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When I was a child HEARING a recent talk about ghosts and the paranormal reminded me that I once had an invisible friend. Our primary-school playing field was bordered by a woodland that we were forbidden to enter. I came to…

Let us pray DECEMBER and January each year are the months when the Church is most out of sync with the rest of society. Church services are full of purple cloth, solemn chants, and consideration of the end-time themes of…

Absent friendsIN THIS column in April, when a trip to Jerusalem was cancelled, I drew on memory and imagination (mine and others’) to travel there in mind and spirit, if not in body (Notebook, 20 June). To my editor’s relief,…

Harmonic dissonance ONLY in the Church of England would the phrase “a tale of two cities” call to mind an episcopal area rather than the Dickens novel. I was recently in one of those two ecclesiastical cities — Westminster —…

To God be the glory MY BUCKET list is mostly cathedrals and ports — God and trade; so I was delighted by a recent excursion to Seville Cathedral, and then by train to Cádiz. I am proud of Ely Cathedral, local to me, but…

Sounds of silenceSOMETHING strange is happening here in Suffolk; but it is the same strange thing as has been reported nationwide. Out of the blue, young men have been turning up at church, wanting to find out more about the…

Undiminishing returns “ALL we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” I may not be much of a Tolkien fan (is that sufficient to have me unfrocked as an Anglican cleric?), but he gives his characters some…