WE'VE just got back from a marvellous holiday in Malta - tremendously impressed. It's like Yorkshire used to be in the 1950s but with all-day sunshine.

The first things you notice are the churches: even the little villages have huge basilicas with twin towers and a dome you can see from miles away. The yellow Leyland buses are like something from the 1950s as well, and when you get on one you are immediately aware of the Christian religion.

The first bus I caught to go out to the silent city of Mdina had a motto written large over the driver's window: Verbum Dei Caro Factus Est. The Word of God is made flesh. Well it sure beats "Please give up this seat to a differently-abled person" or "Do not spit". And next to the gospel text a picture of the virgin and child. When the buses are about to start off, most of the Maltese passengers make the Sign of the Cross. Now the way they drive on Malta, I'm only surprised they don't hold a full votive mass - or a requiem.

I was looking forward to seeing the city of Mdina and St Paul's cathedral there. St Paul was shipwrecked on Malta - Melita, as it was called in those days. Here at St Michael's in the City of London we often sing the hymn called Melita, the sailors' hymn, Eternal Father Strong to Save. We shall sing it again in a couple of weeks time when the Princess Royal comes with the Honourable Company of Master Mariners for their annual livery service. St Paul was rescued by the Maltese and he converted the Roman Governor Publius, who became a bishop and a saint.

No doubt they are not all saints on the island of Malta, but they are extremely pleasant and well-mannered. If you ask directions to a church or cafe they don't just point, they take you by the hand and lead you where you want to go. It's all so agreeably old-fashioned - just like it was in England before we were all "modernised" and "liberated" and instructed in our "human rights". I reckon human kindness is worth more than the whole bag of human rights.

Many local newspapers are in English and there was one story in particular, so moving and illustrative of the great difference between that country and ours. A 65-year-old man had molested an 11-year-old girl. The report said:

"The minibus driver sat near the girl and kissed her on the lips. She told him to let go of her but he kept her seated and touched her legs and her breasts. The magistrate heard the girl say that she had forgiven the man - although she admitted she had had a few sleepless nights. He said in view of the girl's statement that she had forgiven him, he was jailing him for seven months instead of the maximum of 12".

It brought tears to my eyes just to read this item. The evidence that the little girl had forgiven the man - and that her forgiveness actually counted for something when it came to the sentencing - was a wonderful tribute to the fact that Malta is one place that still retains the vestiges of Christian civilisation and a sense of proportion. Imagine what would have happened in a similar case in England where we have paedophile hysteria endemic. The social workers would have solemnly proclaimed that the girl's life "has been totally ruined", that she was suffering from "post-traumatic stress syndrome" and that she would "never" be able to get over the incident. What courage the little girl showed. What a lesson to us about the relation between justice and mercy.

* Peter Mullen is Rector of St Michael's, Cornhill, in the City of London, and Chaplain to the Stock Exchange.