Matthew Bell

Guns, gays and the Queen – a former bishop reminisces

An interview the Rt Revd John Bickersteth, the oldest living former bishop of Bath and Wells

issue 03 May 2014

The bishopric of Bath and Wells comes with more bear-traps than most. For one thing, there’s the baby-eating. Ever since Blackadder told Baldrick he was being chased for a debt by the ‘baby–eating Bishop of Bath and Wells’, the image has stuck. When the last incumbent, Peter Price, made his first visit to the House of Lords, accompanied by his five-week-old granddaughter, the Bishop of Southwark remarked: ‘I see the bishop has brought his own lunch.

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