Hardeep Singh Kohli was a wonderful guide to the religious and cultural stories of three of our cities
What a terrific series The Great British Faith (Radio 2) has been. Over three nights, Hardeep Singh Kohli (pictured) told the religious and cultural story of three cities ? Cardiff, Leicester and Glasgow ? and got right under the skin of each place. I live in the Welsh capital and lived in Glasgow for a long time, and was impressed by the depth and scope of their portraits. Kohli brought to the programmes a real sense of the spiritual textures of these urban landscapes.
Of the three hour-long reports, last night's was the most moving, with Kohli exploring Glasgow, the home town he left almost 20 years ago. In this context he was able to bring in personal reflections and knowledge ("I guarantee it's going to be raining") alongside discussions with people from the city's major faith groups.
He spoke about going to a Jesuit school, and wanting to convert from Sikhism to Catholicism as a teenager. "You just want to belong," he recalled. "It went down, to borrow Billy Connolly's phrase, like a fart in a spacesuit with my parents." These anecdotes, and those of guests such as Eddi Reader, who remembered growing up in a religiously divided city ("in the midst of Orange Walks during my Holy Communion"), were intertwined with Glasgow songs and the sound of steady rain.
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