“Female Viagra” Released Despite Dangers. What YOU Need to Know.

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Image Shutterstock

Sprout Phamaceuticals is touting the development of  a “female Viagara”, brand name Addyi (generic, Flibanserin). If it were a better drug, this could be a tremendous help to a lot of couples. Unfortunately, there are significant reasons for concern.

The problem is that it is hard to argue that the very modest benefits of the drug (4.4 satisfying sexual experiences per month on the drug versus 3.7 satisfying sexual experiences without it) justify the risk of the significant side effects which include dangerously low blood pressure and fainting, especially when used in combination with alcohol or with certain other common medications including antifungals used to treat yeast infections. Other common side effects include nausea, drowsiness and dizziness.

At her Catholic Patheos blog, Seasons of Grace, Kathy Schiffer has an excellent post on everything you need to know about Addyi and, more importantly, a much more effective approach to treating the very real problem of female Inhibited Sexual Desire Disorder.  It’s a terrific piece and I encourage you to check it out!

AND to learn more about effective, faithful solutions to a multitude of sexual problems, I invite you to pick up a copy of Holy Sex! The Catholic Guide to Toe-Curling, Mind-Blowing, Infallible Loving.

 

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Science Says, “Want Happiness? Go to Church!”

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Image Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Image Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Science endorses church attendance?!?  Atheists’ heads explode in 3…2…1…

From the Washington Post

A new study suggests that joining a religious group could do more for someone’s “sustained happiness” than other forms of social participation, such as volunteering, playing sports or taking a class.

A study in the American Journal of Epidemiology by researchers at the London School of Economics and Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands found that the secret to sustained happiness lies in participation in religion.

“The church appears to play a very important social role in keeping depression at bay and also as a coping mechanism during periods of illness in later life,” Mauricio Avendano, an epidemiologist at LSE and an author of the study, said in a statement. “It is not clear to us how much this is about religion per se, or whether it may be about the sense of belonging and not being socially isolated.”

Researchers looked at four areas: 1) volunteering or working with a charity; 2) taking educational courses; 3) participating in religious organizations; 4) participating in a political or community organization. Of the four, participating in a religious organization was the only social activity associated with sustained happiness, researchers found.  CONTINUE READING

 For more information of raising faithful, HAPPY kids, check out our lastest book (coming August 2015 and now available for pre-order) Discovering God Together: The Catholic Guide to Raising Faithful Kids

PRE-ORDER HERE

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CONFIRMED–HISTORIC Record Breaking Attendance at 2015 World Meeting of Families

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Today on More2Life Radio, we were blessed by a visit from Dr. Mary Beth Yount, the Director of Content and Programming at the World Meeting of Families.  In addition to telling our listeners about the event itself, she revealed the BREAKING NEWS that this year’s World Meeting of Families has over 15,000 people currently registered for the week long congress, making the 2015 World Meeting the highest attended World Meeting of Families ever!

That number is expected to climb by several more thousand over the next 40 days leading up to the event. In addition to the many thousands of people registered for the week-long congress featuring dynamic speakers and activities, organizers are expecting that a crowd of 3 Million people will attend the papal mass which is being held atop the so-called “Rocky Steps” leading up to the Philadelphia Museum of Art.   In anticipation of the record-breaking attendance, local hotels have made additional rooms available to accommodate guests.

The World Meetings of Families was instituted by St. John Paul the Great in 1994 and is held every 3 years in various locations throughout the world.  This September’s meeting will feature many internationally-recognized speakers including my wife, Lisa, and I, on the topic, See How They Love One Another:  The Family and the Faith.   Lisa and I will also be broadcasting More2Life Radio LIVE from Booth 206 at the Congress.  In a recent surprise, I was also honored to be asked by Bishop John McIntyre to introduce Word on Fire’s Bishop-Elect Robert Barron at his Opening Keynote Address to the Congress on Tuesday, September 22, 2015, titled Living as the Image of God.

I’m likewise pleased to be able to say that many regular contributors to More2Life Radio will be also be featured presenters  at the World Meeting including Damon Owens, Dr. Joseph White, and friend-of-the-show, Christopher West.  And. of course there will be many other wonderful speakers as well,  including members of the Catholic Patheos community, including Simcha Fisher and Sue Muldoon.

There’s still time to register for the event.  We’ve saved space for you!   Hope to see you there!

Family Spirituality–Caring for the Heart of Your Home

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Spirituality is the heart of our your home.  Are you caring for your family’s “heart health”?  Here’s my latest article for Our Sunday Visitor’s Daily Take.

Are you attending to your family’s heart health?

Your family’s spiritual well-being represents the true heart of your family, the spiritual heart that pumps joy, meaning, and connection into your life as a family and as persons. Experts note that the degree to which your family shares a spiritual life actually predicts the degree of satisfaction you can expect from both your family relationships and life in general. Do you know how to protect your family’s “heart health”?

What is ‘spirituality’ anyway?

Psychologists assert that a healthy spirituality promotes three qualities that are essential for a joyful, meaningful life: transcendence, transformation and integration.

Transcendence refers to times of special connection with God, moments filled with a sense of wonder and awe. Transcendence promotes well-being by reminding us that we are part of “something bigger.” That we are not alone in the world and that each moment of life is packed with divine meaning and purpose.

Transformation refers to our commitment to embrace the changes necessary to become healthier, happier and more fulfilled. For the Christian, authentic transformation is all about embracing God’s plan for our fulfillment in a conscious (versus merely cultural), willing (versus coerced) and whole-hearted (versus grudging) manner.

Finally, Integration refers to spirituality’s power to promote greater peace in our lives — both between us and others and within ourselves. A healthy spirituality compels us to harmonize any conflicts between our beliefs, values and identity, and enables us to live with integrity no matter where or whom we’re with.

Properly understood, “being spiritual” is about becoming fully-formed, vital people who know who we are, what we stand for, where we are going and what we need to do to get there.

Family spirituality: what does it look like?

Families play a critical role in cultivating each member’s spiritual life and all the above benefits that flow from it.Family life is primarily about forming persons — parents and children growing together, learning from each other, supporting one another in living out a shared mission and goals — all of which has to do with spirituality. Without a strong sense of spiritual well-being, families too easily become collections of individuals living under the same roof and sharing a data plan.

Three steps to a ‘heart-healthy’ family

There are three basic activities families can undertake to promote their spiritual well-being.  CONTINUE READING

How to Raise Moral Kids in an Immoral World

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Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Check out the YouTube Video of the webinar Lisa and I did for Ascension Press titled, How to Raise Moral Kids in an Immoral World.  The good news?  You don’t have to be afraid of the culture, of your kids’ peers, or any other influence.  We’ll show you how to make sure your children open their hearts to the lessons you want to teach them about living a joyful, godly, moral life.  We hope you’ll be blessed by the steps we share in this dynamic, practical presentation!

5 Steps To More Joyful Living

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Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Today on More2Life Radio, Lisa and I revealed what our Catholic faith and the latest studies from positive psychology have to teach us about living more joyfully.

Does God Want Us to Be Happy?

A lot of Christians question whether God wants us to be be happy.  I’ve even heard people say, “God doesn’t want us to be happy.  He wants us to be holy.”  But as I argue in Broken Gods:  Hope, Healing, and the Seven Longings of the Human Heart, the two are far from mutually exclusive.   To be holy is to dedicate ourselves to pursuing a closer relationship with God.  Drawing closer to God helps us to discover God’s plan for our life and when we function according to that plan, we are are happy to be functioning as we were designed to function.  Authentic happiness does not stand in opposition to holiness.  It is made possible by it.  As Pope St. John Paul the Great put it. “People are made for happiness. Rightly, then, you thirst for happiness. Christ has the answer to this desire of yours. But he asks you to trust him.“

5 Skills for Increasing Happiness in Your Life

Using the acronym STAGE (Savor, Thanks, Aspire, Give, Empathize), here are 5 skills to practice that can help you increase the joy in your daily life.

Savor–refers to our ability to pause, reflect and live life more mindfully.  To savor our day mean to both recognize the blessings of the day and to reflect on the direction of our life and relationships.  Savoring life allows us to really connect and be present in the moment,to enjoy each moment for what it is, and make conscious decisions about the direction of my life.  Research consistently shows that the ability to be mindful is directly related

Thanks–contributes to joy by helping us be grateful.  Ample research shows that simple gratitude-based activities, like keeping a daily list of 3-5 things we are genuinely grateful for, can increase our “happiness set-point” by at least 20%.

Aspire–refers to our ability to set goals and meet them.  Whether setting and keeping larger life goals, or setting simple goals for the day, the more we are confident in our ability to set and meet goals the more “self-efficacy” we have.  Self-efficacy refers to our capacity to know we can do what we set out to do. It goes to our sense of personal power which contributes to our experience of joy because we are less likely to feel we must simply be dragged along wherever life wants to take us.

Give–reminds us that being self-donative–being generous with our time, talent–, and treasure is an important way to remember that we have the power to contribute to the well-being of others which, in turn, makes us feel good about who we are and what we have.   In Broken Gods (see chapter on The Divine Longing for Trust) I walk readers through several studies that show how  generosity is a key component of joyful living.

Empathize–the more we can make true heart-to-heart connections with those who share our lives the more joy we will experience.  Research consistently shows that the stronger our relationships and social networks are, the happier we will be.  Empathy is the quality that transforms a host of causal acquaintances into true friends who care deeply for us and about whom we can care deeply in return.

Everyone wants to be happier.  With these five skills, you can set the STAGE for greater happiness and real joy in your life.  For more tips on increasing the happiness and joy in your life, check out Broken Gods: Hope, Healing, and the Seven Longings of the Human Heart.