ALPHA & OMEGA (by Father Robert McGuire, S.J.)

   Never, never in the history of civilizations has any nation been made the reluctant and, agonizingly so, custodian of the world. Since the Spanish American war, the First World War, the Second World War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and now the Terrorist war we have lost over 400,000 of our young men and women. Their sacrifice can be seen in the pensive yet awesome array of stones of remembrances in France, Italy, Sicily, England, Africa, Guadalcanal, the Philippines, Iwo Jima, Pearl Harbor and Arlington. Yet we have not claimed any land from these sacrifices. What an amazing country!

   What makes us great, yet so tragically human? It is that we are a nation under God with liberty and justice for all... and that God is Jesus Christ.

   We have been and hopefully will continue to be a nation by the people, for the people and of the people. Our forefathers defined it. Let us hope that we can maintain that identity.

   And to quote Father John Hardon, S.J. -

   "Unless we recover the zeal and the spirit of the first Century Christians-- unless we are willing to do what they did and to pay the price that they paid, the future of our country, the days of America are numbered."