Forte Catholic Podcast: Making Catholicism Fun Again

Liv Harrison guest cohosts this week!. Taylor gives an update on the crying, shares about spiritual direction and how it led to him watching Friends on Netflix instead of praying(dang it!) and locking his keys in his car...again. Our guest this week is Catholic Magician Giancarlo Bernini. He is a college senior who is using his love and passion for illusions as an avenue to talk about the transcendentals(truth, beauty, and goodnes... Read more

Jon Blevins co-hosts on his one year anniversary of first appearing on the show! Taylor shares why he's been crying while listening to podcasts in the woods and wonders if he's progressing or digressing as a human. In the second segment, we're joined by Brian Montfort of the Work To Game YouTube channel. With two of the biggest names in Catholic gaming, the guys chat about some of the pitfalls of gaming, how to avoid them and ulti... Read more

Everyone loves it when Taylor gets thrown off, and cohost Shaun McAfee delivers! In an episode building towards a conversation on what real integrity is and how we may have been setting ridiculous standards for ourselves, Shaun instead wants to start the show by peeling back the curtain on some updates to the intro Taylor has had to implement. We also talk about our failures as parents, scary Churches, share the most insane promo... Read more

Taylor and Allison Sullivan discuss their recent travel, share stories including her getting tackled in an airport and him being better than her lol. This leads to a conversation on Catholic Social Teaching and how it gets a bad rap. Our guest this week is Dave Neeson, a youth minister who's side hustle is cooler than anyone else's. He works with Catholic Athletes for Christ, an organization that makes sure every Catholic in the N... Read more

Fr. Anthony co-hosts as he and Taylor start the show looking back at crappy situations and realizing how they actually helped us. It gives us insight into how we handle these difficult situations. Then in the second segment, we welcome back(to Fr. Anthony's surprise) Kaitlyn Facista, lovingly known as Tea with Tolkien! With the King and Queen of Catholic Twitter united, our goal is to break the internet, and challenge Matt Fradd's... Read more

The Return of the King! Co-host Jonathan "Bearded" Blevins is back after a two month hiatus(cuz he's too cool traveling the world sharing the Gospel smh). We catch up by talking about his trips across the world, including eating hot wings on stage while being interviewed and his trip to Germany. I also yell at him, so there's that. In the second segment, we're joined by Leo Gallegos to hear his story about how improving his physic... Read more

“Let's talk about Jesus and by that I mean the movie Aladdin” -Taylor Shaun McAfee cohosts to talk about the theme of trust with Taylor and this week's guest, Adrian from the Dude Catholic podcast. The conversation starts with comparing Aladdin to The Fall with deep insights Taylor stole from Old Producer Sam. The guys also dive into a conversation about the different spirituality types, put them up against each other and decide o... Read more

Allison Sullivan cohosts and talks with Taylor about the recent Harry Potter game that was released this weekend, what that has to do with friendship and ultimately our relationship with God. Our guest this week is DJ Bernal. He works full-time as a leadership consultant at a hospital. He also travels to share the Gospel and biblical principles of leadership. During our conversation, DJ takes us through the story of David, how he ... Read more

Fr. Anthony co-hosts and Taylor has been saving a story for a month just for this moment with Padre. He shares a story of attending a Mass that had some odd quirks and made him think about the relationship between reverence and familiarity with Christ and how the two can sometimes feel at odds. This week’s guest is Sam Guzman of the Catholic Gentleman to explain to Taylor what toxic masculinity actually is and how to change it. Sa... Read more

Allison Sullivan joins Taylor as this week's cohost! They kick off the show by making fun of each other for quite some time and then Allison reacts to a ridiculous and funny cemetery story(weird right?) Then we're joined by one of Allison's good friends, Chris Field. We were honored to be in the studio with this man! He holds four Guinness World records, author of "Disrupting for Good," has given two TedX talks and founded the Mer... Read more

Liv Harrison is back as guest co-host! Her and Taylor start the show by sharing their odd confession/adoration experience minutes before the show started. It was wild and sparks a discussion on distractions when trying to be holy. The rest of the show, we talk about community & friendship. These are topics we've all heard about ad nauseam but with some new wrinkles that we new to the hosts and made for an interesting conversation.... Read more

At long last, our Italian cohost Shaun McAfee returns! He and Taylor catch up on everything that's happened since they last spoke, including Taylor's recent retreat WHERE HE WAS SILENT! WHAT!?!?! The guys talk about the importance of silence, breaking out of our normal routines, intercessory prayer, selfishness, our gifts...as well as Canadian football(you know, the important things). Tune in for a conversation about the spiritua... Read more

Allison Sullivan cohosts for conversations on when we do our best but it wasn't good enough and how to deal with that. How do we play to our strengths and approach our weaknesses? In the second segment, Dustin Bertrand joins the show to discuss how "God made, self driven" has motivated his life. This conversation is a perfect Forte Catholic balance of intense laughter and deep, thoughtful insights. Dustin truly shares his heart in... Read more

Fr. Anthony co-hosts as he and Taylor dive deep into Jesus as the Good Shepherd and it's implications on us today. Taylor shares a cartoon that wrecked him(weird right?), the importance of scary sheep dogs and Jesus breaking your legs(what!?!?!) This episode also makes Fr. Anthony tell Taylor "You're broken and you're not special," so that's fun. In the second segment, Ali Hoffman rejoins the show to talk Oodles of Doodles, Taylor... Read more

We recorded this show through a tornado warning! That's how much we love y'all! Liv Harrison is welcomed back into the studio to guest co-host. We catch up on life, spoiler free Avengers thoughts & finish last week's discussion on the book of Revelation(the thunder, lightning and tornado were a perfect background.) We also play a game perfectly suited for this dreary day called Job or Eeyore where Liv and Taylor face off by gues... Read more

Fr. Anthony co-hosts as we discuss the ridiculously insane weekend with the Avengers endgame premiere, largest battle in television/movie history on GOT & more! NO SPOILERS! Fr. Anthony gets on the biggest soap box he ever has…and he promises not to spoil anything. In the second segment, we’re joined by one of the coolest dudes in the ministry world, Ennie Hickman. We talk about preaching, actually loving your neighbors and all hi... Read more

Happy Easters!!!! We hope you enjoyed your Easter day and are continuing to enjoy the celebration of this great season! This week, Allison Sullivan cohosts as we discuss how our Lent's went, Easter joy and Taylor being the balance in the Force. Our guest this week is Fr. Joseph-Anthony Kress, a Dominican priest who is the chaplain at the University of Virginia. We talk about how he and Taylor met(including a dino suit, a car wre... Read more

Bearded Blevins co-hosts this week as we discuss Tiger Woods return to Master’s victory and what it has to do with Taylor’s working out and spiritual life. They also talk about the super long Palm Sunday and Good Friday Gospel readings and how to have a good experience with them instead of focusing on your knees buckling for standing up so long. We connect with some of the characters in the Passion narrative that we’ve never really... Read more

The Ministry Madness Bracket results are in! We go through some of the best first round matchups and eventually countdown the Top 10 finishers, all the way down to our winner! Shaun McAfee cohosts to weigh in on the results, share recent travel struggles and once again prove how odd Italy is. Our guest this week is former Broadway/reality TV star and current Catholic mom, speaker and podcaster, Stacey Sumereau. We have a tremend... Read more