the rosary. A guy who had a tremendous impact on my life when I was 16, we got a job together and he would pick me up and drive me to work. The first thing we would do on the way to work was pray the rosary.
00:31:54
Speaker
It was super important to me to have somebody like willing to like, hey, we're praying, like it wasn't like we were best friends or I knew him like really well. Like this is, this is my first exposure to him and like, we're praying erosion. I'm like, okay, this is normal. Okay. And then it was like just something I started doing because he was kind of cool in my eye. Like I looked up to him and he was leading me without and he, he wasn't, he didn't.
00:32:18
Speaker
It wasn't like he was like, oh, I'm gonna lead this new guy to like be super Catholic. No, he was just being himself and then it had a profound effect on me. And when it ended up getting me, like I stopped playing sports and I actually started going to this youth group that I really got into my faith. And without that simple like act of praying the rosary and saying yes to God, are you saying yes to the Holy Spirit moving him? I don't know where I would be today, just from that simple act that he did. And I think we need to look at those opportunities where we can just
00:32:47
Speaker
Be ourselves. Don't react, but we act and we do what God we feel like God's calling us to do. If there's fruit from it, keep doing it. If there's not fruit, then maybe we need to readjust and do something different. I don't know. Oh, what a powerful witness.
Advice for Building a Catholic Homestead
00:33:03
Speaker
I guess I wonder then, if you were considering the experiences that you had in life, what maybe advice would you give them that would help them to build out what could best be defined as a Catholic homestead where everything is intentional but the faith takes priority? I would say trust, building trust and praying together and I know
00:33:29
Speaker
It's crazy. Praying together as a couple sounds so easy, but it is one of the hardest things. One of the things I think that becomes particularly challenging for people when they are considering the vocation of marriage, they feel called to it, they found a spouse, and they've got a date for the marriage. Obviously, in the very beginning, everything, you're particularly excited. It's exciting.
00:33:58
Speaker
It's exciting. If you found someone you love, you want to continue to love, you want to make a conscious decision to love, and then you get married, and I think Chris would agree with me here, there's almost this anticlimactic experience in that this is what marriage is. It's struggling through your faults, my faults,
00:34:20
Speaker
So you bring, you know, we all bring this really powerful human experience and when we're, you know, 17, 18, 19, 20, you know, early 20s or so and even older, we can get so blinded by this passion of love. It can even be framed.
00:34:36
Speaker
really framed really well within the faith and yet you just can't at the same time deny that powerful love and attraction towards the other person that seemingly just shuts off all of their faults.
00:34:51
Speaker
and shuts off all your faults. Like I'm pretty sure when I showed up and went on dates with Carissa, it was best foot forward. I showed my best self. I was always probably showered, smelled good, clean, well presented. I probably only talked about things that I wanted you to be proud of. Then you married me. But I mean, you know, there's a certainly over time, there's like a,
00:35:18
Speaker
peeling back of the onion of sorts in this revelation that you're not as perfect as you thought and I'm not as perfect as I thought and we are not as perfect of a couple as we thought we would be. Summit that comes out like immediately when you are just learning how to live in a household together and who does the dishes and who does the laundry and who brings in the money and how does this whole thing work together. Then you have children and it's a
00:35:43
Speaker
whole different equation. It's how do you take care of them? How do you raise them? What do you teach? When do you teach it? Etc. And it becomes very difficult. But I think ultimately there is an end to this and it is heaven. And it is a vocation, which means it is, you know, God calls us into this. And I often wonder if at times it's considered as the default because society kind of pushes people in this direction towards marriage.
00:36:08
Speaker
And it's not so much a discernment process. Like if you were to become a priest or a sister, you would go through a really intentional discernment process or hopefully you would even in marriage. You know, the discernment that, you know, the more formalized discernment process is kind of up for interpretation and where you're at and what it is. But I really appreciate you all sharing that because I think it provides a certain realness to it while encouraging at the same time. You would say getting married worth it. For sure. Of course. Yeah.
00:36:37
Speaker
not I think it's so good because you learn things that you didn't even realize about yourself I mean when you talked about peeling the onion back like yeah you don't even know things I don't know I need somebody to help me get to heaven like I don't think I can do it on my own I mean obviously I need God's grace but like I also need others that
00:37:00
Speaker
I think I've said to Chris is sometimes you have to carry me and sometimes Well, I might be a little heavier than you but sometimes you have to carry I guess sometimes you have to carry me and sometimes I have to carry you Well, this
Closing Thoughts and Gratitude
00:37:13
Speaker
is great. I think that's a really good place maybe to even consider You know the end of the podcast for today, but I think you all have provided just
00:37:22
Speaker
I guess I want to thank you because you provided a remarkably, you know, we've kind of ebbed and flowed through some lighter topics and some more serious topics and you provided some great insight that.
00:37:33
Speaker
I think is missing oftentimes from the conversation and leaves people discouraged when they have no insight into the realness of the vocation of marriage or into what it takes to run what we may call a Catholic homestead, which is something that is oriented intentionally by the Catholic faith and ultimately nothing else. And so we really thank you for that and we appreciate both you, Mike and Francis for joining us today. Yeah, thanks for having us. Appreciate it.
00:38:04
Speaker
Thank you for joining us on another episode of the Little Way Farm and Homestead Podcast. Check out the show notes for more information about this episode and be sure to tune in next week.