Episode 40. Theo Hobson: Anglicanism, Liberalism and Liberty

SYNOPSIS

Theo Hobson is an Anglican theologian, essayist and journalist whose writings engage with several themes which are germane to the Red Heaven podcast: the reforming English tradition of religious liberty going back to the poet, John Milton; theological and political liberalism across the strands of Anglicanism; secularism and responses to it from Anglo-Catholic theology; and the role that the arts can play in revitalizing Christian worship.   

The interview places Theo’s writings in the light of his own religious pilgrimage, moving out from being raised in an upper-middle class London family and educated at what had been John Milton’s school,  St Paul’s. Theo describes his encounters with a variety of Church of England cultures, including the intellectually untroubled Evangelicalism of the public school, the liberal, secularising theology of the Cambridge academic, Don Cupitt, and the Anglo-Catholic socialism of the East End priest, Ken Leech. His autobiographical account places Theo’s books in the context of a growing personal re-engagement with the Church of England, its religious practices and both traditional and experimental forms of Christian worship. 

The interview develops several themes.  The importance of poetic insight to religious faith in the work of John Milton, George Herbert, W B Yeats and T S Eliot. The anthropological significance of ritual within Christian worship. The tension between two aspects of British Christianity: the part which is open to political liberalism and the part which sets theological and moral boundaries to secular humanism, despite being historically bound up with its creation.    

GUEST

Theo Hobson has written for the Guardian newspaper and as of 2024 contributes to the online Spectator publication, covering theological and cultural trends in the Church of England.

His books focus upon the debt that secular humanism in its English context owes to Christianity. They include  Milton’s Vision: The Birth of Christian Liberty, Against Establishment: An Anglican Polemic,  And God Created Liberalism, and Anarchy, Church and Utopia. 

Further details of Theo’s work can be found at https://theohobson.wordpress.com/

Theo’s interview with Simon Machin was recorded online on 7 November 2023.