Welcome!

“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

Recent Posts

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  • Faith Like Falling in Love?

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Past Posts

mm Tom Carney

Discerning God’s Presence

Dec 15, 2022

I’ve adopted a practice called “Centering Prayer.” My brother, a priest in Kansas City who died in 2008, was an enthusiast and teacher of Centering Prayer but I tried...

mm Ted

Third Sunday of Advent

Dec 12, 2022

“Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the...

mm Tom Carney

In the Interest of Fairness

Dec 08, 2022

Back in October, I wrote a blog in which I was somewhat critical of evangelical Christians. I quoted an opinion piece in Rolling Stone magazine about Lance Wallnau, an...

mm Ted

Second Sunday of Advent

Dec 04, 2022

“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Mt. 3:1 These words from the Gospel of Matthew highlight the cover of a National Geographic magazine. They also scroll...

mm Tom Carney

What We Can Learn from Monks

Dec 01, 2022

My college and much of my post-graduate education was provided by Benedictine monks. For those unfamiliar with Christian monasticism, it’s an ancient form of living the gospel through a...

mm Ted

First Sunday of Advent

Nov 26, 2022

“They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; one nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again...

mm Ted

Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe

Nov 26, 2022

“This is the King of the Jews.” Lk. 33:36 During the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church adopted many of the trappings we associate with people of power in those...

mm Tom Carney

Whom To Thank?

Nov 24, 2022

I’ve developed the habit, during night prayer, to think of the people I’ve met and who have helped me during the day. They include clerks in stores, waiters, workers...