Faith Matters

Latest Episodes:

161. 15 Years to Redemption — A Conversation with Dave Durocher Apr 08, 2023

Show notes

For today’s episode, we thought we’d bring you a really special story that we think we can all learn from, especially during this Easter season as we ponder concepts like redemption and new life.
Our guest was Dave Durocher, the Executive Director of The Other Side Academy in Salt Lake City. If you’re an especially up-to-date listener, or you went to Restore last year, you’ve heard a little bit about The Other Side’s story from Joseph Grenny, Dave’s partner and the Academy’s Chairman.
But with Dave, you’ll get to hear about “the other side” of The Other Side. By the time he was 38, Dave had been to prison four times for a total of 15 years. Not long after his release, Dave was arrested again and facing a 29-year prison sentence — but there was one last chance to turn his life around.
We’ll let Dave tell the rest of the story, but we can tell you that it’s just as wild and inspiring as you are imagining.
Dave’s story seems to teach us that while we like to tell dramatic stories of conversion and change, the reality is that there are many lives in which God seems to be doing slow, patient, redemptive work. The manner in which it happens and the timeline it’s on can be as surprising as Jesus’s resurrection was to his disciples; the journey can be excruciating, but as Terryl and Fiona Givens are so quick to point out — God never seems to give up on anyone.
It’s clear that Dave is now doing exactly what he was meant to do all along — and there may have been no other way to get there. Also, quick note about this episode- there's actually a little bit of swearing. So if you are sensitive to that or have little ears who may be listening with you, we just want to make sure you have a heads up.

The Christmas issue of Wayfare is now available to preorder! Order your copies (bulk discounts are available—it's the perfect gift!) or become a paid Wayfare subscriber by October 31 to receive them by the first Sunday of Advent, and get a look inside the issue here!

160. Reckoning with Marriage — A Conversation with Rachel Rueckert Apr 02, 2023

Show notes

This week we’re bringing you a conversation with Rachel Rueckert, a really amazing young writer who recently published a memoir called East Winds: A Global Quest to Reckon with Marriage.
Rachel’s story is a fascinating one. Perhaps due to a highly tumultuous home life as a child, she inherited her suspicions about marriage early. Growing up in the Church, there was a constant drumbeat about marriage and eternal families, but those lessons always seemed to raise more questions for her than they did answers.
Eventually, Rachel met her husband-to-be, Austin, and soon found herself on the adventure of a lifetime — a year-long backpacking trip on a shoestring budget that would serve as a honeymoon and bring her face to face with marriage in its stark reality. In between an escape from rabid dogs in the Amazon, accidentally stumbling upon democracy protests in Hong Kong, and a 500-mile trek through Spain in sandals, Rachel found a way to finally confront her deepest questions. This book is the incredibly insightful and beautifully written result, and we feel lucky to have, in a sense, gone in this journey with her.
In our conversation with Rachel, we were able to explore her “quest to reckon with marriage” as well as some other fascinating themes in the book: how does one learn to trust their intuition, or recognize the Spirit? How should life’s biggest decisions get made? And at Church in any community, how can we truly practice being brothers and sisters when we all have such different perspectives?
We’re so excited to share this conversation with you, and are confident in saying that you really need to pick up Rachel’s book. It was published by BCC Press, and is available online at Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

159. How to Celebrate Holy Week — A Conversation with Eric Huntsman Mar 25, 2023

Show notes

When BYU professor Eric Huntsman was growing up, he spent time among Catholics in Pittsburgh and Baptists in Alabama and came to love the different ways other Christian denominations worshiped Jesus. And one of his favorite ways that other Christians worshiped was during Holy Week, the week leading up to Easter Sunday. Over the years, Eric began incorporating many Holy Week traditions into his spiritual practice and found it helped him connect more deeply with the Savior and his atoning sacrifice.

To help other Latter-day Saints who may be interested in learning more about Holy Week and developing ways of celebrating it, Eric, along with co-author Trevan Hatch, has recently published a book called Greater Love Hath No Man: A Latter-day Saint Guide to Celebrating the Easter Season.
In today’s conversation, Zach Davis spoke with Eric about his journey as a disciple and scholar of Jesus, what traditional Holy Week commemoration looks like, and how Easter is a time when we can connect with our fellow Christian brothers and sisters.
Eric Huntsman is a professor of Ancient Scripture at BYU. In April of 2023, Eric began a two and a half year appointment of the BYU Jerusalem Studies Program, from where he joined us for this conversation. After initially researching Roman history, Eric’s scholarly efforts have focused on the life and ministry of Jesus in the New Testament Gospels, especially the Gospel of John.

158. The Other Side Academy: "Zion with F-Bombs" — Joseph Grenny at Restore Mar 18, 2023

Show notes

This week we’re sharing with you one of the most popular presentations from our Restore gathering that happened last October — a talk by Joseph Grenny called “The Other Side.”

As a young father, Joseph was determined to have the perfect family. All of kids would be active, go on missions, go to BYU and be stalwart. But that dream was shattered when two of his sons got involved in drugs and crime. Eventually, one son overdosed and almost lost his life.

As a result of that grief and helplessness, Joseph began a spiritual journey that transformed his understanding of God, the atonement and the path to peace.

He eventually felt called to put these principles into action by creating a school for former felons seeking to transform their lives. Called The Other Side Academy, it is a remarkable organization and community located in downtown Salt Lake City that provides miraculous and life-changing hope and healing.

This was an absolute highlight for us at Restore and we’re so happy to share it with you. If you’d like to see Joseph’s presentation visually which is probably what we’d recommend since his slides are so compelling, you can head to the Faith Matters website or YouTube channel.

Joseph Grenny is a New York Times bestselling author of eight books, including the leadership and communication classic Crucial Conversations. He is a co-founder of Unitus Labs, an international nonprofit that has helped over 15 million of the world’s poorest to move toward self-reliance. And in 2015 he and his colleagues started The Other Side Academy, a 2 and a half year school for those with long histories of crime, addiction and homelessness.

157. Using Your Gifts for Good — A Conversation with Liz Shropshire Mar 11, 2023

Show notes

For this week’s episode, we’re bringing you a story that we really think will uplift and inspire you. Our guest was Liz Shropshire, the founder of Peace Through Music.

In our interview with her, Liz tells the story of how she got started teaching music to children in Kosovo who had been affected by the war and ethnic cleansing that took place there in the 1990s. She knew just two things: she could teach music, and she wanted to help: so she got on a plane and made her way to a refugee camp where she began teaching her first group of kids. There was no way Liz could foresee the broad and deep impact that this inspired work would eventually have — and she’ll share some of that with you today.

Liz had tons of great insights to share, but one of the most memorable was that the environments in which children grow up can give them dramatically different worldviews. Liz has found that when a child grows up in war and without meaningful work or learning, the message they learn implicitly is that nothing matters. But by giving children ways to volunteer and serve, they can become leaders in their communities and begin to see that they can make a real difference for people.

Liz also shared insights on how each of us can find our own unique ways to lift and serve in the world, and her advice boils down to something simple: just get to work, and trust that God will step in if we’re heading in the wrong direction.

We want to send Liz a special thank you for coming on and sharing her inspiring story. If you’d like to contribute or help in some other way, check out Liz’s organization's website at https://www.peacethroughmusicinternational.org

156. Friendship in Faith — A Conversation with Andrew Teal Mar 04, 2023

Show notes

Several years ago, Matthew Holland, Elder Jeffrey R. Holland’s son, was on a sabbatical at Oxford University. One day, he passed by a door that said “Chaplain.” Intrigued, he decided to knock. Thus began a remarkable relationship with Andrew Teal, an Anglican priest and lecturer in theology at Pembroke College, Oxford. Since then, Andrew has developed a close friendship with Elder Holland, attended General Conference, given a BYU devotional address and is currently partnering with BYU to establish a center for faith and reconciliation at Oxford.

In this episode, Zach Davis spoke with Andrew about his ongoing journey of friendship with the Latter-day Saint community, how we can build truly meaningful relationships with those who are different than us, and why, for Andrew, God’s infinite love for us remains inconceivable.

Andrew Teal is a chaplain, fellow and lecturer in theology at Pembroke College, Oxford University. He writes and teaches in many areas, including Historical & Systematic Theology, Early Christianity, and the arts. He is the author of many publications, including the 2013 book, The God-Man: Athanasius in Early Christianity.

155. A Year of War and Miracles — Svitlana Miller and Nancy Cadjan Feb 24, 2023

Show notes

** To help, head to https://www.toukrainewithlove.org **
It’s been exactly a year since the world received the shocking news that Russian troops had invaded Ukraine, and exactly a year since the lives of millions of Ukrainian people changed forever.
As news of troop movements, cities under siege, refugee crises and all kinds of geopolitical saber-rattling has come to those of us outside Ukraine, many of us have gone through varying stages of shock, dismay, and fear. But what have been harder to come by than news are stories: the stories of families whose lives have been upended, of women and men who have displayed true heroism, and of the bright light of miracles, big and small, shining through the darkness of war.
And today, we’re bringing you a few of those stories, starting with the story of Svitlana Miller and her remarkable organization, To Ukraine With Love. This is an organization we’ve gotten to know over the past several months and have been astounded at the sheer effectiveness of the work they’re doing: providing immediate needs like food, sleeping bags, and generators — even building homes for people displaced by the war. We’ve been stunned by the impact of each dollar they’ve raised, all of which goes 100% to direct aid in Ukraine, not to wages for team members or any other expense.
Svitlana Miller is a native Ukrainian who founded To Ukraine With Love once she saw the immediate the needs of her friends, family, and country. She had been running an international education agency from the United States since 2009, and with her team and contacts in Ukraine, Svitlana was able to mobilize aid in a remarkably short amount of time.
Svitlana was joined in this conversation by her team member Nancy Cadjan, who has over a decade of experience working with the Global 500 C-Suite and the heads of HR in the biggest organizations in the world. She lived in Russia in the 1990s and has been connected to Eastern Europe for the past 30 years and immediately jumped in to help with both feet when this crisis began.
We were honored to have these two on, because they’ve been instrumental in helping us be more connected to Ukraine. Through them, we’ve met families whose homes have been literally destroyed in a moment by direct missile hits, and we’ve been able to learn from and connect with on-the-ground heroes who have changed everything about their work and lives to help relieve suffering.
We really believe that these two, and this organization, are remarkable in the work that they’re doing and the impact they’re having. If you listen to this episode, and feel moved to help, you too can be a part of their direct relief efforts, getting food on tables and roofs over heads. You can find out how to help or get in touch at toukrainewithlove.org.

154. Every Needful Thing — Melissa Inouye and Kate Holbrook Feb 19, 2023

Show notes

Today, you’re going to hear a really special episode. It’s a conversation with Melissa Inouye and Kate Holbrook that took place last summer, not long before Kate’s passing in August 2022. We spoke with Kate and Melissa about an amazing new book that they co-edited called Every Needful Thing: Essays on the Life of the Mind and the Heart.

In their book, Kate and Melissa gathered so many remarkable Latter-day Saint women who are true leaders in their fields, including academics, psychology, medicine, law, and many more. These women also represent countries around the world; it’s a truly diverse book and gives wonderful insight into how broad the definition of “Latter-day Saint” can be.

Kate and Melissa talked through so many important questions with us, including how we can belong exactly as we are and how we may have more choice in the matter of belonging than we think we do; how it’s important to be thoughtful as we think about change and progress in a global Church; and perhaps most importantly, how we can reconcile both mind and spirit as we live our lives. As the book’s description puts it: “Instead of pushing us to choose between faith and reason, love and law, truth within the restored gospel and truth in the wider world of God’s children, these writers urge us to seek ‘anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report’ and learn to live in a world of complexity and abundance.”

Melissa received AB and PhD degrees from Harvard University. She is a senior lecturer in Asian studies at the University of Auckland and a historian at the Church History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Kate received a BA from Brigham Young University, an MTS from Harvard Divinity School, and a PhD from Boston University. At the time of her death, Kate was the Academic Outreach Director at the Church History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, where she focused on women’s history.

We’re really grateful that we got to hold this conversation with these two, especially at the time we did. Kate was an influence for beauty, truth, and goodness wherever she went, including on us at Faith Matters. And for those interested in furthering Kate’s work — when she passed away, a scholarship was set up in her honor, which anyone can donate to at https://www.kateholbrook.org/scholarship/

This new book, Every Needful Thing is available on Amazon and at Deseret Book.

153. Developing Sexual Wholeness — Jennifer Finlayson-Fife Feb 12, 2023

Show notes

This week, we’re sharing another one of our favorite presentations from our Restore conference, given by Jennifer Finlayson-Fife and called Developing Sexual Wholeness.

In her talk, Jennifer brilliantly laid out human sexuality in terms of development, in the same way we might talk about adult development or spiritual development. Jennifer teaches that in its earliest stages, our sexuality is egocentric and focused on ourselves; eventually, moves into a social stage with deeper awareness of others and concerned with belonging, and finally, into a self-authoring stage, where we both know our own mind and move beyond self-preoccupation and into expansive love.
Jennifer is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor with a Ph.D in Counseling Psychology from Boston College, where she wrote her dissertation on LDS women and sexuality. She teaches online courses and live workshops to individuals and couples seeking to develop their capacity for deeper emotional and sexual intimacy. Additionally, she offers limited private and group coaching services to individuals and couples who have benefitted from her podcasts and courses and are looking for more direct input on improving their lives and relationships. She is frequent contributor on the subjects of sexuality, relationships, and spirituality to many Latter-day Saint themed blogs, magazines, and podcasts. You can find her podcast “Conversations with Dr. Jennifer,” on major podcast platforms, and find out more about her work at finlayson-fife.com.

152. The Richard Bushman Interview Feb 05, 2023

Show notes

This week's guest is Richard Bushman, who is simply one of the most important scholarly voices ever in the Latter-day Saint tradition.
Of course, Richard has been interviewed many times over the years, and we wanted to make sure that we covered new ground while asking for his perspective on some of the questions that have propelled and perplexed us throughout our faith journey.
So in this very wide-ranging conversation, Richard spoke about his own early journey from agnosticism to faith; why learning history, and learning from history, are so important; the revelatory process, including his experience giving many patriarchal blessings; the legacy of Rough Stone Rolling, and even why he wants to live in a world where there could be such a thing as gold plates.
Richard received his AM, AB, and PhD in the history of American civilization from Harvard University. Through the years he has taught at Harvard, BYU, Boston University, the University of Delaware, and Columbia. He married his wife, Claudia Lauper Bushman, in August 1955, and together they have four sons and two daughters. He’s written many books, including, of course, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, which has been called “the crowning achievement of the new Mormon history.” Richard served a mission New England and Atlantic Canada, and his Church callings over the years include seminary teacher, bishop, stake president, and stake patriarch.
Richard is also the co-founder and Chairman of Center for Latter-day Saint Arts, a project that is incredibly important to him; you’ll hear him discuss in the episode why he believes that art is the next frontier for the Church, and why he’s so excited about what’s to come. The Center will be having a large festival in 2024; to stay up to date with that project or to donate, head to centerforlatterdaysaintarts.org.

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