Podcasts

We feature two online conversations this week: the first is with Clayton Sinyai, right, a member of the Catholic Labor Network and the director of strategic campaigns for the Amalgamated Transit Union. Speaking at a conference on Caritas in Veritate held at Princeton University, Clayton explored what the pope’s latest encyclical has to say about […]

Named by Time magazine in 2001 as the “best theologian in America,” Stanley Hauerwas is a towering figure in theology today, a pacifist and author whose work has sought to integrate a variety of Christian and ethical sources. His new book, Hannah’s Child, is an account of his life in theology that deals frankly with […]

Matt Malone, S.J., a former associate editor at America, reports from London on what may be the closest–and most exciting–race to lead Parliament in decades. What happens if there is a “hung Parliament,” and what role does the Queen play in this scenario? How does the British election compare with its American counterpart? Malone provides […]

Gregory Boyle, S.J., the founder of Homeboy Industries, the largest gang intervention program in the United States, talks about why young people join gangs, and the services his agency offers to “homies” and “home girls” who finally decide they want to leave the gang life. In his new book, Tattoos on the Heart, Fr. Boyle […]

Life in Year One is not a book about Jesus, but about the time in which Jesus lived, explains author Scott Korb. What did people eat, where did they work and worship, and what was their relationship to Roman authorities? Few historical records of the time exist, so looking back at this era requires moral […]

In an interview recorded at the 2010 Los Angeles Religious Education Congress, Richard Gaillardetz examines the successes and the still yet unrealized goals of the Second Vatican Council. Should Catholics today focus anew on implementing the Council’s vision, or instead turn outward to evangelize the culture? Or perhaps, fifty years after Vatican II, is a […]

Andrew J. Bacevich, professor of history and international relations at Boston University, discusses the guiding illusions at the heart of the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan. The U.S. commitment to secular modernity, in particular, is at odds with an Islamic culture that is infused with religion at every level. American do-goodism is not enough to win […]

Newsweek’s Lisa Miller talks about her new book Heaven: Our Enduring Fascination with the Afterlife. The idea of heaven comes from the Jewish tradition, Miller explains, but was embroidered later by Christians and Muslims, who have at various times imagined heaven as a place where one is reunited with friends and family, and a venue […]

In the third installment of America‘s Book Club, Kevin Spinale, S.J., and Tim Reidy consider Colum McCann’s Let the Great World Spin, a novel about beauty, grace and coincidence set in Manhattan in 1974. Built around Philip Petit’s famous tight-rope walk between the twin towers of the World Trade Center, McCann’s novel is told from […]

James Martin, S.J., culture editor at America and author of My Life with the Saints, introduces his latest book, a guide to Ignatian spirituality for the general reader. In A Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything, Father Martin explains such Jesuit maxims as “finding God in all things” and “contemplatives in action” while also providing a […]