36: The Criminalisation of Prayer

Michael J. Knowles, the American broadcaster, political commentator, actor and author, is the guest of Dr Gavin Ashenden for this 75th episode for Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald. They discuss the many “diverse and eccentric” identities of American conservativism in the twilight of the Biden presidency and Mr Knowles’ work for the Daily Wire, the popular US news website and media company, amid the shifting sands of the cultural revolutions of the last decade. They also talk about the vital role of the Catholic Church in upholding objective moral truth in the crisis of relativism gripping the West.

Dr Gavin Ashenden is joined this week by Dr Patricia Morgan, the distinguished sociologist and author of the 2023 book Banning Conversion Therapy: The Missing Evidence, amid impending legislation to criminalise counselling, discussion, prayer and teaching based on orthodox Christian doctrine in spite of such changes representing a serious attack upon free inquiry and freedom of speech. In this 75th episode for Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald, Dr Morgan sets such changes in the prevailing anti-family and anti-marriage ideology that has convulsed the West for more than 50 years.

Madeline Page of Right to Life UK joins Dr Gavin Ashenden this week to discuss shocking scenes at Manchester University when a violent mob descended on a meeting of the students’ pro-life group with the aim of closing it down. Hundreds converged on the venue where a group of students met peacefully to spit at the women taking part and to shout “get raped” in their faces, with the police forced to intervene to prevent violent attacks on participants. Dr Ashenden, in this 74th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic, asks Madeline what this was all about and what it signifies.

Dr Gavin Ashenden is joined this week by John Zmirak, a senior editor of The Stream and author of the new Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism, to discuss the new novelties “gathering slime” in the West and within the Catholic Church. Zmirak is the author, co-author, or editor of twelve books, including Wilhelm Ropke: Swiss Localist, Global Economist, The Grand Inquisitor (graphic novel) and The Race to Save Our Century and his essays, poems, and other works have appeared in First Things, The Weekly Standard, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, USA Today, FrontPage Magazine, The American Conservative, The South Carolina Review, Modern Age, The Intercollegiate Review, Commonweal, and The National Catholic Register. He has contributed to American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia and The Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought.

Dr Gavin Ashenden is joined this week by the distinguished Canadian journalist Anna Farrow to discuss Canada’s hysterical grief over mass graves which never existed. Farrow, a Montreal based writer for the Catholic Register, describes how 96 churches came to be burned down after it was falsely claimed that the graves of 215 children had been discovered in the grounds of a former residential school in British Columbia that had been run by the Catholic Church on behalf of the Canadian government – but which years later failed to yield a single body. In this 72nd episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald, Farrow explains how anti-Catholic sentiment played a part in creating perhaps the gravest moral panic since the fabricated Satanic abuses convulsed western societies in the late 20th century.

The horrendous chemical attack on a woman and two children by Abdul Ezedi, an Afghan received into Christianity by Baptists in Jarrow, has reopened debate about the authenticity of the claims of some people who seek asylum on the grounds of religious conversion. Monsignor Michael Nazir-Ali, the former Anglican Bishop of Rochester who became a Catholic in 2021, discusses some of the contemporary problems with the system with Dr Gavin Ashenden for this 71st episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for the Catholic Herald. They also reflect on the Judaeo-Christian tradition of “welcoming and loving the stranger” and the theology that underpins it, and how such biblical injunctions should be interpreted in an age of the mass movements of populations.

Ferdi McDermott, the English headmaster and co-founder of Chavagnes International College, a Catholic school for boys in France, joins Dr Gavin Ashenden for this 70th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald. They discuss the origins and success of the venture and some of the issues confronting Catholic secondary and higher education in the ideologically benighted UK and precisely what underpins the excellence of Chavagnes, an academy which has produced about twenty priestly vocations in just the last two decades.

Stefan Kaminski, the director of the Christian Heritage Centre at Stonyhurst College, the Catholic independent school in Lancashire, is our guest for this 69th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald. He and presenter Dr Gavin Ashenden discuss the mission in a range of Christian leadership formation undertaken by the centre at Theodore House with the objective of preparing Catholics for a broad range of service in public life. Mr Kaminski also explains how the work of the centre continues the tradition of evangelisation of the great Jesuit college that occupies the same site.

Dr Joseph Shaw returns for this 68th episode of Merely Catholic, the podcast series for The Catholic Herald, for the second of a two-part broadcast examining the situation of Catholics under a Protestant monarch in the 21st century. He and Dr Gavin Ashenden explore the role of tradition, the monarchy as a model for papacy, the papacy as “the servant of tradition”, the evolution of the papacy and the significance of the innovations introduced by the reigning Pontiff and his predecessors. Dr Joseph Shaw is the chairman of the Latin Mass Society and a former member of the Philosophy faculty at Oxford University, and last month he published A Defence of Monarchy: Catholics Under a Protestant King, which includes contributions from such writers as Sohrab Ahmari, James Bogle, Charles Coulombe, Peter Day-Milne and Sebastian Morello.

The guest for this 67th 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, to discuss his new book, A Defence of Monarchy: Catholics Under a Protestant King. In this first of a two-part broadcast, they discuss the meaning and function of a monarchy and rituals in the modern world and why this ancient institution may serve as a 21st century repository of Catholic tradition, a politically-neutral focus of unity, and a symbolic interface between the nation and God. A Defence of the Monarchy, which was published in December, includes contributions from Dr Shaw, as well as from such writers as Sohrab Ahmari, James Bogle, Charles Coulombe, Peter Day-Milne and Sebastian Morello.