remembrance

The soothing sort of pitter-patter rain that acts as a therapeutic lazy morning lullaby encouraged myself (and the cat) to roll over and press the snooze button a few too many times until the nagging feeling that I was supposed to be somewhere became a sudden urgent panic that I probably wasn't going to get there on time, and I certainly wouldn't be having breakfast. I wonder how different my life would be and whether I would feel any positive results from less pitter-patter snoozing and more tea and porridge.

I don't often expect much of a Sunday-morning church turnout these days...and certainly not when the service is being held outside and the pitter-patter has become a windy downpour. This remembrance Sunday it felt like the whole of this small, unknown town had turned out to gather around the cenotaph. Hearing the names read out of the fallen ... First World, Second World ...Wars was not the sentimentalist play of history that is perhaps at times can be, but rather a very real enforcement of so many suffering here and now. Solemn army presence evoking tears and a helpless anxiety.

The vicar, white robes soggily clinging to a bony frame, prayed a simple pre-scripted prayer:

"O God of truth and justice

we hold before you those men and women

who have died in active service:

in Iraq, in Afghanistan and elsewhere.

As we honour their courage and cherish their memory

may we put our faith in your future;

for you are the source of life and hope

now and for ever. Amen"

A peaceful silence descended briefly ... swept away with the closing lines of the prayer, but offering still the distant possibility of a tangible hope lying beyond ourselves. And what else could more fully explain so unusually large a performative act, if not the search for hope?