Lessons to learn about war and competition

as the only survivor of a pre-1920 family, you can guess how strongly I feel about “lessons” that need to be learned from war – especially as a Quaker!

I was brought up in an orphanage in the 1930s because both my parents were dead, as was everybody else who may have been able to take responsibility for me.

Also, because I had been born in the 1920s, I served three-and-a-half years in the Second World War and I am typical. We are mainly unhappy in our old age, but there is nothing we can do about it.

The approach to death, for anybody, is a pretty grim period and most British people will have elderly relatives relying on them for their well-being.

I have tried to say so many times that competition (of any one person with another) is the most useless act any of us can consider.

The Olympic Games may demonstrate one person’s physical superiority over others, but they don’t demonstrate either intelligent or spiritually motivated living!