Continuing his series on the Four Holy Habits, Bishop Donald Hying turns to the second habit: daily prayer. At its heart, prayer is communion with God. Bishop Hying looks to the prayer life of Jesus himself, who spent whole nights absorbed in prayer to the Father, as the model for our own prayers. He explores the many forms prayer can take, from the Mass and the Liturgy of the Hours to the Rosary, Lectio Divina, meditation, and contemplation, and offers honest encouragement for anyone who struggles to focus or feels they don't know how to pray. His practical advice for beginning: start small, start with the Gospel of Mark, and trust that the Lord will do the rest.

Bishop Donald Hying opens a four-part series on the Four Holy Habits – the simple spiritual practices he has invited every Catholic in the Diocese of Madison to embrace since launching the Go Make Disciples initiative. He begins with the first and most important: keeping holy the Sabbath. Bishop Hying reflects on why each Sunday is a "mini Easter," why the Eucharist stands at the very center of Catholic life, and what it would mean to reclaim Sunday not only as a day for Mass but as a true day of rest, worship, and time with those we love.

Show Notes
In this episode, Bishop Hying references Dies Domini ("The Lord's Day"), St. John Paul II's 1998 apostolic letter on keeping the Lord's Day holy. Read the full text at the Vatican website: https://www.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/apost_letters/1998/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_05071998_dies-domini.html

In the second of a two-part conversation, Bishop Donald Hying and Fr. David Carrano turn from why young people are searching to what happens when they find the Church. Fr. Carrano, pastor of the St. Paul University Catholic Center at UW-Madison, describes the peer-to-peer ministry at the heart of St. Paul's – students, interns, and missionaries who build the bridges that lead others to Christ – and the remarkable number of students received into the Church this year. Together they consider what parishes might learn from campus ministry, and why teaching people to pray may be the most important work of all.

In the first of a two-part conversation, Bishop Donald Hying is joined by Fr. David Carrano, pastor of the St. Paul University Catholic Center at UW-Madison, to discuss a striking development: the growing number of college students turning toward religion, and toward the Catholic faith in particular. From a front-row seat on a very secular campus, Fr. Carrano reflects on the crisis of meaning facing this generation – the restlessness, the searching, the fundamental questions young people are asking – and why the Church has a compelling answer to offer.

In the third and final part of this series, Bishop Donald Hying and Tristan Borland arrive at the heart of the story: Tristan's conversion and reception into the Catholic Church. A former Protestant Evangelical pastor now serving in the Diocese of Madison's Office of Evangelization and Catechesis, Tristan describes the tangible restoration of his faith and three dramatic miracles that brought profound healing and reassurance on the journey.

In the second part of this three-part series, Bishop Donald Hying continues his conversation with Tristan Borland, a former Protestant pastor and now the Diocese of Madison's Associate Director of Marriage and Family Ministry, as his journey toward the Catholic faith turns to a difficult chapter. Tristan speaks openly about profound personal suffering in the years before his conversion, including the loss of his daughter, and the pain, fear, and hesitation that came with the prospect of becoming Catholic. He shares honestly about a season of existential crisis, his conversations with a priest, and the events that led him to resign from the pastorate and take a genuine leap of faith.

In the first part of a three-part series, Bishop Donald Hying sits down with Tristan Borland – the Diocese of Madison's Associate Director of Marriage and Family Ministry, and a former Protestant pastor – to begin the story of his conversion to the Catholic faith. Tristan opens with his upbringing in Evangelical Protestantism, the misconceptions of Catholicism he carried, and the first encounters that led him to take the Catholic faith seriously. He reflects on the reasons that slowly drew him toward the Church, the personal and relational realities that made it a long and gradual road, and the Catholic friendships that accompanied him along the way.

Continuing his reflection on St. Francis of Assisi, Bishop Donald Hying moves from the facts of the saint's life to the major themes that still speak to us today. Chief among them is Francis's radicality — his desire to live the Gospel in all its freshness and integrity. In this Special Year of St. Francis marking the 800th anniversary of his death, Pope Leo XIV has held up this saint as a model to emulate, one who points us with assurance toward the pristine call of the Gospel.