Jesus was a home wrecker
Research by The Children's Society shows how important family is to the nurture and care of children. But Jesus' attitude to family and children is at best ambivalent and sometimes hostile. Was...
A Sane World
Recent evidence from the Human Genome Project suggests that only 5–10% of differences in psychology between us and our siblings are due to genes. It also appears that ethnic groups and social...
The Homing Instinct
John O'Donohue wrote that spirituality is the art of homecoming. Drawing from his book, Dreaming of Home, Michael Mitton will explore the homing instinct in all of us that yearns for a place of...
Suicide: A pastoral challenge to the church
Suicide is a taboo topic, yet among young males it is the second highest means of death – and the church is not exempt. This session takes a theology based on Easter Saturday to help understand the...
Preacher Girl: The peril and promise of proclamation
Writing a sermon can feel like a wrestling match between the preacher and the text; a match in which the preacher should not walk away before demanding a blessing from that text for their community....
Speaker(s): Nadia Bolz-WeberThe Gospel According to Everyone
How come in church we only ever hear the gospels of four men in Palestine 2,000 years ago? What about the gospels of the people sitting right next to us: the woman who gave up her child for adoption,...
Speaker(s): Martin WroeRelationships, power action: the practice of the common good
Maurice Glasman outlines the basic practices of community organising, particularly the centrality of one-to-one conversation and the primacy of building relationships. And then asks you to work...
Don’t blame the bankers. Why the financial crisis was your fault and its your job to sort out the mess
In the aftermath of the financial crisis everyone has been quick to cast the first stone at the bankers. But in the end we have to take responsibility too because we failed to be stewards of our own...
The Art of Curating Worship: What lies beneath
This talk explores what it means to curate corporate public worship, what a curator needs to be and do, and some of the new vocabulary and language that needs to be developed for good curating. Mark...
The Art of Curating Worship: What happens next
A session exploring the work of several well-established worship curators working in the fields of community, transitional and guerilla worship. Mark Pierson is the founding pastor of Cityside...
Faith and the Benefit of the Doubt
Churches tend not to do doubt very well. Some make certainty – blessed assurance – their hallmark. Others nurture doubt so much that they cease to be sure of anything. There's a balance to...
Speaker(s): Mark VernonPower in the People
Few of us realise how powerful we can be in changing public policy and accelerating the end of extreme poverty. In this session the director of Christian Aid describes the changing face of poverty...
Speaker(s): Loretta MinghellaChristianity & Contemporary Politics: Beyond the Big Society
What do the Franciscans, Calvin and ancient Roman Law have to do with contemporary social policy? Luke Bretherton explores how the churches can look beyond arguments about the good society or the Big...
Speaker(s): Luke BrethertonHIV and new ideas of family and belonging
An examinination of the impact of HIV – physical, psychological and social – on individuals, families and communities. Though thousands die every day and those living with HIV face great stigma...
Paradise lost, Paradise restored? Why the conservation movement has it all wrong
From planting trees to breeding programmes for endangered animals, humans have been interfering with nature, but are these approaches really helpful? A challenging exploration of the conservation...