In Flanders Fields

Remembering the real meaning of Memorial Day

05/30/2022

Jn 16:29-33 The disciples said to Jesus, “Now you are talking plainly, and not in any figure of speech. Now we realize that you know everything and that you do not need to have anyone question you. Because of this we believe that you came from God.” Jesus answered them, “Do you believe now? Behold, the hour is coming and has arrived when each of you will be scattered to his own home and you will leave me alone. But I am not alone, because the Father is with me. I have told you this so that you might have peace in me. In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world.”

We Americans do different things to celebrate Memorial Day. Some people will visit National Cemeteries, where fallen veterans are buried, and decorate the headstones with American flags. That is why today is often called “Decoration Day”. Other Americans will stay home or go to the lake and grill hamburgers or hotdogs, and try to look more tanned. Sadly, such people also forget the real meaning of Memorial Day: a day to remember the dead soldiers who purchased our freedom with the price of their blood. Others only know that Memorial Day marks the beginning of summer, and nothing more. And yet still others write poems or prose works to memorialize Memorial Day. May I share with you two such prominent pieces?

The first is a poem called “In Flanders Fields” by Lt. Col. John McCrae, as a tribute to his friend Lieutenant Alexis Helmer who died in World War I in Flanders. This poem also made poppies the unofficial flower of Memorial Day. Listen to these loving lines: “In Flanders fields, the poppies blow / Between the crosses, row on row, / That mark our place; and in the sky / The larks, still bravely singing, fly / Scarce heard amid the guns below. / We are the dead. Short days ago / We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow. / Love and were loved, and now we lie, / in Flanders fields. / Take up our quarrel with the foe / To you from falling hands we throw / The torch; be yours to hold it high. / If ye break faith with us who die, / We shall not sleep though poppies grow / In Flanders fields.” That poem, “In Flanders Fields” was first published on December 8, 1915.

Almost 50 years earlier, in 1863, President Abraham Lincoln penned the Gettysburg Address as a commemoration of the fallen soldiers during the Civil War. The address is not strictly-speaking a poem, but it is about as close as prose gets to poetry in the English language, short of Shakespeare. It is a little long to quote in full in a homily, but I hope you will indulge me as I do. President Lincoln captured the spirit of Memorial Day like no one else ever has. Our 16th president wrote memorably:

“Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.”

Honest Abe continued: “But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate – we cannot consecrate – we cannot hallow – this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so bravely advanced.”

“It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion – that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain – that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” You cannot say it better than Lincoln.

Of course, we Catholics celebrate our own “memorial day” not on the last Monday in May, but every day we celebrate the Eucharist. How so? Well, at every mass, we “remember” that last great sacrifice of our Captain in the faith, Jesus Christ, who at the Last Supper, said: “Do this in memory of me.” But what makes the memorial of the Mass different from American Memorial Day is that it does not depend so much on us remembering Jesus, but on Jesus remembering us. That is why the Good Thief, hanging on the cross at Jesus’ right side asked: “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom” (Lk 23:42).

Like with everything else in our faith, what Jesus does matters far more than what we do. So, too, with the “memorial day” that is the Mass. In other words, Catholic “memorial day” is more about what Jesus remembers than what we remember.

Praised be Jesus Christ!