Peace Light from Bethlehem arrives with Stamford Scouts at Methodist Church, Barn Hill

A flame symbolising peace arrived in the area from Bethlehem.

The Peace Light is a symbolic tradition maintained by the Scouts, and for the first time in its 20-year history, it has come to Stamford.

The lantern’s flame was lit on the first Sunday of Advent in the grotto at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, thought to be the site of Jesus’s birth.

It was then flown to Vienna in Austria, where it was greeted by 1,300 Scouts, and has since been carried across Europe, including to a Ukrainian Scout group in Nottinghamshire.

Jan Simmonds, a leader with the 2nd Stamford Scouts, was among a delegation to meet the Peace Light in Stamford Methodist Church in Barn Hill yesterday (Friday, December 21).

She said: “The light is lit in Bethlehem and is then carried to Scouts around the world, but this is the first time it has come to South Lincolnshire.”

Stamford’s Methodist minister, the Rev Andrew Hollins, described for the local Scouts what the grotto at the Bethlehem church is like, before sharing a special Peace Light prayer that asked the flame to bring joy and hope and ‘fill faces with smiles’ and to ‘bring us closer to God and each other’.

Scout Henry Stainsby, 12, said: “I feel privileged to have seen the Peace Light because, coming all the way to Stamford from Bethlehem, it is something special.