OPINION: What's the Christian lesson in Remembrance Day?

REMEMBRANCE Day is a powerful opportunity for us to collectively think about some complex questions.

What can we learn from war, asks Bundaberg' Rev Andrew Schmidt.

REMEMBRANCE Day, the 11th of November, is a powerful opportunity for us to collectively think about some complex questions, and I believe we do need to think about them.

The first and most obvious is the question, "how do we honour those who fought in war, who gave of themselves for others, without also honouring the process of war?"

It is easy enough to say, but it is important that our actions reflect this idea.

I have heard stories of soldiers being more traumatised by returning from an "unpopular war", than from the war itself.

I have deep respect for those who are able to articulate this in a way that penetrates the hearts of listeners.

The second question I believe we need to explore is the process of healing. In some small ways I believe war can be likened to the surgical process.

A surgeon who cut a person without cause would be seen as fundamentally wrong, and I am sure some would use the word evil, by the same token, going to war without cause is wrong or evil.

Just as cutting a person is wrong, but sometimes for a surgeon it is less wrong than not, so to going to war.

There are two important parts to this analogy that need to be teased out.

One is the critique of surgeons who, having a scalpel see every problem as surgical, or the government that has an army and sees every problem as military.

The second is the healing journey that continues long after the surgery takes place, and is facilitated by the medical profession.

We need better processes for healing the cuts caused by war, both here and abroad.

It is generally acknowledged, after all, that the conditions in Europe after the First World War facilitated the Second World War.

Recognising that we as a community fold violence into our civic sacred story, and use it to create a narrative that defines the modern world, I have a third question: What is the best way that a Christian might act on this day?