Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts

Transcript

"The disciples had forgotten to bring bread, and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. Jesus enjoined them, 'Watch out. Guard against the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.' They concluded among themselves that it was because they had no bread."

You are listening to Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts. It's February 17th, 2026, Tuesday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time. Today we are joined by clinical psychologist Dr. Peter Malinoski, the co-founder and president of Souls and Hearts and host of our sister podcast, Interior Integration for Catholics.

It is so good to be with you again. It is Fat Tuesday, Tuesday of the Sixth Week of Ordinary Time. Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday and our Gospel is from Mark. And I'm going to be looking at chapter 8, verses 14 to 16. "The disciples had forgotten to bring bread and they had only one loaf with them in the boat. Jesus enjoined them, 'Watch out. Guard against the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.' They concluded among themselves that it was because they had no bread." Okay. So perception. We're going to talk a little bit about perception here today, especially the perception of parts, especially perceptions of you exiles. The deeply troubled author Anais Nin wrote, "We don't see things as they are. We see them as we are." Now, I don't know exactly what was going on in the apostles' systems. I know that they had managers and firefighters and they had exiles, and I bet they were preoccupied about not having enough to eat, right. Exile parts could have gotten up, could have gotten active in them around, we forgot to bring bread. And there's a bunch of them. Like one loaf isn't going to go very far. So when Jesus starts talking about the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod, they're not actually listening to what he's saying. They're not seeing what Jesus is saying. They are responding to who they are, right, where they are in that moment, which is hungry, worried about being able to eat.

And Simone Weil says, "Illusions are very dangerous because they have a tendency to become facts." This was the preoccupation of the apostles. When you exiles are carrying your burdens, it's very difficult to see anything outside of that burden. Why? Because there's so much distress that you have, and it makes sense to me. It makes sense to me that the apostles would interpret what Jesus was saying about the leaven of Herod and the leaven of the Pharisees, and interpret that in light of their preoccupation about not having enough to eat. So, exiles, this is an example of the narrow vision that you have when you are not in right relationship with the innermost self. You can become very focused, very driven, very single-tracked in your desires, right. Just like these apostles were in not being able to attend to the higher things because of their preoccupation with food. And so this is also for you, managers and your firefighters, to recognize that we want to make sure that we're meeting the attachment needs, the integrity needs, the physical needs to of parts, right, as well as addressing those identity questions. When we do that, when we work together collaboratively and cooperatively, when parts are integrated, the vision broadens out. There's not so much just single-minded preoccupation. And that is one of the huge benefits of interior integration.

For our further exploration of attachment needs and integrity needs, check out our sister podcast, Interior Integration for Catholics episode 62, which you will find linked in the description of today's show.

And with that, I'll draw this to a close by invoking our patroness and our patrons. Our Lady, Our Mother, Untier of Knots, pray for us. Saint Joseph, pray for us. Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.