Christianity
Following the followers
In his new book Apostle Tom Bissell has an advantage over writers who go looking for Jesus: he can start…
Hellzapoppin’
The 20th-century painter who called himself Balthus once proposed that a monograph about him should begin with the words ‘Balthus…
On the trail of Piero
Piero della Francesca is today acknowledged as one of the foundational artists of the Renaissance. Aldous Huxley thought his ‘Resurrection’…
Gays for God
Conservative homosexual Christians want something more radical than marriage
Rewriting the merchant’s tale
Howard Jacobson’s novelistic riff on The Merchant of Venice for the Hogarth Shakespeare project turns, unsurprisingly, on what makes some…
Long life
The Egyptian driver of a London minicab said almost nothing during our journey but dropped me off at my destination…
We need Christianity more than ever in this Age of Atheists
Have we ever needed Christianity more than we do today? It’s a rhetorical question, for sure, because the loss of…
Why would a dissolute rebel like Paul Gauguin paint a nativity?
Martin Gayford investigates how this splendid Tahitian Madonna came about and why religion was ever-present in Gauguin's art
Faith is left, right. . . and central
An interview with the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby
The Lord’s Prayer is no more offensive than Jeremy Clarkson or deodorant
There was a time not so very long ago when the most common complaint about Christmas was that it had…
The question Christianity fails to answer: ‘Who is my neighbour?’
‘Fine old Christmas,’ wrote George Eliot, ‘with the snowy hair and ruddy face, had done his duty that year in…
Am I a brave cult survivor, too?
When I was 21, I lived with a cult for a year. It was a commune really, a tight-knit group…
The Spectator’s Notes
Speaking on the Today programme on Monday, Sir David Attenborough, who wants a global agreement to control carbon emissions, pointed…
Is the Archbishop of Canterbury forsaking God?
The Archbishop of Canterbury, we heard during the BBC’s Songs of Praise broadcast last Sunday, ‘doubted God’ after the Paris…
The many fights over the Lord’s Prayer
Amen corner Digital Cinema Media, a company which distributes adverts to cinemas, refused to allow an advert which involves the…
Of gods and men
Tom Holland on Egypt, where the deities were born and history itself began
Battle fatigue
Can anyone explain this sudden enthusiasm for Agincourt, that unexpected victory over the French, now being celebrated, or rather commemorated,…
The Pope’s moment
On Tuesday, Pope Francis set foot in the United States for the first time in his life. His plane touched…
Corbyn’s salvation
If Labour’s atheist leader could show he was at peace with religion, it would go a long way to making his job more secure
Christianity is silent on my great moral dilemma
Proximity shouldn’t make a difference — should it? We were on a beach on the European side of the Mediterranean,…
The contagious madness of the new PC
Obsessive searching for hurt and offence will create it where once it never existed
Who’d have thought that about Ted? Well…
In another blow for freedom and the protection of the vulnerable, Conservative MP Mark Spencer has suggested that anti-terror legislation…
Putin and the polygamists
The Kremlin is tying itself in ideological knots as it tries to make new friends in the Muslim world
The left pillories Tim Farron for his popular view
I wonder who will win the battle for Tim Farron’s soul — the Guardianistas or God? This is assuming that…
God’s new business plan
Justin Welby wants the C of E to focus on growth – and he’s enlisting bankers to help
