I have lifted what follows directly from ‘The Knowledge’ which is an online news summary service that I get daily. I remember President Kennedy quoting, “It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness.” Here, it seems to me, is a chink of light amidst the horrors of the Israeli Hamas conflict and all the cursing and the darkness.

History’s “default setting” is carnage and suffering, says Simon Schama in the FT – “the plague in Athens; slave ships; Passchendaele; the Gulag; Hiroshima”. But we shouldn’t overlook the “small points of radiance” that remain lit amid the darkness. One example is the Max Rayne school in Jerusalem – a “visionary” enterprise where Jewish and Arab children are taught together in Arabic and Hebrew, by teachers from both communities. Founded in 1998, and run by the “inspirational” Hand in Hand Centre, the school hasn’t had an easy time of it – it was burned to the ground by Jewish fanatics in 2014. But it was rebuilt and reopened, and today there are six Hand in Hand schools across Israel, all devoted to “sowing the seeds of a future free of mutual demonisation”.You might assume these ambitious ideals have “taken a beating in the present calamity”. But the war has made the need for this kind of cooperation “more urgent than ever”. After a two-week break following the October 7 atrocity, all six schools re-opened. Arab students have family members who have been killed in Gaza; many of the Israelis know someone kidnapped, or worse. It’s the ultimate test of their ideals – but it’s also “the picture of a possible shared future”. The Israeli writer Amos Oz once compared the conflict to a consuming fire. You can either run away, or you can pour water on the flames using whatever you have – a bucket, a cup, even just a teaspoon. The fire is huge, but these schools demonstrate that “everyone has a teaspoon”.

Many suggestions were put to King George V as how best to acknowledge the first anniversary of the ending of World War 1. Some thought triumphant music should be commissioned, others poetry, others religious services, some thought special prayers, some speeches. And there was mention of a custom that had originated in South Africa, of keeping a two minute silence of commemoration and remembrance.

The King was advised by many and pressed by some; principally by the United Kingdom and Dominion Governments, but also by ecclesiastical authorities of every kind. Most proposed a form of words.

The King chose the silence.  

The King shunned any form of triumphalism and was as strongly resistant to wordiness. He remarked to a friend and courtier that he merely wished people of every kind all over the Kingdom and beyond, simply to pause, to think, to reflect, and to feel – in whatever manner they chose, in a silence which was both theirs and everyone’s.

A statement was issued by Buckingham Palace on November 9^th 1919.

To all my people, Tuesday next, 11 November, is the first anniversary of the armistice, which stayed the world-wide carnage of the four preceding years and marked the victory of right and freedom.
     I believe that my people in every part of the Empire fervently wish to perpetuate the memory of that great deliverance and of those who laid down their lives to achieve it.
     To afford an opportunity for the universal expression of this feeling it is my desire and hope that at the hour when the Armistice came into force, the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, there may be for the brief space of two minutes a complete suspension of all our normal activities.
     During that time, except in the rare cases where this may be impracticable, all work, all sound, and all locomotion should cease, so that, in perfect stillness, the thoughts of everyone may be concentrated on reverent remembrance of the glorious dead.
     No elaborate organisation appears to be necessary.
     At a given signal, which could easily be arranged to suit the circumstances of each locality, I believe that we shall all gladly interrupt our business and pleasure, whatever it may be, and unite in this simple service of silence and remembrance.
           GEORGE R.I. 

In asking for silence the King offered a space to listen, to hear, and to share. Nothing further was mandated and no reaction presumed or required. 

In the silence there is the opportunity to listen to our hearts and thoughts and to enter the Eternal.

As we gathered up our coats and bags after Strength and Balance at the Castle Centre this morning we chatted. There were seven of us today. Eight if you included Jeff our instructor. We all agreed that we benefitted from the session. We also all agreed that we could perfectly well spend an hour a day at home doing the same exercises. And we all admitted that we don’t. 

The question was, ‘Why not?’

 It turned out that some of us do a few exercises most days. Some do a few exercises sometimes. One said she didn’t do any, ever. Yet we all agreed that we knew we benefitted from the classes. Strength and Balance classes cost us nothing. They are provided by the National Health Service. They  are an effort to get to and sometimes we are not in the mood, but they help.

The consensus was that we needed the motivation that comes from being part of a group and that we liked the company. 

I’m reminded of those wise old clergy of the past who, when people asserted, “I don’t need to go to Church. I can worship God just as well at home, or in my garden, or enjoying beauty,” would reply, “Perhaps you could – but do you? And how often?”

And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. Genesis II. xviii 

“I am always ready to learn although I do not always like being taught”

Winston Churchill

Hear Hear

It was writing about choice that reminded me.  In the mid 1960s I first met Dame Edith Evans. I can’t remember how, where or why. She was in her seventies, one of the greatest actresses of her generation, I was in my twenties and training to be a priest. Over time we talked about many things but especially theatre and priesthood.

The conversation I remember most clearly was when she was telling me the importance of working from the inside out and not from the outside in. She told me that many people imagine that actors ‘put on’ a character as they put on their stage make up – that they ‘put on’ the character from the exterior appearance and outward mannerisms. 

She said that it didn’t work like that. Rather, she said, that you find the character from inside yourself. 

“They’re all there,” she said. “You just have to find them.”

And she added, with some force, “That is why I have never played that loathsome woman.”      

We had been talking Shakespeare and I knew the ‘loathsome woman’ was Lady Macbeath. 

“She is there within me,” Dame Edith said, “But I choose not to find her.”