The Mentoris Project Podcasts

From hero to heretic, would he live to see honor again?

From hero to heretic, would he live to see honor again?

To train the greatest, he had to be the greatest.

They said, “No!” She asked, “Why?” The answer was always the same: “Because you’re a woman.”

If asked to list important inventors, few remember to include Alessandro Volta. Yet, his is a household name more spoken than that of Alexander Graham Bell, the Wright Brothers, or even Thomas Edison. That’s because the terms “volt” and “voltage” can be attributed to Volta, the inventor of the “Voltaic pile,” which is recognized as the first electric battery. A product of the Age of Enlightenment—a time when ideas about reason, science, literature and liberty took center stage—Volta employed a very modern, hands-on approach to his work. Though he had no formal education, he was the first person to identify the gas known as methane, and created the first authoritative list of conducting metals. Alessandro Volta saw things not just as they were, but as what they could be. He was a disrupter, an innovator and a visionary. Above all, he was relentless. Without Volta’s hunger to create and his drive to invent and discover, we might not have electric cars, laptops, cellphones, and hearing aids today.

Born in Italy at the tumultuous end of France’s influence in Europe, Giuseppe Verdi went on to become the world’s most recognizable name in opera.

Set against the rise of the Italian states in the middle of the nineteenth century, The Faithful depicts an artist bedeviled by his role not just as a composer, but as an unassuming icon of the Italian Unification and the birth of modern Italy.

Through chance encounters in gilded Milanese salons and the hushed politics of the Italian opera, we experience the struggles of a man conflicted by his role as an artist and by his commitment to a country yearning for independence.

As the first century approached, a sickly boy was born while the Roman Republic was nearing its ultimate demise. The boy’s life and the country both hung in the balance.

But the strong and determined young man grew to be the Republic’s fiercest defender. With his dogged determination and towering intellect, Marcus Tullius Cicero became a famed statesman, celebrated orator, and an esteemed philosopher.

Surviving civil wars, political intrigues, and assassination attempts, Cicero pushed against the grain, standing steadfastly in support of the Republic, even when it threatened his career—or his life.

Known today among many as the most brilliant light of the Church, Aquinas was a Catholic priest and a Doctor of the Church. His synthesis of Aristotle’s philosophy with Christianity significantly influenced Western thought and solidified his legacy as one of the greatest philosophers of the Western world.

Over his lifetime, Aquinas wrote many Eucharistic hymns, some of which are to this day included in the Church’s liturgy. His theological insight and natural reason make him an ideal model teacher for those pursuing Catholic priesthood.

Today, Saint Thomas is often depicted with a writing quill or an open book, proving that the search for knowledge and truth forever lives within his name.

The Forbidden City—home to the opium-addicted Ming Dynasty emperor and protected by thousands of ruthless eunuchs—no European had ever been inside. Would a simple Jesuit priest be the first?

Armed with a homemade clock, a wealth of patience, and an uncompromising drive to share his faith with a new people, Father Matteo Ricci would overcome one barrier only to be met by another: treacherous seas, a complex language, and a culture with an unshakable mistrust of foreigners and rooted in the teachings of Buddha and Confucius.

The Soul of a Child: A Novel Based on the Life of Maria Montessori places the brilliant educator and reformer in the context of her time. It examines the relationships, inner struggles, and inspirations of Maria Montessori, a woman with heart, empathy, and resilience. As a strong woman who lived through two world wars, the rise of Fascism in Spain and Italy, and the dawn of the nuclear age, she remained undeterred in her faith in the possibility of positive change through education. Her life spanned both the joys of innovation and the horrors of destruction of the twentieth century. Her influence on education and humanism remains resonant and enduring. This is her story.