For the Boys...

For the Boys…





It began as Decoration Day, a day set aside and remembered as a day of respect, thanksgiving, and longing for the boys who never came home. Ladies of the South, then the North, adorned the graves of the gray and the blue with waving flag, fragrant flower, and heartfelt tears.

The occasion was first widely observed on May 30, 1868 to commemorate the sacrifices of Civil War soldiers by proclamation of General John A. Logan. By the late 1880’s, many communities across the country had begun to celebrate what was by then called Memorial Day. After World War I, observances began to honor those who died in all American wars. In 1971, Congress declared Memorial Day a national holiday to be held annually on the last Monday in May.

It is deeply saddening that in our time, the significance of the day has largely been lost. An attitude of reverence has been replaced by a search for revelry and relaxation. Cookouts, parties, trips, games, and naps are the preferred plans for the day – most take no time to walk silently among the sodden beds of our sleeping heroes. It is true that a few still bend the knee, to lay a flower and read a name, but the lack of pilgrims to such hallowed ground seems a shame. Every living American, man, woman, boy and girl should come to walk, pause, and pray – to remember.

It is a fact that almost four hundred years ago, settlers came to the shores of this continent in search of freedom and opportunity. They risked all that they had, all they hoped to be, and their very lives to secure the blessings of liberty for themselves and for all of us who have followed. From it’s first, and through every, budding spring, America has had its freedom soil furrowed with the plow of suffering and planted with seeds of sacrifice. Nourished and watered by the blood and tears of the fallen, the vines of liberty have broken through and spread – not simply across this God-kissed land, but around the world, entwining all they reach in freedom’s sure embrace.

It is interesting to note that Memorial Day was conceived and birthed due to a miscarriage – a miscarriage of justice. The institution, acceptance, and tolerance of American slavery came, by March 1865, to be understood to be the root cause for the war and hence, the graves those adorning angels came to decorate. Indeed, this iniquity-in-chains required two hundred fifty years to break from the body politic and another century to release in spirit. The national sin of the nineteenth century made a mockery of our father’s freedom dream and created a fissure in the foundation, which divided the family and almost caused the house to fall. In the midst of the destructive whirlwind of war, we were reminded by our Captain of the challenges and choices to be made and the course to champion:



“The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty and we must rise with the occasion… Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves… The fiery trial though which we pass will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation… We, even we here, hold the power and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free – honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save or meanly lose the last, best hope of earth… The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just – a way which, if followed, the world must forever applaud and God must forever bless.”



Truly, the great ship ‘America’ has steered her course along that way, through the calm and the storm. She has, almost without exception, left behind in every port the most prized possession on her manifest – a destiny of hope and lives lived in freedom’s wake. Every American generation has looked back, awestruck, at that wake, out from which ripples waves of justice, equality, opportunity – love, mercy, compassion – life, liberty, happiness. Ironically, from that backward glance is derived the moral clarity to see forward beyond our human horizons to the Almighty’s invisible purposes. From reflection to revelation, we remember and realize the value of our past and the vision of possibilities to come.

What a legacy! What a cost – in blood, toil, treasure, and lives! Has it been, is it, worth it? Indeed, it has! Indeed, it is! Despite her many sins and shortcomings, America still inspires the world through the two-fold truth that she is the land of the free because she is home to the brave. Lady liberty still stands on the edge of this great land, shining her light of hope upon all those choked by oppression yet yearning to breathe free.

On this day, especially, we are reminded of how much so many, we all, owe to so few. On this day, as always, defenders of freedom stand in harm’s way, ever ready to place themselves between freedom and her foes. On this day, humbly, as they stand and fight for us, we fall in thanks and supplication; as they fall, we stand and fight for them, that their lives might always be enshrined in honor and their memories might always be cherished. We must never forget them.

The feelings of gratitude, wonder, and love we have for those who served, suffered, sacrifice, and died, that we might live every day in freedom, has been expressed most eloquently for us by the one who loved and appreciated them most:



To Mrs. Lydia Bixby Executive Mansion November 21, 1864



Dear Madam,



I have been shown in the files of the war Department a statement of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.



Yours very sincerely and respectfully,



Abraham Lincoln





All of us, as members of the American family, surely echo the ponderings and prose of our gentle patriarch and, with him, reach out loving and longing arms to embrace forever, the boys who never came home.