Eduardo Verastegui: Defending the Faith through Art

You understand what the Holy Father has said about the importance of parents as primary educators in the Domestic Church.

That's the most important thing; a lot of people work so hard to invest in their education at these universities outside of town, and they are going to send them to different cities and they are in a very different world. First of all, you sacrifice your life by not spending time with them, and now you send them somewhere else, far away from you, they are educated by people who could care less, they really don't care about them, and next thing you know you have an engineer, or a lawyer, who is strictly an atheist, who doesn't know who God is; that's why society is the way it is right now.

They like Hollywood because they think that Hollywood people are happy and they have peace, but no, it is the opposite. This is the capital of temptation where they have emptiness. So that's why I think if you give them true love at home they will know what is the right thing to do with their own dreams. Asking them "What are you going to do when you grow up?" I don't think this is the right question; it should be "What do you think God wants you to do when you grow up?" You start involving God in their lives since the beginning. You must realize that your own personal dreams can become your worst enemy. You need to start asking the right questions, challenging them, "What do you think God wants from you?" "Have you ever thought about what is the mission which God has created you for?" If you keep asking that instead of "what do you want to do?" how different everything would be.

That's beautiful; did your mother and dad do that with you?

No! (laughs)

But they prayed for you!

Well, maybe that's why it took me a little time to realize that.

I am Catholic, by the grace of God, because of them, but because my family was not practicing, our faith was not the center of our lives, not because we didn't want it to be, but we didn't know our faith well.

It was later on, when I talked to my English teacher here in Los Angeles, and through a series of friends, and a series of priests that I met, I finally realized that something was missing in my life, and what was missing was that I didn't know my faith well, and, after that I started to get to know my faith well, then, after that, I fell in love with it, and I put it in the center of my life, and all I do is part of my faith.

Do you have a support group there in Hollywood?

Yes, I have friends and a big group here, a lot of people who want to do acting, a lot of people who share the same values; it's important to have a community otherwise, it's really hard. We meet in different friends' houses for Bible study, for fellowship, to get to know our faith. We study the Catechism, encyclicals, apostolic letters, the lives of the saints and now, thanks be to God, my parents and my family, they are all transformed as well.

Thank you for sharing this, my readers will be excited to read this.

Thank you for the opportunity, we need to realize, as Mother Theresa says, "We are not called to be successful, we are called to be faithful to God." That is our real success, being faithful to God. Now, if by, being faithful to God, success comes, it's a blessing, but if it doesn't come, you can't compromise your faith, your values in order to obtain what the world thinks success is, because that doesn't come from God. Sooner or later you are going to be completely empty; you obtained that success by compromise.

At the end of the day, it's just about being faithful to God and that's the only way we can obtain true happiness and internal peace; we need to have that desire in our hearts. Every day we need to beg God to help us to be saints, what Blessed John Paul II said, "do not be afraid to be saints of the New Millennium"—that's the call, that's the vocation, that's the power we have. It's only possible to be a saint through the sacramental life; by the grace of God, through the sacraments, prayerful life, contemplative and meditative life, the life of service, this is going to help us to achieve our goal, which is to be a saint. The only way we can do that is by asking God to help us.

Thank for this beautiful testimony. Do you have a place where people can get in touch with you and attend your appearances?

No, right now, we're working on that, there's a lot of Facebooks out there that are not mine, that I don't have any control over; I don't even know what is there sometimes. I am working on a website that is going to be my official website, it will be Eduardo Verastegui.me.