by Rev. Dr. Jim Warnock
I serve on the North American board of the Community of the Cross of Nails, an international group committed to reconciliation. It was founded after Nazi German bombers largely destroyed the city center of Coventry, leading Provost Richard Howard to call for forgiveness instead of anger. This led eventually to a reconciliation between English and German people after the war. The resulting CCN is an important ministry and a significant one for Christians. It’s particularly critical in our current age with its division and polarization. Recently, the Rev. John Witcombe, Dean of Coventry’s Cathedral in England and head of CCN’s worldwide ministry, visited Ukraine. He went to be a witness to the realities on the ground there, and to see how the Gospel is relevant to a very violent situation. This is his report:
“It turned out to be just the right time to visit. Sometimes things happen like that. Pastor Gross’s two daughters were back home from their studies in America and were able to translate, and the whole family were leaving the next day for a youth camp in the Czech Republic. Arne was able to collect me from the airport in Moldova and take me over the border to Odessa. Several members of the local Christian and civic community were present for my presentation – and the next day also saw the renewing of Russian attacks across the country.
“Sometimes as peacemakers our task is simply to go, to show solidarity and to bear witness. I bear witness to two things: one, that life goes on in Odessa in a way that seems very normal. As someone there said, we are not spending all our time picking our way around bomb craters. We had a lovely meal outside in the summer evening, and strolled on the beautiful tree-lined promenade above the port, listening to street musicians and enjoying the atmosphere. Two, that underneath that is a constant existential threat of attack, and that on my second evening my sleep was more or less destroyed by sirens and the sound of explosions in the middle distance.
“In the midst of my presentation about Coventry’s work in peace and reconciliation on Friday morning I was interrupted by Vladimir, one of the organisers, to say there had been notification of a missile attack, and did I want to go down to the bomb shelter. I didn’t really know what to say, so I asked what they wanted to do – we’ll just stay here, they said, but it’s up to you. I said I’d stay too. Later, over lunch, I was told how much that meant to them. “We have to be here,” they said. “This is our home, it’s where our families are. You didn’t have to be here, but you chose to come – and that means so much to us.”
“I’m not a hero. It did not feel especially unsafe for me to travel to Ukraine. I’d asked my host Arne, and Lesya, my Coventry contact, if I was being foolish travelling into a War Zone – it is a red zone on the government website, where we are strongly advised not to travel. But they had told me it wasn’t foolish. And everything we do is a risk. So we make our decisions on the basis of what is the right thing to do, and in conversation with those we are closest to. My wife Ricarda said, “Of course you have to go – or what on earth is the CCN for, if it’s not to accept a request to be with those who are caught up in conflict?”
“So, I went to bear witness, to be with them and to bring their story back to Coventry. But I also went to bear witness from Coventry, from our story, to them. What do we have to say, from our history? We have two things to say: One is the existential reality that God’s will is for the reconciling of all things. It’s that reality witnessed to by Provost Howard, the leader of the Cathedral when it was bombed, in his words on Christmas Day 1940, “We are trying, hard as it may be, to banish all thoughts of revenge. . . We are going to try to make a kinder, simpler, a more Christ Child-like sort of world in the days beyond this strife.” Yet to simply speak of reconciliation in that context can seem like a call for appeasement, a modern Neville Chamberlain’s call to give in to the aggressor – and many in Ukraine feel or fear that is what the West is asking of them.
“That’s why we need also to remember the other thing that Provost Howard said in that same radio broadcast: “We are bracing ourselves to finish the tremendous job of saving the world from tyranny and cruelty … we are in brave spirits, and can wish the empire a courageous Christmas.” As I was researching this sermon, I realized that I have usually removed those lines from presentations. In fact, they are in the very same paragraph as his repudiation of revenge. The thing is, that whilst speaking of the bigger hope of reconciliation, and holding on to that as our ultimate goal, what we may have do right now is to fight, really fight, against evil, and to defend ourselves against an aggressor, even whilst we hold on to the ultimate hope of peace.
“It was really important to say this in Ukraine. We cannot always achieve reconciliation when we want to. My hosts in Odessa told me that my fine words about gathering around a table to courageously explore our differences, to use art to bring us together, might have been fine before 2014 when Russia invaded Crimea, but now something else was called for. That something else is peace with justice. We can only really be in dialogue with those who are willing to recognize the truth, to take responsibility for their actions.
“Resurrection and Reconciliation” are the two Coventry key words. Another of my hosts said to me, “I have a third R for you: Responsibility”. It was a point well made: Resurrection, Reconciliation and Responsibility will help us move forward towards Peace with Justice, which is today the third of our CCN priorities.”