Francis Spufford: How the critically-acclaimed author came back to faith

Francis Spufford is a child of his times. He was raised on a university campus by “serious and convinced” churchgoing parents, in an era when Christianity was “taken for granted” as part of most people’s ordinary lives. His teenage years began two decades in which God was absent. In his 30s, Spufford committed what he calls a “classic, destructive male mistake of midlife”. He politely declines to provide any further details other than explaining: “They are my shames, but other people’s privacy is involved.” That the crisis somehow led him back to God is both a miracle and a testament to the creative ways that a creative God breaks through into our everyday, he says. In this in depth interview with Premier Christianity's Emma Fowle, Francis unpacks some of his books, including the "sweary" Unapologetic and talks about why Christian art is sometimes a little bit rubbish. You can also read this interview in Premier Christianity magazine.