Sir: Ferdinand Mount is quite right to detect something in
the air arising from the publicity surrounding the reception of the Duchess of Kent into the Roman Catholic Church. But together with the delicate per- fume of incense, which Mr Mount finds so offensive, is the plainer and unmistakable stench of good old-fashioned `no popery' which is certainly no pot-pourri.
Not that Mr Mount's own blimpish ram- blings, bathed as they are in the odour of sanctimony, bear comparison with what has floated to the surface of the Scottish press. Indeed, it is difficult to know quite what to make of Mr Mount's self-indulgent tirade. If anybody less well-informed than he had suggested that the British media were dom- inated by 'the Pope's big guns', I might have been inclined to doubt it. But knowing as I do the English journalist's commitment to the unvarnished truth, I am delighted to take his word for it, and look forward to reading Cardinal Ratzinger's guest column in the Independent.
Richard Rex
42 Windsor Road, Cambridge
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