Lino Rulli, the Catholic Guy, Talks of Life, Faith and His New Book - Sinner

Rulli's new book, Sinner, can encourage many who want to become Saints.

Lino Rulli, host of The Catholic Guy on SiriusXM Radio, wrote a book with an intriguing name - "Sinner." The book is not a showcase for sin but a support system for ordinary Catholics to encourage them in a life of faith in our extraordinary God. Though humorous, Lino is also a man deeply serious about his Catholic faith. The book touches people where they live and encourages them to take their faith seriously.

WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - Lino Rulli believes that if he can live the Christian life there's hope for everyone. The daily host of The Catholic Guy on SiriusXM Satellite Radio, Lino wrote a book to encourage people just like him - ordinary people - to keep going.

Raised in the Catholic Church in the heartland of the upper Midwest, his life was anything but saintly. He was, as he says without hesitation, a sinner, but a sinner who was in search of God's grace. With grace working in his life, he knew his faith can grow and, building on small personal victories, his spiritual life would deepen in devotion.

Lino's new book, "Sinner, The Catholic Guy's Funny, Feeble Attempts to Be a Faithful Catholic," is not a biography. Like album of snapshots, he presents snippets of his life that reveal something about a sinner who knows he needs God's grace to grow in his faith. This handful of stories will help the reader get to know Lino Rulli just a little better.

"I probably started with a hundred stories," Lino said in a recent interview. "I think that one of the most important things that I did was say to myself, 'Who do I want to have read this book?'

"I'll get myself in trouble here. so why not start right off the bat. I don't care if some priest or archbishop or cardinal reads it. I wrote it for someone like myself, or more importantly, someone like myself before I started working in Catholic Media, in other words, just a regular person.

"I picked stories where I thought people would say, 'Oh, that's funny! Oh, that's relatable. I get that.'"

Lino writes about his life, as a "single desperately lonely human being."

"I wanted to talk about my insecurities, the things that led me to be the person I am today, in terms of not just faith, but in terms of my absolute desire to be liked. to be needed. to be wanted. The only way you can find out those things about me is to find out about some of those whacky stories about me in the past."

As you meander through his life, you'll read that, as a boy, his father wanted to be an organ grinder. Guess who had to substitute for the monkey?

You'll also learn about his dream to visit to see David Letterman tape his show, adventures in the confessional, temptation in Thailand, living in the Bahamas, working in media and much much more.

Perhaps the most controversial story involved his visit Thailand, where he was encouraged to get a prostitute and learned what it is like to experience victory over temptation.

We talked about the fact that this story puts the spotlight on the darker side of humanity and the temptations many people face.

"Maybe it's not prostitution for somebody," Lino commented, "maybe it's something else. I'm hoping someone who reads this might say, 'I'm not the only person out there who's been tempted in Thailand. or Las Vegas. or wherever. But it's a story about victory over temptation."

Written in a very honest and transparent style, he never gives you a hint at how things will turn out at the end of a chapter. You just hold on and wait for the surprise.

"There are things I didn't understand at the time but make sense now. I think it's important for everybody to look back and say, 'Now, where was God in this?'"

While Lino does a show called "The Catholic Guy," his website is entitled "Lino Rulli - A Man With a Big Nose." When you talk with him, however, you don't think about physical characteristics; however big his nose might be, his joy and enthusiasm for life as a Catholic is much bigger.

I had to confess to him I had to make one major adjustment in my thinking as I began his book. He seems so "New York," when, in fact, he grew up in Minnesota.

He laughed and said, "There's something that comes from being in what people call 'fly-over land.' I'm the regular person , I get it. I'm the guy from the Midwest. I know what it is to grow up in an average middle-income family, to have those values and roots of the Midwest.

"I approach my Catholicism the same way. I could sit here and talk about the inside things going on in the church - what about this cardinal moving, what about this bishop, what about that decision?

"It's important for me to keep those roots about where normal people are from and take an average Catholic look at life without getting swept up in the 'inside baseball' of the Church.

"For me its about I know what I want to do and I know what I should do; now, let's see what happens."

Without trying to give away too much of the book, one chapter that really sticks out deals pants - not the pants themselves but how he would just leave them around the house. By the end of the story, his pants ended up where they were supposed to be - a small victory we talked about.

"The fact that I can come home and put them away properly means I can change. Just like everything in life, you start small then ... you build up. There are victories in life and, no matter how small they are, we need to look at them and say that I can make a change in my life in the small things. Maybe God can help make the bigger changes."

Lino is a larger than life personality who fills a room the moment he enters. He is honest in his communication, whether in person or on the radio. I asked him about the writing project and how people around him responded when he mentioned he was going to do it.

"A lot of people were afraid I was going to write a crazy book glamorizing sin. I was very conscious this whole time - Am I writing a book that says 'go out, get drunk, have fun, do what you want and then later just go to confession?' No! I concerned for my soul, too, and certainly don't want to mess around with anyone else's."

Always ready to make you laugh, he is also a man deeply serious about his faith. He wants the book to have entertainment value, but, even more, that it really touches people where they live and encourage them to take their faith seriously.

We also talked about whether there would be "Sinner, Part II," coming out and whether he would do more in this medium.

"Yes, I am. I enjoyed the process of writing. especially (being) in radio where it's so fleeting. You go do your three hours and then it goes away, you know; never to be heard from again. I like doing something that can be a little more tangible and a little more concrete.

"I've been really lucky to have a couple of publishers approach me with some ideas. I don't know what I want yet and I certainly don't know what people want. I learning toward doing a second version of sinner.

"I really did pray about this for a very long time - should I write a book? So I did it. Whatever happens next I have to re-start that prayer and re-discern all these things.

"I respect other media forms and I know what it takes to be a good writer - and I don't know if I am or not - but I know what it takes for me to become a halfway decent writer, so I can't crank out another book in two months. It's gonna be awhile and I have to make the decisions.

"I really do enjoy how much people loved the book, so I'm in the business of saying, 'All right, if I can bring some sort of peace and happiness in people's lives and encouragement to Catholicism along the way; yeah, I'd better start writing."

Lino has an ability of bringing unique worlds together. He has friends like Gary Dell'Abate, the executive producer of the Howard Stern Show and others who are deeply involved in the work of the church. He knows that the only way those who walk in the one world to honestly experience the Lord is through real Catholics - honest and open Christians - connecting with them.

"For me, one of the proudest things that happened was that the two endorsements on the back of the book are from the guy in charge of the Howard Stern Show and the guy who is in charge of the bishops in the United States.

"It's important to me that guys like Gary, who I really like - I think he's just an excellent human being - and I know a lot of Catholics who can't stand him because he's associated with the (Howard) Stern Show, and maybe that's what's turning him off to religion. If a guy like Gary and (Archbishop) Dolan get together they would have nothing but fun. If I can be the bridge that brings what other people would think are two completely different worlds together I'm all for it."
Catholic Online

"Sinner," by Lino Rulli, is published by Servant Books from St. Anthony Messenger Press.

Bless this gutter! The "Catholic Guy", Lino Rulli, is back

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I was awarded a medal the other day for admitting that I had never watched Oprah. I just lost the opportunity to get one for never having read "C.J." in the Strib. She has an article on Lino Rulli, St. Paul's and St. Olaf's contribution to Catholic young folks, who will be broadcasting his Sirius radio program from here three days this week.

A Minneapolis bowling alley, Memory Lanes, is naming a gutter after Lino Rulli, Sirius XM Radio's "The Catholic Guy."

That says it all. The hip religion show host is returning to St. Paul, where he'll broadcast his normally New York City-based Sirius Catholic Channel radio show for three days this week. The residence of Angelo and Gina Rulli, Lino's parents, is serving as the broadcasting site for the show airing from 3 to 6 p.m.

Those without Sirius XM probably lost track of Rulli when he moved to NYC in 2006, taking with him two Emmys for his work on the cable-access show "Generation Cross," a behind-the-scenes look at the Catholic Church and its people, and a travelogue when Lino felt like going to Rome. He also did a stint as "Soul Man" on WCCO-TV, where he won an Emmy for a World War II documentary.

Maureen McMurray, producer of his XM show, said they wanted the bowling alley gutter named for Rulli as a joke: "We thought it would be kind of funny. We were just basically going for the most ridiculous things to see if people would actually agree to do it. We thought people would say no, and people in Minnesota are just so polite."

Speaking of ridiculous, Rulli's also receiving the key to the Cathedral of St. Paul, as if they would allow this man about town anywhere near a key that was anything but purely ceremonial. In other more believable honors coming Rulli's way, Kieran's Pub is naming a restroom stall for him; Tom Reid's Hockey City Pub a drink, and Stella's Fish Cafe a lobster that will then be sacrificed for dinner by members of Lino's crew.

That's the other unusual element of Rulli's return: Lino's GOT PEOPLE! Important people, too. When Rulli lived in the Twin Cities, he contacted me himself for publicity. Now, Joseph Zwilling, GM and director of communications for the Archdiocese of New York, manages Rulli's media contacts.

I told Zwilling that despite the single Catholic guy's active romantic life, I've always thought he was fighting a call to the priesthood.

"You know, some people are working on him," said Zwilling.

Lino on the line

After getting my voice mail about how he'd gone big time on me, Lino Rulli did call me.

He didn't realize the GM of the station had reached out to me. I told Rulli that there must have been something divine about Joseph Zwilling's e-mail. The reference to "Lino" in the first sentence meant nothing to me except Lino Lakes, and I was this close to deleting it without reading more, thinking that there was a huge mixup if I was on the "Archdiocese of New York" e-mail list. Star Tribune

Lino Lives! On Television!

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Lino Rulli, local boy, well, there aren't too many locals with a name like that, so let's just call him a "former Twin Cities resident. Lino won a regional Emmy Award for his work on his cable TV program, Generation Cross, from St. Olaf parish in Minneapolis from 1998-2004. Since then, he has been "That Catholic Guy" with a program on Sirius Radio, coming from New York City someplace.

Tonight, he is on television, live, in the Big Apple. Well, not conventional television. Tonight, a few minutes ago, a program called "Currents" premiered on "The Net" (New Evangelization Television) on the Diocese of Brooklyn's cable television channel. 6:30 p.m. CDT It is the first daily Catholic television news program. It should be viewable on your newer computers.

Guess which one is Lino!

Heading The Net is Deacon Greg Kandra, a former long time CBS Television News executive who has receive more reknown with his blog, "The Deacon's Bench" in the last couple of years. Check it out.

It's our very own, Emmy Award Winning Lino "Unrulli", Live from New York, the Catholic Guy

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Lino Rulli, formerly host of the Emmy award winning (regional) "Generation X" cable TV show in Minneapolis, sponsored by St. Olaf parish, has hit the big time on Sirius Satellite Radio in New York City. Even the New York Times is paying attention. See other Stella Borealis posts on Lino HERE.

Mike from El Paso was on the phone line to “The Catholic Guy,” the afternoon drive-time talk program produced via the unlikely partnership of Sirius Satellite Radio (familiar to most people as “Howard Stern’s network”) and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York.

“I called the other day?” said Mike. “About how much I miss confession?” This would be the Mike who was barred from the sacrament of confession under church law because he married a divorced woman whose first marriage was never annulled.

“Yes, I remember!” bellowed the host, Lino Rulli, the Catholic guy of the show’s title. “Mike the Adulterer! O.K., Mike. Are you ready to play ‘Let’s Make a Catholic Deal’?”

It seems an odd marriage of sensibilities: the rough banter of talk radio as practiced by pioneer shock jocks like Mr. Stern and Don Imus, joined at the neck to an official Catholic broadcast whose underlying mission is herding people back into the fold of a religious orthodoxy.

But the stated mission of this new enterprise known as the Catholic Channel is to offer something more than “the audio equivalent of stained glass and incense,” as Joseph Zwilling, a spokesman for the archdiocese, refers to conventional religious radio.

Since taking to the air 18 months ago — with an understanding that there would be no promotional spots for Mr. Stern’s show on any of its programs — the channel has harnessed Sirius, a subscription-only radio network made possible largely by the immense drawing power of Mr. Stern’s profane and pornography-friendly programming, to help propagate a 2,000-year-old institution that preaches against more or less every bodily impulse Mr. Stern has ever named, demonstrated or otherwise celebrated on his show.

Today, in studios down the hall from Mr. Stern’s in Sirius’s Midtown Manhattan headquarters — where Sirius generates a gigantic menu of radio catering to dozens of niche tastes including sports, gay politics, hip-hop and Martha Stewart — the Catholic Channel, No. 159 on the dial, produces a 24-hour stream of radio that reaches most of North America. The Catholic programming runs the gamut from offerings of the stained-glass kind, like Sunday Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and a weekly interview with Cardinal Edward M. Egan, to the offbeat musings of “The Catholic Guy,” which runs five days a week in the showcase 4-to-7 p.m. slot.

Mr. Rulli’s show can sometimes sound like catechism class (“What is the sixth Station of the Cross? Anybody?”) but more often achieves the queasy unpredictability of the Stern show itself — if Mr. Stern were an avowedly guilt-ridden, confession-going 36-year-old prone to sexual double-entendres and self-mocking complaints about not being able to find a girlfriend.

The mix, perhaps risky for the church, is aimed not only at Catholics who attend church but also at a large and growing segment of 20- and 30-something Catholics who do not, said Mr. Zwilling, who as the general manager of the channel hired Mr. Rulli.

Sounding a little like Mr. Stern is exactly the point.

“If someone who listens to Howard Stern happens to turn to the Catholic Channel one day and doesn’t realize for a couple of minutes that what he’s listening to is the Catholic Channel, well, I’m not going to be upset about that,” Mr. Zwilling said. “We recognize that Catholics are listening to Howard Stern. What we want people to know is that they can talk about all the same things he does, but in a Catholic context.”

When Mike the Adulterer called the other day to try winning the day’s “semi-valuable prize” — a bottle opener soldered to a medal of Pope John Paul II, the “Let’s Make a Catholic Deal” question was about St. Teresa of Avila.

At other times, callers are asked less historical questions: Is it possible for men and women to be just friends? (Catholic Guy: No. “Guys are pigs.”) Does using the word “chaste” put people off? (Guy: “Chaste just sounds so Amish-Catholic. Why not just say, ‘I’m going to remain a virgin till I get married’?”)

Mike did not win and was unceremoniously dispatched with a loud buzzer, followed by a suggestion by Mr. Rulli that he “get that annulment” as soon as possible, “even if it’s a big pain.”

The breezy informality sometimes references, and tweaks, Catholic bromides. When a caller complained that he had not received the prize he won playing another of the show’s games, “The Inquizition,” the Catholic Guy counseled the man to forget about it. “That was past,” he said. “Look to the future. God has a plan for your life.”

Almost nothing about religious broadcasting is new. Christian radio is as old as radio itself, and the Vatican has produced a vast network of radio and TV programming since the 1950s.

Still, not many radio hosts use the Imus/Stern model — with on-air sidekicks, comic sound effects and the ad-libbing host who trades in the provocative — while hewing to a message of virginity until marriage and the unquestionable authority of the Catholic Magisterium.

“I have to be careful in areas that Howard doesn’t,” Mr. Rulli deadpanned in an interview.

David Gibson, a Catholic writer whose book “The Coming Catholic Church” describes a newly powerful grass-roots pressure for reform in the aftermath of the priest sexual abuse scandal, said the archdiocesan foray into talk radio may reflect some official acknowledgment of the need for a new, more interactive relationship with believers.

“The church really has no choice,” he said. “The old Catholic world, where you were born and married in the church and stayed because you were part of a ‘Catholic world’ — that’s gone. The church has to find people and make them want to be Catholic.”

Young people are the major target of several efforts, official and otherwise. “Theology on Tap,” an informal project adopted in hundreds of parishes around the country, attracts young Catholics to lectures booked in bars or restaurants.

The Order of Paulist Fathers has started an initiative aimed at people in their 20s and 30s with an Internet ministry known as Busted Halo, whose mission is basically in sync with a recent series of youth-market books called “The Bad Catholic’s Guide to...” In the introduction to their first book, “The Bad Catholic’s Guide to Good Living,” John Zmirak and Denise Matychowiak summarize the creed: Believe in Catholicism, do what you can, admit that you are flawed “and turn to the font of infinite mercy as humbly and as often as you can.”

The Rev. Dave Dwyer, the Paulist priest behind the Busted Halo project, is the host of a program of that name on the Catholic Channel. It is cheerful but less quirky than “The Catholic Guy,” more likely to attract callers with questions about the faith.

“The people we want to reach say they are ‘spiritual’ rather than Catholic, though they refer to themselves as ‘born Catholic,’ ” he said. “We try to get them thinking about what it means to be Catholic.”

In the religion press and blogs, Mr. Rulli’s “Catholic Guy” show has been described affectionately, if somewhat datedly, as the “Wayne’s World” of the Catholic Church. The St. Anthony Messenger, a magazine of the Franciscan order, said Mr. Rulli was “something of a contradiction” for being so well-schooled in Catholic theology, yet capable of a kind of biting wit that, the writer surmised, had most likely “gotten him into trouble just as often as it’s gotten him out of it.”

He has not gotten into trouble on the air yet, though his occasional bouts of testiness have been the talk of fan blogs, one of which urged listeners to “pray for Lino to grow up” after he walked off in midshow one day last month because not enough people were calling in.

His on-air persona is more often funny-pedagogical — reflecting the master’s degree in theology he earned at St. John’s University in Minnesota, when he was considering entering the priesthood. (He later hosted a cable television show in Minneapolis, “Generation X,” which won an Emmy Award for its offbeat reporting about the lives of priests and nuns, and which led in 2006 to his current job.)

He quizzes his producer and engineer about the lives of the saints — “Which one did they flay alive, again?” — and mocks them like the dean of discipline if they do not know the answer. He talks about the old girlfriend he should have married but spurned, bitterly disparaging her for marrying someone else; but then he turns the story into a lesson in Catholicism: “My mistake was in not asking for God’s guidance.” If he had, he might have married her, he says.

He decides to be tattooed with the crest of Pope John Paul II, and asks listeners to suggest “where on my body I should put it.”

A woman calls to say that she has a tattoo.

“Oh? Where is your tattoo?”

“It’s in the cleavage area.”

“Sorry, what? You’re breaking up. Gotta go.”

If any of this has annoyed the boss, Mr. Zwilling, or the boss’s boss, Cardinal Egan, who refers to Mr. Rulli as “Lino Unruly,” they do not show it.

“If we are to succeed in reaching people, especially people who might not otherwise listen to Catholic religious radio, we have to be different, and we have to be appealing,” Mr. Zwilling said.

Just how appealing Mr. Rulli may be is unclear; Sirius says it does not compile ratings for any of its channels or programs. In answer to questions about Mr. Rulli’s salary, which the host refers to on air not infrequently (“I need a raise!”), Mr. Zwilling said all of the Catholic Channel’s expenses, including salaries, were reimbursed by Sirius.

On a recent show, Mr. Rulli declared that America was in moral decline. “And the proof of the moral decline,” he added, “is that people are choosing to watch Leno over Letterman.”

David Letterman is one of his three role models, he said.

The other two are John Paul II and “the only genius in radio,” Howard Stern.

Audio excerpts from the Catholic Channel on Sirius Satellite Radio, ranging from the freewheeling talk on "The Catholic Guy" to a papal greeting available at the NY Times Article..

NC Reporter's John Allen Gets Interviewed by Lino, not Leno

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Lino Rulli, Emmy award winning Cable TV Star from St Olaf parish in Minneapolis, has now graduated from TV to Radio. Sounds like a backwards move, doesn't it? But Lino is now "The Catholic Guy" during "drive time" on Sirius Satellite Radio with a world-wide audience listening to his off-beat and self-deprecating humor. John Allen, Vatican and Catholic Things reporter for the National Catholic Register, subjected himself to one of Lino's early interviews, as "The Catholic Guy" has only been on the air for a couple of weeks.

Actually, Lino has another radio show, "Lino at Large", heard on many radio stations across the country.

Last night, I was interviewed for a half-hour or so by “the Catholic Guy,” Lino Rulli, host of a program by that name on the new Catholic Channel on Sirius Satellite Radio. Rulli vowed that it would be “the most random” interview I’d ever done, and while I’ve actually faced far more bizarre lines of questioning, never before had they been so clearly labeled as such up-front.

Thus it was, for example, that we talked about the reasons for my transition roughly a year ago from a full beard to a goatee (a choice driven mostly by my wife, although my handler at CNN did say it’s “better TV”), what it’s like to fly on the papal plane (not nearly as exciting as it might seem, and far more expensive), and what’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever said to a pope (on my first meeting with John Paul II, I was so paralyzed with awe that all I could spit out was an anodyne, “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”).

This was also the first time a host actually apologized on-air for stalking me. Rulli explained that when he lived in Rome, he would often see me at restaurants or papal events, and would sometimes hang around the edges, but never actually got around to presenting himself.
We also, of course, discussed more substantive matters, such as the significance of Benedict XVI’s recent trip to Turkey, and whether Benedict as pope is a surprise with respect to what we might have expected from the election of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.

Rulli, who still speaks a passable Italian, has a background in TV journalism, but also seems very much at home in radio. The “Catholic Channel” has only been on the air for a couple of weeks, and it will be interesting to follow its development.

One thing about Rulli and his crew that struck me as especially promising: the absence of an agenda. That is to say, Rulli comes off as interested and engaged in Catholic affairs, with a healthy sense of humor about the whole thing, but not someone committed to one or another of the Catholic “tribes” currently slugging it out in the church’s version of the culture wars.

Instinctively, he seems open to different perspectives and temperaments, with no strong need to pass judgment, yet without in any sense fudging his Catholic identity or his love for the church.
If that’s the spirit with which the “Catholic Channel” moves forward, it could represent a valuable addition to the American Catholic conversation indeed ... random or not. National Catholic Reporter

Sirius Satellite Radio Launches "Catholic Radio" September 26

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Local boy, Lino Rulli, Emmy winning star (really!) of the Generation Cross TV show when he was broadcasting on Twin Cities Metro Channel 6 for St Olaf's Parish, will be hosting the drive time show from 4-7 p.m., Central Time. Congratulations, Lino! You commuters stuck in cars during that time might want to check it out. I'm sure there will be other good Catholic programming also. Tip O' the Hat to Amy at Open Book

Lino At Large From LA: Recent Programs

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"Lino At Large" is "Catholic radio for 'Generation X'." This fast-paced half-hour weekly program geared toward young adult Catholics and non-Catholics explores the beauty, excitement, and challenges of being Catholic in today's world. Inspired by "Generation Cross," a widely-acclaimed Minneapolis-area cable television show that Rulli created and hosted for six years.

#06-88 (August 5-6, 2006) Real Player | Windows Media
This Week’s Features –

• Lino’s Random Thoughts – Overflowing Cup
• More with Morrison – What Men Want
• Men on A Mission – Clayton Emmer (from The Weight of Glory blog)
  

#06-87 (July 29-30, 2006) Real Player | Windows Media
This Week’s Features –

• Lino’s Random Thoughts – Blackberry
• More With Morrison – What Women Want
• Men on A Mission – San Luis Rey de Francia
• Listener Mailbag

#06-86 (July 22-23, 2006) Real Player | Windows Media
This Week’s Features –

• Lino’s Random Thoughts – Confession
• Men on A Mission – Spencer Lewerenz
• More with Morrison – Moral Responsibility

#06-85 (July 15-16, 2006) Real Player | Windows Media
This Week’s Features –

• Lino’s Random Thoughts – Pool Table
• Men on A Mission – San Gabriel Archangel
• Fr. Talbot – Marriage Prep
• Listener Mailbag

To Hear Past Episodes, Click Here

Lino Is Indeed At Large, Scoping Out The Big Time in L.A.

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Clayton, former Twin Cities resident now in L.A. blogging at The Weight of Glory, has interviewed Lino Rulli, formerly a major star on Minneapolis' St Olaf's Church hit cable access TV program that earned him a Regional Emmy award (Really!) a few years back.

Lino Rulli, who produces a weekly radio program for the USCCB called Lino at Large, heard on Relevant Radio in the Twin Cities at 8:30 p.m. on Saturdays and 12:30 p.m. on Sundays, recently visited Los Angeles to do a series of shows about the mission fields of California, old and new.

As part of his coverage of the new "mission fields" of California, he recently interviewed friend and fellow Steubenville alumnus Alana Antolak (listen to the June 24-25 show in Windows Media or Real Player format). Alana is out here in Los Angeles pursuing an acting career. The interview with Lino was recorded in my apartment, because we couldn't find another quiet place to record the audio on that Sunday afternoon! [snip] The Weight of Glory