The editor of this paper between 1982 and 2003 tells John Cornwell how he was ‘walking on a tightrope’ Before he took over as Tablet editor in 1967, Tom Burns drew up a declaration of commitment to the reforms of Vatican II which so alarmed some members of the board of directors that they sought to rescind his appointment.When John Wilkins (pictured), a former BBC journalist, applied in 1982 to succeed Tom Burns, he told the board that, if successful, he would edit the paper from the standpoint of the “extreme centre”. He explained this as “the paper drawing strength from the central, radical, roots of Christianity – while lurching neither to the right, nor to the left”. He routinely told colleagues and contributors that this accorded with the sp