At an ecumenical school service for Years 5 and 6 at a secondary school, I saw, for the first time after a long while, two little girls who had fled from Ukraine with their mothers. We’d been in close contact during the first years of their time in our town. When the girls saw me, they came over and gave me a very warm hug. Later, when I was due to give a short message, one of them suddenly jumped up and hugged me again, and her friend did the same, which created a very light-hearted atmosphere during the service. – When I went to do some shopping in a supermarket that afternoon, a car braked very abruptly in the car park in front of the shop and a young student, whom I hadn’t seen for a long time either, jumped out of the car: “I’m so glad we’ve met up,” she told me. We chatted for a few moments whilst her mother waited in the car, and as we said goodbye, she said: “How lovely! I’m really happy now!”
