THE battle for Dunkirk took place between May 26 and June 4, 1940, 77 years ago to the day on Friday. King George VI was a fragile man who will be remembered for two things from those dark days: first, he read a small poem beginning “I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year” in his Christmas address in 1939 and secondly he called the nation to a day of prayer. During the Dunkirk crisis and churches were full to overflowing. The rest is history.

It seems to many of us in the Church of Scotland that the Kirk has reached a Dunkirk moment in its history. The present statistics and the predictions for the next 10 years indicate a critical situation which I do not need to repeat.

Would it be too much to ask the new Moderator to do something drastic but obvious? We are a Church of Jesus Christ. We pray. We pray for the nation but we need now to pray for ourselves. If he wishes to be remembered, and not many Moderators are, as George VI is remembered, let him call the church and nation to a day of prayer.

Peter Kimber,

5 Foreshot Terrace, Dirleton, East Lothian.