August in Norwich feels like a pressure test: the city is busy, the gardens are dusty, and everyone is trying to enjoy the school holidays without melting. We start with the small, real stuff, hosepipe bans, thirsty plants, and the familiar sight of children suddenly free to roam, then we follow that summer energy right through the doors of St Peter Mancroft.

We share one of our favourite parts of the season: families discovering the church as a place to pause and make something. Our Thursday and Friday arts and crafts activities (a follow-up to the Hidden exhibition) create proper off-screen time, and you can hear it in a mum’s relief as her children colour, search for words, and simply enjoy being present. It is a reminder that “community space” is not an abstract idea. It is tables, pencils, conversation, and a welcome that costs nothing.

From there, we shift into a bigger question: artificial intelligence and what it means for writing and creativity. Writer and thinker Justin Reynolds joins Edward to talk about his book AI and the Writer, and he draws a firm line between using AI for research and letting it generate the argument itself. When a machine writes the text, are we still authors, or have we become mere editors of something we did not truly think? We keep it grounded, with a few Terminator worries for good measure, and we also celebrate the rich church life of summer visitors, including an American choir singer exploring Norwich Cathedral and the tradition of bell ringing.

If you care about AI tools, content writing, creative work, Christian perspectives on technology, or simply how to stay human in a screen-heavy world, this conversation is for you. Subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave us a review, then tell us: what should never be handed over to a machine?