Catholic Women Now

Fertility care practitioner Jamie Rathjen, founder of the Fiat Institute, joins Julie Nelson and Chris Magruder to talk about women's hormone health, natural family planning, and how cycle charting reveals root causes like low progesterone, stress, and thyroid issues. Jamie shares how a sleepless night and the word "fiat" led her to a lifelong mission of helping women say yes to God and to the body He gave them. She also explains "bio-evangelism," with real stories of couples and students drawn toward faith simply by learning how their bodies work.

Julie Nelson and Chris Magruder welcome Christie Walker, the Catholic Sobriety Coach, for an honest conversation about alcohol, shame, and the healing only God can do. Christie shares how she went from believing alcohol was a "magic elixir" in high school to nearly 30 years alcohol-free, and explains the four pillars of her coaching approach: the Catholic faith, neuroscience, inner healing, and identity in Christ. Whether you're sober curious, trying to drink less, or quietly wondering if wine has become a habit loop, this episode offers practical tools and real hope for Catholic women seeking freedom from alcohol.

Julie Nelson turns the microphone on her co-host as Chris Magruder steps into the guest chair to unpack temperance, the cardinal virtue most Catholics misunderstand. Chris explains why temperance is not about giving everything up but about balance and self-mastery — over the tongue, the calendar, the phone, food, spending, exercise and emotions — and shares honest stories of the moments God used to teach her. Listeners get a practical temperance inventory, a priorities framework, an emotional-regulation exercise for children, and simple prayers to stay centered in God's will.

Julie Nelson and Chris Magruder welcome Fr. Luke Doyle, chaplain and director of the St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas and author of the new Ascension book Priest in the Wild: Stories of Meeting God in the Everyday. Fr. Luke unpacks why holiness is found in ordinary moments, the difference between being childlike and being childish, and why love always plays offense instead of defense. He also shares how Our Lady crushes our fears, how celibacy opened him to a greater spiritual fatherhood, and how Christ the Lion of Judah offers us His "lion strength" through the sacraments.

Julie Nelson and Chris Magruder walk through more than 20 practical, faith-rooted ways to love your husband and renew your marriage, drawn from Kim Schadt's popular list on Catholic-Link. From daily prayer and hidden acts of service to physical intimacy and asking forgiveness, this episode offers real, doable habits for building a stronger Catholic marriage. Julie and Chris also share personal stories from their own marriages and explain why investing in your husband is really an investment in your own holiness.