Episode 4

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0:00:05 > 0:00:11I think there is something about Armagh as a place of ancient history

0:00:11 > 0:00:13that gives it a very, very special atmosphere.

0:00:15 > 0:00:18So you have the whole Celtic history here,

0:00:18 > 0:00:22and then you have the Ireland of saints and scholars.

0:00:22 > 0:00:24There's accretions of history in this place,

0:00:24 > 0:00:29and I think it has a very, very special atmosphere because of that.

0:00:30 > 0:00:34Even from when I was a child, I loved this city

0:00:34 > 0:00:37because I felt it was a very sacred place to live.

0:00:37 > 0:00:43And I love it when visitors come and say, "Wow! What a place!"

0:01:21 > 0:01:25The discipline of sitting down and of saying our word,

0:01:25 > 0:01:30our mantra, this is a difficult thing to understand when you begin.

0:01:32 > 0:01:36We want to follow our thoughts, to come to new insights.

0:01:36 > 0:01:40But when you meditate, you must transcend all thoughts

0:01:40 > 0:01:48and be silent, still and humble in the depths of your own being.

0:01:49 > 0:01:53Since 2007, I've been working part-time

0:01:53 > 0:01:57as director of the Centre for Celtic Spirituality here in Armagh,

0:01:57 > 0:01:59and we're now based at The Navan Centre,

0:01:59 > 0:02:01which is about three miles out of the city.

0:02:01 > 0:02:06- ALL:- May this group be a true spiritual home for the seeker...

0:02:06 > 0:02:10'It was envisaged, at the very start, to be an inter-church

0:02:10 > 0:02:16'ministry because Celtic spirituality is bigger than any one denomination.

0:02:16 > 0:02:20'Because it's pre-Reformation, it's pre-East/West split,

0:02:20 > 0:02:24'it's looking right back at the very first church in these islands.'

0:02:24 > 0:02:26No matter what denomination you belong to,

0:02:26 > 0:02:30if you trace your roots back, I would say, Celtic spirituality

0:02:30 > 0:02:33or Celtic Christianity, is the roots for us all.

0:02:36 > 0:02:40THEY SING: "The Lord Is My Shepherd"

0:02:46 > 0:02:51I think sometimes the preaching ministry is always associated

0:02:51 > 0:02:54with sermons, and with preaching from a pulpit

0:02:54 > 0:02:57and with theology, when actually what speaks louder

0:02:57 > 0:03:00than anything is life, it's people's lives.

0:03:00 > 0:03:02When you look at the life of Christ,

0:03:02 > 0:03:04he wasn't preaching three-point sermons.

0:03:04 > 0:03:08He drew his stories out of the ordinary life of people.

0:03:10 > 0:03:14Ultimately, all of us have a vocation to live,

0:03:14 > 0:03:19and, to me, ultimately that vocation is to become who you are,

0:03:19 > 0:03:23to become yourself, to celebrate the person that God has made you.

0:03:23 > 0:03:26And I think those are the things that are most important,

0:03:26 > 0:03:29rather than preaching long sermons.

0:03:41 > 0:03:43PREACHER SAYS PRAYER

0:03:47 > 0:03:50I think, for us all, as the laity within the church,

0:03:50 > 0:03:54we are the church, we have a huge role to play in the church.

0:03:54 > 0:03:58We have a role in the office of Christ to proclaim a faith

0:03:58 > 0:04:00to live our faith out daily,

0:04:00 > 0:04:03and to share the good news of Christ with everyone.

0:04:06 > 0:04:08Faith is in your heart.

0:04:08 > 0:04:12It's something that I could not live without today.

0:04:12 > 0:04:15And I struggle in my head to think how I lived without it for so long.

0:04:23 > 0:04:26When your faith is very strong, you always have moments of doubt,

0:04:26 > 0:04:30you always have moments of pain, just like our Lord had in Gethsemane.

0:04:30 > 0:04:34One thing that we have to realise is that God knows a lot more than us

0:04:34 > 0:04:35and he's in control, we're not.

0:04:41 > 0:04:46Knowing, really, that I'm not alone, that Jesus and my holy mother

0:04:46 > 0:04:50are with me day and night is the thing that keeps me going today.

0:04:54 > 0:04:57I mean, life would be very empty if there was nothing after it.

0:04:57 > 0:04:59If we said that it finishes and it ends here,

0:04:59 > 0:05:01what was the point of it in the first place?

0:05:04 > 0:05:09I can't live thinking that this is the be-all and the end-all of everything.

0:05:21 > 0:05:24Everybody believes, nobody wants to believe that their loved one's

0:05:24 > 0:05:29going to be taken to a graveyard, put in a grave and that's it, end of story.

0:05:29 > 0:05:33Especially in Ireland, most people want to believe that, in some form

0:05:33 > 0:05:39or other, that they'll meet up with this person again in the next life.

0:05:47 > 0:05:50Some people that would be a long time in the funeral business,

0:05:50 > 0:05:54you would often hear them saying that it's not a job, it's vocational.

0:05:54 > 0:05:56I always had an interest in it.

0:05:56 > 0:05:58Now what that interest is, I don't know,

0:05:58 > 0:06:01would it be similar to what a priest would get a calling?

0:06:01 > 0:06:03I really don't know.

0:06:03 > 0:06:09Personally, I get a lot of satisfaction because you deal

0:06:09 > 0:06:12with death, you deal with the deceased,

0:06:12 > 0:06:14but you mostly deal with the living.

0:06:14 > 0:06:17Through that, I see that people of faith, good strong faith,

0:06:17 > 0:06:23accept that this is not really the end, but the beginning.

0:06:33 > 0:06:39Like most Catholics in Ireland, your faith basically begins at home.

0:06:39 > 0:06:41My father, the old thing with him years ago was

0:06:41 > 0:06:43when everybody was bedded down at night,

0:06:43 > 0:06:46the next minute the bedroom door opened and you got this skite of water

0:06:46 > 0:06:49out over the top of you, he blessed everybody in the house at night.

0:06:49 > 0:06:54And then later on in life, there comes then the stage of the teenage years,

0:06:54 > 0:06:57and, as far as I was concerned, me and God were done with

0:06:57 > 0:07:01because I was doomed anyway. That's the way I felt.

0:07:01 > 0:07:03And then I got to a stage in my life where

0:07:03 > 0:07:09I had to do something about the problem that had come about.

0:07:09 > 0:07:11Alcoholism or whatever.

0:07:13 > 0:07:15I was 22 years old then.

0:07:15 > 0:07:20I quit drinking and I started my spiritual route.

0:07:53 > 0:07:56My mother would have been a very strong woman, very strong faith.

0:07:56 > 0:07:59Throughout many crises in her own life, faith would have helped her through.

0:08:01 > 0:08:03Myself and my brother, my father,

0:08:03 > 0:08:06would have somewhat shied away from it.

0:08:06 > 0:08:09Up until 2008, it was maybe 15, 20 years

0:08:09 > 0:08:14since I would have been at Mass or went to chapel.

0:08:19 > 0:08:23I suppose in the run-up to 2008, the world was a wonderful place.

0:08:23 > 0:08:26Everything in my life would have been going very well.

0:08:28 > 0:08:32But the financial collapse, and because of some personal

0:08:32 > 0:08:34health issues, I found I had hit,

0:08:34 > 0:08:37I would say, emotionally rock bottom,

0:08:37 > 0:08:40and I found myself in a very difficult place.

0:08:47 > 0:08:51I was in London. My company was up for an award.

0:08:51 > 0:08:53And standing alone in London,

0:08:53 > 0:08:56just before heading to the awards later on that evening, I suddenly

0:08:56 > 0:09:02found myself probably the lowest, probably as low as you could get.

0:09:05 > 0:09:07I needed to find somewhere quiet,

0:09:07 > 0:09:09somewhere where I could gather my thoughts,

0:09:09 > 0:09:11and the only place that I could think of at that time

0:09:11 > 0:09:13that was quiet and in the middle of London

0:09:13 > 0:09:16was probably going to be a church or a chapel.

0:09:16 > 0:09:19And, lo and behold, after 20 years away from the church,

0:09:19 > 0:09:21here I was running back to it.

0:09:25 > 0:09:29I got to Westminster Cathedral and the door closed behind me,

0:09:29 > 0:09:31complete silence, and I looked over at the right-hand side

0:09:31 > 0:09:34and I could see a line of people.

0:09:34 > 0:09:37I couldn't figure out why everybody was queuing up.

0:09:37 > 0:09:40And then I walked over and it dawned on me

0:09:40 > 0:09:42that they were queuing for confession.

0:09:45 > 0:09:48I got very emotional when I joined the queue, and I must have been

0:09:48 > 0:09:51very emotional because people kept letting me skip the queue.

0:09:51 > 0:09:53They must've thought I had a lot to tell the priest.

0:09:53 > 0:09:56I obviously told the priest how long I'd been away from the church,

0:09:56 > 0:10:01and it was the next four words that he said that changed my life,

0:10:01 > 0:10:04and that was, "Welcome back, my son."

0:10:07 > 0:10:10It's very hard to describe how I felt at that moment,

0:10:10 > 0:10:14but I felt as if the weight of the world had lifted off my shoulders.

0:10:14 > 0:10:19I phoned my mother and my mother had always been on to me for years

0:10:19 > 0:10:22to keep going to a place called Medjugorje,

0:10:22 > 0:10:26which, of course, I rebuked, but I found myself saying to her

0:10:26 > 0:10:28that I had to get to Medjugorje quick.

0:10:28 > 0:10:32She said she'd phone me back and she phoned me back within the hour,

0:10:32 > 0:10:35and she told me that I was on the next flight out.

0:11:22 > 0:11:25I landed in Medjugorje thinking to myself, "What am I doing here?"

0:11:27 > 0:11:31Exceptionally nervous about it, exceptionally worried about it,

0:11:31 > 0:11:33and towards the end of the first day,

0:11:33 > 0:11:37I met a wonderful guy from Belfast called Sean Ellis.

0:11:37 > 0:11:39Sean said to me, he says, "Come with me."

0:11:39 > 0:11:41He says, "I'll show you the real Medjugorje."

0:11:46 > 0:11:49For me, it was a whole different experience about faith...

0:11:50 > 0:11:55..a very one-to-one experience, meeting different priests,

0:11:55 > 0:11:57and other men, I would say, like myself,

0:11:57 > 0:12:00who were there for all sorts of different reasons.

0:12:02 > 0:12:06You meet so many people there that have so many painful stories

0:12:06 > 0:12:10to tell you, that have had lives that have been shattered.

0:12:10 > 0:12:14To sit and listen to the outpouring of sadness from them people,

0:12:14 > 0:12:18and of grief, but also to listen to the outpouring of faith,

0:12:18 > 0:12:22as to why they're actually there, and how they have got their lives

0:12:22 > 0:12:27back together after different tragedies, really is eye-opening.

0:12:29 > 0:12:32Throughout the rest of the week, I suddenly come to realise that

0:12:32 > 0:12:35I didn't have problems in my life.

0:12:35 > 0:12:39All I had was really just little puzzles that I had to solve.

0:12:40 > 0:12:45For me, it was a journey that every day got better and better

0:12:45 > 0:12:49until the last day I was here, when I didn't actually want to go home.

0:12:49 > 0:12:50So in the space of seven days,

0:12:50 > 0:12:55I changed from basically being a non-believer to not wanting to leave.

0:13:06 > 0:13:11I think all of us are heavily influenced by parents and school

0:13:11 > 0:13:16and church, more than we realise when we reflect back on it in later years.

0:13:16 > 0:13:21All of that is the kind of parameter of your religious identity.

0:13:23 > 0:13:29I was lucky enough to be brought up in a really good Christian home.

0:13:29 > 0:13:32We were sort of in the middle of nowhere. There were four of us children,

0:13:32 > 0:13:36and we had a nice childhood, running about the fields and just being part

0:13:36 > 0:13:40of nature, and that was a very strong influence on me as well, I think.

0:13:48 > 0:13:51One of the things about Celtic spirituality is that

0:13:51 > 0:13:55the salvation that Christ came to bring is not just about human beings,

0:13:55 > 0:13:57so it's about the whole Earth,

0:13:57 > 0:14:01the whole of creation singing the glory of God.

0:14:02 > 0:14:06We're living in an age where we have a big environmental crisis,

0:14:06 > 0:14:09and again, this is something Celtic spirituality would speak to.

0:14:09 > 0:14:14When we open the Bible, at the very first chapter of Genesis,

0:14:14 > 0:14:18we read that everything that is, all things,

0:14:18 > 0:14:21have come from this sacred, divine source.

0:14:24 > 0:14:27God said, "It is good, it is good, it is good."

0:14:27 > 0:14:30It was repeated five times in that first chapter of Genesis,

0:14:30 > 0:14:33that God looked at all he had made and said, "It is good."

0:14:33 > 0:14:39When we look out at nature and creation, it's like a sacrament.

0:14:39 > 0:14:44It's a visible reminder of the invisible presence of God.

0:14:44 > 0:14:48Everything is imbued with the presence of the divine

0:14:48 > 0:14:50and everything is sacred.

0:14:52 > 0:14:57Every experience, every person, is full of the presence of God,

0:14:57 > 0:15:02so that's the experience that I feel is most important to me

0:15:02 > 0:15:04about the Christian faith.

0:15:09 > 0:15:12Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed are thou

0:15:12 > 0:15:14among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.

0:15:14 > 0:15:16Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners,

0:15:16 > 0:15:19now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

0:15:19 > 0:15:21Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee...

0:15:57 > 0:16:00In the name of the father, and to the son, and to the Holy Spirit,

0:16:00 > 0:16:03as it was in the beginning, as now and ever shall be, world without end.

0:16:03 > 0:16:04Amen.

0:16:07 > 0:16:09I think, at different times in life,

0:16:09 > 0:16:13through it be the loss of a loved one, a child, a parent,

0:16:13 > 0:16:19a friend, we all experience a degree of depression.

0:16:19 > 0:16:22And of the father, the son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

0:16:22 > 0:16:25'I'd previously lost two friends to suicide

0:16:25 > 0:16:28'and I could never figure out why, and I could never figure out how.

0:16:28 > 0:16:32'But I could suddenly understand where they were.'

0:16:34 > 0:16:37'And all of a sudden you can, in life,

0:16:37 > 0:16:41'have the rug pulled from under your feet and find yourself in a very

0:16:41 > 0:16:45'difficult position in life that you cannot explain how you got there,

0:16:45 > 0:16:48'through, probably most people, it's through no fault of their own.'

0:16:49 > 0:16:53'I just needed to have time on my own

0:16:53 > 0:16:57'to think about life, going forward.

0:16:57 > 0:16:59'It's also important to step outside the world, almost,'

0:16:59 > 0:17:03and Medjugorje is a little lifeline in this world.

0:17:03 > 0:17:06I will try again to live a better life.

0:17:06 > 0:17:08Help me to always remember that love,

0:17:08 > 0:17:11Mary, my mother of our risen saviour.

0:17:11 > 0:17:15People say that Our Lady sort of called people to come to Medjugorje.

0:17:15 > 0:17:19I would have wrote it off, I suppose, initially, it's a load of old nonsense.

0:17:19 > 0:17:23But it's like most things, when you come out you have to try.

0:17:23 > 0:17:26I suppose you get to a certain stage in your life

0:17:26 > 0:17:31where you ask yourself the question, "What's it all about?" and, "What's the whole meaning to it?"

0:17:31 > 0:17:34Only he is your peace, your saviour.

0:17:34 > 0:17:38Therefore, little children, do not seek comfort in material things.

0:17:38 > 0:17:40I found myself, as being alcoholic,

0:17:40 > 0:17:43I found that the small sin was a big thing.

0:17:43 > 0:17:46It got into my head and it kind of multiplied.

0:17:47 > 0:17:50You feel that you are beyond any form of redemption.

0:17:51 > 0:17:54When you didn't have your faith to fall back on,

0:17:54 > 0:17:57all these things were building up. You had no outlet.

0:17:57 > 0:18:00You had no way of getting rid of that there.

0:18:02 > 0:18:05And I find with the confession end of things,

0:18:05 > 0:18:08that it takes away all those pressures.

0:18:17 > 0:18:19PRAYER IN LATIN

0:18:19 > 0:18:25I can off-load, and each time you do it, you find that you are more

0:18:25 > 0:18:29aware of your pitfalls, you work a little bit harder on it.

0:18:29 > 0:18:32It's a spiritual progress.

0:18:33 > 0:18:36One of my problems would be, I wanted to be a wee bit

0:18:36 > 0:18:40of a perfectionist so I would always give myself a bit of a hard time.

0:18:40 > 0:18:44But I've come to see that there's nobody perfect and, I suppose,

0:18:44 > 0:18:46to a certain degree, I thought I was perfect.

0:18:46 > 0:18:48And I tell you one thing in life,

0:18:48 > 0:18:52you get a fair battering emotionally if you go down that route.

0:18:52 > 0:18:56But I don't give myself a hard time about that because within

0:18:56 > 0:19:01our faith we are given the necessary tools to deal with those things.

0:19:08 > 0:19:12I don't think there's any human being goes through this life without

0:19:12 > 0:19:16going through some experience of loss or grief or suffering.

0:19:16 > 0:19:20And it is through those that I feel the Christian faith has something

0:19:20 > 0:19:22very important to say to that.

0:19:22 > 0:19:25The high point, I suppose you could say, of the Christian year is

0:19:25 > 0:19:30the crucifixion, followed, in two days' time, by the resurrection.

0:19:30 > 0:19:35It's that call to hope, that out of the suffering comes new life.

0:19:40 > 0:19:44I grew up in Armagh during, I suppose,

0:19:44 > 0:19:48the worst of our current history, during those years of the Troubles.

0:19:48 > 0:19:52I think, when you cease to trust, then fear takes over

0:19:52 > 0:19:55and we lived in that kind of very apartheid way.

0:19:58 > 0:20:00For me,

0:20:00 > 0:20:06the ministry became very focused on being a ministry of reconciliation.

0:20:06 > 0:20:09It's not just about loving people who love you.

0:20:09 > 0:20:13It's about loving the folk that you might find very different from you.

0:20:15 > 0:20:19But I think there's also a pathway of reconciliation with yourself.

0:20:19 > 0:20:20In some ways, I think

0:20:20 > 0:20:23in Northern Ireland we have a way to go on that because reconciliation

0:20:23 > 0:20:28with yourself is about being comfortable with who you are,

0:20:28 > 0:20:32saying, "This is who God made me to be and it's OK to be me."

0:20:36 > 0:20:37We're all different, and for me,

0:20:37 > 0:20:41I dream quite a lot and dreams have been very important in my life.

0:20:41 > 0:20:46But I had a dream some years ago and I think it very much

0:20:46 > 0:20:51changed my approach to how I saw my ministry as well.

0:20:57 > 0:21:00I was walking down big, wide steps into a structure.

0:21:00 > 0:21:05And at the bottom of the steps, there was all this dust and dirt.

0:21:05 > 0:21:07I swept and swept away all this dirt.

0:21:07 > 0:21:14And as I swept it away, this amazing floor began to be revealed,

0:21:14 > 0:21:18in beautiful colours, with great symmetry and beauty.

0:21:18 > 0:21:24The feeling was of huge joy and peace and healing.

0:21:31 > 0:21:34I began to realise that that floor that

0:21:34 > 0:21:39I unveiled was actually my soul, my own soul.

0:21:39 > 0:21:43And it gets covered up with the dust and the dirt of living,

0:21:43 > 0:21:44because stuff happens.

0:21:47 > 0:21:51And about a year after that, we had a clergy conference.

0:21:51 > 0:21:54A man came to speak, to address the conference who was actually

0:21:54 > 0:21:57a psychotherapist from County Cork.

0:21:57 > 0:22:01I told him the dream, and he said that my interpretation was good.

0:22:01 > 0:22:06And he said, "Even better than that, you're lucky that all you needed

0:22:06 > 0:22:09"was a broom to sweep away a bit of dust and dirt."

0:22:09 > 0:22:13He said for many of the people that he worked with

0:22:13 > 0:22:17as a psychotherapist, they had been through such abuse in their lives

0:22:17 > 0:22:23that their sacred, authentic souls were covered up with concrete.

0:22:23 > 0:22:27He said, "In my work, it takes me a long, long time to go

0:22:27 > 0:22:32"through that concrete to unveil the beauty of their souls."

0:22:34 > 0:22:37"It's all in there, waiting to be revealed

0:22:37 > 0:22:41"and it doesn't matter how late in life you choose to reveal it."

0:22:41 > 0:22:44He said, "It's all in there, intact."

0:22:44 > 0:22:47CHURCH BELLS PEAL

0:23:02 > 0:23:04I suppose, as an individual,

0:23:04 > 0:23:06I wouldn't have been completely content within myself -

0:23:06 > 0:23:11I suppose, a restless sort of a soul, and a certain emptiness.

0:23:12 > 0:23:19We get thrown off course by lack of love in relationships, and death.

0:23:19 > 0:23:21I had two sisters that died

0:23:21 > 0:23:24within four days of one another in their 50s.

0:23:24 > 0:23:26At the time when it happened,

0:23:26 > 0:23:30and the practical aspects of being in the funeral business,

0:23:30 > 0:23:33I initially was going to hand that over to someone else to do.

0:23:33 > 0:23:36And then I thought to myself, well, the girls would probably have said,

0:23:36 > 0:23:38"Who would do it better than yourself?"

0:23:40 > 0:23:44I carried that out. And I suppose, at the time, it kept me fairly busy.

0:23:44 > 0:23:49But I mean, the emotion that people go through with death,

0:23:49 > 0:23:51one of them can be anger.

0:23:51 > 0:23:53And at any times in my life

0:23:53 > 0:23:59whenever I felt angry with the girls was because I wasn't praying.

0:23:59 > 0:24:02I wasn't praying to God, I was giving out.

0:24:02 > 0:24:05And I had no right to give out because life starts

0:24:05 > 0:24:09with your birth, and it ends with your death in this world.

0:24:16 > 0:24:18And you look outside of yourself,

0:24:18 > 0:24:22the external pleasures of the world which...

0:24:22 > 0:24:27once you try them for a while, they seem like your friend

0:24:27 > 0:24:31at the start, and they end up becoming your greatest enemy.

0:24:35 > 0:24:39I am a three-dimensional creature - mental, physical and spiritual -

0:24:39 > 0:24:42and I wasn't tapping in on the spirit.

0:24:46 > 0:24:50I would start my day, every day, with a few prayers.

0:24:50 > 0:24:53Then I found, since I started that process that,

0:24:53 > 0:24:57I received many graces, and I suppose the most important grace

0:24:57 > 0:25:02is a bit of peace and contentment within yourself.

0:25:15 > 0:25:20Coming back from Medjugorje was an experience of mixed emotions -

0:25:20 > 0:25:23wanting to tell the world about the wonderful experience,

0:25:23 > 0:25:25but I was exceptionally hesitant

0:25:25 > 0:25:28because of the negativity that I knew I would receive.

0:25:30 > 0:25:35Friends-wise, I suppose it was a shock to probably see a change.

0:25:35 > 0:25:39All of a sudden, you're back at Mass, you've joined different faith groups.

0:25:39 > 0:25:44With most true friends, they were very comfortable with that.

0:25:44 > 0:25:48Some others did not take to it at all.

0:25:50 > 0:25:54Religion is such a difficult subject to approach with anyone,

0:25:54 > 0:25:57and your faith is a very difficult subject to talk about with anyone.

0:25:57 > 0:25:59I think it's more so difficult for men.

0:26:01 > 0:26:05I think the so-called un-coolness of it,

0:26:05 > 0:26:07the macho element of not going to Mass.

0:26:07 > 0:26:11In Ireland here, we seem to be very ashamed of it, almost.

0:26:11 > 0:26:15So it's a difficult transition to come back from Medjugorje,

0:26:15 > 0:26:18and wanting to embrace the church again, so much.

0:26:18 > 0:26:21And yet still be faced with such negativity

0:26:21 > 0:26:24here in Ireland about faith and the church.

0:26:30 > 0:26:32When I came home, one of the first things that I realised was that

0:26:32 > 0:26:35I actually didn't know a whole lot about my own faith.

0:26:36 > 0:26:42I had seen a course advertised which was a degree course

0:26:42 > 0:26:46and it was back to school, aged 39, for me.

0:26:46 > 0:26:48MALE CHOIR SINGS

0:26:56 > 0:26:59We know so little about our faith. We are so ignorant of our faith.

0:26:59 > 0:27:03We make judgments on other people's faiths.

0:27:03 > 0:27:07The thing that makes it tick for me, really, is the void being filled that

0:27:07 > 0:27:11has always been there, the questions, the "why?" questions being answered.

0:27:20 > 0:27:25Faith is a belief in the unseen.

0:27:25 > 0:27:28There's some people that require the seeing of things

0:27:28 > 0:27:32and flashing lights and all that goes along with that there.

0:27:32 > 0:27:34I believe the miracles happen.

0:27:34 > 0:27:38For me, the miracle with my own personal addiction with alcohol

0:27:38 > 0:27:40and the obsession that I had with it.

0:27:40 > 0:27:46And when I asked God for help with it, it was removed.

0:27:53 > 0:27:57"Behold, I stand at the door and knock.

0:27:57 > 0:28:01"If anyone hears my voice and opens the door,

0:28:01 > 0:28:04"I will come in and sup with them and they with me."

0:28:04 > 0:28:08That's a lovely image of the divine, the sacred presence,

0:28:08 > 0:28:11waiting at the door of our hearts.

0:28:14 > 0:28:18The spiritual search that we all have, the questions about

0:28:18 > 0:28:23meaning, about life and all that, that is the knock at our hearts.

0:28:23 > 0:28:28And when we open up to realising the sacredness of who we are,

0:28:28 > 0:28:31that's when we invite in that sacred presence.