Religion

Diarmaid MacCulloch talks to Jane Shaw

Lower than the Angels: A History of Sex and Christianity
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Mon 31 Monday, 31 March 2025 See this event
Alister McGrath

Why We Believe: Understanding Ourselves in a Complex World
Bodleian: Convocation House 12:00pm Tue 1 Tuesday, 1 April 2025 See this event
Rupert Shortt talks to Ayaan Hirsi Ali

The Eclipse of Christianity and Why it Matters
Pusey House: Chapel 12:00pm Wed 2 Wednesday, 2 April 2025 See this event
Lamorna Ash

Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever: A New Generation’s Search for Religion
Department for Continuing Education: Lecture Theatre 2:00pm Wed 2 Wednesday, 2 April 2025 See this event
Eugene Rogan and Peter Hill

The Damasus Events and the Prophet of Reason
Oxford Martin School: Lecture Theatre 6:00pm Thu 3 Thursday, 3 April 2025 See this event
Anthony Julius

Abraham: The First Jew
Oxford Martin School: Seminar Room 6:00pm Thu 3 Thursday, 3 April 2025 See this event
Rod Dreher talks to Iain McGilchrist

Living in Wonder: Finding Mystery and Meaning in a Secular Age
Pusey House: Chapel 2:00pm Fri 4 Friday, 4 April 2025 See this event
Richard Coles talks to Triona Adams

Murder under the Mistletoe
Sheldonian Theatre 10:00am Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event
Saqib Qureshi

Being Muslim Today: Reclaiming the Faith from Orthodoxy and Islamophobia
Weston Lecture Theatre 12:00pm Sat 5 Saturday, 5 April 2025 See this event

Festival information:

The Oxford Literary Festival is intellectual Viagra.

A stimulating and rewarding on-stage conversation; a lively informed and tolerant audience; privileged access to the great treasures of the Bodleian, and finally, wonderfully interesting dinner companions to help me conclude the best day I have enjoyed at any festival – anywhere.

The Oxford festival is the most elegant and atmospheric of literary festivals. It’s a pleasure to both attend and perform there.

The Oxford Literary Festival has in my mind become the leading literary festival of the year. The organisation, the roster of speakers, the ambience and the sheer quality of it all is superb. May it now go from strength to strength each year stretching its ambition more and more. I believe it will.

I came away buzzing and reassured that we still have in this century a wide ranging community fascinated not just by famous authors (I’ve rarely seen so many concentrated in one place) but by challenging ideas and questions.

It was a privilege for me to visit the festival to receive the Bodley Medal. As an incidental blessing I saw Oxford at its most mysterious and atmospheric. It was a day of piercing cold and as I walked through the twilight from the Sheldonian to Christ Church, the streets were empty and the whole city was shutting itself away. Christ Church was silent except for the footfall of unseen persons around corners and the sounds of evensong creeping from behind closed doors. For the first time I understood thoroughly the power of college ghost stories.

Often as an author, I only occasionally get to meet the public who buy and read my books. The Oxford Literary Festival was a special opportunity for me and certainly one of the highlights of my career – it was an honour I will never forget.

I loved the whole atmosphere of the Oxford Literary Festival. From breakfast, alongside some of the attendees, who were talking books with each other a mile a minute, to the public event at The Sheldonian where everyone was lively and engaged – I felt I had arrived in a kind of literary heaven.