Thought for the Day? It’s too religious!

The Today programme’s religion slot is ‘inappropriate’ when ‘more than half our population have no religion at all’, John humphrys claimed.

he said the three-minute Thought for the Day segment was often ‘deeply boring’ and it was frustrating to have to cut a ‘really fascinating programme short’ to hear that ‘Jesus was really nice’.

he added during the Radio Times interview that he would have ‘less of a problem’ with a secular version. Justin Webb described the daily contributions, which are made by representatives of different faiths, as ‘all roughly the same’ and said it ‘really annoys’ him.

Nick Robinson added that there are ‘not enough’ contributors with interesting things to say, although he said that ‘when Jonathan Sacks, the former chief rabbi, does it, I listen’. Mishal husain was the only presenter to appear in favour of the religious slot, saying it provides an element of ‘punctuation’ in the three-hour programme.

her colleagues’ comments angered regular contributors to Thought for the Day.

Giles Fraser, a Church of england priest, wrote on Twitter that the presenters were competing with each other ‘to sneer at religion’, adding: ‘Sneering at stupid little people and their faith has become normalised throughout the BBC.’

Novelist and broadcaster Anne Atkins told the Daily Mail she found the comments ‘puzzling’, saying Thought for the Day is ‘astonishingly popular’ and she would be ‘surprised’ if the sport segment prompted the same volume of ‘positive’ feedback.

A BBC spokesman said: ‘Thought for the Day is a long-standing part of the Today schedule and an important part of Radio 4’s religious content – it will continue to be so. It features speakers from the world’s major faith traditions and regularly provokes a range of different views.’