730 things — Day 118 of 365

This is the feast day of the Holy Royal Martyrs of Russia — Tsar Nicholas II, his wife Tsarina Alexandra, Crown Prince Alexis, and the Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia — as well as those martyred with them. They were shot and bayoneted to death by Bolshevik revolutionaries, and taken to the Koptyaki Forest where their bodies were stripped and mutilated and buried in unmarked graves.

Tomorrow is the feast of Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, another of Russia's new martyrs.

Elizabeth was married to Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, whose policies were very conservative, even reactionary. Grand Duke Sergei was responsible for the expulsion of Moscow's 20,000 Jews; not a great start to his tenure to say the least.

He was assassinated by a terrorist bomb in 1905. His wife Elizabeth rushed to the scene of the explosion, and knelt in the snow to gather up the scattered remains of his body and his scattered medals, so he could be borne away with dignity.

Elizabeth then made some changes to her life. She became vegetarian, sold her jewellery and began to live as a religious. She opened (and became abbess of) a convent dedicated to the saints Martha and Mary, from where she dedicated herself to helping the sick and poor in Moscow.

In 1918 Lenin ordered her arrest, and she was taken first to Perm then Yekaterinburg where she was housed in a school. She spent her days there planting vegetables in the garden and living out the observance of her faith.

But in the summer of that year she and her companions were taken out to a disused mine 20 metres deep, blindfolded and with their hands tied behind their backs. The journey, in horse-drawn carts, took two hours; Elizabeth and her companions sang hymns. When they reached the pit, first Elizabeth was throw in, then the others. There was water at the bottom, and the intention was that they would drown, but some — including Elizabeth — caught on the projections at the side of the pit. She could be heard talking to the person thrown in after her. The Bolsheviks then threw in hand grenades, but still not everyone died. After the explosions, they could still hear people singing. So they stuffed the pit with wood and set fire to it.

A few months later when the bodies were uncovered, they were still in relatively good condition, so it is thought they may have died of starvation.

Elizabeth's sister Alix and her family were murdered on the previous day.

Grand Duchess Elizabeth was canonised in 1981 by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia, and in 1992 by the Moscow Patriarchate. Today is her holy feast.

Her last words are said to have been, "O Lord forgive them, for they know not what they do."

I grew up in a politically Conservative family. My father and mother and sister (and I think my sister's children too) have all been staunch Conservatives. But ever since I reached voting age, mine has been a  socialist vote. I have changed to a Green vote, but that is also socialist. Most of the people I know cast their votes to advance the political interests of themselves and others like them — the workers vote for those who will advance the cause of the workers, the landowners vote for those who will protect their rights, and so on. But I think when we vote it is meant to be not for 'me' but for 'us'. I am a resourceful person, and I hope I will always be able to figure out some kind of solution under any government. There is nothing to take from me, nothing to defend, because I live very simply and own little. So when I vote, I look for administrations I hope will lift up the poor and broken, who will help those members of society (and their families) who either cannot or will not help themselves. My vote is for the common good, an expression of my belief that we're all in this together.

In recent years, watching with horror the development of the political landscape in my country under the Conservative government — I am especially ashamed of its treatment of refugees, its corruption and its progressive decimation of the health service — I have been completely bewildered by Christians voting Conservative. 

Especially when Jeremy Corbyn, whose politics are almost a perfect match with the New Testament and the Old Testament prophets, was vilified by Christian people and undermined by his own party, I felt so grieved, heartbroken even.

I have lived since then with pain and bewilderment I didn't know how to process. I felt so bitterly disappointed in my Christian brothers and sisters voting for these people who want to turn their backs on the poor and let desperate people fleeing torture drown in the sea.

But the stories of Grand Duchess Elizabeth's death have given me some understanding and insight, and that has brought comfort. She was a gentle and most courageous woman of profound faith, devoted to prayer and helping the poor, and she was put to death in the most horrific manner — by socialists.

In my own life, it's also the case that the most vile man I ever met was married to one of my aunts; and he was a trades union rep, a staunch and active socialist. He was also opportunistic and cruel.

I have reached a temporary working conclusion that it doesn't matter one jot what your politics are — the country could be run equally successfully on socialist or Conservative lines. In fact, on balance and in general, I think I favour the Conservative approach.

But what brings a country down is greed and corruption, indifference to the wellbeing of creation, cruelty and callousness, merciless indifference to the poor and sick, the homeless and the refugee.

And almost any political system could be turned to political advantage if good people operated it — if those in hard times were lifted up, if nature was protected and regenerated, if kindness and restraint and honesty and simplicity and humility were the determinants of our way of life.

I am ashamed to the depths of my soul when I see Priti Patel working to have refugees left to drown at sea and turn the gypsies off their stopping places and deport people born overseas who work and live here in peace. But if the alternative is throwing bound people down a mine, then when that doesn't kill them chucking down hand grenades, then when that doesn't finish them off stuffing the outlet with wood and setting it on fire, then leaving the survivors to starve — well, I don't think much of that either.

I have come to believe that humanity is neither saved nor guided by politics — it has to be the other way round. We can learn from such leaders as the Dalai Lama, and Jigme Khesal Namygyel Wangchuck (the present Druk Gyalpo of Bhutan). 

If things do not change radically and quickly, we shall succeed in poisoning and suffocating the entire planet — our greed, our myopic consumerism, our selfishness; these all have to stop.

All I know to do is live quietly and simply, and let change begin with me.

Today's things to go from my accumulation of bits and pieces are a collection of hooks to hang things from the picture rails in Victorian houses. 

Our house is Victorian and has picture rails, but we prefer pictures hung lower and don't like looking at the string, so we tend to put a screw in the wall when we want to put up a picture.