Guardian angels

Guardian angels

We take for granted the responsibility of the healthy to the sick and imagine that the compassion being shown for the victims of the Covid-19 pandemic is the expression of “human nature”. As Tom Holland points out this week, history shows that it is something far more interesting, unexpected and momentous: the expression of the revolutionary Christian idea that the sick should be cherished. 
 
Our lives are being transformed in ways we could not have imagined. Pam Campbell, Fiona Fox, Bruce Kent and James Moran reflect on the resilience, kindness and agility with which so many people have been responding to the pandemic. N. O’Phile recommends some “quality over quantity” wine to help us through. As Christopher Howse says, “Landfall is uncertain, but we are not in the doldrums.”
 
The pandemic is throwing up some difficult ethical dilemmas. Philosopher Daniel P. Sulmasy shows how the way different societies respond reveals their underlying ethical stances. Sara Maitland cannot work out whether she should be more baffled then appalled by the suggestion that Catholics ought somehow to be exempted from having places of worship closed down and should be allowed to go and pray in them regardless. Jesuit priest David Neuhaus joined his Jewish family to celebrate the Passover last week on Zoom; he was struck by how much we could learn from our Jewish neighbours about making our homes as well as our churches places of worship. 
 
Anthony Gardner solves the puzzle of why Wordsworth, born 250 years ago this month, as an old man chose to dampen the celebration of nature’s power in “The Prelude”.  Plans to stage Krishna, John Tavener’s epic opera, in 2024 were revealed last week. “It is slightly big and bonkers”, producer Wasif Kani tells Mark Lawson. “If ever there was a series suited to this period of fear, containment and isolation, it is Unorthodox”, writes Lucy Lethbridge, of the four-part Netflix drama about life in a Hasidic Jewish community.  Joanna Moorhead rounds up some of the best art and culture that we can enjoy from our sofas during the lockdown and D.J. Taylor hears Frank Cottrell Boyce confess his obsession with Tove Jansson on Radio 4.
 
In Books, Anne Chisholm admires Philippe Sands’ compelling attempt to plumb the mystery of why the son of a Nazi mass murderer is unable to accept the truth about his father; Carina Murphy rounds up three books about motherhood; Ian Thomson is weighed down by Adam Gopnik’s massive biography of secret churchgoer Andy Warhol; and Rory Rapple hails Colin Barr’s compelling account of how the Irish came to define Catholicism in the English-speaking world. 
 
In seven pages of news from Britain, Ireland and around the world, Sarah Mac Donald interviews Diarmuid Martin in the week he reached his 75th birthday, Christopher Lamb reports on Rome’s strangest Holy Week and Easter Week ceremonies, Ellen Teague speaks to charity workers under pressure, and Mark Bowling reports from Australia on Cardinal George Pell’s fury at the way prosecutors had pursued him. And in View from Rome, Christopher Lamb speculates on why Pope Francis appears to have stacked his latest commission to investigate women deacons with sceptics. 
 
Amongst the blogs exclusively online, Clifford Longley reflects on Boris Johnson's discovery of the love that transcends economics, and new spiritual resources are posted every day in our Isolated but not Alone directory of lockdown essentials. 
 
Austen Ivereigh tells us in Word from the Cloisters that he was in his garden planting a large jasmine while he listened to Pope Francis answering his questions for the extraordinary interview we published last week. Afterwards, the Pope said, “Don’t put too much effort into reworking this. Just take what’s of use to you, and pray for me.” If only all our contributors were so relaxed about their material.
 
This is a strange time for all of us. There is much sadness and loss, and many glints of grace flashing in the shadows. On our desert islands we are hungry to share stories. We are welcoming many new readers and subscribers every week. We will continue to do everything we can to keep you up to date hour by hour with the latest news in the Catholic world via our website and to make sure the magazine keeps coming through your letterbox every week, even if it sometimes arrives a day or two late. Thank you for your support and loyalty. 
 
Every good wish for Eastertide

Brendan Walsh
Editor of The Tablet