On 13 October, John Henry Newman, a distinguished and distinctive Englishman, was officially declared a Saint. A well-known saying of his is: ‘To live is to change; to be perfect is to change often.’ How did that work in his life and, to a lesser extent, how has it worked in mine?

In 1833, Newman was desperate to get back to England from a trip to Italy, including to Rome, for which he acquired a deep dislike.