On the podcast this week, we hear from the launch of the Green Church Showcase, which took place in Glasgow on Tuesday, during the COP26 climate summit.

The speakers are the Bishop of Norwich, the Rt Revd Graham Usher, who is the C of E’s lead bishop on the environment; Dr Ruth Valerio, director of advocacy and influencing at Tearfund; and Richard Black, senior associate at the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit.

The Showcase, a joint production by the Church of England’s environment programme and the Church Times, highlights seven projects from different denominations (watch a video about them on our website). Read more about the Green Church Showcase in this Friday’s Church Times (5 November).

Picture credit: Albin Hillert

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 COP26 climate-change conference begins in Glasgow, on Sunday (31 October). So this seemed like a good time to revisit a special podcast that we posted a year ago: Everybody Now, a podcast about what it means to be human on the threshold of a global climate emergency, in a time of systemic injustice and runaway pandemics.

Scientists, activists, farmers, poets, and theologians talk bravely and frankly about how our biosphere is changing, about grief and hope in an age of social collapse and mass extinction, and about taking action against all the odds.

On 19 October 2020, Everybody Now was released by podcasters all over the world as a collective call for awareness, grief, and loving action.

With contributions from:

Dr Gail Bradbrook, scientist and co-founder of Extinction Rebellion

Professor Kevin Anderson, Professor of Energy and Climate Change at the University of Manchester

Dámaris Albuquerque, works with agricultural communities in Nicaragua

The Rt Revd Dr Rowan Williams, theologian and poet, and a former Archbishop of Canterbury

Pádraig Ó Tuama, poet, theologian, and conflict mediator

Rachel Mander, environmental activist with Hope for the Future

John Swales, priest and activist, and part of a community for marginalised people

Zena Kazeme, Persian-Iraqi poet who draws on her experiences as a former refugee to create poetry that explores themes of exile, home, war, and heritage

Flo Brady, singer and theatre maker

Hannah Malcolm, Anglican ordinand, climate writer, and organiser

Alastair McIntosh, writer, academic, and land rights activist

David Benjamin Blower, musician, poet, and podcaster

Funding and Production:

This podcast was crowdfunded by a handful of good souls, and produced by Tim Nash and David Benjamin Blower (www.nomadpodcast.co.uk).

Permissions:

The song Happily by Flo Brady is used with permission.

The song The Soil, from We Really Existed and We Really Did This by David Benjamin Blower, used with permission.

The Poem The Tree of Knowledge by Pádraig Ó Tuama used with permission.

The Poem Atlas by Zena Kazeme used with permission.

The Poem What is Man? by Rowan Williams from the book The Other Mountain, used with permission from Carcanet Press.

The Church Times Podcast will return next week (5 November).

This week, Joe Ware, senior climate journalist at Christian Aid, is on the podcast to talk about the UN climate-change conference COP26, which starts in Glasgow at the end of this month.

He has written a preview of COP26 for this week’s issue of the Church Times (22 October), as part of a series of features on the climate crisis. He has also written an in-depth report in our news section on how climate campaigners of faith have been building pressure for change in advance of COP26.

On the podcast, Joe expands on the themes of his articles, explaining the scale of the challenge, the part played by geo-politics in climate negotiations, and what campaigners think that COP26’s priorities should be.

Picture credit: Alamy

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.

Peter Stanford returns to the podcast this week to talk about his new book, If These Stones Could Talk: The history of Christianity in Britain and Ireland through Twenty Buildings (Hodder & Stoughton).

It’s available to buy from the Church Times Bookshop for the special price of £16.

A press release from Hodder says of the book: “In exploring the stories of these buildings that are still so much a part of the landscape, the details of their design, the treasured objects that are housed within them, the people who once stood in their pulpits and those who sat in their pews, he builds century by century the narrative of what Christianity has meant to the nations of the British Isles, how it is reflected in the relationship between rulers and ruled, and the sense it gives about who we are and how we live with each other.”

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, Ed Thornton talks to Andrew Graystone about his book Bleeding for Jesus: John Smyth and the cult of Iwerne camps (DLT (Books, 1 October).

The book is available to buy from the Church Times Bookshop for £11.69.

“I've drawn on a very wide range of sources to produce really quite a detailed account of what has happened,” Andrew says. “But I've tried to weave it together into a narrative that makes sense and is more than just a life of John Smyth.

“The intention is that it should also serve the Church as a bit of a study in how spiritual abuse can happen. So, I hope that people who read the book will not just be horrified, although they will be horrified, by the ways that this man treated young men and children. But I hope they will also reflect on the ways that cultures within the Church sometimes enable abuse to happen.”

Andrew Graystone is a writer, theologian, and activist. His previous books include Faith, Hope and Mischief: Tiny acts of rebellion by an everyday activist (Canterbury Press) (Podcast, 28 August 2020) and Too Much Information? Ten essential questions for digital Christians (Canterbury Press) (Podcast, 4 October 2019).

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 this week’s podcast, Lucy Winkett talks about her new book Reading the Bible with your Feet (Canterbury Press): a collection of her sermons from recent years, some of which were preached during the pandemic.

She is in conversation with Chine McDonald, a writer, broadcaster, and head of public engagement at Christian Aid. It was recorded at the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature last weekend.

The book is available from the Church Times Bookshop for the special price of £13.49. https://chbookshop.hymnsam.co.uk/books/9781786223302/reading-the-bible-with-your-feet

“Walking through scripture is . . . what I’m trying to encourage us all to do,” she says. “And to say we all have a preaching ministry . . . and that can be in a conversation, because conversation is revolutionary in scripture — it can be in conversation as much as it is standing up at the front.”

During the interview, she also talks about how training for ordination in an ecumenical context has influenced her preaching, how she prepares sermons, the privilege of being a White preacher in a White-majority context, and what she learnt while preaching and leading a church during the pandemic.

The Revd Lucy Winkett is Rector of St James’s, Piccadilly, in the diocese of London.

Also at the Festival of Faith and Literature, Chine McDonald spoke to the former Archbishop of Canterbury Lord Williams about her most recent book, God Is Not a White Man: And other revelations (Hodder & Stoughton) (Features 21 May, Podcast, 28 May, Books, 11 June). Access to a recording of the whole event can be purchased at https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk/september-2021/

Picture credit: National Churches Trust/Creative Commons

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.

On the podcast this week, the Revd Jarel Robinson-Brown talks about his book, "Black, Gay, British, Christian, Queer: The Church and the famine of grace." It’s published by SCM Press and is available from the Church Times Bookshop for the special price of £15.99.

He is in conversation with the Revd Winnie Varghese, who is the Rector of St Luke’s Episcopal Church, Atlanta. It was recorded at an online book launch this week, which was introduced by David Shervington, the senior commissioning editor at SCM Press.

In a review of the book for the Church Times (Books, 3 September), the Revd Brunel James writes: “This book is a must-read and deserves to be a bestseller. There is a battle going on for the soul of the Church, and Jarel Robinson-Brown’s new book makes a courageous contribution to the discussion. It really should be compulsory reading for any church leader who has never thought through how we privilege the White and the heterosexual in our church life, and what this means for those among us who are Black and LGBTQ+.”

The Revd Jarel Robinson-Brown is Assistant Curate of St Botolph without Aldgate, in London.

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, Madeleine Davies interviews the Archbishop of Canterbury, who has recently returned from sabbatical.

They spoke in his study in Lambeth Palace about a range of topics, including: what he did during his sabbatical; his time spent volunteering as a hospital chaplain during the pandemic; the future of the parish (“There is no conspiracy to abolish the parish”); church-plants; clergy morale; and the ministry of the C of E in a secular society.

Archbishop Welby says: “I think I would want to say to clergy . . . and to laity: We can only do what God enables us to do, and the rest is his problem. So, if you can’t do things, don’t be guilty. . . Keep a sane home life, and keep up with your friends, and do what you can, having done that, and spend time with God in prayer.

“If that means we end up as a faithful remnant, so be it. But my bet is, if we do go for simpler, humbler, and so on, if we do what God resources us to do, if we don’t exhaust ourselves, and if we get rid of guilt — and I am the champion of self-imposed guilt — the Church God will grow.”

Read a write up of the interview in this week's Church Times (17 September).

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 this week’s podcast, Dr Mark Vernon talks about his new book, Dante’s Divine Comedy: A guide for the spiritual journey (Angelico Press)(Church Times Bookshop £16.20).

This year marks 700 years since Dante’s death, and this week’s Church Times (10 September) includes features by Robin Ward and Alexander Faludy, as well as several reviews of books published to mark the anniversary.

In a review of Dr Vernon’s book, Jonathan Boardman describes it as a “detailed and immensely thoughtful commentary. . . His personal experience as a psychotherapist and student of philosophy, polished further with physics, theology, and ordination, opens . . . a very special reflective door into Dante’s thinking and expression: its dreamlike design is peppered constantly with personal experience and knowledge.”

Read a preview of the introduction to the book at https://www.markvernon.com/books/dantes-divine-comedy-book

Dr Vernon’s books include A Secret History of Christianity (Christian Alternative) (Books, 20 December 2019) and The Idler Guide to Ancient Philosophy (Idler Books).

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 this week’s podcast, there’s a chance to listen again (or, perhaps, for the first time) to Sarah Lothian’s interview with Susanna Clarke about her long-awaited second novel, Piranesi.

The book has just been published in paperback and is available from the Church Times Bookshop for £8.09.

Dr Jane Williams, the McDonald Professor in Christian Theology at St Mellitus College, chose Piranesi as her favourite book of 2020 (Books, 27 November 2020).

“Piranesi looks with loving attention at the world in which he finds himself, caring for everything that he encounters, and receiving everything as loving gift,” Dr Williams said. “Other forces see it very differently. The book is deeply satisfying, with a depth of sadness — or is it joy?”

Picture credit: Sarah Lee

The next Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature takes place on Saturday 25 September. For more information and to buy tickets, visit https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk/

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.