Forged: Timeless Ways of Living

How Young Adults Can Recover Hope, Friendship, and Vocation with Anna Moreland

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What happens when young adults have been taught how to achieve, but not how to work, love, and rest like whole persons? In this episode of Forged, Dr. Brian Williams speaks with Dr. Anna Bonta Moreland about The Young Adult Playbook and the ordinary habits that help men and women build lives of purpose. Their conversation moves from Argentine family dinners and a different relationship to time, to the loneliness and risk-aversion many young adults feel around dating, vocation, and leisure. Along the way, Dr. Moreland offers a hopeful vision for recovering agency through embodied friendship, honest conversation, good work, Sabbath-shaped leisure, prayer, and practical courage.

This is a conversation for young adults, parents, teachers, and anyone who senses that achievement alone cannot form a life. Dr. Moreland helps name the fear many students carry into adulthood, then points toward a better way: not escape from responsibility, but a deeper education in how to live.

About the Guest
Dr. Anna Bonta Moreland is the Anne Quinn Welsh Endowed Chair and Director of the University Honors Program at Villanova University. A full professor in the Department of Humanities, her academic expertise and research include medieval theology, interfaith dialogue, and comparative theology. She is the author of Known by Nature: Thomas Aquinas on Natural Knowledge of God (Crossroad/Herder, 2010), Muhammad Reconsidered: A Christian Perspective on Islamic Prophecy (University of Notre Dame Press, 2020), and The Young Adult Playbook: Living Like it Matters (CUA Press, 2024). She has received grants from the John Templeton Foundation, the Lilly Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities.

She received her B.A. in Philosophy at the University of Maryland, College Park, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in Systematic Theology from Boston College under the direction of Michael J. Buckley, S.J.

Guest Links
Anna Moreland | https://dspt.edu/anna-moreland
The Young Adult Playbook: Living Like It Matters | https://www.amazon.com/Young-Adult-Playbook-Living-Matters/dp/0813239206

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Rusty Reno on The Ordinary Practices that Shape the Soul

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What does it take to form a life with roots, discipline, and courage in an age of distraction and drift? In this episode of Forged, Brian Williams talks with R. R. Reno about the ordinary practices that shape the soul: family dinners, church, books, marriage, friendship, cooking, architecture, and the demanding craft of rock climbing. Reno reflects on growing up in Baltimore, learning endurance in Yosemite, finding stability in marriage and worship, and pursuing excellence as a teacher, writer, and Christian. Along the way, he considers why beauty trains our affections, why embodied disciplines matter, and what it means to “do battle without hatred.”

The conversation moves from childhood rhythms and the gift of rootedness to the spiritual trial of physical risk, the public nature of architecture, and the vocation of First Things as a guide for readers seeking clarity in a fractured cultural moment.

About the Guest
R. R. Reno has served as Editor of First Things since 2011. He received his PhD in
theology from Yale University, and taught theology and ethics at Creighton
University in Omaha, Nebraska for twenty years. He has published in many
academic journals, magazines, and newspapers. His most recent books include The
End of Interpretation, Return of the Strong Gods, and Resurrecting the Idea of a
Christian Society.

Guest Links
First Things | https://www.firstthings.com

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Festival as a Way of Life: Father Nathan Carr on Joy, Time, and Christian Formation

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What would it mean to practice festival at home, in school, and in church? In this episode of Forged, Brian Williams speaks with Father Nathan Carr about the posture and practice of festival as a way of living with joy, gratitude, and holy attention in the midst of ordinary time. Drawing from his work as priest, headmaster, husband, father, and author of Festive School, Carr reflects on Christian calendars, prayer books, school feasts, household rituals, and the slow formation of children who learn not merely to observe the good, but to receive and name it. This conversation is an invitation to recover joy as discipline, delight as formation, and celebration as a serious part of Christian life.

Together, Brian and Father Carr consider how homes, schools, and churches can resist anxiety, urgency, cynicism, and suspicion by learning to inhabit time differently. From Benedictine hours and red-letter feast days to hidden Wise Men during Advent and children serving in the liturgy, this episode explores the small, concrete practices that teach us to see the world as gift.

About the Guest
Father Nathan Carr serves as Vicar and Priest-in-Charge of St. John’s Episcopal Oklahoma City, Missioner for Strategic Development for the Diocese and Bishop, and Headmaster of The Academy—an 1100-student Christian School of Classics with 3 campuses throughout the OK metro. He and his wife Sarah co-own Commonplace Books OKC, chase six children around day and night (one of whom is now married!), and are now willing to take naps in the middle of the day. Nathan is author of Festive School, watches far too many car repair shows in his spare time, and serves as Chairman of the Ralston College Board of Governors.

Guest Links
The Academy | https://theacademyok.org
Commonplace Books OKC | https://commonplacebooksokc.com/
Festive School | https://classicalacademicpress.com/products/festive-school?_pos=1&_sid=665198961&_ss=r
Student Prayer Book | https://classicalacademicpress.com/products/student-prayer-book?_pos=1&_sid=674d00509&_ss=r

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The Harmony of the Parts: on Beauty, Place, and Belonging

Humanitas Institute — Fri, 29 May 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What does beauty have to do with the spaces where we learn, teach, worship, and gather? In this shared bonus episode of Composed and Forged, Christine Perrin speaks with Brian Williams about Templeton Hall, the home of the Templeton Honors College, and the deep work of making a place that feels whole, hospitable, and human. Their conversation moves from architecture and furniture to poetry, asking how beauty forms us before we can fully explain what it has done. This is an episode about attention, creation, community, and the grace of places that help us breathe more deeply and live more faithfully.

Brian reflects on the making of Templeton Hall at Eastern University as an act of stewardship, one that honors the old while creating room for students and faculty to dwell together in the pursuit of the true, the good, the beautiful. Christine and Brian consider why beauty is not a luxury, why material places matter to Christian formation, and how the experience of a beautiful space can awaken desire for God. The episode closes fittingly with Hopkins’s “Pied Beauty,” a poem of praise for the dappled, particular, and creaturely world.

References and Links
Templeton Honors College | https://templeton.eastern.edu/
Templeton Hall | https://templeton.eastern.edu/life-community/templeton-hall
Christopher Alexander, The Timeless Way of Building | https://www.amazon.com/Timeless-Way-Building-Christopher-Alexander/dp/0195024028
Gregory Wolfe, Beauty Will Save the World | https://www.amazon.com/Beauty-Will-Save-World-Ideological/dp/1610171004
Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Idiot | https://www.amazon.com/Idiot-Penguin-Classics-Fyodor-Dostoyevsky/dp/014044792X
C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy | https://www.amazon.com/Surprised-Joy-Shape-Early-Life/dp/0062565435
Charles Williams, The Descent of the Dove | https://angelicopress.com/products/the-descent-of-the-dove?srsltid=AfmBOop0_4ZZscz8U6o_ldEPhSYpkPOBsrJotPNumtbWjmzkJWtypzrJ
Gerard Manley Hopkins, “God’s Grandeur” | https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44395/gods-grandeur
Gerard Manley Hopkins, “Pied Beauty” | https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44399/pied-beauty

Sara Hall on the Love of the Grind

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 18 May 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What does distance running teach us about the body, failure, and the long work of becoming whole? In this episode of Forged, Brian Williams speaks with American distance running legend Sara Hall about the discipline and delight of a life spent running, competing, recovering, parenting, and learning to receive her identity from God rather than performance. On her 43rd birthday, Sara reflects on more than twenty-five years in elite running, the injuries and disappointments that reshaped her, the joy of competition when it is rightly ordered, and the deeper love that has sustained her through the grind.

The conversation also turns toward family, marriage, adoption, Ethiopia, and the work Sara and Ryan Hall have pursued through the Hall Steps Foundation. Sara offers a grounded picture of vocation in motion: a life shaped by training, service, sleep, dinner around the table, and the steady grace of being loved apart from achievement.

About the Guest
Sara Hall is a professional runner, Christian, and author. Sara Hall has been a fixture atop American distance running for more than two decades: first as a national high school champion, then as an NCAA star at Stanford University, and later, as the only pro runner to ever win U.S. titles in the mile and the marathon. She has 10 national titles to her name and was the top American finisher at the World Athletics Championships. She is also the former half marathon national record holder, the runner-up from the 2020 London Marathon, and a two-time winner of the Mastercard New York Mini 10K. Hall attended Stanford University where she was a seven-time All-American. While at Stanford, she met her current husband and coach, Ryan Hall, who owns the American record in the men’s half marathon. The two got married in 2005 and four years later formed the Hall Steps Foundation to help fight world poverty through better health. In 2015, they adopted four sisters from Ethiopia.

Guest Links
For the Love of the Grind | https://static.macmillan.com/static/smp/the-love-of-the-grind-9781250404282/
The Hall Steps Foundation | https://www.thestepsfoundation.org/

Makers by Nature: Bruce Herman on Art, Beauty, and the Call to Create

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 04 May 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What is art for, and why does beauty awaken deep longings within us? In this conversation, Brian Williams joins artist, Bruce Herman, in his studio to explore the human calling to create, the role beauty plays in shaping the soul, and the discipline of learning to see. Herman argues that we are not merely consumers but makers by nature, and that art at its best is a form of hospitality that invites others into a meaningful encounter. Through stories of childhood wonder, reflections on modern art, and the language of longing, this episode offers a compelling vision of everyday creativity, from painting and poetry to spreadsheets and shared meals.

About the Guest
An American painter, author, and speaker, Herman lives (with his wife Meg, extended family, and assorted friendly beasts) in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

Herman’s paintings, prints, and drawings have been exhibited nationally in more than 150 shows––in most major cities, including New York, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington––as well as internationally in Italy, England, Japan, Hong Kong, Canada, and Israel.

Guest Links
Bruce Herman Website | http://www.bruceherman.com/
Makers by Nature | https://www.ivpress.com/makers-by-nature

Tilling Soil & Soul: Michael Lamb on the Craft of Character

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 20 Apr 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What forms a life of character? In this episode of Forged, Brian Williams talks with Michael Lamb about the moral formation that happens through work, friendship, habit, and hope. From Lamb’s childhood on a Tennessee tobacco farm to his work helping universities cultivate virtue, this conversation explores how people learn discipline, responsibility, humility, and shared purpose. It is a rich reflection on education, moral ecology, political hope, and the slow work of becoming the sort of person who can love the good and pursue it with others.

Along the way, Brian and Michael consider what today’s families and schools can learn from agrarian life, why friendship and accountability matter for both adults and students, and why poetry can train us to pay attention. They close with Seamus Heaney’s “Digging,” a fitting meditation on inheritance, vocation, and the probing work of the pen.

About the Guest

Michael Lamb is the F. M. Kirby Foundation Chair of Leadership and Character, Senior Executive Director of the Program for Leadership and Character, and Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Humanities at Wake Forest University. He earned a B.A. from Rhodes College, Ph.D. from Princeton University, and second B.A. from the University of Oxford, where he studied as a Rhodes Scholar. A recipient of teaching awards from Princeton, Oxford, and Wake Forest, he is the author of A Commonwealth of Hope: Augustine’s Political Thought and co-editor of The Arts of Leading, Cultivating Virtue in the University, and with Brian A. Williams, Everyday Ethics: Moral Theology and the Practices of Ordinary Life.

Guest Links

The Program for Leadership and Character | https://leadershipandcharacter.wfu.edu/
Michael Lamb’s Website | https://kmichaellamb.com/
Michael Lamb’s Book List | https://kmichaellamb.com/books/

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The Reading Man: Shilo Brooks on Making a Life with Books

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 02:00:00 -0700

What do books do to a man? In this conversation, Shilo Brooks and Brian Williams discuss reading, ambition, teaching, and the making of a life. Brooks reflects on growing up in West Texas, discovering the great books almost by accident, and learning to read not merely for school or profession, but for wisdom, courage, and the ordering of desire. Together they consider why men stop reading, what is lost when they do, and why the best books are not simply objects of study or instruments of advancement, but companions in the long work of formation. They do more than convey information. They enlarge the soul, sharpen judgment, deepen wonder, and usher us into a richer and more serious way of being in the world.

Along the way, Brooks discusses the teachers who first put serious books in his hands and the books that shaped him, from Fitzgerald’s This Side of Paradise to Xenophon’s Education of Cyrus. The conversation ranges from landscape and longing to teaching and apprenticeship, and from the allure of ambition to the discipline of moderating it through wisdom. This is a conversation about books as guides for life, about the formation of men, and about the kind of education that moves from the classroom to the soul.

About the Guest

Shilo Brooks is President and CEO of the George W. Bush Presidential Center and Professor of Practice in the Department of Political Science at SMU. He was previously Executive Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University, where he taught in the Department of Politics. Brooks is host of The Free Press’ Old School podcast and author of a forthcoming book on noble ambition from Penguin Random House. Born and raised in West Texas, Brooks received his Ph.D. in political science from Boston College and his B.A. in liberal arts from the Great Books Program at St. John’s College. He and his wife Siobhan have one daughter – Clementine.

Guest Links
The Bush Center on Instagram @thebushcenter
Old School Podcast on Instagram @OldSchoolPod

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Pursuing embodied wonder and material wisdom: Chris Hall on the Common Arts

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 23 Mar 2026 02:00:00 -0700

In this episode of Forged, Chris Hall reflects on the formative power of the “common arts”—the ordinary skills and embodied practices that introduce us to the givenness of the world and manifest our humanity. Drawing on stories from the classroom and the farm, Hall argues that formation and education flourish when intellectual study is joined to hands-on craft, inviting students into apprenticeship, real responsibility, and attentiveness to the natural world. He also addresses the cultural divide between academic learning and vocational skill, urging a recovery of an older vision in which the liberal arts, practical arts, and fine arts enrich one another for the sake of a fully embodied, fully aware human life of discipline, delight, craft, and calling.

Contemplate or Exploit: Andy Crouch on Technology, Formation, and the Innovation Bargain

Humanitas Institute — Mon, 09 Mar 2026 02:00:00 -0700

In this Forged conversation, Andy Crouch argues that “we either contemplate or we exploit”—a bracing claim that frames his vision for stewarding our humanity in an age of technological convenience. Drawing on a biblical account of the human person as heart, soul, mind, and strength, he contends that genuine flourishing is found through the relational, embodied labors of home, church, and school. Crouch names the “innovation bargain” as a crucial lens for reckoning with technology’s costs, and he calls listeners back to shared household rhythms and focal practices as ordinary disciplines for becoming more fully human.

Crafting a Poetic Life with Malcolm Guite

Humanitas Institute — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 14:42:07 -0800

Poet, priest, and professor Malcolm Guite invites us into a conversation that moves from the Arthurian legend of the wounded king and ruined land to our own modern struggle to see the world as meaningful and alive. He shares how a childhood encounter with the Grail stories taught him that one reckless act can wound a whole world, and how healing begins with recovering wonder. Guite makes a compelling case for poetry and story as wisdom-bearers that help restore our vision. He closes with his radiant poem “O Sapientia,” a final invitation to recognize hidden wisdom “disguised as everything.”

The Ranger, the Teacher, and the Farmer: Forging a Coherent Life with Doug Woolery

Humanitas Institute — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 13:40:19 -0800

In this episode of Forged, host Brian Williams speaks with Doug Woolery—Army Ranger, teacher, coach, and farmer—about a life shaped by service, learning, and faith. Doug reflects on his journey from the military to the classroom, the impact of male educators, the importance of parental involvement, and the quiet lessons of farming. Drawing on his experiences as a parent and grandparent, he shares insights on coherence, contentment, and living a well-rounded life.

The Opening Question

Humanitas Institute — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 13:31:59 -0800

In the inaugural episode of the Forged and Composed podcasts, our hosts come together for a conversation about what it means to “forge” and “compose” a life marked by beauty, order, and purpose. Their dialogue explores human flourishing, focal practices, and the formative power of beauty, art, and community. Drawing on personal experience, they reflect on hospitality, generosity, nature, and the role of exemplars in shaping lives marked by meaning and fulfillment. Join us at the beginning.