Celebration and humility on the anniversary of VE Day

This is a transcript of an episode of BBC Radio 4’s Thought for the Day, broadcast on 5 May 2025.

Later today, the VE Day celebrations will feature extracts from Churchill’s famous “This is your hour” speech, given originally from a Whitehall balcony.

He did many other important things that day. He had already gained assurances that there were enough beer supplies in the capital! Then, at 3pm, he announced on the radio Germany’s unconditional surrender. He went on to give the same message in the Commons but added his gratitude for the strength of Parliamentary democracy in a time of war, and that the House should follow what happened at the end of the first War. He therefore moved that the House attend the Church of St. Margaret, “to give humble and reverent thanks to Almighty God for our deliverance”.

So the Prime Minister led the Commons to push their way through ecstatic cheering crowds to St Margaret’s while the Lords went to Westminster Abbey. The iconic image of the day was people dancing in the streets, the lesser-known image was of packed churches with the Abbey, St Paul’s and other churches around the country having services hourly throughout the day.

Historians have pointed out that this relationship between faith, the British state and war is of course complex. There were those among the allies who saw Christianity as the only belief system able to match the power of Nazi ideology, and so used it to motivate and unite the population. Recruitment of religion in times of crisis to support the political righteousness of a cause was nothing new, and the troubling message ‘With God on our side’ is still proclaimed today from the US to Russia.

Yet I see in this need to pray and worship on VE Day something deeper. Worship in the Christian tradition is a framework for expression of celebration and thanksgiving. It is also a place to lament and remember those who have been killed or injured in the pursuit of victory over evil, which was so important for many that day. It is also an encounter with the story of Jesus, who embodies the way of peace and justice for all. As Churchill commented, “We may allow ourselves a brief period of rejoicing; but let us not forget for a moment the toil and efforts that lie ahead.”

The St Margaret’s service finished with a rousing version of a hymn by Isaac Watts that originally began, ‘Our God, our help in ages past’. But the Methodist John Wesley changed it to ‘O God, our help’, to say that God is my hope, but I do not own him. Worship allows me to celebrate but it also brings humility.