Holy Mass atop Mount Suribachi
BY FATHER AIDAN LOGAN, O.C.S.O.
F
ather Charles Suver, SJ, was born in Ellensburg and educated at Seattle College, now Seattle University, he joined the Society of Jesus in 1924 and was ordained a priest in 1937. As a 39-year-old Navy Chaplain he was with the Marines on Iwo Jima, the bloodiest battle of the Pacific Theater, lasting from February 19, to March 26, 1945, with more than 22,000 Marines and Sailors killed or wounded. War correspondent Joe Rosenthal’s iconic photograph of the raising the flag on Mount Suribachi, February 23, 1945, by five United States Marines and a Navy Hospital Corpsmen was first published in newspapers the following Sunday and since then it has been a powerful symbol of all that is it means to be a Marine. Father Suver was there and played a little known but profound part. He had just finished supper and one of the Marine officers declared he was sure he could get an American flag to hoist on top of Mount Suribachi. Another officer said he was sure that his Marines could get the flag to the top.
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