Dr. Matthew Bunson - Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

Dr. Matthew Bunson with Kris McGregor
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Dr. Matthew Bunson - Discerning Hearts Catholic Podcasts

Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom and more with Dr. Matthew Bunson. Dr. Bunson Senior Fellow of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, is one of the United States’ leading authorities on the papacy and the Church. His books include: The Encyclopedia of Catholic History; The Encyclopedia of Saints; Papal Wisdom; All Shall Be Well; Encyclopedia of the Roman Empire; and The Angelic Doctor: The Life and World of St. Thomas Aquinas; The Pope Encyclopedia; We Have a Pope! Benedict XVI, the first Catholic biography of the Holy Father in the English language; and most recently, St. Damien of Molokai: Apostle of the Exiled. He is presently completing The Encyclopedia of the American Catholic Church for Our Sunday Visitor.

  1. FEB 21

    DC20 St. Peter Damian – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson – Discerning Hearts Podcast

    St. Peter Damian – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson Born: 1007, Ravenna, Italy Died: February 23, 1072, Faenza, Italy Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses St. Peter Damian, a Doctor of the Church from the second millennium. Born into a turbulent era marked by apocalyptic fears and church reform, Damian’s suffering led to intense prayerfulness. He became a fervent voice for reform, addressing corruption and abuses within the clergy. Despite reluctance, he was appointed Cardinal Bishop of Ostia and played a crucial role in papal reform. Damian emphasized the importance of the cross, penance, and fidelity to Christ. His writings offer insights into addressing contemporary church challenges. Discerning Hearts Reflection Questions * Historical Context: How did the apocalyptic fears and need for reform in St. Peter Damian’s era reflect challenges in today’s Church? * Personal Suffering and Virtue: How did St. Peter Damian’s early suffering shape his spiritual life and virtues? * Balancing Solitude and Service: What tension did St. Peter Damian face between a desire for solitude and a call to serve actively in the Church? * Role in Church Reform: How did St. Peter Damian become a catalyst for reform within the Church, particularly in addressing corruption and abuses? * Emphasis on the Cross and Penance: What importance did St. Peter Damian place on the cross, penance, and fidelity to Christ in the Christian life? * Relevance Today: How can St. Peter Damian’s teachings and writings offer guidance for addressing contemporary challenges within the Church? For more on St. Peter Damian and his teachings: From Vatican.va, an excerpt from the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI General Audience 2009: “St Peter Damian, who was essentially a man of prayer, meditation and contemplation, was also a fine theologian: his reflection on various doctrinal themes led him to important conclusions for life. Thus, for example, he expresses with clarity and liveliness the Trinitarian doctrine, already using, under the guidance of biblical and patristic texts, the three fundamental terms which were subsequently to become crucial also for the philosophy of the West: processio, relatio and persona (cf. Opusc. XXXVIII: PL CXLV, 633-642; and Opusc. II and III: ibid., 41 ff. and 58 ff). However, because theological analysis of the mystery led him to contemplate the intimate life of God and the dialogue of ineffable love between the three divine Persons, he drew ascetic conclusions from them for community life and even for relations between Latin and Greek Christians, divided on this topic. His meditation on the figure of Christ is significantly reflected in practical life, since the whole of Scripture is centred on him. The “Jews”, St Peter Damian notes, “through the pages of Sacred Scripture, bore Christ on their shoulders as it were” (Sermo XLVI, 15). Therefore Christ, he adds, must be the centre of the monk’s life: “May Christ be heard in our language, may Christ be seen in our life, may he be perceived in our hearts” (Sermo VIII, 5). Intimate union with Christ engages not only monks but all the baptized. Here we find a strong appeal for us too not to let ourselves be totally absorbed by the activities, problems and preoccupations of every day, forgetting that Jesus must truly be the centre of our life. Communion with Christ creates among Christians a unity of love. In Letter 28,

    32 min

  2. 12/07/2023

    DC7 St. Ambrose of Milan, Part 1 – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson – Discerning Hearts Podcast

    St. Ambrose of Milan, Part 1 – The Doctors of the Church with Dr. Matthew Bunson Dr. Matthew Bunson and Kris McGregor discuss St. Ambrose, the catechumen who became a bishop, in part 1 of a 2-part conversation. Born: 340 AD Died: January 1, 397  AD For more on St. Ambrose of Milan and his teachings Ambrose  – On the Christian Faith (De fide) – On the Holy Spirit – On the Mysteries – On Repentance – On the Duties of the Clergy – Concerning Virgins – Concerning Widows – On the Death of Satyrus – Memorial of Symmachus – Sermon against Auxentius – Letters For more from Dr. Matthew Bunson check out his Discerning Hearts page Dr. Matthew E. Bunson is a Register senior editor and senior contributor to EWTN News. For the past 20 years, he has been active in the area of Catholic social communications and education, including writing, editing, and teaching on a variety of topics related to Church history, the papacy, the saints, and Catholic culture. He is faculty chair at Catholic Distance University, a senior fellow of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, and the author or co-author of over 50 books including The Encyclopedia of Catholic History, The Pope Encyclopedia, We Have a Pope! Benedict XVI, The Saints Encyclopedia and best-selling biographies of St. Damien of Molokai and St. Kateri Tekakwitha.

    32 min

  3. 12/04/2023

    DC18 St. John Damascene, Part 1 – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson – Discerning Hearts Podcast

    St. John Damascene, Part 1 – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses the life, times and teachings of St. John Damascene Born: 676 AD, Damascus, Syria Died: December 4, 749 AD, Mar Saba, Jordan For more on St. John Damascene and his teachings From Vatican.va, an excerpt from the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI General Audience 2008 Today I should like to speak about John Damascene, a personage of prime importance in the history of Byzantine Theology, a great Doctor in the history of the Universal Church. Above all he was an eyewitness of the passage from the Greek and Syrian Christian cultures shared by the Eastern part of the Byzantine Empire, to the Islamic culture, which spread through its military conquests in the territory commonly known as the Middle or Near East. John, born into a wealthy Christian family, at an early age assumed the role, perhaps already held by his father, of Treasurer of the Caliphate. Very soon, however, dissatisfied with life at court, he decided on a monastic life, and entered the monastery of Mar Saba, near Jerusalem. This was around the year 700. He never again left the monastery, but dedicated all his energy to ascesis and literary work, not disdaining a certain amount of pastoral activity, as is shown by his numerous homilies. His liturgical commemoration is on the 4 December. Pope Leo XIII proclaimed him Doctor of the Universal Church in 1890. In the East, his best remembered works are the three Discourses against those who calumniate which were condemned after his death by the iconoclastic Council of Hieria (754). These discourses, however, were also the fundamental grounds for his rehabilitation and canonization on the part of the Orthodox Fathers summoned to the Council of Nicaea (787), the Seventh Ecumenical Council. In these texts it is possible to trace the first important theological attempts to legitimise the veneration of sacred images, relating them to the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God in the womb of the Virgin Mary. John Damascene was also among the first to distinguish, in the cult, both public and private, of the Christians, between worship (latreia), and veneration (proskynesis): the first can only be offered to God, spiritual above all else, the second, on the other hand, can make use of an image to address the one whom the image represents. Obviously the Saint can in no way be identified with the material of which the icon is composed. This distinction was immediately seen to be very important in finding an answer in Christian terms to those who considered universal and eternal the strict Old Testament prohibition against the use of cult images. This was also a matter of great debate in the Islamic world, which accepts the Jewish tradition of the total exclusion of cult images. Christians, on the other hand, in this context, have discussed the problem and found a justification for the veneration of images. John Damascene writes, “In other ages God had not been represented in images, being incorporate and faceless. But since God has now been seen in the flesh, and lived among men, I represent that part of God which is visible. I do not venerate matter, but the Creator of matter, who became matter for my sake and deigned to live in matter and bring about my salvation through ma...

    31 min

  4. 06/27/2023

    DC12 St. Cyril of Alexandria – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson

    Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses the life, times and teachings of St. Cyril of Alexandria * Born: 378 AD, Alexandria, Egypt * Died: June 27, 444 AD, Alexandria, Egypt For more on St. Cyril of Alexandria and his teachings Clement of Alexandria – Who is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved? – Exhortation to the Heathen – The Instructor – The Stromata, or Miscellanies – Fragments From Vatican.va, an excerpt from the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI General Audience 2007 Cyril’s writings – truly numerous and already widely disseminated in various Latin and Eastern translations in his own lifetime, attested to by their instant success – are of the utmost importance for the history of Christianity. His commentaries on many of the New and Old Testament Books are important, including those on the entire Pentateuch, Isaiah, the Psalms and the Gospels of John and Luke. Also important are his many doctrinal works, in which the defence of the Trinitarian faith against the Arian and Nestorian theses recurs. The basis of Cyril’s teaching is the ecclesiastical tradition and in particular, as I mentioned, the writings of Athanasius, his great Predecessor in the See of Alexandria. Among Cyril’s other writings, the books Against Julian deserve mention. They were the last great response to the anti-Christian controversies, probably dictated by the Bishop of Alexandria in the last years of his life to respond to the work Against the Galileans, composed many years earlier in 363 by the Emperor known as the “Apostate” for having abandoned the Christianity in which he was raised. The Christian faith is first and foremost the encounter with Jesus, “a Person, which gives life a new horizon” (Deus Caritas Est, n. 1). St Cyril of Alexandria was an unflagging, staunch witness of Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word of God, emphasizing above all his unity, as he repeats in 433 in his first letter (PG 77, 228-237) to Bishop Succensus: “Only one is the Son, only one the Lord Jesus Christ, both before the Incarnation and after the Incarnation. Indeed, the Logos born of God the Father was not one Son and the one born of the Blessed Virgin another; but we believe that the very One who was born before the ages was also born according to the flesh and of a woman”. Over and above its doctrinal meaning, this assertion shows that faith in Jesus the Logos born of the Father is firmly rooted in history because, as St Cyril affirms, this same Jesus came in time with his birth from Mary, the Theotò-kos, and in accordance with his promise will always be with us. And this is important: God is eternal, he is born of a woman, and he stays with us every day.

    31 min

  5. 06/13/2023

    DC33 St. Anthony of Padua – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom w/ Dr. Matthew Bunson

    Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses the life, times and teachings of St. Anthony of Padua Born: August 15, 1195, Lisbon, Portugal Died: June 13, 1231, Padua, Italy Buried: Basilica of Saint Anthony of Padua, Padua, Italy Parents: Vicente Martins , Teresa Pais Taveira For more on St. Anthony of Padua and his teachings From Vatican.va, an excerpt from the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI  From the General Audience on St. Anthony of Padua With his outstanding gifts of intelligence, balance, apostolic zeal and, primarily, mystic fervour, Anthony contributed significantly to the development of Franciscan spirituality. In St Anthony’s teaching on prayer we perceive one of the specific traits of the Franciscan theology that he founded: namely the role assigned to divine love which enters into the sphere of the affections, of the will and of the heart, and which is also the source from which flows a spiritual knowledge that surpasses all other knowledge. In fact, it is in loving that we come to know. Anthony writes further: “Charity is the soul of faith, it gives it life; without love, faith dies” (Sermones Dominicales et Festivi II, Messagero, Padua 1979, p. 37). It is only the prayerful soul that can progress in spiritual life: this is the privileged object of St Anthony’s preaching. He is thoroughly familiar with the shortcomings of human nature, with our tendency to lapse into sin, which is why he continuously urges us to fight the inclination to avidity, pride and impurity; instead of practising the virtues of poverty and generosity, of humility and obedience, of chastity and of purity. At the beginning of the 13th century, in the context of the rebirth of the city and the flourishing of trade, the number of people who were insensitive to the needs of the poor increased. This is why on various occasions Anthony invites the faithful to think of the true riches, those of the heart, which make people good and merciful and permit them to lay up treasure in Heaven. “O rich people”, he urged them, “befriend… the poor, welcome them into your homes: it will subsequently be they who receive you in the eternal tabernacles in which is the beauty of peace, the confidence of security and the opulent tranquillity of eternal satiety” (ibid., p. 29). Anthony, in the school of Francis, always put Christ at the centre of his life and thinking, of his action and of his preaching. This is another characteristic feature of Franciscan theology: Christocentrism. Franciscan theology willingly contemplates and invites others to contemplate the mysteries of the Lord’s humanity, the man Jesus, and in a special way the mystery of the Nativity: God who made himself a Child and gave himself into our hands, a mystery that gives rise to sentiments of love and gratitude for divine goodness. For more visit Vatican.va For more from Dr. Matthew Bunson check out his Discerning Hearts page Dr. Matthew E. Bunson is a Register senior editor and a senior contributor to EWTN News. For the past 20 years,

    29 min

  6. 10/15/2022

    DC40 St. Teresa of Avila pt 1– The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom w/ Dr. Matthew Bunson

    Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses the life, times and teachings of St. Teresa of Avila Born: March 28, 1515, Gotarrendura, Spain Died: October 4, 1582, Alba de Tormes, Spain Nationality: Spanish For more on St. Teresa of Avila and her teachings visit her Discerning Hearts page From Vatican.va, an excerpt from the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI From the General Audience on St. Teresa of Avila St Teresa, whose name was Teresa de Cepeda y Ahumada, was born in Avila, Spain, in 1515. In her autobiography she mentions some details of her childhood: she was born into a large family, her “father and mother, who were devout and feared God”, into a large family. She had three sisters and nine brothers. While she was still a child and not yet nine years old she had the opportunity to read the lives of several Martyrs which inspired in her such a longing for martyrdom that she briefly ran away from home in order to die a Martyr’s death and to go to Heaven (cf. Vida, [Life], 1, 4); “I want to see God”, the little girl told her parents. A few years later Teresa was to speak of her childhood reading and to state that she had discovered in it the way of truth which she sums up in two fundamental principles. On the one hand was the fact that “all things of this world will pass away” while on the other God alone is “for ever, ever, ever”, a topic that recurs in her best known poem: “Let nothing disturb you, Let nothing frighten you, All things are passing away: God never changes. Patience obtains all things. Whoever has God lacks nothing; God alone suffices”. She was about 12 years old when her mother died and she implored the Virgin Most Holy to be her mother (cf. Vida, I, 7). If in her adolescence the reading of profane books had led to the distractions of a worldly life, her experience as a pupil of the Augustinian nuns of Santa María de las Gracias de Avila and her reading of spiritual books, especially the classics of Franciscan spirituality, introduced her to recollection and prayer. When she was 20 she entered the Carmelite Monastery of the Incarnation, also in Avila. In her religious life she took the name “Teresa of Jesus”. Three years later she fell seriously ill, so ill that she remained in a coma for four days, looking as if she were dead (cf. Vida, 5, 9). In the fight against her own illnesses too the Saint saw the combat against weaknesses and the resistance to God’s call: “I wished to live”, she wrote, “but I saw clearly that I was not living, but rather wrestling with the shadow of death; there was no one to give me life, and I was not able to take it. He who could have given it to me had good reasons for not coming to my aid, seeing that he had brought me back to himself so many times, and I as often had left him” (Vida, 7, 8). In 1543 she lost the closeness of her relatives; her father died and all her siblings, one after another, emigrated to America. In Lent 1554, when she was 39 years old, Teresa reached the climax of her struggle against her own weaknesses. The fortuitous discovery of the statue of “a Christ most grievously wounded”, left a deep mark on her life (cf. Vida, 9). The Saint,

    28 min

  7. 08/01/2022

    DC14 St. Peter Chrysologus – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson

    Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses the life, times and teachings of St. Peter Chrysologus * Born: 406 AD, Imola, Italy * Died: July 31, 450 AD For more on St. Peter Chrysologus and his teachings From Wikipedia: Peter was born in Imola, where Cornelius, bishop of Roman Catholic Diocese of Imola, baptized him, educated him, and ordained him a deacon. He was made an archdeacon through the influence of Emperor Valentinian III. Pope Sixtus III appointed Peter as Bishop of Ravenna (or perhaps archbishop) circa 433, apparently rejecting the candidate whom the people of the city ofRavenna elected. The traditional account, as recorded in the Roman Breviary, is that Sixtus had a vision of Pope Saint Peter the Apostle and Saint Apollinaris of Ravenna, the first bishop of that see, who showed Sixtus a young man, the next Bishop of Ravenna. When a group from Ravenna arrived, including Cornelius and his archdeacon Peter from Imola, Sixtus recognized Peter as the young man in his vision and consecrated him as a bishop. People knew Saint Peter Chrysologus, the Doctor of Homilies, for his short but inspired talks; he supposedly feared boring his audience. His piety and zeal won universal admiration. After hearing oratory of his first homily as bishop, Roman Empress Galla Placidia supposedly gave him the surname Chrysologus, meaning “golden-worded.” Empress Galla Placidia patronized many of projects of Bishop Saint Peter. In his extant homilies, bishop Peter explained Biblical texts briefly and concisely. He also condemned Arianism and Monophysitism as heresies and explained beautifully the Apostles’ Creed, the mystery of the Incarnation, and other topics in simple and clear language. He dedicated a series of homilies to Saint John the Baptist and the Blessed Virgin Mary. Peter advocated daily reception of Eucharist. He urged his listeners to confide in the forgiveness offered through Christ. He shared the confidence of Saint Pope Leo I the Great (440-461), another doctor of the Church. A synod held in Constantinople in 448 condemned Eutyches for Monophysitism; Eutyches then appealed to Saint Peter Chrysologus but failed in his endeavour to win the support of the Bishop. The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon(451) preserves the text of letter of Saint Peter Chrysologus in response to Eutyches; Peter admonishes Eutyches to accept the ruling of the synod and to give obedience to the Bishop of Rome as the successor of Saint Peter. Archbishop Felix of Ravenna in the early eighth century collected and preserved 176 of his homilies. Various authors edited and translated these works into numerous languages. Death and veneration St Peter died circa or after 450 during a visit to Imola, the town of his birth. Older reference books say he died on 2 December, but a more recent interpretation of the ninth-century “Liber Pontificalis Ecclesiae Ravennatis” indicated that he died on 31 July. When in 1729 he was declared a Doctor of the Church, his feast day, not already included in the Tridentine Calendar, was inserted in the Roman Catholic calendar of saints for celebration on 4 December. In 1969 his feast was moved to 30 July, as close as possible to the day of his death, 31 July, the feast day of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. For more from Dr. Matthew Bunson check out his Discerning Hearts page Dr. Matthew E. Bunson is a Register senior editor and a senior contributor to EWTN News. For the past 20 years,

    31 min

  8. 07/25/2022

    DC13 St. Leo the Great – The Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom with Dr. Matthew Bunson

    Dr. Matthew Bunson discusses the life, times and teachings of St. Leo the Great Born: Tuscany, Italy Died: November 10, 461 AD, Rome, Italy For more on St. Leo the Great and his teachings Leo the Great, Pope (c. 395-461) – Sermons – Letters From Vatican.va, an excerpt from the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI General Audience 2008 Aware of the historical period in which he lived and of the change that was taking place – from pagan Rome to Christian Rome – in a period of profound crisis, Leo the Great knew how to make himself close to the people and the faithful with his pastoral action and his preaching. He enlivened charity in a Rome tried by famines, an influx of refugees, injustice and poverty. He opposed pagan superstitions and the actions of Manichaean groups. He associated the liturgy with the daily life of Christians:  for example, by combining the practice of fasting with charity and almsgiving above all on the occasion of the Quattro tempora, which in the course of the year marked the change of seasons. In particular, Leo the Great taught his faithful – and his words still apply for us today – that the Christian liturgy is not the memory of past events, but the actualization of invisible realities which act in the lives of each one of us. This is what he stressed in a sermon (cf. 64, 1-2) on Easter, to be celebrated in every season of the year “not so much as something of the past as rather an event of the present”. All this fits into a precise project, the Holy Pontiff insisted:  just as, in fact, the Creator enlivened with the breath of rational life man formed from the dust of the ground, after the original sin he sent his Son into the world to restore to man his lost dignity and to destroy the dominion of the devil through the new life of grace. This is the Christological mystery to which St Leo the Great, with his Letter to the Council of Ephesus, made an effective and essential contribution, confirming for all time – through this Council – what St Peter said at Caesarea Philippi. With Peter and as Peter, he professed: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God”. And so it is that God and man together “are not foreign to the human race but alien to sin” (cf. Serm. 64). Through the force of this Christological faith he was a great messenger of peace and love. He thus shows us the way:  in faith we learn charity. Let us therefore learn with St Leo the Great to believe in Christ, true God and true Man, and to implement this faith every day in action for peace and love of neighbour. For more visit Vatican.va For more from Dr. Matthew Bunson check out his Discerning Hearts page Dr. Matthew E. Bunson is a Register senior editor and a senior contributor to EWTN News. For the past 20 years,

    32 min
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Doctors of the Church: The Charism of Wisdom and more with Dr. Matthew Bunson. Dr. Bunson Senior Fellow of the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, is one of the United States’ leading authorities on the papacy and the Church. His books include: The Encyclopedia of Catholic History; The Encyclopedia of Saints; Papal Wisdom; All Shall Be Well; Encyclopedia of the Roman Empire; and The Angelic Doctor: The Life and World of St. Thomas Aquinas; The Pope Encyclopedia; We Have a Pope! Benedict XVI, the first Catholic biography of the Holy Father in the English language; and most recently, St. Damien of Molokai: Apostle of the Exiled. He is presently completing The Encyclopedia of the American Catholic Church for Our Sunday Visitor.

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