Second Opinion | 4 December 2004

Occasionally I walk home from the prison. Usually I take a taxi. Very rarely indeed do I drive; I don’t much care for parking within a mile radius of an establishment from which car thieves are released daily.

I turned on the wireless and an unctuously sermonising Church of England voice emerged. ‘We pray for our world,’ it said, ‘especially those parts of it afflicted with violence.’ I thought for a moment that he was referring to the bed-sits and housing estates near my home, as well as the casualty department of my hospital. But he wasn’t, of course.

‘We pray for the Middle East. We pray for the hostages, and for the hostage-takers.’ I turned off the wireless with a gesture of disgust; you speak for yourself, I thought. Then I made up a little prayer of my own as I drove over the speed-bumps that make kerb-crawlers of us all.