Viewpoint

Cheshire House is truly blessed to have a patron of Leonard Cheshire’s compassion, strength, leadership and vision. He visited Riverview several times, and I was privileged to be on staff during his 1985 visit, when he spoke to students and staff at Cheshire House.

Many would be aware of Leonard Cheshire’s efforts, together with his wife, Sue Ryder, to establish homes for those with special needs, which, worldwide today, support thousands of individuals with disabilities.

Cheshire’s earlier years were quite different. Many will recall that he was the youngest group captain in the RAF and one of the most highly decorated pilots of the war. For his bravery, he received a Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry which can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces. His Victoria Cross was one of only two awarded to the RAF for sustained gallantry throughout the war.

Unlike many VCs awarded for a single, isolated heroic act, Cheshire’s medal recognised his entire operational career with RAF Bomber Command, including 102 dangerous bombing and target-marking missions, a record for a Bomber Command pilot.

He pioneered the highly dangerous, low-level technique called target marking in his Mosquito aircraft. He would fly directly over heavily defended targets at low altitudes to drop flare markers, ensuring accuracy for the bombers following him.

A recording exists of his words to students of a St Ignatius School (probably in Canada or the United States) created in 1974.

We had to devise a new method of precision bombing and our job became that, it was one we’d always wanted, of learning how to destroy a military target or an industrial target, without taking civilian life”.

The first test of this method was to be over France. Gnome Rhone factory, which is making aero engines for the Luftwaffe. And our instructions were to destroy it, but not to take one civilian life, if we did, we would not be given permission to do any more trials in France. One snag was, that at the time that we were due into the target - which is just before 1am in the morning – there were 500 girls on night shift. Now how would you destroy a target, with 500 girls inside it, without hurting any of them?

We were trained as low level flyers, we were doing it day after day, night after night, flying below tree level. The danger was when you came up, you had to go either in and out of the trees or just come up over a tree and quickly down again. And we did three low level runs, as low as we could get, in a four engine Lancaster, which I can assure you, makes a lot of noise, over this factory.

They had developed a way to identify an important target while also saving civilian lives. How different this is from today’s wars in Ukraine and Gaza, where civilians appear to be targeted.

In 1945, Cheshire was an official British observer of the USA nuclear bombing of Nagasaki. He was horrified at the death and maiming of so many civilians. Cheshire later said of the experience, "with such utter devastation before our eyes, how imperative to do something to see that it should never happen again”. He resigned from the forces the following year.

Statistically, by the end of the war in Europe, he should have been killed four times, since he had flown over 100 missions across enemy territory. Almost all the pilots he had started out with in training had died. It was his good luck, he believed, that had kept him alive when so many other pilots had been killed. However, I believe it was more than good luck, and that God had a purpose for him.

Upon returning to civilian life, Cheshire initially struggled to find his exact purpose, and a few of his early veterans’ community ventures failed. He experienced profound soul-searching and a loss of meaning. Witnessing massive wartime loss and the atomic bombing of Nagasaki left him with an uneasy conscience and a strong sense of duty to build a better peace. In 1948, by chance, he offered his own home and nursing care to an old friend, Arthur Dykes, who was dying of cancer and had nowhere else to go.

It came about because whilst I was trying to make up my mind what to do and unable to know what to do, I came across an old man dying of cancer, in hospital. And the hospital could do nothing more for him, there was nothing that could be done to make him better, only to keep him in bed and nurse him, said, ‘I’m sorry but he must go, nowhere would take him because he was incurable'. So, for want of anything else, I asked him if he’d like to come into the large empty house in which I was living. I never thought he would, but I thought I must offer him something. Rather to my surprise, he said, ‘yes, I’d love to.’  Having no money with which to pay a nurse, I obviously couldn’t get a nurse, so the only thing I could do was to try and look after him myself.

That singular act of compassion blossomed into the Leonard Cheshire Disability charity, which today supports thousands of individuals with disabilities worldwide.

His search for life's purpose also deepened his spirituality. In 1948, while he was nursing Arthur Dykes, their conversation turned to religion. Dykes was a lapsed Catholic re-finding his faith, and it was through their late-night discussions that Cheshire decided to convert. After Dykes’ death, Cheshire read one of his books, about an Anglican clergyman who had converted to Catholicism. On Christmas Eve 1948, Cheshire was received into the Catholic Church.

It is significant that it was also a book which St Ignatius read during his convalescence after the cannonball injury that helped him turn to God’s service. Another similarity is that both Cheshire and Ignatius were soldiers who later turned to the service of Christ and his people.

Another Ignatian value which Cheshire displayed was Gratitude. Cheshire’s squadrons were a composite of many different countries. And the largest contingent, outside the English, were the Australians,

I can assure you that for me, for the rest of my life, I will carry, most grateful and affectionate memories, of the Aussies, with whom I was privileged to fly and serve. I think that we, in Britain, will never forget the debt that we owe, to other countries, who came from so far away, to help us in our struggle.

I am grateful for the chance to meet Leonard Cheshire face to face when he visited Riverview in 1985. With just two of us in the room, our paths crossing, he stopped to meet me and chat. His welcoming gaze made me feel that at that moment, I had his total attention.

_{1975 - To the left side of Leonard Cheshire, Mr Robert Hanley, Fr Robert Davoren SJ. To his right side, M Frawley (Cheshire Captain), Mr Les Kirkpatrick (Housemaster)}

Returning to his talk to the students, he noted - If we ask ourselves, what can I do to build the kind of world that we want, a world in which peace and justice and freedom will flourish? The answer is that every single one of us has got a part to play, even if somebody is totally helpless or incapacitated, if they are making the most of their opportunities and their resources, then their contribution is as valuable as that of somebody who is powerful and fit and perhaps wealthy. That’s not the standard by which we judge things. We judge people by their achievements, by what they’ve done. But I’ve come to think that this is not the true test. I don’t think worldly achievement counts so much. Achievements can be washed away overnight. You can work all your life and build something up, and then, overnight, it’s destroyed. But what counts is the effort, the sacrifice, and this is not washed away – this is remembered, it continues. And this is the criterion by which God will judge the value of our actions. Let us do what we can and leave the rest to other people and to God.

In his conclusion, he said – I would say only one thing to you, never stop doing something, or be put off from doing something, because it seems so enormous and you feel too inadequate, too small. Everything that we, as human beings do, because we are human beings, will be inadequate, it will have faults, it will be small – no use persuading ourselves we can do anything big. The important thing is, have we made the most of our opportunities, such as they are. And although you will have been told this before, I will say it again, that the world that you hand on as you grow older, to your children, will be the world that you make.

I’d like to offer every one of you my warmest wishes, and ask God’s blessing, not only on your school and your coming exams, but in your future lives wherever they may lead you. Thank you very much.

I am hopeful that the example of Leonard Cheshire continues to inspire and encourage us to make a positive difference in our world, now and in the years to come!

Year 7 Day of Reflection

I would like to commend all staff and students who were involved in the Year 7 day of reflection, which provides an experience of Ignatian Spirituality within the context of this Jesuit College of Saint Ignatius. All were delighted that the weather allowed all outside activities to go ahead, and from what I witnessed, the students seemed engaged and enthusiastic. I heard one student express surprise and commented, ‘I never noticed that before’. Ignatian spirituality challenges us to observe our environment more carefully and, in many cases, to respond with gratitude for our natural world and for the College's buildings and gardens, which are a legacy of previous generations. All the students I spoke to were very positive about their reflection day. I was impressed with the thoughtful leadership of our Year 10 Peer Ministers and commend them for their generosity and successful engagement with the younger boys in their House. A more comprehensive report on this day is available later in this Viewpoint.