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Episode 1314: Montell Jordan, Ryan Ellis and 40,000 Pope Hats
24 August 2026

Episode 1314: Montell Jordan, Ryan Ellis and 40,000 Pope Hats

The RELEVANT Podcast

About

This week, "This Is How We Do It" singer Montell Jordan joins us. He and his wife, Kristin, went from platinum records and world tours to planting a church, and they talk about what was missing in the middle of all that success. Also on the show, Ryan Ellis, who spent a decade writing worship music and now shows us what else he’s got. We spotlight his new album, ‘No Halo.’

In RELEVANT Buzz, Saints quarterback Drew Brees went into the Pro Football Hall of Fame and built his speech around the day Christ changed his life. In other sports news, the Chicago White Sox handed out a record-breaking number of Pope hats. A new Harvard study suggests the loneliness epidemic may not be for the reasons we assume. And Stranger Things actor Caleb McLaughlin opens up about his faith journey.

In Slices, the FAA solved its air traffic controller shortage by advertising the job to gamers, and a guy in San Francisco bought a billboard for an AI chatbot that turns out to be him. One Has to Go closes it out, and we tell you about four open positions we’ve posted at relevantmediagroup.com.

Editorial Question of the Week: What's something you wish you knew before starting your freshman year? Drop it in the comments or on our socials. We'll read the best ones on next week's show and turn them into an article at relevantmagazine.com.

Highlights:

01:53 — Derek on teenage boys 

04:15 — New York smells and we fix it

08:36 — Cameron's resting heart rate becomes a group intervention 

17:20 — RELEVANT Buzz: Drew Brees' Hall of Fame speech 

19:03 — The time Oprah tried to wipe off Drew Brees' birthmark on live TV 

23:11 — The White Sox gave away 40,000 Pope hats 

26:02 — Harvard says loneliness tracks with income, not gender 

31:05 — Caleb McLaughlin on the faith he found on his own 

34:41 — Montell and Kristin Jordan 

40:30 — Ryan Ellis 

47:34 — Slices: The FAA recruited gamers to run air traffic control 

51:26 — The San Francisco AI chatbot that is one guy typing 

59:10 — Editorial Question of the Week 

59:45 — One Has to Go



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