Warsaw residents honored men and women who died in service to our country throughout Memorial Day weekend. Under the direction of Commander Mark Sowers and Lynn Felgar of American Legion Ralph Parker Post No. 682, members of the organization placed flags on veterans\u2019 graves at Oakland Cemetery. Flags also lined the roads at the cemetery.<\/p>\n
Commander Sowers welcomed guests to the Memorial Day Service and the Rev. Larry Mulch gave the invocation. Aaron Lanning raised and lowered the flag to half-mast, where it remained throughout the service, and the audience recited the Pledge of Allegiance.<\/p>\n
Following the \u201cStar-Spangled Banner,\u201d Mulch also gave the Memorial Address, during which he reminded the audience that \u201ctoday, we honor those who literally shed their blood, gave their life. They could not have known what an immeasurable gift they gave to us.\u201d<\/p>\n
As in the past, as Mulch extended heartfelt gratitude to these soldiers for their service, this correspondent recalled a brave, young Warsaw man whose name is on the Vietnam Wall. Larry Rose, the oldest son of Merle and Hurbert Rose, was only 21 when he was killed in action on April 2, 1966. He served in C Company, First Battallion, 12th Calvary, First Calvary Division, U.S. Army Vietnam (USARV), and received the Purple Heart posthumously. Per those who knew him, Rose understood that he could lose his life in Vietnam, but he still left Warsaw\u2019s safety for the horror of battle.<\/p>\n
Mulch shared the names of local veterans, heroes, that Warsaw lost this year: Bob Hauk, a Navy veteran who served in Korea; Randy Fleming, a veteran of the Navy who served in Vietnam; and Jim Egley, a veteran of the Air Force who served as a B-29 refueler in Korea.<\/p>\n
Expressing gratitude that Americans are \u201ccelebrating 250 years of liberty\u201d this year, Mulch soberly noted that life in the United States affords freedoms that \u201cvery few in the world have the opportunity to enjoy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Expanding on the liberty available to Americans, he cautioned that it can \u201conly be kept safe by being diligent to follow the intentions of the Founding Fathers,\u201d who he said based the Declaration of Independence and Constitution on the Word of God, and reminded the audience that \u201cwithout the guidance of God and His Word, there will never be true freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mulch commented on the eloquent Preamble to the Declaration of Independence: \u201cWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.\u201d He noted that self-evident truth is \u201cso obvious that it requires no further proof, explanation, or demonstration,\u201d and that all men are endowed, \u201cprovided,\u201d by their creator with unalienable, \u201cfundamental, natural (rights), that cannot be surrendered, sold, or transferred to another person because they are inherent to human existence,\u201d and \u201cno government or legal authority can legitimately take them away\u2026among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.\u201d<\/p>\n
Drawing from the Bible, Pastor Mulch broadened his discussion of the sacrificial cost of liberty and freedom. \u201cJesus Christ shed His blood for our freedom. As much as the devil hates Jesus, he hates us first of all for wanting to be free from the bondage of sin and wanting to live in total freedom,\u201d he said, also mentioning the devil\u2019s hatred of freedom Americans have to worship God and to live free from \u201cany yokes of government.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addressing the need to be mindful of our veterans, the high cost of freedom, and our debt of gratitude and respect, Mulch eloquently reminded the audience of five tangible reminders of their invaluable service.<\/p>\n
First, we can recall our military\u2019s service, especially the work of those who made the ultimate sacrifice, when we stand before the flag and recite the Pledge of Allegiance.<\/p>\n
Second, he recalled the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It\u2019s inscribed with \u201cProclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land Unto All the Inhabitants Thereof,\u201d taken from a biblical passage.<\/p>\n
Third, the Statue of Liberty stands in New York Harbor with the torch in her right hand \u201cstanding for the light that leads to freedom,\u201d and the tablet in her left hand inscribed with \u201c\u2018July 4, 1776 (in Roman numerals),\u2019 the date of our Declaration of Independence.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fourth, journeying to Gettysburg, where, standing on hallowed ground, where so many American soldiers lost their lives, Abraham Lincoln declared, \u201cFour score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth, upon this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fifth, \u201cUpon a soldier\u2019s death, we drape their casket with the American flag and give them special military rights.\u201d<\/p>\n
A focused student of history, Mulch strengthened his discussion of America\u2019s costly liberty as he recounted many of the conflicts waged to secure her freedom for 250 years, two-and-a-half centuries: the Revolutionary War in 1775; the War of 1812; the Mexican War in 1846; the Civil War, in which more than a million soldiers were wounded or died; the Spanish American War; World War I; World War II; the Korean War; the Vietnam War; and the Gulf War.<\/p>\n
The conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq remind us to remain diligent, to \u201cnever rest on our laurels,\u201d as we strive to maintain a solid military. Realizing the necessity of a strong armed forces, in 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt is said to have announced, \u201cWe have the finest military in the world.\u201d Decades later, President John F. Kennedy declared, \u201cWe dare not tempt them (our adversaries) with weakness. For only when our Armies are sufficient beyond doubt can we be certain beyond doubt that they will never be employed.\u201d Echoing their position, President Ronald Reagan stated, \u201cPeace through strength.\u201d<\/p>\n
Providing an appropriate history lesson, Mulch shared information about Admiral William H. McRaven\u2019s (U.S. Navy, Retired) childhood visit to the American Cemetery in Normandy, France, that was published this year in McRaven\u2019s book. The cemetery rests on a cliff overlooking the D-Day landing beaches, and McRaven\u2019s father recounted the courage and sacrifice of American, British and Canadian soldiers and sailors, and other allies, as they stormed the shore under German gunfire, thousands losing their lives. Recalling the \u201crows and rows of perfectly aligned white marble crosses as far as the eye could see,\u201d he wrote the poem, \u201cThe Crosses.\u201d<\/p>\n
The ceremony continued with the audience singing \u201cGod Bless America,\u201d and Commander Sowers ordered the three-volley rifle salute by the honor guard of members of the Ralph Parker Post of the American Legion, the VFW 9802, and others. Then \u201cTaps\u201d was played, concluding the service.<\/p>\n
McRaven\u2019s concluding verses speak of a covenant he made and keeps \u201cto live a life of service, to honor all our losses, for those who went before us, those beneath the crosses.\u201d Continuing to live fruitful, committed lives of service is, indeed, respectful gratitude for the ultimate sacrifice made by so many of our nation\u2019s military.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Warsaw residents honored men and women who died in service to our country throughout Memorial Day weekend. Under…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":95283,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[95],"tags":[49624,49622,49623,49625,49628,47612,49621,49626,182,49627,49620,181],"class_list":["post-95282","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-warsaw","tag-all-men-are-created-equal","tag-gettysburg-address","tag-god","tag-liberty","tag-liberty-bell","tag-memorial-day","tag-natural-rights-and-legal-rights","tag-pledge-of-allegiance","tag-poland","tag-satan","tag-united-states-declaration-of-independence","tag-warsaw"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/116661596076072171","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/95283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}