In this clearly-written (if occasionally repetitious) book, based on his 2010 Lancaster PhD thesis, Ben Edwards presents the first detailed account of conflicting British Christian responses to the Spanish Civil War (1936–9). He draws on a wide range of English-language archival and printed primary sources, especially newspapers and journals. The extent of endnotes and bibliography (almost one-third of the volume) is testimony to the depth and breadth of research. Edwards's focus is disproportionately on Roman Catholicism, which mostly took an anti-Republican stance, General Franco's Nationalists being seen as leading a cruzada against the atheistic Communist (albeit democratically-elected) government of an overwhelmingly Catholic Spain, at a time when a godless Communism was also feared to be gaining ground in Britain. Edwards shows how this Catholic line had adverse consequences at home, exacerbating Protestant-Catholic (particularly Anglican-Catholic) tensions, and worsening relations between the Roman Catholic Church and the League of Nations Union, and between the Church and the Labour party and the labour movement generally (which tended to be pro-Republican). There is relatively less emphasis on Protestantism, both Anglican and Free Church varieties, where views were divided, Franco attracting only pockets of support (mainly in the Church of England and through the United Christian Front and Friends of National Spain). Protestant opposition to the Nationalists (as in the 1937 Religious Delegation) or neutrality were more common, linked with a combination of pacifism, anti-Fascism, sympathy for Spanish Protestants, and anti-Catholicism. Thus, as with Catholics, Protestant claims and counter-claims about Spain were heavily shaped by domestic agendas. An ill-judged decision to exclude denominations which did not operate across the whole of Britain explains the omission of the Church of Scotland, notwithstanding that its attitudes to Spain would surely have been relevant since the inter-war years witnessed (in Callum Brown's words) ‘a frenzy of anti-Catholicism to which the Church of Scotland and the United Free Church felt compelled to contribute’. Given the nature of the sources, it is less surprising that the perspective offered is mostly an ‘elite’ and ‘establishment’ one (Edwards's terms), capturing the opinions of national church leaders, lay intelligentsia and denominational press, although there is a helpful (if inconclusive) discussion of positions of working-class Catholics (deriving from proxy evidence). Such an elite approach may not tell the entire story, however, especially since Gallup polls in 1937–8 revealed the British public to be strongly anti-Franco, which might well have mirrored views in the pews. This consideration is pertinent to the author's attempt (not wholly persuasive) to link his findings to the secularisation thesis. Here he argues that the spiritual dimension in British reactions to the Spanish Civil War demonstrates that ‘in the 1930s Christianity continued to exert considerable influence’, and that ‘it is therefore not appropriate to treat interwar Britain as a secular society’.