22nd April 2026

Tomorrow is St George’s Day. Nobody seems to know why St George became the patron saint of England. He was born in Turkey and is popularly thought of as having slain a dragon. I have been to Turkey a couple of times but didn’t see any dragons – so maybe he slew them all!

In reality he was probably a Roman soldier who converted to Christianity and was martyred for his faith at the time of the Emperor Diocletian in the fourth century.

Then we have the flag of St George, with its red cross, as the flag of England. Writing in The Times last Saturday, the Archbishop of York pointed out that the red cross signifies sacrifice and the white background signifies purity and love. As it is flown over many churches and public buildings to mark this day, it will be misunderstood by many. In recent years this flag has been hijacked by people protesting against immigration and, in the more extreme cases attacking immigrants and the hostels where many of them live. And again this has been taken even further by some who attack people of certain races who are perceived as unwanted incomers to this country.

I see this evil as being embodied in the figure of a dragon, so perhaps we should see the St George’s flag, not as a symbol of misplaced ‘patriotism’, but as a reminder that the ‘dragon’, an evil thing, needs to be slain.

David T Roberts