The Habit

Karen Walrond is the author of The Lightmaker’ Manifesto and Radiant Rebellion . She and her work have been featured on Brené Brown’s Unlocking Us podcast, Huffington Post, CNN.com, and the Oprah Winfrey Show. Her blog Chookooloonks is a lifestyle, inspiration, and photography destination. Karen’s new book is In Defense of Dabbling: The Brilliance of Being a Total Amateur...

Kate Gaston’s essays are usually hilarious and always wise. She is the proprietor of the Substack That Middle Distance and a regular at the Rabbit Room. She will also be a featured guest at The Habit's Focus Retreat at the end of October. In this episode, Kate and Jonathan Rogers discuss her essay, "The Heavy Lift of Creativity." Support the show: https://therabbitroom.givingfuel.com/member...

Dr. Louis Markos is Professor of English at Houston Christian University. He’s an authority on C. S. Lewis, apologetics, and ancient Greece and Rome. He’s the author of close to thirty books, most recently From Aristotle to Christ: How Aristotelian Thought Clarified the Christian Faith . In this episode, Dr. Markos and Jonathan Rogers talk about the relationship between virtue and happ...

Carey Wallace is an author and speaker who has devoted much of her professional life to equipping and encouraging other writers and artists. Her most recent book is The Discipline of Inspiration: The Mysterious Encounter with God at the Heart of Creativity . In this episode, Carey and Jonathan Rogers talk about inspiration, openness, surprise, and the connections between spiritual practices and cr...

Speaker and author Vicki Courtney has been writing books for women since the late 90s. Her new book is Motherhood Is Not Your Highest Calling: The Grace of Being a Good-Enough Mother . Vicki says iIt’s the book she would have liked to read when she was a young mother unable to shake the idea that motherhood defined her identity. In this episode, Vicki and Jonathan Rogers talk about swapping...

W. David O. Taylor is Associate Professor of Theology & Culture at Fuller Theological Seminary, as well as the director of various initiatives in worship, theology and the arts. He teaches courses in systematic theology, art and worship, art and theology, art and beauty, spiritual formation through the psalms, and theology and science fiction. Along with Daniel Train, he edited a new collectio...

Jason M. Baxter is a speaker, college professor, and author of eight books, including the best-selling Medieval Mind of C.S. Lewis, A Beginner's Guide to Dante's Comedy, Why Literature Still Matters , and now a new translation of Dante's Comedy. On his Substack, Beauty Matters , he writes about the role of the humanities in our technologically driven age. He currently works at Benedictine College...

Father Damian Ference is a priest of the diocese of Cleveland.  He serves at Borromeo Seminary in Wickliffe, Ohio as Director of Human Formation and Assistant Professor of Philosophy. He is also the author of Understanding The Hillbilly Thomist: The Philosophical Foundations of Flannery O’Connor’s Narrative Art . In a letter to a friend, O’Connor wrote, “Everybody who...

Heidi White is a teacher, a podcaster , a speaker, and an author. In her speaking and writing she explores literature, education, and the Christian imagination. Her new book is The Divided Soul: Duty and Desire in Literature and Life . In this episode, Heidi and Jonathan Rogers talk about the division and ultimate reunification of “want” and “ought,” and they discuss the tr...

Karen Swallow Prior is a public intellectual— a writer, speaker, and literature teacher. Her work centers on the intersection of faith, narrative, and cultural life. Her Substack, The Priory , is devoted to the holy cultivation of a rich inner life. Her new book is You Have a Calling: Finding Your Vocation in the True, Good and Beautiful . In this episode, Dr. Prior and Jonathan Rogers talk...

Mitali Perkins ( mitaliperkins.com ) has written many books for young readers, including You Bring the Distant Near (nominated for a National Book Award) and Rickshaw Girl (adapted into a film), all of which explore crossing different kinds of borders. Her goal is to make readers laugh or cry, preferably both, as long as their hearts are widening. Her new book is for grownups. It’s called Ju...

Carolyn Weber was our special guest at The Habit Summer Writers’ Weekend this past June. Carolyn is the author of Surprised by Oxford and Sex and the City of God . She is also a professor at New College Franklin in Franklin, Tennessee. The following conversation was recorded in front of a live audience of writers. Carolyn and Jonathan Rogers talk about memoir-writing, the memoirist’s e...

Songwriter Wendell Kimbrough has been writing, recording, and performing songs based on the Psalms for the last few years. His most recent record is called You Belong . In this episode, Wendell and Jonathan Rogers talk about loneliness, perfectionism, feeling like an outsider, learning to belong–and how one writes songs that sound like the Psalms while also sounding like the Gulf Coast. Support th...

Daniel McInerny is associate professor and chair of the philosophy department at Christendom College in Virginia. He is also a novelist and dramatist. His scholarship is directed toward reactivating an Aristotle’s understanding of art as imitation, long out of favor among philosophers. HIs biggest step in that direction is his new book, Beauty & Imitation: A Philosophical Reflection on t...

A degenerative muscle disease has made Kevan Chandler altogether reliant on others for his daily care. So he has invited friends into his life—deep into his life—making his need a nexus for community and joy. Kevan’s new book, co-authored with his friend Tommy Shelton, is The Hospitality of Need: How Depending on One Another Helps Us Heal and Grow Together . For Kevan, need is an...

Besides being a stalwart of The Habit Membership for Writers, Meredith Davis is the founder of the Austin Texas chapter of The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. And she’s the author of the middle-grade novel series, The Amazing Adventures of Noah Minor. The Minor Miracle was published in 2024; The Minor Rescue was published earlier this year. In this episode, Meredit...

Miroslav Volf is a theologian and professor at Yale Divinity School, where he is the founding director of the Yale Center for Faith and Culture. He is widely known for his work on reconciliation, forgiveness, and the intersection of faith and public life. He’s the author of at least twelve books, including the highly influential Exclusion and Embrace , as well as many articles and quite a fe...

Judith McQuoid lives in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the hometown of CS Lewis—or Jacks, as he was known when he lived there. Inspired by Belfast, her love of Lewis, and her own family history, Judith wrote a middle-grade novel about young Jacks Lewis and an imagined friendship with a boy from a very different background. It’s a book about creativity, friendship, and the ways we can give...

Dr. Warren Kinghorn is a psychiatrist and theologian at Duke University, where he holds joint appointments at Duke Divinity School and the Duke University Medical Center. Warren’s work focuses on the intersection of theology, mental health, and human flourishing—and he brings an integrated, humane perspective to questions that too often get reduced to biology or technique. His new book...

When Andrew Peterson started the Rabbit Room—this was 2006 or 2007—he didn’t know what to expect. He had no way of knowing that this little group blog written by friends and friends of friends would give rise to annual conferences—Hutchmoot and Hutchmoot UK—to a publishing house, to an event space—North Wind Manor—to The Local Show, to Rabbit Room Theater,...

Will Parker Anderson is a senior editor at Waterbrook-Multnomah, a division of Random House Publishing. He’s also the proprietor of a Substack called Writer’s Circle , in which he provides tips on the writing craft and seeks to demystify the publishing industry. In this episode, Will and Jonathan Rogers talk the “three legs” of publishing: platform, content, and concept. Su...

Amy Baik Lee has written that in every place her life has taken her, "there have been hints of beauty and great knocks of mercy that have called to me from beyond my surroundings, always speaking of a King and Friend and Father whose presence is truly Home.” That sense of longing, those clues that perhaps we were made for a different world, make their way out in every thing Amy writes, and e...

Besides creating the One Year Adventure Novel and Cover Story writing curricula for students, Daniel Schwabauer has also written fiction and nonfiction for writers of all ages. He also teaches English at MidAmerica Nazarene University near Kansas City. His new book is The God of Story: Discovering the Narrative of Scripture Through the Language of Storytelling . In this episode, Daniel and Jonatha...

Mark Meynell is a freelance writer and speaker based in the UK. He’s the author of Life After Life and A Wilderness of Mirrors . He’s a co-host of the Tryptich podcast , and he’s an aficionado of Cold-War spy stories. In short, he’s a polymath and an excellent conversationalist. In this episode, Mark and Jonathan Rogers talk about the "immanent frame," instrumentalized art,...

Matthew Clark is a singer/-songwriter, a storyteller, and a free spirit. He drives around America in a van he calls Vandalf, taking his music and stories and wisdom to audiences across the country. For the last six years he’s been working on a project he calls The Well Trilogy. Three albums of eleven songs, each accompanied by a collection of eleven essays inspired by the songs, written by f...