A message from the Dean - 7 May 2020
Dear Friends,
Had the Covid-19 crisis not changed everything, the Cathedral would have hosted a Service of Thanksgiving and Commemoration for the 75th anniversary of VE Day. We might (who knows?) have the opportunity to mark the 75th anniversary of Victory over Japan (VJ) day in August, which marked the ending of the war in the Far East and the cessation of hostilities. Both these anniversaries are huge milestones in world history. Naturally, we will be remembering these two days with our prayers and I'll end this letter with a few suggestions to aid reflection and intercession on VE day in particular.
Although I have many faults (and thank you for pointing them out!) I don't think I could be accused of being a party pooper. Yet I always feel uneasy when we celebrate victory without remembering the cost of the struggle. It's all too easy for us to indulge ourselves with jubilation for being on the winning side and not to respect the immense cost of World War 2 in terms of lives lost, the devastation to nations and communities, the sheer effort and privation the war generation had to contribute and endure, to say nothing of the time it took our country and the nations of Europe to recover. I was dismayed to see the liturgical material put out by the national Church for the VE day anniversary. It was perfunctory, unimaginative stuff. We could and should do a lot better than that. Why?
Let some of the facts speak. It is hard now to grasp the sheer scale and intensity of the Second World War, or the disruption and havoc it brought across the world. Historians reckon 85 million were engaged as combatants in the armies, navies, and air forces of the world. Seventeen million of them were killed. It was total war, with no distinction between the battlefield and the home front. Twenty-eight nations took part in the First World War; sixty-one states were involved in the World War 2. Between 1914-18 only five per cent of deaths involved civilians; sixty-six per cent of deaths between 1939-45 were of civilians. If the abiding image of World War 1 is that of the trenches of France and Belgium, the image of World War 2 is the bombed and devastated city. In Britain 60,000 died as a result of aerial bombardment. British bomber crews lost 55,000 people in combat, more than all the British officers killed in World War 1. The German cities of Hamburg and Dresden were carpet bombed killing 40,000 and 35,000 in two nights. In Japan victims of atomic bombing at Hiroshima and Nagasaki totalled 105,000. It is estimated that over the course of the war, 78 million people were killed or wounded, including the holocaust of European Jewry: the Nazis murdered six million Jewish men, women and children. If the total mortality figure is estimated at 55 million, this equates to 20,000 people losing their lives each day of the conflict. Suffering on this colossal scale stops me in my tracks. If we don't learn from history, we are condemned to repeat it.
It's clear the generation that went through World War 2 were marked for life: they had seen danger and loss at first hand, but our country showed a unity and determination to win that perhaps we haven't since experienced. The historian A.J.P. Taylor wrote: "In the Second World War the British people came of age. This was a people's war [...] Few now sang Land of Hope and Glory. Few even sang England Arise. England had risen all the same." (English History 1914-45, OUP, 1965, p. 600)
The war years saw the complete mobilisation of the country: all had a part to play, even though in May 1940 when Winston Churchill became Prime Minister, the country's fate seemed fragile. Churchill was frank in his first speech as Prime Minister to the House of Commons.
"I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined the Government: 'I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.'
We have before us an ordeal of the most grievous kind. We have before us many, many long months of struggle and suffering.
You ask what is our policy? I will say: it is to wage war, by sea, land, air, with all our might and with all the strength that God can give us; to wage war against a monstrous tyranny, never surpassed in the dark, lamentable catalogue of human crime. That is our policy.
You ask what is our aim? I can answer in one word: it is victory, victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be, for without victory there is no survival."
Churchill weaponised the English language to raise the morale of the nation and in his coalition Government brought in all the political talent available. It was to be a long war: the frightening year from 1940-41 when Britain stood alone as a shock absorber for the Nazi threat gave way, from 1941-45, to the long slog in all theatres of war and in the factories, shipyards, mines, and fields of the home front. The war required the whole population's contribution. I remember one of my own grandmas telling me the stories of working 12-hour shifts at an engineering foundry in Trafford Park, Manchester. Operating a huge capstan machine that shaped the ship's propellers. Before the war she'd been a cook. Ordinary people got to do extraordinary things.
It has been said that 'war is the locomotive of history' and when we take part in the 75th anniversary of VE day celebrations it would be good to remember the moral determination and resolve of the people who fought in it, kept the wartime economy going, and endured the shocks, losses and weariness of war. As a nation we're good at Remembrance. If there's one fault in our custom, it is that it can focus exclusively on military valour and losses and not pay sufficient attention to the contribution of ordinary people living in and contributing to momentous times.
We've been reminded during the Covid-19 crisis of the national treasure that is the NHS, itself the outcome of the wartime determination to build a better world. The end of the war saw the establishment of the United Nations as a forum and umbrella organisation for peacekeeping, cultural and educational understanding and the relief and resettlement of migrants and refugees. The World Bank and the economic institutions and protocols that came with it allowed shattered nations to rebuild and economies to become productive again. All these institutions grew out of a popular demand for justice and peace.
I'm glad, therefore, that 24 cathedrals have decided to wave a flag for hope on May 8th. The initiative 'The Big Picnic for Hope' invites people to spend time indoors or outdoors, share food and connect with others through phone or social media. We're asked to give thanks for the heroic wartime generation, to be mindful and thankful of all helping us through the current Covid-19 crisis and to share our generosity with the growing number of people reliant on food banks by supporting the Trussell Trust (one of the co-ordinating charities supporting access to food banks up and down the UK).
I started with a bit of a rant about some of the worship material being put out by the national Church. Here is a suggestion to pray our way through the VE day celebration.
- Give thanks to God for every expression of human decency - the desire of people to live good lives in contentment and peace.
- Give thanks to God for the wartime generation that did extraordinary things to bring our nation through darkness and threat - the courage and sacrifice of all who fought, the civilian services that protected our communities, helped to feed the nation and aided the economy.
- Pray for the victims of the war, for any whom you and your family mourn and remember, for all who perished as a result of persecution.
- Pray that we many understand the demands of justice, the inalienable dignity of all human life and the conditions that help it flourish.
- Pray for ourselves that we may live in hope not fear and in our ordinary way be bearers of God's extraordinary love and mercy.
With my love, prayers and blessings. May VE Day 75 give us vision and courage.
Adrian