The Tears of Things: Your Questions Answered

In this season-opening episode of Everything Belongs, the CAC team returns to one of Richard Rohr’s most foundational teachings: The Enneagram—an ancient tool revealing how our wounds lead to our wisdom and our work in the world.   Richard shares the surprising story of how The Enneagram “found” him and how it transformed his work and spiritual teaching. The hosting team —CAC Dean of Faculty Carmen Acevedo Butcher, Drew Jackson, Paul Swanson, Cassidy Hall, and Mike Petrow — reflect on their own “origin stories,” sharing how this tool has shaped their healing, relationships, and solidarity with others.   Whether you’re brand new to the Enneagram or a longtime seeker, this warm, insightful conversation invites you into a season of curiosity, compassion, and contemplative growth. Welcome to a journey that helps reveal how everything — and everyone — belongs.  Additional Enneagram Resources : Sign Up for The Enneagram Email Series  Begin (or deepen) your journey with the Enneagram. Sign up for monthly reflections, practices, and resources that connect the contemplative wisdom with your daily life.  Sign up at cac.org/belongs2026 The Enneagram: An Introduction: A brief introduction to this tool and a compilation of different resources curated for those longing to better understand, and have compassion for, themselves and others.  Enneagram as a Tool for Your Spiritual Journey: Use the offer code POD35 to get 35% off this foundational Enneagram teaching from Father Richard Rohr.  Follow us on Instagram. How can your wounds lead to wisdom? Discover topics about what your number might be trying to teach you.  Join the conversation on Facebook. Share wisdom with others on the Enneagram journey.   The transcript for today's episode can be found ⁠⁠here.⁠  Pick up a copy of Richard's book The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective ⁠here.  Connect with us: Have a question you'd like ask the team to answer about this season? Email us: ⁠⁠⁠⁠[email protected]⁠⁠⁠⁠ Send us a voicemail: ⁠⁠⁠⁠cac.org/voicemail⁠⁠⁠

Today, Richard and our hosts wrap up the season by answering your questions on The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom For An Age of Outrage. Stay tuned until the end of the episode for a preview of what's to come on the next exciting season of Everything Belongs. Resources: Find the transcript for this episode here.

Where does the prophetic journey through our anger and tears finally culminate? In this episode of Everything Belongs, we turn to Chapter 10 of Richard Rohr's The Tears of Things, called “It All Comes Down To Love.” Discover how the prophetic journey through order, disorder, and reorder ultimately leads us to Universal Love. At Richard's hermitage, our hosts discuss how great love is the only sane response to great suffering, and explore why loving one thing deeply can teach us to love everything. Afterwards all four of our hosts share the ways in which they've been impacted by our year long journey through The Tears of Things. Resources:  Grab a copy of The Tears of Things ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. Find a transcript for this episode here. To learn more about The Tears of Things and additional offerings, including the trailer, a FREE Reader’s Guide, and more, visit ⁠⁠⁠thetearsofthings.com.

In this episode of Everything Belongs, we explore Chapter 9 of Fr. Richard Rohr’s New York Times Bestselling book The Tears of Things ⁠⁠⁠⁠— rediscovering the prophet Ezekiel through Indigenous eyes.   In the second half of this episode, you’ll hear from Rev. Dr. Randy Woodley. He reflects on how Western Christianity’s fixation on hierarchy and domination distorts the gospel — and how Indigenous wisdom invites us back into harmony with creation.   Randy Woodley is an award-winning author and a tribally recognized Keetoowah descendant (UKB), Randy weaves together Indigenous wisdom, ecological sustainability, and spirituality. Randy is both a farmer and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus. He is respected by Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities worldwide and has been featured in The New York Times, Politifact, Time Magazine, and The Huffington Post. Randy publishes a weekly Substack at https://rwoodley7.substack.com/ Together, the Woodley’s co-sustain Eloheh Indigenous Center for Earth Justice and Eloheh Farm & Seeds, https://www.eloheh.org/ a non-profit, regenerative farm and school determined to assist others grow healthy food and combat the climate crisis. They are founders of Sho-Kee Cultural Consultants www.Sho-Kee.com  Resources:  Learn more about Randy here  Grab a copy of The Tears of Things ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠.  To learn more about The Tears of Things and additional offerings, including the trailer, a FREE Reader’s Guide, and more, visit ⁠⁠⁠thetearsofthings.com.  Find the transcript of this episode here. Connect with us: Have a question you'd like us to answer about this season? Email us: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠[email protected]⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Send us a voicemail: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠cac.org/voicemail⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ We'll be accepting questions for our Listener Questions episode until December 31st, 2025.

In this episode of Everything Belongs, we explore Chapter 8 of Richard Rohr’s The Tears of Things. Our hosts consider how the book of Isaiah embodies Fr. Richard’s wisdom pattern of order, disorder, and reorder — and how prophecy moves us from anger to lamentation to expansive love.   Later, you’ll hear from author Cassidy Hall for a conversation about women’s often-erased voices, queerness as a contemplative lens, and prophets on the margins.  Resources: Learn more about Cassidy Hall here. Grab a copy of The Tears of Things ⁠⁠⁠here⁠⁠⁠. To learn more about The Tears of Things and additional offerings, including the trailer, a FREE Reader's Guide, and more, visit ⁠⁠⁠thetearsofthings.com

What does it mean to cry with God—and be healed by our tears? In this episode of Everything Belongs, we explore Chapter 7 of Richard Rohr’s The Tears of Things, called The Alchemy of Tears: How We Learn Universal Sympathy and Grace, which focuses on the "gift of tears" as a sacred pathway to healing and transformation. At Richard’s hermitage, co-hosts Mike Petrow and Paul Swanson discuss how grief, when honored, connects us to divine sadness and invites us into deeper compassion. Later, Mike and Carmen Acevedo Butcher are joined by Jungian psychotherapist, Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, to explore how we metabolize trauma and grief, heal intergenerational wounds, and move from pathologizing pain to putting it in service of love and justice. Resources: Find out more about Rabbi Tirzah Firestone here. Learn more about Tirzah's book, Wounds Into Wisdom here. Grab a copy of The Tears of Things ⁠⁠here⁠⁠. To learn more about The Tears of Things and additional offerings, including the trailer, a FREE Reader's Guide, and more, visit ⁠⁠thetearsofthings.com

How do we learn from imperfect spiritual teachers and embrace our own incompleteness? In this episode, we're exploring Chapter 6 of Richard Rohr's final book, The Tears of Things, titled "Unfinished Prophets: Elijah, Jonah, and John the Baptizer." In an extended conversation at Richard's hermitage, hosts Mike Petrow and Paul Swanson dive deep into three biblical figures who never quite completed their prophetic journey from anger to sadness to love. Later, Carmen Acevedo Butcher joins to discuss what it means to love our own imperfection and learn from flawed teachers without idealizing them. Mike and Carmen explore how perfectionism serves oppressive systems, why self-compassion is essential for spiritual growth, and address the significant absence of women's voices in prophetic literature.

How do we live with hope when the path forward demands surrender? In this episode, we explore Chapter 5 of Richard Rohr’s book, The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage, titled “Jeremiah: The Patterns That Carry Us Across.” Through conversation with Richard, we reflect on the prophetic vocation as a lifelong invitation to move from anger and lament into love—and how Jeremiah models that transformation. After our dialogue with Richard, we’re joined by the beloved Reverend Dr. Walter Earl Fluker, Howard Thurman scholar and prophetic voice of ethical leadership. Together, we delve into what it means to be “dismembered to be remembered,” as Dr. Fluker shares his lifelong journey to find home, the role of the trickster God in transformation, and why there can be no liberation without struggle. This episode walks the listener through the wisdom pattern of order, disorder, and reorder as it shows up in Jeremiah’s life—and our own. From ancient covenant to inner apocalypse, from personal grief to collective trauma, this episode is a deep meditation on how tears and laughter both reveal the path to freedom. This episode invites you to consider: What if the tears you cry in sorrow are the same tears that prepare you for joy? What if the very act of being broken is the beginning of becoming whole? Resources: Listen to Dr. Fluker's episode of The Cosmic We here. Grab a copy of The Tears of Things ⁠here⁠. To learn more about The Tears of Things and additional offerings, including the trailer, a FREE Reader's Guide, and more, visit ⁠thetearsofthings.com

What wisdom emerges when contemplative action meets radical compassion? In this special bonus episode, we step outside the chapter-by-chapter rhythm of Richard Rohr’s final book, The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage, for a rare and intimate conversation between Fr. Richard Rohr and his longtime friend Fr. Greg Boyle. Together, they explore the soul of the book and the spirit of this moment in history. Fr. Greg, founder of Homeboy Industries and author of Cherished Belonging: The Healing Power of Love in Divided Times, joins Richard and CAC staff member Paul Swanson for a profound dialogue on everything from the death of Pope Francis and the surprising emergence of Pope Leo, to the themes of humiliation, humility, and radical belonging. Together, they reflect on the journey from order to disorder to reorder, offering insight into how love acts in the world, especially among the most marginalized. Fr. Richard and Fr. Greg Boyle embody the very message they share: that transformation is always possible, and that love, when lived, is the greatest force for healing in our divided world. The transcript for this episode can be found here

How do we navigate spiritual transformation when everything seems to be falling apart? In this episode, we're exploring Chapter 4 of Richard Rohr’s final book, The Tears of Things: Prophetic Wisdom for an Age of Outrage, titled "Welcoming Holy Disorder: How the Prophets Carry Us Through." After our conversation with Richard, we're joined by Jungian psychologist and author Connie Zweig, who deepens our exploration into the role of the shadow, the hidden parts of ourselves and our communities that disorder brings to light. Connie, along with hosts and CAC staff Mike Petrow, Paul Swanson, and Carmen Acevedo Butcher, unpack the cyclical pattern of order, disorder, and reorder that Richard calls the Wisdom Pattern. Together, they explore how disorder is not only inevitable but sacred, a season of necessary unraveling that allows space for grace, healing, and transformation. This episode shows how the prophets help us see what we cannot, why true spiritual growth demands discomfort, and how embracing the dark night of the soul can lead to profound renewal—both personally and collectively. Connie Zweig, Ph.D. is a retired Jungian therapist and author of Meeting the Shadow and Romancing the Shadow. Her award-winning book, The Inner Work of Age: Shifting from Role to Soul, extends Shadow-work into midlife and beyond and explores aging as a spiritual practice. Her book, Meeting the Shadow on the Spiritual Path: The Dance of Darkness and Light in Our Search for Awakening, extends shadow-work into religion and spirituality. Her new podcast, Dr. Neil’s Spiritual Awakening to Non-Duality, posts on all podcast platforms. See her new SUBSTACK for livestreams and new writing: https://www.shadowworkawareness.com/about. Resources: The transcript for this episode can be found here.