The Church Times Podcast

Adam Becket brings us the latest on Brexit - and how the C of E hopes that "tea and prayer drop-ins" next weekend will foster reconciliation among Leavers and Remainers. Madeleine Davies tells us about the first HTB-supported resource church in the Church in Wales - which is facing some opposition. And the editor Paul Handley talks about the Train-a-Priest Fund, which helps ordinands who face financial hardship.

This week, Ed Thornton speaks to the writer and broadcaster Peter Stanford about his new book, Angels: A Visible and invisible history, published by Hodder. The book looks at the origins of angels in religious thought and asks why, in a secular age, they remain more compelling and comforting to many than God. You can buy the book at the Church House Bookshop for the offer price of £16 – go to chbookshophymnsam.co.uk or call 020 7799 4064.

On Thursday evening (7 March), the final of the Theology Slam competition took place at St John’s Hoxton in London. It was a great evening with talks by Hannah Barr (theology and the #MeToo movement, Sara Prats (theology and mental health), and Hannah Malcolm (theology and the environment). The talks are featured on the podcast – and the winner is announced at the end. The winning talk will be published in next week’s Church Times and on our website. You can watch the whole event on the Church Times Facebook page, and on our YouTube channel from Friday afternoon – in addition to the talks, there are a Q&A, judges feedback, and talks from John Swinton on theology and disability and Eve Poole on theology and consumerism. Picture Credit: Stefano Cagnoni Pictured (l-r): Hannah Barr, Hannah Malcolm, Sara Pratts

What causes someone to go from being a committed Christian to a convinced non-believer? On this week’s podcast, Ed Thornton talks to Dr John Marriott, an expert on so-called “deconversion”. His book, A Recipe for Disaster, is published by Wipf & Stock.

This week, two gay priests of different generations talk about the challenges they've faced in the Church. They have both recently published books about their experiences. The Revd Marcus Green has writtenThe Possibility of Difference (Kevin Mahew) and the Revd Stanley Underhill's book is called Coming out of the Black Country (Zuleika). Both books are available at the Church Times Bookshop.

Transforming the one million who regularly attend Church of England services into “agents of mission” is crucial to the Church’s multi-million-pound evangelism push, the General Synod will hear next week. Ed Thornton talks to Madeleine Davies about the drive to give the laity confidence to evangelise - and whether English reticence stops them from doing so. Plus, Adam Becket catches up with the Chaplain to the Speaker of the House of Commons, Prebendary Rose Hudson-Wilkin, at the C of E's National Education Conference. He asks her about Crispin Blunt MP’s call for prayers in parliament to be scrapped.

This week, the education secretary Damian Hinds talks to Hattie Williams about why he would like more faith schools to convert to academies. The Bishop of Gloucester, Rachel Treweek, talks to Adam Becket about how churches must not ignore the realities of domestic abuse. And the Bishop of Liverpool, Paul Bayes, talks to Madeleine Davies about his new book, The Table.

Meg Munn was appointed first independent chair of the Church of England’s National Safeguarding Panel in September. She took over from the Bishop of Bath & Wells, Peter Hancock, who is the lead bishop on safeguarding. Meg Munn is a practising Methodist and former social worker and former MP, who established and chaired the All-Party Child Protection Parliamentary Group. She left Parliament in 2015 to become an independent governance consultant. Hattie Williams sat down with Meg Munn for her first interview since she took up the post. You can read a write up of the interview in this week’s paper and on our website. A fuller version follows on this podcast.

This week, more Brexit uncertainty – what are the bishops saying? Adam Becket has been hearing from them. And we hear from the Revd Christine Smith, publishing director of Hymns Ancient & Modern, about the second Festival of Preaching, which is being organised by Canterbury Press Norwich and the Church Times

This week, a critical moment for Brexit: the Archbishop of Canterbury says that a no-deal Brexit would be a moral failure, and Dame Caroline Spelman calls on the Church to pray for the nation. What’s going on in the diocese of Oxford, where more than 100 clergy are uneasy with their bishops’ approach to sexuality? And, news of the finalists of the inaugural 'Theology Slam' competition.