The Poco a Poco Podcast with the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal

Episode 246 - Jesus's Favorite Things: The Father, Series on Jesus's Favorite Things (Part 1) Have you ever wondered how Jesus experienced The Father? What was it like for Him to be in His Father's presence in the temple? What was it like to offer himself and suffer for the Father? What was it like for Him as he loved the Father with his every being? The Father was the center of everything for Jes...

Episode 245 - Jubilee Year Where is your focus set on this new year, 2025? This year we begin a jubilee year in the church. It is a consecrated time, a special year to stop and take a step back—it's a year of rest to reset while inviting the Lord into it. It is also a year to make a breakthrough or a major shift in our lives with an invitation to a greater intensity of prayer and hope.  In this ep...

Episode 244 - Merry Christmas What does Christmas offer to the reality of our lives? The reality of holidays and people's lives is not always as happy or merry as we've hoped. But amidst all that, the invitation is to be with Jesus and go through whatever the reality of Christmas is with Him. The Lord desires to be born even in the mess of our lives or our hearts and during Christmas, we are invit...

Episode 243 - Hot Takes 7 We have to understand that we are going through different journeys. God is doing something completely different in each of our lives and we have to be attentive to that. Let us not be so quick to judge—everything is not as simple as it may seem. As we continue our journeys through life, we will constantly encounter our own and other people's struggles, flaws, weaknesses,...

Episode 242 - Marian Consecration, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 7) What does it mean to be consecrated to Our Lady and what do we do after that? We've been on this journey of restoration in preparation for this consecration, so what should we expect during this consecration and the days after that? What happens next doesn't have to be super unreachable, but in the simpleness of our lives, i...

Episode 241 - Mary As Mother, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 6) What does your relationship with Mary look like? As we draw closer to the consecration of Our Lady of Guadalupe, we believe it's a good time to reflect and look at our relationship, journey, and encounter with Mary. We are invited to dive deeper into our relationship with her, our personal love for her, and some moments of grace...

Episode 240 - Restoring Our Mission, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 5) What's the mission that Jesus is calling you to do?  We all have a mission that we are picked to do and that mission should be something that we share with Jesus. We are invited to love like Jesus and ultimately, love like The Father-we are invited to live in greatness and give our lives to something that matters.  In this...

Episode 239 - Restoring Our Actions and Attitudes, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 4) How do we act? What are our attitudes toward our relationships, our lives, and our vocations? The invitation to restoration this week is to start to live like Jesus, and we present the Beatitudes as a way to make this happen in our lives. Beatitudes are the actions and attitudes of Jesus. It's a reflection of...

Episode 238 - True Masculinity and Femininity, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 3) What does it mean to be sons and daughters who are living true masculinity and femininity? In a world that has kind of a broken understanding of masculinity and femininity, it seems that our identities as sons and daughters of God—the idea of masculinity and femininity, have been hijacked and somehow misunderstoo...

Episode 237 - Restoring Communion, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 2) What does it mean to be restored, sons and daughters? How do we begin? Jesus was always in prayer, and we are invited to do the same. This is why restoration should begin with the gift of prayer and communion with God. We would also need to create a space for restoration and have the sensitivity and receptivity to be in a de...

Episode 236 - Rebuild to Reconsecrate, Series on the Sons in the Son (Part 1) What does restoration or reconsecration look like, why do we need it? Restoration and reconsecration mean finding our lives once again in Christ and putting Jesus right at the center of our lives. It means to desire to grow, go deeper, and learn again that God is our Father and that Jesus can lead us to a deeper way of b...

Episode 235 - How to Go to Spiritual Direction What is spiritual direction really about and how do we do it? Nowadays it seems that there is an increasing trend of people who are seeking spiritual direction however there aren't a lot of spiritual directors to help us with that. In today's episode, we're gonna try and explain what spiritual direction is, who needs it, and what would be the best way...

Episode 234 - On Beauty How do you experience beauty and how are you moved by it? God presents to us the gift of the beauty of the world. Beauty is usually in the eye of the beholder, and we all experience and see beauty differently. But at the same time, it is commonly an experience of awe and wonder before the other or before the world. We are invited to be more open to the beautiful things in o...

Episode 233 - Know Your Heart If you don't value something, does it mean it's not really valuable to others or to the world? Our life experiences form us and our hearts respond in different ways particularly where there are areas of something that we didn't experience or something that we grew up without in our life.  We can have a coping mechanism or a defense mechanism of numbing and closing tha...

Episode 232 - San Francesco What's your experience of St. Francis? You might know St. Francis differently or may have a different experience of St. Francis, but in this episode, we're gonna look at the life of St. Francis through the lens of the CFR brothers themselves and highlight what part of St. Francis' life stands out in their own lives. This episode gives a deeper insight into who St. Franc...

Episode 231 - Discerning God's Work in You How does Jesus come alive in you? We are invited to share in the heart of Jesus who wants to heal the world and do His works even now. And there are patterns and consistencies in how He works in our lives that are also personal and particular. These are revelations that are not something abstract or different but unique and personal to each one of us.  In...

Episode 230 - Discerning God's Voice How do I hear and know God's Voice?  God desires to break into our lives and speak with us—to communicate with us. But most of the time, what that looks like can be quite unclear. That is why it's important that we are able to discern how God speaks. In this episode, we're gonna look at some practical ways to hear and know the voice of God and see how we can re...

Episode 229 - Learning God's Voice How can we bring our feelings to the Lord? Once we have a sense of what we are feeling and why we are feeling that way, this would be the next step that we're invited to do—to turn to Jesus in prayer in great faith and trust then relate and bring these feelings to him and let him respond to it. In this episode, we'll talk about how we can relate our emotions to t...

Episode 228 - Building on Rock Why do we feel a certain way? This would be a great question to ask ourselves once we identify and name what we feel.  It's good to learn what's ultimately at stake in every emotion, test, or situation we encounter and understand why it's so important to us. This episode talks about some practical examples and applications of how we can dive deeper into that and how...

Episode 227 - Emotions and Jesus How do you feel? And why do emotions matter?  Valuing the emotional life as important, they are an intrinsic part of us. Emotions are neutral in nature but how we respond to them can be both fruitful and dangerous, this is why knowing how to navigate them is vital in our human life. In this episode, we'll talk about the importance of emotions, the right word and pl...

Episode 226 - Know Thyself How much do you know about yourself? This might be a good starting point to ask ourselves in our interior life pilgrimage. From self-protection to self-acceptance, to self-possession, and ultimately to self-gift, it's a journey to know oneself. And the beauty of being in prayer with the Lord is that we're growing in self-knowledge and self-acceptance, self-possession wit...

Episode 225 - SEEK 2024 What do you do when God comes to you in mystery? If we are willing to search for God in the mysteries of suffering, the ordinary, and the sacraments, hidden somewhere in there, we can find medicines. God uses these mysteries to communicate medicines, for our transformation, our holiness, the things we most deeply need to grow, change, heal, and become the children of God he...

Episode 224 - He Knows Your Name, Series on "Mysteries & Medicine" by Fr. Isaiah, CFR (Part 4) Are you able to see the goodness of God? We are invited to trust and surrender that God is good and is always with us, to be rooted in the truth that God is Father, that He knows us, that He is good, and that He loves us. This is the fourth and last episode on the Mysteries & Medicine album which teaches...

Episode 223 - From Me to You, Series on "Mysteries & Medicine" by Fr. Isaiah, CFR (Part 3) Have you experienced being confined in self-centeredness? Sometimes we can have a pretty self-focused approach to our lives where it's all about what we need or what we want. But the invitation for us in this Exodus is to always move towards someone else, towards relationship, towards God—to be totally out o...

Episode 222 - Desire as a Pathway, Series on "Mysteries & Medicine" by Fr. Isaiah, CFR (Part 2) What do you desire and how do you respond to it? One reality of our humanity is that we can forever be dissatisfied and expect a different answer to our desires. But we are invited to let this desire, this hunger, become a pathway that brings the Lord closer to us, to offer Him the desire and just to be...