First Things Podcast

Ryan Marr joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss John Henry Newman’s upcoming canonization and the theology of sainthood.

Charlie Copeland joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss the decline of free speech on the college campus.

Fr. Peter Stravinskas joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss the fate of Catholic schools in America and the work of the Catholic Education Foundation.

Tricia Bruce joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss the large swath of Americans who self-identify as ”partially Catholic”—neither completely in nor completely out of the Church.

Salvatore Babones joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss William Jennings Bryan, the populist tradition in American history, Donald Trump, and Babones's latest book: ”The New Authoritarianism."

Author and Notre Dame priest-professor Wilson D. Miscamble tracks how Father Ted Hesburgh, longtime president of Notre Dame, transformed Catholic higher education in the postwar era and explores how he became a much-celebrated voice in America at large. Yet, beyond the hagiography that often surrounds Hesburgh’s legacy lies another more complex and challenging story. What exactly were his contributions to higher learning; what was his involvement in the civil rights movement; and what was the nature of his role as adviser to popes and presidents?

Reverend Wilson D. Miscamble, C.S.C. joined the permanent faculty in the History Department at Notre Dame in 1988. He chaired the History Department from 1993 to 1998. He also served as Rector and Superior of Moreau Seminary (2000–2004), the principal formation site for the Congregation of Holy Cross in North America. Fr. Miscamble’s primary research interests are American foreign policy since World War II and the role of Catholics in twentieth-century U.S. foreign relations.

In a liberal democratic age, two words are widely used to contrast what liberal democracy is not: aristocracy and populism. Yet, we have both political factions emerging today in new and caustic forms that pit an increasingly corrupt elite against an increasingly coarse and angry populace. Both are morally adrift and engaged in politics as an assertion of power, albeit for different reasons.

While the current trajectory of the West would appear to be an ongoing and inconclusive battle between these two factions, classical political theory understood that only an appropriately mixed regime could correct and even elevate the shortcomings of an opposing faction. In an age in which monarchy and inherited titles are rightly suspect, is there nevertheless a prospect for a mixed regime in the modern age that goes beyond pitting elite against populace and vice-versa, and which might instead give rise to a fruitful combination?

In this lecture, Patrick Deneen will envision the prospects for an ennobled aristoi and a more refined populace. He will at once acknowledge the persistence of class and inequality even in a democratic age (denying a path forward lies in a growing sympathy for socialism), but will propose that only a well-formed elite can support a humane condition of the populace, and only a well-formed populace can fruitfully restrain the hubris of a liberal elite and even orient them toward virtue. Through such a mixed regime, practices supporting a common good might emerge, correcting the core weakness of a liberal order designed to forestall such a possibility.

Mark Lilla joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss identitarianism in America and his book ”The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics.”

Mark Regnerus and senior editor Mark Bauerlein discuss worldwide trends in marriage and Regnerus's forthcoming book: "The Future of Christian Marriage."

Michael Anton joins senior editor Mark Bauerlein to discuss his recent book, ”After the Flight 93 Election: The Vote That Saved America and What We Still Have to Lose.”