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[Back to index of September articles] Military families: are churches doing enough? By Paul Donnelly “Shame on us,” declares Kay Laughton of Trinity Parish in Hughesville, “if we can’t recognize the difference between the policy of the war and the people who fight it.” While no official count exists, many people in the diocese have close family members-spouses, siblings, grown children, parents-who have served or are serving in harm’s way in Afghanistan or Iraq, or who may be called on short notice. Yet according to a small cadre of parishioners with close ties to the military at various congregations, the clergy and community of the diocese as a whole are simply not prepared, nor sensitive, to often unspoken needs. “This is more like Vietnam than anything I can remember,” explains the Rev. Phillip Cato, a retired Navy chaplain who is priest-in-charge at St. John’s in Olney. Cato wasn’t thinking primarily of the macro politics of war and peace, but the micro-ministry to individuals who need prayers and support. “My greatest single fear is our people coming back with post-traumatic stress disorder,” Cato says. Sometimes congregations are unaware that they have a military family in their midst because these families are uncertain how and to whom to speak of their fears. “Where do you start?” asks Kathleen Berney of St. Christopher’s in New Carrollton, who is next of kin for her sister, an officer with a military police unit in the reserves that has been called to Iraq once already. “What’s appropriate? I haven’t spelled it out in so many words that I could come home one day and see the limousine and the two officers, the ‘Oh, my God moment.’” On other occasions, opposition to the war complicates people’s response to a military family. “I was sort of horrified at the reaction I was getting,” says Mary Jo Cooney of her parish in northwest Washington. Her son is a United States Marine currently stationed on Okinawa. “I have been having dreams about saying the eulogy at his funeral,” she says quietly. “For awhile I was getting my son and two Marines at Fallujah on the prayer list and they disappeared from the prayer list without anybody telling me.” Other parishes do not have individuals on whom to focus concern. “It’s a kind of generalized anxiety for us,” says Shearon Sykes Williams, assistant rector at St. Mark’s on Capitol Hill which, like St. Matthew’s, has had two families who have had members in Iraq or Afghanistan, “because we don’t have a lot of people who are directly affected.” “I think our congregation really struggles with the whole thing of how to be supportive of folks and yet I would say that most people in our congregation are feeling very frustrated with the status of the war effort,” says Williams, “but it’s not something that we deal with in a really concrete way on a weekly basis.” Because only a few parishes have more than a handful of members with relatives in the military, Cato decided to attempt to form a diocesan-wide support effort. “What Phil is trying to do is meet a need which cannot be met by the military,” explains Kay Laughton, who retired as an admiral and is credited with being the first American woman to have operational control over warships, “and that’s educating our own priests.” Laughton points out that regular military units are better at supporting families than the National Guard or Reserve units because the families of those in regular units are in daily contact. “The issue isn’t just after someone has been killed,” she explains, “It’s the constant fear when you have somebody over there.” Mike Felton knows this fear. Felton is a longtime member of St. Matthew’s in Hyattsville, and his son Ryan is an intelligence officer in the Air Force who has done a tour in Iraq. His pastor is the Rev. Noreen Seiler-Dubay, and Felton says she has done a better job than others he has heard of: “I want to give her credit; she informed me of Father Cato’s group. She heard about him through the diocesan convention in January.” “Since Ryan grew up in the church, he knew many parishioners,” his father explains. “We knew he was going for about eight months before he went last year; and so I announced it, and we got a lot of support. People sent him packages and emails while he was there.” “I think it’s fair and honest of me to say that most of the parishioners at St. Matthews’ are opposed to the war - and yet, despite that, support me and my son,” says Felton. “They rose above that, and I’m grateful.” For more information contact Phillipcato@yahoo.com or at St. John’s Episcopal Church, P.O. Box 187, Olney, MD 20830. [Back to index of September articles]
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