The pastoral prayer Sunday morning transformed my ambivalence about Veterans' Day. I am conflicted because I value the people who have worn military uniforms, and gave several years of their lives, with some being wounded and some killed. I do not want to overlook or disrespect their significant sacrifice. And on the other hand, war seems so futile and wasteful and devastating. Heather's prayer this past Sunday caught me with her petition that was something like the following: " And we thank You for our veterans who have borne the sacrifice because we have failed to love our neighbor." That's not quite the phrasing, but what caught me was two things: conflict that rages through the centuries and around the globe is because of our human failure to love our neighbor as self; and the recognition that countless individuals (on every side) have paid the price of war and all that effort represents, even death. I have heard it before, but it caught me in a far different way to consider that freedom isn't free. And peace is not real until the whole globe has no more war.

This photo is from the Stones River National Cemetery, site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War.