Dear Brothers and Sisters

For much of my life, Normandy has been almost a second home for me and my family. Charlotte’s father and uncle were among the first Allied soldiers to land in Normandy in the early hours of the sixth of June as members of the Parachute Regiment. And so Normandy in June has been part of our family life since Charlotte was a young girl. I have always been struck by the regard, perhaps a better word is love, which  the people of France still hold towards their liberators. Having been a country occupied by your enemy is such a painful event in the life of any nation that it reinforces the gratitude felt towards those who set you free, even many decades later.  I had the opportunity to experience the emotion being occupied causes when I served alongside Danish troops in Afghanistan ten years ago. When a Danish soldier died the following words were spoken at his memorial service; ‘ Fight for all you hold dear, even death defying. Life will be less hard to bear. So will thoughts of dying.’ When I asked my Danish colleagues where these words came from they told me that they had been written by a member of the Danish Resistance during the Second World War and had become a rallying cry for Danes opposing the Nazis.

Remembrance is part of the DNA of our nation, as it is for all nations. Taking part in an Australian ANZAC Day service a few years ago us Brits were touched to be given a sprig of Rosemary by our hosts instead of a Poppy. For the Aussies, Rosemary, a herb that grows in profusion on the Gallipoli peninsula is the symbol of remembrance.

This year it looks very unlikely that we will be able to be together on Remembrance Sunday or on Armistice Day to remember as a nation. As I write church services have been cancelled as we as a nation combat another enemy. Our Archbishops and Bishops along with other faith leaders are working with our Government in the hope that we can open for worship. If we can then I will let you know as soon as I can.

Along with this newsletter is a short act of Worship that you can use at 11am. if you want to along with two poems. Each time we remember fallen service personnel we say a few lines of Laurence Binyon’s poem, ‘For the Fallen’ so here it is in full:

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.
 
Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal 
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.
 
They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.
 
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old: 
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
 
They mingle not with their laughing comrades again; 
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.
 
But where our desires are and our hopes profound, 
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;
 
As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust, 
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness, 
To the end, to the end, they remain.

The Second poem was written by an Army Doctor; Lt. Colonel John McCrae, who himself died in France in January 1918. It is called ‘In Flanders Fields:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
    That mark our place; and in the sky
    The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
 
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
    Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
        In Flanders fields.
 
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
    The torch; be yours to hold it high.
    If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
        In Flanders fields.

With my prayers and blessings           

Stephen.