Category: HeightsCast

“One of the best places to cultivate a Catholic worldview in the hearts and minds of young people … is in the backcountry,” writes Fr. John Nepil in his recent release, To Heights and unto Depths. Fr. Nepil, who has led dozens of group treks through the mountains of Colorado and said Mass atop every fourteener in the state, joins us to talk about adventure and a young man’s theological education. The backcountry, he says, is rich in lessons of creation, dependence, suffering, and beauty—restoring our sense of being created…

How many times a day do I tell my son what to do next? In this rebroadcast from 2015, our Head of Middle School Andrew Reed offers his ideas on cultivating an environment at home (and in the classroom) where boys can develop their own academic will. This entails not only greater freedom but also—just as necessary—a close and reliable family bond. Mr. Reed explains how this counterintuitive pair works together to teach a boy to choose the good for himself. Chapters: 6:32 The will: a marker for success 9:02…

To help our seniors synthesize the many ideas, events, and texts they’ve surveyed across high school—and to help them better understand their own cultural moment—Heights teachers have developed a senior core class titled “History of Western Thought.” In this episode, Upper School Head Michael Moynihan and long-time teacher Austin Hatch discuss the course and one of its accompanying texts: Carl Trueman’s Strange New World (2022). HOWT covers essential texts from Plato’s Republic to Pope Benedict XVI’s “Regensburg Address.”. Its goal is not only to prepare students for college work but…

Properly understood, the imagination is not something you escape to; it’s something you draw upon every day to make decisions, understand events, and communicate. This week on HeightsCast, Dr. Matthew Mehan explores the purposes of the imagination and the habits of wit and wisdom that help us insightfully process our world. We may think of the imagination at odds with reality. But, he says, cultivating the imagination actually makes us more capable, “wittier” thinkers about reality. Chapters: 3:05 Defining the imagination5:31 “Good mother wit”8:25 How LLMs undermine the wit11:05 Beyond…

… the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild. G. K. Chesterton This week we feature a rebroadcast of a 2021 talk from our lower school head, Colin Gleason. Mr. Gleason addressed the topic of discipline using decades of experience in the Valley, converting the lessons he shares with his homeroom teachers into ideas for parents at home. Ultimately, his guidance is all about bringing a long-term vision and…

In 2008, Tom Vander Woude died saving the life of his youngest son. But this radical self-gift was really the culmination of a quiet life of daily virtue with a heart of faith. Chris Vander Woude, the fifth of Tom and Mary Ellen’s seven sons, now carries the story of his father’s life and death across the country, as well as sharing the process towards canonization that began this year with the assignment of a postulator in Rome. Chris joins us today to speak about fatherhood and the extraordinary man…

They know we love them; but do our children sense that we like them? And how does that relate to their formation? In the intense season of togetherness that is summer break, headmaster Alvaro de Vicente recommends four practices to help us live more in the present and enjoy our children—even when the anxieties of life come knocking. Chapters: 2:17 Distinction between loving and liking6:49 Four tools for cultivating “like”:8:02 One: Express triple-gratitude10:45 Two: Spend unnecessary time15:25 Three: Find the humor17:15 Four: Pray for the grace18:38 Why liking them matters22:59…

Months ago, Heights teacher Joe Lanzilotti took up a prodigious project: reviewing the body of popular literature on boys’ education. Partway through his journey, Dr. Lanzilotti catches us up on the diversity of scientific, biological, psychological, and moral perspectives—and how they cohere into a bigger picture of boys and where their developmental needs differ from those of girls. Framing the evidence with papal guidance from the last century gives us a solid starting-point to consider the education of boys according to their nature. Chapters: 4:09 The timeline of research on…

The ever-changing tech landscape and the ever-growing research on interactive screens means that we must look at the topic anew year after year. For parents trying to keep pace, Clare Morell has compiled the most up-to-date research into her recent release, The Tech Exit. Armed with the facts and interviews with dozens of Tech Exit families (including some from The Heights community!), Morell encourages parents that it’s never too late to reverse course on smartphones. United with other families trying to do the same, we can replace the new “smartphone…

In 1858, six-year-old Edgardo Mortara is forcibly removed from his family’s home in accordance with civil and canon law. His Jewish family’s legal appeal invokes, to great effect, the theology of St. Thomas Aquinas. Dr. Matthew Tapie and former Heights teacher Dr. Lionel Yaceczko join us this week to pull apart this difficult case with the assistance of St. Thomas, who gives a theological basis for parental authority in accordance with natural law—a useful perspective for our culture today. Chapters: 4:06 The Mortara Case (1858)11:12 The personality of an original…