PHOTO: CNS/CILLIAN KELLY

Ireland has a new public holiday to honour its female patron, St Brigid of Kildare, shown in a stained-glass window at Crosshaven, Co. Cork 31

COLUMN

Melanie McDonagh’s Notebook ‘Peter Tatchell was courteous; he didn’t caricature an argument in order to dismiss it’ / 5

REGULARS Word from the Cloisters 15 Puzzles 15 Letters 16 The Living Spirit 17

CONTENTS 29 JANUARY 2022 // VOL 276 NO. 9437

FEATURES

4 / Sheer humbug

Our Lobby correspondent writes that the current government has plumbed new

depths of incompetence and hypocrisy / BY JULIA LANGDON

6 / What Benedict knew … A new report into how bishops dealt with paedophile priests in Germany accuses the Pope Emeritus of mishandling four abuse cases / BY CHRISTA PONGRATZ-LIPPITT

8 / Joyce’s noisy masterpiece On 2 February 1922, the first printed copy of Ulysses was delivered to James Joyce

in his Paris apartment by his publisher, Sylvia Beach / BY MICHAEL GLOVER

10 / The writer and the bricklayer Primo Levi never forgot the Italian mason whose bravery and

self-sacrifice saved his life / BY IAN THOMSON

12 / Trust the science

Science is incomplete, progressing by constantly coming closer to something it

does not pretend it will ever reach: the ultimate truth / BY GUY CONSOLMAGNO

14 / The Tablet Poem

‘Destiny’ / BY SUSAN GLYN

NEWS

25 / The Church in the World / News briefing 26 / Bishops’ criticism of Benedict unsparing

28 / View from Rome 29 / News from Britain and Ireland / News briefing 30 / Warning against silencing of women’s voices

COVER PHOTO: ALAMY/PA

BOOKS / PAGE 19

Lucy Beckett Entering the Twofold Mystery: On Christian Conversion ERIK VARDEN Brian Morton White Debt: The Demerara Uprising and Britain’s Legacy of Slavery THOMAS HARDING Danny Sullivan Hidden Mercy: Aids, Catholics, and the Untold Stories of Compassion in the Face of Fear MICHAEL J. O’LOUGHLIN

ARTS / PAGE 22 Opera Katie Mitchell and Theodora ALEXANDRA COGHLAN Radio Bloody Sunday: 50 Years On D.J. TAYLOR Theatre Into the Night MARK LAWSON Cinema Mass ISABELLE GREY

29 JANUARY 2022 | THE TABLET | 3