Faith Matters

Today we’re joined by Ryan Burge, one of the country’s leading data analysts on religion and politics, to talk about his new book, The Vanishing Church: How the Hollowing Out of Moderate Congregations Is Hurting Democracy, Faith, and Us.

For decades, we’ve measured the decline of American religion by empty pews and shrinking membership rolls. Ryan invites us to see another, deeper loss. As moderate congregations disappear, we’re also losing one of the last places where people with real differences—in politics, class, age, education, and conviction—learn how to love each other as neighbors...

As we approach America's 250th birthday, we're reminded that every generation inherits the responsibility of shaping the nation's future. At a moment marked by fear, division, and distrust, the invitation to become peacemakers has never felt more urgent.

Today, we're sharing a powerful message from Patrick Mason, that he shared at our Restore Gathering at Utah Valley University last year, just two weeks after the tragic shooting of Charlie Kirk on the same campus. Speaking only a few hundred yards from the memorial, Patrick reminds us that violence is never the end of the story. The gospel...

Today we're delighted to share a conversation with Robin Ritch about her new book, Using Friction to Grow: Stories of Strength and Resilience.

Many of us spend our lives trying to avoid friction. We want our faith to feel clear, our communities to feel supportive, and our spiritual lives to move forward without too much tension or uncertainty. But today Robin's asking, "What if our deepest growth comes not in spite of friction, but because of it?"

And that's at the heart of her book. Through interviews with a remarkable generation of Latter-day Saint women—ma...

Today we’re sharing a special conversation courtesy of our friends at Lift+Love. This is a conversation recorded at their first ever Gather Conference in 2023, the world’s largest Christ-centered gathering of LGBTQ Latter-day Saints and those who love them.

In this session, two men sat down together: Tom Christofferson and Darius Gray. Both are devoted Latter-day Saints who know what it is to love the Church while also having experienced real marginalization within it.

Darius Gray is a Black Latter-day Saint who was baptized on December 26th, 1964 — fourteen years before the revelation that lifted...

Today we’re honored to share a special session from Restore 2025 featuring Steven Kapp Perry, Alisha Anderson, and Ben Schilaty—three gay Latter-day Saints who have each taken different paths, and who share a deep commitment to following God with honesty, courage, and faith.

In this on-stage conversation, Steve, Alisha, and Ben share personal and vulnerable reflections on what it means to seek God when the road ahead feels uncertain, and the courage it takes to keep moving forward in faith. They explore belonging, revelation, and the complexity of spiritual life as they describe discerning and following path...

This week, wards across the United States will be having a really unique 5th Sunday discussion centered on the Constitution, moral agency, and peace-building. So today, we wanted to reshare a conversation that originally aired in 2021.

In this episode, Faith Matters co-founder Bill Turnbull joins Judge Thomas Griffith, an expert in constitutional law, to explore the Constitution and the rapid erosion of goodwill and trust in American politics, including among Latter-day Saints. Judge Griffith sees the possibility of a serious crisis and believes that Latter-day Saints can and must play a critical role in healing today’s di...

They call him the Mr. Rogers of farming, and I think you’ll understand why. 

Karl Ebeling spent 33 years as a chemical engineer before feeling an undeniable pull back to the land and to a childhood love of farming that had never really left him. He combined his love of the earth with desire to help and heal and founded Eden Streets in 2020, a community farming initiative that helps individuals relaunch their lives and cultivate community through farming. Karl has watched first hand as the earth does her healing work in the souls of men and women exp...

Today, we’re honored to share a conversation with Tish Harrison Warren on her beautiful brand new book, What Grows in Weary Lands.

From the very first pages of this book, Tish gives us language for something so familiar. She writes about aridity—those seasons of spiritual drought, exhaustion, or distance from God, when prayer feels flat, faith feels heavy, and the life we once found nourishing suddenly feels barren. 

Then she also introduces us to the ancient idea of acedia—what the Desert Fathers and Mothers sometimes called “the noonday demon.” It’s that restless beli...

Today, as we celebrate our mothers and motherhood, we’re exploring the symbols of our Divine Mother hidden throughout ancient Christianity, and what it might mean for each of us—men and women—to cultivate and integrate divine femininity into our own souls.

Our guests are Kathryn and Bob Sonntag, who joined us at Restore last year for a powerful session on ritual, wisdom, and our Divine Mother. Today, we’re bringing that conversation to everyone.

Together, we explore where the symbol of the Mother appears in ancient Christian traditions and grapple honestly with what divine f...

Today, we’re really excited to share a special episode with Jeff Strong on his new book, Torn: Why People We Love Are Leaving the Church and What We Can Learn From Them.

Research suggests that roughly 40% of formerly active, faithful members have stepped away from the Church in the last twenty-five years—and the pace is accelerating. Jeff Strong is asking why. Drawing on hundreds of interviews, he’s found that, again and again, disaffiliation is rooted in unmet spiritual needs, strained trust, and experiences of exclusion or spiritual starvation. Jeff’s book is unflinchingly honest—and genuin...

Hey everyone, this is Aubrey from Faith Matters. Today’s episode is a personal one for me—and probably for many of you—especially if you’ve ever found yourself deferring to someone else’s inspiration, or noticing a tendency to believe that someone else’s knowing is more trustworthy than your own.

Our guest, Deidre Nicole Green, is a professor at Graduate Theological Union and a theologian and scholar whose work explores gender, faith, and the Christian life. The starting place for this discussion was Deidre’s just-released Wayfare Magazine article called "Envying Hannah".

At the center...

Today, we’re honored to share a conversation with Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest, a New York Times bestselling author, and the founder of Outreach, a ministry for LGBTQ Catholics.

His new memoir is called Work in Progress: Confessions of a Busboy, Dishwasher, Caddy, Usher, Factory Worker, Bank Teller, Corporate Tool, and Priest. And yes, he held every one of those jobs before he found his calling. But beneath the laughs, this book is really about the slow, unglamorous, often uncomfortable work of transformation.

In our conversation today, Father Jim talks about growing up de...

Today we’re exploring a tender question so many parents are carrying: how do we help our kids grow in faith when we’re still figuring it out for ourselves? And underneath that—what if we get it wrong? What if we hand them something they’ll spend years trying to untangle?

Today, we’re joined by pastor, author, and researcher Meredith Miller, who has spent her career thoughtfully engaging these questions. Her book, Woven: Nurturing a Faith Your Kid Doesn’t Have to Heal From, offers a grounded and practical guide for what this can look like.

...

Today we’re asking: what do you do when someone you love tells you they’re leaving the Church? What do you say? How do you stay grounded and connected when the stakes feel high or you’re caught off guard?

We sat down with two longtime friends of the podcast—authors and researchers Joseph Grenny and Jeff Strong—to explore these high-stakes moments when someone is ready to talk about their shifting faith.

Drawing on research from over 500 real-life conversations about faith transitions, Joseph and Jeff uncover something both surprising and sobering: statistically, it’s devout par...

We live in a world that prizes activity: being productive, staying in control, always doing something. So when life brings seasons of waiting—through illness, loss, or circumstances we didn’t choose—it can feel unsettling, even threatening to our sense of self. But what if those seasons are actually inviting us into a deeper understanding of God?

Today, we’re joined by Terryl Givens to explore an extraordinary book called The Stature of Waiting by W.H. Vanstone. Vanstone noticed something hiding in plain sight in the gospel accounts of the last week of Jesus’s life. Up u...

This version has the correct audio--thanks to those who let us know the last one wasn't right! 

From time to time we like to share episodes from other shows in the Faith Matters network that we think you’ll really love, and today we’re highlighting one of our new favorites from Article 13, the podcast hosted by Zach Davis.

If you haven’t discovered it yet, Article 13 is one of the most beautifully produced things Faith Matters does. The title comes from the thirteenth Article of Faith and that really captures the spirit of seeking that yo...

From time to time we like to share episodes from other shows in the Faith Matters network that we think you’ll really love, and today we’re highlighting one of our new favorites from Article 13, the podcast hosted by Zach Davis.

If you haven’t discovered it yet, Article 13 is one of the most beautifully produced things Faith Matters does. The title comes from the thirteenth Article of Faith and that really captures the spirit of seeking that you’ll experience in these episodes. These are rich, deeply researched explorations that bring together cutting-edge scholarship and spiritua...

One of the real challenges of studying the Hebrew Bible is figuring out how to make sense of stories of divine violence—where a God of love seems hard to find. These passages raise real questions about the nature of God and what it means for us as we try to live faithfully.

Our guest today is Riley Risto, director of Latter-day Peace Studies, who joined the Church after a powerful mystical experience while praying about the Book of Mormon, an experience that centered his faith on Jesus and shaped his lifelong effort to take Christ’s teac...

In today’s conversation, we explore creativity as a spiritual practice—not something reserved for artists, but a way of living.

Our guests are Lisa Valentine Clark, a comedian, actor, and host of The Lisa Show, and James Rees—artist, educator, researcher, and passionate advocate for the arts.

Both Lisa and James have spent their lives creating—in front of audiences on stages, in studios, in classrooms—and they’ve come to see that creativity does sacred work inside us. It gives form to what we’re wrestling with. It helps us clarify what we think and feel...

Today we’re grateful to share a conversation with our friend Tucker Boyle—a longtime seminary and institute teacher and the founder of Harmony Road Retreats, a nonprofit creating safe, supportive spaces for people in faith crisis.

As a young missionary, Tucker fell in love with teaching the gospel and knew he wanted to become a full-time seminary teacher. He stepped into that role with his whole heart, and years later pursued a PhD, hoping to become an even better, more thoughtful teacher. But during his doctoral research into early Church history, his certainty began to fracture. And...

We’re so excited to share a conversation that our friend and Executive Director, Zach Davis, had with Teresa Morgan, Professor at Yale Divinity School and a leading scholar of early Christian history.

Teresa invites us to reconsider one of the most central words in Christianity: faith. She explains that for the first generations of Christians, “faith” didn’t mean signing on to a list of beliefs. It meant something more like trust—faithfulness, trustworthiness, the act of entrusting your life to God. Faith was less about what you thought and more about the kind of relationship you were l...

Today we’re so excited to share our conversation with Bruce Tift, author, psychotherapist and longtime practitioner of Vajrayana Buddhism. This summer, our friends at Uplift Kids introduced us to Bruce’s fascinating book Already Free, and we’ve been thinking about it ever since.

In this conversation, Bruce dives into some of the ideas in the book. He explores how to make peace with being human. He looks at two seemingly opposing paths—both Western and Eastern wisdom—and shows how each offers a vital piece of the puzzle. Where psychotherapy may teach us to bring our early...

As we explore the Old Testament this year, we’ve found ourselves returning to a past conversation with our friend Terryl Givens. It felt grounding and expansive and we're really excited to share it with you again.

The Old Testament can be incredibly rich—full of beauty, poetry, and profound spiritual insights. But it can also sometimes feel bewildering or even faith-shaking. We get glimpses of a loving, nurturing God—and turn the page to encounter a God that seems angry, even violent. It's a text that raises big questions and invites us into deep wrestles. And maybe...

Hey everyone, this is Aubrey Chaves from Faith Matters. Today I’m excited to share my conversation with Katie Ludlow Rich and Heather Sundahl about 50 Years of Exponent II, their new book tracing the history of a space where Latter-day Saint women have engaged the most urgent questions of their time—while also honoring the dailiness of life.

The roots of this effort go back to 1872, when women began publishing the Woman’s Exponent to speak for themselves and stay connected across distance. A century later, Exponent II carried that work forward—not to create consensus, but to make...

We’ve all heard it called a sifting—the language that sometimes surfaces when someone is struggling or steps away from the Church. Wheat from tares, sheep from goats, a sorting in the last days that reveals truly elect.

But today, our good friend and contributor Jeff Strong is back to invite us into a deeper reflection on that idea—and what he sees as the more essential question: Who is the Church for?

Jeff shares how the way we answer that question has real implications—shaping how we respond to difference, and how we create...

Today we’re joined by our friend Patrick Mason and filmmaker Robert Reynolds. Rob is the director and producer of the new docu-series An Inconvenient Faith—a project that’s already opening hearts and starting some long-overdue conversations.

This series is raw and honest. It takes on some of the most difficult and tender topics in our faith tradition—things like women and authority, LGBTQ belonging, race and the priesthood, and lots more. And it brings together voices from across the spectrum of faith—people who’ve stayed who are still engaging these issues, and people who have decided...

Today, we want to introduce you to another podcast in the Faith Matters Podcast Network called Sanctuary: Discovering the Temple, hosted by Larkin Swain. Larkin brings a candid, curious, and thoughtful approach to conversations about the temple, and this episode felt especially fascinating and timely as we begin a new year studying the Old Testament.

In this episode, Larkin speaks with historical linguist Jared Lambert, whose work focuses on language development, temple theology, and how translation and symbolism have reshaped biblical traditions.

Jared brings a linguistic lens to the Genesis creation story, uncovering rich meanings...

Today we’re sharing a conversation with writers and filmmakers Sarah and Josh Sabey about their new project, The Bible Storybook, a two volume collection of 50 stories from the Old Testament.

You might remember their Book of Mormon Storybook. Like those earlier volumes, this new project is guided by a simple and beautiful idea: “These are stories about a real God who loves real people”—people who are complicated, wounded, and doing their best to understand how God is working in their lives.

For many of us, the Old Testament can feel troubling—full of contradict...

Today we’re bringing you a conversation with Carl Richards, and we think this one might just change the way you think—and feel—about money.

You might know Carl as The Sketch Guy from his decade-long New York Times column, where he offered disarmingly relatable insights about money using just cardstock and a Sharpie.

For Carl, money isn’t about spreadsheets and savings accounts—it’s a mirror, reflecting to us what we value most deeply. And for this reason, he believes money sits at the center of our spiritual lives.

In this convers...

As we move into Christmas week, we wanted to offer something a little different. 

Today’s episode is a reading of “In the Bleak Midwinter,” written and read by Peter Conti‑Brown, and originally published in the Faith Matters magazine, Wayfare.

It tells the true story of a Christmas that unfolded in unexpected ways—marked by absence, uncertainty, and pain. And yet, it’s also a story about how grace finds its way to us—through presence, through each other, and through the quiet mystery of ordinary, imperfect people becoming God’s healing hands in the moments when...

Today, we’re thrilled to share a conversation with New York Times bestselling author and happiness expert Gretchen Rubin, where we explored one of her most practical and game-changing frameworks: the Four Tendencies.

Gretchen explains that we all face two types of expectations—outer expectations, like a church calling or a request from a boss or family member, and inner expectations, like a personal goal or habit. She observed that people tend to respond to these expectations in one of four consistent ways. She defines these responses as the Upholder, the Questioner, the Obliger, and the Rebel.

Today, in light of the upcoming Come Follow Me lesson which covers Official Declaration 2, we’re honored to share a conversation with W. Paul Reeve and Ramesus Stewart-Johnson about race, the priesthood and temple restriction, and what it really means to root out racism in our church community today.

Since lifting the priesthood and temple ban in 1978, we have witnessed a great flourishing of the church, as multitudes have embraced the restored gospel in Africa and elsewhere. We can pause to celebrate this transformation occurring in the body of Christ, while contemplating how we can continue to fo...

Today, we’re so excited to share a conversation with our good friend and teammate at Faith Matters, Cece Proffit. If you’ve followed Faith Matters for a while, you’ve felt Cece’s influence—her energy, creativity, and care shape so much of what we do behind the scenes. And so today, we’re thrilled she’s stepping in front of the mic to talk about one of her very favorite subjects—Advent.

In this conversation, Cece offers a beautiful and grounding introduction to Advent. If this tradition is new to you, you’ll come away with simple, meani...

Today we are so excited to share a session from this year’s Restore Gathering with Mallory Everton. 

Mallory is best known for her work on the sketch comedy show Studio C, and in this session, she asks a question she says she’s been asking her whole life: do Latter-Day Saints have a problem with laughter? She explores how in the context of spirituality, humor sometimes gets sidelined—dismissed as loud, irreverent, or frivolous. 

But she really pushes back on that assumption, flipping the idea on its head. Laughter, she argues, isn’t a distractio...

We’re really excited to share this week’s episode with you—a conversation with scholar and historian, Matt Bowman. 

Matt is the Howard W. Hunter Chair of Mormon Studies and an associate professor of religion and history at Claremont Graduate University. In this conversation, he draws on ancient scripture to explore two archetypes that show up again and again: the prophet and the priest.

The prophet, Matt says, is often a voice from the outside—someone who has had a powerful, personal encounter with the divine and is sent to d...

Today we’re bringing you a special live episode recorded at the Compass Gallery in Provo with filmmaker Matt Whitaker.

Matt is the director and one of the writers and producers of the new film Truth & Treason, which tells the astonishing true story of Helmuth Hübener—a 16-year-old Latter-day Saint in Nazi Germany. After secretly tuning into forbidden BBC broadcasts on his brother’s radio, Helmuth encountered a world of information that challenged everything he’d been told. He then set off on a course of bold and dangerous resistance, writing and distributing anti-Nazi leaflets across his city...

Today we’re wrapping up our week of Unpacking Polygamy with a very honest, illuminating and challenging conversation among three faithful friends: Bethany Brady Spaulding, Patrick Mason and Bill Turnbull. Together, they tackle the profound theological problems that polygamy presents, particularly as it is laid out in what is perhaps the most challenging scripture in our canon—Section 132 of the Doctrine and Covenants. 

They compare and contrast Section 132 with what God has revealed elsewhere in scripture and with what the church actually teaches today. And they consider the question of whether it is possible for the church to ac...

Today we’re joined by Carol Lynn Pearson—poet, playwright, and author of The Ghost of Eternal Polygamy.

With extraordinary honesty, clarity, and compassion, Carol Lynn shares her deeply personal perspective on this chapter of our history and why she believes polygamy was a great mistake—one that continues to “haunt the hearts and heaven” of many Latter-day Saints today.

In this episode, we learn how she holds this belief alongside a deep devotion to her faith. She shares how it’s shaped her understanding of prophetic authority, and why she feels we can honor our past wit...

Today we’re welcoming back Patrick Mason for a conversation with author and historian Brittany Chapman Nash.

In this episode, Patrick and Brittany explore what plural marriage looked like in the early Utah period—how it was lived, how it was taught, and why so many Latter-day Saints practiced it with such deep conviction. Brittany shares stories from women whose voices often go unheard, and helps us understand not just the spiritual and theological motivations behind polygamy, but the complexity, nuance, and sometimes heartbreak that came with it.

She offers a window into the hopes, sacr...

Today, we’re honored to welcome Nate Oman—law professor, scholar, and co-founder of the pioneering Latter-day Saint blog, Times and Seasons.

Our conversation begins with a bold idea: that experiencing a stupor of thought, or being troubled, is very often a prelude to revelation. For Nate, facing discomfort head-on—naming it and wrestling with it—has become a sacred part of his discipleship and a path to deeper faith.

And so in that spirit, today we’re taking a hard and honest look at the doctrine of sealing—where it came from, the ways it’s evolved...