Do you find yourself struggling with perfectionism or a harsh inner critic? 

Today's episode of Everything Belongs explores the Enneagram Type One with special guest author, teacher, and urban hermit, Tessa Bielecki. Tessa shares personal stories regarding how trauma and betrayal shattered her need to fix everything, the 1's ability to make order out of chaos, and how saguaro cacti became teachers  — all opening her up to a more compassionate way of living. 

Both Richard and Tessa shed light on the Enneagram One's struggle with perfectionism, and self-judgment, eventually finding healing through embracing imperfection, forgiveness, and presence. Welcome to a journey that helps reveal how everything — and everyone — belongs. 

 Find the transcript for this episode here.

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Deepen your journey with the Enneagram. Sign up for monthly reflections, practices, and resources that connect the contemplative wisdom with your daily life here: https://cac.org/belongs2026/

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Have a question you’d like ask the team to answer about this season? 

Today the team is honored to speak with author and Enneagram teacher Russ Hudson. Russ reminds us that you are not your type — you have a type, which is connected to your habitual coping strategy. But first, Paul and Mike dive deeper into Richard's particular way of teaching the Enneagram. Join us for an exploration of Enneagram essentials in which both Richard and Russ help us move away from ego-driven patterns towards greater presence and purpose. 

Tune in to discover how the Enneagram is not just about personality typing, but about transformation and solidarity. Welcome to a journey that helps reveal how everything — and everyone — belongs. 

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Deepen your journey with the Enneagram. Sign up for monthly reflections, practices, and resources that connect contemplative wisdom with your daily life: here

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Have a question you’d like ask the team to answer about this season? 

In this season-opening episode of Everything Belongs, the CAC team returns to one of Richard Rohr’s most foundational teachings: The Enneagram—an ancient tool revealing how our wounds lead to our wisdom and our work in the world.  

Richard shares the surprising story of how The Enneagram “found” him and how it transformed his work and spiritual teaching. The hosting team —CAC Dean of Faculty Carmen Acevedo Butcher, Drew Jackson, Paul Swanson, Cassidy Hall, and Mike Petrow — reflect on their own “origin stories,” sharing how this tool has shaped their healing, relationships, and solidarity with others.  

Whether you’re brand new to the Enneagram or a longtime seeker, this warm, insightful conversation invites you into a season of curiosity, compassion, and contemplative growth. Welcome to a journey that helps reveal how everything — and everyone — belongs. 

Additional Enneagram Resources :

Sign Up for The Enneagram Email Series 

Begin (or deepen) your journey with the Enneagram. Sign up for monthly reflections, practices, and resources that connect the contemplative wisdom with your daily life. 

Sign up at cac.org/belongs2026

The Enneagram: An Introduction: A brief introduction to this tool and a compilation of different resources curated for those longing to better understand, and have compassion for, themselves and others. 

Enneagram as a Tool for Your Spiritual Journey: Use the offer code POD35 to get 35% off this foundational Enneagram teaching from Father Richard Rohr. 

Follow us on Instagram. How can your wounds lead to wisdom? Discover topics about what your number might be trying to teach you. 

Join the conversation on Facebook. Share wisdom with others on the Enneagram journey.  

The transcript for today's episode can be found ⁠⁠here.⁠ 

Pick up a copy of Richard's book The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective ⁠here. 

Note: Jim and Kirsten's book on the Enneagram will be available in 2027

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Have a question you'd like ask the team to answer about this season?

Today, Richard and our hosts wrap up the season by answering your questions on The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom For An Age of Outrage. Stay tuned until the end of the episode for a preview of what's to come on the next exciting season of Everything Belongs.

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Where does the prophetic journey through our anger and tears finally culminate?

In this episode of Everything Belongs, we turn to Chapter 10 of Richard Rohr's The Tears of Things, called “It All Comes Down To Love.” Discover how the prophetic journey through order, disorder, and reorder ultimately leads us to Universal Love.

At Richard's hermitage, our hosts discuss how great love is the only sane response to great suffering, and explore why loving one thing deeply can teach us to love everything. Afterwards all four of our hosts share the ways in which they've been impacted by our year long journey through The Tears of Things.

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In this episode of Everything Belongs, we explore Chapter 9 of Fr. Richard Rohr’s New York Times Bestselling book The Tears of Things ⁠⁠⁠⁠— rediscovering the prophet Ezekiel through Indigenous eyes.  

In the second half of this episode, you’ll hear from Rev. Dr. Randy Woodley. He reflects on how Western Christianity’s fixation on hierarchy and domination distorts the gospel — and how Indigenous wisdom invites us back into harmony with creation.  

Randy Woodley is an award-winning author and a tribally recognized Keetoowah descendant (UKB), Randy weaves together Indigenous wisdom, ecological sustainability, and spirituality. Randy is both a farmer and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus. He is respected by Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities worldwide and has been featured in The New York Times, Politifact, Time Magazine, and The Huffington Post. Randy publishes a weekly Substack at https://rwoodley7.substack.com/

Together, the Woodley’s co-sustain Eloheh Indigenous Center for Earth Justice and Eloheh Farm & Seeds, https://www.eloheh.org/ a non-profit, regenerative farm and school determined to assist others grow healthy food and combat the climate crisis. They are founders of Sho-Kee Cultural Consultants www.Sho-Kee.com 

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We'll be accepting questions for our Listener Questions episode until December 31st, 2025.

In this episode of Everything Belongs, we explore Chapter 8 of Richard Rohr’s The Tears of Things. Our hosts consider how the book of Isaiah embodies Fr. Richard’s wisdom pattern of order, disorder, and reorder — and how prophecy moves us from anger to lamentation to expansive love.  

Later, you’ll hear from author Cassidy Hall for a conversation about women’s often-erased voices, queerness as a contemplative lens, and prophets on the margins. 

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What does it mean to cry with God—and be healed by our tears?

In this episode of Everything Belongs, we explore Chapter 7 of Richard Rohr’s The Tears of Things, called The Alchemy of Tears: How We Learn Universal Sympathy and Grace, which focuses on the "gift of tears" as a sacred pathway to healing and transformation. At Richard’s hermitage, co-hosts Mike Petrow and Paul Swanson discuss how grief, when honored, connects us to divine sadness and invites us into deeper compassion. Later, Mike and Carmen Acevedo Butcher are joined by Jungian psychotherapist, Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, to explore how we metabolize trauma and grief, heal intergenerational wounds, and move from pathologizing pain to putting it in service of love and justice.

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How do we learn from imperfect spiritual teachers and embrace our own incompleteness?

In this episode, we're exploring Chapter 6 of Richard Rohr's final book, The Tears of Things, titled "Unfinished Prophets: Elijah, Jonah, and John the Baptizer." In an extended conversation at Richard's hermitage, hosts Mike Petrow and Paul Swanson dive deep into three biblical figures who never quite completed their prophetic journey from anger to sadness to love.

Later, Carmen Acevedo Butcher joins to discuss what it means to love our own imperfection and learn from flawed teachers without idealizing them. Mike and Carmen explore how perfectionism serves oppressive systems, why self-compassion is essential for spiritual growth, and address the significant absence of women's voices in prophetic literature.

How do we live with hope when the path forward demands surrender?

In this episode, we explore Chapter 5 of Richard Rohr’s book, The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage, titled “Jeremiah: The Patterns That Carry Us Across.” Through conversation with Richard, we reflect on the prophetic vocation as a lifelong invitation to move from anger and lament into love—and how Jeremiah models that transformation.

After our dialogue with Richard, we’re joined by the beloved Reverend Dr. Walter Earl Fluker, Howard Thurman scholar and prophetic voice of ethical leadership. Together, we delve into what it means to be “dismembered to be remembered,” as Dr. Fluker shares his lifelong journey to find home, the role of the trickster God in transformation, and why there can be no liberation without struggle.

This episode walks the listener through the wisdom pattern of order, disorder, and reorder as it shows up in Jeremiah’s life—and our own. From ancient covenant to inner apocalypse, from personal grief to collective trauma, this episode is a deep meditation on how tears and laughter both reveal the path to freedom.

This episode invites you to consider: What if the tears you cry in sorrow are the same tears that prepare you for joy? What if the very act of being broken is the beginning of becoming whole?

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