I asked for my first sign from God in the midst of World War II. We had only been in that war a few months in May of 1942 when that day came for me. In the Far East Admiral Nimitz was directing the first Allied Offensive to stop the Japanese Imperial Navy in the Battle of the Coral Sea, while beginning plans for the more famous Battle of Midway. In North Africa, Field Marshall Von Rommel was still a power, but he would fade as the British planes struck his supply lines and a General named Patton began command of our tank corps there.

That was quite an atmosphere in which to celebrate First Communion. Newspaper headlines told of war. The newsreels at the movies were filled with smoke and explosions, usually of airplanes crashing into the sea. When we played in the leaf piles at the end of …