Few if any institutions fuse social standing with spirituality quite like the Knights of Malta, the oldest chivalric order in the Roman Catholic Church. The Grand Prior leads a part of the Order of Malta whose hierarchy, as its website explains, is headed by knights who have ‘made vows of poverty, chastity and obedience’ and are known as ‘Knights of Justice’. Fra’ Max , she adds, ‘indicated this in a formal letter to the Grand Master of the Order, who has accepted his resignation. A friend of Fra’ Max, who describes him as ‘a very gentle soul, a charming man’, tells me that his departure has ‘caused quite a furore’. Fra’ Max, 58, a member of the £1,700-a-year Travellers’ Club, does not respond to my calls – evidence, perhaps, that he has now taken a vow of silence?