What does it mean to be a Catholic in today's world? If you are not eating fish on Fridays and having strings of children, then what distinguishes the modern Catholic from anyone else? At a time when the Vatican provokes hostility by its opposition to contraception, abortion and the use of condoms in fighting AIDS, how many Catholics share its views? And if they don't, how can they in good conscience stay in the Church?

These are among the many questions that writer and broadcaster Peter Stanford has addressed to some of Britain's best-known Catholics. In this entertaining and enlightening collection of short essays, each has come up with a very different reply.