Remembrance Sunday: How can we be peacemakers?

Captain Amy-Jo Battersby (Parkhead with Dennistoun) talks to Major Lynne Shaw about war, Remembrance Sunday and the difference love makes.

When you were a lance corporal with the Royal Corps of Signals, what was your role?

I was a communications engineer, responsible for maintaining and inspecting equipment. I specialised in satellite communications.

You were deployed to Afghanistan. What did you do there?

I kept comms going. Everything falls apart when we can’t talk to each other. It’s ironic that Royal Signal soldiers are shocking at talking to each other. If we were better at general conversation, I think veterans’ mental health would be better.

One of my other duties was to guard those convicted or detained. They were not particularly chuffed with a female guard and they would often try to shock me. It was important to remember I was watching over people: they were brothers or sisters or family members who had ended up being detained. They hadn’t necessarily been convicted of anything. It’s an easy environment to feel hate in.

One night I felt God put nothing but love into my heart. Even though I wanted Afghan girls to have the same opportunities, rights and freedoms I had, and I was happy to stop those actively opposing that, I found I had no capacity for hate left. The prospect for those prisoners was not good and my heart broke over it. In that moment I thought of the love that I got back home in the Church, when I thought nobody wanted me, and how isolating it must have been for the people in that prison. I just wanted them to know that love.

How did and does God’s love make a difference for you?

I knew where I could find it. When I came back to the UK after my tour, having seen a place filled with hate, hurt, vengefulness and constant fighting over territory, I knew I could go somewhere none of that existed. There’s no greater love than to lay one’s life down for another and, as a former soldier in the armed forces, I appreciate the breadth of what that means. Jesus laid his life down for people who didn’t want him, didn’t feel they needed him. If I have to lay down before God everything that I want to do, then fine. I’ll do it so that people might know that level of love and care and compassion. If there’s any part of us that is not filled with love, then that leaves room for hatred. It’s easier said than done but, as Christians, we have a higher calling.

If I can spend every day of my life sharing with people the love of Jesus that I’ve come to know, then I’ll be the richest and happiest person alive.

We’re thankful for all those who gave their lives for our freedom. How can each of us come to Remembrance with a sense of honouring those serving today?

Remembrance Day for me is about remembering the consequences of war and teaching them to the next generation, because if we can’t learn from our mistakes it’s going to keep going. Armed Forces Day (29 June) helps us consider and recognise what people currently serving have given up. We need to bring attention to more recent conflicts and their consequences, to see a 31-year-old woman wearing an Afghanistan medal and be aware that there is a hidden cost to war.

We in The Salvation Army need to be peacemakers wherever we find ourselves, especially for all those veterans and their families who are impacted by suicide long after the conflict has ended. We can’t be the solution to all the consequences, but what The Salvation Army can do well is be a family that communicates. We can surround people with love and compassion, and that happens best through our fellowships, by creating communities that help us live day by day.

When soldiers come away from conflict, they’ve often seen the absolute bottom. They’ll view the world as rubbish and sometimes even long for war again. But there’s something better and we’ve got it in God. We need to live up to his grace and compassion.