In Good Faith

This week on In Good Faith, host Steve is joined by Melissa Inouye and David Peters. Both guests discuss the idea of Sacred Struggles: trying times with a higher emphasis and draw to God. They also both draw parallels between the Christian Crucifixion and their own lives. Inouye and Peters are both published authors on the topic and we loved speaking to and learning from them. Melissa Wei-Tsing In...

This episode is a culmination of comfort and activism. Quilts are usually a symbol of tranquility and peace, but this week we hear from a group that utilized quilts to advocate for the Black Lives Matter movement. First, we follow up with a group we met at the Parliament of the World's Religions: The Sacred Ally Quilt Ministry. We speak with Rev. Mark Koyama, Kathy Barrett Blair, and Dr. Harriet W...

Welcome to the first IGF episode of 2024! We are speaking with Pastor Jeff McCullough and Russell Moore. Jeff McCullough is the host and producer of the YouTube Channel Hello Saints, which records his journey as an evangelical pastor to learn about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Recently, Jeff and his wife Joy relocated to Utah. Jeff graduated from the private free-Methodist coll...

Happy New Year! Join host Steven Kapp Perry and producers Heather Bigley, Lia King, Katarina Martinic, and Ashton Rowan in recounting 2023. They will each discuss some of their favorite interviews from the year, sharing a short soundbite from each. We are so grateful for every opportunity we have had in 2023, so thank you for following along. Stay tuned to see what we have in store for 2024—should...

Think of it as a family Christmas devotional: a little praise, a little witness, some tears, and some laughter, familiar, yet loose around the edges. We'll hear from Cherie Call, Paul Jacobsen, and Molly in the Mineshaft, as well as pianist Jared Pierce and Mark Geslison, who is the director of several student ensembles here at BYU. Our first hymn is "Once in Royal David's City", performed by Cays...

In August, our team attended the 2023 Parliament of the World's Religions in Chicago, Illinois. Since 1893, this interfaith conference has advocated for harmony and dialogue across religious traditions and their believers. This year, In Good Faith presented on a panel (see below for link). Now, we also get to share with you the impromptu interviews Steve conducted at the Parliament. He speaks firs...

Welcome to our 10-part series exploring Turkey as a crossroads of faith, a place where world religions have met, overlapped, replaced one another, sometimes peacefully, sometimes not. In today's episode we're exploring the history of Latter-day Saints in Turkey, one of many tiny minority religious groups finding a place and building community amongst a majority-Muslim population. The size of the p...

This is episode 9 of our 10-episode series about the crossroads of faith in Turkiye, an ancient land a modern nation. In this episode we explore traditions of the local people and suss out the difference between culture and religion. First, we'll speak with Pinar Bayrack Toydemir, the founder of the Utah Turkish American Association (UTAA) and originally from Ankara, but now living in the Salt Lak...

We have a special treat amid the Turkey series--book club is back! To follow up on Episode 7, host Steven Kapp Perry and senior producer Heather Bigley meet with Kevin Blankinship and Rasoul Sorkhabi to discuss the poetry of Rumi. The group discusses the geographical and cultural impacts on Rumi in 13th century Anatolia as well his esteemed writing style and influence. Rasoul Sorkhabi holds a PHD...

This week we visit the tomb of Sufi mystic Rumi, who is one of the most popular poets the world over. We explore the relationship between Islam and Sufism, as well as the influence of Rumi on Muslims everywhere, not just Turkey. We speak with scholar Kevin Blankinship about Rumi's life and poetry and we visit with Sheikh Ahmet Sami Kuçuk in Konya, the city where Rumi settled over 800 years ago. We...

In this episode, we explore Islam in Turkey, a country that is now 97% Muslim, but for over a millennium was pre-dominantly Christian. We'll discuss how that transition took place, well into the rule of the Ottomans, with Professor Christine Isom-Verhaaren, and we'll meet a former Imam, Cemil Usta, who founded an afterschool program to teach girls how to recite the Koran. That recitation is like a...

The Hagia Sophia is the most famous building in all of Istanbul. It's a marvel of 6th century architecture and it's still a marvel today. Originally a Christian cathedral, it was converted to a mosque when the Ottomans conquered Istanbul. In the 20th century, the building was turned into a museum and in 2020 it was converted back to a mosque by Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. We visited du...

Today on In Good Faith, we're exploring–literally–ancient Christianity in Turkey. In fact, for this episode we scrunched down into tunnels in an underground city in the Kapadokya region and we toured churches in caves and contemplated mosaics that were almost two thousand years old. This ornamentation is done in the artistic style of Greek Orthodox churches that can later be seen throughout the Ea...

Today we're talking about a place and a person, both of which were important in the first expansion of a world religion. This week we're visiting Ephesus to understand early Christian converts and the life of Paul, with special emphasis on his confrontation with the silversmiths guild, as discussed in Acts 19. We'll talk again with Professor Luke Drake. Dr. Drake completed a PhD at the University...

In this episode of In Good Faith, we dive deeper into the history of Jewish life in Turkey, including an interview with Avram Sevinti, a leader of the Jewish Community Center in modern Izmir. We'll explore Sardes, the site of an ancient synagogue, and examine statues of the goddess Artemis outside of Ephesus, to better understand the larger society that existed around the Jews. Today we discuss Gr...

Every week on the In Good Faith podcast we take you on a journey—usually that’s a guest sharing their personal journey of faith and belief. Starting this week, however, we’ll take you on a literal journey—a 10-part series we recorded with a crew in Turkey, a place which has seen huge shifts in religious beliefs over the centuries. We’ll talk with historians, leaders, and of course modern-day belie...

Join us for a special series in Turkey, where we explore the history, culture, and religions of this ancient land and modern nation. This new series of In Good Faith starts Sunday, Sep 3.

Steve talks with fellow podcasters from "3 Black Men" and "Mommying While Muslim" about how their different podcasts have created community for their listeners. Steve was able to host this week's guest in studio, because all of them attended the BYU Law School's "Annual Religious Freedom Review," where they spoke together on a panel about this topic. Look for those panel sessions in our extras. Ho...

Join Heather in talking with fellow podcasters Robert Monson, Zaiba Hasan, and Samuel Gay. Robert Monson Jr. is a writer, musician, creative, avid reader, and theologian who does work around the intersection of Black liberation and womanist theology. He is a graduate of United Theological Seminary and is currently working towards a Ph. D. His two podcasts, Three Black Men and Black Coffee & Theolo...

Join Steve in talking with fellow podcasters Adela Cojab, Trey Ferguson, and Uzma Jafri. Adela Cojab is a speaker on Jewish rights and equality under the law. She speaks at conferences and college campuses about anti-Semitism, Zionism, and human rights. Cojab believes that all students are entitled to learn in a harassment-free environment, and works to advocate on their behalf. She has also autho...

Steve prepares for the 2023 Parliament of World Religions in Chicago by speaking with Bernie Newman, Shoaib Khadri, Barb Maloof, and Bruce Duffield about interfaith service projects in Chicagoland. Bernie Newman is a Past-President of Congregation Beth Shalom in Naperville, Illinois, where he has lived with his wife, Judi, for 39 years. He teaches the Introduction to Judaism course at Benedictine...

Steve discusses love and grief with Colin Campbell, author of Finding the Words: Working Through Profound Loss with Hope and Purpose. Colin Campbell is a writer and director for theater and film. He was nominated for an Academy Award for Seraglio, a short film he wrote and directed with his wife, Gail Lerner. He has taught Theater and/or Filmmaking at Chapman University, Loyola Marymount Universit...

Steve discusses how religious identity might get in the way of a more genuine faith life with Haroon Moghul, author of "Two Billion Caliphs: A Vision of a Muslim Future." Haroon Moghul is an Account Director at Unitas Communications, where he helps international clients tell their stories. An award-winning journalist and opinion columnist, Haroon's essays have been featured by The New York Times,...

Heather speaks with Dan Groody at the University of Notre Dame about his book "A Theology of Migration: The Bodies of Refugees and the Body of Christ" and how Christianity teaches an ethics of love for the refugee and migrant. Father Groody’s expertise in and passion for refugee and migration issues has also been applied as executive producer of One Border, One Body: Immigration and the Eucharist...

Steve chats with two historians about the importance of ancient Christianity today. Elizabeth Schrader Polczer discusses how an answered prayer developed her interest in Mary Magdalene and led to a new career in biblical scholarship. Dr. Schrader Polczer is Assistant Professor of New Testament at Villanova University, having recently defended her PhD in Early Christianity and New Testament at Duke...