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“Do Not Be Afraid … You Are My Dearest Friends”*

Toxic Fear is perhaps life’s greatest hostage-taker. One psychiatrist calls it a “disease of the imagination.” Fear and disabling Worry can start off like a tiny seed and, watered by thoughts that emphasize worst-case scenarios, grow into a virus-like fiend that ends up dominating our mental state. It then holds us back from our ability to enjoy nearly every dimension of our life: our talents, our work, our love, our play, and our approach to a life in the Spirit.

This website is dedicated to three major Defense Systems that can be effective in helping us overcome the insidious nature of fear, as well as other mental health demons like depression. It will also focus on how we can better live out our lives free of those persistent foragers that roam throughout the corners of our minds… relentlessly haunting us.

Those three Defense Systems are: Spirituality, Psychology and Addiction. All three of these provide newly developed means of delving into the root causes of fear and depression and other mental health disorders, and assisting people in finding improved pathways to freedom, joy, and peace.

“Do not be afraid” – a phrase found 365 times in Sacred Scripture!

*Luke 12:32; translation found in The Bible in Contemporary Language, Eugene H. Peterson

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Past Posts

mm Ted

Looking Back at 2015: The Church

Dec 23, 2015

A fine analysis of the highlights of 2015 in the Catholic Church http://ncronline.org/blogs/distinctly-catholic/looking-back-2015-church

mm Ted

Inventing a Christian America: The Myth of the Religious Founding

Dec 23, 2015

Book review featured in the National Catholic Reporter. http://ncronline.org/books/2015/12/origin-myth-christian-america  

mm Ted

The quiet impact of Obama’s Christian faith

Dec 23, 2015

From the Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2015/12/22/obama-faith/

mm Ted

Francis exhorts Vatican prelates to be more mature, recognize ‘smallness’ of work

Dec 21, 2015

An article posted in the National Catholic Reporter http://ncronline.org/news/vatican/francis-exhorts-vatican-prelates-be-more-mature-recognize-smallness-work

mm Ted

Crux: Pope Francis was in his element when he opened the ‘Door of Charity’ for the poor

Dec 19, 2015

Article found in Crux, sister publication of the Boston Globe. http://www.cruxnow.com/church/2015/12/19/pope-francis-was-in-his-element-when-he-opened-the-door-of-charity-for-the-poor/

mm Ted

Pope celebrates his 79th birthday as popular as ever — but with criticism

Dec 19, 2015

Article found in Crux, sister publication of the Boston Globe. http://www.cruxnow.com/church/2015/12/17/pope-celebrates-his-79th-birthday-as-popular-as-ever-but-with-criticism/

mm Ted

‘Run, Hide, Fight’ Is Not How Our Brains Work

Dec 19, 2015

Fascinating article found in the New York Times, by Joseph Ledoux. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/20/opinion/sunday/run-hide-fight-is-not-how-our-brains-work.html?emc=eta1&_r=0

mm Ted

Fourth Sunday of Advent

Dec 17, 2015

 “Blessed are you among women” Lk. 1:40 “Mary: The Most Powerful Woman in the World.” These are not the words of some Catholic newspaper, or some otherwise strongly religious...