The Sea of Faith

 BBC4 – which, for much of the time, is the only BBC channel worth watching – no longer has a budget for making new programmes. This apparent deprivation has also been something of a blessing, leaving the channel free to delve in the vast BBC archive of classic (or at least worth another look) programmes from happier times. Lately we've had the brilliant prison sitcom Porridge (razor-sharp scripts, perfect lead performance from Ronnie Barker); that most amiable of panel games, Call My Bluff; the unbelievably erudite (by contemporary standards) music quiz Face the Music; Simon Schama's finest work, Landscape and Memory; and now – The Sea of Faith, Don Cupitt's epic series, now 40 years old, on the history of Christian belief, which popularised the idea of 'non-realist' faith, and even led to the launch of a 'Sea of Faith' network of like-minded Christians. Such thinking was at the time highly controversial, and Cupitt found himself under attack from believers and atheists alike. He also found himself famous – to the point where he had to wear dark glasses in the street to avoid being buttonholed by passersby every few yards. Cupitt, now 90 but clearly in full possession of his marbles, recalls this strange notoriety in a short introduction to the series. He says he greatly enjoyed making The Sea of Faith, which was genuinely what so many series today claim to be – a journey of exploration – but gave the impression that he has since journeyed far beyond its theology, into realms of ever greater uncertainty, though he remains, like Wittgenstein, 'incurably religious by temperament' (like many of us). 
Watching The Sea of Faith today – I've so far seen the first two parts – I was struck, of course, by how much more serious, incisive and spacious it is than anything that would get made today, and I found, to my surprise, that I had remembered quite a lot of it. One feature stands out, and marks it as a product of its time – the amount of attention Cupitt pays to Freud, a figure who was held in much higher esteem 40 years ago than he is today. But it's a wonderful series, well worth watching again, and I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of it.