HeightsCast | January 23, 2026
Frantic Families: Three Questions for a More Intentional Life
Featuring Kevin Twomey
Read OnArticle | January 16, 2026
A Review of The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World by Dr. Christine Rosen
Featuring Robert Greving
Read OnHeightsCast | January 8, 2026
An Epic Education: Tolkien in the Middle School
Featuring Tom Cox
Read OnArticle | December 23, 2025
Educating Boys: Nature, Risk, and the Making of Men
Featuring Dr. Joseph Lanzilotti
Read OnArticles & Essays
In Defense of Wasting Time
Professional and vocational work requires practice and the building up of good habits; but so does our leisure. In his latest article, Alvaro de Vicente defends the disappearing art of wasting time.
By Alvaro de Vicente | January 20, 2026
A Review of The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World by Dr. Christine Rosen
It’s been said that reading a translation is like kissing your wife through a handkerchief. What comes between changes the experience; something is lost. Today, as technology increasingly “mediates” our experiences, we are losing something too—perhaps our humanity. This is the argument of Dr. Christine Rosen, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, in her book The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World. Experiences are direct contacts between our human nature—our bodies, minds, emotions, and perceptions—and reality. Technology (and our desire for ease, comfort, and safety)...
By Robert Greving | January 16, 2026
Cortex, Schmortex
I think I was in my early thirties when I first heard a scientific observation that has since passed into common knowledge, namely, that our brains aren’t fully developed until age 25. While I don’t remember exactly when I first heard this factoid, I am confident that it was after my twenty-fifth birthday. In other words, I don’t think there has ever been a day on which my immaturity could be explained by the neuroscientists’ assertion that my brain was still a work in progress. And yet my brain was...
By Mark Grannis | January 09, 2026
Educating Boys: Nature, Risk, and the Making of Men
In order to thrive, boys need teachers and parents to give them the freedom to act out their natural need for physical play.
By Dr. Joseph Lanzilotti | December 23, 2025
Trust Your Gut
Experienced parents know that reality is always more complex than rigid paradigms can capture. Decisions on the ground are a mix of principles, common sense, and God’s guiding grace. So, trust your gut.
By Alvaro de Vicente | December 16, 2025
Go Fly a Kite: On Growing Up Without Growing Old
Every Thursday morning, the teachers of the Valley gather for a weekly meeting that is low in procedural fluff and high in substance – that is to say, rather than talking about nothing to accomplish nothing, we may read an essay or short story (Edward Abbey’s polemic from Desert Solitaire, Fr. James Schall on grades, Josef Pieper’s Leisure: The Basis of Culture, to name a few) or chew on some poetry alongside bagels and coffee. One such morning last school year, we read and discussed Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “My Lost...
By Elias Naegele | December 08, 2025
Don’t Spoil Your Son
Do we have guiding principles around giving good things to our children? Four practical battlegrounds can help us to raise sons who do not expect a life of constant comfort.
By Alvaro de Vicente | December 02, 2025
The Magisterial Case for Single-Sex Education
The Church has continuously recommended distinct educational settings for boys and girls, including in the 21st century, even as the prevailing educational culture shifts.
By Dr. Joseph Lanzilotti | November 25, 2025
View all in Archive...
Book & Movie Reviews
Soaring Over the Rainbow
" Wicked: For Good completes the faithful adaptation of a Broadway masterpiece. The Broadway musical Wicked first hit movie theate..."
- Mark Grannis Read the ReviewThe Power and the Glory – A Review
"Have you ever read a book that inspired in you a soul-crushing desire to eat fried chicken, shed undefinable tears through a mouthful of Spr..."
- Joseph Bissex Read the ReviewIn Search of Sacrifice: The Drama of the Family in Godzilla Minus One
"2023’s Japanese film Godzilla Minus One is more than a monster flick—it’s a true family movie. Not to be confused with CGI-heavy Ameri..."
- Joe Breslin Read the ReviewTestosterone Tropes: A Review of F1: The Movie
"If the social media “manosphere” became incarnate as a movie, that movie would be F1. Not so much a story as a series of “manly” tro..."
- Joe Breslin Read the ReviewLook Up: Why I Believe in Superman (2025)
"Superman (2025) is a fun and wholesome movie that’s best enjoyed on the big screen. Despite some issues with pacing and a few unfortunate ..."
- Tom Cox Read the ReviewCutting Edge, but Get to the Point
"Fantasy authors have a league of their own. They play for various intramural teams, such as The Snarky Sendups (Terry Pratchett’s Discworl..."
- Joseph Bissex Read the ReviewMelancholy, Minnesotan Medicine
"In a post-progress Midwest, beside that omnipotent and mercurial god, Lake Superior, Rainy and his wife Lark have the closest thing to happi..."
- Joe Breslin Read the ReviewEscaping the Void: A Review of Thunderbolts*
"The Marvel Cinematic Universe hasn’t done itself any favors since Endgame (2019). Between emasculating beloved male characters, inserting ..."
- Joe Breslin Read the ReviewA Sublime Comedy: Joe Versus the Volcano at 35
"Friday, March 9, 1990, was a pivotal day in my life, because it’s the day I picked up the phone and called the young woman who would, eigh..."
- Mark Grannis Read the ReviewPure Murder: A Review of Gladiator II
"I never want to see this movie again. Granted, this might sound a bit harsh coming from a Classics undergrad who spent most of his Classics ..."
- Conn Mehigan Read the ReviewBrowse all Reviews...
Podcasts & Videos
HeightsCast
Frantic Families: Three Questions for a More Intentional Life
Kevin Twomey is a husband, father, and a principal consultant at Table Group, founded by Patrick Lencioni, which specializes in helping executive teams build a healthy operational work culture. Lencioni’s book, The Three Big Questions, brings that same expertise to bear on the modern frantic family: helping parents find their family identity, create intentional priorities, and live with more order and purpose. Chapters: 4:01 Typical family operations 9:09 Frantic families in a frantic world 14:36 What makes your family unique? 21:57 Parent leadership 26:02 What is your family’s top priority...
Featuring Kevin Twomey | January 23, 2026
Forum Faculty Podcast
Athlete or Academic: What’s the Real Priority in Schools?
We welcome to this conversation coaches and teachers Jeff Thompson, Joel Sellier, and Brian Carroccio. They dive into the historical importance of physical education, the post-COVID surge in youth sports, the impact of club sports on school sports, and the critical development of discipline and teamwork through athletics.
Featuring Jeff Thompson, Joel Sellier, Brian Carroccio | August 01, 2025
The Father as Protector
Our role as fathers is to protect—less often as superheroes and more often as a steady presence. When we do our job well, they can live with confidence.
Featuring Colin Gleason | January 15, 2026
An Epic Education: Tolkien in the Middle School
To prepare for Homer, Virgil, Beowulf, the Eddas, and Dante—The Heights begins with Tolkien. In a talk from 2016, former middle school core teacher and current upper school classics teacher Tom Cox defends the place of J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings in the epic tradition. He then explains why Middle Earth is so uniquely suited to the middle school, using Samwise the Stouthearted as our guide to the heart of a middle school boy. Chapters: 2:46 Rethinking “the middle” 4:01 How LotR prepares boys for upper...
Featuring Tom Cox | January 08, 2026
The Father as a Guide to the World
At the Fatherhood Conference, Michael Moynihan shared how a father’s parenting outlook now will shape his son’s vocational and professional readiness as an adult.
Featuring Michael Moynihan | December 18, 2025
Reading into Reality: What Is Intellectual Formation?
Our mission is to assist parents in the intellectual, moral, physical, and spiritual formation of their sons… At The Heights, we repeat these words often, including a paraphrase at the beginning of every HeightsCast episode. But what constitutes intellectual formation? What does educating the intellect look like? Co-founder of the Hillbilly Thomists and Rector Magnificus at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas in Rome, Fr. Thomas Joseph White, joins us for a deep-dive into the rich Catholic understanding of intellectus, habitus, ratio, and what it means to “form” these God-given...
Featuring Fr. Thomas Joseph White | December 11, 2025
Vocational Discernment in an Age of Infinite Options
“Whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matt. 16:25). This week we’re joined by Fr. Carter Griffin, rector of the St. John Paul II Seminary in the Archdiocese of Washington, and Alvaro de Vicente, headmaster of The Heights School, to examine “discernment.” It’s become a Catholic buzzword, applied (or sometimes, perhaps, misapplied) to a number of life situations. Here, Fr. Carter and Alvaro discuss the methods and limits of vocational discernment—and the moral courage of commitment. Chapters:...
Featuring Fr. Carter Griffin, Alvaro de Vicente | December 05, 2025
On Manners: The “ABCs” of Virtue
Please, thank you, after you… Do manners matter? Are they artifice or virtue? In this rebroadcast from 2019, lower school head Colin Gleason shares how manners can be the building blocks to a richer moral life—the habituation of virtue. He then offers practical advice for families and schools to help even young boys strengthen their “moral muscle” through manners that matter. Chapters: 1:34 Why start in the lower school 3:12 Manners: artifice or virtue? 5:34 Orienting them towards the needs of others 10:06 Manners that matter 13:31 Social manners for...
Featuring Colin Gleason | November 20, 2025
Formation for the Body: Lifelong Functional Fitness
In our school communities, we talk a great deal about moral and intellectual formation. But physical development, too, has an essential place in the whole-person, long-term vision of what our sons and students can become. Heights Athletic Director Dan Lively reminds us that the goals of athletic training don’t begin and end with high school sports. In fact, lifelong functional fitness is in service to every vocation. It ensures that we and our sons are capable of having a positive impact—on the world and in our families—for as many years...
Featuring Dan Lively | November 12, 2025
Why Beauty Matters: The Postmodern Pressure on Our Interior Life
One philosopher of our time claims that “today, the experience of beauty is impossible.” Dr. Jason Baxter, director of the Center for Beauty and Culture at Benedictine College, begs to differ. Dr. Baxter joins us on HeightsCast to unpack his latest book, Why Literature Still Matters, which looks at why such a claim might feel true in our digital age. Then, he talks us through why and how we should reclaim our experiences of beauty for the health of our soul.
Featuring Dr. Jason Baxter | November 06, 2025
View all in Archive...