Category Archives: philosophy

October 17, 2010 · 16:35

To the Edge of Oddness and Beyond: Let’s Stuff Bliss Between Peoples Ears Until the Cows Come Home

I don’t think like a lot of people finding humor in events that others see in a more serious light and irony in so many places, so many that I have to remember that I don’t iron anything anymore. Back when I was in college Judy and I had a friend named Eric. Eric to be kind was slightly on the eccentric side of life and he had a phrase that I appropriated for when people told him that he was “weird.” He would say “weird takes work, not crazy like most people.”  Yes weird does take work and as most of the people that know me well attest most never know what I will find funny or say next. Of course there people who are humor deprived that do not see anything that I say or do to be funny or witty.  But that is okay with me because I find their humorlessness humorous. I think our little Red Dachshund named Greta who took life so seriously that it was funny to us helped me in this. I see so many people so consumed with the cares of live that they live in a perpetual state of unhappiness, anxiety, depression with anger seething below the surface ready to implode or explode depending on what day it is.

Even in my darkest moments coming back from Iraq I found humor even in some of the nuttiness that was part and parcel of my PTSD like the time that I got rudely cut off in a grocery store parking lot and I called the other driver an Oedipal Mother you-know-whater.  There were so many other things that even when depressed, anxious and struggling to believe that I found funny, ironic and just plain amusing even things about me that when I got over whatever I wasn’t over that I found ludicrous and had to laugh at myself. I think that humor help sustain me through the most difficult times when I could have easily sunk into a morose bitterness that would have been the end of me as you know me and I think that that would have been a fate worse than a fate worse than death.

This has been especially helpful during the prevailing national nastiness that we Americans seem to be reveling in as we find more ways to hate one another.  That my friends is not for me, I just want to get along and care about people that come my way no matter who they are, what they believe or any other defining characteristic that others label them as.  Why do I want this? Because it is so wacky that it makes absolute sense. I think that if we start learning to love each other despite our differences that we can make this world a better place.

Although some would say that “ignorance is bliss” and I certainly am not ignorant I like bliss.  Bliss should be good even if not grounded in ignorance.  I wish bliss on unhappy and overly serious people because it has to be good for them.  Now we can’t make people blissful even if we stuff bliss between their ears until the cows come home but it would be worth a shot.  Some might find that odd but I think that it might be the will of God.  Kind of like when the Ghostbusters II when they Ghostbusters blasted the toxic slime out of existance with “put a little love in your heart.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3XXWTV0cV0

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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October 16, 2010 · 12:37

The Acrid Smell of an Election is in the Air: The Toxic Politics of Mutually Assured Destruction

Bloom County copyright 1988 by Berkeley Breathed. www.gocomics.com

Yes that pungent stench that is in the air is not the smell of fall, not the scent of freshly run over skunk but yea and verily the scent of yet another poisonously pungent election season. Yes this year stinks more than most because of the division of the country and the absolute enmity between political parties.   Pundits, ideologues, mindless drones and their allied television, radio and print media shills echo whatever their party’s leaders and pundits say regardless of its veracity painting their opponents in the worst possible manner without ever dealing with the issues in a constructive manner.  Back in the 1990s I think it was Hillary Clinton who talked about the “politics of personal destruction” but I think while that still goes on we have entered the realm of “the politics of mutual assured destruction.” Yes candidates will win and lose this election season but the ways they will win will do great damage to the country, regardless of their party that ultimately triumphs.  Since this is a mid-term election expect this to only get worse as the Presidential election of 2012 approaches.

What triggered this article was a visit to Huntington West Virginia my family’s ancestral home where I worked in the 1990s as a hospital emergency department chaplain.  Huntington is in Cabell County and used to be the largest and most prosperous city in the state.  Huntington is located on the Ohio River and is across that river from Ohio and adjacent to Ashland Kentucky.  As a result the local television and radio media carry campaign ads from all three states.  Thus in the week that we were there I was treated with an absolute deluge of negative political advertisement from candidates of both parties in US Senate, US House of Representatives, Gubernatorial and State Senate and House races.  I have lived in Virginia for 7 years and while political ads here are similar to those in West Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio I think they are a bit more tame due to the large number of people from the rest of the country that have settled here due to the military and government related employment.

With the massive amount of exposure that I had to the toxic radioactive sludge that filled the airwaves from the various candidates for office I realized that we have been standing at the precipice of a political cliff for several years with both parties doing everything they can to push us over it. I guess like political parties in Weimar Germany they see a benefit to the chaos of an electorate that no longer sees the opposing party as Americans with opposing beliefs, but enemies of the America that they envision. I guess in a Machiavellian sense whatever tactics that you use to gain victory are irrelevant as long as you win.

Back when I was growing up the statesmen of American politics treated each other with respect and maintained friendships with people on the other side of the aisle; I think that Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill epitomized the men of that era, fierce political opponents who remained friends until the end. George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton seem to have that kind of relationship as well.  But I detect little of that from the current crop of political ideologues in both parties and I think that they all share the blame for the mess that the country is in and I don’t see any change in political climate coming anytime soon.

Bloom County copyright 1988 by Berkeley Breathed. www.gocomics.com

I think that to use the Cold War term we have entered a phase of “Mutual Assured Destruction” regarding the tactics used by both parties in their attempts to keep or gain power. Issues are not discussed or debated they are reduced to sound bites and the opposition candidates views are usually taken out of the context that they were made. Both parties are doing this and when both politicians and their supporters in the media paint caricatures of their opponents using such methods truth suffers.  No one offers a positive vision for the country because I think they have stopped believing in it, all that matters as their party and their ideology truth and their opponents be damned.  What bothers me even more is how some religious leaders and churches have taken this same approach rather than simply preaching the Gospel and caring about God’s people. Even churches and pastors have become shills for political parties sacrificing the Gospel for a share in political power.

Bloom County copyright 1988 by Berkeley Breathed. www.gocomics.com

In spite of this I did my civic duty and voted for those who seemed behave with less rancor toward their opponents, politicians from both sides of the aisle as I have never been regardless of my political affiliation a shill for a party.  I voted for candidates that seemed to care more for my home state than an allegiance to their national party.  Now they may be just as bad and corrupt as the other candidates but as Tip O’Neill said “all politics is local” and my vote was cast in that light.  I am not an ideologue but think that somehow as Americans we need to find a way to work together as the problems of this country cannot be changed when the political climate is so toxic. Maybe I am just an idealist that believes that the people of this country are better at heart than our politicians believe us to be.

In the end I think that both parties, their respective candidates and media shills have decided to paraphrase a quote from the Vietnam War “that we had to destroy the country in order to save it.” God help us.

Peace

Padre Steve+

 

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October 14, 2010 · 02:17

Laughing at Myself: This Moderate is a Liberal….Hide the Silver!

Bloom County Copyright Berkeley Breathed 1988 found at www.gocomics.com

Over the past year or so I have had a number of encounters with various people, most of whom that I don’t know but then some that I have known for years and a troubling word keeps arising.  The “L word” no not “Lesbian” like in the Showtime drama but “Liberal” like in Bill Clinton or even better John Kerry or Jimmy Carter since they were in the Navy for a time.

It bothered me at first as I could not fathom that I might even be considered a liberal. I was a Reagan Republican and even worked for Gerald Ford as a campaign volunteer against Jimmy Carter when I was in high school. Now I did moderate over the years even though until I went to Iraq I listened to conservative talk radio almost every day.  However the charge has been made enough for me to actually have fun with it and not take those who call me a liberal too seriously or for that matter to take myself too seriously.

Bloom County Copyright Berkeley Breathed 1988 found at www.gocomics.com

It has actually become funny to me how often that this pops up. I suppose it is because I am not easy to pin down and as my Church history professor at Southwestern Baptist Seminary said “Liberal to most people is ‘anyone to the left of me.’” He was right. Back in those days the Southern Baptists had something called “moderates” which in most other denominations would have been considered conservatives or even fundamentalists. However in the SBC since they were to the left of men like Paige Patterson, Paul Pressler and W.A. Criswell they were not “moderates” but “liberals.” At Southwestern though I wasn’t a Southern Baptist I certainly fit in with the dying breed called moderates.  I used a NRSV Bible, the kind with inclusive language and by my senior year was a closet Catholic or Anglo-Catholic, which meant that to the Fundamentalists I was a liberal. Of course doing my taped sermons in preaching lab in a tweed sports jacket and black or white long sleeve turtleneck shirt and khaki pants didn’t help matters in how I was perceived. This was of course before I wore a clerical collar which I’m sure would have gone over even worse than my tweed, turtleneck and khaki look.  Since most of my fellow students were wearing black or navy blue suits and power ties as they were using the tape as an audition tape for call committees at churches that they were applying pastor at I was the odd bird out.  In fact kind of like a certain flightless fowl in the Bloom County comic strip named Opus the Penguin.

I am pretty much a moderate.  This means that basically I find little in common with any kind of extremist be they from the right or left in politics, religion or even those that crusade for or against the designated hitter rule in the American League.  I find myself in the middle on most issues which often means to attempt not to offend my friends on the far right or far left I have to be somewhat nuanced in how I say things. Of course to the right now days, especially after the 2004 election when John Kerry was “nuanced” that the word is associated with being a liberal. I find this somewhat amusing.  Basically I will lean slightly to the right on some things and slightly to the left on others occasionally siding with conservatives and sometimes with liberals. In today’s charged political climate of cultural, political and religious wars in American churches and the body politic I am considered by conservatives that don’t really know me as a liberal. Those that really know me for the most part consider me a moderate that maybe is leaning more to the left than I used to.

So in all unserious seriousness I have found comfort and consolation and a certain kinship with Opus the Penguin.  What popped into my phonographic mind which spins around at 45 RPM when I was last called a liberal was the comic at the top of this article.  So anyway since I have recently discovered an online archive of the Bloom County strips at www.gocomics.com I can finally occasionally post one on this site.

Here’s to moderation! Cheers!

So anyway until tomorrow when I post my MLB League Championship Series predictions I will say “goodnight.”

Peace

Padre Steve+

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October 9, 2010 · 21:28

The Church Maintained in Love: Maintaining Integrity and Preserving Relationships When Asked to Leave a Church

“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because his conscience tells him it is right….” Martin Luther

The past three years have been filled with change and transition for me as anyone who is a regular reader of this site understands.  This week another transition took place as I was asked to leave the Charismatic Episcopal Church over my perceived “liberal” writings and spiritual journey.  This has been a long time in coming and while I was surprised at the timing I was not surprised that it eventually came to this.  While my Bishop states that he did not ask me to leave the tenor of his call, which was pastoral and friendly yet used terms such as “you do not appear to be happy in the CEC,” “I would think that you might be happier in another church” and “liberal beliefs” indicated to me that I was being asked to leave and that was how I interpreted it.  He did not at all threaten my status in the military as I made my transition but left me with the impression that the sooner I found a new home the better.

Before I go into the process of how this happened I have to say that I depart the CEC without rancor or personal animosity and that unlike many who have departed the CEC will not engage in criticism or attacks on that Church or its leadership.  While I have theological, philosophical and pastoral disagreements with where I see the CEC going it is not for me to sit as the judge upon the CEC.  I have too many friends in the church and dare not risk relationships over issues that are mine to deal with.  At the same time I will in this post note those differences.  But again I say that all churches have the right and responsibility to do what they think is correct regarding their beliefs and how to deal with their clergy and laity that have differing views.  It is my view that unless a person is willing to stay within their church and abide by its discipline that they should leave peacefully.  I also believe that if a person feels that they are bound by the faith and by Scripture to remain in a church as a voice of loyal opposition that they should but have the grace not to make their opposition a personal crusade to get their way or to force change in their church before it is time.  I believe that a person who practices principled opposition can never use his opposition as an excuse to seek further division in the church. Likewise a person cannot allow his or herself to become so attached to his cause that he sees his opponents as enemies and allows hate to dominate his actions.

I believe that the Church is a community centered on Jesus and bound together by our baptism, One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism, One God and Father of All.  I believe in this community that there are many expressions of that faith.  We maintain the faith that comes passed to us in the Gospel “that God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.” (2 Cor. 5:19 NLT)

Within this context lies my journey. As a priest in the CEC I was bound by my vows to be obedient to the discipline of the church.  When I entered the CEC in 1996 I felt very comfortable with those vows. Over the course of the years I began to have misgivings about those vows as the church went through a number of very bitter splits over what amounted to be the issue of power and authority.  Money was at the root of much of this but also the personal misconduct of a number of Bishops as well as clergy aggravated the situation. In the United States during the period of 2004-2007 a total of 8 bishops left the church to form their own denominations or join other groups, many taking the majority of their clergy and parishes with them. Two of these bishops would return to the CEC in later years. One Archbishop resigned and became a Roman Catholic layman. One Archbishop was removed from his episcopate and left the church to form his own church and eventually the world-wide Patriarch was forced to step down after being complicit in the cover-up of an affair of his archdeacon and the wife of a layman in the church whose father was a priest in the military. All of those Bishops did more to damage the faith and witness of the CEC than any article that I could ever write so I am not ashamed as I have behaved with honor and maintained my vows.

During my time in the CEC I had a number of negative experiences with Bishops and clergy that are no longer in the CEC. The Archbishop that laicized and became Roman Catholic had forbidden me from writing after publishing two articles in a conservative Catholic journal.  The accusation was that I was “too Catholic and misrepresenting the church.” Of course my writings were following the lead of this bishop and a number of others that were trying on their own accord to push the CEC into communion with Rome. He did not inform the Archbishop for the Military of this.  I later had conflict with this bishop when I corrected a priest in his diocese who was not following what the bishop said to do. For my trouble I was forbidden to have relationships with civilian clergy in that diocese. When this bishop laicized this diocese imploded, only a few missions with very few members remain in the CEC. The others found homes in communions that the other departing bishops formed after failing to remove the Patriarch in 2006.  I had many friends leave the CEC at that time.  Thus from 2004 I had no local support of fellowship with anyone in the CEC. The bishop that inherited the scattered remnants of this diocese never contacted me in that time, apart from my fellow chaplains I felt completely cut off from the church.  Thus when all the major scandals and schisms occurred I only had the support and fellowship of a number of the priests of our military archdiocese. Despite this I felt bound to my vows as none of the Bishops that remained had wronged me in any way and I valued my relationship with my military bishop and fellow chaplains.

The CEC continued its implosion while I was in Iraq with the resignation of the Patriarch. I wondered if the CEC would survive in any form and began to explore options contacting a number of communions while in Iraq. When I returned home suffering from PTSD flashbacks, insomnia and anxiety as well as the lingering effects of wear and tear injuries to my shoulders and knees and a badly sprained ankle which refused to heal I was in pretty ragged shape. I told Judy that I felt that I needed to leave the CEC and recognizing the danger of a hasty move she persuaded me to stay and at least wait a year to make any decisions.

In fact in light of the journey that I have been on, especially since returning from Iraq in February 2008 I had began the process of seeking to find a home. This was done in large part because when I am done with my military service we plan on retiring in the Hampton Roads area.  One thing that I discovered after Iraq was that I needed local relationships and a church home.  This was something that even if I had remained in sync with the CEC that they could not have provided and I did find a local church home at St. James Episcopal Church in Portsmouth.

During that year I experienced a major crisis of faith that left me for nearly two years as a practical agnostic wondering where God was. Christmas of 2008 was so bleak that I left the Christmas Eve Mass at Judy’s parish before it started walking into the cold of the night asking God if he even existed.  Faith was a struggle for the next year, but I did find a local church home at St. James Episcopal Church in Portsmouth whose priest, Father John Agbaje became my pastor and friend. Though I was still struggling I found comfort in the liturgy and tradition of this historic church. It was a place of solace, something that I had not had in the CEC for many years.

By the summer I realized that if we were to remain in the Hampton Roads area that I would have to leave the CEC if nothing else for the local relationships that we were building at St. James. While this was occurring my faith journey continued. I saw many things going on in much of the church world, to sometimes include the CEC that concerned me as a Christian. These were pastoral, societal and political issues and not creedal issues even though for many conservative Christians including most of the CEC they are “hot button” issues.  While I consider myself a moderate many people on the far right consider that to be “liberal.” Due to the poisonous political and social climate that we live in here in the United States most people are no longer open to debate or dialogue on those issues. Since I have written about this in my recent article “Faith Journey’s: Why I am Still a Christian” ( https://padresteve.wordpress.com/2010/09/22/faith-journey%E2%80%99s-why-i-am-still-a-christian/) I will not go into them here.

In fact it was the Monday following that article that I received a call from my military archbishop telling me that I would have to find a new denominational home due to my “liberal” beliefs.  He is a friend and I sure that the call pained him to make, we go back almost 15 years.  I do not know what led to the call but presume it was pressure from other bishops to do something about me although he stated that this was not the case. I hold no ill will toward Bishop Doug or anyone else in the CEC leadership for asking me to leave. In a way it was a relief as I realized that my writings, even as circumspect as I tried to make them could cause problems for me in the CEC.

At no time did I attack the leadership of the CEC or its stand on any of these issues but evidently some considered my statements as a challenge to the church and its authority.  I am of the belief that to remain viable that there should be differing opinions on matters that are pastoral and societal and not out of keeping with the Christian tradition.  For me it does not matter if a church is conservative or liberal, if it silences dissent by people who are committed to that church for dissent on non-creedal issues then it does itself a disservice in the long run. But again I have to say that the CEC like any Church has the right and responsibility to maintain its church discipline and uphold what it believes to be true and that asking me to leave was within the bounds of its canons

Another endorsing agent helped me find the the Apostolic Catholic Orthodox Church (http://www.apostoliccatholic.org/default1.htm) an Old Catholic Communion whose ethos is very similar to mine.  I have had meaningful talks with the Presiding Bishop, Diana Dale and a number of priests who have served or are serving as military chaplains.  I really look forward to serving in the ACOC for many years to come.

My original desire was to leave the CEC quietly but my writings have placed me at odds with the CEC as a whole and as a consequence I have been asked to leave.  I can do so in good conscience knowing that for 14 years I served the church well and presented a positive view of the church even when the church was going through its most difficult times.  I can maintain my integrity and be more open in my beliefs by leaving than remaining.

Over the past three years Bishop Doug has been most supportive and even had not chided me on other articles that voiced similar sentiments as the Faith Journey’s article and I shall maintain a friendship even if we disagree on some issues. Relationships matter and I refuse to make enemies on my way out of the CEC. I will miss my friends at Church of the Messiah in Jacksonville where we worshipped in 2002-2003 and St. Michael’s in San Clemente who hosted the best of our military diocese convocations, as well as my friends and brothers in the Archdiocese for the Armed Forces. I will remain in contact with many through Facebook and other means.  Friends are friends and I and I will not leave with the bitterness and animosity of so many that left the CEC earlier in the decade, people who have not been able to move past their hurt and embrace their new church homes.

I hope this article in some ways explains my journey. Bishop Doug has already let my fellow military priests know that I am leaving the CEC so at least some people know what has happened. I will contact those that I am closest to personally and provide this article to others.  This is a painful time of transition but it is the right decision for both the CEC and me.

My official change over to the ACOC will take place sometime next week.  I thank all of my friends in the CEC for your support and prayers over the years.  I will keep the CEC and you my friends in my prayers as I continue my journey.

Peace and blessings,

Padre Steve+

Non nobis, non nobis, Domine
Sed nomini tuo da gloriam

Postscript: I had a conversation with Bishop Doug this morning. In that conversation he stated that he did not ask me to leave the CEC in our conversation two weeks ago, just that I appeared to be “unhappy” in the CEC and might want to look elsewhere because of “liberal views” suggesting the Episcopal Church as a possibility.  This is true, he did not directly ask me to leave, but I interpreted the call in that manner he used the term “liberal views.” It was that term that led me to believe that perhaps he had been talked to about me as the term is loaded in the current climate of American religious and political debate. I did not mention other instances regarding past encounters with some in the current CEC leadership that also influenced my interpretation of Bishop Doug’s words. That serves no purpose and I will not mention names or even incidents because I do not want those encounters to be used against the CEC or anyone in it.

I implore anyone that reads this post NOT to disparage Bishop Doug in any way. He is a gentleman and a Christian and I know that he bears me no malice whatsoever. He has been attacked personally on the blogs of many that left the CEC and I cannot countenance that or lend my voice to those criticisms. SLD+

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September 27, 2010 · 00:27

Passages: Thoughts on My Last Week at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth

“Andre Dawson has a bruised knee and is listed as day-to-day. Aren’t we all?” Vin Scully

“It’s a mere moment in a man’s life between an All-Star Game and an Old-timers’ Game.” Vin Scully

“The oldest pitcher acquires confidence in his ball club – he doesn’t try to do it all himself.” Burleigh Grimes

Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday’s success or put its failures behind and start over again. That’s the way life is, with a new game every day, and that’s the way baseball is.”  -Bob Feller

As any of my regular readers know I relate most of life to baseball. For me it resonates more than more than almost any other part of my life.  I think by now with over 29 years in the military that I count as a seasoned veteran who has been dinged up some and had to try to recover from injuries to his body but also to his self confidence and ability to stay in the game. My assignment at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth has been one of those assignments that was a lot like a rehab assignment to get me back in form for an assignment on a new team where I will be the number one starter in the rotation instead of a rehabbing pitcher making spot starts and relief appearances.

Today I finish up most of my administrative out processing from NMCP as I prepare to transfer to Naval Hospital Camp LeJeune. I have been at the command two years and it has been an eventful tour.  During the assignment I was forced to deal with the effects of my tour in Iraq, notably my PTSD and its related physical, psychological and spiritual impacts which included a loss of faith and absence of God that left me for a year and a half a practical agnostic. I also had to deal with the end stages of my father’s struggle with Alzheimer’s disease which culminated in his death in June of this year.  While this was going on I also dealt with a nasty Kidney stone that sidelined me from almost all human activity for over a month, a tooth that had abscessed and had to be replaced by an implant after a root canal failed and various nagging injuries to my shoulders, elbows, a knee and ankle from Iraq.  Most recently I have had to struggle with my hearing, I have something called Auditory Processing Disorder as well as some really annoying Tinnitus, I can hear lots of noise but somehow my brain is not processing it correctly. With all of this in the background and sometimes the foreground I worked and often struggled through the assignment which despite my skills as a critical care chaplain was more difficult than I could imagine.

I compare my time at Portsmouth to a baseball pitcher that goes to a new team but has injuries that he thought were manageable but which were severe enough to take him out of the game and into a rehab mode.  Of course not all teams give older pitchers that chance and that is true more often than not in the military when injuries to an officer are severe enough, especially emotional ones to keep him from functioning at top form.  I was fortunate as Chaplain Tate gave me the chance to heal and looked at my potential rather than my weaknesses when writing up my evaluation reports.  I can say that that is not the norm in much of the military where I probably would have been given reports that would have kept me from being promoted and resulted in me being placed in second tier jobs until I was able to retire.

I was fortunate however because during the assignment I was given time to recuperate and begin to heal.  That has not been easy by far but I am doing well enough now to handle things that would have sent me down the toilet of tears a few months ago. I give a lot of credit to Chaplain Jesse Tate and my therapist Dr. Elmer Maggard, better known as “Elmer the Shrink.”  I couple of retired Navy Chaplains on our staff also were men that helped me through the very rough times; Monsignor Fred Elkin and Reverend Jerry Shields gave me much spiritual support and provided me the opportunity to vent as I needed to during really difficult times.   As I got better and able to handle more responsibility Chaplain Tate started putting more responsibility on me, especially after I was selected for promotion to Commander.  It was like I was done with the rehab work and being put back into the game.  He held me accountable and was like a pitching coach or manager working with me, pushing my limits and making corrections even while encouraging me.  He did this with the purpose of getting me ready for my next assignment where I will be in charge of a staff of 6 personnel.  The past couple of months were high pressure due to all the activities the department was engaged in. These including a retirement, two major conferences and the transition of our Pastoral Care Resident Chaplains as one group finished their residency and a new group went through orientation.  In that time I had to deal with a lot more pressure than I had been exposed to most of my tour. After the last conference ended I realized that I could now function at a high level again and not just in my clinical areas.  I am now sure that I can do well in my new assignment and I am looking forward to the opportunity.

As I leave NMCP I will be leaving a lot of friends in my department as well as the rest of the hospital, especially the staff of our adult, pediatric and neonatal ICUs.  Some of these staff members will continue to serve at NMCP, others are now either deployed in harm’s way, have transferred to other commands or have left the service or retired.  I have to thank them as well because each in their own way has been a part of my recovery.

Most people do not get this kind of opportunity to serve and to heal at my age, rank or time in service. Most are put out to pasture until they can retire.  To quote baseball immortal Lou Gehrig “today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.” As I re-read his farewell speech a lot of it resonated with me even though I’m not to my knowledge dying and he was.  I’m blessed and somewhat lucky and I am grateful for all that I have experienced at NMCP.  I will leave many friends and if I am lucky enough hope to continue my career as a chaplain in Navy Medicine and return to Portsmouth, perhaps to finish my Navy career.  When I depart on Thursday it will be with a grateful heart and I will miss those that I worked with at NMCP. I am fortunate in one respect that my next assignment is a Naval Hospital and that I will know a good number of the staff at it from my time at NMCP or other duty stations.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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September 22, 2010 · 23:44

Faith Journeys: Why I am Still a Christian

There are many times that I totally empathize with author Anne Rice in saying that she has left Christianity yet still has faith in Christ.  For Rice it was the lack of love shown by the institutional church for people that are marginalized and treated as if they were unredeemable by often well meaning Christians.

I know what it feels like to be marginalized. After I came back from Iraq many of my Christian friends seemed, at least in my view to be tied to the absolute hogwash that spews from talk radio hosts and allegedly “Christian” politicians.  I remember having some Christians question my patriotism and even my faith because I disagreed with them regarding certain aspects of the Iraq war. This despite the fact that I had been on the ground in harm’s way serving with our advisors and Iraqis in Al Anbar Province. After I returned no clergyman, civilian or military, took time to care for me when I was in a major PTSD meltdown and crisis of faith.  Actually, I have to amend that, as my friends Greg and David, both priests of my former denomination afflicted with PTSD, TBI and Moral Injury from their Iraq service were fellow travelers in this journey. What was happening to me as a result of serving didn’t seem to matter to most other clergy, because their political agenda in the midst of a contentious Presidential election was given primacy over the simple truths and hard demands of the Gospel.

Yesterday I wrote about Chaplains that experience a crisis of faith after coming home from a combat deployment.  For me there is nothing more symbolic of the lack of soul left in many Christians and Christian Churches in how they treat those that have served faithfully. Those Chaplains that have served  God, Church and Country and come back spiritually wondering what happened, not knowing what to believe and feeling abandoned by God and cast off by the Church and the military simply because we have a hard time with the so called “orthodoxy” of some Christians.

I went through a period after Iraq where feeling abandoned and isolated from those of a like faith that I was for all practical purposes an agnostic.  That was a really difficult time in my life and if you think that anything sucks try to be a Chaplain when you no longer know if God exists and the only person asking how you are doing with “the Big Guy” is your therapist. I can say without a doubt that this kind of life “sucks like a Hoover” and I know that I am not alone in my feelings.  I have met others whose experience is similar to mine but those that are struggling right now, caught between our faith and the feeling of being abandoned by God and his people because our experience of seeing the human suffering caused by war has shaken us.

Let me talk about spiritual despair.

Did you know that in the past couple of years that two Army Chaplains and one Navy Chaplain have committed suicide? These were men of faith who had served in peace and war at least one that had served at the Battle of Hue City as a Marine before becoming a Priest and Chaplain.  Another Army Chaplain that had served in Iraq as a minister of a conservative Charismatic and Evangelical Christian denomination became a Wiccan and was excoriated by Christians.  I don’t know his faith journey but I have to believe that part was his experience in Iraq and experience on his return. I don’t know about you but those are all signs of spiritual despair and feeling cut off from their faith community and even God, his or her self.

I am still a Christian. I believe in the God of Scripture, the Creeds and the Councils. At the same time that belief is not as rigid as it once was. I used to consider those that didn’t believe like I did in relation to Scripture, the Creeds and Councils not to be Christians.  I cannot say that now. I am much more to have the Grace and Mercy of God be my default position and let other things fall out where they may. I have to say now that my faith is much more Anglican because I try to find balance in the Anglican Triad of Scripture, Reason and Tradition instead of Scripture and Tradition alone.

My practice of my faith has changed. When I came back from Iraq I attempted, as it were without success to keep my faith structure and practice the same as it was before I deployed to Iraq.  Within six months of Iraq I could no longer pray the Daily Office with any kind of faithfulness and by Lent 2009 give up the practice for Lent hoping to recover some authenticity to my faith. The authenticity has returned and after about a year and a half I am seeking a way to reincorporate what had been a very important part of my daily practice of faith into my life without feeling like I am a phony in doing so.

I went through a period of absolute spiritual despair even leaving a Christmas Eve Mass in 2008 to walk home in the dark, alone, looking at the sky and asking God if he even existed.  A year later after my life had completely fallen apart I experienced what I call my “Christmas miracle” where I was called to our Emergency Room to provide the “last rites” to a retired Navy doctor and active Episcopalian when I was the duty Chaplain.  As I prayed the last prayer of commendation and removed my oil covered fingers from the man’s forehead he breathed his last. His wife told me that he was waiting to be anointed before he died.  The young doctor, a Psychology Resident doing his ER rotation who called me to the ER would die a couple of months later of natural causes in his living room not long after we had taken the “fat boy” program PT test together.

From that moment the paradigm shifted.  Faith began to return and I began to experience the presence of God again, not is the same was as before Iraq but one that was more relational, grace filled and informal.  I will likely begin praying the Daily Office again in the near future but I will approach it from a different point of view.  I will no longer use it simply to fulfill my priestly vows and obligations but rather as a way to re-experience and if need be re-imagine God.  Now before the heresy hunters think that I am re-imagining God is some unbiblical manner they are wrong. I want to re-imagine God as he has been revealed to his people both in Scripture, Tradition and in the life of his, or her people today.

How have I changed? I believe again. I am no longer an agnostic hoping and praying that God just might be there. My faith has become much more deeply rooted and grounded in the “Crucified God” and my faith in the “theology of the Cross.”  My faith is no longer a slave to my politics and I refute any political ideology that attempts to use the Christian faith and the faith of well meaning Christians for purposes that Jesus himself would have condemned.

I don’t think Jesus was a big fan of his followers attempting to be the favorites of any political party or ideological system. In fact if I recall he really had pretty harsh words for his fellow Jews who were all wrapped around the axels with that kind of stuff. Jesus seemed to befriend and hang around with those that were not connected to the religious, political or economic elites of his time. In fact he seemed to reserve his harshest words for such people and he reached out to the outcasts.  Jesus seemed to have a pretty good relationship with those marginalized and rejected by the religious folks of his day. He welcome sinners and tax collectors to his table and praised the faith of gentile Roman officers and stopped the super-religious folks from stoning an adulterous woman.

This is the Jesus that I follow and the Jesus that I believe is present in body, soul and spirit in the Eucharist.  I believe like Hans Kung and others that this table belongs to the baptized community of faith and not to an exclusive Priestly class who dictate who can come to the table.  It is not the exclusive property of any denomination or Church organization especially those that most loudly state this to be the case.

Now if saying this makes me a heretic then a heretic I will be. It is better to be a heretic in the eyes of Pharisees than to be one that denies justice to the persecuted people of God.  I guess that makes this moderate a true liberal and to some an unbeliever.  Yet I believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of Rahab, Diana, Esther, Mary, Martha and Mary, Pricilla and the Woman at the Well. I believe in the Jesus that defied religious systems to offer the grace of God to the people that those systems rejected and the Jesus that was far more critical of “believers’ than those rejected as unbelievers.

I guess that is why I can accept women as ministers, Priests or Bishops. It is why I can accept homosexuals as Christian brothers and sisters, and see Christ and the grace and love of God in people that are not “Christians.” That includes the Muslims in Iraq that treated me with respect and even if they had an “Aryan” view of Jesus, but still showed a greater reverence for Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary than many that claim Jesus for themselves in this country.

Why have I come to these beliefs, you might ask. The answer is simple.  I once was lost but now am found.  I thought that I knew it all. Now I know that I don’t know it all and that God is a God of surprises.

I have faith, but I doubt. I know that there are many answers that elude me and I cannot answer just by citing or using Scripture out of its historic, cultural and linguistic context.  I believe in the God who did not reject me when I didn’t know if he even existed.

Why am I still a Christian when I have so many problems with how many Christians practice the faith?

That is more complex. I believe again, and because  of that will not I tow anyone’s party line. I believe in spite of my unbelief. I believe in a fellowship of those whose lives have been changed by war and trauma.  I believe now because many times it was those marginalized by the “faithful” showed me the love of God when the “faithful” for pure or impure motives did not and in doing so abandoned me as they abandon so many others.

So, if I am to be a heretic, if I am to be considered less than a believer, I will quote the words of my favorite heretic Martin Luther. To my critics and those that refuse to understand, I say “Here I stand, I can do no other. So help me God. Amen.”

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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September 21, 2010 · 22:53

Raw Edges: Are there other Chaplains out there Like Me?

Before a Convoy

The past week or so I have had to go back and revisit my Iraq experience. Part of this is due to work, we have had seminars on the spiritual and moral affects of trauma, the challenge of forgiveness and most recently discussing best spiritual care practices for those who suffer from PTSD or Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).  The training has been excellent but has kicked up a lot of stuff in me.  Added to this have been reports out of Afghanistan about more casualties in particular of a helicopter that crashed that killed 9 Americans, the Taliban claim credit for downing the aircraft but the circumstances are not fully known.

One of many helicopter flights, this a daylight flight in a Marine CH-46

The course last week on the spiritual and moral affect of trauma and the challenge of forgiveness brought up issues from Iraq but not upsetting.  In fact the seminar taught by Dr. Robert Grant author of The Way of the Wound was helpful to me in sorting out what I have been going through for the past couple of years.  The training this week is also good, good information but for me it is more unsettling because it deals with images, videos of convoys, burning vehicles and other things like that.  The convoy images coupled with the news of the helicopter crash actually had me pretty shaken as I spent a large amount of time in small convoys with small groups of Americans and Iraqis in pretty dangerous areas of Al Anbar Province stretching from Fallujah to the Syrian border as well as a couple of hundred hours in the air, usually at night in various Marine and Army helicopters as well as the MV-22 Osprey.  During those experiences we took fire a couple of times and had a few experiences on some of our flights that were a bit sporty.  So for a while I was lost in my own stuff but was able to pull out in not too long of time.

Convoy stopped near Al Qaim

Some of our discussions revolved around how trauma and war can impact a person’s image and relationship with God, whatever that may be.  The focus was on us as pastoral care givers caring for those in our charge.  Once again this really good information for me as I will be dealing with a lot of PTSD and TBI cases are Camp LeJeune.  But there was one thing that got me.  I came back from Iraq as most of my readers know in pretty bad shape dealing with PTSD and issues of abandonment feeling disconnected with the Navy and my church.  Part of that was what amounted to be a loss of faith so severe that I was for all practical purposes an agnostic for almost two years because I couldn’t make sense of anything to do with God, I felt God forsaken it was to use the image of St. John of the Cross, my Dark Night of the Soul.  I am doing better now and feel like my faith has returned to some degree, certainly not like it was before but while I have doubts I am okay with that part of the journey now.

Christmas Eve not far from Syria

I know a number of military Chaplains from the Navy and Army that have returned from Iraq or Afghanistan in some sort of faith crisis many suffering from PTSD or TBI.  I am actually wondering how many are out there.  I know that I am not alone, but I need to know if others are going through this experience too.  It was for me a desperate feeling to be the Chaplain, Priest, Pastor and spiritual care giver when I was struggling having no answers and only questions, when people asked me about God and I didn’t even know if God existed.  This is the unspoken cry of at least some and possibly quite a few Chaplains and other ministers who have experienced trauma and moral injury.  One thing my incoming CO at my old unit asked me was “where does the Chaplain go for help?”  At that point I said that I didn’t know.  The sad thing is that I know many chaplains and ministers that have a basic lack of trust in their fellow clergy and do not feel safe confiding in them because they feel that they will be judged, not listened to or blown off.

A different war with the Bedouin in the western desert of Iraq about 5 km from Syria.

When I was diagnosed with PTSD in the summer of 2008 I made it my goal to grow through this and hopefully as I go through this to be there for others. Part of my recovery came through sharing experiences, the good and the bad on this site.  Elmer the Shrink asked me back when I started this if I thought that it would be helpful to me in my recovery, but he also asked if I was okay in opening up about this topic.  Since I didn’t see many people writing about this from the perspective of being a “wounded healer” I told him that I thought that I had to do it.  The experience has been terribly painful but at the same time I think that it has been worth it because as a Priest and Chaplain I think now more than ever in my weakness I can be with people in their difficult times without trying to “fix” them.

Colonel David Abramowitz with me and RP2 Nelson Lebron after presenting me with the Defense Meritorious Service Medal and Nelson the Joint Service Commendation Medal for our service with our advisors and Iraqis in Al Anbar with the Iraq Assistance Group. After this we both dealt with abandonment and other issues on our return home.

So who is there for “damaged” Chaplains? Who takes care of us? I was lucky or maybe blessed. I had Dr Chris Rogan ask me if I was okay. I had Elmer the Shrink do a lot of the hard work with me. At Naval Medical Center Portsmouth I had a Command Chaplain that was wise enough to protect me while I went through the deepest and darkest valley of my life.   As I recovered he challenged much like a Baseball Manager would challenge a pitcher who had been very successful on other clubs coming off the disabled list to regain his self confidence and ability to get back on the mound with a winning attitude. Not every Chaplain gets what I got and I am blessed.  I still have work to do and I need to recognize my limits, much as a pitcher who has recovered from Tommy John surgery makes adjustments.

So this is my question:  Are there others other there like me?  Are there other Chaplains experiencing such feelings after Iraq or Afghanistan? I’d really like to know because I believe that in what might be termed “a fellowship of the forsaken” that we can rediscover faith, belief and hope again and in doing so be there for others.

If you want please let me know if this encourages you or feel free to comment. Prayer is still hard for me but I promise that if someone asks that I will pray and to the best of my ability be available for them as others were for me because I don’t want any Chaplain to experience the abandonment that I felt went I returned from Iraq having felt that it was the pinnacle of my military career. To those Chaplains I just want to say that you are not alone.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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September 15, 2010 · 23:53

A Sea of Contradictions: My Life and Faith since returning from Iraq

Dinner with my Friend, Major General Sabah in Ramadi

“Many people are looking for an ear that will listen. They do not find it among Christians, because these Christians are talking where they should be listening.But he who can no longer listen to his brother will soon be no longer listening to God, either; he will be doing nothing but prattle in the presence of God, too. This is the beginning of the death of the spiritual life, and in the end there will be nothing left but spiritual chatter and clerical condescension arrayed in pious words… never really speaking to others.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Since I returned from Iraq I have grown weary of Christians that have all the answers and are more interested in promoting their agenda than actually listening or caring for those wounded in spirit from various forms of trauma including war. Since I returned from Iraq and going through what amounted to a crisis in faith, belief and experience of what I felt to be abandonment by God and many Christians.  I have elected to travel down a path that has been of great benefit but has been filled with difficulty and pain as I both walked through the psychological, spiritual and physical effects of my time in Iraq and, the moral injuries that I incurred and the practical ways that these crisis’ have had on my life and relationships.

On Monday at work we had some of our pastoral care residents presented their research projects which they had worked on during their residency year.  All were well done but one struck me because of its subject and home much I could relate to it.  The subject was “Writing our Way Home” and dealt with how the use of poetry and narrative could help some combat veterans make sense of their world and deal with the trauma that they have experienced.  After Iraq I began to write, initially because it was therapeutic and helped me to begin to start sorting out what was going on with me. It also helped me, especially when I went public on this site about my experience to get outside of my normally severely introverted self. As I began to write regularly it became a part of my life as I struggled to deal with PTSD as well as  spiritual and emotional crises following my tour in Iraq, alienation on my return as well as various family crisis’s.

The understanding that resonated with me was that our stories, the good and the bad, what we believe to be true and what really is true about ourselves and our experiences is all part of who we are. This is something that I experienced in my own pastoral care residency at Parkland Memorial Hospital in the 1990s when my supervisor challenged be to stop living in the past and begin to imagine a future that was not a prisoner of my past disappointments and failures.  That was a watershed experience for me and as I began to sort through all of the crap that I was dealing with in CPE and family of origins issues I began to realize that I did not need to live my life in a constant repetition of the past.  Now that realization did not always find a place in my life but in a gradual process I began to escape that past and begin to live in the moment with an eye to the future.

Of course Iraq changed that to some degree, in fact to a large degree. What I experienced there and upon my return to the States shook many of my beliefs about the world, faith and life. The images of American Marines wounded by IED attacks, wounded children and destruction of vast areas of cities, towns and villages coupled with having HUMMVs and Helicopters that I traveled on shot at and having rockets fly over my head changed me, especially when I saw how the war was being covered by both the liberal and conservative media which bore little resemblance to my first hand observations. Even worse was the feeling of being isolated and abandoned when I returned home.  I experienced a crisis in faith that left me a practical agnostic even as I desperately prayed for God to show up.  In fact it was psychotherapist that was the first person to even address my spiritual life after I returned.

When Elmer Maggard asked me: “How are you and the big guy?” I could only say “I don’t know I don’t even know if he exists.”  For a priest and chaplain that was a harrowing admission.  I had entered a world of darkness that I did not believe was possible. I would struggle for another year and a half until during Advent of 2009 things began to change and I began to sense the presence of a loving God again.  My faith began to return but I have to say it is not the same as before I went to Iraq.  I still struggle though most of the time I cannot say that I am a practical agnostic as I do have faith and faith which can be considered orthodox but perhaps more negotiable.

You may ask what I mean by this so I will briefly explain.  First I admit that I do not have the answers that I used to think that I had. Likewise I am a lot more apt to say “I don’t know” or “I struggle with that too” when people tell me of their experiences when struggling with faith or even the existence of God.  I refuse to pass judgment on someone’s faith journey or even if they question God’s existence because I have been there and it is not a comfortable place to live.  I am far more willing to walk with someone thorough that valley of doubt or unbelief because I lived in that valley for over a year. As far as who I frame my world, I am far less likely to pin something as “God’s will” or “an attack of the Devil” than I am to recognize that as human beings that we live in a fallen state and that sometimes things just happen. To quote a popular say “Shit Happens.”  In the middle of this I think the real miracle is that God can give us the grace to go through the most difficult times even when we have no faith at all.  I don’t think that is at all heretical because the experience of Jesus on Good Friday and the scriptural accounts as well as the testimony of 2000 years of Christians tells me that this is true. The miracle in my mind is not being “delivered” from crisis or unbelief but through the grace of God making it though the crisis and return to faith, even if that faith takes a different form.

For me the act of writing both about my experience as well as through fiction or history has been therapeutic and forced me out of my comfort zone.  When I began this site and began to tell my story my friend Elmer the Shrink he asked me if I was really sure that I wanted to open up and become vulnerable as I shared the truth as I believed it to be.  I said that I needed to as I thought people needed to know the reality of what many Iraq and Afghanistan veterans were going through.  He told me that what I was doing was risky but let me make the call. 600 posts later, not all of course dealing with what I and other veterans have gone through I can say that it was the right decision.

Our presenter on Monday gave us a few minutes to write something and for me this came quite easily as I was struck by a section of her presentation about how contradictory our life experiences can be. I began to write about those contradictions and will share a bit of that here.

I am a man of faith, a Christian and Priest. I believe but I also doubt and question, in fact there are some times that I feel somewhat agnostic even after the events of last December when faith began to return.  I am much more prone to give the benefit of the doubt to people especially those who struggle with life, faith and even the existence of God. I figure that God is big enough to handle doubt and unbelief while still loving and caring for the person experiencing doubt or unbelief or whose beliefs that may not fit the definition of Christian orthodoxy.

I am a passionate person who is an introvert in an extroverted world both in ministry and the military. I am an intuitive “out of the box” thinker and sometimes rebel.  Yet in spite of this I willingly volunteer to serve the church and the military.  It is interesting because both institutions prize loyalty to the institution, obedience and staying within the lines of prescribed beliefs and traditions.  I believe yet question, I find cause to not agree with what all of my political party or the other political party espouse to the chagrin of the faithful in both parties.

I have learned that there is a healthy tension in this type of life. I do not for the most part follow those that insist that to be a Christian that I must do this and that even though I fully subscribe to the Creeds, the first 7 Ecumenical Councils an Anglican understanding of the Christian faith. Nor do I think that to be to be a “American patriot” that I should vote a certain way, belong to a particular party or follow the agenda of any political party as if it others believe the agenda to be brought down from the mountain by Moses himself.  I have had people on occasion to criticize me for this.  However I cannot allow any political ideology to hold my faith captive, nor can I cast aside the essence of the Christian faith even when I doubt.

One of the things that I find concerning is how it seems to me that many supposedly “conservative” Christians have almost made what I think is a deal with the devil in terms of their political involvement. I think that they are sacrificing a long term witness to short term expedient political alliances with people, particularly “conservative” political talk show host and pundit Glenn Beck that have an antithetical and antagonistic views of historic Christianity.   My concern is more about the faith and witness of the Church than an alliance with someone that appeals to our more base nationalistic ideas than the faith itself.

I have discovered that for the most part I can comfortably live in this tension, in fact I do not think that I was to fall completely to one side or the other be it in faith, social responsibility or politics that my life would be as full as it is, or as some might be thinking now as “full of it as I am.” Whatever… The fact is that I think that as a Christian and as an American that it is okay to live life in balance and with a health appreciation of creative tension.

I have begun to emerge from the darkness of my post Iraq experience and I know that I am still wounded. I know that I still struggle but I now am beginning to see this as a gift.  My faith is not the same as it was, I am not satisfied with simplistic answers or the party lines of people that only care about their agenda especially when they decide that their agenda is God’s will, even if it has nothing to do with the Gospel. I know that sounds kind of snarky to some but I really want to be an authentic Christian not some caricature that is more a picture of the American perversion of the faith than anything found in Scripture or the 2000 year history of the Church.

I believe but I struggle. I will listen to other points of view, including those of people that are not Christian. In fact I found that my Iraqi Muslim friends were much easier to dialogue with and have deep and respectful theological discussions with than many American Evangelicals.  For me that was a watershed moment.

But anyway, this post was not meant to be a treatise on anything but is for me more of a reflection of a dialogue that has been going on in me since my return.  The thing is I know other Chaplains that have returned from Iraq or Afghanistan who have experienced the same feelings that I have been working through but do not have a safe place in their churches to heal, and are afforded little time to do self care.  I am concerned for our caregivers that care of veterans like me.  I wonder how many can be real in their faith community without having people run away from them as if they were radioactive, a feeling that many veterans and other trauma victims experience when they attempt to tell their story.

I just hope that I will be able to be there for others who are wounded and suffering as a result of what they experienced in war.

That is all for tonight.  Blessings and peace my friends,

Padre Steve+

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August 30, 2010 · 23:22

I Hate Appalachian Nazis: A Response to “Briar Cavendish”

Elwood Blues: “Illinois Nazis?”

Jake Blues: “I hate Illinois Nazis”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EoOZKjAjlk

I think I can safely echo the thoughts of Jake and Elwood Blues about Illinois or any other type of Nazis that skulk about the dark recesses of the American heartland attempting to blend in with decent Americans while peddling their hate on the internet.

If you read my post from last night and early this morning about what can only be described as an online assault on me by someone that calls himself “Briar Cavendish” you know that it shook me pretty bad. But I also said that I would not back down.  The words and thoughts of this Cavendish fellow who is too cowardly to use his real name but a rather a nom d’guerre is obviously pretty disturbed. So will endeavor to disturb him more to hopefully cause him to slip up and identify himself.

You see last night I went to bed very upset and didn’t sleep well.  The only thing that got me through the early part of the day at work was one hellacious workout for morning PT but apart from that I was pretty wiped out and in a funk through most of the day. It was only tonight that I decided to fight back.  I researched all that I could about him and it seems that he is most likely according to his IP address from somewhere between Johnson City Tennessee and Abingdon Virginia as both cities came up as the location. I’m presuming that he is in a rural area and that his internet service provider alternates him between cities or hat he lives in one and works in the other.  I had thought that he might be in Knoxville Tennessee but think that my initial hypothesis was wrong as the owner of the business using the name “Briar Cavendish” appears to be legit and pretty busy with real life to go around doing such things. The fact also that the ISP address is not in Knoxville kind of confirmed that.

But tonight as I researched him I found a plethora of pathetic posts on numerous sites. Evidently my admirer “Briar” is rabid Appalachian Nazi; he posts this stuff all over the place and seems to be sought out by like-mindless people on some of these sites. What amazed me was not that he was posting but just how many people like him spew this hate on these sites. Some call themselves White Supremacists, others American Nazis and a host of other titles. But the common thread is a hatred of African Americans, other non-white people, Jews, Muslims, established political parties, Christians that disagree with them and by the way need I say President Barak Obama and the belief that they represent the true spirit of America.  The have affiliated sites that cater to veterans, stay at home moms and pseudo-intellectuals.  They often stand should to shoulder with alleged “patriot” groups who while not in total agreement with the Nazis echo many similar themes.  The thing that freaked me out about my admirer “Briar’s” comments were how close some of them regarding minorities, immigrants, political parties especially the Democrats and Barak Obama are to e-mail that I receive from older friends and relatives who spam out e-mails that are full of lies, distortions, wives tales and are easily identified as such by going to Snopes.com.

I guess what bothers me is that many of the themes of the Neo-Nazis are echoed by well meaning people who are simply upset about the direction of the country and have been whipped into frenzy by the 24 hour news cycle and nonstop talk radio.  I think from my study of history, especially the Weimar and Nazi era, which was a specialization in my Masters Degree that I know a few things about what happens when passions become this inflamed in a polarized body-politic that the result is seldom good. It simply takes a crisis be it political, economic or military to push well meaning people who have been pushed to the edge over the cliff into the abyss of civil war and chaos. I can still see the bullet holes in a school that I helped to paint in Rijeka Croatia and the devastation wrought by the Iraq insurgency the mass graves of Bergen-Belsen and Barracks and Gas Chambers of Dachau to see what can happen when this happens.  In fact I think that is what frightened me most about the attack on me last night is that we appear to be sitting on a tinderbox in a sea of gasoline with idiots all about playing with fire.

So anyway, Briar so go ahead. Take your best shot and if you are a man identify yourself and enter into dialogue. If you don’t I have to assume that you are you simply a Hillbilly Hitler with bad teeth, no real reasoning skills and no writing ability.  You make me long for Joey Goebbels, despite being a Nazi thug at least could write, speak and wasn’t afraid to identify himself.  From now on if you post on Padre Steve’s World it will be on my terms and I will shut you down you racist, homophobic Hillbilly Hitler with delusions of dictatorship.  You see Briar you and cowards like yourself skulk about in darkness using pseudonyms to post your pathetic hate filled drivel using the freedoms that I and millions like me have secured for you since our nation came into being.  You’re a pathetic excuse for an American.

Go ahead, make my day,

Padre Steve+

PS. I know that this was not a very “grace filled” post but people like this need to be called out or they will doom themselves and the rest of us to a fratricidal conflict that will make our Civil War look like child’s play.

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August 30, 2010 · 01:46

My God what have we Come To?

There are times like today when I think I felt safer in Iraq

In Germany they first came for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me –
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

Martin Niemoller

For the first time in my life I feel afraid in my own country and have a growing sense of despair concerning the state of our body-politic.  A number of months back I had a man comment using very racist and homophobic language on this site regarding a post that I did on World War II called “Can Anybody Spare a DIME: A Short Primer on Early Axis Success and how the Allies Won the Second World War” https://padresteve.wordpress.com/2009/11/28/can-anybody-spare-a-dime-a-short-primer-on-early-axis-success-and-how-the-allies-won-the-second-world-war/ He made the following comment at that time:

“You took a few well known history facts added some negroid glitz and glam, and arrogantly rest on your piss bucket of drivel as if you know something. You meinen Herr are a cretinous asshole of predictable disposition. I smell the ratty fumes of a Marxist lurking beneath your pebbled vskin.”

Today after coming home from church, a movie and a beer at Gordon Biersch the same person posted to this site regarding the following incredibly innocuous post: “Moves and Rumors of Moves…well not the Rumors Part…the Orioles and Tides make some Moves” https://padresteve.wordpress.com/2010/05/21/moves-and-rumors-of-moves…well-not-the-rumors-part-orioles-and-tides-make-some-moves/

This was the comment that he posted today:

“You are a mindless weasel, a coward who liks african ass for breakfast. You offal brained reject, worshiping sports as if you had the substance to believe in anything beyond homosexual masturbation. You get off on the dreadlocks and butts don’t you? The world is a mystery to disturbed imps like you. When they come to march your segment of drunks from stadium section f6, you will raise your piteous painted face and wiggle in your woman’s dress as you say. Wha hoppen? You are proof that shit floats.”

I parried Mr. Cavendish accusing him of being a racist and homophobe since I am very straight and white and warned him that he had posted to the site before and that I would ban him. I followed up with a one liner suggesting that he take a creative writing class.  I then received a long diatribe on what he called “New White Male Syndrome” and Wigger Syndrome (which I learned on “the Urban Dictionary is “A male caucasion, usually born and raised in the suburbs that displays a strong desire to emulate African American Hip Hop culture and style through “Bling” fashion and generally accepted “thug life” guiding principles”). This post which was laced with more racist language than I would dare to post as well as this final comment: “Your opinion are typical leftist knee jerk reactions. I see a spade, I call a spade and I do not bother to spell check. ass wipe”

I decided to do a search for him and came up with a Briar Cavendish that allegedly is the owner of “Outdoor Adventure” in Knoxville Tennessee.  He is also a contributor on the National Writers Syndicate http://nationalwriterssyndicate.com/component/option,com_frontpage/Itemid,1/ which appears to be a Mecca for the far right.

In posts to this site and others he seems unhinged and claims to have a Masters Degree in Psychology and to have almost completed his doctorate.  He even attacks House Republican leader John Boehner on his blog.  He refers to illegal immigrants as “parasite races” in comments to some group called the National Policy Institute in Augusta Georgia. This group makes the following claims:

  1. The West is a cultural compound of our Classical, Christian, and Germanic past.
  2. Race informs culture; it is the necessary precondition for cultural identity and integrity. In 1950 whites represented 28 percent of the world’s population. If current trends persist, this number will plummet to 9 percent by 2060. In the United States, whites are projected to become a minority of the national population in less than fifty years. The result will impoverish not only their descendants but the world in general and will jeopardize the civilization and free governments that whites have created.

This group while presenting itself as very “mainstream” appears to be a White Supremacist front organization and Mr. Cavendish seems quite at home there however he seems to attack other pretty right wing guys such as “The Conservative Guy” who he attacks saying “Conservative pride themselves in being to cowardly to be called “right wing extremists,” for example they are very careful to never criticize any racist activities of the black leadership of leftist groups and they are always searching for carnal leftist blacks, like colon powell, who will go along with them publicly, but sabotage them behind the scenes? Why? They desperately voice to need for “black inclusion” black leadership and just love a black telling them what to do. Intelligent people have only contempt for CONservatives, their ignorance, cowardice and extreme fear of blacks which they demonstrate by constant kow towing. Any person who is confident enough and intelligent enough to not care whether he is called right wing extremist or racist as he fights for justice, is a rare and admirable creature.”

Now some might just say that Mr. Cavendish is just an anomaly and not representative of much broader thought. But his sentiments are echoed by many people some of whom I see post on social media sites and some people that have left comments on this site.  I think that he is becoming less of an anomaly than any of us would like to think.

When I see the vitriolic anger in e-mails that are forwarded to me be my mother and people that I have known for years I get scared because this is the same kind of thought that consumed Germany in the years leading up to the Nazi takeover.  I know that some people who become as consumed by their hatred as Mr. Cavendish has become often go beyond the written word to physical violence I am concerned.  At the same time, despite admittedly being frightened by this movement I will not stop confronting such hatred and will fight it.

The attacks on me are disturbing because they involve such innocuous and non-ideological posts and to be called such things as Mr. Cavendish calls me is disconcerting at best.  Having been in combat and having seen things that Mr. Cavendish obviously is clueless about I wonder what is happening to the country that I love. I have seen the results of such ideology at Dachau and Bergen-Belsen, in the former Yugoslavia and in the Middle East.  Abraham Lincoln made the comment that “A house divided against itself cannot stand” in relation to slave and Free states in the same union. Now I wonder how long we have before the divide between the political extremes in our left and right grows to the point of actual physical violence, which actually has occurred in some locales around election time.  That violence has come from the left as well as the right and I wonder if it keeps escalating if we can survive as a nation.

I believe that Mr. Cavendish and those like him are dangerous and pose a real threat to the life and property of those that they hate. I do not believe that such ideology ends with the written word but with physical violence.  I know that some conservative readers will see this as an attack upon them. It is not by any means but a statement of fact that when hatred becomes established that it eventually has nowhere to go except to express itself in physical violence.  When I was growing up this was the prevue of the radical left which members of called me a Nazi for being in the military and who during the Vietnam era did terrible things to our veterans.  Now I don’t know what to think.

I have always been an optimist about the United States of America but when such things occur I doubt my optimism. How long until someone comes for me in the name of patriotism, conservatism, or even Christianity? I wonder if I will be like the officers in the German Army who stood for the Weimar Republic during the crisis even if they did not agree with all that it stood for who were then cashiered or in some cases killed by the Nazis after the takeover.  You see, when people become zealots and enraged even those that have served their country honorable in war become the enemy.  It is a sobering thought.  God help us as we seem to have lost the ability to help ourselves. Darkness is setting in America and we have no one but ourselves to blame.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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