The first half of this column is ugly.
I write about things I’m right smack in the middle of, thus perspective is unapologetically mine and on-purpose, and the bird’s-eye-view big picture is wittingly personal.
I make no excuses for this but don’t claim what I do is reporting in the true sense. It is the truth as I see, feel, hear it.
The funeral I wrote about two weeks ago – Sgt. Nicholas Walsh’s – was for the son of my dear friend. It’s a muddle when you know the people. A funeral is the most public of rituals for the most private of losses.
But there is one picture left to show the public. It begins with the flimflam nonsense of a group of people that call themselves the Westboro Baptist Church (though every Baptist church I’ve ever heard of denounces them). They come from Kansas to picket military funerals, gathering near grieving families and waving signs that say “Thank God for IEDs” and “Thank God for Dead Soldiers.” They believe that when any symbol of America is blown up, it is because God is mad at us for tolerance of homosexuals, Catholics, Muslims, Jews and more.
I want you to see what happened next.
Friday night, people in Fort Collins learned that the leader of the Westboro church had called for his followers to gather Saturday at Sgt. Walsh’s funeral. He wanted them to celebrate that another young man had died, to warn of God’s wrath, and to wave their banners of disturbance, disruption, profane intrusion.
In the morning, legitimate funeral attendees arrived and waited. Though ineffective in our heels and suits, we tried to stand like lions at the gate, dreading a fracas would arise.
But then red-jacketed VFW and Marine Corps League members came and stood beside us. And they kept coming.
Then 100 motorcycles came, one by one, up the street. Loud, bursting, combustive, powerful men and women got off the bikes, lined them up, stood like movie extras in black leather, tattoos, skullcaps. The Patriot Guard.
Next came people with broomsticks and bed sheets – 40, maybe more. Silent but for the click of their sticks on the concrete, they balanced the broomsticks and tied the tips of the sheets tight.
Next came the Episcopal priest from a church across town, in his clericals, white- collared, carrying a tall sign of peace on a pole.
A warning call had been made the night before, and then another, and another. E-mails went out across town, and then across Colorado. Almost none of the people knew the Walshes, but they came.
Hardly anyone spoke, but each quickly figured things out: “We’re the good guys. Stand at attention. Head-on- a-swivel. Watch. Guard.”
And they did. Standing on every corner, on the trolley tracks, at each flank of the church, A wall of peace.
The hearse arrived, and the family.
Up and down the street, American flags tied with yellow ribbons were lifted. The broomstick sheet-shields were lifted. If reverence has a sound, it is bed sheets and flags barely moving, the tiny clink of metal rivets and halyard clips on poles.
Someone told me the protesters were spotted blocks away, in retreat before ever getting close.
Someone told me that outside, no one left, or spoke much at all, during the two- hour mass. They simply waited until the Marine Honor Guard carried Nick’s casket out, the family followed, and the church emptied.
They waited through the 21-gun salute, flag folding, the awarding of the Purple Heart.
They waited as the casket was loaded in the hearse and driven away. They waited as a bagpiper played “Amazing Grace.” They waited until all the family left. Only then did they go.
They left something behind, those people. Lingerings from each of them settled, like the swirled leavings of a small parade, their prayers and peace. They left them falling on the holy ground of a common street full of decent people.
The lingerings are still there, sacred, invisible, palpable. May they spread far, wide, speedily.
Natalie Costanza-Chavez welcomes e-mail at grace-notes@comcast.net.
