Today, on Armistice Day, 18 American military vets will commit suicide. This weekend, military veterans are gathering in Washington, D.C., for the second Truth Commission on Conscience in War.

“War inflicts terrible, tragic consequences on all touched by it,” says Truth Commission member Herman Keizer (U.S. Army ret.). “Moral conscience should not be one of its casualties.” St. Martin of Tours, pray for us.

St. Martin was born about the year 316 in Sabaria, Upper Pannonia, a province comprising northern Yugoslavia and western Hungary. His father was an officer in the Roman army. While Martin was still a child, his father was transferred to northern Italy. There the boy learned of Christianity, became drawn to it, and became a catechumen.

As the son of a military veteran, at the age of 15 Martin was required to begin service in the army. While young Martin was stationed at Amiens, in Gaul, an incident occurred which tradition and art have rendered famous.

As he rode toward the town one winter day, he noticed near the gates a poor man, thinly clad, shivering with cold, and begging alms. Martin saw that none who passed stopped to help the miserable fellow. He had nothing with him but his military uniform, but, drawing his sword from its scabbard, he cut his great woolen cloak in two pieces, gave one half to the beggar, and wrapped himself in the other.

The following night, Martin had a dream. In his sleep he saw Jesus, surrounded by angels, and dressed in the half of the cloak Martin had given away. A voice interrogated him: Look closely. Do you recognize this cloak?

Martin then heard Jesus say to the angels, “Martin, as yet only a catechumen, has covered me with his own cloak.” After this experience, Martin “flew to be baptized.”

When Martin was about 20, Gaul was attacked. However, his conversion to Jesus made him realize that the military life was not compatible with his faith. He refused military service and was taken off to prison. St. Martin was probably one of the earliest conscientious objectors. He made a protest, refused to fight, and lived through one war in prison.

When he was released from prison, he asked to be ordained a deacon. In 360 he became a monk and was one of the pioneers of western monasticism. In 372 he was made bishop but continued to live in his monk’s cell first at the cathedral in Tours and then at the monastery of Marmoutier. During his long life he established many religious communities and traveled around his diocese by donkey, boat, and on foot, preaching the gospel’s peace and healing. His emblems are a tree, armor, a cloak, and a beggar.

Earlier I wrote about Iraq Veterans Against War’s “Operation Recovery.” Their campaign continues to make an impact. (Motto: Friends Don’t Let Friends Deploy Who Are Wounded Warriors.) Here are a couple of news clips that used my photos:

Veterans Day: IVAW’s Operation Recovery Update

In an effort to raise public awareness about Operation Recovery to stop the deployment of traumatized troops, Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) will be exposing information about the different forms of trauma troops and veterans experience. In the weeks leading up to Veterans Day, IVAW has been giving public presentations to educate the public about the realities of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), and Military Sexual Trauma (MST), conditions that affect hundreds of thousands of military members and veterans.

Afghanistan & Iraq Vets Call for End to Deployment of Traumatized Troops

Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) in conjunction with other progressive leaning Veterans and Military family groups has been planning Operation Recovery and now IVAW is ready to publicly release details of their campaign.

Read more about veteran suicide rates here: This Veteran’s Day, 18 Will Die By Their Own Hands

“Memory is one of the most powerful functions of the human mind. It is also one of life’s most determining ones. What goes on in memory has a great deal to do with what goes on in us all our lives. Memory is a wild horse, unbridled, riderless, maverick. It takes us often where we would not go, or takes us back over and over again to where we cannot stay, however much we wish we could. So, it leaves us always in one state or the other, one place or the other, leaves us either pining or confused, leaves us in either case in a world unfinished in us.

It is the unfinishedness that is the price we pay for growing always older.

The young hear memory in the voice of their elders and, delighted by these voices from the past or bored by them, too often miss the content behind the content. Memory is not about what went on in the past. It is about what is going on inside of us right this moment. It is never idle. It never lets us alone. It is made up of the stuff of life in the process of becoming the grist of the soul.

There is an energy in memory that is deceiving. The assumption is that since a thing is past, it has no present meaning for us. But nothing could be further from the truth.

Whatever is still in memory is exactly what has most meaning for us. It is the indicator of the unfinished in life. It gives sure sign of what still has emotional significance for us. It refuses to allow us to overlook what must yet be acknowledged if we are ever to be fully honest with ourselves. Most of all, memory and the way we deal with it is the only thing we have that makes us authentic teachers of the young. It tells us what we did that now we miss doing, and it reminds us of what we didn’t do that now we wish we had. And such things live in memory forever.

But memory is not meant to cement us in times past. It is meant to enable us to do better now that which we did not do as well before. It is the greatest teacher of them all. The task is to come to the point where we can trust our memories to guide us out of the past into a better future.

There is nothing in conscious memory that is unimportant. To sit and listen to a person wander through the storied fragments of their lives is to come to know what worries them, what delights them, what love did to them, what rejection dampened in them, and what is left to deal with now if the press of past failures, the loss of past loves are ever to be stitched into a healthy whole in the here and now.” —Sr. Joan Chittister, OSB

From The Gift of Years by Joan Chittister

In extreme situations, there are always stories of people of faith who act with extraordinary courage. For the movement of nonviolence and the continuation of the faith, we need to learn about these stories, examine them, and tell them in our churches, to our communities, and in our families.

The story of how the Catholic Benebikira Sisters in Rwanda saved children and rebuilt families during the genocide is one such story. Thank you to Kathleen Sullivan at NCR for her article:

It was during the 1994 Rwandan genocide, which witnessed the murders of an estimated 800,000, that the Benebikira Sisters, at great risk to themselves, sheltered hundreds of orphans and others who sought refuge in their convents.

At the Benebikira motherhouse in the village of Save, the militia stormed the convent and demanded that the sisters, members of an order native to Rwanda, separate themselves by ethnic groups. The sisters refused — essentially signing their death warrants. The militia then looted all their food, cut the water lines, and told the sisters they would return to kill them.

At other convents, 20 sisters were killed when they stood up to militia. At their convent in Butare, the sisters hid 22 children and teens whose parents had been slaughtered by the Hutus, but soldiers found the children and carted them off to a certain death.

Benebikira Sr. M. Juvenal Mukamurama, who would later serve as mother general of the order from 1996 to 2008, was at the convent in Butare in 1994. In a recent interview she recalled the horrific day that the soldiers came.

“It was very sad,” Mukamurama said somberly. “They had orders [to take the children]. What danger can a 5-year-old child be?”

When the genocide ended, the sisters found themselves caring for some 350 orphans — most traumatized after witnessing the brutal murders of their parents. The sisters ran an orphanage, but they felt something was missing. The children “had food and clothing,” said Mukamurama, “but it was no life for them. Family is very important in our country. They needed a family. So we decided to build community houses and make families.”

The Benebikiras then built 39 houses and grouped the orphans into “families” of six to eight children. The sisters, who oversaw the network of community homes, found that the orphans found new life in these newly-formed family units.

Balls and strikes.

I’m finally learning
how to pitch
And not simply throw.

A major adjustment
That one might
Call wisdom…

– E. Ethelbert Miller

From The Fifth Inning