I have been at Walsingham in Norfolk, speaking to Army and Navy chaplains. Fine people they are, working alongside the troops and sharing the rigours and dangers of life in the armed forces. I learnt more from them than they did from me.
I learnt that a naval chaplain takes the rank of the person they are speaking to. If you’re talking to an admiral, you’re an admiral. If you’re talking to the youngest rating in the ship, that’s your rank at that moment. That seems to me a good system.
They told me about being with bereaved families when a young soldier has been killed. They told me about the troops serving abroad who say to them, ‘What are we doing here?’ They spoke of the feeling among the troops that they are not much supported by the rest of us.
There’s a problem here. Like many other people, I doubt whether we should have gone to war in Iraq. From that point of view it’s difficult to support wholeheartedly what our troops are being asked to do there.
But that’s not their fault. They are serving with great dedication, courage, and professionalism. They deserve our support and encouragement, even if those who sent them there do not.
The Mercian Regiment marches through Worcester this week, and comes to the cathedral to remember their comrades who died serving in Afghanistan. Let’s give them the welcome they deserve.
Walsingham, where I met the chaplains, is an old place of pilgrimage. It is dedicated to Mary, the mother of Jesus. It is called England’s Nazareth.
It sounds a far cry from where our troops are serving today in peril of their lives. But it isn’t. Nazareth today is an Arab town, caught up in the long tragedy of the Holy Land.
Other towns in the Christmas story, Bethlehem and Jerusalem, are in the news for the same reason. Iran and Iraq are lands of the Bible. The story of the Middle East today and the stories of the Bible of long ago are the same story. It is the story of the struggle for peace and justice and reconciliation amid human conflict and suffering.
Christians believe that God is in the heart of all that suffering, taking it into himself, and meeting it with love. That’s what keeps the Army and Navy chaplains going in their hard but valued work.