"Let us all be upstanding."
Today is ANZAC Day in Australia. We attended the predawn memorial service in the city park. I was very impressed how many people came at such an early hour to show respect for those who have died or suffered in any way in their service to defend freedom.
The speaker told the story of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps harrowing experience on the cliffs at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915. Then, before he read a poem that has become the traditional words of ANZAC Day, he wanted everyone to stand. Instead of “will the audience please rise?” or “please stand,” he said, “let us all be upstanding.”
It struck me as a request that can apply long after we assemble here today. We should honor their sacrifice and be upstanding by the way we live our lives. We should be upstanding in the way we treat our neighbors. We should be upstanding in the way we engage--and even debate--in the free government they fought to defend.
For the Fallen
(fourth stanza)
by Laurence Binyon
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
Lest we forget.
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