The Tablet, one of the UK’s oldest publications will be celebrating 175 years of uninterrupted publication in May 2015 with a programme of lectures, concerts, liturgies and debates to reflect nearly two-centuries of cutting edge coverage.
Acclaimed novelists David Lodge, Lady Antonia Fraser and Andrew O’Hagan will be among the speakers debating faith and fiction at the Tablet Literary Festival in June, while in October pianist Stephen Hough will perform a specially commissioned ‘Tablet Sonata’ at the Barbican Centre.
The anniversary will be marked with a Thanksgiving Mass at Westminster Cathedral, London, on the date itself, while other events planned for 2015 include an interfaith seminar considering whether Catholics, Jews and Muslims remain outsiders in British society, and a panel event on the road to women bishops involving the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord (Rowan) Williams.
The Tablet, founded in 1840 by Catholic convert and former Quaker Frederick Lucas, is today read across the globe and reports on events of Catholic and wider significance in the UK and further afield. Since its establishment, contributors to The Tablet have included esteemed intellectuals, thinkers and writers, including Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene, as well as Popes Benedict XVI and Paul VI.
The 175th anniversary of The Tablet falls on 16th May 2015. The full programme of celebratory events includes:
v The Annual Migrants’ Mass (Southwark Cathedral, 4th May): To be concelebrated by the Archbishops of Westminster and Southwark, and the Bishop of Brentwood. The Tablet will sponsor musicians’ workshops to be held in the three dioceses before the Mass.
v Thanksgiving Mass: London and Dublin (Westminster Cathedral, 16th May): Archbishop George Stack, responsible for the Bishops’ Conference media relations, will celebrate a Mass of Thanksgiving. (St Mary’s Pro-Cathedral, Dublin, 7thJune): Archbishop Diarmuid Martin will celebrate Mass to give thanks for The Tablet’s 175 years of continuous publication.
v Tablet Literary Festival – ‘The Catholic Imagination in Literature’ (The Library of Birmingham, 19th – 20th June): Speakers will include David Lodge, Antonia Fraser, Roy Foster, Maureen Freely, David Almond and Andrew O’Hagan.
v ‘From Mary Magdalene to Women Bishops’ – a Catholic/Anglican Seminar (Magdalene College, Cambridge, 30thJune): Professor Janet Martin Soskice, Professor Eamon Duffy and the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord (Rowan) Williams, in conversation, followed by a Q&A.
v ‘The Book and the Believer: Are Catholics, Jews and Muslims still outsiders in British society?’ (London School of Economics, 15th October): An interfaith seminar moderated by Professor Conor Gearty.
v ‘Tablet Sonata’ (Barbican Centre, London, 23rd October): – Piano recital by Stephen Hough, to include the premiere of the specially commissioned Sonata.
v ‘The Spirit of Catholic Renewal: Signs, Sources and Calling’ (Ushaw College, University of Durham, 2nd – 4thNovember): A theological conference sponsored by The Tablet in partnership with Durham University’s Centre for Catholic Studies. Speakers will include Stanley Hauerwas, Timothy Radcliffe and Elizabeth Johnson.
Throughout 2015 The Tablet will be awarding bursaries to postgraduate students in religious studies departments, while a series of awards will also be made to parishes, individuals or organisations for excellence in pastoral action in areas influenced by Catholic Social Teaching and initiatives in development and justice and peace.
Further additions to the 175th anniversary programme, including events in Ireland, will be added as the year goes on. Speakers will be available for interview and journalists are invited to attend events.
Catherine Pepinster, Editor of The Tablet, said: “Only a few publications in Britain have lasted as long as 175 years. That a Catholic publication should have done so, given the tempestuous history of Roman Catholicism in this country, is testimony not only to The Tablet’s journalism but to the capacity for a minority group to thrive in Britain. The Tablet has charted how Catholics have come in from the cold and are now at the centre of life in our country. The Tablet has also recorded the life of the worldwide Catholic Church too, including covering 13 popes. But it has never been the mouthpiece of the Church and its popes. It is, above all, a voice of the laity, a unique vehicle for dialogue and conversation within the Church.”
Follow the anniversary plans on Twitter: @the_Tablet and #Tablet175