Daniel Berrigan, a Jesuit priest who for the past 20 years has been at the forefront of the peace movement. He has been arrested and spent time in prison many times for his acts of civil disobedience. Berrigan was one the Catonsville 9, who protested the Vietnam war in 1968 by destroying draft records, and a member of the Plowshares 8, who damaged nuclear warheads in 1980. He now works at an AIDS hospice in New York City. Daniel Berrigan recently completed his autobiography; it's titled To Dwell in Peace.
In 2009, Maj. Mary Jennings Hegar was shot down by the Taliban in Afghanistan while co-piloting an Air National Guard medevac helicopter. Though she was wounded in her rifle arm, Hegar managed to return fire while hanging onto a moving helicopter, which saved the lives of her crew and her patients.
The Plimsouls, an L.A.-based band led by singer-songwriter Peter Case, performed extensively during the early '80s. The new release of a Plimsouls performance from Oct. 31, 1981 (called Live! Beg Borrow and Steal) leaves critic Ken Tucker feeling freshly enthusiastic about the continued vitality of The Plimsouls' music.
Washington Post reporter Robert O'Harrow dissects Trump's acquisition of the Taj Mahal casino/hotel, which went into bankruptcy a year after it opened.
Author and actor Martin Moran's new memoir is The Tricky Part: One Boy's Fall from Trespass into Grace. As a boy, he was sexually abused by a male counselor at a Catholic boys' camp. Nearly 30 years later, Moran went to see the man again at a convalescent home.
Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews VHS release of Handel's opera Julius Caesar. It's directed by the innovative Peter Sellars. Schwartz says all five hours just fly by.
From the United States Catholic Conference's Film and Broadcasting office, Henry Herx. He's is office director. They provide reviews of current films, evaluating them for plot, entertainment value, and moral content. Their number is 1-800-311-4222. The office has five ratings, A-1 (for general audiences) to O (morally offensive).
Book critic John Leonard reviews historian Jonathan Spence's newest work, about a Chinese convert in France who is institutionalized by a Jesuit priest name Jean-Francois Foucquet. Leonard says that the historical novel feels more like a poem about history.
Twenty-eight years ago, Mary Clarke left her life as a wealthy divorced mother of seven in Beverly Hills to live and work in a notorious Mexican prison. She became Mother Antonia; Pulitzer-winning authors Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan have written about her story.
John Thavis covered the Vatican from Rome for nearly 30 years while working for the Catholic News Service. In his new book, The Vatican Diaries, he describes a place much less organized and hierarchical than the public imagines.
George Segal died last Friday. In this interview, Segal talks about his work which is being featured through October at The Jewish Museum in New York City. It is his first major exhibition in North America in 20 years. He is best known for his free standing sculptures depicting everyday people in urban settings. (REBROADCAST from 7/23/98)
The author's What Happened to Sophie Wilder features a convert to Catholicism and another character who struggles to understand her faith. Beta talks about his Catholic upbringing, iron's place in fiction and literature's therapeutic aspects.
Thomas Reese is a Jesuit scholar and editor-in-chief of America, the national Catholic weekly magazine. He's also the author of the book Inside the Vatican: The Politics and Organization of the Catholic Church. He'll discuss the pope's recent tour, the pontiff's health, possible successors and the divide between the church and its parishoners.
Journalist Larry Tye examines the social history of the porter in Rising from the Rails: Pullman Porters and the Making of the Black Middle Class. Tye says that the job was one of the best for African Americans at the time, and that it was a foothold in the American workplace. Tye reports for The Boston Globe.
Segal talks about his work which is being featured through October at The Jewish Museum in New York City. It is his first major exhibition in North America in 20 years. He is best known for his free standing sculptures depicting everyday people in urban settings.
Once a grand seaside destination, Atlantic City now faces the prospect of a takeover by the state of New Jersey. Historian Bryant Simon and reporter Amy Rosenberg discuss the city's rise and fall.
"The Power and the Spirit," is a documentary produced by Anne Bohlen and Celeste Wesson that examines the ban on the ordainment of women in the Catholic Church. The documentary features women who would like to become priests and women who favor more traditional roles and support the ban, as well as a bishop.
Hesburgh died Thursday. He was 97. He was an author, theologian and activist who took on the Vatican over issues of academic freedom. Hesburgh spoke with Terry Gross in 1990.
Once a grand seaside destination, Atlantic City now faces the prospect of a takeover by the state of New Jersey. Historian Bryant Simon and reporter Amy Rosenberg discuss the city's rise and fall.
Rubin worked with Johnny Cash for the last 10 years of Cash's life, collaborating on four critically acclaimed and Grammy award-winning albums (American Recordings, Unchained, American III: Solitary Man and American IV: The Man Comes Around.) At the time of Cash's death, they were collaborating on a box set that collects many unreleased tracks from those previous sessions, as well as a best-of CD. The five-CD collection is called Unearthed.
