Peace Cairns of the First Unitarian Church Memorial Garden
The peace cairns in our church memorial garden were dedicated in October 2007 on the occasion of the 4th anniversary of Congress' authorization of the use of force in Iraq. We encourage you to visit the cairns. Below you will find background on cairns and also an explanation of what the cairns mean to us. In addition, we've included a number of reflective pieces of writing that inspired this project and our many other efforts on behalf of peace and healing.
Background and Vision
Cairns (pronounced "carn") are an ancient way to mark and memorialize loss (more history). Before battle, soldiers would each place a rock in a pile. When the battle was over, the survivors would retrieve a rock, leaving the remaining stones to mark the number lost. Over time, cairns have taken the shape of fewer stones stacked on top of one another, often carrying the additional symbolism of the human desire to build something of meaning from "the rubble" of violence and war. Cairns have also been used in mountains and on trails to mark a path–to help those who are lost find their way.
Our Peace Cairns seek to hold all these meanings. Our three large cairns represent the United States, Iraq and Afghanistan–three countries now linked by a devastating and tragic cycle of violence. Each honors the loss of a great many military and civilians. The fourth, smaller cairn is interactive. All are invited to add a small stone to the pile whenever you visit the site. For some it will represent a loved one they've lost due to violence or war. For others, it will represent the hope or commitment to working for peace and healing.
Mostly, this is space for all who need it. May this be a place of reflection, healing and hope. May it remind us not only of the cost of war, but also our deep human hunger for a new day and a better way to solve conflict. May this space and these simple rocks, indeed, be a symbol of all we do to "help the lost find their way."
Writings on Peace
Every war already carries within it the war which will answer it. Every war is answered by a new war, until everything, everything is smashed. - Kathe Kollwitz
I love America more than any other country in the world and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. - James Baldwin
If we could read the secret history of our enemies we should find in each person's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility. - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Problems cannot be solved at the same level of consciousness that created them. - Albert Einstein
The only thing that's been a worse flop than the organization of nonviolence has been the organization of violence. - Joan Baez
There's an alternative. There's always a third way, and it's not a combination of the other two ways. It's a different way. - David Carradine
When will our consciences grow so tender that we will act to prevent human misery rather than avenge it? - Eleanor Roosevelt
Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do. - Jesus
We are here to awaken from the illusion of our separateness. - Thich Nhat Hanh
In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. - Anne Frank
In the dark times
Will there be singing?
Yes, there will also be singing
About the dark times.
- Bertolt Brecht
Honoring The Fallen; For the Parents
Claudia Cashman, member of First Unitarian who wrote this in response to watching the end of the Macneil-Lehrer report on PBS, which regularly shows the photos of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
with what do their hearts swell
when they see their children on the screen?
is pride departed
along with the child,
raw hot anguish taking its place?
can they even get their eyes
to do the looking,
to see the ones they cradled
there before them
in the silence?
in case they can't,
i am their witness.
i stand with my heart at attention,
as their children flash by:
Florida, Vermont, Maryland;
19, 31, 22.
i say my version of a prayer,
i thank them,
as if each had been
my own.
A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor restrain men from doing the things men have always done. If a story seems moral, do not believe it. If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie.
- Tim O'Brien, from How to Tell a True War Story
The truth about war is hard to confront, especially if we have come to believe the romantic image of war. But confront it we must. It will make us conscious of the sacrifices we demand from those we send to fight. Our young men and women do not deserve to be deceived about the difficulties they must undertake. In a democracy, the voting public must grasp the exacting toll of war. And when we know what it is we face, and the possible consequences, we will be better prepared to cope with the stress, pain, and loss. Those who come back from war will be better able to handle their own trauma. They will understand that they are not alone. Perhaps they will also come to realize that we all need help. We all need each other. War is a cross no one should have to bear alone. 'Give sorrow words,' William Shakespeare wrote, 'The grief that does not speak whispers in the overfraught heart and bids it break.'
- Chris Hedges, from What Every Person Should Know About War
I see you again and again
tumbling out of the sky,
in your slate-grey suit and pressed white shirt.
At first I thought you were debris
from the explosion, maybe gray plaster wall
or fuselage but then I realized
that people were leaping.
I know who you are, I know
there's more to you than just this image
on the news, this ragdoll plummeting -
I know you were someone's lover, husband,
daddy. Last night you read stories
to your children, tucked them in, then curled into sleep
next to your wife. Perhaps there was small
sleepy talk of the future. Then,
before your morning coffee had cooled
you'd come to this; a choice between fire
or falling.
How feeble these words, billowing
in this aftermath, how ineffectual
this utterance of sorrow. We can see plainly
it's hopeless, even as the words trail from our mouths
- but we can't help ourselves - how I wish
we could trade them for something
that could really have caught you.
- Annie Farnsworth, "For the Falling Man"
A Nation Rocked to Sleep
by Carly Sheehan, daughter of Cindy Sheehan, nationally known anti-war activist and military mother
Have you ever heard the sounds of a mother's screaming for her son
The torrential rains of a mother's weeping will never be done
They call him a hero, you should be glad that's he's won, but have you ever
heard the sound of a mother screaming for her son
Have you ever heard the sound of a father holding back his cries
He must be brave, because his boy died for another man's lies
The only grief he allows himself are long deep sighs
Have you ever head the sound of a father holding back his cries
Have you ever heard the sound of taps played at your brothers grave
They say that he died so that the flag will continue to wave
But I believe he died because they had oil to save
Have you ever heard the sound of taps played at your brothers grave
Have you ever heard the sound of a nation being rocked to sleep
The leaders want to keep you numb so the pain won't be so deep
But if we the people let them continue, another mother will weep
Have you ever heard the sound of a nation being rocked to sleep
From "Open Letter to America"
by Ariel Dorfman, poet and essayist
Let me tell you, America, of the hopes I have for you...
How could I not wish you well?
You gave me, an americano from the Latino South, this language of love that I return to you.
You gave me the hot summer afternoons of my childhood in Queens... calculating Jackie Robinson's batting average.
How could I not wish you well?
You gave me refuge when I was a toddler, my family fleeing the fascist thugs in Argentina in the mid-Forties. One of you then. Still one of you now.
How could I not wish you well?
Years later, again it was to America I came with my own family, an exile from the Chile of Pinochet you helped to spawn into existence on an 11 September, another Tuesday of doom.
And yet, still wishing you well, America: you offered me the freedom to speak out that I did not have in Santiago, you gave me the opportunity to write and teach, you gave me a gringa granddaughter:
how could I not love the house she lives in?
Where is that America of mine? Where is that other America?
Where is the America of "as I would not be a slave so I would not be a master,"?
the America of "this land is our land, this land was meant for you and me," the America of all men, and all women, everyone of us on this ravaged, glorious earth of ours, all of us, created equal?
Created equal: one baby in Afghanistan or Iraq as sacred as one baby in Minneapolis.
Where is my America?
The America that taught me tolerance of every race and every religion, that filled me with pioneer energy,
that is generous to a fault when catastrophes strike?
Was I wrong when I believed America the just, America the rebellious, the unselfish, would rise to the challenge, was still alive, not entirely spoiled by excessive wealth, with the courage to conquer its own fear?
Am I wrong to believe that the country that gave the world jazz and Faulkner and Eleanor Roosevelt will be able to look at itself in the cracked mirror of history and join the rest of humanity, not as a city on a separate hill, but as one more city in the shining valleys of sorrow and uncertainty and hope where we all dwell?
A chance to grow, America, that is my hope.
November 13 2007