A Growing Home

This episode, I’m excited to share my conversation with Michael Stalcup! I got in touch with Michael somewhere during A Growing Home Podcast’s first season. I was thinking about interesting people that I wanted to learn from, and he came to mind for a number of reasons. First, Michael is a poet! I had seen him post his poetry on social media over the last few years, and I was always so intrigued about his story and writing process.  I’ve always felt that I just don’t get poetry! Anyone else feel me on that one? I wanted Michael to help me understand it more, which, he totally does in this episode.

Also, Michael is biracial like me, and he’s a dad of mixed kids. I was looking forward to digging into his family’s experience. But on top of all that, Michael and his wife are missionaries living in Thailand. So all this poetry and mixed family life is happening abroad! There’s so much here that I get to explore with him. 

I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/biracial-missionary-poet-interview-michael-stalcup/id1546945712?i=1000528584076https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/biracial-missionary-poet-interview-michael-stalcup/id1546945712?i=1000528584076

It’s already time for another Lectio! 

I decided to do something a little untraditional this time. This week’s Lectio episode will be on the responsorial psalm. When I was looking ahead at Sunday’s mass readings and I read the responsorial psalm, it hit me. A good, deep resonance with what had been stirring in me for a while. 

In the episode, I unpack Psalm 123, explore what Psalms are, and I also explore how through the responsorial psalms, the Psalms guide the Church in corporate prayer.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lectio-unity-in-prayer-through-the-responsorial-psalm/id1546945712?i=1000527160568

“I realized that it was common for the people that I respected and whose faith felt vibrant and live… it was common that they all had spiritual directors.”

Larissa Marks had this realization as a young adult and it led to her own journey of experiencing spiritual direction and eventually becoming a spiritual director herself. 

There’s so much good stuff in this conversation! If spiritual direction is a new topic for you, Larissa shares about what it is and how you can find a director. She talks about how being a new mom rocked her prayer rhythms and made her question if something was wrong. Which, I totally remember when I had my babies. 

Larissa also shares what I think is the biggest gem, related to finding people whose faith you respect and intentionally learning from them. 

Oh there’s so much more. Listen here: 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/what-is-spiritual-direction-and-how-can-we-benefit-from-it/id1546945712?i=1000526244372

Get ready for a two part series!! 

The next two podcast episodes are with Larissa Marks. Larissa is a spiritual director and formation coach, she’s also a mom of 4. For me personally, Larissa has been someone a life stage ahead that I’ve always learned so much from. Especially recently, I’ve been indulging in her podcast with her husband Steve! Their conversations about parenting a preteen have been a particularly helpful window to an upcoming life stage. I’m not sure if it’s making me more or less freaked out about it. 🤷🏽‍♀️😆 

I first invited Larissa onto the podcast to talk about spiritual direction, which we do in the next episode, but in this conversation, I ask Larissa about her story as a Chinese-American woman who grew up on Maui. 

We cover a variety of topics including her experience of ohana, watching her parent’s conversion to faith, being part of one of the oldest churches in Hawaii started by an anti-abolitionist pastor and… blond-haired/pasty-white Jesus in her kids’ nativity set. 👶🏼

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/interview-larissa-marks-chinese-american-growing-up/id1546945712?i=1000525407260

The newest A Growing Home Podcast episode is up! It’s a Lectio for this upcoming Sunday mass readings. 

In this episode, I’m joined by my good friend Sarah O’Brien. Like me, Sarah is a mom of lots of littles (4 as of a few weeks ago!) and a convert to the Catholic Church. We both worked full-time for the same interdenominational college campus ministry when exploring Catholicism, and oh yeah, the exploration began because of boyfriends that are now husbands. 

The Last Supper passage we dig into is incredibly deep and there is so much written on and debated about its meaning. Sarah and I aren’t theologians (I recommend checking out Bishop Barron for that), but we are former Protestants and mothers who have wrestled with the Catholic teaching of Jesus’ real presence in the Eucharist. In this episode, we unpack the passage and share our own personal experiences of Jesus in that little wafer. 

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/lectio-two-catholic-converts-talk-about-the-eucharist/id1546945712?i=1000523624004