 No, the graphics of it. Okay. Hey, this is Dana Stephanie Burke. You're watching behind the scenes divine Intimacy radio. We're back talking about a fantastic book republished by Sophia Institute press Visions and revelations. Oh perfect. Just put it right on the screen. It blocks No, it's fine. I don't mind being blocked out. I'll you know the books right in front of my face on the screen That's great. Father Gabriel, St. Mary Magdalene and our guest father Matthew McDonald was the wrote the forward and helped us to get that thing Republished so check that out. That's that'll help you a ton in this time of a lot of weird stuff going on Yeah, and we're ready to start the show. You ready? Yes, and you mark sicko This is Dan 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 navigate This challenging life and it's weird and challenging right now With us again as Father Matthew McDonald You want to get his bio check out the first show out on spiritualdirection.com? This is a series On helping us understand how to discern whether visions and revelations are valid because they're popping up everywhere Which is normal in dark times in dark and difficult times the Lord raises up saints And the devil tries to copy the Lord And so he raises up other than saint or devils to influence people work to confuse Yeah, yeah, and so how do you discern and because there's a there are a bunch of folks that I wouldn't give a moment a minute of the day now I won't mention any of them During this show because the reason is is because and people want me to because they said it last time Why don't you say the names? Well? Because of the church hasn't formally condemned them For instance like they church has formally written warnings against Oh a tear danger dan and others Then we want to leave room for grace and for repentance and that sort of thing And we're not it's not our job Necessarily to do that. So I'm not real fond of that though. We do it occasionally on spiritualdirection.com warn people But in this case We won't mention any names, but we will give you the tools to discern if Some things of the the enemy or some things of god and stephanie's got a little Interesting story related to our next topic about the demonic and visions and revelations Yeah, this this is very fascinating and you know, so we're we're trying to figure out so if we're Spiritual directors or whatever. How do we help those that we're serving? You know muddle through sometimes what happens in prayer and what might be affecting them and especially if they're You know, I think most people that go seeking direction are People of good will they desire the lord they desire Uh to grow near to him, but sometimes they can be carried away If they're not measured or grounded Properly or if they or if they have some open doors somewhere, right? And so one of the situations that happened years and years and years ago, you know So this this person's no longer in our in our circle But had approached me from one of the events and after some discernment I agreed to take them through some direction At the very beginning we were kind of just walking through it um And they had a vision they had a vision Uh, the vision was it was the lord's face that came and presented Before them right in front of their face Of crowned with thorns bleeding, you know, etc Now on face value, you know pun intended we would assume. Oh, that's a that's a god, you know That's amazing. It's the lord's face. Um, you know, you should go tell the world You're probably being called to be a mystic, you know, who knows what right? But I had I had had some formation in what st John of the cross said about these things and he said if you have a vision You should immediately set it aside Because whatever effect was intended if it's of god, whatever effect Was intended to happen Will happen prior before you even realize it before you're even your senses and your faculties can even Uh, perceive that the vision is happening and whatever god desires will have happened It'll move right it'll have its effect And then everything after that is subject to interference disturbance Derailing as it were by the enemy So I shared this with the person And I said well if it's of god praise be to god Whatever he desired for you has happened, right? So we're going to set it aside and we're going to continue on your path of seeking holiness of growing in the lord And just let it be right we're just going to let it be because whatever the lord wants he's going to bring it And if it's not of him Then you know we just set it aside right Well the response was indignation pride absolutely not Telling the world about it telling everybody that would listen and you know If you're not grounded And you're going out and saying jesus came to me to everybody that'll listen They're going to dismiss you outright as crazy especially if they're not people of faith And we talked about it, but there was this intense pride and refusal To even consider that they were not to go do something with it, right? And they went away You know they discontinued with spiritual direction and disappeared off the radar Years and years later three four years later. I receive a text from the person who says Stephanie you may not remember me. My name is ex And I want to share with you that you were right And I'm very sorry for the way I responded to you In time and in reflection. I've realized That it was prideful and which was very very problematic. It led to a number of really disturbing Conflicts and difficulties in my marriage with my friends with my children with everybody And I should have listened so Just a beautiful humility On the other side and the person's going to continue their walk and they're not my directee but I think that is you know, so so that leads us into I think what are some of This number one, right, right, right the number one sign So the number one demonic sign is pride in the soul that leads to trouble discouragement and even despair, right? It created immediate disruption to the family to relationships where The person was probably honestly going towards god and if they had responded In humility Maybe the lord would have started to work me. Of course. He would have started to work in that humility to bring about you know, holiness But the temptation to pride took them a whole different direction and really created a lot of havoc So, I don't know father. Can you speak to that and then all these other signs that help us to denote when Something that we see here experience Maybe of a demonic origin. Let's walk through them slowly because I think it's important But let's just start with that one. Is that a good example that's definitely I think that's a great story and it really shows the danger of pride of you know It's all about me. I'm the chosen one And there's not a detachment A healthy detachment from the reality that is experienced in prayer Something related to Different example One of the earlier followers followers of st. Dominic whose feast day we celebrated yesterday st. Peter Verona He was preaching against the albogensians in italy And one day he came To a albogensian base and he had a vision Of our lady holding the baby jesus and that vision said My son, you're wrong. The albogensians are right. You have to you have to join the albogensians It's like oh really and he they didn't know this He had a pics with a host on him And he said if you are really our lady and our lord you will bow before Jesus and the Eucharist the mid the vision immediately Disappated and there was a foul stench so You know, it's not pride Is the root of all sin And when we make it about ourselves and not about god and not and not about Loving others the way that the lord desires us to love them Then we're under the influence of evil you know a contrary example is I had a woman who was Having revelations who was publishing them on the internet and had some connection with me at spiritualdirection.com And I I reached out to her and I said this is very dangerous what you're doing And I'm not saying you're wrong because there was nothing doctrinally wrong with what she was saying But it just I if I recall right. She didn't have a spiritual director, which is huge You got to have someone directing you to discern And and you know what she did she responded immediately? Oh, you're right. I'm going to take these down and I'll I'll get a spiritual director Uh another example Uh, which by the way, I believe she's legitimate, you know, she's never popped up again But the point being her humility was very compelling to me another example In a book, um, what what's that book? Uh eight days in virtue. I think it's called definitely promoted There's a guy the guy who wrote the book Had some revelations that he published in the book and he wanted us to promote it I spent probably two or three hours with him on the phone just talking through the the issues And about the danger of of doing this without a director. Well, what did he do? He gets a director, right? And and he was super humble In in our conversation. And so though it is not normal for us to do this We ended up promoting his book and I believe it's it's legitimate So humility is and the reason this is number one on the demonic science list Is because it's probably, you know, the most telling Uh regarding the character of the person is whether or not they're humble or prideful Does that make sense father? Absolutely. Absolutely. Um, you know And again, our faith isn't just about us. Our faith draws us to the life of god and and the love of the holy trinity and We have to be healed in order to receive that and when we get visions that could be part of the healing process That we cling on too tightly to what we're receiving like look at me. I'm so holy Red alert Yeah, you know back to an example I gave earlier in a way to deal with it in a little bit healthier way because I didn't really I just said This tends to make me uncomfortable is god told me, you know And if if you think god's put something on your heart one of the powerful ways that you can orient yourself to humility And be prudent and cautious because it's not a bad thing to Be oriented to that kind of reality is to say to someone, you know, I think I'm hearing this How does it resonate with you? Especially if it involves another person? And if they that is very humble and it allows the other person to assess it rather than to go Oh, now, what am I supposed to do? You're telling me what god said or what god is doing. That's a way that we can be Practice this kind same kind of humility. Yeah, and before we go to you know, we're about up on a break But I think what's important too about what you just said Is when people because this happens to us it happens all kinds of people when you're you know in the in the catholic circles Is that someone will say god told me or you know, whatever and as people tell us that But we need to leave room for that, you know to say it doesn't speak to me Um and and to also allow god to work in that however he sees fit, right? So it's okay to say no that doesn't resonate with me, but thank you for your love Thank you for wanting to speak something to me And and I'll I'll let that rest with the lord or just thank you. I'll take it to prayer Yeah, you know and and just always to receive in humility and prayer. So We will be right back and we'll continue about the demonic signs that we can be on a lookout for Regarding visions and revelations Any markets that go this is danis ebony Burke. Welcome back to divine intimacy radio your radio haven of rest We're talking with father matthew mcdonald who wrote the forward to a newly republished book that is very important Uh, it's visions and revelations published by sophia institute press as always If you want to support ebtn You can get it from the religious catalog. You can go to spiritualdirection.com As well and on the shop button and it's an important book. Which is why we brought it back into print Father matthew did his uh, what was it your was it your master's dissertation or what was it? Yes, my ma thesis at st. Joseph's seminary in dunwoody on the discernment of visions and revelations according to scripture Teachings of the magisterium the teachings of the carmelite school spirituality And i'll be teaching a course on this for the avalanche institute school spiritual formation Sometime in spring of 2023 a six-week course that goes more into depth about how do we do that? awesome awesome, so now we're going to move into um into uh Another one of the demonic signs. Stephanie. You want to tell folks what we're going to check out? Sure So father, can you lead us through some of these signs? Maybe give us some examples and and we've got a little bit of time so Um, one of them is an exaggerated mortification. Can you give us an example of what that would be? So an exatter exaggerated mortification would be i'm not eating food for a number of days Um out of love of god without the guidance of a spiritual director Um right fasting penance is good Um and sometimes when we get to a certain level you want to take on more But it should always be checked in Um with our spiritual director that we're seeing To make sure that we're not biting off more than we can chew or tiring ourselves out or just look at me I'm just morally white knuckling this and one of those would be An inordinate use of of discipline. We don't even hear about that anymore Can you tell us, you know, what that is why somebody might be inspired to use the discipline and and what Would be an exaggerate, you know, why it's so important to have a spiritual director to discern those things if they're inspired to do so And in inordinate use of discipline could be done because I want to save souls You know, so i'm going to take on 50 billion things at once and then all of a sudden i'm not getting any sleep My emotions are all out of whack Um i'm being short with people So a good discipline of penance will normally take maybe one to three things at a time Under the guidance of a director where i'm abstaining from a particular kind of food or i'm just having one meal a day or i'm I'm shutting myself off for technology or reducing it to like an hour a day So it it's teaching me right engagement Um into the things of this world rather than just this constant repression This the next one is false humility spurred on by spiritual pride. I won't say the name of the person but uh There is one person who goes around supposedly walked across immense distances In the united states in prayer, which has been debunked by someone who who checked all the timelines out And then I saw them on a video and what I caught immediately was this Self satisfaction in their own humility. So it's this weird thing of i'm showing humility and i'm but what slipped out was the person was sort of Impressed by how humble they were so it's uh, it's You know, some people can feign humility, but You know, you got to look closely When they're when they're claiming humility because Those who wanted to see and by the way this person threatened to sue the national catholic register because There was an article written about the bishops treatment of the person Uh in uh denver colorado and so that certainly is a dramatic Reflection of a total lack of humility. I I just read in scripture this morning You know, why are you taking other christians? You know carinthians were at monistice that you shouldn't be suing other christians similarly another Uh mystical phenomenon in atlanta where there's a handful of books have been published and One of our bloggers in the register You know criticize the guy or something and he went crazy as well and it's just It's such an easy test This either pride or false humility. You have any other examples father? There's a famous saying that I once heard in a seminary about humility That humility is a strange bird and once you think you have it you lost it And Humility we can always think that it's a negative virtue But it's both a negative and a positive virtue. So yeah, I'm I'm realizing my complete dependence on god for everything Without him. I'm lost. I can't be saved. I'm nothing But the positive side of humility is this despite my nothingness despite my sin God loves me and calls me to a relationship with him Which will allow me to fully flower in his grace and his love Right It's it can be an over exaggerated Focus on our sinfulness as well. Can it not to where we're withdrawing from god? We're withdrawing from Stepping fully into who he's called us to be is that not correct? It's another way to Understand false humility. Yes A self deprecation That's unhealthy That woe is me or like a spirit of never This is never going to happen to me. I'm never going to do this or that, you know Except darkness or sadness. Yeah. Yeah, great Okay, so another one is a focus upon what is mostly Extraordinary and marvelous to make the faithful feel esteemed or to bring about what is foreign to our vocation You know, this this was one Example that was fascinating Very very pious beautiful mother of many Believe she hears in prayer You made a mistake You were supposed to be a nun. Oh, yeah and before you know, then you know, so this sense of confusion Like I think I made a mistake. I think I was supposed to be a nun and you know, they're married They have all these children which immediately creates division, right between the husband and wife And god be praised she was humble And I said that's not of god And she also, you know, she said, okay, I'm I'm gonna relook at this Also went to confession and the priest outright said not of god That needs to be dismissed outright. That's straight from the pit of hell It's just gone. You know, it just needs to be dismissed and gone I think what was truly happening is she was being She was being called to a deep piety a deep holiness which has played itself out In time and it was a it was a roadblock that the enemy brought up And because she was humble she listened to her director She listened to the priest got rid of it and kept moving and I've seen extraordinary fruits from proper discernment in that area Um, what about presumption which undermines the theological virtue of hope? Tell us about what that's what does that mean? so presumption would be Either a fixation on something that is good Like oh, this is always going to be here You know kind kind of like the gospel from two Sundays ago of the rich man. Oh, I have this plenty You know, I'm gonna sit down and enjoy it um Where you can lose that at any time or a fixation on um the negative that God's just gonna come and punish us for our sins no matter what we do Yeah, so it's uh, it's it's When the punishment you do see It is not something that God does. It's something that we choose for ourselves. Right in an example would just be It's all bad. The sky is falling. There's no hope everything's, you know, it's just a an overly negative Because there's always hope even in the worst storm And if there's no sense of hope then that's uh, that that really breaks that That it really reveals that it's demonic, right or the presumption that I've got this under control Everything's fine. Right. I live like I go to church I I practice the sacraments. I don't have to worry about anything versus this constant diligence of Keeping an eye out that the enemy's lurking and so that I must be watchful ever watchful with my eyes on the horizon looking for christ Seeking him in prayer and wanting to live a holy life never presuming That my salvation is one and done right not in fear, but rather just prudent diligence. Is that right? Absolutely and again God always gives us sufficient grace in every scenario whether good or bad for our salvation But that doesn't mean It will always be smooth sailing And the important thing is that we do not take anything for granted and that we be vigilant Great. Okay. So the the next one is creation of self-love and the faithful It's an interesting An interesting one in light of so these these this list was compiled quite a quite a while ago by Or it's it's derived from Father reginal gargoyle grange a famous dominican theologian but this Idea that you can actually do this would be Denied in our time that you can create too much self-love. What is a proper understanding of what legrange was getting out here? So self-love would be i'm the center of the universe I'm I you know, I have a key place in salvation history Um and elevating oneself to something that one is not so self-love is a love without humility a love without that you know dependence trust and surrender with God that Exaggerates one's own self worth And it leads to you know as father rippinger would say Um, I am special an excessive fixation on that when If we are unique, but God is the only person got God the fathers and holy spirit Or the three persons of one true God are the only things special in the universe. Okay Great. So we have about a minute left. So let's go quickly through seven and eight. Well, yeah Um, can you explain those to us very quickly and we have one minute just what we can get done, right? So in dead during dissensions and hatreds as opposed to peace So a spirit of excessive divisions that goes against charity and faith And an evidence in which cannot be concealed and creates confusion the vexation and discouragement in the soul Okay, so when sin Is predominant and the person tries to hide it or Or make excuses for himself that could be a sign of demonic demonic Influence great. All right. So we got to wrap things up father. Matthew mcdonald we've been talking about the world this whole conversations inspired by a new Republication of visions and revelations by father gabriel st. Mary magdalene father Matthew mcdonald wrote the forward and helped us get this back out so that people could be Aided in this very difficult time of discerning what's going on in the church in the world Okay, so until next time may the god of peace make you perfect in holiness May he preserve you whole and entire spirits whole and body Irreprutable at the coming of our lord jesus christ. Amen. Now before we jump off the air perfect I wanted to remind you Go out to spiritualdirection.com book study if you want to join our study on st. Francis to sales saturday mornings 8 a.m to 9 a.m Second four saturdays that's spiritualdirection.com forward slash book study. Yes. Thank you for that Correction So if you want to join us there and get a regular formation on this amazing text of introduction to the devout life spiritualdirection.com forward slash book study also don't forget about the the The Pilgrimage Yes next year. Yes, we It'll fill up. It's going to be a carmelite pilgrimage to spain. I'll be teaching through devil in the castle Uh, spirit st. Teresa of Avalos spiritual warfare in the progress of the soul And you will be deeply blessed you can get that out at spiritualdirection.com forward slash events You'll see all of our events there and don't forget the courses. We have at the avalan institute avalan dash institute.org really what we do at Abla foundation is a one-stop shop for any spiritual formation that you need priests religious or lay Yeah, and keep an eye on that because as spiritualdirection.com events because Uh, we're about to load up on 2023 So all of those that haven't been laid out are going to start being uploaded So keep track of that. So and they'll get um, they'll get they'll become full pretty quickly The spiritual wisdom of st. Thomas Aquinas if you have an interest in Aquinas And the spiritual life will be a new course beginning september 6 of 2022 So check that out. Dr. Kevin boast avalan dash institute.org. Got to see you guys. Thanks father. Take care