ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author presents a case of Anglo-Japanese reconciliation after the Second World War, where a pilgrimage was pivotal to British veterans achieving reconciliation with the Japanese. For them, the pilgrimage to Japan was more than an analogy – it was the basis and vehicle for attaining an international reconciliation, which had been overdue by more than half a century. The author contends that the pilgrimage to Japan offers war veterans and their family members a frame where meaning-making can be actualised.
The approach seeks an alternative to a mentalist model of reconciliation. It can be characterised as holistic and integrated, since it explores the experience of conflict through a person’s relation to the lived world and the discursive practice of working out a troubled past through remembering. In discussing the case of the pilgrimage for Anglo-Japanese reconciliation, the author suggests that pilgrimage is not confined to a particular purpose, whether religious or secular, and that there is a blurred boundary between military pilgrimage and secular/religious pilgrimage. It is in this blurred boundary that a life review is afforded, a reinterpretation of the past through opening up dialogues and reunions with historic enemies. The pilgrimage gives them a meaning potential for a new future.
