Your actions — whether noticed or unnoticed, big or small — have been the glue which has held our communities and our nation together during this time of great need

Sarah Mullally, Bishop of London, message to NHS and front-line workers, clergy, parish volunteers, and congregations, 21 February

Rather than condemn the competitive nature of Bake Off, the Archbishop should embrace it. One of the outstanding features of the programme is the way the contestants are rivals, yet still encourage each other. . . If the Church of England really believes that winning and losing is a moral evil, even in a baking competition, is it any wonder it struggles to fill the pews?

Roland White, columnist, responding to Archbishop Welby’s description of Bake Off as a “gladiatorial contest”, The Times, 17 February

I want faith and doubt to dance together, to speak to each other, to challenge and question each other

Elif Shafak, in The Archbishop Interviews, Radio 4, 20 February (Radio, page 25)

I’m always wary of trying to be too tidy in the untidiness of life, even within institutional structures. If it’s a bit blurred at the edges, well, what does it matter? That’s the way the world is. When you get too tidy, you usually end up excluding large numbers of people and damaging people and putting walls up

Justin Welby, ibid.

A wealth tax of the kind we are backing recognises that vastly disproportionate rewards for a very small number of citizens will not make for a cohesive and just national community. Contributing to the creation of a more cohesive and a more just system is not a “tax burden” but an opportunity to build a stable, sustainable economy that works for everyone

Rowan Williams, launch of Church Action for Tax Justice’s “Good Measure Campaign”, 17 February

Dua Lipa: Does your faith and your comedy ever overlap, and does one ever win out?

Stephen Colbert: I think ultimately, us all being mortal, faith will win out at the end! But I certainly hope that when I get to heaven Jesus has a sense of humour. . . I’m a Christian and a Catholic, and that’s always connected with love and sacrifice being somehow related — and that death is not defeat

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, CBS, 4 February

Sadness is like a little bit of an emotional death, but not a defeat if you can find a way to laugh about it, because that laughter keeps you from having fear of it, and fear is the thing that keeps you turning to evil devices to save you from the sadness. . . If there’s some relation between my faith and my comedy, it’s that, no matter what happens, you are never defeated: you must understand and see this in the light of eternity and find a way to love and laugh with each other

Ibid.

The supporters of democracy, institutional transparency, and free speech deserve better than to be criminalised as foreign subversives. They acted in good conscience for what they thought should be the future of Hong Kong. Admittedly, the situation has not turned out how they had hoped, which is why now more than ever they need the UK Government to take a proactive role in upholding their human rights

Alan Smith, Bishop of St Albans, The House, 22 February

We do have to have a much more positive attitude that people seeking asylum come as gift to us — they come with gifts and skills, they come with experience. And, as we know from our history, refugees contribute hugely, in the long term, to the life of our nation when they’re allowed to settle and take a full part in society. It’s not “Let everybody and anybody in,” but we should play our part, as part of the international community, in handling the issue of refugees around the world

Paul Butler, Bishop of Durham, Times Radio, 21 February

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