I’ve been involved in ongoing, fruitful discussions with theologians over the years. These have led to specific works such as my music theatre piece Parthenogenesis and my St Luke Passion, both of which came about through organised interactions with religious thinkers, under the auspices of the theologian and musician Jeremy Begbie. His first project with me, Sounding the Depths in 2000, included a collaboration between the poet Michael Symmons Roberts, the future Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and myself around the topic of parthenogenesis (virgin birth). It was based on the story, or urban myth, of a young woman in Hanover in 1944 who, injured by an Allied bombing raid, gave birth nine months later to a child whose genetic profile was identical to hers. She insisted that she had not had intercourse before conceiving.