James Jones, the great American novelist of World War II, told a superb story from his time as an infantryman fighting the Japanese. It appeared in his non-fiction book WWII. The story is a humorous and bawdy demonstration of the things that bind us together. It is worth retelling on this weekend when we remember those who died for our Constitution and Republic.

As Jones wrote, it was mid-1942 and the outcome of the war was still very much in doubt. During a lull in the fighting on Guadalcanal ridgeline, a Japanese soldier yelled a long string of unprintable epithets about President Roosevelt towards the American lines. One G.I. stood up, loudly agreed with the sentiment, and fired several shots at the enemy, silencing him. While dislike of the commander in chief is a bipartisan sentiment, one can safely assume that particular G.I. was a Republican.

Perhaps this is apocryphal, James Jones was a great storyteller; but to my ears, that one story tells us a great deal about what we can and should be as a nation at peace than almost anything else from the unfamiliar experience of combat.

Whatever else their motivations, our guys on that hill in Guadalcanal ended up on the battlefield because they thought preserving the Republic was worth risking death. Their thoughts on domestic policy were secondary. I think they were right. By extension that means that the things that divide us, like how much you like the president, matter less than those things that unite us, like being able to freely say so. And that brings me to today.

So much of our public debate focuses solely upon divisions. Now, I don’t mean a policy argument where there are reasonable disagreements. That is the useful part of a democracy and we should welcome strong partisan debate. Instead, there seems to be a rush towards issues that have no purpose other than to polarize sentiment. I think this is caustic, and the fault for it falls upon those of us who are silent.

Our political leaders seem trapped by the loud voices of the few on the fringe. This afflicts both parties. On the right, the calls to pass an RFRA were few, but loud and mostly dishonest. The left is also guilty. One needs look no further than Ferguson, Missouri or the intentional distortion of the gender pay gap to see the divisive exploitation of untruths. These issues are fought simply to score points, raise cash and divide us. Our world today needs less of much less of this.

My lesson and hopes are simple. The next time you hear someone say that this is our “Bonhoeffer moment” about gay marriage or “hands up don’t shoot” about inner city lawlessness, don’t ignore them, challenge them. Make them cite facts, and come armed with truth. You won’t win the argument, but at the end of your talk tell them about that G.I. on Guadalcanal and how the future of the Republic belongs to those who bring us together.