Life & Faith

Prof. Miroslav Volf, Director of the Yale Centre for Faith and Culture, delivered four lectures at the ReThinking: A Public Faith conference held in Sydney, Australia, in March 2014. The conference was a joint project of the Centre for Public Christianity, Arrow Leadership, and World Vision Australia. This is the second lecture, in which Prof. Volf looks at how a faith with exclusive truth claims can engage a pluralistic world.

Prof. Miroslav Volf, Director of the Yale Centre for Faith and Culture, delivered four lectures at the ReThinking: A Public Faith conference held in Sydney, Australia, in March 2014. The conference was a joint project of the Centre for Public Christianity, Arrow Leadership, and World Vision Australia. In this, his opening lecture, Prof. Volf addressed the issue of whether or not faith inevitably leads to violence.

British writer Francis Spufford surprised many when he outed himself as a Christian in his latest book Unapologetic: why, despite everything, Christianity makes surprising emotional sense. He joined Life and Faith to discuss his book and why he is a Christian.

Katherine Leary Alsdorf is the Founder & Executive Director of Redeemer's Center for Faith & Work. She came to Redeemer in 2002, after 20 years in the hi-tech industry, to establish the Center and help nurture a meaningful integration between people's faith and their professional work. She is the co-author of Every Good Endeavour: Connecting your work to God's work. She joined Life and Faith to discuss the connections between work and faith. 

Pastor Ray Minniecon is a descendant of the Kabi Kabi nation and the Gurang Gurang nation of South East Queensland, the South Sea Islander people, with connections to the people of Ambrym Island, Vanuatu. Ray has worked with World Vision Australia, the Sydney Anglican Diocese, survivors of the Stolen Generations who were institutionalised at Kinchela Boys home as we as other Aboriginal ministries. He came on Life and Faith to discuss relationship between Christianity and Aboriginal people, the commonalities and differences between Aboriginal Spirituality and Christianity, and his work with former inmates of the Kinchela Boys Home.

In 1945 Lutheran pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer was executed by the Nazis. He is the subject of a recent play called Lies, Love and Hitler. The playwright Elizabeth Avery Scott joined Simon Smart and Natasha Moore on Life and Faith to discuss the life of Bonhoeffer and her play.

The latest science-fiction blockbuster to hit cinemas is Divergent. Larissa Aldridge, who has read the books and seen the film, joins Simon Smart and Natasha Moore on Life and Faith to discuss the film and its themes.

The blockbuster film Noah is one that people may find both familiar and unfamiliar when they compare it to the Bible story. Justine Toh saw the film and sat down with Simon Smart to discuss it.

Greg Lake is a former Immigration Department leader who managed a number of immigration detention centres, including Nauru, Christmas Island and Curtin. He also worked in policy and management roles in Canberra under the Rudd/Gillard governments. Greg resigned from Immigration in April 2013 after examining whether his role in managing detention centres was something that aligned with his Christian faith. He spoke Life and Faith about his experiences working in detention centres.

The new documentary The Armstrong Lie is a fascinating character study, a cautionary tale and a mildly disturbing piece of social commentary. Simon Smart and Justine Toh discuss the film and the questions it raises about truth and moral relativism.