PHOTO: VICTORIA DAWE
Bishop Paul McAleenan, third from left, at the Coronation Big Lunch for faith leaders 29
COLUMN
Joy Marie Clarkson ‘Manners communicate something about our view of the dignity of others’ / 11
REGULARS Word from the Cloisters 15 Puzzles 15 Letters 16 The Living Spirit 17
CONTENTS 22 APRIL 2023 // VOL 277 NO. 9499
FEATURES
4 / Europe’s special case Pope Francis will next weekend visit Hungary, a country taking a controversial and divisive path of social and political reform / BY MARC ROSCOE LOUSTAU
6 / In the steps of St Francis Ahead of a forthcoming exhibition, the director of the National Gallery in London took a group of art critics on a pilgrimage to Assisi / BY JOANNA MOORHEAD
9 / For pollinators’ sake If we hand the choice of plants and planting to algorithms in the name of insect diversity, are we really gardening at all? / BY ISABEL LLOYD
10 / The more I learn, the more I love In the third in our series of conversion stories, a young Catholic describes how the death of his father prompted a search for God / BY CAMERON GARDEN
EDUCATION
12 / Name that plant in order to save it British children display a worrying lack of knowledge about nature, but teenagers will soon be able to study for a GCSE in natural history / BY MARY COLWELL
13 / Lessons for life
Pupils love RE as a subject, parents love it too, but not new teachers whose recruitment has dropped by a third / BY KATHRYN WRIGHT
NEWS
24 / The Church in the World / News briefing 25 / Rome rules out role of laity in episcopal elections
27 / View from Rome 28 / News from Britain and Ireland / News briefing 29 / Missal returns to historic home after four centuries
COVER: EL GRECO, SAINT FRANCIS RECEIVING THE STIGMATA, 1590-95. ©THE NATIONAL GALLERY OF IRELAND, DUBLIN
ARTS / PAGE 18 Exhibition This Fragile Earth LAURA GASCOIGNE Radio Love Stories: Borstal Boy D.J. TAYLOR Theatre Hamnet; A Little Life MARK LAWSON TV The Diplomat LUCY LETHBRIDGE
BOOKS / PAGE 21
Austen Ivereigh Ravenous: How To Get Ourselves And Our Planet Into Shape HENRY DIMBLEBY AND JEMIMA LEWIS Guy Stagg The Marriage Question: George Eliot’s Double Life CLARE CARLISLE Marcus Tanner Speed reading on broken families
For more features, news, analysis and comment, visit www.thetablet.co.uk
22 APRIL 2023 | THE TABLET | 3
