More from Windsor. Informal conversations have brought home to me, with unexpected force,  the extent to which the church is vilified by today’s young people. They see it as fundamentally unjust because of its attitudes to, for example, women and gays. The movers and shakers of tomorrow consider the church to be less just and less ethical than the society in which they live. It is no longer fit to regard itself as a guardian of standards, let alone a preacher.

I hear from an impeccable source that no C of E bishop was willing to go on air to defend the official position on gay marriage. I wonder how many C of E bishops refuse publicly to acknowledge their own sexuality, and condemn those who do.

Is this relevant to the Church of Ireland? I rather think it is. It’ll be interesting to hear how some of its bishops explain the reasons why they’re in favour of ‘exorcising’ gay people. One even hears of church people who look forward to the identification of the ‘gay gene’ so that fetuses that have it can be rubbed out.

This, it seems, is the gospel of love. Kyrie eleison.