In an episode of University Challenge some years ago, Jeremy Paxman challenged eight hopeful students with a rather extraordinary ‘starter for ten’ by asking, “What text could be answered by the responses: No, no, no, no, get them yourself?” One bright young thing buzzed in almost immediately, correctly identifying that Paxman was, of course, talking about William Blake’s Jerusalem – one of this country’s most popular hymns, that we shall sing in just a few minutes’ time.  

University Challenge does not usually generate a lot of amusement, but this produced a brief burst of laughter from the competitors and the audience, before the quiz show returned to its regular diet of more serious and academic questions.  

Blake was writing, of course, before modern day policing had been established in England’s ‘green and pleasant land’ – the Metropolitan Police Act only coming into force more than twenty years later, in 1829. But, while Blake was in many ways an extreme radical (indeed, he was once arraigned for high treason, although acquitted of the charge), the sentiments of that famous poem and hymn set out values with which Sir Robert Peel would, I am certain, have agreed. For, as one major police historian has written, Peel’s vision of policing relied not on force or aggression or fear, but, by maintaining ‘the approval, respect and affection of the public’.  

Despite Blake’s famous reference to the ‘dark satanic mills’ of the early 19th Century, I think most of us would claim that the world has become a darker place than either Blake or Peel experienced. One consequence of this is that those who now serve as police officers not only face challenges of a kind that would, I think, have bemused and horrified Peel, but which place far greater strain on the fundamental value of ‘policing by consent’.

But it was into this service that Rosemary Jane Prior willingly stepped, and the outpouring of grief at her sudden, tragic death last month will, I deeply hope, remind and reassure not just her family and friends, but police across this county and country, that ‘the approval, respect and affection of the public’ continues to underpin the relationship between our police forces and the public.

But, while we are stirred by the curiously overlapping visions of the radical Blake and the conservative Peel there is something yet greater than either man articulated. There is something greater that, I believe, lies at the very heart of policing ‘England’s green and pleasant land’. And that, of course, was what was set out for us in the most famous passage ever penned by the apostle Paul, as he speaks to us about love.

About the real love that must underpin any attempt to create a new, heavenly, Jerusalem – about the real love that must guide and motivate the ‘mental fight’ and the use of the ‘sword’ that should not ‘sleep in my hand’.

Because, on a day like this, we recognize the imperfections of the world in which we live. We face the tragic reality that even highly trained professionals, following and upholding the wisest and most thoroughly rehearsed protocols will and can never be 100% safe. And we – the general public – recognise (and recognise with deep thanksgiving) that those who underpin the security of our society through their police service are, of course, never really off duty.

If we could have asked Rosie what made her pull into the side of the A19 on that fateful Saturday morning, I don’t know if she would have used the word ‘love’ in her answer to such a question. But – as a Christian, and just as someone who has lived into their sixties – I don’t really believe that it is possible  to live out the commitment that she espoused, and which she shared with so many gathered here today, without having some sense of and relationship to what St Paul describes for us in this most famous passage.

 For it is only love of which it can be truly said that it is patient, kind, not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 

It is our awful and tragic loss that, for Police Constable Rosemary Jane Prior, she endured a death so senseless and sudden. But, in dying as well as in living, it is clear to me, from all I have learned about this remarkable woman – and I am sure that for all of you who were blessed by knowing her, it is even clearer – her life pointed clearly to that selfless and enduring love of which Paul speaks so powerfully.

 And, on a day like this, you do not need me to tell you that Paul was right when he said, at the end of that paragraph, ‘Love never ends’. For the love for Rosie that is in the hearts of the many hundred people gathered here today is a love that will not be extinguished, just as the love that God has for Rosie will never be extinguished in life or in death.

I suspect that, unlike William Blake, Sir Robert Peel would not have wished ever to be described as a radical. But in his enlightened gift to the world of modern-day policing, he voiced the principle that ‘the police are the public and the public are the police’ – which, in its way, is deeply radical – as radical as the power of love of which St Paul spoke so passionately.

And that is why we give thanks for those whose ‘mental fight’ and ‘sword’ continue to try and establish and uphold that new Jerusalem in this country and every country that shares Peel’s radical and enlightened vision that is the light and direction of all those who serve in our police forces. And that is why, even – and especially – on a day when we look tragedy head-on in the eye, not only do we give thanks for the selfless vocation and life of Rosemary Jane Prior, but we also dare to say that, in hand with God, our love for her truly never ends. Amen.