Thought for the Week by Peter Willox, Vicar, Ben Rhydding

“…and a little child shall lead them”.

Sunday evening, I sat down with my wife and daughter to watch, on the TV, Ariana Grande and an eclectic mix of musicians perform at Old Trafford. They were singing and playing to celebrate life in the face of death, joy in the face of sadness, music in the face of an attempt to silence. The screams heard that night in Manchester were not of terror but of exuberance mixed with a good amount of defiance and compassion.

I have to admit that Ariana Grande would not naturally be on my playlist. However, I was riveted to my seat, rising only to get some more tissues… yes, Dad was in tears most of the way through. Coming so quickly after the Manchester bombing, and less than twenty-four hours after the sickening van and knife attacks in London, emotions were raw. I didn’t howl or cry, but had a continuous flow of tears streaming down my cheeks, welling up from a mix of deep sadness for the lost, the hurt, the traumatised and the bereaved, and a deep joy and pride in the way those 50,000 people, and the millions of other viewers, wanted to make a statement about togetherness.

The most intense moment - when the stream of tears turned to almost river proportions - was the sight of two little girls standing together on stage holding hands, singing and crying, in front of this huge audience. One little girl was a school girl, a member of the Parrs Wood High School choir from south Manchester; the other was Ariana herself. Both were equals in their vulnerability. No amount of money or fame could separate them. At that moment they were sisters, and as I watched they were my daughters, and the folk in the crowd my wider family, and we were all crying together.

For me, and possibly for many people watching, crying together with those two little girls was a kind of ‘repentance’ moment; an opportunity to see things differently, to alter my way of thinking and to resolve to change my way of behaving. As they sang to us and to one another “you are, you are, you are my everything”, the song’s original meaning seemed to change into an inclusive love that heals the hurts and divisions that terror tries to inflict.

With that thought rolling round my head, and as the crowd went on to sing “Don’t look back in anger”, it was if I heard Jesus say “Yes, that’s what I meant when I said, ‘the kingdom of God is near’.”

That is the bit the terrorists don’t get. You can’t get into heaven by killing people and instilling fear. It opens up to you when you are most vulnerable, for that is when you are able to be loved and to love in return.