Thoughts on VE Day anniversary, in lockdown

THIS IS the strangest of circumstances in which to write a blog for VE Day with much of the world in lockdown following the coronavirus pandemic.

The Minster had great plans to mark the 75th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day on May 8, with a tea party followed by a civic service for the whole borough, led by

The Bishop of Huddersfield and the Band of the Yorkshire Regiment in the presence of the Mayor of Calderdale and the Lord Lieutenant of West Yorkshire.

Victory Day, otherwise known as VE Day, was the day of the formal acceptance by the Allies of World War II, of Nazi Germany’s unconditional surrender of its armed forces on May 8, 1945.

The country had been at War since 1939, six long, hard years, with loss of life to both armed forces and civilians. Life was disrupted in ways that some will find familiar today, with the pandemic.

VE Day resonates for the people of Halifax and Calderdale through the recruitment of the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, whose chapel and spiritual home is inside the Minster. Recruitment for the

Regiment, based here in Halifax at Wellesley Barracks, was across the West Riding.

Many a war memorial in towns and villages, schools and churches, record the names of those who went to fight and never returned.

The Regiment played its part in the Second World

War as part of the British Expeditionary Force in

France, forming part of the rear-guard at Dunkirk; in North Africa; Italy and in France, following the D-Day landings, and as Chindits in Burma. The Colours carried in battle can be seen in the chapel in memory of those who gave their lives, and their names are recorded in a Book of Remembrance. They remind us of the relative peace we have enjoyed across Europe ever since.

The Royal British Legion also reminds us, each year on Remembrance Sunday, of the enormous sacrifice made by everyone at home who contributed to the war effort.

Here in Halifax our thoughts are also with the people of Aachen, whom, after the war, we befriended through acts of reconciliation. In recent years we have come together to mark the end of World War One, and shall look to mark the end of hostilities between our two nations again, as we begin to mark the significant anniversaries of World War Two in years to come. The German people continue to live with the memory of what took place and part of the healing for both nations comes from friendship, dialogue, and time to forgive, but never forget.

Both my parents lived through the Second World War. My father spoke of the black outs and powdered egg; my mother of the incendiary bomb that landed on their house, and being evacuated from the Isle of Wight to Monmouth in Wales.

This current pandemic is the closest we’ve ever experienced such disruption to our daily lives, today.

VE Day provides an opportunity to give thanks and remember those who gave their lives for our freedom, but also to mourn the loss of life on both sides that any war will always bring.

When the lock down restrictions begin to be lifted, many will not want to celebrate, they will continue to mourn the loss of those who went into hospital or care home and never returned. Unfinished business and unresolved grief will stay with us for many years to come, and the process of healing will begin all over again.

I have been talking to the schools and University in Aachen about how to manage the lifting of restrictions, as schools and churches re open in Germany.

VE Day should inspire us to ask once more, what sort of world we want to live in, and how we educate our children and allow older people to complete their lives with dignity and fulfilment?

The Second World War was defeated by nations coming together to defeat the evil in their midst, and the pandemic will be the same, as Boris Johnson, as Prime Minster, hosts a global meeting of leaders this week to support a plan to find a coronavirus vaccine.

VE Day Commemoration should have brought us all together as Christians, as people of other faiths, and people who have no faith, in the Minster as the Mother church of Calderdale. Like those who lived in hope through the Second World War, so too do we live in hope, that the coronavirus pandemic will be overcome and humanity will emerge out of lock-down, into a new free world where wars may cease, care for people and the environment take their rightful place, and kindness and generosity are the priority for individuals, governments and nations.