Each November we set up a Witting Tree at Spring Mount Mennonite Church.  

Witting Trees Call Attention to Veterans’ Suicide Rate  

A growing number of faith communities and organizations from Bucks and Montgomery Counties will be hanging twenty-two sets of dog tags on “Witting Trees” in a public remembrance of the estimated twenty-two veterans who take their lives by suicide every day. 

Glen Miller of Veterans Community Network, a Vietnam Army Ranger, admits that suicide is a word we do not like to talk about. He asks often: “Why are so many of our veterans and active duty personnel taking their own lives?” He hopes that these acts of remembrance will bring awareness, consciousness, and witness to the burdens of war. Roger Kessler, a Desert Storm veteran who coined the name “Witting Tree,” explains that “witting” is an adjective meaning to be conscious or aware of the full facts of a situation. Reverend Scott Hutchinson of St. Andrew’s UCC adds: “There is a communal need for honest acknowledgment of the burdens and wounds of war, careful tending, and genuine homecoming. There is also a deep need for our society as a whole to take responsibility to interrupt and transform destructive cycles that cost our service people so much.” 

Veterans Community Network (VCN) in Harleysville, Montgomery County and Touchstone Veterans Outreach in Perkasie, Bucks County have organized this remembrance along with their partners. The Veterans Community Network (VCN) is a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to promoting collaboration, communication, and innovation among families, groups and organizations providing resources for military veterans in the Delaware Valley. 

For more information or if you know a veteran in need, please contact:

Montgomery County Vet Center

320 E. Johnson Hwy, Suite 201

Norristown, PA 19401

Phone: 215-823-5245 or 877-927-8387

Veterans Community Network 

Co-founder Donald Glen Miller, at dglenmiller@verizon.net  

Phone: 215.527.6203

Touchstone Veterans Outreach 

(headquartered at St. Andrew’s UCC, Perkasie) at pastor@standrewsucc.org  

Phone: 215.257.2880