Love and War and Peace
Due to the lousy male to female ratio at the Naval Academy, every weekend a horde of midshipmen escape from the yard (also known as taking liberty) and close in on Georgetown to talk politics with young, Jesuit-educated female scholars. Or something like that.
We, the ladies of Georgetown, were all too willing to welcome those mids from down Route 50. It was our patriotic duty, a service to our country.
They also looked quite handsome in their uniforms.
I would like to introduce you to two couples. Both of the women are Hoyas, both of the men are Naval Academy grads.
J and D met at Georgetown/Navy mixer. J is a pastor's daughter. D was captain of his varsity team in college. J works in the hunger/ malnutrition branch of an an international nonprofit group based in D.C. She believes in world peace through international outreach; that by giving the opportunity for health to a generation of children, the world will become a more peaceful place. D is currently training to become a Navy Pilot.
M and R met as competitors at a triathlon. M is majoring in Government at Georgetown and has focused her studies in Arabic and the Arab world. She believes in world peace through knowledge --be it a foreign language or international law. R is currently at The Basic School at Quantico where he is training as a Marine Officer. Perhaps she will translate for him?
Both couples are interracial. They are also 'inter-vocational' --one part civilian, the other part military.
I too am on the civilian side of an inter-vocational relationship. I think that we, the girlfriends, fiancées and wives of men in the military feel a sense of urgency in our work and study:
Don't tell J that you don't care about the humanitarian crisis in Darfur.Don't tell me that you don't know anything about Islam and that you don't care to find out.
Supporting the troops takes on a whole new world of meaning and responsibility when you actually know the troops. It certainly is different when you love one.
Policy is no longer abstract. Peacemaking becomes an obligation. Deployment is not just a word that the broadcasters say; it is penciled into our calendars.
Each of us wants to be an instrument of peace. We work for peace through aid, peace through knowledge, peace through awareness and even peace through strength.
In our relationships, sometimes it seems that our missions are at odds with each other. I like to think that we are two sides of the same coin.
Who better to fight for a sane foreign policy than the women who will be left behind as a result of that policy? To whom does peace matter more?
By
Elizabeth Tenety
|
November 5, 2007; 2:12 AM ET
| Category:
Campus Catholic
Share: Email a Friend |
Technorati
| Del.icio.us | Digg | Facebook
Previous: Midterms and Midrash |
Next: Shabbat Unplugged
Posted by: Will Jones | November 7, 2007 5:26 PM
Report Offensive Comment
You make it sound almost trendy to date a midshipman or naval officer.
When my husband graduated from USNA (80s), it wasn't exactly hip or cool to be dating a midshipman in my circle of college friends.
I hope our society also realizes that during peace time, our military families also make sacrifices of long separations.
It wasn't glamorous to talk about military service 15 or so years ago, but men like my husband continued their service anyway (some on active duty, others in civilian life with reserve duty).
I also had women friends who graduated USNA and let's not forget them!
Posted by: Kate | November 7, 2007 3:31 PM
Report Offensive Comment
Will Jones is a kook. Righteousness is toxic you feeble-minded twit.
Men fight...it's what we do. George Bush has pledged to fight tyranny and evil. The cultures of the world that still hold on to the principles of hate and oppression deserve to have the US Marine Corps come down on them with full force.
The airmen, soldiers, sailors and Marines of this nation are proud to serve, and VERY proud to fight for our values. Quit your very "Osama-ish" rants about religion and history and get on a plane to Baghdad. Hang a big sign around your neck telling the boys in the Army that George Bush should be hanged, and let them zip your suck for you!!!
Posted by: Anonymous | November 7, 2007 2:22 PM
Report Offensive Comment
Will Jones is a kook. Righteousness is toxic you feeble-mined twit.
Men fight...it's what we do. George Bush has pledged to fight tyranny and evil. The cultures of the world that still hold on to the principles of hate and oppression deserve to have the US Marine Corps come down on them with full force.
The airmen, soldiers, sailors and Marines of this nation are proud to serve, and VERY proud to fight for our values. Quit your very "Osama-ish" rants about religion and history and get on a plane to Baghdad. Hang a big sign around your neck telling the boys in the Army that George Bush should be hanged, and let them zip your suck for you!!!
Posted by: Anonymous | November 7, 2007 2:20 PM
Report Offensive Comment
"Proper Motivation" is only one of the vital attributes necessary to "fight for a sane foreign policy." Others include "Clear Understanding of the Current Situation's Origins" and "Good Vision of a Sane Foreign Policy for the United States." Be willing to see past your professors/mentors ideological leanings to not only the facts of history but also the best ideals that should underly such a foreign policy so as to put the U.S. and the world on a mutually beneficial trajectory.
Posted by: DoTheRightThing | November 7, 2007 12:26 PM
Report Offensive Comment
To achieve peace in the world one must begin with peace in one's heart and home. A bi-partisan false-elite, fascist plutocracy, now rules over us, instead of the People's Sovereignty.
Only in Truth and Justice can Righteousness reign and peace prevail.
Any couple failing to embrace truth in their duty within society is off to the development of a completely dysfunctional relationship.
Americans of all cultural and ethnic backgrounds can find common good, shared purpose and personal knowledge of Divine Providence through awareness of and appreciation for Our Mottoes as shibboleths of faith in the civil religion of Americanism. Our Whig Founders were anointed: their prophetic wisdom manifest in their work and written words.
The historic power identified by them as "the real Anti-Christ" has usurped Our Republic. Their provable treason, perversion, and false war challenge every family claiming any sense of patriotism for the United States or faith in the Creator.
All who have taken The Oath are sworn on their lives to protect and defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Bush and Cheney, and their accomplices in 9-11, must be convicted and hanged for treason. Those for whom they have so criminally toiled, convictions for whom only Misprision of Treason can be made, must be fully expropriated and banished.
Let us all, true and faithful Americans, get our own House in order, first, as a model for others who wish to be enlightened, as were, and are, America's Founders.
Posted by: Will Jones | November 7, 2007 7:28 AM
Report Offensive Comment
For all of the 21-1/2 years of my Air Force service, beginning in 1954, I said I wanted to work myself out of a job! When I retired in 1979, it had not yet happened, but a decade later (more or less) it pretty much had. The Soviet threat had passed into "the dustpile of history", as one of their leaders said.
Since then, many of my contemporaries, and their sons and daughters, have had to face what I never did: someone actively trying to kill them, personally.
I imagine that there are officers and enlisted in all services today who have the same objective that kept me going for those two decades...work yourself out of a job.
Charlie Brown, Hendersonville, NC
Posted by: Charlie Brown | November 5, 2007 9:53 PM
Report Offensive Comment
For all of the 21-1/2 years of my Air Force service, beginning in 1954, I said I wanted to work myself out of a job! When I retired in 1979, it had not yet happened, but a decade later (more or less) it pretty much had. The Soviet threat had passed into "the dustpile of history", as one of their leaders said.
Since then, many of my contemporaries, and their sons and daughters, have had to face what I never did: someone actively trying to kill them, personally.
I imagine that there are officers and enlisted in all services today who have the same objective that kept me going for those two decades...work yourself out of a job.
Charlie Brown, Hendersonville, NC
Posted by: Charlie Brown | November 5, 2007 9:53 PM
Report Offensive Comment
The comments to this entry are closed.












We, the honorable of America's Armed Forces, take The Oath for a reason. Those in our uniform should not be sublimating as violent psychotics believing any excuse to kill fellow humans in the perverted and futile attempt to become "masculine" to overcome having been molested by Roman Catholic priests.
Bush committed 9-11 and lied us into false war so we have NO MORAL AUTHORITY IN AFHANISTAN AND IRAQ.
The Fifth Column traitors: Bush's father killed JFK to keep us in Rome's Vietnam; Bush's grandfather financed Hitler, the Pope's catspaw, through his fellow Knight of Malta, Fritz "The Rockefeller of Germany" Thyssen.
The Oath requires all service men and women, Officer and Enlisted, to protect the Constitution and the People from Treason! Homosexual draft-dodger Bush and pervert draft-dodger Cheney are TRAITORS who committed 9-11 and must be tried and hanged. Those who continue to commit Misprision of their Treason with full knowledge of the crimes being supported become accomplices and must share their fate that America be restored.