Remembrance Sunday, 2007
By Mark Oakley, Monday 12th November, 2007
Exactly one month ago Queen Elizabeth and members of the British Royal family attended the dedication of a new national Armed Forces Memorial in Staffordshire, England. Designed by the architect Liam O`Connor, this large stone circle is the first national memorial dedicated to the men and women of the United Kingdom Armed Forces (Regular and Reserve) killed on duty or as a result of terrorist action since the Second World War. 16,000 names are listed. The new memorial also commemorates the invaluable contribution of those such as in the Royal Fleet Auxiliary and the Merchant Navy, who have given their lives in conflict zones while in direct support of the Armed Forces.
At the dedication the Archbishop of Canterbury noted that human beings are specialists in not seeing things, necessarily sometimes, screening out what we perceive doesn´t matter or isn´t useful. This can too easily slip into screening out what makes us uncomfortable or challenges our sense of being in control and, he said, one of the things we do not bring to mind enough is the fact that our ordinary lives and security depend on a great deal of invisible work and sacrifice by others. That is why we need visible memorials: if we are not to be dishonest, shallow and unreal we need to make the invisible visible.
In a similar way, this day set aside each year to remember those who fell in two world wars, recalling too the many acids that leaked from those conflicts into innocent people´s lives, as well as those who have fallen since in public service, this day of pride and pain, is a time to name, to name all those who have been ready to risk everything for the good of national community and the good of the world. I am always delighted to welcome ambassadors and representatives from around the globe at this service to remind us all not just of the terrible losses of many nations but also of the force for good that partnership can create. Some we remember today died in heroic circumstances, some in tragedy and conflict, some in routine duties, some as civilians trying to keep daily life as routine as possible, but all of them as parts of a single, great, generous enterprise. In a world often paralysed by cynicism, it is good, it is necessary, to remember. We need to keep still and silent for two minutes each year, to defrost, to see the cost of what we enjoy, in doing this to learn its value, and to harden our resolution to counter what would take it away again in our own day.
One of the images that we have become acquainted with over the last few years is that of a soldier´s coffin being carried out of a transport plane on to the airport tarmac. Indeed a friend of mine was recently brought back to the UK this way. As you watch the moving scene of fellow soldiers bearing the remains you see the huge bulk of the aircraft looming over a tiny coffin. And yet the Union flag draped over it, the waiting family, the officers, the chaplains, give that lonely coffin a powerful dignity. Remembrance Sunday focuses very sharply this contrast between the terrible and merciless forces of armed conflict and the lives and destinies of the individual human beings who are caught up in them. We are confronted with our human desire to live and die purposefully. How vital it is that the names of these fallen men and women are remembered, re-humanising statistics. For Christian people our names are part of our God-given dignity, they are given to us at baptism, when all that would speak against that dignity is drowned in water and we take deep breaths in the fresh air of the divine and eternal life. To remember here our God-given identity is the vocation of faith. To remember the names of those who gave their lives for our freedoms is part of a society´s vocation, literally to re-member, to put ourselves back together , to build on foundations that we see clearly rather than take for granted, and that is why a pledge for the future is now part of remembrance services. We can not talk about freedom without embracing responsibilities and values. For Christian people the lesson of Jesus on the mountain is essential to discerning what those might be.
As I have said before, as one who has not known the realities of war, I always feel uncomfortable standing here. I have had to rely in large part on biographies, histories, novels and films to try and learn what it must have been like to live through war and the death of so many loved ones. I was struck recently by Sam Mendes´s film Jarhead, set in the Gulf War of 1991, exploring the lives of Marines doing their duty in the desert “in a country they don´t understand, against an enemy they can´t see, for a cause they don´t fully fathom�. How similar this is to the reflections of those, for instance, caught up in the First War´s trenches. But in all this mess of war, the non-negotiable God-given dignity and preciousness of each human life, the beauties and strength of friendship and love, the courage of working for what is just and fair: these shine through and are also what we celebrate and give thanks for today. The Christian tradition has taught that war is always ultimately a failure. The pain of Remembrance Sunday is that sometimes that failure is necessary and unveils at the same time all those elements of human life and relating, and of the world in which we find ourselves, that are to be treasured and protected as long as we have breath ourselves.
I end with a personal story. A few months ago I was invited to preach at the newly reconstructed Frauenkirche in Dresden, it had of course remained rubble for 60 years. It was a moving experience to see people light their prayer candles next to the bent and charred cross that had been on the top of the church. The new cross on the top of the church was a gift from British people and was made by Alan Smith, whose father had been one of the British pilots that flew to Dresden. On my way back to the station my taxi driver asked me if I had enjoyed my visit to the city. Yes, I said, I had heard about Dresden as a small boy and had always wanted to visit. How come you heard about Dresden? the driver asked. I took a deep breath. Well, on 13 February 1945, I said, my grandfather, poppa, who brought me up was a navigator in a Lancaster that was part of the firebombing. He has died now, but as a boy I always wanted him to talk about it and he never would, he couldn´t, and the little boy I was remembered this and now I´m here learning why. The driver was quiet and then said, my mother was killed that night. Then I was quiet. He slowed down and stopped the car and I wondered what was going to happen. He turned round with tears in his eyes and held out his arm, �and now we shake hands� he said. I telephoned my grandmother as soon as I got to the station and told her about this remarkable encounter. She cried but then said, I think your poppa will rest a little easier.
That is my hope, our hope, that the way we live now, the values we live by, the compass we use, the just future we work for, will ultimately be the peace that those who sacrificed their lives can rest in. As the survivor of Auschwitz, Rabbi Hugo Gryn, said: the goal of memory is love. That is our challenge, the re-membering that we are to do in our own day and, dare I say, I feel it is urgent. And may all those who gave their lives rest in peace and know deeply the eternal embrace of God their creator and friend whose love is stronger than death.
