What Is Yours to Do? with Michele Dunne

What Is Yours to Do? with Michele Dunne

Michele Dunne is a professed Secular Franciscan and the executive director of the Franciscan Action Network [https://franciscanaction.org/], a collective Franciscan voice seeking to transform United States public policy related to peace making, care for creation, poverty, and human rights. Before coming to her current position, Michele’s career focused on the Middle East and US foreign policy. From 2006 until 2021, she headed programs focused on peace, human rights, and democracy in the Middle East at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Atlantic Council. Prior to that, she served for nearly 20 years in the US Department of State, including assignments in Jerusalem and Cairo. She holds a PhD from Georgetown University and currently lives in Washington, DC with her husband. In this episode, Michele shares with us her spiritual journey and the gradual revelation of her Franciscan vocation—what she describes as “the greatest gift that God ever gave me, and also the most challenging and most humbling”—and explores those elements of the “life-giving and life-affirming” Franciscan Rule that have enriched and encouraged her along the way. We take a close look at the work of the Franciscan Action Network and its mission to “inform, inspire, and mobilize” its collective membership of religious communities, local affinity groups, and thousands of individual members across the country. Michele also touches on the relationship between Franciscan spirituality and activism and explains how the Network supports its members in discerning and carrying out their own unique calling. Get full access to Tomorrow's American Catholic at www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

The Heart Is in the Body with Matthew Fox

Matthew Fox is a spiritual theologian, Episcopal priest, and activist for gender justice and eco-justice. He holds a doctorate in the history and theology of spirituality from the Institut Catholique de Paris. To date he has written over 40 books, including Original Blessing, The Coming of the Cosmic Christ, Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth, and A Way to God: Thomas Merton’s Creation Spirituality Journey. Though he was silenced by the Vatican in the early 1990s, the influence of his work in the field of Creation Spirituality reemerged a generation later in documents such as Laudato Si’—in fact, one of Fox’s former students, Fr. Sean McDonagh [https://www.americamagazine.org/from-our-archives/2015/07/14/church-and-world-prehistory-laudato-si/], served as an advisor in the drafting of that encyclical. Seeking to establish a new pedagogy for learning spirituality melding the ancient Western wisdom tradition with contemporary scientists and modern mystics, Fox founded the Institute in Culture and Creation Spirituality in 1976. After pressure from the Vatican’s Congregation of Doctrine and Faith, the institute closed in the early 1990s. Fox went on to establish the University of Creation Spirituality, or UCS, in California in 1996. On the UCS faculty were persons from Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Sufi, Native American, and Hindu traditions, as well as scientists and ecological and social justice activists and artists. Fox has since taught at Stanford University, Vancouver School of Theology, and the California Institute of Integral Studies, among other places. Fox is recipient of the Abbey Courage of Conscience Peace Award, the Gandhi King Ikeda Award, the Tikkun National Ethics Award, and other awards. He is currently a visiting scholar at the Academy of the Love of Learning in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and conducts numerous workshops each year. Our wide-ranging conversation looked at Matthew’s early life and the influence of Dominican theologian M. D. Chenu on the formulation of Creation Spirituality; explored the fourfold path of the spiritual journey, with a particular focus on the via creativa that links art and meditation; and related the importance of interspirituality or “deep ecumenism” for the future of the planet. Matthew also shares why he feels “human beings need ritual to survive” and how ritual sustains community by “bringing people together to rejoice, to grieve, to commune, to be nourished, and to be strong to return to serve.” See also: The core tenets of Creation Spirituality [https://www.matthewfox.org/what-is-creation-spirituality] An overview of the Cosmic Mass [https://www.matthewfox.org/cosmic-mass] An overview of the “four mystical paths” of Creation Spirituality [https://www.allcreation.org/home/cs-journey] Daily Meditations with Matthew Fox [https://dailymeditationswithmatthewfox.org/] “Continuous Creation”: Our report on Matthew Fox’s presentation for the Association of Pittsburgh Priests on August 6, 2025 [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/p/continuous-creation] Get full access to Tomorrow's American Catholic at www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

The Pastoral Emergency of Hope with Sergio Lopez

Sergio Lopez is a husband, father, educator, and Catholic organizer from Southern California. He serves as the National Director for Mission and Leadership Formation for Catholics in Communion [https://www.catholicsincommunion.org/], where he accompanies Catholic leaders, parishes, and organizations working to build a more just, compassionate, and faithful church. He previously served in leadership formation with Catholic Relief Services, helping Catholics deepen their commitment to global solidarity and social justice. Sergio also teaches pastoral leadership at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. As a Latino Catholic leader, he is passionate about forming communities of faith that respond to the struggles of our time with hope, courage, and a deep commitment to human dignity. In this episode, we speak with Sergio about his awakening to faith as a son of Mexican immigrants, his transition from seminary to the vocation of parish ministry and community organizing, and how recent cuts to US foreign aid impacted the mission of Catholic Relief Services and other international development organizations. Sergio shares how Catholics in Communion arose in response to a “pastoral emergency of hope,” especially around issues of anti-immigrant violence, and gives us an overview of their Season of Faithful Witness initiative [https://www.catholicsincommunion.org/join-us] and ways that people can get involved [https://www.catholicsincommunion.org/corpus-christi-parish-toolkit]—“Catholics being Catholic in the public space,” as he explains, “coordinating love, organizing hope.” Our conversation also touches on the opportunity to “speak as one church” in the era of Pope Leo XIV by reinvigorating social teaching and developing a “shared language around what it means to be Catholic.” Listeners are encouraged to read the accompanying article, “A Season of Faithful Witness: Catholics Are Learning to Walk Together Again,” [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/p/a-season-of-faithful-witness-catholics] published in tandem with this episode in Tomorrow’s American Catholic. Get full access to Tomorrow's American Catholic at www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

Art as Healing and Reminder with Janet McKenzie

Janet McKenzie was born in Brooklyn and raised in and around New York City. She studied at the Fashion Institute of Technology and the Art Students League, and was the recipient of the Edward McDowell Traveling Scholarship. For many years she has lived and worked in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont. In the mid-nineties, Ms. McKenzie began to incorporate diversity, children, and symbolic imagery into her work portraying women. She is well known for her internationally acclaimed painting Jesus of the People, which was the first-place winner of the National Catholic Reporter’s global competition, “Jesus 2000.” She was invited to be the 2013 William Belden Noble Lecturer at Harvard University’s Memorial Church. In 2017, Memorial Church commissioned The Divine Journey—Companions of Love and Hope, a new painting which honors diversity and Radcliffe/Harvard women past and present.Ms. McKenzie’s work is included in numerous collections throughout the US. The Basilica of Saint Mary in Minneapolis holds 17 of her paintings in their collection. Her painting Sanctuary was displayed on the pulpit for the funerals of assassinated Minnesota state representative Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark Hortman, in June 2025. She states, “As an artist I work to be a voice for inclusion and positive change. My art comes from that sacred place within each of us where we exist beyond gender, race, and perceived differences.” Our conversation with Ms. McKenzie touched on her early life and studies, painting as a weekly practice and the “transition” she makes between her home and studio, and art as a form of sacred activism that can embolden people emotionally and spiritually. She also shared how she approaches working with models, why it is important for her to create compositions that people of all backgrounds can see themselves in, and the ways she prayerfully attunes herself to the evolution of each painting as “one thing builds after the next.” We could say McKenzie’s famous painting Jesus of the People (2000) took up Millais’ mantle, showing Jesus as truly “one of us” in a contemporary context. In her powerful painting Woman Offered #5, McKenzie asks the viewer to take the next theological step. Here McKenzie paints in her impeccably skilled manner a person both dignified and suffering. She need not add a halo or give a religious name to the woman she depicts. She simply portrays a Black woman in a cruciform position, in a stark silhouette of black and white. Can this woman image Christ to us? Must this woman be an image of Christ for us to care? Can she not just be herself, in all her unique specificity—a particular Black woman with her particular hardships and struggles? Would that be enough to stir our hearts and minds? And what is she “offered” for, as the title of the painting proposes? Is she offered for our sins? Is she offered for our selfishness and greed? Is she offered for our failures to see all people as made “in [God’s] image, according to [God’s] likeness”? (Gen. 1:26–27). — John Christman, U.S. Catholic [https://uscatholic.org/articles/202302/subversive-art-can-enrich-our-understanding-of-christ/], February 23, 2023 Additional Resources: Official website of Janet McKenzie [https://janetmckenzie.com/index.html] The Divine Journey: A Painter’s Mission [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCYTIBHzQBA] (documentary on the commission for Harvard University’s Memorial Church [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCYTIBHzQBA]) Art That Surrounds Us [https://mary.org/resources/art-that-surrounds-us/] (video on the acquisition of the painting [https://mary.org/resources/art-that-surrounds-us/]Sanctuary [https://mary.org/resources/art-that-surrounds-us/]by the Basilica of St. Mary, Minneapolis) [https://mary.org/resources/art-that-surrounds-us/] HOPE [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbpgMNYzC74] (video presentation of Ms. McKenzie’s work in the world of vigils and protests) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbpgMNYzC74] The Way of the Cross: The Path to New Life [https://www.joanchittister.org/products/the-way-of-the-cross-the-path-to-new-life] (collaboration with Sr. Joan Chittister) [https://www.joanchittister.org/products/the-way-of-the-cross-the-path-to-new-life] Get full access to Tomorrow's American Catholic at www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]

The State of the Church with Fr. Thomas J. Reese

Fr. Thomas J. Reese is a Jesuit priest and currently a senior analyst for Religion News Service [https://religionnews.com/author/tomreese/]. He has previously been a columnist at the National Catholic Reporter as well as an associate editor and editor in chief at America magazine. Fr. Tom entered the Jesuits in 1962 and was ordained in 1974. He was educated at St. Louis University, the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, and at the University of California Berkeley, where he received a Ph.D. in political science. He was a senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center from 1985 to 1998 and 2006 to 2013. While at Woodstock, he wrote his trilogy on the organization and politics of the church: Archbishop: Inside the Power Structure of the American Catholic Church, A Flock of Shepherds: The National Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church. In 2014, Fr. Tom was appointed by President Barack Obama to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission that reviews the facts and circumstances of religious freedom violations and makes policy recommendations to the president, the secretary of state, and Congress. He was reappointed to another two-year term in May 2016, and he was elected to a one-year term as chair of the commission in June 2016. In this episode, we speak with Fr. Tom about the origins of his vocation as both a Jesuit and a journalist, his take on the state of Catholic media today, and the historical roots of political polarization we see within the church and society. Fr. Tom also shares his impressions of Pope Leo XIV’s first year, reflects on the perennial question of how the US church should relate to the public square, and offers the practice he feels is essential for “tomorrow’s American Catholic.” Get full access to Tomorrow's American Catholic at www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe [https://www.tomorrowsamericancatholic.org/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_4]