As mentioned in last week’s article on silence, we live in an incredibly loud and distracting world. There’s rarely a moment of natural silence where one can use the time to meditate or do mental prayer. Those moments often have to be manufactured in the middle of a busy, noisy day.

Recently on Morning Air, John Morales had superstar stuntwoman Brenda Lorena Garcia on the show to talk about how her faith affected her career and vice versa. Nobody is more entrenched in the noise and distractions of the secular world than a Hollywood actress, so having a vibrant spiritual life has been a lifeline for her that helps block out temptation.

Brenda has done work for a myriad of blockbuster films and shows, including Marvel’s upcoming Eternals, The Suicide Squad (2021), Ant-Man and the Wasp, and Transformers: The Last Knight. She is also an actress, former award-winning multimedia journalist, and Catholic evangelizer.

She recalled being a young child and always wanting to be a performer and actress, but she let her dreams take a backseat while she pursued journalism because she didn’t have any connections in Hollywood. However, the Lord had other plans as she was gradually introduced into the entertainment industry. Brenda ended up meeting plenty of contacts that eventually helped her to where she is today.

When she was studying to become a journalist, she started to do some background and extra work to get her “feet wet” in acting. One day, while she was standing in, a young woman approached her and asked her what she wanted to do. Brenda told her that she wanted to be a stunt actress in action movies and the woman responded saying that that’s an entire industry of its own. In fact, her father was a stunt coordinator! “And I was like, ‘Oh cool! Well, I’d love to meet your dad someday.’ All these things were just happening. And she goes, ‘Well sure, he’s standing right over there.’ He was standing about ten feet away from us.” Brenda remembers thanking God that he put her in the right place at the right time to kickstart her career in stunt work.

John brought up the fact that since that day, Brenda has gone on to perform so many incredible stunts including jumping into jellyfish-infested waters, falling off of buildings, and getting hit by vehicles. “When you do all this stuff, how is your Faith with you at all times?” Brenda responded, saying that she thanks the Lord for the gift of discipline. Through a consistently hectic schedule, she has maintained her attendance of daily Mass. She credits this habit as the aid which ensured her ability to practice and keep her faith in the midst of an industry well-known to be saturated with immorality.

In such an industry and with a job like acting and doing stunts, it would be easy to end up lonely and disheartened. There’s very little room made for spiritual wellness in Hollywood, but Brenda has stayed the course and she says that her life has been and continues to be a fulfilling one. Keeping the Faith has allowed her to find happiness in a dark world at a dark time and we should take that as an encouraging example. She said that she often likes to share one of the prayers by St. Teresa of Avila:

Let nothing disturb you,

Let nothing frighten you,

All things will pass away.

God never changes;

Patience obtains all things,

Whoever has God lacks nothing.

God alone suffices.

Amen.

Listen to the full interview below:

Link

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