Can we just pause for 5 minutes while I grab some more popcorn?
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Afghanistan
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That’s a theocracy? Mauritania (had to look up the name but knew where it was!)? I think I flew in / out of Nouakchott–Oumtounsy International Airport once, didn’t nightstop.
Would Saudi also count? The Grand Mufti…
I’m assuming you are referring to Iran, but there’s one other much closer to home. And “Man” does the Bishop of Sodor and Man get very annoyed that people forget about them sitting in the Tynwald.
There’s also Andorra which has the Bishop of Urgell as a Co-Prince (alongside the French President)
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I think I’ve allowed myself to become a tad side-tracked by the less formal nature of this forum 
Getting back on track:
I think we should make Remembrance a secular event so that it is truly open to everyone. It means that many will feel welcome where they don’t currently, and it’ll make some perhaps feel as though they’ve been robbed of something they currently get to enjoy as though it was another Sunday morning in church, but it is the neutral middle ground that ensures a space where everyone can come together and not be reminded of the things that divide us.
Some people will be against this because they want it to remain in the image of their personal religious beliefs (I understand the attraction), but I think if we care about meaning what we say when we say we’re welcoming and inclusive of young adults across the UK, we have a duty to make sure what we provide or facilitate doesn’t erect barriers or divide our people wherever possible, and sees us carry out our equality duties etc.
A padre shared a piece reflecting on Remembrance and asked if it was still relevant, with “kids these days” being more into Strictly and TikTok.
I have another possible explanation, rather than implying it’s their fault.
In the 2021 British Attitudes Survey, 68% of respondents between the ages of 18-24 said they were non-religious. It’s a trend that has been in motion for decades and we’re on the sharpest bit of the curve. The younger they are, the less religious they consider themselves to be, and we’re nearly in 2025, so we’re talking about the next cohort, who will be less religious still.
If we don’t make young adults feel welcome and learn to communicate Remembrance in a language they understand and use references with which they can relate, we’re doing a terrible job of safeguarding it for the future.
Whether or not you want it to change for you, you must surely agree that we want to preserve the occasion for the future?
I’ve demonstrated that it can be both secular and incredibly moving and emotional — we don’t have to choose.
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I’m a pedant on words so forgive the facetiousness. 
Gold is unreactive, easily malleable & has no intrinsic value to itself other than what others project & ascribe.
By implication “secularity” is easily malleable, unreactive & has no intrinsic value to itself other than what others project & ascribe.
Your statement is conjecture & in the word of Wikipedia “citation needed”. Secularity is not the gold standard figuratively or literally, although if can quote a source I would be (genuinely) interested to read.
Non religious does not mean non-spiritual & the actual statement that I could find is the 68% do not belong to any organised religion. This is not the same as having no religious beliefs.
Also by implication one third of your young people DO state they are religious or part of an organised religion. How do you protect them & ensure that they as a minority are not oppressed or bullied as you would any minority?
It’s easy to change when you are the majority less so when you are in the minority.
As Sqn commanders part of our role is to be on the side of the underdogs, because they are the underdogs not to maintain the majority group think.
Agreed & what you have done is commendable but your base assumption is that the young people are not religious.
I would respectfully suggest that this is a bit of confirmation bias - you want it to be true so it has came “true” - young people have a habit of being different & surprising us old foggies - I think some are rebelling by embracing the old ways & not speaking up a bout it (a conjecture I know but I admit & accept it as such)
A single data point & not proof of concept particularly with remembrance as that is often a unique ceremony for each & every town. a small town with 7000 people will have a very different culture to a town of 60000.
You say up above about how many contacted you supporting an article you read but on the other hand how many did not? What was it in % terms? If 95% of yet organisation said nothing to you does that invalidate what you are trying to say?
Of course, It doesn’t invalidate but nor can it be taken as consensus or indicative of general feeling - purely what it is. A small sample size.
A big key thing with remembrance is the repetition of tradition - people gain comfort through going through a familiar service with their grandchildren that they went through themselves with their grand parents. If you change that then people start to drift.
I think we keep coming back to this issue - what is the envisaged end state? Treating religion. Vs secularism as a zero sum situation doesn’t work.
We could replace the deification aspect of religion with a more abstract but less supernatural concept such as the adherence to logic. But would this means to quote the great dictator that we think too much but feel to little?
Yet things must be challenged for society to advance & humans “worship” all sorts of things - it’s why populist leaders & cults often occur & what feeds the media frenzy round the false idols of celebrity.
Nature abhors a vacuum and any attempt at pure neutrality which just leave a gap that humans will fill.
Finally Remembrance Sunday itself is not secular but has the religious trappings- hence it first of all being on a Sunday. The silent two minutes of reflection is of non-specific religion itself but that doesn’t make it secular & I am unconvinced the origin of the act remembrance was purely secular.
The book “small gods” illustrates & explores through allegory what happens when people cease to question and believe more in the form & function of an event or organisation than the original purpose that was intended.
We see this on a base level with the ATC & RAFAC let along a theology that has been in existence for 2000years.
I don’t believe you have made the case for a fully secular Remembrance Sunday service but secularism has its place & shouldn’t be excluded.
Balance & tolerance is the key for any society to keep progressing & avoid stagnation - and inclusive does not mean exclusively secular.
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I’m sure you’re engaging in good faith, but you’re being incredibly inconsistent with how you apply your logic and make your case.
I’m all for a devil’s advocate, but it’s easier to take it one at a time and be clear that you’re doing so.
I need to properly sit down to address your post, as it’ll become clunky quite quickly if I rush.
There will also be stuff that I ignore, as interesting as a find it on an academic level, simply because it just isn’t conducive to keeping us on track. Perhaps that content can be covered at some point in the future, over a whiskey and camp fire.
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You’re probably right, given the data trend, but this does remind me of the argument that because young people vote Labour, in a few years’ time the Conservatives will be extinct. Never seems to happen, though.
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Must be different where you are as the remembrance service where we are has always been inclusive, lots of people of all denominations and non-denominarions always attending and feel welcomed. I am athiest but that doesnt mean others should be, what if your cadets are religious and your crusade makes them feel unwelcoming? Your want a service for everyone yet you feel the need to title it as an inclusiveness remembrance parade. Its doesnt need a new title, its just remembrance parade with a format that has content for everyone.
No doubt you have done alot of work to evolve remembrance to reflect an ever changing world to attract newer generation which is commendable, but labelling as a first inclusive remembrance parade is not exactly true as others have done it but dont feel the need to push it down other peoples throats, and the irony is that’s what is wrong with religion.
In my view remembrance should not be politicised, religious, or a platform for every other organisation to advertise their beliefs or motivation. It is neutral, providing a platform for people to reflect in their own particular manner without prejudice.
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I can’t believe it’s taken this long for someone to get personal and force us to edit it.
I’ve removed the personal aspects and any subsequent posts or quotes that reference it.
So far, it’s been respectful debate. Keep it that way or I’ll lock and suspend users.
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Subsequent generations always rebel against their predecessors. Gen X we’re much more conservative than their hipster Boomer parents, Gen Z are less woke than millennials, etc. These are, of course, generalisations.
Creating a non religious enviromental for the act of Remembrance shouldn’t make anyone feel unwelcome. Making everyone attend a Sunday Christian church service certainly could.
If you have a few Muslim or Jewish cadets, is it appropriate for them to be ‘forced’ along to church? (Forced, in terms of there often not being another option.) I think it’s wrong.
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A quick reply as a busy Saturday but I refer you to my earlier statement about arguing weirdly 
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Its a balancing act, needs elements that everyone can take away, whilst some elements people may tune out. If it is there you can choose to ignore it. if it isnt there you cannot choose to engage with it. As an athiest i dont like religion as it is assumptuous, however there are others who gain from it. Aside from running several adjacent remembrance activities it is impossible to please everyne. Aside from this, mainly the day is about those in the past not us today, but appreciate the solice it may provide.
Agree the act if remembrance itself should be atcwar memorial not church, if the war memorial is on church property that should be pure coincidence or practicality and not considered as a religious icon
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If I understand your position, you are advocating for a purely secular remembrance service as you believe this is the most inclusive.
My position is that an inclusive service includes & permits both the religious & the secular.
These positions seem to be opposed & in conflict.
As long this is acknowledged & respected this is acceptable.
Last week the chaplain leading our town service said last Sunday
“for those to do so let us pray or take moment of silent personal reflection according to our own individual beliefs”
For your service you could flip that with “let us take a collective moment of silent reflection & prayer for those who do so”
If that is the only reference to religion in your service that would probably still be widely acceptable to most people there as it acknowledges that a sizeable percentage of people do pray but leads with the secular rather than the religious aspect.
Whisky & camp fire philosophy always work well on developing understanding & tolerance of one another. It’s a form of Extelligence & helps us develop as people 
Remembrance is a reflection on death of other humans being, so it will go deep into the philosophy & the spiritualism since mankind started following burial customs over 300,000 years ago.
There are 7billion people on this planet, 70million in the UK, 7000 in your town - every single one having a unique & personal philosophy that differs from everyone else. Whilst yes you can categorise people into different boxes or themes this takes away from the nuance & uniqueness of an individual.
The military world is very bad at allowing personal thoughts - it’s very much a black & white we do it this way or we dont. Difference & dissensions are clamped down on and Conformity is enforced over the individuals personality because that’s how the military must work.
Everywhere else, people can be more flexible. So I wouldn’t ignore the “academic” as the philosophy helps inform the debate. Humans work through using allegory & metaphors to understand the world around them.
We have all soon senior managers make a bad organisation decision because it is the right decision but on the wrong data, often extracted from the wrong criteria based on the wrong assumptions.
Challenging & adapting those base assumptions we make as individuals as part of our decision making is how we get to the solution that works rather than something that kinda does the job or just looks like it does but is just smoke & mirrors. 
Whos track? Is the OP suggesting there is only one permitted track so all others will be ignored because it doesnt suit the arguement ( I have possibly been gulty of that). All parts of the discussion are relevant otherwise where is the inclusivity and diversity ?
@OC.1324, I just wanted to say how much I agree with your idea and, and pleased I am that you have managed to organised a ‘proof of concept’.
Attending a church service as part of remembrance Sunday has never really sat right for me.
I understand and accept that religion can be comforting to those in the services, and that many would not be able to face the fact they’ve signed up to make the ultimate sacrifice without having some system of belief in place.
But for me, remembrance Sunday should be all about remembering the individuals who have fought and/or died for our freedoms. The families who have been left behind. The lives cut short to protect us. In short, it should be about remembering people. Not their beliefs, or their political system or anything other than the fact that these people signed up to do a job that ended their lives.
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The act of remebrance was removed from our church 12 years ago, so maybe they were ahead ofvthe game and inadvertently had the first inclusive event :), seriously it was originally removed as the remembrance attendance outgrew size of church but has benefited a good large diverse attendance so all for the greater good
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Ergo, secularism in the sense I defined it, not the corrupted sense some have misrepresented it.
It is impractical to represent the views of all, and it’s not the place for it. Protect the public sphere from private beliefs, all 7000, and focus on remembrance - the uniting purpose.
@JustCallMeFlight is someone with very different beliefs who gets the value of protecting the core event for all of us. Muster in houses of worship etc after for tailored bolt-ons.
Not my full response. Promise to revert.
I haven’t seen it, but thanks to the mods for keeping it friendly.
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Thanks very much for the support! It means a lot.
To address some points from above (without going blow-by-blow):
I need to clarify that my motivations were to create a space that truly welcomes all my staff and young adults. The status quo disenfranchised anyone who wasn’t Christian.
If anyone is focussing on the fact that Christian cadets have lost a deeply-engrained privilege (and not that everyone else previously had to observe someone else’s beliefs and not their own), you’ve missed the point / highlighted the importance of my initiative.
Allow me to frame it in political terms instead, to highlight why this is best practice:
It’s not Conservative, which would alienate some. It’s not Labour, which would alienate some.
Being neither of those doesn’t automatically make it LibDem…
It’s neutral, and we’re not there to do politics anyway. We stop it being political so that everyone can focus on the reason we’re there, rather than having to expose ourselves to distracting differences of opinion.
It’s really simple and we do this the rest of the time.
If we want all our people to be able to engage on an equal footing, then just like our workplaces, we need to not favour one group over another with baked-in bias.
To address a point from @Chief_Tech , it protects minorities most of all by securing them a neutral space in public life and not marginalising them.
Again, I stress that I don’t want anyone else to observe my humanist beliefs, because my humanist beliefs can’t possibly be inclusive to people who don’t view the world that way.
Neither then can Christianity be inclusive to people who don’t view the world that way. And so on for all the other options, religious or not.
It doesn’t mean you’re not welcome to be or think a particular thing, it prevents you from creating an environment where you make other people observe your private beliefs and, insodoing, disenfranchise them.
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