Micah 4.1-5; Matthew 5.43-48

 The Rev’d Sarah Hillman

I wonder what words you would use to describe war.

Get ideas.

Throughout the ages, people who have been caught up in war have written about their experiences in prose and poetry. The First World War, a war like no other, in which millions were killed led many to write poems. Some of those who fought became famous for their writing – Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sasson, Rupert Brooke, John McRae. Others caught the mood of the time, and though they did not fight, still used poetry to express deeply held feelings about war.

Laurence Binyon’s words are used the world over on Remembrance Day. We have used them already in this service, but what many of you will not have heard is the complete poem from which they came.

Binyon was moved by the number of casualties early in the War, and though not a soldier himself, he penned these words.

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of spirit,
fallen in the cause of the free.
Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
There is music in the midst of desolation
and a glory that shines upon our tears.
They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
they fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
we will remember them.

They mingle not with laughing comrades again;
they sit no more at familiar tables of home;
they have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
they sleep beyond England’s foam.
But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
to the innermost heart of their own land  they are known
as the stars are known to the night;
As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
as the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
to the end, to the end, they remain.

The poem reminds us that, so often, the casulaties of war are young – back then young men, now too young women. Lives that end too early because of carnage and slaughter. Binyon did see the horror for himself later. He was too old to sign up as a soldier but in 1916 went out to the battlefields as a Red Cross volunteer.

Wilfred Owen’s poem Anthem for Doomed Youth echoes that thought in its title, and expresses the agonies of the loss of life.

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle? 
Only the monstrous anger of the guns. 
Only the stuttering rifles rapid rattle 
can patter out their hasty orisons. 
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells; 
nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, the shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells; 
and bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all? 
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes 
shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes. 
The pallor of girls’ brows shall be their pall; 
their flowers the tenderness of patient minds, 
and each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

Back in the First World War, the bodies remained where they fell, later to be buried far from home. Rupert Brooke’s poem The Soldier reminds us of this

          If I should die, think only this of me,
          that there’s some corner of a foreign field
          that is for ever England.

In the past year, the last three British survivors of the battlefields of the First World War died. They were men who had lived through immense changes in their lives, who had coped with the horrors of what was supposed to have been the war to end all wars. Society had changed for ever.

Soldiers who have died are no longer left abroad, but brought home with ceremony and dignity.

But some things haven’t changed. Wars come and go. We heard last week that more British troops have been lost in 2009 than in any year since 1982 and the Falklands War. It seems that there will never be a war to end all wars.

Today soldiers are still writing poetry to express their feelings about conflict. There are echoes in them of the sentiments we find in the earlier verses.

Here is A Soldier’s Plea by Bradley Shane.

If only all the dead could cry out
in a single roar
and say don’t send a mother’s son
to die a death in war.

They’d say look at how we lay
without life or limb
the bullet that tore our breast so wide
has caused our eyes to dim.

The flash of a musket,
the crack of a bullet’s speed,
a small piece of death is sent
to splinter bone and bleed.

The cannon sends a rain of death
of steel and grit and bone.
Pay no heed to the dying man
or take pity on his moan

The orders are always the same
move forward, boys, make haste:
a yard of ground a league today
don’t think of the horror and the waste.

The war boys, the war’s for all
God’s on the side that’s right.
But the devil owns the battlefield
when you hear the cries at night

A drummer rolls a steady beat,
a bugle plays a mournful tune,
a sword is dipped in honour
for the mother’s son who died too soon.

War begins when dialogue fails. Harry Patch and Henry Allingham, two of the three veteran soldiers who died this year had strong words about war. Patch said: “It wasn’t worth it. No war is worth it. No war is worth the loss of a couple of lives let alone thousands. T’isn’t worth it.”

And Allingham’s words: “War’s stupid. Nobody wins. You might as well talk first. You have to talk last anyway.”

The hard thing about dialogue is that it needs both sides to participate and that rarely happens.

War leave broken people, devastated lands and smashed hopes and dreams. And that hasn’t changed. Harry Patch said before he died: “It’s right that we should think about the fighting men of the Great War. But that still goes for our boys who are sent off to battle now, in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. Let’s remember them too. They come back bloodied and broken, just the same.”

This is a sermon, but there’s one thing I haven’t yet mentioned: God. Where is God in the battlefields? Many people in the First World War had their faith challenged, and I’m sure many do today. But many also gain hope and courage from faith.

In an interview, Anthony Feltham-White, an army chaplain in Afghanistan, says this: “I am constantly humbled and amazed by the extraordinary courage and commitment shown by our soldiers in this most hostile of environments.

“Our services and Bible studies are always well attended, but what impresses me are the myriad conversations I have with soldiers in the most extraordinary places. Most of my battalion wear a cross on their dog-tags, and are constantly asking me to pray for them and with them; some are even baptised while out here. There is an old expression that there is no such thing as an atheist in a foxhole. In many ways it still holds true.”

“A six-month operational tour uses all my reserves of everything. Immediately I think of ‘footsteps in the sand’ as I feel the arms of God carrying me every step of the way. Being among and ministering to the young men and women of our Armed Forces is a remarkable privilege and extraordinarily fulfilling, but on operations it is a roller-coaster ride. I’m on my knees by the end – but perhaps that is the best place to be.”

God is right there in the midst of battle. God does not take sides in war, for God’s aim is peace. It is not God who fights but human beings. What God sees is his beloved people of every creed and colour, destroying each other and the world.

The six moral values of the army – selfless commitment, respect, loyalty, integrity, discipline and courage – are all values dear to God.

Anthony Feltham-White also says in his interview: “My favourite part of the Bible is the Sermon on the Mount. It’s all there in those three chapters in Matthew. If only we all took to heart what Jesus is explaining, then our soldiers would not have to be fighting and dying in this place.”

And what are those words. We heard some of them earlier.

Jesus said: You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.