Dr. Edward Sri, Catholic theologian co-founder of FOCUS shares with us the origin story, how young Catholic adults are starving for love and truth. He lays out how FOCUS forms their missionaries to live out the four dimensions of personal formation (human, spiritual, intellectual, and pastoral) in a “vision for life.” He offers a pyramid model for the integration of formation with human formation as the base, and he describes how open FOCUS is to bringing in other Catholic organizations, apostolates, and professionals to help in the formation of their missionaries and those they serve. And we discuss where FOCUS missionaries can turn when they recognize they need help. 

Jason Evert of the Chastity Project joins Dr. Gerry and me to discuss the integration of personal formation and chastity. We begin this episode with a brief experiential exercise to check out your spontaneous reactions, briefly discuss What the Catechism of the Catholic Church says about chastity and interior integration, and then Jason shares with us his decades of experience in working with youth. He shares with us how the concept of chastity needs to be rehabilitated and framed in the positive light of love. He shares stories of how young people have responded to the call to chastity in their own formation. He also discusses the importance of starting formation in chastity early, not just prior to marriage. And he shares the connection between chastity and joy. 

Fr. Mike Schmitz, Sr. Josephine Garret, and Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone engage us in discussing integrated personal formation at the National Eucharistic Congress.  Fr. Mike highlights the importance of silence, which is "the great magnifier" that allows us to know ourselves and draw closer to God. In a homily, Archbishop Cordelione exhorts us to rediscover the silence that sensitizes us to the sacred. Finally, Sr. Josephine links human formation to pastoral formation and discusses how we, as Catholics, we should take what the secular sciences have to offer and claim it for our own. Sr. Josephine also defines proper integration as allowing God to work through all the places of our life.  Join in to learn what these modern Catholic thought leaders share with us about human formation, along with some thoughts from Blaise Pascal and St. Augustine.  

Dr. Peter Malinoski shares some dark moments of his story of medical trauma from when he was 11 years old in 1980 with Kathryn Wessling and Gabriel Crawford from Catholic Story Groups at CatholicStoryGroups.com. Discover the power of exploring stories. Join him for this episode to discover how essential story is to your personal formation. We first discuss what a story is, review tips for writing your story, and offer recommendations for listening to a story well. 

Tim Glemkowski and Joel Stepanek, key planners and executives for the 2024 National Eucharistic Congress, join Dr. Peter Malinoski on this episode to continue our series on integrated personal formation and discuss the kind of transformation you can expect at the NEC, as well as what you can do to prepare for it, both in the natural and spiritual realms. We explore how the four dimensions of Catholic personal formation -- human, intellectual, spiritual, and pastoral -- are incorporated into the NEC revival sessions, impact sessions, breakouts, exhibits, and all the other offerings. Finally, Joel and Tim offer you suggestions to help you get the most out of this experience whether you attend in person or virtually. 

Join Dr. Peter and our audience members to experience a guided meditation on your parts’ needs for integrated formation. Guided by John Paul II’s four dimensions of personal formation (human, spiritual, intellectual, and pastoral) you have an opportunity to see what a part of you needs. Several audience members debrief from the exercise and we all discuss with some Q&A. 

Our guest, Dr. Bob Schuchts, shares with us his decades of experience as a healer through his discussion of his four identities of love, the four dimensions of formation, the integration of personal formation in the work of the John Paul II Healing Center, the centrality of love in healing, the necessity of felt safety and trust, and the importance of distinguishing the natural from the spiritual, especially with parts and demons. 

Catholic thought leader, human formation specialist, and podcaster Jake Khym has more than 20 years of experience in a wide variety of ministry settings and he joins me in this episode to discuss integrated personal formation.  In this episode, we focus on these major themes: 1) your heart; 2) your identity as a beloved little son or daughter of God; 3) the integration of formation within the heart; 4) love as the gift of oneself; 5) change vs. growth vs. flourishing; 6) the importance of emotions; 7) how good formation requires relationship; 8) getting into the messy business of your own personal formation; and 9) Jake’s top resources for personal formation.  

Fr. Boniface Hicks joins us once again as we continue our series on integrated personal formation, this time with a Q&A from our live audience. Fr. Boniface answers a wide range of questions about spiritual and pastoral formation, including: 1) What counsel can you give to those who have experienced poor spiritual formation, especially from formators who only acknowledge the spiritual realm? 2) How do you deal with St. Ignatius of Loyola’s “evil spirits” from the IFS perspective? Would this involve a more compassionate approach to temptation? 3) How do you leverage parts in spiritual direction when your director has no experience with IFS? 4) In the context of Colossians 1:15-20, can you share how your inmost self holds space for an encounter with Jesus and some of your exiled parts? 5) Can spiritual direction be positive and productive if the directee has a strong hiding part or protectors that don’t want to be transparent with the director? 6) Can you talk about the prophetic timing of human formation in the context of Pastores Dabo Vobis, given the cultural issues of the meltdown of the family, marriage, etc.? 7) How do different kinds of suffering relate to our parts? 8) In resisting spiritual bypassing, is there not also the risk of bypassing the spiritual, bypassing the walk with Jesus? Is there a way to navigate this?

What makes good spiritual direction?  What makes good spiritual directors?  And what gets in the way in spiritual direction?  To answers these questions, Fr. Boniface Hicks, joins us as continue our series on the integration of personal formation for Catholics. Fr. Boniface is a Benedictine monk and the Director of Spiritual Formation at St. Vincent Seminary as well as the Director of the Institute for Ministry Formation.  He is an accomplished retreat master, author of four books on the spiritual life, and a seasoned expert in what it takes to accompany others on their spiritual journeys.   We explore the formation that spiritual directors need, how you can recognize when something is lacking in your spiritual direction and the most common human formation challenges and deficits that Catholic spiritual directors are likely to encounter in themselves and in those they serve.