Sermon Details

“Remembrance”

A sermon preached at the Mint Methodist Church at 10.30 am on Sunday 13th November 2011

by the Minister, Rev Andrew Sails at a service including

“Requiem: Thanksgiving for a Life”

by Thomas Ledger, sung by the Mint Choir

Today we remember -

For some that means the 2nd World War,

remembering loved ones who died so many years ago.

Others are perhaps thinking of the war in Korea in the 1950s, or conflicts in your home countries elsewhere.

And for some in this Church community, memories are still rough and raw thinking of family members who have died

in terrorist incidents or in Iraq or Afghanistan.

Then again, the heartache of loss comes in peace as well as in war - and today we also remember in particular

our brother Bill Barter who died this week -

Pippa and Liz and Richard - you are in our thoughts and prayers.

Thanks to the choir for singing Requiem for us -

the final part talks about the lux aeterna, eternal light of God and the civitatem sanctam, the holy City.

As you listen to that, hold in your mind those who have died, those dear to you, and see them in your mind’s eye surrounded by eternal light and entering the city of God

For know this - God loves us all - military or civilian, friend or enemy, even hero or coward - and that whoever we have lost,

God will keep them safe -

For in the words of today’s epistle, neither life not death, nor principalities nor powers, nor height nor depth,

nor anything else in the whole of creation

will be able to separate us form the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” That’s why mourners are blessed - because God’s promises never fail

A word of caution.

This is rightly a day when we give thanks for the great sacrifices.. It is not however, a day to glorify war.

Wearing a poppy with pride doesn't include pride in the senseless slaughter of the Somme,

the blanket bombing of Dresden,

or the radiation sickness of Hiroshima. Many acts of war in history,

including many perpetrated by the UK, have been evil and wrong.

Jonathan Tulloch wrote a piece this week in the Tablet about going to a Remembrance Service

which he felt had turned into a glorification of war and a celebration of “God on our side”.

We need to remember, he wrote, the real face of war - “a little girl speared by shrapnel,

the grandfather slowly starving

by the burnt-out home where he raised his now dead family, or a girl giving birth in a radioactive bomb crater”

(Jonathan Tulloch, The Tablet. 12/11/11)

Remember that every human being was made in the image of God, given to us to care for -

A major part of Remembrance Sunday

is about learning the hard lessons of the past

and saying “Never again (whatever the need or justification)

will we treat human life so lightly”.

There have been reports this week that metal thieves

are removing brass plaques from village war memorials to sell for scrap - desecrating three or four memorials each week in this way.

How can anyone be so callous about cherished memories?

Yet honouring our dead is about more than metal memorial plaques. The true memorial is in the way we live our lives after they have gone.

R.H. Tawney, the great historian,

was almost killed on the Somme in the first world war. Caught in no man's land, he was finally rescued,

one of fifty survivors from a group of eight hundred in one of those suicidal pushes over the top.

Returning home, he was appalled by the class-ridden snobbery and selfishness of England once the war was over.

He wrote asking why the spirit of sacrifice could not carry over into peace time.

Why, he asked,

is the idea of a munitions factory run for personal profit so scandalous in wartime, and yet so readily acceptable in peace time?

With Tawney we might pause to wonder why.

It seems that men and women can so easily come together

in self-sacrificial fellowship around the business of the battlefield,

and yet return to greed and selfishness and every one for themselves as soon as military conflict ceases.

A couple of weeks ago we invited Andrew Rawding to speak here at the Mint - Andrew was until recently an Army Chaplain with 40 Commando in Afghanistan. He talked about Cpl Stephen Curley -

Stevie as many of you know was husband

of Alan and Dorothy Worthington’s granddaughter Kirianne - and killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan last year.

Andrew said - “How do we take forward what Stevie Curley did? Just remembering a name on a wall every Nov 11th?

Or continuing to work for the people of Afghanistan?” And he talked about his desire to build up understanding between the British and Afghan peoples.

That is true remembrance - True thankfulness - expressed in the way we live our lives,

the way we build on what others have done.

When Andrew Rawding was about to go to Afghanistan, many people told him “we will pray for you” -

He replied with a poem - let me quote some of it here:

Please don't pray for me;

pray for the people who want to kill me…. for the people who see me as the invader….

for the people who want to avenge the honour of their tribe….

Please don't pray for me;

pray for the people who have brought me here, for the people who make the decisions,

for the people who want money, power, influence and control.

Please don't pray for me;

pray for the people who live here….

for the children who have lost parents, for the fathers who have lost sons,

for the mothers who have lost children, for the wives who have lost husbands,

for the people who have lost everything…. Please don't pray for me;

but cry out for mercy, scream out for justice, shout for compassion, plead for forgiveness, whisper for peace.

So in conclusion -

· Let us trust God to care for us all come what may in this world and in the world to come

· Let us remember the horror and violence of war and say “Never Again”

· Let us thank God for those who have made the ultimate sacrifice

· Then let us honour them in the best way we can -

By building a world of mercy, justice, compassion, forgiveness and peace

ORDER OF SERVICE

Hymn STF 83 “Praise my soul” (HAP 13) Prayer

All Age Ministry - Mary Hext

Peace

Minister: Let us share God’s blessing: Adults: The peace of the Lord be with you Young Church: And also with you.

Minister: Go in peace

(Young people leave)

Choir: Birth of a Soul

All that I saw I truly lov’d.  No malice, jealousy, or spite;

No fraud nor anger in me mov’d, contentment only and delight Were in my soul. O Heav’n! what bliss did I enjoy and feel! What powerful delight did this inspire! for this I daily kneel. Requiem aeternam and Kyrie

Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine, et lux perpetua luceat eis.

Te decet hymnus, Deus, in Sion, et tibi reddetur votum in Jerusalem.  Exaudi orationem meam; ad te omnis caro veniet

Kyrie eleison.   Christe eleison.  Kyrie eleison.

[Rest eternal grant them, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine on them.  To thee praise is due, O God, in Zion, & to thee vows are recited in Jerusalem.  Hear my prayer; unto thee all flesh shall come. Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy.  Lord, have mercy.]

Reading: Matthew 5:3-10

Hymn  STF 698 God! As with silent hearts (see screen)



Act of Remembrance

Introduction

Minister: Let us remember before God, and commend to his sure keeping, those who have died for their country in war

those whom we knew and whose memory we treasure and all who have lived and died in the service of others. Silence

Minister: They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old. Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun, and in the morning, we will remember them.

People: We will remember them.

Minister: When you go home tell them of us and say

For your tomorrow we gave our today

The Last Post

Minister: Almighty and eternal God, from whose love in Christ we cannot be parted, either by death or by life: Hear our prayers and thanksgivings for all whom we remember this day.  Fulfil in them the purpose of your love.   And bring us all, with them, to your eternal joy. Through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

(Congregation sits)

Choir: Agnus Dei and Pie Jesu

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona eis requiem, requiem sempiternam.  Pie Jesu Domine, dona eis requiem, requiem sempiternam.

[Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world, Grant them rest, rest everlasting. Merciful

Lord Jesus, grant them rest, rest everlasting].

Reading: Romans 8:35-39

Hymn  “Eternal God, before whose face we stand” (see screen)

(during which the collection is taken and dedicated)

Sermon

Choir:  “Lux Aeterna” and “In Paradisum”

Lux aeterna luceat eis, Domine. In paradisum deducant angeli, et perducant te in civitatem sanctam

Jerusalem.   Habeas requiem.

[May eternal light shine upoin them O Lord. May the angels lead you into paradise, and into the holy city, Jerusalem. May you have eternal rest.]

Prayers for the Church

Prayers for the World:

Leader: Let us pray for all who suffer as a result of conflict.

For all those who have died in the violence of war, each one remembered by and known to God; may

God give peace

People: God give peace

Leader: For those who love them in death as in life, offering the distress of our grief and the sadness of our loss;

may God give peace

People: God give peace

Leader: For all members of the armed forces of every nation who are in danger this day, remembering family, friends and all who pray for their safe return; may God give peace

People: God give peace

Leader: For civilian women, children and men whose lives are disfigured by war or terror, calling to mind in penitence the anger and hatreds of humanity; may God give peace

People: God give peace

Leader: For peace-makers and peace-keepers, who seek to keep this world secure and free;

may God give peace

People: God give peace

Leader: For all who bear the burden and privilege of leadership, political, military and religious; asking for gifts of wisdom and resolve in the search for reconciliation and peace; may God give peace

People: God give peace

Leader: O God of truth and justice, we hold before you those whose memory we cherish, and those whose names we will never know. Help us to lift our eyes above the torment of this broken world, and grant us the grace to pray for those who wish us harm. As we honour the past, may we put our faith in your future; for you are the source of life and hope, now and for ever.

Amen..

Lord’s Prayer

Hymn STF 347 “Crown him with many crowns” (HAP 255) (see screen) Blessing

[Choir Music for this service is from Philip Ledger’s “Requiem: a Thanksgiving for Life”, with settings of the Requiem Mass interspersed with passages from Thomas Traherne]