Andrew is absolutely right here. There is no single, definitive interpretation of any religious tradition, and it dodges the issue to say “Christian nationalists aren’t REAL Christians”. What’s important is how the symbolic resources of the faith are being employed and the effects that has.
“In a battle between hope and hate, hope has won.”
Congratulations to new MP Hannah Spencer!
bylinetimes.com/2026/02/27/h...
Reform UK have suggested introducing a new ‘patriotic curriculum’ based on Christianity to give children ‘things to take pride in again’. However, there is already plenty that children and young people can and do take pride in. 🧵
To build a cohesive future, we must start by acknowledging the Britain that actually exists, not a mythical version of our past. National confidence comes from embracing our reality as a vibrant, pluralistic, and majority non-religious nation, not from governing by nostalgia.
Hooray! It’s in my calendar! If you ever want to come to the University of Sussex, we’d love to have you!!!
Please come to Brighton!!!
Fantastic news: @faith2faithless.bsky.social's powerful new animation raising awareness of the dangers faced by those leaving high-control religions or cults is a finalist in the 2026 Smiley Charity Film Awards.
Professor Claire Smith joins Peter and Jane Dick on This Morning, to explain why more people are choosing to donate their bodies to science - and what it means for medical training and research.
Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZEu...
Claims that Gen Z is the new ‘spiritual generation’ are a myth, driven largely by a Bible Society report based on weak and misleading data. When you look at robust, independent evidence, the story falls apart. 🧵
www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/...
As I’ve been saying for a while…
Congrats Mic!!!
The narrative of a ‘Christian revival’ among Gen Z makes for a catchy headline but the data tells a different story. High-quality research from @pewresearch.org & the British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey confirms that the trend towards a non-religious UK remains steady.
Celebrating the courage of clergy and other activists out on the streets of Minneapolis right now to document the actions of ICE. I remember what it was like protesting after Mike Brown’s death - this is sacred work.
Humanist Celebrants are trained to provide meaningful, personal, and professional humanist ceremonies to commemorate life’s major milestones - if you’re gearing up for wedding season, consider seeking a celebrant endorsement!
For more info: thehumanistsociety.org
It feels to me very much like the list of supporting evidence in this article was put together by doing a search and finding a bunch of headlines which seemed to support their idea, instead of by carefully considering the evidence critically. It feels biased, basically - and that’s not on.
At the very least they are not carefully reading or considering the material they are themselves using to support the idea of a revival. At worst, they are using these articles knowing that they don’t support that idea. Neither possibility is encouraging. There is a credibility problem here.
The thing to consider here, in my view, is the following: why are Bible Society researchers consistently offering, in support of their thesis, “supporting evidence” which is either unreliable, bad, or non existent? And what does that say about how much we can trust them?
I think we have to be very careful with anecdotal reportage like this. People are now being primed to see more people coming and so will likely notice and speak about their good weeks. I led a congregation for years and know how tempting it is to imagine growth where there is none!
And I think that is basically all the "much larger picture emerging" of a "revival" of Christianity. I hope you agree that it really isn't very impressive. In some cases the "evidence" turns out to be nothing much. In others, it is badly collected or misrepresented data. Not good enough!
The American context is even less relevant to the UK than the French, Finnish, and Swedish context.
I note, too, that the Finnish and Swedish numbers seem not to factor in the change in population size, which is essential, because if a population increases in size then the raw number of people getting baptised within that population (for instance) might well increase. That's not a revival.
The data from France, Finland, and Sweden I am tempted to put aside as not directly relevant to the question of a "revival" in the UK. There seems to be something happening with Catholicism in France, but in Finland and Sweden numbers are truly tiny, such that any fluctuation seems big.
There seems to be an increase in Bible sales overall but this data is not presented in a rigorous way, so it is hard to work out what to make of it. The link provided in this article in particular is to the DAILY MAIL, by the way, which is hardly a reliable media outlet, let alone an academic source
The "dramatic increase in Bible sales in Britain" I addressed in my long article on this, but essentially there is no evidence I can find at all that youth bibles have spiked in sales or that young people are buying Bibles more.
Additionally, the article presents this report as if it were comparative in some way, showing "Higher interest in the Bible among students". But it is not a comparative study - it is a snapshot of interest at one particular time. So it is not "higher" than anything - except authors' expectations.
Obviously, if your sample has too many Christians and too few nonreligious people, you are likely to see more interest in the Bible than you might expect.
The Fusion Movement report apparently demonstrating increased interest in the Bible among young people has a fatal flaw: it didn't control for religious identity. This led to them having more Christians and less nonreligious people than they would have were the sample nationally representative.
Frankly, this report presents data in a way I would fail a student for doing. It is very, very misleading to the point of intellectual dishonesty. I think Youth for Christ should ask themselves some difficult questions about whether this report demonstrates integrity and honesty.
The Youth for Christ report is, I think, dramatically misleading. It compares results from very different questions in order to conclude that interest in spirituality is up. You should ask the same question over time to ensure results are comparable, and they do not in hardly ANY of their questions.
The claim that "Belief in God on the rise among young adults" is based on YouGov polling which is volatile over time. According to that same polling, for instance, belief in god DROPPED quite a bit over the course of this year. There does seem a slight trend up, but volatility requires caution.
