One of the most moving moments of my life was sitting with a friend who had served in Canada’s armed forces in Afghanistan. This man was a dedicated and patriotic person, and yet when we were talking, he was preparing to leave everything behind and move to the United States. The reason why? Because the Canada that he had served and sacrificed his own physical and mental well-being for had decided that he was not worth caring about. Though he had sacrificed himself, the response that he received from society was that he was now a danger, someone to be distrusted, someone who was violent. He looked around the country and saw the things that he had fought for being trampled into the road in Ottawa. His war was not that old, yet he saw that all that he had done was devalued, and the sacrifices that he had made were rejected. Canada was not worth it for one who had given his life to serve her. My heart broke as I watched his family leave our country, never to return.

   Many veterans share this experience. The freedom that they fought for, for Canada and for others around the world, is being stripped away in their own country. The values that they stood for in the hardest situations around the world are now being called hateful, genocidal, extremist. They are shunned by their government, trotted out once a year for a parade and a wreath laying before being pushed into the corner and forgotten. And the things they fought for are now just empty slogans. 

   Every time the Canadian government assaults the liberty of Canadians, every time it enters into relationships with countries whose authoritarian records are well known, every time Canada stands before the world in support of terrorists and thugs, we show our own soldiers that their sacrifice was for nothing. We teach our heroes that the wounds they carry are worthless. 

   This must stop. This must end. It is time for us to honour and value the heroes of our country by standing up for honour and truth ourselves. It is time to make a choice to forge a society where these men and women can once again say with pride that their sacrifices meant something. It is time once more to forge a country that chooses to stand for truth and goodness all over the world. 

   In the past our great warriors have been sources of fear to the unrighteous. The Red Patch Devils struck terror into the hearts of Nazis. The bold men of the PPCLI stood toe to toe with Chinese Communists and sent them running in retreat. The glorious young men and women who fought in Afghanistan reminded us that there is always a need to fight for the things we value and even die. Each of these brave people, each of these lives lost, is a call to fight for truth, for justice, for freedom. These lives call to us to remember the cost and live for greatness because they were willing to die. 

   Canada may be abandoning their memory and forgetting why they fought. But Alberta must not forget. We cannot accept the slow decay of truth and freedom. No matter what happens we must stand for the memory of our veterans. If we break faith with those who died, who gave their all and sacrificed, we are not a country that is worth the name.