At William Temple Foundation we are searching for radical hope in an era of polycrisis. We have located the search in the public square, and are considering specifically how this search relates to faith based organisations and their search for and proliferation of hope.
This is well trodden ground for the temple tradition. Two historic examples stand out: 1) In 1942, contributions by William Temple in Christianity and Social Order, through Temple’s articulation of middle axioms, or a suggested program of policy areas that might be explored as part of the welfare state. 2) from 1985, the Faith in the City report delivered by an interdisciplinary board of commissioners which offered a much more specific set of policy prescriptions for ending poverty across the United Kingdom. Example one provided broad based agendas people, assumed to have a faith, might build a coalition around. Example 2 was highly specific and prescriptive about ways in which Christian’s should act in the face of post-industrial decline. These are two diverse approaches in the heritage of our Tradition about which there is discussion in series 2 episode 1 of the radical hope podcast.
But what of today? Crises are arguably more pronounced, the faiths landscape is more diverse, communications are much more nuanced and take place across public spaces that are more global in nature. A strength of William Temple was his consultative approach. One of myriad examples of this is that before publication, he referred his thinking on middle axioms to RH Tawney, William Beveridge and John Maynard Keynes – all global leaders of their time. Keynes even suggested that rather than their position in an appendix in Christianity and Social Order, they could be in the main text.
In this spirit of consultation with global leaders in their field, for our Communicating Radical Hope campaign, we have engaged with Vice President for Communications and Institutional Advancement at Virginia Theological Seminary, Alexandria and the General Theological Seminary New York, Nicky Burridge.
Two pillars of Nicky’s work cited by those who know here well are ‘authenticity’ and ‘intelligibility’. These are drawn from 25 years of experience communicating as a practitioner, first as a freelance journalist and second on behalf of respected faithbased organisations around the world. This experience in the UK, in Hong Kong, and in the United States, has provided a basis for excellence, responding to crises shaping the lives of millions of different faiths and none, in a way that is both data driven and offers a clear narrative, even under the most challenging of circumstances.
In April 2025 we made Burridge our keynote speaker at our pioneering international conference. Our subject was Communicating Radical Hope in an era of poly-crisis, and we drew participation and engagement from Christian Muslim and secular stakeholders alike in the UK, US and around the world – the expertise Nicky showcased, effortlessly rendered individual and institutional support for alumni speaking truth to power, and astute strategic leadership and crisis communications in intractable conditions on the global stage. Burridge tracked parallel campaigns emerging in Virginia and Washington DC which responded to the sin of slavery rife in the roots of Virginia Theological Seminary itself, and then the rise of practices by the sitting US President which left many feeling marginalised and others, notably VTS alum and Bishop of Washington Mariann Edgar Budde, calling for the President to ‘have mercy’. The full paper by Burridge can be found in our new Temple Book Communicating Radical Hope in an era of poly crisis available for free from the William Temple Foundation website.
We knew the lessons delivered by Burridge were ripe with wisdom, but for another of our speakers, Professor Martyn Percy from St Joseph’s University, Macao, it was the roots of Nicky’s Communication’s practice which stood out. He said, “I want to go back to our keynote speech this morning from Nicky Burridge, which spoke about hope, faith, trust and authenticity, and particularly emphasising consistency and transparency. And I think underneath that, there was a pull towards honesty and integrity in public life… One thing that was missing, I think, from Nicky’s introduction, is that her first degree is in theology and I think it’s no accident that the way that these things come together in her presentation, both as a skilled communications theorist and practitioner, with 25 years and more behind her, underneath that, there is a degree in theology, which actually, of course, is concerned with truth and the eternal things, and not with short-termism”
Burridge’s blend of authentic content and intelligible narrative is modelling and leading change in Virginia and New York, and also offers us a guide for our own transformation at the Foundation in the United Kingdom, driven by the way we curate space for, and communicate hope to, others in 2025.
You can read and listen back to some of Burridge’s work on the William Temple Foundation Website
Editorial by Matthew Barber Rowell, who is the Northern Temple Network Lead for the William Temple Foundation. Until July 31st 2025 Barber-Rowell was Communications Officer at the William Temple Foundation. He is now developing their Authentic Communication Charter to guide the search for Radical Hope launched at the Inner Temple in April.
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