The Sacred

Rev Sally Hitchener is an Anglican priest and Associate Vicar of St-Martin-in-the-Fields, Trafalgar Square. She was previously co-ordinating Anglican Chaplain and inter-faith advisor at Brunel University, and is the founder of Diverse Church, a charity which supports LGBT+ Christians. In this episode she discusses her sacred value of gift, her experiences as a gay female priest, and why sometimes being an outsider can be a blessing.

David Allen Green is a lawyer and legal commentator. He is a contributing editor at the Financial Times and a former legal correspondent for the New Statesman. He led the defence at the Twitter Joke Trial in 2012 and is now known for his commentary on the legal complexities surrounding Brexit. This interview explores why he became a lawyer instead of a historian, the responsibility that comes with a massive Twitter following and how he tries not to upset religious friends.

Christina Patterson is a writer and broadcaster. A former chief executive of the Poetry Society and columnist for The Independent, she now writes for The Guardian, The Sunday Times and The Daily Mail about culture, society, politics and books. She is a regular commentator on radio and TV news programmes and a regular guest on Sky News. She is the author of The Art of Not Falling Apart which you can buy here https://www.amazon.co.uk/Art-Not-Falling-Apart/dp/1786492768/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=U This episode covers her childhood informed by an ethic of public service, gaining and losing a fundamentalist faith, writing personally as a columnist and the sacramental echoes in wine and kettle chips.

James Cary is a comedy writer. He has written sitcoms for BBC TV and radio, including Miranda, Bluestone 42, Think the Unthinkable and Hut 33. He is the author of Writing That Sitcom, Death by Civilisation and most recently The Sacred Art of Joking. He is also a member of General Synod. We spoke about how he doesn't feel fully at home in either his church tribe or his comedy tribe, why he doesn't mind that his socially conservative views offend some people, and the importance of defending the freedom to makes jokes — because they make us fully human.

Shadi Hamid is a political scientist and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, in their Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World in the Center for Middle East Policy. Hes also a contributing editor for The Atlantic. He's the author most recently of Islamic Exceptionalism: How the Struggle Over Islam is Reshaping the World (https://www.amazon.com/Islamic-Exceptionalism-Struggle-Islam-Reshaping/dp/1250135133/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1447698723&sr=1-1), and the co-editor of Rethinking Political Islam (https://www.amazon.com/Rethinking-Political-Islam-Shadi-Hamid/dp/0190649208/ref=mt_paperback?_encoding=UTF8&me=). This episode explores his sacred value of respecting democratic outcomes, why representational intersectional politics is making being a public Muslim a bit more complex, his love for Christian political theologian Abraham Kuyper, and his contrarian tendencies.

Ariane Sherine is a comedy writer, journalist and in 2009 was creator of the Atheist Bus Campaign. She was written comedy for the BBC, Channel 4 and beyond, journalism for The Spectator, The Guardian, Telegraph and Sunday Times, and is the author of The Atheists Guide to Christmas and Talk Yourself Better: a Confused Person’s guide to Therapy, Self-help and Counselling. We spoke about a traumatic abortion experience, her struggles with mental health, what has changed since the bus campaign 10 years ago and why she now doesn't mind that her daughter calls herself a Christian. This episode contains themes some listeners may find upsetting. Please listen with care.

Nick Payne is an award winning playwright and screenwriter. His plays 'Constellations', and 'If There is I Haven’t Found it Yet' have been performed in London and New York and his series 'Wanderlust' was recently screened on BBC 1 and Netflix. Nick adapted Julian Barnes's The Sense Of An Ending for BBC Films which was released in 2017 with Jim Broadbent.Jake Gyllenhaal will star in Nick's play A Life which will run at The Public Theater on Broadway from January to March 2019. In this episode he discusses why publically funded arts are sacred to him, the difficulty of writing about religious belief as an agnostic, and why he thinks the theatre is vital for creating space to reflect on what kind of society we want to be.

There is no full episode of The Sacred as we are taking a break over Christmas. Instead, here's a short message from Elizabeth about dealing with difference in our very own homes and some announcements about next year's exciting line-up.

Andrew Copson is Chief Executive of Humanists UK, previously known as the British Humanist Association, and was formerly Director of Education and Public Affairs at the same organisation. He is also President of the International Humanist and Ethical Union, the global umbrella body for atheist, humanist, sceptic and secularist organisations. He has contributed to several books on secularism and humanism and is the author of Secularism: Politics, Religion, and Freedom. In this episode he discusses his childhood in the midlands, his sacred values of freedom, family and community, and how Blair’s backing of faith schools in the late nineties felt like a disruption of destiny. The episode also covers the pressures on campaigning organisations around integrity, navigating adversarial situations productively and the sometimes unspoken challenges of being friends across divides. This episode was edited for content and clarity. If you would like to listen to the full version, you can access it here: https://soundcloud.com/thesacredpodcast/28-andrew-copson-full-interview/s-EFaPh

Remona Aly is a journalist who writes for the Guardian, presents Pause For Thought on BBC Radio 2, Something Understood on BBC Radio 4, and the podcast Things Unseen. Previously, she was the deputy editor of emel, a glossy Muslim lifestyle magazine, and is director of communications of the Exploring Islam Foundation. In this episode she discusses how she finds riches and wisdom in a wide range of faith traditions — but is ultimately “in love” with Islam, how she deals with the abuse she gets as a public Muslim woman, and why she loves going to Friday night dinner with her Jewish friends.