Ignatius Press Podcast

Author Kevin Wells felt like his marriage—his whole life, even—was falling apart. His wife, Krista, was mired in an addiction to alcohol that cut her off from God, family, and friends, and Kevin felt helpless and alone. When, at last, supported by the grace of the sacraments, Krista started to find her way to healing and sobriety, the Covid-19 pandemic plunged the whole world into confusion and is...

There are multiple ways in which Abigail Favale’s conversion to Catholicism may be seen as unlikely. First as an ex-Evangelical, then as a feminist academic, Favale had built a worldview—and career—on the rejection of “patriarchy” and on the promotion of progressive causes. How could she enter a Church known for male-only leadership, and for rigorous opposition to contraception and abortion? In th...

Pope Francis wrote recently about the importance of literature in moral formation. For millennia, humans have used story-telling to communicate religious beliefs and moral values, and to ensure that history and culture remain alive for future generations. As a teacher in Catholic classical schools, Abigail Palmer has a passion for using stories as vehicles for learning history, language, and the F...

There was a time when Steve Dawson found himself in trouble with the law, mired in destructive behaviors and relationships. Today he spends his days sharing the Good News with anyone who will listen, as founder and president of Saint Paul Street Evangelization (in between these two stages of his life, he says, he could be found downing Jack Daniels while watching Mother Angelica).   Struck by how...

If someone looked at the way you live your life, would they say, “That’s a person who is seeking Christ?” While many Catholics might be able to give personal or intellectual reasons why they practice their Faith, how many really allow the interior conversion necessary for a relationship with Christ to shine through in their daily lives? How many have essentially adopted a secular way of living? Th...

In its earliest days, Christianity was a faith associated with cities. Cities were the spots chosen by the Apostles to begin spreading the Good News, the earliest Christian communities were found in city centers, and cities quickly became the focal points of persecution of Christians—and the blood of the martyrs was always the seed of the Church. Best-selling author Mike Aquilina has written a boo...

The hero of the new novel Death in Black and White is a Catholic priest and classic film buff who finds himself caught in a web of crime, sin, and double-crossings that rivals anything found in his favorite film-noir detective movies. The book’s author, Fr. Michael Brisson—also a Catholic priest and classic film buff—may not have real-life experience of being in the clutches of the Mob, but he doe...

Most Catholics are aware, even if only in a vague way, of the many holy men and women who have come before us who wrote or preached on the spiritual life. We may have read about their lives; we may find their holiness and closeness to God inspiring. But do many of us look to them for concrete, specific spiritual guidance? Archbishop Emeritus Alfred Hughes has written a book that presents the lumin...

When Joseph Ratzinger became pope in 2005, there was a perception in some quarters that this new pontiff—a renowned theologian and former head of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith—was a highbrow academic who would preach from the chair of St. Peter in abstruse theoretical language that the average Catholic would find impenetrable. Fortunately for all of us, this turned out n...

In his latest book “Why Does Everything Come in Threes?” philosopher and author Peter Kreeft ponders the ways in which creation—and the story of humanity in creation—are indelibly stamped with the image of the Creator, that is, with the Trinity.   In this episode, Kreeft speaks with host Andrew Petiprin about this three-fold pattern of the universe, and how the mystery of the Trinity echoes throug...

Because the Catholic Church has always taught that only men can be ordained to the priesthood instituted by Christ, there is a perception that the Church’s story is a story about men. There’s the Blessed Mother, of course, and maybe the occasional nun who rises to prominence, but since only men can be ordained, the thinking goes, it is men who have built and shaped the Church’s common life through...

They’re simple questions, and ones that every believer has to confront at some point in his or her life: why do we suffer, and why does God—who we believe to be good and loving—allow it? Humanity’s struggles with these questions have inspired countless works of art and literature—from the book of Job on through the ages—as well as theological treatises. But the struggle is also very personal; we a...

Francis X. Maier has been immersed in the life of the Church at different levels for decades. As senior aide to Archbishop Charles Chaput for more than twenty years, and as editor-in-chief of the National Catholic Register for many years before that, he got to know the leaders and major players in the American Church in both professional and personal settings. When he sat down to write a book offe...

In a society that often claims to value the voices of the marginalized, one group that find themselves frequently silenced by the very people claiming to speak for them are detransitioners—men and women who have gone down the road of “gender transition,” only to change their minds, embrace their biological sex, and reverse course. In this episode, Andrew Petiprin speaks with Jennifer Lahl, a nurse...

Is beautiful sacred art a thing of the past? Is it impossible for contemporary artists to inspire the kind of reverence and devotion for sacred subjects that the artworks of great masters have done for centuries? The Catholic Home Gallery is an answer to these questions—a collection of eighteen artworks by contemporary artists that embody the richness of the Catholic artistic tradition with fresh...

When Mark Wahlberg’s hit movie “Father Stu” was released in 2022, audiences all over the country were introduced to Father Stuart Long, a former boxer-turned-wannabe-actor-turned Catholic priest who died in Helena, Montana in 2014 at the age of 50. The motorcycle-riding tough guy who found his way to Christ and the priesthood captured the hearts of many moviegoers, but the film only told part of t...