Talk: ‘Celibacy’ – Professor Morwenna Ludlow

• The Rev’d Canon Professor Morwenna Ludlow

Morwenna is Professor of Christian History and Theology at the University of Exeter and Canon Theologian at Exeter Cathedral. Her talk will explore how for the first millennium and a half of Christianity celibacy – a voluntary single life dedicated to God – was seen as superior to marriage. Many Christians today still hold to that view. So what are the sources and roots of that idea? How does it relate to the bible and to early Christian practice? How did early Christian ideas of celibacy relate to marriage and how might we understand that relationship today?