• Tony Blair calls for religious faith to be rescued from extremism

Tony Blair appealed for religious faith to be rescued from extremism and put at the centre of solving the world's problems, during a wide-ranging speech at Westminster Cathedral last night.Addressing a 1,600 strong audience, in his first major speech since stepping down as Prime Minister, he said: "For religion to be a force for good, it must be rescued not simply from extremism, faith as a means of exclusion; but also from irrelevance, an interesting part of our history but not of our future." Too many people saw religious faith as stark dogmatism and empty ritual, he added.