The Habit

John Hendrix is a New York Times bestselling author and illustrator of many books. His award-winning illustrations have also appeared on book jackets, newspapers, and magazines all over the world. The Society of Illustrators named John the Distinguished Educator in the Arts for 2024. He is the Kenneth E. Hudson Professor of Art and the founding Chair of the MFA in Illustration and Visual Culture p...

Daniel Silliman is senior news editor for Christianity Today. He earned a doctorate in American studies from Heidelberg University in Germany and has taught US history and humanities at Heidelberg, the University of Notre Dame, Valparaiso University, and Milligan University. His new book is One Lost Soul: Richard Nixon’s Search for Salvation . From the jacket copy: "Impious and amoral, petty and v...

In this back-to-school episode Jonathan Rogers speaks with Rachel Griffis and Rachel De Smith Roberts about their book, Deep Reading: Practices to Subvert the Vices of Our Distracted, Hostile, and Consumeristic Age . Dr. Griffis is a professor of English at Spring Arbor University in Michigan, and Dr. Roberts is an associate professor of English at North Greenville University in South Carolina. In...

Jared C. Wilson is an author of over twenty books and a popular speaker at churches and conferences around the world. He serves as Pastor for Preaching and the Director of the Pastoral Training Center at Liberty Baptist Church in Liberty, Missouri. He is also an Assistant Professor of Pastoral Ministry and Author in Residence at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Missouri. His...

As of last week, all three books of Jonathan Rogers's Wilderking Trilogy, 20th Anniversary Deluxe Hardback edition, have been released into the wild. The Bark of the Bog Owl released in June. And now The Secret of the Swamp King and The Way of the Wilderking are available wherever you buy books. These new editions have gorgeous new covers by Stephen Crotts and exceedingly swampy new interior illus...

Besides being an award-winning teacher and professor of theology & ethics at Lipscomb University, Lee Camp hosts No Small Endeavor, a podcast that asks What does it mean to live a good life? What is true happiness? What are the habits, practices, and dispositions that facilitate human flourishing? Lee Camp explores these and similar questions with some of the most influential authors, scientis...

Lanta Davis is a professor of humanities and literature in the John Wesley Honors College at Indiana Wesleyan University. Her new book is Becoming by Beholding: The Power of the Imagination in Spiritual Formation . In this episode, Dr. Davis and Jonathan Rogers talk about the perhaps counterintuitive truth that neglecting to engage our imagination makes us more susceptible to imaginative influence...

Joel Miller has been an editor, a publisher, and an author. He is currently working on a book on the history of the book. He also writes an excellent twice-a-week Substack newsletter called Miller’s Book Review . In this episode, Joel and Jonathan Rogers discuss Joel's journey toward publication—and how Joel gets so much reading and writing done while holding down a full-time job an raising a fami...

Dr. Shirley Mullen is President Emerita of Houghton College in New York State and the author of Claiming the Courageous Middle: Daring to Live and Work Together for a More Hopeful Future . In this episode, Dr. Mullen and Jonathan Rogers discuss the idea that, in an era of such dangerous polarization, the “courageous middle” is not a place of bland averaging, moral cowardice, indecisiveness, or ind...

Dr. Junius Johnson is an independent scholar and teacher and a public intellectual who devotes his time to thinking and writing about whatever is noble and excellent, and how to bring those things to bear to nurture meaningful lives. You can find out more about his classes at JuniusJohnson.com . In this episode, Junius and Jonathan Rogers talk about receiving wonder and adding to the stock of the...

Karen Stiller writes about  the intersections between faith and the world, social issues, matters of justice and doing better. Her most recent book is Holiness Here: Searching for God in the Ordinary Events of Everyday Life . In this episode, Karen and Jonathan Rogers talk about holiness as a matter of loving people well as opposed to telling them how they have fallen short–and what that holiness...

In this interview, recorded in front of a live audience at The Habit Summer Writers Weekend in June 2024, Doug McKelvey discusses the ups and downs of a muti-faceted writing career. Doug is the author of the Every Moment Holy books . Support the show: https://therabbitroom.givingfuel.com/member See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Elizabeth Oldfield hosts The Sacred , a podcast about our deepest values, the stories that shape us, and how we can build empathy and understanding between people who are very different. She has a regular column for UnHerd and has appeared on BBC One, Radio 5Live, Radio 4, and The World Service. Her work has appeared in The Financial Times, Prospect, The Times , CNN, The Guardian , and beyond. She...

The 20th-Anniversary Deluxe Hardback Edition of The Bark of the Bog Owl is now available. It has a new cover by Stephen Crotts, new interior illustrations by Joe Hox, and bonus material (poems, songs, riddles) by Jonathan Rogers. To celebrate the Bog Owl's twentieth birthday, Jonathan reads an excerpt in this bonus episode.  You can get your own copy of The Bark of the Bog Owl at the Rabbit Room s...

In this episode of The Habit Podcast, Read Aloud Revival's Sarah MacKenzie sits in the host's chair to interview Jonathan Rogers about The Bark of the Bog Owl , 20th Anniversary Edition, which releases this week.  Support the show: https://therabbitroom.givingfuel.com/member See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Wesley Vander Lugt  is a pastor, theologian, writer, teacher, nonprofit leader, and arts advocate with a passion for beauty, slowness, cultivation, and kinship. He currently works as the Acting Director of the Leighton Ford Center for Theology, the Arts, and Gospel Witness and is Adjunct Professor of Theology at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Charlotte. He is also the Co-Founder of Kinship...

Julie Lane-Gay is a horticulturalist and a writer. Her work has appeared in a range of publications including Reader's Digest, Fine Gardening, Faith Today, Anglican Planet, and The Englewood Review of Books . She sometimes teaches courses at Regent College in Vancouver and edits the college's journal, CRUX . She also writes obituaries. Her new book is The Riches of Your Grace: Living in the Book o...

Weakness doesn’t feel like a gift. But author, podcaster, and songwriter Eric Schumacher believes that it is. His new book is The Good Gift of Weakness: God’s Strength Made Perfect in the Story of Redemption . In this episode, Eric and Jonathan Rogers talk about the gifts that follow when we come to terms with our weakness, what it means to be in a posture to receive rather than to strive, and the...

Poet Rebecca Gomez is the author and also the illustrator of Mari in the Margins , a middle-grade novel in verse. Her editor, also a poet, is Rachel Donahue of Bandersnatch Books. For the first time on The Habit Podcast, in this episode Jonathan Rogers is in conversation with both the author and her editor.  Support the show: https://therabbitroom.givingfuel.com/member See omnystudio.com/listener...

Lore Ferguson Wilbert writes about spiritual formation, faith, culture, and theology in life. She is the proprietor of an excellent Substack called Sayable .  She has also been known to teach writing and do editorial work. Her new book is The Understory: An Invitation to Rootedness and Resilience from the Forest Floor . In this episode, Lore and Jonathan Rogers talk about what it means to really b...

As host of the Read-Aloud Revival Podcast and the Read-Aloud Revival Online Community, Sarah MacKenzie has brought untold joy to bookish families. Besides connecting families with other people’s books, Sarah has started writing and publishing her own picture books. Her latest is Because Barbara: Barbara Cooney Paints Her World . Illustrated by Eileen Ryan Ewen, this picture-book biography tells th...

Malcolm Guite is a poet-priest. Jeremy Begbie has called him "one of the most important Christian poets of our time." In this episode, Malcolm and Jonathan Rogers discuss imagination as a way of knowing. This episode is brought to you by The Habit Membership, a community of writers who learn together and give each other a little more courage. Find out more at TheHabit.co . Support the show: https:...

Besides being a bird enthusiast, Courtney Ellis is a pastor in Southern California, the author of several books, and the host of a podcast called The Thing with Feathers . Her new book is Looking Up: A Birder’s Guide to Hope through Grief . In this episode, Courtney and Jonathan Rogers talk about delight, presence, and cultivating attention.  Support the show: https://therabbitroom.givingfuel.com/...

Leif Enger writes novels about good people living through bad times. His new book, I Cheerfully Refuse , epitomizes what the Los Angeles Tines calls Enger's “musical, sometimes magical and deeply satisfying kind of storytelling.” In this episode, Leif Enger and Jonathan Rogers talk about dystopian fiction; courage, literacy, and hope; and the bass guitar. Support the show: https://therabbitroom.gi...

Emily P. Freeman spends a lot of time thinking, talking, and writing about discernment and decision-making–doing the next right thing. She hosts The Next Right Thing podcast and created The Next Right Thing Guided Journal . Her latest book is How to Walk Into a Room: The Art of Knowing When to Stay and When to Walk Away . In this conversation, Emily and Jonathan Rogers talk about pointing and call...