Remembrance Sunday
The grey skies that have hung over Malvern for the last couple of weeks lifted on Remembrance Sunday, as sunshine flooded through the windows, shedding dazzling coloured light through the stained glass, onto the near-capacity congregation in the Priory.
Remembrance Sunday was marked with a two-part morning service. The first half was attended by the Civic party, and uniformed organisations, from cadets and police to Girl Guides and Brownies.
The standards of the organisations were paraded to the altar, where they glinted, gold, in the sun, hymns were sung, prayers said, readings, the National Anthem, and a minute’s silence was held.
Once the Civic party left for the Town War Memorial, the Priory congregation remembered before the Priory War Memorial during the national two minutes’ silence. A bugler played the Last Post and Reveillé, and a junior chorister read the Kohima Epitaph.
David, a Priory Reader invited those gathered to ‘zoom in’ on war during his sermon. Onto the individuals. The millions of people whose lives are changed forever by the insatiable human desire to fight each other. He told of Vimy Ridge, where, in 1917, the Allies were starting to push back against the German troops dug in to the high ground. On that ridge there was a high point. ‘The Pimple’ the Allied soldiers called it.
Amongst the Allied troops there was a man. Private Frank Arnold, serving in the Artillery Regiment. He’d left his wife and two daughters, Jessie and Babs, back home, in Surrey. But he’d be home for Jessie’s 17th birthday. For sure. He wrote a letter to her, from France, looking forward to their imminent meeting.
Except he didn’t go home. ‘The Pimple’ had to be captured. So he wrote another note to Jessie, promising her he’d enclosed a little present. Praying he’d be with her for her birthday, next year.
On 12th April 1917 an explosion ripped through the advancing Allied troops. Private Frank Arnold was delivering ammunition to the front line. Shrapnel pierced his chest, through the photo of Jessie and the unsent letter. He died. In a muddy field. He has no known grave.
David held the photo and letter aloft, the jagged hole clearly visible to the moved congregation.
Private Frank Arnold was the father of David’s mother in law, Jessie, the young girl who never saw her father again.
Fighting for one bit of land may be glorious. But war is not. It is brutal and bloody, leaving heartache and tears. Most wars can be traced back to big egos, but as Christians we are called to live peaceably with all. To keep the peace and to guard it, in everything we do. To honour the Frank Arnolds of this world.
Lord, let there be peace in the world and let it begin with me.
