Exactly 100 years ago, The Tablet reproduced a pastoral letter by the Belgian primate, Cardinal Mercier, that was a rallying call to Belgians not to be cowed by the German occupiers. The author of a forthcoming biography of Mercier considers whether he deserves to be regarded as a war hero New Year’s Day, 1915. The small kingdom of Belgium, caught up in the colossal clash between Germany and France on the Western Front, had just lived through the most terrible months in its history. On 4 August, German troops had crossed its borders near Liège, in a bid to conquer Paris as quickly as possible, following a plan drawn up a decade earlier by General Alfred von Schlieffen. Germany thus deliberately violated the official neutrality that the European powers, including Prussia, had