On Monday we celebrate Memorial Day. But what exactly is Memorial Day and why does it matter? Well, a memorial, according to Merriam Webster, is “something that keeps remembrance alive” or something that is “serving to preserve remembrance.” The obvious question, then, is what memory are we seeking to keep alive on Memorial Day? What remembrance does this day seek to preserve?
Well, to find those answers, we should look at how this holiday originated. While there are many “origin stories,” perhaps one of earliest observances of what we now call Memorial Day happened just days after the official end of the Civil War at an old race track turned Confederate prison camp in Charleston, SC. According to a Yale historian, in 1865, a group of freed slaves exhumed over 260 Union soldiers that had died in the prison camp and gave them a proper burial. They made a little cemetery, organizing the graves in rows and building a white fence around them with a marker labeled, “Martyrs of the Race Course.” Then, this group of freed black men, along with their families and some white missionaries, commemorated these fallen Union soldiers, with a parade, sermons, picnics, and songs like the “Star Spangled Banner.”
The tradition of honoring those fallen during the Civil War had sprung up in other cities across the South and the North. This tradition came to be known as “Decoration Day.” The first nationally celebrated Decoration Day took place on May 30, 1868 at Arlington National Cemetery. On one particular Decoration Day in 1871, the abolitionist Frederick Douglass delivered a speech at the monument to the Unknown Dead of the Civil War at Arlington National Cemetery. He described those that had fought to keep slavery as “the armies of a gigantic rebellion . . . with broad blades and bloody hands to destroy the very foundations of American society.” Those who had fought on the side of the Union, against slavery, Douglass described as “loyal soldiers” who had “flung themselves between the nation and the nation’s destroyers.” In his conclusion, Douglass said, “if the star-spangled banner floats only over free American citizens in every quarter of the land, and our country has before it a long and glorious career of justice, liberty, and civilization, we are indebted to the unselfish devotion of the noble army who rest in these honored graves.” Douglass praised the Union victory as a victory for the true identity of the nation and for its founding principles of liberty and justice for all.
But Douglass’ speech also contained an admonition. He said, “Dark and sad will be the hour to this nation when it forgets to pay grateful homage to its greatest benefactors . . . I say, if this war is to be forgotten, I ask, in the name of all things sacred, what shall men remember?” But we have forgotten. We have too often disregarded the magnitude of the liberty and equality that we enjoy in the United States. And that is why, in 1971, Congress voted to turn Decoration Day into Memorial Day—a national holiday every last Monday in May to remember and honor those who have fallen while defending freedom.
Memorials matter because they remind us of where we’ve been in the past in order to help us know where we should be in the future. Memorials help us to better interpret the present and navigate into the future. When we remember those who died in the Civil War, for instance, we remember that threats to America’s highest law (the Constitution) and foundational principles (The Declaration of Independence) can come from within as well as without. As a nation, we can lose sight of our guiding star—“that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” So, we need a memorial, something that keeps remembrance alive. Such a reminder, like Memorial Day, should inspire us to live in a way that our “loyal soldiers” who have “flung themselves between the nation and the nation’s destroyers” should not have died in vain.
This principle that memorials are necessary to remind us of where we came from in order to inform where we should be going is found in the Bible. God commanded the children of Israel to set up memorials, whether they were days or physical monuments. In Exodus 12:14, God told Israel, “And this day shall be unto you for a memorial; and ye shall keep it a feast to the LORD throughout your generations; ye shall keep it a feast by an ordinance for ever.” This feast day, called the Passover, was meant to remind Israel of the day God had sent the angel of death to destroy the firstborn of every Egyptian but passed over those Israelites who had put blood on their doorpost. When Israel once again stood on the brink of the Jordan, ready to enter the promised land that their parents had failed to enter, Joshua said, “Pass over before the ark of the LORD your God into the midst of Jordan, and take you up every man of you a stone upon his shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel: that this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones? Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel for ever.” One was a special day of celebration, the other a physical marker, but both were memorials. Both were something that kept remembrance alive. God wanted them to remember where they had come from—bondage in Egypt—in order to navigate where they were going in the future—the promised land of Canaan. Because they had learned from their mistakes in the past, because they had seen God fight their battles in the past, they knew Who their guiding star should be and where they should go in the future. It’s the same for us as Christians. We need memorials, like Easter Sunday, to remind us of our risen Savior and the path of sanctification He would have us to walk.
As Americans, we need memorials too. We need memorials to remind us of the battles we have fought—and more importantly, why we have fought them. We need memorials to remind us of the good, the bad, and the beautiful pages of America’s history.
As humans, we have a tendency to forget, to take for granted, to be discontented and ungrateful. Memorials matter because they remind us of where we came from and point us to the guiding star that will show us where we are going. Memorials matter because the founding principles that our nation has sought to realize since its birth are too unique and precious to neglect. Memorials matter because the cost of pursuing and protecting those founding principles has been too high for too many. Memorials matter because a nation that forgets is doomed to repeat the darkest pages of its history.
So, this Memorial Day, eat some hotdogs or hamburgers. Enjoy family and free time. Remember what makes the United States of America so unique and the loyal soldiers who have died to make her and keep her that way. Forgetting is fatal to a nation, and that is why memorials matter.