In Conversation With

Dr Gavin Ashenden is joined for this 46th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald, by Ryan Christopher, the director of ADF UK, a faith-based legal advocacy organisation defending fundamental freedoms and human dignity.

They discuss the rapid erosion of freedom of speech and its causes and what might be done to reverse such a trend as well as how to defend and uphold other authentic human rights.

Mr Christopher, a former seminarian, also reflects on contemporary challenges to the priestly ministry and parish life and offers some insights on ways in which Christian life and culture might be renewed in the post-modern era.

On the eve of the coronation, as we enter a new Carolingian era, Gavin Ashenden reflects on the challenges posed to the absolutist claims of monarchy and faith, by the revolutionary forces of relativism and secularism.

On hearing the word Chicago, many people might think either of the dramatic musical of that name or else make associations with 1930s gangsters. In this latest edition of Merely Catholic, we go to Chicago to interview Fr Ryan Brady, a local downtown city priest. In the shadow of arguments, about sex, power, scandal, and money we hear from him a different but familiar vision for the future of the Church - the pursuit of holiness.

John Pontifex of Aid to the Church in Need, the international Catholic charity helping persecuted Christians, is the guest on this 43rd episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald.

He tells Dr Gavin Ashenden of how the charity began with one priest reaching out in solidarity to Christians behind the Iron Curtain before enlarging and spreading to more than 130 countries. He describes the work undertaken by Aid to the Church in Need and he sets out how Christians are being persecuted today, including a shocking report from a recent visit to Pakistan, a country in which the Christian minority continues to live in fear of relentless harassment, discrimination and Islamist violence.

Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Conservative MP for North East Somerset, discusses his strong Catholic faith with Dr Gavin Ashenden in this 42nd episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald.

They also talk about such issues as the relationship of religion to politics, the “continual trajectory for anti-Christian values” present in public life, the campaign to decriminalise abortion and the ban on prayer near to clinics, as well as cancel culture, Covid, the family and child care, and the indoctrination of small children by increasingly lurid sex education.

Throughout their conversation, Mr Rees-Mogg refuses to succumb to pessimism, saying he sees signs of hope both within the Church and in wider society – and he also reveals his wishes to be made a cardinal.

Dr Gavin Ashenden this week talks to Eduard Habsburg, Hungary’s Ambassador to the Holy See, a member of the former ruling family of Austria-Hungary and a man still known today by his traditional title of Archduke Eduard of Austria.

They talk about the remarkable family which ruled over the Holy Roman Empire, shaping European politics for 800 years; about contemporary European politics, and perhaps most currently, about the archduke’s new book, The Habsburg Way: Seven Rules for Turbulent Times. Such principles include getting married, being Catholic, being brave in battle, standing for law and justice, and dying well. Archduke Eduard explains how these values can be implemented in the lives of people today.

The Rev. Dr Patrick Pullicino returns to “Merely Catholic”, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald, to talk about the presence of science in the Old Testament Book of Ezekiel.

Fr Pullicino, a retired NHS consultant neurologist who now serves as a priest for the Archdiocese of Southwark, speaks to Dr Gavin Ashenden, in this 40th episode, about his 218-page thesis on “The Science of Ezekiel’s Chariot of YHWH Vision as a Synthesis of Reason and Spirit”.

He reveals that “Fuzzy Epistemology”, a concept formulated by a 20th century philosopher and used today in digital household devices like Alexa and Siri, is present in one of the most puzzling and cryptic books of the Old Testament, reinforcing his view of the compatibility of science with religion, and faith with reason.

The guest for this 39th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald, is Dr Joseph Shaw, the chairman of the Latin Mass Society and a former member of the Philosophy faculty at Oxford University.

He tells Dr Gavin Ashenden that the reasons offered for the ongoing suppression of the Traditional Latin Mass just 15 years after its liberation were largely spurious and ideologically-motivated and are probably driven by actors not yet clearly in view.

They also discuss the recent ‘rescript’ issued by the Holy See that prevents parish churches celebrating the Old Rite Mass without a dispensation from Rome and they reflect on the reaction to such measures throughout the world.

Sherry Anne Weddell, the pioneering American Catholic evangeliser, joins Dr Gavin Ashenden for the 38th episode of “Merely Catholic”, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald, to discuss the renewal of the Catholic Church in an age of unbelief.

Weddell, a convert to the faith from a Southern Baptist background, is co-founder and co-director of the Catherine of Siena Institute and the creator of the first charism-discernment process designed for Catholics. She trains and leads an international team of teachers who have worked with more than 100,000 ordained, religious and lay Catholics in more than 120 dioceses in five continents and one of her books, Forming Intentional Disciples, has sold more than 100,000 copies.

She talks to Dr Ashenden about her journey of faith, the New Evangelisation and what the Church in the West must do to recover its missionary zeal.

Andrew Doyle, the comedian, broadcaster and writer, joins Dr Gavin Ashenden for the 37th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald, to discuss the rise of new ideologies broadly described as “wokery”.

Doyle, author of the 2022 book The New Puritans, compares the followers of destructive new ideologies with old school religious fundamentalists, particularly of the 17th century, noting such shared characteristics as social hysteria, uncompromising moral self-righteousness and the total refusal to tolerate any dissent.

He tells of how “vicious” activists, who “lack human empathy”, routinely use fear, intimidation, threats and the cancel culture to impose their world view and to gradually dismantle the apparatus of liberal democracy and Christian civilisation.