Signs and wonders

Signs and wonders

In The Tablet this week

As Michael W. Higgins writes in his View from Guelph – Christopher Lamb is in vacanza for a couple of weeks – it may have been swept up in a whirligig of conflicting narratives and political point-scoring but Pope Francis’ “pilgrimage of penance” to Canada was nevertheless a success. His heartfelt apologies for the dreadful legacy of the church-administered residential schools for Indigenous children were reinforced by powerful and moving gestures. In his address in the cathedral in Québec, Francis quoted Charles Taylor on the challenge of secularisation and called for an encounter rooted in authentic witness rather than aggressive proselytisation. The Pope’s remarks should trigger a wider reflection. It is as easy in the age of the internet and social media as it was in the era of colonial expansion for Westerners to assume their civilisations are normative. But neither should we assume that we do not have a critical perspective to offer, or that we should not be free to express it. In all things, as we point out in our leader this week, we should remember that the gospel is offered as a gift, not imposed by conquest. 

On the plane back from Canada, Pope Francis, whose next scheduled overseas visit is to Kazakhstan where he may meet Moscow Patriarch Kirill, discussed his health and possible retirement. James Roberts reports. Speaking after the Angelus last Sunday, Christa Pongratz-Lippitt and Jonathan Luxmoore report, Pope Francis said that even during his Canadian trip he had never stopped praying that God might deliver the Ukrainian people from the scourge of war. “Considering the damage that each day of war brings to that population but also to the entire world, the only reasonable thing to do would be to stop and negotiate.” Former Irish diplomat Philip McDonagh looks at the openings and tentatively suggests some concrete steps towards peace. 

Elsewhere in the seven pages of news stories from our correspondents in Britain, Ireland and across the world in the print edition this week, Patrick Hudson reports from the Lambeth Conference, where deep divisions over same-sex relationships threatened to overshadow the first gathering of Anglican bishops worldwide for 14 years. In his latest report for The Tablet Online, Patrick writes that Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby called for a fresh impetus to escape the present “ecumenical winter”. The Archbishop of Birmingham, Bernard Longley, told Patrick that it was more important that the conference seemed to have secured the unity of the Anglican Communion. Tom Heneghan writes from Paris that those in charge of restoring Notre-Dame cathedral say it will be “tense and complicated” but the target of reopening in 2024 “will be met”.

The Croagh Patrick pilgrimage is back after its Covid-enforced absence. Sarah Mac Donald spoke to Archbishop Patrick Duffy of Tuam. Sarah also reports that Archbishop Eamon Martin has written to Northern Ireland’s Equality Commission for “clarification and guidance” over the Belfast Telegraph’s refusal to publish the Northern Ireland bishops’ paid advertisement with their statement in advance of the Assembly elections in May. Madoc Cairns was at the National Justice and Peace Conference in Swanwick and also reports on the funeral of Father Dermott Donnelly in Newcastle.

As pews empty across the west, Pentecostal, spirit-filled, churches and worship groups are flourishing. Their members experience an intensity of feeling that trumps reason and language. Madoc Cairns speaks to a psychologist and former believer who has written about his time as a youthful member of an evangelical church – and the sense of loss that still haunts him. Hilary Davies joined students, scholars, musicians and poets at a conference exploring the links between liturgy, theology and the arts. And Francis Bown, the former vicar of St Stephen’s, Sculcoates, Hull, recalls a long lunch with Philip Larkin. “Only an idiot would claim Philip as a Christian … but I believe that his searing honesty about the human condition and about life’s cruel disappointments left him teetering on the edge of faith.”

In the past few days, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak have both pledged to open new grammar schools if elected as leader of the Tory party and prime minister. In an excoriating blog, award-winning head teacher Andrew O’Neill says this policy would put children at the centre of an even more deeply divided society – the very opposite of the promise to “level up” Britain.

In the Arts pages, Alexandra Coghlan investigates the long-forgotten music composed by cloistered nuns. A new recording project “captures vividly the tensions and contradictions of convent life itself”. Mark Lawson enjoys a “logical and lovely summer double bill” at the National Theatre,  Much Ado About Nothing and Jack Absolute Flies Again – both modernisations of classic texts, both set in the middle of the twentieth century. Staff writer Madoc Cairns peers at an exhibition of Thomas Merton’s photography – a form of work the legendary Trappist spiritual writer came to see as itself a kind of contemplation. And Isabelle Grey is thrilled by a “seat-of-the-pants disaster thriller” about the cathedral of Notre-Dame’s tragic conflagration in 2019, and her near-miraculous salvation at the hands of Parisian fire brigades.

In Books, Mathew Lyons considers another kind of conflagration – albeit a social and political one: the Popish Plot of the late 1600s. Mathew finds Victor Stater’s Hoax a first-rate piece of history, with pertinent lessons for our own time of political turmoil. Rebecca Fraser admires a biography of the wife of Charles I, Henrietta Maria: conspirator, warrior, phoenix queen, as Leanda de Lisle’s sub-title has it, and pawn in the dynastic power-plays of seventeenth-century Europe. D.J. Taylor gives his imprimatur to a new anthology of writing from Suffolk, “at once historically inclined and thoroughly up-to-date”. James Moran scampers through three stylish, ambitious and accomplished debut novels in this week's Speed Reads. And Suzi Feay anoints Jessie Burton's well-crafted if occasionally baffling The House of Fortune as our Novel of the Week.

Badgers rely on earthworms for food, never plentiful in hot weather. An anxious Jonathan Tulloch is able to report that a local sett had survived the worm dearth. “Is it permissible for a Christian knowingly to eat wheat from a threshing floor from which an offering has been made to a demon?” Christopher Howse is entertained by St Augustine’s crafty replies to curious queries sent to him by a scrupulous enquirer. An altogether more pressing question is, How do you make the perfect light and fluffy Victoria Sandwich sponge cake? Rose Prince supplies the recipe. 

I hope you enjoy this week’s Tablet. 

Brendan Walsh

Brendan Walsh
Editor of The Tablet