Hey friends, this is Dan Stephanie Burke and You're watching behind-the-scenes divine intimacy radio We're gonna be talking about spiritual warfare and marriage in a minute Want to tell you about a few things going on? Stephanie and I Will be you know what I'm gonna hold that just I'm gonna hold well actually we We did the five-minute countdown so I could do it, huh? Yeah, okay So Stephanie and I I'll be hosting a divine intimacy and marriage retreat on June 11th through the 13th Say that again 11th through the 13th of June I know sorry farmers branch, Texas and What did you bring any testimonial or anything like that I can get it, okay? So anyway Super powerful. I mean, it's weird to promote your own event, but the The feedback we get from folks when we do surveys is it was like nothing. They've ever experienced It's based on Catholic mystical tradition and the big thing for guys. I can't remember what a Terry say Friend of ours. We were talking about he didn't want to go to the retreat and his wife dragged him there and He loved it in the end. No goofy icebreakers. I don't remember what he said It was something about that guy's hate when they go to things like this He said there was none of it and it was really substantive beginning to end so If you're a devout Catholic and you want to kind of restart kickstart Reinvigorate your marriage find healing It's the response has been really extraordinary And we're what we're trying to do is do it around the country so that people in different regions can get to it So divine intimacy and marriage retreat if you want to sign up go to spiritualdirection.com forward slash events spiritualdirection.com forward slash events Let's see Tuesday, I mean Wednesday, okay, we have a couple of courses That are gonna going to launch here pretty quick introduction to spiritual theology spiritual theology is the theology of the interior life and Dr. Alfonso's pinto is teaching that avala dash institute org if you're a spiritual director Aspiring to be a spiritual director or just someone who really wants to go deeper That's gonna be a great course for you the Aval Institute last thing I'll mention Wisdom of the Saints from St. Athanasius the Saint Bernard of Clairvaux It'll be talked by dr. Ben Wynn. He's fantastic Athanasius Augustine st. Benedict just a beautiful survey of the insights from all of those saints and Avala dash Institute org so check that out. Okay, I think we're ready to start the show Think I think Okay. All right. Yeah, I got everything queued up. Okay good On your mark and get set go This is Dan and Stephanie Burke. Welcome to divine intimacy radio Your radio Your radio haven of wrath Your monastery of the mind where we lift our hearts and minds to heaven even when we're really tired and seek to draw upon the wisdom of the saints and Help to help us navigate the challenges of this life and today God be praised. We're gonna be talking about something that is a very common challenge in marriage and that were you know does a lot of damage and That's spiritual warfare in marriage and there are some secrets to Understanding How to identify it, you know, when is it human when is it psychological when is it spiritual all of that? When is it wounded nests? Yeah. Yeah, so we're gonna go over that today and in particular This whole topic and Stephanie and I've written on it in the past out at spiritualdirection.com you can Find some posts on marriage spirituality that we wrote like a hundred years ago And then we were pressed into it recently again by a nun Assist a mother superior.  Does he not like it, right? You know, it's been a bit like being put into a vice grip Leaning into this area of ministry, but it is so Powerful and we're gonna share some of the testimonies from the retreats that we've done Along with this talk today, but this isn't a promo show. It's it's not a promo show, but it's an understanding of You know how important Marriage spirituality is spiritual work, you know, how to deal with spiritual warfare in your marriage What do you do about it?  No matter where you are whether your marriage is great or whether it's Floundering and struggling, you know, the enemy is always at work trying to divide Trying to separate trying to destroy and we need to fight. We need to understand how to fight. That's right That's very well said and so this nun this wonderful Mother Superior what happened is she kept saying to us you need to have a retreat You need to have a marriage retreat You need to have a marriage retreat a lot of it's because she knows this really well She knows our ministry has been following it praying for years is different Yeah, and she just had this sense that if we applied in the Catholic mystical tradition and kind of the way we think about life in the interior life to marriage that it would be super powerful and we're really grateful because frankly she was right and it's not because of us it's because the Catholic mystical tradition the Tradition that deals with the interior life has far more answers than people realize To the things that ale us to our to our sins to our weaknesses to our despair to all the junk and I think that the reason Well, and I honestly it surprised me. I'll be honest with you It's not that I am ever not honest with you, but I was You know, I agreed to do it because she basically Commanded us to do it and then and Stephanie's been really on fire to do it, too And I and I have to say that as an introvert. I don't much care for Speaking that many hours of that much time, you know three days three days and it's pretty draining, but The fruits have been extraordinary and and so what I want to do is talk about just some of the secrets that we share and That really are the reason why I think it's so powerful and one of the ones I'm going to start with that we've talked about and when we did divine into we did Discernment of spirits and marriage But I think it's worth mentioning again for those who hadn't watched those shows, but also expanding a little bit Some of the thoughts in your head or some of the perceptions of what you think your spouse is saying is not true And you shouldn't listen to them So the principle originally emerged out of my course on discernment of spirits Which is some of the thoughts in your head are not yours and you shouldn't listen to them We've sort of shifted that to some of the some of the things that you think you hear from your spouse They're not really saying right there you go I'm saying that you were waiting for me to get it right. That was very patient of you Yeah, and you shouldn't react to it or listen to it talk a little bit about That it's been pretty shocking to watch that happen over and over again. Yeah It's it's interesting. It's it's it's very difficult. So You know so much of Spiritual warfare has to do with our own brokenness Our own woundedness and so in those places the enemy has a handle, you know I liken it to like the handle on a backpack and So, you know that if your kids are wearing a backpack and they've got that Handle on it that if they start to run out ahead of you and there's traffic coming You can grab that handle and you can jerk them back and you can control them And keep them from being safe.  So it goes back to spiritual warfare. We know that all the thoughts in our head are not From God and they're not all ours.   I never leave my under on the praise Jesus. That is one thing you never do. I don't have to worry about that Um, but you know, so in other words, there's some sort of nuclear explosion that happens and then you go Why was there such a great reaction to that or or a strong reaction to a mundane question, right? So whenever there's reactions, woundedness That kind of stuff then we know there's something going on there We know there's something deeper some sort of message that the enemy's playing a tape And we can say, hey, you know, I said this this is what happened. What's going on? You know, you know it what's difficult about talking about this is is Depending on where people are they have varying degrees of hope or lack total absence of hope or awareness or lack of awareness, yeah, and and the difficult part is and I was even thinking about this before the show is How do you how do you motivate people to? Want to do what it takes Want to come to the retreat or do what it's read discernment of spirits and marriage by Father Gallagher great book listen to our series Whatever and then it live it. What is what how do how do people get motivated to that? So, you know, you described a scenario that probably plays itself out a Million times a day on the planet earth if not more Between husband and wife and and somebody listening might go. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I experienced that It's like in the way they experience it is something seemingly small becomes huge whether it's the husband or the wife But how do you give people hope and I want to give you one post postulate a few things and see what your thoughts are That they can be free is well, how do we give hope people hope they can be free so that they'll be motivated to pursue the remedy One is heaven and hell, you know, I think that in our time and in the church today Even I'm shocked at how often we come to a place and I we attend beautiful churches with wonderful priests I'm not bashing priests, but I am shocked at how often I see a passage where there's a great opportunity for the Communication of the gospel in the sense that hell is real and you can go there and most people go there, which is what Jesus taught But you need to choose the narrow way and heaven is real and heaven is beautiful and there's a way to get there amen, right? so there's similarly, there's a pathway in your marriage that Leads to hell and there's a pathway in your marriage that leads to Really profound goodness and and beauty and you and I are no easy cookies, right? I don't know how to say that but You know, we're both very strong-willed and I would say on a scale of one to ten We're both a ten in terms of one being very passive and ten being pretty pretty for you I wouldn't say aggressive in a destructive way, but certainly You don't get up every day looking for someone else to give you your to-do list, right? Neither do I you know and and generally speaking we get up every day. We give a lot of other people to-do lists, you know so How is it that we have a marriage that I would that is a dream to me? I mean I I Know it's emotional to even think about it, but I I remember as a young man And becoming a Christian and just so desperately wanting to find my beloved The one with whom I could share all of this beautiful thing that's you know happening in my heart the one That I could wrestle through all of what it means to be a follower of Jesus You know all of that and I when I found you I found that even so It was incredibly difficult at the beginning of our marriage and So we're we're coming up on a break maybe after the break you could help I want to try to give people hope that the spiritual warfare and the battles they're facing Can be one and I think we have a testimony not because we're perfect We're far from it, but it's a testimony of two broken people coming together and God really Revealing himself as we seek him in our brokenness For our salvation. Yeah. Yeah, I really can't wait to share this with everybody. So what after the break? Come back and we'll talk about it. Awesome And your mark gets set go. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke. Welcome back to divine intimacy radio your radio haven of rest we're talking about spiritual warfare and the family and How do you get hope really when you know there's that spiritual battle And you and I have worked through it Give you know, where's the light at the end of the tunnel? That's not a train coming right, right, right? Yeah Well, I think the beauty of it and to encourage people to delve into this area because I think the beginning of your question was Why would anybody do this right? You know what do go to a marriage retreat or or lean into marriage healing or read the books or whatever, right? Why would they do any of this? What is it necessary? And I think first and foremost people need to need to understand that as you were talking about we were very strong people We came together in our brokenness This incredible desire to to run towards God together, but just a mess, you know and the thing is is that in marriage those difficulties those Wounded the woundedness in our spouse is there for a purpose and we've been brought together as a for a purpose, you know women have certain a particular woman will have certain virtues and search in certain weaknesses her Spouse her husband will have certain virtues and certain weaknesses often they are opposites and So that when they come together they're complimentary, you know, why does God design it? We tend to and get attracted to somebody who is our opposite and we're drawn together Why because he's seeking perfection? He desires perfection that someone have all the virtues and they were drawn to perfection in him Right to live out their mission in him. Well, you're drawn together as one person You come together with these weaknesses. Well, those weaknesses rub on the other person and the strengths rub on the other person and it's like It's like sharpening steel or sharpens iron iron sharpens iron, right? You come together in those trials those difficulties those those moments of Difficulty in your marriage you rub up one another Against one another in that conflict and it and if you approach it in the right way If you are seeking God's will if you are listening to his voice If you're loving one another and fighting towards one another in Christ He can perfect you and and strengthen you in your virtues within the context of your marriage Why? Because when you are united one another husband and wife fully in who you were called to be in the perfection of Christ It will change your family. It will change the world around you It will change the world it changes the world around you and it's God's design It's why the enemy fights so strong against marriage. He does not want us The enemy of our souls does not want us to succeed. He wants us to fall apart. He wants us to divorce He wants us to to wreck the lives of our children because he knows that if we are together in one in Christ It changes the world. So there's some underlying presuppositions or secrets to some of what you're saying and it's one of it's one of the things we talk about in the marriage retreat is the that our Spouse and I think it came from a question somebody asked even in a in one of the retreats is Is it okay to see my spouse as my cross? Meaning your means to your salvation and That was a powerful thing because I think people were shocked when we both with a smile said Yeah, she's my cross and you said yeah, he's my cross and I think what we The way we come into marriage usually thinking is my spouse is my pillow And my comforter and my supplier of every need right now that can be true You know in part in many ways you have been a beautiful You know softener to the challenges of my own health the challenges of my own weakness the challenges of life But I think if you and I would have come in With this idea that the one I'm marrying is is more so My they're necessary for my salvation not just oh honey, please pray and be a better man That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about your brokenness you Stephanie your brokenness and the experience of that and the painfulness of that in My experience of it is necessary for my salvation and my brokenness and the pain and Purification you experience from that is necessary for your salvation if you have that expectation Then you walk in and you go and you went you go ow. Wow that hurt It's supposed to be this way. I don't like this. I got to figure this out I think a better, you know an analogy that helps is that's what religious life is about cloistered religious life And I don't know how well folks are formed as they come in but I'm John of the Cross is the one who has my head on this is religious life is There that you enter in that you might be purified that you might be broken that you might be restored Over and over because of the other people you're there with yeah Yeah, and I think by the near the the nature of our marriage, right as we come together in marriage that we are Implicated to the extent that we're implicated in the life of the other person that we enter into that vulnerability Into that brokenness and meet the other person where they are and stay within the conversation and not run and hide Not run away not give in not give up, right? But rather this is my beloved my my Dan Burke shaped cross That the Lord has given me and to the extent that I embrace my cross love my cross bear my cross and And and allow his The weight of his brokenness in it in essence to be part of my life and to help him Also by caring him then we can become one in Christ and we can be set free and be perfected If I'm unwilling to do that and to surrender to that brokenness and deal with it Within the context of our marriage then that resistance and that constant. I don't like this This doesn't feel good. You're not making me feel good. You're you're not doing what I want you to do therefore, I'm out of here Kind of thing is the way of the enemy, right? It's not the way of cross of Christ And so that's that's part of the secret of how Why do we want to come to any kind of retreat or any kind of thing like this where we can learn How to be fully who God is calling us to be? In our marriage so that he can perfect us so that he can set the world on fire through us in us around us According to his perfect design just for the folks watching watching the show today at the end We'll hang out for a few minutes to answer live questions. So Hang out with us and we'll do that for you so I think This is extremely powerful. I've experienced it also in community which almost doesn't exist in the catholic church today But it's One of the powers of community and even in apostolate VA Where we have members where we have conflict with other members in the community You can You know the people who get it so to speak and understand community They have no inclination to run or at least if they have the temptation There's no inclinate. They don't give into it. I'm not it's not like oh, I'm leaving. I'm not happy It doesn't work that way Because when you enter into marriage in particular much higher form of community, if you will Because it's a sacred bond and you only get to do it once in terms of be valid validly married Sacrament it's well, this is what I mean. That's my reference is a sacred bond, right? So that you can't you don't just bail on that But I think a broader extension of that is with people you have a little even less of a sacred bond at that level of a sacrament So I think community can help that what else Have you found has been most helpful? in dealing with my let's be honest my brokenness and the You know fighting the instinct to run And and hide or to fight, you know sort of punch back if you will not I've never hit you but you know You know what I mean Well, it's fascinating that you ask this question Because I was actually musing on it Yesterday and today. So, you know, the lord's been working on on this And that is That You have two broken people that come together, right? So you and I come together in this in this bond of holy matrimony It's permanent and it's holy according to god's design. He made marriage, right? So if I come into this relationship and Things are difficult. They're not easy, right? I can I can see the problem as all outside of me Or I can understand That my struggle within the context of that conflict A lot of it has to do with me Right with with how I see god with my relationship with god with my own woundedness Can you give an example? I know it's a little dangerous, but um well, you know I so Well, I've talked about it before I don't know that I want to go down Okay, so um, I didn't give her a look by the way.  So that's kind of normal Uh, so so in the In the context of that just a reader's digest version of this because we don't have a lot of time today But you know, you asked me to To write together on marriage spirituality at the very very beginning in fact people can go back On spiritualdirection.com and find those those original things that we wrote together, right? That was very vulnerable for me I was praying about it It was a big deal for me to step out in that area of vulnerability because I didn't feel like I had anything worthy to say But you kept encouraging me. So I did Um, I wrote it with you the day comes up when it's posted And when it gets posted, it's not our version, but it's your version. It's the first draft It was crushing to me, right Didn't help or actually it was purposeful that I was praying the litany of humility for 40 days And it happened to be the 40th day of the litany of humility and the lord's going be humble sephony Be humble be humble and by the way I'm about to hit you with a huge humiliation and it's going to come through the hands of your beloved and it's going to crush you It did it crushed me. I was devastated In that moment and it seems like a small thing It was connected to my pride my own woundedness my own wounds of abandonment all that stuff really quickly and Instead of running away, which is what crossed my mind because the enemy said pack your bags grab your kids leave He doesn't love you. He's rejected everything that you had to say Instead I went towards you And I understood My battle was not with what you did but with the struggle within me At feeling rejected and I came to you in my vulnerability and we've got about 10 seconds That drove us together I mean, obviously we've got a lot of content to talk about which we do for three days at the marriage Retreats that we give you can find out about those at spiritualdirection.com forward slash events And the testimonies of the of the folks that go is really Are quite remarkable. We don't have time to share them today But we're seeing huge breakthroughs in marriage And we'd invite you to check that out And join us and and look at where the latest one's going to be And we're out of time Okay So until next time may the god of peace make you perfect in holiness May he preserve you whole and entire spirit soul and body Irreproachable at the coming of our lord jesus christ amen And so we want to invite anybody that's still online that's listening to us That hang out for a minute to hang out for a minute and if they have any questions We'd love to do it. We want to remind you that we are going to be In farmers branch texas doing a marriage retreat Um, and those are the dates are where'd that go up here? Oh Uh, I can't see him from right, uh, let's see maybe It's here Uh, just june 11th through the 13th in farmers branch texas branch. Yeah, which is outside of dallas Yeah, um easy to get to kind of central in the country, but we'd love to see you And we promise no No goofy exercises no icebreakers. No kumbaya.  It's only deep stuff. It is deep it's deep water and From the testimonies that we've received It's life changing otherwise We would not be investing in three days Of time in order to do it if we didn't see the fruit. It's a lot of work But it's but it's awesome. Let's do this. So while we're queuing up a few questions. Sure. Why don't you read one testimony? Sure And uh, jordan, are we getting any questions in yet? We'll see if you have questions about how to Uh deal with spirits warfare and marriage or how to deal with uh, just a holy marriage make sure you type those in But either way, we'll give you a go ahead. Okay. So here's some of the testimonials from uh, the last marriage retreat that we did and So she says At first my husband was a little worried about doing a marriage retreat But we came away with a deeper understanding of our marriage and how god works within it No matter where you are in your relationship We recommend recommend it and I think that's important because Some of the folks said well, you know, my marriage isn't in trouble. Why would I do a marriage retreat? You know, or So it's not for it's for those whose marriages are in trouble It's for those marriages that are kind of doing okay And those are and it's also for those that are incredible and they want to take it to the next level So this this what we offer here that we share with you Is uh, it's for everybody. It's uniquely suitable mainly because it's rooted in the catholic mystical tradition Yeah, it runs the spectrum of You know the beginning stages of what it means to be healthy up to what does it mean to really grow spiritually together in a deep way Okay, okay, and so one of the things that That's also powerful is that I don't know where I was going with that. Anyway, okay, so then one more test. So one more testimony The divine intimacy retreat for married couples was a positive enlightening and catholic experience in every respect Um, Dan and Stephanie presented the tools for divine intimacy that not only they have learned But have lived as well their personal testimonies and the wealth of spiritual treasures Shared parallel the exact transformation that is possible in married life Regardless of the state of your married life going into the retreat. You will come out of it transformed for the better What a blessing don't pass it up. So yeah Okay, go ahead Hello, Dan. Can you let us know if a man's prayer challenges would differ from a woman? That's a pretty interesting question Fascinating question. I think so When you look at theology the body and the design of male and female And how it is that we relate to god women are much more receptive. I think that it's easier for women To understand how to yield to god And Stephanie might be able to speak to that for men We can get caught in the more active forms of prayer easily I think in terms of because work we're seeking to always to conquer into advance And so and and also we're not as comfortable with Vulnerability as women are and at least in terms of design. I'm not saying every woman is vulnerable, but so for men learning vulnerability learning receptivity Is uh, those are hard things and for women. It's easier. Go ahead step. Yeah, I I think um in order to try to Mitigate some of that if you're still if you're starting as a couple in prayer One of the greatest things you can do is to tap into the man's natural desire to kind of conquer and lead And allow him to lead. Yeah, and so um, we talk about that in the marriage retreat on on what that looks like in prayer that you can do that in liturgy of the hours and let And uh have the man lead prayer and the woman respond and it gives him a sense of doing something accomplishing something that he can check off a list that he's gone hunting. He's killed it, right? And uh, and he's brought it home. Yeah, and so in that that can help get a comfort with it now The vulnerability in marriage will I mean in prayer will happen in time because the lord Wills it he will begin to heal through vocal prayer through a commitment to daily prayer Daily mental prayer daily mental prayer Um through the rosary as a couple has is hugely transformative those kind of things can really help a couple grow in prayer Good good Sure one more two more maybe who knows? How do you recommend being vulnerable with your spouse when you have a fear they will hurt you or use that against you So here's the deal uh, you're when you're vulnerable with your spouse. They're going to hurt you and use it against you So the first thing you need to do is get over the is just deal with the You're looking at me a little funny, but it's back to the expectation Being vulnerable is painful. Jesus was vulnerable when he got crucified But that shouldn't dissuade us from it because we need it So how do you deal with the inevitability of being wounded? Yeah By your spouse when you're vulnerable and that is I think You've got to work on it in little increments at a time And you've got to you've got to teach one another in a sense And maybe the woman can teach the man more of this in a subtle way Of uh, like reading a book together for instance And just talking together about the content is a way that a man can really handle well the vulnerability because you're speaking in terms of ideas And then that can lead to a deeper kind of vulnerability But one you got the fact is you will be wounded when you're vulnerable, but that's important for your salvation So I know you reacted a bit to what I said Yeah, why maybe talk about why well, I mean it just has so many layers Right. Yeah part of that is an understanding of why I'm why am I afraid of being wounded? Why am I afraid of being vulnerable because there's a fear behind that And that fear is not of god, right that fear is not of god and it's come from Some sort of past or whatever where I was vulnerable when I was you know 13 and x happened to me, right And and so self-awareness is important. Why am I afraid to be vulnerable with my spouse? What's going on here? Is there something in our history or in my history that causes me to be afraid to be vulnerable? That's one thing to check into and then secondly, you know In our marriage retreat we talk about How can a man make a woman Feel comfortable being vulnerable, right? And how can a woman help a man feel? Comfortable being vulnerable vice versa, right safe, right? Better word. Yeah safe And and so that's part of the marriage bond That's part of the healing and the perfection that can and should and needs to happen in a marriage So that you can truly walk one another Because in the end, you know, it's it's my job to get my husband to heaven And his job to get me to heaven and if we can't stay united and and help one another when each other falls back Holding on to one another and going towards christ together in that vulnerability Then we're going to lose hold of one another, right? It's only in that vulnerability that we can truly have authentic Lasting love and so it's important to learn how to do that and to figure out Is that because of my woundedness? Or is that because of from my past or is it because of woundedness within the relationship and either one needs Needs work, right? There's a couple of resources. I think are exemplary in this area You were listening to bobshoots This morning love the jp2 healing center is they do phenomenal Work and they did put out a bobshoots and dr. Jake kim. They're both doctors Put out a podcast and I don't know if there's new podcasts coming But they do do a great job and it's called Restoring the glory. Yeah, and so it's got a few Episodes on there. It's just on woundedness on our brokenness and and it just plays into it It's just so helpful. So if you're working on your own woundedness They have great resources. The other one's father william watson the What's the 40 40 40 40 weeks is a great book to dig in and try to figure out You know where where you are and where you need to be healed and all of that We'll answer one more question. Great question so far Hailey asks When your spouse is far away and you have to carry that responsibility and cross people love to give you advice on how to fix What's a good way to respond to that?  Please pray for me Yeah, that's it. Thank you so much. Please pray for me and it is the most important thing It's a huge cross. I mean we spent a large part of our marriage At the beginning at the beginning that you were living up in connecticut three weeks of every month Yeah, a couple years first when we're first married.  Oh my goodness So I had that cross I had the others were perfect, you know But they were younger and they were you know, they were a little bit more under my control And so I'm trying to keep peace in the home and hope that jordan doesn't get take up get on his bike and Run away somewhere and I couldn't find him So he had that going on and then my husband's in connecticut You know and working to save the register and provide for our family, right? And I was at catholic or I was a school principal in the secular system That was insane, you know Now did I have people that wanted to say oh, you should just do acts and you should do why and you know Your husband needs to consider to leave his job and come and be home where he can help you or whatever Right, of course. Everybody has opinions Um, and I think you know your response is perfect. It's like, you know, thank you. Please pray for me Yeah, and I appreciate so much that that you want to love and help me in this And I will certainly take that to prayer. Please keep praying for us. Yeah, that's the that's the biggest thing Uh, thanks to ewtn. Just want to do a shout out to ewtn for Allowing us to broadcast this show on the radio and of course live streaming On ewtn's facebook page We're grateful for them. Please support them A lot of the books that we mentioned you should go to ewtn's religious Religious catalog. Oh, we had another comment. I had no guys. No idea.  Yes broken Broken blended broken and blended and blessed. We should have a three broken That's not bad. I like it broken blended and blessed. Maybe she just gave us Right the title of something but um, yeah, that's thank you No, I thought we had talked about that some so that's another thing that I want to say about these marriage retreats that there is Literally, I think there's pretty much nothing anybody can bring to the table that we have that we have not seen done Her yeah experienced or dealt with right no shame. No shame here. No nothing, you know, so if you are Anyway, wherever you are on the spectrum in your marriage There's probably I know there's something here for you because it's just so powerful So we just want to remind you to head out on to spiritual direction.com forward slash events If you can join us, especially in person at the farmers branch event A divine intimacy and marriage retreat on june 11th and 13th and don't worry if you can't make it to this one There'll be others Sign up for the emails on spiritual direction.com so that you don't miss any of our upcoming Events and check it out. Amen. All right. Okay. God bless you all. Take care. Bye


Hello, and welcome to At the Crossroads. I'm your girl Keisha King, and we're back again. Thank you so much for viewing with us today. I am so excited that you're here, and I'm really excited that we have a special guest with us on set as we discuss Hollywood and diversity. Our special guest today is none other than Steven Hill. Hello. Aloha, Steven. How are you? I'm great. I'm great. How are you? I'm doing just fine. Thanks. Steven, you are with the latest show right now, filming in Hawaii. Tell us what show that is. Magnum PI. Magnum PI. Awesome. And what? What character do you play? I play the role of T.C. T.C.? Awesome. So, as a few people here know, I've been referring to T.C. as the helicopter guy. Helicopter guy, but it's T.C. played by Steven Hill, and I am so glad you're here. How long have you been here? Maybe about six months now. Yeah? That long? Yeah, yeah. Okay. Filming episode 17, so it takes about a week to film an episode. We had a break, so yeah, about six months. About six months. That is a good long time. Yeah. Yeah? So have you become acclimated to Hawaii and our lifestyle? I think so. I went home for the holiday break for about a week and a half, and I was ready to come back after three days. Yeah? That's what happens? Yeah. And where is home for you? New York City. New York City. Well, I'd go back and forth between New York and Jersey, which is how I also grew up, so. Oh, okay. Neat. So an East Coast friend. Yes. Okay, so I'm also from the East Coast. I went home during the fall, and it was so beautiful, right? Because the leaves were changing and all that good stuff, and it felt kind of nice. My last day there, it got so cold, I was like, please get me out of here. Well, I was looking forward to going home and putting on my coat, because before I booked this job, I had just bought this new fall raven coat, and it feels good when you're in the winter and you've got the proper coat on. It's cold outside, but you're still warm, so I was looking forward to that, and then when I got home, I went and put my coat on, came outside at 65 degrees, so I was sweating. I think I brought the Hawaiian sun with me, because then when I left, it got cold again. I was warm pretty much the whole time I was there. Wow. So that's good. You bring good vibes only, right? Yes. Right? Took some of that Aloha sunshine. Yeah. But that's good. We're so happy to have you here on the island. We have an array of events that always go on throughout the city and throughout all the islands, in fact. I have watched some of the episodes. I'm shocked that they're 17, though, because I think I missed one or two. So I'm going to go back. Oh, yeah. We're filming, so we've only aired, I think the last one was 12. Okay. Okay. Now I feel so bad. 13 should come. 13 will be on this coming Monday. Okay. What night? Monday night. Monday night. Monday at 9. Monday night. 9 Eastern. Okay. And here in Hawaii, I think it comes on at 8 o'clock. I think so, too. And it's 8 o'clock, as well, in West Coast time. Okay. Pacific. Yeah. Okay. Good. Good. So how could you not be familiar, but you can catch them on Magnum P.I. on Monday night. 8 o'clock. CBS. CBS. That's right. Gotta get it in there. You know, I downloaded the CBS app, and I watch it that way. Okay. I haven't watched live television quite some time, but... Well, you're on live right now, so, hey. But you can't watch it because you're here, so I get it. Yeah, exactly. Well, good, good. So in addition to that, I know that you've done some other work, some other, I want to say, some short films and things like that. A million short films, a lot of NYU films, a lot of student films, a lot of indie films. There's one called Writes that I actually just put on my Facebook today, no, Instagram today or yesterday at some point that is streamable on Amazon and a couple of iTunes, a couple of other platforms. I have a show on Netflix called Maniac right now, and I am in the film Widows, which I think is still in some theaters, with Viola Davis and Liam Neeson. Oh, nice. What was it like working with the Viola Davis? Well, she wasn't... We weren't in any scenes together, so I actually didn't get to work with her. She was on set one day, but I was trying to wait around my trailer to see if I could get a little glimpse of her, but I didn't get to talk to her. But she's a really nice person. She will chime in on your Facebook page. Oh, really? Yeah, she's done that a few times, and I'm like, wait a minute, is this Viola Davis talk? Do you even see Viola Davis? Yeah, yeah, she gets involved with the black acting community, the theater community, and she'll have something to say, she's always encouraging as well. That's good. That's good. I think it's wonderful when we have such great actors, such as her, Denzel Washington and others, that will kind of reach back and help the up-and-coming actors. Yeah. Yeah. I remember recently there was a speech from Denzel, maybe a couple of years back, and he was just so helpful, and he said, if it wasn't for this person, there wouldn't be you. Yeah. And he just went down the line of so many greats. Yeah, well, I do know that Denzel, he took in Omari Hardwick at one point. He was couchsurfing on Denzel's couch, you know. And I remember reading something where Omari's first check he gave to Denzel, and Denzel has it framed in the house or something like that. Oh, wow. And also Chadwick Boseman and Susan Kalichi Watson, who's on This Is Us. Okay. I know that Felicia Rashad and Denzel also paid for them to go to the conservatory program in England for acting. So, you know, they've been putting in their dues and giving back for a really long time, you know. Right. I think a lot of times what happens is those types of things go unnoticed. People don't always know that that giving back is taking place, and that's what makes them even more of a great person, right? A lot of stuff goes unnoticed, you know. We think we're abreast of everything because we're in our little internet social media bubbles. Like, for example, I saw an article recently that said, hey, Hollywood, Howard University isn't the only black school, right? So, you know, they're all the only HBCU because, you know, typically any storyline that has an HBCU in it, they're always going either going to Howard or getting ready to go to Howard, right? Exactly. But, you know, people don't know. For this show, I've done my due diligence in trying to get as much Hampton University representation as possible. But I think I've decided today I wanted it to be known that, you know, the character T.C. went to Hampton, but I think I want to make it more ambiguous now and do kind of like what Cosby did during the Cosby show, and he wore paraphernalia from different schools. It's going to be a lot of work on my part because then I have to get permission from each school in order to do so and get them in contact with CBS, and, you know, I don't know if that's necessarily something that CBS wants to put in a lot of work to do, so I'm going to have to do it. So, yeah. That's interesting. If you want something done, you're going to have to do it. You're going to have to do the background work. Yeah, there are a lot of calls back and forth between CBS and Hampton in order to allow myself to wear a Hampton University sweater or a T-shirt or have like Hampton University poster in the background. Right. Right. So, if I were a person that was able to reach out, I would simply say we have HBCU Buzz, I know is on Instagram. If you're listening or watching, please, he has called for HBCU paraphernalia so that he can have it on Magnum P.I. So I think that is a really good cause, you guys. Jump on board with that. I'm giving free shouts out to anybody who does it. Okay. And you should also, if you can, use the hashtag, check on the hashtag stand with Bennett. Bennett College is in a little bit of financial turmoil right now where they may lose their accreditation unless they can come up with $5 million pretty quickly. And it is a all-girls school, one of the first, I think maybe, no, other than Spellman, it might be the only other all-girls HBCU. But you know, some smart sisters coming out of Bennett College so we want to support them as well. That's right. And if you're not familiar as a listener with what an HBCU is, that is a historically black college and university. So I appreciate you for reaching out like that. I think it makes a world of a difference. And anyone who has a platform should do things like that. You know, Cosby did it and he did it very well, but he wasn't the only one. There were others, you know, living single. The original TC. The original TC. TC wore a lot of, I remember watching an episode not too long ago and he had on a Gremlin hat. Okay. You know, I don't think his character went to Gremlin or it wasn't instead. But you know, people do their job of giving back to the community. I do know that he made, he was credited with helping to make Kwanza very popular. His character, it was a Christmas episode of Magnum PI and his character was celebrating Kwanza. And it was the first time a lot of people had ever heard of it and he put it on a large platform like that. So you know, I mean, if you have the opportunity to say something, do something positive, why not? That's amazing. I appreciate you. I appreciate you doing that. I appreciate all the others who are going to help to make sure that this happens. And then when we come back from our break, we're going to talk a little bit more and we're going to talk about diversity, but a different type of diversity, right? And I'm seeing it a lot more in Hollywood where we have diverse peoples that are on screen. They're on television. They're on the big screen, silver screen, whatever it's called, right? So that's his world. It's not my world. I don't know it, but we're going to talk about it. All right. All right. We'll be right back at the crossroads. This is Think Tech Hawaii, raising public awareness. Welcome to Sister Power. I'm your host, Sharon Thomas Yarbrough, where we motivate, educate, empower, and inspire all women. We are live here every other Thursday at 4 p.m. and we welcome you to join us here at Sister Power. Aloha and thank you. Aloha. And welcome back to At the Crossroads with Keisha King. We have been talking with my special guest, Steven Hill, the actor from Magnum PI. We've been talking a little bit about what he's been doing on the show and what he intends to do. And now we're going to switch gears just a little bit and invite another guest. We're going to invite Gina Hummer to come and speak with us. And she is a wonderful children's book author and we're going to talk about diversity. Welcome to the show, Gina. Hi, Keisha. It's so wonderful to be here. Thank you. Thank you so much. So tonight we are just talking with Steven Hill, Steven, Gina, Gina, Steven. Hello, Gina. Hey, how are you? All right. You good? We are just talking a little bit about what we are, I'm sorry, we're talking about diversity as it portrays to Hollywood and all throughout. We have noticed that there have been quite a few people in Hollywood nowadays in our movies and what have you who have had different abilities, such as we have an actor right now on a hospital show who has autism. Kevin Hart's recent movie has a character who is, I believe, has cerebral palsy. So he is in a wheelchair, paralyzed from the neck down. Gina, you have written a few children's books about special needs and how it portrays to children. Can you talk to us about that a little bit? Sure. I'm a special educator in New York City and the children's book came about for a number of different reasons. One because I didn't believe that my students' stories were kind of told. So I don't know if you guys can see it, but there's the cover. Yes, we can see it. Yeah, hold it up a little bit more. There you go. You have different characters and so my students very much so we were used to reading books that didn't include what they look like or didn't include their different abilities in children's books and it became important for me to begin to tell a story that not only included them but to include a lot of other different characters were excluded from literacy, such as the discussion of melanin or ethnicities or religions and we kind of, as it pertains to literacy, deal with one kind of character and that character is usually European-American or European-centered so when I came up with the book it was to look at diversity and how it should be looked at which is in a whole kind of complex way of different ethnicities, religions, sizes, that kind of thing. So children can be seen in the stories and be seen in terms of how they see themselves within this world. Amazing, thank you so much for sharing. That sounds really good. Having participated in some of those readings, I am very familiar with how the books typically look and so I appreciate what you bring to the table for all students. Stephen, we wanted to talk with you because you also have some experience with those who have differing abilities. Yeah, my young sister has Down syndrome. She's a low functioning Down syndrome because she was born with three holes in her heart and then she was too young to be operated on so she got very low oxygen to the brain until she was about two years old when she could actually be operated on so that affected her to the point where they said she would be a vegetable but she is not. She still walks around. She doesn't talk. She makes noises and sounds and stuff but she doesn't actually talk and she can't feed herself. You can assist her in feeding herself but you have to take her to the bathroom, you have to help walk her to her program bus in the morning so on and so forth. I've had a lot of experience with that and then also my mother and now my sister who has taken over from my mother since my mother passed away was a respite caretaker where it actually not respite because I think respite is when someone comes to your house just for a short period of time but my mother had two ladies from the state that they weren't down syndrome but they have some learning disabilities and they live with us. So I've always grown up with them in the house since maybe the seventh or eighth grade. So in two of them they're still there. So they're basically family members now. They live there and my younger sister lives there. And my older sister pretty much holds down the fort now that my mom passed away. Wow. Well I'm really sorry to hear about your mom's passing away. Yeah. It was in 03 she passed away so it's been a while now. I think a lot of times when you are caring for someone who has any type of special needs I think that usually there is one person usually a matriarch in the household who does the primary caregiving of that person but everyone in a family is affected. And wouldn't you agree Gina every person has a role to play in the keeping and caring of a person who has special needs. Absolutely. But that would be for any of us. Right. That's the thing that we don't want to think too broad about it. We don't want to have a body who in our house so we all take special care to take care of them. But I totally get what you're saying. Yeah. Yeah. I think what we all are noticing now is that when or even in your books you bring a certain type of awareness that maybe the general typically developing person may not have been aware of. What has the response been to your books? Oh wow. It's been wonderful. I debuted at the museum of natural history in New York City about three years ago. I've had the pleasure of being on the own network in regard to the book and what we do. It opened up or gave birth to the company of diversity as a verb and to make diversity more than just this kind of popular word but an action behind it. So the book gained a lot of momentum especially during the hashtag Oscar so white. So it worked out really well because it gave a platform of discussing many different ethnicities and groups. So I mean I'm really pleased about the progress with this book. I can't extol it anymore. So I'm really pleased with everything from dealing with melanin to dealing with body size to dealing with awareness, sorry, dealing with awareness abilities as well as different ethnicities. So it's worked out well. Thank you. Thank you. It sounds like you cover the full gamut of different differing abilities and we appreciate that. And I thank you so much for getting the word out to so many different people about so many different people. And next time you're on own you can just go ahead and mention me. Just tell Oprah. Tell her say hey Oprah I'm so glad you're here. But no I appreciate what you do for educators and for parents. I think when I'm out and about I hear a lot from parents how they wish that their child was better represented. Do you feel that same way? Oh absolutely. It goes back to what I was initially saying. You want to be seen and heard but they said before like I've heard this quote where a good children's book teaches the child but a great children's book teaches both the child and the parent. And when you have a book such as this that allows those dialogues and those discussions between each character that allows you to see yourself in others. It brings the humanity discussion into play. And sometimes that is missing from children's books in terms of understanding other people's perspective. Right. Well we wish you well. Thank you so much for being here today Gina. If you'd like to learn more about what she does you can find her on diversityisaverb.com. Is that right? Oh no. No. It's okay. I can find you best well on either Instagram at Gina Humber H-U-M-B-R or Twitter which I happen to love at Gina Humber 720. Okay. Alright well I tried. We'll find you. We'll find you. And you can. Alright and then of course you can subscribe to her on Twitter or on YouTube. I think I also found you on YouTube at one point on Instagram. So wherever you find her along social media please invest and get the word out. Share diversity is a verb. Thank you so much for being with us today Gina. Bye bye. Bye. Well Steven we have talked a great deal about diversity and as it relates to family members and in our books and things of that nature. Let's talk about Hollywood. Have you also noticed that there is a great deal about diversity in Hollywood? I think there's probably more diversity than we care to acknowledge sometimes. I think there's so much diversity that we may not even notice. It's kind of like if you give somebody a plate of food and you give them just enough they'll consume all of it. You have a buffet or a smorgasbord of options a lot of that food is going to go to waste. So in this climate of so much content a lot of things are not recognized. So just to make it personal me playing this role of TC when the original show was out in Roger E. Mostly played TC there were maybe a few black actors that were in roles that were non-comedy roles where it was action on location sort of thing. And that was Mr. T. That's right. That was TC. And I want to say Avery Brooks and he played a man called Hulk and before that he was in a show called Not the Equalizer and a show called Spencer for Hire. Wow, yeah. So outside of those three I could be wrong, it could be more but those are the three that I remembered being in action roles, right? There was a lot of black comedy there was tons of black comedy shows but in terms of there being an action role for a black man there weren't a whole lot of them. Now we have it's funny because you guys kept seeing abilities and it made me think of Luke Cage because in there that's how they mentioned powers they called them abilities. So now we have Luke Cage when I was growing up there was no you had Steve Austin, a million dollar man you had the Hulk you didn't have strong black men lifting people up and throwing them through the walls when I was growing up. So I don't think there were any black characters on Batman. I don't remember any. They had a bad guy. They had a penguin but they didn't have a black man he counted his black penguin suit. He was mixed. Yeah, exactly. So I just feel like my character being on this show that was something where 30 years ago black audience had to tune in it was like whoa it's a show with black men on it gotta watch it. And now I don't know the conversation is more in shows like Power and in the black community at least from what I see I'm on Facebook, I'm on Twitter I'm still pretty active on those platforms and the things that I see people talk about not necessarily a very diverse show like Magnum PI because the show is extremely diverse. Yes it is. There's not a lot of black folks on the show but you know I represent I want to say black folks pretty lovely on the show. Thank you you do a great job. So it's me there are Asian actors on the show there are Hawaiians represented on the show that's right. There are you know even in diversity of gender we have our Higgins the original Higgins was the man now Higgins is a woman she does well. Magnum is Mexican Jay Hernandez is a Mexican-American so there's a ton of diversity in our show now and I'm not sure if all of the audience is even ready for that and I just think that it's something that may fall in deaf ears sometimes so I think we are getting way more diversity than we had do I think we probably still have a long way to go for there to be full equality right but I don't know I don't know how soon we'll get there but we do have a number of things to watch now that we did 30 years ago. And I appreciate them all. I appreciate watching you. Oh thank you. You do a great job flexing out there doing the helicopter thing right? Yeah well we thank you so much for being with us today at the Crossroads we thank you for what you do as an actor. One thing I want to say though because I have a little brother and I don't think he knows this so I want to put him up on game real quick and simply say I know you did something with the Wu Wu Tang and I loved it so can you just give a quick little shout out about that as we close yeah so I it's actually a project that I put together with a couple of filmmakers from Philly and it's called Tales from Shaolin Part 1 Shaky Dog so we basically take a Ghostface killer song it's called Shaky Dog it's on his album Fishgale which I think is his third album but it's the second song on that album and all of his lyrics become the dialogue for the film and it's dispersed through a couple of characters mostly my character but a few other characters say the other lyrics and we make it a story and it kind of comes across very Shakespearean I call it Ghostsperean experience okay okay that's new you heard it here first so it's a fun a fun short and we turned some things we flipped a few things where in the song there's a woman that is kind of like taking advantage of and kind of discarded in the song but in the film she's totally badass she's played by Ninja DeVoe friend of mine who came on and she's been on Queen Sugar she was just in the film Green Book she played a bartender in that and now she's in our film kicking kicking butt okay instead of her just getting shot and killed she is a strong female lead we love that we love what you do and it's free that's right that's how I watched it so that's for my brother Mo my little brother Mo forever great work thank you so much for being here with us today we hope to have you back again you've been here six months we don't know how much longer you're going to be here I'll bring you back not a problem we'd love to have you right here at the Crossroads thank you so much for tuning in tell your friends you can find us on Think Tech Hawaii on Facebook you can find us on our own website and you can watch us on YouTube I'm here every Wednesday at five o'clock I'm your girl Keisha King and we are at the Crossroads hello hi I was beginning to tell people where to find me ah me too I'm sorry I'm telling people where to find us you don't want to buy power I got about six thousand powers maybe I might have reached it so weird six thousand powers on a TV show you know what I mean and then the girl with the girls in bikinis got millions millions easily and they don't talk about nothing they don't have anything to talk about they don't have anything


teaches us about America. And what Ken Burns film teaches us about America. It's called the US and the Holocaust and the stress is really on the US. Although the Holocaust footage is extraordinary, it's footage you have never, ever seen before. You can be watching movies about World War II and the Holocaust your whole life and you will never have seen footage as you see in this Ken Burns film. So today we're gonna study that here on Bigotry in America. The stress is bigotry in America. And Manfred Henningson, who is an emeritus retired political science professor from UH Minoa who has studied this and various other political science issues in the United States and in Europe is here to join us for this discussion. Welcome to the show Manfred, as always. Thanks a lot. So I'll tell you a vibe. There's one thing you should tell, you should mention, you know, I was born in Germany and I grew up after World War II in a country that avoided talking about the Holocaust. And, you know, that changed only 20 years. It took more than 20 years until, you know, Germany entered into the processing of its macro criminal past. It started when Billy Bond became chancellor in West Germany in 69. But it became in a way really very, very powerful in the 70s. So all of that silence, you know, that you had before was gone. And so from then on, you know, Germans confronted their past. And I think came to terms with it. And it's taught in schools and universities, you know. And that's very important. And a lot of what you see in Burns's film about American history, the parallelism is not really taught in American public schools. And I think what we are confronted with is now a political movement in the United States that wants to even further minimize, you know, the teaching, the critical teaching of history. Yeah. Well, we see that increasingly. Yes. We know where it leads when you don't teach history. Leads to a repetition of history. Santayana wasn't it, you know? If you ignore history, you are doomed to repeat it. And some people say, no, no, no, that's not true. It rhymes. It rhymes with history. But my reaction more and more, Manfred, is that it's not a rhyming. It's an actual repetition. Well, in this particular case, yes. And then, you know, when we meet the role of Charles Lindbergh, for example, I think is pretty unknown to most Americans.  I mean, and he's buried in Hanna, I think most people in Hawaii don't know that this super American fascist is buried in Hawaii. Now, the grave has not become a shrine. And I don't know whether it ever will be, but what is so interesting when you listen to his speeches, you know, in this documentary, there are echoes today, you know, of what he is talking about and it's sickening. Yes, but he wasn't the only one. No, no, he wasn't the only one. There were organizations, even organizations that have names that are the same as names that are of organizations that are popping up today. America First, that was a Nazi organization. And then it was something about the Christian League or something along those lines. Those organizations were pretty violent. They had guns, guns stolen from the army, ammunition stolen from the army. They had people who were in the army and their mission, their sworn mission, which they expanded to various places around the country thanks to Father Coughlin on the radio who actually reached 40 million people out of a total population of 120 or 30 million people. That's a huge percentage of people. These organizations were dedicated to blowing up the United States government to assassinating a whole bunch of federal officials, congressmen and the like, and taking over in an overt violent coup. And the public was not really opposed to that. It's really hard to understand. And the reason I'm fresh on this is because only this week, Rachel Maddow has gone into her podcast, which is called Ultra. I recommend everybody to take a look at it or listen to it because it's historic. And she describes these events in the 30s and especially 1940 in great detail and talks about these organizations with some degree of detail and accuracy. And it's well worth knowing because just as you stay, it's repeating itself. Right. Well, I mean, what is so remarkable about American ignorance, historical ignorance, is that they are not only not aware of this fascist past, but the racist past that is connected with the legacy of slavery, the anti-black racism. And when you see these parades of the KKK in New York and in other cities, in the documentary, it scares the hell out of me because you have signs of that today. Despite the fact that you could say, a lot of progress has been made in the area of civil rights. But nevertheless, there is a level of racism that goes very deep and has not been taken care of. So what you have is not only this fascist, the anti-Semitic background, but you have also the general racist background that people do not want to be taught about in schools. I mean, I mentioned the non anti-Semitic background because for Hitler, American history became a model. The genocidal removal of Indians became for him an argument when he was designing in World War II, the move into the Soviet Union in June of 1941. And trying to conquer the agricultural core of the Ukraine and Russia. So he used openly references to the way the United States is trying to conquer the agricultural core of the Ukraine references to the way the United States took care of the native people and removed them or killed them. Now, the other thing is the Jim Crow laws, the race laws were used by the Nazis as a justification for the Nuremberg laws in 1935. I mean, you have a book by James Whitman which was published in 2017, Hitler's American model, the United States and the making of Nazi race laws in which he shows the parallels. So you have there, when you talk with American students about it, even though I'm retired, I mean, I remember having these discussions, they were always shocked. When I mentioned that, you know, that America's race policies were looked upon by Hitler as a model for what he was doing, including the eugenics, the sterilization. You have it in judgment of Nuremberg, one of the great movies about World War II with Spencer Tracy, you know, playing Supreme Court judge and being at the center of some of these trials in Nuremberg, they were totally unaware of these parallels. Well, it was a race, wasn't it? I mean, in a sense that, and I'm speaking now of the Ken Burns episodes, that Hitler wanted to keep this quiet. He didn't want people to know that he was running a big death machine and he was dedicated to killing every single Jew in Europe. And in fact, his killing was way ahead of where American observers thought it was.  That's a lot of, that's millions and millions of people. And in the U.S., the general perception was, yeah, there was some articles in the newspaper, Harold Tribune in New York. I'm talking about maybe two million when in fact it was four or five million. And so, you know, what happened is Hitler won the propaganda game. He lied about, and he didn't tell anybody about the killing machine. And in the U.S., we were oblivious and we didn't believe it. And there was a Nazi propaganda machine in the U.S. that was telling us that no, no, no, this is only rumor. It's not real information. Run by American Nazis, yes. Yeah. So I mean, the bottom line there was like, it was a contention of the truth versus the lie. Right. And for a good part of the war, the lie won out. Right. And there were, you know, all kinds of people, you know, who did not counter this lie. You know, when you think, for example, of the story with the American State Department, with the American State Department, but the same applied to the foreign office in London, you know, to deny extra visas to German and Austrian Jews. Even though these, I mean, they could have submitted, they could have gotten visas, but the resistance within the State Department and in the foreign office to helping them was absolutely amazing. You know, now, whether that was simply a bureaucratic behavior or whether they were anti-Semitic influence as well is not completely clear, but I think there were a lot of anti-Semites working within the Foreign Service in the United States that did not want to let thousands of Jews come.  Now, most of them did not end in Auschwitz or any of the other death camps. Many went to Great Britain, but some went to France, but then they had to flee, you know, once Germany occupied France. So that story is a sickening story, if there is any. Well, talk about sickening, you know, you asked me before the show, what did I learn from this Ken Burns documentary that I didn't know before? And somehow I became emotionally involved, invested to a degree that I have never been involved before. And I began to see things through the eyes, not only of the survivors, but of the people who were killed. And you know, that's the lesson of history. The history is told by the survivors, not the ones who were killed.  And Frank is a good example, you know?  For example, recently I saw a movie called In the Garden of the Finzi Contini, which is an Italian movie made in the early 80s. It was the second time it was made about a wealthy Jewish family in a town called Ferrara, near Rome, and it's so interesting how the walls closed in on them. First thing is they couldn't go on public transport and then they all had bicycles. Europe was so heavy on bicycles that they got around on bicycle, no big deal.  You have to turn your bicycle in.  And you have to have identification papers that confirm the Jewish star. And if you had no Jewish star, but you had identification papers with a J, you were in trouble. If you had the identification paper, if you had the Jewish star and the identification papers didn't say a Jewish, you were in trouble.  And so, you know, it's this, seeing it through the eyes of the decedents is what struck me and involved me. And I think everybody should see it that way because those people, they speak to us. They speak to us today. They speak to us through that film. No, no, absolutely. I mean, you mentioned just the J. You know, that was a demand by the Swiss and the Swedish government. They asked the German foreign service to have Jewish citizens get this J-stamp in their passports. So it was a request that was issued by the Swiss and the Swedes to identify, to help their pass control to identify people. I mean, this sickening implication of governments in the sickening bureaucratic involvement of the Swiss and the Swedish government in facilitating, you know, this has also not been known. Yeah. Well, let me ask you a question, it's slightly academic, but I've been thinking about it. You know, they say the 20th century was really rotten. We had World War I in which millions and millions of people died for no good reason. We had, you know, all this bigotry in the 30s getting worse and worse. And I don't know if you can say that FDR saved us by, you know, what he did during the war, but it was getting pretty bad. And then we had World War II in which millions of people died. And there was a lot of lying and propaganda going on and a lot of, you know, genocide going on in the cruelest, most mechanical way imaginable. And of course, this film helps us understand just exactly how cruel it was to people. So the 20th century really, you know, it doesn't end up very well as an enlightened period for the benefit of humanity. Even those moments where it seemed to be enlightened, I'm not sure you can say it was. Now, here we are in the 21st century, which is revealing itself. 2022, 2023. And we like to think that this country is enlightened and maybe for, you know, part of the time in the 70 years or so since World War II, it had been relatively speaking enlightened. But this is my question, Manfred. Is there any good reason why the 21st century can't turn into a disaster in the same way the 20th century did? Look, I had a colleague, Rudy Rommel, who published five studies on what he called democide. He didn't like the ethnic connotation for the mass killings that took place in the 20th century. And he, for that reason, used DMOS instead of SNOS. And he said in the 20th century, 160 million people were killed in non-war activities. So he did not include the war casualties. And when you're looking, when you're listening to American politicians, you know, talking about the situation today, it's as scary as it was in the 30s. I mean, the immigration issue, for example, the migration of millions of people will grow radically as a result of the ecological crisis. So what you have, you know, the Southern border in the United States, you have the borders of all developed countries in Europe as well as in Asia. So, but there is no general policy, you know, to deal with, you mainly with that. There is an avoidance of that.   You have the same in Hungary, you know, with Orban, you had the same thing in Poland. It's a xenophobic disease, you know, that is in Western countries spreading like the plague.  Let's forget the plague killed a good part of Europe. That's right. Again and again. And so I put this question to you now. So we have had the constitution, the rule of law, it's been, you know, at least theoretically quite remarkable over the history of this country. And it's been a, you know, it's a city on the hill, it's a leadership point, and our political system is in many ways admirable. But we are now at a point where not everybody believes in that political system and the social compact is therefore threatened. And so we may have a situation where the people who hold the offices in Congress and the Supreme Court know that don't believe in it anymore. And if they don't, you know, that changes things. Now a lot of people feel, Manfred, I'm sure this has happened before in history, a lot of people feel so what? So my life will be the same. So what? We don't have the rule of law. So I'll still go to work every day, I'll get my paycheck, I'll be able to buy a car, I'll be okay because it doesn't really affect me. And on the other hand, I say to myself, as a lawyer, you know, an observer, I say to myself, no, that can't be true because if you undo the rule of law, you are also undoing the rights of each individual citizen. And we take those rights for granted. We have for many years. And if we lose them soon enough, like riding a bicycle down the street of Amsterdam in 1940 or 41 or 42, you know, you may have to give your bicycle back. You may have, you may lose the rights. You've been so, you- But you have to remember, you know, when you're praising the American constitution, this American constitution included the enslavement of 18% of the people living in 1789 in the U.S. It didn't include Indians, they were excluded. So what you have here is a genocidal dimension of the constitution that otherwise you could say was really an extraordinary document compared with all other societies in the world. So when talking about the United States, when praising it, when always has, you know, to remind oneself also of these deficiencies that were there. I mean, the first time slavery was mentioned in a constitution was when it was abolished in the 13th Amendment. And so, you know, for that reason, I think talking critically about the American constitution, its achievement has to include these negative dimensions that become quite obvious, you know, in Ken Burns' documentary, which I think is an extraordinary documentary. You know, I did not expect him to do something like that because normally he is in the business of celebrating America, you know? And this is not an uncritical celebration of America. This is a very, very critical portrayal of the United States. And before the background of the sickening history of Nazi Germany and all of its the victims that it has been responsible for. So when I'm listening, you know, when I'm listening to Republican politicians speaking about critical race theory and what it really means, namely being anti-whites, then I'm getting sick, you know? Because that's not what it does. Then I taught classes that had politics of race that included a critical reading of American history and making kids understand that, you know, you cannot leave out these negative dimensions. You have to include them in your discussion of American, of the greatness of the constitutional framework of this republic. If you don't do that, you know, you are simply perpetuating something that is really responsible for some of the things, you know, that have and still are occurring in the United States.   So what you have there, you know, is there are fascist tendencies that float. And I think what is so remarkable about the Ken Burns documentary is that you can make the connections between these tendencies that were afloat, you know, in earlier parts of American history and have never been critically included in the self-understanding of American history. You know, this unwillingness to look in the mirror, I think it's not hypocrisy. I mean, it may be having this impact on people looking at the United States as hypocrisy, but it's a will to be not informed. Is it related to American exceptionalism? Yes, you know, I have some problems with that notion, American exceptionalism, but this exceptionalism has justified a lot of harm that people do not want to confront. You know, they don't want to talk about it. I mean, coming back to Pearl Harbor in this book, Inclusion, I think it's a remarkable book about Hawaii being exceptional in a way it dealt with a crisis that could have torn apart, you know, the state and the refusal to put 160,000 people of Japanese background into camps was an extraordinary achievement that has to be praised. But I think Kaufman, the author of the book, is wrong when he says it had an impact on the mainland. It hasn't because mainland Americans don't know Hawaii and they don't know this dimension of Hawaii, Hawaii history and Hawaii politics. And I don't know how one can make mainland Americans understand Hawaii as being exceptional because it has all the features, you know, that could make America great. And well, you know, you suggest that there's really two Americas, one America is moral and kind and caring and the other America is hatred and bigotry and immoral or amoral and there's a tension between those two forces in our political world, let's say, that is always at play. These two vectors fighting each other to prevail. And the question I put to you is, can you remember a time in the United States, I guess we have to accept the Civil War when those two forces were so aggressively in contention and further that it appeared that those who would like to bring the country down may very well prevail, even more likely than the ones Rachel Maddow talks about in 1940 and the ones that Ken Burns talked about in 1940. Well, I am slightly optimistic about the fact that this disaster will not happen in November and in 2024.  And I'm told, you know, to leave and I must say, you know, as a people, as a person with dual citizenship, you know, German and American, it would be maybe a good solution to go to Germany. But you see the German story is interesting, not only because I'm German, but because I think they have come to terms with their, the evil of their history.  I mean, the hesitation that in now present, Chancellor Scholz, the Social Democrat has always been delivering weapons to the Ukraine is informed by this historical knowledge, you know, he is against war. He does not want to not only start a war that may, you know, end in a nuclear expansion. No, he is somehow, he is tempered, you know, by the history of German history, by the knowledge of German history to not go as easily in the direction, you know, that he is urged to go by his colleagues in the other European countries. So in that sense, the German situation, is a very good illustration of what can positively happen if a society faces the evil of the macro criminality of its past. But you cannot make that, you know, you cannot make a decree that people have to do that. Most countries do not do that.  As you mentioned earlier though, Manfred, it took 20 years for Germany to actually address this. And for 20 years, as you said, they were silent. Yes, I grew up with this. That's a long time. And if you say that right now, we in this country have a pervasive level of ignorance, willful, even intentional ignorance, it would take a generation at least to correct that in the schools and among the population in terms of education. And so that's why, among other things, that's why this Ken Burns movie is so important because it talks truth to power. It talks truth to ignorance. Yes. Just as important. Remember the German story is different in one respect. Two, Germany got bombed twice in the 20th century back into sanity in World War I and in World War II. And these experiences are part of the German memory as well. You know, so in that regard, you know, and you could say the sanity that Germany, the science of the sanity, the political sanity that it shows today was that it became sane was as a result of Germany being after the war occupied by the four powers. Hundreds of thousands of troops were staying there, you know, from 1945 to 1990, when the unification took place. So Germany had the luxury to grow up and get out of that denial, the silence of denial because the forces that may have wanted to prevent this reckoning with the history to come to occur, they were contained by the occupiers, by the hundreds of thousands of American, British, French, and Russian troops. Germans could not take it out on each other. The same you could say happened in Japan, you know, but they were only the Americans. You could have gotten a civil war in Japan in after August 1945 easily, you know, there were a lot of people who were angry. So, you know, American politicians forgot this for example, when they moved into Iraq, Shiseki, you know, the local Japanese general who was asked in the Congress hearing, you know, how many troops do you think we should keep? And he said, well, 200,000 at least and he was laughed out of Congress. But that's what should have happened, you know, the Americans should have learned from the success in Germany and Japan that, you know, you cannot simply defeat the regime and then leave. If you want to be successful, well, I think the German stories and the Japanese to some extent also is the best lesson you can get, you know, don't leave. We don't have that. We don't have that. We have a disintegrating civil society, a disintegrating democracy and we don't have anybody to tell us that. And as a result, in my opinion, the accelerates the disintegration. But let me, we're almost out of time. We are out of time, Manfred. And I just want to ask you one question if you could address. And that is, so here we have this Ken Burns film and we have the Rachel Maddow podcast, both historical, both dealing with what happened in the 30s and the 40s and to some extent after that, immediately after the war in this country and so the historical study. And the funny thing is that comes now, it comes now. It comes at a time when our democracy is clearly under threat and disintegrating visibly. Is that, do you think that's a coincidence? Or is this something that was intended by both of them in order to teach us just as you say, we need to be taught? You mean both of when, what do you mean both? I mean, I don't know. Ken Burns episode and Rachel. Rachel Maddow's treatment of the history of fascism in the United States in the 30s and 40s. You know, I wondered, I mean, I did not expect Ken Burns documentary being what it really is an incredible achievement, intellectual achievement and being honest in a way that is absolutely remarkable. So one would have to ask him and I don't know whether that was intended, that was the motivation. It's possible, but you see what I find also interesting is how little has been written about the documentary. I haven't seen much. I haven't seen any editorial comments in the New York times or in other places in journals that may still come. But I have been waiting to see a public discussion about this documentary. I don't know why nobody talks about it. I mean, but you. But us, but think tech feel like we're ahead of the game on this and I agree with you. There hasn't been enough public discussion about this incredible documentary, but I'm happy that you and I can talk about it and other shows on think tech have talked about it and we're not finished with our conversation. So I hope you'll circle back with me and we'll have a further discussion about it. Manfred, it raises so many issues, so many critical issues. Yes, it is wonderful to have these conversations with you. Your openness is remarkable. Thank you, Manfred. Manfred Hennigson, a regular political science emeritus guest on think tech. We greatly appreciate your time and expertise in having these discussions. Aloha. Thank you so much for watching think tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn and donate to us at thinktechHawaii.com. Mahalo.