To commemorate the sacrifice of the armed forces both her in the UK and the Commonwealth, the Revd Kevin P Jones, a United Reformed Church minister, offers this reflection for Remembrance Sunday:
I’ve recently finished my time serving as a chaplain in the army, and as we approach Remembrance Sunday, I’m reflecting on some of my experiences ministering in the armed forces.
I served for 13½ years and although I moved from army unit to army unit, five-and-a-half of those years were spent with 11 Explosive Ordnance and Search Regiment, which people might know better as the Army Bomb Disposal.
Many people will have seen news items of incidents that bomb disposal teams have gone out to, varying from Second World War bombs that have been discovered on building sites, to one recent incident about a shell being used as a garden ornament and a trowel being banged against it to clean the mud off! They are special people, immensely brave, and being alongside them as their chaplain for a number of years was an incredible honour.
I was privileged, as part of my ministry with them, to dedicate the memorial to those who have died conducting bomb disposal. It is at the National Memorial Arboretum at Alrewas, Staffordshire, which, as well as the main memorial, has many other individual memorials dedicated to different groups of people.
The memorial for bomb disposal is called “The Long Walk” and it depicts an operator in a bomb suit going forward, on their own, towards a device. The last name on that memorial is of Captain Lisa Head, who died from her wounds after she attempted to diffuse an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) in Afghanistan in 2011. Her memory is kept alive in many other ways including having a local road named after her in Didcot, Oxfordshire, (where the regimental headquarters is), as well as at regimental dinner nights when her favourite sweet, Maltesers, are always on the table.
There are many questions for me about the ethics of going to war, about whether we stayed too long in Afghanistan and about how we left, and about serving in the armed forces, even as a chaplain.
At Remembrance those questions aren’t forgotten. However, above all, I will remember those who did not return home from war, and pray for all those who still carry the scars of conflict, both physical and mental.
A prayer for Remembrance
We pray for those who struggle to remember without pain or grief
for those who have lost loved ones in war,
for those who have feelings of guilt or regret,
and for those who are affected by conflict today.
Help all your people to look to the future with hope,
to live in the present without being trapped by guilt,
and for the past not to be a burden but a means of inspiration to confront the challenges of today.
You are our God who stands alongside us,
and alongside all who cry out to you in pain, sorrow, or hardship.
Thank you for your presence with us now
and may your Spirit inspire us to commit ourselves to resisting evil wherever we face it,
and to working for justice, peace and freedom.
Amen.
Image: Revd Kevin Jones.