The Pursuit of Happiness (Memorial Service Homily)

This morning, a memorial service for a fallen soldier took place.  She fell to the most insidious enemy of all... despair.
Here is the homily for the ceremony:

The Pursuit of Happiness

Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness…this well-known phrase comes from our Constitution. Every soldier in this room has sworn to protect this right when we raised our right hands and said:

“I, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Our job is to ensure that people of this great nation have the ability to pursue happiness in their lives.

What about you?    You who are the 1%, who give up your personal luxuries to defend the rest of the nation.  Are you happy?  It seems happiness skips over us warriors.

Let me ask you plainly, how do you pursue happiness? 

Kid Cudi’s song “Pursuit of Happiness” describes what many people feel about their lives.

He acknowledges that some of the things we do for pleasure are for the moment.  They ease the pain just for the moment.  We participate in self destruction… binge drinking,  over-eating,  spending too much money.

You may think, hey Chaplain, hey Commander, hey battlebuddy…I hear what you are saying… but you don’t know the pain I’ve lived through.  You don’t know what I have seen.  Or as Kid Cudi says in his song:

5 a.m., cold sweats, wakin' up, to the sky

Tell me what you know about dreams,

Tell me what you know about night terrors,  NOTHIN'

He goes on to say….

You don't really care about the trials of tomorrow

Rather lay awake in the bed full of sorrow

 

 

There have been a lot of songs written about emotions, especially recently.  It seems to me that artists write about these topics because they have been impacted by sorrow.  Their audience connects to these songs and lyrics because they have been swallowed up by misery as well.  You may be here today and have very real sorrows, or very raw emotions . You may think that this generation of soldiers, this generation of youth has it harder than those before it.  I would agree.  This generation has been afflicted with a greater portion of pain.

Knowing that, how do you pursue happiness?

Maybe you have memories that you cannot get rid of.   Scars from things that have happened and you drink or smoke or do whatever to escape life’s realities.  You feel your life is a race to just get away from this pain. 

We think that as soon as this misery is conquered, we will be happy. 

But that is not the reality of this life.  Happiness is a slippery beast.  The more we pursue happiness for happiness sake, the more it will elude us.

But, there is hope. 

We need to pursue peace instead. 

I am not speaking about world peace, although that is a good thing.

I am speaking about inner peace.

Peace with ourselves and our situations. Peace with our loved ones.  Peace with the people we work with.   And most importantly, Peace with our creator. 

The apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians:

Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.

See, this is the reality.  When we focus on pursuing peace,  happiness and overall contentedness will follow.  Peace is what allows us to come to terms with our past.  Peace is what allows us to come to terms with our sorrows.  Peace is what we need to search for. 

Remember, we are not on this journey of life alone.  Let us seek peace as a community.  Find a chaplain, a friend, a family member to help you towards this goal … Together we can search for peace and find a joy which we all deserve to find.

 

 

Let us pray.

Gracious Lord, we thank you for __________ and bless you for allowing us to serve with a soldier that shared so much happiness…touched so many lives.

Today may your light shine upon us and may your favor rest on us as we say farewell to our sister.  May we find peace and rest in you.  For you are the great shepherd of the sheep.  In your name.

Amen.