Anzac Day reflection

On Tuesday Anzac Day, prayers for peace will be held at St Paul’s Cathedral, for the third year running.

We will remember those who said no to war. As in the past three years, we will lament the carnage in which so many young people were killed. There is an irony in meeting in the Cathedral: as the prayers are offered, the sound of military drums and marching will be heard.

As we have prepared these prayers of lament for the killing fields so far from Australian shores, we have been made aware by the Australian historian Henry Reynolds of war fought on Australian land.

His recent books, The Forgotten War and Unnecessary Wars, are a shocking reminder of the dispossession of indigenous people as European invasion took place.

That is an uncomfortable truth. It also questions why Australians have been so ready to travel around the globe to fight in wars generated by imperial powers, the British Empire and now the United States.

Christians of all people are called to remember these things which are so easily forgotten. With Easter so close to Anzac Day we are brought face to face to the cross on which Jesus was killed by the Roman Empire. And to his call to be peacemakers.

This is particularly urgent this year as military attacks are being threatened or carried out internationally.

The following statement is included in the Order of Service.

This is a service of lament, repentance and hope on the centenary of the First World War. We will lament the destruction and waste of so many young men and women on all sides, the pain and anguish suffered by those who returned, by their families and communities.

This is focused in 2017 in recalling the slaughter of Passchendaele, Fromelles, and Pozieres, those who said no to war, the forgotten Aboriginal wars.

We will repent of the ongoing war and violence in our world and in our hearts, and hear again the hope of God’s gift of peace, given to us in the Crucified and Risen Lord, being lived out in many scenes of conflict.

We will honour the courage and self-sacrifice of all who fought in the First World War by praying for peace and doing all we can that makes for genuine peace, that young men and women may never go to war again.

In this time of heightened tensions, we especially pray that Australia and other nations will not be led into war again.

Rev Dr Wes Campbell

Waste

WASTE

Waste of Muscle, waste of Brain,
Waste of Patience, waste of Pain,
Waste of Manhood, waste of Health,
Waste of Beauty, waste of Wealth,
Waste of Blood, and waste of Tears,
Waste of Youth’s most precious years,
Waste of ways the Saints have trod,
Waste of Glory, waste of God,– War!

G A Studdert Kennedy,  !st world war chaplain

Say no by saying yes.

"...Leave your windows and go out, people of the world,
go into the streets, go into the fields, go into the woods
and along the streams. Go together, go alone.
Say no to the Lords of War which is Money
which is Fire. Say no by saying yes
to the air, to the earth, to the trees,
yes to the grasses, to the rivers, to the birds
and the animals and every living thing, yes
to the small houses, yes to the children. Yes."
Wendell Berry - Look out

Betrayal

 

In 1915 numerous sons

and a few daughters embarked on ships
to participate in a war.
We grew up saluting the flag on Mondays,
and hearing, each April.
the stories of war.
Ours was a young nation, proud, defiant, fearless;
born, we were told, in blood, on the battlefields
and in the trenches of Turkey, Belgium and France.
We heard of courage, larrikin resourcefulness,
and compassion.
These brave soldiers were injured, traumatised and died,
the grand myth attests,
for us, and for our freedom.
We honoured their sacrifice;
remembering, too, those who served in later conflicts.
 
A century later
the stories become a celebratory avalanche;
while dignitaries and politicians make their preparations
to assemble at Anzac Cove. There they will glory in the moment.
The legendary spirit, however, has become elusive,
betrayed by a nation that has become afraid to love,
and by its even more fearful leaders.
Back in this fortunate land, desperate people,
whose only crime was to come seeking refuge,
are, for political convenience,
denied the same freedom so fiercely defended by our forebears.
They are sent off-shore, to be imprisoned behind wire fences
and within an officially sanctioned conspiracy of silence.
For convenience. And for shame.
It is a costly convenience;
in more ways than one.

 

©Ken Rookes 2015

How can we gloat?

At this time when so much is being said about the deaths of young soldiers in the First World War, how can we gloat over the destruction of the Egyptian army and the death of so many men, she asked? Their deaths would have been devastating for most of their families and it is likely that most of them had no choice in being in the army and pursuing the Israelites.

This story comes after the stories of how Pharaoh was persuaded to let the people go by God causing many horrible things to happen, culminating in the death of all the first born sons of the Egyptians. Is this how a God of compassion and love would behave? Sometimes I have an overwhelming desire to try to save God from the Bible and some of the ways in which has influenced our thinking and justified our tactics in war for centuries.

This story is linked in the Lectionary with the Gospel reading begins “Lord, if a member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive him?” It follows on immediately from last week’s reading about going to tell another member of the church when he has sinned against you and binding and loosing things on earth and in heaven.

Rev Julianne Parker

(for full sermon see sermons page. This week, at no extra cost, a bonus sermon!)

I will not dance with Miriam

I will not dance with Miriam,

nor sing her triumph song.

The winners have written

their history; victorious

but confronting.

Scrape away its many layers:

racism, nationalism, vengeance,

religious superiority, triumphalism,

indiscriminate killing,

no thought for the bereaved.

Not much grace,

even less forgiveness;

and the Almighty is conscripted

to justify the hatred.

It could be set in Palestine,

twenty-fourteen.

No.

I will not dance with Miriam,

nor sing her triumph song.

© Ken Rookes 2014