James Le Fanu, Author at Catholic Herald

James Le Fanu

The greatest miracle of all: the incomprehensible natural phenomenon of human nativity

December 02, 2023

James Lefanu describes the almost incomprehensible natural phenomenon culminating in the birth of each one of us. Seeing the Christmas story through the eyes of small children is to be reminded of the remarkable accessibility of Christianity to even young minds. They may not grasp the implications of God Made Man but this central tenet

Painful lessons from the Tavistock clinic

May 02, 2023

Medicine deals, by necessity, in the reliable knowledge of a science-based discipline. So why did things go so drastically awry for the Tavistock clinic’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS). Back in 2005, psychiatrist David Taylor noted a disturbing lack of clarity about the clinic’s goals: was its purpose to treat children with gender dysphoria or

The Lancet Commission: Considering death and its value

March 01, 2023

The ‘Lancet Commission on the Value of Death’ has much to commend it, says James Le Fanu. Like many before me, I find myself at that stage of life when those known – or known of – now feature regularly in the obituary columns. This inevitably prompts reflections on their closing years and the manner

Eggs, cactuses and the breathtaking mysteries of life

September 25, 2020

It is comforting, exhilarating even in these bleakish times, to learn of some wondrously ingenious detail of life, so extraordinary as almost to defy belief. For ornithologist Tim Birkhead a fertilised hen’s egg is an “everyday miracle of nature”, a complete and self contained support system for the developing embryo within. The yolk must contain,

Microbes get a bad press, but some of them have their uses

June 30, 2020

Appropriately in this time of plague, the capital’s Victorian cemeteries have proved a haven for appreciating this extraordinary best of springtimes. The most magical, long neglected until recently, Nunhead Cemetery in South London, is a woodland paradise – cow parsley and intensely blue borage everywhere, suffused by pungent wild garlic and echoing to the sounds

James Le Fanu: Can psychology survive?

April 14, 2016

Psychology, “the scientific study of behaviour and mental processes”, is in serious trouble. Five years ago Professor Brian Nosek at the University of Virginia sought to counter criticisms of the intellectual rigour of his discipline through the gold standard of scientific certainty – replicability. He selected 100 papers with “positive” (ie statistically significant) results selected

James Le Fanu: To the White House, God willing

January 14, 2016

When Prime Minister, Tony Blair famously did not “do God”, or so his press secretary Alastair Campbell insisted during an interview back in 2003 – in marked contrast to the candidates in this year’s American presidential election. Surveys of registered Republicans confirm that more than two thirds would never vote for an atheist, so it

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