‘Edoardo Albert… relates the city’s spiritual history: Christianity arriving from Italy, through King Alfred and the medieval church, taking in atheism and theosophy, up to Hillsong and the present. He relates his own spiritual history too, from Catholicism, through atheism, the occult and Islam, then back again. Both are intriguing.’

Rt Hon Stephen Timms, MP for East Ham.

First Published 19th February 2016 by Lion Hudson.

Excerpt

I was, in fact, the Asian immigrant archetype: a swotty, well presented (through all my years at school, I never once returned home with shirt untucked or tie undone) pupil upon whom the mantle of ‘future doctor’ had already been placed by my proud parents. Every Asian/Italian immigrant in the seventies wanted their son to be a doctor and I loved science, scoring top marks in biology, physics, chemistry and, with a little more effort, maths. What else was I going to be?

But God bugged me.

I don’t remember the answer, but I remember the question. I was about six at the time.

“Mummy,” I asked, “it says in the Bible that God created everything, but scientists say that animals evolved from other animals. Which is right?”

It was a trick question. I had a faith, and it was absolute. I believed in books.