 Um, no, there's still seats available. Okay. Hey friends, you're watching behind the scenes, divine intimacy radio. We have a special guest in studio today. I'm excited to talk to Ann Bernig. You'll learn a little bit more about her in a minute. Today we're going to be talking about, um, the power of community for healing spiritual growth, surviving the crazy world we live in. And, uh, thus the title, what was the title of the show? Producer man alone to hell or together to heaven alone to hell together to heaven. Yeah, that's right. I just remembered. So, so that we can disturb everybody who's going, but what about hermits? Right. It's the first thought. Right. So remind me to do the disclaimer at the beginning. So you get all the silly stuff out of the way. I just want to say thanks before we jump into the show to EWTN for all the great things they do for the church and especially allowing us to do this show and I will tell you, you know, all the books we recommend, we're not necessarily recommending books to show, although my new ones out. And, uh, you know, it's funny. I went into Barnes and Noble, uh, when we were at the summit and I went in and I said, do you have, because they, they're stalking it. Do you have, um, uh, a book by Dan Burke called Finding Peace in the Storm. Right. And, uh, and so the, the lady goes, yeah, but it's not in stock. And so I said, well, can I order one? And she says, yeah, what's your name? And I said, my name's Dan Burke. She didn't blink an eye. She just write it down. So one's going to come in an inventory, um, uh, and they're going to go Dan Burke ordered this, maybe they'll connect it. I don't know. It's pretty funny. But anyway, all the books that we recommend and, uh, are all going to be in the EWTN's religious catalog. And the great thing about, you know, how they handle this stuff is that the, um, is that the, uh, they have a theology department. They vet everything. And so like, if there's any bookstore where you're not going to find junk, that's EWTN, and then you also help the mission. So just thanks to EWTN for letting us, uh, work, you know, work in their system, so to speak, or contribute to the great work they do. So, uh, all right, uh, before one last thing, uh, divine intimacy and marriage retreat, what's the dates? November, November, go to spiritualdirection.com. Board slash events. Yep. And, um, we just have a few, yeah, we have a few seats left. Yeah. So, um, a few seats left. And you know, guys, this is really a way to up your inventory points if they've been depleted. Yeah. Um, and yeah, I just can't say enough about it. Not because it's us. It's because what the Holy Spirit's doing. So come figure out how to grow in oneness with each other and oneness with the Lord and, um, it'll change your life. I met with two doctors last night who are helping me with my lungs. And they came and they came, that's how we met them. And this is like a year later and they are beaming at the effects on their marriage. They, they're like wanting to give me time to help me medically because of what they experienced in, in the retreat. They were so grateful and just beautiful. Yeah. All right. So don't miss it. Let's go ahead and jump into the show. New markets at go. This is Dan and Stephanie Burke. Welcome to Divine Intimacy Radio, your radio haven of rest. 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 to help us to navigate this incredibly strange life and difficult life, challenging life that we all live. And it's getting stranger and stranger, you know, in very devastating ways and very deeply troubling ways in the world, but, you know, because of wars and what's going on in Israel and what's going on, even in our own country, the militant crazy, left, you know, socialist, anti-catholic, anti-faith, anti-good, anti, you know, anti everything. And so what's the answer? Like, what's the Catholic answer? Yeah. And that's what the show is about today. What's the answer? So before we jump in, your daughter has decided to come on to the show today. I know. Yeah, everybody. Look, here's our daughter. You're going to confuse everyone. They're going to think I'm Ariel. So this is not Ariel, but she is our adoptive daughter. Adoptive daughter. Adoptive daughter. And figuratively. Yes, figuratively. So we've embraced her as our daughter, lover to death. How long have you been with us in our, in our circle? Since? Circle. I don't know. Yeah. Long time. Long time. When did you first come across spiritualdirection.com? Probably 2009 or 10. Well, from the very beginning. Well, the article on Rootson by Father Bartunek. I was reading in the office when I was bored at work. Yep. And I said, I like these guys. The little pop up came up that said subscribe to our website. And I was like, oh, I got a sign up for this. And I started reading the newsletter every day. Little did you know the trajectory that it would send your life on, right? No idea. Yeah. Yeah. Awesome. Well, this is Ann Bernig. Yeah. So it's not Ariel. It's it's Ann Bernig. She and Ann Bernig does not sing opera like Ariel, but she we tell her not to sing at all. I think it's true. I already asked this morning if I could sing on the show and I was told no. Yeah. So anyway, so she is our director of mission at Mission Engage. Engagement. That's right. See, you almost I almost set it up. So we will ever she's been with us for a long time. I do have to tell one quick story about her, please, to kind of gives you a little sense of her personality. So we had kind of been, you know, talking to her and Dan kept telling her, are you ready to be poor? Are you ready to be poor? Are you ready to be poor? Work with us. Poor for Jesus. Come work for us because she was in medical, something or another, right? Medical sales sales. And so we had been talking to her, but I kind of thought it was dead in the water, dead in the water. And so I get a text. It was a text, I think, and I look at my text one morning and she said, I've done it. I've quit my job when we had not resolved on our side. We had not resolved it. And I almost dropped the phone and I looked at Dan. I go and just quit her job. We need to figure this out. She's coming to work for us. So anyway, it's the Lord has provided in spades a lot of it through your hard work. So anyway, welcome and thank you. Thank you for having me there. There's more to that story. You guys had just had a meeting with the team. And I think Debbie and Maggie and Chris said, we really need help, Stephanie. We can't do this. We need another person and my text message came through right after that happened. No, you've been an absolute gift. The other place you've been a blessing to us is with the topic today. And I think we'll probably end up doing two shows, you know, one. So for folks who are watching live stream now, we'll pop over to spiritualdirection.com afterwards. I just have a sense we're going to have a lot to talk about. But you're so you're involved with the the Abba Institute, Abba Foundation, obviously, but also with the Apostle of the Community, which is really the community is the topic, not the possibly be a community with communities, the topic. And all three of our lives for, you know, have been changed by this, this thing, this, this idea that has faded in a very demonic way in the Catholic world. And I want to just talk about the title of this show, just so people don't get totally blown up alone to hell together to heaven. And my whole point in naming it that is that the people who are most vulnerable to losing their faith, to doubt, despair, narcissism, to just, you know, just getting attacked are people who are not surrounded by other people. We used to live in Colorado Springs and there was this tragic circumstance where a family was walking through the mountains together and they got spread out too much. And a little one was spread out too much. And a mountain lion got him and it's because, because he was, but he wasn't very far, but he was far enough in what scripture says, the devil's prowling around like a roaring lion. But if they were close, they'd never gotten attacked. The boy would be alive today. All the tragedy would have been averted. And I think that's a perfect analogy for why, I mean, you just in macro, why a community is so valuable. So I just want to start wherever you want to go with this. We all have testimony, but I, you, you, you, you moved me. I don't know. We were just talking, I don't know, in a meeting sometime, not too far back. And I said, you know, what has it done? You know, what, like if there's this pivotal thing that happened to you because of it, you're not sure that, but tell me what's, why is community important? What is it? Why is it important? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It changed everything for me. Yeah. I mean, I would say I grew up in a strong community of my family. Yeah. Very devout parents and very devout grandparents. And so when I went off to college, I was just on fire through Jesus. And, but it was, even when I, in high school, I was sharing, even in high school, it's kind of like, there were a couple of church groups and just like, no, I didn't want to be a part of it. I have, I love to evangelize and I wanted to be out with the people. So I went to college and was just on fire and, you know, my college roommate converted, another best friend converted, a guy that I dated converted. And it was thing after thing, or people after people God kept bringing me. But I didn't really, other than my, my family, I didn't really have a community of relationships and support. I was supporting a lot of people in their faith that I didn't really have it for myself. So there is, there is some aloneness in that. And probably in my own wounds, some self-reliance, some independence, you know. Self-protection. Yeah. Yeah. You are a strong, you are a strong woman. You're not, you know. You're not a wallflower. You're not a wallflower. You, you know, you're, you're a leader and not a joiner. Right. Yeah. And, and you, you all, you know, so all of those are good things in a way. Because not a joiner is, can be independent thinking and separate from culture. But it can also then do you harm when, because we need each other. Mm-hmm. You know. Yeah. What comes to mind is the isolation. You know, how did the enemy take out Eve? He got her alone in the garden. Mm-hmm. Right. Out of, out separate from Adam. Out separate, you know, out from, you know, protection. And I think that's just really important to even consider is like, we can look all through scripture. The Lord teaches us through scripture and story to help us understand, you know, like what's the bigger picture and what's going on here. And I think it's really important for us to understand not just for marriage, but even just in the context of community, which is a type of marriage, because we're walking together, living together, loving each other, supporting each other, being purified by each other. Yeah. And if we get out on our own, then we can be picked off, you know, the isolation is really deadly. Yeah. So let me just like structurally talk, give some context to this. What do we mean by community? So historically in the Catholic Church, it's been community centric. You know, you have pockets of fervor, Catholic community, you know, Italian, some ethnic base like the Italians who established so much of Alabama or, you know, in the Northeast or whatever. And it's just this organic reality of people who are in a parish giving each, giving and serving one another. So because of the decline of Catholicism, that is almost gone. It's just, it lingers in some small places. But the other kind, which is complementary and even grows out of that are spiritual communities. So they have a spirituality at the core, Carmelites, Franciscans, Dominicans, the, you know, third order where you have the nuns and the religious and the priests and then the ladies see the spirituality and they want to participate. So then they come together. So that's what we're really talking about. And in fact, though the kind that comes in community life is thriving, by the way, in the Latin mass world. I mean, that's incontrovertible. But that's not really what we're talking about today. We're talking about the spiritual kind of community. So ours is Apostoli VA, which is a Carmelite at its center. And we don't all live together. It could sound like we were talking like that. We do have a home base in Montgomery, Alabama. It's a large retreat center. And some of us live together here that are who are not blood. But what we're talking about is living together in the sense of implicating ourselves in one another's lives. And in terms of Apostoli VA, we're all over the world. We have, you know, people who are meeting every week in Australia and Canada and, you know, Ireland, Ireland, you know, all over and saying we need each other. And we're in the charism, which is how this spirituality comes through, is what they come around and they learn and study, grow together, you know, experience life together, help one another. And so those, that's what we mean by community, if that makes sense. So I guess we've got about a minute and a half or whatever. What, did I miss any of the description of community that like hits to the heart of the thing for you guys? I think one thing that's unique about AV is we implicate each other, implicate ourselves in each other's lives. But there's a commonality in how we study, pray, intercede, sacrifice, you know, how we live out this spirituality that is Carmelite, that is Apostoli VA. And in that commonality, then we end up coming up against one another, you know, with each other, walking alongside each other. And there's a beautiful, just symbiotic kind of support, because it's priest, religious, laity, all coming together to walk together and live out what it means to be a Christian. Right, right, very good. So one, we're going to head to the break and come back and then just talk about personal impact, really. And that's why one of the reasons we wanted to have Anne on today. But the way, just practically, so people can conceptualize, we have live online formation for the whole community, second and fourth Saturdays normally. So the world, everyone logs in from all over the world, even weird time zones. 2am sometimes for our Australian friends. And then they all have local physical communities they meet in. So they have their own retreats in Australia, and we're actually going to go visit God willing in January. But they have their own retreats, they have their own small groups all around the spirituality. So it's not an online community, but we have like an online monastery where all the formation is housed and the courses and different things and we bring in scholars and we teach constantly. And that's out at apostoliva.org, A-P-O-S-T-O-L-I-V-I-A-E.org. And you can head out there and check that out. We get back, we'll talk a little bit about personal impact on community. We'll be right back. So before we go back, setting the captives free is an event. Mary, star of the C. Catholic Church in San Pedro. San Pedro, sorry. The locals corrected me, San Pedro. So if you want to go to the setting the captives free event, November 11th, 2023, Mary, star of the C. Catholic Church, San Pedro, California. And if they come, they can get connected to some of our local A-B members out there that are amazing. I love our West Coast group. They're just beautiful, beautiful. You do a lot more than you like to people on the East Coast. No, no. I mean, you know, there's a lot of darkness in that part of the country. You know, in California. So they are a light in the darkness. Listen, they're amazing. All right. So go to spiritualdirection.com forward slash events on your market seat, set, go. Welcome back. This is Dan Stephanie Burke with Divine Intimacy Radio with our special super double quadruple guest, Ann Vernig talking about community life. So let's go to you about community life, like what, how do you want to describe the impact on your life? Yeah. I mean, a big question. But I think, you know, we talk a lot about progress and prayer. And I think that the, for me personally, this community has made all the difference and has been able to help me really grow in my prayer life because of that. And one of the facets of our community is accountability. And that was something that I really needed because the people that I was close to, the people that I daily companion with, thought I was crazy for getting up early and praying, getting up and going to daily mass or, you know, go on a vacation together and everyone's going to the beach and I'm leaving to go to mass somewhere. And I would get criticized or I, people would complain and. Or mocked. Or mocked, yep. And these are close, close friends that look right, right. And so coming to this community is like a breath of fresh air. And like, I always say on our Saturday formations, we're like the women at the well, we all come to the well to drink the water together as a family, talk about dad, and then go back out and fight our battles because we each have our own, because of the uniqueness of our community here, we kind of each have our own little fire that we get to light where God has us in our state in life. But we have this uniqueness of being able to come together and be refreshed together, to rest together, to heal together. And yeah, so it's just been very helpful for me to grow in that way. What are the spiritual fruits from it? So you went from trying to fight this battle on your own, feeling like, you know, no pun intended, but a fish out of water, right, Christian fish out of water. So now you're, you're in the ocean with others, right? We can think of the chosen opening graphics, right? So now you're with others and you figure out, okay, I'm not so weird after all, this stirring, this desire of my heart has a purpose, it has an aim, and there's others out there like me. And we're helping others to set that fire as well too, right, to find your mission, your vocation, and direct it towards bearing fruit. So what has been the personal fruit and then what has been the extended fruit, like radiating out from your life since you've engaged in community? I mean, I think the biggest fruit is just, this is all about love. And growing in prayers, growing in union with God and growing in union with God is growing and understanding that you are loved. And when you understand that you're loved, you can pour yourself out in charity. It's like a purification of your yes that happens here. And when that yes moves from fear of going to health, obligation, because I know I better do this, or guilt, because I'm gonna feel really bad if I don't do this to, I just wanna do this because I love the person. Your love just becomes purified and it's really about receiving. That's been one of the things that in this community is I receive. I've learned how to receive love in a deeper way from the Lord through others. And it's kind of changing, I have a little boundary small group. We talk about codependency a lot and I think with our beautiful teaching on redemptive suffering sometimes some of us can have this false burden of I have to offer everything up and carry all these things. And so we walk around as good Christians trying to sacrifice all the time, which can make us and create this false sense of depending on others or having others depend on us. And I feel like in community and apostolate VA it's divinely ordered so that we all look to God and then he fills what we need through others. But we're not looking to others to fill our needs. Oh, well said. Yeah. That's well said. That's really well said. He made us to be interdependent. He did. Not codependent, but interdependent. It reminds me of St. Catherine of Siena who said, I made you in such a way that you must be dependent upon others to be to be to get to heaven. He saved. Yeah. You know, so he designs and like just at this table and our producer, we have already discovered this. He designed you in such a way that you need me. He designed me in such a way I need you. Stephanie, most of all, like the biggest things I need are with Stephanie and then Jordan and you and Jordan and Jordan and Stephanie. And me and Ann. And you and Ann, you know. And then when we say yes to that, what we're doing is saying yes to the means of grace. And this is a key. There are graces related to who we are in Christ and what he desires to do in us that can become no other way, but through community life. And so if you're separated from that, I just want to say to everyone, this isn't about coming to Apostoli VA. Everyone's invited, come to the free formation, go out to the website, create a profile. You got to get through the orientation just so we're not acting like Facebook in our digital monasteries. That's a little investment. But it isn't about Apostoli VA. What we really want for all of you is every one of you belongs to some kind of tribe. Like you're wired for a tribe. You know, I would just get a retreat for CEOs and the head of Ave Maria Law School is a Dominican. He thinks like a Dominican. So he's a part of a Dominican third order. So it's very powerful for him. He's they have structured way of prayer. They have a way that they study. And he has other people that the same, you know, similar dynamics that we're talking about here. Not all communities are healthy, by the way. I mean, there are, there are, you know, communities of all names that will not be faithful to their founders. And you just have to figure that out. You have to discern very carefully. But really, given where the world is headed, I will say with boldness, if you do not engage more deeply with people around you, you will find yourself in a place where you don't have what you need to survive, in my opinion. And that's not good. I mean, every Catholic should have a group of people. Somehow that's not blood. Blood's good. But where we're implicating ourselves in one another's lives, we're praying together, we're supporting one another, we're strengthening one another so that we can, we can fight and, and, you know, even create, you know, people are gonna think I'm crazy. Maybe even eat. Maybe even have the groceries you need. Maybe even, maybe even, yeah. Maybe, maybe even being in the underground. You know, if this country continues to go so hard left, crazy nut, so socialist left, and we're the ones in the way of all the progress in quotes, when, and, and that's happened in the lifetime of one of my family members, you know, Nazi Germany. It's happening in Armenia, you know, right now. Yeah, it's beginning to happen here. Look at our pro-life people being put in jail right now. Right. Again. Yeah. Right. Or getting beat up. And then, you know, the government takes the side of the, of the aggressor instead of the one that's trying to save babies. Yeah. I mean, point is, it's really, it's dark. And I, you know, I, I, I just, when we're all together, like we were just together, you know, at the summit here recently. And, and we're loving and serving one another and talking. I mean, and you look into the eyes of one of our community members and they look into our eyes. We see Christ. We see friend. Friend. We see safety. Safety. Family. We see love and joy. A joy that, you know, I, I know it's contagious. I know that it stirs the hearts of others because it draws others into our community. Yeah. You know, and that's not our work. That's the work of the Holy Spirit saying, come, you know, my brothers and sisters are those who do the will of the Father. Yeah. And, and we have an entire community that is working to do the will of the Father to, to love, to serve, to implicate ourselves in the lives of others, to be obedient to the teachings of the Lord. And it's, it's just amazing. I think you just said a really key word is safety. Yeah. A lot of people, the reasons why people are not in community is because they don't feel safe and they don't trust. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And that one of our values is vulnerability, safety. And, you know, one of the things we'll talk about, we won't be able to get through it all on this show, but we're going to do it in the second show is healing in community. So why, I'll add a question. Why are most saints religious community life? I'll let you answer first. Oh, you've answered. I've answered. Okay. Yeah. The pause was too long. Why are most for radio? Why are most saints religious? It's because the power of community life, because it has all the blessings we've been talking about. And it has a healing dimension that comes with that deep orientation to Jesus, vulnerability, and then rubbing up against one another in terms of our wounds, our sin, and our brokenness, but it provides a healing context. If it's a healthy community, it provides a healing context. Yeah. You know, what's interesting, I was just kind of using, as you said that, and I was thinking, well, how is that different than family life? In family life, you have all these different dynamics. Maybe not everybody's committed. And you don't pick them. And you don't pick them, you know, right? But when you go into religious life or into a religious community, you know, like we have, then the deciding factor is the formation, the orientation to Christ to the commitment to orient our hearts, mind, souls, bodies, all that we are, all that we have, all that we do towards the Lord. And we're all trying to do that, you know, in our own broken weak ways. But in that support, we're purified, and we learn how to walk the walk, to follow the way. Next, part two of the show is going to be called Healing in Community Life. And for those who are live streaming, now you can pop out to spiritualdirection.com. We'll talk through that. But if this is interesting to you, you don't have a community, it doesn't matter where you are, as long as you have an internet connection, apostoleva.org, A-P-O-S-T-O-L-I-V-I-A-E.org. And second and fourth Saturdays, live online formation that is things of equality most people don't ever see in their parishes or whatever. So you're welcome or find a local community in your area. Okay. Come, come, come. Come join us. Okay. 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. Let me just jump out.