Perhaps she deliberately drew a veil over this point for no more reason than keeping a short piece cohesive. Or maybe the position she currently finds herself in seems quite far-fetched enough already. But in any case, Madeline Grant’s church-going atheist calls to mind Saint Augustine and his theory of the restless heart: “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.” Might this be a case study in the early stages of Augustinian restlessness?

The fact that beauty is what drew Madeline back into some kind of relationship with the church is also significant. It has long been the case that the gateway presented by beauty has provided a wider path into faith than, say, theological argument; many more have edged their way into the church (or indeed back into church) under the influence of seeing and hearing things not wholly of this world than by going the full twelve rounds with Saint Thomas Aquinas.

In an era such as ours, one that is arguably starved of beauty, the Christian churches, thanks to their unmatched inheritance in architecture, art, music and liturgy, may find themselves as the leading suppliers of something that is increasingly in demand.