The Shift from Secular to Christian Music w/ Marie Miller | Fr. Patrick Briscoe & Fr. Gregory Pine

March 3, 2025

Fr. Gregory: This is Father Gregory Pine.

Fr Patrick: And this is Father Patrick Briscoe.

Fr. Gregory: And welcome to Godsplaining. Thanks to all those who support us. If you enjoy the show, please consider making a monthly donation on Patreon. Be sure to like and subscribe to Godsplaining whenever you listen to your podcasts. I think I got confused there between wherever and whenever. Irrespective, both apply. Nevertheless, for this episode, we’re very delighted to be joined in studio by Marie Miller. Thanks for joining.

Marie: It’s great to be here.

Fr. Gregory: We are pumped that you are here. We’ve only recently begun doing studio interviews or studio Guestsplaining episodes, but to this point they have been delightful.

Marie: Good!

Marie, I’m just very glad you survived lunch at the Dominican House of Studies because it’s sort of like allowing a bunch of farm animals to run to a food trough. 

Marie: No! 

Fr Patrick: So when you introduce a female guest to the Dominican House of Studies, you always sort of have to remind the boys, gentlemen, there’s a lady amongst us. 

Marie: Everyone was on their best behavior.

Fr Patrick: Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Fr. Gregory: And we came in like, 5 minutes into the meal, so it wasn’t an effect at best behavior. It was a genuine best behavior. I would say that we can be somewhat mechanical in our consumption of food, but not nece – I wouldn’t say animalistic. You would differ. You’re a man of greater refinement than I am.

Fr Patrick: It’s fine, we don’t have to fight about it.

Fr. Gregory: So we can just talk about the stains in my habit for the next 45 minutes and then that’ll supply context as to why…[laughing]

Fr Patrick: That we can review.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah. Somebody was looking up at my habit the other day and they said never mind, it’s not worth repeating. It wasn’t laudatory or flattering.

Fr. Patrick. We do, listeners, have a number of washing machines and they do work, so you don’t need to be concerned about that.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, I just get – never mind.

Fr Patrick: We wear white! It’s just the thing. 

Fr. Gregory: I walked to and from Mass this morning and it started out just like very lightly drizzling on both walks. And then it ended by raining on both walks. And then I went, I looked at my scapular and I was like, this is a dirty scapular.

Fr Patrick: Did you get hit by a bus?

Fr. Gregory: No, I didn’t. 

Fr Patrick: Oh that’s the worst, to get a puddle splash.

Marie: Oh, yeah. 

Fr. Patrick: It’s like swoosh. And yeah.

Fr. Gregory: In my case, it’s because my rosary beads bleed. So it’s water induced bleeding. And then I look at my habit and I’m like, woof. But that’s besides the point. The point is…

Fr. Patrick: Marie is here.

Fr. Gregory: We have Marie Miller in studio. So many of our listeners will know you from various. Yeah, like musical spots, from various musical apostolate or from various musical things. But for those who don’t, would you say a word of introduction?

Marie: Yes, sure. So I began performing when I was really young and I…

Fr. Gregory: Were you forced to by your family?

Marie: It was highly suggested, you know, like, this is a good idea.

Fr. Gregory: We have a family band…we need a mandolinist. 

Marie: Exactly. And at one point, there were nine siblings. There are many of us playing. And I’m kind of like the only one who chose to do this full time. And I chose to do it full time in a really young age. So I got signed when I was 16 years old to a country label called Curb Records, did it for a couple years and then kind of was feeling sad and all my friends were going to Christendom College. So I thought, I’m going to do that too, Right? Went to Christendom for a year, did other school for a little bit, and then moved to Nashville and like, really went for it again. And have been doing it ever since. But always in a folk pop world and sort of like, okay, if Catholics asked me to do something, I will say yes. And I am Catholic and I’m happy to be Catholic, but I’m not writing religious music.

Fr. Gregory: So when I said a past musical apostolate, that’s kind of off?

Marie: No, it’s not off at all!

Fr. Gregory: Okay. Here we go.

Marie: Because it May 31st of last year, I recorded my first religious album, and it was so cool because I used all the same of like my favorite musicians in Nashville, the musicians that I use, the producers that I used when I was doing my secular art, thinking I want to make better art, but it be religious art. And so this album is a reflection of that, and it’s inspired by Saint Therese and the she’s the patroness of this project, and it’s called “The Way of Love.” So I am now really only doing Catholic stuff and I love it. I love Catholic events, especially because women’s conferences, they cry and laugh at everything and they buy so much stuff.

All: [laughing]

Fr. Gregory: Savage! Dang, truth is told…

Fr Patrick: Well, we’re certainly capitalists on Godsplaining. If you sort of review our guests, ya know, there’s nobody that’s been on the show that’s against that. 

Marie: You guys are on Patreon, right?

Fr. Gregory: We are.

Marie: You need the, so these women out there: give them money.

Fr. Gregory: Right exactly, she said and not us.

Yeah we love that. Was the mandolin the first instrument you picked up, Marie?

Marie: So I played the violin for about two weeks and then was asked maybe try something else. Yeah. Yeah. 

Fr. Gregory: The family band. They needed diversification.

Marie: Yeah. And violin is a tough one to learn. And so mandolin is a lot easier. They’re similar! It’s the same strings. So, yeah. So I love it.

Fr. Patrick: So you transferred that wealth of violin knowledge…

Marie: Yes. Yeah.

Fr Patrick: Onto the mandolin, all that – everything!

Marie: All that I learned! 

Fr Patrick: The sweat, the tears! And you’ve been with the mandolin since then?

Marie: I have. So I play mandolin, guitar and piano and. But mandolin is my favorite to play.

Fr. Gregory: Okay, So here. So, mandolin question. I once went to a I think it’s pronounced Chris Thile concert. Okay. And it was for like Octoberfest. This would be like ten years ago. And he was playing a bunch of his kind of Americana, old time funky, light stuff, but he was punctuating it with extended like Bach pieces set to mandolin, which was wild, and the concert was like 2 hours. And at a certain point, maybe like an hour and 45 minutes, and he’s like, “You all have been listening for almost 2 hours to the mandolin.” And it kind of like washed over me at that moment because the mandolin is a somewhat tinny instrument and it’s not typically an instrument that you hear solo. And because yeah, there are other sounds that we rely upon to kind of fill things out so as to please our ears and conductors to whatever musical end we hope to attain. But like the way that he did it, it was just, yeah, it was delightful and it was virtuous in the sense of like, he’s a virtuoso. And it was as if he had taken us by the proverbial hand and then just brought us into the sense of mandolin. Okay, long prologue, you play the mandolin. I mean, you also play the piano, which is an instrument which I don’t know what the word I’m looking for is, but it’s kind of like more it’s fuller or it’s more grounded, right? And then the guitar, you know, shares in that too. But you pick like a kind of headliner instrument. So what I’m trying to ask is this: what’s that like to play an instrument which requires of you a certain virtuosity to like bring people in which it’s not the type of thing where people are like, okay, it’s Christmas. We’re all going to get around, you know, like gather around the fireplace and listen to the mandolin as we carol. You know, it’s like it’s a somewhat weird instrument, but you’re like doing it and you’re really doing it.

Marie: Sure. Yeah. And I love that you mentioned Chris Thile because his band Nickel Creek and then the Punch Brothers and him, like he’s just been a huge inspiration in a lot of why I do music. And I, I went to a mandolin camp and I really didn’t want to use my pinky because it’s hard and it hurts. And so Chris Steely was my teacher and he named an exercise after me.

Fr. Gregory: Get out. 

Marie: Yeah, he doesn’t remember that, but I do. [laughing] 

Fr. Gregory: You never know. Maybe he does. So I love that you went to see him. That’s amazing. So what I love about the mandolin is that it’s just weird enough that it catches people’s attention. But it’s not too weird. It’s not a cool instrument. The accordion, let’s say, and say, like, all I’m going to do is play the accordion for 2 hours. Like, it may be hard to do that, where mandolin is just enough that it kind of goes, what’s she doing? And I feel like that’s been helpful, especially because there’s so many, especially like in the pop world, there are so many female singer songwriters, and I would be opening for some bigger bands, which was awesome!

Fr. Patrick: Coolest band you opened for. 

Marie: Coolest band? Yeah, so I…so the biggest band was the Backstreet Boys.

Fr. Gregory: Let’s go! 

Fr Patrick: No way! Oh, that’s incredible. 

Fr. Gregory: Yes!

Marie: Maybe not the coolest, but the biggest.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, I mean that can be said in many ways.

Marie: The nicest, they were very nice. 

Fr. Gregory: Everybody who still has the case Logic CD case still has the Backstreet Boys in the back pages because they’re like, I haven’t listened to Backstreet Boys since 1999, but like, if they really wanted to, they could get rid of those CDs, but they haven’t because they care.

Marie: That is so true. Yeah, that is so true. But beings like kind of like a nobody like artist opening for bigger bands. It was so helpful to have the mandolin because all these like in that instance, these women had been waiting since like 7 a.m. to get in. Because it was at Disney World. It was like first come, first serve, right, so they’re like, I’ve been waiting this long and they’re like, this woman that is performing is between me and Nick Carter, right? And it could go really bad.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah. Like it went for Aaron Carter.

Marie: Yes. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah. We all know. Yeah.

Marie: So, but for me, having the, having the mandolin was, you know, just. Yeah, just one more thing. I was like, Oh, what’s she doing? This is interesting. So it helped. 

Fr. Gregory: Okay. So it’s got that light and funky interest.

Marie: Exactly.

Fr. Patrick: I now know twice as many professional mandolin players as I did walking into this episode today. The other, the other being the mandolin player of the Hillbilly Thomists. 

Fr. Gregory: Right. Fr. Thomas Joseph? The plays the mandolin?

Fr. Peter Gautsch!

Fr. Gregory: Ah, I – 

Fr Patrick: Well, they all move around on everything, so it’s – even asserting that is dangerous.

Marie: I’ve known Father Justin Bolger, since I was like 12 years old. No, that’s a lie, like 18. 

Fr Patrick: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Fr. Gregory: I mean, yeah. 12 rounds up.

Marie: Exactly. But yes, they were, they were like the coolest musicians in Nashville. 

Fr. Gregory: Judd and Maggie?

Marie: Yeah. Judd and Maggie and I remember thinking like, oh my gosh, he’s, you know, he’s leaving the music world to enter a vocation. Like, what a sacrifice. But he’s actually way more famous now! It’s so cool. [laughing]

Fr Patrick: Marie, have you thought about becoming a Dominican nun? I don’t think your husband would appreciate that. 

Marie: But for the fame, maybe. 

Fr. Gregory: Yeah. So here’s a question you got to do. Like the archeology when it comes to Father Justin Bolger, can you tell when he’s being serious and when he’s not being serious?

Marie: [pause] No.

Fr. Gregory: See? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[chatter] 

Fr Patrick: I would love you know, I was really hopeful that you had the secret… [laughing] So I think it’s very interesting that you started off because a lot of people start off the other way, where they do something faith where they do something, faith forward first. But you started off wanting to wanting to be a country music artists of your own, right. And what was that decision making process like? Because clearly you’re a woman of faith. You were living in this and the certain environment. You were talking a little bit about your time in Christendom College…why did you have a kind of caution toward the Catholic space or maybe didn’t what but what prompted that decision to move to country music first?

Marie: That’s a great question. I think that… I thought at the time and probably at the time that it was a little bit like being like a spy in the pop world and performing at these secular events, but bringing light to these events. And I think we did that. But my songs were about friendship. They’re about mainly about relationships, about boys. And I was thinking about it even though they were not like, bad, right?

Fr. Gregory: That’s Taylor Swift. 

Marie: Sure. Or like Sabrina Carpenter. Yeah. Chappel Roan, like, right. There’s all…

Fr. Gregory: Carrie Underwood.

Marie: Yeah.

Fr. Gregory: Property damage. Yeah.

Fr Patrick: Okay. No, we’re not doing this The rest of the episode. Yeah. That’s enough out of you. Yeah.

Marie: Yeah, it is kind of crazy. If a guy wrote that, Before He Cheats. Like that would, he would go to jail.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, right, exactly. Yeah. Premeditated.

Marie: Yeah. So. But and it was. It was beautiful. It is where kind of I probably where I was in my faith life, too, was that I… God mattered. But I also really I just loved music so much. And I had read John Paul II’s Letter to Artist, and he talks about how it’s beauty stirs in us, the hidden nostalgia for God. And I feel like as I got older and I kept getting that stirring inside of me, like that feeling like that, that need, I would write songs about boys. And if all of this worked out because they’re all heartbreak songs, if all this worked out, like, would I be happy? And I realized no, like it would be a stepping stone towards something else. And so this music is kind of there’s freedom in it because it’s actually about what my heart was shaped for. So but at probably at the time, to be super honest, I don’t think I was thinking about it that much. Like when I was doing secular music, like Faith was really important, but I have recently taken just like one more step forward. And not that I say anything bad about because we need to write songs about everything and folk songs are beautiful. But for me personally, this new The Way of Love, which, you know, is inspired by Saint Therese’s quote on talking about how the way of love like takes even our brokenness. And Jesus quickly consumes it and leaves in us deep and humble peace is that it’s like this is the only way for me at this point.

Fr. Patrick: Yeah. Let’s step in. Let’s follow that a little bit further. What was that shift like? When is there a moment that prompted you or your change in music, or was it more of a gradual movement? How would you describe this, this shift in your musical career?

Marie: It felt gradual, I think, because, and I was doing I got to do really like fun Catholic stuff, too. I got to sing for Pope Francis, which was amazing.

Fr Patrick: Oh that’s cool! When was that? 

Marie: That was in Philadelphia in 2015.

Fr Patrick: Oh the World Meeting of Families!

Marie: Oh, yeah. And that was like a really cool moment. I remember thinking because I was like, with all these artists… 

Fr Patrick: He said, there’s that girl from Virginia I want to meet.

Marie: Exactly. But I was it was like a secular event in a way, because there were a lot of, like Catholic artists, but they weren’t really… like Aretha Franklin was. I don’t think she’s actually Catholic.

Fr. Gregory: Bono.

Marie: Yeah, Bono would have been more…I think he wasn’t there. But. But yeah and I…[laughing]

Fr Patrick: [laughing] Good Lord.

Marie: Like, I like, am I like, super Catholic and a musician or am I like a musician that’s Catholic and trying to figure that out. And that was like when I started wrestling with that because there were a lot of people there that were like sort of Catholic was sort of not. And, and maybe that began my journey of trying to figure it out.

Fr Patrick: I do actually like those things that, that the Holy that the Holy Father does. You know, there’s some people around Pope Francis, they want him to talk to other celebrities. And I like that there’s not a litmus test for someone’s faith in order to have a kind of conversation or performance. I think that’s okay. As long as it’s clear that the Holy Father is not endorsing the lifestyle or the views of these people, that’s the thing. That’s where it gets a little dangerous. Almost all of them support abortion for example, which is crazy. And that has to be named. And we we have to be very clear about some of those things. But I like that there were a bunch of comedians at the Vatican, for example, telling jokes around and about Pope Francis. And it just has people thinking about the Church or it makes them confront faith. These artists, I really think something happens in those moments. So it’s very curious to me that you’re talking about the World Meeting of Families kind of doing that in your own life.

Marie: Yeah. No. And it was it was it was so awesome. And it was awesome not just for like my Catholic world, but for like my record label was super excited about that because because Pope Francis is somebody that people were thinking about the world’s thinking about. And so it was good in that way. But if you’ve grown up Catholic and you are searching for the deepest thing, I wasn’t sure, like in my life with the secular music, if I was really, truly searching for the deepest thing. And so this music, it’s not I’m not trying to say so you guys, I figured it out. I’m where I need to be. Everything’s great, but rather like going back to like The Way of Love. Like what is my end was what is my end goal. And maybe throughout my twenties I wasn’t quite sure what it was. And so now I think I at least know like this is the way I  want to go, I think.

Fr. Gregory: All right. I have some weird thoughts about art and then some questions about how you conceive of your own art. So sometimes you’ll encounter Christians who are artists, whether musicians or visual artists or otherwise, and they describe their art as a matter of vocation, which is like, I think vocation is an accommodating word that can account for a variety of experiences. I’m not like whatever taking issue with that in any way, shape or form, but it’s almost like the Lord has asked me to do this thing. But the thing that they do isn’t necessarily that good, which is like, it’s not like I can’t make art, you know, like I stink at every imaginable mode of artistry, Like I’m really bad at all of them.

Fr Patrick: You’re a decent singer, don’t sell yourself short.

Fr. Gregory: I appreciate that, except we had a traumatic kind of experience in the novitiate where I was asked to match pitch like 27 times in a row and I failed all 27. So it’s okay, you just got to learn early.

Marie: Well, you’re good. I’ve heard your pop voice. It’s great.

Fr. Gregory: Thank you. I appreciate that. Okay. Just as long as there isn’t a note to match. Okay. So. So, like, on the one hand, you want to say to this person. Yeah, continue to make of your life something beautiful for God, but you also like. Yeah, there’s a sense in which it represents a kind of scandal. Not not, not like a strong sense of scandal, but in the sense that, like, people will look at Christians and their artistic enterprises and think like, Christians are just bad at art. So like, how do you conceive of your artistic? Like it’s obvious that you want to do something excellent, but you want to do something for the Lord in a kind of embracing sense of vocation. But like, I mean, how do those fit? How do those pieces fit in your life? You know, in your mind, in art?

Marie: Yeah, That’s such a beautiful point. And it’s so true. And it’s made me really sad because it used to never be that way, right? Like the best artists were creating beautiful works for the Church, and that was just part of it. And that’s what we enjoy when we go to beautiful churches and see going to see paintings and go to concerts. You know, you were at a Bach concert on mandolin. Bach is writing Masses, you know, like that kind of thing. So now, yeah, it’s like when you turn on the radio and you haven’t heard the lyrics yet, you’re like, Oh, this is Christian radio. And like, you shouldn’t do that, right? Because you should know it because of because of the lyrics. But also it should be like different enough that you’re surprised and great enough that you’re happy that it’s a Christian art. Yeah, I think that for me that’s been the gift of working in the secular world for me is it pushed me to like I had I had to be good enough to get signed to a secular label. And that gave me confidence. And as, I’ve also just really worked tried to work on my voice even now, to stay excellent or to keep getting better and to keep being better instruments. And with this project with The Way of Love, you know, I really wanted to to use the best, you know, musicians in Nashville, like my the bass player for this album was Ricky Skaggs, bass player for five years. His name’s Scott Mulvahill. He also is Catholic. He’s a great example of someone who can play. He’s like one of like Paul Simon’s bass player in him are like best friends, and he’s like, we’ll come in to like, hang out with Scott. Like, that doesn’t happen unless you’re just good at this. But he’s also Catholic, and so trying to surround myself with people that are really great but also good people and not settle for It’s sad because there are some there are some good Catholic artists out there. It’s not not there are not that many right into.

Fr. Patrick: I had a really great conversation with well, there’s a series of conversations actually with people about the Hillbilly Thomists because I think the phenomenon is interesting that they’ve that they’ve made that they’ve made such a splash. And I hope they continue to grow and that people find them and listen to them. So I’ve asked why are people interested in them? Because people are not that interested in what priests do, because priests do it. They’re just not categorically not not in 2024, not in 2025. And they won’t be in 2026 either. So there’s something there that’s kind of a spark. Right. And I think that what I hear repeatedly is that they’re doing something that’s different. They have a different kind of sound than most Christian artists. And the thing that they’re presenting is different. A lot of Christian music is heavy in a in a way that’s kind of soul baring. It requires an emotional commitment that is just going to be exhausting. And and the Hillbilly Thomists’ music is just fun. It’s silly and it invites a kind of levity toward life that a lot of Christian music doesn’t.

Marie: Yeah, I agree. I love that the Hillbilly Thomists is named after Flannery O’Connor too, because it’s going back to like good Catholic artists that are Catholic, but also like matter in the secular world because it’s just so good that it matters. And yeah, Veronica is my favorite Hillbilly Thomists song you’re talking about. Like some day, every day I will see his face. I want to see his face. Right. And Father Justin Famous father Justin, the Nick Carter of Hillbilly Thomists . He I mean, just like that is so beautiful. And, like, how have I never heard that beautiful of a song in Catholic music? So I’m very grateful for them for that. And you’re right, it is different also to like folk music works really well with Catholic lyrics, with religious lyrics, because it’s it’s it’s of the earth kind of like what we’re trying to figure out, like we’re just human beings trying to like, reach for sacred things. And so I think folk music does that same thing. And so, yeah, I think that’s another reason and that’s my music is very folk forward too. And I found that works really well. And also it helps you listen to the lyrics.

Fr Patrick: Now, how did you come to Saint Therese? Did she visit you in a dream? Did you go on pilgrimage? Did you get a rose?

Marie: Yeah. I can even say “Lisieux.’ I say “Liz-oo”. That’s how much…[laughing]

Fr Patrick: Take that, France. 

Marie: So my dad is a huge Saint Therese fan and he named his road when he bought property in Virginia ‘Little Way Lane’ and I always I like read a little bit of her autobiography and I was like I was such a tomboy like this is so flowery like literally and figuratively like she’s like all about these flowers. And I felt like this is not me. And so for many years I didn’t relate to her. I also just was thinking, like, I have struggled, like I’m such a sinner. She seems so perfect, this perfect, nun. And then I actually started reading about her and reading her, and I learned that her emphasis was on God’s mercy and his merciful love to total trust and surrender to the merciful love of God, and doing the little way, doing all things, even the littlest things for love towards love. And I realized that mercy, of course, is not about how good you are, but how good God is. And I thought, Oh my gosh, like, I can go on this little way too, with her. And so yeah. And then I started learning, Oh, my goodness, she’s a poet. So she has beautiful poetry and she’s just a present saint. A lot of people say about her is that they asked her when she was dying, you look down on us, will you not? And she said, “No, I will come down.” And she really kept that promise. And so when I was looking for help with this, I knew that she would be the right person for me. 

Fr Patrick: So you took the little away home? 

Marie: I did.

Fr Patrick: That’s the one, I want credit for that one.

Marie: [laughing] Yeah, definitely.

Fr. Gregory: Okay, let’s just think a little bit more with St. Therese. Again, weird prologue eventually arriving at a question. I think often. I mean, I just love stories. I never had an experience of St. Therese which wasn’t like convicting slash and devastating. But one thing about centuries which I find so potent is that she testifies so clearly to the love of God while herself having experienced so many disappointments in love, specifically like her mom dies when she’s little, all of her sisters go off to the car- like they go off to the convent after she’s been kind of like she was like very attached to her mom and she’s very attached to her sister, Pauline. And then she’s very just kind of on down the line. And these people just leave her. And even though she kind of gets her sisters back in the convent, she gets them back in the context of late 19th century French religious life, it’s like. I mean, good luck given…

Marie: No sleepovers. 

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, exactly. And then, you know, when she’s in the convent, her father loses his mind and, like, ends up in a neighboring town, not really knowing who he is or what he’s doing. So like love in a certain sense, from a certain vintage, it disappointed her in every imaginable way or so it seems. And yet she testifies to the love of God with just this wild power, you know, just like this real conviction. And so I’m thinking, like people who interest themselves in an artist or in music, they’re often looking for a kind of love. They’re looking for a kind of security, They’re looking for a kind of relationship, even if it’s like one sided or at a distance. And so how is it that like, how is it that you help? I’m thinking of St. Therese right? Like she found a love that lasts. She found a love that would not disappoint. She found a love that was thick, that was strong, That would see her all the way to Heaven. Like how how can your. I don’t know, Maybe this is asking too much of music, but like, how does your music direct beyond itself to, like, something that won’t disappoint? Not to say that you’re going to disappoint your fans, but like at the end of the day, like you’re a human being, you know, like we’re all going to disappoint everyone else in some way, shape or form insofar as we’re like, limited in, we’re fallible and we’re just humans.

But like, God won’t, you know, So like, how do you direct people beyond the music to the things that abide or do the things that remain?

Marie: Hmm. Yeah. And I thought that I was and I think I was doing trying to do that with the secular music for many years because beauty is so, you know, it’s a call to transcendence. John Paul II said that. So even the beauty and I would call it holy leisure. So when we bring people out to like music clubs or whatever, like, Oh, here’s a chance for them to have like a really wonderful time, that’s like holy and fun. And so I was I was doing that for many, many years. And then why did I decide with this album to go to be more explicit with, with the lyrics? And because I realized in my life is that I’m not that smart and I don’t remember things very long. So if I’m not told all the time, the God is the only thing that matters. I will forget. And so this music is the reminder of that. So and what’s also really nice is that these lyrics are from like the Catechism, from Saint Theresa’s writings. I have to say Ignatius’ prayer, take, Lord receive, and I’m just setting music to it. So I’m not like depending on my knowledge, I’m just like letting people that are a lot smarter, a lot holier than me, and I’m just using my music to maybe get it to an audience. Like maybe a young woman has never heard, like, take orders in my liberty, my memory, you know, give me your grace, you know, your love and your grace is enough for me. Maybe she’s never heard that. And she will not hear that unless she decided to go to this woman’s event at a random parish in Illinois or something. And she sees like, Oh, okay, this girl seems nice. I’ll go to this concert and she hears the most important thing on earth, right? And his love and his grace is enough for us. So. So, yeah. So I, my music is the hope that maybe in a like a more easy way that people could hear the most important thing.

Fr. Patrick: What was the most difficult song on the album for you?

Marie: Hmm, that’s a really good question. They were all hard in some ways because I didn’t want to be cheesy and I really wanted to write things. My favorite song, which I don’t think like is most people’s spirit song, which said to me is Among These Rocks. I like all of them in different ways. But I wrote a song from the T.S. Eliot poem Ash Wednesday, and he talks about it like a lady in blue and white. And he’s kind of like sort of like a Beatrice kind of thing. And then I just made it Our Lady. And there’s a there’s a I basically steal from his poem like a ton, but there’s a there’s a line in the song I say, Will the veiled sister pray for the children at the gate who will not go away but cannot pray? And that’s just from his poem. And I love that so much because Our Lady is the one that when we’re going through our worst sufferings, like for me personally, when I’m going through the worst of the worst, it’s really, really, really hard for me to pray. And so like, will she pray for me? And basically the Hail Mary, like pray for us now. And so I think that’s I guess I didn’t answer your question, really. You asked me what’s the hardest? I’d say my like kind of one of my favorite and maybe people don’t like as much would be Among These Rocks.

Fr. Gregory: I listen to…I like Hillsong. So people are going to react as they react to that.

Fr. Patrick: Let’s pause this episode for Oceans.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, yeah. Bingo.

Fr. Patrick: 10 minutes later.

Fr. Gregory: Bingo. But I just heard them talking about maybe there was like two or three albums ago, the one that contains the song 100 Billion X and Shadowstep saying like they just kept failing at the song Shadow Step. Like they just kept trying to write the the song Shadow Step and they just kept spinning other songs out of it. Like Failed lyrics became whole other songs because they, while they didn’t fit in this setting, they fit in their own setting. So I’m wondering if, like sometimes people, they encounter an album, they just see a finished product and they think to themselves, Cool, a finished product. But are there any stories like along the way where a thing came to be that might not have been or I think came to be dust and search, which may have been otherwise, like ways in which you experienced the problems of God and like writing music and making music. I don’t know, anything that comes to mind.

Marie: Yes, I think what was really special for me was the song The Way of Love, because I wrote it with a girl named Savannah Locke, who was a Christian writer in Nashville, and then Sarah Kroger, who is a Catholic artist. Everybody loves, and she’s amazing. And I had written the chorus and I went into in Nashville, you go into like a writer’s room and, you know, there’s like coffee and little snacks and vibes, and you’re supposed to…

Fr. Gregory: Like our studio.

Marie: Yeah, yeah. Actually it is! The and then you’re supposed to create. And I am awkward about that. And so these girls are like Nashville, like, amazing writers that can no matter what’s going on in their life, they can just shut it all out and write, and I’m just not that way. So they basically wrote all of the verse and the bridge, and I had written the chorus like three weeks before, and they were just like going back and forth. They were like, Yeah. Savannah Yeah, yeah. Sarah Yeah. So, and, and I’m just watching them do it. And it was humbling because that’s the album name. Yeah, it’s about Saint Therese… Shouldn’t I be able to write the song that I’m theming everything and now I’m going around the country doing these presentations called The Way of Love, and I didn’t even really write a lot of that song. But I think it’s the most Therese-ian thing, right? Because she’s like, Your Jesus, you’ll be my elevator. They’ll take me up to heaven. I don’t need to grow up, but stay little. And I was like, So little in that situation.

Fr. Gregory: Boom, beautiful.

Fr. Patrick: Yeah, there was an irony there in the Basilica of Saint Therese itself in the building. And because it’s so high up and I said, so that represents, I think, how Saint Therese seems very far from a lot of people. And then you get inside the basilica and you realize that you’re very small and you look up into the ceiling of the basilica. And Saint Therese is massive. She just she’s just huge. And you’re standing there and you’re like, okay, this woman has given me the little way. She’s big now, though, and I’m the little one. And then you realize that she’s surrounded by all of these rose petals which are just raining down from her to you. The little one below I think of and I think it’s just so majestic and so very well designed. And in the building itself, it tells the story of what so many people find in Saint Therese, which is again and again facing our own smallness and realizing the graces we need from the giant saints who have come before us.

Marie: Yeah. Oh, that’s beautiful. I have not been and I really want to go. But what a great example of great art, like, you know, helping us. Yeah, that’s. That’s awesome.

Fr. Patrick: Someone thought of that, I’m sure. Mm hmm.

Fr. Gregory: I was there when I was 19, and I was on my way home from Lourdes, where I just served for a week.

Fr. Patrick: You were closer to her than me because you’re a foot taller than me.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, exactly. So naturally, I look down to everyone. No, I’m not even the tallest member of my family. So actually, my brother Matthew is younger than I, eight years younger than I. And he joined a recent one of our like, Livesplaining episodes, which was hilarious because my brother in will sometimes hop on to troll me. So like, he’ll make his the image of his YouTube account will be the window of my childhood house. Like my window. So it’s like I’m looking, you know, like the creepiest imaginable things. But now he sends out links into the family chat when we go live. So like, if anyone wants to troll, you know, you can just do it at this. So my brother joined recently. That’s besides the point.

Fr. Patrick: It was wonderful having him.

Fr. Gregory: It was great. He brought a certain vibe, which I appreciate. He gave infallible testimony of his relationship to me by referring to me by a childhood nickname that no one else uses. Quote, brosie-bones.

Marie: So back to the bro’s thing. I like that.

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, exactly. All roads lead back to the Bro’s. Yeah.

Fr. Patrick: So you’re 19.

Fr. Gregory: So I’m 19, right? Sorry. My bad. And I’m on my way home from Lourdes. I mean, home to Austria. And I remember being especially tired, but, like, I think the experience of having been with Saint Terese’s, the experience of having been loved in simple and it just kind of you go home with the impression that something has changed, but not yet clear as to what exactly. So, like what are the ways in which your album… like people will tell you about your music, the effect that it has in their lives. And sometimes we’re surprised by that. I mean, I don’t make music, but like talking to Hillbilly Thomists, they wrote the song called Marigold and like a bunch of women who have had miscarriages have come to them and say, like, this song was like, incredibly helpful. So like, what are ways in which, like, people have testified or just kind of, you know, let you know that your your music has sent them home different fearful.

Marie: Yeah. I mean the most memorable for me, two women that met in the hospital with their two sons that were sick and they got tattoos to say, you’re not alone, which my song, You’re not Alone. And that was really cool. So this is like pre-St. Therese stuff. Yeah. Yeah.

Fr. Patrick: Let’s do it. Today. All three of us.

Fr. Gregory: We actually have a tattoo parlor here in the studio. 

Fr. Patrick: We’ll have a tattoo artist come to us.

Fr. Gregory: Bingo.

Marie: That would be very memorable and probably not the best. [laughing]

Fr. Patrick: All right, we won’t do it.

Marie: Actually. So this is kind of random, but I…I was doing a bunch of Christmas concerts, and I was singing Joy to the World, but I added a chorus because kind of Christmas last year is kind of like very mix of sorrow and joy in my life. And so I wanted to sing Joy to the World, but also maybe just twisted a little bit to maybe make people think a little differently and so I the course is joy to the fall and joy to the broken joy to the mourning. And that has a really special because I had several people come up after woman had her husband, you know, had his funeral that week. And that was yeah, that was really special. She was like, wow. Like, I didn’t think it was possible for me to have joy this year. And I had talked about like the weight of joy and just that it is stronger than even grief and so that was just really speacial said like, thank you for making me believe that joy is possible. So I was really cool. 

Fr. Gregory: That’s beautiful.

Fr. Patrick: People will discover your album. They will listen to it. Once you’ve done this with hundreds of recording artists, you discover something once and you listen to it and maybe something hits you. But are there experiences in music that that you’ve had, Marie, where you’ve listened to something over and over and that that sinking in of it has changed you? So I like this point Father Gregory is making is that the music really changes us. Is there something that you that you’ve listened to over and over again that has that has really shaped the way you view the world? Like for me, an example that that that I’m always thinking of is “The Messiah” because. There’s certain but I love that piece of music so much. I know the whole thing very well. And there are certain passages of Scripture that I cannot read without starting to hum along to myself and sort of bopping along like Handel because he bopped obviously. And so that’s that’s just a that’s a kind of little way. But then there are other things that that shaped the way you actually view the world. So I wonder if there’s a work or two like that you might share that is something that you go back to that has washed over you, that is, you know, like cut, like carved.

Marie: Yeah, there are a couple and in, in the old days there were there are a lot of singer songwriters in Christian music. There’s not really any as much anymore. It’s much more worship oriented. But when I grew up…

Fr. Patrick: Yeah, that’s a good point. That’s a bit that’s been a big change.

Marie: Yeah. And it’s because I used to love I listen to so much of that music and there is an artist named Nicole Nordman who was a Christian artist that had just some beautiful songs on the songs called “Holy.” And she just that would be a song for me. That was that’s changing. I come back to, interestingly enough, because I know that right now, like, things are different for her. But Audrey Assad wrote a song called “For Love You” and she I… it’s so beautiful. The bridges is, “You are my deepest longing. And so I see you everywhere. It’s you I’m chasing after, for I’m captivated by who you are Alleluia. I will follow you forever.” And the way she does it, it’s just like sweeping. I’ll follow you forever. And. And I think I love anything that suggests that, like, we are ultimately the spouse of Christ. You know, that ultimately, like, as no matter what my vocation is, is that, like, He’s my He’s my deepest, deepest longing, you know, that my my heart is shaped for his Sacred Heart. So that yeah, that one would be something that’s very moving.

Fr. Gregory: I, um. I don’t often write, like, famous people letters. In fact, I think I’ve only done it like, once. And it was to Josh Garrels, but it was in listening to, um, at the time when I was. I haven’t listened to his music probably in five years, but it’s like the home album and then the album before that, specifically the song, like “Ulysses.” It was like it was it was unlocking my or unraveling my life for me. And it’s like, I don’t even know it. This I can’t I don’t actually know lyrics because I just sing like 55% accurately and then 45% creatively. People will hear me sing songs like that’s not even close. So I’m like, I’m very sorry. But yeah, this is for me, a happy reminder to return to that song and see how life has changed me, it, him, us in the process. Okay, but question kind of in a new a somewhat of a new tack but I’m thinking like so how do I live my life? I, you know, live my life for God. And then I preach and teach in testimony to what I have experienced or encountered. And I find that, like, you know, what are the most important virtues, like faith, hope, charity, duh. But there are other virtues that are in service of that life, you know, like other virtues which are subordinate to the theological virtues and the ones like words that I’ve been coming back to recently are curiosity and honesty, even though like classically curiosity as a vice. But I mean it in the sense that, like, I want to be able to come before my experience and actually interest myself in what’s going on, rather than telling a story of what happened a few months ago or a few years ago, or anticipating a story that hasn’t yet happened and may never happen. Like I want to talk about what this is, and then I want to be honest with what I find, because I’ve I have discovered that that’s like the only way to get what’s real. And I find that in getting what’s real, you’re able to like, meet people. So in terms of so I’m thinking of like your artistry, you know, you’re writing songs and sometimes you’re going to be tempted to cheat, you know, just to like, write an easy rhyme or write an easy lyric or just like, do the same chord progression that everyone’s been doing for the last billion years because you just whatever, you know, it’s like it’s just like it becomes a of mechanical process or it becomes like we feel the industry in our own habits. Like what? What do you do to cultivate a kind of, you know, like curiosity or a kind of honesty, whatever the virtues that you would identify, which makes for like real arts and real communication.

Marie: Um, I think going to great artists. So and what’s fun about this project and it’s fun and scary because I am thinking there’s a lot of people that followed me because they saw me in secular venues and I think they just, I think some of them are. I mean, I’ve lost followers and stuff like she’s a Jesus freak now, I don’t know. But then others it’s so interesting because they’re I’m discovering like like there’s there’s a guy that’s a big fan in Boston, and I’ve done like a private show, like for him and his friends and and the first, you know, he met through a secular event and he just said, like, my sister passed away and her favorite saint was Saint Therese. I had no idea that he was that he was had it knew who Saint Therese was. So that’s kind of been amazing. But great artists pushed me and with this album because it doesn’t matter because I’m not trying to get on a radio station or get signed to a record label. I’m basically just giving up to a certain extent, any kind of fame or fortune and just more like, God, whatever you want to bring. I mean, I mean, I say that and I’m on this podcast and I’ve been wanting to be on this for so long…

Fr. Gregory: There you go, fame and fortune.

Marie: Praise God! [laughing]

Fr. Gregory: Our new motto.

[Together] Fame and fortune.

Fr. Gregory: Exactly. 

Marie: Yeah. There you go.

Fr. Gregory: Cash rules everything around me. Yeah. Never mind. Keep going. 

Marie: I’m looking forward to your rap music.

Fr. Gregory: I think that’s the first time that the Wu-Tang Clan has been quoted here on Godsplaining. So I’ll try to make it a custom.

Marie: Thank you, thank you. 

Fr. Gregory: Yeah, it’s my joy.

Marie: So with this album, artists like, okay, so the I wrote a song about the Eucharist and Tolkien has that letter that he wrote to his son, you know, out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, you know, pity. The one thing, the love on Earth, the Blessed Sacrament. And it’s like, cool. I don’t really have to do a lot of work because I just need to, like, take that and run with it. And so I think that’s how I’m trying to. I love what you said, though, because I what you said about being present and having that curiosity because you I think you can change someone’s life if you’ve listened to them and are actually interested and curious about them, because so much of conversation is just waiting for you to tell them something about what you did, it’s like, Hey, I’m excited about this thing. Oh, I need to tell you about this trip that I went on where I was really excited about this thing. And then when you don’t do that, they’re like, so delighted, like, And so that was beautiful that you mentioned that in the same way in art too. It’s like, how do you just like, actually not think about what you’ve done before and what you will do, but like, get in there and I think great artists, help me do that. So yeah, so everything I, everything with this project, I basically just like stood, you know, and like raised my hand and asked better artists than me for help. They’re all dead. But they all answered.

Fr. Gregory: We just had a conversation with Andrew Peterson I don’t know if you’ve come across him in the Nashville days. But yeah, just like…

Fr. Patrick: Man, is that guy cool.

Fr. Gregory: He like, honestly, I was like, just staring into my camera over my computer just singing like, “I like you a lot!”

Marie: Does he have Tolkien’s like he has something…He has something of Tolkien’s. Has he told you guys about that?

Fr. Gregory: If so, I’ve forgotten. But yeah, no, it’s…

Marie: But he is cool.

Fr. Gregory: He is a boss. Holy smokes. Yeah. Okay. Um, as we come to the end of our time together, any final thoughts on ways in which people can be in touch with you? Ways in which people can encounter your music, ways in which yet people can continue the conversation, things like that.

Marie: Yeah. So my website is mariemillermusic.com and I’m also traveling quite a bit, so hopefully I’ll be in the area of your listeners at some point soon. And yeah, I’m blessed to have some help now with a wonderful young girl, Gen-Z girl with social media. So actually my social media isn’t terrible.

Fr. Gregory: That’s awesome.

Marie: And so Instagram MarieMillerSing. That’s me.

Fr. Gregory: Father Patrick, can you…

Fr. Patrick: Give that a big follow! Love the music. Thank you so much. Thank you for taking the time and thank you for just being real with us. I think people appreciate when they talk to us about the podcast, when whatever they say, they love that it’s authentic because we are who we really are here. So thanks for revealing your soul to us.

Marie: Thank you so much. This is special and I appreciate it. There were questions had never been asked before. And it’s probably really good because I think I do like my canned answer. And but you guys didn’t really ask. I mean, like you weren’t like, so did you start singing? I was like, we… it was kind of fun. I kind of liked it!

Fr. Gregory: We’re just weird people with weird thoughts asking weird questions. So yeah, sometimes it goes catastrophically because like, the person on the other end is like, yeah, like I’m waiting for you to ask a normal person question. And we’re like, We’ve only got weird questions. [laughing]

Fr. Patrick: [laughing] Don’t have any of those.

Marie: This was so fun!

Fr. Gregory: Dig. All right, well, God love you. God bless you and yeah, yeah. Beautiful. I’m just going to stop blabbering and I’m just going to turn to the main camera and say, thanks for tuning into this episode of Godsplaining. Be sure to like and subscribe to Godsplaining wherever you listen to your podcast, whether on YouTube or your audio app or other other options. If so, I haven’t found them. But if you discover them, yep, go for it. If you check out Godsplaining.org, you’ll find links for merchandise and links for upcoming events. So I could list those. But you’re better at navigating the web than I am because I live under a rock. But know of our prayers for you. Please pray for us and we’ll look forward to chatting with you next time on Godsplaining.