Sunday 10 November 2013

Remembrance Day, 2013

Like a lot of people in this country, I attended a Remembrance Day service on Sunday.

It was a cold, crisp day, just as I remember many Remembrance Sundays being when I was a child.

I was a Brownie, then a Guide, and we always attended the services in the village in which I grew up. 

I think this is a fantastic tradition, and long may it continue.  It keeps the younger generations in touch with these events.

Now I still attend them with my husband and daughter because I think it's important that we remember the huge sacrifice ordinary people made in order to keep our freedom. 

Members of my family were killed in action in the First World War, and their names join that of many others on the War Memorial in my home village.

But getting back to this year's service, the little church was packed, the Silver Band played the hymns - I Vow to Thee My Country and Onward Christian Soldiers made all the more powerful for being accompanied by the band. 

As the Vicar gave her sermon, a beautiful butterfly fluttered through the Church.

I found this particularly poignant.  In the midst of this solemn service of remembrance, there was a lovely reminder of the beauty of nature and the fragility of life.

It makes you think, doesn't it? 

'They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old,
Age shall not weary them or the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.'

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