 Hey friends, welcome back to Divine Intimacy Radio part two Paris Priests Survival Guide on your market set go Welcome back to Divine Intimacy Radio. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke You are listening to Divine Intimacy Radio, which I said twice or three times Reset and your market set go well, you know stop what is wrong with my brain I don't have sleep stop Reset, thank you and your markets that go This is Dan and step For live radio This is Dan and Stephanie Burke welcome back. No, that's not back because it's not the break Reset. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke. Welcome. You're listening to Divine Intimacy Radio your radio Haven of Wraths your hermitage of the heart your monastery of the mind Where we lift our hearts and minds to heaven to draw upon the wisdom of the saints and the long-standing beautiful glorious tradition of the church to understand how we can navigate this challenging life and Today we're talking about how to navigate the challenging reality of diaston priesthood challenging glorious beautiful Amazing we love our priests. Yes, we love our priests one of one of my dear friends She uses the combination of brutal and beautiful together and so you could describe it as brutal And we're joined today by Father John barrier He's a diocese. He's a priest of the diocese of Peoria And he oversees two parishes st. Joseph of Broomfield and st. James of Williams field So shout out to parishioners in both their parishes You're very blessed in our opinion to have Father John and Then dr. Joseph Holcraft who is the director of our high calling priestly Formation program where we help men prepare for seminary to discern the priesthood and we also do priestly formation for those who will direct seminarians and then Dr. Joseph New part of our program, which is so exciting to me Is at the mount tell tell our listeners about what we're doing at that seminar? Yeah, so we are providing some didactic contents and teaching content for the first-year seminarians there Up there at Mount st. Mary's Emmitsburg Maryland some of our professors dr. John Burksma Dr. Nguyen just you know our all of our five-star professors are our Forming these men in the area of sacred scripture in the interior life, and it's just a beautiful opportunity to engage More diocese, but more specifically the men in those diocese who have been accepted in seminary and they are seminary and so It's just providing us more opportunity To speak to the interior life and as we've been talking about its foundation to to discern well You know Joe, I think what distinguishes us and not in a competitive way But just what our emphasis is is we believe that at the heart of a healthy priesthood Is a man who has a healthy and beautiful and powerful relationship with the Lord? And so our emphasis is on of course all the the Practicals but the interior life is first and foremost What we're concerned with because if a guy gets Jesus right in his relationship with Jesus, right? He can weather any storm and if he doesn't he can't weather any storm, you know So I see father barrier is shaking his head. What are your thoughts on that father barrier my third year in seminary? I was in Philadelphia and my mom called and Oops my computer just went dead. We can we're we can hear you. Okay. Well, she called and I said mom Is everything okay? It was the middle of the week and She said yes, but I have a question for you. I said, what is it mom? She says to me. Are you falling in love with Jesus? Hmm, and I pause and I thought about it. I said mom. I think I am Especially when I'm in the chapel and I look at the tabernacle and I think Jesus. Do you want me and And and I am falling in love with the mom and ever since that day every day Including today. I asked myself the same question. Am I falling in love with Jesus? Hmm, and so I can't thank my mom enough for giving me that the one necessary thing Do you spend time at the feet of Jesus every day falling in love with him? That's so beautiful the one thing Necessary right wouldn't as necessary I'm to be at the feet of our Lord like Mary Instead of rushing around all the time like Martha, you know, which is necessary, but it's not the one thing necessary And so it goes back and by the way, can I just give your mom a virtual hug? What's her name? I mean I'm hugging you on this, you know, I just thank you for giving birth to this beautiful priest Thank you. Thank you. What I think behind Most of our beautiful priest is an incredible praying mother a woman of prayer. So Just what a beautiful story. So, you know, father as you were talking about this beautiful group of J Sukkari toss it that you have With there's six of you together that that, you know, follow this pattern of supporting one another prayer and one of the things that after we talked about the mental prayer and the Importance of the liturgy of the hours is that you mentioned that you spend time together in Eucharistic adoration Truly at the feet of our Lord and and as we know so many of our Catholic brethren Do not truly believe in the real presence of the Lord that that terrible Whatever you call it the survey that went out and that that came back and that just made us all ache, you know It just made our hearts ache Tell us about the power of being in front of our Lord body blood soul and divinity What is it that you experience in that what how is it shaped your priesthood? What what is it doing for you to be in front of our Lord? And I want to add to that. How do you practically protect? All of this time that you're giving to prayer so but particularly with adoration I Would say What happens on a natural level when you lay out on the beach and you get a suntan your skin changes Your soul changes when you spend time in front of the exposed blessed sacrament And you may not understand how it changes just like you don't understand how you got a tan But if you Dispose yourself if you give your heart to Jesus, he will change you My prayer is always please Jesus make me a holy priest after your own heart And that's my I beg Jesus because I don't know what to do I know he's got to do it for me and through me. And so that holy hour is so indispensable This group that invited me into that into their support group about 15 years ago We just had a conversation and The conversation was what is the most essential part of our group? The answer was when we do a holy hour together that really binds us together and Focuses on our the real mission of why we're a priest and why we need each other to support each other to keep going to person of year You're right. It's it's a tough world we live in but But that Eucharistic holy hour so important and our new bishop has had a Monstrance made for the diocese and every single parish every week is getting this Monstrance wow that every parish is undergoing for the next two years Eucharistic adoration together Yeah, it's beautiful and I just think it's so important for people to understand because I think so often We see sign-ups for adoration and folks going and if for an outsider You go in there and everybody's just kind of sitting in front of this beautiful gold thing You know and it's holding a piece of bread. What is you know? What's going on? But the supernatural reality is the Lord is he is Loving his people that are sitting there to adore at his feet, right? I have to add this and it was just really an extraordinary grace that I received when we were on pilgrimage to Spain just recently and We would go and do these beautiful cathedrals and a lot of our community was with us Apostle via Apostle a via community and so and and they really get unanimous Necessarium because that is our motto That is our call for for the charism of Apostle a VA and so we would go into these cathedrals And I I would just feel this tug of my heart And and it would happen and it happened again And then then I would go and find the Lord and I would kneel and and then I was out Walking around with Dan we came around the little church and my eyes immediately went to this little sentence that was You know almost in the script on that list of schedule and it said Eucharistic adoration today, right? So we go in to adoration and I sent out a text through telegram I said everybody we found Eucharistic adoration. We're here. I kid you not within two minutes That little chapel was full of our community members that just found us where we were Came and dropped and then I realized that this tug of my heart that I kept feeling in every one of the churches Was the Lord's call? He was saying come to me Come be at my feet. Come say hello. Come. Let me love you and and I think that's what we don't understand That it is happening Imperceptibly to us, but he is truly calling his people to be at his feet. Why not because you know Of anything, but he just wants to pour himself out on his people so that we can follow his will so Wow well said Beautiful well, we're gonna we're gonna go to a break in a minute what I want to do is is really make sure we get to practicals because Father John there's something about you That gives you some pretty strong boundaries, I guess or or whatever it is There's something that says to you. I've got to protect this because this is the protection of my priesthood That a lot of priests maybe don't have naturally, I don't know if it's natural for you or if you had to fight to develop it But when we get back from the break, I do I want to focus on You know what it like talk to a priest who I Don't know. Do you have good protection mechanisms? Do you have a good secretary? Do you have a good scheduler? Do you have do you have people who block and tackle other parishioners if they won't leave you alone, you know Bring these periods. How do you how do you do this because I think the I'll just say I mean I have a very strong personality if you mess with my boundaries It's not gonna, you know, it's not gonna break my boundaries I'm not gonna hurt you or anything, but it's not gonna break my boundaries. I'm just super clear every day This is my mission. This is my mission, but I Not all of us have that I think I'm wired with it in in some way and then I'm also very disciplined But when we get back, I like to you to just share how you protect all of this and Then I want to go back to your band of your holy band of six and then get any comment from Joe as well So we'll be right back So we were at 12. Do you want to tell folks? I don't know what you told them last time Check out all of our events at spiritual direction forward slash Events we have the Abola summit 2023 Coming up on the Marian mystery and the triumph of the Immaculate Heart so so important especially as we celebrate Mary's queen ship today and The divine intimacy and marriage retreat we have one in November and one in February big big big emotional Love points deposited when you sign up for a divine intimacy and marriage retreat Come give yourself that gift give your spouse that gift of being together with the Lord and finding out how to get strong in him Because your marriage is just so divinely Important and loved by Jesus. I'm amen your markets that go. This is Dan Stephanie Burke Welcome back to divine intimacy radio in our part two of parish priest survival guide and We're with Father John barrier from the diocese of Peoria and Dr. Joseph Holcraft who heads up our high calling priestly Discernment and formation program so before the break father. We're talking about the Boundaries like how do you keep like what are the practical things you do to to? Protect these important times of prayer and fellowship with other priests well, the first thing is to go to bed early and get up early because no nobody really calls you at 6 a.m. or 5 a.m. and So that's the most important thing is to have a regular going to bed time and getting up because if you want to spend time with Jesus I think it was I was you or Stephanie said maybe with Stephanie said When you die and face the Lord wouldn't it be great if he said you always kept your appointment with me every day That's that mental prayer time in the morning where you just can be intimate with the Lord and also If only a funeral will keep me from going to my monthly support group So if I have a funeral that can't be moved off that first Monday And then I'll do the funeral because that's the ultimate trump card, but other than that Anything else can be moved around. I make that a priority commitment for me for my support group But as far as the holy hour You have to have a really good boundary to make sure you get your holy hour in every day because That's the one thing in scripture that Jesus asked for the priest. He said Couldn't could you not spend one hour with me? So that's separate from the daily mental prayer That's something separate. We I'm lucky. I have a church right next door I can just go over there and but I still need an appointment and if somebody calls If it's an emergency and an anointing that's different But otherwise if it's if it can be put off maybe a couple hours, let's say well, I already have an appointment They don't have to know it's with Jesus So you have to have a really good boundary there and I think Jesus will reward you when you put him number one That's really so beautiful father and I think you know some people would say oh That's just a wasted amount of time, you know But there is no more beautiful waste of time than to waste it with the Lord, right? To give him that hour every single day and and that that's so important to you And I really I ache when I hear that priests When we come across the priests that may not pray That doesn't take advantage of the fact that he's right there right next to them I would love to have the Lord right next to me all the time where I could just go sit his feet and say Lord I'm struggling with this Lord help me with this or just I love you I love you, you know And and help me with my day and help me to love other people like you want me to love them So wow, you know one thing I've I've had the blessing of leading multiple global organizations And one of the things I've learned is that there is never Ever ever a lack of demand against my capacity Ever like it's always exceed the demand against my capacity always exceeds my ability To fulfill what people wish I would fulfill for them So trying to do it. Let's say I tried and set aside everything I couldn't succeed no matter what I would fail and then if I did that then I would fail Catastrophically because now I'm not praying. I'm falling into sin and all these other things But one of the things I've learned as a leader is it's actually more important To know what to know how to say no than to how to say yes It's it's more important to um To realize that you have that excessive demand and you just have to be comfortable with I'm not answering every email Not answering every phone call. I'm going to deal with funerals anointing of the sick You know, whatever the whatever, you know, it's different for me as a layperson But for a for a diasom priest there are things you must respond to but outside of that do you have a discipline of of just kind of realizing that same thing and therefore Having peace knowing that you will get to what divine providence Wants you to get to if you take care of first things first Yeah, that's that's absolutely Your prayer your mask your your holy hour And if you get all those in Everything else will fall into place. Jesus will line it all up for you. Just like you said Dan Dr. Holcraft, you know as you're preparing young men to you know, live the life that father john Is living or you know in religious life What's the message, you know To you from you To guys discerning the priesthood so that because father I You know Father john wrote me this like how this all started his father john's dad Saw us a video of mine and said told father john Hey, you should check this out and and then father john wrote me this just beautiful letter and then I talked with him on the phone I'm like, wow, this priest is awesome. I want him to be as infectious I want other priests to hear this but also I want seminarians to hear it. I want guys who are considering the priesthood to hear it But what is the advice you have for young men saying? You know what if I could be like father john, I'm in If that's the priesthood of this that's diocesan priest said I'm in but It just isn't magic. I mean father father john isn't isn't a product of just you know chance He's super deliberate about all this stuff. So anyway, what are your thoughts about that? Yeah, well, uh, you know, I think father john already really spoke into it and it has been The centerpiece of a lot of my conversations, which is to say That uh, it's about falling in love with jesus That was uh, such a beautiful, uh, truth. It's about in the end falling in love with jesus and So what I tell the guys is look All these men have been in a courtship with another have courted a young lady And I asked them do they pre-offin prior time and they laugh. Oh, of course they do, you know So let us take this to your relationship with jesus Now saintries of avala as we know said louis carerich is calling jesus your friend I challenge the guys with specific things. Um, you know, we have 1400 minutes of the day We probably sleep away seven hours, which gives us approximately a thousand minutes if you were courting You know a young gal How many minutes would you be courting her with would you be thinking about her? Um transfer that to your courtship with jesus And and see what happens I mean can we not give 40 50 60 more minutes to jesus that that formal time that formal courtship with with jesus will then Kind of form all of those other informal moments. I think about my relationship with jackie You know talking about guardrails that we put around we have our date nights And nothing is going to get in the way of those date nights Talk to our friends and kids. I mean those are You know sacred or just nothing's going to get in the way that so I tell that to the guys You know, don't let that interfere when I look at father very I see a very happy Joyful man, which oh by the way, father john You are a signpost for vocations because if there's anything these guys telling me is The impact that happy joyful priests have on them. So thank you for your joy because it just it goes so far with these guys Um, and I talk about that I talk about that because joy is a life of grace grace and joy actually come from the same Greek group There's a reason why so joy is a life of grace The deeper you go and that courtship the more joy you receive and the more love of god that you're going to um Absorb, you know father john earlier you're talking about that beautiful analogy of the rays of the sun hitting us and it changes My wife's in dermatology and so she often explains what that you know, what's going on So I laugh at that the same things going on when we are just beholding our beloved Just allowing the grace of god to absorb us and that's the message I give to the guys to just simplify and say spend time with the one That you call your beloved or the one you espouse to and that then opens up ultimately You know as the pope benedict would say New avenues which will lead a new doors which will lead to new avenues to the heart So and just to give a pathway to some resources on this because we've hit it so hard and it's so important Uh, it strikes me to remind folks. We have uh, the most one of the most popular courses at the avila foundation avila institute I'm teaching now. It's called foundations of prayer and union with god We teach a truncated version of that to our guys discerning a seminary life Or a life in the priesthood and it's based on a book I wrote called into the deep which we also have a film series of which is free Even though it wasn't free to produce we want to get it out to as many people as possible. It's a five-parter I think they're half it's designed for parish use. You know small group use You can find all that out at spiritualdirection.com And and I you know, some of our listeners are saying, isn't it arrogant for you to tell You know assume the priests don't know how to pray Well, I I've never yet met a priest who said I learned how to pray in seminary In fact, they all tell me the opposite and I've had a even a religious priest say He'd been religious for 20 years and never knew how to pray until he took the course So it's no shame. It's just it's just a matter of you know to figure out Because we're admonishing, you know spend an hour get up early and all of that But it may be Beyond the imagination of a good man to say, okay. Yeah, that's all good and well But I've just never been taught and I don't know how to do this Pick up into the deep. It's it you can read it in an hour. It'll take you a few years to Implement it, but that can be a great starting point. Yeah, and I think you know at the core of all that It's not that we're trying to go fix priests. No, we you know, I I think about a life of Without prayer. It's like being a lamp and you're not plugged into the source And we want you to explode with the light of christ We want because we know priests like father john Who they are so plugged in and they change the world around them They carry christ everywhere That joy that life of christ that life of grace spreads joy And it heals it heals just in its present And with because the lord's there the lord is healing as people still and he desires For his priest to live fully united to him. So that's what we're talking about. It's not about fixing priests It's about and nor is it a chrism. It's like please there is so much more We long for you to have the fullness Of what we've been grace to experience what what father john is experienced What I know doctor your whole craft experiences And so many of the beautiful people that really take this life of prayer Seriously, let's take this show out and finish it with this one question. I think father john Tell me what parishioners can do to serve their priests better Those who are listening and who get it and want to help what what can they do? Well, um, maybe they can just think just encourage the priests that we're so happy that you have a good Support group having a good spiritual director is important. Um, you know sending the priest a mass card saying, you know, Hey, uh, I offered a mass for you and just to tell just to just tell the priest, you know, hey, uh We we love you. We're praying for you And you know for You're my that's my family. I like you want to hear your family tell you that they love you and um, so that To pray for you to to I encourage you to to do the yeasu character when I go on These outings with my support group Oh, my parishors love to hear that say they they want they want the priests to be healthy priests and so That kind of encouragement the joy that the prayers the masses that's that really lifts me up That's the greatest gift if they can give me really that's beautiful and become people of prayer themselves to keep you up To hold up your hands on either side So until next time may the god of peace make you perfect in holiness May he preserve you whole and entire spirit soul and body Irreproachable at the coming of our lord. Jesus christ. Amen. Amen