Between 7 and 13 March, we had the privilege to host the John Hick Centenary Conference 2022. This was an event organized by us and it is the result of well over a year of planning. Our main ambition with the event was to celebrate the memory and legacy of John Hick and, by doing this, create opportunities for interreligious and intercultural dialogue. Therefore, the week was filled with lectures, talks, and workshops meant to inspire our students to further explore religion from philosophical perspectives.

We started the week with the whole school gathering for the opening of the conference, during which we welcomed our guests and listened to an address by Professor Peter Hick (son of John Hick who was also joined by his sister Eleanor and his brother Mark) and a keynote lecture by Professor David Cheetham.

In the following days, we were privileged to be able to listen to a philosophical discussion on Hick’s pluralism and the result this hypothesis has on the interreligious dialogue between professor Cheetham and Professor Perry Schmidt-Leukel who joined us online from Germany. Later that evening the students could listen to a talk on the religious pluralism of Gandhi and Hick by Dr. Sharada Sugirtharajah and enjoy three different workshops, led by Dr. Sugirtharajah, Mr Hugh Rice and Revd. Canon Philip Lambert, and Dr. Alan Race on such diverse topics as the problem of evil, the masculine and feminine in Hinduism, and the interreligious response to the climate crisis. The conference continued on Wednesday with a lecture by Dr. Race on early, global efforts to create arenas of interreligious dialogue and another set of workshops led by Revd. Sonya Wratten (who interacted with students talking about how views on the Transcendent reality can transform through interfaith encounter), Dr. Timothy Musgrove joining us online from California (who delivered a session on the evolution of John Hick by talking about 5 major works), and Professor Schmidt-Leukel (who had a workshop on Buddhist responses to religious diversity).

On Thursday, Dr. Musgrove gave an appreciated lecture on the dialectic between religious inclusivism and religious pluralism, and on Friday, Mr Hugh Rice gave a lecture on optimism, rationality, and faith. We ended the week by the students organizing a religious “speed-dating” during which students had the opportunity to interact with many different believers from many traditions.

Our students have made us proud with their engagement, openness, and focused questions. We are convinced that they all have gotten new ideas to analyze and wrestle with and we expect that the different discussions will continue for a long time. A lot of material, including recorded sessions, will soon be available on the Centenary’s website