Chosen

A unique and moving memoir from the maverick former Canon of St Paul's Cathedral

It was one of the most startling moments in the history of the City of London. In 2011, the Occupy movement set up camp around St Paul's Cathedral. Giles Fraser, who was Canon Chancellor of the Cathedral, gave them his support. It ended in disaster.

This remarkable book is the story of the personal crisis that followed, and its surprising consequences. Finding himself caught between the protesters, the church and the City of London, Fraser resigned, and was plunged into depression. As his life fell apart and he battled with ideas of suicide, he found himself by chance one day in Liverpool, outside the great Victorian synagogue once presided over by a distant ancestor. Suddenly Fraser realized that there was a great deal he did not know about himself, about his relatives and about his Jewish roots.

Fraser calls this book 'a ghost story' and it is a book which is indeed filled with many ghosts. His search into his family's Jewish past makes this both a fascinating personal story and a wonderful piece of writing about theology. It is a book about the deepest, most ancient elements in our culture, and the most modern and intimate. It is throughout alive with the charm and intellectual vigour which have made Fraser such an admired and controversial preacher and broadcaster.

About the Author

Giles Fraser is a parish priest at St Mary, Newington in South London. He has been a Lecturer in Philosophy and chaplain at Wadham College, Oxford, and Canon Chancellor of St Paul's Cathedral. He is the author of Redeeming Nietzsche- On the Piety of Unbelief, How to Believe- Investigating Wittgenstein and Christianity with Attitude. For some years he wrote the 'Loose Canon' column in the Guardian and is a regular broadcaster on The Moral Maze and Thought for the Day on Radio 4.