Radio: Rowan Williams on Genesis

04 December 2025, The Tablet

Dr Williams is a class act, and the confines of a Radio 3 music forum find him on top form.

Catholic Church in England and Wales / Mazur

Was there something in the creation of the world that resonated with the artist’s task?

Music Matters: In the Beginning
BBC Radio 3

Introducing this six-part series (29 November–3 January and BBC Sounds), the composer James MacMillan is understandably keen to relate his Catholicism to the creative act. Although he has put his hand to both sacred and secular work, above the proceedings hovers the thought of divine inspiration. All this leads naturally to the first chapter of Genesis, its influence on countless generations of artists and the effect on their imaginations of this “allegory of God’s act of Creation”.

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