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Graham writes ...  Graham and John co-led the 7th conference in the ‘Big Bang to Biology’ series, which was hosted by Lee Abbey, Devon during the week of 6th-10th October 2025. And what a great place to do it! Lee Abbey is a Christian retreat, conference and holiday centre situated on the North Devon coast near Lynton, which is run by an international community of predominantly young Christians. The main house nestles on the hillside, overlooking a grand view of the beautiful North Devon coastline in a 280-acre (113 hectare) Estate of farmland, woodland and coastal countryside. It even has its own beach, but there wasn’t too much call for bathing during this early October period!  Lee Abbey main house, in low October sun. The house in its current gothic revival style was originally built in the 1850s as a family home, and it wasn’t until 1946 that the house was adopted ‘to equip and serve the church and its people’. The house now has been refurbed to modern standards and is a delightful place to host a conference. The South West Coast Path passes through the Estate and the Exmoor National Park is just a short drive away. The meeting took place just before the Autumn clock change so that nightfall occurred at a reasonable time (not too late) in the evening. The site is on the edge of the Exmoor National Park Dark Sky Reserve, and has an amazing night sky, but unfortunately a full moon and persistent high-level cloud prevented any organised star-gazing activity.  The main meeting room for the conference - the Octagonal Lounge - is one of my favourite speaking venues. It was originally the family's music room when the house was built in the 1850s. Credit: Jane Tompsett.  We were pleased to welcome around 40 guests to the conference, who had booked in for a Science and Faith extravaganza. One of the joys of Lee Abbey is that speakers and delegates share the whole experience; meeting, eating and talking together for the whole week. The guests were very enthusiastic, encouraging and gracious (which made the week a pleasure for us speakers) coming as they did with a hunger to learn more and to share their own thoughts and experiences in discussion. It was also great to welcome Liz Cole back to the conference, with her new publication ‘God’s Cosmic Cookbook’ (1) – cosmology for kids!   Graham and John were the main speakers for the week. The usual format for the conference is to have two one-hour sessions each morning, with the afternoons remaining free to allow time to relax or to explore the local area. The opportunities to walk the Estate or the ‘Valley of Rocks’ are many and varied, and guests often find that the car remains in the car park for the week. The Valley of Rocks is very close-by, literally a 15- or 20-minute walk from the House, and is designated an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Its U-shaped, dry valley is known for its dramatic cliffs and ancient rock formations. Unusually the valley runs parallel to the coast, and it is believed that a river once flowed here.   The Valley of Rocks is very close by, providing ample opportunity to get out and walk during free time. Regarding the conference sessions, Graham kicked-off on Tuesday morning with talks on the limitations of science (2) and the remarkable events of the early Universe (3), followed on Wednesday by a presentation on the fine-tuning and bio-friendliness of the laws that govern the Universe, combined with the story of his own journey of faith (4). Following on, John presented a session entitled ‘We are Stardust’ in which he discussed the origin of life, and the difficulty that science currently has in understanding how it all started (5). In his second session on Thursday morning, ‘There is more to life than the Double Helix’, John discussed human evolution and what it means to be human (6). This was followed by a one-hour slot to give guests (and speakers!) the welcome optional opportunity to receive prayer ministry. The final session was a hour-long Q&A session in the late afternoon on Thursday. This was both a pleasure and a challenge for us speakers, with some piercing questions asked.  Questions and Answers on Thursday afternoon. As mentioned earlier, after the efforts of the mornings, guests are free in the afternoons to enjoy the delights of the Lee Abbey Estate and the adjoining Valley of Rocks, followed by entertainment in the evening. However, additional activities were also arranged by speakers or community. Another attribute of the Lee Abbey Estate is that it is a working farm, and on Tuesday afternoon guest were invited to visit the Lee Abbey farm by Estate Manager Simon Gibson. Later that afternoon, guests were also invited to attend an optional interactive work shop ‘DNA & Genetics: what’s Ethics got to do with it?’, led by John who has significant expertise and experience of this topic.  John, in his cool sun glasses, leading a geology walk on Wednesday afternoon  One 'find' on the walk was a slab of rock by the roadside, which shows the undulating surface of an ancient sandy beach. On Wednesday afternoon John offered a walk to see the local flora, fauna and geology of the Estate and the Valley of Rocks and he was appreciative of the able assistance in this of a guest, Prof Tony Hurford, who is a professional geologist. Wednesday afternoon also saw an entertaining presentation in the late afternoon by Dave Hopwood on Film and Faith. Graham, John and Liz were able to sell several copies of our respective publications during the week, and on Thursday afternoon offered a book signing event prior to the Q&A session.  John, Graham and Liz at book signing time. Thank you to all who booked in and made the experience so enjoyable and worthwhile.
Graham Swinerd Southampton, UK John Bryant Topsham, Devon, UK October 2025 Picture credits: All pictures were taken by Graham or Marion Swinerd, unless indicated otherwise. Postscript: Graham and John have been offered a week at Lee Abbey in the Spring of 2027 to run another science & faith conference. Our response to this kind offer has been along the lines of ‘we will do it, God willing!’, given our advancing years. We will seriously consider the offer, but the current conference may have been the last time …? (1) Elizabeth Cole, God’s Cosmic Cookbook: your complete guide to making a Universe, Hodder & Stoughton, 2023. (2) Graham Swinerd and John Bryant, From the Big Bang to Biology: where is God?, Kindle Direct Publishing, November 2020, Chapter 2. (3) Ibid., Chapter 3. (4) Ibid., Chapter 4. (5) Ibid., Chapter 5. (6) Ibid., Chapter 6.
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John writes ...  Science sometimes comes up with results which are puzzling and/or difficult to fit into current understanding. Many years ago, early in my career, one of my PhD students was doing research on tobacco mosaic virus, which like the virus which causes COVID, has a genome made of RNA and not DNA. Thus, we expected infected plants to express a virus gene encoding an enzyme which copies RNA into RNA (so that the virus genome is replicated in the infected plant). This expectation was fulfilled but very puzzlingly, there were two such enzymes, not one, with the second one being present in uninfected plants. The latter fact means that it was encoded in the plant’s genome, not the virus’s. We checked and double-checked but the result was still clear: plants had an enzyme which copied RNA into RNA but why they did was a complete mystery. Our paper attracted some attention but then was quietly forgotten. In my recent blog post, I wrote about types of RNA that cells synthesise as part of a process to get rid of unwanted messenger RNA molecules* that are no longer needed. One of these regulatory RNAs, anti-sense RNA was discovered about ten years after we discovered our mysterious enzyme. We now know that our ‘orphan enzyme’ has a major role in the synthesis of anti-sense RNA, although the discoverers of the latter were actually credited with discovering the enzyme. It was several years later, in a conversation between me and one of the leaders of the anti-sense research group, that it was recognised that our discovery was indeed the enzyme that made anti-sense RNA and it was a pity that our paper had not gained as much attention as it should have done. But, hey, that’s science and my research group has been very happy in making significant contributions to our understanding the control of the replication of DNA genomes (including the discovery of another pivotal enzyme).
* See pages 115 – 121 in the book if you need to know more about messenger RNA. John Bryant Topsham, Devon October 2025 |
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