Logo for The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber

The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber

The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber

Forget the selfies and social media updates of everyone at their best, three-time New York Times best-selling author Nadia Bolz-Weber’s new podcast, The Confessional, invites guests to share stories about times they were at their worst. Guests talk honestly about what led to that moment, what they learned from it, and how they changed as a result. A former stand-up comic and a recovering alcoholic, Bolz-Weber is a Lutheran Pastor and the founder of House for All Sinners and Saints, in Denver, Colorado.

Everyone needs grace and healing, no matter your beliefs. Step into The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber - a carwash for people’s shame and secrets.

Forget the selfies and social media updates of everyone at their best, three-time New York Times best-selling author Nadia Bolz-Weber’s new podcast, The Confessional, invites guests to share stories about times they were at their worst. Guests talk honestly about what led to that moment, what they learned from it, and how they changed as a result. A former stand-up comic and a recovering alcoholic, Bolz-Weber is a Lutheran Pastor and the founder of House for All Sinners and Saints, in Denver, Colorado.

Everyone needs grace and healing, no matter your beliefs. Step into The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber - a carwash for people’s shame and secrets.

12hr 26min
Thumbnail for "The Confessional Trailer".
The first season of The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber will drop weekly starting April 21.
April 14, 20202min 35sec
Thumbnail for "Meg Lavery, Storyteller and Teacher".
“I knew that I had to do something, I was going to have to let him know, but I didn't let him know. I became paralyzed with fear of telling him.”
May 19, 202130min 18sec
Thumbnail for "Crushed Episode 1: The Feel-Good Story".
Sportswriter Joan Niesen explores the complicated history of baseball and its heroes.
May 12, 202139min 25sec
Thumbnail for "Rev. Jeff Grant, Minister and Co-Founder of Progressive Prison Ministries".
"I was dressed up looking the part, but deep inside, I was just vacant. I just was not someone I was proud of anymore."
May 5, 202132min 30sec
Thumbnail for "Wilhelm Verwoerd, Researcher and Facilitator".
“We would also be very conscious of preaching anti-communism because people were saying that the African National Congress, you know, former President Mandela's political party, they were really not liberation fighters, they were terrorists.”
April 28, 202130min 38sec
Thumbnail for "Nadia Bolz-Weber: "Panic on the Road to Jericho"".
“I spent the entire time praying, and cursing, and praying and cursing.”
April 21, 202118min 22sec
Thumbnail for "Elizabeth Lesser, Co-Founder of Omega Institute".
"And that was the moment ... where I was like, 'Girl, you can be a good mother and a happy, embodied woman, but you can't be a good mother and a liar.'"
April 14, 202126min 16sec
Thumbnail for "Dr. Ray Christian, Storyteller and Fulbright Specialist".
"I got the super squad, the dirty dozen. Nobody needs to know what's going on here; I'm handling everything."
April 7, 202128min 21sec
Thumbnail for "Joshua Harris, Storyteller and Author of "I Kissed Dating Goodbye"".
"There is always going to be another person coming along with a book or a conference to sell that is going to tap into that (fear) and say, 'You're right, you're not doing enough. Let me show you how you can do more.'”
March 31, 202135min 44sec
Thumbnail for "Claire Bidwell Smith, Grief Therapist and Author".
“I just remember the feeling of having his arms around me, and I just felt so sickened that I had chosen this instead of my mother.”
March 24, 202124min 41sec
Thumbnail for "Sarah Edmondson, Actor and Former Member of NXIVM".
“I essentially told her to override that very important internal compass called your gut instinct... and I wonder where she'd be now if she'd just stayed in Vancouver and not done ESP."
March 17, 202129min 14sec
Thumbnail for "Maria Hinojosa, Journalist".
“You know, it comes down to a human error, but one of massive proportions because you're dealing with humanity and people's lives.”
September 22, 202035min 34sec
Thumbnail for "Amber J. Phillips, Storyteller and Reproductive Justice Activist".
“My attachment to success prevented me from doing the one thing that I value the most in my life, which is showing up for other black women.”
September 15, 202031min 2sec
Thumbnail for "Jonathan Williams, Writer and Pastor".
“So what I ended up doing was being an incredible dick to my father. That's what I ended up doing.”
September 8, 202027min 20sec
Thumbnail for "Joel Leon, Storyteller".
“But like being a father, I have to excel at that because a lot of people were expecting me not to.”
September 1, 202025min 48sec
Thumbnail for "Kasey Anderson, Singer/Songwriter".
“I truly believed that we had gotten Bruce Springsteen to commit to this benefit compilation. And so when I went to present that to the group, I went back through my emails and there was no such communication.”
August 25, 202030min 8sec
Thumbnail for "Abby Wambach, Soccer Star".
“I didn't feel like, oh, I need to call my lawyer or anything like that. I felt like I was totally with it. And then I did the breathalyzer and I can't remember exactly what number I blew, but it was like, I think, two times the legal limit. And I thought, this machine is broken.” 
August 18, 202026min 43sec
Thumbnail for "Darin Strauss, Writer".
“And then all the emotions sort of flowed and I started crying in a way I don't think I have since or probably didn't before. I was just sort of heaving and then I thought, wow, this is going to ruin me. This is the end of my life. You know?”
August 11, 202027min 27sec
Thumbnail for "Wilhelm Verwoerd, Researcher and Facilitator".
“We would also be very conscious of preaching anti-communism because people were saying that the African National Congress, you know, former President Mandela's political party, they were really not liberation fighters, they were terrorists.”
August 4, 202030min
Thumbnail for "Forgiveness and Reconciliation with Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg".
“So it's not necessarily an overnight thing. And the only person, the only person or people who get to decide if a person should be forgiven, are the ones harmed.”
July 21, 202021min 5sec
Thumbnail for "Melissa Febos, Memoirist".
“You know, it was like very hot - with that particular hotness of a terrible, terrible thing driven by desperation beyond the immediate situation.”
June 9, 202025min 4sec
Thumbnail for "Mishka Shubaly, Singer/Songwriter".
“I held Nate's face as far away from me as I could so that he couldn't hit me. And then with my right hand I tried to destroy him”
June 2, 202025min 11sec
Thumbnail for "Amy Brenneman, Movie Star".
“I just was super hungry sexually. I was super out there. I just didn't want to be the victim. You know, I wanted to run the show. And I did.”
May 26, 202018min 24sec
Thumbnail for "R Eric Thomas, Columnist at Elle.com".
"So I just googled, 'how to tell if your boyfriend is a Satan worshiper.'"
May 19, 202025min 46sec
Thumbnail for "Theresa Thames, Dean of the Chapel at Princeton University".
“On the playground, people would be singing this song, Yo Mama's on Crack Rock. … And I love that song because I love chanting it and everything. And I also loathe that song because it was my truth. I grew up in the height of crack cocaine in poverty, and my mother was on crack rock.”
May 12, 202021min 1sec
Thumbnail for "Chris Schuhmacher, Software Developer".
“I came into software development relatively late in life. You know, I'm in my mid 40s and my training actually started in 2014 inside the walls of San Quentin.”
May 5, 202023min 42sec
Thumbnail for "Lenny Duncan, Lutheran Pastor".
“I run into someone in Boulder, and they're like you want to do some speed? And I was like, 'hell, yeah.' And I do some speed, and I just fall off the map.... I didn't see my daughter for 13 years after that.”
April 28, 202026min 51sec
Thumbnail for "Megan Phelps-Roper, Former Member of Westboro Baptist Church".
"Everybody around me, my family, the church members, we'd be celebrating and making plans to go and protest the funerals. And, you know, at the same time on Twitter, I'm seeing people mournful and grieving.”
April 21, 202026min 22sec

The Confessional Trailer

Thumbnail for "The Confessional Trailer".
April 14, 20202min 35sec

The first season of The Confessional with Nadia Bolz-Weber will drop weekly starting April 21.

Do you have something you’re not proud of that you’d like to confess? Leave a voicemail at 618-CONFESS, that’s 618-266-3377, and we may play it on an upcoming episode.