For the last couple of weeks I’ve been watching “The War” by Ken Burns on Netflix.  I guess Veteran’s day is as good a day as any to share some reflections on the nature of this documentary series.

First, due to my Mennonite background, I lean heavily towards a pacifist expression of the Christian faith.  It is deeply embedded in my psyche.  Yet, I’m not pastoring in a Mennonite context – and have people under my care who are retired from military service, and have had people in the past who are active in the military.  The tension between the fellowship of Christians, and differing expressions of the Faith has been good for me – and I hope good for those I shepherd.  I do my best to make room for people who feel that it’s their duty and privilege to serve in the armed forces of this country – and they do their best to make room for me, it’s a win-win.  Still, my tendency is to speak to power through weakness.

I’m also, however, a student of history.  This means, for better or for worse, that I study the history of war.  So much of humanity’s story, sadly, is defined by conflicts between cultures and peoples.  Sometimes wars are fought over greed and power, and other times wars are fought for defense – but in all wars is the truth that war is traumatic and awful.  It does things to one’s soul that are difficult to process, even if mentally a soldier recognizes the necessity of the violence they’re called to inflict.  In all the journals, biographies, and movies I’ve taken in this truth is always present.  Two quotes, both from the Civil War, bring it to the fore:

“I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation. War is hell.”

William Tecumseh Sherman

“It is well that war is so terrible, or we should get too fond of it.”

Robert E. Lee

The heartbeat of these quotes comes out in “Ken Burns: The War.”  In it we encounter men and women, young children and parents, and husbands and wives whose lives are torn upside-down because of a war the likes of which no one had ever seen.  There is, however, none of Hollywood’s drama and glory.  There is no glee over death, and the heroes are not unbreakable.  Instead you meet human-beings who, even decades later, were still struggling with the inhuman things they were called to do, and which had been done to them.  Yet, even in the midst of the pain in their reflections is still the resolve, “Yes, we felt this had to be done.”  War, in this film, is evil.  A necessary evil it may have been, but an evil nonetheless.

In fact, Ken Burns’ documentary captures the strong undercurrent of the book Band of Brothers that the HBO series never quite captured (and The Pacific missed entirely) – these men weren’t hardened killers, they’d had enough of death and dying and it changed them forever.

So, while I cringe at the merging of human violence and sacredness, I can truly appreciate what vetrans go through in their duty.  On this Veteran’s day, and every day, I hope for peace.  Not the peace brought by bomb and gun, but the peace that will only come with the Kingdom of Heaven, the presence of shalom – a peace we Christians must always be striving for.

Come quickly, Lord Jesus.