Hi, I'm Edwards Three, and welcome to all things Catholic where real faith meets real life.

What's the real reason behind the increase in loneliness, anxiety, and sadness in the modern world?

So many people experiencing so much stress and pressure, self-hatred and shame, especially

among the younger generation. There's almost an inability to cope with life.

Well last week at the Focus Seat conference we had an amazing, amazing event there in St. Louis.

But my senior James Shay, a good friend of mine who's the president of University of Mary

up in Bismarck, he gave a wonderful talk in which he addressed this question.

And in his keynote address he talked about how, you know, we can answer that question and say, well,

maybe it's because of our phones and devices and social media and the impact that has on the

brain or how young people today

are growing up in a very divided polarized world and maybe we need to have better

access to mental health services but then he paused and says but sometimes I just want to be able to give a different answer.

And he explained how maybe the anxiety that so many young people experience today is the appropriate response to growing up in a world without God,

and growing up in a secular age that has removed God from the modern age.

We grow up in a world where everything is permitted

and nothing is forgiven, he said. And he says anxiety and stress and sadness that would be an appropriate response when you grow

up in a world without God.

But then he turned to something even deeper.

When Senior Shay talked about how if there was a malicious person following you around who

hates you and is trying to destroy you.

Anxiety would be another appropriate response to that.

And yet that is exactly what's happening.

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