Messy Family Podcast : Catholic Conversations on Marriage and Family

We talk a lot on our program about the "messy-ness" of life, but we thought it would be good to take some time to unpack why exactly we use this term and why it's so important to every family.  Every family is a messy family because we live in a broken, fallen world and we constantly are trying to repair relationships and situations that have ruptured.  Why is it so important to recognize this?  B...

All of us deal with fears in life and overcoming them is the key to living in freedom in your relationships.  People have anxieties about all sorts of things, but within your spouse you should be able to find a safe place. Within marriage is where you should be able to admit your fears, have them be seen in the light of truth, and then overcome them through action.  Listen in while we discuss how...

  Divorce is so common in our culture today that the effects of it on children can easily be dismissed. Almost every couple who gets married has a family member whose life was affected by divorce, so we can think it must not be a big deal. But those people who are adult children of divorce will tell you that it is.  It is a wound they carry their whole lives, but because of Jesus and His power ove...

Parenting kids in a tech age; Teaching kids virtue in an age of tech; Is it possible to use tech with virtue? "It is your responsibility to train your child in virtue and slowly move from protecting their innocence to building Christian maturity.  This is true for many areas of life, including use of technology" - Mike and Alicia Hernon We have talked about the harm that the overuse of screens can...

At the suggestion of our members, we talked MONEY with Sam and Rob Fatzinger, parents of 14 and authors of the new book A Catholic Guide to Spending Less and Living More . This conversation was insightful and full of great ideas for you and your families!  Money is a hot button topic for many couples and we need to find ways to use our resources wisely especially when you have a larger family and...

In this podcast, we answer listener questions in a new format - our new Program Coordinator, Katie Gamboa joins us to present topics for us to discuss. She did a great job! We may be biased since she is our most amazing oldest child (but we aren't - she DID do a great job!) With Katie's help, we tackle some sticky questions such as how to handle a sister who is coming out of the closet? How should...

Part of our message at the Messy Family Project is that parenting is a path to holiness. But the question many couples have is how much parenting is God asking of us? Within the bounds of the Church's teaching, there are many prudential judgements that couples have to make - when to abstain from sexual relations, how to give birth, how many children to have, how long to wait in between births, and...

April 22 is Earth Day, but maybe we Catholics could call it Creation Day and celebrate the loving Father who gave this world to us to "till and keep".  Maybe we were thinking of this because Mike was chopping down old trees on our property and we all have sore backs this morning!   But seriously, some may look at the extreme environmentalists and be tempted to move to the other extreme and not tak...

During this episode, Mike shares his story of his parents' divorce when he was a teen and his own journey of healing over the past 20 years.  But this is more than just his story.  We also share the hope that Christ brings to us in all our relationships, the lessons learned from suffering and pain, and, ironically, how the divorce actually strengthened his belief in marriage as a covenant between...

For years, Patrick Lencioni has had books on the top of the best seller charts.  He is a master at teaching businesses how to improve their culture and organizational health.  In this podcast, Pat and his wife Laura join us to talk about the culture and health of our families and how his lessons from business can help us!  In our Family Board Meeting course, we use his book 3 Big Questions for the...

This is the year of St. Joseph so let's talk about what we can learn from this man who knew Jesus and Mary more intimately than any other person who has ever lived.  There is so much we can learn from him! Because there is really no definitive teaching on St. Joseph, we can extrapolate from what we know about Jewish culture at the time and what we read in scripture to imagine what he must have bee...

Join us for an extraordinary interview with Fr. Jay Donahue, a priest of the Diocese of Pittsburgh who has a heart for marriage and a deep and abiding love for Christ.  We discuss with Fr. Jay the impact that his own large family had on him, how couples can image Christ's love for the Church and the importance of the Blessed Mother in the lives of priests and everyone in the Church.  He even dives...

Discipline is the issue that we get the most questions about probably because there is so much conflicting advice for parents out there.  The bottom line is that every couple must decide for themselves how they will form the children that God has given to them. But, don't worry, we do have some principles and encouragement to give you!  In this episode, we discuss the importance of Respect in the...

Looking for ideas on how to celebrate Lent as a couple or as a family?  Listen  in!  When a married person celebrates Lent, especially when they have children, it looks very different than how a single person or religious does it.  Lent is a time to take stock of how we are responding to God's grace to become who He is calling us to be.  How are we becoming a better wife, mother, husband, or fathe...

In 1924, Eric Liddell gave up his place to compete in the Olympics final heat of the 100m race because it was held on a Sunday.  He probably would have won that race, but his desire to keep the Lord's Day holy stopped him.  Would we have that courage?  Starting in Exodus, the Lord has asked HIs people to keep holy His day.  He commands us to set it apart from all other days to honor Him, but also...

January is a time of beginnings and new resolutions.  The best way to make plans for the future is to evaluate where you are today!  You can't get directions unless you know where you are.  In this podcast, we give you some encouragement as well as a method to assess where your family is at using our Five Elements of Family Culture.  We hope that doing this assessment will inspire you to do your o...

We are asked very often how parents can create an environment in the home that will keep their kids close to the faith. To help give parents even more resources for this, we decided to interview Colin and Aimee MacIver, who are both parents, teachers, and authors for Ascension Press. They have created resources for parents to help them catechize their children and also to communicate the beautiful...

There are many parents who look for advice from friends, and sometimes the responses are in the form of absolute declarations about the "only way" to parent.  In reality, many parenting matters are best left to an individual's judgment.  As Catholics, we believe that there are certain issues that are black and white, but not everything falls into that category!  The first step to responding to oth...

If you've been wondering how to bring the rich traditions of the Catholic Church's liturgical year into your home and into your family, this is the podcast for you! In it, we interview Kendra Tierney of Catholic All Year about incorporating the richness of our faith into the life of your family.  Kendra has lots of great ideas for moms and dads of all ages and family sizes.  After discussing the i...

The use of technology is a major issue in most households. Tech is invading our homes in an unprecedented manner and the influence on our children is something we are just beginning to comprehend. How can parents effectively navigate these waters with their children? Kids need guidance in this area more than almost any other area of Life, but it is here where parents usually are completely unaware...

Many times when we think about taking time to pray parents' first reaction is "I don't have time to pray!"  But the problem with that is that prayer is the foundation of our life of faith and relationship with God.  As we pray, we grow in knowledge and love of God.  We all need that! In this podcast, we discuss internal prayer which is also called mental prayer.  The many means that the Church has...

We have a treat for you as we are sharing a special date night interview with Scott and Kimberly Hahn. They have been married for 40 years and have six children along with eighteen grandchildren. They are world-renowned Catholic evangelists, speakers, authors and teachers. In this show they share their wisdom on falling in love and staying in love through the tough times. They share some of their...

After 26 years of parenting you would think that we knew how to promote an atmosphere of virtue in our home automatically. But it doesn't work that way!  We have had to stop and evaluate the way that our younger children have been treating each other and address it intentionally.  In this podcast, we share some of the teaching we gave to our kids about practicing kindness, how we followed up after...

The sexual relationship you have with your spouse is the most intimate relationship you will ever have, but it certainly can be complicated! In this podcast, we have a conversation with Byron and Francine Pirola, founders of Smartloving and international speakers and teachers.  Our conversation about physical intimacy between spouses is honest, frank, and explicit, so please listen to this podcast...

All parents will fail.  How do we know this?  Because we are all imperfect!  Many parents feel like failures when grieving over their children's poor decisions or loss of faith. Or they look at themselves in the mirror and don't like who they have become. How we define failure and how we deal with it will either paralyze us or call us on to greater holiness and virtue.  Recognizing how we have fai...