The Creative Mind: A Memorial Day Reflection

Sermon: May 24, 2026 . Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of San Dieguito

Tomorrow is Memorial Day, the day we honor those who gave their lives in service to our country. For some of us, this day can elicit conflicted feelings. Early in our country’s history, war efforts were well supported. Wars felt justifiable. Beginning during the Korean and Vietnam wars, citizen support for overseas war activity began to diminish. Now, it can be a challenge to emotionally separate the support for our troops, the individuals putting their lives at risk, and support for a war itself. Then there is the guilt we carry of the harm we may have caused others through our war efforts. And so, each year Memorial Day brings with it an internal struggle of our own as we weigh our thoughts about war against the reality of the loss of life. 

Today we will take an historical journey through the five wars that had the highest number of US casualties and look at the art forms that helped the people living in the aftermath of those wars process their profound grief. 

Let’s begin with the Revolutionary War. The war that gained America its independence from Britain cost this country over 32,300 lives, which doesn’t include the Native American lives that were either lost or displaced during the conflict. Including those numbers, we reach nearly 75,000 lives lost. Normal mourning practices of the day in early America included strict timelines for wearing black attire and hanging black drapery in one’s home. People wore jewelry to commemorate the dead, which might include a lock of hair in the setting. As a way to creatively process loss, people engaged in the art form of memorial embroidery. 

The piece above was created to honor Major General James Green, who served as a Captain of Light Horse Company, Monmouth Militia during the war. He didn’t die during the conflict, but survived the war and later died in 1811.

While the creation of mourning and memorial embroideries was already in practice during the revolutionary war, they were made especially popular upon the death of George Washington in 1799 and remained popular through the first half of the nineteenth century. Images in memorial needleworks tended to include weeping willows, urns, columns, gardens, and mourning women.

The embroidery above, a tribute to George Washington, was designed by Samuel Folwell and most likely stitched by his wife Elizabeth, along with students from her school for young ladies in Philadelphia. Again you can see an urn and a weeping willow set in a garden. This example has a church in the background. 

Creating embroidery pieces such as these would have taken a significant amount of time, each stitch encouraging healing and acceptance of the loss. 

Is it possible to stitch away our grief?

The Civil War was the largest loss of American life in history. With American fighting American, the number of US casualties numbered 1,129,418, fifteen times the amount of lives lost in the Revolutionary War 90 years earlier. The heavy loss of life during this war is what encouraged the creation of Memorial Day, which was originally called Decoration Day, as loved ones would decorate the graves of the fallen with flowers and flags. The practice of mourning embroidery had fallen away and been replaced by penning Dead Soldier Poems, which suited the dramatic and highly romantic Victorian era. These poems, written by one who personally knew the fallen soldier, reimagined the soldier’s deathbed moment as valiant and heroic, regardless of any realities of the death circumstances. Early in the war, these patriotic poems encouraged people to enlist. Later, as casualties grew in number and citizens became tired of the ongoing battles, they provided meaning for the deaths that became more and more senseless. The following are 4 stanzas of a Dead Soldier Poem that was written by Mrs. S.D. Tandy – Canon Falls, MN – Upon hearing of the death of a young man who attended her church. It is entitled:

In Memory of Philip Rice Hamlin

Killed in Action

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

3 July 1863

Where the battle raged the wildest,

In the thickest of the fight,

Fell he like a hero, bravely,

Proudly battling for the right.

—

Far away from home and kindred,

Loving Mother, Father dear,

Gentle Sister, youthful Brothers,

Ne’er again his voice shall hear.

—

‘Neath the shadow of the wildwood

There we made his lowly bed.

Left him there to rest unbroken

With the silent nameless dead.

—

Death for Philip had no terrors.

He was strong in faith and love.

Hopeful, trusting, patient ever,

Living for his home above.

Can we write away our grief?

World War I took 320,518 American lives, less than one third of lives lost during the Civil War, although it shook American soldiers with a disillusionment that echoed through novels, poetry, and other art forms through the 1920’s. In 1929, Ernest Hemingway wrote A Farewell to Arms, which spoke of the Lost Generation of souls still traumatized by the Great War. Since this war wasn’t fought on American soil, citizens were disconnected from the realities of the battles. Because of this, in 1918, the US War Department sent eight artists to France, right into the center of the battlefield with the instructions to paint what they witnessed. Those eight artists provided over 700 works of art, which now reside with the National Museum of American History and have recently been digitized.

The piece above, entitled “His Bunkie” by William James Aylward, speaks to the loss soldiers experience when they lose their comrades and friends in battle.

Also created in 1918, the painting above is by George Matthews Harding, and depicts German prisoners carrying the bodies of the deceased and wounded to a first aid station. These images gave American citizens the chance to understand the realities of what soldiers were experiencing in Europe. 

Can we paint away our grief?

The second most deadly American war was World War II, with 1,076,445 American lives lost. There have been many artistic memorials to this war. One that captured America’s fascination came over 50 years after the war ended: Steven Spielberg’s film Saving Private Ryan. This film was based on the true story of the Niland brothers, 4 American brothers from Tonawanda, NY, who served during WWII. There was a period of time during the war that three of the brothers were reported having died in battle and so the fourth brother was ordered to come home since no family should suffer losing all four of their children. Later, it was discovered that one of the deceased brothers was actually alive in a POW camp in Burma. He later returned home. If you haven’t seen the film, it is gritty, raw, and nauseatingly realistic in its depiction of Allied forces storming the beach at Normandy. However, it’s not the shockingly violent images that provide us an opportunity to process the loss. It’s the music. John Williams' score has become an iconic expression of the honor and sacredness that accompanies the loss of life during war. 

Steven Spielberg stated, “It's a testament to John Williams' sensitivity and brilliance that will stand the test of time and honor forever the fallen of this war... He did not want to sentimentalize or create emotion from what already existed in raw form. Saving Private Ryan is furious and relentless, as are all wars. But where is music? It is exactly where John Williams intends for us, the chance to breathe and remember.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvpQMTY8H9Y

Can we sing away our grief?

Tattoos have long been utilized by service men and women to commemorate their time and experiences in the military. It wasn’t until the “Tattoo Renaissance” of the 1970’s that brought tattoo artistry into the mainstream American public. Today, one can see many examples of memorial tattoos on the bodies of veterans and family members who have lost loved ones in combat. These artistic memorials offer visual expressions of grief that honor the deceased for as long as one’s body lasts. Very recently, the tattooing industry has adapted a way to integrate the cremated remains of loved ones into tattoo ink, so that the deceased can be permanently carried with us in a new way. While early examples of tattoo memorials from the Civil War through the second world war have since disappeared with the passing of those service men and women, there are still many tattoo memorials evident in our society from the Korean War onward. 

The Vietnam War took 211,454 American lives, but the destruction was far more reaching than that. Some soldiers didn’t know how to process the pain, except to wear it on their body, as an outward symbol of their inner wounds. 

The first Tattoo Memorial depicts a traditional military symbol known as the Battlefield Cross. This symbol originated during the Civil War and remains to this day. The components include:

• The Rifle thrust into the ground, which signals that the soldier was killed in action.

• The Helmet: Placed on top of the rifle to represent the fallen soldier.

• The Boots: Positioned at the base to represent the soldier's final march.

• The Dog Tags: Suspended from the rifle to keep the individual's identity remembered.                       

  
  

The second is a tattoo of the 4th stanza of a poem that originates from World War I called “For the Fallen” by Laurence Binyon. The red poppy is the universal symbol of military sacrifice, a notion that was established following the popularity of the poem "In Flanders Fields" by Canadian soldier John McCrae in 1915. 

The third is of John Collie, a Veitnam veteran who served in the 173rd Airborne Division of the U.S. Army. He says "The tattoo is a memorial to my brothers and sisters who never came home.”

Can we wear away our grief?

Needlepoint, poetry, painting, music, drawing... These art forms not only give us insight into the lives lost, but they also shape our understanding of how humans grieve, and how creativity can be an avenue toward healing.

Creativity requires a flexible mind. Flexible minds can heal and grow. 

This Memorial Day, as we remember those who have fallen, as we hold loss in our hearts, let us also remember that we have been blessed with very human ways to process and understand our grief. May our creative minds offer the tools we need to make meaning, process pain, and connect with others to share our stories. May we not lean into despair, but instead into a flexible, creative space that allows us to breathe and reflect.

Write a poem, sing a song, draw a picture. Healing begins when we take our internal pain and express it externally, in any way that we can. May your expressions lighten your heart and forever be held in sacredness and honor.

Amen.

OTHER READINGS FOR REFLECTION:

Called By Loss, Called By Peace

Rev. Heather K Janules

We come this day, called by war

By the suffering we inflict and endure

When minds across borders

fail to reason and compromise.

We come this day, called by loss,

The deaths of those who serve in our name,

Those whose lives end before their natural course

In service to a cause greater than their own.

We come this day, called by hope

Hope that we will, in some season,

Finally surrender our swords for ploughshares

And we come this day called by peace.

May we hear its song, may we proclaim its promise.

May our remembrance today renew our struggle.

We can never stay or rest.

Decoration Day

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Sleep, comrades, sleep and rest

  On this Field of the Grounded Arms,

Where foes no more molest,

  Nor sentry's shot alarms!

Ye have slept on the ground before,

  And started to your feet

At the cannon's sudden roar,

  Or the drum's redoubling beat.

But in this camp of Death

  No sound your slumber breaks;

Here is no fevered breath,

  No wound that bleeds and aches.

All is repose and peace,

  Untrampled lies the sod;

The shouts of battle cease,

  It is the Truce of God!

Rest, comrades, rest and sleep!

  The thoughts of men shall be

As sentinels to keep

  Your rest from danger free.

Your silent tents of green

  We deck with fragrant flowers;

Yours has the suffering been,

  The memory shall be ours.