Canadian faithful in Afghanistan celebrate Easter in multinational service

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KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - It's a tiny, unassuming but immaculately maintained church, with thin plywood walls, a modest flower garden -- and a gun rack where soldiers can check their rifles at the door.

Perhaps nowhere else is the notion of faith more important than in a war zone such as Afghanistan, where life itself can be a fragile commodity and a day's work is often shrouded in violence and death.

On this Easter Sunday, the pews at Kandahar Airfield's Fraise Chapel were filled with a multinational cross-section of Catholic and Protestant faithful as American padre Rev. Jim Connolly reminded the congregation that the work they do is for a greater good.

"You're living on the edge of life and death, and you've got to ask some hard questions," Connolly said after the Easter service.

"On many occasions, people are saying, 'Is it really worth it? Is it really this important?' My basic hope is that I can help them come to a sense that yes, it is important, it does matter, because every single one of us counts."

Yesterday's services capped a difficult three weeks for Canadian forces in Kandahar province where three Canadian soldiers lost their lives in three separate incidents.

The ramp ceremony commemorating the most recent death, that of Sgt. Jason Boyes of 2 Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, was one of four this past week alone for the multinational NATO coalition known as the International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF. Two Americans and a Romanian also died.

"Every time that we lose soldiers ... the whole coalition is losing soldiers," said Rev. Bastien Leclere, who's originally from Edmonton and who assisted in Connolly's Sunday service.

"We're all in this together, and we all pray together, and we keep up each other. It is important that we support each other in this journey. It's a marathon, not a sprint."

Easter Sunday may have felt like a sprint for Padre Jim Brown, the chaplain for the Canadian military contingent, who attended an early-morning ramp ceremony for the slain Romanian soldier, then presided over "six or seven" multi-denominational services.

There's little doubt that Easter can be a difficult time for a Christian to be in Afghanistan, Brown said.

"We're Christians in a Muslim country, and you have to be attuned to that," he said. "All of the images of Easter are gardens and spring and bunnies and all that, and you look out here and it's a sterile desert. There's that dissonance."

Later in the day yesterday, Capt. Patrick Hannan, 39, of 5 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group, based at CFB Valcartier, Que., emerged from the chapel after a Protestant service.

Hannan admitted he'd rather mark Easter at home with his family. But his work in Afghanistan brings hope to those who have none, he said, and Easter is a holiday that's all about sacrifice.