"10 Downing Street, change for Rome"

Tony Blair, who resigned as UK prime minister last summer, was received into the Catholic Church last night, ending ages of speculation.

Right-wingers have already pounced, citing his political record and asking if he will now repudiate his pro-choice views and policies.

The Archbishop of Canterbury, whose dotty pronouncement about the Magi got him loads of press this week (not to mention the irony of C of E Christmas e-card card illustrations this year, also in Gledhill's post), sounded the right note this time, observing:

"Tony Blair has my prayers and good wishes as he takes this step in his Christian pilgrimage," he said.

"A great Catholic writer of the last century said that the only reason for moving from one Christian family to another was to deepen one's relationship with God.

"I pray that this will be the result of Tony Blair's decision in his personal life."

Reinforcing our long-standing theory that famous people only know other famous people, Blair was received into the faith by the Archbishop of Westminster in his private chapel after being led in his preparations by the Archbishop's private secretary. Doubtless personal privacy plays a role in such things, but at this time of year, and, recalling Jesus' frequent admonitions to the powerful, there would have been something appropriate and humbling in reading the act had taken place in a local parish, with the local priest.

Such cavils aside, it is a pleasing thing to see a statesman who attends so assiduously to his spiritual life without resorting to the chest-beating in the Temple approach taken by- well, pretty much everyone running for president in this country.