Oct 7, 2026 | Family, Featured Content, Identity, Popular, Relationships
First of three pieces on what the hobbits inherited, and what they did with it. Each stands on its own. To inherit something is a good. A house that was your grandfather’s, a name that was carried before you were born, a place at a table that was set long before...
Sep 23, 2026 | Family, Featured Content, Healing, Identity, Popular, Relationships
Last of three pieces on Denethor and his sons. The first, The Son He Loved Best, is about Boromir; the second, The Son He Could Not See, is about how his father missed Faramir. Each stands on its own. Two essays have brought me to a single question. Faramir of Gondor...
Sep 16, 2026 | Family, Featured Content, Healing, Identity, Popular, Relationships
Second of three pieces on Denethor and his sons. The first, The Son He Loved Best, is about Boromir. Each stands on its own. Denethor, son of Echthelion and Steward of Gondor, had two sons, and he failed them in different ways. He loved his elder son, Boromir, and...
Sep 10, 2026 | Family, Featured Content, Healing, Identity, Popular, Relationships
First of three pieces on Denethor and his sons. Each stands on its own. No one chooses the hands that first shape them. By the time we are old enough to have opinions about who we are becoming, a great deal of the shaping has already occurred. We are molded by a...
Jul 22, 2026 | Catholic Psychology, Dealing with loss, Faith, Featured Content, Healing, Popular, Prayer, Relationships, St. Joseph
by Dr. Gerard McNicholas A few months back I sat down with Dr. Greg Bottaro on the Being Human podcast for an episode called “Stop Preventing the Saints From Doing Their Job.” The premise was simple but, I think, quietly radical: the saints are not statues to admire...
Jul 8, 2026 | Communication, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
We all avoid. Let’s start there. We avoid far more than we realize. Just like breathing—we all breathe—but how often are we consciously aware that we’re doing it? Avoidance can be much the same way. It becomes so automatic, so woven into our daily lives,...
Mar 11, 2026 | Borderline Personality Disorder, Catholic Psychology, Dating, Relationships, Trauma
Is there someone in your life you feel like you have to walk on eggshells around? There is someone in my life who I used to treat like that. When things were really difficult, it didn’t matter what I did or how I did it, at least once a month we’d get into a fight....
Mar 4, 2026 | Catholic Psychology, Dating, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
It’s become commonplace in a romantic relationship for one person to say to the other, “I don’t know what I’d do without you!” On one hand, it’s really nice to know you’re making a difference in someone’s life. Especially someone you deeply care about. But when we...
Feb 28, 2026 | Catholic Psychology, Dating, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
You’re doing the work. You’re confronting your not-so-ideal habits. You’re naming your wounds. You’re in therapy, mentorship, spiritual direction—or maybe all three. You’re growing. And your partner isn’t. They’re staying stuck. They’re avoiding help. They’re not...
Feb 24, 2026 | Catholic Psychology, Dating, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
Five Questions Every Couple Should Ask Themselves Not all connection is good connection. Sometimes the wires run too deep – become too entangled – for the connection to be truly stable. Consider this couple: John and Rebecca have been together for two years....
Feb 18, 2026 | Anxiety, Catholic Psychology, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
Finding the line between a free gift of self and giving to regulate a deep inner anxiety. From the beginning of our spiritual formation, we’re told to follow Jesus. To imitate Him. To do what He does. We’re supposed to pick up our cross and follow after Him....
Nov 6, 2025 | Dealing with loss, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
Every November, the Church pauses our normal rhythm of life and hands us a strange but beautiful invitation: Remember death In a world that avoids silence, glorifies youth, and pretends death is far away, the Church stands apart. She looks us straight in the eye and...
Nov 3, 2025 | Catholic Mindfulness, Catholic Psychology, Communication, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
Every once in a while, someone asks:Is this trauma response coming from the brain… or the body… or the relationship? The answer is yes. We like categories. We want to know if healing is neurological or emotional, cognitive or behavioral, relational or somatic. But the...
Oct 22, 2025 | Communication, Featured Content, Popular, Relationships
When most people hear Theology of the Body, they immediately think about sex, marriage, and family life. And it’s no surprise, St. John Paul II had profound insights into these areas, and his teaching has been a lifeline for many Catholics navigating modern confusion...
Oct 16, 2025 | Communication, Featured Content, Parenting, Popular, Positive Psychology, Relationships
This week on the Being Human Podcast, Fr. Dave told a story about an interaction with his dad when he was in eighth-grade that, as a young father, deeply moved me. Fr. Dave started rattling off a fact about Pikes Peak to his dad. Engaged in the conversation, his dad...
Mar 4, 2024 | Pornography, Relationships
There are two types of pornography: physical and emotional. Let’s talk about what emotional pornography is and why it tends to target and hurt women. Sex sells Marketing in our culture is almost exclusively based on sex. We have known this for years, and...
Feb 29, 2024 | Human Dignity, Identity, Relationships
Guest blogger and CatholicPsych Institute psychotherapist, Sean Faulkner, LPC, shares what should define our identity, and what shouldn’t. God is in our identity There are many ways that we try to define ourselves. We so often seek to determine our identity...
Feb 27, 2024 | Catholic Mindfulness, Communication, Relationships
Conflict in relationships is unfortunately unavoidable. But how we get through said conflict is a skill we can try to develop. Here are my thoughts on how to get better at resolving conflict. Consider the last argument or disagreement you had with a loved one During...
