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Everything Happens with Kate Bowler

Naming the Silences with Miriam Toews

Everything Happens with Kate Bowler

Everything Happens Studios

Health & Fitness, Religion & Spirituality, Society & Culture

4.84.7K Ratings

🗓️ 21 October 2025

⏱️ 48 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

When someone you love is in pain—but can’t say the words out loud—what can you do? Kate speaks with beloved Canadian novelist Miriam Toews (All My Puny Sorrows, Women Talking, A Truce That Is Not Peace) about the silences that shape us: the kind that settle into families, into churches, into whole communities where mental illness is unnamed and suffering goes unspoken.

Together, they talk about the long shadow of religious shame, the courage it takes to tell the truth, and what it means to stay present with people we can’t fix. This conversation is tender, fierce, and unflinchingly honest.

This episode includes discussion of suicide at the beginning and end of the episode. If you're struggling, you can call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.


SHOW NOTES:

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Transcript

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0:00.0

This episode is brought to you by Primrose Schools. Who children become is as important as what they know.

0:07.3

That belief is at the heart the Primrose School's balanced learning approach, which weaves character

0:11.8

development into lessons every day. Balance learning goes beyond academics to nurture traits that

0:17.4

help children learn what it means to be a good friend, how to show respect for others,

0:22.0

why it's important to keep promises and more, all in a warm environment filled with loving teachers.

0:28.0

You know I love a space where kindness isn't a bonus, it's baked in, where little people are

0:32.7

learning to be brave and gentle and silly and strong, where they aren't just filling their brains,

0:37.3

but growing their

0:37.8

hearts. It makes me want to go back to preschool. A little snack time wouldn't hurt either.

0:43.1

From infant to age five, Primrose Schools is the leader in early education and care. Learn more

0:49.3

at Primrose Schools.com. This episode is brought to you by No Small Endeavor. These days, our culture is marked by

0:56.4

political unrest, polarization, and anxiety. Beauty and art feel like a luxury, or even a

1:02.2

distraction. But what if art, beauty, and poetry are exactly what we need to face the crisis at hand?

1:08.9

Can poetry help us protest, pray, lament, and even hope?

1:13.3

On a special series from the No Small Endeavor podcast, host Lee Seacamp invites us all to pursue

1:18.9

goodness and light in spite of the darkness that seems to descend around us.

1:23.6

You'll hear from poets like Joy Harjo, former U.S. Poet Laureate, Halea Liza Gafori, a poet musician and acclaimed

1:31.2

translator of the Persian poet Broomie, and Padre Gautuma, poet Theologian, and host of Poetry Unbound.

1:39.3

Their conversations evoke thoughtfulness about how to fight for beauty in the current culture

1:43.8

and how to make it through the fires of our time together.

1:47.5

Listen to no small endeavor wherever you get your podcasts.

1:51.5

There are things you can say out loud, and then there's all the things you can't.

...

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