[00:00:00] Hey, everybody, welcome to the EquipCast. So today I sit down with Jonna Schuster. , Jonna just wrote the most amazing book on prayer. It's called "Hearing God's Voice: A Catholic Guide to Listening Prayer," and we talk all about it. We talk about the scriptural foundations for how we know that God wants to get into a conversation with us.

We talk about,, the languages of God, how we can hear His voice and recognize Him, and all the various ways He speaks, and the challenges that get in the way of that, and how to overcome those. We talk about prayer as the foundation and power for evangelization, and where to find Him and how to connect, knowing that He's looking for us from the very beginning.

It's really a great conversation. If you love prayer, if you wanna connect with the Lord more deeply, you're gonna love this conversation. Take a listen.

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[00:01:21] Jim Jansen: All right, Jonna Schuster, welcome to the EquipCast. How you doing?

[00:01:26] Jonna Schuster: you. Oh, I'm great. How are you, Jim?

[00:01:28] Jim Jansen: I'm really good. Okay, so the listeners, right, who listen to the EquipCast regularly know I always love to chit-chat, but shocker, right, before I turn on the mics.

And we are not old friends, but it is somewhat amazing that we're not old friends 'cause, like, we have, like, so many friends in common that we have both known for a while, multiple decades.

Jonna give, just as we, as we get started here, give people a little bit of your, your, your background particularly centered on the Catholic Disneyland [00:02:00] beautiful, wonderful place that we know as St.John's Newman Center at U of I. Tell us a little bit of your story.

Tell us a little bit of your story

[00:02:06] Jonna Schuster: Yes. Well, Jim, I grew up, like many Catholics, cradle Catholic, and going through motions, doing all the right things, and interestingly, it kind of started feeling a little unsatisfactory when I was about to graduate high school. And a lot of it had to do with, like, I would go to church with my family, and I felt like no one was really paying attention.

My mom would nudge me and say, like, "Remind me to stop at the grocery store," like, during mass, and I was like, "This can't be all that there is." So I knew that I was about to embark into a whole new world going to college, and so I remember a moment at church saying to God, "I don't know for sure that you're real, but I want to know.

So when I get there, when I get to U of I, I'm gonna look for you, and I'm gonna go into all the churches. I'm gonna check out where you are, you know, reputed to be and I'm gonna see if I [00:03:00] can find you there. And I hope I do, but, you know, who knows? Who knows where it's going to be?" I was willing to even look outside of the Catholic Church, and so when I got to U of I, wouldn't you know, the first place that drew me in happened, just so happened to be the Newman Center because of a barbecue. You know, a, a way to anyone's heart on a college campus is free food.

[00:03:21] Jim Jansen: Hungry college students. Oh, yeah, for sure. Oh, that's so awesome.

[00:03:23] Jonna Schuster: Exactly. And so it drew me in. I got to meet the most wonderful people, the most beautiful community. They immediately welcomed me in, fed me made me feel like I already belonged, invited me to sing in their choir, one of their many beautiful choirs.

I had no singing experience, but I loved these people so much that I instantly said yes just for the chance to see them again. And that set me on a path where I never even looked beyond the Catholic Church after that because I encountered the, the beauty of God in so many facets through that community at St. John's, through [00:04:00] choir, through the retreat program, through just the goodness and the kindness of the people that I was encountering, paired with some of the most amazing preachers in the, the clergy that were assigned there, and just hearing the truth of our Catholic faith articulated in such a powerful manner from the pulpit, in casual conversations, and then lived out in front of me.

I got to be a part of it. It was... It convinced me right off the bat, just convinced me.

[00:04:28] Jim Jansen: Yeah, it was really... I mean, we were talking about this. For those who don't know, I mean, the St. John's Newman Center at the University of Illinois' campus was a- and is exceptional. I mean, just, you know, decades before... Now there's kind of a resurgence of Newman Centers rebuilding and adding dorms and adding complementary theological studies where a student can get their, you know, general ed kind of lang- or you know, get, get their, their literature requirement at, like, the Newman Center [00:05:00] from, like, an accredited professor or, you know, accredited courses.

Instead of taking something at the university, they can take, you know, a Tolkien and Lewis class. But U of I was doing that before anybody else. I mean, a dorm, the classes, you know, Monsignor Swetland is pra- practically a certified genius. Like, I mean, there just, there was really, it really an exceptional place that has borne tremendous fruit.

I mean, you know, vocations and dozens of people like yourself, lay leaders, right? You're, you're a wife, you're running a, an apostolate, and now you're an author. We're gonna talk about your book Hearing God's Voice, here in, in a little bit. Really bore exceptional fruit. I don't know, I wasn't planning on going here, but Jonna, what, like, if you could just name a couple of the elements that made, that made that community so fruitful.

Off the top of your head, what would you say?

[00:05:56] Jonna Schuster: Mm. I think one of them [00:06:00] was there was just a, a deep hunger and sincerity in everyone that I met to know the Lord, and to know him on an intellectual level, but also to really dedicate themselves to him in prayer. And there... It was very common to have a prayer partner. Like, you find a friend, and then you meet up once a day and you pray together.

You do a walking rosary. It was very common to go on retreats together, silent retreats, quinaria retreats. It was, it was just this beautiful all-in from the people who were participating in the ministries there, and I really feel like when we come to the Lord with a hunger like that, he can't resist but showing up, and I, I think we were just really, really blessed and privileged, especially during that season.

So many... I, you know, I've heard it said that saints grow together. Saints, like, you, you find them in clusters, and I feel like there were such clusters of saints during the years that I was there. And I, I think that had a lot to do with the hunger.

[00:06:58] Jim Jansen: Well, and there was, I don't know [00:07:00] when the apostles of the interior life showed up, giving them a shout-out, but, like, there was a commitment to the interior life, which sadly I think is kind of rare, right? You know, that, like, even, you know, kinda my, my thing is parish renewal. Even amongst those who are committed to parish renewal, oftentimes a commitment to the interior life, like really teaching people how to pray, and providing all of the personal accompaniment needed for to actually grow in habits of prayer, that's often missing or a little under, right, underrepresented.

And as I reflect back, that was just a hallmark of this community, which nurtured your faith, and I think now is, I mean, probably at part of, like, your own, like, fruitfulness in, in your new book, Hearing God's Voice: A Catholic Guide to Listening Prayer. Jonna, this is, this is great. So my wife found the book and [00:08:00] she...

So my oldest son is a FOCUS missionary, and he's, like, using it with all his guys out in California. Yeah. 'Cause he, he came across it, and it's just, it's been... It's so practical. It's so grounded. But I think that's the, the practical, you know, that's, it's a great adjective, but it's maybe sometimes, like, overused, but, like, it really, it, it's like you're there mentoring people into prayer.

So we're, we'll dive into it, but I just wanna give it like, give you an opportunity. Like, what inspired you to write the book? How does your own story kinda intersect in it?

[00:08:34] Jonna Schuster: Thank you. That's such a kind thing to say. I'm so excited that your son is getting so much mileage out of it. It definitely was born out of my experience starting at U of I living in an environment that prioritized prayer, that accompanied people through prayer. I honestly can't even point to a singular individual that said, "This is how you do this."

It was like it was just in the air. We were all breathing it. I remember going

[00:08:58] Jim Jansen: community. Everybody

[00:08:59] Jonna Schuster: [00:09:00] Yeah. Yeah, it was just the norm, and even on silent retreats, I absolutely loved going on silent retreats together in community. Father Stanley Deptula, Monsignor now he would lead these beautiful retreats for us, and I, I don't even remember how we learned this, but we were listening for God's voice, and because we were in silence, we couldn't speak to one another, all the participants, we couldn't speak.

So we would write notes to each other and slide them under each other's doors saying like, "This is what God is saying to me in prayer," and almost speaking prophetically to one another in that silence, and you know, it, it was definitely fostered by Monsignor Deptula and whoever else was leading the retreat with like a, you know, bring a spirit of service, bring a spirit of openness to the Lord.

And it's almost like I, I learned the habit without even recognizing that I had learned the habit. It just felt so normal, you know? And so fast-forward to after I graduated from college, I I pivoted a little bit. I studied graphic design in [00:10:00] college, expecting to pursue a career in graphic design, but by the end of my studies, I realized I love Jesus so much.

I love graphic design, but I love Jesus more, and I really have a passion for not just serving people in the church, but I felt like I, I wanted to share about Jesus, and I felt like I had a, a knack or a gift for creating experiences for people that facilitated encounters with the Lord. Like, I am a retreat planner at heart.

I love, you know, getting inside the what can I do to make it possible for someone to have a, a meet-up with the Lord, an encounter with the Lord. And so I ended up pivoting into doing some graduate studies in moral theology on the East Coast, thinking I'm not sure where this is going to lead, but I at least think this is a good next step to explore if this is the career path that I wanna pursue from here.

I didn't know what careers were possible with a degree in theology. I knew teaching probably, but I ended up getting a job pretty [00:11:00] shortly after I finished my studies as a youth minister at a parish, and I thought, you know, this is a great in-between while I figure out what's the long-term plan, and I ended up falling in love with the job, with the kids.

I was teaching high schoolers mainly with some junior high and then college students kind of would, you know, high schoolers would graduate, come back as college students. And I ended up staying there for 10 years, and part of the experience of...

[00:11:25] Jim Jansen: Wow. 10 years as a youth minister?

[00:11:26] Jonna Schuster: Yep, 10 years as a youth minister.

[00:11:30] Jim Jansen: That is nine years longer, I think, than the typical youth ministry tenure. Or, or at least eight and a half longer. Holy cow.

[00:11:37] Jonna Schuster: Yep, yep. But the, I think the thing that made it so wonderful is that, number one my pastor just, he was so trusting of me. He said, "Do what you think is best. I trust your judgment." And so I was able to actually look back to my experience at University of Illinois, experience volunteering for the church elsewhere, and say, "What, what [00:12:00] can I do to create that same kind of environment where prayer is just in the air as something we breathe?"

And so that kind of led to Oh, so that was one reason that it was such a beautiful experience that was worth staying for 10 years. But the other one was my now husband ended up working side by side with me. We had two- there was room for two full-time youth ministers at this parish. And so about three years in I, I was dating Jim, and we spoke to the pastor about having him come on board as the counterpart to my position, and he applied and he got accepted.

And so that was extra special, just being able to kind of go all in, again, that whole all-in idea in community with this, this man that I was seeing a future with, and these wonderful people that I'd built relationships with, the youth and their parents and our volunteers, and it kinda bled out into the parish community.

And being in a position of trying to, I guess you could say, recreate perhaps the same experience that I had received from U of I, that same [00:13:00] like, "Let's get it in your hearts," I, I was almost forced to find words to teach the idea of how to develop this kind of prayer life. It's like that saying like, you don't know how well you know something until you're forced to teach it to someone else.

And so I was in a position where I had to figure out, how do we teach this? What are the, what are the ways that we can kind of journey with someone a- as kind of a mentorship process to show them how to listen for God's voice in prayer? And so really that's where both my husband and I were doing this together side by side, and so he had a huge part in, you know, we worked together in formulating what are the best ways that this is gonna bear fruit and how do we express this?

And so my experience in teaching it within a community like that kind of led me into further on down the line when we started our own independent apostolate bringing that same kind of teaching approach into the apostolate, and then farther down the line from there, writing this book.[00:14:00]

[00:14:00] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I mean, you really had to create the culture. Let's come back to that. I wanna give you the chance here to just, like, kinda lay a foundation for us here, because again, I said before, the book reads like a mentorship conversation way more than a theological lecture. That's clearly the fruit of your experience, experiencing kind of a, a mentorship into prayer.

I wanna give you a chance just to kinda l- lay the foundation. One of the things you talk about is that, okay, like, the Lord wants to speak to us. Just lay kind of the theological foundation just for the whole concept that the Lord wants to speak, that we can hear His voice, that there's someone on the other side when we dispose ourselves to listen

[00:14:47] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. There are so many places that we could look to validate that statement, and I think if, if we know to look for it, we'll see it all throughout church history in the lives of the saints, in the writings [00:15:00] of our, our popes, and in theologians. My, my favorite place to go, though, to teach on it is the words of Jesus himself actually.

If you were to unpack the parable of the good shepherd, you'll see that Jesus is painting actually this beautiful picture. It's an analogy of the sheep being able to hear the voice of the shepherd. So he's painting this whole picture of... In, in biblical times, shepherding culture was understood. It was a very normal thing that people were familiar with, and so we have to do a little research to understand it nowadays.

But he's painting this picture of the shepherd arrives at this enclosure as he's traveling with his flock of sheep, and he, you know, has to crash for the night and get some shut-eye, and so he has to put the sheep into this enclosure overnight. And then, oh no, what happens if another shepherd shows up with their sheep and they're all mingled together in this one enclosure?

And so how do they sort out one sheep from the other? And it's through the sound of the shepherd's voice calling out to his own sheep, and they come based solely on the [00:16:00] sound of their shepherd's voice because they know the sound. They're familiar with the sound. And not only that, but as he is leading them through the fields, presumably, I, I'm guessing shepherding culture, they're just grazing.

They're just traveling around grazing. And so he has to lead them somehow, and he doesn't lead them through his scent. He doesn't lead them through the visuals of what his, his walk, his stance looks like, or even his physical form. It says in scripture he leads them with his voice, the sound of his voice.

And so underneath that, you, you have to see that there's a presumed sense of familiarity between the sheep and the shepherd's voice that has to have come from somewhere, and the place that that has to have come from would be a repetition of the shepherd speaking to his sheep. There's no way to build that level of familiarity and trust without that sort of uh, pattern or repetition of the shepherd speaks to his sheep, and the sheep [00:17:00] recognize the sound of his shepherd's voice.

Even distinct from the sound of other shepherds' voices, other humans' voices, they've learned to distinguish their shepherd, and they follow him. So Jesus unpacks this whole picture, and it's beautiful, and I think sometimes we can take it for granted because, like, okay, that's nice. But then he has this mic drop moment at the end where he says, "I am the good shepherd."

I am the good shepherd. I know my sheep. They know my voice. They follow me. And so it's basically painting this picture of those who follow Jesus know the sound of their shepherd's voice because he is continually speaking to them. If we look at that analogy that Jesus paints for us, he's, he's demonstrated that he is a God who speaks regularly, consistently, building up trust, building up a history with his followers so that they can come to know and recognize his voice even amidst competing voices.

And we can expect this. This is meant to be the norm.[00:18:00]

[00:18:00] Jim Jansen: Okay, so I wanna, let's keep going here. I wanna go deeper. You, one of the first things you kinda lay out in the book, which I think is just brilliant, exceptionally helpful, is that God has languages, right? Different, not like French, German, Italian, but like God has different languages, ways that He speaks that help us, that, that like as we think about it in this way, it begins to give us the eyes or ears to be able to recognize how He is speaking to us.

Just kinda lay those out for us. What are the, what are the languages that God uses?

[00:18:34] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. The way I like to think of this is if you were to collect all of the ways that God communicates to his people, you would have this massive pile in front of you. You'd have like, oh, he speaks through scripture, he speaks through nature, he speaks through you know, this, the homily at mass. He sp- like, there are so many different things that it's kind of this messy, giant pile, and so it can become difficult to figure out, how do I listen when there are so many options through which God [00:19:00] might speak to us?

So when I talk about this, I- it's almost like I'm taking that pile and I'm breaking it into categories. So that's mainly just as a tool for us to learn, what are we on the lookout for when we're trying to listen for God speak to us? So that's what we mean by the languages of God. So the four languages that I tend to group things into, which they each have their own subcategories, too, because I'm just that analytical-minded.

But the four primary languages that I use are seeing, hearing, feeling, and thinking.

[00:19:32] Jim Jansen: Okay. Seeing, hearing, feeling, thinking.

[00:19:35] Jonna Schuster: Yeah, so seeing being an experience of God communicating to you through images. Those images can be internal in our imaginations, like an image that comes to mind as we're praying, as we're attempting to listen.

It could also be images in our external surroundings, like we're, we're walking through the woods and there's something beautiful, like a flower that calls out to us, captures our attention, and it leads to further [00:20:00] reflection, connection with God, a sense of his closeness, further revelation, I guess you could say.

So that could come through the words on a page that you're reading. It could come through the scene of a movie that you're watching, any...

[00:20:12] Jim Jansen: Yes! That's what I was thinking. Like, I was- as you were talking about this. So I, I had this, you know, a season in my life that was very intense. I had a number of... I was part of a team, and this team was really beat up. And we were, we were all hurting in various ways. We were tired. And I remember being in the chapel praying, and I kept getting this flashback to this old movie, I don't know, I mean, it's not super old, but it's it's called the, The Memphis Belle, right?

Story of a, of a B-16 bomber on its last kinda run and, spoiler alert the last mission is not an easy mission, and they get shot up, and they, they make it home, but the plane is limping back in, and the pilot is kinda white-knuckling trying to keep the [00:21:00] thing in the air.

And I'm praying and, you know, begging God to spare us and sustain us, and then this movie clip keeps coming, and I'm like brushing it away as a distraction until I realized, oh, gonna make it home. Like, that is exactly how I feel right now. And it was this beautiful consoling image, literally a movie clip, that God's like, "You're gonna make it. I'm with you."

[00:21:24] Jonna Schuster: Yes. Ah, that's so beautiful. Yeah, that type of experience happens so frequently, and I love that you named, you brushed it aside as your first reaction.

[00:21:34] Jim Jansen: Didn't, At the time, right, I didn't have your book, and so I'm like, "Well, this is a movie clip. Stop getting distracted, Jim." But oh, turns out, you know, the Father was trying to encourage me and until, yeah, it took a little while for me to recognize it was a gift.

[00:21:49] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. Yeah, and that's so common. I've done that myself as well, is... And, and this just hearkens to how if we know what is possible through which God could speak to us, [00:22:00] we might not be dismissing so many things that seem distracting in prayer. We might instead be considering, "Oh, could that have been the Lord communicating to me?"

So that's, that covers the language of seeing, and that could also include things like apparitions or something a little bit more of a mystical experience, but that's less common, so...

[00:22:17] Jim Jansen: yeah, I don't have story there.

there

[00:22:20] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. Yeah. God could also speak through the language of hearing both internally and externally again.

Like, in your imagination hearing words or phrases or statements and externally hearing something audible in your surroundings that speaks to you, that grabs your heart, the words of a friend over coffee that just arrests you. The words that you're hearing through lyrics on the radio, perhaps it catches your attention and um, you feel like there's something more there that the Lord's inviting you into.

It could be the, the words of a homily. It could be the sound of the birds chirping or even a beautiful melody that we might hear. Anything in our external surroundings that's audible in nature could be a means through which [00:23:00] God speaks, in addition to hearing internally

[00:23:02] Jim Jansen: Right. It's almost as though sometimes in conversation the volume gets turned up.

[00:23:09] Jonna Schuster: Mm.

[00:23:10] Jim Jansen: You know, it's like you're having a con- I love you k- kind of gave the coffee conversation. You're having a coffee conversation with your friend, and I'm, I'm a little embarrassed to, I won't say which friends, but you know s- sometimes I'll, kind of like I'm not listening the way I should be, and I'll be a little bit spaced off.

And, you know, it's a little bit like the Charlie Brown teacher, you know, "Wah, wah, wah. Wah, wah, wah." And then they'll say something, and all of a sudden, like that cuts through. It is crystal clear. It's like someone turned up the volume, and I either hear something I need to hear or I hear something of their heart that the Lord is asking me to attend to, to be a, you know, a companion and a good friend to them.

[00:23:48] Jonna Schuster: Yes. Yes.

[00:23:50] Jim Jansen: Literal hearing, in that case.

[00:23:51] Jonna Schuster: Yeah, absolutely. And that, that tends to be a very common one that people that resonates with people's experiences, especially [00:24:00] the internal experience of like a, a word comes to mind just out of the blue. You just aren't, you're not expecting it, and it maybe sounds like perhaps something you might have said to yourself, but sometimes it's a surprise, something you would never think to yourself.

And that's where it gets a little tricky because sometimes we might think, "Oh, that's just my own cognition kicking in, and that's myself thinking of what I want to hear." And so there's, there is a little bit of a process that we have to engage in with discernment, but I think even considering the fact that God could speak through these manners is our, is the best starting point to open ourselves up to hearing from Him what He wants to say, and we can pursue further from there.

[00:24:41] Jim Jansen: Right. I mean, just knowing He loves us and He is willing to accommodate Himself to our language, to our, you know, the movie clips in, in our, in our head, that He's willing to come to us and get down on our level to make sure that we can hear Him, that we can [00:25:00] connect.

[00:25:00] Jonna Schuster: Yeah.

[00:25:01] Jim Jansen: Yeah. I love that.

[00:25:02] Jonna Schuster: Thomas Aquinas had this phrase that was kind of circulating among the philosophers and theologians at his time that was the Latin is what I capture in the book, but it essentially says that whatever is received is received in the mode of the receiver. So if we think about God speaking to us, he's not gonna speak to us in a foreign language that we don't comprehend.

That's not going to serve anything in building relationship with each other. So if I were to say something to you in Latin, you're not going to understand me. So that's being delivered in a, a mode other than the mode of the receiver, which your language would be English. So when we lean upon that principle, we can say that God speaks to us in a manner that we can receive.

That looks very human a lot of times. Like, "Oh, that felt like part of my human experience," but that's just it. That's the beauty of it. God, he's not afraid to lower himself to the mode of human understanding.

[00:25:53] Jim Jansen: Yeah. And you know, , we talked about this, and we could do a whole, we could have a whole podcast just on, like, how do you [00:26:00] discern God's voice and tell the difference? But I think I love how you talked about sometimes we're like, "Oh," you know, it's like, "Is that just me?" And there's a lot that needs to be considered as, you know, as you're sorting that out if you're in doubt.

But I think one of the easiest marks is when it's just a little bit surprising, right? When it's like, I would not have said that to myself. Like, the, of the things that I would say to myself, maybe, you know, self-scolding or something else, I would not have said that. And there's sometimes this surprising consoling voice that like, oh, that's the Lord.

[00:26:35] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. Yeah. I, that happens so often, and I also find that when he repeats himself, like when we're, we're leaning in to listen for an answer and it's like, "Wait, he just said that last week. Why did that come up again?" Or you're going about your day and something catches your attention that reinforces something that you heard him say the previous time.

So it's, it's kinda like he's got these ways of almost like he demonstrates over and over how much he wants to be [00:27:00] heard, wants to be understood. He's not trying to play this elusive game of, "Oh, I wonder if they can catch me." No, he wants to come to us in a manner that we can hear, 'cause this is about building relationship together.

It's not about hide-and-go-seek where he could just try to evade our pursuits. No, it's about connection.

[00:27:16] Jim Jansen: Yeah, you do see the hide-and-go-seek, , happen in the scriptures, but God is not the one who's hiding. It's Adam and Eve that, that are hiding, and he's like, "Come out, come out. Where are you? I actually know where you are, but do you know where you are?" And, ugh.

[00:27:31] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. And even if, if we do run with the analogy, it's almost like it- when you play hide and go seek with a small child, you hide behind curtains with your feet sticking out so that there's a clear way for that, like, "Oh, that's where you are," and..

[00:27:44] Jim Jansen: Oh yeah, I used to make...

[00:27:45] Jonna Schuster: The joy of the finding.

[00:27:46] Jim Jansen: Yep, I, I would m- I would purposely, you know, make noise and leave clues, yeah, so they, so they could find me. Okay, so we got two down here, right? We've got the seeing and hearing. What

else?

[00:27:58] Jonna Schuster: Feeling. [00:28:00] That's a big one for I would say especially women because we are more in tune with our emotions than men.

[00:28:04] Jim Jansen: I was is it, you know, is this both genders? I'm j- I'm just tea- I'm just

[00:28:08] Jonna Schuster: Yep. Yep. Both physical feeling and emotional feeling are ways that God could communicate to us. So physically it's very common for people to have sensations of warmth or tingling or heat or, or like a physical, like a breeze that refreshes you or your muscles physically.

[00:28:24] Jim Jansen: Yeah, just a, a lightness. It's like, oh, I feel just a little bit lighter now.

[00:28:29] Jonna Schuster: Yeah.

[00:28:30] Jim Jansen: Yeah

[00:28:31] Jonna Schuster: A little bit lighter, and sometimes the, the converse, feeling a weightiness in, like you enter a chapel and it's like, "Oh, something important is here." This like, like burden that's like not bad, but just significant. So physicality is a way that God can communicate through, and then our emotions as well.

You know, the fruits of the Spirit include things like peace, joy. We could experience things like jubilation, things like even tears, some kind of swelling up of an emotional experience. We [00:29:00] might not even have the words for what we're experiencing, but there's an emotive thing that's kind of bubbling up in us.

And I, I find that that's in addition to what you named about, "Oh, I, I got this image in my mind and I'm just gonna dismiss it 'cause what, that doesn't seem very holy or from God," I think emotions are very quickly dismissed as well because we think, "Oh, this is just me reacting to something," versus, "Is God speaking to me through this?

Is He showing up through this right now?"

[00:29:28] Jim Jansen: Yeah, I, I, you know, as you're saying that, as particularly the tears thing kinda comes to mind. So I mean, for some of us, it depends, right? You know, like kinda stoic German or whatever your, your, your kinda ethnic ancestry is. There are some cultures where showing emotion isn't comfortable. It doesn't feel safe.

It's not, But like St. Ignatius of Loyola, you know, in the spiritual exercise talks about tears as a gift from the Lord and a sign of his consolation, that, that he is at [00:30:00] work that he's speaking. So that's a huge one, which depending on, again, on your, on your experience, your background tears may not feel safe or comfortable, but times that I've been in a spiritual direction role or a kind of a mentoring role, tears are a godsend for me.

I know it's like, "Okay, now I can see the Lord is at work in this person," and it's often a confirmation for me that the person that I'm guiding is, is truly hearing from the Lord.

[00:30:27] Jonna Schuster: Yeah.

[00:30:28] Jim Jansen: 'Cause it's a telltale sign of His, of His work.

[00:30:31] Jonna Schuster: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I've even had people ask the question quite commonly, actually, "Well, Jonna, these are all very kind of positive-sounding emotions, like you're moved to tears and you are experiencing a deep peace, but is there room for any negative emotions in here? Because I, I sometimes have things like anger come to the surface, things like that."

And I, I would say definitely there is room for those sort of, I think, those emotions we might tend to label as negative. [00:31:00] But the way that I see it is oftentimes we could, we could probably relate to the experience of if we've had a really hard day or it's been a really rough season, we've just had one thing after another after another, we're carrying these burdens and we're holding it together for the sake of our friends and our family and our loved ones, and then we get into the presence of someone who's like, "Hey, how are you?"

And you've got ... They, they are giving you their full attention, a listening ear, and suddenly all of the grief comes pouring out, all of the pain comes pouring out, all of the anger because you're in the presence of a safe person, and your heart feels the freedom to let the walls come down and for things to come out.

And I, I feel like that's very often the case with the Lord in prayer, that we, if we view God as a safe person and we truly go into prayer expecting that He's there waiting for us with a listening ear and He's ready to speak to us, sometimes those walls come down from our hearts, and whatever is in our hearts comes out, and [00:32:00] we're processing it in the presence of the Lord.

And so sometimes those negative emotions are simply an indicator that we are in the presence of God. We're in a safe place. Our, our ... We are processing the things that we've been carrying. We're laying it before the Lord, and it's not something that we have to try to shut down necessarily. It's just be aware that this is a way that God can show up for us.

[00:32:21] Jim Jansen: Well, we don't need to shut it down, and actually we shouldn't shut it down. Now again, there's a time and a place and a way to be angry with the Lord, but as you're talking, I'm thinking about the Psalms of Lament, right? So I'll, I'll throw a couple of them out there, but like Psalm 130, Psalm 6.

I've been in Psalm 4 lately, Psalm 38, Psalm 10. Just, just a handful of these Psalms where the authors are... Like there, there's this Holy Spirit-inspired lament. It's a pour o- It's a pouring out of grief, of a [00:33:00] righteous anger a frustration. And God not only, like, can handle it, but often there's something true.

And not that our anger is per- You know, human anger is, is, is never perfectly righteous, but neither is our love. You know, neither is our joy. And so to be able to pour out our anger and our frustration in and with the Lord. For those of us who, like, anger wasn't a safe emotion, man, the Psalms of Lament are a literally h- a godsend to, to teach us how to grieve and how to be angry in a holy way.

[00:33:39] Jonna Schuster: Yes. Ah, I love that. I love the way you articulated that. And, and to me, what that really is coming down to is being vulnerable with the Lord, being authentic with the Lord, and that's, that's the whole point of prayer, isn't it? Is just to be together, to spend time together, to know one another deeply. [00:34:00] If, if we let our walls down with the Lord and show him what's inside, and it comes out messy and ugly, that's fine because it's authentic and it's showing him.

It's like l- inviting him in.

[00:34:10] Jim Jansen: He knew anyway.

[00:34:12] Jonna Schuster: Exactly, you knew. But we're not performing for him anymore.

[00:34:16] Jim Jansen: If you say this, but one of the mantras we often use as we're kinda teaching people to pray. I say we, you know, just, you know, friends, associates, mentors, you know, that's like y- the test of your prayer is honesty and consistency.

[00:34:30] Jonna Schuster: Mm.

[00:34:30] Jim Jansen: , That like you're being honest about your thoughts, your feelings, your desires and then consistently showing up with those. That's, that's the, that's the gold of prayer. Sometimes we may not recognize how he's speaking to us. Fine. We can grow in that. But we can, we can almost always be honest if we let ourselves.

So, okay, John, we've got one more. That's the [00:35:00] thinking. Talk about that

[00:35:01] Jonna Schuster: Yes. The language of thinking, I like to think of it as sort of a, an experience of having some kind of comprehensive idea or thought or insight that you receive from the Lord. Beyond just simply hearing a word or a phrase or a sentence, there's kind of a fleshed out idea that comes to mind. So this could be something in the area of you're reflecting on one of the mysteries of the rosary and you, like the Lord just kind of takes you away into thought and you're ruminating on these beautiful ideas that perhaps are new to you and the Lord's kind of pulling back the veil and helping you comprehend things that you couldn't before.

I also see very practical application here with seeking the Lord's input for ideas to solve problems in our lives. Like...

[00:35:47] Jim Jansen: yeah. Like he's that, like he's that kind of friend. You know, it's so funny. We wanna run to AI or to, you know, a professional and r- and God bless those. And if you need a professional, you know, I don't know how often [00:36:00] God gives legal advice. But, but to like, but to ask the Lord for like, "Lord, what should I do? What's my first step? How do I think about this?" He he's a smart guy. He has something to say.

[00:36:13] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. Why are we leaning just on our own human wisdom when we have access to the divine wisdom of the Lord? We can invite that.

[00:36:21] Jim Jansen: That's good prayer, to converse with the Lord about the problem that's haunting me. You know, it's like, I mean, how weird would it be if my kids come to me as a dad and I'm like, "No, no, no, no. I don't wanna hear, you know, about this problem that's weighing on you. I wanna talk about dad's favorite subject again."

[00:36:41] Jonna Schuster: Yep.

[00:36:42] Jim Jansen: "No, I wanna hear what's on your heart, and, and I want to speak into that."

[00:36:46] Jonna Schuster: Yes. Yes. I love stories that I've been picking up along the way of people who have just developed this habit of inviting God's input into pretty much anything. They're just open and ready to receive from the Holy Spirit, [00:37:00] and one of my recent favorites is a little bit more whimsical, I guess you could say. I was in Kansas City visiting the Museum of BBQ, as one does when they are in Kansas City.

Gonna eat barbecue, go to the museum about it. And I was reading through... You know, they've got all of these placards describing, "This is what you can expect in the sauce in, like, the North Carolina, South Carolina area. This is how it differs in Kansas." And so it's like this whole history, and then stories about who originated certain sauces.

Like, who, who was behind this? How did they come up with that idea? There was one sauce that was created by a minister, I think somewhere in the South, if I'm not mistaken, and he basically got the idea because he had a dream and-- in which he felt like God was giving him ingredients to put into a barbecue sauce.

So when he woke up, he got into the kitchen, and he started putting those ingredients together, and he created this sauce that today is still being sold on the [00:38:00] shelves. It's like--

[00:38:01] Jim Jansen: Oh, that is fantastic. I love that.

[00:38:02] Jonna Schuster: I joke with my friends about it. We're like, "I need to taste this godly barbecue sauce. What is this?" But that's, like, the sky is the limit with how much we're welcome to invite God to speak into the things that are important to us.

Like, this is-- I, I'm not sure. I can't remember his circumstances, but this was very-- a very practical, helpful thing for his community. I'm sure it earned...

[00:38:25] Jim Jansen: Parish barbecue coming up, and he's like, "I need a sauce." No, but I mean, all of this is like resting on this conviction that he loves us and that he's infinite. You know, he's not like, "Hey, sorry Jim, little distracted. I don't know if you noticed like the bad stuff going on in the world." You know, like he is handling global peace and massively important issues in the church, and my plan for the day, you know, and my barbecue sauce, right?

What, you know, what's for, what's [00:39:00] for dinner?

[00:39:01] Jonna Schuster: Exactly. Exactly.

[00:39:03] Jim Jansen: Oh. All right. Let's take a quick 30 seconds to highlight a tool built for the leaders listening today.

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Okay, Let's pick up right where we left off.

. John, I wanna, I wanna give you a chance here to talk about some of the obstacles because it's like, okay, great, God speaks, and there's these kind of clusters of, you know, groupings of all the different myriad ways that God speaks. You can kind of group them together in these four languages. But what gets in the way?

I mean, just [00:40:00] real practical.

[00:40:01] Jonna Schuster: Hmm. I see most commonly one of the largest obstacles that people face is actually a mindset that they carry that they are not able to hear from God or that God, for one reason or another, either they are not worthy to hear from God, they're not holy enough to hear from God, it's not meant for them, it's meant for other people, or that God is not a God who speaks, that He-- if He does, He reserves it for a special time, a special place, a special person, in an emergency crisis situation only.

And so there's sort of this theological hurdle or a mental hurdle that needs to be overcome sometimes to just really embrace that truth that He does care that deeply about us. And there's, there are so many places that you can go to kinda retrain your mind to think that way. Just seeing again that the Good Shepherd, read through that with fresh eyes and it, it really does confront some of those I guess concerns that people often [00:41:00] have or disqualifications that they put on themselves.

There are so many examples throughout saint history of people who hear from God and talk about it like it's nothing, like it's just another day. And so...

[00:41:12] Jim Jansen: Yeah, and for many of them, when God did speak in a much more dramatic way, it was to help them become an ambassador for these kinda sneaky little heresies that would be like, "He doesn't really like you." Yes, he's all-powerful and we're not, and yes, we're sinful and he's all holy, but the subtle heresies that would keep people away, distanced you know, he would then reveal himself.

I'm thinking, like, St. Margaret Mary Alacoque. You know, he's, you know, reveals himself as the Sacred Heart, and he's like, "Do you see this heart? I'm on fire with love for these people. Don't let them stay away."

[00:41:58] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. [00:42:00] Yeah. And that actually touches on another obstacle that I see very often. Well, I guess the second most common obstacle is people actually just don't know how to listen. It's just a simple, how do I do it? Which we can remedy that, so not, no big deal. Like, we'll get over that hurdle together. But then a- another, like probably the third most common obstacle I see is people might carry the belief that, yeah, it's possible.

Yeah, I'm created to hear from God. He wants to speak to me. I understand that there are ways that I can choose to listen, but I'm not sure that I want to hear what he has to say.

[00:42:33] Jim Jansen: Mm.

[00:42:34] Jonna Schuster: I think that hits on a heart issue as well with

[00:42:36] Jim Jansen: Mm-hmm

[00:42:37] Jonna Schuster: I, I'm not convinced that God actually likes me or loves me or looks at me with kindness and compassion.

We might expect God to come in with a voice of condemnation or shame, or that he's only interested in highlighting our failures and our faults. And who wants to go into prayer as though it's another performance review? Like, no one, no one would find that [00:43:00] life-giving. And if that's our expectation, of course, we're going to avoid approaching God in this manner.

And so that's sometimes a hurdle that also needs to be addressed

[00:43:09] Jim Jansen: Well, and I wanna, let's, let's just camp out there for a little bit 'cause I can, I can just in transparency talk about my own experience. You know, I'll, I'll often use some form of Lectio Divina. So I like to use classic Lectio. I like to also use the RAP method where you in- intersperse journaling into the Lectio process.

But that process is often very helpful for me 'cause I'm a fast thinker. My mind runs a million miles an hour, and so I will sometimes come into prayer, and for those who are familiar with the process, multiple kind of readings of a scripture passage. I'll come into prayer, and my first reading I'll be like, "Oh, yep, this is what the Lord is saying.

This is the..." You know, I'll have this kind of quick response which is, sad to say a little bit harsh, a little bit condemning. And as I continue in the prayer [00:44:00] process, what the Lord is actually saying is so much more loving, so much more encouraging than the first read that my mind jumps to.

And I'm like, "Oh, why did I imagine that would be what the Lord is saying?" But there's something about, for me, the faithfulness to the slow unfolding process that helps me really hear the Lord and begin, this might be a great place in the conversation, to distinguish between my thoughts and His voice.

[00:44:32] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. Yeah, I agree w- with what you said in that experience of many times our first thought is something that's a little more condemning. We kinda jump to, "Well, this is the obvious lesson I'm supposed to take away from this."

[00:44:45] Jim Jansen: Oh, oh, I should pray more. This is means Jesus s- Jesus says I should pray. I'm sorry, sorry. I'll be, I'll d- I'll be, I'll get up earlier. And he's like, "Dit, dit, dit. I love talking to you." I was like, "Oh, you do? Oh.

[00:44:58] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. It's like a [00:45:00] reflex, and it makes me wonder who, who have we heard speak to us in that manner in our life, in this fallen human world?

Whose voice is actually the voice that we're hearing? Like, does that sound like, you know, a parent that has scolded us in the past? Does that sound like a particularly harsh homily we once heard? A teacher? Yeah. Yeah, typically authority figures that have been harsh or condemning that we've embraced along the way as like this is what love looks like, this is tough love.

We just naturally ascribe those things to the Lord. And in my perspective, I feel like there... I- if you fall into this struggle, there could need to be maybe some attention put towards recapturing the idea of God's goodness, reconnecting with how good He really is, and even what's our definition of good.

You know, there's tough love, but before tough love could have a- an appropriate place in our lives, tender love has to be present first. We have to be convinced that God actually truly cares about our [00:46:00] wellbeing, is kind towards us. And so reconnecting with that I think there's a little bit of inner healing and deliverance that might need to take place in order to hear God come through a little more clearly.

[00:46:11] Jim Jansen: Yeah. Well, and it may be a little obvious, like even in the moments where he is offering tough love, there's a kindness to it. There's a gentleness to it. There's a lovingness to it. And the, especially those of us who have come to him in prayer, the, he doesn't need to yell 'cause we've come to him in prayer.

He doesn't need to startle us to get our attention. You know, that's, that's another voice. That's likely the enemy or, you know, old tapes playing in our head. When we've come to him in prayer even if he has to correct us, there's a gentleness and a kindness and a love and acceptance that we should be able to feel in that

[00:46:53] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. He never leaves the posture of love towards us, even when there's some kind of corrective direction that we need to [00:47:00] receive from Him. Absolutely.

[00:47:01] Jim Jansen: Okay, Jonna, I wanna give you a chance 'cause we've been talking about mental prayer, quiet time, you know, contemplative prayer, Lectio, just , different traditions, different names for this. Talk about how,, this type of listening prayer intersects with devotions.

And I sometimes feel like devotions can be this beautiful gateway and a, a contemplative experience, and sometimes they can be a tool to help us feel like we're checking the prayer box, but not actually having an uncomfortable conversation.

Can you talk about , the role , that devotions, I'm thinking like Rosary, Chaplet of Divine Mercy, litanies, et cetera. Like, , you know, what role do those play with this type of listening prayer? How do they intersect?

[00:47:48] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. I, I resonated with exactly what you just said. I do feel like those are very powerful ways for us to engage in prayer, and crucial. I do think that developing a habit of [00:48:00] speaking to God, sharing with God, sitting down and spending dedicated time with Him, those are all part and parcel with what a prayer life, a healthy prayer life ought to look like.

But I think there's a complementarity that is offered through the addition of listening prayer to those habits. So if we were to think about prayer as conversation with God, that's a, a very common definition that is used, prayer as conversation with God.

[00:48:26] Jim Jansen: All the saints. Yep

[00:48:27] Jonna Schuster: Yep, I see devotionals as one-sided prayer.

We are speaking to God. We are sharing things with Him. We're offering Him our praise, our petitions, our voice, our worship. We're o- where it's output. But listening prayer is two-way. It's both offering the output and inviting the input. We are speaking and listening to the Lord. And I think the value of having this addition to our prayer life is kind [00:49:00] of, as you said, if our prayer with the Lord remains one-sided, if it's just output, I'm just offering things to the Lord, there's a tendency to kind of fall into a rut a little bit with the checklist of, oh, I have to do this and this and this and this, and it becomes, at least in my experience gone unchecked.

It turns into perfectionism, performance. Like, did I do enough this week? Did I get through all of my prayer things? Did I demonstrate to God that I am, that I love Him? Did I, you know, how many times did I mess up? It's kind of this self-evaluation thing that is the sort of natural outgrowth that eventually turns prayer into something that is pointing back at us versus keeping our gaze on the Lord.

So if prayer is two-way- We are inviting God to speak back to us, and then it's about conversation. It's about what is God saying to me? The focus then gets shifted to Him. And so that's where relationship builds. [00:50:00] So I think we do need both, but it's in the, the back and forth dialogue where we actually can build intimacy.

Kind of like if you and I had a standing coffee date once a month, and we were just catching up, and every time we got together, I filled the entire conversation with talking and then looked at my watch and said, "Okay, gotta go. See you next time. This was great." I'd feel fabulous. Like, I get to talk and be heard, and this was wonderful, but then you would go away feeling unsatisfied because we are limited in the level of intimacy we can reach when conversation remains one-sided.

And so that's what's happening in prayer, is if, if our dialogue with the Lord is one-sided, there's a cap to the intimacy that we'll have with Him.

[00:50:45] Jim Jansen: Mm-hmm. Okay. Jonna , I wanna give you a chance to talk about the difference this makes. And it can be your own life, it can be other people that you've mentored and seen grow in prayer. But just talk a little bit about the [00:51:00] transformation that listening prayer works in us

[00:51:04] Jonna Schuster: Yeah. That what I just kind of described as the struggle that I found myself in, that was a huge area that shifted for me. I went from thinking that I needed to perform for the Lord and be perfect for the Lord, and if I wasn't perfect, get to confession. Like, it all felt like I was really striving, and I got wrapped up in, "I have to do this all.

There's so much on the line." And it, it became very um, my heart got removed from the process, and I lost sight of the, the goal. And so learning listening prayer actually removed that piece of, "Oh, I need to do something, I need to perform," and it shifted it into, "My goal here is connection with the Lord." And then what that did for my experience of prayer, it went from a place of anxiety and performance to a place of rest, a place of exploration with the Lord.

What does He have to say about this? What might He want to show me today? [00:52:00] It became a place where I could again, develop greater intimacy, but walk away refreshed, replenished, rejuvenated, and inspired. And that actually paved the way for me to develop a relationship with the Lord that became collaborative in everything that I did.

So the, the time of prayer itself got transformed into a beautiful place of rest and rejuvenation, but then as an outgrowth of that, once I started bringing these sorts of skills, listening skills, into my mission, it was like, "Oh, now I know how to invite the Holy Spirit into everything that I do," whether it's creating something or speaking to someone, writing a talk, or even just listening to someone and offering them counsel and wisdom.

I have an ear on Heaven. I've got an ear on the Lord's voice speaking to me.

[00:52:50] Jim Jansen: It's always a three-way conversation when Jonna shows up, you know? 'Cause you're always listening to the... Yeah. I mean, it's kinda like, okay, I have a scheduled, conversation [00:53:00] with the Lord, and now I'm starting to text him or chat with him all throughout the day.

[00:53:06] Jonna Schuster: Yes.

[00:53:07] Jim Jansen: Oh, that's, that's so good. Okay. Jonna, w- we've both experienced this. I think we've seen communities that have been transformed by this type of commitment to prayer. W- we've seen certainly individual lives, dozens and dozens of people. What would the church in the United States look like, let's just say over the next, you know, 10 years, if this kind of prayer became common?

[00:53:33] Jonna Schuster: Hmm. I love this question so much. In a sense, I think it's already starting to become common. I think there's a, a certain language that's entering our culture, our, our Catholic culture about hearing God's voice. What did God say to you? This is how God is speaking to me. And so I think that's beautiful, and I see us kind of on this trajectory for this to become normal.

And so I think if this were to, in fact, become [00:54:00] like the air we breathe, like at the University of Illinois, I think what we'll end up seeing is just various forms of beautiful fruit growing out of this, both individually, I think there's so much room for people as individuals to get set free from a lot of the things that they've been struggling with or carrying because they're inviting God to come and meet them in those places.

That was my experience. I also see it as a means for almost a rebalancing of the head and the heart. I think for a long time, kind of historically, our emphasis in prayer and even in the faith has been on the intellect, where we feel like learning about God is the highest thing, and now not just learning about Him, but knowing Him personally, I think has, is entering the picture.

And I think if those two can come side by side, I think there's a sort of integral human fulfillment that can take place from that. We can operate from a place of full integration living, [00:55:00] living holistically. And then I think even beyond what can transform within a singular individual in that manner, I think recapturing this in community in the Church, I think the outgrowth of that would be new initiatives, new endeavors, new creativity, new art, new beauty, new things that are released into the world because, again, there's-- this is just the beginning.

Learning to hear God speak to us is the beginning of a lifelong relationship of collaboration with Him. And so when we're engaging with the world, solving problems, trying to bring, you know, the kingdom of God more manifest here, there are ways that God can...

[00:55:42] Jim Jansen: You know, like, 'cause I, I'm thinking about some people are listening like, "Oh, no, more stuff." It's like, no, no, no, easier, because God is your co-laborer, right? You're, you're collaborating with him. I mean, I love... I agree with everything you said. I think this is essential. I mean, you look at history, not that I'm [00:56:00] like, but, like, all of the great renewals in the church have been an interior renewal, right?

That has been the fuel for, for, for this, a, a renewal of contemplation, of prayer, of love of scripture, God's word speaking to us. Like, all of those things are, are kinda like the conditions, and I think we're desperate for it. You know? I mean, I, I kinda live in the parish renewal space, and there's a, in many now who are trying to foster renewal, evangelization in parish, there's a franticness because we see the decline, we see the contraction, and those things are all true, and it makes things harder.

But it can drive us to try and rely on our own efforts rather than, "Jesus, what do we do about this? Lord, how do w- what, what's our first step? Where do we go? What..." You know, I love the way Father Ricardo t- talk, talks about this is, like, yeah, Jesus doesn't just want you to evangelize. [00:57:00] He actually has a plan for you to do it.

He has, he has counsel and accompaniment all the way through the process.

[00:57:08] Jonna Schuster: Yeah.

[00:57:09] Jim Jansen: Oh.

[00:57:09] Jonna Schuster: I think there are two dimensions through which ease can enter the picture. I think number one, ease and evangelization of what's the heck? Like, Lord, what, what's the way to this, this person's heart? What's the way to this community's heart? And I've definitely made use of that in, in my professional life.

Like, Lord, I need to write content for social media. What do I say? What do you wanna say to these people? Or Lord, I'm designing this event. What do they need? And so there's... It's like removing the burden from our own faculties, our own strength, and leaning on the strength of the Lord to get it done, to get the heavy lifting done.

And so that's s- powerhouse for evangelization.

[00:57:47] Jim Jansen: Mm-hmm.

[00:57:48] Jonna Schuster: But I also think the level of evangelization um, we're basically trying to give people an exposure and an encounter with the [00:58:00] heart of God. And if we are living a life of intimacy with the Lord, connection with the Lord, if this becomes like the air we breathe, kinda like at U of I, where everyone's just kinda talking about it like it's the norm, you are passively witnessing what a life in the Spirit looks like, what a life of connectivity with the Lord looks like, and it is compelling.

And so you don't have to put effort into how do I explain to someone what's available? They're seeing you walking it out, and that itself is a testimony. And so I think there's an ease that comes with that as well. You're, you're on the receiving end of wonderful blessings and, and connection with the Lord, intimacy, and then that's visible to other people and evangelizing without you even having to try.

[00:58:46] Jim Jansen: Yeah, I mean, it's like, it's, it's in us, it's been our experience, and it just starts to radiate from us. Jonna, our time has totally flown here. I wanna give you a last word, just for those who are listening who are like, [00:59:00] "Ah, I want this, I want this, I, I want to listen. I, I want this kind of deeper connection. I'm not quite sure where to begin." What do you wanna say to them?

[00:59:13] Jonna Schuster: My advice is always go where God is. Double down on what He's already doing. He's already active in your life. And so if you're encountering Him in some measure somewhere, double down on that and ask for more. If listening prayer is the thing that He's stirring in your heart, grab a copy of my book, talk to someone that you see is already living it out, and ask them, "How'd you do it?"

Tips for venturing down that road, I would say embrace and foster that hunger, that desire. It is a good thing, it's a beautiful thing, and it's a way that God can draw us to Him. And then pay attention. What's capturing your eye? What's moving your heart? And consider that God might be already speaking to you through those things, and that's just the start of a conversation. You can engage with Him [01:00:00] further from there.

[01:00:01] Jim Jansen: Oh, that's so good. Jonna, thank you. For those who wanna pick up a copy of the book, where do they find it?

[01:00:08] Jonna Schuster: They can find it on Amazon. You can also find a copy on my website, catholicrevivalministries.com

[01:00:15] Jim Jansen: All right, we're gonna link to that. And we've got for our international listeners we'll give you a link that you can go directly to find it as well. So we'll put a link to both of those, and people can find you at catholicrevivalministries.com.

Jonna, thank you. All right, everybody. You know somebody who needs to hear this conversation 'cause you're thinking of someone who needs to hear God's voice, right? Who's like, "Hey, no, no, no, no, it's actually okay that God sometimes speaks in movie clips," whatever. Whatever touched you, when you get to your destination, when it is safe for you to use your hands and to share this out, right, you're done walking the dog, whatever share this out with a friend.

Thanks, [01:01:00] everybody.