[MEDIA] Talking about Faith, Uncertainty and Cancer for @BBCRadio4 for Lent

I have just returned from recording for the BBC Radio 4 Lent Talks, with my episode to be broadcast 27th March 2019 at 8.45pm (when I will link to iPlayer, and post up my script – although note we changed a few words as we recorded).

 

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Done my recording for BBC Radio 4 Lent Talk. #cancer #faith #uncertainty. On 27 March 8.45pm

A post shared by Bex Lewis (@drbexl) on Mar 1, 2019 at 5:59am PST

My script features the YBCN, Gillian Straine, Jenny Baker, Susan Sontag, #YouMeBigC Podcast, Jo Taylor‘s #BusyLivingWithMets hashtag, Tanya Marlow, Sara Batts, Peter Harvey, Andrew Graystone and Kathryn Mannix, and starts:

I’m just posting a picture onto my Instagram feed, and as I have done several times over the past year or so, tagged it with #waitingroomfeet. As you might guess, this is a picture of my feet, in a waiting room – typically a hospital waiting room. In most of the waiting rooms that I’m in, I know that the majority of other people in this room have been affected by cancer, as I have, and I don’t want to breach their privacy in unwittingly capturing them on camera. I don’t know their individual stories or their prognoses, although I suspect they share many of my hopes and fears as we wait to see the surgeon, the oncologist, the radiologist, or any of the other myriad (of) specialists attempting to control the cancer that is seeking to take over our bodies.

The official introduction for the series is:

This year’s Lent Talks explore the theme of uncertainty through the stories of key figures in the Passion narrative. How do their trials relate to contemporary life? The six speakers reflect on these characters from a personal or professional perspective. Psychotherapist Mark Vernon argues that Doubting Thomas has much to teach us about the value of uncertainty in our lives, even though it is something we might instinctively try to avoid; psychologist Sandi Mann, explores the parallels between Peter’s denial of Jesus and the lies we tell each other every day; author Bex Lewis draws on Jesus’ Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane as she describes her experience of being diagnosed with cancer; retired High Court judge, Sir Paul Coleridge uses the example of Pontius Pilate to examine the moral conflict in the minds of those responsible for administering justice; theologian Candida Moss considers the questions surrounding Judas’ motives and what they say about the demonization of others and the complexity of betrayal; and finally, Alison Cope, whose son Joshua was stabbed to death, reflects on the grief of Mary standing at the foot of the cross.