Angels on the Battlefield

“My oldest son Andrew is in the Army Reserve, with the 458th Engineers out of New Kennsington, Pa,” writes Terri Anastasia, a mother from the Pittsburgh area. “In December 2002, Andrew received orders transferring him to the 459th Engineers, out of West Virginia. He was to report to the West Virginia base in January 2003, to be trained in bridge building and then to be deployed to Kuwait, to await the decision whether our troops would go into Iraq.”

Terri and her husband and their four other children were upset at this news. Almost immediately, as word spread, Terri received an email from a cousin in California, who wanted to share a prayer she was praying each day for Andrew. The prayer asked God to keep a legion of angels around Andrew to protect him and keep him safe, and to give strength to his family. As she read the prayer, Terri thought that she would do the same thing.

The family went to West Virginia to say goodbye to their son. “We left him with great difficulty,” she says, “but with peace in our hearts that he would be well protected.” Apparently, the angels went right to work on this heavenly assignment. 

Andrew arrived in Kuwait February 14th, 2003, and his unit was one of the first to go into Iraq. “As the bombing began and the war got under way, we did not have any communication with Andrew, but of course continued to pray for him and for his unit,” Terri says. “I had wonderful support from many family and friends. One day as I was talking to another one of my cousins she told me she no longer had her guardian angel, because she asked her guardian angel to be with Andrew. I was relating this to my sister and she told me the same thing; she too had asked her guardian angel to be with Andrew.” Terri met a wonderful young woman on the Internet, who also asked angels to surround the 459th. Angelic power was being invoked everywhere.  

During the heat of battle, Terri read stories on a website involving the 459th, what they had been doing and what they were going through. She wept at how difficult it all sounded---the men had even built a bridge while being fired upon. But there was also a comment from a sergeant, which lifted her spirits: "Just the other day,” he had written, “the sergeants got together and decided that God had dispatched a whole battalion of angels to watch over us. We've had accidents and we've taken fire, we've been through a lot. But we're all still here." 

On another occasion, Andrew was sent on a special and dangerous mission, gathering and detonating munitions. He was down in a pit when something went wrong, and an explosive above him went off prematurely. “All the guys up out of the pit were screaming at Andrew to run,” Terri says. “He looked up and saw a huge wall of fire coming toward him, and he just ran. The guys at the top said they never saw anyone run so fast, they never thought he was going to get out of there alive. I told him he must have been carried by his guardian angel.” 

The 459th returned home on February 21, 2004. Although they had been in the heaviest of battles for an entire year, they had suffered NO casualties. Not one. “What a beautiful confirmation to us that angels really were around my son and his unit,” Terri says.

Was this amazing result because people were praying for Andrew? Because angels were asked specifically to guard him and his fellow soldiers? What about those men and women, loved by God as much as Andrew, who have lost their lives in Iraq? Surely people were praying for them too.

“I have asked myself those same questions,” Terri says, “and my heart aches for them. All I know is that we need to lean on God and His Holy Angels and our Blessed Mother, for support for whatever trials we have to endure.” There will always be questions, she says, but God will provide the answers someday.

(C) 2005  Joan Wester Anderson   www.joanwanderson.com

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