You're listening to a podcast on Catholic Saints.

This podcast is produced by the Augustine Institute, an Apostolate helping Catholics understand,

live, and share their faith.

My name is Dr. Ben Acres, and I'm the Executive Director of Formed.

Joining me today as a friend and colleague, Dr. Scott Heffelfinger, who is a professor here at the

Augustine Institute Graduate School of Theology. And we're going to be talking about St. John of the

cross. 1542 to 1591 are his dates. Good friend of St. Teresa Vavala, not only a saint of the church

and reformer of the Carmelite Order for the male branch,

but also a doctor of the church. So his wisdom teaches us about how to live as a saint,

how to live as a Christian in the world today. Before we get to our conversation about John

of the Cross, this great teacher of prayer, this great mystical doctor, I want to thank you for your support of the Augustine Institute. I want to thank you for your support of the

Augustine Institute. I want to thank you for your support of Form, and that's done so through the

Mission Circle. So thank you for your monthly donations. Your donations help us be able to have

conversations like this that are timely and liturgically minded as well. So thank you for that.

Scott, we talked about John of the Cross being a saint and a doctor of the church. And I know that you have a great devotion to John.

Before we get into some of the biographical details of John's life,

just a quick take on what attracted you to John, or how did you first get introduced to John of the Cross?

That's a great question.

I mean, I think, first of all, it was a question, a challenge.

I think many people face, and that was what didn't attract me, meaning he can be presented sometimes as very demanding, because he was very demanding

with himself. He can be presented as having a great kind of austerity and just, you know,

sort of beyond normal human capacities, which is true. But that can be kind of off-putting

...