Veterans' Administration Needs to Approve Symbol

Sergeant Patrick Dana Stewart was a loving father and husband – and was killed-in-action when his Chinook helicopter was shot down by Taliban terrorists on September 25^th, 2005.  When he was buried alongside Chief Warrant Officer John Flynn – who was also on that fateful mission – Sergeant Stewart’s memorial marker was left blank.  Why was this?  After all, CWO Flynn’s memorial marker was properly inscribed with his name and the symbol of his religious faith – a cross.  Why hadn’t Sergeant Stewart’s memorial marker been engraved?  Well, it was because Sergeant Stewart was a Pagan, or more appropriately a Wiccan – and there was no approved symbol for Pagan or Wiccan markers.  When Mrs. Stewart was offered a blank memorial marker – in other words, a marker with just her husband’s information inscribed on it with no religious symbol – she refused that and opted for no marker to be put up.  For the next year, Roberta would join in a struggle that continues today:  to have the pentagram approved as a religious symbol with the Veterans’ Administration, and thus allow the headstones and memorial markers of Pagan and Wiccan veterans to be marked appropriately.

This particular issue of getting the pentagram approved didn’t start with the plight of the Stewarts’.  Instead it starts back in August of 1997 with the Archpriest of the

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