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September 10, 2025
18:30
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September 24, 2025
18:30
Written in 1853, Ruth is one of the first novels written by a female novelist to explore the experiences of working class women in Victorian Britain. The novel explores the tension within Christianity between morality and faith.
October 8, 2025
18:30
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October 22, 2025
18:30
A literary sensation when it was first published in 1980, Umberto Eco’s debut novel is a murder mystery, a metaphysical thriller, an exploration of language, biblical literature and medieval history.
November 12, 2025
18:30
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November 26, 2025
18:30
Thoreau’s masterpiece tells the story of his period of self-seclusion - two years, two months and two day living in a cabin in the woods near Concord, Massachusetts. It is a genre-defying work, combining social theory, nature writing, spiritual memoir, satire and practical advice.
December 10, 2025
18:30
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December 17, 2025
18:30
To the Lighthouse is one of the great works of modernist literature. It describes the experiences of a family: The academic philosopher, Mr Ramsay, his wife, their children and his various young acolytes (including Lily Briscoe and Charles Tansley). In exploring the interaction between personal phenomenal experience and interpersonal relationship, it has been described as a work of secular mysticism by contemporary scholars.
January 14, 2026
18:30
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January 28, 2026
18:30
Gillian Rose, the Hegelian philosopher and critical theorist was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 1993. In the last years of her life, she produced a work of startling clarity and beauty: a memoir which unflinchingly explores the meaning of pain and love and learning death. It is a memoir which manages to embrace and also to transcend the personal.
February 11, 2026
18:30
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February 25, 2026
18:30
The great novelist, essayist and activist here takes on the history of race in America. He addresses the complex role which Christianity played in the development of his consciousness and in the development of African-American identity, echoing the fictionalised account of his youth described in Go Tell it on the Mountain.
March 11, 2026
18:30
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March 25, 2026
18:30
Piers Plowman is one of the founding texts of English literature. Written in the late 14th century, it is an allegorical poem which traces the dream of a sleeping Christian on a quest to discover the key to living a Christian life.
April 8, 2026
18:30
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April 22, 2026
18:30
The great long form journalist and essayist Janet Malcolm here turns her attention to the ethics of writing and journalism itself. She tells the story of Joe McGinniss: a journalist who documents the trial of an army doctor who claimed to have been wrongfully convicted for the murder of his wife.
May 13, 2026
18:30
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May 27, 2026
18:30
Born in Melbourne in 1939, Gerard Murnane has - in the past two decades - come to be recognised as one of the most innovative novelists working in the English language. His debut novel is a semi-autobiographical account of his coming of age in a Catholic family in rural Australia.
June 10, 2026
18:30
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June 24, 2026
18:30
Flaubert spent fifty years of his life working and reworking this story about the temptation of a 3rd century hermit. The final work incorporates great poetry, theology, philosophy and ethical meditation.
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July 8, 2026
18:30
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July 22, 2026
18:30
The first autobiography. The first spiritual autobiography. A seminal work of Christian theology. A social history of late antiquity. This small volume contains multitudes and ably holds its reputation as one of the great works of literature.
Join us for Literature and Theology Group as we explore, grow in and discuss spirituality through novels, biographies, and accounts of personal spiritual journeys.
The Literature and Theology Reading Group meets every month to discuss a novel or work of creative nonfiction. The works which we read are not (usually) explicitly theological in nature. However, we work on the assumption that all works of human creativity are essentially or implicitly theological: they have something to say about human beings and their relationship to the divine. Each month the book that is being read will be accompanied by a lecture, exploring the theological significance of the text given by Dr Aidan Cottrell-Boyce. You are invited to join the group in person (on the second Wednesday of every month) or online (on the fourth Wednesday of every month. Please note that in December, the online meeting will take place in the third week). The reading group runs from September to July.
Discover our amazing library which specialises in theology and philosophy in the Catholic tradition.
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