Two Become Family with Renzo and Monica Ortega
Renzo and Monica share stories, advice, and encouragement for everyday Catholics navigating the human side of a faith-filled marriage. They both bring a voice of joyful solidarity from their experience living in the trenches with a growing family. Their honesty and witness offer hope to couples who want to find confidence in their vocation to marriage through a candid and faithful discussion.
Renzo and Monica Ortega are Catholic ministry leaders, podcast hosts, authors, and national speakers. Their latest title, Lovemaking: How to Talk about Sex with Your Spouse was published through Ave Maria Press. They host the popular marriage podcast Two Become Family and speak nationally for the St. John Paul II Foundation’s Together in Holiness conference series.
Their testimonies of faith, marriage, and parenting have been featured by the National Catholic Register, the Knights of Columbus, and Augustine Institute. They are coauthors of the children’s devotional Go to Joseph for Children, and Renzo is also the author of the men’s devotional Go to Joseph: 10 Day Preparation for Consecration to St. Joseph.
Two Become Family with Renzo and Monica Ortega
180. Lent - Changing Our Aim
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Why does parenting feel so overwhelming, even when we’re trying to do everything right? In this episode of Two Become Family, we explore how much of our stress, guilt, and burnout as parents comes from aiming at the wrong goal. When success is measured by calm children, good behavior, or having everything under control, everyday family life can quickly feel like failure.
“Changing Our Aim” invites Catholic parents to rediscover the virtue of magnanimity, the call to live with a greatness of soul that aims beyond perfectionism and control. Rather than shrinking our expectations out of fear or comparison, magnanimity helps us set our sights on the true goal of parenting: forming hearts for love, virtue, and holiness. Through the lens of Lent, we talk honestly about missing the mark, feeling discouraged, and how re-aiming our hearts allows God’s grace to do the real work.
This episode lays the foundation for the entire Lenten series by reframing parenting not as performance, but as participation in God’s slow, faithful work of transformation in family life.
In this episode, we discuss:
•Catholic parenting during Lent
•What magnanimity really means for parents
•Why control and perfection increase parental burnout
•How changing your aim reduces guilt, shame, and comparison
•Raising children with faith, hope, and trust in God