Excerpt

Since as long ago as the twelfth century, England has been organised into parishes for it was one of the most well-organised and prosperous realms of the Middle Ages. Parish churches have been a constant feature in the English landscape right up to the present: their towers loom out of the misty Somerset fens, their spires peep valiantly between the monstrous London skyscrapers or lurk behind a Grantham shopping centre. Whether in Scunthorpe or Woking they proclaim higher values than the market: something or someone who calls us to account. They assert a spiritual depth to reality.