Making it Personal with Bishop William Joensen

Spacewalking with God: Hubble, the Space Shuttle, and a Pilgrimage to Poland with Col. Michael Good - 10/24/2026

Episode Summary

Retired NASA astronaut and Air Force Col. Michael Good joins Bishop William Joensen to share how his Catholic faith carried him from altar boy and Notre Dame engineering student to spacewalking on the final Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission. Fresh off a pilgrimage to Poland with the Bishop, he reflects on the Divine Mercy Shrine, Auschwitz, and St. John Paul II. He explains why seeing Earth from space strengthened his belief that science and faith go together perfectly. Space shuttle Atlantis missions to Hubble and the ISS Washing out of pilot training, then finding a new path Training for spacewalks underwater in a 40-foot-deep pool Weighing risk after the Challenger and Columbia accidents Faith, family, and 41 years of marriage

Episode Notes

Bishop William Joensen and co-host Jeanne Thill welcome Col. Michael Good, USAF (Ret.), a former NASA space shuttle and space station astronaut who recently joined the Bishop on pilgrimage to Poland with former Iowa Catholic Radio morning host Jon Leonetti.

Bishop’s Opening: Respect Life Month and Church News

• Bishop Joensen describes a moving Respect Life Mass at St. John Catholic Church in Adel, with a homily by Fr. Michael Hutchison. Afterward, stones bearing the names of children lost to miscarriage or in early infancy were placed in the parish’s rosary garden. Knights of Columbus took part.
• Confirmations at St. Francis of Assisi Parish this Sunday, October 25.
• Thanks to Lincoln Bishop James Conley for keynoting the first gala of St. Thomas Classical Academy at The Tea Room in Des Moines.
• Prayers for Pope Leo XIV as he recovers from lung surgery ahead of his apostolic journey to Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru, November 6–17.

Pilgrimage to Poland
Col. Good reflects on the saints and stories of suffering he encountered in Poland: the Divine Mercy Chapel and St. Faustina, going to confession during the pilgrimage, and the visit to Auschwitz the day before.

Growing Up Catholic
One of six children, Good served at the altar from a young age, sometimes alongside three of his brothers at once, while trying to make each other laugh.

The Road to NASA

• Watched the moon landing at age seven and built model rockets as a kid.
• Chose aerospace engineering at the University of Notre Dame and was inspired by the first space shuttle launch in 1981.
• Joined Air Force ROTC during finals week of his sophomore year and walked out with a two-year scholarship. Commissioned in 1984.
• Washed out of pilot training, worked as an engineer, then became a navigator flying the F-111.
• Graduated from the Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base and flight-tested the B-2 stealth bomber.
• Selected on his third application to NASA’s Astronaut Group 18 in 2000.

Risk, Family, and Faith
Good talks about the Columbia accident early in his NASA career, how he and his family weighed the risks of spaceflight, and his wife, Joan, whom he met in seventh-grade math class. They married at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart at Notre Dame and have been married 41 years.

The Final Hubble Servicing Mission
After two and a half years of training, the STS-125 crew performed five back-to-back spacewalks that left Hubble with new cameras, spectrographs, and batteries. Good describes training underwater in a 40-foot-deep, six-million-gallon pool, and his first breathtaking step outside the shuttle with Earth 300 miles below.

Science and Faith Together
Good shares how spaceflight strengthened his faith. He sees the beauty and immensity of the universe as evidence of a Creator and believes science and faith go together perfectly.

Learn more about Col. Good’s career in his NASA biography: https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/good_michael.pdf

Hear Making It Personal with Bishop William Joensen every week on Iowa Catholic Radio and at https://IowaCatholicRadio.com/

Support for Iowa Catholic Radio and Making It Personal is provided by Serra Vocations Ministry. Learn more at https://JoinSerra.org/

#MakingItPersonal #BishopJoensen #CatholicPodcast #Astronaut #NASA #HubbleSpaceTelescope #SpaceShuttle #FaithAndScience #CatholicFaith #Spacewalk #NotreDame #AirForce #DivineMercy #PolandPilgrimage #StJohnPaulII #IowaCatholicRadio #RespectLife #PopeLeoXIV