LETTER FROM OUR MINISTER ROBERT BARTHRAM

 

Dear Friends

 

As some of you may know, Viv and I have three daughters, one of whom now lives in Australia. Communication with her is usually by text messages and the wonders of WhatsApp on modern phones. Recently, out of the blue she asked if we still have her great-grandfather's drawing books from the First World War. I answered we did, which prompted me to go and look at them again and it set me thinking.

 

The books were for collecting autographs but had plenty of space for drawings as well. My grandfather worked in a hospital in London throughout the war, a hospital that cared for wounded soldiers; several of them have written and drawn in his book. The contributions demonstrate a mixture of emotions, including some dry humour, but that, I suppose, is often how people cope with horror. My other grandfather was in the trenches on the Western Front. From him there is a curious relic of the war: he collected postcards wherever he went and there is a book of them, some written on but many blank. They all seem to be from Belgium.

 

From the Second World War we also possess the more expected relics, medals. My father served in the army during the war, landing in France after D-Day, then moving through France, Belgium and Germany. My mother was in the Land Army, working on a farm in Surrey. Her medal only came years later after a long campaign. She, unlike some, lived long enough to receive her medal. Maybe a more poignant relic is the two photos my father put in an album, which he put together shortly before he died. They are official photos taken before D-Day. One is of around a hundred soldiers, including him. Under it he wrote all those years later, ‘many killed in action Normandy and Arnhem 1944.’

During November we will remember the sacrifice made by so many, almost all of them people unknown to us, but for some there are personal connections, especially from more recent conflicts. Whether there are connections or not, for people living in the UK, I think there is a special reason for thanksgiving because if not for the courage and sacrifice we could have been invaded by the Nazis and if that had happened how different life would have been and probably still would be now.

 

For me personally the Remembrance in November is made more poignant because of the connections but I know it is not as simple as that. I used the term ‘relic’ to describe some of the objects we possess. It seemed the most suitable term but I realise there are other left overs of the two World Wars, and we should not ignore them.

 

For the past year our TV screens have shown a war in Gaza between Hamas and Israel and war now in Lebanon as well.  I heard one politician say it had all started on 7th October 2023 but the UN Secretary General pointed out that it ‘didn’t happen in a vacuum’, meaning there is a history here. For instance, during the First World War, the British made an ally of the Arabs of the Middle East to help overthrow the Ottoman Empire but after that there was not the hoped for freedom but just a change of power as they came under British and French rule. After the Second World War came the creation of the State of Israel leading to around 750,000 people driven from their homes and becoming refugees. In part the suffering and death happening now in the Middle East is another relic of past wars.

 

It has been my privilege to stay and study in the West Bank and meet many Palestinian Christians living under occupation. They were very gracious to their brothers and sisters in Christ from the west but I can never forget that the peace won for us by people like my parents and grandparents is not shared by all. This month we should give thanks to God for the sacrifices made and the absence of war we have enjoyed in these islands for so long and if that thanksgiving is genuine, pray and work for peace in our world today.

 

With best wishes,

 

 

Robert