A great series of lectures and seminars last year – and another tremendous programme to come!
We ended last season’s programme with a fantastic lecture by Bishop Rowan Williams. If you missed it, you could always catch up with the recording (along with all of last year’s lectures) on YouTube. As Revd Alan Garrow (who chaired the lecture) remarked on the day, however, there’s nothing like meeting the real person, is there?
We have an excellent line up of varied speakers for next season also. We begin on Saturday 7th October 2023 with the rescheduled lecture by Prof Paul Foster Meet the Apostolic Fathers: Christianity in the first half of the Second Century. You may recall that we had to postpone this lecture last March was we were hit by blizzarding snow! Prof Foster will explain the impact of these early Christian thinkers not only on the development of theology in the second century, but how we understand and explain our faith now.
We move from what might be thought of as abstract and theoretical, to the specific and practical on 25th November, when Esther Swaffield will talk to us about Fixing Systems not Just Symptoms: The Biblical Call to Justice with International Justice Mission. She will remind us of the Biblical call to justice; diving into real examples of where International Justice Mission are working on the ground to see freedom, justice and transformation. It will be truly inspiring.
In the New Year, we have invited Rev’d Mark Vasey-Saunders to present a lecture drawing on his research (recently published in a book) as to why the churches of all denominations find it hard to talk about, let alone agree on, issues of sexuality. Whatever your views, this important lecture will help us unpick some of the underlying issues that have made dialogue so hard.
Our final lecture of the year will be given by poet, scholar and recently appointed Dean of Southwark Cathedral, Canon Mark Oakley on ‘The curse of literalism’: poetic spirituality and the language of Christians.
We are also in the process of setting up the HST&M seminars for the coming season. We have been debating whether to include some element of live lecturing by local speakers. Do you have any thoughts about this – or any thoughts in general about HST&M? If you do, we’d love to know so either email us at [email protected] or speak to one of us at a lecture or seminar.
In this time of inflation, we are managing to hold the costs of our lectures at the same price (£8 per lecture inclusive of breakfast, £5 for students and under 18s free) and our seminars are still £5 inclusive of breakfast (under 18s free) – BUT there is a bargain season ticket of £24 for all 4 lectures!
All lectures and seminars are bookable via Eventbrite
Two final items of interest for the coming season:
- We are planning another young people’s theology essay writing competition – watch this space!
- We are also planning a 6-month journey through the Gospel of John – separate mailing coming soon.