G
gilliam
Guest
From an article by Roman Catholic Priest: Father Raymond J. de Souza:
There ought to be nothing gauzy or ambiguous about our remembrance that others fought so that we might be free, and so we fight that others will be free. The blood-red poppies are very concrete and specific; they grow over specific graves in which lie real soldiers. They deserve our remembrance; our country requires that we keep faith with them.
Now that Canadians have returned to combat, our remembering needs to be remembrance with a purpose. Not only gratitude, but a recommitment to the ideals for which others once fought, and for which we now ask our armed forces to fight. The poppies passively blowing in Flanders Fields need to be complemented by another image from the same poem: to you from failing hands we throw the torch; be yours to hold it high.
Keeping the torch aloft and aflame demands rather more than a poppy in the lapel. Yet that is what Lt. Col. McCrae asks on behalf of those who lie in Flanders Fields, not victims looking for memorials, but fighters looking across the ages for comrades
canada.com/nationalpost/columnists/story.html?id=13c2cd62-6025-4345-a188-f73fe20cf28e&p=1
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,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing 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.
– In Flanders Fields, by Lieut. Col. John McCrae, (1872-1918).
There ought to be nothing gauzy or ambiguous about our remembrance that others fought so that we might be free, and so we fight that others will be free. The blood-red poppies are very concrete and specific; they grow over specific graves in which lie real soldiers. They deserve our remembrance; our country requires that we keep faith with them.
Now that Canadians have returned to combat, our remembering needs to be remembrance with a purpose. Not only gratitude, but a recommitment to the ideals for which others once fought, and for which we now ask our armed forces to fight. The poppies passively blowing in Flanders Fields need to be complemented by another image from the same poem: to you from failing hands we throw the torch; be yours to hold it high.
Keeping the torch aloft and aflame demands rather more than a poppy in the lapel. Yet that is what Lt. Col. McCrae asks on behalf of those who lie in Flanders Fields, not victims looking for memorials, but fighters looking across the ages for comrades
canada.com/nationalpost/columnists/story.html?id=13c2cd62-6025-4345-a188-f73fe20cf28e&p=1
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,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing 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.
– In Flanders Fields, by Lieut. Col. John McCrae, (1872-1918).