The Cordial Catholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by Father Matthew Hawkins, a former Agnostic and a convert to the Catholic faith from a long line of ministers in the American Methodist Episcopal Church. Father Matthew's story is an incredible one and he's a wonderful storytellers.From early touchstones and experiences of Catholicism to a deep and abiding love of Scripture to a phase of serious rebellion and turning away from the Church to his ultimate conversion to Catholicism and, decades later, his amazing call to the priesthood – this is a wonderful story you aren't going to want to miss. You can also read about Father Matthew's story in the article where I first found him from The Coming Home Network.Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com.Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show!For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined for an absolutely astounding conversation with Dr. Jennifer Bryson, a scholar, a military analyst and lecturer, a former Guantanamo Bay interrogator, and a Catholic convert to talk about the incredible life she's lived – and her amazing conversion to Catholicism!This episode is absolutely packed. Dr. Byrson begins talking a bit about the work she is currently doing translating the writing of Ida Gorres for Ignatius Press and then launches into the amazing story of her Catholic conversion – from inside Communist East Germany! – and up to her work today in peacemaking, ethics, and freedom of religion. What an amazing story.For more from Dr. Bryson visit her website. And check out her books from Ignatius Press.Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com.Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show!For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by Peter Carter from the Catholic Sacred Music Project and the author, with Cardinal Robert Sarah, of The Song of the Lamb, a wonderful new book from Ignatius Press which explores the idea of the sacred Mass and all its beauty.We talk about the idea of creating the sacred space appropriate for Mass, the evangelistic opportunities present in Mass, and how we can make the Mass mean more and grow deeper in our relationship to Christ through beauty and through truth. This was a wonderful conversation that I truly hope you love! For more from Peter Carter check out The Song of the Lamb from Ignatius Press and visit his project The Catholic Sacred Music Project to learn more.Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com.Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show!For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William. A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   Spotify Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by my friend Justin Hibbard. Justin is a former Baptist pastor, a convert to the Catholic faith, and the host of the Why Catholic Podcast and Instagram profile – and he's here this week to share his incredible conversion story with us! As a pastor and worship leader, Justin had decades of evangelical church experience under his belt when he began to question some of the foundations of the evangelical church structure: which Church was the one founded by Christ? How do I find it? What was the Great Apostacy? When did it happen? These questions and more led Justin to look deeply into Church history and, to his surprise, the answers began to come back Catholic. This week on the show,  someone so in love with Christ searing for him more deeply ... and ending up in the Catholic Church! For more from Justin check out  Why Catholic and his Instagram profile.Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com. Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show! For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by two of the best experts on the Canon of the Bible, my friends Matthew Mark McWhorter and Gary Michuta. Together, we'll dig into exactly why Protestant Bibles are smaller than Catholic Bibles – what happened to the missing books and the unfounded theories that led to them being removed. We look at modern evidence which proves that the Catholic canon of Scripture was what Jesus and the apostles were reading, that it contains more intact and reliable versions of Scripture, and that Jerome's famous thesis – which led Martin Luther to REMOVE books from the Bible – is historically false, and has been proven so! For more from Gary check out his YouTube channel and his incredible books available from Catholic Answers.For more from Matthew McWhorter including his incredible book Canon Crossfire: Does the Protestant Bible Blow Up the Case for Christianity visit his website. Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com. Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show! For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

Dr. Lawrence Feingold, Catholic theologian and seminary professor, and Jewish convert to Catholicism. He explores how Scripture, Jewish context, and early Church tradition shape the Eucharist. Short takes cover Eden and the tree of life, the Ark and temple as foreshadows, John 6 and the Last Supper, and how sacrifice, presence, and communion interlock in worship.

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by David L. Gray to talk about the Mass, the Liturgy, from his perspective as a Catholic convert – and how we can explain it to other converts, draw them in, and demonstrate the incredible truth and beauty of how and why Catholics worship through the Mass.This is a great conversation! With David as our guide, we dig deeply into what's happening in the liturgy of the Mass, the liturgies that are present in all non-Catholic Christian settings, how to evangelize through the Mass, and the incredible experience of Christ we receive each and every time we worship at Mass.To read or see more from David visit Saint Dominic's Media.Be sure to check out his wonderful new book The Liturgical Sense of the Readings At Mass (Year A) and, for listeners to our show, use the code CORDIALCATHOLIC to get 20% off the price!Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com. Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show! For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

This week on the show I'm joined by my friend Nate Cline to talk about his amazing journey from Evangelical Christianity into the Catholic Church. Nate's story is one of a passionate Evangelical Christian, honestly and wholeheartedly seeking after Christ through a variety of churches, church plants, church splits, and serious soul searching to find Christ, ultimately, in the last place he ever thought he could: the Catholic Church. After all, the Catholic converts we know, Nate points out, became that way only after passionately and in full abandonment, seeking out Christ and where He could be found.For more from Nate please subscribe to his YouTube channel:https://www.youtube.com/@thenateclineshowSend your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com. Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show! For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by my friend and Early Church scholar Dr. Thomas Scheck to talk about his latest work, a translation of St. John Fisher's refutation of Martin Luther. The importance of this discussion can't be understated as we unpack one of those Catholic writers, theologians, and bishops who wrote against Martin Luther, and the Reformers, at the very time of the Reformation. Counter to what so many of us thought as Protestants, the Catholic response to Reformation era ideas was immediately, intense, and thorough. Our discussion this week digs into that response and how figures like Fisher called Luther to task – on some of his misquotations and misuses, too! – at the very inception of the Reformation.For more from Dr. Scheck check out his author page on Amazon.Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com. Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show! For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic

In this episode of The Cordial Catholic, I'm joined by Bible scholar Dr. Stephen Boyce to tell the story of his conversion from Baptist to Anglican and, ultimately, into the Catholic Church. Stephen's story begins in independent Baptist churches, up through his PhD in a Baptist seminary, and through teaching and pastoring, researching the Early Church, and ultimately coming to the conclusion that his own denomination didn't look like Early Christianity. Driven by these realizations, Dr. Boyce, his wife, and kids became Anglican and, eventually, driven by the Real Presence in the Eucharist, Catholic.Dr. Boyce is someone that I've personally followed for some years. I love patristics and have appreciated his work and I couldn't be more excited to sit down with him and listen to his conversion story this week. I hope you enjoy! For more from Dr. Boyce check out his FACTS podcast on YouTube and Spotify.Send your feedback to cordialcatholic@gmail.com. Sign up for our newsletter for my reflections on  episodes, behind-the-scenes content, and exclusive contests.To watch this and other episodes please visit (and subscribe to!) our YouTube channel.Please consider financially supporting this show! For more information visit the Patreon page.  All patrons receive access to exclusive content and if you can give $5/mo or more you'll also be entered into monthly draws for fantastic books hand-picked by me.If you'd like to give a one-time donation to The Cordial Catholic, you can visit the PayPal page.Thank you to those already supporting the show!Theme Music: "Splendor (Intro)" by Former Ruins. Learn more at formerruins.com or listen on Spotify, Apple Music,A very special thanks to our Patreon co-producers who make this show possible: Amanda, Elli and Tom, Fr. Larry, Gina, Heather, James, Jorg, Michelle, Noah, Robert, Shelby, Susanne and Victor, and William.Beyond The BeaconJoin Bishop Kevin Sweeney for inspired interviews with Catholics living out our faith!Listen on: Apple Podcasts   SpotifySupport the showFind and follow The Cordial Catholic on social media:Instagram: @cordialcatholicTwitter: @cordialcatholicYouTube: /thecordialcatholicFacebook: The Cordial CatholicTikTok: @cordialcatholic