Theresa May is effectively “Britain’s first Catholic prime minister”, the former education secretary Michael Gove has claimed.
In an article for the Times, Mr Gove, MP for Surrey Heath, said Theresa May was “an Anglo-Catholic rather than a Roman Catholic, but no less a Catholic for that”.
Mr Gove said that Mrs May, though an Anglican and the daughter of a vicar, drew deeply on Catholic social teaching in her approach to her office.
Mr Gove argued that the strength of this Catholic influence was shown when she appeared on the Radio 4 programme Desert Island Discs, and chose two hymns including Therefore We, Before Him Bending, which is often sung during Benediction. He also noted that Mrs May had given up her favourite crisps for Lent, which seemed especially typical of “Catholic practice”.
