Latest / The Lila Rose Show / E226: Hoping Against Hope: A Love Story Written By God w/Stephanie Gray Connors | Lila Rose Show

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E226: Hoping Against Hope: A Love Story Written By God w/Stephanie Gray Connors | Lila Rose Show · The Lila Rose Show

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  We all have common needs to be recognized, to be loved and to
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  have someone to share life with. I.
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  Remember, you were so terrified of not getting married.
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  For those years, the amount of times I got mad at God and he's
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  like you. Would be ugly crying on my couch
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  about being single. Each person has to wrestle with
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  am I being too picky? And I was certainly told that.
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  There is this narrative that there's something wrong with you
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  if you don't get married in your 20s.
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  What's your take on that? At the exact moment he's praying
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  over me, and I know the exact moment because you were
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  involved. I was When God plans something
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  for you, when He wills something for you, all hosts of things
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  will come into play that you couldn't even possibly imagine
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  could occur. Hi everyone, welcome back to the
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  Lila Roe Show. I am so delighted that today I'm
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  sitting down with one of my best friends, Stephanie Gray Connors.
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  This episode is very personal. We get into some of her
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  apologetics work on issues like IVF, euthanasia, assisted
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  suicide, but it really is a story of someone who is trusting
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  God and going through good times and bad and discovering God's
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  incredible mercy and how she found love at 40.
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  Stephanie's story will inspire you to see how God can work
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  through the unexpected and even in the dark times to bring about
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  His calling in our lives. Also, a huge thank you to
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  everybody who has subscribed to the show.
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  If you are not subscribed yet, make sure that you subscribe.
• 1:23
  That helps the show reach more people.
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  Also, if you're listening on podcast app, leave us five
• 1:27
  stars, leave us a review that also helps the show grow.
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  And if you're over here on YouTube, make sure you ring that
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  notification bell so you don't miss future episodes.
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  Stephanie Gray Connors, welcome back to the podcast.
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  Thank. You I'm finally here in person.
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  I love it. It's.
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  Beautiful. Thank you.
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  I'm so glad you're here. I'm delighted to be in.
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  Full disclosure for the folks listening.
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  Stephanie and I are filming this after hours.
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  Kids are asleep. Our babies are sleeping.
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  Yes, finally, finally, it was a. It was a bit of a stretch,
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  especially for you. Yes, my youngest clashed with my
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  oldest and the youngest got to stay up later.
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  She's a very cute. Little girl she is.
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  They both are. So Stephanie and I go way back.
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  We've known each other I think 20 years now.
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  Yeah, so I circa 2007, I was 27 and you were 19.
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  You were actually just really making it big in the undercover
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  work you had done. And that was hitting the news.
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  And I remember the the days that we were hanging out, we went to
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  Costco at one point and you were taking media calls and I was
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  just sitting in like the Costco cafeterias.
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  You were like walking around and like doing interviews.
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  Yeah, I don't even, I don't remember the Costco calls.
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  I do remember meeting you for the first time because Greg
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  Cunningham, who's a real patriarch of the pearlife
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  movement in a good way, he's done really trail raising work.
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  But he said you have to meet this Canadian, Stephanie Gray.
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  She's doing amazing things to bring the pearlife movement to
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  Canada, and I learned a lot from you right away.
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  Yeah, well, I remember he was really keen to have us meet
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  because there weren't a lot of, at the time, like young female
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  activist apologists that were getting the message out there.
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  And he wanted, yeah, wanted us to meet.
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  And yeah, that was the start of a beautiful friendship.
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  So I'm, I'm your I'm your big fan.
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  But for those who don't know you yet, and I also want to say one
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  other quick thing. Stephanie is an incredible
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  author. We'll talk about her work in a
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  minute, but she's also beautifully not on social media
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  intentionally, which is a very interesting thing for a public
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  person to do. I'm going to ask you about that.
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  But if you don't know, if you don't know Stephanie yet, you're
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  in for a treat. First off, kick us off with a
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  little bit about your background.
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  Yes, well I am a wife and a mother.
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  I have 4 babies in heaven and two on earth and I got married
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  late at 40. And so career wise leading up to
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  my marriage for about 20 years I worked full time in the pro-life
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  movement. And I was very inspired when I
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  was 18 years old by another American, Scott Klusendorf, who
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  actually had been inspired by Greg Cunningham who you
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  mentioned. And I heard Scott give a
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  pro-life apologetics weekend lecture series, and he said
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  there are more people working full time to kill babies than
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  there are working full time to save them.
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  And I became deeply convicted that weekend that I was meant to
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  be one of the people working full time to save babies.
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  And I was particularly drawn to Scott's style of speaking,
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  apologetics, debating, and thought, I not only want to work
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  full time saving babies, but I want to do it the way this man
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  does it. And so I stayed in touch with
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  him after the conference and he really began to mentor me from a
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  distance. And so I finished my degree and
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  he really helped connect me to others and into training that
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  would prepare me to be able to turn kind of a passion for A
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  cause into what would be my full time work.
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  And so I started that when I graduated in May of 2002 and did
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  that for years and decades. And I still do, but not to the
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  same level because, well, now I've got my little ones to focus
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  on so. How many speeches do you think
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  you've given across the world? Well, so I'm very Taipei and so
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  I literally have every talk I've ever given recorded in an Excel
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  document year by year. Wow.
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  So I know it's over 1000 and in various countries obviously
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  originally. Over 1000 individuals talks.
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  Individual talks, yes, yeah. Over over the, you know, the two
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  decades, obviously being from Canada, a lot of them began in
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  Canada, but then now we live in the States and, and certainly a
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  lot of my speaking has been in the United States, but then some
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  in Europe and Latin America as well.
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  And then how many countries have you been to speaking?
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  Speaking so Canada, US, Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Ireland,
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  Scotland, England, Latvia. At least nine Austria 10 Did I
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  say Austria? I don't think so.
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  At least 10. And then you've done a lot of
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  debates. Yes.
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  And I think my ability to do debates now is in no small part
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  because of what you modeled and the way that you approach
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  debates, which is obviously logic and science first,
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  apologetics, winsome. But also your tone is something
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  that's so commendable because you go into this as a Scott
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  Klusendorf style. I mean, a huge kudos back all
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  the way back to Scott, right? But it's this approach of really
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  loving winning the other person. And you gave that phenomenal
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  talk over at Google's headquarters a few years ago,
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  very famous talk now, where you talked about winning people to
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  the pro-life cause, not just winning the argument.
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  Right, exactly. And that's key.
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  And yes, that has been, you know, built into me through the
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  various mentors that I've had and then through direct
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  experience of debating people and engaging people and trying
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  some really solid intellectual arguments, seeing them work at
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  times and then at other times seeing them fail and thinking,
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  well, why is this failing? Because I know in theory it's an
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  airtight case and in practice it's worked in other
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  circumstances. Why is it failing now?
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  And then over time, I began to see it fails sometimes because
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  you're dealing with very wounded people who are coming from
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  personal experiences where they've had abortions or they
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  drove a friend to a clinic or their mom had an abortion.
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  And so their close ties with that act have caused them to
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  think, if I align with this woman's views and I get
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  convinced by her and I admit that I'm convinced by her and I
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  admit abortion is wrong, then what am I saying about the
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  abortion that I drove my friend to get?
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  What am I saying about my mom who had an abortion?
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  What am I saying, You know, whatever that person's story
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  might be. And so that causes them, if it's
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  very personal, to then not accept the logic.
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  And so that's where we really need to be extra compassionate
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  and extra what I call compassionately curious where we
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  want to draw out of them what that story is so that they can
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  then encounter someone who knows where they're coming from and
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  doesn't sense that we hate them even though we hate the act of
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  abortion, doesn't sense that we judge them even though we judge
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  the act of abortion. And so if they can receive from
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  us someone who says, what does someone who's had your
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  experience want, someone who has my experience to understand and
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  just be quiet and listen to what they have to say.
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  That speaks volumes, you know, to say, I'm curious, where does
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  your passion come from? Instead of sharing your own
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  passion, truly want to know the origins of theirs and just
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  listen and see what they say. And so as I have done that over
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  the years and as people, as a result of those open-ended
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  questions, revealed things to me like that they were victims of
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  rape, that they were raised in terrible poverty and grew up,
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  you know, getting food via food stamps.
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  And you know, that their mother was abused, used.
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  And all kinds of stories that people have revealed to me has
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  has broken my heart in a good way because then I could have
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  profound compassion, not just for the child in the womb, but
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  for the person before me. And so through all that
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  experience, besides being taught the importance of compassion,
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  but really having to live it out, that has defined, I think,
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  how I then want to present the pro-life case in the public
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  square. You do a phenomenal job of it.
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  Thank you sis. This thought just keeps coming
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  to me while you're talking. I think about Stephanie in
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  college, at uni, they call it right?
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  In Canada, they call it. What do they call it in Canada?
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  Yeah. Uni, I mean university, but I
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  actually often do have like notes written about uni.
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  Maybe that's just the short. Form, What do they call it?
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  Do they call it college? What do you guys call it in
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  Canada? Yeah.
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  University. You say university, you don't
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  say uni Yes. Yeah, well, some.
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  People in the in the states, we don't say uni well.
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  You don't even say university after they say college, they
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  say, right. People often say college and
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  that is a big difference. If people go to a university,
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  they say I'm going to university not.
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  What's the other word? Bad bag.
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  Say bag, bag, bag. Like, like begging your
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  groceries, Yeah. What's the other word that are?
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  Are we say so differently? Apparently roof RO that's pretty
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  that sounds pretty good sorry sorry, sorry, sorry right
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  Americans say sorry like as if it's an A sorry and actually.
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  Sorry, now I'm saying it your way.
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  Speaking of Scott Klosendorf being with his kids and and they
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  the his one son ran up to me with the board game.
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  Remember the old board game? Sorry.
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  And he's like, can we play this? He didn't say what it was
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  called, but he showed me the box and of course I see sorry
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  written on it. And I said sorry, I love that
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  game. And he looked at me and he was
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  like 10 years old. And he goes sorry.
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  What do you mean it's sorry? That's so cute.
• 10:49
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  What I'm imagining is you, because you're very bright and
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  I'm imagining you. You hadn't committed to full
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  time pro-life work yet. You're in college, What were you
• 11:53
  studying? Or you're in uni, whatever.
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  Actually started in theater. OK.
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  I hadn't declared my major but I was taking a lot of theater
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  classes and was wondering if I would major in theater.
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  But after the first year taking some other arts classes I ended
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  up taking more poli sci. In the end, I landed on making a
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  major in political science. What did you imagine yourself to
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  be in the future when you were entering college?
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  Because it wasn't prolifactivist yet.
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  OK, this is very interesting. Tell me please.
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  You will like this. I don't know if I've ever.
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  Told you I don't know if you have either, that's why I'm
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  asking. OK, well, there's what I always
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  said. And then there's the thing
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  that's interesting that I think you'll like.
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  So I remember I didn't know that was one of the biggest crosses
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  for me at the as high school was ending because there's that
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  there's that sense of what's next?
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  I've got to I've got to go to university.
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  That seems like the responsible thing to do.
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  And then it and then but I didn't know what I wanted to
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  actually study. And I had three very dear best
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  friends who were still like the core 4 we call ourselves.
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  And all three knew that they were going to be doctors.
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  And all three to this day are still doctors.
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  And I remember thinking, I like biology, but I hate the other
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  sciences and I don't really want to do math, math and all the
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  things that are required as as prereqs.
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  So I thought, I'm not going to be like them and do Med school.
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  So then what do I do? But I really liked acting and
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  performing. And I also like play piano.
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  So I kind of had a performance background even musically.
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  And so I thought, well, I'll do theater, but that didn't seem
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  like it was going to result in any type of job.
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  So then I would always say, and if that doesn't work, my backup
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  will be occupational therapy. It was just, I don't know, I've
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  read about different jobs. Maybe I would like that, but
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  it's. Funny because I can imagine this
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  torturing you because you're you're a type A and a little
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  OCD. So you're like totally.
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  I had my my other girlfriends have their lives figured out.
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  What? Where's my figure out able plan
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  here? I totally didn't know, but at
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  the same time, I also so and I had a passion for things that
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  didn't seem like careers or at least income producing careers,
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  like being an actress, whatever that is going to manifest into.
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  And you know, I also had a great passion for the pro-life
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  movement. So even though I heard Scott
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  when I was 18, I was that kid going to pro-life conferences as
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  a child because my parents were activists and I was going to
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  marches and rallies and protests because that's what they did.
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  So I grew up in the movement, loved the cause, loved babies
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  and was horrified when I learned at an early age what abortion
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  was similar, similar to you learning at an early age.
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  And so I knew I also wanted to give myself to the pro-life
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  movement, but had no concept that that could be a career.
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  So I went to college and really struggled with what to do.
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  But years later, once I began full time pro-life work and had
• 14:33
  been particularly working full time as a speaker and educator,
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  it was years in that I found a little journal letter that I had
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  written in 1997. It was 97 or 98.
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  It was as those years went into each other when I was in grade
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  12 or 12th grade as Americans say, but Canadians say grade 12
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  and we. I had come across this little
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  prompt in a journal that said write a letter to someone dead
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  or alive just expressing what's on your heart and what your
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  dreams and aspirations are. I had forgotten I'd ever written
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  this letter and years later when I was already a full time
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  speaker, I stumbled upon it. And my grade 12 year in high
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  school started in September of 97 when Mother Teresa died.
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  I wrote my letter to Mother Teresa.
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  She was already dead. I'm getting chilled right now
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  because I wrote a letter to Mother Teresa.
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  Sis, how did I not know? That and I didn't know mother.
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  Teresa. I didn't know what what you're
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  sharing, So what did you say in your letter?
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  So I said I don't know what I want to do with my future and
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  all my friends know. But I guess if I were to really
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  think about it I would love to be some form of speaker.
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  I have like no. Wreck of life.
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  I, I probably said that too. I at this point, like forget I
• 15:59
  still have the letter somewhere. But I remember reading it
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  thinking, Oh my gosh, in 1997, just after Mother Teresa died, I
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  wrote her a letter and I basically told her that deep
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  down I actually would like to do what I am now doing.
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  And I'd completely forgotten I'd ever written that and ever
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  dreamed that, which is just a cool God thing, which I also
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  think it shows like we often, you know, the truth is written
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  on our hearts. We often hear and say, but it's
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  like a truth was written deep into my being as to what God was
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  calling me to do. And I knew it, even though I had
• 16:36
  no idea how that could be possible or what that could look
• 16:39
  like because asked me in 1997 what being a speaker was.
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  I mean, back then even like the Internet was literally just
• 16:47
  coming up, which is also very funny.
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  I'm that old. I tell people now like 1998 was
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  when I got my first e-mail address, e-mail was just like a
• 16:56
  couple years old. And and so like, it's not like
• 16:59
  we had Ted Talks and it's not like we had all these lecture
• 17:02
  series that are available online and being a public speaker was a
• 17:06
  thing the way it is now. Of course, there were always
• 17:08
  traveling speakers and people would come to our church and
• 17:11
  give talks and do series and stuff.
• 17:13
  So obviously speaking and educating existed, but not the
• 17:16
  way it kind of is now. And that there was something in
• 17:19
  me in 1997 and this 17 year old girl wondering what what am I
• 17:22
  meant to do? But yeah.
• 17:24
  It's beautiful that you're confiding that to Mother Teresa
• 17:27
  because she is the Pearl Life champion, right?
• 17:30
  She was the Pearl Life Champions.
• 17:31
  Oh, yeah. Every time she spoke publicly,
• 17:33
  she talked about abortion, even when it wasn't popular.
• 17:36
  And we were like, what did she hear?
• 17:37
  She supposed to talk about the, you know, orphans of Calcutta,
• 17:40
  India and she's talking about Americans abortion problem,
• 17:43
  right? Because the spiritual poverty
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  that was in the West. Yes, yes.
• 17:47
  She said our spiritual poverty because of the death, the death
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  killing of abortion is greater than the physical, material
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  poverty of Calcutta, India. Yeah, but but you were her
• 17:56
  spiritual daughter and I, I'm going to, you know, folks here
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  on the show, you know, we, you know, Catholic, I believe she
• 18:03
  was praying, praying for you, praying for your vocation,
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  praying for your work. Yeah, well, and I think also her
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  prayers are very mighty because even I remember thinking at my
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  young age of 17, when she died, it was about five days after
• 18:18
  Princess Diana died, something like that.
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  And I and they were also very close friends.
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  Yes. And I remember Mother Teresa's
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  death was overshadowed by Princess Diana's death.
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  And I remember thinking, I bet she asked God to die then like I
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  remember thinking I bet she did because she was such a humble
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  woman who didn't like all the attention that she was given.
• 18:42
  That for someone like her who didn't want all the attention
• 18:45
  that inevitably she would get upon her death, the one person
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  who could over shadow that would have been Mother would have been
• 18:51
  Princess Diana. And it was so she died.
• 18:54
  I almost wondered. I hear this thought.
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  I mean, I'm so so young and thinking.
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  Diana died 1st and then Mother Teresa found out her friend had
• 19:01
  passed and said now's a good time for me to go.
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  No, I, I. Believe it.
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  But just thinking, wow, So what other time would the world not
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  respond the way it should have? Because I remember thinking it
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  is very unusual. Obviously there was a lot of
• 19:14
  talk about Mother Teresa's death, but it was not what I
• 19:18
  thought would have been the case because the world was still
• 19:22
  talking about the death of Princess Diana.
• 19:24
  You know, you know, I have this interesting kind of newer theory
• 19:27
  about holy deaths. So these very holy people who
• 19:30
  die and often become Saints, right?
• 19:33
  But I, I think about like Carlo Akutis, who's about to be
• 19:35
  canonized, and Piero Giorgio Farsadi, who's about to be
• 19:37
  canonized. And I think about the lives of
• 19:40
  some of these Saints and how they lived largely without
• 19:42
  notoriety. They were just normal people,
• 19:45
  right? And the fact that in one sense
• 19:49
  we kind of overlook holy people like they're, they're just like,
• 19:54
  Oh yeah, I like, that's a great, they're a lovely person.
• 19:56
  I love them. But they're not really
• 19:58
  commanding attention. If anything, they're often
• 20:01
  avoiding it to some degree. You know, they're, they're just
• 20:03
  moving about their work and just doing paving their head down.
• 20:07
  And I just think that's, I don't know, maybe the parable of the
• 20:10
  modern age that the people that command the most attention, that
• 20:14
  have the most attention that, you know, are are.
• 20:18
  You know, I'm not saying they don't have things they can teach
• 20:19
  us to or they're on goodness. You know, there maybe there are
• 20:22
  Saints that are these huge people.
• 20:24
  Right, but that's we're all called to be Saints, so want
• 20:27
  everyone to be yes. But that that little person you
• 20:30
  pass by on the street who's your next door neighbor or whatever,
• 20:33
  or that grandmother who's in the church, back at the church
• 20:36
  praying the rosary, who you're like rushing past, right?
• 20:39
  That literally could have a higher crown enough and like
• 20:42
  probably does devotion than me anyways like.
• 20:45
  Of their soul. Yeah.
• 20:46
  Living well, really living. What comes to mind as you're
• 20:49
  speaking is the old civil rights movement song that APBS series
• 20:54
  was titled after, which was the Eyes on the Eyes on the Prize is
• 20:58
  what it was called. Eyes on the Prize.
• 21:00
  Amazing PBS series that really documents the civil rights
• 21:03
  movement. But the the activists would sing
• 21:06
  Keep your eyes on the prize. Oh, Lord.
• 21:10
  And that's like every episode in the series starts off with them
• 21:14
  singing that song. But yeah, it's often the quiet,
• 21:18
  humble soul that keeps their eyes on the prize and they're
• 21:21
  remembering it's not about worldly praise.
• 21:23
  It's just focused on. They're just whatever is on the
• 21:25
  prize, It's holy, goalless. They're they're, they're focused
• 21:27
  on heaven. They're focused on the next
• 21:29
  World, that this world is not our home, that we are pilgrims
• 21:32
  on a journey we are passing through.
• 21:34
  But my eye is on the prize. My eye is on, on heaven.
• 21:38
  That's where that's where I meant to go.
• 21:40
  And yeah, it's often these quiet, holy souls that maybe we
• 21:44
  don't notice them as much because they are focused
• 21:46
  elsewhere and we're focused elsewhere.
• 21:48
  But shouldn't we be focused where, Yeah, where they are?
• 21:52
  When you found that letter, how old were you when you looked
• 21:56
  back? I don't remember exactly.
• 21:57
  But I was several years into public speaking because what
• 21:59
  struck me when I read it, and this has happened several times
• 22:03
  with my journals, was that I had basically expressed what had
• 22:09
  come to fruition. And I've seen that happen a
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  number of times, which is pretty cool in my journaling over the
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• 23:31
  I want to ask you if it's OK about the vocation element of
• 23:35
  what you have done with your life.
• 23:37
  I mean, you're now married. You're living the vocation of
• 23:38
  marriage, but you were a pro-life activist and very much,
• 23:44
  you know, traveling the world speaking, you know, dozens and
• 23:47
  dozens of times a year, over 1000 times you've given
• 23:50
  individual talks. And we didn't even talk about
• 23:52
  the media interviews you've done and everything else, which is
• 23:55
  probably 1000 more. A lot.
• 23:57
  I mean, I've also kept record of those too, but it's it's a lot,
• 24:01
  Yeah. It's a.
• 24:01
  Lot a lot of talking, but for life and and to save to save
• 24:06
  lives. And as an aside, you noticed how
• 24:08
  well my 15 month old talks. I know, I just.
• 24:10
  She's from a long line of. Talk.
• 24:12
  I just met her 15 month old and the girl is articulate.
• 24:16
  She's talking. I'm like, wow, this girl, like
• 24:19
  her mother actually. You know what about two months
• 24:21
  ago we were driving in the car, me and both the girls and I was
• 24:24
  saying to my 3 1/2 year old Violet.
• 24:27
  We would drove past something and I was like hey remember when
• 24:29
  and I was recalling this memory and I kept saying remember
• 24:33
  Violet remember and then all of a sudden from the backseat you
• 24:36
  hear her little at that point like 13 month old sister Molly
• 24:40
  go remember. I was like.
• 24:43
  Wow. Molly just said remember.
• 24:46
  That is very she's very precocious.
• 24:49
  Yes. So were you hoping to get
• 24:52
  married when you started out as a younger activist?
• 24:55
  So, and I have to just say one thing for folks listening really
• 24:58
  quick here. Contextually, there is a debate
• 25:01
  on going, especially in the more conservative space of the
• 25:04
  Internet, about womanhood, femininity, and this idea of
• 25:09
  rejecting girl boss culture, right?
• 25:13
  Then there's the other element of, OK, as Christian women,
• 25:16
  we're called to actually double down on the gifts we've been
• 25:18
  giving to give back. And if you feel expensive
• 25:21
  calling to marriage, you want to be open to marriage, but you
• 25:24
  want to also be able to prepare to be a Good Wife and a mother,
• 25:26
  whatever that looks like. That's also confusing for a lot
• 25:29
  of women. What does it even mean these
• 25:30
  days? And then you throw in there the
• 25:32
  the other complication, especially if you're a
• 25:34
  practicing Catholic of, well, maybe I'm called to be
• 25:36
  consecrated or maybe I'm called to the religious life.
• 25:40
  And, and so I think a lot of women I talk to, and I know you
• 25:44
  talk to younger women and sometimes now women in their 30s
• 25:48
  and 40s are kind of having these vocational crises is maybe a
• 25:54
  strong word, but I wouldn't say it's the wrong word.
• 25:56
  I mean, people are really wrestling with their vocation,
• 26:00
  their, their, their, their purpose.
• 26:03
  So I think your story is fascinating.
• 26:07
  I mean, obviously know it Full disclosure, but I think it's the
• 26:12
  way that you navigated these questions yourself before they
• 26:15
  became like trendy topics to discuss today, I think was
• 26:17
  actually very, it's very commendable, but it's also very
• 26:21
  interesting and I think it lends a lot of food for thought so.
• 26:24
  Yeah. So that, yeah, vocation, the,
• 26:28
  the big V vocation, right? Like now I'm living out the
• 26:31
  vocation of marriage was something that I remember
• 26:35
  praying about wrestling with, almost like fighting with God
• 26:40
  over in terms of wanting to know what I was meant to do, what he
• 26:43
  made me for, what he wanted me to do with what I wanted to do
• 26:46
  and did those match up and all of that.
• 26:48
  I wrestled with that. I mean, really until I met my
• 26:52
  husband and I remember. So I started full time work.
• 26:56
  I wasn't quite 22 when I start. I was 21, and that was the year
• 27:00
  I turned 22. And I remember thinking, well, I
• 27:06
  feel very passionate about this. And doors clearly were opening
• 27:09
  in the direction of speaking. Every time I would give a talk,
• 27:11
  someone in the audience was, hey, can you speak at this event
• 27:13
  or that event? It was like God was clearly
• 27:16
  shining a light on this particular path that he wanted
• 27:18
  me to do. But then it involved a lot of
• 27:20
  travel and involved a lot of time building something really
• 27:25
  from nothing, also like a nonprofit organization and so
• 27:27
  forth. In an organization back in
• 27:30
  Canada. Yeah.
• 27:31
  And so I remember being like, God, I want a companion for the
• 27:36
  journey. You said it is not good for the
• 27:38
  man to be alone when you, you created the world.
• 27:41
  And I don't want to be alone. But I really feel called not
• 27:46
  only to the pro-life movement, but to this aspect of pro-life
• 27:49
  education of apologetics and teaching and so forth.
• 27:52
  So what is that? What is that going to look like?
• 27:55
  And so I have journals to Jesus starting when I'm probably like
• 27:58
  20-3 years old, being like, oh Lord, please.
• 28:00
  Like I would just love someone to really help me do this and to
• 28:04
  be my companion for the journey and you.
• 28:06
  Know kids, when you were imagining this like missional
• 28:09
  marriage and you're like globetrotting, did you think,
• 28:13
  well, when when we have our kids, they just come with.
• 28:16
  So that's a great question because that started to become
• 28:19
  the source of conflict in my prayer of thinking as a
• 28:22
  Catholic, I'm going to be open to life.
• 28:26
  But if I get married now, when I feel so-called to do all this
• 28:29
  stuff and I get pregnant, will I be able to fully pour myself out
• 28:36
  and give myself to the world in a way the way I think I'm called
• 28:40
  to do while being faithful to not only my husband, but but to
• 28:45
  my children who will require a special attention of me that
• 28:48
  that not even, you know, a husband does?
• 28:51
  And so without being married and without even being close to
• 28:54
  that, that was that was a big source of struggle for me.
• 29:01
  And I have years of journals where I'm like God, like where
• 29:05
  is my husband? But then wondering, well, has
• 29:08
  God not given me a husband because he wants me to do this
• 29:12
  very specific. And that was also a source of
• 29:14
  some potential even resentment, right?
• 29:17
  With God, yeah. Yeah.
• 29:18
  I got very angry at God over the years.
• 29:20
  There were times. Yeah, yeah.
• 29:23
  Was I always ultimately convicted that God existed and
• 29:27
  God loved me and I was to be faithful to him and I was to
• 29:30
  keep going to Mass and keep going to confession and using
• 29:32
  the sacraments and loving, yes. But my heart was deeply wounded
• 29:38
  on on various occasions being like feeling abandoned, feeling
• 29:42
  like, why haven't you given me what I want and what I want
• 29:46
  isn't bad and all of that. And I there were even times like
• 29:51
  I would watch movies of social reformers like Schindler's List.
• 29:56
  I remember watching a movie about the suffragettes who
• 29:59
  fought for the women's right to vote in like early 1900s.
• 30:03
  I remember watching even the movie movie Freedom Riders,
• 30:06
  which the title is a spinoff of Freedom Riders, the civil rights
• 30:10
  movement. But in each of these movies, it
• 30:13
  often involved very strong characters, sometimes female.
• 30:17
  Obviously Schindler's, this is a dominant male character, But in
• 30:20
  these other movies, dominant female characters.
• 30:22
  But what always struck me in these movies was the total
• 30:27
  giving of self that these people gave to their causes and that it
• 30:30
  often involved terrible things to the relationships they had or
• 30:37
  not having relationships that they wanted.
• 30:40
  And honestly, sis, I would watch these movies and often those
• 30:43
  nights I would cry myself to sleep because if I saw a movie
• 30:47
  where someone didn't live faithfully out their
• 30:51
  relationship because they were giving themselves to A cause, my
• 30:54
  heart would break thinking I don't want to hurt other people
• 30:57
  as I give myself to A cause. But I feel called to give myself
• 31:00
  to A cause. But I also feel called to, you
• 31:03
  know, have family and support and community around me.
• 31:06
  And I think when someone is not yet locked down into a vocation
• 31:09
  of religious life or marriage or some form of very clear
• 31:14
  consecrated life where they still have a community of like
• 31:19
  minded individuals. The way you would in religious
• 31:21
  life or the way you would in married life, where you're in a
• 31:24
  sense building a family structure, a small unit in in in
• 31:29
  the lifestyle that you have. How important it is to
• 31:34
  nonetheless carve out very intentionally good community,
• 31:38
  good friendships so that you don't feel the aloneness.
• 31:41
  So what carried me through, you know, those times where I was
• 31:44
  feeling really heartbroken was, for example, our beautiful
• 31:49
  sisterhood that we have with our dear friend Christina.
• 31:52
  I met Christina in 2003 when I was 23, and I think we're four
• 31:57
  years of art. So was she like 19?
• 32:00
  And then a couple and we instantly felt like soul
• 32:02
  sisters. She was on her crusade as well.
• 32:05
  Yes, also in, in the pro-life cause and I just we, we clicked,
• 32:10
  we felt like, you know, if if anyone, any of your listeners
• 32:12
  know, Anne of Green Gables, which by the way, is a Canadian,
• 32:15
  written by Canadian author, a classic book, but right, Anne
• 32:19
  and Diane are, are booze and buddies.
• 32:21
  There's just this, this connection.
• 32:22
  And that's what I felt with Christine.
• 32:24
  And that was 2003, so more than 20 years ago.
• 32:27
  And then when you and I met, I felt the same.
• 32:29
  Well. My and Anna Green, we'll be the
• 32:32
  same. Just.
• 32:33
  Three of us, but I felt the same, the same connection.
• 32:38
  And then that was O 7. And then a couple years later
• 32:41
  when Christina and I were hanging out, I mentioned having
• 32:44
  met you and she's like, no way. I met her too.
• 32:47
  And then we started doing vacations together and the the
• 32:50
  three of us. And just so that this sisterhood
• 32:53
  with you and Christina and myself gave me so much life when
• 32:59
  I was like, who are the people that really get me and
• 33:01
  understand me because I don't have a religious community and I
• 33:03
  don't have a spouse. Consolation.
• 33:06
  It gave me consolation. Tremendous.
• 33:08
  And the number of times also that our work overlapped,
• 33:14
  sometimes just you and Christina or me and you or whatever, but
• 33:17
  then also other times, all three of us, year after year after
• 33:21
  year, the amount of times with our crazy schedules, we managed
• 33:23
  to be together and sharing experiences together and, and
• 33:27
  talk about, you know, the depths of our our souls was so life
• 33:32
  giving. And so I think back now also in
• 33:35
  these more recent years where we have seen much less of each
• 33:37
  other because we now have the husbands we so longed for and
• 33:40
  the children that we so longed for.
• 33:43
  I think back now looking in hindsight at the precious,
• 33:46
  precious gift of sisterhood that God gave me.
• 33:51
  That was a consolation. Now when I think back to those
• 33:53
  times of desolation and was a very beautiful source of life,
• 33:58
  which is ultimately what ones vocation should be.
• 34:01
  And then the many, many myriad of other people that I met
• 34:05
  through my travels, the number of families I stayed with on it,
• 34:08
  it was so life giving to me. The elderly couples, the young
• 34:11
  families, there's so many different people who spoke life
• 34:14
  into me and in in a short window of time over just a couple
• 34:18
  years, invited me into their world and their families and
• 34:22
  made me feel like I had belonging when I was in another
• 34:25
  part of the world. That was also profound
• 34:28
  consolation in a season where I didn't have the defined
• 34:32
  vocation, which, yeah, for any listeners who are kind of
• 34:35
  feeling they're like, it's not defined yet, having those those
• 34:42
  friendships and communities and support structures around you
• 34:45
  that aren't exactly what you're looking for can nonetheless be
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• 35:51
  Before I got married to Joe or shortly after, I was reflecting
• 35:54
  on our friendship. You know, you're obviously a
• 35:55
  bridesmaid and I was able to, during the pandemic, make it to
• 35:59
  your wedding, which is. Like one of the nights.
• 36:01
  Which was such a blessing. And I was just reflecting on
• 36:06
  just the moments of, you know, those relationships where you
• 36:08
  feel fully known, fully seen, fully loved, and you can be
• 36:13
  completely open about truly anything transparent.
• 36:18
  And you're also with someone that can hold your transparency
• 36:22
  safely. And then on top of that, you
• 36:25
  have fun with them. And then on top of that, you're
• 36:28
  like passionate about the same, like big goals.
• 36:31
  And then on top of that, they're actually helping you grow and
• 36:34
  mature, not just by hearing your deepest thoughts, but also by
• 36:38
  like cultivating, you know, conversations about how we're
• 36:41
  going to get to this big goal. And I mean it, it had like our
• 36:44
  relationship has had all those things and with Christine, it's
• 36:47
  had all those elements to make it a true spiritual friendship
• 36:50
  and every, every aspect. But I was just contemplating on
• 36:54
  my life when I was getting married and just, I was
• 36:57
  realizing like the best moment of my life.
• 37:00
  Besides obviously like being Catholic, you know, like, you
• 37:03
  know, I'm Catholic, I get to receive the Eucharist.
• 37:05
  But it was like, I remember especially the last I think
• 37:10
  sister retreat we had at that random hotel, we went to the
• 37:13
  Airbnb in Northern California and the cat dandruff was making
• 37:18
  you sneeze and like wheeze and die.
• 37:20
  We had to go to a hotel. We went to that random hotel so.
• 37:23
  Actually, it was. It was Christina's dog allergy,
• 37:27
  although I have the cat allergy. It wasn't your.
• 37:30
  Cat allergy still like, oh, right, this is this is the
• 37:33
  difference between us, which is so great.
• 37:34
  Your memory is always great with the big picture and then I come
• 37:37
  in with the detail. Like, OK, well.
• 37:39
  Actually. But no, you're right.
• 37:40
  We had it was the Airbnb. Christina walked in.
• 37:42
  She was. There's been a dog here.
• 37:44
  It wasn't a. Cat.
• 37:45
  Allergy. No, she is the dog allergy.
• 37:46
  I have the cat allergy. So you did.
• 37:48
  No, but you had a cat. There was a.
• 37:49
  There was a big, fat, fluffy cat.
• 37:52
  Oh, really? Yes, I, I remember this.
• 37:54
  It was the lower unit of the double unit Airbnb and we were
• 37:58
  going to do the upstairs unit, but then maybe then we went
• 38:03
  downstairs and there was a bacon dog and you said there's a cat.
• 38:06
  Well, maybe there was a dog that Christina.
• 38:08
  Couldn't stay in one unit and I saw the.
• 38:10
  Cat, he couldn't do either. Well, for sure.
• 38:12
  I remember going to the hotel. It was a cat for you.
• 38:14
  But anyways, that at that hotel, and I think some of us were on
• 38:18
  the cusp of big decisions. I think Christina had just
• 38:20
  started dating her husband and. Her now husband, I don't.
• 38:24
  Think I was You were dating Joe, I was dating Joe.
• 38:27
  I was dating no one and I. I'm very sad about it so.
• 38:34
  Dramatic, yes, but we also, I think always felt like whatever
• 38:38
  I remember one of us said, whatever our vocation is, it's
• 38:41
  going to be the same for all three of us.
• 38:42
  And it did work out. It did, but I just remember the
• 38:46
  feeling of of just like Zen, I mean peace, joy, consolation I
• 38:51
  had being with you women in this beautiful random hotel.
• 38:54
  It wasn't even a fancy one. It was just like some random
• 38:56
  hotel just having conversation with each other.
• 38:59
  It's such a it's like it just reminds me of the power of
• 39:01
  friendship and also how rare it is to find true friends.
• 39:04
  This is true that really as. You say get you on every level
• 39:07
  and because the. Aristotelian view of friendship
• 39:09
  is you're looking towards something together.
• 39:11
  You're sitting side by side, you're looking towards someone
• 39:13
  together. It's not just doji, affection
• 39:16
  for each other. Right, right.
• 39:17
  It's what's the word, what's the Greek word for friendship?
• 39:19
  Oh, phile Philothea filial. Love filial.
• 39:23
  Is it there's, there's Agape Eros filial.
• 39:26
  Filial is that, Yeah. That's the that's like
• 39:29
  friendship, right? Yes, yeah.
• 39:31
  And Stoje yes, yes. And then Stoje is am I saying
• 39:34
  this right is affection. That's not how you say it.
• 39:39
  Thank you, Harris, that store. Hey, whatever.
• 39:41
  Anyways, we had the affection, but we had a real we had we
• 39:45
  have. But the point is it is so
• 39:47
  consoling to have that kind of relationship and I think a lot
• 39:52
  of people today struggle to have that true deep friend that on on
• 39:57
  every level it's activated for them.
• 39:59
  I mean, I just sort of. I just want to thank you for
• 40:01
  being my friend. So I mean but but then also.
• 40:06
  Yeah, go ahead. Well, no, I was going to say
• 40:08
  actually what I. Remember about that now that
• 40:09
  you're bringing back all the memories is you're right.
• 40:12
  We, we were just so blessed by the presence of being able to
• 40:17
  share openly with each other. But I remember also there was
• 40:21
  this thing that always happened every time we got together where
• 40:22
  one of us would like, it was like a day where we would just
• 40:25
  share what was on our heart. And then the next day would be
• 40:26
  the next sister. And the next day was the next
• 40:28
  sister. But I remember at one point, I
• 40:30
  think because I was the one who was like, woe was me because I'd
• 40:34
  had the broken engagement and, and still kind of heartbroken
• 40:37
  and life isn't working out. And how old were you at this
• 40:40
  point? Well, this was.
• 40:42
  In our in my 30s for sure, I was 30s when when that when we did
• 40:46
  that. There were been many events
• 40:48
  together, but that was one of them.
• 40:50
  Later 30s, I remember, I don't remember this, but when I was
• 40:54
  sharing, I started just sobbing and weeping and I just at one
• 40:59
  point could no longer even talk. I was just so sad.
• 41:01
  And I remember exactly, you kind of just lay down at my feet and
• 41:06
  Christina put her hand on my hand and you guys said nothing.
• 41:11
  And you were kind of like a cat and a dog, you know, like now
• 41:16
  was I the cat or the dog? I'm.
• 41:19
  Not a pet. But I can, I can understand from
• 41:22
  that moment why people like that.
• 41:24
  This sounds like a terrible comment to make about your dear
• 41:27
  sisters. But what I mean is that was so
• 41:30
  meaningful to me because I just felt loved and fully accepted
• 41:36
  and supported and you understood my pain.
• 41:38
  And there weren't words you could give, there weren't things
• 41:41
  you could say, but you could just be there.
• 41:44
  And it reminds me in my apologetics, in my speaking,
• 41:47
  when I, when I speak about suffering and in the topic of
• 41:51
  euthanasia and assisted suicide and end of life.
• 41:53
  One of the things I I share is this beautiful care home project
• 41:59
  thing that goes on in the state of Washington, which involves a
• 42:03
  home for elderly people that also runs a childcare daycare
• 42:07
  kind of preschool center. So the very old and the very
• 42:11
  young are constantly interacting every day, and it's not your
• 42:15
  traditional relationship. Again, we're talking about
• 42:17
  traditional vocations and we were yet living the traditional
• 42:20
  vocation, but God was still providing us support through
• 42:23
  sisterhood and community. And so here you've got old
• 42:26
  people and children who aren't as they daily interact in the
• 42:29
  traditional relationship. It's not their grandparents,
• 42:31
  it's not their grandchildren, it's not their, you know,
• 42:34
  primary family unit. But day-to-day, this preschool
• 42:37
  and this elder care center have multiple programs where these
• 42:40
  two generations interact and hang out.
• 42:43
  And when I talk about this program and the life giving
• 42:45
  aspect, it is particularly for the elders who in our world
• 42:48
  today often feel abandoned. The director of the care home
• 42:52
  says we all have common needs to be recognized, to be loved and
• 42:59
  to have someone to share life with.
• 43:01
  And when I desired marriage, of course, what I wanted was to be
• 43:07
  recognized by a man who had committed to me for life, who to
• 43:11
  be loved by a man who committed to me for life, you know, to
• 43:14
  have that man who committed to me for life that I was living my
• 43:19
  day-to-day with. But I didn't have that.
• 43:21
  But what I had to come to terms with, even though I eventually
• 43:25
  did get married, married, was that I didn't need marriage.
• 43:30
  What I did need is exactly what that woman said.
• 43:32
  I needed to be loved, I needed to be recognized, and I needed
• 43:36
  to have someone to share life with.
• 43:38
  And so in that season of not having the defined vocation, the
• 43:42
  Lord fulfilled that need and still dies, but of being
• 43:45
  recognized, loved and having someone to share life with
• 43:47
  through, for example, our beautiful sisterhood, you know,
• 43:50
  with Christina. And that moment in particular
• 43:53
  when I remember being so sorrowful and just having the
• 43:56
  silent sacred presence of sisters who deeply cared for me,
• 44:02
  recognize me, love me. That was.
• 44:03
  Yeah, it kind of that moment and that quote I feel really come
• 44:07
  together. Beautiful.
• 44:11
  What is the difference between being loved and being
• 44:13
  recognized? I have a thought about what it.
• 44:18
  Is, but I'm curious how you see it.
• 44:20
  That's a good. Question if I.
• 44:22
  Thinking out loud because I'm not really defined it.
• 44:27
  I mean to be loved if we just go classic Saint Thomas Aquinas
• 44:30
  says to love is to will the others good.
• 44:33
  So whatever the need is of the other fulfilling that bestowing
• 44:38
  compassion kindness, patience, right as Saint Paul defines love
• 44:42
  is patient love is kind. So bestowing that on another to
• 44:45
  recognize them. I think if yeah, if you love,
• 44:48
  you are recognizing you are really seeing them if you're
• 44:52
  truly loving them. But to be recognized I think is
• 44:56
  to be as you, as you kind of alluded to earlier is really
• 45:00
  seen to be really known. So.
• 45:02
  To be known, you know. And appreciate it for those.
• 45:05
  Things, yeah, in some good thing you've.
• 45:08
  Done. Or some public act that you've
• 45:10
  done, but fully known with your good bits and your bad bits and
• 45:14
  your boring bits and whatever, and still someone notices and
• 45:20
  they seize. And what was your idea?
• 45:22
  That's just, no, I think that's it.
• 45:23
  Because I think you. Can be loved and you're still a
• 45:26
  dirty scoundrel that has nothing good about themselves, you know
• 45:29
  what I'm saying? But to be recognized, it's like,
• 45:31
  no, the person sees and enjoys and embraces and delights in
• 45:38
  even the weaknesses and the follies, but certainly also the
• 45:41
  strengths and the goodnesses and the beauties and everything
• 45:43
  else. Yeah, recognize delighting and
• 45:45
  I. Like that, It's like almost.
• 45:46
  Like an identity thing, perhaps. So so I I've so there's so many
• 45:52
  things directions to take this. And we're going to obviously
• 45:54
  talk about your book here in a minute, which is beautiful at
• 45:58
  your all your books are amazing. But I, I think your vocation
• 46:02
  story is so powerful and I do think it would speak to a lot of
• 46:05
  the people listening or maybe there's people listening who
• 46:08
  know people that would benefit from your vocation story.
• 46:12
  And, you know, when this back to that scene, you're crying, you
• 46:16
  know, and I know many tears were shed by all three of us on these
• 46:19
  little retreats that we would do, you know, annually or
• 46:21
  sometimes even twice a year. But you were engaged at one
• 46:27
  point. You had another boyfriend early
• 46:32
  on that you almost got engaged to.
• 46:34
  I mean, there was a few close calls, Yeah, I mean.
• 46:37
  Obviously a bunch of when you when you don't get married till
• 46:40
  you're 40, you go through a lot of different OK, but in terms of
• 46:43
  official engagement ring on finger, yes, that was when I was
• 46:46
  34, almost 35. So there's a few things I.
• 46:50
  Want to ask you because you are the expert in terms of living
• 46:53
  it, having lived so much right there is this sort of like
• 46:57
  narrative you could say among people who are more conservative
• 47:00
  right now that there's something wrong with you if you don't get
• 47:03
  married in your 20s. What's your take on that?
• 47:07
  I think the only time I would say there's something wrong with
• 47:11
  someone if they don't get married in their 20s is if God
• 47:14
  is calling them to get married in their 20s and they don't get
• 47:16
  married. And are they?
• 47:19
  Called, then are. They not.
• 47:20
  I mean, that's what each soul has to work through in terms of
• 47:25
  is there anything stopping them from pursuing a relationship
• 47:29
  they're already in or whatever. But but for me, as I look back,
• 47:32
  because I had all those years of wrestling with, can I do
• 47:35
  marriage and ministry? Can I do both, particularly if
• 47:38
  I'm going to be open to life that I believe I should be open
• 47:41
  to having. I now look back in hindsight and
• 47:44
  see God wasn't calling me to be married when I journaled to him
• 47:49
  at 25 and when I journaled to him at 31, when I journaled
• 47:52
  again at 38. You know, as hard as it was, as
• 47:56
  the years went on, he was calling me to fully, in a sense,
• 48:02
  be his spouse. And that's what religious life
• 48:05
  is. And I remember thinking, but is,
• 48:07
  is this forever? And in my case, it wasn't
• 48:11
  forever. I mean, obviously we're all
• 48:13
  called to ultimately like have that spousal relationship, but
• 48:16
  in terms of vocation. But I think there was a very
• 48:19
  clear season where for me to be as fruitful as I was, and
• 48:24
  there's different types of fruitfulness and there's still a
• 48:26
  fruitfulness ministry wise to my life even now.
• 48:29
  I'm perhaps even more so complimented by my experience of
• 48:34
  marriage and my experience of motherhood, my experience of
• 48:36
  loss through miscarriages and so forth.
• 48:39
  But I do believe now in hindsight, I look back, I'm like
• 48:42
  I really was meant to be single. That time to fully give myself
• 48:48
  in the way I was able to, to give myself.
• 48:51
  And it's interesting though, when I finally met my now
• 48:55
  husband, it was the year of the pandemic and my work changed
• 49:01
  radically because events were being cancelled.
• 49:05
  And suddenly everything I've known professionally was
• 49:09
  dramatically changing at the exact time as, as my kind of my
• 49:13
  professional life, you could say is tanking my personal life now
• 49:19
  started taking off. And I remember thinking as time
• 49:24
  went on, I don't even want to leave Joe before even kids came
• 49:28
  into the picture. I don't even want to leave Joe
• 49:30
  to go do an event, but events weren't even happening.
• 49:33
  So I didn't have to worry about that.
• 49:34
  So my heart was already changing.
• 49:38
  And as I fell in love with him, it just became, I know it was a
• 49:44
  season where I was able to say, I don't even feel a drive to
• 49:49
  keep doing things to the degree that I've been doing them, that
• 49:53
  I felt so-called to be doing them to that degree.
• 49:56
  And so it just was this natural change.
• 49:59
  And we got married and I still obviously do work and we're in
• 50:03
  person with this podcast because I was giving a talk, but my
• 50:06
  husband and kids came with me. And so.
• 50:09
  Yeah. So I'm not sure if I answered
• 50:11
  your question. I remember you were so.
• 50:13
  Terrified of not getting married.
• 50:16
  It was like. Terrifying.
• 50:18
  Yes. So yes.
• 50:19
  So I mean, and you were worried it wouldn't happen?
• 50:22
  Yes, and I and I just I don't want to belabor this, but I just
• 50:25
  think it's such an important thing because I know so many
• 50:28
  women really of. All ages.
• 50:32
  Very young, they shouldn't even be worrying, but they're
• 50:35
  worrying in their early 20s to their early 40s to even.
• 50:40
  There's some women past that who are not and there's men too.
• 50:43
  So, you know, obviously I'm speaking from the woman's
• 50:45
  experience, but who are just struggling.
• 50:47
  They want to be married and they are not right, right?
• 50:53
  Yeah, no, I I was very, very upset at the thought that I
• 50:57
  wouldn't be as time went on. And now again, looking back in
• 51:02
  hindsight and and hearing other people's stories, like a friend
• 51:04
  of mine just got engaged at 50, her story is incredible.
• 51:09
  Can you share? Well, I don't know if I can.
• 51:11
  Without sharing her name, but someone.
• 51:13
  Someone very holy and very. Special.
• 51:15
  Yeah. Who?
• 51:16
  Who's? Also just given her life, a
• 51:18
  public person, but we're not going to say.
• 51:20
  Yeah, yeah, a public figure has just.
• 51:21
  Given her life so profoundly, so fruitfully as a single person,
• 51:27
  sacrificially to the pro-life. Cause the profoundly
• 51:29
  sacrificial. More than I do.
• 51:31
  I wouldn't even think we're We're a child's play to what the
• 51:34
  child has sacrificed. Truly, truly.
• 51:38
  This person is a living thing. This person is a living thing.
• 51:40
  If we go back to what we were talking earlier.
• 51:42
  Eyes on the prize, living it out humbly.
• 51:45
  Don't draw attention to me. This is who we're talking about
• 51:49
  and I did. She desire marriage, so this is
• 51:54
  the thing. I had never.
• 51:55
  Asked her. She was too holy.
• 51:58
  She just wanted God. I never asked her like I.
• 52:00
  But I assumed that she wasn't going to get married.
• 52:03
  Isn't this funny? We make these assumptions about
• 52:04
  other people and I just find out that that she's about to get
• 52:07
  married that she's engaged and and just overcome with the grace
• 52:12
  and the and the the the Super abundant generosity of God to
• 52:16
  bring this love into her life. That was totally in a very.
• 52:20
  Special way, very special and beautiful way that.
• 52:22
  Just kind of. She's 50, puts the puzzle pieces
• 52:24
  together in her. Life not to share too much, but
• 52:26
  like in a in a really incredible way that involves other people
• 52:28
  too, yeah. And so.
• 52:31
  To, to now, as someone who's married and thought, well, I had
• 52:33
  the cool story getting married at 40, you know, and here she is
• 52:37
  getting married at 50. And then there's also a friend
• 52:41
  of mine. I always held on to this story.
• 52:44
  Her mom had was married with my friend and her siblings and her
• 52:50
  husband died and so she was a single mom of these four
• 52:52
  children. And then she befriended a lovely
• 52:56
  man and was really falling in love with him.
• 53:00
  He was so good to her children, a real father figure and found
• 53:05
  out that he had been married before and couldn't get an
• 53:07
  annulment. And this kind of deep wound to
• 53:12
  her heart of here I am a single mom here I have fallen in love
• 53:15
  again, but I can't, I can't get married to this man because in
• 53:21
  the eyes of God, he's still married.
• 53:24
  And so she was faithful to the teachings of the church and did
• 53:30
  not pursue a romantic relationship with him.
• 53:33
  And years went by, her children grew up and they got married and
• 53:37
  had grandkids with this woman, met a man when she was like 72
• 53:42
  and just got married and is like over the moon, delighted, happy.
• 53:48
  Her daughter says, yeah, they're like teenagers.
• 53:52
  So, you know, whether it's my story at 40 or this person or,
• 53:55
  you know, we referenced at 50 or this woman in her 70s.
• 53:59
  And I remember holding on to that story because that I knew
• 54:01
  before I got married. So when you were crying when you
• 54:05
  were? Crying with me at 37.
• 54:07
  You're like, well I guess I can wait till I'm 72 but.
• 54:12
  This You've got staying power, but you've always.
• 54:14
  Had staying power is this that's that's something but this idea.
• 54:18
  That we're all on a journey and yes for sure, vocation wise, the
• 54:24
  vast majority of people are called to marriage as opposed to
• 54:28
  religious. Do you know anyone who went to
• 54:30
  their? Death unhappy that they weren't
• 54:32
  married. I guess not that I know of.
• 54:36
  Do you? Yeah, yeah.
• 54:38
  Not that I know. Like someone who just like they
• 54:39
  really wanted to get. Married, they never met the
• 54:41
  person and they just died. I mean not not that I know of.
• 54:45
  I mean, it's possible that I'm, I'm sure those stories are out
• 54:47
  there, but what I when you go. So anyways, these stories are,
• 54:53
  are signs that God can really have a desire of our heart come
• 54:57
  to fruition, but not on the timeline we expect or think or
• 55:04
  in the way we expect, in the way we expected or the way that is
• 55:07
  at all within what we would think is a normal time frame.
• 55:12
  But we can still find great, you know, fulfilment in our lives.
• 55:17
  And but when I think back to you, just reference to like,
• 55:21
  there were times I was like super sorrowful.
• 55:23
  That's where in my book on IVF, when I talk about suffering, one
• 55:28
  of the things I talk about is just how we can turn things into
• 55:31
  idols. And to idolize something is to
• 55:34
  put that as your top. That is your eyes on the prize.
• 55:37
  That is your prize, your idol, and our prize should be God or
• 55:41
  having. Kids could be having kids.
• 55:43
  Right, so when the overcoming infertility, the idol is I.
• 55:45
  Just want that child so badly, right?
• 55:48
  I want to get married so badly. And I for sure there were.
• 55:51
  Seasons in my life where I had turned marriage into an idol,
• 55:54
  that I can't be happy without this, which is entirely not
• 55:57
  true. And even when I look back in
• 55:59
  hindsight at those seasons, I had moments of great happiness
• 56:02
  and great fulfillment and great joy.
• 56:06
  So. So I think it is possible
• 56:09
  though, if someone is, is deeply sorrowful over something that
• 56:12
  that could be a sign, whatever that something is, that they
• 56:16
  have turned it into an idol and need to work through that
• 56:20
  spiritually, you know, with God and ideally with different
• 56:23
  spiritual directors, advisors and so forth who can help them.
• 56:26
  How did you did you know that Joe was the?
• 56:28
  One because you both wanted to marry each other at the same
• 56:32
  time. How did you know that your
• 56:34
  husband was the one? I honestly am that person who.
• 56:37
  Says the moment I saw him I knew he was the one, really.
• 56:40
  But had you said that about other?
• 56:41
  Guys, I'm trying to remember. There were certainly people.
• 56:46
  That I remember thinking, OK, this is the one.
• 56:49
  But when I think back to how I felt in those moments and in
• 56:53
  those relationships, I always sensed something was off.
• 56:58
  And usually, obviously, because those ones never worked out, it
• 57:01
  was I felt they were the one, but they didn't feel that I was
• 57:04
  the one. And I even sensed that you
• 57:06
  didn't sense being loved, right? Or fully seen and recognized,
• 57:10
  loved and recognized. Yeah.
• 57:11
  Yeah, it was. It was like I knew.
• 57:14
  But yeah, so, and I think we've mentioned this before in
• 57:17
  episodes, but it was you who tried to set me up with my now
• 57:21
  husband in 2016. Tell me again how great I am for
• 57:23
  setting you up with him. Like, really, there's no words
• 57:27
  to say. How great.
• 57:27
  You are for setting me up with him because truly he's he's you.
• 57:30
  You guys are so beautiful together.
• 57:32
  I've married a St. I have married a St.
• 57:35
  And I mean, you know what it's like to be married to a Joe
• 57:39
  who's also a St., who's also a St., I think, I think.
• 57:42
  Like you live up. To your name.
• 57:43
  Did I say this to you the other day?
• 57:44
  I was just talking about it yesterday.
• 57:45
  Yeah, yeah, like every. Joy I have met.
• 57:47
  Like every woman who's named Joy is ridiculously joyful.
• 57:51
  The ones I've met anyways. Like it's like, whoa, you live
• 57:55
  out your name. Just there's some aura about
• 57:57
  them that's joyful. And so I feel like pretty much
• 58:00
  all the Joseph Simons. That's true.
• 58:02
  I'm thinking about the other the other Joes.
• 58:04
  Besides my husband and I, I'm trying to think of one that's
• 58:06
  not like, like Saint Joseph. Yeah, yeah.
• 58:10
  So it's interesting so. Yeah, I shout.
• 58:13
  Out to all the Joes out there, but my Joe in particular, I'm
• 58:16
  sure there's a serial. Killer named Joe somewhere at
• 58:19
  one point we wanted to name one of my kids one of our I, I like
• 58:23
  the name David and we were looking up the name.
• 58:26
  But there's like with my husband's last, with our last
• 58:29
  name and everything else. There's a series, there's a
• 58:31
  blend. What would the name look like?
• 58:33
  And then? There's an actual serial, like a
• 58:34
  really. Horrible one.
• 58:35
  And you're like, forget it. I don't want.
• 58:38
  But I can't think of a terrible criminal.
• 58:40
  I don't know a bad. Joe, I only know good Joes.
• 58:42
  But certainly I think I've got the best Joe, of course.
• 58:46
  But you tried in 2016, which was not even a year after I'd had my
• 58:50
  heart broken with the broken engagement.
• 58:52
  So my heart was already kind of guarded.
• 58:56
  But you were very persistent in thinking that my now Joe was the
• 59:01
  one for me. And I remember being hesitant,
• 59:03
  but being open enough to be like, OK, fine, you can connect
• 59:05
  us by e-mail. And we did e-mail for three
• 59:07
  weeks and I remember just over the emailing being like, there's
• 59:11
  some things like I was jumping to conclusions of about him
• 59:14
  based on what he'd written, which I've now learned were
• 59:17
  entirely wrong. And I can kind of be ENTJ judgy.
• 59:20
  So I remember shutting it down, emailing him.
• 59:25
  Oh yeah, the e-mail about. The the happy clappy music at
• 59:29
  Max Yeah, yeah, we don't have to go into the.
• 59:31
  Specifics, but the point is there were a few things he said
• 59:34
  where I was like, Joe made your, Joe made a joke about.
• 59:37
  Novus Ordo kind of 1980s westernized musical masses, and
• 59:43
  it was like a very. Mild joke, I don't.
• 59:45
  Think it was that specific, but he wasn't.
• 59:47
  He didn't use that language. That was specifically.
• 59:49
  What was that I don't like So I actually.
• 59:51
  Like very traditional, very sacred Masses and the more like
• 59:56
  I experienced like actually where I went to Mass on Sunday,
• 1:00:00
  just like Scolas and sacred music like Latin love beautiful.
• 1:00:05
  I also have experience. Attending a Byzantine Ukrainian
• 1:00:10
  Catholic literature on in your camp I know.
• 1:00:12
  So here's point. It was just some still there's.
• 1:00:14
  No point going to the specifics, but there was some silly
• 1:00:16
  reference that he made which made me think, but I also have
• 1:00:19
  what I call a charismatic heart. And so I do like the praise and
• 1:00:23
  worship music and all that as well.
• 1:00:24
  So I'm kind of this blend. And so just something to me
• 1:00:29
  where I thought, I don't know if we're going to click in this
• 1:00:31
  way. And, and I remember just
• 1:00:34
  emailing him being like, you know, the long distance thing
• 1:00:36
  isn't working because we can't really meet in the flesh.
• 1:00:38
  So I don't think I'll book a flight tomorrow.
• 1:00:41
  I didn't. Know he was going to.
• 1:00:42
  Actually, he would. Consider he would have
• 1:00:44
  considered coming in person. All that to say I incorrectly
• 1:00:47
  shot it down and you got mad at me correctly and told me that I
• 1:00:51
  had jumped to conclusions and I was misinterpreting and that we
• 1:00:54
  actually would be a really good match even though I thought we
• 1:00:57
  wouldn't be. Anyways, the point is, four
• 1:01:03
  years go by and there's kind of crazy no contact.
• 1:01:08
  And what he didn't know was he. Remarkably, stayed single.
• 1:01:11
  He remarkably sees a catch beyond all.
• 1:01:14
  Catches and and you for those four years your luck.
• 1:01:18
  I know and when. I think for those 4.
• 1:01:20
  Years, the amount of times I got mad at God and he's like, I know
• 1:01:23
  you would be weeping and you would be.
• 1:01:25
  You would be ugly crying on my couch about being single.
• 1:01:30
  And I'd be like. Joe Connors, I know you kept
• 1:01:32
  saying that every time I saw. You over those four years, you'd
• 1:01:35
  be like Joe's the one for you and I'd be like Lila enough of
• 1:01:39
  the Joe Connors guy and and all of that to say this is a very
• 1:01:45
  long winded answer to your question.
• 1:01:46
  Ironic is like on any. Category.
• 1:01:49
  He's superior to your exes. Well, I mean not to be offensive
• 1:01:52
  to your offensive. I just don't.
• 1:01:53
  Yeah, he's just like. He's just amazing, honestly.
• 1:01:56
  I've I. I am not exaggerating when I say
• 1:01:59
  I live with a St. I kind of feel like the Holy
• 1:02:01
  Family in reverse, like poor Saint Joseph had to live with
• 1:02:03
  two Saints like who didn't sin and Jesus and Mary.
• 1:02:05
  And it's like that must have been rough on him.
• 1:02:07
  And I often feel like it's reverse for us where I'm the big
• 1:02:11
  Sinner that's always like, you know, impatient or whatever.
• 1:02:14
  And he is just this patient kind, you know, whatever.
• 1:02:17
  Anyways, the point is you asked me.
• 1:02:19
  So all these years go by when we finally meet after four years of
• 1:02:23
  no contact and we don't, we can or don't have to go into the
• 1:02:27
  story of how the contact happened.
• 1:02:28
  But when it came to us actually meeting and I was walking
• 1:02:33
  towards him. And so he got out of his car and
• 1:02:36
  I was walking towards him. I took one look at him and I
• 1:02:39
  thought, Oh my gosh, Lila was right.
• 1:02:43
  The whole time I literally thought that and, and yes, he's
• 1:02:48
  very handsome and I obviously was attracted to him, but it was
• 1:02:52
  more than that. I like kind of like joys or just
• 1:02:55
  joyful. There was an aura about him.
• 1:02:56
  He's profoundly kind. He is so virtuous.
• 1:02:59
  Anyone who knows him like will acknowledge that there's
• 1:03:01
  something really special about him.
• 1:03:03
  That's the thing how people get overlooked.
• 1:03:05
  Like obviously he did in terms. Well, but also in terms of the
• 1:03:10
  advantage I had is he had to also want it.
• 1:03:12
  There was a lot of people I think he probably would have
• 1:03:14
  wanted to. Dated him but not a.
• 1:03:15
  Swaggering smooth talker he's not.
• 1:03:17
  Flashy. Well, he's not flashy.
• 1:03:19
  Yeah, he's he's just. Wonderful.
• 1:03:21
  But anyways, the point is I could tell he was virtuous.
• 1:03:24
  It was it was more than just he's handsome, which he is.
• 1:03:27
  It, it was he's good. Obvious he was good, he was
• 1:03:30
  good. My Joe, he's good.
• 1:03:32
  I knew that when I also. Met your Joe and I knew he.
• 1:03:34
  Was the one for you. But anyways, Oh yeah, you, you,
• 1:03:36
  you actually held that out before.
• 1:03:38
  I held it out. I have always believed your Joe
• 1:03:40
  was the. Best for you, Absolutely.
• 1:03:42
  That's true. You gave the imprimatur Very.
• 1:03:44
  Quickly. Yeah, very quickly.
• 1:03:45
  Yeah, I'm proud. Of that too anyways so I knew I
• 1:03:49
  knew right away not everyone's can make that their story so
• 1:03:51
  then what happened is he picks me up we go to a coffee shop we
• 1:03:54
  start talking and I'm just like literally everything is being
• 1:03:57
  confirmed that I felt in my gut every conversation random
• 1:04:01
  reference I'm like oh we align on this we align on this we
• 1:04:03
  align on this and we go for dinner and we keep talking like
• 1:04:06
  everything aligned and so by the time the weekend was done and we
• 1:04:09
  had done all sorts of different like we went kayaking did more
• 1:04:12
  coffee all kinds of things I knew and he knew and we were
• 1:04:18
  married very quickly. Pandemic wedding.
• 1:04:23
  Yeah, which? Is a sign that God is a God of
• 1:04:28
  miracles because first of all, the border collaborated by a
• 1:04:32
  border. There were a few visas that were
• 1:04:35
  still allowed and so in fact, I haven't had a work visa.
• 1:04:40
  Obviously I'm in different status now, but at the time I
• 1:04:42
  had a work visa and the, my law firm that helped me get my visa
• 1:04:47
  emailed all their clients and said, OK, with the pandemic
• 1:04:50
  update to all our clients, you know, border closures are
• 1:04:54
  happening. These Trump is shutting down
• 1:04:56
  this visa, this visa this. And there was this long list of
• 1:04:58
  visas being shut down. And then these are the visas
• 1:05:00
  still active. And it was a short list.
• 1:05:03
  And would you believe my visa was one of the visas that wasn't
• 1:05:06
  shut down? So you were able to actually
• 1:05:07
  stay in the US and marry? I was able actually.
• 1:05:10
  And I still actually had a. Couple events that still
• 1:05:14
  happened in the US. So I actually had work events
• 1:05:18
  that I did. They were very selective.
• 1:05:19
  Obviously a lot, a lot went online.
• 1:05:22
  But yeah, I was able to return into the US.
• 1:05:25
  And so it was like at a time when it seemed literally
• 1:05:31
  impossible for us to get together there was there was
• 1:05:36
  this way for us to get together. Did he live?
• 1:05:39
  Did you go out and live close to him or did?
• 1:05:41
  He live close to you. He he came to Canada for a short
• 1:05:45
  stint. No, because he could not get
• 1:05:47
  into Canada. And we're going back and forth,
• 1:05:49
  basically talking all the time because everyone was online and
• 1:05:54
  so we would even do work. Sometimes with our.
• 1:05:56
  Our our like audio muted, but that it was almost like we were
• 1:06:00
  in the same house and then we would like eat lunch together
• 1:06:02
  over the screen. I mean, again, not ideal, but it
• 1:06:05
  enabled us to just focus on getting to know each other.
• 1:06:08
  And then when I was able to return, we thought, OK, well,
• 1:06:12
  then why don't we get to know each other in the context of
• 1:06:16
  people that were close to. So we visited family and we
• 1:06:19
  visited friends. And so that's how we were able
• 1:06:21
  to like basically spend time with each other, but in the
• 1:06:24
  context of of other people and through visiting our relatives
• 1:06:28
  and visiting our friends. When did you get engaged?
• 1:06:30
  We got engaged. In.
• 1:06:32
  That year we got engaged in May. So you met in January?
• 1:06:38
  No. We met well.
• 1:06:40
  We officially met in March. I returned in April.
• 1:06:43
  He proposed in May and we got married in August.
• 1:06:47
  And you got a special dispensation to do that?
• 1:06:49
  You actually don't need a special dispensation the.
• 1:06:51
  Idea that you need six months of engaged preparation is a
• 1:06:55
  guideline, not a requirement in the Church.
• 1:06:57
  And a Bishop marry too. Yes, so is.
• 1:06:59
  Exercise well tactically presided over the marriage.
• 1:07:02
  Because it's the spouses that marry each other, if we're going
• 1:07:04
  to be technical, yes. So anyways, all well in terms of
• 1:07:10
  the power of. God is what I think the.
• 1:07:12
  Story of God story shows is that there were so many
• 1:07:15
  impossibilities, so many things that would like is this even
• 1:07:18
  going to happen? And so the the point of it is
• 1:07:22
  when God wills something for you, back to your original
• 1:07:24
  question of what if someone's 25 and thinks there's something
• 1:07:27
  wrong with them because they're not married?
• 1:07:29
  It's like when God plans something for you, when he wills
• 1:07:32
  something for you, at the time that he wills it to occur, all
• 1:07:37
  hosts of things will come into play that you couldn't even
• 1:07:40
  possibly imagine could occur that are profound and wonderful
• 1:07:45
  and amazing and awe inspiring. Because God is all powerful and
• 1:07:50
  all amazing. And so he orchestrated something
• 1:07:53
  that I couldn't have even dreamed of in terms of the
• 1:07:57
  practicalities, working out at a time when things were very
• 1:07:59
  difficult in the world, but also in terms of an amazing match,
• 1:08:05
  you know, that I am. Here I am almost five years into
• 1:08:08
  my marriage, blissfully happily married and still saying, like,
• 1:08:11
  marriage is amazing. Marriage is wonderful.
• 1:08:13
  And I've still can say I've married a St. you know, so that
• 1:08:17
  all of this can happen. But I was 40, and I had to wait
• 1:08:20
  a long time. But I had things that God wanted
• 1:08:22
  me to do and things that I also had to learn in preparation to
• 1:08:26
  be the wife and the mom that I am now.
• 1:08:29
  But you flew to Florida. I mean yes to all of that, of
• 1:08:33
  course, yes, yes, and thanks be to God's Providence and his
• 1:08:36
  mercy. I mean he's got our God is
• 1:08:39
  perfectly good. He's our father.
• 1:08:41
  But you got on that plane. You listened to me finally to
• 1:08:45
  four years and you got on the plane you flew yourself to
• 1:08:48
  Florida, right. So am I getting this story right
• 1:08:53
  when you to meet the guy. I mean, the point is God did not
• 1:08:57
  just put him in your lap like you did.
• 1:08:59
  You did the work. Well, He did put them in my lap
• 1:09:02
  and I. Kept saying no to you.
• 1:09:03
  It was like, I guess he would have come to your lap.
• 1:09:06
  If you would let him if I hadn't shut.
• 1:09:09
  Down in 20. 16 but eventually you got on the plane, but yeah,
• 1:09:12
  so. Actually, and another cool.
• 1:09:14
  God thing was he when in in January of 2020, I basically was
• 1:09:22
  like, OK, I'm still single. I've got to put roots down.
• 1:09:25
  I have to start feeling like I have home.
• 1:09:27
  And so I bought a condo, you know, and it was a beautiful,
• 1:09:31
  beautiful condo right close to my family, a good church
• 1:09:34
  community. And I was like, OK, this is
• 1:09:36
  going to be it. This is going to be where I'm
• 1:09:38
  always coming home to in between trips.
• 1:09:40
  So I have that community and support right around me and not
• 1:09:42
  just far afield when I'm traveling.
• 1:09:44
  And I remember my spiritual director, a Byzantine Ukrainian
• 1:09:49
  Catholic priest monk coming to visit me and bless my new home.
• 1:09:53
  And in the course of the blessing, you know, we then have
• 1:09:57
  spiritual direction. Of course, as usual, I'm
• 1:09:59
  sobbing, saying like I'm, I have this beautiful home and no one
• 1:10:02
  to share it with. And it was at that.
• 1:10:07
  Sorry I'm flashing, you know, but so.
• 1:10:08
  Then he starts praying over me and like taking his big like
• 1:10:10
  Byzantine cross out and like pressing it into my head.
• 1:10:12
  I'm telling you like he could see how upset Catholic girls
• 1:10:15
  are. So it is like a Catholic girl.
• 1:10:20
  It's such a. Stereotypically Catholic
• 1:10:21
  Catholic girl thing to find that poor poor priest.
• 1:10:24
  I feel so bad for our 4 sweet priest and we're like knocking
• 1:10:29
  on the singers little confession like I'm not married.
• 1:10:32
  The priest has like, hear all of our love.
• 1:10:34
  Life and all about this and like we want the priest to tell us
• 1:10:37
  what to do. And the priest is like, I have
• 1:10:39
  no idea what you should do. I know the holy, holy priest.
• 1:10:42
  You know what I'm talking about Catholic girls like.
• 1:10:45
  This is a thing, but so at the. Exact moment.
• 1:10:49
  He's praying over me and I know the exact moment because you
• 1:10:52
  were involved. I was.
• 1:10:56
  Why was was I there? No.
• 1:10:58
  But after four years of no. Contact my now husband is back
• 1:11:02
  in Florida flossing his teeth before going to bed and I popped
• 1:11:07
  into his head and he grabbed his phone and texted you and he
• 1:11:12
  texts. Is that Stephanie Gray girl
• 1:11:14
  still single? Whoa, I didn't remember.
• 1:11:17
  That detail. But that's true.
• 1:11:18
  I'm going to go see if I have the text in my phone right now.
• 1:11:20
  My father is praying over sobbing.
• 1:11:22
  Me and you. And then I immediately texted
• 1:11:24
  you, No, you waited. A couple days.
• 1:11:26
  Why? You, I don't know, you called me
• 1:11:29
  and you probably don't know me either because it's a detail you
• 1:11:31
  probably don't remember. You called me and you said,
• 1:11:36
  remember that Joe Connors guy keep telling you is the one for
• 1:11:39
  you. Well, he contacted me and was
• 1:11:41
  wondering if he could reach out to you and I said, Lila, you
• 1:11:45
  reached out to him, didn't you? And you said, I swear I didn't.
• 1:11:49
  He reached out to me on his own and I said you're right.
• 1:11:53
  Jan 27th, 2020 Hi. Lila, I hope you're doing well.
• 1:11:57
  4:38 PM. That was pretty cool that Trump
• 1:12:00
  addressed the March for Life. I thought I would bug you about
• 1:12:03
  Stephanie Gray. I know she is not big on long
• 1:12:05
  distance, but I have been spending more time in the
• 1:12:08
  Pacific Northwest these days. If she is not currently seeing
• 1:12:11
  anyone, I thought I would reach out to see if she's interested
• 1:12:13
  in meeting up the next time I'm up there.
• 1:12:15
  I will of course do the reaching out part, but I thought I'd
• 1:12:17
  check with you to see if she's seeing anyone.
• 1:12:19
  Thanks and I hope you're well. Yeah, wait, what did I say?
• 1:12:22
  That's a 4/30 time stamp. And I respond 3 hours ahead and.
• 1:12:26
  I knew I had had father for. Lunch and then he stayed like
• 1:12:30
  way longer because I was a blubbering mess and he was
• 1:12:32
  praying over me and I was just like in awe.
• 1:12:35
  God prompted him to send this text.
• 1:12:37
  Obviously it was totally a God thing.
• 1:12:39
  So then when you contacted me and told me that he contacted
• 1:12:42
  you, you said you called me on the phone and I remember exactly
• 1:12:45
  what I said to you. You probably don't remember what
• 1:12:47
  I said, but I said, oh, Lila, beggars can't be choosers.
• 1:12:51
  Let them contact me. So then.
• 1:12:57
  You responded and my response to him two days later.
• 1:13:01
  After I got your permission. Hey Joe, great to hear from you.
• 1:13:04
  I am doing great. My husband Joe and I just had
• 1:13:06
  our first baby named Pete Nova and it's been amazing.
• 1:13:09
  Joe is a great name. Winky face.
• 1:13:10
  Hope you're doing well too. Ha ha.
• 1:13:12
  We are always go back and forth on this.
• 1:13:14
  Steph is not seeing anyone exclusively right now, so go for
• 1:13:18
  it. Smiley.
• 1:13:18
  OK, By the way, when? I what is really funny I don't
• 1:13:22
  know what possessed you to write not see anyone exclusively as if
• 1:13:25
  I was seeing anyone which I wanted to I wanted to wait.
• 1:13:29
  Was that intentional? Well, I don't know.
• 1:13:31
  What's your memory? That's one thing I don't know,
• 1:13:34
  because I can't. Remind you of?
• 1:13:36
  But anyways, Joe and I laugh about this because he was like a
• 1:13:39
  little offended by that. He's like, exclusively who does
• 1:13:41
  this girl think she is? I know you're already so hard to
• 1:13:45
  get then. He thought, wait a.
• 1:13:47
  Few weeks before I reach out so he didn't.
• 1:13:49
  That was January. He didn't even e-mail me till
• 1:13:52
  February. So again the God thing.
• 1:13:54
  So here's the whole point of this.
• 1:13:55
  It's so funny because my next text I am like 2.
• 1:13:58
  Two more texts later. Let me know if you need help
• 1:14:00
  with the ring. Right in what?
• 1:14:02
  What month? May 3rd.
• 1:14:03
  That was me right when we already knew.
• 1:14:05
  I know within literally three months later.
• 1:14:07
  Like let me know. If I can help you with the ring,
• 1:14:08
  yeah, so amazing. But the the why don't you listen
• 1:14:11
  to? Me about the eyelashes, really.
• 1:14:14
  OK, we're not. Even going to talk about.
• 1:14:17
  People need to listen to me. Sometimes I know.
• 1:14:19
  Things and then people don't listen and and then things
• 1:14:22
  don't. Good things don't happen.
• 1:14:24
  Well, thank goodness. Good things still.
• 1:14:26
  Happen, which shows as powerful as you are Lila, even more
• 1:14:30
  powerful is God. Yes, of course, all power is
• 1:14:33
  God. So to think.
• 1:14:36
  That it was in that moment of being prayed over that he gets
• 1:14:40
  that inspiration. And then the other cool God
• 1:14:44
  thing is when he finally reached out to me in February, his way
• 1:14:48
  of saying, hey, I know in person mattered to you and, and long
• 1:14:51
  distance was going to be hard. I travel a lot out West.
• 1:14:55
  I travel a lot to all kinds of places.
• 1:14:56
  And I know you travel a lot. And he said you came to mind.
• 1:14:59
  So if you'd be open to meeting up, these are the places I'm
• 1:15:01
  traveling to in the next few months.
• 1:15:03
  And so I looked at the different States and places and looked at
• 1:15:05
  my schedule, and we basically were going to have an overlap in
• 1:15:09
  April in North Carolina. And so that's when we were going
• 1:15:15
  to meet up. And there was one thing I hadn't
• 1:15:19
  told him, which was that I was actually flying through the
• 1:15:22
  state of Florida, where he was earlier than that in March.
• 1:15:26
  But I didn't tell him because I was literally like flying
• 1:15:31
  through the airport, but had to get back to Canada for a friend
• 1:15:34
  who was going to be visiting me. And I committed to her, like
• 1:15:36
  coming and having almost like a little retreat weekend at my
• 1:15:38
  house. And I want to really bless her.
• 1:15:40
  And I thought, I can't, like, bail on her to go meet some guy
• 1:15:42
  I've never met. So I'm not even going to tell
• 1:15:44
  him I'm going to be in the state of Florida because I've got to
• 1:15:47
  get right back to BC. Well, as it should happen, my
• 1:15:52
  friend cancelled on me. I called her.
• 1:15:55
  I'm just kidding. I'm.
• 1:15:56
  Just kidding, she cancelled on me.
• 1:15:59
  Funny enough because. Of COVID because her way to get
• 1:16:01
  to me was a free ride and her friend's ride didn't work out
• 1:16:04
  because the COVID thank God. The work thing.
• 1:16:07
  Got cancelled. So she's like, I'll have to I'll
• 1:16:09
  have to plan another time. And another girlfriend I was
• 1:16:12
  talking to about this, she goes, well, you've got to tell that
• 1:16:15
  Joe guy you're now available on that weekend because you'll
• 1:16:17
  actually be flying through the state of Florida.
• 1:16:20
  And I was like, wow, you know, I don't want to sound like too
• 1:16:23
  keen, like I'm plus I'm going to see him in April.
• 1:16:25
  She goes, oh, I cannot wait like more than 40 days to hear like
• 1:16:29
  whether this is going to go anywhere or not.
• 1:16:31
  You need to tell him you're going through Flora in March.
• 1:16:34
  So even though we were set to meet each other in April, I was
• 1:16:36
  like, by the way, this all this change happened and I'm now
• 1:16:41
  available to I, I'm now free when I come through the state of
• 1:16:45
  Florida. I don't know if you'd be free
• 1:16:47
  that weekend and want to hang out, hang out then or instead or
• 1:16:50
  whatever. And he replied and said,
• 1:16:51
  actually that weekend works and you're flying through this
• 1:16:54
  airport, but I could actually pay to change your flight to
• 1:16:57
  come down to where I am. And, and the weekend that we
• 1:17:02
  then got together because the friend cancelled because I told
• 1:17:05
  him thanks to that other girlfriend that I was available
• 1:17:08
  was the weekend COVID was declared A pandemic.
• 1:17:11
  And literally days later, the border was shut.
• 1:17:14
  And of all my events, some of which most of which were
• 1:17:18
  cancelled, a few were in person. The still still happening in
• 1:17:21
  person, the April event that we would have met at was cancelled.
• 1:17:28
  And so I had no like I wasn't going to be going to that event.
• 1:17:34
  We and he wouldn't have been going to to the area then.
• 1:17:39
  So we wouldn't have met had I not met him that weekend that
• 1:17:42
  COVID was declared A pandemic. You're not so crazy to think
• 1:17:45
  about. You wouldn't have.
• 1:17:46
  Violet, if you had met Joe later and married him later, my sweet
• 1:17:51
  daughter your, you wouldn't have your daughter.
• 1:17:52
  You would. Maybe have other kids.
• 1:17:54
  I don't know how you know, so mystical this right, but timing
• 1:17:58
  right like is miraculous. Yeah, I wouldn't have.
• 1:18:02
  Conceived this God wanted violent yeah right right like
• 1:18:06
  God to understand in His Majesty also when we are.
• 1:18:12
  Wanting to be in his will and even.
• 1:18:14
  When I was frustrated and even when I was like, God, why aren't
• 1:18:17
  things working out the way I want them to work out?
• 1:18:20
  I still knew deep down, and I still would pray God, I want
• 1:18:23
  your will. I want what you want for my
• 1:18:25
  life. And so when we're constantly
• 1:18:27
  trying to be in the will of God, even when we fail and even when,
• 1:18:30
  you know, it doesn't go perfectly, God still is
• 1:18:33
  redeeming and working all things.
• 1:18:36
  And to think that, yeah, even the timing of everything,
• 1:18:39
  because we then got married that August.
• 1:18:41
  We actually were very blessed to conceive a month later.
• 1:18:45
  And I say very blessed because I was 40 and we didn't even know
• 1:18:49
  if I could have kids at that age.
• 1:18:51
  I mean, there are people that have kids in their 40s, but
• 1:18:54
  obviously fertility declines, you know, in your late 30s and
• 1:18:57
  certainly when you hit your 40s. We miscarried that baby.
• 1:19:02
  And then right after that we got pregnant with Violet and she's
• 1:19:06
  almost four years old. Would you go through all the?
• 1:19:09
  Pain and loneliness again. If you could wait, wait for your
• 1:19:13
  Joe at 40, yes, absolutely. And I remember.
• 1:19:17
  In my single sorrowful days, I would often speak to the friends
• 1:19:22
  who had gone through that but finally found love.
• 1:19:24
  And there was this one girl back in Vancouver who had also had a
• 1:19:28
  very similar experiences as me and eventually met her husband.
• 1:19:32
  And she, I think, was like over 40 when she married him.
• 1:19:34
  I think she might have been like 41 or 42.
• 1:19:36
  And he was 10 years older than her.
• 1:19:38
  So he was in his early 50s. And I called her on a couple of
• 1:19:42
  occasions to just get her to like, remind me, have hope, but
• 1:19:46
  also like, wait for the one that you really feel deep down is the
• 1:19:50
  one for you. Don't settle just because you
• 1:19:52
  want to get married with just anyone.
• 1:19:56
  And I remember her saying to me, like, Stephanie, if I had to
• 1:20:01
  wait 10 more years than I did to meet my husband, if I knew at
• 1:20:07
  the end of it all, I would still be meeting him.
• 1:20:12
  I. I would, I would go through it
• 1:20:14
  all again. I'd go through all the
• 1:20:15
  heartbreak again. I would have an even longer, you
• 1:20:18
  know, wait and heartbreak in order to ultimately get him
• 1:20:21
  because he is so amazing and our marriage is so amazing.
• 1:20:24
  And I remember hanging on to that.
• 1:20:25
  And then when I met Joe, I was like, he's my Mcconney.
• 1:20:29
  How do you advise? I just remember.
• 1:20:30
  Being like his name, is it or? Her husband's name is Mcconney.
• 1:20:33
  But I said Joe. No, but I.
• 1:20:35
  Met like I. I finally experienced like,
• 1:20:38
  yeah, like, even if there was more heartache, even if I had to
• 1:20:41
  go through it all again, if I knew at the end of it all I
• 1:20:44
  would have the treasure that is my amazing husband, then he's
• 1:20:50
  worth it. Do you advise when other girls
• 1:20:52
  talk to you? Or women talk to you about
• 1:20:54
  vocation, discernment, dating, marriage stuff.
• 1:20:57
  Do you advise like hold out for that The one where you are in
• 1:21:01
  peace that he. Really.
• 1:21:02
  Is the right one? Yes.
• 1:21:04
  Well, and yeah, there's. There's another school of
• 1:21:06
  thought. Really.
• 1:21:06
  Yeah. Go ahead, the other school of
• 1:21:08
  thought. Is some.
• 1:21:09
  Women are too picky. And I think each woman has men.
• 1:21:13
  Are too picky, right And each person has.
• 1:21:15
  To wrestle with. Am I being too picky?
• 1:21:17
  And I was certainly told that. But now I look back in hindsight
• 1:21:22
  and think, no, actually. And, and with clarity, I can see
• 1:21:24
  in each relationship that didn't work out, that was good, it
• 1:21:28
  didn't work out and why it didn't work out.
• 1:21:30
  So, so each person will have to discern if perhaps there is
• 1:21:34
  something holding them back from someone who is within the will
• 1:21:37
  of God. But it's entirely possible it's
• 1:21:40
  just not the right match. And again, all of this, these
• 1:21:44
  are matters of the heart and they involve prayer and they
• 1:21:47
  involve discernment and they involve the wise counsel of
• 1:21:50
  others, which I was constantly seeking.
• 1:21:51
  So I, I was not wanting to just be like going with the whims and
• 1:21:56
  the emotions of the moment. I, I was getting the advice of
• 1:21:59
  others, not only godly friends like you, but spiritual
• 1:22:02
  directors, priests and so forth. But I do when, when people ask
• 1:22:07
  like, you know, I just, I'm not totally right or totally at
• 1:22:10
  peace. And there's some things that,
• 1:22:12
  you know, so I'm just not sure. I say, look, I can just tell you
• 1:22:14
  from my experience that when I was in those relationships where
• 1:22:17
  I had those same kinds of senses.
• 1:22:20
  Oh, I'm just not sure. I'm just not, I don't know about
• 1:22:24
  this or I don't know about that. I never had that with Joe and I
• 1:22:29
  had peace and I had clarity and I had conviction and there was
• 1:22:34
  an unfolding that did not have to be forced.
• 1:22:38
  It unfolded. And I think that's also a sign
• 1:22:43
  like you think about a flower coming into bloom and flowers
• 1:22:45
  bloom at different rates based on what type they are.
• 1:22:48
  But they it can't be forced. It has to happen as it should
• 1:22:52
  happen. And then you don't destroy or
• 1:22:54
  crush the flower. And that's.
• 1:22:57
  Yeah, that was my experience. Congratulations.
• 1:23:01
  Well, I am. I'm so grateful.
• 1:23:02
  To you myself, it's such a. Treat to see you.
• 1:23:04
  Married and see your. Children and see you, you know,
• 1:23:08
  living out the sacrament. It's just beautiful and your
• 1:23:10
  work is beautiful. I mean, I think your your recent
• 1:23:14
  book. So this is the latest one, guys.
• 1:23:16
  The Dignity series published by Bishop Barron's Word on fire on
• 1:23:20
  IVF, in vitro fertilization. But you're you're very fruitful
• 1:23:25
  obviously with your family life, but you're still doing
• 1:23:27
  incredible work in the pro-life space.
• 1:23:31
  Why this book? Why now?
• 1:23:33
  Yeah, so I actually. Over the years of speaking so
• 1:23:37
  long on abortion was finding in more recent years audience and I
• 1:23:41
  was asking me my views on IVF. And as I started to respond to
• 1:23:46
  their questions, I realized there was a need for information
• 1:23:51
  and formation that a lot of people didn't know how to think
• 1:23:55
  properly about the the the subject.
• 1:23:58
  They had a lot of questions and no answers and they would kind
• 1:24:01
  of convey some answers they've been given that didn't seem to
• 1:24:04
  have the depth and the detail that I thought was necessary.
• 1:24:07
  And as I started to provide formation, I was getting a sense
• 1:24:11
  and a feedback that this was resonating with people.
• 1:24:14
  So I thought, OK, there isn't really an apologetic out there
• 1:24:17
  on IVF that I think is needed. And so I wrote a book on it.
• 1:24:24
  It's, it is my passion to not only speak, but to write.
• 1:24:26
  And in, in the more recent years of a slower paced life with,
• 1:24:30
  with my girls, writing is one of the things that I can do more
• 1:24:34
  easily and work around, you know, scheduling with them.
• 1:24:37
  And so I wrote this book actually, I already had Violet,
• 1:24:45
  but not Molly yet. And then I actually self
• 1:24:48
  published it and then Word on Fire read it and said, we really
• 1:24:53
  like this and we want it to be part of it.
• 1:24:54
  A, a broader series we're doing on life issues.
• 1:24:57
  So can we basically rebrand, repackage, and you even write
• 1:25:01
  some more content for us and then we'll put it in in our
• 1:25:05
  series. And so they just released it
• 1:25:07
  this year. And so, yeah, stuff like that
• 1:25:09
  that I'll still do podcasts, some talks and and as as the
• 1:25:14
  spirit leads, are you hopeful that the.
• 1:25:17
  IVF issue and and abortion, I mean, you're, you've 20 years
• 1:25:22
  plus under your belt. You've watched Roe V Wade fall
• 1:25:25
  in the US, you've watched Canada in many ways get more extreme on
• 1:25:29
  abortion and now with assisted suicide coming with picture and
• 1:25:33
  I know you've written obviously extensively on that as well.
• 1:25:36
  What is your spiritual sense of the way that Northern America is
• 1:25:39
  going? What, what kind of country do
• 1:25:41
  you think our daughters and our sons are going to inherit?
• 1:25:47
  I think. There's a lot of.
• 1:25:50
  Work to be done. It is really ugly right now.
• 1:25:53
  Is, is, It's not only with humans being killed in the womb,
• 1:25:58
  humans being destroyed in labs, humans being left and abandoned
• 1:26:03
  in freezers, humans being mutilated through different
• 1:26:07
  transgender surgeries. I mean, there's a lot of
• 1:26:08
  ugliness and a lot of darkness going on around us, but it's
• 1:26:11
  almost like, what else can be done?
• 1:26:14
  Like it's almost like it's so bad we're going to hit rock
• 1:26:17
  bottom. And you know, we're going to get
• 1:26:19
  so extreme where there's going to be that almost that reaction
• 1:26:22
  and propulsion of we can't keep doing this.
• 1:26:24
  This is this is not leading to human flourishing.
• 1:26:28
  This is leading to brokenness and despair and despondency and,
• 1:26:33
  and all of that. And so I think we're, we're
• 1:26:35
  getting to that point. So I think, you know, the next
• 1:26:40
  few years for our children is not, is going to be a lot like I
• 1:26:43
  think it is now. But I think the change is
• 1:26:45
  coming. And I, I do hope that by the
• 1:26:48
  time they're adults and certainly older adults, that it
• 1:26:51
  will be a better world, particularly because we are
• 1:26:55
  raising them and we are having kids and we being the, you know,
• 1:26:59
  the broader conservative pro-life Christian movement,
• 1:27:04
  whether that be Catholic, you know, evangelical Protestant,
• 1:27:07
  there is this movement towards, you know, getting married and
• 1:27:12
  having children and raising them in a traditional environment
• 1:27:15
  with traditional values. So there there's movement going
• 1:27:21
  on of justice organizations and causes like you and I are
• 1:27:24
  involved in, but then there's just this movement of the
• 1:27:26
  fundamental cell of society that leads to human flourishing,
• 1:27:29
  which is family life. And I think even of my community
• 1:27:33
  of friends, certainly in the Catholic Church where I go,
• 1:27:36
  there's just like week after week, there's like new families.
• 1:27:38
  I'll say to Joe, my goodness, have you seen that family
• 1:27:39
  before? They're babies and new babies.
• 1:27:42
  And it's not just husbands and. Wives, it's like, oh, oh look,
• 1:27:44
  she's pregnant. Oh wow, it's their third.
• 1:27:46
  Oh it's their 4th. And then amongst my mom friends
• 1:27:48
  who aren't Catholic but are like evangelical Protestant, you
• 1:27:51
  could say of various denominations, they're like a
• 1:27:54
  bunch of them. I just brought meals for and
• 1:27:56
  meal trains where they're on their third child.
• 1:27:58
  And usually kind of like the Catholics are known for having
• 1:28:01
  3-4 and five kids. And, and the Protestants may be
• 1:28:03
  known for smaller families, but not in my circle of friends.
• 1:28:07
  The, the, the Christians who aren't Catholic, who, who I know
• 1:28:11
  are actually having more than one point.
• 1:28:14
  Whatever for, you know, two kids, they're having more,
• 1:28:18
  they're having three, they're having 4, they're having five,
• 1:28:21
  sometimes even more than that. So I I'm seeing a movement
• 1:28:25
  towards the more traditional. We had Josiah Churnham on the
• 1:28:29
  show. Recently, he's a he's a Orthodox
• 1:28:31
  priest, but he was commenting on how most of the prime ministers
• 1:28:35
  of Europe, I mean, as of a few years ago was all of them.
• 1:28:37
  But I think Georgia, Melania has one child, I think.
• 1:28:42
  But virtually all the large majority of the prime ministers
• 1:28:46
  of European nations are childless and.
• 1:28:51
  That people. That don't build dynasties,
• 1:28:54
  family legacies, kingdoms for the future of the generation
• 1:28:57
  children. And I'm not saying you can't be
• 1:28:59
  childless and build for the future generations, but you're
• 1:29:01
  really invested in the future generations when you have your
• 1:29:03
  own kids, right? And we've just lost that and
• 1:29:07
  we're not replacing ourselves as populations.
• 1:29:09
  America's I think 1.6. A lot of Europe, I think parts
• 1:29:13
  of Europe are .9. I mean, there's like it's
• 1:29:16
  meaning you need 2.1 to replace yourself.
• 1:29:17
  Otherwise the population declines precipitously.
• 1:29:19
  And then it just, it implodes. Like you can't economically
• 1:29:23
  survive that because everybody's aging and there's no younger
• 1:29:25
  people. And it's really, it gets really
• 1:29:27
  dark and ugly. The only, the only reason the
• 1:29:29
  United States economically is strong is because of
• 1:29:32
  immigration, right, Right. Which is kind of.
• 1:29:35
  Wild to think about as well. But I think about the people who
• 1:29:39
  are having the kids like you're saying, and they're all good
• 1:29:43
  people. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:29:44
  And in today's. World you don't have.
• 1:29:46
  Kids, if you're not a good person to some degree, I don't
• 1:29:50
  want to sound Pollyanna about it, but the project of being
• 1:29:53
  open to life, the willingness to be open to life today, I think
• 1:29:57
  is very much a married couple who has timeless values project
• 1:30:02
  well and I think what what is also really.
• 1:30:04
  Important because looking at, you know, as you say, like all
• 1:30:06
  these prime ministers that that don't have children is we ought
• 1:30:10
  to be ordered to life, whether that is a spiritual life.
• 1:30:17
  Or a physical. Life in terms of we are
• 1:30:19
  biological parents, but there is a spiritual parenthood that
• 1:30:22
  everyone is called to, to be spiritual fathers and spiritual
• 1:30:25
  mothers. So that's why, you know, as
• 1:30:26
  Catholics we can say that religious orders of nuns or
• 1:30:30
  religious orders of priests or brothers are profoundly fruitful
• 1:30:34
  even though they have no biological children because they
• 1:30:36
  are laying down their lives for others.
• 1:30:38
  They are laying down their lives for the Church.
• 1:30:40
  And so for someone who might be in the public square, whether it
• 1:30:45
  be a Prime Minister or someone else who isn't married or is
• 1:30:49
  married but doesn't have children, the question would be,
• 1:30:53
  well, do they have at least an attitude of I, I am childless
• 1:30:58
  because I am fully laying down my life for the good of the
• 1:31:01
  world and the good of my country.
• 1:31:02
  And is that really what's guiding, you know, these people?
• 1:31:05
  Do they have the attitude of a monk or a priest or a a
• 1:31:10
  religious sister of I want to bear great spiritual and
• 1:31:14
  political, but it's like it's an interesting.
• 1:31:16
  Like ontological question even like should political office
• 1:31:19
  belong to people who have this like like.
• 1:31:23
  Vow to sort. Of give themselves fully to the
• 1:31:25
  state as opposed like the governance of the state as
• 1:31:28
  opposed to the governance of a family.
• 1:31:29
  If you can't govern a family, can you govern a state?
• 1:31:35
  Unless you. I mean if someone had a special
• 1:31:37
  calling. You know that you can have
• 1:31:39
  someone who whether like me, it was, it wasn't a perpetual
• 1:31:43
  singleness, but a season of singleness that I think enabled
• 1:31:46
  me. Obviously I wasn't working
• 1:31:48
  politically, but to to really dive into work that I was doing
• 1:31:52
  to be fully available for that. But my point is what these these
• 1:31:55
  people would have to ask themselves if that's what's
• 1:31:57
  really guiding these people who you know, who don't know is for
• 1:32:00
  for Vladimir Putin. Is it a?
• 1:32:01
  Special call or is there something?
• 1:32:03
  Else weird going on. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:32:07
  Sis, you're the best thank. You so much.
• 1:32:09
  Where can people find your work? Obviously there's this beautiful
• 1:32:11
  book that I recommend everybody gets because IVF is a hot topic
• 1:32:15
  and there's a whole world of reproductive technology that's
• 1:32:18
  potentially coming down the pipe we need to be prepared to
• 1:32:20
  understand and speak to. So highly, highly recommend
• 1:32:23
  Stephanie's book, The work people find your work.
• 1:32:25
  Yeah, so going to Word on Fire. They sell it in their their
• 1:32:28
  bookstore online and the rest of their not the rest but some of
• 1:32:32
  their other dignity series which includes another book that I
• 1:32:34
  wrote. And if people want links to all
• 1:32:36
  of that just my website is Love Unleashes life.com,
• 1:32:39
  loveunleasheslife.com and that has links to my books, my blog
• 1:32:44
  and other information. You are amazing.
• 1:32:46
  Thank you. A treasure.
• 1:32:47
  One-of-a-kind. Thanks for being my friend and
• 1:32:49
  inspiration, and thanks for doing this interview.
• 1:32:52
  Well, you're welcome. It's been fun.
• 1:32:53
  It's very fun. Love you lots love.
• 1:32:56
  You thanks so much for listening to this episode of The Lila Roe
• 1:32:58
  Show. I hope it was inspiring for you.
• 1:33:01
  I always love to talk to my dear friend Stephanie, but I wanted
• 1:33:04
  to share her story and her work with all of you.
• 1:33:07
  Don't forget to check out her work over at
• 1:33:09
  loveunleasheslife.com and get her latest book on IVF, which is
• 1:33:14
  fascinating. Published by Word on Fire.
• 1:33:16
  Also, don't forget to subscribe if you aren't already and we'll
• 1:33:20
  see you all next time. And a huge thank you to EWTN
• 1:33:23
  Eternal Word Television Network, which is the largest religious
• 1:33:26
  broadcaster in the world. You can get access to Lila Roe's
• 1:33:29
  show episodes 24 hours in advance at ewtn.com.
• 1:33:34
  Slash on demand. And a big thank you to EWTN and
• 1:33:36
  their incredible mission to bring souls to Jesus.