My father, Eric Burton, who has died aged 96, was a Congregational Church minister who conducted services in many churches across the UK and in the 1960s was secretary for children’s work at the Congregational Union headquarters in London. He also wrote a book, No Walls Within (1968), which was an innovative guide to creating a more inclusive atmosphere within churches and congregations, especially in terms of youth and children’s work.
Eric was born in Reading, the only son of Frederick, a Post Office clerk, and Annie (nee Roe), who worked in a general store. He went to the Perse school, Cambridge, as an evacuee during the second world war, and in 1944 joined the RAF.
