First Looks at ACT in Faith

The thing that stayed with me was not the video or the discussion. It was that someone was being genuinely kind to me and wanted to make sure I had enough of the really good antipasto.

A parish that has genuinely internalized a culture of acceptance - of sitting with discomfort, naming struggle without shame, acting from values rather than from the discomfort of not knowing what to say - looks and feels different.

Up to now I've covered the first two thirds of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. If you have been trying the exercises, hopefully you have developed a little bit of confidence in being able to be present to the moment and your internal experiences (thoughts, feeling, sensations, memories, urges). To review, acceptance in this context is not approval, but awareness. Awareness so that these internal experiences are less likely to blindly influence your reactions, or drag you i

In the last reflection, we considered the “ choice point ," or the moment when we can turn either toward or away from our values. We can choose actions which move us towards living in line with our values and goals, or we can choose actions which move us away from them. Here in lies a fundamental problem of being human. It's just not easy. Or, summarized by St. Paul in Romans: " What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate." In our imperfe

In the last reflection, we considered the call to return, over and over again, to the God who invites us out of fear and self-reliance. That “return” is not only a spiritual image but also something that happens in the most ordinary moments of our day. Each time we act, we are making a choice. In spirituality, the choice is between the choice that draws us closer to the person God calls us to be, or one that carries us away from that call. In psychology, this is named in a bi

“Even now,” declares the Lord, “return to Me with all your heart.” (Joel 2:12) The Christian life is a continual return. Again and again, God invites us to turn from distraction, fear, and self-reliance, and to come back to Him with trust. In the last blog, I spoke about the serious difficulty posed when trust is injured through highly chaotic relationships or trauma. But even in more ordinary circumstances, humans are ones to prefer to plan, to choose, and to control what h

“You received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry, ‘Abba, Father!’” (Romans 8:15) In the last post I pointed to trust in God, or filial trust, as a practice related to well-being in the Christian life. Filial trust is a concept woven throughout the Gospel, but often without directly being named. It makes an appearance in the Gospels of Mark and Luke as Jesus states "whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it." Shall not enter it. That's a

CCC 2734 Filial trust is tested - it proves itself - in tribulation. News of violence, especially connected to churches, can stir fear, anxiety, or anger. These emotions are understandable. They reveal our respect for life and the sacredness of the places we worship. But if left unchecked, they could pull us away from peace, prayer, and one another. How do we persist in these times? Faith does not mean we never feel afraid or angry. It means we turn toward God with our emoti

The answer, in the words of my grad school professor Dr. James Werth, would be - it depends. Experiential Acceptance and Avoidance In...

At the core of experiential acceptance is learning the skill of sitting with our emotions. It is letting ourselves be with our feelings,...

Perhaps it was providential that I met with so many of my clients who have chronic health illnesses this week when I was formulating this...

In the past few posts, we’ve been exploring the ACT skill of cognitive defusion , or the ability to notice thoughts without getting...

In which I take something pop psych off the internet and dissect it. There’s a lot of content online that presents itself as solid...

"Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts". Psalm 139: 23 Being in the here-and-now, connected to our true...

“Who is this, that even the wind and sea obey him?” (Mark 4:41) The Gospel tells us of a time when Jesus' disciples were caught in a...

In the quiet of prayer or the chaos of daily life, we may find ourselves asking: Who am I, really? Am I the roles that I fulfill? My...

There are moments in our day when we sense that something within us is stirring. It could be an emotion, a memory, a sensation, or a...

Faith for all defects supplying - where the feeble senses fail. - Pange Lingua Something I'll be talking a lot about is "internal...

“Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections, but instantly set about remedying them—every day begin the task anew.” St....

“Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.” Matthew 6:34 (NABRE) In our...