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(peaceful music)

- Thanks for seeing me, Father.

The last time we talked, I was telling you

about how I seem to have
a sense all the time

of just great joy in the Lord's presence

and that's continued and so
much that I almost in silly ways

it seems like the Lord is just always,

I can't open the Bible
without finding Him there.

Even dumb things like, you're
going to think I'm silly,

but the other day I was stuck in traffic

and instead of being annoyed,

I started praising the Lord for the fact

that there were all these people.

And I thought, I'm a pro-life person.

A pro-life person should be
happy that they are people.

And that's dumb, but
that's the level of joy

that I'm experiencing at the moment.

In fact, I would say the only
negative thing that's come up

is in the last month or so of prayer

where it just comes easily is,

I have a sense of maybe I
should quit volunteering

for marriage preparation,
which I've done for many years.

I'm not sure what you think about it,

but my resolution was, no,
I'm going to stick with it.

I don't even know where that came from,

but I talked to my husband about it.

The doubt in my mind was maybe I should

be spending more time with
my husband and my family

and maybe this is too much.

But what I thought was,

first of all, I just asked my husband.

He doesn't seem to think

I'm neglecting the family in any way,

but also I just noticed that
when I talk to those couples,

even if what I say doesn't go over well

because I give kind of the hard teaching

of the church with respect to sexuality,

but even when it doesn't go well

and I can feel a certain hostility,

I just have such a sense
of the Lord's presence

at work in people and I
go home energized so that,

this is weird maybe,
but the number one thing

I feel like doing after talking
to couples at marriage prep

is make my husband his favorite meal.

So, I guess it could be the case

that I need to do something more at home,

but it seems to me like
my apostolic work in fact

energizes me for my life at home,

and so I decided to
just ignore that doubt.

- So, there's a deep sense of joy you said

and what a gift from God that is.

Could you tell me a little
bit more about that joy?

What's that like?

How do you experience that joy?

- Well, different ways at different times,

but I would say two things in particular.

One is oftentimes I just
experienced this abiding

sense of peace and a sense
of the Lord is really close.

And sometimes people will
say, "I'm in the zone."

I feel like I'm in the zone with the Lord

and that's beautiful.

But the other thing I feel a lot,

I wouldn't say this is
kind of all the time,

but I just have these constant insights

into feeling great love of everybody.

So, the traffic idea,
which it makes me laugh.

It's so dumb in a way, but
it was a real experience.

And even sometimes when I hear bad news,

my sense is not a sense of,

I don't know, hatred or fear of evil,

but more just a sense of sorrow

because I know the Lord
loves that person so much.

The Lord seems to be filling
me with lots of insight

into how loved we are,
all of us as human beings.

And I experience that not only for myself

but for other people.

- So that experience you had in traffic,

that sounds like a great gift.

Did you get any sense in
that moment of where God was?

As you were sitting there in the car

just experiencing this
love for these people?

Where was the Lord in that?

- You mean location-wise?

- I mean how was he looking at the others?

So, you experienced this with,

any sense of how He was
experiencing that situation?

- I don't think so.

It's not something I've reflected
on, but when you ask me,

I would say I felt Him more inside me.

Like we are looking out
at the world together

and I had just a joy of,

the ordinary me would be
annoyed at this situation,

and what a gift it is
to just feel liberated

from annoyance and liberated
from caring whether I'm on time

and just a sense of
everybody here is beautiful.

- You got the sense that
that was a gift from God?

- Oh yeah, absolutely.

I'm not capable of thinking
that about traffic.

- Yeah.

Are there any Scripture passages

that are speaking to this experience

or resonating with you
especially right now?

- Well, nothing particular.

Sometimes in my spiritual
life when I pray,

I find like certain
passages keep coming back

and I'm not aware of that in particular.

But I do feel very moved
to just praise the Lord

and so I've been praying with the Psalms

and I especially just think
about make a joyful noise.

And I also have a really
dear friend who passed away

a number of years ago, but
when she was dying of cancer,

I remember her saying, and it
just touched my heart so much,

she said, "Worthy is the Lamb."

That was her response to realizing

that her cancer was terminal

and that there wasn't really
further hope and she just said,

"Worthy is the Lamb."

And I just have that sense of He's worthy

and He's trustworthy and He's alive

and moving through the world.

- And you can see Him everywhere.

- I can see Him everywhere.

- Let's spend a moment exploring

that second scenario you mentioned

where you have this
ministry that you're doing

with marriage preparation,

but you also had this sense or
this thought of stopping it.

Can you tell me a little
bit more about that,

what that was like?

Was it more of a thought
or what was that like?

- It was a little bit of a thought.

It was a recurring thought, which is why,

I don't actually have at my stage of life

enough memory to pay
attention to a single thought

that comes once.

But it was recurring and because
it came up more than once,

I thought maybe there's
something I'm supposed

to be looking at there.

And I think it's very much
on my heart to be a good wife

and to be a good mother.

And so, any kind of suggestion
that maybe I'm not being,

I pay attention to.

I also have to say very honestly

that the last couple of
sessions when I've given a talk,

there have been some kind of hard cases

where the Q&A afterwards
was a little difficult,

so maybe there's a little
fleeing from terror too.

That's not the most pleasant experience.

But when I just analyzed it,
I think I'm doing some good.

And as I said, it seems
like the Lord is blessing it

because the accusation was
that it's taking you away

from your family.

But when I looked at it,
it's actually taking me

towards my family because
it fills me with joy

to serve them and it
seems to give me energy.

- So, you used to an interesting
word there, accusation.

You said the accusation was this.

So, it felt like an accusation?

- Yeah. Maybe that's my legal
training coming through,

but yeah, it feels like that's
the premise of the argument

is when I started to weigh
the pros and cons was

this is taking you away from your family.

And then when I analyze that,

especially just taking
it to the Lord in prayer

and then taking it to my
husband to just analyze if

it was true, and it seems not to be true.

So, unless you show me
something that I'm not seeing,

my inclination is to just keep going.

- Had you ever heard anything
like that accusation before,

maybe in a different context
or in a different way?

- I mean, I would say that that's,

yeah, that's a pretty much constant fear

in my spiritual life is the
fear that I'm not a good wife,

that I'm not a good mother.

So yeah, those kinds of thoughts
come up on a regular basis.

- So how do you think the Lord

might want to speak to this fear?

- The simple answer seems
to be in a way He did speak,

which is I asked my husband
and he said, "No, it's fine."

Then He, the Lord, I'm taking it to be

the Lord pointed out to
me that it wasn't true.

So that's reassuring at
the level of something

that's very deeply important to me

that actually you're doing a good job.

Not to say that, there's always
growth to be had, I suppose.

And I'm sure my husband could list you

some things where I could grow,

but overall that nagging
fear that I sometimes have

that deep down he's not happy,

that's not actually true.

(peaceful music)