Writing Religion

Barbara Bradley Hagerty is a New York Times bestselling author and contributing writer for The Atlantic. Her third book, Bringing Ben Home, tells the story of Ben Spencer, a Black man wrongly convicted and sentenced to life. In large part because of Barb’s reporting, Ben Spencer was exonerated in 2024. Barb worked for NPR for nearly 20 years, covering criminal justice and religion. She’s received the American Women in Radio and Television Award (twice), the National Headliners Award, and the Religion Newswriters Association award for radio reporting. Her work as NPR’s Justice Department correspondent helped the network win the 2001 George Foster Peabody and Overseas Press Club awards after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. She earned a masters of legal studies Yale Law School, when she was awarded a Knight Fellowship for journalists in 1993-94, as well as the Templeton-Cambridge Fellowship in Science and Religion in 2005. Barb lives in Washington, D.C. with her husband, Devin, and their dogs, Patchett and Ravioli.