A Podcast Recommendation: Catching Foxes
Ok, here’s the thing. I can’t actually recommend this podcast. Or at least not with any promises attached to it. Catching Foxes is one hundred percent one of my favorite podcasts of all time, but the very reason that it’s one of my favorite podcasts is, at the same time, why it’s difficult for me to recommend to a lot of people. What is that reason? It comes down to this: Imagine you’re back in college and imagine that you and your roommates make time every Friday night to sit around and just talk. There may or may not be a specific topic you wish to discuss together; you’re probably having a drink; sometimes your conversation partners are going to say completely unintelligible things; other times someone is going to get incredibly emotional; and still other times people could get upset with one another. However messy and sloppy this process is, it’s in these kinds of conversations that life gets digested. This is where we come to understand profound things through mundane interactions. Catching Foxes is just like this. It is, quite simply, a conversation that takes place every week between two college friends just like the ones we had in college. And that’s why it’s hard for me to recommend. Just like I can’t say that you would have absolutely loved all the conversations my friends and I had during our college years, I can’t promise that you will love Catching Foxes.
Not completely turned off yet? Ok, here are a few more basics: Luke Carey and Michael (Gomer) Gormerly both went to Fransiscan University at Steubenville. They’re both in their mid to late thirties, have kids, are married, and are passionate Catholics. Their two taglines: “Conversations about faith intersecting with culture” and “Discussion over instruction”. They talk about a whole range of things: being a Catholic Christian in the twenty-first century, family life, sex life, theology, movies, books, other podcasts, Church politics, friendship, the power of Christ in their lives, and generally how to make the world a better place. There’s no format, they don’t stick to any kind of script or time limit (usually the podcast is under two hours), and they happily take detours and get off on long tangents frequently. Sometimes you can tell that one or both of them have probably enjoyed their drink a little too much by the end of the show.
The sloppiness, the crassness, the utter lack of a filter, these only make the podcast all the more endearing to me, because this is exactly what a real conversation is like with real friends as you try to grapple with life’s complexities and figure out how to apply ideas to reality. Now, I have to admit that these things seriously turned me off to Catching Foxes when I began listening to it about a year ago. A good friend recommended it to me, and I felt the need to give it a try. I did, and I must admit, I was completely repulsed. I dropped it and didn’t listen to it again for several more months. After hearing them interviewed on another show I listen to regularly, I started to listen to the show intermittently. This was usually when I was bored and had listened to all of my other podcasts. After listening to four or five full episodes, a switch was flipped. I was able to listen to these two fellows with the familiarity and affection that one has towards friends. They were no longer professional podcasters in my mind, they were just Luke and Gomer, shooting the breeze, being goofy, and probably talking about something I found interesting too.
So if you’re looking for a new podcast to try out, and have the patience to listen to at least three full episodes of Catching Foxes -- give it a try! You might enjoy it! And if you don’t, go have great conversations of the style you most enjoy, with people you like, and you will have achieved what this podcast is aiming at. I recommend you listen to at least three episodes because it will probably take you some time to get warmed up to it. Just like getting to know a new person, there are quirks and eccentricities that come with this show. It is not your neat, tidy, 35-minute podcast. You will probably get lost with Gomer’s ramblings and have trouble with Luke’s stutter. But it’s precisely this humane dimension of Catching Foxes that recommends it.