The Church Times Podcast

From Palm Sunday to Maundy Thursday, Malcolm Guite shares a sequence of sonnets for Holy Week. They are taken from his collection, Sounding the Seasons (Canterbury Press). “In composing these sonnets, I had in mind that mysterious and beautiful phrase in the Psalms about the man in whose heart are the highways to Zion (Psalm 84.5),” he says. “I wanted to develop the hint offered in that phrase that there is an inner as well as an outer Jerusalem, and that therefore the events of Holy Week are both about Jesus’s outward visible and historical entry into Jerusalem. and what he did there, and also about his entry into the inner Jerusalem, 'the seething holy city' of our own hearts.” The Revd Dr Malcolm Guite is a Life Fellow of Girton College, Cambridge, and writes the weekly Poet’s Corner column for the Church Times. 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, Olivia Jackson talks about her book (Un)Certain: A collective memoir of deconstructing faith. After the interview, she reads a short excerpt from the book. Faith deconstruction — the intentional examination of one's religious faith and beliefs, leading to a profound change in, or even loss of, that faith — has received increasing attention in the past few years, with the emergence of podcasts and online fora dedicated to discussing it. So, who are the people who deconstruct their faith, what causes them to do so, and where does the journey take them? (Un)Certain is a collective memoir built on the stories and reflections of more than 150 interviewees and nearly 400 survey respondents from all over the world, including the author's own story. Read an extract from the book here: https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2023/10-march/features/features/faith-that-expects-you-to-fall (Un)Certain is published by SCM Press and is available to buy from the Church Times Bookshop: https://chbookshop.hymnsam.co.uk/books/9780334063636/uncertain Olivia Jackson spent nearly 20 years working for mission agencies in the UK and overseas, and then as a human rights consultant with a focus on violence against women and girls, all of which fed into her own faith deconstruction. She lives on the side of a windswept hill with two dogs. 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 Fergus Butler-Gallie talks about his new book, Touching Cloth: Confessions and communions of a young priest. He is interviewed by Ed Thornton. In a review of the book for the Church Times, the Ven. Dr Lyle Dennen says the book “tells the story of his [Fergus’s] first year as a priest at a city-centre church in Liverpool. The book is in the style of a diary following the liturgical year. It is filled with many funny stories of clerical mishaps, and profound spiritual reflections.” Read an extract from the book in this week's Church Times. Touching Cloth is published by Bantam Press (an imprint of Transworld) at £16.99 (Church Times Bookshop £15.29). The Revd Fergus Butler-Gallie is a writer and priest who has ministered in parishes in Liverpool and central London. His previous books are A Field Guide to the English Clergy (Books, 30 November 2018, Podcast, 7 December 2018) and Priests de la Résistance! 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

In the fifth episode of the Church Times Poetry Podcast for Lent, Mark Oakley reflects on the poem “Prayer” by Zaffar Kunial, published in his collection Us (Faber & Faber, 2018). “The beauty of life is heard in this poem, but are the prayers that emerge out of its fragility and pain heard by anyone, by God?” Canon Oakley says. “For all our stores of knowledge and ingenuity, there are questions whose answers remain unknown in life. Our approach to them can distil us or destroy us. The poet John Keats referred to “negative capability” . . . that is, the ability we can have to hold doubts and mysteries without resolving them, resisting the impatience for quick clarity, in order to deepen and learn from them. “This is a defining characteristic of Kunial’s work, and certainly one of its attractions. The natural reticence mixed with the quiet strength of not grasping to a single view is, for me, very aligned to the sensibilities of a religious faith.” This is the last of Canon Oakley’s Lent podcasts. The series will continue in Holy Week when Malcolm Guite will reflect on a series of sonnets. Canon Mark Oakley is the Dean of St John’s College, Cambridge. His book The Splash of Words (Canterbury Press) won the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize for Theological Writing. Artwork by Emily Noyce. Producer: Ed Thornton 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

In the fourth episode of the Church Times Poetry Podcast for Lent, Mark Oakley reflects on “Winter Swans” by Owen Sheers, published in his collection Skirrid Hill (Seren Books, 2005). “Those with a religious belief are as human as everyone else,” Mark says. “They live with the ebb and flow of the heart, as well as the pain of what the past is up to in the present. "Deep within the heart of Christian faith, though, is the belief that human beings were made for relationship, and that, although many things work against this — past traumas, present stresses, future doubts — it is an elemental part of the human adventure to seek to place our relationships in good order, integrated with honesty, freedom, and mutual concern.” Canon Mark Oakley is the Dean of St John’s College, Cambridge. His book The Splash of Words (Canterbury Press) won the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize for Theological Writing. Artwork by Emily Noyce Producer: Ed Thornton 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

In the third episode of the Church Times Poetry Podcast for Lent, Mark Oakley reflects on “Love (III)” by George Herbert. “Over my years of reading Herbert, I have come to see him as the poet who most expresses our relationship with God as a friendship,” Mark says. “I’m not talking about friendship in terms of the 600 ‘Friends’ we have on Facebook, but rather the one or two people who have changed our life for good and maybe at some cost to us both. “Thinking about these friends can dare us to reflect, as I think did Herbert, that our life with God is a friendship that asks of us a mutual freedom. Friendship deepens as honesty deepens. We cannot put the other on a pedestal. We must try and prize off the mask that has begun to eat into our face. We need to be brave in hearing what we don’t like or saying what we have never dared. “Friendship requires courage enough to stop skating so quickly over our own thin ice in case we disappear through the cracks. Instead, we face the fact that we need support and connection and that, also, we have much to give as well.” The material in this podcast is taken from Mark Oakley’s book The Splash of Words (Canterbury Press), winner of the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize for Theological Writing. Canon Mark Oakley is the Dean of St John’s College, Cambridge. Artwork by Emily Noyce Producer: Ed Thornton 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

In the second episode of the Church Times Poetry Podcast for Lent, Mark Oakley reflects on “Don’t give me the whole truth” by Olav H. Hauge (1908–1994). The poem is published in Hauge’s 1996 collection of the same name, published by Anvil Press Poetry, an imprint of Carcanet Press. “Here in this poem, Hauge prays that he will only be given enough in life to keep him going,” Mark says. “He doesn’t want all that there is. Like birds who only carry off a few drops of water from the stream, or wind that only takes a grain of salt from the ocean, he doesn’t want to possess everything or understand it completely. “Instead, he asks for glints, epiphanies, droplet recognitions that feed us enough to keep us exploring but not enough to make us feel we have arrived. It is the prayer of a pilgrim.” The material in this podcast is taken from Mark Oakley’s book The Splash of Words (Canterbury Press), winner of the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize for Theological Writing. Canon Mark Oakley is the Dean of St John’s College, Cambridge. Artwork: Emily Noyce Producer: Ed Thornton 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

For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway is the choice for this month’s Church Times Book Club. On this episode of the Book Club Podcast, the Revd Alexander Faludy, who has written about the book in this week’s Church Times, is in conversation with Sarah Meyrick. Published in 1940, Ernest Hemingway’s war novel For Whom the Bell Tolls is set in 1937, near Segovia, during the Spanish Civil War. The lead character, Robert Jordan, is a young American teacher who volunteers to help a group of guerrilla fighters blow up a bridge to stop the advance of Francisco Franco’s fascist forces. The drama evolves over three days at the cave hideout of the guerrilla fighters in the pine forests of the Spanish Sierra. During that time, Robert Jordan falls in love with a Spanish girl, Maria. As tension mounts and death seems certain, the book’s title, derived from one of the metaphysical poet John Donne’s meditations takes resonance: “Ask not for whom the bell tolls It tolls for thee.” Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) was an author and journalist, and is celebrated as one of the leading American 20th-century novelists. For Whom the Bell Tolls is published by Cornerstone at £8.99 (Church Times Bookshop £8.09); 978-0-09-990860-9. The Church Times Book Club is run in association with the Festival of Faith and Literature. 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 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

We are pleased to present a new poetry podcast for Lent, in association with Canterbury Press. This week, Canon Mark Oakley reflects on “Paternoster” by Jen Hadfield. "Paternoster" is published in her collection Nigh-No-Place (Bloodaxe Books, 2008), which won the T.S. Eliot Prize. We are grateful to Bloodaxe Books for giving permission to play a recording of Jen Hadfield reading the poem. bloodaxebooks.com. “‘Paternoster’ is, to my mind, one of her most beautiful poems,” Mark says. “It is a prayer of a draughthorse in which she reworks the texture and rhythm of the Lord’s Prayer through the horse’s heart. . . If you want a glimpse of the beauty of a prayerful, intimate litany from a tired but hopeful heart then I recommend you listen to it as well as read it. Hadfield’s poems are mesmeric and are meant, as are all poems, to be heard.” The material in this podcast is taken from Mark Oakley’s book The Splash of Words (Canterbury Press), winner of the 2019 Michael Ramsey Prize for Theological Writing. Canon Mark Oakley is the Dean of St John's College, Cambridge. Artwork: Emily Noyce 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 General Synod voted this week to welcome the Bishops’ proposals to provide prayers to bless same-sex unions in church — but with a last-minute clarification that their use would not contradict the Church’s current teaching on marriage. On the podcast this week, Francis Martin speaks to different Synod members to hear their reactions to the vote — from both those who welcome it and those who do not. Picture credit: Max Colson/Church Times 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 Music for the podcast is by Twisterium.