Letters: Bring back mutton

Man out of time

Sir: That Mary Wakefield left Rowan Williams ‘with my questions for the most part unresolved’ will come as no surprise to his former students, myself included (‘The ABC of faith’, 19 April). As a ‘mature’ student at Cambridge, there was something very inspiring about Williams the academic, but also comfortingly peaceful about the man; someone always on the journey of discovery and therefore reluctant on many issues to be dogmatic or final about them.

His genuine surprise at how the real world operated one easily forgave; his naive approach to other issues, such as Islam, was dangerous but never disingenuous. As an Arabist I did find this hugely irritating. Unlike many shamefully careerist bishops, he found himself chosen for a role as Archbishop of a hugely flawed institution in which – despite the pressures to bend or prevaricate – he always maintained his great integrity. He was undoubtedly born out of time and would have been much more at home among the Fathers of the early Church. He once told me that he had never played team games and was instead always in a book. I think this explains much.

R.C. Paget

Marcham, Oxfordshire

Woolly issue

Sir: Olivia Potts writes that if we eat lamb at Easter, we are eating it in the wrong season, as lambs are born in early spring and need to grow for several months (‘Ewe bet’, 19 April). That means that much of the lamb we eat at around this time of year is from New Zealand. There is, of course, a better way. We should be allowing our lambs to live longer and we should eat hogget – the meat of a sheep of between one and two years of age. Better still, bring back mutton.

Elizabeth Street

London N1

Friends in need

Sir: Douglas Murray’s paean to older friends is timely (‘The secret to great friendships’, 12 April). I’ve visited more than 180 Women’s Institute groups across Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire as a speaker since lockdown. It’s refreshing to witness the goodwill and compassionate wisdom they share, yet I grieve the way our society has kicked them to the kerb – some members are impoverished, unwilling to ask for charity. To watch them scratch around in their well-worn purses for the few pounds that will allow them to participate in a minibus trip to the local manor for tea is heartbreaking. Women’s groups such as the WI offer friendship to counter the loneliness epidemic, yet receive little or no funding from a government that appears to only want to strip this ageing generation of their hard-earned assets, remove their winter heating allowance and impose restrictions on anyone over 70 driving a charity minibus.

Suzi Clark

St Albans, Hertfordshire

Peer review

Sir: It would be good to keep the much-admired 3rd Viscount Stansgate and the other remaining hereditary peers in the Lords by giving them life peerages as Charles Moore suggests (Notes, 5 April). The government may have a plan which it is keeping in reserve. The prospects of compromise have not, however, been enhanced by the party political battles that broke out during prolonged and sometimes bitter discussion of other changes to the composition and work of the Lords that have nothing to do with the 92 hereditaries who remained after the Blair purge. Matters will only get worse if further argument between the government and the Conservatives rages during the final stages of the legislation. The government should call together the leaders of the various groups in the Lords, with the aim of replacing acrimony with agreement. The view of the 180-strong crossbenchers, who back sensible compromise, would be particularly important.

Alistair Lexden

House of Lords, London SW1

Up in arms

Sir: You will be shocked to know that a Spectator reader joined a Palestine Solidarity Campaign march. But I did, not because I was supporting Hamas or – contrary to your leading article (‘Moment of truth’, 19 April) – ‘calling for the murder of Jews’. No doubt the 100,000 or so marchers had a mixture of reasons for taking part, but the overwhelming ones were a need to show humanitarian sympathy for the plight of Palestinians, support for a Palestinian state and to express revulsion at the shockingly disproportionate actions of the Israeli government and IDF and officially endorsed criminal activities of West Bank settlers. Similar motivations, in fact, to those that compelled 36 members of the Board of Deputies of British Jews to say that ‘silence is seen as support for policies and actions that run contrary to Jewish values’.

David Woodhead

Leatherhead, Surrey

Guiding light

Sir: Thank you for the beautiful cover evoking stained glass (Easter Special, 19 April) by J.G. Fox. St Ethelbert’s Church, in the hamlet of Herringswell, near Newmarket, has magnificent stained glass, yet it goes virtually unnoticed, which is terribly sad. Readers might like to treat themselves if ever in the area.

Brian Emsley

Kennett, Cambridgeshire

Sin of omission

Sir: Cosmo Landesman mustn’t give up the ‘dream of one last romantic fling before the curtain falls’ (City life, 19 April). My late mother, approaching 88, was accosted post-Mass by two grand ladies on the steps of the Brompton Oratory in South Kensington. Her friends had noted that my mother hadn’t been taking Communion for a few weeks, so was possibly in a ‘state of sin’. One loudly enquired: ‘Jocelyn, does this mean you’ve been fornicating?’ Not waiting for an answer, the other swiftly followed with: ‘Oh, lucky you.’ I am grateful not to know the end of the conversation.

Nick Crean

Stanton St Bernard, Wiltshire