Episodes
Scholar Jared Staudt joins us for a conversation about the social value of Christianity. Does it do any good for anyone? Does it have a good record as a movement? Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. We’re going to talk a little bit about whether Christianity has been good for the world or bad for the world, but try to guess which side we’re going to come down on. Maybe share some ideas with you...
Published 10/11/23
Church councils have shaped and formed the Faith for every living Christian, whether Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant. So what is the basis for the councils, and what do we make of their teaching. We get answers from Paul Senz, author of “Church Councils: 100 Questions and Answers.” Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and this time we welcome Paul Senz, the author of...
Published 10/04/23
With the 50-year anniversary of the original film, The Exorcist, and the upcoming release of a sequel, we figured this would be a great time to sit down and talk to contributing apologist Tom Nash to discuss the film that caused such a stir.     …
Published 09/30/23
Protestantism has some explaining to do about its own traditions. Did the new theologies of the reformers actually make sense? Do they make sense today? John Martignoni joins us. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and we got a long time author with a new book. And the new book is about does Protestantism make sense? And it’s a Catholic approach to looking at Protestantism...
Published 09/27/23
If Catholics are right about John 6, every Christian is under divine command to celebrate the Eucharist. So is the Catholic Church right? Karlo Broussard joins us to explain why Catholics aren’t wrong. Cy Kellett: Hello, and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic beliefs. A lot going on as far as the Eucharist goes. We have all this kind of bad news that we’ve had in recent years about Catholics not accepting the real presence of...
Published 09/20/23
What is the Gospel of Thomas? Is there just one such gospel? What can it teach us about Jesus? Tim Staples joins us.   Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living understanding and Defending Your Catholic Faith. One of the most popular conversations we’ve ever had here if the internet is to be believed, and I think in this case it is. One of the most popular conversations we’ve ever had here at Catholic Answers was a conversation with Tim Staples about the...
Published 09/13/23
Everywhere you will find misconceptions about the Church’s role in slavery. Even most Catholics do not know the truth about what the Church did, and did not do, regarding slavery. Best-selling author Paul Kengor joins us to share some of the surprising true story. Cy Kellett: Hello, and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and one of the things, among the many, that modern people accuse the...
Published 09/06/23
Are you “sex positive”? If not, get ready to be called a closed-minded bigot. Theologian Angela Franks, from St. John’s Seminary in Boston, gives us a Catholic critique of the “sex positivity” movement. Cy Kellett: Hello, and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and today, a very special opportunity to get to talk with Dr. Angela Franks, who is a professor of theology at St. John’s Seminary in...
Published 08/30/23
The idea that Scripture is the sole rule of faith is central to the thinking of man Protestants, who see Tradition as a watering down of scriptural purity. But Catholics have good reason to reject this view. Author Casey J. Chalk explains. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I am Cy Kellett, your host. And one of the things you have to be able to defend as a Catholic is the Catholic understanding...
Published 08/23/23
Christians often think that Christianity is purer–more Christlike–when it is less doctrinal. Tim Staples explains the dangers of this grave error. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. Tim Staples with us this time. Tim, of course, the author of Behold Your Mother – A Biblical and Historical Defense of the Marian Doctrines. I mentioned that in particular because we’re going to talk...
Published 08/16/23
What does it mean that Jesus “rose from the dead?” Did his body literally come back to life? What kind of life? Joe Heschmeyer discusses common errors about the Resurrection, and the beautiful truths we often miss. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, joined in studio this time by Joe Heschmeyer. We usually connect with him via the internet. Joe, welcome. Joe...
Published 08/09/23
With “Oppenheimer” filling up the cinemas, and today being the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, we take a look back at an earlier episode we produced about the morality of dropping the atom bomb. Can a Catholic assent to blowing up entire cities? What about when to do so will save perhaps millions of lives? Catholic Answers President Chris Check joins us as we consider again America’s use of Atomic weapons to end a long, bitter war with Japan. Cy Kellett: Why would a Catholic support...
Published 08/05/23
The first century of Christianity was often a raucous argument. Essential truths were constantly under threat, and confusion was common. Jimmy Akin joins us to discuss what the great arguments of the first century were about and what we can learn from them. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. Last time we talked with Jimmy Akin, we talked about when did the early church...
Published 08/02/23
Larry Chapp has some confessions to make, and some powerful insights to share with a Church in crisis. He joins us for a conversation about his new book, “Confession of a Catholic Worker: Our Current Moment of Christian Witness.” Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. And the conditions of the world and the Church in recent decades have given us a whole lot of writing, some...
Published 07/26/23
The earliest Church did not think Jesus was God, says one modern theory. Rather, he was deified over time by people who loved his message. Jimmy Akin examines this theory, and finds precious little evidence for it in the historical record.   …
Published 07/19/23
Discussing euthanasia with Monica Doumit. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and we’ll talk a bit about euthanasia today we’re around the world we’re having to defend what used to be a pretty straightforward idea, which is that you should not take the lives of innocent people and that we should do all we can to care for those who are in distress rather than dispose of...
Published 07/12/23
“Jesus loves you, and if you don’t have faith in him, he’ll send you to hell.” In one form or another this reduction ad absurdum is used against Christians again and again. It is not just silliness, however. The problem of hell is a tough one, as apologist Karlo Broussard explains in this episode. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers podcast for living, understanding and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. And among the things that are probably...
Published 07/05/23
Having failed at humanism, secular modernity now moves on to trans-humanism. Father Tad Pacholczyk, director of Education for the National Catholic Bioethics Center explains transhumanism’s ethical problems. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living understanding and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and in the area of bioethics, in the area of biological technologies and the integrating of our own biology with other kinds of...
Published 06/28/23
What are the options, and where is the hope, for Catholic couples who encounter infertility? Ann Koshute and Kimberly Henkel, founders of Springs in the Desert, a ministry to those struggling with infertility, join us for a conversation. Cy Kellett: Hello, and welcome to Focus the Catholic Answers podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. We do apologetics here. That’s what we do. Sometimes the most important apologetic, really the...
Published 06/21/23
The Sacrament of Marriage is filled with power for growth toward intimacy with God. Dan and Stephanie Burke, from the Avila Institute, explain how they are helping couples access that power and thrive. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers Podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host, and today we’re going to talk a bit about marriage. We have a wonderful couple here who we were just having a conversation over lunch...
Published 06/14/23
Jeff Cavins and Father Mike Schmitz are now doing for the catechism what they did for the Bible. Cavins joins us to explain the value of the catechism in sharing the Faith. Cy Kellett: Hello and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers podcast for living, understanding, and defending your faith. I’m Cy Kellett. And as we think about sharing the faith and defending the faith these days, we can take heart not from too many things, but from this we could take heart that the church has a...
Published 06/07/23
In such a confusing world where nothing seems to make sense anymore, one question comes to mind: how do we discuss anything with our kids when they keep getting conflicting answers? Ana Samuels joins us to discuss gender identity with our children and how to speak clearly on these issues. …
Published 05/31/23
Defending the Faith can take an emotional toll. Rather than turn to bitterness, the person who engages with those who attack the Faith will be most effective with some distance and calm. Psychologist Dr. Ray Guarendi offers tips on how to gain this distance and calm. …
Published 05/24/23
Mike Aquilina, author of Africa and the Early Church, explains the African roots of much of what we now take for granted in Christianity. His work reminds us of an age when Christianity spread quickly in all directions so that before the Muslim invasions, a fruitful Christianity had taken root in Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, Libya, Eritrea, Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia.   …
Published 05/17/23
Once again, legislatures in some states are considering bans on the seal of confession. We asked the chaplain of Catholic University of America, Father Aquinas Guilbeau, to explain why we have the seal, and why breaking it won’t to anyone any good.   …
Published 05/10/23