Research Seminars and Conferences
Research Seminars 2025-2026
Research Seminars take place six times per year, on a Wednesday from 16.15 to 17.30 pm. In-person attendance on campus is encouraged for those able to come but a Zoom livestream is made available for those who are not.
The programme of Research Seminars features a mix of external speakers, internal speakers from among LST Faculty/Visiting Lecturers/Associate Research Fellows, and LST Research Students. The annual slot for research students features two short papers of 25 minutes’ length with 10 minutes each for questions. The other slots feature papers of up to 45 minutes’ duration, with 30 minutes for questions and discussion.
One of the six seminars per year, or an additional, seventh seminar, may be shared with the Rosina Parkes Seminar; as such, it will always feature a woman speaker or speakers appointed in conjunction with the convenor of the Rosina Parkes Seminar.
Seminars will be planned to accord with LST’s areas of research excellence: Church and Society; Evangelicalism and Ecumenism; Theology, Spirituality and Formation; Jesus and the Gospels.
Upcoming Research Events
Research Conference 2026
Our 2026 LST Research Conference will be ‘internal’ and takes place on 6-7 May. The theme of the conference will be in our most prominent area of research excellence, ‘Church and Society’. We will have papers from LST faculty, visiting lecturers and doctoral students.
A schedule of the programme will follow in due time.
ISERT Conference 2026
The International Society for Empirical Research in Theology (ISERT) is delighted to hold a conference during 25-27 March 2026 at LST. The theme is Religion, Globalization and the City. Short papers, panel discussions and poster presentations will explore the nature of globalization as a religious phenomenon in the context of a ‘global city’. Presenters will explore how empirical research in theology and religion might address the following issues:
- Beliefs, values and attitudes in relation to the concepts of globalization and religion
- The impact of migration and hybridity on ‘glocalized’ expressions of faith
- Megachurches and their responses to globalization
- Different religious traditions (e.g. Islam, Pentecostalism, Roman Catholicism) as global and urban phenomena
- Theological explanations of globalization
- Global explanations of theology and religion
- Professor Suvi-Maria Saarelainen will deliver the ISERT presidential address. She is an Associate Professor in Theology of Wellbeing and Professional Skills and Pedagogical Head at the School of Theology, University of Eastern Finland. Professor Saarelainen will address the question: ‘What Makes Theology, Theology? Reflections from the Threshold of Empirical Theologies’.
- Professor Michael Wilkinson is Professor of Sociology at Trinity Western University, Langley, BC, in Canada and was a Visiting Fellow at the University of Cambridge in 2025. His keynote address is entitled ‘No Religion and the Global City: A Comparative Analysis of the Spiritual but not Religious in the Pacific Northwest’ (Canada).
I work in one of the world’s global cities. The rest of the world has come to work and live in London, which makes it a very multicultural reality. It also the case that these people have brought their religious commitments with them, and this has added to the diversity of the city. I was inspired by this association of place with religious activity, but also by the importance of recognising the role that globalization makes to our understanding of religious life. Time and space are compressed via travel and migration, as well as continued digital connections to home countries. I am hoping that some of my own students will attend, rub shoulders with experienced academics, make friends, but also be inducted into a very specific community of enquiry. It is one of the best places to learn how empirical theology is practised. I also hope participants will be greatly encouraged by the reception of their work among supportive colleagues, but also challenged to grow as academics, develop new techniques, or read new areas of the literature. It may be the case that new collaborations are initiated via informal conversations over meals or coffee breaks. Please do join us. We are planning to make it a fantastic experience for those of us engaged in empirical research in theology and religion!
Laing Lecture 2025
The annual Laing Lecture, hosted by London School of Theology, was endowed by the late Sir John Laing, is held every year in November. This free, public lecture showcases evangelical scholarship, making it accessible for a public audience.
Our latest Laing lecturer was Cor Bennema, LST’s head of Research and Professor in New Testament Studies, speaking on ‘Imitation in Early Christianity Today.’
Imitation ethics is a form of ethics where one intentionally associates with an exemplary person to imitate and become like that person. In Christianity, the issue of imitating role models plays a crucial role but has not received much attention. This lecture explores what history and the Bible can teach us about imitation and how to live well.
Past Research Conferences
The 2025 LST Research Conference, titled ‘Spiritual and Pastoral Abuse: Issues in Theology and Practice’ took place during 8-9 April 2025. The concept of Spiritual or Pastoral Abuse was developed by various North American writers in the 1990s to describe forms of psychological manipulation, coercion and bullying in specifically religious contexts. Later, the UK-based research of Lisa Oakley, Kathryn Kinmond and others explored the experience of such abuse within a more formally academic frame, focused especially—though by no means exclusively—on Christian contexts. That research has in turn prompted significant dialogue and debate, spurred particularly by a series of high-profile cases in various church settings in Britain, the USA and beyond. The fact that several such settings have been Evangelical and/or Charismatic has led theologians in those traditions, and scholars of them, to reflect both on the distinctive challenges and solutions they might present where Spiritual or Pastoral Abuse occurs.
This conference will examine these issues while seeking to advance understanding of Spiritual or Pastoral Abuse within Evangelical-Charismatic, broader Christian and other faith settings. As a leading scholarly voice in this area, Prof. Lisa Oakley will draw on her extensive published work and consultancy with a range of safeguarding bodies to provide understanding and insight into current academic psychological thinking around Spiritual or Pastoral abuse. From his perspective as a front-line Evangelical-Charismatic theologian and former Chair of the Evangelical Alliance’s Theological Advisory Group, David Hilborn will present a new taxonomy for the phenomena concerned, while seeking to deepen specifically theological understandings of them, and of antidotes to them. Other speakers to be confirmed shortly will represent a diversity of backgrounds and perspectives on this pressing concern for faith communities, and for society as a whole.
Plenary speakers: Prof Lisa Oakley (Professor of Safeguarding and Knowledge Exchange, University of Chester), Rev Dr David Hilborn (Academic Dean and Senior Lecturer in Theology and Church History at LST)
Presenters: Brett Riches; Sr Mary Maximillian Koos; Graham Nicholls; Jenny Kimble; Graham White; Mandy Madden; Wien Fung; Andy Hunter; Amy Quinn-Graham; Chris Steed; Joanna Douglas; Ellen Yun