"The empire history wars that have flared up so viciously of late, are about the future as much as the past" 💬 In his latest longread, @nickebs.bsky.social takes a deep dive into imperial history and today’s "empire wars." 🔗 Read it here www.theosthinktank.co.uk/comment/2025...

“There was an intense apocalyptic smell in the air, and writer after writer claimed they were living at the end of history.” I have written a long read on empires and history ending, then and now. Enjoy. www.theosthinktank.co.uk/comment/2025...

If you're interested in the Future of the West cf this series of Reading our Times which explores its "contours" - choice, growth, democracy, sex, Christianity & with @samirpuri.bsky.social @lucyaash.bsky.social @richarddouglas.bsky.social Jonathan Sumption, Diarmaid Macculloch tinyurl.com/5677vdbf

"We're already well aware of the risks and challenges that we face in our own kind of own persons. Having a child means opening yourself up to that vulnerability in the life of another person." What are children for? tinyurl.com/37n7wrj7

Why are we having so few children? Ah, now there's a question. In conversation with Anastasia Berg on her @oneworldbooks.bsky.social book What are children for? tinyurl.com/37n7wrj7

"I'm not trying to say that choice is a bad thing at all. Choice is vital to our independence. That said, it isn't necessarily the solution to everything and some of our collective needs require us sometimes to decide that choice isn't our highest value." tinyurl.com/r323xt4b

"Our sense of ourselves as free, and what that means, has evolved over time. I think humans do seek freedom in some form, but what they mean by that can be very different in different times and places." Analysing freedom and choice on... tinyurl.com/r323xt4b

Choice, choice, choice. Everything is choice. These days, to deny someone freedom of choice is almost to deny them their humanity. Where did this come from? Me in conversation with Sophia Rosenfeld on The Age of Choice: tinyurl.com/r323xt4b

"There's a knowledge you derive from a test tube, when everything else is just wishy washy nonsense, on the one hand. But on the other there's a postmodernist approach… Western truth, white truth, male truth, my truth… this is a pretty slippery slope." tinyurl.com/y9kbcfrc

"For all the immense flaws of Western civilization, many of the goods that we take for granted - individualism, parliamentary democracy, belief in human equality, science itself - these derive from Christian culture." tinyurl.com/y9kbcfrc

It's one thing to say that Christianity has a richer account of the human person than secular alternatives. But that prompts an inevitable response from the sceptic who might say, “ultimately the comfort that it offers is spurious because atheism is true.” tinyurl.com/yw69cfnk

"He rang me up and said, 'Rupert I'm a lifelong agnostic. I can't speak to any of the philosophy or theology in your book. The point is that Richard is wrong about the science let alone the theology.'" I speak to Rupert Shortt on science, religion & Richard Dawkins tinyurl.com/yw69cfnk

If you are interested in what the discovery of alien life would mean for humanity - and how could you not be? - please join me tomorrow for an on-line talk with the Scientific and Medical Network. Details here: tinyurl.com/2tbd2dkc

This week on Reading our Times, in conversation with Rupert Shortt: Would it matter if Christianity were eclipsed? podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/w...

Lots of debate today from Chris Coghlan MP, Tim Stanley, @politicshome.bsky.social et al on the proper role of religious in the assisted dying debate. Here is the @Theosthinktank take on this tinyurl.com/bdhcpfjb

“Asking about the limits to growth is not just an interesting policy question. What we're doing here is not just questioning how we should navigate the policy minefield. We're fundamentally questioning who we are, what is our foundation of our existence.” tinyurl.com/2t8sk2tb

“You might see this as a single crisis, an environmental crisis, a physical crisis. Beyond that, it's also a political crisis… But fundamentally, I think it’s a philosophical or even a theological crisis... the fundamental cause of political inaction” : tinyurl.com/2t8sk2tb

"What environmentalism has done is it has contradicted an idea of progress, which is providing a secular understanding of meaning, of what it means to be human, without offering something to replace it." The Meaning of Growth @cusp.ac.uk @theosthinktank.bsky.social tinyurl.com/2t8sk2tb

The future is endless. Once you buy into that, the idea of progress, whereby humanity would, over time, through scientific learning, understand & master the universe, you have the idea of a future which is material, but which is attaining God like mastery. tinyurl.com/2t8sk2tb

In the latest episode of Reading our Times, I talk to Richard Douglas about his book on "The Meaning of Growth", and we explore how the environmental challenge "is really a treble crisis": physical, political and philosophical. tinyurl.com/2t8sk2tb

This is a great piece by @j-amesmarriott.bsky.social on the importance of reading. tinyurl.com/ms66muuu I confess I am far from unbiased on this topic. tinyurl.com/yrzm389t

"I wanted to understand why Patriarch Kirill seemed so craven, so blindly loyal to Putin, and why he was coming up with all this rhetoric that seemed so warmongering, so unlike anything you associate with the Christian faith." @lucyaash.bsky.social @theosthinktank.bsky.social tinyurl.com/jexnt8hk

"I do like your @theosthinktank.bsky.social reports," a MP said to me recently. "They LOOK so stylish." I couldn’t agree more (natch) but this is esp. so with our latest one on churches work with #Refugees , with stunning photography from John Boaz. tinyurl.com/yzsrepy5

He understood the church could bring a sense of dignity to these humiliated parts of Russian society but pretty soon there were icons appearing in the cockpits of bomber jets & every army division battalion would be named after a saint @lucyaash.bsky.social on Kirill tinyurl.com/jexnt8hk

"The Evangelicals were lecturing Russians about Christianity. Some of these people that came [in the 90s] from Europe and America didn't have the foggiest idea that Christianity had existed in Russia for 1000 years already." In conversation with @lucyaash.bsky.social tinyurl.com/jexnt8hk

A: If you want to do public debate, don’t quote religious stuff at me. Use public reasoning! B: OK, sure. I am against assisted dying because I fear what will happen to the vulnerable. A: You’re being dishonest! I know you real reason is religious! Read: tinyurl.com/bdhcpfjb

Why is the Orthodox church so supportive of Putin's war? This was a great conversation with @lucyaash.bsky.social about orthodoxy, Putin, Kirill, Ukraine, history and theology. tinyurl.com/jexnt8hk

"I do not see where the improvement is going to come from, because it seems to me that the problem lies in certain very basic characteristics of humanity which aren't going to change." Jonathan Sumption on future of democracy. Sobering. tinyurl.com/2utkwtfp

Holding an opposing view is not 'imposing' belief on the assisted dying debate... Unpacking the dishonesty objection to religious contributions in new @theosthinktank.bsky.social report: www.seenandunseen.com/preview-link...

Slightly confusing title but article is spot on... www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/202...

"I think that the consistent denigration of our past is loosening the main bond that makes us a nation, and that's why I think that it is regrettable, not simply because it's untrue." I talk to Jonathan Sumption about democracy, politics and history. tinyurl.com/2utkwtfp

Ta da

Religious contributions to the assisted dying debate have, we are told, been “dishonest”. But this accusation fails to understand how a religious argument works or even what is it. Fresh off the press from @theosthinktank.bsky.social … www.theosthinktank.co.uk/research/202...

OUT TODAY from @theosthinktank.bsky.social “How much have your religious views influenced your decision?”: religion and the assisted dying debate. tinyurl.com/bdhcpfjb

We @theosthinktank.bsky.social are publishing a big report tomorrow on assisted dying, & why all the arguments levelled against the religious contributions ("irrational", “inflexible”, "dishonest", etc) are... well, a bit rubbish. Check Theos website tomorrow for more details.

"There is bound to be a distance between the representatives and their electors. This is absolutely unavoidable. The truth is that you can't have a democracy without politics, and you can't have politics without politicians." tinyurl.com/2utkwtfp

“the mysticism is of equality between husband and wife… is a sexual equality. It's bodies that matter. It's very interesting seeing over the centuries how embarrassing Christians have found this” Me in conversation with Diarmaid Macculloch for Reading our Times: tinyurl.com/yusmjcrz

Is it all over for the West? This week @nickebs.bsky.social talks with Samir Puri, Director of the Global Governance and Security Centre at @chathamhouse.org, about his book ‘Westlessness: the great global rebalancing’ 🔗 Listen here: podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/i...

The story of Noah's flood will never go out of fashion. I wonder why. Me in @thespectator1828.bsky.social on a cultural history of a classic: www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-...

Great to talk to Doru Costache of The Australian Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies last night about what “science” and “religion” are – or what we think they are – and how they relate to one another. Full conversation here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBOv...

“Come down too hard on immigration or free trade and you can negotiate and debate your way back. Come down too hard on representative democracy and there is no obvious political path home.” @nickebs.bsky.social on the dangers of overcorrecting liberalism.

Engaging Woolwich Episcopal Area Study Day today, with @nickebs.bsky.social Nick Spencer of @theosthinktank.bsky.social , on Faith & Science. With additional input from our own Science PhD clergy: Jo Lewis-Burgess, @charliebelllive.bsky.social, and Edward Scrase-Field. @southwark.anglican.org

www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/202... are we really re-enchanting?

Are Trump supporters feeling buyer’s remorse? My piece for The Tablet this week: www.thetablet.co.uk/features/are...

What does ‘Judaeo-Christian’ actually mean? My piece for @churchtimes.bsky.social this week: www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/202...

Talking about designer babies, gene splicing and Playing God with Sam McKee was great fun. I even look like a crazed Frankenstein in the photo. Listen in here: youtube.com/watch?v=njwr...

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...

Interested to see that Colorado Supreme Court has ruled that elephants are not people. Seems like a weird headline but the case opens up some seriously interesting questions about what is a person which I discuss here readingourtimes.podigee.io/62-new-episode