Sometimes when we talk about religious people, we imagine we are talking about good people. And that’s another reason why people have problems discussing Wagner’s religious life. He was not a good person

James MacMillan, Faith in Music, Radio 4, 14 December

There is a way forward for the Church. It needs to decide on a path of openness and genuine remorse for its past failings. If it takes the other path of commissioning a new coat of whitewash every time there is a scandal, public trust and respect for the Church will continue to decline

From a post on Stephen Parsons’s blog Surviving Church, “Whited Sepulchres and Integrity”, 7 December

Even if only a small fraction of PPE was produced by Uyghur forced labourers, it is not good enough. State due diligence should be an example to encourage businesses not to profit from forced labour

Alan Smith, Bishop of St Albans, on the government response to the suggestion that a “small fraction” of PPE supplied by the Daily Mail’s charity came from Medwell Medical Products, reported to have used a factory in China with a 25 per cent Uighur workforce. The Chinese embassy said that there was “no forced labour” in China

Becket’s cause is not our own. We do know better than him in some areas. But too often his courage is not our own either: the courage that puts our all in the hands of God, and like the modern martyrs sees death as simply the cost of discipleship

Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, sermon on St Thomas Becket, Southwark Cathedral, 11 December

The Bible itself never claims to be without error or internal inconsistency. That is a product of the Enlightenment. . . The notion that texts only mean what they say is devastating enough for Jane Austen, and a complete catastrophe when it comes to sacred texts

Nicholas Henshall, Dean of Chelmsford, on Living in Love and Faith, Via Media blog, 14 December

My dog Bracken has been making the best of the situation by inventing a new game which gives him hours of fun. He likes to steal the baby Jesus from our nativity and then hare around the flat with him until we manage to catch Bracken and rescue Jesus from being chewed

Sarah Mullally, Bishop of London, Christmas letter to children

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