When you’re over here, and they’re over there, what can you do for soldiers other than pray? Military wife Judy McCloskey knew she could do more. After giving birth to six children during the course of her husband’s military career, McCloskey decided to develop a tangible form of assistance to soldiers and their families across the globe. In December 2001, McCloskey launched CatholicMil.org, a Web-based apostolate designed to spiritually and practically help soldiers and their families adapt to military life. Four years later, this apostolate is currently gaining formal control of the Father Vincent R. Capodanno Foundation, which was founded by Arlington’s Father Daniel Mode in 2000.

"I recognized that there were too few resources out there for us," McCloskey said in an interview last week. The Father Capodanno Foundation was a start, but "my thoughts about reaching the military were more extensive," she continued. "I envisioned more of an outreach — more of access on the Web."

McCloskey said this type of resource was badly needed. For example, she explained, most Catholic resources for raising a family assumed that both parents were living at home and able to help out.

"That doesn’t apply to military families," she said. "The books I turned to the most were books about being a widow or a single parent, and I thought to myself ‘that is so not right.’ So I was looking for answers."

As she searched, McCloskey found help adjusting to her military life through the Catechism of the Catholic Church’s teaching on "just war," which helped her view her husband’s calling as a peacemaker, instead of a warrior (No. 2309).

In the case of just war, the Catechism stated, "Public authorities … have the right and duty to impose on citizens the obligations necessary for national defense. Those who are sworn to serve their country in the armed forces are servants of the security and freedom of nations. If they carry out their duty honorably, they truly contribute to the common good of the nation and the maintenance of peace" (No. 2310).

McCloskey said that passage helped define her husband’s service as a calling from God.

"Understanding his sacrifice, I was able to understand ours," she said. "It does not make sense if it’s just a job. But if it’s a vocation, it makes sense. They’re not out there to kill; they’re out there to save and to make peace."

McCloskey said understanding this calling was like putting together a giant jigsaw puzzle. "I thought, ‘this needs to be gathered up and put into one place.’ So that’s what I did."

The "one place," CatholicMil.org, came to fruition out of McCloskey’s volunteering with the Father Vincent R. Capodanno Foundation, which was created to uphold the legacy of Father Capodanno, a Catholic chaplain who died providing spiritual guidance to front-line soldiers in Vietnam.

In the fall of 2001, after McCloskey had volunteered for the Father Capodanno Foundation for over a year, the Sept. 11 attacks increased her determination to put her ideas into motion.

The barebones of CatholicMil.org was launched Christmas Eve 2001, after McCloskey, her husband and Chaplain Father John Echert received a January blessing from Archbishop Edwin F. O’Brien, archbishop of Military Services.

At the beginning, the Web page wasn’t much to brag about, with its content consisting of a few military saints, testimonies, inspirational quotes and biographies of military chaplains. Even though McCloskey said it wasn’t much to start with, she thought they were important resources to help military families understand what military vocation is all about.

"The suffering and sacrifice that are entailed with being in the military don’t make sense without the Faith," McCloskey said.

As CatholicMil.org slowly began to receive funding — "we kept that Franciscan approach — we begged," laughed McCloskey — it developed into a resource filled with book suggestions, offers for free materials for Catholic chaplains, news and feature stories from the war zone, links to help find birth certificates, tips on organizing holy hours, biographies of inspirational military saints and a cache of multimedia spiritual aids. A link is also provided to CatholicMil.com, the "sister site" of CatholicMil.org "that offers books, videos and other resources of special interest to those who serve in the military."

In the spring of 2005, McCloskey reconnected with Father Mode, then the pastor of Queen of Apostles Church in Alexandria, whom she had met when beginning her search for resources for the military family. Together the two visited Major (Father?) Timothy Vakoc, the first wounded chaplain of the War in Iraq, at Walter Reed Hospital in Washington.

"He was a mess," McCloskey said, thinking back to the first time she saw Father Vakoc. "I didn’t get this chaplain out of my mind. I think he reminded me of Capodanno."

While traveling back and forth to Walter Reed, Father Mode proposed that CatholicMil.org take over the Father Capodanno Foundation. The transition began in the late spring and is ongoing.

"Father Mode saw the mission of Capodanno being fulfilled through the CatholicMil Web site," McCloskey explained. "(Father Capodanno) was a missionary. The work of CatholicMil is missionary indeed."

McCloskey said that CatholicMil.org is currently developing an Amazing Grace book for those in the military as well as working to connect past war families with current war families. McCloskey described one soldier who was a POW during Vietnam. During his five years and three month stint as a POW, he was fed worm and maggot filled bread and water. "He prayed the rosary. He did his best to evangelist communists, which basically meant more torture," she said.

When he was released at the end of the war, his two children saw their father for the first time. He and his wife renewed their marriage, and they had five more children. Now they travel around the country talking about God’s presence in POW camps and Catholics in the military.

"They’re the real missionaries of this work, as are the military saints like Father Capodanno," McCloskey said. "That’s what we do — try to bring it full circle."