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PODCAST · religion

On the Way Podcast

by St John's Cathedral

A podcast exploring the deeper mysteries of faith, meaning, and beauty. Based at St John's Cathedral in Brisbane, the podcast invites others into conversation who are also "on the way"; seeking a transformative spirituality and inclusive faith that speaks to real issues of today. Together we seek to make meaning and articulate a Christianity that expresses the liberating and life-giving message of the Gospel in our time.

Publisher-supplied feed metadata · PodParley refreshed Oct 1, 2026 · Source feed

Episodes

  1. O'neil Van Horn: Making Hope

    How do we have hope in amongst worsening reports of global warming, species loss and natural disasters? O’neil Van Horn, describing himself as a hopeful nihilist, argues that while there may be little reason for feeling hopeful, the real challenge of hope is to create it through the actions of…

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  2. Frank Brennan: Magnifica Humanitas

    What does it mean to be human? Pope Leo XIV addresses this question in his encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, a letter addressed not only to all the Catholic faithful but to "all men and women of goodwill". In addressing the challenges, threats and possibilities of AI, how do we ensure we do not…

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  3. Sarah Bachelard: Pools Of Grace

    There has been interest and renewal of contemplative practice amongst the Christian church in recent decades. Rather than just a comfortable solace in a busy world, there is an urgency in such practices that seek transformed and transforming ways to be and to live in a time of such complexity and...

  4. Alikki Vernon and David Moore: Setting Relations Right

    How does faith show up in the everyday? How might we bring intention and focus to living out our faith in the everyday micro-moments of our lives and relationships? It is easy to remain in relational habits that are encultured or habituated by social patterns that are so often 'win-lose' and...

  5. Anne Pattel-Gray: Raising our Prophetic Voice

    Where is the Church calling Australian society to accountability in the face of experiences of escalating racism and hatred against First Nations people? This is a question Professor Anne Pattel-Gray asks as she recalls the times of church support for land rights and justice for the Stolen...

  6. Kwok Pui-Lan: The Colonial Mind

    Often we hear colonialism spoken of as something that happened in the past. At other times in public discourse the term attracts heated resistance and the voices of the colonised are frequently not heard. If colonialism is not just the past but remains in the air we breathe, we can miss the…

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  7. On the Way: The Weight of Everything

    There are plenty of reasons right now that we may feel inclined to despair. The news brings to us all the violence of the world and a sense that the all we have known is fundamentally changing. Dom, Sue and Peter gather for this 'check in' conversation on how we are adjusting to the shifting of…

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  8. Jeff Chu: Good Soil

    What soil did you come from? There is no self-made person and perhaps this is a lesson that emerges with greater clarity in the garden than in many of the other spaces and ways we live and work. Our sacred texts are rooted in agrarian cultures and the Gospels are full of Jesus' stories of green…

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  9. John Na'em Snobar: Peace with Justice

    What if reconciliation is resistance? John Na'em Snobar, a Palestinian Christian and former Australian Diplomat, joins the podcast to speak from his lived experience both in diplomatic circles and on the ground in Israel/ Palestine of how speaking the truth is, in itself, a nonviolent response....

  10. Peter Kline: The Double Bind of Being Human

    To be human is to find oneself bound to multiple things that are conflictual yet at the same time compelling. The interplay of desire and morality creates one such 'double bind'. It is possible to follow desire and disregard the claims of morality in such a way that you can ruin your life.…

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  11. Jim Schirmer: Integrating wellbeing, therapy and the soul

    While society has advanced in its understanding of mental health, with advances in treatment, wider awareness and a reduction in stigma, there seems to be no abating of the mental health crisis. Tracing the history of modern psychotherapy, and the systematic approach taken by the medical…

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  12. Iain McGilchrist: The Sense Of The Sacred

    Anyone who describes an experience with the sacred will find themselves often struggling for words because they find the sacred is not a 'thing', nor a set of beliefs, but rather an encounter in open and vulnerable relationship which requires a far more humble and receptive form of knowing. Dr…

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  13. Donna Ladkin : The Leadership Moment

    So often we think of leaders as born rather than made, or at least as having some kind of specialist predisposition such as charisma or perhaps an extraverted, more dominant personality. Dr Donna Ladkin joins Dom, Peter and Sue to explore the idea that maybe leadership is much more complex and…

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  14. Beth-Sarah Wright: the Dignity Lens

    What if dignity is a way of seeing that changes the kind of attention we pay to each other and to our world? Authenticity, human dignity and the courage to confront difficult truths are a common thread in the writing of Dr Beth-Sarah Wright who joins the podcast for this conversation during her...

  15. Spiritual Misfits, On the Way (LIVE at 'Words for Those Who Wander')

    A special cross-over podcast episode between Spiritual Misfits and On the Way, recorded at 'Words For Those Who Wander' at West End Uniting Church in Brisbane. In this conversation, Will Small, Dom Fay, Sue Grimmett, and Peter Catt explore what happens when the old spiritual maps stop working and...

  16. Wil Gafney: Reading and Seeing from the Margins

    We do everything we do in this world through our embodiment. There remains a pervasive myth that we move through this world working and creating without leaving any trace of our own lived experience upon our moving and interacting, commenting and creating. With such a mythology the dominant…

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  17. Meg Wheatley: Restoring Sanity

    After 50 years of working with leaders globally, Margaret Wheatley, argues that leadership has never been more difficult. In the face of a multicrisis of climate and human created catastrophes, Meg points to the compelling need to awaken the human spirit and create “islands of sanity”: spaces of...

  18. Lamorna Ash: A New Generation's Search for Religion

    Exploring a curious story that she thought might be “knotty and weird”, of two comedians from her student days who converted to Christianity and decided to become Anglican priests, journalist Lamorna Ash unearths a recurring phenomenon of a new generation discovering religion for themselves....

  19. Parker J. Palmer: Everything Falls Away

    "Sooner or later, everything falls away." With these words, author Parker J. Palmer begins his much-loved poem exploring the landscape of loss, grief and letting go. In this conversation, Parker reads the poem and reflects on the transient nature of reality and the great tapestry that holds all...

  20. Pádraig Ó Tuama: The Room Next To Belief

    Alongside being the title of Pádraig Ó Tuama's recently released collection of poetry, Kitchen Hymns is also an informal term referring to the hymns sung in Irish homes that weren't allowed in formal church contexts, due to their being in the Irish language rather than Latin. It is this…

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  21. Barbara Brown Taylor: Rediscovering Reverence

    In the midst of our busy lives, we can so easily miss the sacred shining through every moment. Children are instinctively drawn to bewilderment and astonishment at the wonder of life, and yet it is a way of seeing that often fades as the rigours and responsibilities of adult life take over.…

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  22. Rob Bell: Grief, Guilt & Growth

    What do we do with the weight of the past? We so often find ourselves clinging and grasping to that which has ended, getting stuck in self-loathing and judgement over that which we regret, or becoming too cautious and comfortable to step boldly beyond that which we have outgrown, leaving us...

  23. Rowan Williams: Holy Longing

    While we may struggle to agree on the answers to life's biggest questions, we are all united in asking them. It is this shared questioning that binds us as humans, with each of us carrying a deep ache for something greater, something sacred and something real. Drawing on the wisdom of the Desert...

  24. Iain McGilchrist: A Distorted Reality

    What if the way our brains have evolved is inhibiting us from seeing reality as it actually is?This is the groundbreaking theory of renowned neuroscientist, psychiatrist and philosopher Dr Iain McGilchrist, whose research on the two hemispheres of the brain and the different ways in which they...

  25. Alexander John Shaia: Recovering The Mystical

    Karl Rahner once remarked that 'the Christian of the future will be a mystic or will not exist', and it is in this spirit that friend of the podcast Alexander John Shaia joins Dom for a conversation about recovering the mystical way of seeing today. Recorded in Granada, Spain, this episode…

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  26. Pete Rollins: Nothing Matters

    Our culture constantly bombards us with products, ideas and approaches that promise to heal us, cure us, make us whole, and take away the pain of life entirely. We are led to believe that we are only one change away from the life we've always felt like we should be living, and that we need only…

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  27. Richard Holloway: Looking for Life's Meaning

    What are the biggest questions that would stay with you across your life? is there a God? Why is there something, not nothing, and what can it possibly all mean? How can we live a good life? Richard Holloway joins the podcast once again from Edinburgh to share some of his reflections on these...

  28. Rowan Williams: Passions Of The Soul

    What cost do we pay when we remain living in self-regarding reactivity? What do we do when we find ourselves stuck, trapped by the illusory pictures we have of ourselves and unable to be a channel of life for others? Former Archbishop of Canterbury and author of many books, Dr Rowan Williams…

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  29. John Philip Newell: The Great Search

    There is a strong sense that the Church is in a time of transition- preparing to birth something new. John Philip Newell in his new book, The Great Search: Turning to earth and soul in the quest for healing and home, addresses this idea and speaks to the group he refers to as the Christian...

  30. Alexander John Shaia: The Mystical Christos

    Is there an ancient path that can transform lives when we find it together, giving hope and meaning? Alexander John Shaia returns to the podcast from his home in Spain to share his deep mining of the Gospel of John which he argues offer the most important, beautiful and dangerous words in...

  31. Anne Van Gend: Restoring the Story

    On the Way Episode 107 Anne Van Gend: Restoring the Story Are we too squeamish about atonement? Anne Van Gend, priest, author and ministry educator, joins the podcast to explore how we tell and keep telling stories about ‘atonement’ in different ways; in mythology, in fantasy novels, movies and…

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  32. Parker Palmer: Healing The Heart Of Democracy

    How do we find a way back to one another, across shrill voices and opposing ideologies? How might we reclaim a democracy which appreciates the value of 'the other', creating community and living with tension in life-giving ways? With the recent release of the updated version of his classic book,...

  33. Eleanor O'Donnell : Power & God

    Australian priest, teacher and author, Eleanor O’Donnell joins the podcast to talk about the way we understand power, hierarchy and divinity. How do we talk about God when that word conjures a big other, looking down from a throne in the sky directing the traffic on earth? The language instead of…

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  34. Palestine: a humanitarian and ecological crisis

    With the UN reporting on acts of genocide in Gaza and the ongoing violent colonisation of multi-cultural, multi-religious and multi-ethnic Palestine continuing, a global understanding and response to the situation is vital. Eight million of the 15 million Palestinians are refugees or displaced...

  35. Domestic and Family Violence: changing the narrative in the church

    In Australia this year, one woman has been violently killed every four days. Increasingly we are aware of the way abusive behaviours form patterns over time to create and maintain power and dominance over another, whether emotionally, sexually, spiritually, or financially. This is not an isolated...

  36. Brian McLaren: Life After Doom

    We live in turbulent times. Amidst the ecological, political, and economic crises dominating news headlines, it can be easy to feel overwhelmed by a sense of doom about where this whole thing is going. Is it possible to face these very difficult realities with honesty and insight, while resisting...

  37. Paul Young: Known and Loved

    Amidst all our wrestling with the big questions of life, faith, and meaning, how do we move beyond our minds to a deeper, embodied experience of what it is to simply be loved? As Dom continues the podcast's Northern Hemisphere excursion, he joins Wm Paul Young (author of The Shack, Crossroads &...

  38. On the Way : 100th Episode!

    Peter, Sue and Dom sit down to share how these many conversations across 7 years with wise and thoughtful people from around the world and closer to home have shaped their thinking and their lives. What shifts have happened in the world and the church across this time and how did the…

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  39. Rob Bell: Finding The Way Forward

    Amidst the endlessly complex and varying longings, fears, passions, and possibilities that animate our lives, how do we find the courage and clarity to step into the path that’s truly calling to us? Rob Bell knows this journey well. After many years as an author and speaker in the emergent faith...

  40. James Hollis: The Summons of the Soul

    Carl Jung once remarked that "life is a short pause between two great mysteries", and it is in the midst of this pause that each of us are given the task of creating a life of depth and meaning. But with the psychological baggage of our personal histories and the many ways we've learned to adapt…

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  41. Pete Rollins: Loving The Loss

    Dom Fay is travelling and here once again from Pete Rollins' apartment in Belfast comes a special New Year podcast release to explore how the real object of our New Year's hopes may be found in our failure to achieve them. This is an existential crisis within an hour's listening enjoyment…

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  42. Wild Landscapes and Soul Work: Belden Lane

    Are we drawn to landscapes that echo the symptoms of our soul? Desert spirituality knows that the God of the vast spaces is an experience of the sacred where we can find ourselves completely undone, stripped of our usual protective identities and driven to awe-filled silence. Safer images and...

  43. Understanding desire: James Alison

    Understanding human desire, the way it is caught and the way it can lead us to scapegoating and violence is foundational to understanding what it is to be human. Drawing on the work of René Girard, James Alison joins the podcast once again to explore the essential goodness of desire while...

  44. Telling the Truth - Henry Reynolds

    The Uluru Statement from the Heart urges Australia to come to terms with its history. This year the slogan, “History is calling” reminds us that the past is never the past- particularly when it has been forgotten or wilfully misunderstood or ignored. How might we better know our own story and so...

  45. Indigenous spirituality and a grounded faith: Garry Deverell

    How does an Indigenous person express spirituality grounded in country in the wake of colonisation and the continued colonial nature of our institutions and systems? Dr Garry Worete Deverell, a Trawloolway man from northern Tasmania, joins the podcast to explore country and kin as the building...

  46. The Science of Worship

    There have been many conversations about the interface between science and theology and the rich understandings that can result. There have been few explorations, however, of the way science can inform and lend insight to our understanding of the public worship experience. Dr Kenneth Miles,...

  47. Mess, grace and glory: The Anglican Church in fiction as in life

    It is said that stories make us what we are. If that is true, then perhaps creating stories about ourselves may help us to see more clearly who we are and who we want to become. Fictional author of the Lindchester Chronicles, Catherine Fox (Wilcox) joins the podcast to talk about the power of…

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  48. Cruel optimism

    Being aware of the water in which we swim is not always easy. Dr Peter Kline joins the conversation to help us to see more clearly the culture in which we are immersed that we may understand the way it has constrained our desire, providing the delusion of freedom. More than that, the promises of…

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  49. Live at the cathedral with Pádraig Ó Tuama

    Pádraig ÓTuama joins On the Way in St John's Cathedral for a live recording of this conversation which explores the power of language to build up or destroy, open us to curiosity or shut down understanding, to wield shame or honour the beauty of human dignity and this embodied life. Pádraig tells...

  50. Announcement- live event with Pádraig Ó Tuama

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ABOUT THIS SHOW

A podcast exploring the deeper mysteries of faith, meaning, and beauty. Based at St John's Cathedral in Brisbane, the podcast invites others into conversation who are also "on the way"; seeking a transformative spirituality and inclusive faith that speaks to real issues of today. Together we seek to make meaning and articulate a Christianity that expresses the liberating and life-giving message of the Gospel in our time.

HOSTED BY

St John's Cathedral

Produced by Suzanne Grimmett

Frequently Asked Questions

How many episodes does On the Way Podcast have?

On the Way Podcast currently has 100 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.

What is On the Way Podcast about?

A podcast exploring the deeper mysteries of faith, meaning, and beauty. Based at St John's Cathedral in Brisbane, the podcast invites others into conversation who are also "on the way"; seeking a transformative spirituality and inclusive faith that speaks to real issues of today. Together we seek...

How often does On the Way Podcast release new episodes?

On the Way Podcast has 100 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.

Where can I listen to On the Way Podcast?

You can listen to On the Way Podcast on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.

Who hosts On the Way Podcast?

On the Way Podcast is created and hosted by St John's Cathedral.
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