{"id":7684,"date":"2022-07-01T17:41:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-01T17:41:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/?p=7684"},"modified":"2022-08-30T15:32:45","modified_gmt":"2022-08-30T15:32:45","slug":"guard-soldiers-train-in-military-funeral-honors-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/2022\/07\/01\/guard-soldiers-train-in-military-funeral-honors-program\/","title":{"rendered":"Guard Soldiers Train in Military Funeral Honors Program"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\"The
The Virginia National Guard Funeral Honors Program hosts Level 1 funeral honors training for nine National Guard Soldiers from four states June 29, 2022, at the State Military Reservation in Virginia Beach, Va. Soldiers from Maryland, North Carolina and Ohio joined Virginia Soldiers for the five-day course, which prepares Soldiers to conduct professional military funeral honors in accordance with service tradition. (A.J. Coyne)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. \u2013 The Virginia National Guard Funeral Honors Program hosted Level 1 funeral honors training for nine National Guard Soldiers from four states.

Soldiers from Maryland, North Carolina and Ohio joined Virginia Soldiers June 27-July 1 for the five-day course, which prepares Soldiers to conduct professional military funeral honors.

\u201cIt feels great knowing that one day someone will be doing this for me,\u201d said Spc. Raativ Rahman, a Virginia National Guard Soldier assigned to the 29th Infantry Division Band. \u201cI\u2019m honored to be a part of it.\u201d

Rahman has been assisting with the program for about a year and has served at a few funerals. But the formal training program provides insight and guidance into exactly how and why the services are performed.

\u201cComing here, you learn why you do things a certain way,\u201d he said. \u201cEverything builds upon something else.\u201d

Sgt. Byme Taylor, a Maryland National Guard Soldier assigned to the 175th Infantry Regiment, has performed more than 1,000 services for the Maryland National Guard Funeral Honors Program but, because of COVID-19, was unable to attend the Level 1 training sooner. He assisted the instructors with some of the newer Soldiers.

\u201cSometimes Soldiers are more receptive to a peer telling you what to do, and it makes it easier to learn from them,\u201d he explained.

After graduating from college, Taylor worked in the civilian world for a while before deciding he needed a break and volunteered for the funeral honors program.

\u201cI ended up loving it and seeing the faces on the family after the services,\u201d he said. \u201cAfter services, they come to us and thank us and tell us they are grateful for us. I really love that feeling.\u201d

Drill and ceremony and physical fitness are two of the primary topics covered in Level 1 training.

\u201cAttention to detail is so important,\u201d Rahman said. \u201cYou want to look crisp. It carries over to other parts. Even in the band, you are what people see and hear.\u201d

Soldiers in the course quickly learned why physical fitness is so vital.

\u201cI\u2019ve done up to four services a day, and you have to stand there, and you have to be mentally and physically strong,\u201d Taylor said. \u201cYou have to stay focused and do everything properly, even if you\u2019re hurting, because at the end of the day, the service is not for you. You\u2019re there to honor that veteran and their family, and you just have to power through.\u201d

Taylor pointed out that some families record the service.

\u201cSo it\u2019s a lasting memory,\u201d he said. \u201cWe want them to see perfection every time they go back and watch that service.\u201d

Begun in January 2007, the Virginia National Guard Military Funeral Honors Program includes six teams throughout the state that provide funeral details to National Guard Soldiers and veterans of the active Army, Army Reserve and Army National Guard.

The program\u2019s Soldiers have performed more than 28,000 funeral services throughout the commonwealth and average more than 200 services each month.

There are three levels of training in the military funeral honors program. Level 1 is the foundation and how to perform the services. Level 2 covers instructing and how to become more of a trainer. Level 3 is used as a recertification for anyone with an expired Level 2 certification.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. \u2013 The Virginia National Guard Funeral Honors Program hosted Level 1 funeral honors training for nine National Guard Soldiers from four states. Soldiers from Maryland, North Carolina and Ohio joined Virginia Soldiers June 27-July 1 for the five-day course, which prepares Soldiers to conduct professional military funeral honors. \u201cIt feels great knowing  Read the Rest…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":160,"featured_media":7703,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/160"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7684"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7704,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7684\/revisions\/7704"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.maryland.gov\/ng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}