16th August 2026 

Summer Holiday Listening:
Church Going with Giles Fraser and the Quiet Revival Podcast

In this week around the middle of the summer holidays, a pause from theological reading for some spoken word recommendations. I've been listening to these series side by side over the last few weeks. Both series are an attempt to capture a picture of the Church at this particular moment in time, to discern what is going on and what might be our future.

You have probably heard of Giles Fraser - a Church of England priest whose career has not been without controversy. In his series Church Going (the title is a play on words) he addresses the question of decline in church attendance, and he goes back to parishes where he has worked, meeting lots of different people and hearing their stories, both of challenge and of joy. As a priest, I found the second episode, where he goes to a mass outdoor baptism broadcast on Tommy Robinson's YouTube channel, challenging. The baptism candidates Giles Fraser spoke to had genuine stories of encounter with God outside the church, but many of them did not feel that church was for them. This outdoor baptism was a genuine and deep emotional experience for them, but it was surrounded by some very clear political messages from the front. What is the church missing, and how can we engage with this spiritual moment?

And the question of how to engage with this spiritual moment is the topic of the Bible Society's Quiet Revival podcast. Again, you have probably heard of the Quiet Revival report, and of the fact that the Bible Society retracted it in March 2026 because YouGov's research was found to be flawed. Nevertheless, the anecdotal evidence that many people, especially Gen Z and Gen Alpha, are experiencing some sort of spiritual awakening is strong. The Bible Society are recommissioning research but, in the interim, the host of the Quiet Revival podcast is visiting church leaders and ministers in a variety of settings and denominations to listen to stories of their experience and to talk to them about how they are changing in order to meet the needs of a new generation.

One theme that is common to both series is that of deep discipleship. The younger generations are growing up often with no or minimal contact with church, with the Bible, with the stories and teaching that may well have formed the older generation culturally even if they did not become believers. There is interest, a hunger for God. There is, one minister on the Quiet Revival podcast said, a desire for deep discipleship. Their church has stopped doing a lot of their former activities encouraging people to dip a toe in the water, and replaced them with intensive discipleship programmes. And people are coming to faith.

As we look ahead to our next five years, what might these series have to say to us? How might this moment be both a challenge and an opportunity for us to reimagine what we do and find new ways to reach this generation?

If you are a parent, someone who works with our children or youth, a PCC member, a leader or preacher or intercessor, or, in fact, anyone interested in discipleship, I would thoroughly recommend these two series. Taken together, they offer a broad, challenging yet hopeful perspective on the state of the church today and on how God might be leading us into tomorrow.