The Church Times Podcast

On the podcast this week, Ed Thornton talks to the Revd Helen Gheorghiu Gould, who is a member of the Interim Ministry Steering Group. She speaks about what interim ministry (IM) is, why it works for some parishes — such as those navigating change or seeking healing of conflict — and what the future might hold for it. Until March, Ms Gheorghiu Gould was interim-ministry adviser for Chelmsford diocese. She put together the Interim Ministry Resource Book to support and expand interim ministry in the Church of England (News, 9 April). Read more about IM and download the resource book at https://www.interimministry.org.uk/. Read a feature on Interim Ministry in this week’s Church Times (14 May). Find out about forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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, Christopher Totney, director of music at St John’s, Devizes, is interviewed about his new anthem, “God Of All Creation”, which was the winner of the Royal School of Church Music’s Music Sunday competition. He is interviewed by Stefan Putigny, the Royal School of Church Music’s Magazines Editor. A recording of the anthem, sung by St Martin's Voices, is played after the interview. The world première of the anthem will be on the annual RSCM Music Sunday on 6 June, which celebrates the part played by music and musicians in church life. The podcast also features a talk by Prebendary Chris Thorpe, “Creating worship that connects: Liturgy as a tool of mission in reaching out”, which was given at the “Creativity out of Crisis” webinar last October, hosted by the Church Times and the RSCM. Prebendary Thorpe is the author of books which include Ploughshares and First Fruits: A year of festivals for the rural church (Canterbury Press) (Books, 1 January 2021) and Apprentices and Eyewitnesses: Creative liturgies for incarnational worship: Lent, Holy Week and Easter (Canterbury Press) (Books, 8 March 2019). The Church Times and the RSCM are hosting a webinar on Tuesday 18 May, “Lift Up Your Voices, Lift Up Your Hearts”, which will explore questions of music and worship. Subjects include how congregational singing could come back stronger after the pandemic, what next for choirs, and a training taster session for clergy who are not musicians. Speakers include the director of the RSCM, Hugh Morris; John Bell; Brenna Conin; and Gill Fourie. For more information and to buy tickets, visit www.churchtimes.co.uk/events Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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, Cole Moreton talks to Gareth Higgins about his new book, How Not to Be Afraid: Seven ways to live when everything seems terrifying. Their conversation was recorded at the UK launch of the book, held online on Thursday evening. You can watch the whole event at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMs0NEJH5mQ. In the book, Gareth explores the root causes of fear and shows how we can break its power through life-giving stories, simple spiritual exercises, and practical steps to take as individuals and communities. The book is available to buy at a 20-per-cent discount at the Church Times Bookshop. Dr Gareth Higgins is a speaker, storyteller, and activist, who grew up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, and now lives in the United States. He is editor of The Porch Magazine. Cole Moreton is a writer and broadcaster. His debut novel The Light Keeper (Books, 10 January 2020; Podcast, 27 March 2020) is out in paperback on 21 May. https://www.hownottobeafraid.com Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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, Claire Gilbert talks to Gareth Higgins about her book Miles to Go Before I Sleep: Letters on hope, death and learning to live (Hodder & Stoughton). It’s available to buy from the Church Times Bookshop for the reduced price of £14.99. After being diagnosed with myeloma, an incurable cancer of the blood, Claire Gilbert, who is the founder Director of the Westminster Abbey Institute, began writing to her siblings and a group of close friends about what she was going through. In a review of the book for the Church Times, Caroline Chartres writes: “This is not a book about dying, but, rather, a book about how facing death enables us truly to live.” Read the review and an extract from the book at www.churchtimes.co.uk This conversation was recorded on Saturday at an online event organised by the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature, Finding Meaning. Other speakers at the event were the journalist and broadcaster Sarah Sands, talking about her book The Interior Silence; Gareth Higgins speaking about his book How Not to be Afraid; and Brian McLaren, who spoke about his latest book, Faith After Doubt. Buy access to a recording of the event at https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk/buy-tickets/ The conversation features occasional strong language. Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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, the Rt Revd Graham James, a former Bishop of Norwich, reflects on the faith of Prince Philip. Bishop James preached numerous times at Sandringham and was quizzed by the Duke of Edinburgh about the content of his sermons, as well as wider theological matters. “It was a questioning, searching faith,” Bishop James says. “There’s a sense in which his own restlessness, which was obvious throughout the whole of his life, was also applied to his religion. But that, I think, was why it meant a lot to him. He didn’t want a routine religion: he wanted one which challenged his mind as well as his spirit.” Bishop James writes about Prince Philip in this week’s Church Times, which also contains coverage of church leaders’ tributes, an obituary, and more. 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. Picture credit: Alamy

The regular podcast is on a break this week, so here is a chance to listen again, or for the first time, to an episode from our archive. It’s a talk by Brian McLaren called “Worship that destroys (and saves) the world”, which was recorded at the 2019 Church Times Festival of Preaching (Features, 20 September 2019). On Saturday 17 April, Brian McLaren will be speaking about his new book, Faith After Doubt (Hodder & Stoughton), at a Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature one-day online event. Buy tickets at https://faithandliterature.hymnsam.co.uk/buy-tickets/ Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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. Picture credit: Copyright David Hartley

On this week’s podcast, Vicky Walker talks to the actor Sir David Suchet, whose reading of the whole of St John’s Gospel will be broadcast online on Easter Day at 4 p.m. The reading was recorded in the Jerusalem Chamber at Westminster Abbey, and will be streamed at www.youtube.com/c/WestminsterAbbeyLondon/. “I want the listener to feel very comfortable. I want you to be sitting with me,” he says. “And as I look into the camera, I’ll be looking at you. And I’m just reading to you. I may be speaking to what may amount to millions, but my tone is intimate, warm, friendly, not to push you away, but draw you in and just share it.” Sir David also talks in the interview about his conversion to Christianity and his journey of faith since. In 2015, Sir David, best-known for playing Agatha Christie’s fictional detective Hercule Poirot, recorded the first full-length audio version of the Bible, for the NIV Audio Bible App by Hodder & Stoughton (News, 1 January 2016). In 2017, he read the whole of St Mark’s Gospel aloud in the pulpit of St Paul’s Cathedral, to more than 2000 people (News, 7 April 2017). The video has received 2.4 million views online. 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, John Pritchard considers how the experience of pilgrimage can enrich our everyday lives once we return home. This talk was recorded at the latest Church Times Festival of Pilgrimage, which took place online on Monday. The experience of pilgrimage, he hopes, “will permeate the rest of our lived experience. . . The essence of religion is actually about the presence of God in the midst of everyday life. Not God in a box on the edge of our everyday lives, but God in the heart of it all, because that’s where discipleship is to be found — right at the heart of everything.” The Rt Revd John Pritchard is a former Bishop of Oxford and a popular writer of books such as The Life and Work of a Priest, Why go to Church?, and God Lost and Found. The full 2021 Festival of Pilgrimage event will be available to watch at https://pilgrimage.hymnsam.co.uk/ Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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 2021, which took place online on Thursday evening. The first talk is by Imogen Ball, a final year ordinand and MA student at Trinity College Bristol, speaking on “Creativity in a time of pandemic”. She is followed by Joshua House, a recent theology graduate from the University of Leeds who is now a trainee RE teacher, and who speaks on “Community in a time of pandemic”. The final talk is by Flo O’Taylor, a Phd student at Durham University, on “Justice in a time of pandemic”. 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 the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. Read more about the final, and find out the winner, at https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/ Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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, Canon Mark Oakley talks about the books that have helped him through the pandemic so far. “Literature is more a verb than a noun; a living conversation,” he says. “Opening up the covers is opening up the door to a hospitable place, asking me to come in and take a seat. Literature makes thing matter. Literature, like faith, is a celebration of the meaning of experience and of the experience of meaning.” This talks was originally given at a one-day online event organised last month by the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature. Buy access to a recording of the whole event here. Canon Mark Oakley is Dean of St John's College, Cambridge, and the author of The Splash of Words: Believing in poetry (Canterbury Press), which won the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize. Find out about other forthcoming Church Times online events at www.churchtimes.co.uk/events. Sign up to receive our email newsletter at churchtimes.co.uk/newsletter-signup 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. Picture credit: KT Bruce