Welcome to the Catholic Novelist Webinar!

Presented Worldwide on Saturday, November 5, 2022

Catholic novelists provide an important imaginative link between our material and spiritual worlds.

Rick Akins, Ben Bongers, Danny Fitzpatrick, Lucy Underwood-Healy, and Jim Papandrea present on their work in a special two-hour event moderated by Sebastian Mahfood.

As a young and prideful scribe, Nicodemus told King Herod where the ‘king of the Jews’ would be born. From this mistake, the children of Bethlehem were butchered. 

The twelve stories of True Love contain every emotion that we feel daily, but we’re too afraid to let out. They are offered in the hope that readers will give themselves permission to really feel. To laugh, to hope, and yes… to cry. 

Woven together like a fine tapestry, Fred and Nikolas’s stories in The Saint Nicholas Society inspire everyone to remember that the best ways to live are through kindness, community, and good deeds.

All is changed when a hurricane floods the city of New Orleans, displacing fourteen-year-old Roman Moran and his family not only from their home but also from the daily round rehearsed for them by generations of life in the Crescent City. 
This is a story of a journey, written to help young people deal with grief and loss. 

Three teenagers are drawn into the hidden underside of Elizabethan England: a world where how you pray can get you hanged, and misplaced trust can kill. 

Rick Akins is a father of three and currently lives in Wheaton, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. He was born and raised Catholic in upstate New York and has an electrical engineering degree and MBA from the University of Illinois. For more, see The Rebirth of Nicodemus.

Ben Bongers was an international operatic tenor and sommelier for 30 years based in San Francisco, CA, and Germany and is now a Gerontologist. He is currently studying for the Permanent Diaconate in Kansas City, MO, and is a Knight of Magisterial Grace in the Order of Malta. For more see The Saint Nicholas Society and True Love: 12 Christmas Stories, My True Love Gave to Me.

Daniel Fitzpatrick grew up in New Orleans, LA, studied Philosophy at the University of Dallas, and lives in Hot Springs, AR, with his wife and two children. His poems and essays have been widely published. For more, see Only the Lover Sings.

Dr. James L. Papandrea is an award-winning author and Professor of Church History and Historical Theology. A Catholic layperson and catechist, Jim currently teaches the history and theology of the early and medieval Church at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary and is recognized for his ecumenical work on behalf of the whole body of Christ. For more, see The Squire’s Journey.

Lucy Underwood-Healy grew up in Cambridge, England.  She received her BA in History and English from Oxford University and completed postgraduate studies at Cambridge University.  A mother and scholar as well as a writer, she lives in St Albans, England with her husband and children. For more, see The Guest of Night.

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