CLI DOC Michael Belz interview 1-9-2026.txt
English (US)

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Got it. I can do that. Okay. I am Michael Bell's the and spell it


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Bell's and my title. I'm currently the president emeritus of Catholic Life Insurance.


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All told


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the time that you started to. Now has there.


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Has there been one thing that sticks out as this is what my


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North Star would be as far as


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the world changing around you for the past 49? Well, how long were you the president? I was president for 40 years. I've been here 52 years. 1974 what? From 1974. And?


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More than one is fine, but what kind of what? What are the real signposts or or


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big things that happen that cause that either cause disruption or change or something that that really was a challenge for Catholic life. Not talking now forward, but up until now when you faced it, when you were, when you were running the organization, what were the big challenges you faced? Well, maybe before the challenge is the thing that my, my, my goal was to keep monsignor Gerlach or founder his dream intact, and his dream intact was to to have this common bond amongst membership and to remind ourselves that we are a member owned organization and as a fraternal, uh, means bond, fraternal bond, fraternal twins, whether it be brothers or sisters that were a little different than your normal insurance company, because back 1901 you just couldn't get insurance for certain segments of the population.

And he saw that and recognized that when he began passing the hat, when he went around with his horse and buggy in these little communities of Castroville and High Hill, and he did just that, he saw that there were people missing that were there two years ago or a year ago. And he asked, where were they at? And they said, well, they lost their form.

They, they there was a fire and nobody could step up to the plate. And he literally passed the hat. He passed the hat at each meeting. And he had what he did and realized was forming this grouping insurance together. So I've been reminded of that. And from the leaders that introduced me to Catholic life Insurance, the Monsignor Stubbins says, you don't forget where you came from.

You know, you can you may go in different directions, but don't forget where you came from. And that's always been my kind of golden sewer. To preserve Monsignor Gerlach, keep the bond, keep the organization. You're fraternal. You're not just another life insurance company out there, you know, talking about what where you came from.

The story of American immigrants is very deeply enmeshed in in in your story, too, in Catholic life story.


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Talk a little bit about the immigrant experience back then and the the priest who saw that these people are going to struggle to get insurance. Sure. I think, well, let's just be factual in 36. The organization was still a German organization. You spoke German. You needed to have a priest sign your application.

You needed to maybe find a priest with an agent just to sign the application. And not everybody spoke German. And I think the organization realized there was a change going on. The world was changing. And in 36, the organization you asked about change changed that you didn't have to be German. We recognized there's a lot of great people out there the Polish, the Hispanic, the Czechs, and the organization began to open its doors and said, we're still having this bond together.

We're still Catholic and we still are brothers and sisters, and let's keep it intact as such. And so that was probably the biggest change that happened to Catholic life when they opened the doors for folks. There have been other changes as well along the road, but that was the biggest back in the late 80s.

We had a big change. I'll never forget. We were all worried about going to the convention because we wanted to open up to non-Catholics. That was the deal. Oh my goodness. We're going to have a non-Catholic that's going to buy life insurance. And


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I'll never forget, Monsignor Schmidt was at the podium, and he was our spiritual advisor at the time. And the topic came up and you could see the crowd was getting a little anxious out there. And then he said in front of the group, he said, you know, my housekeeper is a good loosen lady, and she's been with me 27 years and God love her.

She has kept me on the path and straight and never missed a mass and never missed a meal. She took care of me, took care of the parish and it probably took all of about two minutes for somebody. One of the delegates out there stood up and said, I move that the organization be opened up, and you don't have to be Catholic to be a member of Catholic Life Insurance.

And here his lady that was taking care of him for 27 years, she was eligible. From that point on, to become a member of Catholic Life Insurance, I believe it was 89. It was the late 80s.


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I would have expected that to have come sooner. You know, it's the signs of time. Change sometimes takes takes time. An organization, though, that hasn't been to change in some circumstances. Yes, sir. Yeah, I think that's been, you know, I'd rather win the marathon in a short sprint. And I think that's Catholic life story.

Be open to change. But the key right now, that's why the new president of Catholic Life, and I'm proud of who it is, happens to be my son. Uh, he's his comment has always been let's be relevant for today. And to be relevant today means a lot, and we have to recognize that. Don't lose our traditions. Don't lose the past.

Don't lose the bonding. But let's just be factual of what we have. Speaking Spanish, putting all the literature in Spanish at Catholic Life Insurance. What a smart move. New president is totally fluent in Spanish and Portuguese. That's the future. That's a change. But it's a good change. You, I guess, starting in 74, oversaw


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the transformation of Catholic life from typewriters and Xerox machines to, you know, modern computers that we use in laptops and the internet and everything. Yes, sir. That's it. What was that journey? A tough one,


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facing any business. Or is that particularly tough because of the culture of Catholic life? I think it was a it's an interesting question because I think people are looking for guidance. And they're looking, but sometimes they just don't know where to look. They're looking for that leadership. And and if you surround yourself with good ideas and surround yourself with good people, you know, good things happen.

And that's what happened. Then we were able to look at other leaders in the insurance industry, both fraternal. Both commercial, both mutual. And find out what's working out there. Let's look over maybe in some other tents and find out. Don't change our values. Don't change what Catholic life's all about.

And that's what was an eye opener for me. I'd go to meetings and I'd say, wow, this is cool. You don't have to retype something and do it when there's this new computer out there that all you need is make some corrections and you can. Speed was the name of the game. I guess that's what introduced me to to to, to.

The biggest change in the insurance industry is speed. It has to happen and it has to happen now. And that's the hardest thing for an old organization to change to is because you're going to ruffle some feathers along the way. But if you show them what are the riches and what you're going to gain out of it, it makes the changes a lot easier.


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I have a question regarding the change. I want you to kind of expound on a little bit about because you're a fraternal, you can't just change it on a whim. You have to go through bylaws. You have you had there's a there's a governance that has to be adhered to. Can you kind of talk about how that's a good and a bad thing and maybe a good and sometimes a challenging thing is to have that.

The fraternal protects who we are. But at the same time, if we have to go through maybe a few extra steps, then a point. I think the hardest thing would change is and this is something for me to overcome, that I would eat and live it all day and then go home at night and live it. And I could see it. It was right in front of me.

And I said, well, this is so obvious to everyone, surely this will pass. Then I realized the real world is we need to sell that story. We need to tell the story. And if I don't tell the story or whomever is trying to make this change, somebody else will tell the story and they'll tell it the way they want to tell it.

And I think the success in our changes, the Catholic life, have been let's. What's the industry doing? Well, not that we have to jump over the cliff if everyone else is jumping over the cliff. But what's working? What's relevant today? But let's paint the picture. Let's show folks this is what we want to do.

This is why we want to do it. And this is the end result of where we're headed. And so change really can be good. It just needs to be laid out. It has to be forthright. You have to be transparent and no surprises. That's always been my name of the game. Even with the board of directors in my career at Catholic Life Insurance, there's no surprises.

This is what you have. This is what you see. We ask everybody how they get started with Catholic life out, you know, how did you how did you start? I, I started in 1974. I was a student at Saint Mary's University. Uh, currently covered. You didn't have a policy? No, sir, I didn't. I'd never heard of Catholic life insurance.

I not like a lot of the great members that you probably interviewed or talked to. They've got a grandfather or somebody, an uncle or an aunt. Somebody introduced me to. I wasn't introduced to Catholic life insurance by a life insurance policy. I was introduced by my Fortran COBOL teacher at Saint Mary's University, and I'm sitting in the class.

I'd have a couple classes with him. His name was Tom Trillian, and I just was dating my now wife of 50 years, Esther, and I needed a job. Frankly, I'd played baseball at the university, and. But I needed some money. And I asked him after a class one day, I said, Mr. Trillion, could you tell me any advice I need to get a job?

And he said, you know what? There's a company looking for a marketing person, and it's named Catholic Life Insurance. And I said, Catholic life insurance. I said, like, life insurance, Catholic life insurance. He said, yes, Catholic. Well, I had gone to a Catholic grade school. I'd gone to a Catholic high school.

I went to Catholic University. I said, well, maybe I've already qualified for the job, right? It was the editor of the yearbook in high school, but I was a Fortran COBOL guy. I thought I was a computer career. And I said, But Mr. Trewin, I'm taking your cobalt classes, and this sounds like a marketing position.

He says, you're no computer guy. So I knew right then I said, well, he's giving me good guidance. So he gave me the name of the individual to talk to. They were off of West Woodlawn in San Antonio, a small little office building, and I called and asked for an interview. Got the interview and met with some folks and and the rest is history.

I began doing their brochures. I did their marketing. I sponsored their first trip to Rome. I figured a Catholic organization. How great is that? Let's get the bishop and everybody involved. Let's go to Rome. And it just began to climb and I went to various positions at Catholic Life.


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It sounds like you somebody might lump all that under sales, that you are a great salesperson and a great storyteller. To send somebody to the Vatican is telling a story and to to talk about that. I mean, that seems like rather than being a Fortran genius. You're a sales genius. Am I getting that right? Well, I don't know about genius, but I know that they no longer use Fortran, and COBOL is going out the window.

So I'm glad I took that track in marketing. And and I've always considered myself to favor the marketing side because like our agents, I always tell the agents there are storytellers. They're our first introduction to Catholic life. So we want them to know the story of Catholic life. And that's what I tried to do when I started A Catholic Life is to take what I saw.

They had a great organization. It was an older organization then and old brochures, and they needed some, you know, refreshing. And so we did just that, and I brought out my old yearbook hat and said, well, we can I can do this. And it began the story. When did you first think about the idea of your son following in your footsteps?


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You know, I can't say that I thought of that. I think I think Christopher thought of that because


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Obviously, I'm very proud of him. I'm proud of my other son and my daughter, but I really want them. We've really brought them up to be extremely independent, and he had a great background, a financial background, and he came to me one day and said, you know what? I I'm listening to what you're looking for and the board is looking for in the future leadership of Catholic Life Insurance.

And I'm just listening. And he says, and I speak Spanish and and you don't. And, you know, I traveled a lot and you haven't necessarily done that. I've got a complete financial background, and I did. I was an economics major, and he did. And I started thinking, and he's kind of checking a lot of boxes right then.

And I said, well, you know what? You probably need to talk to the headhunter because we went through a system and go through protocol. And and that's exactly what he did. And I've seen I've seen this young man grow, and he has the love. He was brought up at Catholic life. He he went to all these branch meetings that you heard about.

You know, as a small child, he started as a child. I didn't start until I was in college, and I started as an employee. He started as a member when he was a baby at Catholic Life. So he technically he's been a member about as long as I have. And it sounds like you really do have different, different skill sets.

I'm sure there's a lot of overlap. Yes, sir. Different skill sets. Monty? Yes, Monty? Okay. Yeah. Monty I


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absolutely, absolutely I consider myself a financial background as well with my major, but Chris definitely has that. Plus he has the additional attributes. And I think that's really coming strong for Catholic Life Insurance. And more importantly, he's a good listener. And in this job you have to be a good listener.

You need to you surround yourself with good people. Good things happen. You've got to kind of look back every so often and make sure there's people with you and you're not just ahead of the pack. And I think, Christopher, I know Christopher does that. Well. We saw that today in a bylaw meeting. We we had a meeting with past chairs and past people that have been involved in Catholic life.

And Chris laid out, this is this is what the industry is doing. This is where I think we should be. This is relevant. This is why this is the picture he's telling the story. And thus, you know, we had a good bylaw meeting, frankly, and we're ready for the convention in July to make the presentation. Still some nips and tucks, but we'll be ready to present it to our delegates.

And which is different because you need the delegates. Member owned preserving Monsignor Monsignor Gerlach dream that the members get to make that decision. The delegates. I do want to ask this question. I have no idea whether it will be of use or not, but I do want to ask for both you and Chris aware that there would be the thought, oh, the sun's going to take the job now.

I mean, did you ever feel like this is going to be a little bit difficult for the employees to see the son following the father, or did you think of that maybe as an advantage? No, I think you're absolutely correct. I think I was concerned more of of the on site. What what does it appear? Is this a that you're passing it on?

Because this is not a I don't own Catholic life insurance. You know, it'd be a whole different situation if this were a a family owned organization. It's not. It's a member owned organization. That's why it was up to Chris to to make his own statements in front of the the appointment and review committee and the search committee and to do his own thing.

And I stepped back, frankly, and it was up to him to sell the sizzle if he was the right person, because I would never want to position my son in the wrong position. And and it was him positioning himself and pretty much convincing me as well that, you know, he can do this because there is some pride in legacy here that, you know, after spending 50 years at the same place, you want to make sure whomever the next person is coming in, that they have the same attributes, the same love for this organization, in the same trust in the faith.

And I absolutely believe that in my son.


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Can you talk to us a little bit? I'm going to switch gears here a little bit about Casa de the Padres. Casa Cassidy padres


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the story of how coastal padres came about. Uh, you know, I think what what has been the byproduct of me being Catholic life insurance, the president it's been obviously, I've been very honored and privileged and I, I don't know who to thank other than the man upstairs for the opportunity and Mr. Tyrolean to say, why don't you go answer this ad?

Because they're looking for a marketing person and to go through all those positions, because I did, I went through everything, I, I picked up the trash, I worked in the mailroom, you name it, I did it during my career, but I wanted to make sure that it was relevant for me. Am I getting something out of this?

I'm an only child, so I never had any brothers or sisters. And I've always looked at Catholic life as my extended family. I genuinely enjoy being around the people of Catholic Life Insurance. I genuinely enjoy going to these branch meetings, hearing their stories, what you've heard and why they became members.

It's an extended family for me, okay? And I'm in San Antonio and my family was in Saint Louis area, so I was the only person here in Texas. And so it was. I was looking for family as well, and I found it, but I also found an avenue in an organization that could make a difference. And that's what Catholic Life has done.

And I could name numerous, numerous projects that Catholic Life did over 50 years, everything from raising the largest flag in Texas to the sculpture that's out there right now with Moses. But Casa de Padres was a special one. That was one that was special, and that was from Archbishop Flores. And Archbishop Flores had mentioned that he needed he wanted to do something for the retired priests, because these gentlemen are 75 years old and they're retiring.

And their parents at the time, a lot of them were Irishman and were from Ireland. Their parents are dead. They have no place to go. And then he told me a story about a priest that was at an apartment complex in North San Antonio. And he died on a Friday, and they didn't find him until Sunday. And he's in an apartment complex.

Nobody knew anything about the fellow, okay? And I said, wow. I mean, these gentlemen deserve to be treated with dignity. And he says, I know I'd like to start a retirement center. And so I got really excited about that. And I respect the elders. My grandfather lived with us when I was growing up. I played pool with him every night.

Johnny Carson at 1030, and we'd play for an hour, and when it'd be over with, he would beat me. And till I got to be about a junior in high school. Then I took him on, but we used to watch it and talk. So I have a special place for an older person in respect, and that's where the the game began. And so I was asked to get involved.

I guess I kind of asked myself, I asked him if I could because there's another event that happened at the same time, a very dear man close to me, Monsignor Jenks, who was here 27 years as our spiritual advisor, and he had passed away in comfort, Texas, in his house, and nobody found him for a couple of days either.

Pretty sad. And he had done so much for so many communities all over the state of Texas. And he was a friend. He's a friend of myself and Herr von Steuben. And a gentleman by the name of Father Lopez. So that's when I said the stars are lining up. I believe in fate. And I said, I need to be there. I need to be there to raise the money for this place.

That was the absolute easiest campaign that we've ever raised money for, is to raise it for these gentlemen. And it's over at Casa de potties off I-10, Bernie Stage Road right now. And it's been nothing but a positive thing. You talk about surrounding yourself with good people. Good things happened out there and we never had to beg anyone.

People gave us money. We we built that place. We had builders. Thanks to Art Burdick and his, uh, custom home building. He lent us his superintendent. This gentleman lent it his superintendent of electrical and plumbing. It all came together. It was lined up. And it is truly a success story out at Casa de Padres right now.

That's been 30 something years ago


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about bringing helping sponsor. When the Pope came to visit the Pope in 1987, I believe it was the year the Pope came here. That was a, uh, another event that, uh, Monsignor Steuben, his name is all over the footprints and of Catholic life insurance. I was asked to do a do the initial fundraiser. So we raised the first $2 million to get the funds established.

We did everything from luncheons here to call outs to speaking at engagements at different parishes. And again, that was an easy fundraiser. In fact, the fundraising I've been on, I've I've really liked it. I like to raise money for a good cause and a cause that I can understand and tell the story. And I think, and Catholic life's been there because it was Catholic life that gave me the opportunity to do that, because I did it.

Let's face it, we did it in the name of Catholic life Insurance. And Catholic life also was a major donor in all these events in the Casa de Padres, and also a donor to the papal visit, which the membership wants. They want to see where their money's going. That's what's so great about the organization. We're not sending it to the IRS.

We're sending it to the communities of Catholic Life Insurance. Tell me the value of having the largest American flag in that?


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Well, there's a yeah, there's a story with that. I'm coming on a trip in a plane from a fellow, and he was a veteran, and he's, uh, we're talking about, uh, different things going on in the world. And at the time, the Pledge of Allegiance was being challenged. Uh, and with the words under God. Okay. And, uh, Catholic life, Knights of Columbus, a couple other fraternal was very instrumental in 1954 keeping the words under God in the Pledge of Allegiance.

And I was always pretty intrigued by that. And then when he asked me, he says, well, of course, you sound like an astute businessman. He was giving me more credit than I deserve. And, uh, but I'm on a plane and I'm sitting next to him. We got a couple hours of flight, and he said, of course you've got a flag in front of your building, don't you?


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And I couldn't remember. I knew we had a flagpole, but I hadn't seen it in a while. So we landed in San Antonio International. I got in my car, I drove over here. It's late at night, and I saw that we did have a flagpole, but it was in the middle of a tree, and we hadn't raised a flag there in some time. And I was just really upset with myself because I, I didn't have the answer for this gentleman.

And I talked to our building manager that next day or two days later, it was the weekend. And he said, well, Mike, we we can't raise a flight because of the tree. And I said, well, move the flagpole. And I said, well, well, okay. And I said, and put a big flag up there and real big flag, you know, then I started having a guilt trip, you know.

And so a long story short is we not only put a big flag, we did a flag on a 100 plus foot pole and it was 30 by 60, I believe, in the largest flag. And we had a huge ceremony. And since then, Christopher, I'm proud to say, continues that tradition with a Flag Day celebration every year on June 14th. Girl Scouts, boy Scouts, free hamburgers, free hot dogs, t shirts, the whole nine yards, and something else I'm really proud of.

This year at Christmas, I had my eight grandchildren together with my children. There was 16 of us and my daughter gave me a present, and it was a quilt and had every shirt that we've done all these years of the flag preparation items. So I have every year's flag shirt and made into this beautiful quilt. It is so cool.

So don't ask me what I'm going to do with it. But anyway, it's so cool when I opened it up, but it's it's huge. Yeah. So it's the facade or the face of every t shirt. I mean, that's very cool. Yeah. It's cool. What do you do now? Well, I'm retired. I've been retired for two years. Uh, I am, I'm I'm a active grandparent, I am Papa, I take my son grandson to speech class.

I take it on to basketball. Uh, I try to get as involved as I can. I traveled a lot with my children, kind of making up for some of that lost time with my kids to my grant through my grandchildren. And I'm I'm on a couple of committees here at Catholic Life Insurance, so I still am able to come over and and put in my history.

I call myself the the fossil of Catholic Life and just give them a little bit of 52 years of history. Well, give me an example, though, of what a fossil give me. When you give your $0.02 now as president emeritus rather than president, and you give your $0.02,


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what are you saying? Well, I don't ever try to to change the direction that Chris and his team are doing because they're they're ahead of the game. They're they're living it every day. There are that eight, 10 to 12 hour person, okay? Not a person on the side, but I feel that I can give them some history of the reason that we may have done something at the time.

Why did we do this? Well, this is at the time. This is the conditions. This is why we placed that position. We may have signed that contract, what we did, and I think that helps just to give them context of exactly why we are at it. But never to say you should do this now, I've I'm not. I'm backed off. We have a very good leadership team here right now and Chris has surrounded himself by good people.

Is there something that Chris needs to get better at? I know we won't tell him. Yeah. No, I, I see Chris back there right now. Hey, Chris. Um, I, I just is I can't I can't answer that right now. I'm not there eight 16 hours I think Chris is a is a good listener. I've always told him just hear what the team wants, what's the team want and what's the industry doing and what can we do at Catholic Life Insurance?


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Is there one person I'm going to ask you? The same question I ask is there a do you have a mantra? Is there somebody in your life that just really


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made it made a huge impact in you, in who you became and what helped you lead and what helped you bring Catholic life to where it was and when you handed it off? Is there is there is there a principle you live by a quote or something like Well, my dad was, uh, he died in 87, very unexpectedly, and he was by far my best friend.

I used to look forward to that Sunday afternoon phone call. It was only 20 minutes because it's expensive to talk in 1984. They charge you per minute on the phone. And so I took advantage of that. Every ounce of that, that time and, and, uh, I he'd always remind me I'd talk about wanting to do different things.

And he says, you remember how you eat an elephant, Mike and I would always say, how do you. An elephant? He said, you eat it one bite at a time. You said, you know, you you where's your goals? You know, and where are your steps? How are you going to get there and celebrate your victories along the way? Because if you don't, you you have some failures immediately and think that you're going to lose the whole cause.

Sometimes you got to stumble a lot to get there. So I would I would say my dad, he was always there for me. Very encouraging. Uh, even him.


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Yeah. That's bad. Amen. Yeah.


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Should we just. Should we just wait? He's walking away. Okay. Very good bye. No, no, no, that's fine, that's fine.


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Can't use it. Yeah. Yeah. We're in Saint Louis. Uh, east Saint Louis. Oh, East east. Saint Louis, Illinois. Uh, it's on the Illinois side. Right across. I'm so familiar. Are you really okay? I Quincy, my my my uncle was the principal of Quincy of Griffin High School. Griffin High School is a Catholic high school in Quincy.

And he's also the Saint Louis Cardinals scout. And so that was his he is a real inspiration for me for baseball. But anyway. But my dad was a big hero in my life. Kind of, uh, the similarities. I think I'm roughly your age. Yeah. Uh, do you know just he's passed away? Yes I do. He he's my father in law. Wow. He I grew up in.

Like I said, in the Midwest, I moved down here. I married his daughter who went to Providence. Yeah, her brother went to Saint Louis. Yeah, yeah. What a small world. What a small world. No, I'm a midwest guy, and I, I when I came down here, I. Yeah, yeah, I, I always thought I would go back to Saint Louis. My home was to go back.

And then. Then I met this lovely place, and I just. There was no question. I mean, I had found home and East Saint Louis had gone through some tough times, too. So, you know, it was there weren't too many job openings in in East Saint Louis in the 70s. And I came here in 71 I am now. And if we could pick up that answer with a phone, calls were expensive.

I look forward to talking to my dad for 20 minutes every Sunday. That's kind of like a leaf blower. I'm sorry, I didn't. I didn't hear you. Okay, what what Mike said was, can you pick your answer back up from from. Can you just give us that whole answer again about your dad and the phone call being very expensive.

I only had 20 minutes. Yeah, but it comes from CCS. Question about is there a mantra? Yeah. There you go. There you go. Sure. Um, so I think my dad, I, I was my I have a lot of champions out there. I have a few heroes, but a lot of champions that I really look at and to emulate them. But one of the heroes is, is my dad and I just we used to have that Sunday phone call for 20 minutes and he'd, you know, remind me you got 20 minutes because it's expensive.

They're charging us per minute on this phone call. And he was a pretty straight shooter fellow. He and Archie Bunker. Okay. And but I we used to take advantage of 20 minutes. And I used to look forward to that 20 minutes. And unfortunately, I became president 84. The unfortunate part is he died in 87. So they only got to see me as president of the organization in three years.

But I had so many things to tell him of, things I wanted to do. And about this Catholic life insurance Company. And he said to remember, remind me of how do you deal elephant? And I said, how do you get an elephant? And he said, you need an elephant, one bite at a time. He said, you know, you got to celebrate these small victories along the way.

Let other people celebrate those victories with you so they see what it feels like to have a victory. And they see the end game. Wow, this is where we're headed. This is what we're about to do. So I learned a lot about that from him. I also learned a lot about people making mistakes in my life and I, and in coming from the town that I did in East Saint Louis.

And it had its challenges and another motto that I lived by, in fact, I put in my yearbook, I was the editor and it said, today is the first day of the rest of your life. There's plenty of time to make some changes, whether you're 20, 60, or 80. And that meant a lot to me, and I remember that a lot. So I would say him, there have been a lot of heroes or excuse me, champions along the way, priests that I've met through Catholic Life Insurance.

And man, I would be remiss if I mention 1 or 2 along the way. But. But if I had one beacon that stands out, it would be my father.


00:31:32.720 — 00:31:45.400
One you. So you got here in 74 and were the names president in 84. So in that ten year period where you get everything. Yes. Taking out the trash to designing brochures and everything.


00:31:46.600 — 00:33:59.170
When you see people today doing that same thing, you know, where you really what's the value of saying, I've been there, I've done what you've done. I've, I mean to to have passed through it rather than somebody who just comes in. Having never worked here before you came up, what kind of advantages? Well, I think it's everything happened so fast now in, in in the newer employee, they want it now.

You know, the kids want their home now. They want to have the immediate gratification. And the sensationalism has been lost in, in social media with just, you know, make it shocking. Everything is shocking. And I like to take the attitude. Let's take a deep breath. You know, this is all wonderful, but this may pass.

And as such, let's take it one step at a time. You're in such a great position. You're learning whether it be a clerk, whether it be someone on the phone. To think the richness that you're learning right now, you're learning the fundamentals of how what makes this company work. I said, you know, that's how I did it, frankly.

You know, people say, well, I want to do that. I want to become the president of insurance company. Well, you just don't wake up one day and say you're going to be president. Insurance company. When I was at Saint Mary's University, that is the last thing I thought I would do is be president of an insurance company.

But then as I got involved in it and began to eat and live and drink and sleep it, I realized, you know, this is pretty cool. We can make a difference and a fraternal, no doubt that we're not answering to Wall Street. We're doing it amongst our friends, our members, our family. We're all sharing in it, and we're member owned.

It just doesn't get any better. So I'm I'm very encouraging to a younger person or an older person that starts a second career and then the organization. The sky is the limit. It just depends. And you Set your own boundaries. And I've told my children that. Let me ask you, do you say we don't answer to Wall Street?

Is that a message for a young audience today? Looking. You know. Assume they're convinced they need to buy insurance. Is that a good pitch to say? We don't answer to Wall Street. Has that always been kind of a out there? We look at, you know, we we are looking out for ourselves. We are we don't have an external, uh, blessing from anyone.

I didn't mean to use the word blessing. That's not the right word.


00:34:00.810 — 00:35:32.060
No, but you don't answer to Wall Street. Go into that a little bit more. I mean, that, to me, is the essence. One of the essences is. Yeah. And not to pull other people's cliches, you know, Main Street, not Wall Street, but but but but we are Main Street. This is it. This is it. Now, the beauty that I think a any person young, old and different, they want to have regulations.

They want to know they're buying something that's governed and it's structured, but they also want to know what the reward is at the end and think about it. We're selling a promise. We're selling $100,000 life insurance policy, and that odds are that everybody that's sold is going to be dead, and that somebody out there is going to pay it in 40 years, 30 years, 60 years, whatever the number may be.

We're selling trust and we're selling a promise. So if we can show that promise and show the integrity and show the individual that this is what we're doing with your money, and the profits of the money are going right back to the community and the things that you want and you live for. It just doesn't get any better.

It's not going to Washington, D.C., it's not going to Wall Street. So that's our pitch and our sale. Not that they're doing the wrong thing on the other side, but we're a different breed than a commercial insurance carrier. I just not knowing what the difference was back in college and knowing what the difference is today, I don't see why everyone just doesn't buy from a fraternal insurance carrier, and why they're buying from a commercial carrier, that the profits are going someplace.

They have no idea where it's going, and they have no idea where their values are. They have no idea where this is all at. They know where it's at here because they're part of it. They can get as active as they want.


00:35:33.660 — 00:36:06.219
What's the relationship between. And you may not use this, but this is my personal curiosity. What's the difference? Or what's the relationship between Catholic life and the Texas State Board of Insurance? Oh, well, a it's a great relationship. B it's the it's a governing structure. It assures policy holders, we call them certificate holders.

Commercial carriers call them policyholders. Same thing. But it assures them that we're under the same governing rules under reserves, and we're making sure that we're following all the proper steps on the financial side


00:36:07.220 — 00:36:30.660
of the state. We follow the we have independent audits every year. We have exams every year we go, if anything, we go an extra step as a fraternal because then we're telling our membership what we're doing as well. I wanted to because you had said when I said I thought it was a good pitch. About Wall Street.

You said, well, people want to know it's regulated. Yes, sir. So I want to get I want to get at that. Absolutely.


00:36:31.820 — 00:36:39.500
But is there anything else you want to say that we haven't asked you? About what? Is there anything else you'd like to say that we haven't asked you about?


00:36:40.780 — 00:37:34.909
You know, uh, you know, I've got 52 years of a bundle here, you know? So, yeah, I'm very happy. I'm flattered to be celebrating. I'll tell you the 125th. I mean, I believe in stars in the lineup. It's 125th anniversary of this organization. We're one of the oldest continually running operations in the city of San Antonio in the state of Texas.

A lot of these companies have merged and purged, and they call them this and call them that. And they're part of another organization in the country's 250 years old. What a what a story, 250 year old company country in 125 year old continuous running operation that has the same values, that has not changed and began with immigrants.

You know that to me isn't anybody. Yeah. And it's that's why if you when we had this the angels unawares, we had a statue out in front of this property. And I'm sure you've seen it through some of the


00:37:36.390 — 00:37:48.710
pictures and things you've looked at. If not, I would encourage you to. It was an artist by the name of a sculptor by the name of Timothy Schmaltz, and he was commissioned to to put out this piece. And and


00:37:49.990 — 00:38:43.229
he wanted to it was traveling throughout the United States and it was a bronze. It was weighed X amount of tons, and we authorized it to be here. We the Board of Catholic Life Insurance. And it said on this berm out here, and it was I want to say it was eight tons. I'm not sure the weight of it. It was 20 plus feet long.

It was a showstopper for people in front of this building. And what it was was immigrants. It was immigrants from the time, signs of time, from the very beginning, saying that we're all on this boat together And what a story that it sold about Catholic Life Insurance that was built on immigrants. And and that's to me, that was probably the best piece that's ever happened to Catholic life Insurance.

And that piece right now, by the way, it traveled throughout the United States. It stopped like 12 times. And right now is at the in Washington, D.C., and it's a at the Catholic, uh, college up there. Catherine


00:38:44.310 — 00:40:14.200
Catholic University. Yes. It sits in a prominent spot of Catholic University. And it's, uh. And I'm really flattered. I was asked to speak at that event, and I did, and it was we had a crowd there. We had the bishops there, we had the cardinal there. And it was just a whole discussion about openness. And and I'm thinking, wow, that's Catholic life.

That story to the immigrants when the Germans couldn't get insurance, and the poles and the Czechs and the Mexicans, you know, saying that's what this company has been built on. Well, I think I, you know, going going I mean, the idea that a conversion from one language to another or the inclusion of a second language, which is English, in this case.

English not the first language, but the second, right? For that to be a major milestone for a company is a real interesting. You know, you don't see that you asked a challenge that I had. One was in I started a cattle life as president 84. We had a death claim come through, and it was all in German because all of our documentation was in German.

And I'm looking at it going like, oh, okay. And it was an onion skin paper, okay. And we ended up changing all our we ran it through and did a conversion. My daughter speaks German. She spent time in Germany and here we are. What's it say. And we we had a staff person at the time. We had a couple of people on staff that spoke German at Catholic.

I thought that was pretty cool. So you have you have a son that speaks Spanish and Portuguese? Yes. Your daughter that speaks German and German and obviously English. And then I have another son that speaks Spanish is all my kids. My wife has been very instrumental in making sure that we all spoke Spanish.

You know, I'm the slowest of the group, so.


00:40:17.320 — 00:40:17.840
I'm happy.