On Monday\u00a0the 4th of\u00a0August, at 2300, a small group\u00a0of people from the village I live in met to plant an oak tree to \"remember the start of the 1st world war in 1914\". \u00a0This\u00a0was the day and time the British ultimatum to the Germans ran out, and we tragically joined that tragic war (which had actually been going on for a day or two).<\/p>\n
Planting oaks is a rather English obsession. \u00a0We do it all the time, and have done for a long while. \u00a0The senses stir at the sight of an isolated oak with its unmistakable profile. \u00a0The oak is one of those cultural symbols beloved of us \u2013 whatever sort of English woman or man we might be. \u00a0If you don't understand that, then, in Andy Stables's sense, you lack a certain cultural literacy. \u00a0You also lack, I'd say, a certain sustainability literacy \u2013 dodgy concept though that might be.<\/p>\n
To plant an oak in 2014 is an act of hope, and, if this weren't a secular oak, an act of some faith. \u00a0How will it fare as the climate shifts and the land (probably) warms? \u00a0Actually, it might just fare better than we shall.<\/p>\n
This oak is secular because it was planted with no order of service or clerical blessing; no prayers were said, no pious hopes for peace were expressed; no priest was present to lend a spurious gravitas. \u00a0This was in stark contract to what was on offer on TV at the same time when a ridiculously literal *<\/strong> 'lights going out' service was broadcast from Westminster Abbey. \u00a0I was relieved\u00a0to stop watching this as the cant was both considerable and suffocating, particularly\u00a0as none of\u00a0the many bishops, cardinals, right reverends, and most venerables on show had anything remotely worthwhile to\u00a0say about war or peace. \u00a0To a man, they lacked the grounding, solidity and gravitas of the\u00a0oak.<\/p>\n In contrast, those of us\u00a0who planted the tree, shared\u00a0stories of our grandfathers' experiences in the war, and that sense of hope. \u00a0It was low key, and really rather wonderful.<\/p>\n Note<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n *<\/strong> The service was based on British Foreign Secretary Edward Grey's remark' just as war was engaged, that \"the lamps\u00a0are going out all over Europe, we shall not\u00a0see them lit again in our life-time.\" \u00a0This was obviously a metaphorical assertion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On Monday\u00a0the 4th of\u00a0August, at 2300, a small group\u00a0of people from the village I live in met to plant an oak tree to \"remember the start of the 1st world war in 1914\". \u00a0This\u00a0was the day and time the British...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6081"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6081\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}