Newsletter - December 2025

Dear All,

A reminder: announcements of upcoming CRPL events (alongside archived records of recent/past CRPL events) are on the University’s CRPL site, which you can access here. For more CRPL goings on, see also the Religion in Public blog.

This is our second newsletter of the 2025-2026 academic year. In semester 2 communications about CRPL will come from Interim CRPL Director, Dr. Aled Thomas. Look out for all the terrific plans Aled has in store – including for upcoming CRPL seminars.

We say thank you, farewell, and wish all good things to Dr. Zaynab Ango, who spent several months in our midst while funded by a British Academy International Fellowship Award.

And we wish Dr. Al McFadyen a long and happy retirement. Don’t be a stranger, Al!

Congratulations!

We congratulate newly minted Drs. Risaw Walis and Laura Wallace, as well as our newest Professor on the block, Mikel Burley!

We also congratulate Professor Jasjit Singh on a fantastic and highly entertaining inaugural professorial lecture and Dr. Grace Nwamah who has been awarded the award of Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (AFHEA).

Review of Events

We have had CRPL seminar presentations by Rabbi Dr. Barbara Thiede, Dr. Zaynab Ango, Dr. Halyna Teslyuk and Professor Kate Adams. CRPL has also co-sponsored an event on religion and violence, a book presentation by Professor Sarojini Nadar, the Hook Lecture, the inaugural professorial lecture of Professor Jasjit Singh, and the book launch of Professor Adriaan van Klinken’s new book. We also hosted our first CRPL meeting, with Professor Emma Tomalin presenting.

For a podcast episode on the topic of Rabbi Dr. Barbara Thiede’s CRPL presentation, “On Not Fixing the Biblical God,” please see this episode of the Shiloh Podcast.

Don't miss this event, hosted by the Iqbal Centre, "Why Islamic Feminism?" This panel discussion is followed by an open Q&A and features CRPL alumna Dr. Sofia Rehman. Tuesday 16 December, 16:30-18:00, Newlyn Building, SR (GR.07).

Recent Presentations

PRHS Postgraduate Manoj Thekkepattath Parameswaran has presented a research paper titled "Hugging the Divine: Corporeal Devotion and Divine Embodiment in Mata Amritanandamayi's Spiritual Practices" at the British Association for South Asian Studies (BASAS) Annual Conference (10-12th September 2025, Lancaster University). Manoj was also selected to present his research paper titled “The Paradox of Sacred Modernity: Mata Amritanandamayi as Continuity and Rupture in Kerala's Guru Tradition” at a Doctoral Workshop with the title “Research Dialogues on Kerala: Malayali Worlds in Focus” in Tübingen, Germany (October 31 and November 01, 2025). This was for an event organised by The Department of Indology at the Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies (AOI), Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen.

Ann Gillian Chu was invited to co-chair and serve as a respondent to the "8th Conference on the Glocalization of Chinese Christianity: Pastoring, Caring, and Evangelizing in the Time of Doubt," held at the Centre for the Study of Chinese Religions, National Chengchi University (Taipei), on 14-15 November 2025. She was also co-presenter of “Hong Kong Christian Communities and Artificial Intelligence – a response to Beth Singler’s Religion and Artificial Intelligence: An Introduction,” at the International Conference on Platform and AI Society in Asia at Deakin University (Melbourne, Australia) on 24-25 November 2025.

Johanna Stiebert took part (online) as keynote speaker in a research roundtable on Researching Spiritual Harms: Prevention, Protection and Healing, for the Spirituality and Wellbeing (SWell) Research Network at Deakin University (Melbourne, Australia) (on 10 November 2025).

Recent Publications

Dr. Caroline Starkey has had an article in The Conversation, “The Spiritual and Emotional World of Pub Psychic Nights” (2 October 2025) (see here). Caroline also has a book contract with OUP! The provisional title for this book is Spirit Communication and the Disenchanting World: Mediumship, Social Class, and the Politics of Resilience (due 2027). If that’s too long to wait, you can hear more from Caroline here on this podcast, Psychic Matters!

Dr. Ann Gillian Chu has published “God Outside of (Hong Kong) Churches: How Dechurched Hong Kong Christians Understand the Role of Churches and Christian Communities in Relation to their Faith Identities,” in Religion and the Sense of Self, edited by Theodora Wildcroft (Sheffield: Equinox, 2026, here).  Together with Claire Hiu-ching Cheung, she has also published “Left-Behind Elderly Parents: Psychology-informed Theology and Older Adults in Hong Kong Whose Adult Children Migrated through the British National (Overseas) Visa Scheme,” in Migration Psychology: Global Dynamics of Family, Policy, and Inclusion, edited by Laura De Pretto and Saira Mirza (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2026, here).

Grants

Dr. Ann Gillian Chu has started research work on a newly funded project alongside Levi Checketts, Rachel Siow Robertson, and Pak-hang Wong, with the title “AI and Vulnerable Populations in Hong Kong.” This is an Initiation Grant for Faculty Niche Research Area, awarded by Hong Kong Baptist University.

Professor Johanna Stiebert is part of a successful LUCIA (“Locally Unlocking Culture through Inclusive Access”) AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council) grant, led by Professor Sarah-Jane Page (University of Nottingham), with Community Interest Company SAS Rights, founded by Saima Afzal, playing a leading role. The project begins in April 2026.

Calling all graduates!

Take a look at this competition for the Hakluyt Society Essay Prize (deadline 1 March 2026): https://www.hakluyt.com/hakluyt-society-essay-prize/

The Hakluyt Society awards annual essay prizes of £1250 to the winning essay, with a second prize of £250 to the runner-up (on occasions one or both prizes may be shared between entries). The competition is open to any registered graduate student at a higher education institution (a university or equivalent) or to anyone who has been awarded a graduate degree in the past three years. If possible, the prize will be presented at the Hakluyt Society’s Annual General Meeting in London.

On the Religion in Public blog

Please continue to keep an eye on our blog. Among recent posts you will see some new researchers of the month: Dr. Joanna Sadgrove, Emmanuel Erhijodo and Dr. Edward Graham-Hyde.

Please send contributions for the next newsletter to Aled Thomas, [email protected].

Please follow us on Instagram (crpl_leeds)!

 

Here’s wishing everyone a restful and enjoyable break and happy celebrations if you are celebrating anything around the December solstice.

Johanna (Stiebert)

Director of CRPL, the Centre for Religion and Public Life