Hi. My name is Fr. Mike Schmitz and this is Ascension Presents.
So, a number of years ago, my best friend and his wife were becoming Catholic.
Now they had been raised in just a really great, really loving Christian denomination.
And they got a lot of great things from the church in which they were raised.
They had great friends. They had great fellowship.
They knew the Bible. They had the Holy Spirit.
Just a lot of great incredible gifts.
And at one point when my friend was becoming a Catholic,
he was more and more convicted, like,
"No, I think this is really the Church that Jesus Christ himself founded."
One of the questions he said was this:
He said, I'm sad to leave some of the things that I love about the church in which I was raised
in order to become Catholic.
And one of the things that I was able to say was,
“I'm convinced, I'm absolutely convinced that everything you love about the church in which you were raised,
you will find in the Catholic Church."
Now, why can I say this?
Well how about this?
Imagine that a long long time ago,
there was this master ship builder.
And this master ship builder built this massive ship.
A masterful ship. An amazing ship. An incredible ship.
And he had this captain. And the captain was there to guide the ship, to guard the ship, to move the ship, right?
And so the captain, what the captain does is assembles the crew.
And out of the crew, he picks a first mate.
And he trains the crew, trains the first mate,
and then they basically say: Everyone, on the ship! Because we want as many passengers on this ship as possible.
And what the master ship builder and the captain, what they did is they outfitted the ship with everything that the ship needed for this journey.
They gave it destination. They gave it maps,
and compasses, and all these things to kind of guide it.
The master ship builder and the captain gave the ship water, and food, and medicine, and other things to heal,
and other things to strengthen the people on this long journey.
Then, then as the ship builder and the captain were about to set the ship off to sail,
the captain said this, "I'm not coming with you."
"So the first mate that I selected. The first mate is in charge in my stead."
And the ship began to sail.
Now as the ship sailed, sometimes the first mate was awesome,
sometimes the crew was great.
Sometimes the first mate was not great.
Sometimes the crew was not awesome, sometimes the passengers weren't great!
But all the while, the ship stayed on course.
Now over the course of many many years,
what happened is, the first mate dies.
And they have to replace him.
And the crew dies, so they have to replace the crew.
Passengers died, so more and more passengers had to be replaced.
Now they're using the maps, using the compasses, using the medicine that they need, the food they need,
all these kinds of things.
Now, even when there was a terrible first mate,
even when there was an awful crew,
the great news is the ship stayed on course.
But over the course of years, people became discouraged.
People became despondent, people didn't like the crew,
didn't like how the first mate was running the ship.
They didn't like the other passengers.
So they said, "Here's what I'm going to do,"
"I'm going to build my own ship."
Great. Okay. You're in the middle of the ocean.
You're going to build your own ship.
Where are you going to get your materials for your own ship?
Well, you take them from the first ship.
So, here's someone who builds a ship using all the materials from the first ship, taking them and making their own ship next to it.
And they take some of the maps, they take some of the compasses.
They take maybe some of the water, but not the food. They take some of the other.. *muttering*
Here's how the first ship was organized and structured.
I'll take what I like and leave what I don't.
And over the course of time,
more and more people say,
"I want to build my own ship!"
And every time they build their own ship,
all of their materials come from the first ship.
EVERYTHING they have comes from that first ship.
And there are a lot of good things.
There's a lot of good things.
In fact,some of those people in other boats,.
Some of the people in those other boats, all they took were the maps.
And so they studied the maps. They know the maps forwards and backwards.
They might even know the maps better than the people on that first ship.
Now, if you look now at the ocean,
there'll be this fleet of ships.
The one main ship, the principle ship that the master ship builder and the captain crafted and established themselves
Is still going on course, still heading straight for the destination.
Some ships next to it will look a lot like it.
Other ships will be so far away from it. Tthat they weren’twouldn't even going necessarily to the destination anymore.
This ultimately of course is an analogy.
Jesus Christ historically speaking in 33 A.D. founded the Catholic Church.
And in the Church, he did what? He assembled the crew, the apostles.
He named a first mate, Peter, as the first pope.
And he assembled all these disciples, these believers.
And he equipped it. What? Jesus gave us the sacraments.
And the Church gave us the Scriptures.
God gave the Catholic Church the ability to interpret the Scriptures by giving it the Holy Spirit.
And over the course of time, the Church has always stayed on course.
Now the captain hasn't always...
*self-correction* the first mate hasn't always been great. And the crew hasn't always been great.
The passengers haven't always been great.
But the entire time, the Church has stayed on course.
And over the course of time, other Christians came along and said,
"I don't like everything about this ship."
But where did you get the materials to start your own church?
Where did you get the Bible?
You got it from the Catholic Church.
Where did you get the doctrine of the incarnation of Jesus Christ, fully God and fully man?
You got it from the Catholic Church.
Where'd you get the doctrine of the Trinity?
You got it from the Catholic Church.
And one of the things I was able to tell my friend was that,
“Everything you love ... everything you love in the ship in which you're raised, that came from the original ship.
And actually we have IT, and every other good thing that's found in every other good ship.”
Isn't that great news?
This is one of the reason why I LOVE, absolutely LOVE being Catholic.
Because God the Father sent his Son Jesus, the captain.
And he established a church.
Christ established a church
with bishops, the first apostles,
with a pope, St. Peter,.
aAnd hHe's called us all to be a part of it.
And if you’d like to be a part of it, you can!
There's no restrictions.
There's no eliminations. There's no disqualifications.
And I'll guarantee you this:
If you we're not raised Catholic, but you're intrigued by it,
if you weren't even raised Christian, but you're intrigued by it,
I’d say check outyou got the Catholic Church. Everything you love about your church, you'll find in the Catholic Church,
and more...
I don't know if that sounds cocky,
it's not meant to.
I didn't make the Church. I didn't do it myself.
I didn't.. I didn't build the ship.
And I didn't craft it. And I didn't bring any of the goodness to it.
It was here when I got here.
And it's simply a gift.
Total gift.
And so ... It's hopefully not sounding cocky, because I didn't have anything to do with it.
Jesus did it. I'm only saying this because I believe it.
I only believe it because it's true.
From all of us here at Ascension Presents, my name is Fr. Mike. God bless.
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