Sermon for Remembrance Sunday, St John the Evangelist 12.11.17

Sermon for Remembrance Sunday, St John the Evangelist – 12.11.17

“In Flanders field the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row That marks our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below

We are dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw the sunset glow. Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields”

…the immortal words of Lieut. Col. John McCrae, written in 1915, shortly after the loss of a friend at the Battle of Ypres. It was or was meant to be, ‘the war to end all wars’, and 100 years ago John McCrae and other poets (among them Wilfred Owen, Rupert Brooke & Robert Binyon) dared to articulate both the tragedy of war and also the passionate hope of peace: that somehow their loss, their blood – represented, by the poppies - may yet herald a yearned for peace: good coming out of evil. And this year we remember the battle of Passcendale, that crucible of suffering, one hundred years on. And yesterday, at 11 O’clock, on the 11th day of the 11th month, the nation again fell silent (as we will do this morning), to commemorate the signing of the Armistice, and to remember and pay tribute to all those who fought and died in WW1 and in wars and conflicts since, to this very day. My own story, like many of our’, is interwoven with memories of war; and I always remember my grandfather – who as a young Cambridge undergraduate, at Emmanuel College, fought at Gallipoli and miraculously survived, his youth yet scarred by four troubled years on the front – telling me stories (before his death) of those war-torn years & the courage with which ex- soldiers and civilians rebuilt their lives, after WW1. How ironic, that these young men faced the same challenge, many of them, yet again, nearly 3 decades later, after WW2. History has a habit of repeating itself. But somehow those tragic images of WW1 (the 1st truly global war) have been seared into our collective unconscious: images of muddy wastelands, barbed wire, trenches, dugouts and (from film maker) slow motion footage of men stumbling hopelessly over the top. The poppies of Flanders Fields, forever remaining a potent symbol of remembrance- and of every young life lost. Every city, town & village across the land, including our own parish in Hills Road, was affected; as they were in WW2. And for each of our families, there is or was a memory of loved ones, lost or maimed in conflict. Behind every war, every campaign, every conflict – then, as recently, in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria – a human face, a story to be told… But today, of course, the nation and commonwealth remembers not only the iconic and tragic significance of WW1, but that 20th Century of war and conflict that 1914-1918 tragically ushered in, and all that has followed since, to this very day. That most violent century, which so bitterly dashed the hopes and dreams of our forbears: of world wars, of cold wards, colonial wars, civil wars, genocidal wars and the threat of nuclear war. And in our own century, especially since 2003, there has been further escalation of war, terrorism and conflict, including the conflict in Syria triggering the worst refugee crisis since WW2: a story which so easily slips from our headlines, as our columns are taken up with the machinations of Brexit. And in the past year we have suffered, on our own soil, a proliferation of terrorist incidents that serve only to heighten fear; while globally, tensions remain at a level of heightened tension. We live at a time, it would seem, when the forces of disunity and hatred could quite easily overwhelm the forces of love and peace, when the bonds of faith and shared humanity could be rent asunder. So it’s vital, in our remembering today, that we not only remember the fallen of our two world wars, but that we face honestly the tragedy of war and conflict since; praying for those (on all sides) who lost their lives, for those maimed by fighting, for their families and all those communities (civilian and military) still affected, in the Middle East and Africa, in this country and across the world – including our armed forces and their families, striving to defend human freedom. We need to remind ourselves that in many ways the trauma of conflict now – out amongst the crowded streets and refugee camps in Syria and Lebanon, or on the desert roads of Afghanistan – is no less severe, although the conditions may be different. And while the world’s media moves on to other things, battles are still being fought and lives lost – and every soldier or civilian caught up in conflict or suffering under terrorism, needs our solidarity, our support and our prayer. ‘How long, O Lord’ - we can pray in the words of Psalm 46 – ‘until wars cease, the spear is shattered and shields can be burned with fire?’ Such experiences of war raised many questions, and we come today seeking wisdom and guidance, so that our remembering – and the lives of those lost (from the fields of Flanders to the deserts of Syria and Afghanistan) are not in vain. For today we need, more than ever, it would seem, to examine our hearts and to draw on our great traditions of faith and wisdom, to reassert all that makes for peace and builds up our common life and humanity. In our reading, from St John’s Gospel, Jesus is speaking to his disciples on the eve of what was to be his greatest sacrifice. He was about to be betrayed, arrested, tried and crucified, for evils he did not commit – but was merely caught up in, as an innocent victim. A man, we believe, who was Son of God, and who so identified with our humanity, that he was prepared (out of love) to suffer the deepest inhumanity we could inflict, in order to win our freedom – and to show that there are no situations, no places (however ghastly) where God’s presence is not to be found. So Jesus’ words here are not pious platitudes or mere sentimentality, but hard won insights – forged in the crucible of his own sufferings. And what does Jesus say?

‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.’ ‘Greater love hath no man than this that he lay down his life for his friends’. Jesus knew what love meant, how difficult and agonising it can be, and he called his disciples – his followers, you & me – to tread this same costly path of love. A love which is prepared to struggle and to fight, to make the ultimate sacrifice, but which is also committed to the painstaking work of reconciliation and peace; of being prepared to meet the other, to listen to their story, to overcome our differences, and to live together as one. As Victor Hugo wrote, in Les Miserables, ‘To love another person is to see the face of God.’ For we need to remember, the Gospel reminds us, in all our strivings for love, that (in the end) we are all one, in our humanity, whatever our race or culture or creed; and we need each other, if we are to build (with God’s help) a better world, where there is no more war or violence or weeping in the land. And this means, Jesus tells us, that we must love even our enemies, in our struggle for peace and our confronting of evil. So today, as we honour the fallen and as we pray for all peace-keepers – still harrowed by past images of war: let us pray and commit to a world without war or terror: a world where good triumphs over evil, where love overcomes fear; a world where peace with justice prevails over any desire for unjust gain; a world where all are welcome, where all live together in love and harmony; a world where hard hearts and frustrated wills are transformed by the divine possibility of forgiveness, and by the vision of true community. And so, trusting God alone (and his great love, revealed in Jesus Christ), we pray, for that day when, in Isaiah’s great vision:

‘[peoples] shall beat their swords into plough-shares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more’ a time when we shall take courage to ‘do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with our God.’ (Micah 6.8) Amen.