by Missy Daniel
This year marks the sixth Veterans Day since the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the fourth since the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and churches around the country will join national observances with the usual services and music to salute the armed forces and to recognize the sacrifices of those who bear the burden of America's wars.
But at some churches a quieter and much less visible acknowledgment of that military sacrifice has been going on for years now, week after week -- praying aloud by name at Sunday morning worship services for every soldier who has died in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The Rev. James L. Burns, rector of the Episcopal Church of the Heavenly Rest in New York City, says including the individual names of the war dead in the church's weekly prayers for the departed has been met with gratitude by all members of his congregation, whatever their political persuasion. Burns is a Navy veteran, the son of a World War II veteran, and the grandson of a veteran of the Spanish-American War. "Every generation gets its war," he says. "We are a species that seems incapable of living without war. War costs dearly, and we should stop and remember."
Many churches pray more generally for all members of the military and those "in harm's way," but naming the dead one by one, says the Rev. Morris K. Thompson, dean of Christ Church Cathedral in Lexington, Kentucky, powerfully reminds people what their country has asked the armed services to do. "Wars are started by the president and the Congress, not by the military," says Thompson, a Marine veteran. "They have just followed orders, and we remember them simply because of that -- they are following an order." One or two of his members complained that reading the names in the prayers somehow makes a politically charged statement, but Thompson says such prayer is not about politics. "It is a reminder of what we are doing. On behalf of every one of us, America has asked them to go to war. Agree with the war or not, we have asked them to go and fight a battle. The prayers are to remember their duty and sacrifice, and remembrance is an important type of theological reflection."
Some weeks, says Thompson, when thirty or forty names have been read, the effect has been especially profound. "It gets very quiet, and it does sink in, one name after another after another," he observes. By reading each name deliberately and intentionally, he adds, "we are giving to God what is God's, giving these people back to God, that they will continue to know God even in death."
