Martin Shaw on re-enchanting the Christian dream

Martin Shaw is a renowned storyteller and mythologist, who in the last couple of years has his own quite extraordinary conversion story to tell.

After many years as a poet, author and teaching others through the West Country school of myth, Martin had a visionary encounter that confounded all his expectations.

Martin is now a Christian but sees this homecoming as a fulfilment of a life invested in mythology and storytelling. He tells Justin and Belle his story as they discuss storytelling, mythology and rediscovering Christianity as a ‘dream’.

There’s more to life than the world we can see. Re-Enchanting is a podcast from Seen & Unseen recorded at Lambeth Palace Library, the home of the Centre for Cultural Witness. Justin Brierley and Belle Tindall engage faith and spirituality with leading figures in science, history, politics, art and education. Can our culture be re-enchanted by the vision of Christianity?

[lauracaruso]

As one of the older folks, my advice is just go to church, week after week. It will become a part of you and you will become part of it. That is how I would start. 💙🙏

[stuartwait]

Great chat. Gives space and hope for everyone.

[alanwindsor]

Yes, Martin Shaw is great but what I like about all of these conversations is the interviewers. The way they respond to their guests and invite them to speak is impeccable. By the grace of God their voices are also so lovely.

[ModerndayStoic]

thanks to Ruslan this is a fascinating conversation

[ImaginalSpheres]

This is great! I love him giving a quick brief shoutout to the early 20th century Russian theologians and their emphasis on Sophia, figures like Sergius Bulgakov and Vladimir Solovyov. Martin Shaw, like Paul Kingsnorth and Malcolm Guite are treasures.

[BpWalterMcAlister]

I am 67 years old. This is one of the most instigating and lucid things I have heard lately. Many of the takes expressed here are spot on. Not to engage with this after 44 years of ministry, 30 of which as a reformed charismatic bishop who has been immersed in the Great Tradition, of late, would be sin. Thank you Martin.

[peckerdecker]

first time listening to to this podcast (seen unseen).
*enjoyed* the converstaion between martin shaw and the two presenters

keep sharing

[bobohanson]

I just discovered this guy😀. What a great mind. So grateful to YouTube for letting us find brilliance like this! ❤

[deirdrecarney]

This was amazing, thank you. I am in this process at the moment and it is so important for those of us doing so to have these kinds of talks available to us so we don't feel so alone.

[aaronwolf]

“I don’t need everything stretched on the rack of exegesis.” BRILLIANT way of putting it.

[frompinetopalm]

Last night I re-listened to Martin Shaw's wildly beautiful two-episode appearance on The Almanac of Ireland. I listen to it from time to time when I need to remember to come out of a trance state from work or hard times. I stumbled across this video during search to see if he's speaking soon and yes, I'm definitely disappointed to learn that his open, astounded, questioning view that makes room for the theory and power of storytelling and myth in every person's life (Christians included) has been closed. People's disappointment in him, the loss of friends, or whatever other pretended difficulty is cheered by the hosts' smiling nods—very shallow in the face of what must be a very painful loss of trust from indigenous communities—is annoyingly and predictably aligned with that old long-time trope of persecution that was truly a threat to early Christianity.

I used to think there was, and even tried hard to see or even create, a place in Christian spaces for the Old Ways. Bringing our bread to bless it together, no priest, no non-profit tax status, no fancy buildings, a celebration of poor people, a forgiveness for mistakes. There isn't and I don't believe there can be. Why? The religions that remain among us should have died away to make room for others or new versions of same, as all good old myths do, as Shaw himself has inspirationally said, to metamorphose into the spirituality that we need when we need it. Not an answer, but a path... relevant and alive. Perhaps these hosts don't realize it, and it would certainly be challenging for them to, but that's likely the Christianity Shaw hopes for and wants to build. I wish him luck. Every powerful religion that remains past its welcome has an element of it that is ideal for controlling people and their behavior, or in the worst of times, an acceptance of bad people (Trump was mentioned here) or inequity because some good thing awaits when we're dead. I may like that Jesus who flips tables and befriends whores and can't be governed, but I HAVE to acknowledge the lack of room for disobedient Christians or charitable views of nonbelievers, and that these views or inextricably tied to that faith at this point.

[tulganandvaldyavin]

So much synchronicity in this for me. Thank you for doing this interview!❤

[workingonitagain]

I’ve been away from Christianity for about 10 years now. Shaw is one of the very few people who makes me reconsider.

[atelier]

I enjoy Shaw’s storytelling and way of being. I can embrace some of the tenants of Christianity, forgiveness, kindness etc and do not believe we would even have any desire for an egalitarian society without it but I can never believe the religious stories are real or ignore the also very negative effects of Abrahamic religions.

[CaroleMcDonnell]

Ah, this really blessed me. I'm a writer and i understand the mythic in our stories and lives but i was wavering a bit about my stories because some of them are not "obviously" Christian. My son is going to be baptized as an Orthodox Christian although he was raised episcopalian and I am charismatic. Martin's peace in the Orthodox faith gives me peace about that denomination now. Thanks so much.

[mjamesmcdonald]

I the "way of the pilgrim." I read it every couple of years.

[zondratyre]

I find this fascinating. Thank you. As one whose age is 70+, I'm grinning and nodding my head. Martin, what you say resonates with some of what I've been reading in Alexander John Shaia's book Radical Transformation. And, there's author Nancy Naylor Rue who is bringing forth her work which calls forth in me a desire to stay engaged, to mentor, and live into and share Wisdom. There is an undercurrent, a stirring, and I hope to see and live into its surfacing and enlivening.

[wmarkfish]

If only we had 5 hundred thousand Martin Shaws.

[annprehn]

When I taught New Age, one of my ex students said she was trying to demystify religion. I said oh no, she'd missed my point - I wanted to remystify religion.

[helenalexander]

The Lord knows when we are able to accept him