Friends under fire
Sermon preached in St Salvator's Chapel, St Andrews on Remembrance Sunday, 8th November 2009 by Rev Angus MacLeodReadings: Deuteronomy 4: 9 - 14, John 15: 9 - 17
"I have called you friends."
John 15:15b
"What I can never forget is the moment I heard the war was over.
It was the evening of the 10th November,
and I was reading in the smoking room before dinner,
when Tod, the tall dignified butler quietly entered.
He told me what was going to take place on the following morning at 11 o'clock.
I heard it all quite dispassionately, even indifferently,
and talked to Tod about it in a remote sort of way until he eventually withdrew.
Then something snapped inside me.
I suddenly dropped my book and began to sob and cry.
I sobbed and sobbed until I was so utterly exhausted
that I could sob no longer."
(C L Warr, pp119, The Glimmering Landscape)
Charles Warr, officer in the Argyll & Sutherland Highlanders, enlisted 1914; wounded near Ypres, 1916.
"I have called you friends."
Last week I accompanied a group of new Army chaplains on a Battlefield Tour to Flanders - the front line of much of World War I. We visited museums and memorials, spent time in autumnal cemeteries, amidst those long lines of headstones, heard the accounts of soldiers and chaplains (known as padres), laid wreathes at chaplains' graves and offered prayers.
We do these things to be mindful of all that we inherit and consider how we might serve in time ahead.
Having decided the itinerary of our pilgrimage I had asked one of my colleagues to find out the exact locations of the cemeteries we would visit. In these days of SatNav I suggested he simply get the postcodes from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website. That proved problematic. There was no such detail. Trusting fellow that he is, he continued with his allotted task. He rang the War Graves Commission.
"Could you please give me the postcodes for the following cemeteries?"
A pause.
"You're having a laugh aren't you"
"You reckon they're receiving mail these days? And who do you thinks writing to them anyway?"
Fair one.
But absurd as that moment proved, it led me to wonder, if we could address a letter to those we remember today what would we write?
"I have called you friends."
We stayed in Poperinge, a few miles west of Ypres. It is the town that gave rise to the expression, 'on the pop.' Sufficiently far from the immediate fighting, it was a place where troops could relax and indulge. (That in large part translated as drink and women.)
To offer an alternative and to provide some of the comforts of home a considerable network of canteens and soldiers' rests were established throughout France and Belgium, close to wherever troops were. YMCA tents, Scottish Churches - Canteens - perhaps the most well known was Talbot House (or Toc H). It survives today - that is where we slept. A converted grain merchant's house, from 1915 onwards it welcomed, fed and housed innumerable numbers of soldiers, giving them precious respite and something akin to 'normal life.' Its charismatic co-founder, Padre 'Tubby' Clayton set its tone with the injunction: Abandon rank all ye who enter here. Another written command, more poignant: Come out into the garden and forget the war.
Set in the eaves of the house and reached by a vertiginous ladder is the House chapel - The Upper Room. It is estimated that around 100,000 soldiers climbed those stairs to pray and receive communion, many on their way to the front. An inscription on the ladder: Here you are on holier ground than any.
Downstairs in the hall way is a surviving notice board; The Facebook of its day. It reads: This Space is Reserved for Friendship.
This board is intended for the use of the men who wish to get in touch with friends who may possibly see a message left for them. A later commentary marks it as "the place where rendezvous took place between old friends. Fathers and sons here met, brothers and neighbours. Could this wall speak, it would be eloquent)"
"I have called you friends."
If you wonder through the archway of St Mary's (on South Street) and enter the quad, you will find a stone bird bath; it bears the inscription: For the refreshment of the doves. (MD gave this in memory of George Duncan 25 years Professor and 14 years Principal of St Mary's College.) MD is Muriel Duncan, the first woman lecturer in St Andrews. She taught German throughout the Great War. She was ostracised by colleagues for doing so. Her husband, a trained theologian had volunteered to become an Army chaplain. (Due to his lack of parish experience he was delayed from being posted to a front line unit and retained at a HQ in France.)
On 02 Jan 1916, Duncan led Sunday worship; a congregation of officers and soldiers - one attendee wrote in his diary:
"I attended the Scotch Church at 09.35am. Service was held in a school up a stair. A most earnest young Scotch man, George Duncan conducted the service. He told us that in our prayers we should be as natural as possible and tell the Almighty exactly what we feel we want. The congregation was greatly impressed and one could have heard a pin drop during the service. So different to the coughing and restlessness which goes on in Church in peace time."
The diarist was none other than Douglas Haig, future Field Marshall. Also a man with St Andrews connections. Voted by the student body as University Rector at the end of the war; and appointed Chancellor three years later.
That service was the beginning of a remarkable friendship. From 1916, through the horrors of the Somme, to the eventual victory and Armistice of 1918, Duncan, the academic theologian, a far from military man, in effect, became personal chaplain, confidante and courage-giver to Britain's senior commander.
From Duncan Haig learnt the text in 2 Chronicles 20:15: "Do not fear or be dismayed at this great multitude; for the battle is not yours but God's"
After the war Haig poured his efforts into the care of veterans in a nation that too easily overlooked the plight of ex service personnel. The poppies we wear today emerged from the original Earl Haig Fund Appeal. He was instrumental in the foundation of the British Legion, whose banners may well be lowered at the War Memorial following service today.
(Addressing the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1919 Haig spoke of his chaplains:)
"They bought with them from their liberal education a fine human sympathy with the men. (They) taught all our soldiers of all ranks the great lesson of comradeship."
"I have called you friends."
If all this feels a bit remote - a bit Blackadder Goes Forth, please remember that fighting, friendship and faith are neither academic studies nor museum curios. Last Sunday I was in the chapel at the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst - where the Army trains its future officers. During training, the cadets conduct a service for their term, Company Prayers - to which family members are invited. There had obviously been one such service a day or two before. Their speaker had left his notes in the pulpit; part of it read:
"To all our parents, wives, girlfriends, children and loved ones. Through Sandhurst and onwards into our careers we will work hours we did not know existed. Our free time is rare and that means seeing you less. We will miss your Anniversaries, Birthdays and Holidays. We will come home and be bad company, tired, grumpy and hungry. When we are out on exercise, you worry more than we do. Off on operations, every news report will make you jump. We knew our calling was a sacrifice for you and us. How it affects you is at the top of our thoughts. Your support means more than you could ever know."
(from Company Prayers,RMAS, Nov 09)
You will be aware that the majority of those in that chapel would be your age, (90% are graduates.) The soldiers they are training to lead, younger. The cost that they and their loved ones pay on behalf of the Nation is real, uncompromising and continuing. That is not history; it simply is.
"I have called you friends."
If you could pen a letter to all those we remember today what would you say?
Perhaps we might say; we mourn all that is lost by your premature passing, we are sorry for what we fail to understand, sorry for what we forget or treat too cheaply. But also we remember - that from your lives, possibilities for so many of us have arisen - as the seed falls to the ground, a harvest follows.
And if we could find their address, what, in time, might they write to us?
Don't miss it - any of it. Inhabit that single God-given precious life - yours. Follow your passions: Whether you are destined for the steps of Sandhurst or march for peace - do it with conscience and conviction. If you want to honour the Fallen, learn to live. Scale mountains, build bridges, unearth discoveries. Give life to others; enliven your faith communities. Vote, or better still, be someone worth voting for.
For to those to whom much is entrusted, much is expected. Tell the things you most want to tell to the people you hold most dear - while you still hold their addresses. Are these not the signs of a Christ like friendship? Friendship which is the very nature of God.
In the Name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.