Reflections on VE Day 2020 .......
I was a war baby.
I was born in 1945 in Ashton under Lyne in a private nursing home / cottage hospital before the launch of the NHS.
I was born in April and my Mother was discharged and I was brought home on VE Day.
My father who was in the RAF was discharged a couple of years later, he was an instrument fitter, and his engineering skills continued to be needed by the air force.
On his return to his day job, which in fact was a reserved occupation as an engineer with AVRO in Manchester, the reaction he received was such that he left the job after a week and through a couple of lucky accidents and family connections, he became a Bus Driver.
My father had some deep reservations about many things and he was happy to spend his days isolated in his cab, very much his own boss, keeping to his timetable and spending time with his own thoughts.
Once discharged he rarely referred to his time in the RAF but form time to time and as I grew older I concluded that in a phrase of the time, he'd had a 'good war' but was glad to be home with his family.
For myself I anticipated until conscription was lifted that I too would be required to spend a couple of years doing my National Service.
The idea of celebrating VE Day didn't raise any issues or cautions in my mind, either as a child growing up or during my student days.
Certainly when I was 50 which was of course the 50th Anniversary of VE Day I was happy to be involved in the Celebrations in the parish where I was serving as Vicar.
I remember we had an anniversary lunch of Shepherds Pie and toasted the Veterans who lived in the village and those names were remembered on the war Memorial.
More recently I have worked in Europe initially with my job as Director of Toc H, a charity founded in Belgium in the first world war and then as a Chaplain in Italy, France and Spain.
As my association with Europe has developed I have had a new opportunity to review what the European Project really means. It is in it's way a memorial, the real victory in europe is the peaceful co-existence which has lasted now for some 75 years.
Free exchange of people, borders which can be passed through freely, with only the empty buildings a reminder of what travel between nations used to be, a common currency, I remember being shown my first euro in an Irish pub in Birmingham by a catholic priest friend of mine who saw it as a great symbol of hope for the future.
There are also ironies as we seek to celebrate our victory in 1945 which relied on support not only from America, but also the participation of so many Polish airmen who came to add their lives to ensuring victory and so many in Europe who formed a 'resistance'.
But sadly as the hostility towards immigrants has grown, as negative values have surfaced, as the nation has been encouraged to turn its face against europe, so my own pro-european views have been challenged until the final decision to turn away from Europe entirely.
Of itself that might have been OK.
After all we live in a democracy and if the majority feel that the way forward is as a singular nation, going it alone, then so be it, but we should remember that Victory in Europe was not the victory of a single nation going it alone. I have come to feel European in my outlook but I can live with change, even change that I feel to be negative, but this year it seems to me that VE day has been politicised, it has been hi-jacked not in order to value the sacrifices of those who defended our country, but to celebrate Brexit.
The May Bank Holiday was moved from May1st when we celebrate the workers of the world to May 8th so that we might and not everyone will agree with me about this, be encouraged to celebrate victory in (over?) Europe.
So sadly this year I feel that I have been disenfranchised.
I will reflect on the sacrifices that so many made to ensure that we emerged as victorious in 1945, I will remember the heroic stories of Polish Airmen and those many other European and Commonwealth and American soldiers who resisted the rise of facism in and across Europe and I will be grateful.
But I will remember also my many European friends who feel so sadly let down by our decision to withdraw from the European project and the hope that it represented for a continuation of peace and the growth of justice across the nations of Europe.
I was born in 1945 in Ashton under Lyne in a private nursing home / cottage hospital before the launch of the NHS.
I was born in April and my Mother was discharged and I was brought home on VE Day.
My father who was in the RAF was discharged a couple of years later, he was an instrument fitter, and his engineering skills continued to be needed by the air force.
On his return to his day job, which in fact was a reserved occupation as an engineer with AVRO in Manchester, the reaction he received was such that he left the job after a week and through a couple of lucky accidents and family connections, he became a Bus Driver.
My father had some deep reservations about many things and he was happy to spend his days isolated in his cab, very much his own boss, keeping to his timetable and spending time with his own thoughts.
Once discharged he rarely referred to his time in the RAF but form time to time and as I grew older I concluded that in a phrase of the time, he'd had a 'good war' but was glad to be home with his family.
For myself I anticipated until conscription was lifted that I too would be required to spend a couple of years doing my National Service.
The idea of celebrating VE Day didn't raise any issues or cautions in my mind, either as a child growing up or during my student days.
Certainly when I was 50 which was of course the 50th Anniversary of VE Day I was happy to be involved in the Celebrations in the parish where I was serving as Vicar.
I remember we had an anniversary lunch of Shepherds Pie and toasted the Veterans who lived in the village and those names were remembered on the war Memorial.
More recently I have worked in Europe initially with my job as Director of Toc H, a charity founded in Belgium in the first world war and then as a Chaplain in Italy, France and Spain.
As my association with Europe has developed I have had a new opportunity to review what the European Project really means. It is in it's way a memorial, the real victory in europe is the peaceful co-existence which has lasted now for some 75 years.
Free exchange of people, borders which can be passed through freely, with only the empty buildings a reminder of what travel between nations used to be, a common currency, I remember being shown my first euro in an Irish pub in Birmingham by a catholic priest friend of mine who saw it as a great symbol of hope for the future.
There are also ironies as we seek to celebrate our victory in 1945 which relied on support not only from America, but also the participation of so many Polish airmen who came to add their lives to ensuring victory and so many in Europe who formed a 'resistance'.
But sadly as the hostility towards immigrants has grown, as negative values have surfaced, as the nation has been encouraged to turn its face against europe, so my own pro-european views have been challenged until the final decision to turn away from Europe entirely.
Of itself that might have been OK.
After all we live in a democracy and if the majority feel that the way forward is as a singular nation, going it alone, then so be it, but we should remember that Victory in Europe was not the victory of a single nation going it alone. I have come to feel European in my outlook but I can live with change, even change that I feel to be negative, but this year it seems to me that VE day has been politicised, it has been hi-jacked not in order to value the sacrifices of those who defended our country, but to celebrate Brexit.
The May Bank Holiday was moved from May1st when we celebrate the workers of the world to May 8th so that we might and not everyone will agree with me about this, be encouraged to celebrate victory in (over?) Europe.
So sadly this year I feel that I have been disenfranchised.
I will reflect on the sacrifices that so many made to ensure that we emerged as victorious in 1945, I will remember the heroic stories of Polish Airmen and those many other European and Commonwealth and American soldiers who resisted the rise of facism in and across Europe and I will be grateful.
But I will remember also my many European friends who feel so sadly let down by our decision to withdraw from the European project and the hope that it represented for a continuation of peace and the growth of justice across the nations of Europe.
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