Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E176: Obedience, Boundaries and Trust in Spiritual Direction w/Fr Boniface

Transcript

E176: Obedience, Boundaries and Trust in Spiritual Direction w/Fr Boniface · The Lila Rose Show

• 0:00
  What is spiritual direction? Spiritual direction is what
• 0:03
  ChatGPT cannot be. It's a relationship.
• 0:06
  Do you have any kind of obedience to that spiritual
• 0:09
  director? When you have external authority
• 0:12
  and you're in the area of conscience, that's how you form
• 0:14
  a cult. We don't like that.
• 0:16
  In the beginning God said it is good, it is good, it is good, it
• 0:20
  is very good. The first time he said it is not
• 0:22
  good is for man to be alone. Father Boniface Hicks, thanks
• 0:28
  for joining the podcast. It's great to be with you, Lila
• 0:30
  Rose. I feel that I know you, even
• 0:32
  though I don't really know you feel the.
• 0:34
  Same way. Because in part, Christina
• 0:37
  Whelan, now she's married, Yes, But one of my dearest friends
• 0:41
  who you have accompanied for, I don't know.
• 0:43
  It's been 20. Years first directe.
• 0:45
  She was your first directe? No way.
• 0:48
  Yeah, yeah, 20. Yeah, more than 20 years.
• 0:51
  Wow, did she still call you? We just talked a week ago.
• 0:56
  Amazing. It is amazing.
• 0:59
  So this is a topic we haven't explored yet on the show in
• 1:02
  depth, and I'm really excited that you're going to do this
• 1:05
  with us. Spiritual direction.
• 1:07
  Great. What it is, why it's needed, all
• 1:09
  the things but would love to hear first.
• 1:12
  Your background, sure, and also you are a priest, but more than
• 1:16
  that, you are a. Benedictine A.
• 1:18
  Benedictine. And tell us about that, too.
• 1:20
  Yeah. Well, there's lots of fun
• 1:24
  chapters in all of that. I grew up in a very loving
• 1:28
  family with very good parents who themselves didn't have a
• 1:33
  religious formation, but they had the formation of a Christian
• 1:37
  culture. So if you want to know what a
• 1:38
  Christian culture can do even without more formal religious
• 1:43
  formation, my parents are a good image of that.
• 1:47
  My mother, who is gone to the Lord now seven years ago, and my
• 1:50
  father who's very much alive and a lovely person, but didn't
• 1:54
  raise me anything because they didn't really have anything to
• 1:57
  give, but raised me in a moral, loving, very committed marriage
• 2:03
  kind of household. So a very good human formation.
• 2:07
  But I was invited to study the Bible one-on-one with a nice
• 2:12
  total stranger. Evangelical at Penn State came
• 2:16
  up to me when I was sitting under a tree, invited me to
• 2:18
  study the Bible with him, and over the course of three years
• 2:23
  professed faith in Jesus and then started going to Mass and
• 2:28
  was eventually baptized, confirmed and received First
• 2:32
  Holy Communion at Penn State in 1997.
• 2:35
  So you didn't have any We, we weren't baptized yet anything.
• 2:39
  But it was an evangelical guy who said you got to read the.
• 2:44
  It was a, it was a, a pretty genuinely non denominational
• 2:48
  group. Their mission, the University of
• 2:49
  Bible Fellowship, was to study the Bible one-on-one with
• 2:52
  college students and then just get them back into their own
• 2:55
  churches. So they were not so much drawing
• 2:57
  people to themselves. But I didn't have a church, but
• 3:00
  I had this idea that the, the Catholic Church sort of had all
• 3:03
  the stuff. And so I just sort of followed
• 3:07
  that. And the bells and whistles.
• 3:09
  Yeah, I think so. I think it's something like
• 3:11
  that. And maybe I had in the back of
• 3:13
  my mind like, you know, the Reformation was breaking away,
• 3:16
  the, the Catholic Church was there.
• 3:18
  I don't know. So, but I started going to Mass.
• 3:21
  I had a lot of friends who are Catholic.
• 3:22
  And so I was, yeah, baptized in, in 97.
• 3:28
  And then already in that journey, in my encounter with
• 3:32
  the Lord, which moved from a little bit more intellectual
• 3:35
  faith to a more personal relationship with Jesus, coming
• 3:39
  to know his voice in my heart was a transforming moment.
• 3:43
  And I spontaneously had the idea this is something that would be
• 3:47
  worth giving my life to, sharing the gift of prayer.
• 3:51
  So that was nine months before I was baptized, when I was
• 3:55
  studying abroad in Germany, has one of my Penn State programs.
• 4:00
  And I came back and went into our CIA, was baptized and
• 4:05
  visited Saint Vincent Arch Abbey the weekend after my baptism.
• 4:10
  What was it like to hear Jesus's voice in your heart for the
• 4:13
  first time? Yeah, that's a great question.
• 4:17
  Well, it was, it was life changing and it was.
• 4:22
  So at that point, I had been doing a one-on-one Bible study
• 4:27
  for three years, 2 and 2 1/2 years I guess, and even every
• 4:33
  day getting together with this guy to read the Bible, pray,
• 4:37
  write. So I had a lot of kind of
• 4:40
  process happening in me, things that fit together.
• 4:43
  I sort of knew the right language.
• 4:44
  But I didn't even know that a personal relationship with Jesus
• 4:47
  was a thing. So I didn't even know I was
• 4:49
  missing something until 1 morning when I was in Germany.
• 4:53
  And it was in the wake of kind of running into some of my own
• 4:56
  limits, really asking God for help for the first time.
• 5:00
  And he provided in some beautiful ways.
• 5:03
  And then when I was praying, I just suddenly had this sense of
• 5:08
  really, I would say inner stillness, a deep interior
• 5:12
  peace, and just a sense of I was in my dorm room across the
• 5:16
  street from Saint Elizabeth of Hungary's castle in Germany, and
• 5:22
  was. Just aware of a of a presence
• 5:25
  and then. Really in my, in my own
• 5:30
  language, you know, in, in English and, and thoughts that
• 5:33
  were somehow inside of me but didn't really belong to me was,
• 5:38
  was hearing him just in, in simple ways expressing his love,
• 5:43
  calling me to more. And, and then realized at that
• 5:49
  time also, you know, I would say in the, in the echo of my
• 5:52
  conscience, it was a voice that was in a way familiar, but I had
• 5:57
  never recognized was his voice. So all of this kind of Christian
• 6:01
  formation came together to put a lot of that together with
• 6:05
  something that was also radically personal, which was
• 6:08
  his voice that had been echoing in my conscience in some way for
• 6:12
  my whole life, really. But you felt that was the first
• 6:15
  time you actually recognized this is Jesus.
• 6:16
  That's right. Wow, why a Benedictine?
• 6:21
  Yeah, and is the. Weird part of that or is that?
• 6:24
  These are great questions. Yeah, you're asking all the
• 6:26
  right questions. So I my first thought when the
• 6:30
  director of campus ministry at Penn State, who was a
• 6:34
  Benedictine, although I didn't really understand even what
• 6:37
  these categories were. When he said, Do you want to go
• 6:40
  visit a monastery? I'm bringing a group of guys
• 6:42
  from Penn State to visit the monastery.
• 6:45
  My first thought was like, not a monastery.
• 6:48
  My call is to share the gift of prayer.
• 6:51
  So and that had already turned into evangelization inside of
• 6:54
  me. And I thought, that's not what
• 6:56
  monks do. So, but then I thought, well,
• 6:59
  whatever, you know, I'll go check it out.
• 7:01
  And, and I had a really powerful experience there that weekend
• 7:05
  and the Lord confirming some things, but I was still on the
• 7:09
  need to go do the evangelization thing.
• 7:11
  So I visited the Franciscans of the renewal.
• 7:14
  Really love them. They're awesome.
• 7:16
  They're awesome and. No shoes, though, Or no sandals.
• 7:19
  What do they do? Not no shoes?
• 7:21
  Yeah, no, sometimes. No shoes.
• 7:23
  Yeah, no shoes that. Is right, no shaving.
• 7:26
  And all that stuff. So it's great.
• 7:27
  I love all. Of them no shaving.
• 7:29
  OK, so that it was, it was attractive.
• 7:31
  It was attractive and those guys are all like the captain of the
• 7:34
  football team. They just draw these these young
• 7:37
  men who are zealous and strong leaders and.
• 7:41
  And they're very creative too, right?
• 7:43
  Creative, yeah, they're, they're outside of the box, they're on
• 7:46
  the streets, they're developing new things, proclaiming the
• 7:49
  gospel. And so I was very drawn to them,
• 7:54
  spent time with them. I'm still close to the community
• 7:56
  and do things with them. But.
• 7:58
  But really, in that process, again, that same voice, the Lord
• 8:03
  just made it abundantly clear to me He wanted me to go to Saint
• 8:07
  Vincent. The.
• 8:07
  Benedictines And so I would say, you know, kind of 20 years,
• 8:14
  well, 26 years in now for me, the dimension of community, the
• 8:20
  importance of, of accompaniment and building deep meaningful
• 8:25
  relationships, the value of the intellectual life and, and
• 8:30
  really the gift of Saint Benedict, I think are the
• 8:33
  reasons that the Lord formed me for that and, and brought me to
• 8:36
  that life. Amazing.
• 8:38
  What is spiritual direction? And then I want to hear about
• 8:42
  the history of it because I know that's tied into the
• 8:45
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• 9:33
  In so my spiritual director, Father Tom Acklin and I wrote a
• 9:37
  book on spiritual direction and the definition that we use in
• 9:41
  the book is a spiritual direction is a relationship.
• 9:45
  And I think that's really important.
• 9:47
  Even just a pause there. It's a relationship.
• 9:51
  I think a lot of times we have the idea that spiritual
• 9:53
  direction is information, it's guidance, it's expertise, it's
• 9:57
  and really we have a temptation to reduce spiritual direction to
• 10:01
  what ChatGPT could probably do a lot better, which is provide
• 10:04
  information and answers to questions.
• 10:06
  So, but spiritual direction is what ChatGPT cannot be.
• 10:11
  It's a relationship and it's a specific kind of relationship.
• 10:15
  It's a relationship, one-on-one, between a director and a
• 10:19
  directee, and the focus of the relationship is the directee's
• 10:23
  relationship with God. So a spiritual director ends up
• 10:28
  fitting into similar spaces in the directee's life as God does,
• 10:34
  because that's the focus of the relationship.
• 10:37
  And so the things that we can work out in spiritual direction
• 10:40
  are going to be the things that we're going to be able to pray
• 10:43
  about more easily or bring before the Lord in prayer.
• 10:46
  So it helps to process really the interior life of the
• 10:50
  directee. How is that different from, say,
• 10:53
  discipleship or mentorship or even therapy?
• 10:57
  Yeah, I think it's a great. There's a We're in this very
• 11:00
  interesting space in our world that.
• 11:04
  Broadly speaking, relationships are a complete train wreck.
• 11:08
  The social matrix is shredded, as you know very well, the
• 11:12
  family is a disaster. I mean, we have.
• 11:16
  Divisions between mothers and their babies in utero, right?
• 11:21
  What else can stand in the face of that?
• 11:24
  So broadly speaking, society is falling apart at the seams.
• 11:28
  And in the midst of that, all of these specialized relationships
• 11:32
  are developing. We have more therapists,
• 11:34
  coaches, mentors, disciples, spiritual directors than I think
• 11:39
  we ever had before. And everybody's got like 1-2 or
• 11:42
  three of those at a given time. So somehow, and I would say God
• 11:48
  has really filled in the vacuum with something that's been an
• 11:50
  added benefit. I think those relationship
• 11:52
  specialists. And then that wisdom is sort of
• 11:55
  flowing out. Everybody knows something about
• 11:58
  trauma now because people are doing trauma therapy and you
• 12:02
  know, everybody knows a little more about spiritual direction,
• 12:05
  a little more about coaching and disciple.
• 12:07
  Do you? Think that's overblown or do you
• 12:08
  think that's really because everyone is?
• 12:10
  So like you said, it's broken at the seams or it's, you know,
• 12:14
  society is struggling so much because of broken families.
• 12:17
  I mean, there's a million abortions a year.
• 12:19
  Just think about talking about trauma, spiritual devastation
• 12:22
  that brings. So yeah.
• 12:24
  Do you think some of it's overblown?
• 12:25
  Because I do think on the right, there's a criticism of the left,
• 12:28
  like you're so, you know, but you're navel gazing.
• 12:33
  You're so focused on yourself. You know, you're everyone's in
• 12:35
  therapy. We're overly, you know, seeking
• 12:38
  therapeutic answers. Well, I think the really
• 12:42
  fundamental need and and some of the things that I have learned
• 12:46
  about. Trauma that are very interesting
• 12:48
  is that it's not so much about the significance or the
• 12:52
  intensity of the wound or the the hurt.
• 12:56
  It's about being alone in the pain.
• 12:59
  And so, yeah, I think there is a lot more because there's a lot
• 13:01
  more aloneness because the relational structure of our
• 13:04
  world is a disaster. So children don't have mothers
• 13:10
  who can just receive them and hold them in their pain and say
• 13:13
  you hurt something was bad, it's appropriate that you hurt.
• 13:18
  And that really fundamental thing is missing.
• 13:21
  And so there's a lot of stuff that's coming out of us.
• 13:24
  And I think there's a hunger for relationships.
• 13:26
  So does everybody need to be in therapy?
• 13:28
  Or is is everybody sort of fundamentally broken or
• 13:32
  something like that? I don't know about that, but we
• 13:34
  have a deep need. To be received, to be seen, to
• 13:37
  be understood and to have somebody else.
• 13:40
  So it's, it's fascinating. You know, the brain is really a
• 13:44
  social, a relational organ and it develops in relationship.
• 13:49
  So just a simple thing. How did you discover that
• 13:52
  something is happening in your stomach and it has to do with
• 13:55
  something needing to be put into your mouth?
• 13:58
  Like, why did you think that? Because when your stomach was
• 14:02
  hurting and you cried, your mother fed you and then you
• 14:06
  learned this connection. But that connection didn't exist
• 14:09
  prior to that. And there's so many things in us
• 14:12
  that that don't exist unless we have someone outside of us to
• 14:16
  help us make the connections. And so all of that is to say, we
• 14:20
  have this fundamental need for meaningful relationships where
• 14:24
  there can be a real emotional attunement and we can have
• 14:28
  somebody else help us to to work through process and just be in
• 14:33
  touch with the stuff that's happening in us.
• 14:35
  So no, I don't think it's navel gazing.
• 14:38
  It's actually the communion that we're made.
• 14:40
  For. That people are missing.
• 14:43
  Yeah, I mean in the beginning God said it is good, it is good,
• 14:46
  it is good, it is very good. The first time he said it is not
• 14:50
  good is for man to be alone, and that's when man was alone in
• 14:56
  paradise with God. That's not good without another
• 15:03
  because we're made to be in the image and likeness of God.
• 15:06
  John Paul the second in his theology of the body, he said
• 15:10
  man is in the image and likeness of God, but he's more in the
• 15:14
  image and likeness of God when he's in a communion of persons
• 15:19
  and so. That's the Trinity.
• 15:21
  That's why God is 3. Yeah, of course, and one as
• 15:24
  well. And.
• 15:25
  That's what heaven is. Heaven is only communion of
• 15:28
  persons, only pure mutuals, total self giving love.
• 15:33
  So the more that we are pulled away from that, of course we
• 15:36
  have a deep hunger for that. And then all of these
• 15:39
  relationships, you mentioned mentoring, discipling, you know,
• 15:42
  I said coaching, talk about therapy, spiritual direction,
• 15:45
  all of these are, are various forms of a communion of persons,
• 15:50
  which again is, and so it's a little taste of heaven in these
• 15:54
  moments when we can be seen and received, when there's a
• 15:57
  connection and of course, friendship, when there's a
• 16:00
  mutuality, marriage being the, the most profound expression of
• 16:05
  that, which also bears fruitfulness in children.
• 16:09
  So, you know, we're made. We're made for relationships.
• 16:12
  The thing I explore a lot on the podcast and I'm personally
• 16:15
  deeply invested in, as you are not surprised to hear, is the
• 16:19
  relationships with between family members and a
• 16:22
  particularly mothers and their children and obviously in
• 16:24
  marriage between spouses. But I'm curious when we were
• 16:28
  talking about all this trauma that you perceive and the
• 16:31
  brokenness you see, which I see it too, and you've run into it
• 16:34
  almost on a daily basis. But I, I also wonder, you know,
• 16:38
  there's always been the human condition.
• 16:40
  There's always been brokenness. So is today more broken than it
• 16:43
  was 100 years ago or there's just different kinds of
• 16:45
  brokenness today? You know, I, I try not to think
• 16:48
  like today's worse than it's ever been, you know, because
• 16:51
  every century has had its great challenges.
• 16:54
  That being said, would you say in your experience and even on
• 16:58
  this proliferation of the least therapist and spiritual
• 17:00
  directors and coaches, there's something uniquely bad happening
• 17:05
  in the development of many children?
• 17:07
  Meaning they're missing out on key bonds with their mothers or
• 17:12
  missing out on the foundational assurance that comes from having
• 17:17
  a mother and a father in an intact family that love each
• 17:19
  other and then love them? What's your take on that?
• 17:22
  Yeah, yeah. I do think I'm also resistant to
• 17:26
  saying it's worse than it's ever been.
• 17:30
  I think there's probably a truth.
• 17:31
  There are things that are worse than they've ever been.
• 17:33
  There. Are also things abortion is.
• 17:35
  Amazing is an obvious one because it's the abortion rates
• 17:38
  historically bad. It's horrific.
• 17:41
  Yeah, yeah. Unbelievable.
• 17:42
  And so how can that not have an effect, right?
• 17:45
  Like, what? What would that even mean?
• 17:47
  If God created a world in which you could just have astronomical
• 17:51
  numbers of abortions and it didn't really matter, It didn't
• 17:53
  really affect anybody like. What?
• 17:55
  What would that? Even mean so and I think
• 17:57
  likewise, I mean the the amount of separation single parent
• 18:01
  households divorce, just the breakdown in the family, which
• 18:05
  it goes, you know, those are certain kinds of extremes, but
• 18:08
  just the the separation when we don't have nuclear families, we
• 18:13
  we have the. Possibility of being isolated
• 18:15
  now in ways that we never could, so we're surrounded by a bunch
• 18:19
  of stuff that we had no hand in creating.
• 18:22
  How much effort did you put into making the electricity today?
• 18:26
  Zero. Do you know how many people it
• 18:27
  takes to make electricity? How many of them do you know?
• 18:31
  None of them so. My husband can start a fire, but
• 18:36
  that's about in the fireplace. But that's about it.
• 18:39
  Right. And that's the kind of thing we
• 18:40
  used to be connected to those people.
• 18:42
  Like in the Middle Ages, if you got into a feud with the
• 18:45
  cobbler, you went without shoes. Now you just order them on
• 18:48
  Amazon. If you don't want to deal with
• 18:50
  the person at the bank, you can do online banking.
• 18:53
  If you don't want to actually let yourself be seen in a
• 18:56
  grocery store, you can have your groceries delivered.
• 18:58
  We can substitute money for relationships in a way that was
• 19:02
  never possible before. But there's a weird kind of
• 19:05
  thing. There's so much more
• 19:06
  interconnection than there ever was before to create all of
• 19:09
  these possibilities. So that's amazing.
• 19:12
  We have a more global world. We have, you know, we are
• 19:15
  connected to all the people that made the electricity.
• 19:18
  Sometimes we feel that and then we wake up and we pay attention
• 19:21
  to how we can, you know, not exploit them or something like
• 19:23
  that. But so there's a tremendous
• 19:26
  amount of interconnectedness, but there's a lot of anonymity
• 19:29
  that's entered into that. So I see that, you know, as a a
• 19:32
  pro and a con, Obviously I think in terms of things like trauma,
• 19:40
  the. I have a sense that there's
• 19:43
  there's lower levels of resiliency than there were in
• 19:47
  the past because of the lack of relationship.
• 19:49
  We could bear a a certain amount of pain when we knew we had a
• 19:52
  mother to go home to who would just like hold us and tell us
• 19:56
  it's OK. When we don't have that, we have
• 19:59
  to harden some other things and, and, and then maybe we break
• 20:04
  more often in the face of certain kinds of difficulties.
• 20:09
  At the same time, I think we've learned more about the nervous
• 20:11
  system in the brain and the importance of relationships and
• 20:14
  the effects of trauma, and there are more healing techniques.
• 20:19
  I think we're able to rise to a. Higher level of relationality in
• 20:24
  the process of healing. That's what God is always doing.
• 20:27
  When we lose something, He gives us something better as a as a
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• 21:26
  How much of it do you think too, is the overload of not just
• 21:30
  information, but of kind of a sense of connectivity to other
• 21:35
  people that's not actually authentic?
• 21:37
  Meaning you feel connected to someone via what you're learning
• 21:39
  about them in the media or social media or some digital
• 21:42
  relationship, but it's missing the human wholeness.
• 21:45
  And so there's sort of, I'm sure, weird stuff that can
• 21:48
  happen psychologically, emotionally, spiritually because
• 21:51
  of that. Yeah, yeah, I I think that's
• 21:53
  very true. The the lack of committed,
• 21:58
  attuned, affirming relationships where I can really count on
• 22:03
  someone to receive my heart, to pay attention to what's
• 22:07
  happening in me, to help me work through a problem.
• 22:10
  I think the danger of being cancelled in any relationship at
• 22:14
  any time, being blocked on a phone, shut down on social
• 22:18
  media, yeah, I think that introduces a lot of anxiety.
• 22:23
  So spiritual direction is a relationship to get you closer
• 22:27
  to Jesus. What does that look like in the
• 22:29
  day-to-day? So again, the, the relationship
• 22:33
  is really the the principal force in that.
• 22:37
  So when I have when I have a relationship with somebody, that
• 22:43
  person is receiving me and what part of me needs to be received?
• 22:49
  Well, the deepest parts of me, the interior, my interior life.
• 22:54
  So how I'm processing reality, what I'm feeling, what I'm
• 22:58
  thinking, things I'm struggling with, my heart.
• 23:02
  In short, it comes into spiritual direction.
• 23:05
  And in the process of sharing my heart with a spiritual director
• 23:09
  who is in the position of God for me in a particular way, then
• 23:15
  I start to work through things. So there are certain things that
• 23:18
  I can't even really face, things that are particularly painful
• 23:22
  without a relationship to help me hold that.
• 23:25
  So together we can look at things that I can't really face
• 23:28
  very well on my own. And because we are able to face
• 23:32
  them in spiritual direction, that makes it possible for me to
• 23:36
  bring that up in prayer as well. So the spiritual director gives
• 23:39
  me a a kind of quasi Sacramento experience of, of God's love, of
• 23:45
  his mercy, of his wisdom. So there's so it's really
• 23:50
  working those things out in a relationship concretely.
• 23:53
  We generally meet with people monthly for about an hour and as
• 23:58
  the trust builds in the relationship and ideally would
• 24:02
  extend through a lifetime. So I actually like the term
• 24:05
  spiritual father or spiritual mother as opposed to spiritual
• 24:09
  director. The the director thing sometimes
• 24:12
  gets people off on those like more information and giving
• 24:15
  directions and stuff like that, which is not so much the stuff
• 24:19
  that that kind of thing can be there, but it's not really the
• 24:21
  hardest spiritual direction. Does everyone need a spiritual
• 24:25
  director in your view? I don't think we could say it's
• 24:29
  a necessary instrument for salvation.
• 24:32
  So can you get to heaven without a spiritual director?
• 24:35
  Well, a whole lot of people already have.
• 24:37
  So it's not necessary in that sense.
• 24:42
  Is there a value there for everyone?
• 24:44
  Yeah, I think there's a value for everyone to have a spiritual
• 24:48
  father, spiritual mother. I think that is a a profoundly
• 24:52
  formative influence in the spiritual life.
• 24:54
  What's the history of spiritual direction?
• 24:57
  And the spiritual direction, in some sense it's going back to
• 25:01
  the very experience of Jesus with the apostles or of Saint
• 25:05
  Paul when he talks about being a spiritual father for Timothy and
• 25:10
  Titus. When he says you have many
• 25:15
  pytagogoi, you have many tutors or disciplinarians, but you have
• 25:20
  only one father. Or when Saint Paul even says I'm
• 25:26
  bearing you with pain that that Christ could be born in you said
• 25:31
  Galatians 419. So Saint Paul's spiritual
• 25:36
  fatherhood over his people, which is not just a matter of
• 25:40
  communicating information. It's not a matter of just giving
• 25:43
  instructions. It's a matter of fathering.
• 25:46
  And he bears that in pain, like the the word is actually trying
• 25:52
  to think of what that is in Greek.
• 25:54
  Now come back to it. What's so amazing about Saint
• 26:00
  Paul's letters is he really knows those churches and the
• 26:04
  people he's speaking to. Like he knows what they're
• 26:06
  dealing with. He knows what they're fighting
• 26:08
  over. He knows what they need.
• 26:10
  So he's really like Co. I mean, it really is a fathering
• 26:13
  thing that he's doing because he's really coaching them.
• 26:15
  He's saying, I love you so much and you guys got to stop this.
• 26:18
  It's very intense. It's like this intense,
• 26:22
  passionate relationship that he has with them.
• 26:24
  Yeah, yeah. And And burying them with a kind
• 26:28
  of birth pang. So carrying them in his heart,
• 26:32
  continuing to write to them even when he's already left them,
• 26:36
  when it was much harder to do that than it is now.
• 26:38
  With an e-mail. He was writing letters, sending
• 26:41
  messengers, continuing to hold them in prayer, revisiting them,
• 26:45
  sending them a father like Timothy or Titus to watch over
• 26:51
  them. Now there's a real fatherhood in
• 26:52
  that so, so his fathering of communities is a is a model and
• 26:58
  then really out of the the monastic movement.
• 27:02
  So monastic spiritual fatherhood.
• 27:05
  And you'd find this in the 3rd and 4th centuries.
• 27:09
  St. Anthony of the desert is
• 27:11
  generally heralded as the the father of monasticism.
• 27:15
  And he went out to the desert responding to a word from
• 27:19
  scripture. If you would be perfect, then
• 27:21
  sell all you have and give to the poor and come follow me.
• 27:25
  And he was struck by that and felt that following Christ would
• 27:29
  be to go out to the desert and have this intensive relationship
• 27:33
  with him. But he ended up founding a
• 27:37
  movement in a way and other men came to learn from him and and
• 27:42
  the. Heart of it.
• 27:44
  Going back to what I was describing about spiritual
• 27:46
  direction was to reveal everything that's going on
• 27:49
  inside and to be able to reveal all of the hidden thoughts.
• 27:53
  All of the the inner movements and to entrust that to the
• 27:57
  spiritual father who could then receive that with love and guide
• 28:03
  the the learning monk towards living that monastic life.
• 28:07
  But that would be a again, a a lasting relationship.
• 28:11
  So more father than. Counselors tend to be short
• 28:15
  term. Coaches tend to be short term.
• 28:16
  Disciples tend to be short term. But spiritual direction or
• 28:20
  spiritual fatherhood. Motherhood is a lifelong.
• 28:24
  We have a lot of Protestant brothers and sisters who listen
• 28:27
  to the show and people of different faith backgrounds.
• 28:30
  And there is the verse from Matthew 23, nine that says, call
• 28:34
  no man your father upon earth, for one is your Father who is in
• 28:38
  heaven. And this, I think, is, you know,
• 28:41
  confusing for some folks who look at priests or look at this
• 28:44
  idea of a spiritual father or spiritual mother, but
• 28:47
  particularly, you know, priests who are called father and
• 28:51
  obviously some religious women called mother.
• 28:54
  And I think that's confusing for some folks.
• 28:56
  So can you speak to that? Well, Jesus doesn't prohibit
• 29:00
  people from calling anyone mother, and he talks about that
• 29:05
  in terms of fatherhood. So that we always create, we
• 29:07
  always maintain the right primacy.
• 29:09
  Human fatherhood does not define God's fatherhood.
• 29:12
  God's fatherhood defines human fatherhood.
• 29:15
  And 1 is a father. Only to the.
• 29:17
  Extent that one is like God the Father, so and that would be
• 29:21
  very much the case in spiritual direction or spiritual
• 29:24
  fatherhood or motherhood is that one is meant to be a kind of
• 29:29
  manifestation, a reminder, a connection or in psychological
• 29:34
  language we would talk about transference.
• 29:36
  We're really trying to be intentional about my
• 29:39
  relationship with God is going to be assisted by my own
• 29:44
  spiritual father who gives me a taste of what God's love is like
• 29:48
  now. My spiritual father is not with
• 29:50
  me right here, right now, but God the Father is with me right
• 29:53
  now. So that relationship with God
• 29:55
  extends through time, but it's really formed through the course
• 29:59
  of our human relationships. And you dare not call man a
• 30:03
  father who is not like God the Father.
• 30:06
  And that's really the fatherhood we're trying to foster in, in
• 30:11
  the priesthood. We should be living that out and
• 30:14
  and in the ways that we exercise our priestly ministry.
• 30:18
  There's there's a value to some of the ritual because then I can
• 30:23
  as long as I celebrate the Mass, right?
• 30:25
  Somehow then you're getting an experience of God the Father
• 30:28
  because his love is being made present through the the worship
• 30:32
  and ritual of the Mass. The more that I insert myself
• 30:37
  and to whatever degree I'm dissonant from that.
• 30:40
  And we know the damage that that's caused.
• 30:42
  When men who are called Father were acting contrary to God the
• 30:46
  Father, that causes a lot of damage.
• 30:48
  But when men who are called Father act like God the Father,
• 30:51
  that gives people a felt experience of it.
• 30:54
  That helps to open the heart to God.
• 30:57
  What about marriages and the idea of spiritual headship?
• 31:02
  Because this has been something that I know a lot of women who
• 31:05
  are women of faith and maybe they're not married yet or
• 31:07
  they're married and they want to make sure that they're doing,
• 31:11
  you know, putting in to their love into their marriage, the
• 31:14
  right, the right efforts. And then also have the right
• 31:18
  perspective about how God speaks to them as a couple.
• 31:21
  And So what does it look like if you are married and he's your,
• 31:26
  he's the head of the household? There's a sense of it being the
• 31:29
  spiritual head, and yet the woman may also get she has a
• 31:34
  spiritual director over here and she has her own unique spiritual
• 31:37
  insights, her own sense of guidance from the Holy Spirit.
• 31:41
  How does that? What's the proper?
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• 32:44
  Yeah, I know that that's these, these things are are are
• 32:47
  bubbling recently. Well, maybe for a long time, but
• 32:50
  anyway. Oh, and some very, I should say,
• 32:52
  some very traditional folks say that, well, the the husband
• 32:57
  should be the spiritual director.
• 32:59
  This is not as much in the Catholic world.
• 33:00
  It's more, I would say, in some parts of the Protestant world,
• 33:03
  but there's some view of like the husband should be the one
• 33:06
  directing the wife. Yeah, why I would, I would say
• 33:12
  that the husband should always be modeling God's love for his
• 33:15
  wife and for his children. So.
• 33:17
  And again, may he not bear the name if he does not actually
• 33:22
  model the reality of God's incredible love, Right.
• 33:27
  So I would say that is, is certainly true.
• 33:31
  I'm, I feel like there are some kind of forced models that are
• 33:35
  trying to be fit onto every situation in a way that's a
• 33:40
  little problematic and, and gets twisted up.
• 33:44
  It seems to me that where there's a lot of healthiness is
• 33:47
  where there's a lot of mutual trust.
• 33:49
  And that trust has been earned, not sort of forced because I'm
• 33:52
  the head, but I've earned the trust.
• 33:55
  And this is what I also teach and promote in spiritual
• 33:58
  direction. So we come with an expectation
• 34:01
  to a spiritual director that this is someone who is
• 34:03
  trustworthy. And I take the step of starting
• 34:06
  to open my heart. But the way that I'm received is
• 34:09
  going to be determined, the way that I continue to open my
• 34:12
  heart. And I think that's very
• 34:13
  appropriate to marriage as well, and, and fatherhood and
• 34:17
  motherhood. So if a man can't earn the
• 34:19
  headship, then he doesn't deserve it.
• 34:23
  So he may get the first sort of a free pass to start with, and
• 34:29
  then he needs to receive that well and earn every step beyond
• 34:32
  that. So what does it mean to say then
• 34:34
  that the man is a spiritual head of the household, but then the
• 34:37
  the wife may also have a spiritual director?
• 34:40
  How does that work? Well, again, the so that's going
• 34:45
  to be the spiritual head of the household is going to have is
• 34:48
  not going to be directing the wife's conscience.
• 34:52
  So that's going to be directing the household.
• 34:54
  It's directing the family. And and again, I think that
• 34:58
  that's really formed genuinely in mutuality.
• 35:01
  I think having a sort of forced kind of, I mean obedience is
• 35:06
  really built on trust, which is why Jesus can say if you love
• 35:09
  me, do what I command you because you actually trust me
• 35:12
  enough to know that I'm not going to lead you astray ever.
• 35:16
  I would more likely relieve myself astray than I would lead
• 35:20
  you astray. When I can trust that, then I
• 35:22
  can be obedient. So, but in terms of spiritual
• 35:27
  direction, if it's working well, I direct a number of married
• 35:30
  women well like Christina and it helps them to open to their
• 35:33
  husbands more so they're able to work through maybe more
• 35:38
  sensitive interior places and, and areas of their relationship
• 35:43
  with God, who of course, their husband is not God.
• 35:47
  Their relationship with God is distinct from their relationship
• 35:50
  with their husband. And and that's the play, the
• 35:52
  piece that I'm playing into more is.
• 35:55
  Developing that relationship, but then that relationship
• 35:57
  should open them more to their relationship with their husband,
• 36:01
  their availability in marriage, the their yeah, the the
• 36:08
  generosity of their. Hearts in in parenting and
• 36:11
  things like that. I've seen the Holy Spirit speak
• 36:13
  through my husband many times, and I do have a spiritual
• 36:17
  director and I have had, you know, blessings port abundantly
• 36:21
  through spiritual direction. But then I see it sometimes come
• 36:23
  in through my husband in a unique and consistent way.
• 36:27
  And I'm saying, I think both are great.
• 36:29
  And again, sometimes you're you're you're married and maybe
• 36:32
  you're married to a non believer.
• 36:34
  You know, some women are married to or maybe they're married to a
• 36:37
  believer, but they're not practicing their faith as
• 36:39
  seriously, whatever it might be. And God can still work good
• 36:42
  through that because he pours graces everywhere.
• 36:45
  But I think there's what I like what you're saying is there's a
• 36:47
  freedom in it that God works through so many different people
• 36:52
  and in marriage, it's actually not good to have this very maybe
• 36:56
  legalistic view of what spiritual headship means and how
• 37:00
  it operates. And I have seen when people have
• 37:03
  that legalistic view, especially in some kind of more
• 37:05
  conservative culture spaces, it actually gets them into trouble
• 37:09
  and it can be counterproductive. Yeah.
• 37:12
  And I'm, I'm more inclined my my first thought would be that
• 37:16
  somebody that's trying to impose that is working out of some of
• 37:19
  their own insecurities that if you have confidence in who you
• 37:22
  are and there's real mutual trust, then there there isn't a
• 37:27
  need to force that on someone or then it happens much more
• 37:32
  naturally. And yeah, talking with people
• 37:36
  who, you know, there's a, there's a way we we can think
• 37:40
  about hormones for a moment. You know, like men's flat lined
• 37:45
  hormones can be a great benefit when women's body oriented to
• 37:50
  having children are up and down at different times.
• 37:52
  And the stability, the steadiness of that can be a real
• 37:56
  strength that what was clear to you as the wife whatever 2 days
• 38:02
  ago is not clear now. But your husband has held that
• 38:05
  has received it from. You how do you know that is
• 38:07
  true? You know what you're saying is
• 38:09
  true? Literally, we were just talking
• 38:11
  about something the other day and I was like, this is like,
• 38:14
  he's reminding me what I knew to be true two days earlier.
• 38:17
  But there's like now there's, you know, doubts that have
• 38:19
  entered in or additional frustrations.
• 38:22
  And then it's like, oh, da, da, da, And you're like, yes, that's
• 38:24
  true. Thank you.
• 38:26
  Yeah. So I think there's a beautiful
• 38:27
  complementarity that we can see between male and female, which
• 38:31
  which again, you can't sort of radicalize to say it's always
• 38:35
  the case that this or always the case that that.
• 38:38
  I mean, you can say that biologically it's always the
• 38:40
  case that a woman bears a baby. But things that you can't
• 38:45
  radicalize, maybe at the emotional level, you certainly
• 38:48
  can generalize and say, yeah, there's this beautiful
• 38:51
  complementarity. What do the Saints or other
• 38:56
  folks throughout, you know, Christian history say about the
• 39:00
  importance of spiritual direction?
• 39:02
  And I'm also asking this partly from the lens of maybe folks
• 39:05
  with seniors like, well, I've got my Bible study leader who's
• 39:08
  not my spiritual director, but they're a good guy and I'm
• 39:11
  reading the Bible and I'm praying every day.
• 39:12
  So why do I need some other person involved in this intimate
• 39:16
  relationship that I'm developing with God?
• 39:18
  Yeah. And again, I would you're
• 39:22
  presenting that in a certain way, but I would say you don't
• 39:25
  need. So I'm I'm not putting that on
• 39:27
  people making an invitation to say there is a way that when we
• 39:31
  have someone again and and trust needs to be earned and.
• 39:36
  That relationship grows over time and but then to have
• 39:40
  somebody who has who has been connected to your spiritual life
• 39:45
  for an extended period of time. Is a tremendous blessing.
• 39:49
  There's an integration that takes place there.
• 39:52
  There's a person with whom to whom I have brought all of these
• 39:55
  things as they have unfolded for decades for me now.
• 39:59
  And and that brings something together in me and that
• 40:03
  consolidated things that are happening in my spiritual life.
• 40:06
  So I would see it in those kind of positive terms that your
• 40:12
  spiritual life is always going to be your spiritual life, but
• 40:15
  having a relationship, having a person who's in that.
• 40:18
  Who can help to put a little flesh on God on a regular basis
• 40:22
  and can be an integrating factor is a real gift.
• 40:25
  What are some of the Saints, some examples of the Saints or
• 40:29
  things that the Saints have said about the value of spiritual
• 40:31
  direction? Yeah, again, the going back to
• 40:36
  the 3rd, 4th century with the the Desert Fathers and we still
• 40:42
  draw from their wisdom which flowed out of a relationship.
• 40:45
  We often get these little pithy sayings from them that are
• 40:48
  profound, but it's really flowing out of a relationship
• 40:52
  that was necessary in their context.
• 40:54
  And I think you can see that especially for I don't know how
• 40:59
  more supernatural or or exceptional vocations in terms
• 41:03
  of priesthood and religious life, which are not natural.
• 41:07
  Marriage is also supernatural, but it's building on something
• 41:09
  natural. So I think the formation of that
• 41:14
  really requires spiritual direction in a, in a different
• 41:16
  way. But so that's been reinforced
• 41:19
  throughout history. But then we see people like
• 41:24
  Saint Francis de Sales was a great spiritual director of lay
• 41:28
  men and women as well as clergy and and religious and reinforced
• 41:35
  the the the value of a of a spiritual director to open help
• 41:40
  open our hearts and help us to hear the Lord more clearly
• 41:43
  confirm what we're hearing. St.
• 41:45
  Faustina spoke in very glowing terms about the importance of
• 41:49
  spiritual direction for her, that she received it as a gift
• 41:54
  and felt that she would have lost so much grace to not have
• 41:57
  someone who could help her to navigate.
• 41:59
  And again, she had a very particular calling to spread
• 42:02
  God's mercy and and pretty remarkable ways.
• 42:06
  John the 23rd was actually a a seminary spiritual director and
• 42:10
  then, as Pope, addressed seminary spiritual directors and
• 42:13
  pointed to where real points of renewal have taken place in the
• 42:18
  Church through the ages. And hidden underneath several
• 42:22
  significant figures was a holy spiritual director who is
• 42:26
  helping them to become the Saints and reformers and and
• 42:31
  that that they then developed into.
• 42:34
  That's really something that fascinates me, is that when I
• 42:36
  look at the history of Saints, you often find them in these
• 42:39
  little clumps. Yeah, Saints travel in packs.
• 42:42
  Yeah, they're like little besties, or they have, or
• 42:45
  they're being spiritually directed by one another.
• 42:47
  You know, Saint John of the Cross I think of as an example,
• 42:51
  and he's directing Saint Teresa of Avila and he's younger
• 42:54
  significantly, right, than Saint Teresa of Avila.
• 42:56
  Yeah, she had a couple of spiritual directors, Peter of
• 42:59
  Alcantara and Saint Peter of Alcantara, and then had some
• 43:04
  connection with Saint John of Avila also, but then really Co
• 43:09
  founded the reformed the order with John of the Cross and then
• 43:14
  he was directing her for some time and was younger than she.
• 43:17
  Yeah. Yeah, he started pretty young,
• 43:18
  right? Yeah, yeah.
• 43:19
  And you started young, too. Yeah.
• 43:22
  How old were you when you've had your first directory?
• 43:25
  Just after I was ordained so 28. And Christina was one of the
• 43:30
  first, right? She was the first that I'm still
• 43:33
  meeting with. She's the. 1st that you're still
• 43:34
  wow wish she was here. We could ask her about it too.
• 43:38
  What what's I have a lot of questions about that, but one
• 43:41
  big picture question I I was been on my mind.
• 43:43
  I'm like, I want to. He already says about this is
• 43:45
  the fruits of spiritual direction.
• 43:46
  You've said multiple times it's not necessary for salvation, of
• 43:50
  course, but there have been so many fruits that have served.
• 43:55
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  What does that look like or what are some examples of that?
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  That's We Heart nutrition.com. What does that look like or what
• 45:15
  are some examples of that? I think well the the ultimate
• 45:19
  fruit is holiness, that it helps us to grow in receiving God's
• 45:24
  love, which is always the first dimension of holiness, that we
• 45:28
  might also love him more and and that happens in a relationship.
• 45:32
  Because there is a there's a real love that develops in
• 45:35
  spiritual direction, again, the love of a father and son, or a
• 45:39
  father and daughter, mother and son, mother and daughter.
• 45:41
  But that love of spiritual direction just flows very much
• 45:46
  into learning to receive. And to, to love God.
• 45:51
  So, so that would be the the fruit.
• 45:53
  And, and that can happen through ways of healing that there are
• 45:56
  places that maybe I'm inhibited in receiving God's love because
• 46:01
  of my own self perception, because of things that have
• 46:03
  happened because of other relationships.
• 46:06
  There can be healing that comes through spiritual direction as I
• 46:09
  open some of those places and bring them into relationship.
• 46:13
  And then there are things that get worked out in relationship.
• 46:16
  And that's where we talk also about discernment and
• 46:19
  understanding where where the Holy Spirit is moving.
• 46:24
  I think that's a nice way to say it.
• 46:26
  And, and how do I hear that? Well, sometimes I can pay
• 46:29
  attention like we were talking about earlier.
• 46:31
  I can understand what's happening in me better when I
• 46:35
  share it with you and I receive it back from you.
• 46:38
  And there's a way that we can process things together in
• 46:41
  relationship that are happening in my heart that I can't do
• 46:45
  alone as well without anyway. So, so dimensions of discernment
• 46:51
  that being able to talk through things that are happening,
• 46:54
  understanding what's happening in my prayer, understanding
• 46:58
  where God may be leading me or where the fruits of something
• 47:01
  are. So it's another fruit of
• 47:03
  spiritual direction. There are, you were mentioning
• 47:07
  multiple times, women or mothers, spiritual mothers.
• 47:09
  So spiritual directors aren't just necessarily priests or
• 47:12
  religious. They can be laypeople and men
• 47:16
  and women laypeople. Yeah, and that really goes back
• 47:18
  to the beginning again, the monastic movement.
• 47:21
  Anthony of the Desert was not a priest and other spiritual
• 47:26
  mothers. So women also went out to the
• 47:28
  desert to live this kind of more intensive spiritual life.
• 47:33
  And then had women forming them on Saint Mary of Egypt or Saint
• 47:39
  Pelagia. Anyway, the number of different
• 47:42
  desert fathers and mothers would be kind of the the foundation of
• 47:46
  this. And then you see.
• 47:47
  It through time I mean in a real way Saint Teresa of Avila was a
• 47:51
  was a spiritual mother and was formative in within her
• 47:55
  community and for for people outside of her community and
• 47:59
  then yeah, I think we're seeing that more and more in the lay
• 48:04
  space as well. I, I think that there's a real
• 48:08
  renewal. So even among clergy and
• 48:10
  religious, I think spiritual direction became much less
• 48:17
  common or much less deep. The kinds of things that I'm
• 48:20
  describing with you now I think are really true to the
• 48:23
  tradition, but I think waned quite a bit before the, let's
• 48:27
  say the Vatican Council, you know, whatever, 60s, seventies,
• 48:30
  80s. But I think as society has
• 48:32
  fallen apart and I think in some ways as as church culture has
• 48:36
  fallen apart. That the need for someone with
• 48:40
  whom I can relate and grow in my relationship with God.
• 48:43
  There's been a hunger for that, and I think God has provided
• 48:47
  more. I would say there are more
• 48:49
  spiritual directors now than maybe ever in history and
• 48:53
  certainly a number of spiritual directions schools now and just
• 48:56
  a lot of good. Happening in that in that space,
• 49:00
  so. So when you're first starting
• 49:01
  and you have which one is it here?
• 49:03
  It's the Spiritual Direction Formation program.
• 49:05
  So you actually have a program at Saint Vincent Seminary to
• 49:10
  teach people how to be spiritual directors.
• 49:12
  You started Spiritual direction at age 28.
• 49:15
  We talked about my friend Christina.
• 49:17
  She's one of my bridesmaids, one of my dearest friends.
• 49:19
  Now she's a mom. She's got her own, her own kids,
• 49:22
  married and what, what are, I guess, what are the principles
• 49:27
  of a spiritual director, how they're operating and how do
• 49:31
  they, what kind of training should a spiritual director go
• 49:35
  through? Because you know, for example,
• 49:36
  myself, I know I'm not trained as a director, so I'm not going
• 49:39
  to tell someone, I'll give you spiritual direction.
• 49:41
  But I know there are women, some of them even younger women who
• 49:44
  say that they are trained spiritual directors.
• 49:48
  So what does that look like? Well, I like to first of all
• 49:51
  place this on a kind of a spectrum of relationships.
• 49:56
  And I like to call, you know, one of one end of the spectrum,
• 49:58
  accompaniment and a spiritual accompaniment.
• 50:02
  And, you know, Pope Francis said in his first, the joy of the
• 50:05
  Gospel, the entire church needs to be formed in the art of
• 50:10
  accompaniment. And I think that's a beautiful
• 50:13
  statement. So again, it's a way of
• 50:14
  recovering these relationships to have real, meaningful,
• 50:17
  committed relationships of affirming love that are able to
• 50:21
  receive the heart to be in it with people.
• 50:23
  So that's the foundation. We have a a course called the
• 50:27
  Art of Accompaniment. And I would love for everybody
• 50:31
  in the church to take this course because it's a
• 50:33
  combination of some of the psychological models.
• 50:36
  What is in the interior? How do I understand what's
• 50:39
  happening in myself? But then also the the spiritual
• 50:42
  principles around how that relates with God and how we
• 50:46
  listen in a way that develops trust and helps to open the
• 50:49
  heart. And and then what kinds of
• 50:51
  things we can say in a spiritual context because we believe in
• 50:55
  the gospel and the truth that God has revealed and what he has
• 50:59
  given us in Christ. So that art of accompaniment
• 51:02
  class would be foundational. And then the rest of our
• 51:06
  curriculum is built around. So things like moral theology
• 51:10
  and ecclesiology, praying with Scripture and in general the
• 51:13
  principles of prayer, developing a personal relationship with God
• 51:18
  who is Godfather, Son and Holy Spirit.
• 51:21
  What are the dimensions of prayer as an encounter of two
• 51:25
  freedoms, not a technique that we master in order to get a
• 51:29
  certain state of consciousness, so distinguishing it from other
• 51:33
  religious traditions and and things that can become sort of
• 51:36
  muddled. And then we have a, a practicum
• 51:40
  where people are offering spiritual direction and
• 51:42
  receiving mentoring along that path.
• 51:46
  We require a directed retreat as well and are really trying to
• 51:50
  foster a deeper conversion. Ultimately, you can't give what
• 51:54
  you don't have. So you can't be in relationship
• 51:56
  with someone as a, you know, sort of experience of the.
• 52:00
  Father, if you don't even know him.
• 52:02
  So all all of that's being formed.
• 52:04
  Our program is about two years. There are a number of spiritual
• 52:07
  direction programs that would have some similar principles.
• 52:11
  Our our program is taught by seminary professors with
• 52:15
  doctorates and a lot of experience and a lot of depth,
• 52:20
  so I think we have something special to offer.
• 52:23
  It's all online as well. We have in person classes, but
• 52:28
  the entire program can be done online synchronously.
• 52:31
  We're developing the relationships but using the
• 52:33
  technology. If someone's listening right now
• 52:36
  and they're say in Missouri or they're in Texas and they're,
• 52:40
  you know, maybe they go to church and they have some good,
• 52:42
  a few good friends, but they are just at a loss for how to find a
• 52:46
  spiritual director. And maybe they're at a parish
• 52:48
  and the priest seems nice enough, but they're like, I
• 52:50
  don't know if you'd make a good spiritual director, if he would
• 52:52
  even do that for me. How would you recommend they go
• 52:55
  about finding a spiritual director?
• 52:57
  So there's actually a nice service that was developed by
• 53:01
  some folks and has been supported by me and the Avila
• 53:04
  Institute and others called Seek direction dot app.
• 53:08
  Amazing. And it's a kind of, they do a
• 53:10
  little bit of matching. It's not correct match.
• 53:14
  It's not anyway, but they do a little.
• 53:16
  Bit of matching, that's great. And it can be online or in
• 53:19
  person. Matching, meaning you put in
• 53:21
  your personality type and your address and then.
• 53:26
  A. A.
• 53:26
  Little bit of yeah, I mean your your interest.
• 53:28
  Like swiping left or right and like this.
• 53:30
  This version of here looks it's not.
• 53:32
  As it's not as as in depth as all of that, but a little bit of
• 53:36
  of matching around interest and and some people, you know, just
• 53:40
  because there are lay women offering spiritual direction
• 53:44
  doesn't mean that you need to be comfortable with that person.
• 53:47
  So there may be some shaping of those possible connections.
• 53:53
  What would be your recommendation for finding out
• 53:56
  if you're the person you're starting to get to know would be
• 53:59
  a good spiritual director long term?
• 54:01
  Are there some things you would recommend that the person would
• 54:04
  consider or do in the first couple sessions to kind of
• 54:06
  discern if this person should be a spiritual director for them?
• 54:10
  Well, I would say certainly critical as trust.
• 54:15
  If the person doesn't listen and receive you with reverence in a
• 54:20
  way that helps you to open your heart more to him or her, then
• 54:24
  it's not going to work very well.
• 54:26
  And then of course you're you also need to have a.
• 54:30
  A reverence, have a sense that that person has a real
• 54:32
  relationship with God, that you could entrust your your
• 54:37
  relationship with God to that person.
• 54:39
  So I think those things are going to come out fairly quickly
• 54:42
  if you if there's the kind of chemistry there that opens your
• 54:45
  heart and trust and and that you have a sense of, yeah, there's
• 54:49
  really like the Lord is really present in this relationship.
• 54:52
  What do you recommend? If you're going to a spirit,
• 54:54
  someone's going to a spiritual director, and the director gives
• 54:56
  them advice that they don't agree with.
• 54:59
  Well, I would. The way I teach directors, first
• 55:03
  of all is advice emerges best from the conversation.
• 55:09
  So advice that's imposed I would already have a little bit of
• 55:12
  concern around. But even then, of course there
• 55:15
  is advice to be offered, but it should always be offered in a
• 55:19
  way that's really free. What's coming to me is that
• 55:24
  maybe you should reach out to your mother and see if you can
• 55:28
  repair that relationship. What do you think about that?
• 55:31
  So it's really spiritual direction should be fostering
• 55:35
  greater freedom. Again, like, what is God doing
• 55:37
  with us all the time? I mean, he seems to give us a
• 55:40
  pretty long leash. That sometimes we get a little
• 55:43
  concerned about, but if the spiritual director is is getting
• 55:47
  constricting like that, I'd have some concerns.
• 55:51
  If, if the person is comfortable, I would even, you
• 55:54
  know, maybe bring up that topic with the spiritual director.
• 55:57
  They might find that the spiritual director is, you know,
• 56:00
  actually does have some freedom around that and doesn't realize
• 56:03
  how that's coming across. So a lot of times we have more
• 56:06
  power than we kind of feel like we have.
• 56:08
  And our advice can be heavier than we can feel it is.
• 56:11
  And so getting some of that feedback and help.
• 56:14
  If you're a layperson, so you're not a priest, you're not a
• 56:16
  religious, you're just an everyday person argue and you
• 56:19
  have a spiritual director. Do you have any kind of
• 56:21
  obedience to that spiritual director?
• 56:23
  Because I know if you're in an order or if you're a priest, you
• 56:26
  have obedience to your spiritual father, your Bishop, or to the
• 56:30
  head of your order or whoever it may be.
• 56:33
  Well, we we actually distinguish even in those contexts.
• 56:35
  So the Bishop or the Abbot cannot be a spiritual director
• 56:41
  for a person. There needs to be room for what
• 56:44
  we call the internal forum, the a place of manifestation of
• 56:48
  conscience. And that's for a few different
• 56:52
  reasons. But when you have external
• 56:54
  authority and you're in the in the area of conscience, that's
• 56:58
  how you form a cult. So we don't like that in the
• 57:01
  Catholic Church. We're trying not to do that.
• 57:05
  So the, the sense of obedience is again, it really develops out
• 57:08
  of trust more so that I can receive things.
• 57:12
  You know, I trust that God is really working through this
• 57:15
  relationship of spiritual direction.
• 57:17
  And when something is emerging there, I'm going to trust that
• 57:20
  enough that it may push me to do something that I don't feel 100%
• 57:24
  confident about. But because it emerged and I
• 57:27
  trust you, I'm going to take that step.
• 57:30
  So that would be more the sense of of obedience.
• 57:33
  So obedience to what I believe this Holy Spirit is showing me
• 57:37
  through the conversation with this spiritual director, father
• 57:41
  mother and it's not that I'm taking it as they said this I
• 57:45
  have to go do it, but it's more of God I think is directing me
• 57:47
  this this this way. What about have you seen or do
• 57:53
  you, do you see this? You mentioned obviously our
• 57:55
  friend, your director Christina, 20 years relationship and I know
• 58:00
  she loves you and is so blessed, been so, so blessed by you for
• 58:04
  years. I think maybe there's other
• 58:07
  people who had an amazing experience with a spiritual
• 58:10
  director for a year, 2 years, maybe even 5-6 years.
• 58:14
  And then for multiple reasons, changes in the way that they
• 58:18
  live, you know, they, they had a vocational change that got
• 58:20
  married or something else happened or a location change or
• 58:24
  just changes maybe in the spiritual director's life.
• 58:27
  Now they're for whatever reason, they don't feel that the
• 58:29
  relationship is as fruitful and maybe they're going, there's
• 58:33
  trying to maybe seek out someone else.
• 58:35
  Have you run into that? Can that be the case where
• 58:38
  someone has had a really wonderful run with a spiritual
• 58:40
  director and then they kind of graduate, not that that director
• 58:43
  can't teach them anything or that the director isn't good,
• 58:46
  but they the spirit moves them to someone else?
• 58:49
  Well, I would say first. Of all in that kind of
• 58:52
  situation, and I've had a number of my own directees do this with
• 58:56
  me is to acknowledge that shift that they're perceiving that it
• 59:01
  feels like it was really fruitful.
• 59:03
  And now something has changed. I think it's a good thing to
• 59:06
  talk about in spiritual direction.
• 59:08
  And. And there could become a mutual
• 59:11
  agreement that, yeah, maybe there's for the reasons that you
• 59:15
  just listed, a reason to transition.
• 59:20
  I must. I'm the seminary spiritual
• 59:21
  director at Saint Vincent Seminary.
• 59:23
  And every seminarian has to have a priest spiritual director once
• 59:28
  they're ordained. I can't keep having new
• 59:31
  seminarians coming in to meet with me and continue to meet
• 59:33
  with all the ones that I've I've been meeting with.
• 59:35
  So there tends to be a transition there.
• 59:38
  And that's because they're now a priest.
• 59:40
  They're now in their diocese. They're now, you know, and so
• 59:43
  there certainly can be those kinds of transitions and they
• 59:46
  can be totally fine. But if I would say the first
• 59:50
  step is to talk about it in spiritual direction.
• 59:52
  And I've had directories do that with me and say, you know, this
• 59:54
  is really fruitful. And now I feel like you're not
• 59:57
  as present or things have become a little bit more stagnant.
• 1:00:00
  And and that was actually a good wake up call for me and it
• 1:00:03
  shifted our relationship a little bit and then things were
• 1:00:06
  renewed and became more fruitful again.
• 1:00:10
  Have you run into this? And I kind of have perceived
• 1:00:12
  this or seen through personal experience in different friend
• 1:00:16
  groups that especially for women, that's what I'll talk
• 1:00:19
  about as a woman. And with spiritual direction,
• 1:00:22
  you know, there's some very, maybe they're more melancholic
• 1:00:25
  or maybe they went through a really bad breakup or they're
• 1:00:28
  really struggling with their state in life.
• 1:00:31
  Maybe they're single or not married yet.
• 1:00:32
  And that's really a big cross for them.
• 1:00:34
  And so part of their attraction to spiritual direction is the,
• 1:00:38
  the consolation of being accompanied and, and having a, a
• 1:00:41
  friend, you know, having a, someone who will listen to them
• 1:00:44
  and care about them and love them.
• 1:00:46
  But that's not always the healthiest thing to bring
• 1:00:49
  because that's kind of a raw, open need.
• 1:00:51
  It's like the kid who needs a hug from their mom like you need
• 1:00:53
  a hug. And yeah, I'm your spiritual
• 1:00:56
  director, but I'm not, I'm not your therapist.
• 1:00:58
  I can't be your best friend. And I'm not your mother like
• 1:01:01
  your mother, mother or your father.
• 1:01:02
  Father, have you run into that? And what is your, what's your
• 1:01:06
  take on that? Yeah, I think that's, that's you
• 1:01:11
  just described that really beautifully and I think very
• 1:01:14
  sensitively. That's really nice.
• 1:01:17
  No, really, it's it would be easy to sort of shame.
• 1:01:20
  Or too much personal experience maybe?
• 1:01:23
  And, and I think there can be, I guess I wouldn't want to make
• 1:01:27
  that black and white. I, I feel like I've helped to
• 1:01:29
  sustain some people through some of those times.
• 1:01:31
  And I can be a hug also, you know, and there's a place that a
• 1:01:35
  father and a spiritual father can play in, in some of those
• 1:01:39
  difficult spaces. I have some natural boundaries
• 1:01:43
  because I don't have a lot of time and so I can't be as
• 1:01:47
  available. As somebody might need in that
• 1:01:50
  space. So I can touch that and I think
• 1:01:53
  that helps. I can support it and I think
• 1:01:55
  that helps, but I can't fulfill it and I won't try to.
• 1:02:00
  And so then that pushes the person to keep working through
• 1:02:04
  that, carrying the pain, finding the other relationships.
• 1:02:06
  If I had more time and I were also more inclined because of my
• 1:02:11
  own needs to play into that dynamic, that could be more
• 1:02:14
  dangerous. And one has.
• 1:02:17
  To meaning you're getting like it could be dangerous for the
• 1:02:19
  director if he's getting or she's too much emotional
• 1:02:22
  gratification from being needed. That's codependence, then.
• 1:02:26
  Yeah. So you want to be careful about
• 1:02:28
  that. And that's why every spiritual
• 1:02:30
  director should have a spiritual director.
• 1:02:33
  People ask what's necessary for spiritual direction.
• 1:02:36
  I always say, well, three things.
• 1:02:40
  You should have a spiritual life, you should have a
• 1:02:42
  spiritual director, and your spiritual director should think
• 1:02:45
  it's a good idea for you to give spiritual direction.
• 1:02:48
  I'd say those those things are absolutely necessary.
• 1:02:52
  So those are the kinds of things that I need to be aware of, that
• 1:02:56
  my spiritual director should be aware of in me before even
• 1:03:01
  signing off on me giving spiritual direction.
• 1:03:03
  That if I'm in danger of codependency, if I'm trying to
• 1:03:06
  meet my own emotional needs with my directees, then that's
• 1:03:11
  something that I I need to really keep a close eye on.
• 1:03:15
  Have you personally had to manage in all of the people that
• 1:03:18
  you've directed, you've formed, I mean, you've done, you've
• 1:03:21
  helped thousands of people and you're very in the Catholic
• 1:03:25
  world. His father, Boniface, like he's
• 1:03:27
  the guy. He knows what he's doing and
• 1:03:28
  he's you've blessed so many people.
• 1:03:31
  You hear these horror stories, and I know you've heard about
• 1:03:33
  them of when the relationship has been abused.
• 1:03:37
  And I think that's particularly scandalous for people in and
• 1:03:41
  outside of the church who themselves maybe are hungry for
• 1:03:44
  that relationship, but are afraid of it because of the
• 1:03:48
  potential for abuse. And I think particularly, you
• 1:03:51
  know, I don't know if I should even name any names or call any
• 1:03:54
  specific examples, but I think people get it like, meaning you
• 1:03:57
  have the horror stories and in the church that have obviously
• 1:04:00
  been the priest, you know, abuse scandals, which are just
• 1:04:02
  absolutely horrific with involving children and all of
• 1:04:05
  that. But then because of the uniquely
• 1:04:07
  intimate relationship of a spiritual director and direct D,
• 1:04:12
  and I'm not just talking about physical boundaries or sexual
• 1:04:14
  boundaries that are crossed. I'm also talking about potential
• 1:04:17
  emotional boundaries. It could be between a woman and
• 1:04:20
  another woman, where again, the power of that relationship you
• 1:04:24
  are, you are there to help them discern God in their lives and
• 1:04:27
  in their hearts and receive God in their lives and in their
• 1:04:30
  hearts. So it's so intimate.
• 1:04:32
  So that's particularly, I'm sure that Satan would just be so
• 1:04:36
  thrilled to pervert that or to destroy that or to confuse that
• 1:04:40
  or to just do anything to harm that.
• 1:04:43
  So, yeah, What are your thoughts on that and what are some
• 1:04:46
  examples that you've seen, if you can share, where maybe that
• 1:04:50
  was? There was the potential for risk
• 1:04:51
  there, but there were good protections put in place to
• 1:04:54
  avoid that. Well, you just expressed all
• 1:04:58
  that really well and, and described very well the you
• 1:05:02
  know, there's there's always a a matching danger with a matching
• 1:05:06
  value when you take the risk to enter into trust that can.
• 1:05:11
  So well said. A matching danger with a
• 1:05:13
  matching value. That's that's life.
• 1:05:15
  Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's thus
• 1:05:18
  vulnerability. And you know, we want to make
• 1:05:20
  meaningful risks. We don't want to be foolhardy.
• 1:05:23
  We don't want to be reckless. And and that's why trust
• 1:05:27
  develops steadily over time. We don't sort of entrust give
• 1:05:30
  everybody, give somebody everything without knowing that
• 1:05:33
  they can really receive that. And we have to have enough self
• 1:05:37
  respect and enough of our own boundaries for that.
• 1:05:41
  And, and a spiritual director should be able to help with
• 1:05:43
  that, not let somebody pour out everything like let me earn it.
• 1:05:48
  Let me let me earn your trust and give you the the sense of
• 1:05:51
  being received. And so, yeah, so, well, that's,
• 1:05:58
  that's an example of, of how a spiritual director certainly
• 1:06:02
  holding some of the boundaries and, and, and steadily
• 1:06:06
  moderating the time that we can space these things out, that we
• 1:06:09
  can meet. We don't need to solve
• 1:06:12
  everything in two meetings. We don't, you know, So I think
• 1:06:15
  that steadiness in the relationship and then it has a,
• 1:06:18
  a more natural way of incorporating more of the
• 1:06:20
  person's life and you get a, a larger sort of slice of, of
• 1:06:26
  experience from them over over months, not just an intensity
• 1:06:31
  over a couple of days or something like that.
• 1:06:36
  And now I've lost the, well, certainly the, the danger of
• 1:06:42
  that kind of spiritual abuse, which, as you pointed out, even
• 1:06:46
  just in that realm of using someone or imposing things on
• 1:06:52
  someone or, but then as much as that flows over into forms of
• 1:06:58
  sexual abuse or other kinds of abuse, it's just the worst
• 1:07:02
  corruption. The corruption of the best is
• 1:07:05
  the worst. And those things do tremendous
• 1:07:09
  damage. I mean, there are whole
• 1:07:10
  religious orders that are devastated by some of those
• 1:07:14
  realities that they've gone through.
• 1:07:16
  So there's a there is a a religious order, the Sisters of
• 1:07:21
  the Little Way who have been formed kind of in a response to
• 1:07:25
  that, really trying to take care of those who have suffered from
• 1:07:28
  abuse in the church at various levels.
• 1:07:30
  And they've just started up in the past couple of years.
• 1:07:36
  Yeah. So I think there's more, more
• 1:07:39
  sensitivity to that. And and you know, the the child
• 1:07:42
  thing is, is clear, but the vulnerable adult.
• 1:07:48
  Who is vulnerable, not just because they're, you know,
• 1:07:50
  mentally limited or something like that, but vulnerable
• 1:07:53
  because of the power imbalance in the relationship is also
• 1:07:56
  really significant, significant. And I see the church becoming
• 1:08:00
  more sensitive to that now and and putting some.
• 1:08:05
  Clear boundaries in place even in terms of Canon law and
• 1:08:10
  acknowledging that as abuse and. What do you think the healthy
• 1:08:13
  boundaries look like? So for example, I know, you
• 1:08:17
  know, there's some priests that I know that will not meet alone
• 1:08:20
  in a closed. I mean, they'll meet in like a
• 1:08:23
  confessional or whatever, but they like to have a screen up.
• 1:08:25
  Like there's some priests that that's what they're not that
• 1:08:27
  they don't always have that luxury, but they want that
• 1:08:29
  because they don't want to be alone in a room with all the no,
• 1:08:33
  no windows, etcetera, with another no particularly woman.
• 1:08:37
  I mean, I don't know, that's like a, a concern for scandal.
• 1:08:41
  I'm not sure what that is. Obviously that's highly limiting
• 1:08:44
  because having a confession, giving a confession or having a
• 1:08:47
  spiritual direction, you can't do that publicly.
• 1:08:50
  So what do you think are some smart rules of thumb that you've
• 1:08:53
  implemented or that you think others have implemented that you
• 1:08:57
  think are good? Well, I think it's worth
• 1:09:00
  distinguishing some ranges of the relationship.
• 1:09:04
  So if I'm meeting for the first time with a stranger, that's a
• 1:09:08
  different thing. What then when I'm meeting with
• 1:09:10
  Christina, who I've met with for 20 years, right.
• 1:09:13
  So it's it's worth making those distinctions.
• 1:09:16
  But I do find that rooms with windows can be helpful that just
• 1:09:23
  just the potential that somebody could walk by or the OR the
• 1:09:26
  express willingness to be seen. I'm not doing anything that you
• 1:09:31
  could see is inappropriate or or abusive.
• 1:09:37
  That is is certainly helpful. And yeah, then just developing
• 1:09:45
  trust over time. I think being sensitive to what
• 1:09:47
  the direct. I always learned, I learned in
• 1:09:50
  seminary, you know, you never sit between a person and the
• 1:09:52
  door, for example, just little things that we don't even
• 1:09:55
  necessarily pay attention to. But but to foster freedom, like
• 1:09:58
  I don't have anything that anybody should be afraid of.
• 1:10:02
  And so I'm not afraid of myself. And so I I can do lots of
• 1:10:06
  things. And it's really oriented around
• 1:10:09
  protecting the other person, then how do I create an
• 1:10:12
  environment that that person feels most safe in?
• 1:10:15
  And, and in some cases, that's not to be seen by everybody
• 1:10:19
  that's walking by. And so I can respect that as
• 1:10:23
  long as I can trust that that person is not going to make up a
• 1:10:25
  story about. Something that I did so.
• 1:10:27
  That that has happened too, unfortunately.
• 1:10:29
  It has happened so so being. It's it's kind of a danger.
• 1:10:32
  Like you said, it's fraught. There's there's danger.
• 1:10:35
  Anything very good can be very dangerous.
• 1:10:38
  That's right. So, but that's part of the
• 1:10:40
  question is am I protecting the other person or am I protecting
• 1:10:42
  myself? And yeah, I, I take risks in
• 1:10:46
  terms of, I put a lot of, we talk about the vulnerability of
• 1:10:50
  the spiritual director, which is it's not a symmetrical thing.
• 1:10:53
  I'm not sharing my heart or my interior life with my direct
• 1:10:56
  ease, but I'm really vulnerable in the way that I receive them
• 1:11:01
  and in the way that I trust them not.
• 1:11:02
  To. Accuse me or attack me or
• 1:11:05
  something else? So there really.
• 1:11:07
  Is a mutual vulnerability that it's necessary for spiritual
• 1:11:11
  direction to be a relationship. Not just chat beat GPT advice,
• 1:11:16
  but if I'm actually going to enter into sensitive places in
• 1:11:18
  people's hearts. They need to.
• 1:11:20
  Trust me and I need to trust them.
• 1:11:23
  This is such a good conversation.
• 1:11:25
  I hope folks listening are edified.
• 1:11:27
  I know it's edifying to me and I've, you know, they had the
• 1:11:30
  blessing of spiritual direction since my before coming into the
• 1:11:34
  church, which has been, I don't know how many years has this
• 1:11:36
  been well over 15 years. I don't know the exact number
• 1:11:38
  off the top of my head. Do you have any final words of
• 1:11:42
  advice or encouragement for folks listening who, you know,
• 1:11:46
  maybe they had the sense they need more help, whether it's
• 1:11:51
  with decisions they're making or just getting closer to Jesus.
• 1:11:54
  And they're wrestling about how to do that, how to answer that
• 1:11:57
  longing, or how to deal with where they just know their life
• 1:12:00
  is not fully on track. And what would you say to them?
• 1:12:04
  Well, the importance of relationships and someone to
• 1:12:09
  share that with first of all. So that doesn't have to be a
• 1:12:12
  spiritual director. It can be someone that you trust
• 1:12:15
  who can listen to you and receive you and you can share
• 1:12:18
  your doubt, your concern, your, your failures, your you know, we
• 1:12:24
  have confession in the Catholic Church, which can be a place
• 1:12:28
  that there is at least the expectation of confidentiality.
• 1:12:31
  But but the spiritual friendships, somebody that you
• 1:12:33
  admire that you think would listen to you, somebody you met
• 1:12:37
  at church even, but certainly closer friendships.
• 1:12:40
  So share it. I think we just need to bring
• 1:12:42
  more things into relationship with all of the potential
• 1:12:47
  dangers, but all of the potential benefits of of
• 1:12:50
  entrusting our hearts to someone.
• 1:12:52
  And and then that will flow over into, you know, and talk, talk
• 1:12:57
  with Jesus about it, obviously. And and I'll say that would that
• 1:13:00
  would be the first step for anybody seeking help is ask
• 1:13:04
  Jesus to provide that and then pay attention to how he provides
• 1:13:08
  he he is he does have a vested. Interest in this thing.
• 1:13:11
  He does really want us to be with Him forever in heaven.
• 1:13:14
  And he, he, he will provide the relationships and the supports
• 1:13:19
  that we need. They are life changing, though a
• 1:13:22
  good spiritual director is so life changing.
• 1:13:25
  Is there is there any kind of final story or thought you have
• 1:13:29
  for us of that life changing aspect?
• 1:13:31
  I mean, I, I feel like compelled to tell my story.
• 1:13:33
  I, I'll say, I'll say it and then I'll let you share any, any
• 1:13:36
  other thoughts you have. But it was before I became
• 1:13:38
  Catholic and I was at a pivotal lots of turning points, but I
• 1:13:42
  was at school at in college, and I was looking so much for
• 1:13:47
  direction because I was doing all this prolific activism and I
• 1:13:51
  felt really called to just go 1000% and just pour out
• 1:13:55
  everything I had for the sake of God's children.
• 1:13:58
  And then I wanted, I knew I was so limited.
• 1:14:00
  I needed help because I was making mistakes left and right
• 1:14:03
  and struggling with my struggles.
• 1:14:05
  And so I remember being at the top of the little Chapel at this
• 1:14:09
  little Chapel at a women's center was a open state women's
• 1:14:10
  center at about UCLA. And after this Mass, I wasn't
• 1:14:14
  Catholic yet, didn't fully understand the Mass.
• 1:14:15
  But I turned to this woman and I said, is there someone here who
• 1:14:17
  can mentor me? And it was certainly the Holy
• 1:14:21
  Spirit. And she ended up becoming my
• 1:14:22
  sponsor and guiding me, shepherd me me into the church and giving
• 1:14:25
  me incredible spiritual guidance for years.
• 1:14:30
  And she's still someone I consider a dear.
• 1:14:32
  I mean, I'll always owe everything to her.
• 1:14:35
  Owe that to her. So yeah, it changed my life
• 1:14:38
  dramatically. And spiritual directors have
• 1:14:40
  helped me at key moments of discernment with, you know,
• 1:14:43
  marriage and big decisions and then also just been consolation
• 1:14:46
  and encouragement along the path.
• 1:14:50
  Yeah, really. Beautiful.
• 1:14:52
  I'm sure you have a story, but. No thanks for.
• 1:14:54
  I wanted to share mine. Yeah, I love that.
• 1:14:57
  Yeah, it's. And, and again, you know, what
• 1:15:02
  you just shared is, is my experience that it's not so much
• 1:15:06
  about what she told you, it's more about how she received you.
• 1:15:11
  And, and those are the most prescient moments for me as a
• 1:15:14
  spiritual director to hear someone say I've never said this
• 1:15:17
  to anyone before. I've never been able to tell
• 1:15:20
  this to anyone before. No one has ever received me like
• 1:15:24
  you have. And because that's what a gift
• 1:15:27
  relationship bestows identity. You know, how do I know who I
• 1:15:30
  am? Well, because someone calls me
• 1:15:33
  father, someone calls me son, someone calls me beloved.
• 1:15:38
  I received that from the outside.
• 1:15:40
  I we, we didn't use the word, if I can add a little footnote to
• 1:15:45
  our conversation, you know, the we talked about obedience, but a
• 1:15:49
  lot of times we talk about authority together with
• 1:15:51
  obedience. I like the word authority
• 1:15:53
  because it has the word author in it.
• 1:15:55
  Each one of us has a story and there are certain people that we
• 1:15:58
  entrust with the pen to help co-author that story.
• 1:16:03
  And when that person says to me, you are beloved, you are
• 1:16:07
  important, you have value, you have something great to offer.
• 1:16:11
  You are a gift that writes storylines into my story that I
• 1:16:15
  believe those are. So someone with that kind of
• 1:16:19
  authority that we're willing to a trust and trust with that kind
• 1:16:22
  of authority to co-author our story.
• 1:16:26
  Yeah, can write beautiful things that we would never have the
• 1:16:28
  courage to write for ourselves. But when you write it, I can
• 1:16:31
  believe it and then I can live it.
• 1:16:33
  And that's life changing. Beautiful.
• 1:16:36
  Thank you, Father. So beautiful.
• 1:16:38
  How can people learn more about your work and the programs that
• 1:16:44
  you lead? There's so much good stuff you
• 1:16:46
  do. I don't know how you do it all,
• 1:16:47
  by the way. I have, I don't know if it's OK
• 1:16:48
  that I'm sharing this, but I know even after this interview,
• 1:16:51
  you have somebody driving from somewhere, probably far away, to
• 1:16:54
  come see you and meet you for spiritual direction.
• 1:16:57
  So I know you're swamped between the Saint Vincent's and horses
• 1:17:02
  and spiritual directees. How can people learn more about
• 1:17:04
  what you're doing? Well, thanks.
• 1:17:06
  It's a it's a real privilege to be with you and, and with all
• 1:17:10
  the viewers and listeners. I am a monk of Saint Vincent
• 1:17:15
  Arch Abbey. I am the director of spiritual
• 1:17:19
  formation at Saint Vincent's Seminary.
• 1:17:21
  I am the director of the Institute for Ministry
• 1:17:23
  Formation. And all of those things have
• 1:17:25
  their own website. I'll give you the last one,
• 1:17:28
  which is IMF, not the Impossible Mission Force, but the Institute
• 1:17:34
  for Ministry Formation, IMF. Dot everything spelled out Saint
• 1:17:38
  Vincent seminary.edu and that'll get you to our spiritual
• 1:17:43
  direction program. We have a catechetics program.
• 1:17:46
  We do different kinds of missionizing, parish outreach,
• 1:17:50
  variety of things there. And then also I have my own
• 1:17:54
  website, fatherboniface.org. You have to spell out father and
• 1:17:58
  you have to figure out how to spell Boniface.
• 1:18:00
  But Father boniface.org will kind of link you to a variety of
• 1:18:04
  things and and then there are books and podcasts and all the
• 1:18:08
  things. Amazing.
• 1:18:09
  Thank you. Thank you for your generosity.
• 1:18:12
  Pouring out so much for so many souls.
• 1:18:15
  It's beautiful. It's a joy to do it with you.
• 1:18:19
  A huge thank you to our partner. EWTNEWTN is the largest
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• 1:18:26
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• 1:18:29
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