Fr. Mike Schmitz

Fr. Michael Thomas "Mike" Schmitz (born December 14, 1974 [age 47] ), is an American Roman Catholic priest and YouTuber from Duluth, Minnesota, known for his vlogs and media reviews produced by Ascension Press, which provide a Catholic perspective on various cultural and societal "talking points." He presently has 707,000 subscribers on his 'Ascension Presents channel, which started in 2015, and beginning in 2017 he has been offering his videos in audio form as podcasts. Aside from YouTube, Schmitz, is also known for his memorable quotes, including "golly!" and "wow, what a gift!," as well as publishing his own version of the Bible with Ascension Press called the Great Adventure Bible.

On January 1, 2021, Schmitz launched a podcast with video forms as well, The Bible in a Year with Fr. Mike, which consists of 365 episodes in which he reads the entire Bible along and provides commentary. In March 2021, it became the number-one ranked podcast overall on Apple Podcasts, and the first season concluded on December 31, 2021, after its 365th episode.

Why He's a Gift, Golly!

 * 1) He provides an interesting perspective on concepts like popular culture and media, politics , and mental health from the point of view of a publicly engaged priest and Catholic. He has even been hired to speak on these topics at conferences !
 * 2) He is also very open-minded and against Biblical fundamentalism, which is refreshing for a Catholic priest, as he claims that literal interpretations of the Bible are not the best way to live out its values today.
 * 3) His content is a way to make the teachings from the Catholic Church, as well as Christianity in general, accessible and digestible to the general public by applying them to contemporary culture.
 * 4) He has a good sense of humor in many of his videos, and a very entertaining and genuinely good personality, even shown in videos on more serious topics.
 * 5) His videos are often well-edited and provide helpful visual aids of the key points he is speaking about, even shown in his video thumbnails.
 * 6) His team makes subtitles of videos in multiple languages so that people who may not be native English speakers can understand what he's saying.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some of his videos can be biased towards his personal opinion, which is not always the best perspective to have when discussing sensitive issues.

Trivia

 * 1) He is presently the Newman Center (college church) chaplain of the University of Minnesota, close to where he is from.
 * 2) He is considered the "biggest" Catholic YouTuber by multiple people.