'God didn't take Stephen, a war took Stephen'

[LynneSin]

http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060522/NEWS/605220301/1006

There have been several Delawareans of lately who were killed in Iraq. Our local paper was doing an 8 part series about the death of a soldier and this one brought me to tears. This priest summed it up perfectly who who killed this soldier. It wasn't God - it was the war.

'God didn't take Stephen, a war took Stephen'
By KRISTIN HARTY
The News Journal

05/22/2006
Part 2 of 8

He needed to get to Bobbie. He needed to be with her. The priest rushed to the mother the moment he found out. Cpl. Stephen McGowan, 26, had been killed the day before by a bomb in Iraq.

As he drove, Father Greg Corrigan prayed the rosary to clear his head.

The explosion. The charred vehicle. The broken body of his friend.

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee...Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.

Father Greg had known Stephen since he was a curly-haired boy with a cherubic smile and a devilish wit. He had watched with pride and fear as Stephen grew up to become a burly Army medic who liked to drink beer and play rugby but had a gentle heart.

The priest loved this family -- Stephen and his younger sister, Michaela, and their mom, Bobbie, who doted on her son. He counseled them when Bobbie and her husband divorced a decade ago. He prayed publicly for Stephen every Sunday at Mass.


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[LostinVA]

1. He exemplifies the Church I grew up in

As do the Sisters who recently served hard time for protesting.

[DemonFighterLives]

2. Evil war started by an evil punk

:cry:

[boobooday]

3. God didn't take any of them

And She is probably pretty sick of taking the rap for the neocon's bloodbath.

[nancyr]

4. God doesn't kill people

This is certainly true...God has absolutely nothing to do with the deaths of victims of war. The fault is on the heads of the perpretrators.

[renate]

5. I loved what the priest said: "God caught him when he fell."

That's a comforting thought.

This story is so sad in so many ways... the contrast between the goodness of this priest and this family, and the evil of the war. And to be told that the casket had to be closed, and that your son was in pieces.... there just aren't words.