Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts

Transcript

"Jesus said to his disciples, 'Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock, and the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks, receives, and the one who seeks, finds, and the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Which one of you, if his son asked for bread, would hand his son a stone?'"

You're listening to Scripture for Your Inner Outcasts. It's February 26th, 2026, Thursday of the First Week of Lent. Today we are joined by Peta Evans, a wife and mother and the founder of Esencia Life Center, a pregnancy resource center in Albury, Australia.

Matthew 7, verses 7 to 9. "Jesus said to his disciples, 'Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives, and the one who seeks, finds, and the one who knocks, the door will be opened. Which one of you, if his son asks for bread, would hand his son a stone?'" The word stone reverberates at the end of this passage. Do you wonder if you have been handed a stone instead of a loaf of bread? If it feels safe to your managers, I would like to speak directly to you exiled parts. Exiles, you often feel like you are the burden you carry. But in truth, it is separate. Is it in your hands, on your chest, or loaded upon your back? Do you feel it weighing you down like a ball and chain about your leg? Does it block out the light? Is it the burden of shame, feelings of failure, insecurity, anxiety or worthlessness? The burden of pain due to abuse or trauma? The burden of neglect or being abandoned, the burden of sadness, of disappointment, grief and loss? When you hear Jesus's words, you may want to run and hide.

Ask? Let him notice me? You say. No way. Then he'll ask something great of me or give me more suffering. And so you hide. But when you do, you feel all alone. Just you and this heavy weight to bear. What if, instead, love and compassion were pursuing you? The innermost self has the curiosity to ask, to seek, to knock and to open the door of the places that you hide within. Until that time, do not stay alone. Who could accompany you? Would there be a spiritual confidant who perhaps understands your burden and your misery? Jesus says he wants to give you good things. Maybe you need a spiritual friend to show you how to receive. In the story of the prodigal son, when the son returns to the father, he has spent all his inheritance, used up all his resources, degraded and ashamed by the way of living with the pigs. And yet the father doesn't just tolerate him, but runs to receive him in all his fetid failure. But it is not his failure that defines him, but his name. He is, as you are, the son.

Listeners are invited to learn more about the innermost self, which was mentioned in today's episode, by checking out our sister podcast, Interior Integration for Catholics, episode 158.

Let's end with our invocations. Our Lady, our Mother, Untier of Knots, pray for us. Saint Joseph, pray for us. Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.