Reverend David Warner, the Vicar of Mossley, reflects on the tragedy of 2017 in which 22 people sadly lost their lives at the Manchester Arena.
On Saturday (22 May), we recall those who lost their lives, and those whose lives were changed forever by the Manchester Arena bombing in 2017.
As we have done now for several years, the floodlights of St John’s will be switched on from 10.09pm, staying on for a minute for each life lost in the tragedy: the lights will go out at 10.31pm, the moment the bomb exploded. We are proud to play our part in remembering, and working for a better world.
In the days after that tragedy, and in the years since, we have been reminded of Manchester’s worker bee, and the slogan ‘one love.’
It’s a phrase and a mindset that saw many through the dark times of 2017, and which has held many together over the past year of our collective struggle - like the bees who work for the good of the whole hive, defeating Covid and moving forward can only be as a society and communities that work collectively for the good of all.
This week lots of us have been able to return to some more normality - pubs and restaurants are open, and we can finally eat indoors, which is even more of a treat than we could possibly have imagined a few months ago.
We hold in our ‘one love’ all the business owners still struggling to rebuild their livelihoods and offer hospitality while doing so, and we continue also to extend that love to all finding it hard to begin to readjust.
As the Christian writer Martin Wroe has recently said: “Let’s make sure that the new normal is more than a vaccinated version of the old normal.”
We must build again, build better, all the time held together in the one love that will see us through.
Reverend David Warner, the Vicar of Mossley
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