The Pearl of Great Price

Send us Fan MailToday we remember the life of Michael Novak - influential author of the Spirit of Democratic Capitalism.  He tweaked Weber's famous Protestant Work Ethic and claimed that free capitalist economies owed more to a Catholic Work Ethic

Send us Fan MailFrancis Collins the director of the Human Genome Project is a devout Christian. we explore his life today

Send us Fan MailJos - the capital of the Plateau state in Nigeria's Central Belt is also a flashpoint for tension and violence between the Christian South and the Muslim North  

Send us Fan MailToday we remember how the Vatican placed the Pascals Provincial Letters on the Index. He was a brilliant French polymath, the inventor of the syringe and a promoter of an exaggerated theology called Jansenism

Send us Fan MailArchbishop Josef Beran of Prague defied both the Nazis and the Communists. He nearly died of typhus in Dachau concentration camp and after the iron curtain fell was placed under 16 years house arrest by the Communists. He was only allowed to leave the then Czechoslovakia to go to Rome to be made a cardinal - on the condition he didn't return. He died in exile

Send us Fan MailRafailo Momčilović was a celebrated Orthodox painter (writer)  of Icons. He was murdered by the fascist Ustase in Croatia whilst they were a Nazi puppet government 

Send us Fan MailThe discovery and publication of the Heliand started to explain a historical mystery.  How were the warrior Germanic Cultures subsumed into Christendom? This life of Christ in Old Norse is now an invaluable epic poem in a forgotten language

Send us Fan MailThe translations and summaries of Orthodox wisdom from Fr Seraphim Rose became valued as illegal Samizdat, material banned and shared in a clandestine manner under Communism. We look at the life and conversion of this monk who died at a young age after live a harsh asceticism

Send us Fan MailThe Friendship between Jesuit Priest Ed Dowling and the founder of the AA Bill Wilson was deep and rich,  We look at how Dowling became his advisor and sponsor and how he integrated the Ignatian Exercises into the 12 step programme

Send us Fan MailMatthias Grunewald masterpiece was commissioned by the Antonite Monks at Isenheim.  His depiction of an excruciating crucifixion is now iconic and was commissioned in the context of a monastery that was treating victims of the plague and skin disease

Send us Fan MailWhen Ben Chambers became the Methodist Minister at St Domingo's chapel he started the 'Band of Hope' putting on activities to distract youngsters from drink.  Thus Everton FC was born and then its younger brother - the more successful Liverpool FC

Send us Fan MailToday Michael Faraday induced the first electrical current - this would change civilization.  Not formally educated - his enquiring mind was underpinned by his faith - we explore this today 

Send us Fan MailPaul VI opened the Second Conference of Latin American Bishops in Medellin, Colombia.  This was influenced by the Brazilian educationalist Paolo Freire and his theory on 'conscientisation'.  The conference endorsed the 'preferential option for the poor' and base Christian communities. This was the start of what would become known as Liberation Theology. 

Send us Fan MailEnrique Shaw was a successful lifelong businessman from Argentina.  As he was dying awaiting for a life saving blood transfusion - hundreds of his employees queued outside the hospital to give him their blood

Send us Fan Mail Adrian of Ondrusuv sacrificed his estate to become a monk after meeting a holy hermit. Ivan the Terrible. a tyrant  and cruel leader asked him to be the godfather at his daughters baptism 

Send us Fan MailFriedrich Nietzsche died today in 1900 - one of the most influential intellectuals of the modern era.  His relationship with God is much more complex than the famous statement that 'God is dead' Today we explore it and his life

Send us Fan MailToday approximately 2000 puritans resigned their pulpits as deadline came for forced assent to the Book of Common Prayer. We look at the remarkable impact they have had in both Britain and North America

Send us Fan MailThe Taize ecumenical monastic community in France was founded by Roger Schultz in the ashes of WW2.  It still attracts thousands of young people every year as a community of reconciliation. Brother Roger was stabbed in the neck by a young Romanian woman. 

Send us Fan MailDe Lubac was one of the most influential theologians of the 20th Century. His experience of WW1 and WW2 was followed by 10 years being banned from teaching by the Vatican. He was appointed cardinal by Pope John Paul 2, the first one to be named without being a bishop in the modern era

Send us Fan MailThe final novel of Dostoevsky is possibly his most famous - the Brothers Karamazov.  Wrought out of terrible grief and struggles with faith after the death of his three year old son Aloysha.  One of Russia's greatest novelists has produced on of the greatest novels of all time. Charting the tumultuous transition of Russia from feudalism, the devoutly Orthodox Christian has produced one of the most powerful chapters on faith and reason with the Grand Inquisitor.  

Send us Fan MailBishop Bartholomew De La Casas chronicled the terrible atrocities that Spanish colonists carried out on the indigenous people of Central and South America.  He was appointed protector of the Indians by the Spanish Legal Establishment, His writing and thinking was influenced the School of Salamanca  and lead to both international law and the first concepts of universal human rights.

Send us Fan MailCarl Gustav Jung was one of the most creative thinkers of the 20th Century. The founder of analytical psychology his fascination with religion was life long

Send us Fan MailToday we look at the life of St Aethelwold, who rebuilt the church after 300 years of Viking raids.  Also the unlikely assimilation of Christianity into the Vikings and how Bluetooth got its name 

Send us Fan MailMount Athos is a unique centre  for Orthodox Christianity,  today in 1913 the Russian Navy removed 800 monks.  We look at the traditions there and its claim to be Marys Garden

Send us Fan MailThe greatest of the Baroque composers was a man of profound Lutheran faith, we look at his life

Send us Fan MailHumane Vitae is the most controversial of papal encyclicals, restating the Church's opposition to artificial birth control. It also marked a moment in the shift of the authority of the Church.  It was Pope Paul VI last encyclical. Was it prophetic or a disastrous overreach? 

Send us Fan MailThe Franciscan friar, Francesco Forgione took the religious name Pius when he entered his order.  He lived an unusual life of spiritual intensity and holiness and was strongly persecuted by his religious authorities for 20 years.  He would become one of Italy's most popular saints

Send us Fan MailToday we look at the unprecedent global journeys of John Paul II, a stampede at a mass in Fortaleza in North East Brazil and its Dom Helder Camara the bishop who spoke for the poor and instituted the pact of the Catacombs 

Send us Fan MailJohn Templeton, one of the worlds most generous philanthropist was fascinated by religion and science.  His annual prize is bigger than the Nobel Prizes in monetary value as he felt that spirituality was ignored by the Nobels. 

Send us Fan MailAlexander Solzhenitsyns book the Gulag Archipelago sold over 30million copies and did much to expose the cruelty and lies of Stalins Regime.  He was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. This is the story of his own spiritual journey and conversion in the Gulag.

Send us Fan MailHow a young emigrant to USA had an experience of being born again, which prevented him from being bitter and gave him the resilience to build up one of Americas most famous companies.  His deep faith led him to share most of his wealth through tithing 

Send us Fan MailThe greatest mind of the 8th Century - changed how we read letters, and saved a lot of knowledge from Viking Destruction. Alcuin of York - a one man renaissance was the sun who shone over Europe 

Send us Fan MailToday we remember the disappearance of Aimee McPherson a remarkable and pioneering evangelist. And how she reappeared 5 weeks later in the Mexican Desert ... what happened? 

Send us Fan MailThe Jesuit explorer Jacques Marquette and the Canadian Fur Trapper Louis Joillet were the first to explore and map the Mississipi - they embarked today and this is their story 

Send us Fan MailDid a Celtic Monk called Brendan cross the Atlantic 1000 years before Columbus? 

Send us Fan MailRerum Novarum was described as ground breaking - the foundational encyclical on Catholic Social Teaching. The only encyclical to spawn to follow up encyclicals as the Church tries to tread a middle line between Capitalism and Socialism 

Send us Fan MailThe infamous Salem Witch trials are now understood to be a bout of Puritan Mass Hysteria - and some historians argue lead to the end of experimental theocracies in the USA 

Send us Fan MailTurkish gunman Mehmet Ali Agca  came millimeters from killing John Paul II today by shooting him four times at close range in St Peters Square.  We look at the theories about why it happened and their relationship afterwards 

Send us Fan MailOn a thanksgiving pilgrimage to Fatima Pope John Paul II was attacked by a ultra-conservative priest brandishing a bayonet. Why was the Pope there in the first place? What was he giving thanks for? 

Send us Fan MailWe look at the life of Comgall, his student Columbanus and the distinctive form of Christian Community that emerged in Ireland.  We also look at how that had shaped the universal church. 

Send us Fan MailThe greatest Protestant theologian of the 20th Century, today we look at the life and thought of Karl Barth 

Send us Fan MailToday we remember the killing of Aldo Moro, former prime minister of Italy and how it tested the faith of an old friend Pope Paul VI 

Send us Fan MailA story of the savage French Revolution - its attempt to de-Christianise France and how a humble priest rebuilt the spiritual lives of his parishioners after. Jean Vianney would become the patron saint of priests

Send us Fan MailAt the turn of the Millennium the first Slavic Pope, John Paul II made bug steps towards reconciliation with the Orthodox Church. This covers his visit to Romania

Send us Fan MailIts been described as the most stolen piece of art, the first great oil painting of the Northern Renaissance. A complex multi-panelled painting laced with Catholic Theology. Recovered by the famous monuments men in the second world war after Hitler had hid it in a salt mine. 

Send us Fan MailToday we look at infamous Scopes Monkey Trial and the attempt to overthrow the Butler Act which prohibited teaching evolution in schools.  Also how the anti-evolution movement evolved into a Christian Science movement

Send us Fan MailToday Alexander VI, the infamous Borgia Pope, issued a papal bull which drew up a line of demarcation dividing the New World between Spain and Portugal

Send us Fan MailToday we look at the birth of Uriah Smith and Seventh Day Adventism.  Emerging out of a failed prophecy of the End of the World we look at his writings about the Book of Revelation. 

Send us Fan MailThe last polymath of the renaissance era was Fr Antanasius Kircher SJ. Among his many accomplishments he was the first to look at the blood of bubonic plague victims under a microscope and to realise that the 'pestis' was contagious. He suggested Quarantine, wearing masks and burning the clothes of victims. 

Send us Fan MailPerhaps the Westerner who did more to shape thinking about Africa then anyone else. Both a father of European Colonialism and a forerunner of African Nationalism. He died today and this is his story.