 how to go big screen. Okay. How to go. All right, we're live now. We're live now. So, hey friends, this is, you're watching behind the scenes Divine Intimacy Radio. We have a very exciting show for you today. Something unusual that you might not expect to hear on Divine Intimacy Radio, but we thought it was so important. We wanted to share it with you. And I'm not gonna tell you what that is until the time comes. But before we jump into the show, you're not gonna wanna miss it. Stephanie wants to tell you about some things coming up, opportunities for holiness. Absolutely. So, one of the things, and I'm just a real, I don't know, I just love this. I just love this particular retreat. And I think I love it because I see so much fruit. Come out of it, and that's the Divine Intimacy and Marriage Retreat that we started two or three years ago. And I'm telling you the impact and what the Lord does is nothing short of miraculous. It's so beautiful. You know what's surprising to me? How many people stay in our lives after they go to the retreat? I bet you that never happens. I don't know, it's just been really beautiful to be able to walk with people, to continue to minister to them, to watch what the Lord does. It's amazing. It's just really amazing. I was just texting with one of the couples that came and all of a sudden there's been this shift and this change and she's texting me and she's going, God is answering our prayers. That's awesome. And just, wow, it's just awesome. So, Divine Intimacy and Marriage Retreat, it's February 10th through the 12th upcoming at the Shrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Hansville, Alabama. Honestly, one of the most beautiful venues in the United States. So, it's just really covered in grays, because the second largest monstrance in the world and it's just this really grace-filled, grace-covered location to hold this most important retreat. Because if we don't have healthy marriages, nothing really else matters outside of our relationship with Christ. Because if our marriages are struggling, if they're not imbued with the grace, if they do not become what God desires them to be, then we're really limiting the work the Lord wants to do. In and through us. In and through us, in and through our marriages. I mean, you impact a marriage and the world changes around that family. And it's just awesome. It's just awesome. So, make sure you check that out at spiritualdirection.com events. You'll see everything that we're doing, where we're gonna be, but in particular that upcoming marriage retreat. Okay. And I'll think I'll do that at the break. Okay? Okay. All right. Sounds good. Let's go to start. Onto our mystery guest. Onto our mystery guest. You're not gonna wanna miss the show. You're gonna wanna share it too, folks. You're gonna wanna share it on YouTube, on your social media and Facebook, whatever. All right, let's go and jump in. On your market set, go. Welcome to Divine Intimacy Radio. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke and you have joined your radio haven of rest. Your hermitage of the heart. What was that? What was that? Like, we're, that's like totally different. I'm going, wait, where are we going? What show are we on? But you said the right thing. You said the right thing. I know. But then you totally blew it because then I couldn't say it. So you said, say it, let's go back and start again. We're not starting over again. We're not gonna edit this out to say, what's your part again? The hermitage of the heart. Your monastery of the mind, where we lift our hearts and minds to heaven to draw on the wisdom of the saints so that we can understand how to navigate the tumult and difficulty and challenges of this life with joy and peace, I might add. Yes. And our guests, I have a feeling it's gonna be hard to get through the show without being emotional, but our guest is doing something that is so important for the world and for the church. Something that I, she is caring about something and pursuing something that God cares about more than most things. And I can explain what I mean in a moment, but why don't you introduce her to our audience? Absolutely. This is Nicole Bicinio. Did I say that right? That was perfect. Okay. She is a Catholic disciple of Christ. I love that she leads with that. She is known for her work as a film and television producer, a writer, an actress and a director. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much. It's amazing to be here. And the show is about, of course, Nicole is central to it, but it's about a new TV series called The Advocate, which is on PureFlix, which is a clean version of Netflix. You can find it on Roku or your app on your phone or your iPad or your desktop or whatever. But Nicole, why don't you tell us a little bit about, I think the genesis, like the subject of your work, which is of course human trafficking, but what was the genesis of it? Why did it emerge? I mean, it's a big deal to take this on. And in fact, it's dangerous to take this on and be a public figure. Yes. And much more dangerous than I had initially thought. I thought actually everybody would be for fighting human trafficking. And I learned very quickly that that was not the case and there were more people against and that we're going to try and stop this work and stop what we were doing. You know, someone at the studio said to me the other day that I've been writing this or working on this my entire life. And that was so profound to me because I think my entire journey has led to this point. There was actually a prophecy from a priest in a church in a healing mass, maybe five or six years ago where it wasn't even a glit in my eye that I would be working or protecting children or helping in human trafficking for awareness and prevention and just in the fight in general. And he had was praying over, I'm sure you've seen them where he's praying, they're praying over everyone in the church. And I decided to go up and he prayed over me and he stopped and he said, what do you do? And I said, what do you mean? He said for work and I said, oh, you know, I do movies or I do, you know, speaking. And he said, no. And he kept asking me and literally the entire church is standing around, you know, witnessing this. And he says, no, that's not it. You have something that you need to do. And he was so frustrated that the Lord wasn't showing it to him and I didn't know what it was. I thought I was doing what I was supposed to do. And he put his hands on me again and he cried out, help the girls, help the girls, you have to save the girls. And the entire everyone was just silent. And I still was like, okay, Lord, but had no idea and went back to my life. And I was actually traveling for speaking in 2019. And I had horrible experiences in that year that I was traveling, which I had never experienced traveling by myself again. I was almost trafficked. I had an issue, very bad issue with the TSA at the airport. And then I almost got kidnapped in New York City, which was my home and I jumped out of a moving car. So I was able to, and I thought, Lord, why are you, why am I going through these experiences? And I realized that there were so many young, well, any age, women, boys, everyone that wouldn't think fast enough that didn't have the background that I did to be able to get out of the situations like I did and would never have been seen again. And that was the start of this beautiful journey. You know, I don't know if this is a realm you wanna go into, but as I was thinking about this show, by God's grace, I've never been hooked on pornography or even drawn deeply into it. And one of the reasons was, even as a young non-Christian when I was first exposed to it, I had this sense that this wasn't all voluntary. I mean, how much of pornography comes from women that have been stolen away against their wills, drugged, and then given to this horrific work? Or just not being able to get their life together in some way, just kind of circumstances, yeah, finding themselves in horrible situations. It is so many more than you think. And I think that was why a lot of people, which took me a lot of prayer to realize that's why a lot of people are silent on this issue is because they're really struggling with pornography. And there's a link there. They're silent about it because they're unfortunately participating in trafficking by going to pornography on the computer. A lot of those girls are not doing that. And even the ones that think that they're doing it in their own free will have been brutally abused as children or they grew up or they have a boyfriend that is pimping them out and for a lot of psychological abuse reasons as well. I think the horrifying reality of it is is that people think pornography is a victimless crime, which is one of the most ridiculous assertions one could ever make. And when you participate in it, you not only sin against God and put your soul in mortal danger because it is a mortal sin, but also you are funding or somehow benefiting an industry. You are yourself a part of little girls getting abducted and abused sexually. Or boys. Or boys being abducted. You are part of that grave horrific evil that stinks to heaven. So tell us a little bit, Nicole, about your background and your journey to faith and what got you into the film business. Sure. Well, actually, the film business was kind of my first words. All I ever really wanted to do was be in the business. And I think part of that came from, a single parent family. I was with my mom. I actually came from a very difficult background where I was supposed to be aborted and my father wanted that. My mom didn't want that. So he tried to kill my mom and me. And then I ended up getting put into hiding. And just really that was how my mom became Catholic. She was very sick and she was dying. She became Catholic. She was a Jewish girl. And so she didn't know Jesus and ends up having this conversion puts me into Catholic school. And so that was the beginning of that journey. But it was a nominal Catholic. There wasn't really any full understanding of it growing up. And one of the things that's in the show, I actually had left the church when I was eight years old after something that had happened at my school. And because all of this, it's happening right in this moment, right now the enemy did not want to see come to fruition. And so there was a battle there. And the film industry really did become my God for quite a number of years. Of course, without realizing that either, I think so many of us are in the film industry thinking that we're there to entertain people and make people happy. We don't really understand the spiritual nature of what's going on behind the scenes or even the power that we have in media. We have an enormous amount of power and influence. And I think if more people realize that, they would be more careful about what they make. Yeah, you, so the genesis back of this particular project in film, did it come in that moment with that pastor? I mean, because obviously that moment was incredibly powerful. It had Stephanie in tears here in the studio. Was that the beginning or did, or, well, I think you already shared that you've had some traumatic events at the outer edges of this issue of violence and abuse and use. But what then turned all that into action? Maybe that's a better question since we know those other things. What was the catalyst to really making this finally come to fruition? What we're talking about, of course, for our listeners is the advocate, the TV drama series you can find out on Pureflex, Roku or on your phone app about human trafficking. You can also find it at theadvocatevseries.com. So what was the catalyst to really just making it happen? Well, and of course, it was all the Holy Spirit. Basically, I was making Hollywood stuff, nothing of God. And I wasn't Christian and I had a huge conversion actually on the red carpet at a Woody Allen premiere in 2009 at Cannes Film Festival where the Holy Spirit came upon me and basically let me know everything I was doing was wrong and that I was working for God now and I wasn't allowed to do anything else. And that was the beginning of this incredible journey. But what's interesting is this idea of this show about a woman with these spiritual gifts who was going to protect children and get ahead of the bad guys because she had these supernatural gifts was brought to me by a gentleman named Jim Coleman in maybe five or 2006 when I was in New York City. God wasn't in my heart. None of this was even on the radar. And after 2020 hit and everything, the world got flipped upside down. I called him and I said, the world's ready for this idea now. That's great. That's great. And of course now it's not supernatural gifts which it was at that time from non-Christians. Now it's everything is from the Holy Spirit. Yeah, yeah. It's wonderful. And no, and we're about to go to a break here shortly. So before the show, we were visiting about this and you said you've reached a milestone with the advocate that it's now trending. It's now in the top five, which is amazing. So congratulations on that. That's so exciting. So when we're gonna start, I think we can take a break. Did you tell me once? Yeah, yeah. You're the boss. Well, I am at the moment, I guess. So anyway, let's talk about how the entirety of the advocate, all of the stories in it are inspired by true events and where did you get the stories for the episodes? You know, why, you know, how did this come to be? So let's take a break now. And when we get back, we're gonna start with true advance. Where did you get the stories and this amazing series, The Advocate? We'll be right back. Okay, you did good. So we can go to 13. Sorry, that was kind of botched. No, it's okay. No, you guys are great. Hey friends, before we jump back into the show, I wanted to tell you about a course at the Abelah Foundation that you're gonna wanna check out. If you've never taken a course, it's a life-changing experience. And I do mean that. I mean, some people say, you know, face cream is life-changing. Of course, we're talking about substantive eternal realities and they really are. So this is a true claim. The title of the course is Exploring Theosis, a patristic understanding of our participation in the divine nature. So we'll discover the salvific promise, investigating as we do into the mystery of the Holy Trinity and what it means to be partakers. What it means to know union with God in some very powerful way. So that's gonna be taught by Dr. Michael Gamma, one of our favorite professors at the Abelah Institutes. Go to abelah-institute.org. That's A as in Apple, B as in Victor, I-L-A-institute.org. And you'll find something about that. And if it so happens that anyone out there is considering the priesthood or you know someone who's considering the priesthood, we are well into a launch of our Abelah Institute High Calling Program. We have a hundred young men that we're forming for the priesthood. And if you're interested in that, head out to abelah-institute.com. But there's also a myhighcalling.com, I think is the webpage, myhighcalling.com. And Dr. Joe Holcroft would love to talk with you about the call that you think you might have or that you're sure you have and help you to know how to walk that well. So we're gonna head back into the show. So again, if you have anyone you know who's called to the priesthood or you are, go to myhighcalling.com. Any more? Okay. Get set, go! This is Dan Stephanie Burke. Welcome back to Divine Intimacy Radio, your radio haven of rest. We're talking today with Nicole Abesinho who has produced, written, directed The Advocate, a TV drama series on human trafficking. You can find it on PureFlix, which is a clean version of Netflix. And you can find more at theadvocatevseries.com. It's an important thing. Folks might be wondering why is Divine Intimacy Radio talking about this because we are a show about the interior life. And the reason is because sometimes we get stuck spiritually and we get stuck because our prayer life is stuck because our life of virtue is stuck and we're not giving our lives to helping and serving other people in active ways. It's one of the reasons Stephanie and I have gotten involved in the past in direct service to the poor like going under bridges and doing things like that to serve the poor. So similarly, we want to encourage you to consider this as a work of corporal work of mercy. If not in your prayers, maybe your support or your promotion of this great work, the Advocate TV drama series. So Stephanie, before the break, you had a question for Nicole. Let's jump in back into that. Yeah, I was just really, by the way, I was really incredibly moved about the prophecy that the priest spoke into your life. I mean, I just really emoted and was trying not to burst into tears. It was so moving. And I just love what the Lord does because it just shows that his will will be done. And when he desires something to move and he desires something of us, that we just avail ourselves to that movement and he could just come in a moment and everything changes. He's done it for me. He's obviously doing it for you. So here you've got this incredible series. It's in the top five, it's trending right now. And you said it was based or it was inspired on true events. Where did you get the stories for these episodes? Sure, and yeah, it came out for Christmas and we just did not expect what the Lord has done in any way. I mean, I'm sorry, I just have to, this is just on my heart because I want people to see this show and hearing the young people that are loving it. I mean, even eight year old girls that are learning from this, that are learning how to protect themselves and getting awareness and prevention, but which is always what our hope had been. And to see God just glorify it and lift it up. And yeah, they just named top five New Year's picks on their page for Pure Flick. So the true stories, we worked with human trafficking units. We worked with not-for-profits. We worked with SV units. So we were taking stories from everywhere. And then of course, going in the adoration chapel and letting the Holy Spirit write this, kind of more like a court stenographer where God was basically giving us what we felt were the ones that he wanted to share. And of course, protecting values. But additionally, the first episode is actually my true story of what happened to me in that school when I was eight years old, which had pushed me out of the faith. But to show it now in such a hopeful light of what the Lord was really doing and that he didn't leave me and that he was there with me and that he wanted to show me at eight years old that I had a voice and that I wasn't powerless and that no matter how little we are, that we can make a huge impact. And so I want everyone to be empowered by this show to have that impact. And additionally, my mom was a child abuse investigator and a detective my entire life. And she had become that afterwards and was always trying to protect the vulnerable. She was the corporal works of mercy. She did so much. I can never do as much as she did, but some of the stories are hers as well and stories, I mean, she would literally bring kids home that had nowhere to go. And back at that time, you could get away with doing that. Now you can't, because people would may say something, but at that time, I mean, it was kind of a revolving door. So I was seeing at my age, other children that were abused, that were neglected, that were going through these things and they would share their secrets with me. Wow. Now when I was watching one of the elements of your show, there's a woman who's a character who says, but I'm so careful with my children. What strikes me, and I don't know why I've always been so sensitive to this, our producer was a cop. So he knows all the junk that goes on out there. But I'm always a little bit surprised at how loose people are with their kids and how loose they are with the internet and electronics and not realizing that those are doorways through which predators find and target them. Tell us a little bit about the safety tips from that families can learn from that you have. Just before you do that, I want to make sure we don't, we can't say it enough. It's the advocate TV drama series on Human Trafficking on Pure Flicks. You can find out more at theadvocatevseries.com. We're talking with Nicole Avicinio who's the creator and writer and director. So safety tips for families. Tell us a bit about that. Including safety tips was very, very important to me. And I thought, I think what's happening is, people are in their bubble, I think with their families and they're thinking, one of the tricks I think is that, oh, trafficking or bad things happen in Hollywood or they happen over here, but they don't happen in our backyard. And I think that's where people get a little thrown off that they think that they're in the safety and they don't want to think about it. And so safety tips are easy. They're just simple ones that you can just incorporate in your family's lives. For example, in episode four, there's social media episode tips. So that entire episode is about social media, specifically about Snapchat and certain functions that occur in Snapchat. And if you just turn them off, if you just understand them, you could protect your child, your family, yourself. I mean, it's really amazing and interesting what's out there. And of course, it's not that Snapchat has a bad purpose for it. It's that the bad people use it for bad. And so we have to protect against those things. And in the trafficking episode and episode three, there's also something about keeping a personal online diary. A blog of your happenings of where you're going. You don't have to share it. It can be private, but if someone needs to find you, they'll be able to access that. And I thought that was a very key tip. Fascinating. Now, one of the things I think that most families that are victims of human trafficking, their children are taken, is they think that the perpetrators are like, have fangs and maybe horns in their head and look really bad and evil. But that's not, I think that's one of the most problematic delusions of parents is that normal looking people, people with families of their own, people whose families play with your family and your kids, are often the perpetrators. Tell us a little bit about that deception. Absolutely. I mean, it's often someone you know, and we talk about that in episode two, it could be a friend, a family member, the entire thing of grooming, of trying to get people to trust you and they befriend you and well, why don't you come here? There's, we're having a little party or we're having this. I mean, it's about gaining your trust and then bringing you in, as opposed to just necessarily like ripping you off the street when you're walking down at one day. Yeah, so these folks are, just to elaborate a bit more, they are predators and they're driven by one goal, which is to subjugate another person to this evil and whatever form it is. And they construct their entire personas in a way, they'll be a devout Catholic, if that's what it takes, they're targeting your kid, they'll be a devout Catholic, they may even be in your parish. They'll be a devout Christian in your Protestant parish, you know, whatever, go ahead. In school systems. They'll work in school systems. Yeah, and that's one of the misnomers is that is with any kind of sexual abuse. There's tends to be this thought of, oh, it's, and I'm gonna say it out loud. It's always the priest. And the member, the amount of priests is minuscule compared to the amount of educators. That are predators. That are predators. You were a principal. Yeah, I have worked both in secular and Catholic education. I worked in both as an administrator as a principal. 15 years of experience. Oh, no, 25 years, yeah. You don't seem that old. Thank you, that's very nice. So, you know, all of that, not only that, but, and I'll say it here, I do speak about it in part of my testimony, but I was lured by a neighbor. I was four years old, you know, I, he was, his name was Mr. Church, God help him, you know, God have mercy on his soul, you know, and he's long gone now, because he was an old man at the time, but, you know, the grooming, the conversations, the luring, all of that. And, you know, my mom's a beautiful, wonderful woman, a dedicated mother. She had no idea. This happened within about 20 yards of where your parents were. Right, right. Just in a moment when I was playing in the front yard, it only took a second. And she could see me from the window, but it just takes a moment. So we cannot be diligent enough. And that doesn't mean that we need to walk around in fear, but it does mean that we need to have our eyes open. We also, more importantly, I think needs to understand that the spiritual covering of the home is very important. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So I'm gonna ask Nicole before we run out of time, how can folks listening or watching help you with this mission or the mission in general, is there a way they can get involved with the episodes you're producing or how does that all work? There is. Well, first of all, you know, having the amazing Catholic support, and we made a show that has Catholic themes and has a lead Catholic priest that's a spiritual director. And that's almost never been done. And so going on there, seeing these family friendly episodes, sharing them with your friends, your family, you know, that's the point of the show, getting it out as far and wide as possible in this month of fighting human trafficking, January is that month. So that's a first help. If you would love to volunteer, we are, it looks like we are gonna be rolling into season two this year, it's looking like. And so we always need, you know, additional crew, if you are actors, crew members, volunteers. I mean, there's so many different things that we need that it takes to get a production done. We always need additional investors as well. And I've been trying to only have investors that are Christian. And so we turn down a lot because we wanna be equally yoked. We wanna make sure that we're working with people who are doing it for kingdom purposes. So that's very important to us as well. So theadvocatevseries.com is a website. Is that where they go if they wanna get involved or do they go to gabrielsmessengerfilms.com? Either or we're receiving emails from both. So you can go on the Advocate TV series and get on our mailing list to get information or email us personally about being involved. Gabrielsmessengerfilms will get those emails as well. But obviously to see this show, you're going to the PureFlix app and going directly there. Well, I'm grateful for all your work, your good work. I'm grateful for it. You know, it's interesting, you know, PureFlix, I'm sure has a lot of Christian, non-Catholic, Christian programming. And it's beautiful that you're depicting a priest, you know, these days. And a beautiful light. And a beautiful light, which is so important because most of them, the vast majority, aren't those that cause the problems in the church. It's the few that besmirch the good work of so many good and holy priests. And we need to pray for our priests to protect them. Also from false accusations and all the junk that goes around that the enemy tries to work in the church and in the world. Nicole Abicinio, producer, director, creator of the Advocate TV drama series, which you can find on PureFlix. Clean Netflix is what it is. Roku, you can find it on an app. And then go to theadvocatevseries.com. Nicole, thank you for being with us and thank you for your great work. God bless all you do and all glory to him. Amen. Amen.