Faith and Imagination: A BYU Humanities Center Podcast

Mary Eyring is Professor of English at Brigham Young University – a colleague of mine and a dear friend. She’s the author of two scholarly monographs and an edited collection in which esteemed contemporary poets respond to the work of the C17 American poet Anne Bradstreet. Today, we discuss Mary’s book Saltwater: Grief in Early America. …

Conversation between podcast host Matthew Wickman and producer Cate Thorpe about the Season 6. Then Cate shares excerpts from some of the episodes from this season that stood out to her. We’re grateful, as always, to this season’s amazing guests: Darren Middleton, Callid Keefe-Perry, Emma Mason, Karen Swallow Prior, Diane Glancy, Makayla Steiner, Jason Crawford, …

Min-Ah Cho is an associate teaching professor at Georgetown University, where she specializes in constructive theology and Christian spirituality. She recently published a fascinating and thoughtful book titled The Silent God and the Silenced: Mysticism and Contemplation amid Suffering that explores the implications of reckoning with God’s silence for our spiritual and ethical lives.

Paul J. Pastor is a poet, writer, editor, and a former guest on this podcast. He is the executive editor for Nelson Books, an imprint of HarperCollins, where he publishes work that encourages spiritual renewal. In our last conversation, recorded four years ago, we discussed his poetry collection Bower Lodge. We speak today about his recent …

Katie Kresser is Seattle Pacific University’s resident Art Historian. She’s the author of books on John La Farge and on how the death of Christ ushers in the birth of art as a window onto the divine. A former guest on this podcast, she’s our guest again to discuss her new book on Christianity and …

Richard McLauchlan is an independent scholar, a professional biographer, and the author of Saturday’s Silence: R.S. Thomas and Paschal Reading. With Easter approaching, we thought we’d run again this episode on the subject of Holy Saturday, the day between Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection that represents a period of suffering and silence. The poetry of R. …

Jason Crawford is Professor of English at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee, where he teaches and writes about early modern literature and culture, with secondary interests in ancient drama and epic. He’s the author of several academic books and articles, and his work has also appeared in such venues as the Los Angeles Review of Books. …

We resume a tradition from the past years, discussing some favorite books we read in 2025. As always, our themes involve religion, spirituality, and the intersection of faith and intellect. This time we welcome Makayla Steiner, assistant professor of English at BYU. Matt’s list of honorable mentions: Douglas Coupland, Life After God; Paul J. Pastor, The Locust …

Diane Glancy is a prolific and acclaimed poet, novelist, essayist, playwright, and professor emeritus at Macalester College. Her awards include the Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, the Arrell Gibson Lifetime Achievement Award from the Oklahoma Center for the Book, the American Book Award, the Pushcart Prize, and the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers’ …

Karen Swallow Prior is the author of several books, among them The Evangelical Imagination, On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books, and Fierce Convictions: The Extraordinary Life of Hannah More. A prominent voice in the Christian public sphere, she is a frequent speaker, a senior fellow at the Trinity Forum, a contributing writer at Dispatch, and …