The Royal Shepherd...

The backlash against the Church of England’s most recent ‘pastoral statement’ is gathering pace. The voices being raised don’t just belong to cynical old atheists like me, but to serving members of the church. The letters in today’s Guardian suggest that the church has “a death wish”, and that the time may have come for church and state to disengage.

A couple of excerpts from today’s letters… “An organisation claiming that so many have no right to a sexual life should have no official ties to the state, no automatic right to seats in our legislature and no role in running state-funded schools”. “Is it any wonder that intelligent human beings will simply think, as I do: what possible relevance does this ridiculous state institution have in the 21st century?” I can’t argue with that.

Licensed today: the Royal Shepherd pub overlooking a spur of the Leeds-Liverpool Canal in Skipton...