#CoronaVirusResponse. Effective Response to Disasters:  A Caring Conversation with Dr Roger Abbott.
Channel: John G I Clarke
Date: 2020-03-18

How can ordinary people be the "difference that makes a difference'' between a crisis becoming a disaster versus a deep learning opportunity to move society forward? 

Revd Dr Roger Abbott is a Senior Research Associate with the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion, based at the University of Cambridge, UK. His specialises in effective responses to so called 'natural' disasters.  

Given the urgency of an educated response to the Corona Virus pandemic, when I heard Roger speak at a breakfast meeting on Thursday 12 March 2020 over breakfast, I could not stifle my social work intuition that was telling me to sit him down to share his experience in researching effective responses to major crises more widely. 

This is a twelve minute 'highlights package' from our hour long conversation. 

The full interview will be uploaded shortly, but I thought I should waste no time to share key insights, in the hope that it will help turn this global crisis into a deep learning opportunity, to save lives and help people come to terms with what is happening.   

Roger is currently working on the religious and cultural impacts of natural disasters upon Christian communities, with special reference to vulnerability and resilience in Haiti in the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake. He has also commenced a longitudinal study in the Philippines following the response to and recovery from typhoon Yolanda. He holds a PhD in the practical theology of disaster response in the UK, which he gained from the University of Wales, Trinity and St David, following over thirty years in church pastoral ministry. He runs a consultancy in pastoral care of trauma, and he teaches University of Chester validated MA and DMin modules in the pastoral response to trauma at the Wales Evangelical School of Theology, Bridgend. He is a member of the British and Irish Association of Practical Theology.

Thanks to Tebogo Phaahle of ImageWorks Multimedia, who dropped everything at short notice to film and direct.

Thanks to the Management and Staff of the Sunnyside Park Holiday Inn for letting us film this in their board room at no charge, and for providing refreshments. 

And thanks to Prof Bob White, the director of the Faraday Institute, and Dr Roger Abbott for allowing me to disrupt their plans, without creating a disaster :-) .  

For more information on the Faraday Institute for Science and Religion see their website www.faraday-institute.org,