(In our world, interestingly, the news media assume that the task of holding authorities to account belongs to them, often thereby setting themselves up as a new kind of ‘authority’. They thus, having taken over the Church’s vocation, regularly delight both in reporting the Church’s follies and failings – of which there have tragically been many – and in downgrading Christian practice to the status of a curious minority hobby, which is of course how many Christians appear to understand their faith).
