Fr. Brendan McGuire - Podcasts that Break open the Word of God
Aug 22, 2026 · 9 min · 6 segments
This last week we had a great opportunity as a parish and school staff to go away on a day of retreat. It was wonderful just to be away and to spend a day in prayer, holding up the whole year ahead…
Brendan McGuireHost
This last week, we had the great opportunity as a parish and school staff to go away on a day of retreat.
It was wonderful just to be away and to spend a day in prayer, kind of holding up the whole year ahead.
And I introduced the theme for the year, Flourish, Cultivating Dignity Through Presence.
And I introduced two books that we're going to use for the year to kind of understand and break this open, this theme.
And that is the new encyclical by Pope Leo, Magnifica Humanitas, and then a book from an author called Daniel Coyle called Flourish.
So I divided the retreat into three movements, and they're really powerful movements.
The first movement is that of presence, of how important presence is in our life.
You've heard me talk about this many times before, how important that we are present to each other.
And what I mean by that is, of course, that we genuinely are present, that we have no devices, no distractions.
That's still probably most important at the times when we are struggling or illness or even dying, is that when we're present, especially silent presence, it's really, really powerful.
This last week, we had the great opportunity as a parish and school staff to go away on a day of retreat.
It was wonderful just to be away and to spend a day in prayer, kind of holding up the whole year ahead.
And I introduced the theme for the year, Flourish, Cultivating Dignity Through Presence.
And I introduced two books that we're going to use for the year to kind of understand and break this open, this theme.
And that is the new encyclical by Pope Leo, Magnifica Humanitas, and then a book from an author called Daniel Coyle called Flourish.
So I divided the retreat into three movements, and they're really powerful movements.
The first movement is that of presence, of how important presence is in our life.
You've heard me talk about this many times before, how important that we are present to each other.
And what I mean by that is, of course, that we genuinely are present, that we have no devices, no distractions.
That's still probably most important at the times when we are struggling or illness or even dying, is that when we're present, especially silent presence, it's really, really powerful.
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