at the back of everyone’s mind will be the feeling that a rare opportunity has been missed for an heroic religious engagement. Either the camp will go quickly and brutally or the proceedings will come to resemble the Dale Farm debacle, with endless litigation, media summits, appeals, further clarifications of court orders and – eventually – a nasty moment when the camp is physically dismantled by the authorities.

If and when this does come about, the cathedral will have been primarily responsible. Had it adopted Fraser’s line, the protesters would probably be gone by now (as they had always intended), the institute’s report on the City would be a widely admired and much read document, and the Church’s commitment to economic justice would have been given a tremendous boost. Instead, we have this spectacle of a great cathedral acting not as a focus for Christian action but as a grand, religious Nimby.