Catholic Founders

Quick Announcements:

* Pray with us: the Novena to St. Homobonus. We go live on Substack around 6:30-7 AM CT.

* Next Guild topic call: Tuesday, Nov 10, 5-6 PM CT, on how to use holidays to transform culture (Guild members only).

* All in-person meetups, open to all Catholic business owners: luma.com/catholicfounders

* Partner Event: Catholic Founders is proud to co-host Faith & Founders. Join us tonight at the Catholic Information Center following 5:15 PM Mass to connect, collaborate, and build together!

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(1) Launch/grow your biz, (2) Learn the Theology of Entrepreneurship, (3) Discover Community, and (4) Transform Culture by making it Catholic. 200+ members and counting.

Join today for $100 a year or $10 a month.

Curious? --> “What is the Catholic Founders Guild?”

In This Post:

* Catholic Founders in one minute and Who it’s for

* The three pillars:

* Start & Grow,

* Educate,

* Convene

* The goal: Transform Culture (with practical ideas)

* What Catholic Founders is not

* How to get involved

* References

First time here? Learn more about our mission. And don’t forget to subscribe.

Why Catholic Founders Exists

People ask me all the time, “What exactly is Catholic Founders?”

Despite us starting out as simple curiosity around the question ‘what would Jesus do if He were the CEO of a company?” — it has grown into much more than that. We now have over 280 paid members, several cities host semi-regular meetups — a true community is forming.

After a lot of prayer and thought, and a huge assist from the Holy Spirit, I feel we have a really strong understanding of who we are and why we are doing this.

So, we’ve taken the time to boil this down. We can condense it (we do often) but this is an opportunity to hear the in-depth understanding of what we are.

In the same way a religious order would be reluctant to tell you their spirituality in an elevator pitch, we prefer to give you a holistic understanding of what we are up to and WHY we are doing this.

It is long, but watch or listen to it when you have time. Save it for later in case you have a friend who is wondering what Catholic Founders is all about in the future (or send it to the ones you think should be part of this movement).

Catholic Founders in One Minute: S-E-C-T

* S: Start and grow. We help Catholics start and grow their businesses.

* E: Educate. We learn the “theology of entrepreneurship” together: how the Church’s teaching gets applied in real businesses.

* C: Convene. We bring people together long and often enough to build real unity: a tribe.

* T: Transform culture. Through those three pillars, we transform the culture, in our case America, and make it Catholic.

Who It’s For

Two words: faithful and ambitious. People who know they’re called to heaven, and who have a switch they can’t turn off: big ideas and a drive to build things in the world.

* Founders, owners, and people buying or running a family business

* Beginners with only an idea, all the way up to people who’ve built multi-million dollar companies and want to mentor

* Mom-and-pop shops, consultancies, agencies, tech companies, and some nonprofits

* Not for the hustle culture bro who is chasing fame or money as the end goal. Our goal is Heaven.

Pillar 1: Start and Grow

The idea: God chose when you were born, to whom, and where. That “package” set the river you’re on. If it has led you to feel called to build, that desire is a good thing. Entrepreneurs are co-creators with God, made in His image (the image and likeness of THE CREATOR).

Why we are open to beginners:

* Permission to be ambitious. Ambition isn’t a dirty word. Be magnanimous, not pusillanimous (small-souled). St. Thérèse lived a “little life” greatly, and it changed the world.

* The first leap is the hardest. Seeing others take it, and having brothers in arms, makes it possible.

* No one is serving them. Because beginners may not be serious, and likely don’t have a lot of excess capital, no one else is really serving them. We know they need help so we’re here for them.

* A strong foundation. It’s easier to build in a Catholic way from day one rather than having to unlearn the bad habits.

How we grow together:

* A preferred economy, not a parallel one. Buy from Catholics when you can, ideally local ones. Keep the money in the community.

* Two or three key relationships: It only takes a few key relationships to accelerate an early business. We help make those intros.

* Invest in each other. Back people you know and have watched grow up. Build a ladder from beginners to those who’ve made it.

* Non-predatory capital. Raise and invest money with your brother in mind.

* Be aware of the environment. Many want Catholic ideas gone. Choose to actively support each other.

How we do it today: the Guild’s online network and directory, the group chat (our hive mind), the podcast, and curated masterminds of 5-8 founders at a similar stage. In the future: a curriculum for beginners.

Pillar 2: Educate

The idea: You can’t love God until you know Him. In the same way, you can’t run a rightly ordered business until you know what that looks like.

Most of us know some Catholic social teaching. What we rarely hear is how owners actually apply it: hiring, pay, benefits, layoffs, hard times, and staying out of legal trouble.

* Learned from people who live it. Guests’ stories become frameworks, published mostly in the Saintly CEO newsletter on Tuesday mornings.

* A group effort. We educate each other. Nobody, including me, has all the answers. This is a group effort of discovering these answers.

* It takes time. Some ideas only click after you’ve lived them, so we repeat things and cover them from different angles. We are humans on a journey, and we are here to be on that journey forever. This is the work of a lifetime.

* Not an official teaching. This is a grassroots effort. We consult priests and hope to bring on an official chaplain soon but, we do not carry some ecclesiastical seal of approval.

* Prerequisites. The sacraments, sound doctrine, and a real spiritual life are necessary if you want to succeed in this pursuit. That is not as much our focus to teach those things, although it does get brought up. Without these, you will not bear fruit.

How we do it today: the podcast, the Saintly CEO newsletter, local meetups, online Guild calls with experts, and retreats (coming soon).

Pillar 3: Convene

The idea: We were made for unity with God, and we practice it on earth through the Eucharist. One with God through the Eucharist and one with each other.

If you’re called to build, you’re like a steward in the parable of the talents. Stewards need other stewards. Without them, you either bury your talent (because of the pressure from those who do not understand) or spend your time with secular builders whose scoreboard is money.

* A tribe takes time and openness. Five minutes after Mass won’t do it. Instead, we convene people as often as we can. Weekly MASSterminds, monthly intellectual discussions, impromptu hangouts, dinners, 1:1 coffee, get our families to meet, and practice openness/vulnerability.

* Protection against the downside. Friends who ask why you need a third Porsche. Someone to call when the business is struggling, or when you need help with the mortgage. Isolation is how fear and greed creep in. The devil controls us in fear and isolation. When we have unity, it’s easier to be courageous.

* Multiplying the upside. Together we can do the non-consensus Catholic thing: family wages, marriage and baby bonuses (check with your lawyer), and fight or change bad laws as a group.

* Safety nets for big swings. “We’ll invest in you, and if it doesn’t work out, we’ll employ you.” Imagine how many young Catholics would take the leap.

This episode is also brought to you by Bonaventure Bookkeeping.

Most of us didn’t start a business to reconcile bank statements at midnight. But if your books are a mess, you’re flying blind. You don’t know if you can afford that first hire, where the money’s leaking, or how much to set aside for taxes.

Bonaventure takes the books off your plate. They tra…

Kathy and Patrick Terry bake a birthday cake for every one of their 1,800 employees, have lent them $900K+ interest-free, and walked away from a buyout so P. Terry's would never stop treating people like people.

Want to build a business like that? Become a paid member of the Catholic Founders Guild: join.catholicfounders.com

The Terrys opened a 527 sq ft burger stand in Austin in 2005. Today P. Terry's runs across Austin, San Antonio and Houston, and they're selling the company to an Employee Ownership Trust so the culture outlives them. Silas asks how they scaled without losing the human touch, and the question every founder eventually has to answer: how much is enough?

In this episode:

• Why they'd rather slow down than change how they treat employees

• Becoming the safety net: interest-free loans with about $5K in defaults

• Milton Friedman and how the employer-employee deal broke down

• Walking away from a buyout, then selling to an Employee Ownership Trust

• Keeping prices low while everyone else raises them

• Faith, humility and being public about your success

Core lesson: Know your people. That's where the joy is.

Guests:

Kathy Terry: linkedin.com/in/kathy-terry-atx

P. Terry's Burger Stand: pterrys.com

Sponsor:

Bonaventure Bookkeeping takes the books off your plate, with monthly reports you can actually understand. Get your Sunday nights back: bonabook.xyz or [email protected]

Chapters:

00:28 – Can 1,800 employees really be treated like family? “But of course.”

02:21 – Costco vs. Sam’s Club, and how you measure success

04:11 – The two-way deal between employer and employee

05:48 – How capitalism became extractive and transactional

09:22 – Milton Friedman and the shift to shareholder value

11:07 – Scaling a business that stays human

14:18 – Vin’s broken-down car and becoming the safety net for employees

16:58 – Giving Back Saturdays: a full day’s profits to local nonprofits

21:46 – Over $900K in interest-free employee loans, with only about $5K defaulted

23:15 – Why every employee gets a birthday cake

24:30 – Selling to an Employee Ownership Trust to lock in the culture

28:54 – Know your people: “that’s where all the joy is”

33:27 – “We didn’t set out to build a Catholic business”

41:27 – How to know when it’s time to take the leap of faith

45:33 – Walking away from the buyout offer

49:43 – Keeping prices low while everyone else raises theirs

52:04 – How much is enough?

54:54 – Advice for scaling: grow at a pace your culture can handle

56:57 – Closing and Rapid Fire

Join the Catholic Founders Guild ($10/month or $100/year): grow your business, learn the theology of entrepreneurship, and meet 270+ Catholic founders. join.catholicfounders.com

Newsletter: catholicfounders.com

YouTube: youtube.com/@CatholicFoundersPod

Meetups: luma.com/catholicfounders

Why are modern buildings so ugly? Architect Erik Bootsma explains the ideology behind it, why beauty is worth the cost, and why Catholics should build villages again.

Become a paid subscriber to Catholic Founders: https://join.catholicfounders.com

Erik Bootsma leads Erik Bootsma Architect in Richmond, Virginia, focusing on Catholic church architecture: new churches, liturgical renovations, monasteries, and work at Benedictine College. For 15+ years he's also been designing Catholic villages, neighborhoods built with the church at the center. We cover:

- The "spreadsheet brain" that can only see 10, 20, or 30 years ahead

- Why a cheap building is a burden on your grandchildren, not a gift- How to talk about money with the people paying for a building

- How business owners can help build real community

"A real community is one that lives and breathes all day, every day." — Erik Bootsma

This episode is sponsored by Bonaventure Bookkeeping: bookkeeping for business owners, handled with honesty and care. https://www.bonabook.xyzand Our Father Constructors & Associate, your partner for any construction project.

If you want to ensure your church, school, monastery (etc) project is done well, on budget (or under budget), and ultimately, that it serves the Church for generations — reach out to Cristian and his team. Go to OurFather.US to learn more. Tell them that we sent you!

Connect with Erik:

Website: https://bootsma.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erik-bootsma-161363286/

Find a Catholic Founders meetup near you: https://luma.com/catholicfounders

Chapters:

02:20 – Architects as “executives” rather than just “creatives”

03:55 – Discussion on architecture and why so many ugly modern buildings were built

07:40 – The true function and purpose of churches

11:11 – What constitutes a real, living community

11:20 – The concept and vision of Catholic villages

13:55 – Favorite project: The Rosary Walk in Gallup, New Mexico

16:20 – The spiritual aspect of volunteer labor and building

19:30 – Taking on projects that cannot be completed in a single lifetime

20:44 – Winston Churchill’s quote: “We shape our buildings and then they shape us”

27:24 – How the Church and modern society have fallen into “spreadsheet brain”

28:48 – Moving past 10–30 year ROI to embrace true generational thinking

30:40 – Building as a gift versus saddling future generations with a burden

33:17 – Working with clergy and the mindset shift in younger priests

43:17 – Using traditional building materials

54:01 – Advice for business owners on long-term community building and investments

56:50 – Closing and Rapid Fire

Episode references:Churchill, House of Commons, 1943: https://api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/commons/1943/oct/28/house-of-commons-rebuilding

St. Charles Borromeo on church building: https://www.sacredarchitecture.org/articles/charles_borromeo_and_catholic_tradition

The Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30): https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/25

St. Kateri Rosary Walk: https://bootsma.com/portfolio_page/st-kateri-rosary-walk/

Support the show and join the community. Become a paid subscriber: https://join.catholicfounders.com

Most software tools are built to capture your focus and trap your attention. In this episode, Garren DiPasquale (founder of Artifact) shares how he’s taking on dev incumbents like Replit by letting people build software with plain English specs.

Join the Catholic Founders Guild:

Ready to build, scale, and transform culture through business? Become a paid subscriber and join 250+ Catholic entrepreneurs today at 👉 join.catholicfounders.com

In This Episode:

Coding in English: Why natural language is becoming the primary interface for software creation.

Human-Centered Tech: Applying Catholic social teaching and papal encyclicals to product design.

Form Follows Function: Dieter Rams, the Bauhaus movement, and rejecting "AI slop."

Why Software Fails: How internal organizational silos manifest as bad user experiences.

Key References Mentioned:

Magnifica Humanitas, Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical

Dieter Rams’s Ten Principles of Good Design

Donald Knuth & Literate Programming

Daniel Jackson

Standout Quotes:

"Our mission really is centered around this question of what happens when you can code in English." — Garren DiPasquale

"Never expose your organizational silos... because that’s what you end up seeing in a lot of software—you’re actually experiencing the backend friction of the company." — Garren DiPasquale

Episode Sponsors & Partners:

Bonaventure Bookkeeping: Bring peace to your financial management with bookkeeping designed by entrepreneurs who care about your mission. Connect today: Bonaventure Bookkeeping

ParacleteVA: Hire vetted, mission-aligned Catholic remote talent from LatAm and the Philippines. Email [email protected] to get started.

Connect with Catholic Founders:

Become a Paid Subscriber: join.catholicfounders.com

Website: catholicfounders.com

In this crosspost of my guesting on the Prosper Podcast with Andreas Widmer and Rebecca Teti, we jam on some of my absolute favorite topics:

Business as a Divine Calling: Why we have to stop compartmentalizing our faith and our work, and how business can be a primary vehicle for holiness and personal growth.

Presence-Centric Leadership: Lessons from incredible Catholic CEOs (like Dr. Daniel Tatahe) on setting aside distractions, looking people in the eye, and treating employees and customers as irreplaceable human gifts.

Agency, Fear, and God's Providence: Why waiting in paralysis is more dangerous than taking a six-month burst of action, and how to embrace the momentum God has given you.

If you've ever felt that pull to build something meaningful and want a practical roadmap for walking out both your faith and entrepreneurship, this conversation is for you.

Ready to build together?

If you're ready to put these principles into action, come join us inside the Catholic Founders Guild!

We're building the biggest network of Catholic business owners in America, offering local chapter meetups across the country, monthly expert calls, an active community WhatsApp network, and a custom AI assistant trained on Catholic business insights.Membership is only $10/month or $100/year. Head over to join.catholicfounders.com to get plugged in.And don't forget to subscribe to my weekly newsletter, The Saintly CEO, for free spiritual and tactical advice every Monday at catholicfounders.com!

Listen on: Fio (Catholic Spotify) | Apple Podcasts | Spotify | YouTube

News / Updates:

* NEW! Real Estate Sub Group. We have just created a Real Estate Sub group inside of the Guild, for all folks involved in real estate. This is a great way for us to collaborate and build beautiful buildings again - to elevate the human soul. Consider this your sign to upgrade to paid!

* Stuck in a business challenge? Read the latest of the Saintly CEO: Grow Your Business Through The Primary Constraint Method

Join the Catholic Founders Guild Today

(1) Launch/grow your biz, (2) Learn the Theology of Entrepreneurship, (3) Discover Community, and (4) Transform Culture by making it Catholic. 200+ members and counting.

Join today for $100 a year or $10 a month.

Curious? --> “What is the Catholic Founders Guild?”

In Today’s Issue:

* Intro to the Guest and Topic

* Core Takeaway

* Episode References

* Select Quotes

* Key Moments

First time here? Learn more about our mission. And don’t forget to subscribe.

Today’s Topic & Guest:

Regina Bethencourt | Tenuto

In today’s episode we discuss, how to build a workplace where moms can thrive — the Catholic way.

To do this, we enlisted Regina Bethencourt, founder of Tenuto Consulting, a creative marketing agency for mission-driven organizations.

Regina started out in a traditional 9-to-5 PR firm. She watched a pregnant colleague get treated like her baby was a problem to hide, and she knew she could not raise her own children that way. So she left, started freelancing, and built the kind of work she wished existed.

Today Tenuto is a team of eight offering 10, 20, and 30-hour-a-week roles alongside full-time work. Clients still get an attentive, proactive agency. Inside, moms get to be present at home in the season when their children need them most — and still be ready as professionals when that season changes.

From there we go deeper: why women work differently than men, why matriarchs will be the ones to rebuild our neighborhoods, how a husband and wife run a family like a joint venture, and how to build a family brand and legacy your grandchildren will inherit.

Core Lesson:

“Build the work around the vocation, not the other way around.”

Most companies try to fix motherhood by forcing moms to work exactly like men — 40 hours, in an office, pretending nothing at home ever interrupts the day. That does not work, and it is breaking our communities.

Regina’s answer is not lower standards. It is better systems: shift coverage across the week, backups who stay up to speed on every client, and a team culture where everyone knows each other’s children and steps in with charity when life happens. Do that, and flexibility stops being a weakness. It becomes your unfair advantage.

And this is bigger than one agency. If women get work that leaves room for family, they get time back for the neighborhood — for other moms, for the parish, for the human connection we have all lost.

God Bless & Happy Building!

~Silas Mähner

Hire Catholic Overseas Talent

In LatAm and the Philippines, there are millions of Catholic remote workers (across all domains) who want to work for ethical bosses.

Often, they’re treated as second-class citizens or work for organizations that ask them to do questionable things. They reach out to us in search of a Catholic boss.

So, we started ParacleteVA (website coming soon).

With ParacleteVA, we’ll find you vetted, Catholic overseas talent who will help you move your business forward.

How it works: Pay a $500 finders fee when the candidate starts and $500 if you’re still happy with them after 30 days.

To get started, reach out to [email protected] with what you’re looking for, and we’ll get started.

Key Episode References:

* Patrick Lencioni

* St. Edith Stein

* Well-Read Mom

* 2 Timothy 1:7

Select Quotes:

* We need to honor the fact that a parent is bringing up children who are the next generation. ” — Regina Bethencourt

* “We want to redefine how you show up professionally. And it is perfectly professional, for example, to bring a bring an infant into a call who needs to just feel their their mother's body. That is normal, that is professional.”

— Regina Bethencourt

* “Women can work and have their hands in many different things if we had ways to embrace that part of who a woman is. There would be more time for community, more time for doing things in the neighborhood, building more human connection.” — Regina Bethencourt

* “If the husband and wife see what they are doing in raising their family as a joint venture, as like real business partners, and they say, Okay, this is your salary... That allows me to take risks.” — Regina Bethencourt

* “Creating a family brand... saying, the Bethencourts right? That’s us. We are hardwork. We never say no to a challenge. We... have these value statements that help children even from a very long age, know who they are. They belong to something and there are values there...” — Regina Bethencourt

Key Moments: (outline)

* (00:53) - The Origins of Tenuto

* (03:20) - What Tenuto Is: A creative agency for mission-driven organizations on the outside, flexible work on the inside.

* (04:53) - Vocation, Not Just a Choice: Raising children as a calling from God, not a personal lifestyle preference.

* (05:38) - Parenting as a Public Service: Making the common-good case for honoring mothers and fathers.

* (09:49) - Tenuto Today: In business since 2018, grown since 2022 to a team of eight, full-time and part-time.

* (10:34) - The Unfair Advantage: No recruitment problem and great retention when you offer what moms actually want.

* (11:45) - Running a Part-Time Team: Shift coverage, backups for every client, and planning for maternity leave on a small team.

* (15:28) - Using AI Without Outsourcing Your Thinking: Client knowledge in Claude Projects so anyone can step in.

* (20:18) - Redefining Professional: Why bringing an infant to a call can be normal and professional.

* (21:25) - Matriarchs and Community: Women as the glue of the family, the neighborhood, and the parish.

* (24:15) - Can Community Replace Daycare? Sharing childcare and support so moms do not have to do it all alone.

* (25:09) - The Nanny Share: Five Northern Virginia moms building community-based childcare together.

* (26:42) - The Hard Sacrifices: Losing status and accolades as a mom, and the loneliness of the early years.

* (29:56) - Geography Matters: Why your actual neighborhood, not just your parish or friend group, needs rebuilding.

* (31:32) - Where to Start: Well-Read Mom, mom groups, and older moms inviting younger moms out of the trenches.

* (34:01) - Marriage as a Joint Venture: Husband as the stable foundation in one season, wife in another.

* (36:36) - Legacy After Loss: What her husband’s family learned fleeing Venezuela and losing their social capital.

* (40:17) - Branding Your Family: Giving your children an identity and values to carry into adulthood.

* (41:49) - School as a Second Front: Choosing classical, Catholic, screen-free schools that back up what you teach at home.

* (46:55) - Against Hiding Away: Why we need strong Catholic families in places of power and influence.

* (50:24) - Stay or Go? Discerning where God is calling your family, without choosing complacency or comfort.

* (52:26) - Transform Where You Are: Invite the neighbor over and live the faith visibly.

* (53:08) - Rapid Fire: 2 Timothy 1:7, Patrick Lencioni, St. Edith Stein, and the daily Rosary.

Hire Catholic Overseas Talent

In LatAm and the Philippines, there are millions of Catholic remote workers (across all domains) who want to work for ethical bosses.

Often, they’re treated as second-class citizens or work for organizations that ask them to do questionable things. They reach out to us in search of a Catholic boss.

So, we started ParacleteVA (website coming soon).

With ParacleteVA, we’ll find you vetted, Catholic overseas talent who will help you move your business forward.

How it works: Pay a $500 finders fee when the candidate starts, and $500 if you’re still happy with them after 30 days.

To get started, reach out to [email protected] with what you’re looking for, and …