Memorial for fallen soldier focuses on life, service to country

Photo By Sgt. 1st Class Stephen Scott | Gen. Don S. Cornett Jr., the commander of the 310th Expeditionary Sustainment Command along with Command Sgt. Maj. Debbie Schroeder, the command sergeant major for the 310th Expeditionary Sustainment Command, pays tribute to Spc. Andrew Lara during the Fallen Soldier Memorial Service May 2 at the Joint Operation Center on Joint Base Balad. (Photo by: Sgt. Allyson Parla.)  

JOINT BASE BALAD, IRAQ

05.01.2011

Story by Staff Sgt. Patrick Caldwell 

77th Sustainment Brigade

JOINT BASE BALAD, Iraq – In a crowded room at Joint Base Balad, Iraq, May 1, Chaplain Jock Johnson, of 3rd Battalion, 116th Cavalry Regiment, 77th Sustainment Brigade, 310th Expeditionary Sustainment Command, read the eulogy at a ceremony to remember Spc. Andrew E. Lara, a vehicle driver with Company Foxtrot, 3rd Battalion, 116th Cavalry Regiment, and an Albany, Ore. native.

Lara, was born Dec. 7, 1985. He died in Babil province last week.

Writing about death and offering aid to those who grieve is part of Johnson’s job. He knows that, and he knows this, too: a eulogy for a soldier carries its own kind of significance, its own weight.

The ceremony, Johnson said, was all about honor: honor for those who serve and honor for those who gave their life for their country on hostile shores far away from their home.

“We do this to honor soldiers,” he said. “The soldier stepped up. Less than one percent of our total population serves their country in the military. I think that speaks volumes about [a soldier’s] character.”
While a eulogy is, by its very nature, about death, Johnson said he doesn’t like to focus on the end of life.

“Is it fair to link someone’s whole life to that one event? I don’t think so,” he said.

So the focus is on the person, his or her life and what they meant to their friends, battle buddies and loved ones. The tribute ceremony is crucial, Johnson said.

“It gives closure for us over here,” he said.

And of course there is the inevitable, acute question as heavy as the shroud of grief: Why?

Johnson is an honest, simple man from a small town; he understands some things in life simply are unanswerable.

“There are questions that have no answer this side of heaven,” he said.

He understands, too, that his job requires that he step to the forefront when a soldier dies.

He could talk about scripture, or the celebrated motifs of the Bible, yet he doesn’t. As a man of God in Iraq, Johnson’s words and thoughts rest with the fallen soldier.

He lives inside the code of the chaplain – care for the living, care for the sick, honor the dead.

“Ultimately when you have a death, you want to do something that helps,” he said.

In the end, though, everything narrows down to a simple concept for Johnson.

“It is important for [Lara’s] family, his mother, to know we are honoring her son in every possible way,” he said.

Johnson knows that on this day, honoring Lara is more important than anything else in the world.

With his eulogy finished, as the last bars of taps linger in the hall where the remembrance ceremony was conducted, Johnson went back to his work as the 3rd Battalion chaplain. He goes back to offer guidance to soldiers and to the study of scripture.

• Date Taken: 05.01.2011
• Date Posted: 05.08.2011 07:50
• Story ID: 70046
• Location: JOINT BASE BALAD, IQ