Eulogy Excerpts of Meghan McCain honoring her father, John McCain, at the funeral service in Washington, D.C.
As originally published in Texas Border Business newsprint edition September 2018
“The world is a fine place and worth the fighting for and I hate very much to leave it.”
When Ernest Hemingway’s Robert Jordan, at the close of For Whom the Bell Tolls, lies wounded and waiting for his last fight, these are among his final thoughts.
My father had every reason to think the world was an awful place. My father had every reason to think the world was not worth fighting for. My father had every reason to think the world was worth leaving. He did not think any of those things. Like the hero of his favorite book, John McCain took the opposite view. You had to have a lot of luck to have had such a good life.
I am here before you today saying the words I have never wanted to say, giving the speech I have never wanted to give, feeling the loss I have never wanted to feel.
My father is gone. John Sidney McCain III was many things. He was a sailor. He was an aviator, he was a husband, he was a warrior, he was a prisoner, he was a hero, he was a congressman, he was a senator. He was a nominee for the president of the United States.
These are all the titles and the roles of a life that has been well lived. But they are not the greatest of his titles nor the most important of his roles.
He was a great man. We gather here to mourn the passing of American greatness. The real thing, not cheap rhetoric from men who will never come near the sacrifice he gave so willingly. Nor the opportunistic appropriation of those who live lives of comfort and privilege while he suffered and served.
He was a great fire who burned bright… My father was a great man. He was a great warrior. He was a great American.
I admired him for all of these things, but I loved him because he was a great father. My father knew what it was like to grow up in the shadow of greatness. He did just as his father had done before him.
He was the son of a great admiral who was also the son of a great admiral. And when it came time for the third John Sidney McCain to become a man, he had no choice, but in his own eyes to walk in those exact same paths. He had to become a sailor, he had to go to war. He had to have his shot at becoming a great admiral as they also had done.
The paths of his father and grandfather led my father directly to the harrowing hell of the Hanoi Hilton. This is the public legend that is John McCain. This is where all the biographies, the campaign literature and public remembrances say he showed his character, his patriotism, his faith, and his endurance in the worst of possible circumstances. This is where we learned who John McCain truly was.
And all of that is very true, except for the last part… John McCain was not defined by prison, by the Navy, by the Senate, by the Republican Party or by any single one of the deeds in his absolutely extraordinary life. John McCain was defined by love…
John McCain was born in a distant and now vanquished outpost of American power and he understood America as a sacred trust.
He understood our republic demands responsibilities even before it defends its rights. He knew navigating the line between good and evil was often difficult, but always simple. He grasped that our purpose and our meaning was rooted in a missionary’s responsibility stretching back centuries.
Just as the first Americans looked upon a new world full of potential for a grand experiment in freedom and self-government, so their descendants have a responsibility to defend the old world from its worst self.
The America of John McCain is the America of the revolution. Fighters with no stomach for the summer soldier and the sunshine patriot making the world anew with the bells of liberty.
The America of John McCain is the America of Abraham Lincoln. Fulfilling the promise of the Declaration of Independence that all men are created equal and suffering greatly to see it through.
The America of John McCain is the America of the boys who rushed the colors in every war across three centuries, knowing in them is the life of the republic and particularly those – by their daring – as Ronald Reagan said, “gave up their chance at being husbands and fathers and grandfathers and gave up their chance to be revered old men.”
The America of John McCain is, yes, the America of Vietnam. Fighting the fight even in the most forlorn cause, even in the most grim circumstances, even in the most distant and hostile corner of the world. Standing in defeat for the life and liberty of other peoples in other lands.
The America of John McCain is generous and welcoming and bold. She is resourceful and confident and secure. She meets her responsibilities, she speaks quietly because she is strong…
All photos courtesy of the McCain Family
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