By Gretchen Keiser

Twenty-seven families in St. Philip Benizi parish in Jonesboro, including two of the parish deacons, have sons, husbands or other relatives in the Persian Gulf.

Parish activities director, Mrs. Helen Rickman, says the time since August has been “the worst thing I’ve seen this parish have to go through” including the stress placed on many Eastern Airlines families who also live in the parish.

Prayer services led by deacons in the parish, a continuously maintained list of those in the parish who have family members serving, prayer for them by name at Mass, now a daily rosary for peace and telephone contacts are among the activities she has initiated to try and support the families.

On Jan. 17 as the first 24 hours of fighting unfolded, she said that the families she was in contact with were under great stress, but hopeful that the initiation of combat would resolve the conflict. Before the combat started, sentiments about war were not uniform in the parish, she said. A petition was sent to Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) “with hundreds of names on it” supporting efforts to come to a peaceful solution to the crisis instead.

When fighting began the sense was, however, that “the decision has been made. We have to support the President,” she said.

Bridget Cahill, whose 25-year-old son, Fred, is in the U.S. Marine Corps, said, “I’m apprehensive and I’m worn out” but added, “I know he’s in God’s hands and I know he’s going to be okay.” Her married son, who is based at Camp Lejuene, N.C., has been “anxious to get it over with and come home.” He is on a ship and assigned to maintain helicopters and is hopefully far back from the area under fire.

The prayer services with other parish families who also have sons and husbands in the area help, Mrs. Cahill said, although she added, “it brings out all my emotions, when you see everyone else and realize they’re in the same boat.”

Asked about the concern of the U.S. bishops that the economic embargo and peaceful pressure on Iraq had not been given enough time to work, Mrs. Cahill said, “My feeling is that they should have done what they did – go on in. I think they waited long enough.”

“Prayer, that’s what’s pulling us through,” said Mrs. John Ham of the parish, who has a son and a son-in-law in the military, both assigned to the war zone. She said her strain was lifted after the deadline of Jan. 15. “I had been depressed and crying, so worried, until the 15th,” she said. Her feeling changed dramatically. “I just knew it was going to be okay,” a confidence that has lasted. “We know the Lord is looking out for them.”

Saying she and her husband are retired people, Mrs. Ham also knew of the bishops’ position on the fighting before it began. “I don’t agree,” she said. “I think this is something we had to do. I hate to see those demonstrators. This is a madman. We have to make the world safe for our children and grandchildren.”

Her son’s children, three and four years old, are too small to understand what is happening, she said.

Even adults have their difficulties. “We’re watching a war,” she said of the television coverage. “It boggles the mind.”