The documentary is not designed to serve a Catholic audience because it gives us the Pope for beginners, explaining who he is and where he lives. When Clark asks, “Can I go out all week, drink and smoke and do whatever and still be a good Catholic?” my husband splutters: “Of course you can! That’s the cornerstone of Catholicism!” (He’s from a family of Irish Catholics, mind you.)
Clark hasn’t been to Confession in the last 10 years and says he wants “to understand what makes a good Catholic”. He has had troubled moments in life, suffering from depression and at one stage contemplating suicide, and there is a heartfelt moment when he meets British cardinal Arthur Roche, who is based in Rome, to discuss this. “What I really found hard was that someone who would take their own life would be a sinner,” Clark says, and is reassured when Roche answers in a roundabout way by telling him that making a rational choice to end one’s life would be sinful, but that anyone contemplating suicide would be in such torment that they could not think rationally.