First Duty

On the day that the UK began taking part in bombing Islamic State, there was some irony - not quite a bitter irony, I settled on the adjective 'sour' - that in the evening I did my first duty as Chaplain of the local Air Cadet Squadron, helping to enrol a group of new cadets. Years ago I used to work for the Army (only as a museum curator, very civilian) and came out of that experience with a great deal of sympathy with the Force, which I manage somehow to combine with near-pacifism in political terms. 

The Drill Hall area is like a little world to itself at the end of a street, surrounded by houses. It was raining quite heavily last night so out of compassion for the families of the new cadets to be enrolled the parade and enrolment took place indoors in the rather cramped surroundings of the hall. It strikes me as rather quaint that the local rector is seen to have a natural role in this process (although the guidance notes you get from the RAF do at least recognise that, shockingly, some cadets may well not be even nominal Christians), and equally quaint to be referred to as 'Sir'. Being confronted with a lad I knew from the infants school a few years ago as one of the recruits, saluting and heel-clicking, was something for which 'quaint' was hardly the word, as was the fact that the staff refer to the recruits' mums and dads as 'the parental units'. 

I am usually very reluctant indeed to take on new responsibilities but have done in this case as it gives me a rare opportunity to talk to young people who I get next to no chance to interact with in any other context. Having a padré around to 'do moral leadership' with the cadets offers, in the o/c's words, 'a slight counterbalance to some of the more gung-ho chaps who think the answer to anything is probably to bomb it'. Perhaps Mr Cameron could come and take part. I am trying to think of the ritual of the military as similar to the ritual of the Church, somewhat silly but with a serious purpose. As opposed to somewhat serious but with a silly purpose.