Catholic Media Suggestions

[DiscerningTheTruth]

Does anyone have any recommendations for good Catholic documentaries, movies, etc? I want to add some solid Catholic content to my homeschool while our family is in the process of converting. Any topic (Saints, Church history, Bible history, Theology) would be welcome. We have children between the ages of 4 and 14 but are also open to strictly adult-oriented selections as well. Thank you!

 

[Magnanimity]

Does anyone have any recommendations for good Catholic documentaries, movies, etc?

Word on Fire has produced a lot of this material, and everything I’ve seen has been top-notch. Great content, excellent production quality, etc (eg, the Catholicism series).

 

[SJstl]

movies

The Song of Bernadette - historical but enjoyable
The Bells of St. Mary’s - fiction but fun to watch

 

[Tommy999]

Boys Town (or Boystown) is an oldie but goodie. It stars Spencer Tracy and Mickey Rooney. I am not Catholic but got a good feeling from it towards Catholics, especially Father Flanagan.

EWTN TV might be a good choice for some documentaries. I saw one once pertaining to some Catholic martyr priests who were killed in Canada while bringing Christianity to the Indians in Ontario. A little dry but very informative.

 

[Dominic8603]

 

[Thom18]

If you go on Formed, there’s a lot of good stuff there. Shows like Brother Francis for kids, and movies like Bakhita for adults (this movie, and many others, are about 3 hours long- I don’t know that a child has that attention span). There’s also various documentaries and apologetic material available.

 

[Joe_5859]

In addition to the media outlets already mentioned above, I will add that Ignatius Press, the Augustine Institute, Dynamic Catholic, and Ascension Press all produce pretty solid Catholic videos on a variety of topics and for a variety of age groups.

In general: Ignatius Press has many movies about the saints and some documentaries. Augustine Institute has many multi-part faith formation studies and some youth-oriented offerings. Dynamic Catholic has several sacramental prep programs (for free!) that are geared towards younger folks. And Ascension Press has loads of Catholic Bible studies.

As Thom18 said, Formed.org is a good place to go to get some of everything. They are run by the Augustine Institute and include most of their offerings and a lot of Ignatius Press materials as well. Many parishes have a subscription so that all of their parishioners (i.e. everyone in their geographic boundaries—including non-Catholics) can access the materials. Think of it as a sort of “Catholic Netflix”. So you might check if any of the parishes in your area have such a subscription.

Bishop Barron’s “Word on Fire” has a lot of YouTube videos. Ascension Press also hosts “Ascension Presents” with Fr. Mike Schmitz on YouTube. EWTN has a lot of their videos on their website and YouTube, too. So those would be where I’d start as you can view videos for free and right away.

 

[1ke]

If your parish has FORMED the content on there is awesome. You can log in and watch whatever you want. You can also add it to your Roku, Apple TV, Kindle Fire, Xbox, or Chromecase. You can also download the iPhone or Android app.

If your parish isn’t a subscriber, they have individual plans just like Netflix.