大象传媒

Does it matter to you how you might be remembered? Cathy talks to Philip Blackledge, Rector of Holy Trinity Church in Melrose, and Audrey Cumberford, Principal of Edinburgh about what we mean by legacy.

The subject of loneliness has been in sharp focus in 2020 but is there a solution to be found through Artificial Intelligence? One chatbot, called Replika, has been designed as an online companion you can talk to and engage with. Cathy is joined by Amanda Curry, a PHD student at Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh focusing on AI; Video Games Designer Cara Ellison, and Philip Blackledge to find out if artificial friends are our future.

The nation's favourite vicar, Geraldine Grainger, returns with a collection of online sermons delivered to her parishioners via Zoom, reflecting on the changed times that lockdown has brought to us all. We ask Philip Blackledge if any of the trials and tribulations of The Vicar of Dibley reflect his own experiences.

鈥淪ometimes an uprooting can be a healing or radical makeover.鈥� These words from Pope Francis are included in a new book Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future - the first book written by a pope in response to a major crisis. It is the result of several exchanges between Pope Francis and his biographer, Austen Ivereigh, and Cathy talks to Austen this morning.

Uuganaa Ramsey grew up in the western part of Mongolia, spending her days helping to look after the family鈥檚 horses and sheep. After moving to the UK in 2000 and the death of her young son, she began to involve herself in campaigning work, which has led to the setting up of a new charity to promote inter-culturalism and diversity, launched this week to mark Human Rights Day.

鈥楾is the season to be singing. Well it would be if this year hadn鈥檛 turned our old routines and plans upside down. Choirs have felt the impact of lockdown with the loss of the companionship of meeting and singing together. But somehow they鈥檝e managed to keep going and keep creating. Cathy talks to Jenny Cheung of The Voice Project Youth Choir and Philip Blackledge about how choirs are doing things differently this festive season.