The Pearl of Great Price

Send us Fan Mail A popular superstition linking this Anglo Saxon Bishop and the weather has proved remarkably resilient. We investigate it in todays podcast as we remember Swithins death on July 2, 863

Send us Fan Mail An outpouring of anti-foreign and anti-Christian violence in China lead to the beheading of Horace Tracy Pitkin. He would become known as the first missionary martyr from Yale University

Send us Fan Mail One of the worlds experts on Cheese is a Benedictine Nun who has a PHD in microbiology 

Send us Fan Mail A Victorian Poet who was outstanding for her poetry - love sonnets, religious poem and feminist poetry.  She died today after eloping to Italy with her husband.

Send us Fan Mail Lord of the World is a 1907 dystopian science fiction novel by Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson that centres upon the reign of the Antichrist and the end of the world. It has been called prophetic by Dale Ahlquist,  Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis

Send us Fan Mail One of the most innovative thinkers of the 20th century was the polymath Rene Girard. His theory about mimetic desire, mimetic rivalry and the scapegoating mechanism have had a huge effect across various disciplines, from economics, sociology and theology.  He even inspired the Pay Pal founder Peter Thiel to make the first investment in Facebook.  Bishop Robert Barron think he wil...

Send us Fan Mail One of the greatest theologians of the 20th Century, Hans Urs Von Balthazar.  We look at his monumental 15 volume work and his relationship with the mystic Adrienne Von Speyer. 

Send us Fan Mail John Lafarge, an American Jesuit, stood behind Martin Luther King at the  famous 'I have a dream speech'.  He also was directly and secretly commissioned by Pope Pius XI to write an encyclical against the Nazi's. It was never promulgated - why? 

Send us Fan Mail Said to have preached the Gospel before more people that anyone in history, We look at the life of Billy Graham as we remember his last crusade that started today. Criticised by all sides, he was a bridge builder,  was friends of many presidents and grew too close to Richard Nixon.  Accused by his critics of being manipulated by the Soviets. he preached all over the world. 

Send us Fan Mail The story of a Polish/American Jesuit who endured 5 years in Moscow's notorious Lubyanka prison and then 15 years in the Siberian Gulags before being exchanged in a prisoner swap 

Send us Fan Mail This is the story of Kateri Takakwitha the first American Indian to be declared a saint 

Send us Fan Mail Cyrus McCormick invented the mechanical reaper, it changed the world. 

Send us Fan Mail George Lemaitre started thinking about the origin of the universe in the trenches during WW1. The Belgian priest went on to become an expert on Einstein's theory of relativity. applying it to the whole universe, he created a theory of the beginning of the universe that would be called The Big Bang.  An insult from the atheist Fred Hoyle, it stuck.  It also was proven when Hub...

Send us Fan Mail One of the most intellectually interesting figures of the 19th Century in the UK. A Catholic Historian who specialised in liberty and had a profound influence on Gladstone

Send us Fan Mail Laudato Si was a ground breaking encyclical from Pope Francis on the call of the poor and the call of the planet. We look at how it stands in the  tradition of Catholic Social Teaching 

Send us Fan Mail Today the Methodist Lay Preacher George Loveless returned from exile in Tasmania after being pardoned by the British Government. One of the Tolpuddle Martyrs, this is his story. 

Send us Fan Mail A hymn that became an international favourite and used at times of crisis, started on a becalmed boat between Italy and France. We look at how it was written and who wrote it - John Henry Newman. 

Send us Fan Mail Getting the tyrannical King John to sign the Magna Carta was a huge moment for individual rights (of barons).  By curtailing tyrannical power it laid the foundations for liberty. Down to the diplomatic powers and conciliatory effort of Archbishop Stephen Langton. Who also left a significant legacy to how we organise the Bible 

Send us Fan Mail Church Bells rang out all over the country today to defy the restriction on religious activities enforced by the Communists. Stalin had gone back on the promises made at the Yalta conference, and an Iron Curtain had split Europe. Hungary's Christians under the leadership of the brave and obstinate Cardinal Mindszenty

Send us Fan Mail Dr Jerome Lejeune was the first to identify the double chromosome that caused Downs Syndrome. When the medical profession starting using his discovery for pre-natal screening result in the routine abortions of Downs children it devastated him. He vigorously campaigned for their protection and became a close friend and advisor to Pope John Paul II. 

Send us Fan Mail A decisive and democratic vote in  1991 returned the title of St Petersburg after it had been called Leningrad for 70 years. It was another clear indication that Christianity was more resilient than Communism.

Send us Fan Mail Fulton J Sheen was one of the first televangelists. A telegenic, gifted communicator, he had a very fruitful apostolate.  Was the victim of vicious inter-church politics but his cause for Sainthood is now open. 

Send us Fan Mail Hugely influential Theologian and Historian, training generations of leaders and teachers in Liberal Protestantism and the Theology of Culture.  One of his key  pupils Karl Barth would spectacularly fall out with him before the two world wars. 

Send us Fan Mail Terese Martin was a remarkable teenager - who at the age of 15 refused to leave the side of the Pope in a public audience as she wished to enter a Carmelite Convent.  Dying at the early age of 24, her spiritual memoirs of a hidden life have become a classic, translated into 35 languages and she has been declared a Saint and a Doctor of the Church

Send us Fan Mail The rich and varied life of John Donne, the greatest of the metaphysical poets in Elizabethan England.  Born into a persecuted Catholic family he ended up as the Dean of St Pauls.