On the podcast this week, the Bishop of Maine, the Rt Revd Thomas James Brown, talks to Madeleine Davies about the American Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Elizabeth Strout – many of whose books are set in the State of Maine, New England.

They discuss, among other things, Strout’s depiction of the Puritan mindset, the challenges of small-town ministry, and how clergy might respond to the gossip that occurs in their communities. Bishop Brown also considers the comparison often made between Elizabeth Strout and Marilynne Robinson.

Madeleine has written a feature on Elizabeth Strout for this week’s Church Times (16 December).

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader

This week, the Revd Michael Coren is interviewed about his book The Rebel Christ.

The book is is published in the UK by Canterbury Press and is available to buy from the Church House Bookshop for the discounted price of £10.39.

Michael is a priest in the Anglican Church of Canada, a contributing columnist for the Toronto Star, and the author of more than 18 books. He also writes regularly for publications such as the Globe and Mail, The New Statesman, and the Church Times.

Once a high-profile figure in conservative Roman Catholicism in Canada, about a decade ago Michael changed his mind on issues such as same-sex marriage and embraced a more progressive form of Christian faith. It cost him his lucrative broadcasting career and made him the target of vitriol, but he says he found freedom in the radical and progressive nature of the gospel.

The Rebel Christ starts with the question: "Why is it that the purest, most supremely liberating philosophy and theology in all of history is now seen by so many people around the world as intolerant, legalistic, and even irrelevant religion embraced only by the gullible, the foolish, and the judgmental?"

Interview by Ed Thornton

https://michaelcoren.com

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The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave is the choice for this month’s Church Times Book Club. On this accompanying podcast, Dr Natalie K. Watson, who has written the Book Club essay about the book, talks to Sarah Meyrick.

The book is published by Picador at £8.99 and is available from the Church Times Bookshop for £8.09.

Dr Natalie K. Watson is a theologian, writer, and editor, living in Peterborough.

The Church Times Book Club is run in association with the Festival of Faith and Literature. Tickets are now on sale for the next Festival, which takes place in Winchester in February. For more information and to buy tickets, visit https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk

Sign up to receive the free Book Club email once a month. Featuring discussion questions, podcasts and discounts on each book: https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup

Discuss this month’s book at https://www.facebook.com/groups/churchtimesbookclub

About the book: Inspired by the Vardø storm and the witch trials in northern Norway in 1621, The Mercies follows the lives of the women who are left behind on their remote island after a ferocious storm wipes out all the men at sea. In the storm’s wake, the women learn to embrace independence, but their newfound strength is put to the test when an official arrives from the mainland armed with the task of dismantling their power and restoring male domination. The women’s independence is perceived as subversive, and charges of witchcraft soon follow. A chilling witch hunt begins.

On the podcast this week, James Runcie talks to Sarah Meyrick about his new memoir, Tell Me Good Things: On love, death and marriage.

It tells the story of his love for his late wife, Marilyn Imrie, a drama director, singer, and artist, who died of motor neurone disease (MND) in August 2020.

“It’s about grief, and love. And I hope it’s also about gratitude and thank fulness,” Runcie says.

James Runcie is an award-winning novelist, playwright, and film-maker. He is the author of twelve novels including the seven books in the Grantchester Mysteries series, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. His most recent novel is The Great Passion (Books, 8 April).

Tell Me Good Things is published by Bloomsbury at £12.99 (Church Times Bookshop £11.69); 978-1526655448.

James Runcie will be in conversation with the tenor James Gilchrist at the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature in February 2023. Tickets available now at https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk/

Photo credit: KT Bruce

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.

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On the podcast this week, the novelist Robert Harris talks to Susan Gray about his latest book, Act of Oblivion.

The novel takes place in the aftermath of the English Civil War, and swings between Restoration England and pre-Independence, Puritan New England.

“A huge manhunt was started: 59 people signed the death warrant of Charles I, and there were about 30 left alive,” Harris says. “They were wanted, together with anyone who had sat as a judge on the King. A manhunt would make good structure for a novel, especially if I could invent a manhunter-in-chief: someone must have co-ordinated this hunt which went on across the Continent and throughout England.”

The book is reviewed in this week’s 12-page Christmas Books supplement, and a write up of the interview also appears.

Robert Harris is the author of 15 best-selling novels, including Fatherland, Conclave, Munich, and The Second Sleep (Books, 29 November 2019). He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Act of Oblivion is published by Hutchinson Heinemann at £22

(Church Times Bookshop £19.80); 978-1-5291-5175-6.

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader

On the podcast this week, the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Williams considers the significance of the Christian hope of a new heaven and a new earth.

The talk was delivered this week in St Martin-in-the-Fields, in central London, as part of its autumn lecture series, “What am I living for?”, in partnership with the Church Times.

The next lecture in the series, on Monday 21 November, is by Grayson Perry, and is on the theme of art. Book tickets at https://www.stmartin-in-the-fields.org/whatson-event/what-am-i-living-for-art

Rowan Williams will be delivering the Sir Tony Baldry Lecture at the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature, which takes place in Winchester in February. Find out more about the festival programme and how to buy tickets at https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader

The Day That Went Missing by Richard Beard is the choice for this month’s Church Times Book Club. On the podcast this week, he talks to Sarah Meyrick, who has written this month’s Book Club essay about the memoir.

The book, which won the 2018 PEN Ackerley Award for literary autobiography, is published by Vintage and is available from the Church Times Bookshop for £8.99.

The Church Times Book Club is run in association with the Festival of Faith and Literature. Tickets are now on sale for the next Festival, which takes place in Winchester in February. For more information and to buy tickets, visit https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk/

Sign up to receive the free Book Club email once a month. Featuring discussion questions, podcasts and discounts on each book: https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup

Discuss this month’s book at https://www.facebook.com/groups/churchtimesbookclub

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader

On the podcast this week, Jo Swinney talks to Sarah Meyrick about A Place at The Table: Faith, hope and hospitality. The book is a joint project with Jo’s late mother, Miranda Harris, who died suddenly in October 2019. Mrs Harris and her husband, Peter, founded the Christian conservation charity A Rocha International.

In an age when loneliness and isolation have reached unprecedented levels, the book calls for Christians to embrace the practice of hospitality — which can be simpler and more profound than is often imagined.

“To be hospitable doesn’t require culinary excellence or matching cutlery — it doesn’t even require a home of one's own; true hospitality offers a welcome into imperfection and messiness, a place to belong and be embraced.”

A Place at The Table is published by Hodder & Soughton at £16.99 (Church Times Bookshop £15.29)

placeatthetable.info

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader

This week’s podcast features talks from the final of the Theology Slam 2022, which took place on 27 September in St Edmund Roundhay, in Leeds, as part of the HeartEdge conference “Humbler Church, Bigger God”.

Theology Slam is a competition to find engaging young voices who think theologically about the contemporary world. Its organised jointly by the Church Times, SCM Press, and HeartEdge.

The first finalist to speak is Alex Clare-Young, a pioneer minister in the United Reformed Church, currently serving in Cambridge, who is in the final stages of submitting a thesis for a Ph.D. in queer theologies at the University of Birmingham. Alex, who is a trans non-binary person, spoke on the implications of the incarnation for how Christians think about the body.

The second finalist is Victoria Turner, also a member of the URC, who is in the final stages of a Ph.D. in world Christianity at the University of Edinburgh, where she is exploring developments in Christian mission. Victoria spoke on the theme of justice in relation to Amos 5.

The third finalist is Amanda Higgin, who is training as a Baptist minister at Regent’s Park College, Oxford, alongside working towards a Master’s degree in New Testament theology, with a focus on the Letter to the Hebrews. Amanda's talk was on the topic of recovery.

Watch the whole event, including, judges’ feedback and Q&A, at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9E4CHXphg4&ab_channel=ChurchTimes

Read the winning talk at https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2022/7-october/comment/opinion/theology-slam-winner-wandering-from-pain-to-healing

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.

Find out about forthcoming Church Times events at https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/events

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader

To Calais, In Ordinary Time by James Meek is the choice for this month's Church Times Book Club - and on the podcast this week, the author speaks to Rachel Mann (who has written this month's Book Club essay about it).

The book is published by Canongate and is available from the Church Times Bookshop for £8.99.

The Church Times Book Club is run in association with the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature. Tickets are now on sale for the next Festival, which takes place in Winchester in February. For more information and to buy tickets, visit https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk

Sign up to receive the free Book Club email once a month. Featuring discussion questions, podcasts and discounts on each book: churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup

Discuss this month’s book at facebook.com/groups/churchtimesbookclub

About the book: To Calais In Ordinary Time is a work of historical fiction set in England in 1348. It covers the story of a group of travellers journeying towards Calais across England as the Black Death sweeps across Europe. Written in a way to capture the authenticity of spoken medieval English, the language is interspersed with Middle English words. The young noblewoman’s language is marked by Norman French, the learned proctor’s language is punctuated with Latinisms, and the language of the down-to-earth adventurous ploughman is more Saxon. It is a novel about life, love, death, and war, set during a time of turbulence and uncertainty across Europe.

Picture credit: © MARZENA POGORSALY

Music for the podcast is by Twisterium

Try 10 issues of the Church Times for £10 or get two months access to our website and apps, also for £10. Go to churchtimes.co.uk/new-reader.