More popular than Jesus Cleave's article mentioned that Lennon was "reading extensively about religion", and quoted a comment he made: Cleave's interview with Lennon was published in the "Evening Standard" in March 1966 and provoked no public reaction in the UK. Church attendance there was in decline and the Christian churches were making no secret of the need to transform their image into something more relevant to modern times. Music historian Jonathan Gould wrote, "The satire comedians had had a field day with the increasingly desperate attempts of the Church to make itself seem more relevant ('Don't call me vicar, call me "Dick" ...')."
Evening Standard newspaper's editor is the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, who replaced Sarah Sands. Ms. Sands replaced Geordie Greig following his departure to "The Mail on Sunday" in March 2012. Veronica Wadley was the newspaper's editor between 2002 and 2009. Max Hastings was editor from 1996 until he retired in 2002. The "London Evening Standard", although a regional newspaper, does cover national and international news, though with an emphasis on London-centred news (especially in its features pages), covering building developments, property prices, traffic schemes, politics, the congestion charge and, in the "Londoner's Diary" page, gossip on the social scene.