I'm not the first Christian to have a fruity past. I hesitate to compare myself to St Augustine or St Paul, but there is a precedent for this sort of thing.
In my opinion, the best of the knockout cookery series is 'MasterChef', which I have watched since Loyd Grossman's day, back in the 1990s.
Grandpa Keith made shoes for Adam Faith and George Best. I was dazzled by such people. As a teenager, I was haunted by the idea of people living glamorously beyond my provincial horizons.
My dachshunds are not substitutes for children. But the pattering of tiny feet around the place is a joy.
I will be doing a lot of human interest interviews. It involves empathising and listening. Which is a lot of what my day job is about. And, frankly, the priesthood isn't without its element of showbusiness.
In corporate life, I have noticed, it is getting harder and harder to say that things are bad.
Jesus comes among us, in our all division, not to instruct, comfort or inspire but to die. In doing so, He answers the sum of our self-regard, stupidity and cruelty.
I remember in one parish a terrible row over the ideal size of mince pies, and in another two great ladies dashing trays of pancakes to the vicarage floor in a controversy over whether to roll or to fold. But the real arena for food combat is television.
I frequently find myself praying for punk, for something to come along and upset everybody and ignite a few fires and behave disreputably.
This unthinking assumption of moral virtue on the Left is frustrating. I saw someone on Facebook talking about capitalist scum, he was angry and thought it was OK because his anger was righteous.
There's more of me on Twitter than there is in real life.
I was the middle child of three boys and grew up in the village of Barton Seagrave near Kettering, Northamptonshire. My father, Nigel, followed his father, Keith, into shoe manufacturing.
I got lucky with my parents. They were unfailingly loving and supportive, which gave me confidence about my place in the world.
You find you have a lot of friends when you are rich and idle.
I suppose I've always had a very genuine curiosity about religion. I loved the atmosphere of churches, the ethos; I adored Evensong.
I don't think you need to justify faith, faith is its own justification.
In the church I am very accountable, to the parish and the deanery; in the media thing I am not really accountable, I am out there on my own as a sort of busy, recognised religious person.
I spend much of my time in a broadly liberal secular world but I don't belong to it, I belong somewhere else.
I think that Christians should have confidence, we have always been part of the mainstream conversation, and if we don't join in often what you hear gets hectoring and mad, just people on the margins.
I don't have any ambitions. I am looking forward to retiring, or at least having more time. When I was young I wanted more stuff, now I am older, I want more time.
