The Sacred

Over the coming weeks we will be releasing short extra episodes in response to the strange times we are living through. Former guests will be returning to reflect on how they are processing this season, if this crisis has crystallised or even changed what they hold sacred, and what it might tell us about our collective sacred values. In this episode, Elizabeth reflects on who we value and what we owe each other. We would also love to hear your responses to these same questions - has this time changed or crystallised what you hold sacred, and/or what can this time tell us about the values we share? You can send us your thoughts in a voice note to 07778160052 or you can email us at sacredpodcast@gmail.com. Please keep your responses to under a minute and a half if you can, and if you need somewhere quiet to record, we recommend under a duvet! Finally, in case you missed it, our filmmaker Emily Downe created this short film based on the poem Pandemic by Lynn Ungar, which Elizabeth read in a previous episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qU65FsVDcKc.

Rabbi Sacks is an international religious leader, moral philosopher and author. He was the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth for 22 years, and has written books that have been formative for many including ‘The Dignity of Difference’ and ‘Not in God’s Name’. His most recent book is called ‘Morality: Restoring the Common Good in Divided Times.’ In this episode he speaks about the twin threads of his life in religious leadership and academic moral philosophy, and how those two things have worked together, what his own religious practice looks like, and why the Holocaust makes him doubt humans but not God.

In this short bonus episode Elizabeth Oldfield reflects on how peace building practices can help us in this unprecedented public health crisis, and offers some possible reasons for hope. She also reads Pandemic, by Lynn Ungar, which can be found here: http://www.lynnungar.com/

Charles is a journalist, columnist and former editor of The Spectator, The Telegraph and The Sunday Telegraph. He’s also the authorised biographer of Margaret Thatcher. In this episode Charles speaks about his sacred value of orthodoxy, his conversion to Catholicism, and why he thinks a good adversarial argument is one way to the truth.

David is a comedian, screenwriter, author and television presenter. He’s written novels for children and adults, the play ‘My Family: Not the Sitcom’, and the film ‘The Infidel’ among many other things. His most recent play, ‘God’s Dice’, is about science, religion and quantum theory, and he’s currently touring with a new comedy show ‘Trolls: Not the Dolls’. In this episode David speaks about his sacred value of truth, growing up only knowing Jewish people, why he’s an atheist who quite likes religion, and how he uses his public voice.

Beth is a novelist and the author of WHSmith's book of the year The Flatshare. She studied English at Oxford and worked in publishing before leaving to write full time. Her next novel, out in April, is called The Switch. In this episode she speaks about which novels and which writers we take seriously and why, the experience of suddenly having a public voice and the power of fiction to make us feel better.

Sameer is Managing Editor for Arts and Books at Prospect Magazine, and has been a judge for the Costa Poetry Book Prize, the Forward Prize for Poetry and the Orwell Prize for non-fiction. He is also the author of Asghar and Zahra, a novel about a young couple born into the same British Muslim community and their first year of marriage. He speaks about his religious childhood, loving his time studying English literature at Cambridge, his evolving Muslim faith and why the true history of our religions will always be just out of reach.

Richard and Lydia Ayoade discuss the challenges of depicting faith in films, the media's appetite for personal information, complexity in public conversations, Michael Haneke's films, the absence of redemption arcs in popular shows, and the difficulty of identifying sacred values.

Daniel is Baron Finkelstein, a Member of the House of Lords, and has a column in The Times newspaper. He is a former executive editor of The Times and advisor to John Major and William Hague. In this episode he speaks about the impact of the holocaust on his Jewish family, what drew him to politics and how he thinks about the moral responsibility of the political decisions in public life.

Welcome to a special second birthday episode! This week we have turned the tables and former guest, Ian Dunt, has come in to interview host Elizabeth Oldfield. After putting her guests through their paces for the last two years, Elizabeth takes her turn at answering some of the big questions sharing some of her own story. In this episode she talks about her sacred value of relationships, working for the BBC and her reflections from 2 years on The Sacred. We are really grateful to Ian Dunt, whose episode is still one of our most listened to, for hosting this special podcast. Ian is a British journalist and editor of the political news website, politics.co.uk. We are going to be taking a little break over Christmas so this will be our last episode for about a month. We’ll be back in the New Year with our interview with Danny Finkelstein, and our re-recorded episode with Richard Ayoade and Lydia Fox.