In this podcast, Charbel Raish sits down with the founders of the Avila Institute, Dan & Stephanie Burke. They discuss how they met, their conversion testimonies, what is prayer and explain about the work that they do with the Avila Institute. They also run an apostolate called spiritualdirection.com

Avila Institute: https://avila-institute.org/

Navigating the Interior Life Spiritual Direction and the Journey to God

~ Dan Burke with Fr. John Bartunek, LC, STL

In concise, straightforward prose, author Dan Burke here provides an invaluable road map for spiritual growth, complete with signposts to help ensure that you remain on the right path. He guides you through the hazardous terrain that can threaten your spiritual health and shows you how to discern God’s will daily and follow it in a meaningful way.

Through intensive study of the major Catholic mystics, Dan has acquired the keys to developing a more meaningful relationship with Christ, which he shares with you in this indispensable volume.

If you follow the time-tested advice in this book, your faith is sure to grow stronger as you purposefully, consistently, and substantively grow in your relationship with God and neighbor.

Into the Deep

~ Dan Burke

Prayer—it’s mysterious, challenging, frustrating . . . and life-changing. Discover why growing in prayer, which sometimes can be compared to a battle, is worth every ounce of effort you give it. Even if you’ve never prayed, or if you’ve never developed the habit of daily prayer, God is waiting to meet you where you are and encourage you every step of the way.

Using a simple approach to prayer, you’ll learn how even ten minutes a day can change your life. Author Dan Burke explains how to set up your own sacred prayer space, discusses the common obstacles to prayer, and provides practical ways to overcome them. You’ll also read stories of others who are seeking to orient themselves to God through prayer.

If you’re ready for God to transform your heart and mind, you will know the life that Jesus has promised; a life of peace and joy that cannot be taken away by the trials of this world.

Spiritual Warfare and the Discernment of Spirits

~ Dan Burke | Sophia Institute (Paperback)

Satan is always at work breeding sadness and anxiety while providing obstacles that prevent souls from making spiritual progress. In this concise yet powerful book, author Dan Burke presents the venerable, time-tested wisdom of Catholic mystics to help you understand the influence of the Enemy on your mind and heart, and the tactics you need to combat him.

With St. Ignatius as his guide, Burke presents here an indispensable, authoritative manual for engaging in daily battle with the Adversary—combat that is both inevitable and winnable. Burke will help you recognize the ebbs and flows of consolation and desolation, and distinguish between the voices of God and of Satan. Best of all, you’ll come to see the spiritual life not as a science to be learned, but as an intuitive art to be practiced as you move with increasing success from habitual sin to sanctity.

The battle for our souls is unavoidable. The saints won theirs by learning how to be spiritual warriors and by recognizing that we become stronger through battle and grow weaker from avoidance.

Finding Peace in the Storm: Reflections on St. Alphonsus Liguori’s Uniformity with God’s Will

~ Dan Burke | Sophia Institute (Paperback)

Sometimes discernment seems complicated, and we struggle to “be still” to listen to God’s voice. Following the death of his spiritual director, St. Alphonsus Liguori penned timeless advice in a letter to one of his spiritual daughters, and it became the famous work titled Uniformity with God’s Will. Now Dan Burke breaks open St. Alphonsus’s eighteenth-century classic for you. He intersperses relevant explanations and insights within the text of this great saint and includes reflection questions for each chapter.

St. Alphonsus explains, “We should most confidently abandon ourselves to all the dispositions of divine providence, since they are for our own good.” In page after page, Burke shows you how the “wind and waves” can help you ascend to union with God. You will discover:

• The “paralyzing cocktail” we drink when we reject God’s will
• When good works are displeasing to God (Can you guess?)
• Three prayers that will assist you in directing all things to God’s will
• Two ways we can know God’s love and hear His voice
• Two life-altering spiritual disciplines according to St. Teresa of Ávila
• How humiliation, adversity, and trials can bring freedom, healing, and salvation (You will be shocked!)