Podcasts

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 […]

In this, the third edition of our annual Oscar Podcast, Bill McGarvey of BustedHalo joins Father James Martin and Tim Reidy of America to review the best picture nominees for 2009. Will “Avatar” triumph or can “The Hurt Locker” squeak out a surprise win? What are the surprise nominees in the expanded list of ten? […]

Can health care reform still pass now that the Democrats have lost their filibuster proof majority? How do the bishops assess the House and Senate bills, especially on the question of abortion? As the director of domestic social development for the U.S. bishops’ conference, Kathy Saile has worked to insure that the bishops’ voice is […]