Where they were on that fateful day

German television station ARD broadcast a programme this evening 'Where were you'. It was a documentary on how a number of people experienced the last days of the war in May 1945.

They interviewed a woman, who was a 12-year-old girl in Bergen Belsen, an 83-year old man who was above the beach at Omaha, who later defected, was sentenced to death, then sent to the Eastern front, captured by the Soviet Army and eventually released in 1950.

A war inflicted on the world because of madness and fanaticism.

Surely a world, which tends towards relativism of thought and philosophy makes far more sense than a world of absolute beliefs.

Does the name Adolf Hitler and the millions who supported his madness and fanaticism not leave one with no alternative but to dismiss all forms of dogma and 'certitude' in whatever hue it is peddled.

Unfortunately there is something seductive about certitude.

A current trend within the Catholic church to pull back on all the 'confusion' that appeared after the Vatican Council will lead to an unspeakable style of church. And that trend is taking place with frightening speed right now.

There is also a terrible hypocrisy being perpetrated by the peddlers of 'true dogma' and certainties.

Ask the woman who was a 12-year-old inmate in Bergen Belsen or the man who spent his 19th birthday at Omaha Beach in June 1944.