Arun Arora and Paula Gooder share their passion for Advent and reflect on some of the inspiring stories of faith.

Paula Gooder will explore what angels are and what they do in the Old and New Testaments and ask why, at a time when experience and belief in angels is widespread, we talk so little about them in the church.

Jarel Robinson-Brown will introduce the life and work of James Baldwin. He will explore how Baldwin can help us as Christians to broaden our horizons, to be more honest, more imaginative and challenge us to ask ourselves what kind of world we hope for.

Andrew Rumsey will explore what place means in our spiritual lives, in the search for meaning and identity, in the Bible, as well as in our own local neighborhoods, parishes, city and nation.

Susanna Snyder says hope is not just optimism that things will turn out alright, if not in this world then in the next, but is something much more present, supple and resilient. She will explore what hope is and isn’t, its surprising relationship with anger, courage, imagination and action, and how we can cultivate and sustain it in our own lives.