God of the whole world and all peoples,
we pause on this day to remember those who have gone to war in our name.
We give thanks for their courage and their love of country.
Enable us to know how to comfort them, how to bind up their wounds,
to celebrate their lives even as we mourn the loss of others.
Remind us that the widow, the orphan, the widower, and the veteran – all know the cost of war.
Challenge us to love the warrior but hate the cost of war.
Remind us, O God, that the goal of any war need be justice and peace.
For we pray for a time when peace will reign and swords become plowshares once more,
that war be known only in history books.
Amen.

The eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month—today—is set aside both in the U.S. and Canada, as well as France and Belgium, to commemorate the signing of the armistice that ended the fighting of World War I. In big cities and small towns across our country today, there will be ceremonies at cemeteries and around flagpoles, seeking to properly express our gratitude to all the men and women who served and suffered so that we might live free. 

The war that was to end all wars didn’t, of course. Since then, the U.S. government has sent young men and women to fight on the beaches of Europe, in the mountains of Korea and the jungles of Southeast Asia, on the deserts of the Middle East, and on other peacekeeping missions worldwide. The Geneva Academy currently monitors 110 armed conflicts worldwide. And in every single one, whether from our side or theirs, both veterans and civilians continue to pay the cost of war with their lives. Or pay in their living, forever haunted by what they have witnessed and lost. 

I have only experienced the horrors of war indirectly, from books and movies; I know I can never fully imagine what it would be like to have taken such an extraordinary risk for my fellow citizens, or to have then carried its burdens for a lifetime. But I can wonder: how, on this day, and also tomorrow, and on all the days after that, how those of us who are not veterans can honor their spirit of sacrifice but not the acts of destruction; to give thanks for their selfless nature without condoning the horrific violence in which they were asked to participate; to advocate for better treatment of those who serve in our military without supporting the work of the military industrial complex? 

Less than one percent of Americans serve in uniform at any point; I don’t imagine it’s all that different in Canada. The moms and dads, teachers and doctors, engineers and entrepreneurs, social workers and community leaders who also are veterans—their stories and experiences often remain invisible. I’ve tried to listen, to hear the stories. And what I have taken away most from those conversations is this: Yes, we served our country, and we fought for freedom, and we did so with a sense of honor and integrity. We were proud and afraid and determined, all at once. But most of all, we were together. We fought for each other, to keep each other safe and to have each other’s backs. To save each other’s lives. So that, as many as possible might come home to their families.

Might one reflection, then, on this Veterans Day be grounded in that broader lesson our veterans’ voice? That in a world where the dominant metanarrative has long been increasing our own individual power and resources and domination, at the expense of others and too often by war, what if instead, all of us, individually and together, what if we honor our veterans by telling, by insisting on, by living a better story, the story they have repeatedly told us. That our livelihood, yours and mine, our success, our freedom, our real hope for a better future, maybe even our very survival, is one that depends on caring for all with whom we live and serve. That in crisis, especially, we must have each other’s backs; that we don’t leave people behind. That to get to any of us, you’ll need to get through all of us.

I don’t pretend for a moment that this will stop the next war or oust the great dividers from America’s current leadership. But maybe it will remind us as a people that amidst the chaos all around us, like this abusive government shutdown, our true wellbeing is grounded in an unwavering commitment to care for, to support, to protect, to defend, all whom God loves, and maybe especially those who have suffered on our behalf. Only then, it seems, can we with integrity pray for a time when peace will reign and swords become plowshares once more, that war be known only in history books.

Header photo by LOGAN WEAVER | @LGNWVR on Unsplash
Cemetery photo by 𝕡𝕒𝕨𝕤 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕡𝕣𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕤 on Unsplash