Recording – Harrogate School of Theology & Mission: Recent Episodes
Recording – Harrogate School of Theology & Mission
To a church apparently obsessed with sin, death and ‘Doom’ the fourteenth-century visionary Julian of Norwich proposed that there is no anger in God towards us, that God finds in us nothing that needs forgiveness, and that sin itself is ‘behovely’ (fitting). Julian also claims to be faithful to the traditional teaching of the Church, yet she has been described as putting a bomb under the church’s teaching on divine anger, a bomb which left no part standing. How can we make sense of this, and do we dare to believe her?
Happiness is big business in the world out there: it motivates consumerism, advertising, political choices, and shapes communities; lack of happiness is often associated with mental health struggles. Yet the church rarely speaks of happiness, or of how a Christian framework may help us think of happiness in faithful and distinctive ways. This talk will explore how the Psalms help think about happiness, its contours and its challenges, and how we can develop a positive Christian vision for wellbeing.
Discipleship: So What?
Why do we even use this word? I have no idea what it really means.”
Every denomination says making disciples is the main priority. But discipleship can be a mystifying thing. What does it really mean? How can it be a gift, rather than a stumbling block?
And, even if we have an inkling of its meaning, what is really different about Christian disciples? In our lived experience?
After all, in many ways people of faith, no faith or some faith seem to live quite similar lives. We are born, we work, we shop, we sleep, we love, we struggle, we laugh, we cry, we pay taxes (perhaps!) and we die (definitely!). If you’re interested in the questions ‘What difference does this make?’ Or ‘What is the way?’ this HSTM morning is for you. It is a little bit about what Christians believe, but it is more about how what Christians believe shapes our lives.
Guy Donegan-Cross will introduce two books he has published this year with BRF: Discipleship: Start this Way and Discipleship: Walk this Way as a way of exploring these questions. Both books are available to order now at brfonline.org.uk/guy-donegan-cross
Download Lecture handoutAfter spending over twenty years on ‘The Gospel of John. A Theological Commentary‘ (2021) and then a few more years on a follow-up ‘Lent Plus’ book, ‘Meeting God in John: A Companion for Lent, Holy Week, Easter, and Beyond‘ (November 2025), I want to share some of the main insights that John has given me. These include seeking answers ro questions such as: What was John’s aim in writing the Gospel? How should we understand the Prologue? Who is Jesus? What is the meaning of his crucifixion? What are the essential Christian practices taught by Jesus? Can John give us a spirituality for serious times such as ours? How can we share in Jesus’s passionate desire for the unity in love of his followers? How should we read John now?
We would like to draw your attention to 2 books by David Ford:
- The Gospel of John – A Theological Commentary
- Meeting God in John – A Companion for Lent, Holy Week, Easter and Beyond.
The Lord’s Prayer is a prayer text and practice that unites Christians worldwide and puts us in touch with Jesus and Christians throughout the ages. People of other faiths and traditions are also drawn to this prayer. But how do we pray this prayer today, in light of our growing awareness of the dangers of patriarchal and monarchical language and thinking? In this lecture, Nicola Slee will share something of her own journey with the Lord’s Prayer and suggest that we are called, not so much to repeat the prayer unvaryingly, as to live in its pattern and improvise around it to find our own authentic way of praying and our own authentic relationship to the Abba Amma God of Jesus.
Nicola’s book of the same title is available from Canterbury Press, and other booksellers.
A link can be provided to Bishop Arun’s talk for those were at the lecture. He has requested we don’t make the talk publicly available.
The following are the 5 helps Arun spoke on:
- Thank God. Often and always. Thank him carefully and wonderingly for your continuing privileges and for every experience of his goodness. Thankfulness is a soil in which pride does not easily grow.
- Take care about confession of your sins. As time passes the habit of being critical about people and things grows more than each of us realize. …[He then gently commends the practice of sacramental confession].
- Be ready to accept humiliations. They can hurt terribly but they can help to keep you humble. All these can be so many chances to be a little nearer to our Lord. There is nothing to fear, if you are near to the Lord and in his hands.
- Do not worry about status. There is only one status that Our Lord bids us be concerned with, and that is our proximity to Him. That is our status; to be near our Lord wherever He may ask us to go with him.
- Use your sense of humour. Laugh at things, laugh at the absurdities of life, laugh at yourself.
In 1873 Archbishop Philotheos Bryennios discovered the only surviving copy of a text called ‘The Didache’ or ‘The Teaching of the Lord, by the Twelve Apostles, to the Gentiles’. This book nearly achieved inclusion in the New Testament canon. After it was placed in the ‘second rank’, it disappeared for well over a thousand years. Since its rediscovery it has baffled scholars. No one has been able to work out who wrote it, when, where or why. In this lecture Alan Garrow presents a new solution to the puzzle. The Didache is not a single text. Instead, it is two that have been spliced together and overlaid with additional material. When that process is reversed two ancient treasures emerge. The first is the Complete Apostolic Decree (mentioned in Acts 15), the earliest Christian document and the text that set Christianity on course to become a religion separate from Judaism. The second is the Missing Epistle of John (mentioned in 3 John 9), a text that helps illuminate doctrines and practices that remain essential for Christians today.
Due to technical difficulties, the opening few minutes of the lecture are not available.
The accompanying booklet can be downloaded from alangarrow.com/texts
Looking through the Kaleidoscope: Hebrews’ Use of Old Testament Narratives in the Light of Jesus’ Ascension and Awaited Return
Hebrews’ engagement with the Old Testament is among the most exciting and creative in the New Testament. It creates a kaleidoscope of Biblical texts so that their interaction draws out the author’s fundamental convictions about Jesus. The resulting images bring out new theological insights about Jesus and the congregation.
We will explore three Old Testament figures mentioned in Hebrews—the high priest, Moses, and Joshua.
All three of these figures left God’s people to do important work for them, before returning. This return of the absent figure forms a significant, part of Hebrews’ argument. Thus joined together they illuminate who Jesus is. They also show what the ascended Christ is doing for us now and how we should understand our own identity and situation as we await his return.
Mark Oakley addresses the questions, ‘How should Christians use language? How should they express their belief and what language is needed for self-scrutiny? He will then argue that poetry is the native language of faith and that a crude literalism simmers down the richness and resonance that faith liberates in us. In this talk, Mark uses some poems explore his theme.
A common conceptualisation of the current debate over sexuality is that it is one between traditionalists and revisionists. In this lecture, Mark Vasey-Saunders argues that this is based on a misunderstanding of the degree to which both conservatives and liberals represent a break with earlier tradition. The current sexuality debate is between two different ways of interpreting the tradition of the church in a modern context.
Download Slides
Mark’s book on the subject is available from all good booksellers.
“Defusing the Sexuality Debate: The Anglican Evangelical Culture War” [SCM Press 2023]
Watch on YouTube
As we seek to live out the call of Micah to act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with God, what does it look like to meet the immediate needs of those experiencing oppression and violence, whilst also reforming the systems that perpetuate injustice?
In this live lecture, we will be considering 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. We will explore how we can take action to bring greater justice and mercy in our world today.
With around 50 million people trapped in slavery, 1 in 4 of these children, this is a massive issue for our world. How might we engage as individuals and churches to help end slavery in our lifetime?
https://www.ijmuk.org
https://www.ijmuk.org/our-work
Watch the lecture on YouTube:
Download the slides
During the first and second centuries a group of miscellaneous Christian leaders wrote down their understanding of the meaning of Jesus Christ’s life, death and resurrection. These authors were considered by later Biblical scholars to be the next generation of Apostles and as a result were named The Apostolic Fathers, and their works are considered by many to be the most important collection of post-New Testament writings. Indeed a number of these texts were considered for inclusion in the New Testament, but later rejected. Their obvious significance stems from the fact that they are the first Christian writings produced outside the New Testament Canon and as such contain an essential insight into the development of the early Christian Church and Christian thinking. Much Christian Doctrine came, not from the New Testament, but from the writings produced by the early church and in particular the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. Therefore, these texts are crucial to an understanding of the shaping of Christian thought and Christian doctrine.
We are delighted to welcome back the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who delighted us with back in 2014 with his lecture on the Gospel of John. This lecture addresses some intriguing issues in modern contemplative spirituality and its missional opportunities. Bishop Rowan tells us, “We will look briefly at two twentieth century figures – Mother Maria Skobtsova and Madeleine Delbrêl – who attempted to live out a contemplative vocation in the setting of modern urban poverty, and will ask what we can learn from them about integrating contemplation and action.”
We live and function in a capitalist society, but how often do we stop to examine and question the values and assumptions underlying this approach to economics, which has such a pervasive effect on our society? Under the broad umbrella of Capitalism and Christianity, Eve will cover her books on Capitalism’s Toxic Assumptions and Theology and Consumerism. How best should Christians grapple with Capitalism, and what is our role in the economy?
Suggestions for further reading:* Capitalism’s Toxic Assumptions: Redefining Next Generation Economics Hardcover, by Eve Poole (Bloomsbury, 2015) * Buying God: Consumerism and Theology, by Eve Poole (SCM Press, 2018)
How St Benedict and Celtic spirituality is inspirational for these changing world times.It couldn’t be timelier as, in the words of Bob Dylan’s song, The Times They area Changin’, and the world is being shaken. As Roy puts it, ‘The tectonic plates, politically, economically, environmentally and societally are shifting. The idea of returning to normal is to deny reality. In the light of such a changing world and church, we ask, How Then Shall We Live? How do we sing the Lord song in a strange land? What does it mean to love God and follow Christ in a changing world? As we embrace the challenges and opportunities of the present times look to the future that is uncertain, we will explore the wisdom that comes to us in scripture and the monastic traditions of Benedictine and Celtic spirituality. In an emerging new Dark Age they speak of light with which to illumine our paths.’
- Download Roy Searle’s presentation
Suggestions for further reading:* Celtic Daily Prayer, Books One and Two * New Dark Age by James Brindle * Celtic Christian Communities by Ian Bradley * Benedictine Options by Patrick Henry * The Way of Saint Benedict by Rowan Williams
Galileo famously quipped “The intention of the Holy Ghost is to teach us how one goes to heaven – not how heaven goes.” Jesus Ascension was not the same as the ascent of a rocket. But what is the relationship between life in heaven and life in outer space? Lucas Mix will talk about the history of ascent narratives, tales of journeying into the heavens, both scientific and spiritual – from Plato to Carl Sagan and The Expanse. For centuries, physical and spiritual “up” were aligned in the popular imagination. Astronomy and biology have revealed more complex – but no less Biblical – models for the place and direction of life in the cosmos. Come find out more about the stories we tell and why they matter for the future of humanity.
Unfortunately, due to technical issues the recording of Dr Mix’s lecture is unavailable.
Suggestions for further reading: Philip Lewis & Sadek Hamid: New Directions in Islamic Thought, Creativity and Activism (Edinburgh UP 2018) Ed Hussain, Among the Mosques: A Journey Across Muslim Britain (Bloomsbury, 2021) Sarfraz Manzoor, They: What Muslims and Non-Muslims Get Wrong About Each Other (Wildfire, 2021) Karamat Iqbal, British Pakistani Boys, Education and the Role of…
The recording starts part way through the Q&A. The video is on our You Tube channel. The link is https://youtu.be/UntWxI8KmP4