The Queen in her broadcast for VE Day ended by saying, “our streets are not empty, they are filled with the love and the care that we have for each other”.
I do not know if it is because we are an Island nation or because we belong to a generation of parents, grandparents and great grandparents, who lived and fought through two World Wars, but on the whole the people of these islands are amazingly resilient in the face of great adversity.
We have all hoped and prayed for an end to this Pandemic and the many restrictions and hardships it puts upon so many. To go freely about our daily lives again, to visit friends and families, cuddle our grandchildren, plan our outings and holidays, shop and travel without social distancing. We all realise now that these are not things that are going to happen ‘any time soon’, perhaps some never again as we have previously done them.
We enjoyed our first Zoom Service on Sunday morning which was a joyful occasion with a very good ‘virtual’ congregation, and it may well be the first of many with the Bishop of London warning that it maybe next year before some churches return to services as we used to know them. Yet as I have said before, and as Father Peter alluded to in his sermon on Sunday, we the people are the ‘living stones’ that build our church and where ever and how ever we come together, that is where ‘our church’ shall be, living and even growing.
It is that ability, whatever the situation, to make the best of it and to find the love and generosity of heart to do even more unto others than we would expect for ourselves. The examples over these last few months have been too many to count, with many making that greatest of sacrifices of putting down their lives for the sake of others. We as Christians, and that is not to belittle any other faith, have the greatest example of that true love and self sacrifice, in our Lord Jesus Christ, and I know that our Queen, as Head of our Church, sees that love reflected, directly and indirectly, in the love that she, and all of us, witness in our Island Country day by day through these difficult times.
Michael.