#67 Virginia Stem Owens 1994 by Festival of Faith & WritingOleh Festival of Faith & Writing

#66 Thomas Lynch by Festival of Faith & WritingOleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In episode #65 of Rewrite Radio, Newbery Medal winner Clare Vanderpool shares how stories transform us and how to maintain our most honest selves. She also sings a few yodel-ay-hee’s from her book Moon Over Manifest.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In episode #64 of Rewrite Radio, Jennifer Trafton teaches her listeners and students that play is at the heart of creativity. She draws on her experiences as a child and in the classroom to invite writers to play so that the idea brings something new to the world. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.…

In episode #63 of Rewrite Radio, Sefi Atta and Diane Glancy offer their own thoughts on writing across the borders of religion, culture, language and more. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In episode #62 of Rewrite Radio, Jeff Zentner tells how he invited his characters to live inside his head for months in order to let them tell their own stories. He encourages listeners to write who fascinates them and that the story threads will follow.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.…

In Rewrite Radio episode #61, Brady Udall offers his thoughts on teaching how to write a novel as opposed to short story or poetry. He distinguishes the long-lived popularity of novels in today’s society and why that is.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio episode #60, Dr. Anbara Salam teaches us more about the human interest in cults, how they are represented, and how they reveal our deepest vulnerabilities and anxieties.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In episode #59 of Rewrite Radio, author and minister Gloria Pinkney retells stories of how God answered her prayers through a reoccurring bumper sticker, through a yellow tow truck outside the LaGuardia Airport, and through many other signs. Listen as she encourages others to take time for God and ask Him questions.…

In episode #58 of Rewrite Radio, Mitali Perkins offers five truths about fiction. Listen as she thinks of stories as windows and mirrors that teach us to make things right. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In episode #57 of Rewrite Radio, Helena María Viramontes shares her thoughts on prayer, compassion, and love to form a deeper connection with others. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio episode #56, Doris Betts reads from her novel, Souls Raised from the Dead, at the 1994 Festival of Faith & Writing. This particular chapter involves a quick-witted conversation between the two grandmothers of the main character, Mary Grace, who is currently in the hospital. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by…

In Rewrite Radio Episode #55, writer, speaker, and traveler Daniel Taylor discusses the healing power of stories and the way stories make us a different person.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio Episode #54, journalist Emma Green opens up her reporter’s notebook from her time spent living in Jerusalem, looking at the broader themes that animate global religion.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio Episode #53, Luis Alberto Urrea shares his journey as a faithful writer—from a Tijuana garbage dump to Devil’s Highway. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio Episode #52, Eugene Peterson and Scott Hoezee discuss teaching, preaching, and conversation at the 2010 Festival of Faith & Writing.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio Episode #51, National Book Award winner Carlos Eire muses on the ethics of false memory, the power of images, and the story of thousands of children who, like him, were airlifted from Castro's Cuba, without their parents, in the early 1960's.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.…

In Rewrite Radio Episode #50, Jen Hatmaker and Jennifer Holberg discuss the truths that humor conveys, the need for good friends, and the problems facing evangelicals.Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.Oleh Festival of Faith & Writing

In Rewrite Radio Episode #49, writer Lee Smith talks about and reads from her novel Saving Grace. Smith lets us into the stories behind her novels, her experiences with southern churches, and her fascination with all forms of ecstatic religion. Theme music is Modern Attempt by TrackTribe and June 11 by Andrew Starr.…

In Rewrite Radio Episode #48, Walter Wangerin, Jr. begins his Festival talk by comparing hard rain on a roof to the sound of applause and praise, and he says that he found it his job to seek God in the common things and know that the whole earth is filled with God's glory. He also dives into the whole process of writing–from observation to idea to …

In Rewrite Radio Episode #47, CCFW co-director Jennifer Holberg interviews some who have been there since the beginning of Festival: Henry J. Baron, Donald Hettinga, and Gary D. Schmidt. This episode shares the journey of the Festival’s past 30 years–its speakers, triumphs, difficulties–all driven by the idea for a place where writers of faith can …

Episode 46 of Rewrite Radio features a collection of excerpts from our second season of the podcast, curated and edited together by CCFW media producerJon Brown and program coordinator Natalie Rowland. Join us as we journey through past Festival sessions in an exploration of stories as service.Speakers in order of appearance in this episode:Gene Lu…

On this episode of Rewrite Radio, we go back to the first night of Festival 1998 and Nobel-prize-winning writer Elie Wiesel, who offers powerful and prophetic words as applicable today as they were then. The author of over 60 books, Elie Wiesel was born in what is now Romania. At 15, he was deported to Auschwitz. By the time of liberation in 1945, …

Today on Rewrite Radio, we bring you Nikki Grimes, speaking at Festival 2018 about the potential story and poetry have to teach us empathy. Drawing examples from her own work, Grimes talks about the way that words can connect people across time and across cultures.The 2017 recipient of the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award for a “substantial and lasting c…

Today’s episode, a recording from the very first Festival in 1990 and it features Will Campbell. Campbell, a Baptist minister, is perhaps best known for his involvement in the Civil Rights movement, first through the National Council of Churches and then through the Committee of Southern Churchmen, through which he published Katallagete, the New Te…

In this session of Rewrite Radio, we listen back to a conversation with writer Yann Martel from Festival 2008. Interviewed by Otto Selles, a French professor and poet, Martel lets us into the stories behind his stories, the quirks of his freewheeling curiosity, and the ideas at play in his art and mind.Yann Martel is the author of four novels: The …

Marilynne Robinson is the author of four novels: Housekeeping, winner of the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award for the best first novel published in 1980; Gilead, winner of the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for fiction; Home, the winner of the 2009 Orange Prize for Fiction; and, most recently, Lila. Robinson has also written books of non-fiction, including Moth…

On today’s episode of Rewrite Radio: working in the television and movie industry, Abigail Disney and Dorothy Fortenberry are involved in making some of the most significant media today. In this wide-ranging conversation with Jennifer Holberg, co-director of the CCFW, they discuss the ethical imperatives that shape--and should shape--the stories we…

In this episode of Rewrite Radio, we bring you a session from Festival 2004. Listen in as two poets—Li-Young Lee and Nick Samaras—define the “demonization” of lyrical language and explore the meaning of pauses articulate in poems. Along the way, they reminisce about their lives as readers and writers, speaking about their own stories as pilgrimage.…

On this Rewrite Radio: Calvin College chaplain, Mary Hulst--first woman ordained in the Christian Reformed Church in the US--interviews Rabbi Sandy Sasso, the first woman to have been ordained a rabbi in Reconstructionist Judaism. Sasso and Hulst discuss Judaism, feminism, and why children’s books are so significant.Rabbi Sandy Eisenberg Sasso is t…

On this episode of Rewrite Radio: Scott Hoezee, a noted preacher himself and the director of the Center for Excellence in Preaching at Calvin Theological Seminary, conducts a wide-ranging interview with Fleming Rutledge. Fleming Rutledge is an Episcopal priest and writer of nine books, including the award-winning The Crucifixion: Understanding the …

On today’s Rewrite Radio, independent scholar Sarina Gruver Moore talks with author Afaa Michael Weaver about how his journey took him from factory work to a Fulbright and ultimately to a professorship and an established writing career--and the spiritual practices that helped him along the way. Afaa M. Weaver is a poet, short story writer, playwrig…

On today’s episode, a look back to 2004 when the 2018 National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, Jacqueline Woodson, visited the Festival.As we listen back to the 2004 Festival, we hear Jacqueline Woodson consider how her upbringing, including her family’s faith commitments, prepared her for life as a writer, a mother, and a humanitarian. T…

Today’s episode of Rewrite Radio features a conversation between the writers April Ayers Lawson and Jamie Quatro, hosted by Amy Frykholm. Titled “Sex, the Spirit, Short Stories, and South,” this conversation takes up the complicated work of writing about religious experience and sexual experience. It may not be appropriate for all listeners.Jamie Q…

On today’s Rewrite Radio, Kathleen Dean Moore, a philosopher and nature writer, proposes that the art of spiritual nature writing is to explore unfathomable ideas—mystery, astonishment, sanctity, despair—in the plain language of ice and frogs, returning stars, bells, birdsong, and pawprints in snow. The work of the nature writer, Moore argues, is t…

In Rewrite Radio Episode #32, Gary Schmidt discusses the ethical implications of using memories in fiction at the 2006 Festival of Faith & Writing.Gary Schmidt’s novels, though set as far back as 1730, often include moments and scenes from his own past and experience. So how does the writer for middle-grade and young-adult readers adapt his or her …

On today’s episode, Pádraig Ó Tuama and Marie Howe, in a conversation with Micah Lott of Boston College, discuss the political possibilities of poetry: to bear witness, to inspire the moral imagination, and to provide perspective on our neighbors’ lives and the world around us. A poet, theologian, and group worker, Pádraig Ó Tuama is the leader of …

On this episode of Rewrite Radio from Festival 2010, Richard Rodriguez delivers the speech he rewrote after realizing that Festivalgoers really did want him to talk about the complexities of faith and class in his life as a writer. Starting with an Elvis-singing taxi-driver in the Sinai and a Thanksgiving turkey blessed with a Hindu hymn, he unfold…

In Rewrite Radio Episode 29, Anya Silver and several other poets discuss the landscape of joy amidst suffering in their personal and public lives. Joy, distinct from happiness, can be a form of religious practice. They explore questions regarding what cheapens joy, how Christians view joy and how to “balance the scale” of joy and pain in writing.Re…

As an editor, mentor, and friend, Luci Shaw has enjoyed deep creative partnerships with many writers, perhaps none so special as her relationship with the late Madeleine L’Engle. Despite differences, the two animated each other’s work in important ways. They coauthored three books—WinterSong, Friends for the Journey, and A Prayer Book for Spiritual…

Madeleine L’Engle reflects on her life and the “cosmic” questions that have guided her writing. Why do bad things happen? Why do people die? Why? Weaving stories of hurt knees and publisher rejections with the realities of marriage and the deaths of those she loves, L’Engle illuminates her commitment to writing and abiding faith in God. Opening int…

In this episode, Billy Mark, Kwame Alexander and Nate Marshall engage in a conversation about the power of poetry for children and young adults. Because of particular systemic and social issues within the literary communities, it can be difficult for some kids to gain access to the sorts of books they want to read. They suggest poetry, as a form of…

Episode 25 of Rewrite Radio features a collection of excerpts from our first season of the podcast, curated and edited together by our creative director Jon Brown. He’s teased out a conversation between Festival speakers through the years about the power of stories to help us understand and navigate dark times. Jon also joins Festival director Lisa…

Episode 10 of Rewrite Radio features one of the oldest recordings in our Festival archive, Frederick Buechner speaking at our gathering in 1992. Frederick Buechner’s books—fiction, essays, sermons and more—have been translated into 27 languages and he has often been praised for his ability to inspire readers to see the grace in their daily lives. T…

Today’s episode of Rewrite Radio features Katherine Paterson at the 2004 Festival of Faith & Writing. In this talk she discusses how and why she finds meaning in the midst of life’s chaos, the comforts and challenges of art, and also the vital importance of teachers. Katherine Paterson is the author of more than 30 books, including 16 novels for ch…

Episode 5 of Rewrite Radio features Patricia and Alana Raybon on the power of the pen to bridge a deep divide. They talk about writing UNDIVIDED: A MUSLIM DAUGHTER, HER CHRISTIAN MOTHER, THEIR PATH TO PEACE and the truths, troubles, and triumphs of co-authoring when the collaborators are struggling not just to write a book, but to reconcile their d…

Episode 23 of Rewrite Radio features Barbara Brown Taylor at the 2004 Festival of Faith & Writing. In this talk she discusses writing for the ear and the difference between what she calls the language of belief and the language of beholding. Barbara Brown Taylor is a teacher, Episcopal priest, and New York Times best-selling author of books includi…

Episode 6 of Rewrite Radio features George Saunders in an on-stage conversation with Calvin College English professor Lew Klatt at the 2016 Festival of Faith & Writing. A critically acclaimed author of essays, short stories, and now his first novel, LINCOLN IN THE BARDO, Saunders discusses a wide range of topics including the intimacy of storytelli…

Episode 22 of Rewrite Radio features a conversation with Shauna Niequist at the 2016 Festival of Faith & Writing. Shauna was interviewed by Ansley Kelly, a Calvin College senior at the time, and their wide-ranging conversation includes claiming the authority to create, the need writing meets in Shauna’s own life, the writing practices she’s develop…

Today, we have something a little different in store for you. Russian poet, author and activist Irina Ratushinskaya passed away earlier this summer, and as we dug into the Festival archives, we knew we wanted to celebrate her life and work with a special episode. Irina spoke at the 1998 Festival of Faith & Writing ten years after her release from a…