God is love, and Love is goodness giving itself away. It is a fullness of being that does not want to remain enclosed in itself, but rather to share itself with others, to give itself to them, and to make them happy. Edith Stein

Significant that the author credits her 6 years attending Quaker school for an appreciation of silence here. They are under-acknowledged as modes of Quaker outreach: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

“But the way we’ve responded to it – the return to our collective ideals that moments like this inspire – gives some meaning to all the pomp and circumstance.” Is this piece really arguing that the papal conclave was given meaning only by… the meme response? 😑 www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Glad to see @theguardian.com again drawing attention to the (social, physical, emotional) challenges of infant feeding, which place such a heavy burden on new mothers - as @chinemcdonald.bsky.social and I explore in episode 3 of Motherhood vs the Machine…

Two things can be true at once. 1. Overall levels of religiosity are declining. 2. But religious people are actually *more* religious now. Look at the top left graph - that's the share of 18-35 years old Christians who attend church weekly. It's up 7 points since 2008.

Elaine Green reflects on what "synodality" means for Quakers. This may sound boring, but our Local Meeting watched it this morning, and we all agreed it was worth the time. Thank you, Elaine @bsequakers.bsky.social Elaine starts speaking at 28:15 www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9oQ...

The year is 1650 and the Quakers are being unruly. The year is 1848 and the Quakers are being unruly. The year is 2025 and the Quakers are being unruly.

TW: stillbirths, pregnancy loss, miscarriage and death. The final episode of #MotherhoodvsTheMachine is out now. @chinemcdonald.bsky.social and @mlpennington.bsky.social explore what motherhood teaches us about loss, grief, change and death. open.spotify.com/episode/698k...

🚨 Outrage as 20 police officers break into Westminster Quaker Meeting House and arrest six. 🚨 This shocking violation of a place of worship is a direct result of crackdowns on protest and dissent - freedom of speech, assembly and democracy are at risk.🕊️ 👉 www.quaker.org.uk/news-and-eve...

“The kind of biblical worldview Jesus wants you to have is inseparable from the kind of heart Jesus wants you to have.” —Michael Wear, The Spirit of Our Politics

People in decision-making / -influencing roles tend to underestimate how many of us are struggling to make ends meet* 1 in 8 of us are skipping meals 1 in 5 are spending our savings (*availability heuristic: people in their circles tend to be doing OK, & humans overestimate our normality)

No one wants bland cheerleading. But headlines could be a bit more factual ("The government today announced...") with the follow-up doing the analysis. Instead, the headline is almost always opinion-led ("Fury at..."). So the "story" becomes the anger, rather than the thing that prompted it.

Feat. my daughter’s podcast debut, at 32 weeks gestation. Enjoy!

Our beautiful home planet, teeming with life ❤️

Last month I did a little experiment. I wanted to see how the exact same post would perform on both X (Twitter) and Bluesky. The results were...interesting... [Thread]

Your timeline cleanse for the day

What is 'work'? What's the relationship between paid employment & mothering? What skills does it demand of us? Why isn't it valued more highly? Where does it cross into love? So proud of this project, which taught me so much along the way. Do give our new podcast a listen - episode 1 out now. 👇

Good lord. A 24% increase in working age 'deaths of despair' (attributed to alcohol, drugs,suicide) comparing pre- and post-pandemic. h/t @cjayanetti.bsky.social ifs.org.uk/news/various...

New research from @theosthinktank.bsky.social ahead of the launch of the Motherhood Vs The Machine podcast next week! @chinemcdonald.bsky.social @mlpennington.bsky.social

Could headlines please not just take for granted that Trump “is doing” stuff he has no legal authority to do just because he said so? Because the implication to the reader is that he can in fact legitimately do these things.

“And there was one piece of information that allowed us to recognise what was happening at a crucial moment: a sign that death was close.” Great piece on the importance of death literacy here, chiming with what we found in @theosthinktank.bsky.social research on a lack of exposure to death/dying.

As ever, @hopenothate.org.uk do fantastic & important work

What does social prescribing actually look like? Catch Dr Marianne Rozario on BBC Radio 4 Sunday unpacking our latest research on social prescribing. 🎙️Tune in from 31:40 to hear more. www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...

And Quakers!

Love that we are spending all our time discussing Reform and ignoring the Lib Dems and then you see this…

Academics have always been complaining about admin duties eating into their teaching and research time

Job ad of the year just dropped: its only BLACK ROD housesofparliament.tal.net/vx/mobile-0/...

Terrible news. Tamam was involved in a Parents Circle - Family Forum peace project. It is a joint Israeli-Palestinian group of over 700 families, all of whom have lost an immediate family member to the ongoing conflict and want to find a route to sustainable peace.

Today’s collect, for St. Agatha, hit hard.

Brilliant as always from my colleague Paul Bickley, asking: “Should there be bishops in the House of Lords?” www.theosthinktank.co.uk/comment/2025...

For what it’s worth, when I spent years in Afghanistan and Iraq, the most powerful thing I ever saw was USAID digging wells & repairing schools. The most effective power we will ever have.

Our atomised society just isn’t designed for parenting - and it‘s often mothers who bear the consequences. Looking forward to exploring the challenges of Western motherhood (and what they can teach all of us) with @chinemcdonald.bsky.social in our upcoming Theos podcast, Motherhood vs the Machine.

I predict we are going to hear a lot more about Social Prescribing in coming years so this new report from @theosthinktank.bsky.social by my colleague Marianne Rozario on the topic is both timely and perceptive: www.theosthinktank.co.uk/research/202...

The world's richest man - perhaps the richest man who has ever lived - gloating about shutting down aid for the world's poorest people. All while posing as the champion of the common man. The great lie of populism in its most naked and morally putrid form.

hey quick question does Goliath win in that story

If you wanted no leaks you should have gone into Settings -> Security -> Configure privacy & security -> Privacy options -> Other -> Configure -> Media interface and clicked “Disallow.” The Leak setting is on by default but we understand your privacy is important so we’ve made it easy to opt out

Worth listening in full. Two types of power are on show in this video, and I know which I find more compelling. 🔥

👏💯👏💯👏💯👏 I want to love the BBC, but the trend towards clickbait and human interest stories makes it increasingly inadequate to rely on for the actual news. And once you can’t rely on it for news… unherd.com/newsroom/bbc...

Only someone with no understanding of liberal history would treat fact-checking and free speech as a binary opposition. The whole point of free speech is that it gets us closer to the truth. Where free speech has no purchase in the truth, its purpose collapses.

The @bmj.com has posted a very important piece about our disconnect with dying, & how that is hurting rather than helping us, by @lucyselman.bsky.social This ⬇️ fantastic thread by @trishaelliott.bsky.social analyses the paper beautifully. Read. Contemplate. Talk to each other. TY Lucy & Trisha 🙏🏽

Beautiful piece here on Notre Dame, distraction, productivity, spirituality, and the call of church bells... “The sound of bells seemed to be a call to the city, and perhaps even the world at large, given all the political divisions, to refocus on spiritual and social renewal…”

The Humanities must firmly reject AI taking over our classrooms, our pedagogy. It’s the only way.

I’ll shortly be going on maternity leave and the wonderful Rob is steering the ship while I’m off. Give him a follow! 👏🥳

The share of Americans who expressed "hardly any" confidence in organized religion in 1972: 16%. The share of Americans who expressed "hardly any" confidence in organized religion in 2022: 34%.

There are still a few weeks left in the year (though December is generally a quiet month for book proposals), but it looks like I’m going to close out 2024 with around 80% of total book proposals coming from men, 18% from women, and 2% from persons whose gender was not apparent/obvious.

I wouldn't go quite as far as this piece - but here's a refreshing antidote to the common, lazy attribution of religion as The Problem. The bottom line: religious ideas are among humanity's most powerful forms of self and collective expression. No surprise they can be weaponised to ulterior ends.

I will never, ever get over this.