Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lectures
Eric Abbott was Dean of Westminster between 1959 and 1974. Before that, he was Dean at King's College, London (1945–1955), Chaplain to King George VI and HM Queen Elizabeth II, and Warden of Keble College, Oxford.
He died in 1983 and was buried in the Abbey's Nave. His friends set up a memorial trust to provide for an annual lecture on spirituality, and we held the first one in 1986. The lecture is repeated each year at Keble College.
2024 lecture
On truth telling and storytelling
Canon Dr Paula Gooder will give this year's lecture in the Abbey at 6:30pm on Thursday 23rd May.
Join us as she discusses truth telling and storytelling.
Further Reading
You can obtain booklets of the Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lectures from King's College London.
Read Eric Symes Abbott's The Mystery of the Transfiguration: Seven Meditations.
Past lectures archive
37th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
From Black Theology to Black Lives Matter and Back Again
Speaker: Professor Anthony Reddie, Director of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture
Thursday, 25th May 2023
36th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Securing a Europe of Peace, Freedom and Justice
Speaker: Lord Adonis, Chair of European Movement UK and Visiting Professor at King's College London
Thursday, 12th May 2022
35th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Money, Bias and the Geography of the Heart
Speaker: Loretta Minghella, Master of Clare College, Cambridge
Thursday, 11th November 2021
34th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
The Most Spiritual of the Arts: Music, Modernity, and the Search for the Sacred
Speaker: Sir James MacMillan, composer, conductor and artistic director
Thursday, 9th May 2019
33rd Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Beating the Bounds: Parish Ministry and Spirituality Today
Speaker: The Reverend Richard Coles FKC, Vicar of Finedon, Northamptonshire
Thursday, 24th May 2018
32nd Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Faith and Imagination – How the Arts speak to the reality of the Unseen
Speaker: Salley Vickers, author and critic
Thursday, 11th May 2017
31st Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
The Sacred, the Profane and the Desecrated
Speaker: Professor Roger Scruton, philosopher, public commentator and author
Thursday, 26th May 2016
30th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Blessed are the Hypocrites?
Speaker: The Reverend Lucy Winkett, Rector, St James's Piccadilly
Thursday, 21st May 2015
29th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Beyond Justice
Speaker: The Reverend Dr Sam Wells, Vicar of St Martin-in-the-Fields
Friday, 25th July 2014
28th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Constantine's Vision and the Church Today - From the Battle of the Milvian Bridge (AD 312) to the twenty-first century
Speaker: Professor Dame Averil Cameron FSA FKC, Former Warden of Keble College, Oxford
Thursday, 2nd May 2013
27th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Mis-establishment - Locating, and Re-locating, the Church of England
Speaker: The Right Reverend Dr Peter Selby, President of the National Council for Independent Monitoring Boards, Visiting Professor in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, King's College, London; formerly Bishop of Worcester and Bishop to HM Prisons
Thursday, 10th May 2012
26th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
The Word in Print
Speaker: The Right Reverend and Right Honourable Dr Richard Chartres KCVO, Bishop of London
Thursday, 26th May 2011
25th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
The End of the Permissive Society? Towards a Christian understanding of the common good
Speaker: The Right Reverend the Lord Harries of Pentregarth FKC, Former Bishop of Oxford, Gresham Professor of Divinity, and Honorary Professor of Theology at King's College London
Thursday, 6th May 2010
24th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Religious and Scientific Faith - The case of Charles Darwin’s ‘Origin of Species’
Speaker: The Reverend Professor Alister McGrath Professor of Theology, Ministry and Education at King's College London
Thursday, 14th May 2009
23rd Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
The Mystical Turn - Religious Experience in the Modern World
Speaker: The Reverend Canon Dr Jane Shaw, Dean of Divinity, Chaplain and Fellow, New College Oxford and Canon Theologian, Salisbury Cathedral
Thursday, 8th May 2008
22nd Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Being Biblical? Slavery, Sexuality, and the Inclusive Community
Speaker: The Reverend Dr Richard A Burridge, Dean, King's College, London
Thursday, 10th May 2007
21st Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
A New Song in a Strange Land - The contribution of women to the priestly ministry of the Church
Speaker: The Very Reverend Vivienne Faull, Dean of Leicester
Thursday, 11th May 2006
20th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
A Room with a View - the Aspiration of a Parish Church
Speaker: The Reverend Nicholas Holtam Vicar of St. Martin-in-the-Fields
Thursday, 12th May 2005
19th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
The Crisis of Truth Telling in Our Society
Speaker: Father Timothy Radcliffe OP
Thursday, 27th May 2004
18th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Beyond Racism and Sectarianism: Is Religion the Problem or the Solution?
Speaker: The Reverend Professor Duncan B Forrester New College, The University of Edinburgh
Thursday, 8th May 2003
17th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Spiritual Society, Secular Church?
Speaker: The Reverend Mark Oakley, St Paul's Covent Garden
Thursday, 2nd May 2002
16th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Deep Time: Does It Matter?
Speaker: Professor Stephen Clark, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Liverpool
Thursday, 10th May 2001
15th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
A Knowledge of Angels - How Spiritual Are the English?
Speaker: The Reverend Canon Dr Martyn Percy
Thursday, 4th May 2000
14th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Who is to judge? The role of the judiciary in ethical issues
Speaker: The Rt Hon Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss
Thursday, 6th May 1999
13th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Spirituality, Shakespeare and Royalty
Speaker: The Revd Canon Eric James FKC
Thursday, 7th May 1998
12th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Waiting for God
Speaker: The Rt Rev. and Rt Hon. Lord Habgood
Thursday, 15th May 1997
11th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
When Shall We Live?
Speaker: David Hare, Playwright
Thursday, 9th May 1996
10th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Deconstructing the Church’s Ministry
Speaker: The Most Revd Richard Holloway D.D., Bishop of Edinburgh, Primus of the Scottish Episcopal Church
Thursday, 4th May 1995
9th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
Christian Counsel and the Meaning of Wholeness
Speaker: The Revd David Conner
Monday, 9th May 1994
8th Eric Symes Abbott Memorial Lecture
‘He Made the Stars Also…’
Speaker: Angela Tilbyat
Monday, 24th May 1993
