Catholicism
Chris Patten: ‘wearing red feathers (and a Hula-Hula skirt)’
My old friend Richard Ingrams was said always to write The Spectator’s television reviews sitting in the next-door room to…
Does it matter whether Gaudí’s masterpiece is ever finished?
In his biography of Gaudí, published in 2001, Gijs van Hensbergen opined that ‘we should never try to finish the…
My father, the gun-toting Catholic priest
This is one of the most remarkable, hilarious, jaw-droppingly candid and affecting memoirs I have read for some time —…
The Benedict option
By embracing their minority status, Christians can revive their faith
Vatican II gave carte blanche to architecture’s wild men, with overwhelming results
In the 1960s, the Catholic Church gave carte blanche to architecture’s wild men, says Jonathan Meades, with overwhelming results
David Jones – the 20th century’s great neglected genius
When Stravinsky visited David Jones in his cold Harrow bedsit, he came away saying, ‘I have been in the presence…
A century of holy heroes — from Thomas More to George Fox
The Reformation is such a huge, sprawling historical subject that it makes sense, in this the 500th anniversary of Martin…
The key to the Italian Renaissance lies in the home
There have been many explanations for what happened in the Italian Renaissance. Some stress the revival of classical antiquity, others…
It’s commendable that Radio 4 continues its tradition of the Lent Talks
Perhaps surprisingly, in these secular times, Radio 4 keeps up its annual (and very Reithian) tradition of holding a series…
Why more and more priests can’t stand Pope Francis
Questions are increasingly being asked about the Pope’s judgment and state of mind
Lady Jane Grey — a quintessential Tudor
It is easy to see why the bare century of the Tudor dynasty’s rule has drawn so much attention from…
There were none so queer as the Bensons
The Benson family was one of the most extraordinary of Victorian England, and they certainly made sure that we have…
Embroidery: the great British art form
For much of the Middle Ages, especially from 1250–1350, ‘English work’ was enormously prized around Europe from Spain to Iceland.…
Why are so many composers drawn to the Stabat Mater?
Music likes to tell the same story over and over again. This is part of its tradition but even individual…
Chesterton’s fence – and the idiots who rip it out
There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a…
At times utterly gripping: Crystal Pite at the Edinburgh International Festival reviewed
Crystal Pite, the Canadian dancemaker who combines intellectual, emotional and physical intelligence in rare degree, is classically trained, but her…
The enduring mystery of Hieronymus Bosch
To call Nils Büttner a killjoy is perhaps a little unfair, but not very. The professor at Stuttgart’s State Academy…
Martin Luther: one man who changed the world
After Luther, the Christian world would never be the same again. David Crane on the bruising, paradoxical, charismatic, appalling Augustinian monk from Mansfeld
The many, many resting places of St Thomas à Becket
A man in full A relic said to contain a fragment of St Thomas à Becket’s elbow arrived from Hungary for…
Equipped for life with a copy of Thucydides
‘What distinguishes Cambridge from Oxford,’ wrote A.A. Milne in 1939, is that nobody who has been to Cambridge feels impelled…
Let’s vote ‘in’ to renew the EU, says Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor
There is more to the idea of Europe than narrow economic considerations. The Remain side needs to say so
Following Jesus’s followers
In his new book Apostle Tom Bissell has an advantage over writers who go looking for Jesus: he can start…
The embarrassing story of Scotland’s most important 20th century structure
Finding St Peter’s is not straightforward. I approach the wrong way, driving up a pot-holed farm track between a golf…
John Irving spoilt my Christmas
This novel, John Irving’s 14th, took the sheen off my Christmas, and here are the reasons. The comments on…
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Cartoons
Pretentiousness isn’t such a crime
Jonathan Beckman 20 February 2016 9:00 am
Aversion to pretentiousness was probably an English trait before Dr Johnson famously refuted Bishop Berkeley’s arguments for the immateriality of…