Courage

I'm looking at the title head, and I'm suddenly at a loss for words. What can I say about courage? Courage is maybe one of the most misunderstood things in our world. A person can be called by some courageous for hanging on in a desperate situation with no hope in sight, and others might disagree, calling that same person a fool for doing so. Or let's look at that soldier leading himself and his buddies into certain death during a battle, but planting that flag of theirs smack right on that hill. He might be called courageous too by some, or plain crazy by others. There is a clear disagreement among all of us whom to call courageous, and whom not.

Then, we have the small, inconspicuous, anonymous person who toils every day to feed his family with what he earns in a sweatshop under inhuman conditions. Is he courageous? Maybe yes, although I doubt whether he has the time or the energy to consider that. If he is courageous, then the world is filled to the brim with millions of unsung heroes. Is it courage to hang on life and not jump off a cliff or a bridge on a bad day?

My grandparents lived through the war in Amsterdam, Holland. Holland at that time was occupied by Nazi Germany, and life soon became bad, specially for the Dutch Jews which made up one fifth of Amsterdam. Not only did they hide a German Jew in their home with false papers, who made it through the war. They also defied the police when those came to pick up the German Jewish neighbors, and with success. My grandmother went weekly on her bicycle to the Jewish ghetto with a suitcase full of food, bought on the black market, and clothing, and one day almost got caught by an SS guard standing on an access bridge. She would have been sent to a concentration camp together with my grandfather, and the German Jew's cover would have been blown. Just as my grandmother was stopped on that bridge, a lorry stopped too. The German looked over to the lorry, and my grandmother took her chance and just sped away on her two wheels.

After the war, my grandfather was sent a high Dutch decoration for what he and my grandmother had done during the occupation. My grandfather wrote a note, put it with the medal into an envelope and sent it back. On the note stood: "I didn't do the things that I did, to get this."

My grandparents, God have them in His glory, are my true heroes. They are my example of courage. And maybe there we have the answer. Each one of us has their own ideas about courage. The hanger-on. The war hero. The unsung toiler making sure his family gets what they need. The selfless person doing what they can to do good, at their own peril.

Even animals can be courageous. Courage, one saying goes, is not the absence of fear. But the ability to control that fear, and do good. I agree with that.

Good evening to you all. Have courage, specially in these days hovering between war and non-war. Let's not lose hope.