Mourners sang “America the Beautiful” as pall bearers wheeled the casket carrying First Lieutenant Andrew Bacevich out of St. Timothy’s Church in Norwood, Mass., yesterday. Before exiting into the bright May sunshine and the sight of the soothing waters of Willett’s Pond, they paused and draped an American flag over the coffin.

The governor of Massachusetts, Deval Patrick, and Senator Kerry were present as was Kerry Healey, the former lieutenant governor whom Mr. Patrick defeated in November. Young officers clad in dress blues lined pews in the front. Older veterans, out of uniform, and a woman in desert fatigues sat in the back. All paid tribute to a 27-year-old man from the nearby town of Walpole, who fell on the morning of May 13. As of Sunday, he was one of the 3,421 Americans slain in Iraq.

These are Americans for whom the fight against terror is not an abstraction. Bacevich died while commanding troops at a roadblock in Balad, Iraq. His men stopped a vehicle. Insurgents exited their car. One of them detonated a bomb, killing the lieutenant. American officers are trained to lead from the front, and Bacevich followed that principle of leadership to the end. His positioning saved his gunner and others with him when the bomb went off, Boston University’s public radio station. WBUR, reported.

Bacevich’s relationship with the Army began long before his service in Iraq. He was born at West Point, where his father, Andrew Bacevich, a graduate of the United States Military Academy, taught. His father’s military career had taken him to Vietnam, and he left the army as a lieutenant colonel. Mr. Bacevich is a professor on international relations at Boston University. While during the 1990s, he worked with Eliot Cohen, a supporter of the Iraq War and now counselor at the United States Department of State, Mr. Bacevich has been a vocal and honorable opponent of the conflict. The author of the 2005 book “The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War,” Mr. Bacevich became a frequent speaker at churches and other gatherings on the anti-war circuit.

Mr. Bacevich gave his only son, with whom he shared a strong jaw and inner strength, the space to follow his own heart. His parents, said Father Culloty, who delivered the homily at Bacevich’s funeral service, gave him “the gift of freedom.” Bacevich used that freedom by volunteering for the American army not once but twice.

In 2003, Bacevich graduated with a degree in communications from Boston University, which is not necessarily known as a school with a strong military tradition. It does have a Reserve Officers Training Corps chapter on campus, and Bacevich briefly enrolled in ROTC, but, according to newspaper accounts, had to leave the program because of asthma. A determined marathon runner, Bacevich joined the military in 2004 and received his commission after college.

The magnitude of Bacevich’s choices is amplified when his pre-army resume is examined. After college, he worked at the State House on Beacon Hill. He served as an aide to a Republican state senator and then signed on with the staff of Governor Romney. Had he not opted to join the military, he might by now be safely and energetically working on a presidential campaign. But for Bacevich, patriotism demanded more.

“I think he really was a patriotic person, and I think he really just loved this country and wanted to do his part,” his sister Jennifer Bacevich told WBUR last week. “He felt that that was a way he could … show his love and provide service to his country.”

Bacevich represented the best of the American military. His background and training — like most of the modern officer corps — are far from where the American army had sunk to in the waning days of Vietnam.

Colonel Barry Price, who conducted the commissioning ceremony of Bacevich as an officer at Fort Benning, spoke of the slain soldier. “I saw in Andy all the values” adults seek in the younger generation, Col. Price said. He mentioned, among others, “valor, strength, character, commitment.” Bacevich shared these qualities with prior generations of American fighting men, including the most decorated combat soldier of World War II, Audie Murphy, he added.

Col. Price also told of an e-mail Bacevich sent 12 hours before his death. In it, Bacevich spoke of his commitment to his troops and his efforts to rally them for the fight ahead. Bacevich will no longer be able to inspire them in person, but, as Father Culloty stated, his life is an example to those GIs and all of us looking for character during these difficult times.

Mr. Gitell (gitell.com) is a contributing editor of The New York Sun.