On this very day, just six years ago, terrorists, seeking to destroy our country and everything that we stand for hijacked four planes and crashed them into three iconic buildings of the American skyline. Just a few days after thanksgiving this year, my dad will leave to go help as we continue to search for the evil men that did this.
We have captured many of them. We have foiled many other terrorist plots. We have captured one of the most evil and dangerous dictators of this age. And yet, there is still more to do. There are still insurgents to kill, schools and hospitals to build, people to protect, a goverment to establish. There are still those who want us dead. We are the infidels. We will always be.
And so we must fight. As long as there is freedom in this world we must fight. As long as there are people that desire to abolish this freedom that we hold dear, we must fight. We must send the best that we have. Those that have volunteered to sacrifice their lives so that we can stay here at home and complain about McDonalds not giving us enough cheese on our burger.
My youth pastor's husband is a Marine. He leaves for Iraq in less then a month. He doesn't have to. He's served his time. He's earned his purple heart. But he goes to be with the young men he helped train. He won't see his men go while he stays at home. He will take his place at the front, with his men, where he belongs.
One of my closest friends leaves this week for Marine bootcamp. He doesn't know all that he is getting into it. But he's done everything he can to prepare. He's ready to serve.
My dad goes too. Twenty-four years as an Air Force Officer. We'll spend thanksgiving with him and then he will leave for training and we may not see him again until next July. He will be leading a multi-billion dollar project to rebuild the schools and hospitals in Iraq.
"Freedom isn't free." How poignant. How true.
During the Revolutionary War, Nathan Hale was a spy for the Continental army. He was a Quaker as well, Quakers are traditionally pacifists and do not believe in warfare as a proper means to resolve any conflict. At twenty-one years of age Nathan Hale was hung by the British Army for espionage. On September, 22nd 1776, as the noose was placed around his neck, his final words revealed the core of his existence. "I only regret that I have but one life to lost for my country."
When you see what terrorist want to do to this country, when you read about the men and women laying their lives on the line every day, when you watch your friends, your father, prepare to go to war; it gives you a new perspective on those famous words. It makes it all a little bit more real.
No, Freedom Isn't Free
I watched the flag pass by one day.
It fluttered in the breeze.
A young Marine saluted it,
And then he stood at ease.
I looked at him in uniform
So young, so tall, so proud,
With hair cut square and eyes alert
He'd stand out in any crowd.
I thought how many men like him
Had fallen through the years.
How many died on foreign soil?
How many mothers' tears?
How many pilots' planes shot down?
How many died at sea?
How many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
No, freedom isn't free.
I heard the sound of taps one night,
When everything was still
I listened to the bugler play
And felt a sudden chill.
I wondered just how many times
That taps had meant "Amen,"
When a flag had draped a coffin
Of a brother or a friend.
I thought of all the children,
Of the mothers and the wives,
Of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.
I thought about a graveyard
At the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
No, freedom isn't free.
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