Beautiful meditation on a beautiful tradition re saints and souls days. Thank you for this.
"It is a sad tradition."
Is it sad because the colors linger so briefly? Or because of the quantity of graves?
To me, the saddest aspect of Flanders is the possibility many buried there believed in their last minutes that what they had done might be a sacrifice sufficient to ensure such horrors never repeated. Yet, scarcely a generation later, travesties as horrific or worse recurred.
Might that mean their deaths were in vain? That would be cruelly tragic - but I think, inaccurate. Perhaps it's up to us to decide how to honor them - one time with color - another with choices wiser, kinder than those made during their lifetimes.