Novelist Amanda Craig helps launch Social Justice Programme
An important part of the refreshed Vision of the Cathedral is a commitment to social justice. Each year a specific area will be highlighted for attention and action. This year we are focusing on modern slavery and exploitation.
You will find here a programme of talks, events, exhibitions, stalls and workshops, that will run through 2025. If you don’t know much about this contemporary abuse of human dignity, please try and come to our congregation and volunteer training hour on Sunday 23 February at 9.45am in the Library. We are partnering with Hestia, a charity that supports survivors of slavery, and they will be running this informative event in which we will learn what modern slavery is, the forms it can take, how London is affected by it, and what we might do about it as individuals and as a community.
Throughout this year, we will be hosting workshops and activities with survivors of slavery, as well as exhibiting art by survivors, and welcoming a choir made up of those who have suffered this cruelty.
The Cathedral staff attended a training session at the beginning of the year.
To help launch this year’s programme, the novelist Amanda Craig spoke with the Dean about why this is such an important topic and why she is grateful that the Cathedral has taken up this injustice for exploration. She speaks about her novel ‘Hearts and Minds’ (available in the Cathedral shop), in which she tells of the story of various individuals who find themselves in London, some exploited and abused, and how their lives interact with the dark underbelly of the city, as well as the good it offers. Maggie O’Farrell described the novel as ‘ambitious, compelling and utterly gripping'. Amanda has been called a Dickens of our day, and she relates how she believes novelists have a duty to scrutinise the world we are living in right now, exposing what is wrong in order that it might be challenged. You can find the conversation with the Dean here. We strongly recommend you listen to it.
The Dean also has recorded a conversation with the CEO of Hestia, Patrick Ryan. Together they discuss Hestia and the support it provides to survivors of modern slavery, the extent of slavery in London and Southwark today, how we can detect signs of slavery and where we can find more information, how to report our concerns, and how we can support Hestia’s work. You can find the conversation here. As well as being Hestia’s CEO, Patrick is also a registered psychoanalytic psychotherapist with a particular interest in trauma.
Please look at our programme for the coming year and play a part in all that we are doing. Join the campaign to eradicate this evil, deepen your awareness of the issues, and learn how to spot the signs if people are being exploited or imprisoned. If you have any concerns, contact the Modern Slavery Helpline: https://www.modernslaveryhelpline.org/ Remember, this is an abuse that can be hidden in plain sight.