Today’s Epistle lection tells us about the armour that God provides in order that we might stand safe in our faith. The various parts of a suit of armour are used as images for what we might require in our day to day living out of the faith.
There is truth and righteousness; there is the gospel of peace as well as faith; there is salvation and the word of God. The overall image of putting on armour is a useful link to the fact that today is Remembrance Sunday.
Remembrance Day, which is also known as Poppy Day or Armistice Day, is a memorial day observed in Commonwealth countries to remember the members of their armed forces who have died in the war since World War I. This day is also recognized as a special day for war remembrances in many non-Commonwealth countries. Remembrance Day for many years was observed on 11 November to recall the official end of World War I in 1918; hostilities formally ended "at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month" of 1918 with the German signing of the Armistice.
Armistice Day was specifically dedicated by King George V on 7 November 1919 as a day of remembrance of members of the armed forces who were killed during World War I. At 11 o’clock on the morning of the 11th November two minutes silence would be observed for those who lost their lives in the war which had ended a year earlier. It is important to remember that the day was instituted to remember those who actually died in the war. There were many who fought in the war, and have since died – they are not remembered on this day. As Christians we remember them on All Souls day. Remembrance Day has as its focus those who lie buried in a war grave in some foreign land, for example the 440 South African soldiers who are buried at the British and Commonwealth War Cemetery at El Alamein.
The common British, Canadian, South African, and ANZAC, by which is meant Australian and New Zealand, tradition includes either one or two minutes of silence at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month (11:00 a.m., 11 November), as that marks, as I have said, the time (in the United Kingdom) when the armistice became effective. In many places it is transferred to the Saturday or Sunday closest to the 11th.
The Service of Remembrance in many Commonwealth countries generally includes the sounding of the "Last Post", followed by the period of silence, which is followed by the sounding of "The Rouse" – a bugle call often mistakenly referred to as "Reveille", and finished by a recitation of the "Ode of Remembrance". The tunes "Flowers of the Forest", "I Vow to Thee, My Country" and "Jerusalem" are often played during the service. Services also include wreaths laid to honour the fallen, a blessing, and national anthems.
The red remembrance poppy has become a familiar emblem of Remembrance Day due to the poem "In Flanders Fields". These poppies bloomed across some of the worst battlefields of Flanders in World War I, their brilliant red colour an appropriate symbol for the blood spilled in the war.
The idea of remembrance is a powerful one in society. As Christians we celebrate the Mass as a remembrance of what the Lord instituted at the Last Supper. A word which we use to describe this remembrance is ανημνεσις, which literally translates from the Greek as memory raised up. So perhaps we could think of it as memory that is brought up into focus. But the sense of that word goes beyond simply focusing; it has about it something more immersive. We almost become part of the story being told. The liturgy of the Mass is blatantly anemnesis invoking. Here our story mingles with the story of Christ in a way that we literally take the story or the narrative into our bodies and are subsumed into the body of Christ. We can say that we become what we eat.
As we keep this Remembrance Sunday, let us remember that we are remembering, and telling the stories of, not only those who died in the First World War, as our parish Memorial does, nor of those who fell in the Second World War. Those who went off to that war and survived are in their nineties now. Soon there will be no veterans from that war left alive. We in this country remember all those of our compatriots who have fallen in war.
In helping us to remember their story I would like to read you parts of a letter originally penned just after the battle of Sidi Rezegh in 1941. The operation began on the 18th November and continued through to the end of the year. We do not know who the writer of this letter was – he only put his initials at the end. He was a member of the Transvaal Horse Artillery regiment. From the research I have done he probably had the rank of bombardier. While I was the Chaplain of the THA I received a copy of the letter from an Australian ex-serviceman who, during the war, had the job of censoring the letters written by the soldiers. He had been so moved by this particular letter that he had written out a copy of it – there were no photocopiers in 1941/2.
Our Bombardier wrote: “Early in November, in Merca Metrouh, we had a full regimental church parade ... This... was the first indication that the coming campaign was soon to be underway. The only thing I liked about the Church Service was the Padre’s choice of hymns. For the first time ever I felt the power behind the words of some of our grand old hymns.
‘Time like an ever rolling stream
Bears all its sons away
They fly forgotten like a dream
Dies at the opening day.”
“... When we broke ranks, it was with a feeling of confidence for the future. Air supremacy was assured; we had as support a proved and experienced Armoured Division; we had faith in our guns...”
He writes about the height of battle:
“After a short time there slithered over the skyline German tanks – to the attack! In fives and tens they came into view disappearing for a few minutes in the deep wadis which gave the Germans such an advantage, then re-appearing on our right and left or front. As each wave of tanks surged forward, the German machine guns would come forward under their fire. Meanwhile at the gun position our boys were performing heroic work. It was now a fight for life. We hurled after them round after round of gunfire. As the tanks attempted to form into line, we broke their formation again and again with shellfire. But as each tank was beaten off we could tell those terrible machine guns were 50 or 100 yards closer. Our gun positions were now well within range of the tank 6 pounders.
“From where we were, observation (which meant sitting up) was impossible and almost suicidal, but the officer beside me was magnificent. Only for those shells and mortars, whose whirring whining swishing scream told us that they would land right on us, would he duck his head. This almost split-second warning was followed almost immediately by a crackling explosion, which made the ground shudder and enveloped us in a shower of smoke, dust and flying metal.
“All this time our guns were pounding away. Gunners were hit and others took their place.”
After the battle he concludes:
“It would be unwise for me to mention casualty figures. General Smuts has already told you they were heavy. In our first battery roll call we had the sad little figure of 24 men and two officers... The lesson I have learnt is this: Put your trust in God and never say die.”
The writer of this letter never came home. When I was at El Alamein in 1992, with some war veterans for the 50th anniversary of that battle, I placed a flower on the grave of a bombardier whom I think was the writer of the letter. If nobody else remembered him, on that day I did; and today, 70 years after that catastrophic battle in which so many Allied servicemen lost their lives, we here in Observatory remember him.
May God bless you as you remember those who lost their lives in war.
