This week, Joe interviews author and speaker Danielle Strickland, about patriarchy – the male-centring and male-ordering of the world. They discuss the challenges of calling it out, the heretical concept of the male-ness of God, and the way in which patriarchal thinking and theology affects the world and the church. Most importantly, they talk about some practical things we can all do to make a difference.

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Danielle Strickland - Website
• The Other Side of Hope
• Better Together: How Women and Men Can Heal the Divide and Work Together to Transform the Future
• The Liberating Truth - How Jesus Empowers Women
• baremarriage.com
• Christians for biblical equality
• Deep and Wide Academy

More on metaphors. We talk more about the idea of Jesus as 'Lord', and discuss how changes in culture, society or even technology might change our understanding of long-standing human metaphors. Also we talk about ritual and sacraments and how so many of them are simply heightened versions of everyday human activities. Meanwhile, Nick's preaching has some unexpectedly dramatic consequences and Joe thinks everyone should wear a tiara.

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Ched Myers, Binding the Strong Man
• Sacraments of the Catholic Church
• Sacrament
• Japanese tea ceremony

Happy Candlemas to one and all. In this episode we talk a lot about baptism: what is it, where did it come from and does it still matter? And did Nick really write a book on it without realising? Also we have more on the neurodiverse approaches to church, we touch on different ways of understanding justice, and we think about whether laying down your life for others means denying who you truly are. Finally, we have a worship song about Worthing and we launch the mystical experience helpline.

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Candlemas
• Erin Burdett, With All Your Mind: Autism and the Church
• 'I want to love God with all my mind, but as an autistic Christian, my brain works differently to yours'
• Brains faggots
• Tapioca
• Is it Worthing? - song

Lots of interesting feedback this week, including more reflections on worship songs, our calling to attend to our own 'small' world, the difficulties of Bible translation (and food translation come to that) and why, for the Goths, Jesus was head of the household. Also we talk about neurodiversity and churches. How can we attend to different ways of thinking and different learning styles? Must one size fit all? Oh, and lots of TV watching homework because, as Joe says, 'Life's too short to not watch a lot of TV'.

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde at the Inauguration service
• Severance
• Faggot (food)
• Burn's Night
• The War of the Worlds - Jeff Wayne's Musical Version - Full Musical
• Eddie Lang- recordings
• Eddie Lang
• Ted Lasso
• The Detectorists
• Danielle Strickland
• Nick Page's Blog: Reflections on episode 315
• Nick Page, And Now Let's Move Into A Time Of Nonsense
• Clive James, Poetry Notebook

Joe has forgotten how to count and Nick is bewildered by a worship song. We discuss whether the metaphors we use are helpful, how God is always 'in translation' and what we can do to avoid reinforcing unhelpful patriarchal systems. Also, we touch again on the subject of judgment, and think about relationship, restoration and reading the Bible more in sorrow than in fury.

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Severance
• Ted Lasso
• Nick Page, Revelation Road
• Wyvill Monument
• Episode 253: Mothering Father – an interview with Lacey Finn Borgo

We return to the Bible this week, to the thorny topic of how we deal with difficult Bible verses, particularly verses about eternal punishment and divine vengeance. As our correspondent puts it, it's like Biblical whack-a-mole: you hammer one passage down, only to see new ones pop up. So we talk about the inadequacy of systematic theology, the need to recognise contradiction and mystery and how everybody, frankly, is whacking their moles. Most importantly, we consider how, despite the difficulties, we can continue to engage with and be inspired by the scriptures.

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Wicked
• Dune: Part One
• Dune: Part Two
• Nick Page, The Badly Behaved Bible
• Gregory Macdonald, The Evangelical Universalist
• Midrash

Happy new year (although, as we all know, the official Mid-faith Crisis New Year isn't until March). Anyway we're back, and in this episode we mark a special anniversary - 45 years since Nick became a Christian. So, what's changed? How did we understand 'conversion' back then and how do we understand it now? And how do we see our purpose today, all those years later?

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Discussing the new year in Episode 229 (Starts at 10:25)
• Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
• The Traitors
• Red One
• The Holdovers
• What is the good news? Nick’s version

Happy Christmas! In this festive episode we share – and then judge – our Christmas micro-sermons. Also we think about the practices that will nourish us this Christmas and reflect on how the darkness and worry of the nativity stories does not diminish the life and hope. Remember everyone – you're still alive, and that's a wonderful thing!

• Support the podcast
• Contact the podcast through your email machine
• Mid-faith Crisis Facebook Page
• Nick's Blog

Mentioned in this episode:

• Strictly Come Dancing FInal
• Coldplay - ALL MY LOVE (Official Video)
• Coldplay - ALL MY LOVE (Official Video) (Directors' Cut)
• Conclave
• Winter solstice