The Spirit Of Things - Program Podcast

The medieval mystic Meister Eckhart once said, “If the only prayer you said in life was ‘thank you’, that would be enough.” It sounds simple, doesn’t it? But there’s more to gratitude than it seems. In this episode, Professor Mona Siddiqui – one of Britain's most influential public intellectuals – tells RN’s Meredith Lake about her project on Christian and Muslim approaches to gratitude. 

What monks knew about the emotions of isolation.

Today on the show we’ll take a look back on the year that was with writer and storyteller, Julie Perrin, whose journey of faith and doubt infuses the way she writes about the world around her. And, former chef-turned-Christian pastor, Simon Holt, on the way Collins Street Baptist Church will celebrate Christmas this year.

Have you got a holiday reading list already on the make? Or perhaps, in light of Hanukkah or Christmas, it’s a time to dwell with profound stories of faith? Literary critic Tali Lavi and award-winning biographer Jacqueline Kent join Meredith Lake to discuss the stories at the heart of Hanukkah, and the story of suffragist and feminist, Vida Goldstein.

On Soul Search today, we're marking the International Day of People with Disability. According to the UN, about one billion people around the world live with a disability — that includes 1 in 5 people in Australia. In this episode, we'll hear from Abdulah Hamimi, a young Muslim man from Melbourne who suffered a spinal injury when he was only eighteen, and Dr Louise Gosbell, a scholar at the forefront of a new area of Biblical Studies - reading the Christian gospels from a disability perspective.

Today on Soul Search, we encounter meditation and stillness in unexpected places. From the streets in the U.S. at the height of the Black Lives Matter protests, to the third floor of Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art. We meet U.S. activist and Dharma practitioner Dr Rima Vesely-Flad and Lindy Lee, one of Australia’s most significant contemporary artists whose work is saturated in Zen philosophy.

One of the biggest religious trends of the century thus far has been the rise of Pentecostalism around the globe — and our Prime Minister Scott Morrison is just one of its 650 million adherents. So what is Pentecostalism, who represents it, and what's its story here in Australia?

Ursula Rakova's home in the Carteret Islands of Papua New Guinea is in danger of being washed away. The Catholic community organizer reflects on the challenges of relocating the Islanders, and the role faith plays in her life. And, Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad on Europe's first eco-mosque, combining Islamic ideas of nature with green technologies.

Dr Rose Elu, an elder from Saibai Island, reflects on the impact of climate change on the Torres Strait, and the role faith plays in fostering her connection to the land. And, what does the recovery of Aboriginal place names for Dyarubbin (the Hawkesbury River) mean about how we remember the past, and think about the future?

She’s graced pop’s biggest stage, but for Dami Im it all began with singing gospel songs in South Korean churches. She joins Meredith Lake to talk about the role faith plays in her life and music, and how she makes sense of it all. And, the Christian and pre-Christian roots of Halloween.

We're all familiar with the idea of a film festival — but what about a festival devoted to a particular faith? On Soul Search today, Meredith Lake chats with Chris Vlahonasios, curator of the world's only online Orthodox Christian film festival called 'Byzanfest,' and Andrew Smith, Priest at the Holy Annunciation Orthodox Church in Brisbane.

This week marks ten years since Mary MacKillop — Australia’s first and so far only Catholic saint — was canonised by Pope Benedict XVI. But how much do you know about Mary? And why is she informally remembered as the 'patron saint of trouble makers'? On Soul Search today, Meredith Lake finds out with the help of Sister Mary Ellen O’Donoghue and Carole Cusack, Professor of Religious Studies.

2020 marks 100 years since the introduction of the Baha'i Faith to Australia. As they mark their centenary, we take a look at the beginnings of the faith and find out more about the local community. And, a Buddhist psychotherapist on how mindfulness can help couples under pressure.

Have you ever considered that emotions have a history — even an emotion like loneliness, which so many of us have been feeling lately? On Soul Search today, Meredith Lake dives into the history of emotions with Dr Dawn LaValle Norman and Dr Jonathan Zecher from the Australian Catholic University.

In the final episode of our series The Bigger Picture, we're joined by renowned scholar of Princeton University, Professor Elaine Pagels. Professor Pagels has spent decades seeking to understand religion, and as her latest book reveals, this isn’t a merely academic exercise, but a quest bound up with her own experience of life, and bereavement.

What are the possibilities for a grounded spirituality, in the aftermath of colonisation? Indigenous theologian Garry Deverell has lived the search for a spirituality that connects land and body. He joins Meredith Lake in part three of our series The Bigger Picture, to discuss ritual, reconnection and reconciliation.

What is the inner self? What is there deep down, that makes us who we are and enables us to keep going? In part two of our series The Bigger Picture, we meet Melbourne-based lawyer and writer Nyadol Nyuon, and social researcher Hugh Mackay, who joins Meredith Lake from Canberra.

What do the #metoo movement, political secularism and the widespread sympathy for Black Lives Matter have in common? According to historian Tom Holland, they all point to the residual influence of Christianity on the west. In the first episode of our 4-part series The Bigger Picture, best selling author and historian Tom Holland chats to RN's Meredith Lake.

#religion. Videos with that tag have over 600 million views on Tik Tok, the video sharing app popular with teenagers. It’s clear that social media is changing how we express and explore faith. On Soul Search today, meet the vegan priest on Instagram Jennie Hogberg, hijabi influencer Yasmin Jay, and Rabbi Lee Weissman who goes by Jihadi Jew on Twitter.

Sasha Sagan joins Meredith Lake to discuss her new book, For Small Creatures Such As We, and the long-term task of processing the life - and loss - of her famous father, the astronomer Carl Sagan.