Simnel cake, culture wars, Amandaland and singing along.

New episode: Katherine Amphlett, Graham Tomlin, Beatrice Scudeler, and Natalie Garrett write.

Natalie Garrett

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

A close up of a Simnel Cake shows 12 balls on top.

James Petts, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

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In this week's particularly eclectic mix, Katherine Amphlett shares what she's learnt about forgiveness from a Simnel Cake; Graham Tomlin brings Blaise Pascal into play in today's culture wars; Beatrice Scudeler finds the reality of Amandaland, and Natalie Garrett lets loose with some Primary school assembly bangers.

Podcast

Podcasts

Seen & Unseen Aloud

21 November 2025

1 min read

Alan Bennett, rationality and the Budget

New episode. Listen to articles by Roget Standing, Alister McGrath, and Annika Greco-Thompson.

Natalie Garrett

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

In the style of a Raeburn portrait, a set of young people lounge around on their phones looking diffident

Enlightened disagreement (with apologies to Henry Raeburn).

Nick Jones/Midjourney.ai.

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About the episode

This week we start with Roger Standing's review of Alan Bennett's latest film, The Choral; then Alister McGrath unpacks the terrain between the "Age of Reason" and the era of "post-truth" and finally Annika Greco Thompson discusses the possible Christian response to financial (in)security, in the lead up to the UK's Chancellor announcing the Autumn Budget.

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