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‘Sister Sarge,’ a nun from a military tradition, tells her story
11/10 10:34 p.m.
Updated 11/11 12:14 a.m.
BY BILL GUIDA
bguida@kenoshanews.com
PLEASANT PRAIRIE — Before she took her vows as a nun, Sister Linda “Sister Sarge” McClenahan wore Army fatigues, serving a tour of duty in 1969-70 with the First Signal Brigade in Long Binh, Vietnam.
McClenahan, a counselor and psychotherapist serving at the Racine Dominican HOPES Center and at Psychological & Counseling Services, Inc., also in Racine, earned her nickname working at the Wisconsin VA center in Union Grove with homeless military veterans.
Thursday night at the Veterans Day “Service of Remembrance” hosted by Hospice Alliance, Inc., 10220 Prarie Ridge Blvd., McClenahan shared some of her personal story, paid tribute to veterans and spoke of the long history of women serving in uniform.
She was 23 when she got to Vietnam, and about 12 minutes after getting off the plane that brought her there, she was introduced to the reality of wartime service — the eighth generation of the McLenahan family to do so, dating back to her great-great-great-great-great-grandfather fighting in the Continental Army under Gen. George Washington in the Revolutionary War.
Her grandfather fought in WWI, father in WWII. Today, a cousin’s son is headed to Afghanistan, the ninth generation of McLenahans to serve in the military. “To be honest, I don’t know if my family is all that patriotic, or if, being Irish, we just like to fight,” quipped McClenahan, now 60, evoking laughter from the 50 people who filled the room.
She enlisted while still living in Berkley, Calif., where she grew up. In Vietnam, she found herself working 12-hour shifts, six days a week, like fellow personnel snatching sleep when they could on the floor, in chairs, on tabletops.
During the 1969 TET offensive when all of South Vietnam erupted simultaneously with heavy combat, signal personnel worked 50-70 hours straight sending and receiving radio traffic, urgently relaying information from the front to the rear and back again. In the midst of it, she lost her faith, questioning whether God existed at all, given the horrific reality of war. She regained her footing — and her spirituality — after coming to believe war was man’s doing not God’s.
McClenahan said those who come to Hospice likely undergo similar “faith testing,” leaving them angry at times with their God. But, she likened the experience to children getting mad at the parents who love them, saying it’s a normal human response when trying to make sense of things beyond our immediate grasp.
Thursday’s event featured a 21-gun, honor guard salute, the Sweet Adelines Blue Plate Special chapter singing patriotic songs and a medley of George M. Cohan WWII Era numbers, the bugling of “Taps” and a prayer for veterans.
McClenahan called for people to “know whose shoulders you stand on.” No matter whatever reason they serve, they do so under whatever conditions required, including, if necessary, risking life and limb sometimes with less than a moment’s notice, she said.
Whether we believe politically in the cause they’re sent to undertake in duty to the nation, McClenahan said, “we must not let the service of any man or woman be forgotten.”
One of those veterans, Mary Stein, 87, of Kenosha, was presented with a certificate at the event by Kenosha County Veterans Service Officer Derrell Greene honoring her Air Force service from 1945-47.
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