When a writer was looking for a subject for her first work of fiction, she returned to the subject of her first book, the Church of England – and found disturbing new phenomena

Endeavouring to parody some of the Church of England’s endearingly annoying habits in my debut novella, Love Divine – chummy sermons, weak coffee from a hatch, interminable intercessions read out by a gloomy parishioner in an anorak, the frantic push towards a bronze eco-church award, ridiculously long-drawn-out interregnums, efforts to draw the young in through initiatives called things like “Messy Church” – I thought I was doing quite well, nailing the institution I love, which also drives me mad. But when, last month, graffiti suddenly appeared on the medieval walls and columns inside Canterbury Cathedral, and turned out to have been done not by local vandals but by “a poet” and “a team of skilled artists”, with the approval of the Dean and Chapter, the expression “You couldn’t make it up” came to mind.

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