Village SquareCast

Is political branding of  everything  really good for  anyone? These days politicians aren't the only ones who have to state their opinion on every single political disagreement du jour. It seems like practically every religious, nonprofit and for-profit company has to do the same, with everyone from mom-and-pop operations to Fortune 500 companies forced to run the gauntlet through our cold civil...

Throughout American history , Black women have been expected to serve and support others.  Now , what should be done to support Black women? Despite Black women being the anchor for their families, networks, and community, they continue to be disregarded for economic opportunities, dismissed in health care, and deprioritized in society. Black women in America have historically faced an intersectio...

Don't miss this warm, funny professional's guided tour of an industry that is failing us—the "Broken News." You'll laugh, you'll cry. You'll know a thing or two to do to fix it. Our very special guest, Chris Stirewalt—a former Fox News political editor— gives us an inside view of the rage-driven political environment we've found ourselves plunged into: "Rage revenue-addicted news companies are pla...

Love Thy Neighbor. No Exceptions? Does the admonition to love one's neighbor really come without exceptions? Must churches welcome white nationalists? Gay couples? January 6 sympathizers? BLM activists? Is everyone my neighbor? And what does love really mean? Joining us for God Squad are Father Tim Holeda of St. Thomas More Co-Cathedral, Pastor Joe Davis, Jr. of Truth Gatherers Community Church, S...

Why do we connect emotionally with some places and not others? And why does that matter? Author and speaker Peter Kageyama loves cities. Big cities, small cities, villages and small towns. Our special podcast guest is Peter Kageyama on his extraordinary book. Wherever you live, this program is for you. In fact, wherever you live, we think you ought to begin a love affair with your city. So what do...

The forces that divide us are big, strong, viral, international in scope and have seemingly infected every system of our body politic. It's the degree of that rot that has led us back this year to where it all began — to people we've come to know over these years — to  this place, these people.  Through this tumultuous time, we have come to believe that if we're going to care about the American id...

"WHEN TWO ENEMIES ARE TALKING, THEY'RE NOT FIGHTING." When Daryl Davis was ten, he didn't understand hate yet. But then he was the only black scout in a parade to honor Paul Revere's ride to Concord, when he began getting hit by bottles. It was then that he formed a question in his mind that he's spent much of a lifetime answering: "How can you hate me when you don't even know me?" Failing to find...

In our year-long celebration of the superpower of healthy friendships across differences, you'll meet God Squad's friends who they don't quite agree with. Then we'll let friendly disagreement rip (and live to tell).  Join us for this chat about how to tackle difficult topics within the relationships that matter to us the most… and how to keep friendships healthy even when conflict arises. Joining...

Isn't Hanukkah the most important holiday to Jews? Don't Catholics object to sex unless reproduction is the goal? Don't all religions worship the same God and (more or less) teach the same things? Doesn't the Bible say that God helps those who help themselves? The God Squad will consider many of the myths, truths, and misunderstandings that everyday people have about religion in America. Joining u...

Hedrick Smith, Pulitzer Prize-winning former New York Times reporter and editor and Emmy award-winning producer/correspondent, has established himself over the past 50 years as one of America's premier journalists. His best-seller, "Who Stole the American Dream" is a startling and revealing portrait of the past 30 years of U.S. political and economic history, hailed both for its compelling stories...

"Chloé has an independent cast of mind and a roving curiosity that leads her to ask probing questions, pursue original lines of inquiry, and reach provocative and often brilliant conclusions. Every time I see her, I walk away with my mind buzzing with new ideas—her ideas."—New York Times columnist Bret Stephens Chloé Valdary has a refreshing and humanizing approach to the fraught moment we're in a...

Back in the day, many political foes were friends in real life—hanging out for a beer after a tough legislative floor fight, attending their kids' weddings over the weekends. It's a sure sign of the times when any across-the-aisle friends that still exist out there in the wild tend to keep their friendship on the down low, in case they'd be accused of fraternizing with "the enemy." From the halls...

'The way you show people that they matter is aiming your curiosity at them. Ask yourself "what kinds of people do I talk about, but never with?" Whoever is underrepresented in your life will be overrepresented in your imagination.' —Mónica Guzmán Ready to fight back against the confusion, heartbreak, and madness of our dangerously divided times? Find the answers you need by talking with people—rat...

It's an election year. Should churches have political candidates speak at Sunday services? Should clergy tell congregants how to vote? Should congregations organize political rallies or get-out-the-vote efforts? What are the proper lines for religious involvement in politics? And what are the consequences (to the body politic and to religious communities) when these lines get crossed? Joining us f...

Bridge building?!  (We're not talking about the Golden Gate, people.)   An industry that was recently unknown and almost nonexistent has exploded in recent years, as average citizens begin to see the sharp growth in political divisions as an emergency that requires our attention. In the midst of a divisive election season, we'll take a pause to chat with leaders in the bridge building field about...

In celebration of The Village Square's determination this year to celebrate what's working and worth emulating (in a world in which so much seems broken), God Squad will kick off their 13th season thinking about our fellow humans who have behaved heroically during these challenging times. But—beware—one person's hero might be the other's villain in these divisive "us or them" times. If we can't ag...

"There's people wandering around in packs, not thinking for themselves, seized by this mob mentality trying to spread their disease and destroy society. And you probably think, as I do, that you're the good guy in the zombie apocalypse movie, and all this hate and polarization, it's being propagated by the other people, because we're Brad Pitt, right?" —Dr. Robb Willer, Polarization and Social Cha...

In the year prior to his assassination, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King isolated himself in a house in Jamaica where he wrote what was to become his final book. King said he felt at home there: "In Jamaica I feel like a human being." "One day, here in America," said King, "I hope that we will see this and we will become one big family of Americans." 50 years later, it is an aching American tra...

Why don't liberals seem to care about moral behavior and the moral communities that support it? Why don't conservatives seem to care about rampant public corruption at the heart of our political system? If we care about doing the right thing, can't we care about both? There is perhaps nowhere in our civic debate where the conversation has grown so calcified as the one about morality. We've long si...

Join us as podcast host Corey Nathan of Talkin' Politics and Religion without Killin' Each Other flips the switch by interviewing The Village Square's Liz Joyner and Vanessa Rowse about how we make pigs fly.  We were fast friends with Corey right from the start because of our shared goal to have constructive and respectful conversations about those taboo topics of politics and religion. Corey star...

On this special edition of Village SquareCast, we're excited to introduce you to one of our BFFs in the saving democracy space. Jenna Spinelle of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy has a new podcast we think you'll love, so we're sharing episode #1 in our feed. When the People Decide is a new eight-episode narrative series on ballot initiatives that tells the stories of activists, legislators,...

It's really easy to be in touch right now with the dark side of human nature that's been so thoroughly highlighted through the pandemic, but is there something else to see?  Maybe transcendence, empathy and heroic self-sacrifice?  And where there isn't much to look at that's positive, can we turn our trauma into a spiritual evolution — personally or even as a culture?   Join us as we welcome God S...

Meet "The Skeptics," a DIY lay version of God Squad — they're a group of politically and spiritually diverse group of people who've been meeting once a week for years (in some private location that for some reason they're not letting on to). Lucky us — we'll meet four of the Skeptics (a Catholic, a Protestant, a Mormon, and an atheist) who have forged deep friendships by gathering regularly to dis...

On this episode of Village SquareCast, we're thrilled to introduce you to one of our besties in the saving democracy space. Corey Nathan, host of Talkin' Politics and Religion without Killin' Each Other , is committed to taking some airspace back from the screamers who feed off our divisions. He says politics and religion are too important to be left only to the extremes, so he hosts engaging, pro...

"Trenchant and groundbreaking work." —Molly Ball, National Political Correspondent,  TIME Magazine "The go-to source for understanding how demographic change is impacting American politics." —Jonathan Capehart,  The Washington Post  and MSNBC How do societies respond to great demographic change? This question lingers over the contemporary politics of the United States and other countries where per...