A Word from Our Outpost: Faithful Formation for Catholic Missionary Disciples

We're joined with JohnMarc Skoch-- musician, missionary, man of God, and all-around great guy-- to talk about the role of music in the home and in the liturgy.

JohnMarc Skoch is the Director of Music for FOCUS, as well as a Senior Regional Director in FOCUS. Not only did he compose the music that he permitted to be used in our intro and outro, he was trained by Adam Bartlett, of Source and Summit hymnal fame, and oversees the music at all of the major FOCUS events.

Check out his missionary page here: https://focus.org/missionaries/johnmarc-skoch/

Check out his music here: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1LQ166KWgN5KLIqT20qe12?si=q58VbxQ-RcWbIcDmm2kNQA

As always, 

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How do we foster healthy masculinity in a world that is skeptical that such a thing even exists?

We have John Bishop, founder of FORGE, on for an exciting discussion of things men can do to form the next generation of men. His website is here: https://myforge.org/

John started his professional career working at the Fellowship of Catholic University Students (FOCUS). During his tenure with FOCUS John served as campus missionary; compiled and/or wrote a variety of resources; and taught on a variety of topics. He oversaw several departments at FOCUS’ international headquarters but is best known for co-founding and scaling FOCUS Summer Projects, an intensive collegiate summer formation program. While working for FOCUS, John earned his doctorate from the Catholic University of America, writing his dissertation on the nature of masculine virtue.

Inspired by the thought of John Paul II, John is now fighting for men and for the family as Founder and Executive Director of FORGE. John lives in Des Moines, Iowa, with his wife Katelyn and their two children.

You can find the course "Fathers and Sons: Conversations on Sex Ed, Marriage, and Masculinity" here: https://myforge.org/courses-content/#feature-course

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Friendship! It's one of those things that, without which, we can't really say we're happy.

We gave a talk to a group of missionaries a few weeks ago on this topic, and we cover not only the standard friendships of use/pleasure/virtue, but also what the levels of intimacy are, and how to communicate truth, goodness, and beauty to a friend on the regular.

Just fyi, for all you married folks out there, we're doing a lenten series, called Love Your Marriage Lent, on all of the Sunday evenings of Lent. Find out more here! https://youroutpost.stellarwebsystems.com/join?euuid=741eb19c-b470-11ee-8f3a-16256db603cb

As always, 

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Marriage, that bedrock of society, is a little bit crumbling these days. So we invited Pete Burak, from Renewal Ministries, to talk with us about it. 
Pete has spent many years investing deeply in that vaguely defined group known as Catholic Young Adults, so if anyone has a clue about what's going on with this demographic, it's probably him. 

Find more about what he's up to here!

Also, for those who are already married, it's probably good for you to know that we'll be offering a Lenten series each Sunday night of Lent-- it'll be $59 for 6 Sunday nights, 8:30pm EST. Sign up here! Let your friends know-- we've got a lot of epic material to work through with you over Lent!

As always, 

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One of the most jarring stories of all of Scripture, the sacrifice of Isaac invites deeper and deeper exploration. Come with us and an uncle as we go line by line through this densely told story from Genesis!

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'Tis the season to make goals, resolutions, pacts, vows, and Exoduses... And if you haven't taken time to consider what your hopes and dreams are, maybe now is a good time!

We talk about common reasons to avoid our hopes and dreams, and then why it might be a good idea for them to see the light of day.

Happy New Year!

If you want some help to re-connect with your dreams, we're co-hosting a "Plan Your Year" virtual video workshop with Jonathan and Amanda Teixeira (founders of WalletWin) this coming Saturday, December 30th, from 10am to 1pm eastern time (and yes, it will be recorded). Check it out here: ⁠https://courses.walletwin.com/a/2147754273/po42YcGp

As always, 

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Romans 12:1-2 sounds an awful like we're all priests in the new covenant, with no room for a set-apart priesthood a la Leviticus...or does it?

Always a joy to have Fr. Jacob with us, and we hope you enjoy as well! If you've been missing us (and we've been missing you too), we'll be offering a live video workshop with the founders of WalletWin!

Plan your 2024 with the Grubers and the Teixeira's on Saturday, December 30th, 2024! https://courses.walletwin.com/a/2147754273/po42YcGp

Or if you want more of a bundle with the workshop, go here: https://courses.walletwin.com/a/2147526831/po42YcGp

As always, 

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Due to the sensitive nature of the topic, we don't recommend listening with children present (you probably figured that out by the title, though...)

We are delighted to have Steve Pokorny on our podcast to talk about his story and his mission!

Steve Pokorny is the founder of Freedom Coaching (found at freedom-coaching.net), a one-to-one mission for both men & women to break the chain & shame of attachment to pornography & unchaste behavior. Steve holds an MA in theology and a specialization in catechetics from Franciscan University of Steubenville, as well as an MTS from the John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family Studies in Washington D.C. Steve is a Certified Life Coach from the Life Coach Training Institute. Author of "Redeemed Vision: Setting the Blind Freed from the Pornified Culture”, Host of “The Redeemed Vision Podcast”, and Host of the 12-part video series on Formed “Redeeming Our Vision”, Steve also is an internationally-known speaker, speaking with a wide variety of audiences on many topics. He is married and lives with his family in San Antonio, Texas.

As always, 

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We have a great guest on, Daniel Boyd, who has spent years working to support the Catholic Church, with everything from campus ministry through RCIA through consulting to having a lovely marriage. And, almost needless to say, he has spent years letting the Catholic Church support him.

We talk about some of the ideas from Msgr. Shea's little book, From Christendom to Apostolic Mission.

You can find more of Daniel Boyd here and everywhere podcasts are: https://beingandmakingdisciples.buzzsprout.com/

Check out our work at our website: ouroutpost.org

And follow us on Instagram! 

Please rate, review, and share!

As always, 

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Speech is creative. It creates attitudes, relationships, tension, release, stories, purpose, etc.

And when God speaks, He literally creates everything else.

So we talk about the speech of God in Genesis 1.

Check us out at ouroutpost.org, email us at hello@ouroutpost.org, and check out our instagram at @ouroutpost.

And if you would be so kind, please review, rate, and share!

As always, 

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For whatever reason, our nature as humans seems to handle groups of three pretty well. Three stages to the spiritual life, three stages to acquiring knowledge according to classical education, three stages to a moral education...the list probably goes on, but those are the three groups of three we'll be talking about!

We reference the book Morality: The Catholic View by Servais Pinckaers.

As always, 

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There's a crisis of loneliness in the world, and a lot of it has to do with being closed off to other people. If we want to be open to other people, it means we need to live in a world that's big enough for people to disagree. 

Being open to potential conflict and disagreement is a necessary step to having a deeper relationship. 

The book we mention is "The Seven Levels of Intimacy" by Matthew Kelly, flavored a little bit by Diedrich von Hildebrand's "Liturgy and Personality" and Mortimer Adler's "Aristotle for Everybody".

As always, 

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We don't think it's alarmist talk to say that the whole idea of marriage today is, well, fraying. And without strong marriages, there can be no strong society. 

And that's pretty well why we left our job as parish missionaries to start a marriage ministry. There's an enormous need out there, and when it gets as bad as it is now, even our help may be required...

We don't want to use this podcast very often for our marriage ministry in particular, but there's a lot going on right now and we thought you all would want to hear a bit more! 

We're running a cool workshop for married couples this week, called 'Vision for Marriage'-- you can still sign up for it here: https://ouroutpost.ck.page/workshop

We're also launching a monthly membership for married couples, called Your Outpost! You can find out more here: ouroutpost.org/youroutpost

And you can just check out the other things we're doing at ouroutpost.org!

As always, 

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Joseph sits down to talk with friend, former teammate, and civil-engineer-by-training, Alison De Lima Fernandez, to talk about community, zoning, suburbia, and the like. 

Alison referenced Jane Jacobs, who advocated for such things as mixed-use development, bottom-up planning, and treating a city as an entire ecosystem. Joseph had never heard of Jane Jacobs, but her wikipedia is here, so now you don't have any excuse either: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Jacobs

As always, 

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We may not like being wrong, but if there were no way to tell right from wrong, that seems a worse scenario.

Joseph has been re-reading a book by Hilaire Belloc, called The Great Heresies, and he wanted to talk both about the book and the fact that Catholics belong to a substantial tradition and ascribe to a real body of teaching, to which we can be in alignment or out of alignment. And he's glad that that exists.

You can find the full digital text of the book here: https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/great-heresies-3103

Or a paper copy here: https://ignatius.com/the-great-heresies-grhep/ or various other places...

As always, 

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Some people are embarrassed by doubts and difficulties, whether their own or others'.
Some people people are inclined to find resolution to their doubts and difficulties in the faith on their own.

And some people make it an adventure worth sharing with others. 

So we talk about the kind of desire for truth that gives us the confidence to say, "I don't understand this yet, but I'd love to have you with me as I figure it out!"

As always, 

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Joseph and Father Peter talk about making time for Eucharistic adoration, and the difference it has made in their lives.

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Eucharistic adoration: where did it come from and is it still of use? 

We get into the history and the relevance of Eucharistic adoration, using as our stepping-off point an article from September 2009 about Eucharistic adoration returning to perpetual status in Boston's Back Bay. This article was especially poignant for Joseph, as he spent many an hour at the shrine in Boston in question, as he arrived as a missionary at MIT in August of 2009! But it is also especially not helpful for understanding the history and trajectory of Eucharistic adoration, as we explore in this episode... https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/essays-theology/perpetual-eucharistic-adoration

As always, 

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Have you ever read the Letter to the Hebrews? It's beautiful, it clarifies so much of the connections between the Old Testament and the New, and is supremely preoccupied with Jesus as the new high priest. 

And did you ever wonder, while reading it, whether it had anything to say about the ministerial priesthood? About the men who offer the holy sacrifice of the Mass? About men set aside for such service? 

Probably not so much, likely because you were pretty settled on whether there should (or shouldn't) be a ministerial priesthood before you picked up the letter. And it doesn't seem to make much mention of a ministerial priesthood in the New Covenant, one way or the other. 

So you probably weren't thinking about that question at all. But my brother, Fr. Jacob (recently ordained!) thought about it a good bit, and wrote a paper about it! So I had him on to talk through some of the questions.

As always, 

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Does it ever feel like the world is against building up true community? Depending on where you live, the world around you might truly be physically constructed to be antithetical to building true community. So you're not crazy that it's hard!

We talk about suburbia, zoning, the rise of the automobile, and the desire to have so little "not in my backyard" that we just don't have anything in our backyards anymore worth walking to. Which, incidentally, impacts evangelization...

The book Joseph is still in midst of listening to is called Arbitrary Lines, and can be found here. It's a popular book, in that it's written for someone with no experience in the history of zoning, which suits Joseph just fine, as he is a beginner. If you are further along and want to continue his education, email us at hello@ouroutpost.org!

As always, 

• check out our work, and join our email list, at https://ouroutpost.org/
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