Knife Crime - No More County Lines - The God Cast with Emma Owen from The Message Trust

Will Brown - Welcome To Brownsville - The God Cast Podcast

Raised as a preacher’s son in Kansas, Will Brown arrives with Welcome To Brownsville, a debut EP rooted in vulnerability, connection and emotional honesty. It is a project that doesn’t just play, it moves. From the very first moment, it feels like stepping into a place built from reflection, where every note carries something lived, something overcome. The EP opens with “Welcome To Brownsville,” an introduction to a space that feels both imagined and deeply personal. A town where stories sit in the air, where voices come together. Backed by a choir, the track expands into something communal, something bigger than one person. It sets the tone clearly: this is a world built on connection. “Golden” follows, the track that marked a defining moment for Will Brown. It rises with warmth, pushing past insecurity and reminding you of your own worth. There is something immediate about it, something that stays with you. It doesn’t just tell you that you are enough, it makes you feel it. With “I Found You,” the mood softens into something more vulnerable. It feels like a quiet reflection, a moment of searching and finding at the same time. Will Brown sings about identity, about feeling lost, about learning to accept yourself through someone else’s presence. It is gentle, but it holds weight. “Better Man” shifts the energy again, more open, more facing forward. A song about growth, about trying, about becoming. There is a sense of movement running through it, of wanting to move beyond who you were. It carries both doubt and hope at once, grounded in honesty. One of the EP’s strongest moments arrives with “Scars and Glory.” Driven by rhythm, the track turns pain into something powerful, something visible. Will Brown doesn’t hide from what has shaped him, he leans into it. As he sings about wearing those experiences like armour, it becomes a reminder that everything you’ve been through has built you into who you are now. It is uplifting, honest, and impossible not to feel. “Mr. Turner’s Song” brings things back down to something more intimate. A story shaped by love and loss, by longing and distance. It sits in that space between holding on and letting go, showing just how deeply someone can feel, even when that feeling isn’t returned in the same way. The closing track, “Oceans Of Love,” begins almost weightless. Will Brown’s voice comes in a cappella, soft and exposed, with the faint sense of the outside world around it. It feels like standing by the water, hearing birds in the distance, the song unfolding like a quiet moment at the edge of something vast. The ocean becomes a metaphor for everything uncertain, everything overwhelming. But within that, there is calm. There is reassurance. A reminder that you will move through it.

Knife Crime - No More County Lines - The God Cast with Emma Owen from The Message Trust

Links https://www.message.org.uk/nomoreknives/ [https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbnhmVmN3RVpZalFVU2xtZG8tQ3BFREdRSkNXd3xBQ3Jtc0tsS3QtdjBsZS1ac09VbWx2MU5UYWNVaGk1V0lHbXY1MFpwSTRpNThTV25Ed3FBZFVDR2RKc0ItdlFHRW85aTQtR1Vuc0lKSjhob0pQSnAzODBOeDQxZmZyek5HbGp3bzRaMHo0dml4dDJUbDdxa0l1cw&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.message.org.uk%2Fnomoreknives%2F&v=2PwHtStQv68]   / messagetrust   [https://www.youtube.com/user/MessageTrust]  / themessagetrust   [https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbUR3UlhaRUlERENKNnRiZVFEV1NTWWZZS2F6d3xBQ3Jtc0ttT1ZzS0thUGRCM0xUT1BRVXFCdFlINjRtRHdNREJJTDdwV1pmM09pZDhnNklsQ3BuMWoyaHdseDAtcGVDX3NRU3VwWTFxX2JGa3FFQjlTSE8zU0JvZGo1VFprdU40cC0wdjM5WUx5LUV4dlF0WWxOVQ&q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2FTheMessageTrust%2F&v=2PwHtStQv68]You don’t have to look far to see in the news the devastating impact that knife crime and drug abuse is having on young people across the country. We refuse to stand by and do nothing and so we take our programme of creative lessons to schools around the UK to help inform and equip young people to make positive choices.Since launching in January 2020, we’ve delivered over 30 No More Knives tours to over 150,000 students with the aim of raising awareness of the dangers of knife crime and equipping young people to say ‘no’ to knives. In 2024, we launched the No More County Lines tour to address the increasing danger of drug dealing and exploitation and to support young people in making positive choices.Knife crime and the devastating impact it has on lives is never far from the headlines. Something must change, so the No More Knives tour is heading into high schools to show young people there is another way.Combining music with powerful stories and teaching, we deliver lessons and assemblies that equip young people with the skills and knowledge they need to say no to knives and start to discover their full value and identity.Following the schools week, we book a major venue to invite students along to a concert by the bands they’ve met in school and featuring guest speakers. And all this is done in partnership with the local police force and Councils.The Message Trust exists to passionately share the good news of Jesus with young people and urban communities in word and action.From building up evangelists all over the world in our Advance Groups, equipping and training young people on our Message School Of Evangelism, serving communities through Eden and Community Groceries, reaching those in prison with the hope of God, supporting those with barriers to employment through Christ-centred enterprise, and declaring the love of Jesus in our schools work, we are seeing lives transformed as people discover their true identity in Christ

What is Ableism? Church of England Ableism and the Church - Revd Canon Timothy Goode - The God Cast Podcast.

Religious guest playlist https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXJbQwP9mIn8kI3XM5EmGD81OFTZSOVOmOrder his book here https://chbookshop.hymnsam.co.uk/books/9780334063162/breaking-not-broken#yorkminster Blog excerpt for Tims book.Would you introduce yourself and tell us about your background? What brought you to this point in your life and your current focus?I am the Revd Canon Timothy Goode, currently Canon for Congregational Discipleship and Nurture at York Minster. I am a priest, theologian, and disability justice advocate, and I have lived with permanent disability for over thirty years. My theological work is inseparable from my lived experience. Diagnosed in childhood with a rare hereditary bone condition and later left permanently disabled following a cancerous spinal tumour, I have spent much of my life navigating churches, institutions, and sacred spaces, drawing attention to the reality that they were not designed with bodies like mine in mind.What brought me to this point is a long journey of wrestling with faith, suffering, vocation, and belonging. Though I love the Church deeply, I also know, painfully and personally, how often it has failed disabled people, not simply through thoughtlessness but through theology, architecture, and inherited assumptions about what a “proper” Christian body looks like. My current focus is on helping the Church reimagine itself theologically and practically around what I call a risen-body anthropology: a vision of humanity shaped not by ideals of perfection or self-sufficiency, but by the wounded, risen body of Christ.Tell us about your new book,Breaking, not BrokenWhat is it about? What inspired you to decide to write this?Breaking, not Broken is a theological critique of ableism in the Church and a constructive vision for how Christian theology, heritage, worship, and memory might be re-formed through the lens of disability. It argues that ableism is not a marginal pastoral issue but a deep theological distortion that has shaped how the Church imagines God, holiness, leadership, healing, and the human body.I was inspired to write this book because I realised that many conversations about disability in churches stop far too early. We talk about inclusion or access, but rarely ask what kind of God our buildings, liturgies, and doctrines proclaim. Over years of ministry, and particularly since becoming a Residentiary Canon at York Minster, I have seen how sacred heritage can both proclaim the gospel and quietly contradict it. This book is my attempt to draw attention to that tension, and to offer hope that the Church can be re-membered, put back together differently, more faithfully, around the wounded and risen Christ.You write about accessibility and heritage in churches but go beyond the idea of “a ramp or a hearing loop”. What do these concepts mean to you, and how might your vision look different from current practice?Ramps and hearing loops matter. They are essential, and I would never wish to minimise them. But on their own, they risk treating disabled people as a logistical problem rather than as a theological presence. Accessibility, as I understand it, is not just about entry; it is about belonging, authority, visibility, and memory.Heritage is especially important here. Churches often treat heritage as something neutral to be preserved, when in fact it is a theological act of remembering that shapes who is seen as holy, central, or authoritative. My vision seeks answers to deeper questions: Who were our buildings designed for? Whose bodies do our liturgies assume?

Church of England Vocations - Is the C of E stifling vocations - Especially The Working Class?

Please subscribe to The God Cast - Here are some links of Interest.Andy's Substack https://discernwithdyslexia.substack.com/p/cofe-ordinand-fundingThe details of the new system are available here ddo-maintenance-training-fund-2026.pdf Church of England - Tackling Working Classism in the Church https://www.churchofengland.org/resources/diocesan-resources/ministry-development/addressing-classism-church#naChurch of England - Current MFT Funding for Ordinands (2026) - Funding / Grant Details for Ordinands https://www.churchofengland.org/faith-life/vocations/preparing-ordained-ministry/financial-support-ordinandsChurchTimes - Fr Alex Forst Speaks Up For The Working Class https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2026/20-february/news/uk/more-working-class-role-models-needed-in-c-of-e-leadership-synod-is-toldChurch Times Survey 2023 https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2023/3-november/news/uk/new-survey-reveals-debt-and-mental-stress-among-ordinandsOrdinands association 2023 https://ordinands.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/financial-pressures-among-ordinands-in-training.pdfcofe financial support package: https://www.churchofengland.org/faith-life/vocations/preparing-ordained-ministry/financial-support-ordinandsKey stats:43% of training candidates go directly into debt to pay for everyday living costs.£6,770 is the average amount of debt a candidate builds up during training.25% suffer severe financial hardship, such as falling behind on energy bills.10% are forced to regularly skip meals to afford their basic expenses.Over 50% of female candidates state that money stress has actively damaged their mental health. (43% for males)

Anglican Bishop of Lancaster - + Jill Duff - The God Cast Podcast

Bishop Jill Duff is a British Anglican bishop. Since 2018, she has been the Bishop of Lancaster, a suffragan bishop in the Diocese of Blackburn. Previously, she had been Director of St Mellitus College, North West, an Anglican theological college, from 2013 to 2018.Before ordination, she studied chemistry at university and worked in the oil industry. After ordination in the Church of England, she served in the Diocese of Liverpool in parish ministry, chaplaincy, and church planting.