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Good morning. As the Tory leadership race enters what feels like its 40th year, the one subject that’s hardly been touched is religion - even though the choice Conservative members face is fascinating. Liz Truss has said she shares the values of the Church of England but isn’t a “regular practising religious person”. Rishi Sunak says he is a proud Hindu. Were Mr Sunak to win, he wouldn’t just be our first person of colour to be prime minister - he’d represent a magnificent faith that is very different to the traditional Christian heritage of the British Isles. Whatever you think of either candidate, this contest is historic. What it tells us is that Britain has changed. We are now decisively a multicultural society. To give another example, the mayor of London, Labour's Sadiq Khan, is a Muslim. And just as striking as the fact of our religious diversity in politics is that it is subject to so little comment. One could see the broad silence about the faith of our next PM as a sign of tolerance. Or it could be a sign of the declining role of faith in British life. It’s not that many voters are quietly glad about the religious diversity of our politics, it’s that they don't see its relevance. Some, I suspect, would rather not hear about it at all on the grounds that the Tories are electing a prime minister, not a bishop. So, to avoid alienating large sectors of the electorate, politicians who have faith might be tempted to present it as a detail of their life rather than a motivating force. It can thus be relegated to a curiosity, like discovering the candidate enjoys Morris dancing or owns a parrot. I understand this. My only word of caution is that I think the attempt to compartmentalise candidates and their faith is unrealistic. That’s not how faith tends to work. When people really believe in something, it shapes their character and their worldview. Labour PM James Callaghan drifted from his faith later in life, but as a young man he was a Baptist Sunday school teacher – that’s where he met his wife – and he credited his socialism to his nonconformism. His successor, Margaret Thatcher, was a Methodist who believed strongly in free will. That's a key reason why she favoured a small state. Today there’s a great hunger for trust in politics. Well, trust requires honesty, and the bedrock of honesty is authenticity - and I for one do want to know what a candidate believes in. Because it gives me an insight into what they might actually do if they win.