For those who laid down life itself'
Our thoughts are given today;
Who breathed their last on foreign shores
Or fell at distant gates or doors,
O Lord, teach us to pray.
For those who answered nation's call,
And gave their lives away
In wars both noble and unjust,
Who placed in us their dying trust:
Forgive us, Lord, we pray.
For families torn by raging grief
When sorrow comes to stay,
When loss pervades both soul and mind
And on the heart begins to grind,
Bring healing, Lord, we pray.
We give so much to waging war
But peace ne'er gets its say.
May all these lives rebuke us now,
And Lord, we plead, some way, somehow,
Undo our warring way.
TEXT: Charles Spence Freeman, May 2025 (Memorial Day)
MUSIC: Tune REST, Frederick Charles Maker, 1887.
Memorial Day has haunted me for some time even though my family has not known any losses in military service. Hearing a speaker today (5/26/25) at the Memorial Day observance at the National World War I Museum and Memorial in Kansas City describe the day as a kind of secular holy day prompted some further reflection. As awkward as it may be, the church cannot keep its distance from the loss of life in the very secular exercise of nations at war. If nothing, this is hopefully a start for ... something.
