Memorial Day: Honor Courage and Forgiveness that Built America.
The Meaning of Memorial Day: A Reminder of America’s Founding Ideals
Memorial Day is more than just a day off work or a time for barbecues. It’s a day to remember and honor those who died in military service to the country. But it’s also a day to connect with a heritage that began with a courageous and faithful group of founders, who risked everything for the birth of freedom and the establishment of America as a “city on a hill.”
If the last few generations of Americans understood the origin and meaning of Memorial Day, we might have avoided the trauma of division and corruption that now threatens the United States as never before.
Memorial Day was founded on the biblical ideals of forgiveness and reconciliation shortly after America’s most divisive and bloody conflict, the Civil War, which extended from 1861 to 1865.
The United States was so mercilessly divided at the time of the Civil War that many thought reconciliation impossible. And yet, it began with humble and virtuous actions from the vanquished South, not the victorious North.
Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, was established to honor the dead from the Civil War. The holiday’s origin dates to April 25, 1866, when a former chaplain in the Confederate Army accompanied a group of women from Columbus, Mississippi, to Friendship Cemetery — the burial ground for about 1,600 men who died in the Battle of Shiloh — for the purpose of honoring the dead with decorations of flowers.
Despite the war’s staggering death toll and Confederates having inflicted far more casualties on the North than the Union did on the South, Abraham Lincoln expressed no blame or bitterness toward the Confederacy. Rather, in his Second Inaugural Address, he held both sides accountable for this most costly war. Memorial Day might be our most important holiday today because it reminds us that the country paid more in deaths to reunite the nation and correct the offense of slavery than it paid in all other wars the nation fought in its ensuing history.
Defending God-Given Rights
Americans were unique in sacrificing their treasure and lives to found the first country in history proclaiming that all people have natural rights that come from God rather than from rulers or government. The Declaration of Independence affirmed the equality of all people, and that they were endowed with inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
And just because it took nearly 200 years to realize that vision, it does not diminish the founding based on those ideals. Thus, when Americans sacrificed their lives in military service, we should remember that it was not just to defend the United States but to uphold the natural rights and moral values associated with the nation’s founding that provide inspiration for others worldwide.
The Constitution provided a charter for an unprecedented arrangement of governmental institutions designed to mitigate corruption and abuse of power while also protecting the citizens’ inalienable, God-given rights. The Bill of Rights, an integral part of the Constitution, enabled people living in America to rise closer to the divine image in which all were created than they would have under any government previously conceived.
Memorial Day means more than remembering and honoring those who died in military service to the country. It means connecting with a heritage that began with a courageous and faithful group of founders, who risked everything for the birth of freedom and the establishment of America as a “city on a hill.”
Memorial Day, rightly understood, provides inspiration and depth to rediscover and restore the ideals that made America great.
