Volume 122 Issue 3 May/June 2007

Editorial: He did God: Tony Blair helped bring the toxic certainties of religious belief back into politics and culture. Let's hope Gordon Brown doesn't do the same, says Caspar Melville

Cover Stories

Holy Relics: Why do we still tolerate the presence of bishops in the House of Lords? Jake Bromberg calls for their eviction

Gurus of endless war: Rumsfeld resigned, Wolfowitz ousted, Fukuyama defected, 'Scooter' Libby convicted. You could be forgiven for thinking that neoconservatives have had their day. But that would be a grave error, warns political philosopher Shadia Drury
Choice busters: Anti-abortion groups have found a new way to deny women their rights, says Solana Larsen. And this time it's global
Free from crooked things: Buddhism is fatalistic, deeply misogynist and riven with superstition. And yet, argues Karen Connelly, it also inspires resistance to tyranny and the fight for freedom
In Denial: Nick Cohen caused a furore when he published "What's Left?", an excoriating attack on what he sees as liberal hypocrisy. Here he answers his critics
Blind faith: Does it derive from delusion or derangement, irrationality or something deeper? Laurie Taylor explores the meaning of belief
Change, change, change: Will you be a dentured crone, a leotarded granny, mutton dressed as lamb or an overweight harridan? Sally Feldman enters the mid-life maelstrom

Cosy concrete: Alvar Aalto's organic modernism may be seductive. But, warns Owen Hatherley, it can also lead to the banal
Waking dream: As the "Dalì and Film" exhibition opens at Tate Modern, Isabelle McNeill reflects on the legacy of Surrealist cinema
Deep-boned sadness: Caspar Melville remembers a melancholic master, the novelist Kurt Vonnegut

Be tolerant or else: Eliane Glaser challenges a core British value
Diary: Birthing Pains: For Martin Rowson the agony and ecstasy of publishing a book is the male equivalent of childbirth

After Dark by Haruki Murakami: Jonathan Derbyshire stays up for a rendezvous with Haruki Murakami
A Guinea Pig's History of Biology: Lewis Wolpert learns the facts of life from plants
Minding by Chris Paling: Philip Womack is impressed by Chris Paling's mind
Scientists Confront Intelligent Design and Creationism by Andrew Petto & Laurie Godfrey (eds): AC Grayling cheers as the scientists vanquish Intelligent Design
Fangland by John Marks: Nina Power relishes a Dracula for the TV generation
Napoleon in Egypt by Paul Strathern: In 1789 Napoleon set off to conquer the East. We're still living with the fallout, says Michael Binyon