Episodios

  • Stop Running Your Home on Willpower: 3 Signs Your Household Was Built to Be Managed, Not to Form Saints

    Stop Running Your Home on Willpower: 3 Signs Your Household Was Built to Be Managed, Not to Form Saints
    Apr 2 2026

    Most Catholic dads are working hard in their home. The problem? They’re not working on it. There’s a difference between a household that runs because you’re there holding it together — and one that’s been designed to form your wife and children for heaven even when you’re not in the room.

    In this episode, Dave and Adam get into John Cuddeback’s framework for the domestic church, pull from their book Living Beyond Sunday, and share the 3 telltale signs your home is running on willpower instead of design. Plus: what to do about it, how morning chaos is actually a design problem, and why the living room might be the most important room in your house.

    In This Episode
    • Why Holy Week is the lens through which this entire conversation happens
    • The Deacon’s homily: “You are a thought of God made flesh” — and what that means at your most broken moments
    • Adam’s son Luke wins concert tickets — then realizes it’s Good Friday. What happened next.
    • Adam announces M6 Marketing and The Grounded Builder Substack
    • The body-soul composite of the home: daily life vs. moral and spiritual formation
    • Working IN your family vs. working ON your family (the entrepreneur analogy every dad needs)
    • 3 signs your home runs on willpower, not design:
    • The same corrections keep happening to the same kids — it’s not a motivation problem, it’s a design problem
    • Morning chaos — nothing was built right the night before to make it smooth
    • Your presence is the only thing holding it together — when you’re gone, the wheels fall off
    • 3 diagnostic questions to ask when something keeps breaking in your home
    • The Great Silence: Dave’s family morning prayer rule (and why it’s formed him more than his kids)
    • Why bells beat yelling — and the sacramental case for ringing a blessed bell in your home
    • Giving kids real work with real consequences: why sweeping the floor doesn’t cut it
    • The dinner table as non-negotiable — and why screens are the enemy of family formation
    • The one room in your house not ordered toward a biological need — and why it matters most
    • Why designing the household is a man’s domain and responsibility — ordered entirely in love

    Timestamps
    • 00:00 — The manliness warning. Yes, they played it twice.
    • 01:30 — Blessed Holy Week + Deacon’s homily: “You are a thought of God”
    • 07:00 — Luke wins concert tickets. It’s Good Friday. What he said.
    • 09:30 — Mary’s procedure + prayer request
    • 11:00 — Adam announces M6 Marketing + The Grounded Builder Substack
    • 15:30 — White Lightning: the 1989 Chevy, the gas station, and the woman whose dad owned it
    • 22:00 — The topic: designing your home as the domestic church
    • 25:00 — Cuddeback’s 4 things a home must do + the body-soul composite of household life
    • 30:00 — Working IN the family vs. ON the family (business owner analogy)
    • 34:00 — The 3 signs your home runs on willpower, not design
    • 40:00 — The 3 diagnostic questions when something keeps breaking
    • 45:00 — Rules for the day, the Great Silence, and preparing kids to hear God’s voice
    • 53:00 — The case for blessed bells (and why yelling kills the spirit of what you’re doing)
    • 58:00 — Giving kids real work with real consequences
    • 1:02:00 — The dinner table: the most attacked and most essential daily ritual
    • 1:07:00 — The living room: the only room not ordered toward a biological need
    • 1:12:00 — Why this is a man’s job — and what authority granted in love looks like

    Resources Mentioned
    • The American Catholic Land Movement — edited by Jason Craig and Jared Stout (TAN Books)
    • Living Beyond Sunday: Making Your Home a Holy Place — by Dave Niles and Adam Minihan
    • John Cuddeback, Ph.D. — philosopher, professor, and homesteader. Find him at LifeCraft.org
    • The Grounded Builder — Adam’s Substack on virtue, business, fatherhood, and homesteading. Published every Thursday.
    • Select International Tours — selectinternationaltours.com — The Catholic pilgrimage company Dave and Adam trust.
    • Divine Mercy Chaplet — pray it daily at 3:00 PM, the Hour of Mercy
    • The Great Silence — a monastic morning practice you can adapt for your home. Start with Psalm 51.

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    1 h y 9 m
  • The Sin No One Talks About: Avarice, Money, and Spiritual Blindness | The Catholic Man Show

    The Sin No One Talks About: Avarice, Money, and Spiritual Blindness | The Catholic Man Show
    Mar 26 2026

    In this episode of The Catholic Man Show, Adam and David crack open a rare Teeling whiskey from Ireland and dive into a topic most men never examine: avarice.

    Often reduced to “greed,” avarice is far more subtle—and far more dangerous. Drawing from St. John Cassian, St. Thomas Aquinas, and the spiritual tradition of the Church, the guys explore how a disordered attachment to material things can quietly shape our lives, distort our priorities, and even blind us spiritually.

    They discuss how modern “grind culture” can normalize avarice, why money itself is uniquely deceptive among the vices, and how this sin can creep in unnoticed—even among faithful men striving for holiness.

    The conversation also tackles:

    1. Why avarice is different from other sins
    2. The “seven daughters” of greed according to Aquinas
    3. How avarice leads to restlessness, anxiety, and spiritual blindness
    4. The connection between avarice and a lack of trust in God
    5. The surprising concept of spiritual avarice
    6. Practical strategies to root it out, including manual labor, generosity, and community

    If you’ve never considered avarice in your examination of conscience, this episode will challenge you to take a deeper look—and give you a path forward.
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    1 h
  • Focus on the Now: A Catholic Man’s Guide to Time, Prayer, and Sainthood

    Focus on the Now: A Catholic Man’s Guide to Time, Prayer, and Sainthood
    Mar 12 2026

    What is time for?

    In this episode, Adam and David reflect on the gift of time through the lens of Catholic theology, fatherhood, prayer, suffering, work, and even Nick Saban’s famous process-driven mindset.

    The conversation begins with updates on baby Mary and a moving reflection on the fragile beauty of life, suffering, healing, and hope. From there, the discussion turns toward a deeper meditation on time itself: how easily we waste it, how often we rush through it, and how every moment is a gift given by God.

    Drawing from St. Augustine, St. Teresa of Avila, the Psalms, leisure, memory, mortality, and the demands of vocation, Adam and David explore what it means to live well in the present moment. They also connect this to Nick Saban’s practical framework of focusing on the now, controlling the controllables, and trusting the process over the outcome.

    This episode is a call for Catholic men to stop drifting through life, stop living in regret or anxiety, and start receiving time as the arena in which God prepares us for eternity.

    In this episode:
    1. An update on baby Mary and the power of prayer
    2. Why suffering, life, and death sharpen our awareness of time
    3. St. Augustine on the mystery of past, present, and future
    4. Why Catholic men must stop wasting the present moment
    5. Fatherhood, busyness, and the fear of missing what matters most
    6. Leisure as the wise use of time
    7. St. Teresa of Avila on growth in prayer
    8. How to stop rushing through life
    9. Nick Saban’s “focus on the now” mindset through a Catholic lens
    10. Control the controllables and trust the process
    11. Time, judgment, memory, and eternity

    Key takeaway:

    You cannot control the future. You cannot relive the past. But you can receive the present moment as a gift from God and use it for holiness.
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    1 h y 2 m
  • Dante's Divine Order: What the Inferno & Purgatorio Teach Us About Sin, Love, and the Moral Life | The Catholic Man Show

    Dante's Divine Order: What the Inferno & Purgatorio Teach Us About Sin, Love, and the Moral Life | The Catholic Man Show
    Mar 9 2026

    David and Adam are back in the groove for Lent. They open with a timely conversation about Pope Leo's call for priests to stop using AI to write homilies, and why that warning matters far beyond the pulpit. The guys explore how AI threatens the muscles of human creativity, the irreplaceable nature of human-to-human proclamation of the Gospel, and where men should draw their own lines before the technology draws them for you.

    Then it's deep dive time into Dante's Divine Comedy — specifically the Dantinian ordering of sin, love, and the moral life across the Inferno and Purgatorio. David and Adam unpack:

    1. Why lust is the first (mildest) circle of Hell — and why that's actually a message of hope, not a free pass
    2. Why fraud and treason sit at the bottom — and what it means to so disfigure your soul that evil looks like good
    3. The mirror structure of Purgatory — pride at the base, lust at the summit, and why the climb starts now
    4. Misdirected love, deficient love, and excessive love — how Dante's ladder maps directly onto your daily examination of conscience
    5. Why Hell is isolation and Purgatory is communion — and what that says about Christian hope
    6. Acedia (sloth) redefined — it's not laziness, it's spiritual sluggishness, and it may be the most dangerous sin of the comfortable
    7. Cato's charge at the gate of Purgatory: Run. Don't wait a second.

    The guys also taste a rare bottle of Angel's Envy Rye finished in Anejo Tequila barrels (104 proof, surprisingly mellow), give a shout-out to their upcoming 10-year anniversary, and share a sneak peek at the Catholic Man Show Campout short film dropping soon on Patreon.

    Resources mentioned:

    1. The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
    2. Ascend the Great Books podcast with Deacon Garlick
    3. Patreon.com/TheCatholicManShow
    4. SelectInternationalTours.com
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    1 h y 3 m
  • If You Can’t Say No, Your Yes Means Nothing

    If You Can’t Say No, Your Yes Means Nothing
    Feb 26 2026
    We’re back, and life got realIt has been the lightest recording stretch the show has had in almost ten years. Adam owns the delay and explains why. Since the last episode, baby Mary arrived very early at around 27 weeks and about two pounds. She was baptized immediately, and there is a question about whether she was also confirmed due to the use of holy oils and the circumstances.A few days after birth, Mary underwent an intense and invasive surgery that lasted more than six hours. The surgeon later said it was the hardest operation he had ever performed. The procedure connected her esophagus to her stomach, and the family is now living the day to day reality of the NICU: small adjustments, constant monitoring, and a careful balance with oxygen, blood pressure, heart rate, and long term risks.The charity that is hard to receiveA theme that keeps surfacing is gratitude, and how hard it can be to receive help when you want to be in control. Adam and David thank listeners for prayers, meals, transportation help, and the quiet generosity that shows up when you least expect it.They give a major shoutout to the Ronald McDonald House, which provided a place for the family to stay near the hospital, along with meals and support that would have been financially impossible otherwise. Adam also mentions friends and patrons who opened their homes and brought food. It is a reminder that “village” is not a cliché when your world turns upside down.Also, in the middle of all this, Adam’s son Leo drops a classic kid moment at Mass: during a serious homily he leans over and asks when he will get to meet J.B. Mooney, the professional bull rider. Fatherhood keeps you humble.What they’re drinkingDavid brings a bottle from the Scotch Malt Whisky Society featuring Royal Brackla. The tasting notes are ridiculous in the best way, described like “dessert in the workshop,” with custard, toffee chunks, marshmallow, and an unexpected “carpenter’s shop” vibe. It even has a hint of iodine that makes David think of Islay, without the heavy peat and smoke.A relic in the hotel roomA priest from the diocese drops off a first class relic of St. Gemma, telling Adam to keep it while the family walks through this trial. Adam and David talk about the reality of having the body of a saint in the room with you, and the comfort that brings, especially when the road ahead is long.Lent and temperance: not a “no,” but a “yes”The episode’s main topic is temperance, framed as the Lenten virtue that touches everything. The simple kid definition they love is: temperance is having a healthy amount of everything. Not perfect, but memorable.They push back against the idea that temperance is just restriction. Temperance is not merely refusing the extra piece of cake. It is also the positive ordering of your life so you can say yes to the right things at the right time in the right way: exercise, prayer, rest, work, family presence, joy, celebration.The key theme: virtue is always a yes. The “no” exists to protect the “yes.”St. John Cassian and the “bread” of SodomOne of the most interesting turns comes from St. John Cassian’s Institutes. Cassian argues that Sodom’s first sin was not the obvious sin people associate with Sodom and Gomorrah. He points to Ezekiel and emphasizes surplus, abundance, and gluttony. Cassian’s logic is that the disorder starts low and spreads upward: feed the appetite, then the passions grow louder, the will weakens, and eventually the mind rationalizes what it should never have chosen.They connect this to the common sense link between food appetites and sexual appetites. If you cannot curb the basic, you will struggle to curb the higher.A line that lands: If you can’t say no, your yes means nothing.Pleasure, pain, and spiritual clarityAdam shares a sharp thought: pleasure clouds judgment faster than pain. Suffering, especially voluntary suffering, tends to focus the mind. It wakes you up and forces clarity. That is why fasting can sharpen spiritual vision. It reveals attachments you thought you did not have.They bring in Father Anselm Stolz’s point: ascetic practices are not the end. The end is contemplation, union with God, and becoming more like Christ. The danger for men is turning Lent into an achievement badge, turning penance into pride, and making the self the center.Temperance orders the whole manThey outline a hierarchy: God, reason, will, passions, body. Temperance helps keep the order intact, so the higher rules the lower and the lower serves the higher. When the passions take the driver’s seat, the will becomes a servant, reason gets distorted, and you can rationalize sin quickly or slowly over years.They also emphasize something many men miss: the temperate man feasts. Feasting well matters. If you do not fast, you will not feast well. If you cannot feast temperately, your fasting might be more about control than freedom.Practical takeaways for dadsOne of the ...
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    56 m
  • Dante, Wonder, & Raising Kids Who Love Truth

    Dante, Wonder, & Raising Kids Who Love Truth
    Mar 4 2026

    Adam Minihan and Dave Niles open this episode with a story about two broken-down vehicles, a newborn daughter named Mary, and a prayer over a dying engine that — Amen — actually worked. From there they settle in with some Basil Hayden bourbon and turn to a piece of Dante most people have never read: the Convivio, his unfinished philosophical treatise written during his exile from Florence.

    The main topic: wonder. What it is, why Dante considered it the most critical virtue to cultivate in adolescence, and what we lose when we crush it in our kids... often without realizing it.

    Dante divides life into four stages: adolescence (birth to 25), youth (25 to 45), old age (45 to 70), and extreme old age (70 and beyond). Each stage has its own virtues and tasks. But it's adolescence — the age of obedience, wonder, and ordering loves — that Dante treats with the most urgency. Because wonder, once crushed, is very hard to resurrect.

    Adam and Dave unpack why screens flatten the imagination, why GK Chesterton's wonder at green grass wasn't eccentricity but sanity, and why Dante's most devastating line about education still applies today: if you raise kids without wonder, you may make them competent... but not wise.

    Also in this episode: the connection between Dante and Aquinas, the KU Integrated Humanities Program and David Dean, a monk at Clear Creek who hadn't read his prior's book and why that was one of the wisest things Dave has ever seen, and the difference between knowledge and wisdom in the age of AI.

    Deacon Harrison Garlick's Ascend the Great Books podcast is working through the Purgatorio right now. If you're not following along, this episode is a good reason to start.

    This episode brought to you in partnership with Select International Tours — selectinternationaltours.com.

    Topics covered in this episode:

    1. Adam's van saga, a dying alternator, and what happens when you pray like Jeff Cavins
    2. Dante's exile from Florence and why Pope Boniface VIII ended up in the eighth circle of hell
    3. The four stages of life from the Convivio — adolescence, youth, old age, and extreme old age — and the virtues and tasks for each
    4. Why Dante places the pinnacle of life at age 33 (and why that's not a coincidence)
    5. Wonder vs. ignorance — Dante's distinction and why it matters for how we raise kids
    6. Screens and the flattening of wonder — Dave's strong opinion, delivered with characteristic conviction
    7. GK Chesterton and the green grass
    8. "You cannot love that which you have never wondered at" — Dante's most profound parenting insight
    9. The connection between leisure and wonder — why you can't have one without the other
    10. Why the goal is heaven, not Harvard

    Referenced in this episode:

    1. The Convivio (The Banquet) — Dante Alighieri
    2. The Divine Comedy (Inferno, Purgatorio) — Dante Alighieri
    3. Iris Exiled: A Synoptic History of Wonder — Dennis Quinn
    4. Ascend the Great Books Podcast — Deacon Harrison Garlick
    5. David Dean — humanities professor, student of John Senior's program at KU
    6. Jeff Cavins
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    1 h y 6 m
  • Perseverance: The Virtue of Enduring in the Good

    Perseverance: The Virtue of Enduring in the Good
    Feb 2 2026

    What does it actually mean to persevere?

    In this episode, Adam and David unpack the Catholic understanding of perseverance—not as white-knuckled suffering, but as faithfully enduring in the pursuit of the good over time.

    Using insights from St. Thomas Aquinas, they explain why perseverance is less about dramatic hardship and more about showing up day after day in prayer, marriage, fatherhood, and work—even when there is no immediate payoff.

    From the slow labor of a sow giving birth, to the monotony of daily prayer, to the demands of being present as a father, this episode reframes perseverance as one of the most essential virtues for the modern man.

    Topics include:

    1. St. Thomas Aquinas’ definition of perseverance
    2. The difference between perseverance and constancy
    3. Why perseverance is about duration, not difficulty
    4. Why there is no “excess” of perseverance
    5. Final perseverance as a gift from God
    6. Why motivation fades but discipline remains
    7. Practical ways to grow in perseverance as a man
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    1 h
  • Raising Kids Who Love the Faith: Catechesis, Prayer, and Fatherhood

    Raising Kids Who Love the Faith: Catechesis, Prayer, and Fatherhood
    Jan 28 2026

    In this episode of The Catholic Man Show, Adam and David discuss the essential role of fathers in catechizing their children... not just by teaching information, but by forming habits, traditions, and a lived love for the Catholic faith.

    Adam shares a personal update about his family and the power of prayer and community during a time of serious medical uncertainty. From there, the conversation turns to what real catechesis looks like in the home: modeling prayer, creating a culture of beauty, building liturgical traditions, and making the Eucharist the center of family life.

    The guys explore why passing on the faith is less about producing kids who can pass a religion test, and more about raising children who know God is real and worth ordering their entire life around.

    Topics include:

    1. Why fathers are primarily responsible for catechesis
    2. The difference between knowing the faith and loving the faith
    3. Teaching children how to pray by example
    4. Using beauty, art, and the home to form souls
    5. Why habits and traditions matter more than programs
    6. Making the Eucharist the source and summit of family life

    Support The Catholic Man Show: www.patreon.com/thecatholicmanshow

    Thank you to our sponsor: Select International Tours
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    1 h y 2 m