More Christ Episode Thirty Eight: Mike Aquilina: How Christianity Saved Civilization: …And Must Do So Again

Welcome to More Christ, where we seek to bring some of the world's most interesting and insightful guests to discuss life's central and abiding questions.  In this thirty eighth episode in a series of discussions, I'm joined by the magnificent Mike Aquilina.  Mike Aquilina is a popular author working in the area of Church history, especially patristics, the study of the early Church Fathers. He is executive vice-president and trustee of the St. Paul Centre for Biblical Theology, a Roman Catholic research centre based in Steubenville, Ohio. He is a contributing editor of Angelus (magazine) and general editor of the Reclaiming Catholic History Series from Ave Maria Press. He hosts Way of the Fathers, a podcast produced by CatholicCulture.org.  Aquilina is the author or editor of more than sixty books, including The Fathers of the Church (2006); The Mass of the Early Christians (2007); The Resilient Church (2007); Living the Mysteries (2003); and What Catholics Believe (1999). His books have been translated into many languages, from Croatian and Portuguese to German and Braille. The Grail Code has appeared in ten languages since its publication in 2006.

Critics have praised Aquilina's work for making the Fathers accessible to non-academic readers: "Most scholars … study the paper trail — homilies, letters, teaching manuals, works of theological disputation … Aquilina loves the words, too. But he also finds the sermon in the stuff, the theology expressed in the little things that the first Christians left behind — fading murals on catacomb walls, pottery and dishware, pieces of coinage, ancient hymns and Mass prayers, common household items … The point is that for Aquilina, the little things matter — because they tell us big things about what Catholics believe and how they look at the world." Dr. John Grondelski said in the National Catholic Register: "Aquilina has made a vocation and career out of, in many ways, single-handedly popularizing patristics."  Aquilina's 2015 book Ministers and Martyrs was an official companion volume to the NBC series A.D. The Bible Continues. A year later he published The World of Ben-Hur as a guide to MGM’s remake of the Lew Wallace classic Ben-Hur.  Aquilina is also a poet and songwriter. His poems, collected in the volumes Terms and Conditions (2014) and The Invention of Zero (2020), have appeared in U.S. literary journals and in Polish and Spanish translations. His collaborations with Rock and Roll Hall of Fame artist Dion DiMucci include one book (Dion: The Wanderer Talks Truth) and three albums, Tank Full of Blues (2012), New York Is My Home (2016), and Blues with Friends (2020). The title song of New York Is My Home was recorded as a duet by Dion and Paul Simon, launched by Rolling Stone magazine, and released as a single in 2015. It was used in episode 5, season 1, of the drama series “Horace and Pete.” It was also chosen by clothing designer Ralph Lauren as the catwalk theme for his 50th-anniversary show in 2018. The song appears as well in the Deluxe Edition of Paul Simon's album Stranger to Stranger. Dion's 2020 album Blues with Friends, which included twelve songs co-written with Aquilina, debuted at Number 1 on Billboard and U.K. charts and was Billboard's Number 1 Blues Album for 2020. American Songwriter magazine honored “Song for Sam Cooke,” a single from Blues with Friends, as “Greatest of the Great 2020 Songs.” DiMucci-Aquilina songs have also been recorded or performed by Van Morrison, Jeff Beck, Amy Grant, Christy Altomare, Joe Bonamassa, Steven Van Zandt, Brian Setzer, Joe Louis Walker, Billy F. Gibbons, Rory Block, John P. Hammond, Sonny Landreth, and Samantha Fish. Bob Dylan praised these songs for their craft.