Jerry, like our kids can feel the difference when we're attuned to them and when they know that we're not just all about the results and about the behavior, but it's about the being with piece too.

Yeah.

And I think that it's occurring to me.

I'm recalling when I used to do a lot more family.

I don't really do almost any family counseling now.

But when I was, I would, you know, coach families to get together and create kind of their family values and create like what are the family expectations and what are the.

consequences and having a discussion when it's not because someone has done something wrong.

And it is a bit harder to like walk into this territory of like, how do we help them have consciences that can become informed themselves with help of, you know, scripture, tradition, parents, all of that.

He's a marriage and family therapist with his practice Transfiguration Counseling based out of Atlanta, Georgia, and he also just moved to Rome to be a counselor and human formation programming consultant at the North American Pontifical College.

Good morning, and welcome back to Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts, and I'm glad to be with you this morning.

You know, reflecting on these readings, we've got Paul on one hand who seems so agitated and urgent, and he's defending the integrity of the gospels to the Galatians, and then we also have the Good Samaritan, uh, parable.

It's, you know, a beloved story that Jesus told.

And it might seem at first like they're really different texts, but I think they're asking the same underlying question, and that is, whose voice do you actually trust? And who gets to be within the circle of care? And I think for you, exile parts, carrying shame or fear, old wounds, I mean, I think that question is, is kind of everything.

So let's just start for a moment and reflect on what Paul says, uh, to the Galatians.

He almost sounds wounded himself.

That's with Sophia Institute Press, and it's linked below.

So, but I'm curious, like, what are you zeroing in on, dear Dr. Jerry? What is grabbing your attention?

Yeah, I mean, I am intrigued here.

I mean, these readings are kind of intense.

And the idea of this vineyard that produces wild grapes, or in the psalm where it says, like, why have you broken down its walls? Or, you know, in the Gospels, the landowner whose servants are beaten and killed.

You know, and even the son who's thrown out and murdered.

Yeah.

you know and paul saying like have no anxiety at all like so i could see where like exiles would be like freaked out by these readings it doesn't sound comforting at all but i actually think like I'm hoping like as we look closer, we'll see the opposite because, you know, I don't think our exiles are the wild grapes.

in a way that would maximize its potential.

of

that.

Yeah.

it kind of speaks to secure attachment, you know, because it says after the phrase in the Psalms you mentioned, it says, in your kindness, remember me because of your goodness.

And so all the passages come together and it's like, if you break something, you know, yes, there could be a correction or you might need to like buy a new vase if you broke the vase or something.

But it doesn't change my love for you.

I'm not going to, I'm not going to, take my love away, withdraw my love, and give you a permanent character indictment for whatever happened.

There are a lot of pretentious like scribes and Pharisees.

Mm-hmm

... and all of the stuff that is involved there, is it Catholic? [laughs] You know, I was like, how is this consistent with the faith? Uh, 'cause I see it working, so it must be, if it's true, but how? And so- I, I did a deep dive into exploring, um, you know, the richness of our faith and how it relates to this view of inner multiplicity, and what I discovered was amazing.

And what it, it took me, yeah, into the Bible, a lot of Liturgies of the Heart, I'm, like, looking at scripture primarily, um, and not just proof texts, but like, "Hey, what does Ephesians say? What does Corinthians say? What does," you know, these gospel stories.

And so it was really going deep.

But it also led me into really exploring another passion of mine, which is the sort of the saints, you know, the r- the, the saints and the whole tradition of our Catholic faith.

And so it took me into, like, looking especially at the mystical tradition.

Like, all these great saints that nobody knows...

Well said.

Today we're joined by Dr. Jerry Creed, a marriage and family therapist.

hey welcome it's good to be with you today on this feast of saint matthew apostle and evangelist let's take a moment i like to invite you to take a breath you know maybe relax notice your physical body a little bit as we enter into this reflection Especially here because this is a powerful gospel passage, I think, that can easily get kind of, some aspects of it could get missed.

So we know it says, Jesus passed by and he saw Matthew sitting at the customs post.

He said to him, follow me.

And he got up and followed him.

So let's sit with that.

Maybe we don't realize or we forget just how despised tax collectors were in that world.

To

That's what that responsorial psalm brought back to me.

Yeah, I mean, the Lord is gracious and merciful.

And to me, the line, slow to anger, great kindness.

Like, that's just balm to my exiles' hearts, honestly.

It's really saying, you know, I care about you.

Well, all these readings are kind of saying that.

I care about you more than I care about your performance.

My own distorted perceptions of what love is and who you are.

And some things in here might be frightening in some ways to our Exiles.

You know, this is a really interesting reading in the gospel.

I'm going to just jump right over to the gospel.

Jump to the gospel.

All right, here we go.

Because it's the one where Peter says, Lord, if my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive? As many as seven times, right? And so we get the seven times seven, which really means there's no...

There's no limit.

Uh, that's an important reason why we need this integration that we at souls and hearts are, are really invested in because otherwise, We can be doing these things kind of like piecemeal, you know, in an incomplete way.

When you penned those words, when you offered that as a title for today's episode, what was on your heart? What were you feeling, thinking? What did you want to bring to us?

Yeah, I think I want to really focus today on marriage.

And I feel like the bond of the marital bond is the centerpiece, obviously, foundation piece of any family.

And that relationship is paramount.

I know that The reality of a lot of families, maybe for the husband or the wife, is that they prioritize things like their children or their jobs as the most important thing they're focused on.

When in reality, it needs to other than God, of course, it needs to be.

each other in terms of the marital couple because if that foundation is strong and that's a model for the whole family right that attachment bond and that love is a model for the whole family and it needs to be a priority right and we can get into more why but the heart is this sacramental marriage that hopefully we'll get into today I'm excited because I'm a marriage and family therapist.

Yeah.

Today's guest presenter is Dr. Jerry Crete, a marriage and family therapist with Transfiguration Counseling Practice in Atlanta.

Hey there, it's good to be with you today, this Monday of the 23rd week in Ordinary Time.

Well, today's gospel is, you know, a pretty powerful one.

Jesus is in the synagogue, and there's a man there with a withered hand.

And it says that the scribes and Pharisees are watching really closely so that they can, quote, to see if he would cure on the Sabbath so they might discover a reason to accuse him.

So there's something important here to notice the man with the withered hand has become without his consent, a test case.

He's a trap.

other conflicts.

Right.

And so we naturally vow, you know, I'll never let that happen again or I won't let anybody hurt me again.

and we harden for a god here to be saying like harden not your hearts is powerful to me because it's saying you don't have to protect yourself from me you're safe enough here to soften Which I think is a very powerful thing for any of us, and we have to trust that, right? But it's if you hear the voice, if you hear my voice.

And it just makes me think of, it's not in these readings, but when Jesus talks about... sheep right and and being the shepherd and that the sheep know his voice right right they respond to him and so like to me it's just like wow like if i hear his voice i am no i know i can soften i can relax i can move to i can let take off my armor for a moment and be curious what would it be like right in this moment to just receive

But how can this extend to our exiles? This idea of receptivity, responsiveness, not hardening our hearts as we listen to his voice.

well and to me that takes us into the gospels a little bit right because in the gospels here in matthew there's a there's a few different components that jumped out at me and one is you know someone has harmed you that you were to go to them so there's that piece and then there's another piece that is When two or three are gathered in my name, I'm with you.

Right.

So, of course, I'm thinking they're like a little bit parts.

Well,

take a moment, settle in, take a deep breath, allow yourself to arrive.

Just inviting you to let your shoulders drop and breathe a little bit.

We have a good reading today.

You know, Paul opens his letter to the Corinthians with something I find so disarming and so counter-cultural and healing.

I did not come to you with sublimity of words or of wisdom I came to you in weakness and fear and much trembling Right, so let's take another breath.

Can we say with that, this is St. Paul.

was enough.

But nevertheless, there might have been some real vulnerability there.

Well, I can imagine.

And of course, Jesus says this to Peter.

He doesn't talk this way to every single person he encounters.

So he is very, what's beautiful about Jesus is that he says the thing that each person needs for some reason in the way that they need it.

Right.

As a counselor, I know there are some people that I need to give them a kick in the butt.

just this idea of being duped and duping and i just want to hear what you have to say about it

May our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who has loved us and given us everlasting encouragement in good hope through his grace, encourage your hearts and strengthen them.

He's a clinical psychologist based out of Atlanta, Georgia.

Hey there, welcome.

This is Tuesday of the 21st week in ordinary time.

And you know, in this reading, St. Paul opens his letter to the Thessalonians with something pretty relatable.

He says, "Don't be shaken out of your mind suddenly.

Don't be alarmed by rumors, by supposed prophecy, by letters claiming that the day of the Lord is already here." You know, I think there's something tender in this, you know, that there's some part of that early community, maybe many parts or people, that had been activated into some kind of panic.

You know, rumors that are spreading, some claim the end was imminent, and there was some kind of wave of alarm throughout the whole community.

So there's fear and anger there.

I'll tell you the way that I receive that same passage might be different, obviously, than you.

But I hear in this and in many of the Psalms, not that God is the one saying, you know, come to me all lowly and come to me all forsaken, but that it is parts that themselves maybe finally, like an exile who finally surfaces.

And the first thing out of that exile's mouth at being somewhat exposed is is don't hurt me.

Wow.

Don't forsake me.

Don't...

This is how you pray.

Today's guest presenter is Dr. Jerry Crete, a marriage and family therapist based out of Atlanta, Georgia.

Well, hello there.

It's good to be with you.

This is today the Memorial of St. Bernard, who is a doctor of the church.

I actually want to let you know, like, this particular saint, St. Bernard, is very dear to me.

You may know from some of my other writings that his writings on love, especially his sermons on the Song of Songs, have shaped how much I understand the soul's relationship with God.

So before we even get to the readings, just indulge me for a moment.

something that can feel again.

He's a clinical psychologist with his own practice, Transfiguration Counseling, based in Atlanta.

Hey there, it is so good to be with you.

Let's step into the gospel reading today.

This is the rich young man.

It's interesting because, you know, this young man runs up to Jesus.

A few other gospel accounts, it says that he ran or knelt.

There's an eagerness, right? He's really hungry.

His most recent movie review is on Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey, and you can find it linked in the description of today's show.

I've got a feeling that we're going to get to something in these readings.

Oh, for sure, for sure.

Well, I think the obvious one that leaps out, of course, is the gospel, right? And this is that Canaanite woman that comes asking for Jesus' help, and he seems to refuse, right? He initially refuses.

And so I immediately thought, wow, isn't that the experience of exiles, right? Dismissed, insulted, ignored.

And yet, interestingly, in this case, this woman persists.

I mean, she continues.

Isn't that amazing, right? Like when every part of you has been told you don't belong and you're not enough and the table wasn't set for you, for this woman to still come forward and persist.

And I think it's an amazing way that that our response can be a choice to love or a choice to flee or a choice to hide or a choice to reject or a choice to stay on the fence for a while or whatever it is, you know? Yeah.

And so I'm curious if there was something in this, in these readings from this 19th Sunday in ordinary time that landed with your exiles in some particular way.

Yeah, I think for me, what landed the most was maybe the story of Elijah here.

And I think we sometimes expect to find God in giant moments, you know, some emotional surge during worship or some thunderclap conversion, you know.

And I think what we hear is that it often shows up somewhere else, some quiet, smaller, easier to miss kind of thing.

And so I have to wonder here, just understanding our exiles, like maybe that's the message for them, especially the quiet little messages, right? That here's a prophet kind of hiding in a cave.

I don't know, maybe he's exhausted, he's tired, you know, and yet God is speaking to him in this quiet little way, like possibly speaking to his exiles or in some way burning parts.

And so I thought that was kind of beautiful.

And it's like the perspective of Peter as Christ is bending down to reach below the surface to grab him.

welcome back to scripter for your inner outcasts today is august 3rd 2026 monday of the 18th week in ordinary time today's guest presenter is dr jerry crete one of our co-founders of souls and hearts and a clinical psychologist at transfiguration counseling based in atlanta georgia

Hey there, it's so good to be with you today.

Wherever you're listening from, whether you're in your car or on your way to work or maybe sipping your coffee, I'm glad to be with you today.

I'm sitting with this reading about Jesus and Peter especially, and we did look at this when it showed up as a Sunday reading earlier this year, but I want to just slow down for a moment and just kind of Notice that Jesus sent his disciples out without him.

You know, they get into the boat and they go ahead while he goes up to the mountain alone to pray.

And there's something about that detail that kind of strikes me this morning.

First of all, even Jesus needed solitude with the Father.

dangerous.

I'm just really curious about how we are all reacting to what the church offers us in the lectionary today.

Yeah.

Well, my first thought about this is that there is a hunger within us, and especially, and I'm speaking to exiles here, outcasts, inner outcasts, there is a hunger that food doesn't quite touch.

Right.

Right? You know what I'm talking about.

There's a hunger that...

You know, still there even after a full meal or a successful day, right? We're talking, even though there's loaves and fishes and different talks about talking about food, in these passages altogether, there's something way deeper.

You know, our Lord could have created this ex nihilo, right, out of nothing, but he chose to work with what we had and to bring a multiplicity and a fruitfulness out of that that is just mind-blowing.

so we are here together again so good to be with you dr jerry so good to be with all of you in the audience and all of your parts for our sharing our coming together around the readings from the 17th sunday in ordinary time through a parts and systems lens

So excited to be with you, too.

And these are, in my mind, very powerful readings in many ways.

Do you want me to just launch into it? Just launch into it.

Let's go for it.

I want to speak directly to the exiles listening, whatever inner outcasts are listening.

What if the treasure buried in the field is you? Right? Not the polished, presentable...

Tell us about that, Dr. Cherry, if you will.

Today's guest presenter is Dr. Jerry Crete, one of the co-founders of our parent organization, Souls and Hearts, and and a clinical psychologist with his own private practice called Transfiguration Counseling based out of Atlanta, Georgia.

Hey there, good to be with you today.

We have a reading from Micah and it starts with this stunning image.

Oh my people, what have I done to you? Or how have I wearied you? Answer me.

This is rather remarkable.

God calling the mountains and the hills as witnesses.

You know, in this line, this stunning line, what have I done to you? I want to just sit for a moment with the emotional texture of what God is saying here.

There is almost...

Jerry.

Yeah, I mean, I've been sitting with this parable, right, of the weeds and the wheat, right? Mm-hmm.

And this idea that there are weeds in this garden or in this whatever field.

And he actually says not to pull out the weeds just yet.

Eventually, they do get burned and thrown away and burned.

But...

And I really was wondering, because we so often look at the inner world as a field.

So those are some of my reflections on that.

yep.

But you know what was jumping out at me in this was insane in Romans where Paul says, all creation is groaning, groaning in labor pains, waiting for something.

And I think that groaning is our deepest, most wounded parts, our exiles especially, who are groaning.

And so I think there is an acknowledgement of that pain.

And instead, maybe for our parts that are listening that may have felt like what you're saying, like, oh, it's being dismissed, maybe what they need to hear here is that Yeah, it is bad.

And it is like labor pains.

Other than my kidney stone, I understand.

So I was just making the connection for the very first time that where the seed is landing is in our hearts.