Month: April 2026

“The difficult freedom of being human”– a BBC Pause for Thought

/ Trey Hall / Leave a comment

Here’s the text for the 27 April 2026 “Pause for Thought” I offered on the Breakfast Show with Gary Davies on BBC Radio 2. Listen here.

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I’m a decent preacher – I don’t generally put people to sleep – but a few times in 25 years of sermons, I have unintentionally provoked someone to walk out.

Once when I accidentally cussed in the pulpit.

Once during LGBTQ Pride when I joked that God loves straight folks, too – not just the gays – and that despite loads of evidence to the contrary, it is possible to be both heterosexual and Christian.

But I was really surprised when someone quite dramatically stormed out after I suggested that Christians should embrace the biblical practice of confession: to regularly come clean with a trusted friend or pastor about how we’ve screwed up.

After the service, I approached the offended person and said: “Did something hit a nerve?”

They said: “Oh yeah, when you told me I had to tell my sins to someone other than God”.

I felt tempted to respond: “Would you like to confess something to me now?”

But I did not say that. Because I know personally how scary and unappealing confession sounds.

I got sober through The Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. Step Four suggests we write down a moral inventory of our entire life. Then Step Five suggests we read that inventory out loud, admitting “to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.”

When I first heard that, I thought: Uh-uh. No way.

But I have come to believe: that if we haven’t shared the honest truth with another person, we probably haven’t really told God – and we certainly haven’t accepted it ourselves.

On my podcast, Spill the Spirituality, I recently chatted with Harry Clark, Traitors winner. His new documentary follows his rediscovery of faith, including his attempt to meet up with the Pope at the Vatican. (Spoiler: he did!)

But Harry told me his most transformational spiritual experience wasn’t meeting Pope Leo, but going to confession for the first time as an adult – describing his mess, in detail, in the loving presence of another person.

I get that. In my Fifth Step, I had a lot to confess. It was very painful, but my deepest feeling was relief, even joy. The person I shared it with said: “Well done. You have now joined the human race”.

Which reminded me of Jesus’s words after receiving confessions. He says: “Take heart, friend.” “Go in peace.”

When I feel the temptation to walk out on the truth, may God help me to stay put, take heart, and practise the difficult freedom of being human.

“It is solved by journeying”– a BBC Pause for Thought

/ Trey Hall / Leave a comment

Here’s the text for the 20 April 2026 “Pause for Thought” I offered on the Breakfast Show with Gary Davies on BBC Radio 2. Listen here.

Every spring, the BBC television series Pilgrimage follows seven celebrities of different faiths, trekking together towards a spiritual place like Istanbul or Rome, or this year: the holy island of Lindisfarne.

Now I’m no celebrity but, BBC, if you ever need a punter, give us a shout.

I’m not expecting producers to call anytime soon. So last week, I went on my own pilgrimage, without a camera crew, to an ancient monastery off the coast of Wales, on Caldey Island, where Christian monks have prayed for 1500 years.

The island is accessible only by boat – and only weather-permitting. And storms had thwarted crossings since Easter, but by the grace of monastic insider-information, I managed to stowaway on a morning mail boat that braved the waves.

Reaching the shore was like diving off the edge-of-the-world – a gateway into heaven. And not just because of lovely-old, barnacled monks chanting in the abbey. The whole landscape was bathed in currents of peacefulness, something I long for in my everyday life – but don’t fully experience, because I’m battling armies of distractions, or my awful addiction, sometimes, of watching myself perform a life instead of living mine.

Hiking the island cliffs, I saw a colony of seals on the beach far below. And then I noticed a rope-ladder hanging over the cliff-edge. More rope than ladder, actually – and not a risk assessment in sight.

At first, I felt a surge of fear, but then I heard a voice: “Mate, it’s a pilgrimage. Dive in!” And so I did, practically abseiling down the brambly cliff-face.

I landed on the beach, and immediately the seals startled, and honked and scooted dramatically into the sea. I thought: God, I’m like that sometimes. Anxious, reactive, so quickly-offended. The first sensation of fear, I rush, I shake, I snark with resentment.

But over the next hour as I sat, quiet, on the beach, the seals bobbed back to shore and then out of the water, cautiously welcoming my presence. As we all relaxed, I even felt welcomed by them. Seal pups started to play almost at my feet, and I felt a surge, not of anxiety, but of spiritual joy.

There’s an old Latin saying, from St. Augustine. Solvitur ambulando. Which translates, in paraphrase: “It is solved by journeying”.

I believe that’s how God works. By journeying alongside all of us – celebrities, monks, pilgrims, punters. Shifting our fear with love. Calming our anxiety with peace. And healing our loneliness – by being the truth that connects every created thing.