20 March 2014, The Tablet

Fat lady sings


 
Clarissa Dickson Wright, the television cook and countrywoman who died last week, regretted the conveyor-belt atmosphere of Mass in big inner city Catholic churches. The reformed alcoholic, who at 21 became the youngest female barrister in England, was raised and educated a Catholic and retained a deep personal spirituality, “which doesn’t have anything more to do with spirits, fortunately”. Dickson Wright, who died aged 66, told a Scottish friend she regretted that the Mass had lost contact with its origins in a community meal. “These days, particularly in a big city church, going to Mass has all the soul and pomp and impact of a visit to Yo Sushi.” (It should be said that Dickson Wright was a fan of the conveyor-belt Japanese-style restaurant chain –
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