Mark Thompson, Director General of the BBC, has said that the long predicted global recession of religion has failed to materialise. Instead, we have witnessed a generation of global religious revival: '... over a generation – as it happens over roughly the time I've been involved in broadcasting myself – one picture of religion has been replaced by another, more complex, more challenging, in many ways deeper one.'

In a speech on faith and the media, given on Thursday as part of the 'Cardinal's Lectures' at Westminster Cathedral, Thompson also said that the patterns of religious belief in the United Kingdom are also becoming more complex. Quoting recent Theos research on Easter beliefs, Thompson noted that over half of all Britons believed that Jesus rose from the dead, including 12% of people who said they were atheists.

Commenting on the future of faith in the media, Thompson outlined his view of the new dilemmas facing faith in broadcasting – including nervousness around debating religious issues and a growing sense of victimhood in society – but cautioned against pessimism:

'We're determined that that spirit of boldness and unexpectedness should continue. There are other very ambitious projects already in the works... we want to go on exploring ways of using non-factual genres – drama, comedy – as well as live events and our growing creativity on the web and multimedia to bring the topics of faith and belief to life for audiences.'

A transcript and video of Mark Thompson's speech can be found here.

Theos research on Easter beliefs can be found here.