Leonard Cheshire morality of force
Title
Leonard Cheshire morality of force
Description
Leonard Cheshire talk on "Why I became a Catholic" at St Clement Danes. Speaks of his personal faith and search for the obligations that arise from it. Found answers in Catholic church. Continues to expand on his beliefs with examples. Submitted with caption 'Original container labelled "Sermon 22/3/75 Clement Danes". Leonard Cheshire sermon on the reasons for him being a practising Roman Catholic. He reflects on 30 years of Christian faith. at St Clement Danes Church, London on 22 March 1978. (Known as the RAF Church)'.
Creator
Date
1978-03-22
Language
Type
Format
Audio recording 00:20:18
Publisher
Rights
This content is property of the Leonard Cheshire Archive which has kindly granted the International Bomber Command Centre Digital Archive a royalty-free permission to publish it. Please note that it was digitised by a third-party which used technical specifications that may differ from those used by International Bomber Command Centre Digital Archive. It has been published here ‘as is’ and may contain inaccuracies or culturally inappropriate references that do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of Lincoln or the International Bomber Command Centre.
Identifier
SCheshireGL72021v20006-0001, SCheshireGL72021v20006-0001-Transcript
Transcription
Leonard Cheshire Resonate Project
File Title: GLC talk on "Why I am a Catholic" at St Clement Danes on 22 March 1978
Duration: 15 mins 47 secs
Transcription date: 29/09/20
Archive Number: AV-S 009
Start of Transcription
Group Captain Leonard Cheshire: This is a sermon to St Clement Danes; the subject: why I am a Catholic, and the date is March 22nd, 1978. I’d like to say first and foremost what a very great privilege I count it to have been invited to give this talk in this historic and beautiful church, and on this particular occasion as we approach the 3 holy days of Easter. And I would like to thank Mr Renaudin so much for your kindness. I know that the theme that I have been given is why am I a Catholic. Well I will in a word or two answer that question, but I would rather if I might look at some of the things that I think I have learnt now after 30 years as a Christian. And in particular I would like to try and address myself to what I feel is the fundamental question of all, and that is what is our purpose in life; why are we here, and what is our destiny. And I mean by that not just the destiny of each of us as a separate individual, but the destiny of the entire human family. It was only I think in my 28th year that I came to realise and believe that God existed, that God the creator of the world is a personal God and a god of love. And once I had come to realise and believe that in my mind, said if that is so, then obviously there are certain obligations that arise from that fact, and I wanted to go away and find out what those obligations were and make up my mind as to whether I could face up to them. I think that above everything else I was looking for reality. If there are laws that hold the natural world in place and in harmony, then given the fact of a creator there must also be laws that hold society together and help it attain its end. Not laws that are arbitrarily imposed from above, but which arise out of our essential nature, the nature of man and the nature of society. And I think it was that that predominated in my thoughts and a little later on I felt that the Catholic church gave me what I was looking for. Now I think that when we come to talk about the purpose of life the Christian church has tended rather to look upon this world and eternity - our heavenly home - as 2 quite distinct things. We are here only as passengers, as travellers. And that gives rise to the feeling in some people’s - non-Christians’ - minds that we’re not overly concerned with the affairs of this world. And I believe that the true teaching of the Christian church is very different. If we look at ourselves in our origin it is perfectly clear that man has gradually evolved over literally millions of years from the groundwork of this world, formed out of the slime of the Earth. We depend upon our existence on every single part of the Universe. In one way or another we are affected by everything that happens in the universe. We are an integral part of it. And when, however that may have happened, God created man or infused an immortal soul into man, he gave him a specific task. It was to subdue the Earth. Now if I were asked to say in a short sentence what is our purpose on Earth, I would say that we are here to construct eternity. We are not here just to save our own individual souls. We are an integral part not only of the human family but of the entire creation. And I believe that our task is to carry through with us into eternity not only our immortal souls joined to our bodies, but the works of our hands. I believe that every single thing that we do in life, however great, however humble, provided it is what God wills for us and is in keeping with his plan that has an eternal significance, we are actually here and now by our labours, whether it’s sweeping a floor or directing the government of a country, whether it’s in our relations with other people, doing something for them, we are actually participating in Christ’s work of building eternity, building the new heaven and the new Earth. Our Lord himself told us that he was going away to build a place for us. He gives the impression that that is actually a labour – something that needs to be done. And we know that he’s called upon us to share not only in his redemption of the world, but in his entire work. The obstacle of course to this is unfortunately the Fall – in other words sin. And for a moment I would just like to consider what is the nature of sin. Scripture and the tradition of the Church place sin very fairly and squarely in the depths of our being, as an attitude of mind, not as a single act, and again we can sometimes give the wrong impression by thinking that … giving … by saying that because one has done this that is wrong, unless he asks for forgiveness he is debarred from Heaven. But sin is far more an internal direction that we give to our thoughts and our life. When our Lord came down for his baptism and the Holy Ghost descended upon him, and as I believe the word literally means drove him out into the desert, he stayed there as we heard just now for 40 days fasting and praying. I believe that it was essential for him as a man - he is both man and God-, but as a man he had to discover what his life’s mission was and how he was to accomplish it. And one thing that always seems to stand out when God deals with us when he intervenes in history, intervenes in our own personal life to give us some direction, is that he’s incomprehensible to us. We can’t believe that that is really what he wants us to do. Even Abraham, the great man of faith of all time, his faith didn’t always stand firm. As you know, when he went down to Egypt, he was afraid that Pharaoh would take his wife, and so he said that she was his sister. He didn’t believe in God. And I think that what God was asking of his son our Lord, to him in his human nature must have appeared incomprehensible. And when we see how he set about the task of the salvation of the world, we can well believe that it looked incomprehensible to a human mind. And then we can see at the end of those 40 days the tempter coming to him and saying ‘Look, you’ve got a nice mission, you know that you are the special favoured one of God. You’ve eaten nothing for 40 days and you haven’t got the strength to get out of the desert. If you don’t get out of the desert you will achieve nothing. So, use your power. Ask your father to turn those stones into bread and he will’. Now which of us would stand up to a temptation like that? We wouldn’t. We would think it was reasonable. But our Lord alone amongst all men put his trust completely in his father even though he could not see how it could make sense. Adam may well have been presented with a similar situation in which the tempter didn’t just say ‘That’s a very nice apple, eat it’, but perhaps presented him with some sort of argument similar to our Lord. It’s reasonable to suppose that there’s a similarity between the temptation and the fall of Adam and the temptation and the victory of our Lord. But when it comes to our own lives, whatever the real truth of those 2 situations may have been, it does fall upon us to put our trust in whatever we can see God wants for us, even though it may seem incomprehensible and even to destroy everything that we’ve built up. We have the pattern of our Lord, and everything that he built up in his working life was pulled down. He died, again as we hear in one of the prayers; he died a failure. And out of that failure came the redemption of the world. I think that in particular looking upon ourselves as members of the entire human family we need to have faith that however impossible it seems, God does mean to bring every single member of our human family into a complete integrated unity and entity, an entity of its own, the mystical body of Christ as the Church might say. He intends that we should bring with us the entire creation. We share existence with the rocks and with matter; we share life with the plants, sense and instinct with the animals and the power to love and reflect with the angels. We are a little microcosm of the entire creation. And in us I believe the entire creation is to be united into a unity that our Lord compared with that between himself and his father. To us it’s impossible. We can hardly even think that such a thing could ever have been thought of. But I think that we need to have faith that what God says will be done, and that even this, the glorification of a united creation, a new heaven and a new earth will be brought about. And that it will be brought about by the little things that we do here and now in our daily work, in our relations with other people and in particular in working for unity, whether as Christians, or at any level in our life. This I feel is a special message of Easter, and I think for me it is a special message that my membership of the Christian church has given to me. I thank you.
15:45: Speech ends
15:47: End of recording
End of transcription
File Title: GLC talk on "Why I am a Catholic" at St Clement Danes on 22 March 1978
Duration: 15 mins 47 secs
Transcription date: 29/09/20
Archive Number: AV-S 009
Start of Transcription
Group Captain Leonard Cheshire: This is a sermon to St Clement Danes; the subject: why I am a Catholic, and the date is March 22nd, 1978. I’d like to say first and foremost what a very great privilege I count it to have been invited to give this talk in this historic and beautiful church, and on this particular occasion as we approach the 3 holy days of Easter. And I would like to thank Mr Renaudin so much for your kindness. I know that the theme that I have been given is why am I a Catholic. Well I will in a word or two answer that question, but I would rather if I might look at some of the things that I think I have learnt now after 30 years as a Christian. And in particular I would like to try and address myself to what I feel is the fundamental question of all, and that is what is our purpose in life; why are we here, and what is our destiny. And I mean by that not just the destiny of each of us as a separate individual, but the destiny of the entire human family. It was only I think in my 28th year that I came to realise and believe that God existed, that God the creator of the world is a personal God and a god of love. And once I had come to realise and believe that in my mind, said if that is so, then obviously there are certain obligations that arise from that fact, and I wanted to go away and find out what those obligations were and make up my mind as to whether I could face up to them. I think that above everything else I was looking for reality. If there are laws that hold the natural world in place and in harmony, then given the fact of a creator there must also be laws that hold society together and help it attain its end. Not laws that are arbitrarily imposed from above, but which arise out of our essential nature, the nature of man and the nature of society. And I think it was that that predominated in my thoughts and a little later on I felt that the Catholic church gave me what I was looking for. Now I think that when we come to talk about the purpose of life the Christian church has tended rather to look upon this world and eternity - our heavenly home - as 2 quite distinct things. We are here only as passengers, as travellers. And that gives rise to the feeling in some people’s - non-Christians’ - minds that we’re not overly concerned with the affairs of this world. And I believe that the true teaching of the Christian church is very different. If we look at ourselves in our origin it is perfectly clear that man has gradually evolved over literally millions of years from the groundwork of this world, formed out of the slime of the Earth. We depend upon our existence on every single part of the Universe. In one way or another we are affected by everything that happens in the universe. We are an integral part of it. And when, however that may have happened, God created man or infused an immortal soul into man, he gave him a specific task. It was to subdue the Earth. Now if I were asked to say in a short sentence what is our purpose on Earth, I would say that we are here to construct eternity. We are not here just to save our own individual souls. We are an integral part not only of the human family but of the entire creation. And I believe that our task is to carry through with us into eternity not only our immortal souls joined to our bodies, but the works of our hands. I believe that every single thing that we do in life, however great, however humble, provided it is what God wills for us and is in keeping with his plan that has an eternal significance, we are actually here and now by our labours, whether it’s sweeping a floor or directing the government of a country, whether it’s in our relations with other people, doing something for them, we are actually participating in Christ’s work of building eternity, building the new heaven and the new Earth. Our Lord himself told us that he was going away to build a place for us. He gives the impression that that is actually a labour – something that needs to be done. And we know that he’s called upon us to share not only in his redemption of the world, but in his entire work. The obstacle of course to this is unfortunately the Fall – in other words sin. And for a moment I would just like to consider what is the nature of sin. Scripture and the tradition of the Church place sin very fairly and squarely in the depths of our being, as an attitude of mind, not as a single act, and again we can sometimes give the wrong impression by thinking that … giving … by saying that because one has done this that is wrong, unless he asks for forgiveness he is debarred from Heaven. But sin is far more an internal direction that we give to our thoughts and our life. When our Lord came down for his baptism and the Holy Ghost descended upon him, and as I believe the word literally means drove him out into the desert, he stayed there as we heard just now for 40 days fasting and praying. I believe that it was essential for him as a man - he is both man and God-, but as a man he had to discover what his life’s mission was and how he was to accomplish it. And one thing that always seems to stand out when God deals with us when he intervenes in history, intervenes in our own personal life to give us some direction, is that he’s incomprehensible to us. We can’t believe that that is really what he wants us to do. Even Abraham, the great man of faith of all time, his faith didn’t always stand firm. As you know, when he went down to Egypt, he was afraid that Pharaoh would take his wife, and so he said that she was his sister. He didn’t believe in God. And I think that what God was asking of his son our Lord, to him in his human nature must have appeared incomprehensible. And when we see how he set about the task of the salvation of the world, we can well believe that it looked incomprehensible to a human mind. And then we can see at the end of those 40 days the tempter coming to him and saying ‘Look, you’ve got a nice mission, you know that you are the special favoured one of God. You’ve eaten nothing for 40 days and you haven’t got the strength to get out of the desert. If you don’t get out of the desert you will achieve nothing. So, use your power. Ask your father to turn those stones into bread and he will’. Now which of us would stand up to a temptation like that? We wouldn’t. We would think it was reasonable. But our Lord alone amongst all men put his trust completely in his father even though he could not see how it could make sense. Adam may well have been presented with a similar situation in which the tempter didn’t just say ‘That’s a very nice apple, eat it’, but perhaps presented him with some sort of argument similar to our Lord. It’s reasonable to suppose that there’s a similarity between the temptation and the fall of Adam and the temptation and the victory of our Lord. But when it comes to our own lives, whatever the real truth of those 2 situations may have been, it does fall upon us to put our trust in whatever we can see God wants for us, even though it may seem incomprehensible and even to destroy everything that we’ve built up. We have the pattern of our Lord, and everything that he built up in his working life was pulled down. He died, again as we hear in one of the prayers; he died a failure. And out of that failure came the redemption of the world. I think that in particular looking upon ourselves as members of the entire human family we need to have faith that however impossible it seems, God does mean to bring every single member of our human family into a complete integrated unity and entity, an entity of its own, the mystical body of Christ as the Church might say. He intends that we should bring with us the entire creation. We share existence with the rocks and with matter; we share life with the plants, sense and instinct with the animals and the power to love and reflect with the angels. We are a little microcosm of the entire creation. And in us I believe the entire creation is to be united into a unity that our Lord compared with that between himself and his father. To us it’s impossible. We can hardly even think that such a thing could ever have been thought of. But I think that we need to have faith that what God says will be done, and that even this, the glorification of a united creation, a new heaven and a new earth will be brought about. And that it will be brought about by the little things that we do here and now in our daily work, in our relations with other people and in particular in working for unity, whether as Christians, or at any level in our life. This I feel is a special message of Easter, and I think for me it is a special message that my membership of the Christian church has given to me. I thank you.
15:45: Speech ends
15:47: End of recording
End of transcription
Collection
Citation
G L Cheshire, “Leonard Cheshire morality of force,” IBCC Digital Archive, accessed June 15, 2025, https://ibccdigitalarchive.lincoln.ac.uk/collections/document/40104.