Editor's Postlude: We Shall Remember Them
My relationship with Remembrance Day has shifted through the years. As a child, I loved the ritual and formality of the occasion. I cherished remembering my grandfather, a German immigrant, who served as a gunsmith in Toronto during World War II. As a public school teacher, I embraced my role in civic socialization, engaging the children in Remembrance Day as well as other national civic occasions.
As a seminary student, I questioned the marking of Remembrance Day. Did it celebrate war? Do Remembrance Day rituals have a place in worship?
In my 35 years of congregational ministry, I have come to understand Remembrance Day in its role of providing space for pastoral care for veterans and their families. Yes, the veterans and soldiers dress in uniform and display their medals, but I realize that something deeper is going on for them. They are not honouring war or condoning it. It is the one day that they publicly can give witness to what they experienced. There is unexpressed grief rumbling behind the solemn faces and stiff military stances. There is deep trauma just under the surface as they march on and off, raise and lower flags, and lay poppy-laden wreaths. At the 2025 Ottawa Remembrance Day ceremony, a CBC reporter asked a veteran in his nineties what he wanted younger generations to remember from this day. His answer was clear: “You don’t want war. You don’t want to go to war.”
I’ve come to recognize that, especially here in Canada, Remembrance Day is not about celebrating war. It is about all of us gathering alongside one another, offering support and bearing witness to the deep grief and trauma that veterans and soldiers cannot begin to put into words, do not want to put into words.
Many of us know that Remembrance Day is on November 11 because the armistice ending the fighting of World War I officially went into effect the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. Did you know that there is more to the date? As Diana Butler Bass points out in her November 2025 blog, November 11 became a common date to sign treaties because of its relationship to a particular saint, including the Treaty of Granada (1500), the Peace of Zsitva-Torok (1606), the Peace of Westphalia (1648), the Canandiagua Treaty (1794) and the Treaty of Sinchula (1865).
November 11 is the feast day of St. Martin of Tours (316–397 CE). Martin, born in Hungary, showed interest in Christianity at a young age. Horrified by this interest, his father enrolled Martin in the Roman army. Yet, Martin continued to be intrigued by Christianity. As the story goes, one day when he was on patrol, Martin saw a naked beggar on the road. He took off his military cloak and covered the man. That night, Jesus came to Martin in a dream and honoured him for his gift. It was a turning point. Martin was baptized and asked to be released from Roman service, declaring that as Christ’s soldier he could no longer fight for Rome.
Martin devoted himself to the church, as a monk, as a priest, and then as the third bishop of Tours. He is most remembered for his peacemaking and his generosity to the most vulnerable. The feast day of this soldier-turned-peacemaker became the day for signing treaties, though his story has been lost to the rituals of November 11.
No holiday, civic or religious, has only one way of understanding it. What I have come to understand is that Remembrance Day is a needed and valid way to express in ritual the horrors, the grief, and the trauma that cannot be put into words.
In 1 Corinthians 12:26, Paul declares that “if one member suffers, all suffer together with it.” And so, I join in Remembrance Day rituals and include a time of remembrance in worship in order to share in the unexpressed suffering of those whose deep desire is for no more war.
Susan Lukey, Editor
