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Good Morning, Whilst we remember a terrible World War it’s interesting to see how our former enemies are remembering it. I recently listened to Prince Philip Kiril – the great, great grandson of the Kaiser - speaking about reconciliation between England and Germany. At the end of a moving speech he apologised for what his country had done in both World Wars. Seventy years after the Second there are still Germans asking for forgiveness. In 1945, when forgiving Germans was anathema, my grandfather Walter Brook was governor of a district outside Hamburg and responsible for its reconstruction and the feeding, re-housing and de-nazification of thousands of displaced people. It was a formidable task. Of the zones, the British was the most devastated. It was said ‘the American’s got the view, the French the wine, and the Brits the ruins.’ More bombs were dropped on Hamburg in a weekend than on London in the entire war. A shortage of housing led the British to requisition what buildings remained standing to accommodate their own families. Germans were put in billets. But when my grandfather went to requisition a house for himself, he did something radical and unique: rather than have the family ejected he let them stay, declaring the house big enough to share. Just one year on from the war, a British and German family lived under the same roof and continued to do so for the next five years. My grandfather’s decision was counter to the mood of the times. Europe was still raw with a desire for revenge and Germans seen as guilty and deserving of punishment. The appalling discovery of the concentration camps only compounded this. My grandfather was perceived as soft-pedalling not only by his fellow servicemen but, initially, by grandmother who had adopted Atlee’s directive to maintain ‘a cold and dignified aloofness towards Germans at all times.’ Forgiveness always costs something. It might mean accepting a personal loss, or dropping our right to be paid back. It can also open us up to the anger of those who demand their pound of flesh. But, as the gospels demonstrate, reconciliation is a much riskier business than retribution. Revenge brings instant results and momentary gratification; forgiveness requires faith in an outcome we can’t always see. And as so much of history and present strife prove, we are trapped in an endless cycle of destruction without it. It’s right to remember those lost in war but let’s not forget those who’ve helped build a lasting peace. Two years ago, I went back to Germany with my father to see the house and meet the German brother and sister he’d shared it with. He was unusually nervous. Worried that they wouldn’t remember things with the same benevolence. Within minutes of the reunion his fears lifted. Their fondness towards him was obvious. Later that evening they told us how grateful they had been to stay in the house. They even had a nickname for my grandfather. They called him ‘Dei Brucke.’ In German, the surname Brook means bridge.