The coronavirus pandemic has had a devastating impact on our spiritual and imaginative life, argues an Anglican bishop and writer, welcoming the government’s announcement this week of a £1.57 billion fund to help save the short-term future of theatres, concert halls, museums and galleries

I spent many childhood summers with my grandparents in the seaside town of Broadstairs. One of the places I used to visit with my grandfather was St Augustine’s Church in nearby Ramsgate, where Augustus Welby Pugin, its famous architect, is buried in his own side chapel. I will never forget the beauty of this sacred space. Even Philip Larkin, a poet who was dogmatically indifferent to religious faith, recognised how the atmosphere of being in a church building might surprise in us a hunger “to be more serious”.

The weeks of our confinement have brought home to me how important it is for us to be in places of beauty – and sometimes to be there with others, to be part of an assembly. Simply looking at images, or making virtual visits to galleries and museums, or watching a livestreamed religious service, is good, but it is not the same. The lockdown has deprived us of something more precious to us than perhaps we realised.