Memorial of sin

In his latest book ( Migrations of the Holy: God, State, and the Political Meaning of the Church ), William Cavanaugh offers an intriguing analysis of the liturgy of war memorials. Drawing on Marvin and Ingle’s Blood Sacrifice and the Nation: Totem Rituals and the American Flag (Cambridge Cultural Social Studies) , he notes that the celebrations of heroic sacrificial patriots “can never really reproduce the bodily sacrifice” that they commemorate: “Thus, D-Day celebrations were marked by guilt that the present generation is merely living off the sacrifices of those who died there. There is a fear that the ‘greatest generation’ has passed and that the current generation has not undertaken sacrifices to equal those in the ‘Good War.’” This guilt, he argues, can only be purged by further blood, more sacrificial patriotism.

One is put in mind of the letter to the Hebrews, which speaks of the Day of Atonement as an annual memorial of sin: Each year, there is yet another reminder that the sins of the past have not been atoned. But that memorial of sin has been removed by the final Atonement of Jesus. In place of a memorial of sin, we have an intercessor. And hence no need for guilt-inducing national celebrations of sacrifice.