The Story Behind Operation Watch Over
Mark Cattelona served in the United States Armed Forces from the 1970’s to the 1980’s at Edwards AFB. Mark’s time in the military was a tremendous experience while stationed on the test base in the Mojave Desert at Edwards AFB. Mark’s squadron was on the flight line for the first 3 Space Shuttle landings and guided them in from the atmosphere with T-38’s and F5’s. While Mark enjoyed much of his lifetime in the military, there were also dark, overwhelming times that he experienced both before and after his service. During his time of service, he struggled with drugs, depression, and eventually decided to attempt to take his own life. Thankfully his wife showed up in time and his attempt at suicide was unsuccessful.
Since this time Mark has come to know Jesus and has been healed and freed from those lies, wrong beliefs and wounds that led to his suicidal thoughts. Mark’s desire and vision is to help fellow veterans and active service members who are struggling with thoughts of suicide. And that’s where Operation Watch Over was birthed. Mark decided to create a faith based suicide prevention organization to provide suicide prevention for veterans and active military. Our ultimate goal is for these amazing people of service to experience complete healing and freedom and to enjoy the life they were created to have.
Our Vision and Mission
A Beacon of Hope
Vision
Our vision is to be a beacon of hope to the many service men and women, retired, and post-combat, that are suicidal and in need of emotional and spiritual healing.
Noone Left Behind
Mission
Our mission is to help heal the wounds of our service men and women that are not visible so that no man or woman is left behind. We are a Life-Line to expose the enemy and give veterans and service members the weapons to take him out!
The Problem
Active duty and prior service military are seeing record breaking suicides due to a vast array of reasons including, hopelessness, lack of belonging, and loss of purpose. It is now estimated that over 25 service members per day that take their own life. This is an enemy that must be dealt with and defeated.
Over 25 service members take their life each day.
Suicides are the 2nd leading cause of death among service men and women.
The suicide rate for veterans between the ages of 18-34 years old has increased 76%.
Every suicide affects an estimated 135 surviving individuals.
Our Solution – Suicide Prevention for Veterans & Active Service Members
While there are various issues that could lead a person to take their own life, their basic need is to find hope again. This enables them to see that their life is valuable and they can live free of the tormenting thoughts that would drive them to want to end their life. We believe that the key to restoring this hope is faith.
There is positive data accumulating that verifies that faith based solutions are having greater success at preventing suicide than traditional approaches – and, we believe there’s a reason for that. Most suicide prevention programs are lacking the spiritual aspect in their “solution”. Implementing spiritual healing through the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Truth of God’s Word is critical in healing the whole person; spirit, soul and body. When a person is spiritually dead or broken in their soul, our solution leads them to hope, life and wholeness.
Our solution, carried out by our 4-Stage Process, not only helps prevent our service members and vets from wanting to take their own life, but it also produces lasting transformation and change. This enables them to walk in lasting freedom, which is what our service members and veterans are looking for. To learn more about our solution, take a look at our 4-Stage Process.