• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Catholic Review

Catholic Review

Inspiring the Archdiocese of Baltimore

Menu
  • Home
  • News
        • Local News
        • World News
        • Vatican News
        • Obituaries
        • Featured Video
        • En Español
        • Sports News
        • Official Clergy Assignments
        • Schools News
  • Commentary
        • Contributors
          • Question Corner
          • George Weigel
          • Effie Caldarola
          • John Garvey
          • Father Ed Dougherty, M.M.
          • Guest Commentary
        • CR Columnists
          • Archbishop William E. Lori
          • Rita Buettner
          • Christopher Gunty
          • George Matysek Jr.
          • Father Joseph Breighner
          • Father Collin Poston
          • Robyn Barberry
          • Hanael Bianchi
          • Amen Columns
  • Entertainment
        • Events
        • Movie & Television Reviews
        • Arts & Culture
        • Books
        • Recipes
  • About Us
        • Contact Us
        • Our History
        • Meet Our Staff
        • Photos to own
        • Books/CDs/Prayer Cards
        • CR Media platforms
        • Electronic Edition
  • Advertising
  • Shop
        • Purchase Photos
        • Books/CDs/Prayer Cards
  • CR Radio
  • News Tips
  • Subscribe
U.S. Naval Academy Midshipman First Class Maria Weimer will start her military career at Naval Base San Diego on a destroyer. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

God and country: Catholic midshipman among growing ranks of women in military service

March 14, 2023
By Yvonne Wenger
Catholic Review
Filed Under: Colleges, Feature, Local News, News

ANNAPOLIS – A summer camp when she was 17 awakened in Maria E. Weimer the values that would come to define her life: She is a protector, a defender and a believer – and her future would be with the U.S. Navy.

Weimer grew up Catholic in a military family in Somerset, Pa., and when she served as a companion to a severely autistic woman at the camp for adults with special needs in her hometown, she discovered what was always in her heart.

Maria E. Weimer converses with a visitor at the Naval Academy’s Memorial Hall, which is dedicated to graduates who died in service of their country. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

“I saw someone completely vulnerable and completely helpless who would never have the ability to defend herself,” said Weimer, now 23 and a midshipman first class in the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis. “I remember thinking to myself, ‘What is the best way I can impact lives?’ The military was the obvious answer.

“I wanted to keep our name on a military uniform.”

She is following in the footsteps of her father, brother, grandfather and uncles, but with a special distinction: Weimer will be the first woman in her family to serve in the military when she is commissioned a naval officer May 26. She joins an ever-growing legion of women in the armed forces.

At the Naval Academy, just one in five of the midshipmen are women, although the number is up a whopping 218 percent since 1990 when 98 women graduated. Congress authorized female admissions in 1976 to all of the service academies, including the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in New York and the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado.

“Today’s military is much more integrated along gender lines than at any time in the past,” according to a 2020 essay by the Brookings Institution titled, “Women Warriors: The ongoing story of integrating and diversifying the American armed forces.”

The percentage of women across all military forces has roughly doubled in the last generation. Women represent one in six Americans in uniform, the think tank reported. Their ranks range from 8 percent in the Marine Corps to 19 percent in the Air Force.

Midshipman First Class Maria Weimer, who said she looks forward to being a mom one day, will be assigned to a destroyer with responsibilities in surface-to-air defense after graduation. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

“We’ve come a long way,” according to the Brookings authors, retired Air Force Gen. Lori J. Robinson and Brookings senior fellow Michael E. O’Hanlon. “But there is plenty of work yet to be done to encourage the participation of women in the military and to ensure their experiences and opportunities are equitable to those of the men who serve.

“If we put the work in, we will have a stronger military – and country – for it.”

At the Naval Academy, female midshipmen pursue the same academic and professional training as do their male classmates, although physical standards differ. Midshipmen earn an undergraduate college degree over four years and receive commission as a military officer in the U.S. Navy or Marine Corps. As students, midshipmen are on active duty.

Weimer, whose home parish is St. Peter in Somerset, Pa., aspires to become a surface warfare officer on a Navy warship at the base in San Diego, Calif. In this role as an ensign, the rank she will attain at graduation, she hopes to lead a crew of seamen and petty officers aboard a destroyer.

Her father, Mark Weimer, served as a sailor in San Diego before he married her mother, Laura. The couple volunteers as “Gold and Blue Officers” to help high school students in western Pennsylvania navigate the academy’s admissions process. Their goal is to expose other young people to the opportunities they can find in military service.

Mark Weimer said he remembers a visit to the Naval Academy before Maria started her sophomore year in high school. Their time together on the Yard – and a group of midshipmen who stopped their volleyball game to talk to Maria – helped her to see the life she could make for herself with a Navy career.

The Weimers say they’re in awe of their daughter’s quiet leadership, sense of right versus wrong and deep gratitude.

“It’s her calling to serve in the military and to give back what’s given to her,” Laura Weimer said.

Alongside her parents, Weimer is helping build the pipeline for female midshipmen. She has made phone calls and joined panels to share her experience, offer advice and give encouragement.

“I hope to be a light for young girls and empower them: You can be a female and you can pursue the military as a career,” Weimer said. 

One of her role models is Capt. Tracie Severson, an academy professor who has helped mentor Weimer. She is the officer representative to the Naval Academy’s chapter of the Catholic Daughters of the Americas. Weimer is its president.

Maria Weimer, shown in her living quarters in Bancroft Hall, said she yearns for a life dedicated to God and country. (Kevin J. Parks/CR Staff)

Severson, who is also Catholic and a 1995 graduate of the academy, said Weimer provides inspiring leadership to the chapter and the 20 midshipmen who are members.

“Having that sisterhood is important, because in this world there is a lot of pressure on women to look or think or act a certain way that is counter to our Catholic faith,” Severson said. “That sisterhood can help us make the best decisions for ourselves, our families and communities so we can find what God desires for us.”

Standing inside the academy’s storied Bancroft Hall and its majestic rotunda, Weimer reflected on the service, life and achievements that she dreams for herself. At the center of all she yearns for is a life devoted to God and country.

She understands the sacrifice that her commitment might require. The names of her fallen shipmates, killed in action and enshrined in the Yard’s legacy, are memorialized in crests for each and every academy class. Her class crest is blank, for now.

“I fail a lot here,” Weimer said. “It’s made to break you. The only thing that has been consistent for me is to rely on my Catholic faith. All of those principles and truths that the Church teaches allow me to live at peace and remember the whole goal and intention.

“One day if I can look back at my career when I walk in these doors, I’ll ask myself the question: ‘Did you give it all that you had and did you serve the Lord to the best of your abilities?’ ”

Read More Local News

Catholic Charities’ William J. McCarthy Jr. named Loyola’s Business Leader of the Year

Sister Joan Cooper, O.S.F., dies at 94

Pathfinders: Five Archdiocese of Baltimore women who made history

Sister Elizabeth Ellen Kane, O.S.F., dies at 81

RADIO INTERVIEW: Dining with the Saints

Archdiocese dispenses with meatless obligation for St. Patrick’s Day

Copyright © 2023 Catholic Review Media

Print Print

Primary Sidebar

Yvonne Wenger

Yvonne Wenger is a former journalist with the Baltimore Sun who now serves as director of community affairs for the Archdiocese of Baltimore.

View all posts from this author

For the latest news delivered twice a week via email or text message, sign up to receive our free enewsletter.

| MOST POPULAR |

  • Pathfinders: Five Archdiocese of Baltimore women who made history
  • Movie Review: ‘Shazam! Fury of the Gods’
  • RADIO INTERVIEW: Dining with the Saints
  • Sister Elizabeth Ellen Kane, O.S.F., dies at 81
  • Legendary communist-era priest, Father Blachnicki, was murdered, Polish authorities confirm

| Latest Local News |

Catholic Charities’ William J. McCarthy Jr. named Loyola’s Business Leader of the Year

Sister Joan Cooper, O.S.F., dies at 94

Pathfinders: Five Archdiocese of Baltimore women who made history

| Latest World News |

Vatican envoy warns UN General Assembly racism mutating and ‘reemerging’ globally

‘We all need to do more’: House hearing demands action over Nicaragua regime’s anti-Catholic persecution

Notre Dame Cathedral reopening date announced as reconstruction on its famous spire wraps up in eastern France

| Catholic Review Radio |

CatholicReview · Catholic Review Radio

Footer

Our Vision

Real Life. Real Faith. 

Catholic Review Media communicates the Gospel and its impact on people’s lives in the Archdiocese of Baltimore and beyond.

Our Mission

Catholic Review Media provides intergenerational communications that inform, teach, inspire and engage Catholics and all of good will in the mission of Christ through diverse forms of media.

Contact

Catholic Review
320 Cathedral Street
Baltimore, MD 21201
443-524-3150
mail@CatholicReview.org

 

Social Media

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Recent

  • Vatican envoy warns UN General Assembly racism mutating and ‘reemerging’ globally
  • ‘We all need to do more’: House hearing demands action over Nicaragua regime’s anti-Catholic persecution
  • Notre Dame Cathedral reopening date announced as reconstruction on its famous spire wraps up in eastern France
  • AI and the meaning of life: Tech industry turns to religious leaders
  • Movie Review: ‘John Wick: Chapter 4, a festival of fatality’
  • Pope calls European bishops to be prophetic voices for peace
  • En la frontera de México y EE.UU., defensores de migrantes que buscan asilo hacen un llamado a la acción
  • At U.S.-Mexico border, migrants’ advocates call for action on U.S. asylum policy
  • Jewish parents challenge California ban on special education funds at religious schools

Search

Membership

Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada

Maryland-Delaware-DC Press Association

The Associated Church Press

© 2023 CATHOLIC REVIEW MEDIA, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED