Advertise on podcast: Ye Gods With Scott Carter

Choreographer Jacob Jonas, whose memoir CEMENTED BEAUTY is the intimate documentation of his 2-year battle with stage 4 cancer, told in stark, intimate, black-and-white photos and brutally honest and vulnerable journal entries, dictated to Jacob’s partner, Jill Wilson, who also provides an Afterword. Ana Marie Cox is a political columnist and culture critic. Her writing has appeared in Time Magazine, G.Q., The Guardian, Sports Illustrated, The Washington Post, The Daily Beast and Esquire. She’s currently a contributing editor at The New Republic. She’s also a prolific podcast host. In her weekly podcast, Past Due, she and co-host Open Mike Eagle, chronicle the struggles of creatives in today’s collapsing media landscape. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

George Saunders, often hailed as America’s greatest living short story writer, who's collections include THE TENTH OF DECEMBER and LIBERATION DAY. George discusses his new novel, VIGIL, as well as being raised Catholic in Chicago, growing away from the church and, joining his wife Paula to become a meditator, then an Episcopalian and, currently, practitioners of Buddhism. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Lee Hawkins is a journalist, musician, and author of I Am Nobody's Slave: How Uncovering My Family's History Set Me Free - which has been nominated for the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in the nonfiction category.  A few weeks after sending his book to his publisher, Lee was contacted by the FBI. His DNA indicated that he was a distant cousin to a murdered unidentified woman. Discovering the story of that Jane Doe is the subject of his recent Wall Street Journal Article: What I Owe My Murdered, Nameless Cousin.  Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Comedian and host of the podcast “You Made it Weird” Pete Holmes. Pete starred in the Judd Apatow-produced, HBO dramedy CRASHING, which ran from 2017 to 2019. We discuss his memoir COMEDY SEX GOD, his search for spiritual meaning, and what his religious upbringing means to him now Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tim Gunn, who after many years as a fashion educator at Parsons School for Design was introduced to American televisions as the stern but encouraging mentor to designers on the reality competition show Project Runway. In 2020, he and Runway host Heidi Klum created a new fashion competition show for Amazon called MAKING THE CUT which ran for 3 seasons. Project Runway has since returned screens sans Tim but he continues to appear on TV cameoing on CBS’s Elsbeth, advocating for the Charities he holds dear such as the American Cancer Society, The LGBTQ+ Victory Fund or sometimes just giving his trademark savvy yet gracious opinion on a different kind of art: cooking as guest judge for shows on The Food Network. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hospitality entrepreneur, author, speaker, and host of the Midlife Chrysalis Podcast, Chip Conley. He discusses his time mentoring the founders of Air BnB, why he believes midlife is a great time to develop new skills, and how his Modern Elder Academy teaches people to find purpose, especially in a world of rapid technological change. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A quick look ahead at some of the guest coming up at the beginning of 2026, including Tim Gunn, Chip Conley, Ana Marie Cox, and Larry Wilmore. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David Melville, Managing Director and lead actor of Los Angeles’ Independent Shakespeare Company, is celebrating 20 years of portraying Charles Dickens reading A CHRISTMAS CAROL Stephen Turner reads an original, true, and heartfelt story about a chance encounter that led to an unlikely - and life-changing - friendship in his story, “You Blessed Me, I’ll Bless You.” A perfect holiday offering. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Scott talks with actor, activist, 4-time Grammy-winning rapper, and half of hip-hop supergroup, Run The Jewels, Killer Mike. In the episode, Mike talks about his admiration for - and friendship with - Civil Rights icon and former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Andrew Young, growing up in the all-Black neighborhood of Atlanta’s Collier Heights, and his musical evolution. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Neuroscientist and host of the guided meditation app Waking Up Sam Harris returns to discuss tech’s effect on our psyches. And how the loss of “liminal” spaces may alter us as a culture. Since 2013, Harris has hosted the Making Sense podcast, which produced his 2020 book, Making Sense: Conversations on Consciousness, Morality, and the Future of Humanity. Sam’s 2014 book Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion, inspired his WAKING UP meditation app. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

John Fuglesang is a comedian, actor, Sirius XM host, and author of Separation of Church and Hate: A Sane Person's Guide to Taking Back the Bible from Fundamentalists, Fascists, and Flock-Fleecing Frauds. In 2012, John performed in the Coexist Comedy tour. In 2015, he hosted the PBS documentary Dream On about the many faces of the American Dream, and he’s the longtime host of Sirius XM’s interview show Tell Me Everything. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Susie Essman is best known as the foul-mouthed Susie Greene on HBO’s CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM. For 12 seasons her character berated her show biz manager husband, played by Jeff Garlin, and his client, played by Larry David, in expletive-laden tirades that remain masterclasses in verbally-castrating vulgarity. Actor Armin Shimerman is best known as the iconic Ferengi alien Quark on STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE. But it was a love of classical drama that led him to a career in theatre and, eventually, earned him a place in the science-fiction pantheon. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David French is a New York Times columnist, who has called himself a “Reagan conservative,” a “pro-life classical liberal”, and an independent. In 2020, David published Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation. For The Times, David often writes about “friendship, marriage, parenting” and “the evangelical church". In 2024, the fundamentalist wing of the Presbyterian Church, where David and his family had worshipped for 15 years, cancelled him from appearing on a panel at the Church’s General Assembly to discuss “how to be supportive of your pastor and church leaders in a polarized political year.” Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Scott talks with legendary documentary filmmaker Ken Burns, whose sweeping storytelling has turned history into something deeply human. From "The Civil War" to "Baseball", "Jazz", and "The U.S. and the Holocaust", his work has shaped how we see not just what happened, but who we are.  Raised in a family that valued both curiosity and conscience, Ken describes himself as a spiritual deist. He believes there’s meaning woven into the story, even if we’re still editing the final cut. Ken's films ask quiet but profound questions: What does it mean to be an American, and what stories do we tell to prove it? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Scott talks with author Valarie Kaur, about her book "See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love", her activism, and some historical perspective on the Sikh faith.Valarie’s activism was sparked after the murder of a Sikh family friend in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks. She began to document hate crimes against Sikh and Muslim Americans, out of which came her award-winning 2008 documentary film, Divided We Fall: Americans in the Aftermath. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices