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T H E M A G A Z I N E O F R E G E N T ' S P A R K C O L L E G E | 2 0 1 7
R E G E N T ' S N O W
JUBILEE EDITION
PIONEERING SPIRIT
Revd Barbara Cottrell & Revd Dr Myra Blyth reflect on the place of women at Regent's
GLOBAL FUTURE
Dr Shidong Wang introduces the Oxford Prospects and Global Development Centre
LIVABLE LIFE
Friends and colleagues remember the life and work of
Professor Pamela Sue Anderson (1955-2017)
Celebrating Sixty Years as a Permanent Private Hall of the University of Oxford

From the Development Office
We are grateful to everyone who has contributed to
this year's anniversary edition of Regent's Now,
especially our Jubilee Photographer, Oliver
Robinson, who is responsible for the excellent
pictures, as well as Ron Ruhle and all at CDP for
printing and mailing.
CONTENTS
1
FOREWORD
Robert Ellis, Principal
Stay connected with us...
www.rpc.ox.ac.uk
groups/RPCOxford
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4
5
JCR REPORT
Ella Taylor-Fagan, JCR President
MCR REPORT
Allison D'Ambrosia, MCR President
NEWS FROM THE MINISTERIAL COMMUNITY
Esther Mason, Ministerial Association Representative
development@regents.ox.ac.uk
6
DISSENTING SPIRIT
Anthony Clarke & Paul Fiddes on their new History of
the College, 1752-2017
7
A GLOBAL FUTURE
Shidong Wang introduces The Oxford Prospects &
Global Development Centre
8
JUBILEE DEVELOPMENT REVIEW
Julie Reynolds & Matthew Mills
10
ALUMNI NEWS
Evie Ioannidi & Will Obeney
12
THE HEART OF THINGS
Molly Boot recounts a transformative journey to the
Holy Land
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A PIONEERING SPIRIT
Barbara Cottrell & Myra Blyth reflect on the place of
women at Regent's
16
JUBILEE PERSPECTIVES
Keith Riglin, Rex Mason, John Morgan-Wynne & Tom
Weinandy
20
VULNERABILITY AND A LIVABLE LIFE
Adrian Moore, Susan Durber, Kate Kirkpatrick, Lara
Montesinos Coleman & Paul Fiddes recall the life and
work of Professor Pamela Sue Anderson

Foreword
Dr Robert Ellis
Principal
The title of a new History of the College, Dissenting Spirit,
launched at the end of November, speaks volumes about
our community. Staff, students, alumni and friends of
Regent's do things their own way; testing everything and
holding fast to what is good, as our motto instructs.
Throughout 2017, we have been celebrating sixty years in
which the dissenting spirit of Regent's has made a special
contribution to the life of the University of Oxford,
building upon earlier achievements since the eighteenth
century to which the College traces its roots. This year's
edition of Regent's Now offers a glimpse of the ways in
which our community has come together to celebrate
throughout the Jubilee, as the Development Review
elaborates. Reports from the JCR, MCR and Ministerial
bodies - not to mention one undergraduate's reflection on
an immersive trip to the Holy Land - describe the many
accomplishments of our students, who push the
boundaries of representation and inclusion, and continue
to make great strides in sport and the creative arts. In
turn, a report from the Oxford Prospects and Global
Development Centre explains how, as a small and agile
community, Regent's has been quick off the blocks to
build new and exciting links with the higher education
sector in China. Initiatives like this show Regent's to be
forward-looking and ambitious; but in looking ahead, we
are also conscious of the debt owed to those who have
helped to build the community in the past. Timely and
valuable retrospectives are offered from several
generations of alumni, and members of academic staff
from the early days; as well as a former Warden of
Greyfriars Hall, which also received a licence to
matriculate students into the University in 1957, and
from which students and alumni migrated when it closed
in 2008. Finally, articles from Barbara Cottrell and Myra
Blyth, and about the legacy of our much-loved Fellow in
Philosophy, Professor Pamela Sue Anderson
(1955-2017), mark one of the College's proudest acts of
dissent in making a place for women at the heart of
academe. As all of this shows, Regent's has many reasons
to celebrate and to look forward with confidence; I am
certainly excited for what the future holds.
The Principal addresses guests at the Jubilee Gala
Dinner in September. Below: Jubilee display cabinet.
1

JCR REPORT
Ella Taylor-Fagan (History, 2015)
JCR President
Despite the doom and gloom associated with 2016-17, for
an undergraduate at Regent’s the past year has been both
exciting and successful. It all began with the arrival of a
new cohort of first-years. The Freshers’ Week Committee
worked tirelessly to integrate thirty-six new students, with
ice-cream trips, club excursions, college-family meals, and
an ‘Alphabet’ themed bop. Before they had even finished
their first term, the freshers had produced a play, ‘Mercury
Furr’, as part of an intercollegiate drama competition,
which was a great success. The term also saw success for
the wider JCR. The men’s football team was promoted, the
pantomime showcased an array of thespian talent, and the
busy term ended in traditional OxMas style; we were
welcomed to the Principal’s Lodgings for mince pies, and
the JCR came together with the whole community to sing
carols in the quad.
Hilary term was kicktarted with the launch of a
weekly film club and the introduction of a JCR-run
Saturday morning brunch. The term was again studded
with exciting annual traditions, such as Burns’ Night, which
included a fantastic meal accompanied by a band and
ceilidh. It was also in this term that the Social Equalities
Committee was set-up, under the fantastic leadership of
Grace Barrington (English Language and Literature, 2014).
Thus, an undergraduate-led space was created for various
liberation groups to discuss and tackle issues of inequality.
The women’s rowing team managed to secure its place in
the division, whilst the men’s boat – in one of its most
successful years to date – was sadly prevented from
getting much-deserved blades due to the interruption of
the race by some evil swans. Exciting Friday night socials
burst back on to the scene, with the introduction of a
chocolate fountain which proved to be quite a hit and has
since made regular appearances.
The undergraduate community continued to
thrive into the summer months. We celebrated our
tortoise’s 114th birthday with a party in the quad in aid of
Meningitis Now, raising £1003. The College was filled with
music, a bouncy castle and many guests – human and
tortoise. Once the finalists had finished their exams, it was
time for the much-anticipated Jubilee Fling (pictured right).
Recognition goes to Amelia Williams (Classics and English,
2014) and David Marchington (English Language and
Literature, 2015) for doing a sterling job of organising the
night and turning the College into a laboratory full of
enchanting alchemy and exciting potions. Once again, we
were particularly grateful to alumnus and Treasurer, Tony
Harris (English Language and Literature, 2007), who
generously donated champagne for the evening. The few
last days of Trinity term rolled by, spent lounging on the
lawn in the quad, playing rounders against the SCR, and
reminiscing with the finalists before they departed.
The brilliance of the JCR spread its wings across
the wider university, too. Beth Davies-Kumadiro (History
and English, 2014) organised a ‘Common Ground’
symposium in order to tackle issues surrounding Oxford’s
imperial past, with Vogue magazine printing a feature about
her success. In addition, freshers Kiya Evans (History and
English, 2016) and Philippa Lawford (English Language and
Literature, 2016) produced the play ‘Blavatsky’s Tower’,
which received wonderful reviews and included many
familiar faces.
Oxford has been as beautiful and elegant as ever
in 2016/17, but the Regent’s student body has
shone even more brightly, with triumphs in sport,
the arts, democracy and diversity.
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Twitter: @regentsjcr
Facebook: @regentsjcr
Instagram: @regentsjcr
Website: regentsparkjcr.org

MCR REPORT
Allison D'Ambrosia (MTh Applied
Theology, 2016)
MCR President
Never before has Regent’s Park College MCR been
composed of such a young, eager, and active group! As
President this past year, I was assisted by an enthusiastic
and supportive executive board of a Treasurer, Welfare
Officer, Social Secretary, Ministerial Representative, as
well as an MCR Outreach Representative. With a higher
intake and a wider range of degrees than ever, the MCR
has also become more diverse. This provides us with an
incredible opportunity to share global perspectives and
understandings, which our world could use more than ever
at the moment, and which also hold the power to influence
and change the character and culture of the College.
Because of the younger and more diverse
demographics of the MCR this year, we have worked very
closely with the JCR to utilize resources wisely and
combine social gatherings. The MCR also hosted the JCR
for a pre-Formal Hall wine reception in 6th week of
Michaelmas term, which was attended by over seventyfive
undergraduates. The MCR also planned and hosted a
Thanksgiving meal for the JCR, where the hospitality of the
MCR was widely appreciated. To end the term, the MCR
decorated the quad with twinkling fairy lights and served
mulled wine during Christmas carols, with the Salvation
Army brass band. Outside the College, the MCR has seen
five different college MCRs in exchanges since Michaelmas
2016, allowing our own community to integrate into
Oxford’s graduate student body even more.
Regent’s has developed rapidly over the last
decade and it is clear that a vibrant and flourishing
graduate community is vital to the College’s continued
success as an academic institution. In order to realize this,
significant investment by both the College and graduates
will be necessary. The current MCR executive is excited to
make its contribution, and looks forward to making a
valuable contribution to defining and realizing a new role
for the MCR within Regent’s. The MCR will continue to
collaborate with both the JCR and the SCR in order to
enrich the College as a whole.
Looking back to the academic year 2016-17, the
MCR has also contributed greatly to the wider university.
One student received a travel-study grant to do oceanic
research, whilst others have contributed to the academic
life of the University as postgraduate tutors, and many
have been active on the music scene. The College Choir
has been particularly successful under the direction of
three female MCR members, performing a gorgeous
Advent carol service at Pusey House Chapel, a Taizé prayer
service with the Christ Church Cathedral Choir, and a
performance of Fauré’s 'Requiem'. Continuing in this vein,
the academic year 2017-18 is looking incredibly exciting as
the MCR at Regent’s has the largest ever intake of students
and a more diverse range of courses, which looks to
provide the College as a whole with a glorious cornucopia
of knowledge and experience.
Website: regentsmcr.com
4

NEWS FROM THE
MINISTERIAL COMMUNITY
Esther Mason (Theology, 2015)
Ministerial Association Representative
The year began with second and thirdyear
Ministerial Students visiting
Romania for ten days; an opportunity to
experience Baptist life in a different
country and context. It was fantastic to
see some of the beauty of Romania
whilst also being given an insight into
some of the challenges that nation has
faced in recent years. Our visit is the
continuation of a long association
between Regent’s and the Baptist Union
of Romania, and our hosts, Dr Otniel
Bunaciu and Dr Sorin Badragan, were
both former students.
An additional benefit of our time
in Romania was the deepening of
friendships between Ministerial
Students and a growing sense of
community. Ministerial Students are
now in College just one day a week in
term time, so opportunities such as the
Romania visit and our residential block
weeks have become increasingly vital.
Most Ministerial Students are now
following a congregation-based course
where half their week is spent working
in their placement church and the other
half is allocated to their studies.
However, because we only spend a day a
week in College it is all too easy for
church work to fill more than three
days! Our residential weeks in College
allow time to study a topic in depth and
also give us the pleasure of feeling more
like students. Topics covered during
these weeks have included racial,
gender and disability justice, occasional
offices, and entrepreneurial mission.
It is an ongoing challenge to
ensure that Ministerial Students still
feel part of College life and we continue
to discuss, both at Joint Common Rooms
and Governing Body meetings, how this
might be achieved. A JCR challenge to
other common rooms to field a rounders
team saw a team comprising members
of the Senior and Middle Common
Rooms, including Ministerial Students.
It was an enjoyable evening, with the
provision of Pimm’s for all participants
making it easier to bear our resounding
loss! We hope to see similar events
develop which allow the whole
community to come together.
Advent carols and dinner ending
Michaelmas term, and punting on our
final day of Trinity term, were special
moments; only one tutor and one
student fell in the river this year! A
highlight of the year was a Ministerial
Gaudy held as part of the Jubilee
celebrations. Former Ministerial
Students were invited to attend. Revd
David Kerrigan, then General Director
of BMS World Mission, was an
extremely entertaining after-dinner
speaker. The Gaudy took place during
one of our residential weeks, enabling
Ministerial Students to attend and
benefit from meeting ministers who had
trained at Regent’s in the past. It would
be lovely to see a ministerial dinner
established as an annual fixture so that
those in Baptist Ministry can continue
their association with the College. It is a
privilege to train for Ministry at
Regent’s as part of a diverse learning
community. Whatever the next sixty
years of life at Regent’s bring, our hope
is that Ministerial Formation will
continue to be part of this special place.
5

Dissenting Spirit
A History of Regent's Park College
1752-2017
Did you know that the first
Principal of Stepney Academy
(the original name for
Regent’s Park College) left
under something of a cloud?
Or that the decision to move
premises from Stepney to
Regent’s Park seems to have
been made in a London Club?
Or that in March 1922 the
Committee of the College
agreed to sell the remaining
lease of the property in
Regent’s Park and move to
Cambridge?
As part of our Jubilee celebrations we
have taken the opportunity to
produce a new History of the College,
which expands and updates the
earlier work, From Stepney to St Giles,
by R. E. Cooper, and these are just
some of the little-known snippets of
information that are part and parcel
of our history. There are rich archives
in the College’s Angus Library, and we
have drawn on these throughout the
book to create as full a picture as
possible.
The new History traces the
College from the very first attempts
by Baptist churches in London to
organise and fund the education of
ministers in an ‘Education Society’,
established in 1752, through to the
opportunity of purchasing a property
to make into an Academy, funded by
the gift of William Taylor in 1810, and
the various changes and
developments since. It begins at a
time when those who were Dissenters
(not confirmed members of the
Church of England) were unable to
access university education in
England and were forced to develop
other initiatives, and ends with a
Baptist College flourishing in the
University of Oxford. The book seeks
to tell the story – such as the link with
London University, the moves to
Regent’s Park and then Oxford, and
becoming a Permanent Private Hall –
as well as to explore how the College
understood its purpose and work, and
how this has developed over the last
two hundred years.
Alongside the main text there
are also a range of appendices that
offer extracts from some of the
College documents, explain the
‘President’s Board’ in Helwys Hall,
and also offer a list of all former
students of the College arranged by
the year of their valediction. The
College is larger, more complex and
more diverse than it has ever been,
and the book charts the course it has
taken to reach this point. If you are a
former student of the College or have
been connected with it in any way,
then you are part of this story, and the
history of the College is part of your
history too.
Revd Dr Anthony J. Clarke is Tutorial
Fellow in Pastoral Studies and
Community Learning at Regent's Park
College, Oxford.
Professor Paul S. Fiddes is Professor of
Systematic Theology in the University
of Oxford, and Principal Emeritus and
Director of Research at Regent's Park
College, Oxford.
Dissenting Spirit: A History of Regent’s
Park College, 1752-2017, is available
to purchase through the Development
Office: development@regents.ox.ac.uk.
6
Anthony J. Clarke
Paul S. Fiddes

A GLOBAL FUTURE
Dr Shidong Wang, Director of OPGDC
The Oxford Prospects and Global
Development Centre (OPGDC) is an
interdisciplinary centre which aims to
promote discussion and inspire new ideas
among students, scholars, and
distinguished figures, focusing on the
development of East-West relations in the
light of present day globalization.
Universities and Industry Outreach
On 20 January, we received a delegation
from Tsinghua University led by Vice-
Provost, Professor Li Zheng, and hosted
by the Principal. Tsinghua, a prestigious
university in China, visited to explore
further collaborations with Regent’s,
based on our existing dual-direction
visiting student scheme. In November
2016, Dr Shidong Wang and Dr Lynn
Robson made the first ever college visit
to China, visiting several partner
universities, including Fudan, Shanghai
Jiaotong and Zhejiang. Received with
warm hospitality, they had very fruitful
meetings with officials and intend to
work closely on visiting student and
summer programmes. Dr Robson was
invited as the Visiting Professor at
Tongji University. The most fruitful
outcome of the trip was the signing of an
agreement with Shanghai MEC, the
umbrella office for education sectors in
Shanghai. Under the agreement,
Shanghai MEC and Regent’s will build a
stronger partnership on research and
student exchange. In April, the Principal
met Mr Shi Wang, Chairman of Vanke,
the largest real-estate enterprise in
China. Shi Wang was promoting boat
races and had a good dialogue with the
Principal on the relationship between
sport and faith.
Dialogue and Workshops
As one of the events to celebrate the
Regent’s Jubilee year, OPGDC
organized a China-UK University
President’s Round-table with the
Development Office on 9 June. The
theme of the forum was: ‘The Shaping of
World Class Universities in the 21st
Century: Challenges and
Collaborations’. Four Pro-Vice
Chancellors from other UK universities
and Oxford (Professor Nick Rawlins),
four Presidents from Chinese
universities, and the Minister
Counsellor of Education from the China
Embassy attended and had an in-depth
discussion on two panels. The Principal
gave a welcome speech to the guests
and the event concluded with Formal
Hall. This forum shows that Regent’s is
one of the most active Oxford
communities in its engagements and
influence with China as Britain begins to
negotiate a new relationship with the
rest of the world in light of Brexit.
Between the 18 and 23 June, eight
professors from Jilin University
attended a week-long Interdisciplinary
Workshop in the Humanities and Social
Sciences, and exchanged ideas on crossdisciplinary
teaching and research.
'Regent’s is one of the most
active Oxford communities in
its engagements and influence
with China as Britain begins to
negotiate a new relationship
with the rest of the world in
light of Brexit.'
Student Exchange
The Looking China Filming Project, a
fully sponsored project by Beijing
Normal University, allowed five UK
students to work on a filming project in
China. Regent’s student, Charlotte
Haley (Classics and English, 2016), was
amongst those promising young film
makers from thirty-two countries. As an
outcome of Tsinghua’s visit early this
year, Peggy Reeder (Theology and
Religion, 2016) from Regent’s was fullyfunded
to attend the Experiencing
China Tsinghua Summer Programme,
which another student, Kate Bickerton
(History, 2014), had attended the year
before. In the other direction, the
Oxford Prospects Programme’s visiting
student scheme (with the efforts of Ms
Emily Gong, PA to the Director) has
admitted fourteen students from about
eight China universities in partnership
with Regent’s and three Oxford
colleges, Mansfield, Pembroke and
Worcester. These students will study at
Oxford for the coming academic year.
7

Jubilee
Development
Review
As 2017 draws to a close, the Development team is
laying down its tools for Christmas after another year –
and what a truly amazing year it's been.
The College has celebrated its Diamond Jubilee –
sixty years as a Permanent Private Hall of the
University of Oxford – with staff, students, alumni
and friends sharing in the festivities; and there has
been something for everyone. From special lectures,
sermon series and the launch of a new College
History, to a Ministerial Gaudy, Jubilee Fling, Garden
Party and Gala Dinner, the Regent's community has
pulled together throughout the year to celebrate in
style. These are just a few of the events which have
marked the year, and we would like to take this
opportunity to extend heartfelt thanks to colleagues
and students who have made them all possible. It
would not be wise for us to recognise individual
contributions here – someone would inevitably be
missed – but we would like to extend particular
thanks to the Domestic and Catering teams of whom
so much has been demanded and whose tireless
efforts are often unsung. We would also like to thank
our Jubilee photographer, Oliver Robinson, whose
excellent reportage photography (on display here and
throughout the Magazine) will ensure that the Jubilee
is remembered for many years to come.
June 2017: London drinks for alumni, generously hosted
by Roland Rudd (Philosophy and Theology, 1981).
An even more tangible legacy has been success in
fundraising and planning for the future. We are
delighted that the Jubilee has reminded friends and
supporters that Regent’s is an exciting community,
ambitious to improve the student experience and
create the conditions for world-class academic

performance. Amongst other milestones, this has led
to a 13% increase in donations to the General Fund,
amounting to more than £100,000; a 43% increase in
donors; launch of the Oxford Prospects and Global
Development Centre, which fosters academic links
with China; a $60,000 matching fund from a longstanding
American partner; a £20,000 gift (from two
benefactors) to enable the creation of a new door
connecting Main and the Gould Quad; and a £15,000
gift in aid of student support and a Greyfriars
Postgraduate Scholarship to be launched in 2018/19.
The support of alumni and friends is always vital to
the College and we have been incredibly grateful for
these gifts, and others, received during the last
financial year, encouraged by the Jubilee.
Ms Julie Reynolds is a Fellow, and Director of
Development and Alumni Relations. Dr Matthew Mills
(Theology, 2007) is a Non-Stipendiary Lecturer and
Development Officer.
June 2017: Jubilee Lecture, 'Inclusion in the Age of
Populism and Nativism: An Optimistic Take', by Yasmin
Alibhai-Brown (Columnist of the Year, 2017).
December 2017: Advent Carol Service, held
in the beautiful Chapel of Pusey House, by
kind permission of the Principal.
9
September 2017: Jubilee Gala Dinner, attended
by over 140 alumni and staff of the College.

Evie Ioannidi (English, 2012)
Omnia probate quod bonum tenete.
'Test all things, hold fast to that
which is good.'
Nothing could describe my experience of Regent’s better
than the College motto – though I may not always have
realised at the time. It’s a cliché, but I learnt so much more
than the narrow scope of my degree. In fact, as the quiz
machine in the bar often reminded me, I probably retained
less about literature than I would have liked.
I’ve had occasion to think about my time at
Regent’s more than usual recently, as I head back to
university for a Master’s degree in Media and
Communications at the London School of Economics. To
remember what I’ve tested and what I’ve held fast to. How
strange it will be to be a student again, in London this time,
far from the beautiful red ivy that embodied the beginning
of the new year in College. I’ve been telling everyone that I
want to do ‘being a student’ properly this time (writing an
essay at 5am on the day it was due was certainly something
I ‘tested’, though I’m not sure it was ever one to be ‘held
fast’), but I’ve realised that I wouldn’t have done anything
differently. Playing First Witch in Macbeth, whilst going
for Blades in Torpids and writing my dissertation may not
sound advisable, but I would be lying if I said I hadn’t
enjoyed every minute of it.
This year will be the first when I will have no
overlap with any of the current students. This means that I
probably won’t be in the JCR very often, but events like the
annual alumni drinks in London or Summer VIIIs will make
sure that I’m never too far away. The friendships I made
are still very important to me, the connections and
experiences very much part of the good I am determined to
hold. While I may, therefore, have less occasion to turn up
unexpected to bops and socials, I will certainly not be
drifting away from my alma mater. As Leavers’
Representative for my year, I’ve had the chance to stay
abreast of developments within College and find out about
current students’ achievements. This Jubilee year has been
a fantastic opportunity to reconnect with fellow students
and to take part in a celebration of Regent’s. I’m excited to
keep playing a part in College life, to follow it as it strides
into the future, and continues to go from strength to
strength.
Already, I can feel that my experience will be
different as I start this new adventure into academia. It
may just be that my commute is longer than the five
minutes it takes to get from Wheeler to the JCR, but
Regent’s community is not easily replaced or replicated.
However, one thing is the same: a Latin motto which I think
may already be influencing my time in London. LSE’s is
Rerum cognoscere causas: ‘to know the causes of things’. I
can confidently say that I know one of the causes of where I
am today, and that is Regent’s.
Rerum cognoscere causas.
‘To know the causes of things.’
A L U M N I N E W S
10

Like many recent Regent’s graduates, I now live in a
cupboard flat in London. Despite being in the same city as
friends, it takes much more planning than you would first
imagine to meet and keep in touch. It is not surprising,
then, that even after just two and a half years away from
Regent’s, I already reminiscence about a time when a drink
in the ‘Bird & Baby’ took as long to plan as it did to walk
around the library after dinner and grab some friends who
had equally lost the resolve for further study that day.
Memories of Regent’s are notable for their variety.
We got involved in all sorts of activities – sports, the arts,
student politics, journalism. To some extent, this isn’t
surprising. When you need to fill teams in rowing, football,
and darts, provide a full cast and crew for the college panto,
and the choir is getting into swing, there are only so many
volunteers to go around! But tireless students also made a
mark on the University scene. If you weren’t getting
involved yourself, you were supporting from the side-lines
(often literally). What a unique opportunity, to be able to
have fun new experiences with good friends around you.
So it was, when I stood to be the Student Union
President. Despite only deciding to stand a few weeks
before the election, the community of Regent’s banded
together and made an almighty ground force. At our peak,
we had thirty people knocking on doors from St Hugh’s to
St Hilda’s, getting out the vote. Although the efforts did
not make up for the campaign’s late start, it was humbling
to have so much support. If it had been someone else
standing, Regent’s would have banded round in the same
way. And they did. When I ran, the College had waited
forty-one years since its last Student Union President, but
it only had to wait two more years after that, as Kathryn
Cole won a high-turnout election and is now the ultimate
student representative in Oxford. Not only does this
reinforce the energy with which our College takes on the
University, it is also a measure of the impact we have. I’m
sure this spirit is also familiar to other alumni. Although my
study of economics and of critical thought in philosophy
have been very helpful for working on policy at HM
Treasury, this go-getting and inclusive spirit is just as useful
(if harder to capture on a CV!).
I now have support from my Regent’s friends in
another equally-odd choice of extra-curricular
activity…tower running. The premise is simple: you have
to run to the top of a building against the clock, and the
person with the fastest time wins. It might surprise you to
learn that this is a ‘sport’ with a worldwide following and
races up all the most famous skyscrapers. I took it up when
I remembered that at Regent’s, ‘yes, why not?’, was the
immediate answer, rather than, ‘no because…’. Although
I’m a pain when I can’t make a social event because of a
race (or even worse, I’m abstaining from drink in
preparation), Regent’s friends are still supportive, if a little
more bemused.
In order for the College to maintain its unique
offering – a particular community spirit; a vibrant oasis by
the centre of a great city – it needs to constantly adapt and
change. Whether it’s by going veggie in Hall one day a
week – something I was proud that we did during my time –
or more seismic changes, such as the broadening of the
postgraduate community to bring in new people, from new
backgrounds, studying new subjects and creating new
interdisciplinary discussions. It’s because of the
importance of constantly reacting to changing
surroundings that I have chosen to stay involved in the
College, sitting on the Council. I’m excited to see what lies
in store – what more the community will support its
students to achieve, and how many more people will be
touched by the life lessons to be found in our little spot in
the University of Oxford.
Will Obeney (PPE, 2012)

THE HEART OF THINGS:
MY JOURNEY TO THE HOLY LAND
Molly Boot (Theology, 2016)
My first year as a Ministerial student at Regent’s has brought
with it some fantastic opportunities: I’ve been taught by
some incredible scholars and have met people at the
forefront of exciting ministries in the UK and beyond, as
well as enjoying the riches of Oxford’s vibrant classical
music scene. It’s been a crash course in seizing
opportunities as they present themselves; so, when I heard
about a summer scholarship to study in Jerusalem I didn’t
hesitate in sending off my application. Within a week, I
started making plans to fundraise the remaining costs,
booking flights, and before I’d had a chance to catch my
breath at the end of Trinity term, I was on a plane to Tel
Aviv. On landing in Israel, I boarded a shuttle bus, hoping
to be able to talk the driver into taking me beyond
Jerusalem to the Tantur Ecumenical Institute, my home for
the month of July. Tantur is an incredible place to live and
study: set in the olive-laden hills lining the Hebron Road
between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, it is an oasis of peace,
promoting ecumenical, inter-religious and political
dialogue in one of the most complex and turbulent
contexts imaginable.
It was a huge privilege to share my time at Tantur
with a truly fantastic group of people. The group
represented eight nationalities, and was comprised of
ordinands, priests, pastors, and a couple of people from
other professions. Firm friendships quickly formed, given
the sheer intensity of the whole experience; the more we
discovered about the political and religious divisions on our
doorstep, the more perplexing it all seemed. As such,
regular opportunities to pray, eat and reflect together
were invaluable. Besides my programme, it just so
happened that, for the first two weeks of July, Tantur also
welcomed scholars and PhD students at the forefront of
ecumenical research and dialogue in the US, who
contributed greatly to our learning through a series of talks
and panels.
After introductions by Tantur’s staff – around half
from Notre Dame in the US, and half from Bethlehem and
surrounding villages – my programme began with lectures
from local Jewish, Christian and Muslim scholars on the
theological and ecclesiological issues faced by worshipping
communities in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. What with
Tantur overlooking both places, there was ample
opportunity for investigation. To begin with, I encountered
the kaleidoscopic worship of the Greek and Armenian
Orthodox churches, the Roman Catholics, Egyptian Copts,
Syriacs and Ethiopians, all of whom inhabit the Church of
the Holy Sepulchre (below). Each day, fragrant incense and
12

eautiful chants in many languages fill this vast church,
which is believed to house both Calvary and the tomb of
Christ. Other highlights included a visit to Dome of the
Rock (below), whose serenity now seems strange in light of
the shooting and demonstrations that followed just a few
days after we met and interviewed the Director of al-Aqsa,
and a visit to the Church of the Nativity, where I joined a
choir in singing Persian carols at the birthplace of Christ.
Besides trips and lectures, there were a number of
poignant devotional opportunities. We celebrated
Communion together in Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Nazareth,
and on the Sea of Galilee, and every day we each led
evening prayers in our own traditions: we experienced
everything from traditional Anglican compline to a full
service of Greek Orthodox vespers. I had the privilege of
leading a short time of Taizé prayer in the Golan Heights, at
the border with Syria. It is far easier to offer eloquent
prayers for peace from a safe distance; faced with such
violent discord, I found there to be few, if any, appropriate
words to offer.
Whilst conflict inevitably permeated much of our
Tantur experience, we turned to focus on it more intently
towards the end of the trip. I was struck by Hebron (below),
a once bustling city now bearing the ugly scars of brutal
massacres, in the form of an eerie ghost-town separating
the Israeli settlement and Palestinian marketplace, policed
by huge numbers of Israeli military personnel. On the same
day, we interviewed the Mayor of Efrat, one of many
settlements in the West Bank; there seemed to be an
insurmountable gulf between the Mayor’s stories of
peaceful collaboration with the Palestinian villages
surrounding Efrat, and the countless stories of oppression
we’d heard from our neighbours in Bethlehem. I was left
wondering how these narratives could possibly coexist, let
alone be reconciled. It was thus both a relief and an
inspiration to meet people actively seeking peace, first at
the mixed Palestinian and Israeli community at Neve
Shalom-Wahat Al-Salam, a group of contemplative
activists with a radical commitment to unity and
collaboration. The same can be said for our tour guides
from Mejdi, an organisation promoting reconciliation and
dialogue; a non-religious Israeli Jew and a Palestinian
Muslim. I hoped that their measured, empathetic approach
to each other’s stories might begin to chip away at some of
the all too prevalent animosity between their communities.
My time at Tantur (above) drew to a close far too quickly.
As I navigated the incredibly strict security at Ben Gurion
Airport, I was very aware that I was leaving having only
scraped the surface. Before my trip, when people told me
that I’d be ‘walking in the steps of Jesus’, they meant on the
Via Dolorosa, or on the shores of the Galilee. Instead, I
encountered him in guides, clergy and activists –
peacemakers, from whom I learnt so much about the
beauty, pain and volatility of this impenetrably complex
region. I am more convinced than ever that we must strive
to be people of peace wherever we may find ourselves;
those of us who are privileged enough not to face a daily
threat of expulsion, oppression, or even death have a
responsibility to our brothers and sisters the world over.
We must go on challenging injustice, speaking truth to
power and seeking freedom, that all people may have the
opportunity to thrive.
13

A PIONEERING SPIRIT
Regent's, Women, and Ordination
Revd Barbara Cottrell (Theology, 1968) and Revd Dr Myra
Blyth (Theology, 1976) reflect on life as amongst the first
women to train for Baptist Ministry at Regent's in the decades
after the College became a Permanent Private Hall of the
University of Oxford.
Revd Cottrell writes: When I arrived at
Regent’s in October 1968, I was the
third woman since the War to be
accepted for ordination. I was preceded
by Marie Isaacs, who caused something
of a stir by her arrival on a motorbike.
She was a high-flyer, spending almost
her entire career at Heythrop College as
a lecturer, I believe, in Patristics. She
was followed by Ruth Vinson, whose
father endowed the Vinson block. Ruth
married John Matthews and they served
together for some years at our Swindon
church. I came up from the University
College of North Wales, Bangor, having
obtained a Second-Class Honours
Degree in Biblical Studies. (Those who
were ordained before the War were
Gwyneth Hubble, Elsie Chapel, and
Violet Hedger.)
I had confided to my Professor at
Bangor, Bleddyn Roberts, that I wished
to enter the Baptist Ministry. As a
member of the Old Testament Society,
he knew Professor Gwynne Henton
Davies, and during a visit to give a series
of lectures at Bangor, he arranged for
Henton Davies to interview me; and
subsequently, having received a
recommendation from my home church
and Essex Baptist Association, I
appeared before the Council of Regent’s
Park College and was accepted.
My early days at the College were
fraught, whilst negotiations took place
as to my matriculation (Regent’s was
unable to do it, being a male college).
Eventually, an arrangement was
reached with Dr Kathleen Kenyon to
matriculate me via St Hugh’s, so I had a
foot in both camps. (Marie and Ruth
were also matriculated by St Hugh’s.)
My training and education were in the
hands of Regent’s and my contact with
St Hugh’s was minimal – they provided a
Moral tutor. Initially, I lodged in
Summertown but in due course, Henton
Davies arranged for me to live in College
having obtained a statute to enable me
to do so. My residence was far removed
from the male students. I lived on the
third floor of the main building, in the
room to the left of the Library, which
had a small integrated cloakroom. My
bathing and any washing I had, took
place in the Principal’s Lodgings.
My advent was not universally
approved as some took the view that
they had signed-up to a male college and
a woman was an intrusion they did not
welcome. This was rarely articulated
but was like an undercurrent. On one
occasion which was potentially
embarrassing, during Formal Hall, a
Ministerial said to me across the table,
‘So, you think you’re going to be a
woman minister?’ As quick as a flash,
and to my astonishment as I barely knew
him, our Rugby Blue came back, ‘Yes,
she is, and what are you going to do
about it?’ I was fortunate that a group of
students headed by the JCR President,
As Principal, Gwynne Henton
Davies (1958-72) championed the
admission of women to the College.
Chris Cunnigham-Burley (Theology,
1966), took me to their heart and gave
me a home.
I would not say that my time at
Regent’s was particularly happy, since it
was marked by the pressure of reading
‘Schools’ in two years (this was allowed
on the strength of my degree in Biblical
Studies) and the strain of my peculiar
situation. Nevertheless, I know that
those two years were the most
important in my life; they enabled me to
examine my faith with a rigour I could
not have imagined and articulate it with
clarity. Above all, Oxford taught me to
think – and the ability to analyse any
problem down to its constituent parts
and draw a conclusion is a gift beyond
rubies. I was ordained by Henton
Davies at St Mary’s Baptist Church,
Norwich, in September 1970, and
served there as Assistant to Revd Eric
Sharpe, MA, a member of the Psalms
and Hymns Trust, and where music was
at the heart of the worship and life of
the Church.
14

Dr Blyth (right) writes: I came to Regent’s
in 1976, straight from school at the age
of 17. At the time, I had no idea what a
privilege it was. In fact, I did not realise
until reading the new College History,
published this autumn, how unique the
moment was. No female undergraduate
had matriculated into the University
through Regent’s before that year!
Previous female Ministerial Students
(six in total) had either matriculated
through the women’s college, St Hugh’s,
or had entered as graduates.
Looking at this now I think to
myself, how did I not realise that this
was such a privilege? I guess it’s in the
nature of being young; you just think
something is natural – why wouldn’t it
be possible? For the same reason, I did
not fully appreciate what huge struggles
many women had gone through before
me to win the right to an Oxford
education, and to be trained for Ministry
at Regent’s.
In my three years at Regent’s,
there were two other women students,
one graduate from Bristol and one
doctoral student from the USA. Despite
being outnumbered 100-1, the JCR was
very welcoming and lively. Elected at
the end of my first year as Social
Secretary, my responsibility was to
organise the equivalent of the current
Friday night bops! We did not have a
bar, but we were not without liquid
refreshment, and I particularly
enjoyed arranging live music events. In
my first year, I also coxed the Men’s VIII
and we nearly got four bumps; but the
less said about that the better. In my
second year, I threw myself into
University music life and through that
met my husband, Robert, a Chemist at
Worcester. In my third year, not a lot
happened on the extra-curricular front
because I needed to catch-up on lost
time, and so spent most of the year in
the Library next to the big bay window,
which in those days permitted the wind
to howl dramatically so that late nights
and early mornings were pretty eerie!
They were good times.
Happily, the year after I
graduated, the University granted the
right to Regent’s to accept female
undergraduates in all subjects. With
each decade, more and more women
have come to Regent’s to study the full
range of options on offer and now the
majority of our undergraduates are
women. There is also an impressive
range of female alumni who have
entered many professions and made
significant marks on society. In this
anniversary year we should celebrate
that Regent’s was amongst the first of
the colleges within the University to
become co-educational, and I personally
want to say, ‘thank you’, that in 1976
Regent’s made it possible for me to
matriculate as an undergraduate female
ordinand.
‘Ever since the College had become a [Permanent Private Hall], women ministerial students could be accepted
if they were graduates, and they could matriculate in the University through an arrangement with a women's
college, St Hugh’s. In October 1968 the Principal sought consent from the University for Regent’s to
matriculate its own women ministerials, despite the general single-sex rule for the colleges. In this he was in
advance of the University, as the Vice-Chancellor wrote declining permission on the grounds that so far the
principle of co-education had only been granted to graduate colleges; in October 1970, however, the Principal
was able to report that PPHs were now permitted by the University to matriculate women students who were
candidates for ministry.’ From, Clarke & Fiddes, Dissenting Spirit: A History of Regent's Park College,
1752-2017 (Oxford, 2017), 131.
15

J U B I L E E P E
I studied at Regent’s (1980-83) in the
days when ministerial students were all
full-time and residential, and all read for
the Honour School in Theology. So for
me, as a recent graduate from London,
to have three years living and studying
in the heart of Oxford, within a diverse
and challenging college community, was
a huge privilege. I was ordained in 1983
and served for twenty-five years in
Baptist and United Reformed charges,
before receiving holy orders in the
Church of England in 2008; I now serve
as a Chaplain and Assistant Dean at
King’s College London.
Much has changed in my life since
leaving Regent’s, but it is for me (and
others) at Regent’s where I was not only
educated but formed to be and become
who I am. I attribute this to a number of
distinctly Regent’s things which I
continue to value.
First, the balance and creative
tension of locating the seminary within
the academy. Regent’s is, with the
possible exception of one Durham
college, the only place where ministers,
Baptists and others, may receive a
theological education and their
Ministerial Formation within a
community which, whilst firmly within a
Christian ethos, does not require
religious subscription of its members.
For me, this enhanced and enriched my
time, created friendships beyond the
restrictions of my subject and
profession, and marks Regent’s distinct
place in the University.
Secondly, and related to the first,
the diversity of disciplines with the JCR
and beyond, and the range of theological
opinions and styles amongst the
Ministerial Students and the University,
enabled me to work out my own
understanding of my faith and how I
should live it – to test all things and,
having tested, to hold fast to that which
is good.
Thirdly, genuine hospitality. Those
from my time will recall regular
Saturday evenings with the Dean and
his family in Headington – no student
omitted, all included. In sporting events
– I was in the First VIII (the only VIII in
those days) – Regent’s would produce a
higher percentage of its own members
cheering from the banks than any other
college. And the traditions of daily Brew
and daily chapel – feeding the body and
the soul in collegium.
Fourthly, the depth of scholarship.
I observe that too much of theological
education and Ministerial Formation
today, in all churches, can easily tend
towards mere training for a task –
echoing the utilitarian approach in other
disciplines. Regent’s, whilst immersing
us in contextual theology, certainly
never avoided the rigour of academic
study. For me this was life-changing, has
remained with me, and fires me in my
delight in continued study, research, and
academic reflection on pastoral
practice.
I am aware of changes since my
time. Ministerial Students are usually
non-residental and with a higher
element of training, the College
community is larger and even more
diverse, and the necessary emergence
of an MCR has perhaps diminished the
breadth of the JCR that I knew.
However, the values I treasure, and
which made me who I am and sustain
me, were begun and continue here. I
look forward, in confidence, as Regent’s
continues to offer balance, hospitality,
and scholarship for future generations.
Revd Dr Keith Riglin (Theology, 1980), top
left, is Deputy Chairman of the College
Council and Governing Body.
16

R S P E C T I V E S
It is a very great pleasure to be asked to
write of one’s memories of the College
after sixty years since its elevation to
the status of Permanent Private Hall of
the University. The pleasure is partly in
the kindness of the Editor in inviting me,
but also in the rather smug recollection
that, at my advanced age, I must have
some of the earliest recollections of the
College amongst those still living! I
came on to Regent’s in 1949 from
reading English at St Edmund Hall. That
I did so is a little strange, since I came
from a church (Ashurst Drive, Illford)
with very strong leanings towards
Spurgeon’s College. Indeed, a student
straight from Spurgeon’s had recently
settled as Minister and made a great
impression on me, one George Beasley-
Murray. But when I told him that I
would like to stay in Oxford he was
generosity itself, and encouraged me
warmly. Robert Child was Principal
then, a gentle bachelor living with his
sister at 55 St Giles’. He had enjoyed a
distinguished Ministry, latterly in
Bristol, but was perhaps slightly less
effective in the academic realm. The
real power behind the throne was the
Senior Tutor, one Ernest Payne. He was
a great church (particularly Baptist)
historian, and an effective teacher and
encourager. The college community was
small and we were all training for the
Baptist Ministry, although after the War
several had broad church and
theological sympathies. In those days,
relations with the college at Bristol were
close and some of their brightest came
on to do a degree; amongst them, Morris
West. I made good use of my time at
Regent’s, became engaged to my wife,
Audrey, who was at Lady Margaret Hall
– oh, and I also read some theology.
I certainly felt the advantage of
my Regent’s training during my years in
the Ministry, until George Beasley-
Murray intervened in my life again and
invited me to teach at Spurgeon’s. I was
eventually rescued in 1975 by another
Principal, Barrie White, who was
already a firm friend, who engineered
my coming to Regent’s to teach Old
Testament. It was still a small
community and the few of us on the
teaching staff became firm friends and
enjoyed a lot of laughter together.
Gradually, under Barrie’s distinguished
leadership the College began to expand,
taking undergraduates in a wider range
of subjects and taking on the teaching
staff for them; mostly, at first, by
appointing Fellows of other colleges as
'lecturers', in the Oxford terminology.
New accommodation was built and the
College became an evermore significant
force on the Oxford scene. This was
particularly so under the inspired
Principalship of Paul Fiddes; and his
great contributions to the life and
character of Regent’s have been
brilliantly carried on by Robert Ellis. Dr
Ellis has at least had the advantage that,
by his time, I had retired and left the
scene to far more able and active men
and women. And still that warm,
welcoming, sometimes hilarious spirit of
welcome and ‘family’ that characterises
Regent’s burns brightly, and makes it
always such a pleasure to visit. Floreat
Regent’s.
Dr Rex Mason (below) is Fellow Emeritus in
Old Testament Studies.
17

J U B I L E E P E
Apart from a cautious peep from outside
on the pavement in March 1953 (I was
sitting the entrance examination at
Jesus College), my first contact with
Regent’s was while reading History at
Jesus (1955-58). The Baptist Society
met in the JCR (then one long,
uncarpetted room) on Sunday
afternoons. There, I met some Regent’s
students who used to attend before
slipping out to fulfil preaching
engagements.
I came up to Oxford already
feeling called to the Ministry and I
applied to Regent’s during Hilary term
1958. I was required to sit an entrance
examination (ten days after History
‘Schools’, and I relied on my knowledge
from Sunday School and Scripture
Examinations!). The whole Council,
packed into the seminar room,
interviewed me. I was accepted to start
in October as among the first of the new
Principal, G. Henton Davies’ students.
After starting at Regent’s, I had to
‘migrate’ from Jesus to Regent’s, which
had just become a PPH.
Physically, on the north side of the
quad, there were sixteen study
bedrooms, eight to each floor, with
communal toilets and washing facilities.
On the south side, stood two old houses.
The ground floor of each was let as flats,
while the remainder provided six study
bedrooms, a guest room and a toiletbathroom.
So, Regent’s could
accommodate twenty-two students on
site (any others lived out, e.g. a Canadian
research student and a French World
Council of Churches’ scholar). Next to
these houses were a cycle shed and then
the entrance gates with the ‘Star’
straddling the two halves (last heard,
these gates were in Simpson the
builder’s yard – what happened to
them?). At the opposite end of the quad
were the houses of the Principal and
tutor. The former looked externally
rather unprepossessing, but it was
rebuilt internally in 1957-58 and the St
Giles’ frontage given a facelift.
In my first year, we were almost
exclusively a Ministerial community
(and male). Michaelmas 1959 saw the
admission of four non-theological
students (I think two read English, two
science), in accordance with Henton
Davies’ policy. As an Oxford graduate
already, I had to do Theology ‘Schools’ in
two years (including New Testament
Greek), plus Ministerial Training which
included a year’s student pastorate with
Clive Tougher at Bayworth (we cycled
out the 7.5 miles there!). This was a
very heavy programme for two years,
but I took to theology like a duck to
water. My acquaintance with the
tutorial system was a great advantage.
Compared with modern Ministerial
Training programmes, what we received
was sparse. Henton Davies lectured on
the theology of worship and the
theology of preaching, and I remain
eternally grateful for the insights and
stimulus of what he gave us. He also
agreed to change the format of sermon
class; each week a student conducted a
short service with sermon in the Chapel,
followed by the assessment by two
students, a tutor and the Principal. One
morning, Henton Davies was late for a
9am lecture. When he came in, he
apologised, saying that he didn’t often
hold a cheque for £10,000 in his hands!
It was the gift from Mr Baldwin, which
led to the erection of the Balding Block
(this, after I had left in Trinity 1960). We
were well looked after; three meals a
day except on Sunday evenings, when
those who had got back from preaching
heated up soup, and there were
sandwiches and cake. Sometimes we
discussed theological topics; other times
we just shared experiences of our visits
to the churches.
When Mr Argyle resigned in 1964,
I was then minister at Botley Baptist
Church and was approached to cover
the New Testament teaching until an
appointment could be made. Eventually,
the Council invited me to become New
Testament Tutor and I commenced full
time in September 1965. At the first
Council meeting which I attended, the
decision was taken to build the ‘South
Side’ following a generous gift from Mr
Vinson. The demolition of the two
houses and the erection of the new wing
took place from the summer of 1966
onwards. Whilst Tutor and Dean, I
witnessed also the erection of the
married students flats (where there had
been a car repair business), and then the
replacement of the St Giles’ Hotel with
College accommodation. So, I was
privileged to see the completion of the
College's buildings.
Dr John Morgan-Wynne is Fellow Emeritus
in New Testament Studies.
18

R S P E C T I V E S
I first want to congratulate Regent’s Park
on the sixtieth anniversary of it
becoming a Permanent Private Hall
within the University of Oxford. I
remember fondly my association with
Regent’s, especially my friendship with
its former Principal, Paul Fiddes.
Permanent Private Halls were
established within the University to
allow other than Anglican Christian
denominations to have a rightful place
within this august academy of higher
learning. For fifty years, Greyfriars,
sponsored by the Capuchin Franciscans,
was also a PPH. Together with Regent’s
Park, and other PPHs, the Christian
presence in Oxford increased
significantly both spiritually and
academically. On this sixtieth
anniversary of Regent’s Park, we
celebrate the continued Christian
academic life within the University of
Oxford.
But what is the Christian
academic life that Regent’s Park
continues to imbue within the
University, and so doing helps keep alive
the contribution that Greyfriars also
made? Firstly, it is a Christian
contribution in that Regent’s wishes to
live out the Gospel of Jesus Christ
within an academic setting. Regent’s
Park, and the other PPHs, do not see
Christianity as a hindrance to the
intellectual life, but rather recognise
that God, in creating humankind in his
image, has placed within the human
mind and heart a desire for the truth;
truth that can be attained through
human reason, through all of the
academic sciences, and also by means of
God’s own saving revelation, especially
In 2010, the Chancellor unveiled a shield to commemorate the migration of Greyfriars students to
Regent's Park in 2008. (L-R) FrJames Boner, Lord Patten of Barnes (Chancellor), Fr Mark Elvins
(Warden of Greyfriars, 2007-08), Revd Dr Robert Ellis (Principal of Regent's Park College).
in his Son, Jesus Christ. For Christians,
to grow in knowledge, in pursuing all
that is true, gives glory to God and
enables human beings to become more
fully human; become more fully God’s
image. Moreover, in the light of the
Holy Spirit, Christians believe that they
have the necessary help they need in
sorting out what is truly good, just and
right, the better to serve not only the
academy, but also society at large. The
Gospel for Regent’s, as it was for
Greyfriars, is the soul of its academic life
and the heart of its communal
fellowship.
Secondly, to foster a Christian
academic life demands that an
institution not simply be Christian, but
also that it be fully and truly academic.
This means that the faculty must be of
highest academic quality, performing its
tasks of teaching and research within
the academic standards that the
intellectual community rightly demands.
Something less would not only be an
embarrassment within the academy, it
would be an embarrassment to the
Gospel. Also, to be truly a Christian
academic institution means that the
faculty fosters within its students a love
for learning and the intellectual habits
needed to obtain that learning. Every
student within a Christian institution of
higher learning is to manifest that he or
she is determined, as are other students,
to know the truth that resides in every
science, and so contribute to the
advancement of knowledge.
To be then a Christian institution
of higher learning within the University
of Oxford, as is Regent’s Park and as was
Greyfriars, means to radiate a love for
learning and a desire for God, and that
they imbue this love for learning and
this desire for God in their students, and
through them, to the whole of society.
In so doing, they continue the work of
creating a Christian culture in which the
common good of all is fostered; a
common good that is founded upon
truth, goodness and justice. May the
Lord Jesus bless Regent’s Park – its
faculty and students – on this the
sixtieth anniversary of its founding, and
may it continue to give glory to God the
Father in the Spirit of love and truth.
Fr Tom Weinandy, OFM Cap., is Warden
Emeritus of Greyfriars Hall, having served
from 1993 to 2004.
19

VULNERBILITY &
A LIVABLE LIFE
Remembering Professor Pamela
Sue Anderson (1955-2017)
For the most part, 2017 has been a year of celebration,
when the College has welcomed the passage of sixty years
since it became a Permanent Private Hall of the
University of Oxford. In March, however, the year was
also tinged with sadness with the death of a much-loved
colleague, tutor and friend, Professor Pamela Sue
Anderson, after two years' living with cancer. In the
2016 edition of this magazine, Pamela wrote eloquently
about her most recent (and final) research into the
potential of choosing vulnerability in the pursuit of a fully
livable life. Whilst her article did not reflect on her final
illness, its argument that vulnerability ('openness to
affection') is something to be embraced seemed to be
imbued with a special power. Pamela spent many years
in Oxford, including as Tutorial Fellow in Philosophy at
Regent's Park from 2001, and to her colleagues and
students she embodied her own philosophy, exuding
passion, humanity, and a zest for life. This special feature,
drawing together contributions from those who knew and
worked with Pamela, celebrates her life and work, and
explains why she will be sorely missed. The first two
articles began as contributions from friends, Professor
Adrian Moore and Revd Dr Susan Durber, at Pamela's
Thanksgiving Service in the Chapel of Mansfield College
on 18 March; the third and fourth have been contributed
by colleagues who engaged with her work; and the fifth is
a reflection by the Principal who employed Pamela at
Regent's, Professor Paul Fiddes, on her contribution to
the Project for the Study of Love in Religion, of which he is
Director.
Pamela Sue's influence continues through her
Studentship for the Encouragement of the Place
of Women in Philosophy, which has been
generously supported by family, friends and
admirers, via 'www.campaign.ox.ac.uk'.
Pamela Anderson - or rather, Pamela Sue Anderson, as she
always preferred to be known (I think she was always
sensitive to how unfair the danger of confusion was on her
less illustrious and younger namesake) was a force of
nature. She was lively, funny, and intelligent. Indeed, she
was hyper-lively, hyper-funny, and hyper-intelligent: she
was hyper in every aspect of her being. It is always difficult,
when we have just lost a loved one, to believe that that
person is no longer with us. In Pam’s case, it is especially
difficult. Her very parting seems like a violation of some
natural law.
When I think of Pam, I cannot but think of her joy
of life. I literally cannot remember a single extended
conversation that we had, during the forty years or so that
we knew each other, that did not include smiles and
laughter, often raucous laughter. And I include the
conversations that we had when she was coming to terms
with the pain and sadness of the death of her partner, Paul.
For that matter, I include the conversations that we had
when she was coming to terms with the pain and sadness of
her own impending death, which she faced with
remarkable dignity and with inspiring fortitude. The last
two or three times that I talked with Pam, there were still
the same smiles; there was still that same laughter.
More often than not, when we were laughing
together, we were laughing at the silliest and most
inconsequential of things. I clearly remember one occasion
when we were travelling together on public transport and
disgraced ourselves, the tears streaming down our faces, as
we reflected on a bizarre mistake of predictive texting in a
message that she had sent to me earlier in the week. In
response to my question, whether she was able to
accompany me to some event at short notice, instead of
replying that she couldn’t because she had a graduate
student round helping her to proofread, she replied that
she couldn’t because she had a graduate student round
helping her to procreate! The hilarity, though never truly
malicious, was not always exactly kind either. Pam had an
incorrigibly sardonic view of human nature. She delighted
in people’s foibles, and could be merciless - albeit playfully
merciless - in exposing them.
But Pam was not just a delightful friend. She was of
course a significant academic, too. She had been a Fellow
of Regent’s Park College since 2001 and Professor of
Modern European Philosophy of Religion in Oxford since
2014. In 2009, she received an honorary degree from the
University of Lund in Sweden in recognition of her
outstanding work. That work ranged widely, but it always
20

confronted the great mysteries of religious experience -
whether through exegesis of other thinkers, as in her first
book, Ricoeur and Kant, and the book that she co-authored
with Jordan Bell, Kant and Theology, or through the
development of her own ideas. Not that the two were ever
clearly distinguished in Pam’s case. Her exegesis of other
thinkers was always of the best and most generous kind,
the kind that involves sympathetic reconstruction and
appropriation of her subjects’ ideas to breathe new life into
them.
Her book, A Feminist Philosophy of Religion, showed
that same creative eclecticism. One particularly striking
example of this was the way in which she combined
elements of what are standardly referred to as the
'analytic' tradition and the 'continental' tradition in
philosophy. Despite the chasm that has often seemed to
divide these, Pam was at home in both. She had a lively
sense of how each is able to benefit from the other. Her
book was enormously influential. It was the focus of
debate at a number of international conferences, and it
provided the inspiration and subject matter for much
impressive work by other people. In the philosophy of
religion in general, and in feminist philosophy of religion in
particular, Pam had become an international figure whose
work broke important new ground. It continued to do so in
the book that I myself believe to be Pam’s most significant,
Re-Visioning Gender in Philosophy of Religion. The very title
of this book, along with its subtitle 'Reason, Love and
Epistemic Locatedness', indicates the breadth of her
concerns. There are, in this book, profound intimations not
only of an advancement in our understanding of the
philosophy of religion but also of an advancement in our
understanding of what it is to be human.
In the last two years of her life, Pam was an active
participant in the Templeton research project 'Enhancing
Life'. The work that she carried out for this project had a
particular poignancy in the context of the various contours
of her own life, and indeed of the lives of those of us who
now mourn her loss. She explored the idea of vulnerability,
especially the vulnerability that is manifest in profoundly
transformative experiences such as facing critical illness or
coping with bereavement. And she argued for a positive
reappraisal of such vulnerability - so that it could come to
be seen, not just as an openness to suffering,
disempowerment, and death, but also, in Pam’s own words,
as 'an openness to mutual affection', and as 'a provocation
for enhancing life'. In all her work, Pam displayed an
unusual combination of directness and sensitivity. Over
the course of her career she developed her own highly
distinctive voice, and it is a voice to which philosophers and
theologians have paid sustained attention.
But Pam’s academic work was by no means
confined to her own writing. She was a model of what
might be called good academic citizenship. She was a
wonderfully conscientious, proactive, indefatigable
member of the Oxford philosophy community, as indeed
she was of the philosophy community more broadly. She
was particularly good at supporting and championing
younger women in the profession, partly through her work
with the UK Society for Women in Philosophy. It is
characteristic, as well as entirely fitting, that she wanted
one of her legacies to be a Studentship for the
Encouragement of the Place of Women in Philosophy.
'Pam will always be a part of our lives. Let us
rejoice in all that she has meant to us, and all
that she will continue to mean to us.'
Pam also had excellent relations with her students, to
whom she was a constant source of encouragement and
inspiration and many of whom went on to make significant
contributions of their own to the discipline - as well as
becoming close friends of hers. I cannot tell you how many
moving messages I have received since Pam died, from
former students expressing their gratitude, their
admiration, and their deep affection for her. But it was not
only her own students for whom Pam cared so
passionately. She cared passionately for all young people:
she was always ready to affirm them in whatever way she
could. She showed a keen interest in, and a great love for,
the children of her friends for example, as of course she did
her three nephews and niece - Joseph, Erik, Sarah, and
Kevin. Her family meant a huge amount to her, just as she
did to them. I used to love it when she regaled me with
stories and reminiscence of her parents, her brother Larin,
and her two sisters, Heidi and Laurie. This must be an
extraordinarily difficult time for them. They are all in our
thoughts and prayers. In losing Pam we have, between us,
lost a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a teacher, a mentor, a
colleague, and a friend. But in another sense we have not
lost anyone. Pam will always be a part of our lives. Let us
rejoice in all that she has meant to us, and all that she will
continue to mean to us.
Professor Adrian Moore is Professor of Philosophy in the
University of Oxford.
21

Pamela once said, in a sermon preached before this
University: ‘Let a unity of virtues, connected by love, shape
the stories we read and write about our lives.’ It’s a phrase
characteristic of her; beautiful, poignant, drawing
connections, not quite transparent, inviting thought.
Today, we are reading and writing Pamela’s life and our
own lives that we shared with her. We are drawing on the
best of what we know, even while we are in grief, to tell the
story truthfully and from love. We are making a unity of
her virtues, and lovingly connecting them in the work of
making sense. One of the things that so marked Pamela’s
later life was her bringing together of the different parts of
life; her longing to be honest about life and truth, about
beauty and love and sorrow and loss. Her own reflections
in the work to which she was so committed are eminent
among the things that can sustain us today and in the time
to come. She blesses us at the very point when we gather
to praise her.
Pamela had, as she herself described it, a secure
and happy childhood. She was warmly loved by her
parents, Vonne and Doug, for whom we must all feel deeply
today. And her brother and her sisters accompanied her in
these years at the beginning of her life, as well as through
her dying and her death, with such devoted and constant
affection. Pamela’s father, reflecting on her distinctive
characteristics, says that she always had, in this order:
ability, understanding, and drive. We can all recognize the
truth of those words. She was bright and brave and
determined enough to move away even from such a secure
home to find and play a part in a wider world, to learn new
patterns of thinking, to question and to search for herself.
After some time in France, she came to Oxford and
to Mansfield College, a place that shaped her in so many
ways, and the place where she wanted this service to be
held. She and I first met then, when she arrived in 1979. I
remember how impressive and attractive she was, and yet
also how vulnerable too. She lived at that stage, and for
many years, in a small room in a house in Holywell Street
where she also cared for the landlady, Tony, who was living
with disability. That relationship said much about Pamela’s
willingness and need to care for others and to love them,
while she was also working hard at forging a life of her own
and seeking independence. Pamela had her own
insecurities and anxieties then and it was far from easy to
be a young woman in Oxford, doing Continental
Philosophy, defined a great deal still by the American midwest,
longing for love, vulnerable to suffering. I think there
were some who could never have imagined that this small
woman would one day achieve her ambitions, break
through Oxford’s ceilings, and become an inspiration to so
many of us, a respected and ground-breaking philosopher.
But what Pamela did was to make what many saw as her
weaknesses shine as the strengths they truly are. Over
time, as she became more herself, she stormed into the
future crafting her work from the very texture of the
realities of her life. She was one of the most brave, honest
and faithful women I have known. She made the
connections between her child-like trust and her loving,
drew the cares that might have destroyed her into
conversation with the disciplines of thoughtful philosophy
and showed that they were not opposites at all, but
profoundly connected. And she took the bliss and the joy

of which women have learned sometimes to be ashamed
and made it brave and true, worthy of reflection.
Pamela had a year working in the University of
Delaware, before working at the University of Sunderland
and finally, returning to her beloved Oxford. She said, ‘My
heart never really left Oxford.’ I remember what a joy it
was for her, and for her friends here, when she got a post at
Regent's Park College. And Regent's was a place where
she found a congenial place to work, colleagues with whom
she could develop shared projects and passions, and a
community in which she could care for others and in which
others could care so deeply and wonderfully for her.
Pamela was such a remarkably kind person. She
loved her students and cared about the details of their
lives. She nurtured and treasured relationships and
friendships. Her arms were swift to embrace. And she
knew the cost of love too. The deaths of her landlady,
Tony, of her student and friend Hanneke, and of course of
Paul, were huge moments in her life, from which she
emerged with fresh understanding of the cost and
demands of life, but also of how we grow and develop our
capabilities as human beings. She learned and wrote and
spoke so movingly about love. She pleaded with us, and
'Regent's was...a community in which she
could care for others and in which others could
care so deeply and wonderfully for her.'
showed us, that love is about emotion becoming intelligent,
that we don’t have to choose between passion and reason,
but that each can make more beautiful the other. She
refused the idea that love is simply a mysterious ‘gift’ that
comes from somewhere outside ourselves, or that it’s
something we just ‘fall’ into. It is something we can give
and make and improve. She taught us to believe that we
can be intelligent about love, that it can be a form of
knowledge. She knew, from her own life, that our loving is
imperfect, but she believed that love can be perfected. I
heard in her an echo of the Christ who commands us to
love, who says we can choose to love by doing and
enduring, by disciplining duty with delight. While I might
be tempted to say that Pamela was saying something about
the love of God, I can hear her rebuking me, and saying that
it was her love, and that I must claim and take responsibility
for the love I feel and think and act upon too. She called us
all to cultivate love as a virtue; habitual, reliable,
consistent. It was this love that was in her heart. There are
so many ways in which to remember her. She was amused
when an Oxford philosopher once remarked about her
that, ‘She may be a feminist philosopher, but she is a very
nice person.’ And in the end, she really wanted her
students and her friends to see that she was loving more
than she wanted them to see that she was clever, though of
course she was clever. She was nice, but she could
deconstruct nice for you if you needed it.
Above all, she said, ‘I feel that philosophy must be
bound up with living, with other lives and my life’. And she
cared especially deeply that women’s lives should be
better, enhanced in every sense, that every Eve should be
credited with the search for the knowledge of good and evil
and not shamed, but valued and loved and encouraged.
She gave her energy to the task of raising a feminist voice
within philosophy of religion, so that every Eve could be
given at last, the fruit of the tree of knowledge – in justice
and in hope. She had an uneasy relationship with the
Church, as any feminist must, but her influence, her work,
her voice will go on sounding in the Church with the power
of a prophet for years to come, through her writing, her
students, her readers; as her story writes the stories of
others.
And now Pamela has come to the end of the day. I
imagine that we might want to rage at the sadness of it,
grieve at the tragedy of this loss, and also to make some
meaning of it. We can do little better than turn to Pamela’s
own words about vulnerability, loss and love. She believed
that vulnerability does not destroy life, but is its material
and its strength. We may be undone by her loss, but we are
also becoming something more. We may lose confidence,
but we shall be enhanced. We will all die, but we shall all be
transformed. We may be hit by waves of sorrow, but we
are facing the reality that there is something bigger than us
shaping the world of our desires. We are undone by the
other, but we may find that the ‘other’ is also a force for
love and that our lives can be turned again to joy. Life is
precarious, but it is also beautiful. Hasn’t Pamela shown us
this? Pamela herself has said, ‘Grieving…makes possible
the opening up new worlds; but this requires accepting the
loss of the world as it has been known’. Today, we are
facing loss. And it is real. The world we knew with her is
lost to us. But we are also promised, even by Christ
himself, the gift of new and risen life, enhanced life, joyful,
hopeful life – life ringing with the laughter of friends and
the delights and passions of love. May it be so. Amen.
Revd Dr Susan Durber is a URC Minister and Principal Emerita
of Westminster College, Cambridge.
23

Thinking with Pamela
Virtuous Dialogue and the Philosophy of
Religion. Pamela Sue Anderson is well
known for her work on the feminist
philosophy of religion; her 1997 book on
that subject being one of the first in the
discipline. In the last two years before
her death, however, her work focused
on the themes of vulnerability and love.
Drawing on Anderson’s as-yet
unpublished ‘Introduction’ to a volume
of Michèle Le Doeuff’s philosophy
(edited by Anderson and to which I
contributed as translator), I will outline
the ways in which her vision for the
philosophy of religion – and her
methodological ideals for philosophy in
general – are encapsulated by a desire
for virtuous dialogue of the kind her
most recent work discusses.
From her earliest work, Anderson
was concerned to reject a model of the
‘empirical realist philosopher of religion’
that I’d like to call by the shorthand
homo philosophicus. By this term, I mean
to denote a negative exemplar, and thus
it is important to clarify that I do not
take it in the same sense in which it has
recently been used by Quassim Cassam
– that is, as a ‘model epistemic citizen
who can discover what his beliefs and
other attitudes are by establishing what
they ought rationally to be’ (Cassam,
Self-Knowledge for Humans¸ 2015).
In the case of religion,
determining what our beliefs and
attitudes ‘ought rationally to be’ is, of
course, much disputed. But Anderson’s
work criticized homo philosophicus
precisely for the confidence he placed in
disembodied reason (or formal
rationality) to answer our questions. On
Anderson’s account, homo philosophicus
– historically male, white, and privileged
– claimed a god’s-eye view that failed to
acknowledge the experiences of less
privileged others, especially women and
the marginalized. In doing so, Anderson
argued, homo philosophicus endangered
the philosophy of religion by
downplaying the importance of ‘desire,
need, ethical truth, and justice’; and
assuming ‘the status quo of patriarchal
beliefs’ (Anderson, A Feminist Philosophy
of Religion (1997), 16). As such, one of
the aims of her work – frequently
reiterated in the decades that followed
– was to transform ‘the focus and the
conceptual scheme in contemporary
philosophy of religion’ (Anderson, in
Cornwell and McGhee, eds, Philosophers
and Gods (2009), 167).
In 2009, she argued that the
required transformation involved not
only concerning ourselves [that is,
philosophers of religion] ‘with knowing
[…], but with thinking, acting, and
making reflective judgements which
would be creative, spiritually’ (adapted
from ibid., 171). She appealed to
philosophers of religion to examine and
exhibit ‘spiritual virtues’, calling her
readers to be ‘creative’ ‘for a world in
need of love, trust, respect, and hope’
(ibid., 171). These virtues, she argued,
should become characteristic of
reflective subjects, shaping the way we
imagine and interact with the world.
This was needful, on Anderson’s view,
because ‘[i]n a time when the world is
increasingly aware of global diversity,
the tradition of philosophy of religion
seems disinclined (or, is it simply afraid?)
to scrutinize its own practices not only
for epistemic injustice, but more
positively for the passion implicit in
yearning for the virtuous life’ (ibid., 176).
She followed Robert Solomon in
claiming that the virtuous spiritual life
should be understood in terms of the
transformation of the self (see ibid.,
173). This is significant because, on
Anderson’s view, ‘the spiritual life
directs reason’ towards a telos. In a
world increasingly divided by difference,
the telos towards which the spiritual life
directs us is an exploration of ‘love’ as
openness to others, the world and our
natural being; ‘trust’ as a coming
together of uncertainty and confidence;
‘respect’ as an active responsibility to
join love and trust in attention to life;
and ‘hope’ in past, present, and future
(see ibid., 176).
Anderson is no naïve optimist
about the realization of these ends,
however. In her recent work on
vulnerability she wrote about the
human tendency to shut itself off to the
danger of being wounded – to the
possibility of pain that can ensue from
openness gone wrong. But even so,
through the practice of virtuous
dialogue, Anderson proposed that she
had ‘found a transformative strategy for
refining philosophy’s self-definition, in
order that philosophy itself becomes far
more inclusive, and not just ‘western’,
not largely elite, and not largely for
certain privileged men alone’ (Anderson,
‘Introduction’ to In Dialogue with Michèle
Le Doeuff (forthcoming), 8). Instead of
paradigms of discipleship – in which
powerful masters instruct their
disciples, inducting them into readymade
worlds of thought – Anderson’s
dialogical approach invites others –
including marginalized others – to think
with us for themselves. It is a condition
of such a method that we are vulnerable
24

to these others – that we open
ourselves up to them, and to the
possibility of being – in some respect –
challenged or even ‘undone’ by our
encounter. Because the social self is
dialogical, and unfolds in a context and
with interlocutors that are not always of
its choosing, the prospect of dialogue
can fill us with fear. As Charles Taylor
has written, ‘we define our identity
always in dialogue with, sometimes in
struggle against, the things our
significant others want to see in us’
(Taylor, Multiculturalism: Examining the
Politics of Recognition (1994), 32-33).
So, alongside this call for dialogue
Anderson’s recent work also called for ‘a
new philosophical imaginary – which
would transform the myths we live by’
(Anderson, ‘Love and Vulnerability’
(unpub.)). In particular, she wished to
transform ‘a patriarchal myth which
projects on to “vulnerability” only
negative affects’, arguing that love and
vulnerability needed to be liberated
‘from the excessive fear and violence
which has been conveyed mythically by
our (western) philosophical imaginary’.
As Anderson reconceived it,
vulnerability was a ‘capability’ that
enhanced life, enabling us to be open to
receive from others in love. As such, it
has redemptive potential for the
discipline of philosophy – and for the
dialogues in which each of us
participate.
Dr Kate Kirkpatrick, FRSA, read
Philosophy and Theology (2002) at
Regent’s Park College, Oxford.
Speaker Vulnerability and Feminist
Collectivity in Philosophy. I never quite
crossed paths with Pamela Sue
Anderson. She returned to Oxford in
2001, the year after I finished my
undergraduate studies. In February
2017, we were both invited to speak at a
British Academy conference in Durham
on 'Vulnerability and The Politics of
Care'. Anderson’s paper was read by a
friend, just weeks before her death. All
of us spoke about vulnerability, but
Anderson’s contribution stood out in
that she addressed our own
vulnerability as speakers. She began by
recounting an occasion, earlier in her
career, when her audience was unable
to receive her as an expert on feminist
philosophy. The story stayed with many
of us because it reflected the painful,
hidden histories of speakers who do not
conform to preconceptions of how a
‘knower’ ought to look, be or think.
These stories, if they are told at all, are
normally the topic of hushed and
anxious conversations, where the
speaker’s close friends and colleagues
express outrage and reassurance.
Anderson, however, put her
vulnerability on display.
Her story was about a talk (also at
Durham) on feminist philosophy. Before
she arrived, the posters announcing the
event had been defaced with the image
of another Pamela Anderson: the
Playboy model and actress who rose to
fame in the 1990s. Anderson’s talk was
particularly well attended – mostly by
male students and philosophers drawn
to it by interest in the other Pamela.
From the outset, Anderson was not
quite believed to be a philosopher
because of her name. However, she was
also accused by a prominent male
philosopher of ‘disappointing’ her
audience because the content of her
epistemology was deemed to lack the
‘particularity, concreteness and
relationality required for women, and
so, for “feminism”’.
How do we respond when an
audience is unable to recognise us as a
'knower'? Sometimes, we are silenced
because the audience refuses to listen.
Sometimes, we pre-emptively silence
ourselves, smothering our own voices
because we risk too much by expressing
those ideas, to that audience, at that
time (see Dotson, ‘Tracking Epistemic
Violence’, Hypatia, 26.2 (2011), 236-57).
Sometimes, we soldier on, knowing that
the audience will find it hard to hear us.
We hope that if we appear invulnerable,
we might be taken seriously. At the
time, trying to appear invulnerable was
Anderson’s reaction to being silenced.
'How do we respond when an
audience is unable to recognise
us as a 'knower'? Sometimes,
we are silenced because the
audience refuses to listen.
Sometimes, we pre-emptively
silence ourselves'.
I didn’t make it to hear Anderson’s paper
in February, exhausted by my own
performance as an invulnerable speaker
and needing to recover some energy
before collecting my young daughter,
but afterwards my colleague and
collaborator, Doerthe Rosenow, insisted
that I read the text: 'You would have
loved it. It resonated so much with
everything we’ve talked about.' About
the incident in Durham, Anderson said
that she came to wonder what she might
have done differently. She realised that
nothing she could have done on her own
could have made her a trustworthy
'knower' to that particular audience.
Women’s attempts to be recognised
25

are unlikely to succeed by trying to
imitate the figure of the ‘great man’.
Following feminist philosopher Michèle
Le Doeuff’s call for a collective approach
to access to philosophy, Anderson came
to advocate collectivity, not just as
groups working together, but as an
attitude geared toward ‘reciprocal
relations to the “unknown”’. Her
proposal was that such a collectivity
should be ‘modelled on our mutual
vulnerability as speakers and audiences’.
If silencing exploits speakers’
vulnerability, then might not one way to
undo this be active avowal of our
vulnerability? Indeed, the denial of our
vulnerability is no less than a ‘systemic
form of self-deception’, a ‘wilful
ignorance’ that reflects and reinforces
inequality and privilege.
Silencing is both harmful and insidious.
Any single instance is easy to explain in
another way. As a result, we can miss
the often-gendered nature of the
phenomenon. It is then easy for
institutions (such as those offering
confidence training to women) to locate
the problem with the individual, rather
than addressing the institutional and
cultural mechanisms through which
some learn that they are entitled to
speak and be heard, while the
confidence of others is insidiously but
systematically eroded. These
experiences begin early in life and are
reinforced in our educational
institutions. I doubt that, without
encouragement given by my male tutors
during my time at Oxford, I would have
had the confidence to continue in
academia; particular thanks are due to
Pamela’s predecessor at Regent’s, Dave
Leal, as well as Tim Bradshaw and Paul
Fiddes. Yet, that encouragement was
particularly needed in a context where I
was not once by taught by a woman, nor
even saw a woman give a lecture.
Through these experiences, we learn –
as one of my students put it – ‘that
knowledge has a body and that it is not
my body’. The result is what has been
called ‘a war that a woman faces nearly
every day, a war within herself too, a
belief in her superfluity, an invitation to
silence’ (Solnit, Men Explain Things to Me
(2014), 5).
In her article in the 2016 edition of
Regent’s Now, Anderson set out how the
embrace of vulnerability might provide
a means, not only of countering sexism
and epistemic violence in academia, but
also of ‘enhancing life’ in general.
Vulnerability is not just a condition of a
speaker before an audience, but a
general condition of our coexistence. As
one of the other speakers at the British
Academy conference, Judith Butler, has
famously argued, we are all dependent
upon others from the minute we enter
26

the world. Vulnerability is not just
openness to being wounded, it is also ‘a
capability for openness to affection’.
Being wounded – be it through abuse,
injury or loss – can be transformative,
personally and politically. It can open us
up to the needs of others, even those far
away. ‘In acknowledging our
vulnerability,’ Anderson wrote, ‘the
hope is that we become capable of living
(more) openly and fully for ourselves
and for others. This assumes a striving
to become what we are more “deeply”,
to employ another image, becoming in
all of our “complexity”’. Anderson’s
paper affected so many of us because
she brought her own vulnerability into
the open in order expose the practices
through which relations of
power/knowledge are maintained. As
the writer Ariel Leve put it, in
recounting her own experience of being
wounded through childhood abuse: ‘We
tell our stories in order to be heard.
Sometimes those stories free us.
Sometimes they free others. When they
are not told, they free no one.’
Dr Lara Montesinos Coleman read
Philosophy and Theology (1996) at
Regent’s Park College, Oxford.
This article is abridged from a longer
version which was published online by
the feminist philosophy blog, 'In
Parenthesis', with which Pamela was
associated: www.womeninparenthesis.
co.uk/speaker-vulnerability-andfeminist-collectivity-in-philosophy-bylara-montesinos-coleman.
Quotations from Pamela are taken from
her Durham paper, ‘Silencing and
Speaker Vulnerability: Undoing an
Oppressive form of Wilful Ignorance’, or
her article in last year’s edition of
Regent’s Now.
PAMELA ON
LOVE IN
RELIGION
Paul S. Fiddes
In the last eighteen months of her far-too-short life, Pamela
was one of the co-investigators on the Project for the
Study of Love in Religion at Regent’s Park. She interwove
her participation in this project with her engagement in an
‘Enhancing Life’ project at the University of Chicago,
enjoying the interaction between the two. Dr Minlib Dallh,
our Fellow for Love in Religion, and I deeply appreciated
her as a conversation partner, and she was typically
encouraging to the younger women scholars who became
associated with the Love Project.
The Project itself has developed from an ‘Open
Letter’ of Muslim scholars written to Christian worldleaders
in 2007, urging that Muslims and Christians should
live and work together on the common ground of love for
God and love for neighbour, as commanded by Jesus
Christ. With the collaboration of the main writer of the
Letter, Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad of Jordan (now an
27

Honorary Fellow of the College), the Project has drawn
together scholars of several faiths in the UK and from
'It is hard to conceive of the Project
without Pamela, who was both hopeful
and realistic'.
throughout the world to explore the nature of love as the
Ultimate Reality of the universe. Pamela was a key
member of an international colloquium held in the College
in November 2016, when philosophers, theologians,
leaders of religious communities and social scientists came
together from many countries, assisted by a grant from the
John Templeton Foundation, to debate the ‘cutting-edge
issues’ in the place of love in religious thought and
experience. A report of the conference and some of the
papers given can be found on ‘www.loveinreligion.org’.
It is hard to conceive of the Project without Pamela,
who was both hopeful and realistic about the outcome,
writing at one point that ‘it is difficult to imagine what our
contemporary global world might look like, if the
Abrahamic religions actually shared – in current practice –
the two love commandments and the one God who is love
itself.’ Two themes about love in particular absorbed
Pamela during her time with the Project, and both touched
on her wider and personal concerns as a feminist
philosopher of religion, especially concerned that young
women venturing upon their careers would be given the
respect and recognition that they deserved.
The first theme was the place of love in forgiveness,
and I well remember her making an impact on the selection
panel for her post as Fellow in May 2001, when she offered
a paper on forgiveness for a ‘demonstration’ lecture given
to staff and students. In a paper published in 2016, headed
‘When Forgiveness and Justice come apart’, she argued
that expecting forgiveness from a woman injuriously
wounded – experiencing intimate violence – can often
obstruct justice. The more, she insisted, that a woman
seeks a changed relationship with her offender, the more it
may become urgent to withhold forgiveness for a period
during a process of ethical reparation. This argument was
typical of Pamela’s bringing into a rigorous philosophical
argument a desire that women be not imposed upon and
made willing victims, so holding love and justice together.
Her second theme was more located in her own
personal situation, living with cancer with great courage.
It was to find in our very human vulnerability the seeds of
loving relationships. She observed that we often associate
vulnerability with violence in our imagination. We either
think of our ‘wound-ability’ as a state where we are simply
a hapless victim of violence or something to be avoided by
inflicting violence on others. Pamela was ambitious to
change our ‘social imaginary’, re-imagining vulnerability by
transforming ‘an exclusively dark myth of fear and
violence’, into a pattern of experience which is open to
mutual affection with others.
Just five months before her death, Pamela was able
to journey with me to a conference at the University of
Leuven on the theme of ‘Relation, Vulnerability and Love’,
where we together presented the aims of the Love Project,
and she explained her own particular track of research,
declaring that ‘Reciprocal affection in vulnerability would
aim to renew our conception of love. But this affecting
needs to be learnt by allowing ourselves to attend to each
other.’ The conference was a moment I will long
remember, when she gave her ‘attention’ to a number of
former students who were also presenting there, and
recalled with me her memories of being in and around
Leuven as a young woman scholar, when all of life was in
front of her.
In the colloquium on love in November 2016, she
said this in commenting on the Gospel passage where Jesus
sets out love for God and neighbour: ‘If we return to the
scriptural passage from Mark 12:28-31, we might find four
ingredients for true neighbour-love. First, we need to show
how love means both caring for and caring about the
wound (vulnus) which opens us up to the possibility of
mutual affection (‘your heart’). Second, we need to strive
to know a one God whose love reveals the world as it
actually is (‘your soul’). Third, we need to show that shared
or collective knowledge in religion is a knowing whom to
love as the neighbour, and how to love that person (‘your
mind’). Fourth, we need to discern how we have the
capacity for this love (‘your strength’).’ This was the
agenda for philosophical investigation that Pamela wanted
to carry through herself, but which she now leaves as a
legacy to us.
Professor Paul S. Fiddes is Principal Emeritus and Director of
Research at Regent's Park College. He is also Director of the
Project for the Study of Love in Religion.
28

STUDENT RECOGNITION
Sophie Aitmehdi (Jurisprudence, 2015)
Vice-President Elect of the University Law Society
Peter Burke-Smith (Geography, 2014)
Vice President of University Lightweight Rowing Club
Kathryn Cole (History and Economics, 2013)
Oxford Student Union President-Elect
Kiya Evans (History and English, 2016)
Producer of ‘Blavatsky's Tower’ at the Michael Pilch Studio
Savannah Fishel (Philosophy and Theology, 2015)
Social Secretary of the University LGBTQ+ Society
Theophina Gabriel (Philosophy and Theology, 2016)
Founder and Editor of Onyx magazine
Jacob Greenhouse (Philosophy and Theology, 2016)
Half Blue for Eton Rugby Fives
Laura Hamilton (Philosophy and Theology, 2014)
President of Oxford Women in Business
Ella Holden (English, 2015)
Art and Literature Editor of the Oxford Student
Thomas Jordan (English, 2015)
Editor of the ISIS Magazine
Founder of the Mental Health Support Network
Suzie King (English, 2014)
Marketing Manager for the original musical, ‘STOP’, which
appeared at the Edinburgh Fringe
Philippa Lawford (English, 2016)
Director of ‘Blavatsky's Tower’ at the Michael Pilch Studio
David Marchington (English, 2015)
Vice President of The Oxford Guild
Georgia Reddington (English, 2015)
Co-Director of ‘I Know You’ at the Burton Taylor Theatre
Executive Make-Up Artist for several University musicals
Rosie Richards (Theology and Religion, 2015)
President of the Oxford Alternotives
Producer of ‘Rewritten’ at the Michael Pilch Studio
Ellie Siora (History, 2015)
Writer and Director of ‘Rewritten’ at the Michael Pilch Studio
Hebe Westcott (English, 2014)
Committee and Blue for the University Netball Team
Ali White (History and Politics, 2015)
Co-Chair of the Oxford University Liberal Democrats
Esther-Jane White (Theology, 2014)
Member of the University Netball team
Member of the University band, Garfunkel
Hannah Wooldridge (History and Economics, 2015)
Treasurer of Oxford Women in Business
IN MEMORIAM
Regent’s Park College
Pamela Sue Anderson
Edward A. Barton
David Boone
Arthur Francis
Charles Garrett
Hal Germer
Marie Isaacs
Alan Kreider
Matthew Neale
Howard Tillotson
Ian Tomlinson
Charles Whitworth
Barrie White
Greyfriars Hall
Br Thomas Boyle