St Mark’s Church Armistice Day Vigil
I had looked in St Mark’s Church earlier on in the day for a World War One window which had been restored.
I could not find.
Passing by a few hours later, now dark, a light on, the church still open.
St Mark’s Church open, a vigil to mark Armistice Day.
I quietly walked around the church. I still could not find the window.
I remained a little while in silent contemplation. I thought of the horror of those souls who died in the trenches.
I wished to walk back down the side aisle to light a candle, but reluctant to disturb those in the church.
The First World War did not end at eleven o’clock on 11 November 1918 one hundred years ago. That was when an Armistice was agreed, a ceasefire, the day the guns fell silent. Peace was not declared until the following year.
Exacting reparations were imposed on Germany. Keynes warned against but he was ignored. This led to the Second World War.
What we see today in Europe, in the Middle East, is unfinished business from WWI.
No lessons have been learnt.
Greece dared challenge the EU. A vassal state for daring to challenge the EU is being destroyed to serve as a warning to other vassal states.
WWI was the first democratised war, no family was left untouched, unlike the Boer War. It was the first industrialised war. Cavalry charges of little use against machines guns and barbed wire, the first use of tanks.
How it affected communities was brought home to me this summer in a church in Arundel. In the pews, silhouettes of the fallen.
New injuries. In the Boer war, wounds did not become infected. In the mud of the trenches, wounds became infected
Not all who died died in action. Many were unfairly executed for cowardice.
There are no survivors left from WWI. Soon their children will also be lost to us.
Memories fade.
BBC, in a ground breaking work, collected the living memories of those who lived through WWI for a series marking 50 years since WWI.
My grandfather served in the trenches in France but he never talked about it, other than to complain it destroyed his health.
Did the veterans not talk about their experience because of the horrors it brought back, or because no one wished to listen?
Uncle Albert of the Trotter family in Only Fools and Horses told to shut up each time he tried to recount his wartime experience.
International Bomber Command Centre, in a race against time, has recorded and archived memories of veterans of WWII Bomber Command.
British are obsessed with the two world wars. Eighty per cent of the books on the two world wars are in English.
When veterans of Bomber Command turn up at an event people wish to talk to them, ask for their books to be signed, even though they are not the authors.
£45 million is raised by Poppy Day Appeal. To what end?
Those homeless on the street with serious mental problems are too often ex-service men who can no longer cope with modern life. Do we commemorate the dead and ignore the living? This was raised by Aaron Bastani, who was then condemned for doing so.
The First World War was called The Great War, the war to end all wars. By the 1930s this was being questioned as the nation prepared for yet another war.
In 1939 there was no commemoration of Armistice Day.
UK is built on a war economy. Weapons are supplied to the world’s most repressive regimes.
UK arms and provides military support to Saudi Arabia. A corrupt Islamic regime no different to ISIS, that is carrying out genocide in Yemen, that degrades women, that beheads its critics, that killed and cut up a journalist who walked into a Saudi Embassy in Turkey.
Tommies fought in the mud of the trenches. Donald Trump could not be bothered to attend a ceremony at an American War Graves Cemetery because of a little drizzle.
Did the fallen die for nothing?
On Armistice Day our thoughts turn to those who died in two world wars to liberate Europe from tyranny.
A decade ago, 60% of countries across the world were democracies. That figure is down to 40%.
Two weeks ago Greeks marked Oxi Day, the day at the start of WWII when they said no to Fascism. They paid a very heavy price. Two years ago they voted Oxi in a referendum, to then be be betrayed by Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
We have a Europe in chains, vassal states of the EU.
Across Europe we have a rise of Fascism as a direct response to the EU.
Armistice Day should never be about poppies, red or white, or even solemn reflection on those who died, and in the wars and conflicts of today, those who die are not only soldiers, combatants, they are civilians, innocent civilians who are not even party to the conflict.
We must question the wars, even more important question who is profiteering from the wars.
It is sickening that British Legion partners with war profiteers British Aerospace.
