Almost Good Catholics

Interesting conversations with interesting people about religion and faith.

Episodes

David G. Bonagura Jr, "100 Tough Questions for Catholics: Common Obstacles to Faith Today" (Sophia Institute, 2025)

May 23, 2025 • 67 mins

David Bonagura teaches classical languages and theology at St. Joseph’s Seminary in New York and Catholic International University; he also teaches high school kids. He invited them to ask their questions about the faith, which led to some exciting classroom discussions and David’s new book—100 Tough Questions for Catholics—which we are talking about today. David Bonagura’s website. David Bonagura’s new book, 100 Tough Quest...

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Art and Its Holy Object (with Steve Auth)

May 8, 2025 • 70 mins

For the transcendental and numinous things, sometimes there are no words. But art—paintings, sculpture, music, film—can knock us sideways a little and help us see something, or understand a fleeting meaning, a dream we’ve woken from, that we try to hang onto. He was a successful Wall Street investment guy for decades, but he had a deep love of art and art history; after brush with death and a re-conversion to his Catholic faith, S...

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Salve Regina (with Bishop Athanasius Schneider)

April 14, 2025 • 43 mins

“And a great storm of wind arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already filling [.…] And he awoke and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” (Mk 4: 37-41) Bishop Athanasius Schneider, auxiliary bishop of Astana in Kazakhstan, has identified the challenges of our age, “a new pagan soc...

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Lived Experience and the Search for Truth: Revisiting Catholic Sexual Morality

April 5, 2025 • 73 mins

“What is truth?” Pontius Pilate scoffed at Jesus (Jn 18:38), and that’s how we think about matters today in our culture—subjectively: my truth, your truth, etc. To make the argument that there is a knowable Truth (with a capital T) that is written in the world and in our bones, theologians Deborah Savage and Robert Fastiggi examine a selection of autobiographical accounts of ‘lived experience.’ They take a number of personal essays...

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David Hollenbach, "Human Rights in a Divided World: Catholicism as a Living Tradition" (Georgetown UP, 2024)

March 22, 2025 • 67 mins

In his most recent book, Human Rights in a Divided World: Catholicism as a Living Tradition (Georgetown UP, 2024), Jesuit scholar and Georgetown professor, Fr David Hollenbach explains the Judeo-Christian roots of our concept of human rights and the contributions of secular institutions like the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948). He explains further when it is right for a country to intervene in the affair...

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This is the Way (with Cristofer Pereyra)

February 28, 2025 • 38 mins

Cristofer Pereyra is the founder and CEO of the Tepeyac Leadership Initiative (TLI) and was a friend and follower of Bishop Thomas Olmsted (who was instrumental in restoring of Paul Zucarelli from the dead, the subject of our last two episodes). Cristofer talks about his collaboration with Bishop Olmsted, whom he considers a saint, and about the book he wrote about this holy man. He also talks about the Tepeyac Initiative and how w...

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Talking with a Man Who Returned from the Dead (with Paul Zucarelli)

November 28, 2024 • 72 mins

This is my second conversation with Paul Zucarelli who died in 2017 and returned from the dead through the intercessory prayer of Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix and the faith of his family. Since his resurrection, he has been serving God as a lay evangelist. In the earlier interview, we talked about his new book, One Lord, One Faith, One Church: An Inconvenient Truth, in which he made a strong case for the authority of the Roman ...

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Holy, Catholic, Apostolic (with Paul Zucarelli)

November 7, 2024 • 73 mins

Paul Zucarelli died in 2017 and returned from the dead through the intercessory prayer of Bishop Thomas Olmsted of Phoenix and the faith of his family. Since his resurrection, he has been serving God as a lay evangelist. His new book, One Lord, One Faith, One Church: An Inconvenient Truth, makes a strong apologetic case for the authority of the Roman Catholic church. He goes into supernatural evidence: Eucharistic miracles, Marian ...

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Mercy Ships (with Reanne Newquist)

October 1, 2024 • 57 mins

Reanne Newquist tells me about her voyage on Mercy Ships bringing healthcare to some of the poorest people in the world, a mission started by Don Stephens in the 1970s and encouraged by Saint Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Reanne, her husband, and her kids left everything behind, sold their home and sailed off to adventure and service. Most people go back to normal life, but Reann stayed on with Mercy Ships as part of the communication...

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A Letter from Jesus (with Dann Aungst)

September 12, 2024 • 60 mins

Dann Aungst was pretty far gone in his sexual addiction when Jesus grabbed him (figuratively) by the lapels and sent him (literally) messengers, a letter, and a locution during Adoration. He left the road of destruction and chaos and found himself on the road to purity. He then founded his apostolate (which he called The Road to Purity) after writing his inspired, From One Addict to Another. He talks about his story and also the ro...

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Localism (with Dale Ahlquist)

August 29, 2024 • 54 mins

Dale Ahlquist is the founder the of the Society of G. K. Chesterton and Chesterton Schools, of which there are currently 70 and number is rising. He is also the editor of the book we are talking about today, Localism: Coming Home to Catholic Social Teaching, from Sophia Press, which explores the economic and social questions of how we should organize out society. It is a third way, I think, that departs from both the big government...

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A Hidden Life (with Brian Zahnd)

August 15, 2024 • 71 mins

What would you do in the place of Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter in 1943? Mumble your loyalty oath to Hitler like everyone else—or refuse and pay with your life? This martyr is a blessed in the Catholic Church and on the way to being canonized. He is also the subject of a transcendentally beautiful movie A Hidden life by Terrence Mallick in 2019. Pastor Brian Zahnd, author of the Wood Between the Worlds, talks about the man, th...

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Let My People Go (with Matt Osborne)

August 1, 2024 • 76 mins

LISTENER DISCRETION IS ADVISED: The topic of today’s episode is human trafficking and crimes against children, usually sexual crimes, and sometimes ritual abuse and organ harvesting. Matt Osborne has worked with OUR Rescue (originally Operation Underground Railroad) for ten years; he left his CIA career to join this NGO and is now one of the longest-serving members of the team. Last year he was COO and president and these days he’s...

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What Would Jesus Say about Diversity and Inclusion? (with Pete Imperial)

July 18, 2024 • 55 mins

Pete Imperial has been principal of St. Mary’s Catholic High School in Berkeley, California, a Lasallian Catholic School of 160 years and going strong. Yet only 45% of the students are Catholics (though a similar number are Protestant Christians) and some of the kids have had no religious experience at all. How does a good Catholic school infuse the souls of its charges and the secular society at large with the Gospel and the teach...

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Verso l’Alto (with Christine Wohar)

July 4, 2024 • 74 mins

Christine Wohar talks about Finding Frassati: And Following His Path to Holiness (EWTN, 2021), her book about Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati. The book is a biography, hagiography, and delightful conversation about the participation of the Communion of Saints in our lives and how can join hands with them in our daily lives. Like many of us, Bl. Pier Giorgio was a normal guy with a comfortable life, and he did normal fun things availa...

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Wise as Serpents, Gentle as Doves (with Dorcas Oyelade and Kailea Barte)

June 20, 2024 • 46 mins

Dorcas Oyelade and Kailea Barté, two young women, still teenagers, organized a Christian club in a public at John Swett High School in Crockett, Northern California, where I am a teacher. The students worked with a Protestant NGO, Decision Point, which supported them even as they insisted on their First Amendment rights when there was opposition. The club has been an impressive success with many students joining them at lunch time,...

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Late Have I Loved You (with John Michael Talbot)

June 6, 2024 • 64 mins

John Michael Talbot is a tremendously successful musician and writer; he is also the founder of a monastery—the Brothers and Sisters of Charity at Little Portion Hermitage in Arkansas—where he is Minister General today. He started as a Methodist and a country rock musician in the seventies and the story of his journey is amazing, from the encounter with Jesus he had at seventeen to the intense mystical experiences that he had later...

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Jerome’s Tears (with David Bonagura Jr.): Death and Mourning in Christian Late Antiquity

May 24, 2024 • 45 mins

Professor David Bonagura, theologian and Latinist, has translated and edited seven of St. Jerome’s letters dealing with death and mourning. This doctor of the church consoles his friends in first centuries of Christendom, describing death as sleep, and dying as our journey back home to God. And though the Mediterranean is big and fourth-century travel was slow, we see that the Christian community is surprisingly close. The letters ...

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Knocking at the Brothel Door (with Michael John Cusick)

May 9, 2024 • 48 mins

Michael John Cusick argues that our addictions and disordered sexual desires are really a misdirected effort to reach God and live in connection with Him. How can this be? The crude simulation is but at poor substitute for the real thing, for the Truth. Yet in this fallen world, sinners repeatedly fall into the snares. “I do not understand my own actions,”—Paul wrote in his letter to the Romans—"For I do not do what I want, but I d...

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Making Moves (and Making Movies) in the Mission Field (with Temeko Richardson)

April 25, 2024 • 50 mins

Temeko Ricardson grew up in the Protestant American tradition; she was a “GPK” (grand-pastor-kid) from a family of church leaders. She has been thinking about Christianity and social issues—failure to include God’s people into His Church, fractured families, homelessness—and how to weave out society together and spread the Gospel. She’s an entrepreneur, consultant, philanthropist, and filmmaker. Today we talk about her work and the...

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Almost Good Catholics

Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}David G. Bonagura Jr, "100 Tough Questions for Catholics: Common Obstacles to Faith Today" (Sophia Institute, 2025)

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}Art and Its Holy Object (with Steve Auth)

Salve Regina (with Bishop Athanasius Schneider)

Lived Experience and the Search for Truth: Revisiting Catholic Sexual Morality

David Hollenbach, "Human Rights in a Divided World: Catholicism as a Living Tradition" (Georgetown UP, 2024)

This is the Way (with Cristofer Pereyra)

Talking with a Man Who Returned from the Dead (with Paul Zucarelli)

Holy, Catholic, Apostolic (with Paul Zucarelli)

Mercy Ships (with Reanne Newquist)

A Letter from Jesus (with Dann Aungst)

Localism (with Dale Ahlquist)

A Hidden Life (with Brian Zahnd)

Let My People Go (with Matt Osborne)

What Would Jesus Say about Diversity and Inclusion? (with Pete Imperial)

Verso l’Alto (with Christine Wohar)

Wise as Serpents, Gentle as Doves (with Dorcas Oyelade and Kailea Barte)

Late Have I Loved You (with John Michael Talbot)

Jerome’s Tears (with David Bonagura Jr.): Death and Mourning in Christian Late Antiquity

Knocking at the Brothel Door (with Michael John Cusick)

Making Moves (and Making Movies) in the Mission Field (with Temeko Richardson)

Popular Podcasts

David G. Bonagura Jr, "100 Tough Questions for Catholics: Common Obstacles to Faith Today" (Sophia Institute, 2025)

Art and Its Holy Object (with Steve Auth)