I think we got rid of religion, essentially, which may or may not be a good thing, but there’s a vacuum that we created that we don’t really know what to do with. And I think that it’s been filled with people trying to find spiritualness in the wrong things, like politics, for example
Nick Cave, Hay Festival, quoted in The Times, 30 May
He [Rowan Williams] wanted to talk about poetry and I wanted to talk about religion. He wanted to get off religion and get on to poetry
Ibid.
When Tony Blair began his ham-fisted reform of the upper house, he reduced the hereditary element to a self-elected rump. . . The Lords Spiritual, however, were allowed to remain. Why? . . . We do not allot or allow special seats in our second chamber to rabbis, imams, shamans or ministers of the whirling dervish community. What on earth are the C of E bishops still doing there?
A. N. Wilson, The Times, 27 May
What they are doing, with the Illegal Migration Bill, is trying to prevent the enactment of legislation by the Government which has been democratically elected
Ibid.
“There is a padlock on your lips as a vicar,” he says while he feeds the dogs. “But now that I’m not one I can be a bit more direct about stuff, and the anger is coming out since I retired. I’ve had some right humdingers, actually”
Richard Coles, interviewed by Decca Aitkenhead, The Sunday Times, 29 May
It was a lonely place, I was hurting. But it’s by the grace of God, for me leaning on him and take me through. . . It was a time to step up really. But for me, as an individual, obviously it’s grace, really
Darren Moore, manager, Sheffield Wednesday, formerly criticised, on his team’s winning promotion to the Championship, Sky Sports, 29 May
The Jesuits are my “Hotel California” — you can check out, but you can never leave
Alistair Dutton, new head of Caritas Internationalis in the Vatican, on having abandoned his training to be a priest, The Times, 26 May
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