One of the first things Tony Abbott's new government did has not received much publicity, although it was an excellent decision.
In the dying days of the former labor government, the governing council of the Australian War Memorial (led by the War Memorial's director, former liberal leader Brendan Nelson) decided to remove the words "Known Unto God" from the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. These words were to be replaced with words from a speech by former labor prime minister Paul Keating: "He is one of them, and he is all of us".
Our new prime minister Tony Abbott, and the new Veterans' Affairs Minister Senator Michael Ronaldson, intervened and there will now be no change to "Known Unto God".
I would like to see Brendan Nelson and every member of the council that attempted to remove the reference to God sacked immediately. I have had an absolute gutful of the political correctness (which is a tool of the evil that never sleeps) editing out God at every opportunity, and even creeping into sacred places like the War Memorial.
The stupidity of this whole episode is that the words "Known Unto God" were written by Rudyard Kipling and chosen by the generation of diggers themselves. Although the words were added in 1999 these are the words the diggers had placed on thousands of crosses around the world to mark the graves of their comrades who were unable to be identified.
The Australian War Memorial exists through the efforts of First World War veterans and their vision of how to remember their mates: "Here is their spirit, in the heart of the land they loved; and here we guard the record which they themselves made" (Charles Bean, 1st World War Official Historian). Precisely. Who are we in our modern corrupt pathetic society of 2013 to change the way the war veterans themselves want to be remembered.
I agree with radio broadcaster Michael Smith's view about the current governing council: "The people who made the plan to remove the historical words used by our diggers are vandals. They have no place as stewards of our most sacred national memorial".
I grew up in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and one of my favourite places was, and still is, the Australian War Memorial. These days the ACT is a hotbed of leftist extremism, perversion and social engineering. The War Memorial has had a narrow escape, although no doubt the God haters will be back. Perhaps they will try and remove actual items from the War Memorial that offend their evil master, such as the Long Tan Cross.
I have never had much time for Paul Keating, and his words have no place in the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in the Hall of Remembrance. However, Keating did use words in parliament once that I believe are a good description of the vandals and anti Christians that wage a continuous assault on our nation: "Scumbags of dog's vomit; sleazebags of pigswill; maggot-infested buckets of pus; crims; grubs; boudoir bandicoots; box-heads; liars; lice; maggots; in and out of a cat's arse; like a dog returning to it's vomit". Yes, that was our former prime minister speaking. He had a turn of phrase, but was not Rudyard Kipling.
I think military means wars which means casualties. The life and death experiences inevitably mean the mind turns to higher things and that means God. In the context of the First World War, the massive casualties and the fact that the vast majority of soldiers in our army were Christians (and at that time, practising Christians) makes it completely understandable that references to God and the afterlife would be an integral part of war memorials and coping with the tragedy.
Posted by: Paul | Wednesday, 30 October 2013 at 10:40 AM
I always feel nervous when church and military overlap. The needs of the military are usually political: short term, trend-driven and populist.
My current PP is becoming an army chaplain. As a dissident Chinese who was banned for not acknowledging the government appoint bishops when teaching at the seminary, he must be made of the right stuff. I would have thought this would make him very anti-military, and I am surprised that ASIO would sign off on this.
Posted by: PythonMagus | Wednesday, 30 October 2013 at 09:29 AM