{"id":8206,"date":"2004-01-10T12:15:49","date_gmt":"2004-01-10T12:15:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/viamedia\/2004\/01\/coveting_lukes_faith.html"},"modified":"2004-01-10T12:15:49","modified_gmt":"2004-01-10T12:15:49","slug":"coveting_lukes_faith","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2004\/01\/coveting_lukes_faith.html","title":{"rendered":"Coveting Luke’s Faith"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the NYTimes Magazine<\/a><\/p>\n

I assumed we had stranded our 4-year-old son Luke in the same spiritually arid place we’d found ourselves in. When my husband went to Iraq for several months, I thought Luke and I were in it together, a suddenly single mom and a nervous boy whose daddy was in a war zone. I was numb with anxiety when I talked to my husband on his satellite phone; yet Luke was chatty and calm. He missed his daddy, but he wasn’t scared. He wanted to see pictures of Dad holding an AK-47. I thought he was just too young to understand.<\/p>\n

Then one night Luke and I were watching television, and a story flashed on about a soldier home on leave for his wedding. I tried to switch the channel, but Luke wanted to see, so I let him, thinking, It’s a wedding; it’s fine. But the soldier started talking about how afraid he was of going back, how dangerous it was in Iraq. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Luke steeple his fingers and bow his head for a split second. Surprised, I said, ”Sweetheart, what are you doing?” He wouldn’t tell me, but a few minutes later, he did it again. I said, ”You don’t have to tell me, but if you want to, I’m listening.” Finally he confessed, ”I was saying a little prayer for Daddy.” <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the NYTimes Magazine I assumed we had stranded our 4-year-old son Luke in the same spiritually arid place we’d found ourselves in. When my husband went to Iraq for several months, I thought Luke and I were in it together, a suddenly single mom and a nervous boy whose daddy was in a war…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":180,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nCoveting Luke's Faith - Via Media<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/viamedia\/2004\/01\/coveting_lukes_faith.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Coveting Luke's Faith - Via Media\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"From the NYTimes Magazine I assumed we had stranded our 4-year-old son Luke in the same spiritually arid place we’d found ourselves in. 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The Catholicism comes from her side. Amy grew up in a number of places - Indiana - Washington, DC - Lubbock Texas - Arlington, Virginia - DeKalb, Illinois - Lawrence, Kansas - and Knoxville, Tennessee, where the family settled in 1973. She attended Knoxville Catholic High School, then the University of Tennessee where she majored in history. She received an MA in Church History from Vanderbilt University, where she wrote a thesis on the changing role of women in 19th century American Protestantism, and the ways Scripture was used to justify those changes. She worked as as a teacher in Catholic high schools and a Parish Director of Religious Education and started writing for the diocesan press - the Florida Catholic - in 1988. Amy has written columns for Our Sunday Visitor and Catholic News Service at times over the past twenty years. Her articles have been published in venues ranging from Our Sunday Visitor to the New York Times to Commonweal. She has written 17 books. 18, if you included the as yet tragically unpublished novel. Amy has five children, ranging in age from 26 to 4 and was married to Michael Dubruiel, who died unexpectedly in February 2009. 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