Studdard Kennedy on Honor, Danger, and Goodness

Taken from a letter written by Studdard Kennedy to his family during WW2 :

"The first prayer I want my son to learn to say for me is not, 'God, keep my Daddy safe', but 'God, make Daddy brave, and if he has hard things to do, make him strong to do them'.

Son, life and death don't matter, but right and wrong do.

Daddy dead is Daddy still. But Daddy dishonored before God is something to awful for words.

I suppose you'd like to put in something about safety too and Mother would like it too. Well, put it in afterwards, always afterwards. For it really doesn't matter as much as doing what is right."

* * *

Studdard Kennedy was a chaplain during the war. An unarmed para-military person, working on the front lines with the men who served our country during the Second World War.

Now, I've heard about the sort of firefights that went on during WW2 thanks to my grandfather's stories (as well as an endless supply of cinematic displays from Spielberg and others who are passionate about war movies) so I'm fairly certain that being a medic or a chaplain must be some of the most nerve-wracking roles in the military. You faced the same dangers as the rest of them- without being able to defend yourself against attack.

That's guts.

And I'd honor those guys even without letters like the one above. But when I see the contents of Kennedy's letter- I'm shaken. Oh to be like the men who place honor, goodness, bravery, and strength before safety. They want to be safe, sure- but never at the cost of the aforementioned attributes.

* * *

I don't know that I'm ever going to be in a war situation, but that doesn't lessen the impact of these words on my life.
I truly hope that my son will want me to be brave and strong rather than safe.
And even more than these- I pray that he'll want me to be good.

And I pray that I will be.