Episodes

  • John Wilsey Is Priming Conservatives for Religious Freedom

    John Wilsey Is Priming Conservatives for Religious Freedom
    Nov 19 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with John Wilsey, professor of church history and chair of the Department of Church History and Historical Theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, about his new book, Religious Freedom: A Conservative Primer. How have the spirit of religion and the spirit of liberty existed harmoniously in the American tradition? What contrasts between French and American society did Alexis de Tocqueville observe in his own day? Has the American experiment failed? How does Peter Viereck’s conservative nostalgia for the permanent beneath the flux chart a course distinct from both progressive and reactionary utopian politics? Is religious traditionalism antithetical to dispositional conservativism? Why does the human imagination loom so large in conservative thought? What should secular dispositional conservatives make of religion? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here Religious Freedom: A Conservative Primer | John Wilsey The Man vs. the Myth: Who Was John Foster Dulles? | Acton Line Democracy in America | Alexis de Tocqueville The Old Regime and the Revolution (1856) | Alexis de Tocqueville Conservatism: From John Adams to Churchill | Peter Viereck Conservatism Revisited: The Revolt Against Ideology | Peter Viereck The Leopard | Giuseppe Di Lampedusa The Great Conversation: The Substance of a Liberal Education | Robert Maynard Hutchins If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    57 mins
  • Peter Lipsett Is Podcasting to Answer the Question, "What Is the Right?"

    Peter Lipsett Is Podcasting to Answer the Question, "What Is the Right?"
    Nov 12 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with Peter Lipsett, vice president at DonorsTrust, about the recently concluded 11-part series “What Is the Right?” for the Giving Ventures podcast. What is “the Right”? What are its largest and most influential factions? Does it share a common intellectual culture or merely political interests? How does the bottom-up nature of populism complicate the story we tell about intellectuals’ influence on political movements? What are the prospects for conservatives after the Trump administration? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here DonorsTrust Giving Ventures Podcast Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 85 — Freedom Conservatism Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 86 — The Libertarians Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 87 — The New Right Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 88 — The Traditionalist Conservatives Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 89 — The Fusionists Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 90 — Catholics on the Right Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 91 — Jewish Conservatism Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 92 — Christian Conservatism Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 93 — The Defectors Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 94 — The MAGA Right Giving Ventures Podcast: Episode 95 — Reflecting on the Right with Yuval Levin and Chris DeMuth My Simplistic Theory of Left and Right | Bryan Caplan National Economic Planning: What Is Left? | Don Lavoie If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    59 mins
  • Anne Bradley Interrogates Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s Abundance

    Anne Bradley Interrogates Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s Abundance
    Nov 5 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with Anne Bradley, vice president of academic affairs at The Fund for American Studies and professor of economics at The Institute of World Politics, about Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson’s book Abundance, which she reviewed for Religion & Liberty Online. What is the concept of “abundance,” and who comprises the book’s audience? How do Klein and Thompson think through regulatory obstacles to material abundance? For Thompson and Klein, what drives innovation and growth? How much of the book’s rhetorical criticism of markets might be misdirection to potential critics from the left? Do Klein and Thompson really understand the economic way of thinking? Are there better programs for material abundance? How do you respond to conservatives who believe we had greater “abundance” in the past? Why are utopian visions of the future or the past dangerous? Do Klein and Thompson have a conception of civil society beyond the state? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here The Curious Task of ‘Abundance’ | Anne Bradley Abundance | Ezra Klein, Derek Thompson Eat Today, Feed Tomorrow (Yogurt Commercial) History | Thompson-Markward Hall Building the Future the Past Promised | The Daily Economy The Conservative Futurist: How to Create the Sci-Fi World We Were Promised | James Pethokoukis Bootleggers and Baptists in Retrospect | Bruce Yandle Superabundance: The Story of Population Growth, Innovation, and Human Flourishing on an Infinitely Bountiful Planet | Marian L. Tupy, Gale L. Pooley The Devil Went Down to Wall Street | Dan Hugger Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community | Robert D. Putnam If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    55 mins
  • Acton Rundown | November 2025

    Acton Rundown | November 2025
    Nov 3 2025
    This month on the Acton Rundown, Dan & Dylan chat about upcoming Acton events and new video content. Essays and Books:The Kingdom of God and the Common Good: Orthodox Christian Social Thought God at Work: Loving God and Neighbor Through the Book of Exodus Super Habits: The Universal System for a Successful Life | Andrew Abela Can Nigeria’s Church Survive the Storm | Kelechi L. Nwannunu Are Americans Too Political? | Thomas Dias Video Content: What We Gained from 8 Weeks in the Emerging Leader Program | Alums Share Their Story Upcoming Events: Poverty, Inc. in Detroit Acton Institute Fifth Annual Academic Conference: Character, Commerce, and Human Flourishing Virtues, Not Values: Reclaiming the Human Core of Business | Acton Institute Rethinking Charity: Local Agency, Commercial Society, and the Human Person | Acton Institute Annual Calihan Lecture and Novak Award Presentation | Acton Institute Artificial Intelligence, Human Dignity, and the Free Society | Acton Institute Acton University 2026
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    15 mins
  • John Pinheiro Interrogates Thomas Jefferson on Limited Government

    John Pinheiro Interrogates Thomas Jefferson on Limited Government
    Oct 29 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with John Pinheiro, director of research at the Acton Institute, about his feature essay in the latest issue of Religion & Liberty: “Thomas Jefferson ant the Virtue of Limited Government.” What is Jefferson’s status today relative to the other Founding Fathers? What was Jefferson’s agrarian republican vision for America? How did that vision clash with those of the other Founders? What is Jefferson’s fundamental anthropology, and what are its underlying assumptions? What does Jefferson make of the commercial society? Where does Jefferson root his case for limited government? What is his conception of subsidiarity? Why should we turn to Jefferson for inspiration to meet today’s challenges? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here Thomas Jefferson and the Virtue of Limited Government | John C. Pinheiro The Roots of Jefferson's Union | John C. Pinheiro Lessons from Early America’s Tariff Wars | John C. Pinheiro If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    58 mins
  • Dylan Pahman Is Starting the Conversation on Orthodox Christian Social Thought

    Dylan Pahman Is Starting the Conversation on Orthodox Christian Social Thought
    Oct 22 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with Dylan Pahman, research fellow at the Acton Institute and founder and president of the St. Nicholas Cabasilas Institute for Orthodoxy & Liberty, about his new book, The Kingdom of God & the Common Good: Orthodox Christian Social Thought. What is the state of contemporary Orthodox Social Thought? What is the “social question,” and how have churches sought to answer it? Why turn to the Bible to answer modern social questions? How does the historical experience of Orthodox churches inform Orthodox Social Thought? Why should economics inform Orthodox Social Thought? What are some uniquely Orthodox Christian perspectives that have been brought to bear on social questions? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here The Kingdom of God & the Common Good: Orthodox Christian Social Thought | Dylan Pahman St. Nicholas Cabasilas Institute for Orthodoxy & Liberty Orthodox Communities in the Middle East | Acton Institute An Ascetic Way of Life in a World of Abundance | Dylan Pahman For the Life of the World: Sacraments and Orthodoxy | Alexander Schmemann Great Lent: Journey to Pascha | Alexander Schmemann If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    1 hr
  • Anthony Bradley Finds the Answer to Anxiety in Exodus

    Anthony Bradley Finds the Answer to Anxiety in Exodus
    Oct 15 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with Anthony Bradley, Distinguished Research Fellow at the Acton Institute and research professor of Interdisciplinary and Theological Studies at Kuyper College. They discuss Anthony’s new book, God at Work: Loving God and Neighbor Through the Book of Exodus. Why is Exodus such a great evangelistic conversation starter? What human emotions drive the narrative of Exodus? How do thinkers like Gerard Van Groningen, Reinhold Niebuhr, Karen Honey, and Abraham Kuyper help us understand the meaning of Exodus? What lessons for individuals, churches, and society are contained in Exodus? What is the role of women in the Exodus narrative? How does Exodus speak particularly to the anxiety of men and boys particularly? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here God at Work | Anthony B. Bradley From Creation to Consummation | Gerard Van Groningen The Nature and Destiny of Man: A Christian Interpretation | Reinhold Niebuhr The Neurotic Personality of Our Time | Karen Horney Common Grace: God’s Gifts for a Fallen World: Volume 1 | Abraham Kuyper Common Grace: God’s Gifts for a Fallen World: Volume 2 | Abraham Kuyper Common Grace: God's Gifts for a Fallen World, Volume 3 | Abraham Kuyper If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    57 mins
  • Pope Leo XIV Exhorts Us in DILEXI TE to See Christ in the Poor

    Pope Leo XIV Exhorts Us in DILEXI TE to See Christ in the Poor
    Oct 10 2025
    In this episode, Dan Hugger speaks with John Pinheiro, director of research at the Acton Institute, and Caleb Whitmer, project manager at the Center for Social Flourishing, about Pope Leo XIV’s first apostolic exhortation, Dilexi Te. This exhortation to all Christians encourages us to see Christ in the poor among us. How does Pope Leo use scripture to show us Christ in the poor? Which of the church fathers argue that charity is a matter of justice? Why is it so important to have a wholistic definition of poverty? Can economic data be trusted? Why is meaningful work the best solution to poverty? Do Christians have a duty to accompany migrants? How can we embrace almsgiving today? Subscribe to our podcasts Watch this podcast here Apostolic Exhortation Dilexi Te of the Holy Father Leo XIV on Love for the Poor (4 October 2025) Centesimus Annus (1 May 1991) Laborem Exercens (14 September 1981) Universal Basic Community Now! | Rachel Ferguson Pope Francis’ Plea for Migrants and Acton’s Core Principles | Stephen Barrows Center for Social Flourishing If you’d like to support this podcast, you can help by leaving a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts. If you have questions or suggestions for a future episode, you can email us at podcast@acton.org.
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    1 hr and 9 mins