Anzac Day this coming Wednesday.
That gives you time to nip down to the local library and grab a copy of a book written 40 years ago about one Anzac Day in the life of one fictional boy.
Five pages from the end of the book it says:
“Did Margaret know that he had fought for her? Did she care? Was this the way it was with wars? The people you fought for not caring. Did you fight for nothing? After it was all over did they all go home, not looking back, shrugging it off, forgetting that you weren’t the same any more?”
* * *
Why did he say that?
You have to read the book to find out.
It is a book about a particular boy.
It is a book about all of us.
It is a very odd book.
It is a very good book.
It is called “Bread and Honey”
Author: Ivan Southall.

By Thy blood that flowed from Thee in Thy bitter agony;

By the scourge so meekly borne; by the purple robe of scorn,

Jesus Saviour hear our cry, Thou hast suffered just as we;

Hear the loving litany we Thy children sing to Thee.

By the thorns that crowned thy head; by Thy sceptre of a reed;

By Thy foot-step faint and slow, weighed beneath Thy cross of woe;

By the nails and pointed spear; by Thy people’s cruel jeer;

By Thy dying prayer which rose, begging mercy for Thy foes;

By the darkness black as night, blotting out the sun from sight;

By the cry with which in death, Thou didst yield Thy parting breath,

By Thy weeping Mother’s woe; by the sword that pierced her through,

When, in anguish, standing by, on the cross she saw Thee die.

. . . adapted from the writings of Irish novelist, Cecilia Mary Caddell.

Last Sunday, US soldier, Sergeant Robert Bales, allegedly left his base and killed 16 civilians in a nearby Afghan village.

What made him do it?

* he is on his fourth Middle Eastern tour of duty, has seen too much bloodshed and perhaps just “cracked up”.

* the rampage followed soon after his seeing a colleague blown more or less to pieces.

* he may also have been consuming alcohol.

* * *

The politicians are making politician responses.

President Karzai wants American troops kept away from villages: “This has been going on for too long. This behaviour cannot be tolerated.”

Mr Obama says justice will be done. (He was smart getting Bales out of Afghanistan where he would have been tortured, maybe crucified).

But will he get justice in America?

Mr Obama needs to please all kinds of interests on whom his political survival depends.

He may need a scapegoat.

* * *

This kind of horrible event always happens in every war.

War is so awful, so subhuman.

There is no easy answer.

The US and friends should never have invaded Iraq or Afghanistan. It’s a bit late to talk about that.

We had all better pray hard for peace.

And live for peace.

“O God, Creator of the universe, you are Father of every living creature.

You guide the events of history.

We beg you, break down the hatreds and discords of mankind.

Make us ready for reconciliation.

Send forth your Spirit to work in the intimacy of hearts.

Help us to commit ourselves to search for true peace and to have the charity which overcomes hatred and disarms revenge.”

Englishman, Tony Nicklinson, 58, has “locked-in syndrome” following a stroke in 2005.

Locked-in syndrome means being  totally paralysed (except for eye movements) while remaining fully conscious.

Such person are incapable of carrying out their own suicide.

Mr Nicklinson has been granted permission by a High Court judge to take to a full hearing his request for legal protection for any doctor who agrees to kill him.

The Ministry of Justice opposes granting this request — because it would would authorise murder, bypassing parliament and changing the law.

* * *

It’s hard for the rest of us to imagine what the syndrome would feel like.

Moments of death-wish would be natural — we all become fretful when unable to get our own way.

However killing an innocent human being is wrong.

Our responsibility is to make the existence of persons like Mr Nicklinson as tolerable as possible, sparing no effort.

Suicide, sadly, is in the news again this week.

Almost everybody has probably thought, sometime, “This is too much — I would be better off dead.”

Our world is full of suffering.

Many overseas suffer hardship more than we can imagine: those with no food to offer their half-dead children.

Yet we Australians, affluent by world standards, are miserable because we want more money, conveniences, comfort etc.

* * *

Hardship can bring out the best in people.

The Bible bids us believe that:

“Sufferings bring patience,

patience brings perseverance,

perseverance brings hope

– and this hope does not disappoint us

because God’s love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit . . . .”

* * *

The thing Australian young people need most urgently, desperately, is to learn how to suffer– to understand suffering — to find in suffering a way to God.

That means getting true religion into school curriculums — not as a filleted, watered-down concession to little old ladies whose votes might swing a tight election . . . .

No, true religion as the only way to deal with real life.

Religion as common sense.

Religion as deciding not to continue living in permanent denial.

Victorian Police have revealed that family violence is on the rise.

This last Christmas period, 30 percent more domestic assaults were reported than the previous Christmas.

4700 compared with 3600.

Why?

(1) Many of the people involved in such violence think it is normal — having come from homes where they witnessed violence by their own parents.

(2) Practically all would have watched television and videos during childhood, which contained – even glorified — violence.

Today’s parents might consider insisting that their children never watch any film that the parents haven’t viewed from end to end. If they haven’t the time to do that, they should change their priorities until they can do it.

(3) Another sobering thought . . . . In a society where unborn human babies whose existence is inconvenient are legally exterminated, little surprise that the ones they didn’t get around to aborting have no respect for anyone else’s rights.