www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall What is a Vet...by Fr. Dennis O'Brien USMC

Found this elsewhere;


What is a Vet . . .


Some veterans bear visible signs of their service:
a missing limb, a jagged scar, a certain look in the eye.
Others may carry the evidence inside them:
a pin holding a bone together, a piece of shrapnel in the leg -
or perhaps another sort of inner steel:
the soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity.
Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept
America safe wear no badge or emblem.
You can't tell a vet just by looking.


What is a vet?
He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia
sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel
carriers didn't run out of fuel.


He is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose
overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the
cosmic scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th parallel.

She (or he) is the nurse who fought against futility and went
to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang.
He is the POW who went away one person and came
back another - or didn't come back AT ALL.

He is the Parris Island drill instructor who has never seen combat - but has
saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and
gang members into Marines, and teaching them to watch each other's backs.

He is the parade-riding Legionnaire who pins on his
ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand.
He is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and
medals pass him by.

He is the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns,
whose presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever
preserve the memory of all anonymous heroes whose valor dies
unrecognized with them on the battlefield or in the ocean's sunless deep.

He is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket -
palsied now and aggravatingly slow - who helped liberate a Nazi
death camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still
alive to hold him when the nightmares come.

He is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being - a
person who offered some of his life's most vital years in the
service of his country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so
others would not have to sacrifice theirs.


He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness,
and he is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on
behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known.


So remember, each time you see someone who has served our
country, just lean over and say Thank You. That's all most
people need, and in most cases it will mean more than any medals
they could have been awarded or were awarded.
Two little words that mean a lot, "THANK YOU."


It's the soldier, not the reporter,
Who gave us our freedom of the press.
It's the soldier, not the poet,
Who gave us our freedom of speech.
It's the soldier, not the campus organizer,
Who gave us our freedom to demonstrate.
It's the soldier,
Who salutes the flag,
Who serves others with respect for the flag,
And whose coffin is draped by the flag,
Who allows the protester to burn the flag.

* Father Dennis Edward O'Brien, USMC


Semper Fi

Thanks Fr. O'Brien for writing this and Jakub for posting it.

I am / my husband and I are Viet Nam Era vets, who spent our time in Washington, DC helping to keep everybody's teeth in order Fr. makes that seem important in the scheme of things.

But, I had to chuckle when I read this one:
"He is the Parris Island drill instructor who has never seen combat - but has saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and gang members into Marines, and teaching them to watch each other's backs."

That was my uncle, don't know if he was ever over seas, but just over five feet tall, and a red head - that's what he did. Let me tell you, you never wanted to mess with him. He knew how to knock those young folks into shape real quick.

My dad is 85, served on the USS Marshall during WWII. One of only three men wounded on board that ship, and that was right at the end of the war. He says every day was a miracle, God was truly protecting them. His legs are pretty messed up, but it never stopped him from living life the best he knew how