The recent ratification of the Lisbon Treaty and first steps towards its implementation were a major step forward in the development of the European Union. And what is good for the EU should be good for Britain. But where were the celebrations, the rousing speeches from politicians, the multi-page supplements in the newspapers, the hour-long documentaries on television? Instead, Britain greeted this landmark event with a mixture of xenophobic cynicism and schoolboy trivialisation. Great fun was had at the expense of the Prime Minister of Belgium, Herman Van Rompuy, after he was chosen as the first President of the re-jigged European Council, because of his nationality - his native land being dismissed as a country of no consequence - and even his name. Cultural assumptions of effortless Anglo-Saxon ­superiority are clearly undiminished in modern Britain.

It might have been expected that the continuous media fascination with the two world wars would have persuaded the British by now that failure to engage with the rest of Europe and foster a common European identity was a sure route to conflict and misery. It is dangerous to ignore the fact that Britain's peace and prosperity depend on the peace and prosperity of the nations of the European continent, as does much of its influence in international diplomacy and its place in the global economy. The English Channel remains a decisive factor in our relations with the Continent. The British also seem closer culturally to their North American cousins 3,000 miles away than to their close neighbours. A common transatlantic language, and even memories of Britain's troubled religious history - nationalist British Protestantism versus internationalist European Catholicism - may also play a part.

It is disappointing, however, that British politicians do not see these as reasons to confront or correct small-minded Euro-scepticism, but seize every opportunity to woo the voters by aligning themselves with it. The Prime Minister ...

In 1984 the then-Lutheran (later Catholic) American polemicist Richard Neuhaus published his book The Naked Public Square, a counter-attack on those who were trying to use the American First Amendment about the separation of Church and State to make religion disappear from public visibility. The Naked Public Square quickly became something of a cult in America. But from a British perspective at the time it seemed far-fetched. ...

The apostolic constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus has now been published by the Holy See, and no one will read it more avidly than members of the Anglo-Catholic wing of the Church of England and Anglicans of similar mind abroad. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Rome has devised it, with Pope Benedict XVI’s blessing, to meet the needs of Anglicans who wish to preserve some of their traditions and ...

What is a crucifix? It is not a symbol of the almighty power of the Catholic Church, but a representation of one innocent man’s agonising death at the hands of the state, after torture and a sham trial – in other words, a gross human-rights violation. Catholics believe that that innocent man is also the Son of God, but the depiction is realistic, not metaphysical. The decision of the European Court of Human ...

This edition’s Letters pages include an account by Fr Dermot Power of an event that took place in London as part of the Intelligence Squared series of debates. MP Ann Widdecombe and Nigerian Archbishop John Onaiyekan were thrown to the secular lions, Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry, as they tried to defend the Catholic Church to an unsympathetic audience. Fr Power, who teaches at the Allen Hall seminary, ...