First ever Wiccan service for Fallen Airmen at EAFB

Written by CoG Member Lisa Morgenstern

Thursday night May 9, 2013 at 5:30pm at Chapel 1, Edwards Air Force Base in California, Elder Priestess and Non-Chaplain Worship Leader Amy Watson led a Wiccan service. To honor the 20 Airmen fallen in 2013, Amy has been leading services on a weekly basis since last April. The group was small but there was plenty of emotion. Memorial Day is approaching and an airman pilot who grew up and attended school in Palmdale, the local area, was lost in a KC-135 aircraft crash this month on May 3rd.  So Amy felt it was time to honor those in the Air Force who have given the ultimate sacrifice to their fellow countrymen and the United States of America.

The circle keened the names of the fallen in Celtic tradition, calling their names loudly. Amy, a member of Dragon’s Weyr Circle, a Covenant of the Goddess Member coven, stated, “Thursday night as I started to set up the sacred space the wind started to whirl around. The sky looked as if there was a storm brewing, The Celts would say that it was the Sidhe showing their knowledge of the events …..when the circle was done so was the whirling and swirling winds.”  The altar held patches of all the squadrons of the men and women lost.

The circle members called in Badb, and the Horned God, and invited the fallen Airmen to join them and be honored. Then they raised healing energy “to send back through their threads of life/energy to help those which are a part of their tapestries of life.” Several traditional poems were read, and as Captain Victoria Ann Pinckney, the local Palmdale High School Graduate and pilot, was a WASP and a tanker pilot, the poem Vectors to the Tanker, along with a WASP memorial poem for female pilots. The Heathens in attendance spoke of the honor accorded to fallen warriors and that those slain in battle are collected by Freyja and Odin and brought to their halls, Sessrumir and Valhalla. They shared mead and lemon cookies on an altar with red roses. The lemon and red roses are military traditions when honoring those lost.

The service included three generations, parents, children, and grandparents. “When I approached the Wing Chaplain to have services scheduled, he insisted that we schedule weekly services,” said Watson, “just like all the other denominations have.” Amy is wife to a Captain, who supports her services and attends as his schedule permits. Their group was small Thursday night, but Watson says that attendance varies, as many of their members have children and weeknight commitments.

Vectors to the Tanker

I’ve got troops in contact Pinned down by the Tali
Made one more pass, way low on gas
“I need vectors for the tanker.”

Tonight my wounded warriors
Need medevac to Landstuhl.
A double A/R out of Kandahar
“I need vectors for the tanker.”

The Kims and their kin are at it again,
In far away Korea
We are looking tough,
with my cell of Buffs
“I need vectors to the tanker.”

Earthquake, flood or famine
The world needs US aid
The air bridge is faster, to any disaster
“I need vectors to the tanker.”

NKAWTG! We take pride in this expression.
Day or night, we fuel the fight.
“I need vectors to the tanker.”

A CSAR helo has been launched
A grim hunt for 3 survivors.
A burned patch is found, now hallowed ground.
“I need vectors to the tanker.”

Today a crew is coming home.
Boom stowed and bound for heaven.
They passed their gas, now haulin’ ass.
“I need vectors for the tanker.”

All SAC aircrews please stand by
This is GOD on “Guard.”
Lemay and I from up on high
“Are giving vectors to the tanker.”