“You Are the Average of the 5 People You Spend the Most Time With.”

Yesterday on More2Life Radio, Lisa an I discussed an assertion of a new book, The Power of No Specifically, that “you are an average of the 5 people you spend the most time with.”

shutterstock_74932492I haven’t read the whole book, but I was struck by this assertion.  It’s really a terrific way of communicating, in simple terms, the Theology of the Body’s claim that the human person is communal and relational by nature.  We have a profound impact on the lives of others and others have a profound impact on us.  And although we have a tendency to think of ourselves as entirely separate and in charge of our own choices, the people we associate with do play a huge role in supporting or undermining our efforts to become the people God is calling us to be.

So, let me ask you….

1.   Are the 5 people you spend the most time with helping or hurting your chances of becoming the person God created you to be?

2.  If–whether you realized if or not–you really were an average of the 5 people  you spend the most time with, would that be a good thing or a bad thing?

3.  Finally, if you are less than pleased to be the average of these 5 people, what do you need to do about it?

Learn more about how the Pastoral Solutions Institute’s Catholic Tele-Counseling practice can help you transform your relationships.  Call 740-266-6461 or email us to speak with a professional, Catholic counselor.

My Son, Jacob Popcak, In the News

For his presentation at the recent Theology of the Body Congress.

Jacob Popcak, a student at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio, led a group discussion on “How to Start a TOB Organization on Campus.”

“People have wounds. We’re all dealing with similar hurts. Our culture has done a number on everybody both in and outside of the church. Theology of the body is not a mandate, it’s not a get fixed quick solution,” Popcak told CNS in an interview afterward. “It’s the redeeming grace of God saying, ‘Hey, I love every part of you, your body and your soul, your mind and your heart, the desires you love and the desires you’re ashamed of — all of it. And I want to use it for not only my glory, not only your glory, but also for the glory of everyone else on earth and everything that you love.'”“It’s a cosmic love that’s beautifully and practically applied,” Popcak said.

Students and campus ministers, both those new to the theology and those experienced in spreading its message on campus, joined the discussion. Popcak, who leads Franciscan University’s theology of the body organization, offered insights and suggestions to participants.

The biggest virtue needed to bring the theology into campus ministry, Popcak said, is humility.

“Approach it with humility. Really study it. Know enough that you can start living your life according to it — change yourself according to reading it. Once you have done that, be brave, be not afraid; go out and start talking to people — not about what it is but why you love it. Share that love with people and that love and joy will be infectious.”

Ultimately, Popcak encouraged students to keep the leadership of their groups small so they can do big things. Referencing St. Paul, he said, “You can do this stuff because God wants you to. The church was not built on the backs of people who did tiny, measly little things. Do whatever you’re doing to the utmost degree and if God doesn’t like that, he’ll knock you off your horse and make you do something else to the utmost degree.”  READ MORE

My Son, Jacob Popcak, In the News

Theology of the Body Congress A Huge Success

Lisa and I just returned from Philadelphia and the Theology of the Body Congress where we presented a seminar on Capturing Your Child’s Heart Through the Theology of the Body.  In addition, I participated in a panel discussion on Natural Family Planning and the Theology of the Body and our son, Jacob, led a round-table discussion on Theology of the Body at College:  Promoting TOB on Campus.    The Congress was a tremendous success and our contributions were terrifically well-received.   We’re so grateful to have spent last week with so many other people who have committed their lives and ministries to promoting Pope St John Paul the Great’s vision for life and love and how God desires to use our relationships to bring Christ to the world.

After two full days of teaching, practical application, and inspiration on the Theology of the Body, the 2014 International Theology of the Body Congress officially closed on Friday, July 11.  The Congress was sponsored by the Theology of the Body Institute, whose mission is to promote Pope Saint John Paul II’s important teaching on the divine meaning of the human body.

Over 700 people from 12 countries and 40 states attended the Congress.  They represented 50 dioceses in the United States and 60 individual ministries and apostolates. The total also included more than 120 priests, religious and seminarians. “That diversity tells me that this is more than a conference, it’s more than even a beautiful symposium of delving into the teachings,” said Damon Owens, Executive Director of the Theology of the Body Institute.  “This Congress is really accomplishing what it was created for, and that is to convene representatives who are invested in Theology of the body in their own unique way, coming together and learning how together how we can move the teaching forward as well as integrate better into the culture today.” 

Owens delivered the final keynote encouraging those who attended the Congress to take the “communio,” or communion, they experienced with one another to “missio,” the mission of being sent out as an ambassador for the teachings of the Theology of the Body. The Theology of the Body Institute is celebrating ten years of promoting Theology of the Body as a direct answer to the pervasive misunderstanding and misuse of human sexuality in modern culture.  As the Institute’s Board Chair, David Savage looks to the future. “We’re blessed and humbled that the mission continues to resonate in people’s hearts,” commented Savage.  “We’re hoping that in the next ten years it will be recognized as an even bigger gift from St. John Paul II to the Church.”

Pope St. John Paul II & Pope St. John XXIlI: Partners in the Universal Call to Holiness

It surprises many people that the Church will be canonizing both Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II this Sunday, April 4/27.  Most of the commentary I’ve read sees this in political terms. That is to say, the perception by many secular observers seems to be that the Church is throwing a bone to liberals by canonizing their guy while the Church throws a bone to conservatives by canonizing their guy.   I doubt there is much to this political angle, but I think there is a deeper, much more significant reason the Church is declaring both of these great men to be saints on the same day. 

Pope John XXIII ushered in the reforms of Vatican II. His successor, Pope Paul VI saw them through, but Pope John XXIII got the ball rolling.  One of the  most important emphases of Vatican II was the “Universal Call to Holiness” (more specifically spelled out in Lumen Gentium). The Church has always called all people to lead holy lives, but prior to the reforms of the Council, the Church had popularly fallen into the perception that true holiness was largely reserved to priests and religious.  Vatican II stood in strong opposition to that trend and challenged the whole Church, not just priests and religious, to be holy and pursue ever greater holiness by embracing even deeper conversion to Christ.

Pope John Paul II was really the first Pope to reign in the fully post-conciliar Church.  Yes,  Pope Paul VI saw the reforms of VII to their conclusion and beyond but he was the architect of the council.  It always has to be left to successors to understand how it will play out.  Pope John Paul I wasn’t around long enough to leave his mark and, as such, it fell to Pope John Paul II to define what the Universal Call to Holiness actually looked like.

I think that JPII’s Theology of the Body–his attempt to present an “adequate anthropology”–was, in large part his attempt to answer the question, “What does the universal call to holiness look like in practice?”

To say that something is holy is, according to Aquinas, to say that something has been “set aside for a divine purpose.”  But to set something aside for a divine purpose requires us to know what that thing is, what it’s intended purpose is, and how that purpose could be fulfilled for the good of the Kingdom.

This is exactly what the TOB does for the human person.  TOB discusses where we come from, what we were destined for, what became of  us and how we are to live now so that we might reclaim our inheritance.  It discusses the nature of the relationship between men and women (in general), husbands and wives (in particular), and what it means to be a person living in communion with other persons.  It promotes a sacramental worldview as applied to every day life as well as all the things that that laity is so consumed with–including sexuality–and helps every man woman and child understand the holiness that can be gained by following what St. Therese the Little Flower (whom JPII declared a “Doctor of the Church”) the “little way”; that is, doing even small things with great love.  In short, it seems to me that Pope John Paul II’s entire pontificate was dedicated to describing how to live the blueprint Pope John XXIII drew.

This weekend, the Church will celebrate the legacy of two great and holy men whose vision laid out a plan the rest of us could use to discover our destiny in Christ, and fulfill that destiny by looking for little ways to make a gift of ourselves to the world so that all of us might, one day, be one in him.   In a sense, Pope St. John XXIII and Pope St. John Paul II are the bookends of Vatican II.  As they are canonized this weekend, I pray that their intercession will see the fulfillment of the good work they started.

Martha Sears Invites Dr. Greg Popcak to Serve on Attachment Parenting International–Resource Advisory Council

I was genuinely honored today to receive an invitation from internationally-recognized parenting expert/author, Martha Sears,  and  Attachment Parenting International Board President, Janet Jendron, to become a member of API’s Resource Advisory Council. 

Dear Greg,

I am happy to inform you that the Board of Directors for Attachment Parenting International has voted to ask you to become one of our advisors on the API Resource Advisory Council.  Having you as a resource, as an advisor, for the work API does will be valuable in many ways.  You will bring a much needed expertise to API, and we appreciate that you have been a friend of API for a long time.

We are looking forward to your acceptance and your increased involvement with the important task we all have to help parents be the best parents for the children they have in their care.  We thank you so much for considering this, as we have enjoyed the writing and media work you and Lisa do.

All best,  Martha Sears

I look forward to lending my professional support to API and helping them continue their excellent work of helping moms and dads raise truly remarkable children.  To learn more about attachment parenting and applying the principles of Blessed Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body to parenting and family life, check out the many great resources at the Attachment Parenting International website, as well as my and Lisa’s books, Parenting with Grace and Beyond the Birds and the Bees.

What Do Pope JPII, Pope BXVI, and a Lesbian Feminist Have in Common? (Guest post by Dave McClow)

In a WSJ interview with Bari Weiss, Camille Paglia, a self-described “notorious Amazon feminist” who is identified as a lesbian and a mom, actually sees that we have a problem with how we view men in our culture.  This is the theme I discussed in my previous blog, “Towards a Theology of Authentic Masculinity.”  She gets that, “Houston, we have a problem”!  Weiss states, “…no subject gets her going more than when I ask if she really sees a connection between society’s attempts to paper over the biological distinction between men and women and the collapse of Western civilization!”  Paglia says it this way, “What you’re seeing is how a civilization commits suicide.”  Blessed John Paul II (JPII) used to say, “The future of the world and of the Church passes through the family” (Familiaris Consortio, 75).  I would add that “The future of the family passes through fatherhood.”  And as we will see shortly, Popes JPII and Benedict XVI (B16) believed there is a crisis of fatherhood. 

While the reporter did not mention an explicit connection, certainly the general anatomy and physiology along with JPII’s Theology of the Body make clear that the “biological distinctions” point to motherhood and fatherhood.  And the status of fatherhood (human and God’s) have Popes B16 and JPII sounding the alarm that civilization is being threatened.

Cardinal Ratzinger, later Pope B16, identifies, on two separate occasions, this insidious threat to humanity that is found in how we view human fatherhood, and its effects on our relationship with our Father God:

God himself “willed to manifest and describe himself as Father.” “Human fatherhood gives us an anticipation of what He is. But when this fatherhood does not exist, when it is experienced only as a biological phenomenon, without its human and spiritual dimension, all statements about God the Father are empty. The crisis of fatherhood we are living today is an element, perhaps the most important, threatening man in his humanity (emphasis mine, Zenit, March 15, 2001, address at Palermo).

Human fatherhood can give us an inkling of what God is; but where fatherhood no longer exists, where genuine fatherhood is no longer experienced as a phenomenon that goes beyond the biological dimension to embrace a human and intellectual sphere as well, it becomes meaningless to speak of God the Father. Where human fatherhood disappears, it is no longer possible to speak and think of God. It is not God who is dead; what is dead (at least to a large extent) is the precondition in man that makes it possible for God to live in the world. The crisis of fatherhood that we are experiencing today is a basic aspect of the crisis that threatens mankind as a whole (emphasis mine). (Joseph Ratzinger, The God of Jesus Christ, p. 29.).

John Paul II sees this cultural suicide from the perspective of God’s Fatherhood and the culture’s attempts to abolish it.  Crossing the Threshold of Hope ends with a lengthy reflection on fatherhood and the two types of fear of the Lord—filial and servile.  The former comes from being loved by the Father, the latter from working for the love of the Father as a servant—a master-slave relationship.  But what is startling is his quote of André Malraux’s prediction in the middle of a hopeful message:

In order to set contemporary man free from fear of himself, of the world, of others, of earthly powers, of oppressive systems, in order to set him free from every manifestation of a servile fear before that “prevailing force” which believers call God, it is necessary to pray fervently that he will bear and cultivate in his heart that true fear of God, which is the beginning of wisdom.

 

This fear of God is the saving power of the Gospel.  It is a constructive, never destructive, fear.  It creates people who allow themselves to be led by responsibility, by responsible love.  It creates holy men and women–true Christians–to whom the future of the world ultimately belongs. André Malraux was certainly right when he said that the twenty-first century would the century of religion or it would not be at all.

 

The Pope who began his papacy with the words “Be not afraid!” tries to be completely faithful to this exhortation and is always ready to be at the service of man, nations, and humanity in the spirit of this truth of the Gospel. (pp. 228-229)

Civilization is on the brink—according to popes who don’t exaggerate for effect.  Human fathers and God the Father are critical in changing this tide.  This is why I argued in my previous blog that it is time for the Church to lead the charge in defining masculinity, as all men are called to spiritual [and I’m now adding “chivalrous”] fatherhood lived out as priest, prophet, and king.

Getting back to Paglia, she laments that no one in the elite class has any military experience, and this is a huge problem because “there’s this illusion out there that people are basically nice, people are basically kind, if we’re just nice and benevolent to everyone they’ll be nice too. They literally don’t have any sense of evil or criminality.”  But John Paul II and the whole Catholic Church are very aware of what people are capable of and call this personal and original sin.  They would also agree that if you get the anthropology wrong, everything else is going to be skewed or in error after that.  Interestingly, John Paul II ties original sin and God’s fatherhood together:

…[W]e know from Revelation, in human history the “rays of fatherhood” meet a first resistance in the obscure but real fact of original sin.  This is truly the key for interpreting reality.…  Original sin, then, attempts to abolish fatherhood, destroying its rays which permeate the created world, placing in doubt the truth about God who is Love and leaving man only with a sense of the master-slave relationship.  As a result, the Lord appears jealous of His power over the world and over man; and consequently, man feels goaded to do battle against God. (Crossing the Threshold of Hope, p. 227-228)

Evil, original sin, and the abolishment of fatherhood—all are THE KEY FOR INTERPRETING REALITY! 

Paglia also sees men being silenced by Political Correctness. 

“This PC gender politics thing—the way gender is being taught in the universities—in a very anti-male way, it’s all about neutralization of maleness.” The result: Upper-middle-class men who are “intimidated” and “can’t say anything. . . . They understand the agenda.” In other words: They avoid goring certain sacred cows by “never telling the truth to women” about sex, and by keeping “raunchy” thoughts and sexual fantasies to themselves and their laptops.

While I’m not advocating that a Catholic man engage in a “prophetic raunch fest,” the lack of truth-telling is a deficit in men who are not living out their fatherhood as prophets—speaking the truth in love. 

Paglia says there are very few models for men to imitate.

Politically correct, inadequate education, along with the decline of America’s brawny industrial base, leaves many men with “no models of manhood,” she says. “Masculinity is just becoming something that is imitated from the movies. There’s nothing left. There’s no room for anything manly right now.”

“A key part of the remedy, she believes, is a ‘revalorization’ of traditional male trades—the ones that allow women’s studies professors to drive to work (roads), take the elevator to their office (construction), read in the library (electricity), and go to gender-neutral restrooms (plumbing).” 

While this would certainly help, I would argue there needs to be a “revalorization” of masculinity as a whole!

So what kind of feminist is Camille Paglia? An “equal-opportunity feminist” “that demands a level playing field without demanding special quotas or protections for women.”  Her heroines are Amelia Earhart and Katherine Hepburn who were “independent, brave, enterprising, capable of competing with men without bashing them.”  John Paul II would say it this way, “there is an urgent need to achieve real equality in every area: equal pay for equal work, protection for working mothers, fairness in career advancements, equality of spouses with regard to family rights” (Letter to Women, 4).

Palgia continues, “’Equal-opportunity feminism’ has triumphed in basic goals. There is surely a lack of women in the C-Suite and Congress, but you’d be hard-pressed to find a man who would admit that he believes women are less capable.”  Palgia argues that the women’s movement needs to return to these roots and give up the “nanny state” mentality that leads to the PC witch/warlock hunts—my term, not hers.  If this movement is to succeed, it will have to go the big-tent route, “open to stay-at-home moms” and “not just the career woman.”

Here’s what Chesterton would say to the feminists who demand special quotas and protections for women: “It isn’t that they can’t see the solution.  It is that they can’t see the problem.”  Paglia sees the problem accurately, and she ends up in the neighborhood of JPII and B16, echoing their thoughts on the problem.  Her conclusions point in the right direction—we need men to be manly; but the Church and the popes have a deeper solution, and it begins with “Our Father…”

Dave McClow, M.Div., LMFT, LCSW is a clinical pastoral counseling associate of the Pastoral Solutions Institute.  To learn more about how the Pastoral Solutions Institute’s telecounseling practice can help you transform your personal, marriage, or family life, visit us online at www.CatholicCounselors.com or call to make an appointment at 740-266-6461.

Well, Shucks. Y’All Are Makin’ Us Blush.

I had to post this truly touching review from the Snoring Scholar of Lisa and my new book Just Married:  A Catholic Guide to Surviving and Thriving in the First 5 Years of Marriage.

oh, the things I would’ve missed if I hadn’t read Just Married: The Catholic Guide to Surviving and Thriving in the First Five Years of Marriage, by Dr. Greg and Lisa Popcak (who’ve written about 100 other books, and are professional marriage people, and have a radio show, and all sorts of credibility stuff).

This book wasn’t necessarily written for me: I’ve been married ten years this year. Honestly, I intended to skim through it and pull together a general review.

But I couldn’t.

I got sucked in, just as surely as the dog hair gets into the toothpaste container. (Don’t ask.) I was intrigued and nodding and (dare I suggest it?) making notes of things and learning a thing or three…

We want you to remember four little words that will help you get through these times. Ready?

NEVER BLAME YOUR MARRIAGE

Write it down. Tattoo it on the back of your hand. Memorize it. Chant it. Say it until you can dance to it. Marriages do not have lives of their own. A marriage only has the life a husband and wife give it. People say things such as, “It just didn’t work.” or “It just didn’t make sense anymore.” “It just died.” Remember this. There is no it. There is just you, your spouse, and God. If your marriage is dying on the vine, it isn’t because it (your marriage) is broken. It is simply that you don’t currently have the skills to nurture it under the pressures you are currently facing. Get those skills. Read good self-help books; go on a marriage retreat; join a support group; get therapy.

I’m pretty sure that these are some kick-donkey people, here, and I’d like to meet them someday. This book put words to things that I’ve felt at a gut level and have struggled to articulate (not that I needed to articulate anything, mind you, but as a word person, I sometimes just want to have the words for things).

Many people believe that in order to be “true to themselves” they are obliged to say what they are feeling in the middle of feeling it, but the truth is, feelings are God’s gift to you, not anyone else. Your feelings are God’s way of calling your attention to a potential problem. Having received the emotional message, you need to go to God to figure out whether the emotional message was a glitch (because you were tired, or underfed, or overwrought, or otherwise not functioning properly) or whether it was intended to point out some real issue that needed to be addressed. Having sought God’s counsel and calmed down a bit, now it’s time to raise the issue. Instead of leading with your emotions, leading with possible solutions gives you a way to discuss possible ways to prevent the situation from occurring in the future without letting the conversation devolve into “I feel so awful about who did what to whom.”

I agree wholeheartedly with the plug on the front of the book by Christopher West: “Every married couple—newly married or otherwise—will benefit from this book.” Yeah. What he said.

 You’re very kind.  Lisa and I hope many couples are similarly blessed.

 

Więcej moich książek zostały przetłumaczone na język polski! (That is, “More of my books are coming out in Poland!”)

For Better…Forever! ( NA DOBRE… NA ZAWSZE! )  and Holy Sex! (ŚWIĘTY SEKS! )  as well as God Help Me, This Stress is Driving Me Crazy! (Boże, pomóż mi! Ten stres doprowadza mnie do szaleństwa!) and God Help Me, These People Are Driving Me Nuts! (Boże, pomóż mi! Ci ludzie doprowadzają mnie do szału) have  been translated into Polish and are apparently selling well in JPII’s homeland.

I just got a note from the Polish publisher of For Better…Forever and Holy Sex! that they will now be bringing out our parenting books;  Parenting with Grace: A Catholic Guide to Raising (almost) Perfect Kids and  Beyond the Birds and the Bees:  Raising Sexually Whole and Holy Kids.

I can’t tell you how exciting it is to see that these titles that seek to apply the Theology of the Body to the challenges of every day life are coming out in Poland, the birthplace of TOB!

Sto Lat!

Science Supports Theology of the Body: Your Happiness Type is Expressed in Your Genes

The Theology of the Body tells us that each person was made for self donation and that if we want to be happy, we need to make a gift of ourselves.   It further tells us that when we treat others, or ourselves, as objects of pleasure, we break down spiritually and emotionally because we are acting in a manner that is inconsistent with God’s plan and our design.    This sounds like a lovely theological speculation, but what if it was physiologically true as well?

This week, researchers at UCLA  demonstrated that the type of happiness you pursue in life effect your overall well-being on a genetic level.   That is not to say that the level of happiness you experience is genetic, but rather the kinds of happiness you seek in life actually effect you on a genetic level.

Researchers discovered that people who, as a matter of habit, chase after “hedonic happiness”  (the pleasure that comes from partying, sex, overeating, drinking, etc.) show physical evidence of gene expression that resulted in higher inflammatory response and the lower production of anti-viral and antibodies in their immune cells.  This response is similar to the physiological response of depressed or exhausted individuals.

By contrast, people who pursue, as a matter of habit, “eudaimonic happiness”  (happiness that comes from pursuing the greater good) show physical evidence of gene expression that resulted in less inflammation and a stronger immune response (i.e., higher production of antiviral and antibodies in their immune cells).    This particular pattern of gene expression is associated with better physical well-being and overall good health.

The truly surprising thing was that both groups claimed to feel good.  Both groups claimed to be happy and well, but only the people who habitually pursued the greater good experienced  the good health–all the way down to the genetic level– that ought to accompany their happiness.

In the words of the researchers…

 

And while those with eudaimonic well-being showed favorable gene-expression profiles in their immune cells and those with hedonic well-being showed an adverse gene-expression profile, “people with high levels of hedonic well-being didn’t feel any worse than those with high levels of eudaimonic well-being,” Cole said. “Both seemed to have the same high levels of positive emotion. However, their genomes were responding very differently even though their emotional states were similarly positive.    What this study tells us is that doing good and feeling good have very different effects on the human genome, even though they generate similar levels of positive emotion,” he said. “Apparently, the human genome is much more sensitive to different ways of achieving happiness than are conscious minds.”

St Thomas Aquinas talked about the “two books” that reveal truth; the “books” of nature and revelation.  Something that is true in one “book” cannot be contradicted by the other.  Faith and reason should go together.  That’s why I’m so excited when I can point to studies that show the clear link between these two sources of truth.  Pope John Paul II proposed the Theology of the Body as a vision for how we are to live, but living according to that vision is only good if it can be shown to help us achieve our potential as human persons–as he claims it should.  Research like this demonstrates that JPII’s claims hold up not just to theological debate, but scientific investigation as well.   The Theology of the Body is not just theological speculation.  It’s assertions, particularly the idea that we can only discover God’s plan for our lives and true happiness by making a generous gift of ourselves and living in mutually self-donative relationships, are true on every level, including–as you might expect for a theology of the body–the physical level.

To learn more about how you can increase the happiness in your life, contact the Pastoral Solutions Institute’s Tele-Counseling Service  (740-266-6461).  You can work with a faithful, professional, Catholic counselor to help you experience more joy in your marriage, family, or personal life.