Sarah Irving-Stonebraker: re-enchanting the ahistorical age

In our age of self-invention, we are profoundly disconnected from the history that once gave us identity.

Nick Jones

Nick is the senior editor of Seen & Unseen.

A woman sitting in an empty church talks to the camera and gestures with one hand.

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Sarah Irving-Stonebraker is an Australian historian whose new book Priests of History: stewarding the past in an ahistoric age, says that, in our age of self-invention, modern people are profoundly disconnected from the stories, practises and history that once gave them their identity.

Justin and Belle talk to Sarah about re-enchanting an ahistorical age and about her own journey from atheism to Christianity as a young academic at Cambridge and Oxford in the early 2000s.

Visit Sarah Irving-Stonebraker's web site. https://www.stonebraker.com.au/

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Podcast

Podcasts

Seen & Unseen Aloud

17 November 2025

1 min read

BBC, bequeathing and being still

New episode: listen to articles by Tim Wyatt, Annika Greco-Thompson, and Helen Cowan

Natalie Garrett

Natalie produces and narrates The Seen & Unseen Aloud podcast. She's an Anglican minister and a trained actor.

1920's BBC Handbook.

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About this episode

This week, Tim Wyatt dives into the crisis of trust and asks whether the resignations from the hierarchy will serve to rekindle trust in the BBC, Annika Greco Thompson encourages us to pass on our values as well as our wealth to the next generation, And, Helen Cowan poignantly explores the power of different types of stillness within wellness and illness that she witnesses as a care home nurse.

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