I recently participated for the first time as a panelist in an episode of John Dehlin’s groundbreaking weekly podcast, Mormon Matters. In it, we discuss the Pope’s recent statement about the exclusive authority of the Catholic Church by virtue of apostolic succession and the back-and-forth between Barak Obama and Mitt Romney on sex education for children. In a second part that will be released later this week, we discuss the tension between presiding and equality in marital relationships and raising gay children in the church.

For those of you who haven’t listened to Mormon Matters, you really should. John Dehlin does a terrific job moderating these weekly talk shows, which gather a broad spectrum of opinion about a variety of Mormon issues — ranging from the timely to the timeless.

In case you don’t know how podcasts work, here’s instructions:

You can either listen to the mp3 audio file that John links to on Mormon Matters, or you can click on his iTunes link to listen to them in iTunes. If you have an iPod, you can subscribe to the podcasts, which means that every time there is a new one it will be automatically downloaded and sync’d with your iPod next time you connect it, thereby allowing you to catch the episode at your convenience next time you listen to your iPod — kind of like onDemand for radio, except that it’s free.

I’m both honored and excited to be listed among such a distinguished list of panelists — including my fellow perma-blogger John F. Give the podcasts a listen — you won’t be disappointed.