Remembrance Sunday

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It was pretty tough getting up after a short night's sleep to celebrate the 8.00am Eucharist, but somehow I survived. Thankfully Chris, my student on placement was down to preach his first sermon at the 9.30am Eucharist, and made a very good job of it. Unfortunately his speaking voice did not project as well as it should. If I'd realised I would have turned up the sound amplification in advance so that he could be better heard. So many people complained, it at least indicated how keen they were to listen to him.

After the post-service refreshments we gathered in the War Memorial chapel, where Burma Star Veteran and Reader Emeritus Bill John read out the list of the departed from the two Great Wars, reminding us that many of those names were of people his generation grew up with and went to church with. It says something about our times that no names of post World War conflict victims have been added to the Roll of Honour in the past sixty years, because no young men living in the Parish are recorded as having served in the military and died. Very much a sign of the social changes that have taken place in the city.

We actually have one of the city's main military establishments just inside the north boundary of the old Victorian Parish - Maindy - where Lord Kitchener was quartered for a season during one of his famous recruitment campaigns, earning him a mention on our Parish Roll of Honour. Over sixty years, tens of thousands of men have passed through, or served there for a while. If any went on from their to their deaths on active service, they are commemorated, not by us, but in their home Parish, wherever that may be.

After Evensong, just as we were saying goodbye to each other, two visitors, seeing the lights on and the doors open popped into church to look around. One of them was instantly recognisable as ex-Guardsman, Simon Weston OBE, hideously injured in the bombing of the Sir Galahad during the Falklands campaign, but lived to tell the tale, to triumph over his suffering and then become a public speaker and media personality of renown.

He'd been in town for a re-union lunch following the National Service of Remembrance and parade at the end of the morning at the City Cenotaph in Alexandra Gardens. I'd managed to watch the parade on my way home after church.

Simon said it was the first time ever for him to visit St John's. How often we hear the same said by people who've lived most of their lives in the city. We're always glad to welcome newcomers, especially locals. It turned out that Percy, one of our stalwarts who'd worked in the Rhymney Valley as Medical Officer of Health, knew his mother, though he'd not met Simon before. How often this kind of co-incidence also happens.

At the end of this long tiring weekend that included Remembrance Sunday, such a special, timely encounter with a victorious warrior was refreshing to the spirit.

Nine eleven remembered

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Well, I expected to be away from a computer for the inside of a week, as this is down time for me,in St Luke's Hospital for the Clergy in London, for a hernia repair. St Luke's has been totally overhauled, however, and each bed has its own thin client system, delivering radio TV and Internet services. The touchscreen virtual keyboard is not wonderful, but adequate to email the kids, and surf for news.

TV, since my admission on Sunday evening, has had a rash of programmes on 9/11, including Michael Moore's polemic documentary Fahrenheit 9/11, last night. It's been good to have something to occupy my mind, useful for dealing with the pain, and staying relaxed in the empty hours, except for the annoyance when web mail keels over and refuses to send, and loses the message! Still, it's a unique opportunity to practice patience as well as be a patient.

I remember well where I was on 11th September 2001, when I first saw/heard the news of the first plane collision with the W.T.C. We were living in Monaco, and it was a hot clear sunny afternoon, with not much to do. I switched on shortly after the first collision had been reported, and sensed this was going to be a world shaking event, and not just a tragic accident. I remembered the earlier failed attack on the W.T.C, and even then thought - this is the shape of things to come.

I kept vigil in font of the screen for a couple of hours, and then stated to work out what to do. That week, the church was kept pen for prayer, and I stayed round it for counselling opportunities. Few people came, a couple of dozen during the week. We held a special service, which was not hugely well attended, despite the number of Americans in the Principality. Once it was clear what had happened, people worried a lot more than they prayed.

Having time to reflect, and catch up on my memories of the event during my enforced idleness here - to hear stories I missed at the time - has been valuable. I just can't help wondering what the past six years of history might have brought us, if others than the Bush mafia had held the reins of power. So many hundreds of thousands of innocent deaths at American hands might not have occurred, with a wiser, less corrupt leadership holding the world together.