Ave Maria in the Afternoon Full Hours

Segment 1: Lessons on the Spiritual Life from a Man who Climbs Skyscrapers Free climber Alex Honnold recently made worldwide headlines for climbing the Taipei 101 skyscraper without the use of any ropes, harnesses, or other safety equipment. Such a decision may be foolhardy, but it’s nothing compared to living our life without the safety harnesses God has provided us. Marcus has more. Segment 2: M...

Segment 1: A Hidden Mental Health Crisis in the Church? A new survey by CatholicTV suggests widespread emotional distress among US Catholics, raising questions about how mental health may shape parish life and Mass attendance. Dr. Greg Popcak joins us. Segment 2: Healing the Wounds of Infertility Infertility and pregnancy loss plagues many Catholic marriages. And it’s a wound that continues to sta...

Segment 1: Wisdom is the Path to Redemption Thomas Aquinas writes that wisdom is where the revelation of God begins, because it is God who draws near to us in covenant love. Marcus has more. Segment 2: ‘Detransitioner’ Wins $2 Million Medical-Malpractice Lawsuit The first gender “detransitioner” medical-malpractice case to go to trial resulted in a $2 million dollar verdict against the medical pro...

Segment 1: “Who is the King of Glory? It is the Lord?” In today’s Responsorial Psalm for the Feast of the Presentation, we declare “Who is the King of Glory? It is the Lord!” It’s an especially appropriate prayer for this era of political division and “No Kings” protests. Doug Keck joins us with more. Segment 2: Ignatian Discernment and the Religious Life Fr. Timothy Gallagher has founded the Igna...

Segment 1: We’re Failing the Ultimate Lie Detector Test Today marks an odd historical anniversary. On February 2, 1935, an inventor named Leonarde Keeler strapped an accused man to a polygraph machine and asked him a series of questions. For the next few minutes, the machine declared what was true and what was false. The polygraph promised something humans have wanted since the Garden: a shortcut...

Segment 1: “Blessed are the poor in spirit…” In this Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus delivers the Sermon on the Mount and gives us the Beatitudes. We unpack the readings with Rob Corzine Segment 2: The Humility of the Saints Every saint — from the greatest thinker to the commonest servant — has walked the same narrow road: the path of humility. It is the foundation of every virtue and the key to sanctity....

Segment 1: Marcus’ Monologue: When Hitler met Gandhi Today marks three historical anniversaries including three of the most significant figures of the last century. On this day, Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, Mohandas Gandhi was assassinated, and Winston Churchill was laid to rest. If these three very different men were to meet, what would they say to each other? Marcus imagines a dial...

Segment 1: Meet the man who could be Nigeria’s first saint (2 segments) Nigeria is home to an estimated 35 million Catholics and has one of the highest rates of Mass attendance in the world. Yet despite Catholicism’s rapid growth, Africa’s most populous nation has never had a native canonized saint. That could change with Blessed Cyprian Michael Iwene Tansi, a Nigerian priest known for his holines...

Segment 1: The Meaning of the Light In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells us not to hide our “light” under a bushel basket. The entire passage is deeply rooted in history, as God has long revealed Himself through the light. Marcus discusses more on the Covenants. Segment 2: Century, Bloody Century January 30 marks the anniversary of the infamous Bloody Sunday, one of the darkest days in Northern Ireland’...

Segment 1: A classical education revival hits the capital region In the shadow of the nation’s capital, a growing number of Washington-area families are quietly rethinking where and how their children learn. From the economically struggling neighborhoods of Anacostia to the affluent suburbs of northern Virginia, families of faith are discovering an alternative to the region’s increasingly polarize...

Segment 1: Careless Exaggeration Dishonors Holocaust Victims Speaking this week about continued immigration crackdowns, Tim Walz stated “Many of us grew up reading that story of Anne Frank. Somebody’s gonna write that children’s story about Minnesota.” The comparison confuses genocide with governance, racial annihilation with civil law, and totalitarian extermination with constitutional enforcemen...

Segment 1: Holocaust Denial and the Abuse of History On January 27, 1945, Soviet troops entered the death camps at Auschwitz and Birkenau. What they saw defied description or imagination. This date now stands as the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. In the decades since the liberation of Auschwitz, the horror has faced a new enemy - an enemy that seeks to deny it ever happened. Marcus discu...

Segment 1: Violence – the Sacrament of a Godless Society After Vladimir Lenin’s death, his body was placed in a mausoleum in Red Square – preserved as a saint of the new faith of Marxism. He envisioned a society without God – but this society created its own gods, with disastrous results. Marcus has more. Segment 2: Pope Leo Highlights Risks of AI Pope Leo has made it clear that addressing the ris...

Segment 1: Vance Sidesteps Biggest Concerns at March for Life Vice-president JD Vance addressed huge crowds of pro-lifers on Friday before the March for Life in Washington, DC. In his speech, he reassured the crowds that “you have an ally in the White House,” but largely sidestepped the issues that have been at the heart of critics. Doug Keck joins us with more. Segment 2: Connecting the Dots in M...

Segment 1: Our Christian Obligation to Alex Pretti The deaths of Alex Pretti and Renée Good are tragic and eminently avoidable. They emerged from volatile circumstances where passions ran high, when authority was challenged at close quarters, and prudential judgment failed on multiple levels. How can we as Catholics contribute to better civil discourse? Marcus has some thoughts. Segment 2: Society...

Segment 1: Pornography and the Culture of Life Notorious serial killer Ted Bundy was executed on January 24, 1989. Before his execution, he discussed his previous addiction to violent pornography. Marcus discusses how pornography devalues the human person and leads to a culture of death. Segment 2: Why I Traded News for Pro-Life Work Denyse Shannon was working the assignment desk at a local TV sta...

Segment 1: God Uses the Broken Man It began on the shores of Galilee – Jesus called a man named Simon, later Peter, to follow him. Peter was far from perfect and he knew it, asking the Lord to depart from him for he was a sinful man. But throughout history God uses broken, sinful man for his plan for the world. Marcus has more. Segment 2: Do Women Have a Universal Vocation? What distinguishes men...

Segment 1: Will the Vatican join the “Board of Peace?” President Trump has invited the Vatican and several other European countries to join a “board of peace” to oversee the reconstruction of Gaza. Matthew Bunson has the details, and also honors the late Vatican journalist John Allen, who passed away this week. Segment 2: The Faith – and Joy – of Indiana Football On Monday the Indiana Hoosiers foo...

Segment 1: Protests during Worship should concern us all The interruption of Sunday services at a church in Minnesota marks a watershed moment in the moral and religious imagination of the American Republic and the Western world. If even religious worship may be interrupted in service of political expression, then truly nothing is sacred. Marcus has more. Segment 2: Is the Church a Cruise ship, or...

Segment 1: Breaking the Deadlock on the Life Issue What role should our government play in the life and death choices we all face? Andrea Picciotti-Bayer is featured on an upcoming PBS series that will explore this question. She joins us. Segment 2: Lessons from the Eucharistic Revival In the summer of 2024, thousands of Catholics flocked to Indianapolis for the National Eucharistic Congress. In t...

Segment 1: How the French Revolution Failed On January 21, 1793, the guillotine fell upon the neck of French King Louis XVI. The execution of the French monarch was a symbolic moment then because the revolt ceased to be rhetorical. At that point, it became a public declaration of warfare. Unlike the American Revolution, which sought continuity with inherited law, custom, religious conviction, natu...

Segment 1: The Christian Meaning of Confidence Many Christians struggle with confidence because we’ve absorbed the world’s definition of it. The culture tells us that confidence means believing we’re strong, capable, and talented enough to handle whatever comes our way. If we don’t feel competent or certain, we assume something is wrong with us. But the Theology of the Body offers a radically diff...

Segment 1: Wikipedia and our Quest for Truth, Knowledge and Wisdom January 15 was the 25th anniversary of the first edits on Wikipedia and many consider the date to be the website’s “birthday.” Wikipedia has grown from the website your teachers warned you never to cite as a source, to one of the most widely-used resources on the web. But while it can provide us with knowledge about countless topic...

Segment 1: Anti-ICE Agitators Storm Church A group of anti-ICE agitators stormed Cities Church in St. Paul, Minnesota yesterday during Sunday services. We look at the story with Doug Keck. Segment 2: Old Wine into New Wineskins: Understanding the Covenants In today’s Gospel, Jesus is asked why His disciples do not fast, while the followers of John and the Pharisees do. Jesus’ answer is key to unde...

Segment 1: Did the Civil Rights Movement go too Far? The Civil Rights Act of 1964 has a significant place in the American moral and legal imagination. It addressed grave injustices that had disfigured our nation’s legal and civic life for generations. At the same time though, history has called us to some level of discernment on the unintended consequences of the Act. Marcus has more. Segment 2: J...