MFP354: How Can I Have a Relationship with God?

Messy Family Podcast : Catholic Conversations on Marriage and Family

Mike and Alicia Hernon : Catholic Marriage Parent and Family

Parenting, Religion & Spirituality, Christianity, Kids & Family

4.9 • 841 Ratings

🗓️ 20 October 2025

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

"Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person,

which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction." - Pope Benedict XVI

Summary

Every one of us is on a journey towards eternity. Our life here on earth, our vocation, our careers, our relationships are all just ways that we can grow in our knowledge of ourselves and of God. But many of us struggle to learn how we can stretch ourselves and prioritize our own spiritual growth. In this podcast, we share our own stories of conversation moments and how our spiritual practices have changed and matured over the years. We hope this will give you some inspiration and ideas of how you can come closer to God our Loving Father and see that none of us are ever "done". We are all on a journey towards our eternal home.

Key Takeaways

To be a good mother or father you must first know who you are as a beloved son or daughter.
Do things that put yourself in that place to receive from God such as mass, regular confession, and staying in a state of grace.
Be honest about where you are in your season of life. Adopt spiritual practices accordingly
Our perception of God is colored by our experience of our parents. Do we see God as having high or low expectations of us? Do we see God giving us high or low support to achieve those expectations? The most healthy relationship has high expectations and high support to achieve them.
Recognize that we are constantly growing and maturing in our relationship with God and others. Growth takes time!

Couple Discussion Questions

What is our perception of God and the Church? Where are we right now in our relationship with Him?
How can we as spouses help each other grow in our relationship with both?

Resources

Go here to purchase these books! https://amzn.to/3O6ce8V

Transcript

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0:00.0	Family, all in this together.
0:08.2	Family, we're taking a chance.
0:10.8	Family, like birds of a feather.
0:13.3	Family, get off my shoes and dance.
0:15.4	Hey, we are Mike and Alicia Hernin.
0:17.4	We have 10 kids and grandkids too, and we are here for every parent. Because we are on a
0:22.2	mission to empower moms and dads to embrace their sacred calling. So join the conversation.
0:28.0	Welcome to the podcast. We're glad you joined us today. We're going to talk about something
0:36.1	that I think it is really fundamental to who we are individually, but also just human beings.
0:41.8	Definitely brought us to this point. Yeah, we wouldn't be where we are today. And it's something
0:46.7	that we get asked about often. And you were saying, and I forgot about this, is that we talk about
0:52.6	this more of our relationship
0:54.3	with God is what we're talking about. How do we grow and deepen our relationship with God?
0:58.8	What does that even mean? And we talk about that a lot when we go out to parishes and that we lead,
1:04.8	you know, kind of married, whether it be on the getaways or on the kind of marriage retreats or parenting retreats that we do in parishes.
1:14.2	All of that is so important.
1:17.5	And it really comes to the heart of who we are.
1:19.3	And no matter where you are, we can always grow.
1:22.4	We can always get deeper.
1:23.4	And it actually becomes more and more fundamental, I believe, as we mature in our parenting, in our marriage, in our life in general.
1:32.9	It's something that we talk about when we go out and speak in person, but it's not something we always talk about on the podcast.
1:38.7	True.
	...

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