Category Archives: PTSD

January 12, 2015 · 23:06

I wish I did not dream that much: PTSD and Memories of Terrorism

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Those who are new to what I write on this site may not know a lot about me, nor my struggles with PTSD, Moral Injury, depression and anxiety.

The past week I have been writing about my support of LBGT rights and planned on dealing with some other social issues leading up to the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday next week.

But that was before the attack on Charlie Hebdo. That attack triggered some very unpleasant memories from Iraq and before, and since that attack I have had very little sleep. I actually dread the night.

As a historian and chronicler of the Battle of Gettysburg ands the men who fought there I find many connections with those men and what they wrote. One of them, Major General Gouverneur Warren wrote his wife after the war was over:

“I wish I did not dream that much. They make me sometimes dread to go to sleep. Scenes from the war, are so constantly recalled, with bitter feelings I wish to never experience again. Lies, vanity, treachery, and carnage.”

I feel that kind of angst, and those terrible feelings about the Iraq War, so well said by Warren, come back to the fore in January and February. For me these two months are normally the most difficult of the year as they mark my transition and return back to the United States from Iraq and since my new therapist is walking me through them again and I am in a sense reliving that trauma. It is like having the scar over a deep and unhealed wound ripped away.

January is also the anniversary of the suicide of Captain Tom Sitsch, my last Commodore at EOD Group Two. He was one of the first people to ask me where I as a chaplain would go to to get help for PTSD. Sadly, this man, a true hero died by his own hand just over a year ago suffering from so many after effects of PTSD and Traumatic Brain Injury.

Ever since returning from Iraq in February 2008 I have had a terrible time coping during those months. The reality of PTSD, Moral Injury and possibly Traumatic Brain Injury, which I will be evaluated for in the coming weeks, make sleep nearly impossible. Nightmares, terrors and anxiety are the norm for me and I can completely understand what Guy Sager, who wrote the book The Forgotten Soldier wrote:

“Only happy people have nightmares, from overeating. For those who live a nightmare reality, sleep is a black hole, lost in time, like death.”

So when there is a trigger event like the Charlie Hebdo attack, things get that much worse.

This year was really no different than any since 2008, even before the attack on Charlie Hebdo, I was already struggling but all the thoughts, feelings and memories from Iraq have flooded and often overloaded my senses since the Charlie Hebdo attack. What I felt in Iraq came back full force last week as I read about the massacre of the cartoonists and writers of Charlie Hebdo. I have not had a good night sleep since that attack. I talked with this in depth with my therapist today and that discussion brought back other memories.

When I read about the slaughter of the Charlie Hebdo staff in their offices brought back strong memories of an encounter in a remote border post in Iraq in 2007 where I was the only unarmed person in a meeting where everyone had their finger on the trigger of their weapon and even the Iraqi commander did not know who was loyal. We all knew that things could go bad very quickly and the memories of that event are deeply etched in my memory. I have written about it before, but I might need to again. 

Thinking of the men and women murdered in Paris my thoughts went to that room at Al Waleed in late August or early September 2007. What happened to them, to be gunned down in a place where there was no help and no escape reminded me of what well could have happened at Al Waleed in 2007.

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Aftermath of the Frankfurt PX Bombing and Frankfurt Airport Bombing in 1985

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The memories buried in my subconscious have connected with other memories, about narrowly avoiding terrorist attacks by the Red Brigades and Baader Meinhof Gang in Germany at the Frankfurt PX and Airport in 1985. I fear going through the gates of military installations and breathe a sigh of relief when I get through without a bomb, improvised explosive device or other terrorist attack. I feel terribly vulnerable and I am very scared about going to places that are soft targets, especially the Main Navy Exchange at Norfolk which is off base. In such places my head is constantly “on a swivel” as we say in the military. A am hyper-vigelent and pretty likely to stay that way so long as I do not feel safe. 

So anyway, I need to stop for the night. I found out that former Negro League player, and member of the Negro League Hall of Fame, Carl Long who I knew well from my time in North Carolina passed away today. He was an amazing man and I will write about him tomorrow.

Likewise, I will  write more about my struggle soon because I know there are other veterans who like me, dread the night.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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December 31, 2014 · 00:42

Padre Steve’s Year in Review

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Well it has been a year, well almost a year unless your are like in Australia when you read this.

As Charles Dickens’ wrote, “it was the best of times” and depending who you are or where you live it could have been one, the other or both. For me it has been one of those, not that there is anything wrong with that.

But really, look at the past year, personally it has been a mixed bag for me, in the end the plusses outweigh the minuses but what can I say? Great job, back with my wife, complete PTSD meltdown, being nearly suicidal for a while, but in the end a trip to Oktoberfest, the Orioles win the AL East, the Giants win the World Series and I’m doing better. On the other hand a whole lot of people are not doing better in a lot of places in the world. I’ve written about some of the events of the year as they affected me. Not all of them would be major, but hey, this was my year. If I had a song that described the year it would be Barry Manilow’s Trying to get the Feeling Again”

On January 6th I lost a man who had shown compassion and empathy for me, Captain Tom Sitsch, US Navy retired. Captain Sitsch was a true hero who worked his way up throughout the ranks in the Navy Explosive Ordinance Demolition community, made many combat deployments and suffered untreated PTSD and TBI. He took his own life. It was a sobering time for me, as he was one of the few people who showed much compassion for me when I was falling apart in the summer of 2008. He asked me “where does a chaplain go for help?” The best I can remember was that I told him not to other chaplains or clergy. I had no idea what he was going through and after he left the Navy under a cloud in 2009 I lost contact with him. His death brought me back into contact with men I had served with and who had served with him. I wrote about that a number of times as it was such a shattering event. I wish I had known and could have been there for him. The first article I wrote about that was on January 7th and can be found here: Rest In Peace Captain Tom Sitsch USN

February was a month of reflection on the sixth anniversary of my return from Iraq, the Winter Olympics in Sochi Russia and a time of intense preparation for my first journey to Gettysburg leading the Gettysburg Staff Ride for the Joint Forces Staff College. It also was a month where we began to see the tip of the iceberg of the attempt of some Christians in Kansas to enshrine  religious intolerance in law, that article A Matter of Degree: The Taliban, Kansas, Jim Crow and Nuremberg really pissed some people off.

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I wrote a reflection about the long strange trip back from Iraq in this article The Long Strange Trip: Six Years After Returning from Iraq

In March Russia pulled off its occupation of Ukraine and Malaysian Airlines flight 370 disappeared from the face of the earth. I also led my first trip to Gettysburg and really began to sink my teeth into writing about the battle as well as many other components of the American Civil War, including the politics, ideology, economic and religious aspects of the war. But for the most enduring mystery was the disappearance of MH-370. I ended up writing a “conspiracy theory” about it, which because it hasn’t been proven wrong could possibly be right, if not maybe the basis of a great terrorism novel. That article is here  My Malaysian Airlines Flight MH-370 Conspiracy Theory

April was the beginning of baseball season, the end of Lent, Holy Week and more work on a lot of history. I wrote about civil rights, Jackie Robinson, and a whole series on a Roman Centurion in Jerusalem during the first Holy Week. I also took on former half-term Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin in this article  War Crimes are Us: I Want No Part of Sarah Palin’s Torture Loving Christianity But it was an interesting time because I was asked to do an interview about my struggle with PTSD for the Washington Times. The article about that is here Not the Cover of the Rolling Stone but the Front Page: Padre Steve Featured in Washington Times article on PTSD

In May I took another group of students to Gettysburg and did a lot more writing about that subject as well as the subject of Memorial Day. But an event occurred that caused me to reflect on the way Christians often use the power of religion in attempts to silence or shame others who are in pain. That came after I had an experience trying to get help in the Navy Mental Health system and because of how I was treated began to implode all over again. That article is here: Frightened by Christians. I also did a fair amount of reflecting on the sacrifice of others in articles about Memorial Day, including this one “The Offering We Bring…” Remembering the First Memorial Day

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In June my struggle continued and was intensified by the collapse of Iraqi forces as ISIL swept into Iraq, overrunning many of the places I had served in Al Anbar province. Looking back at all that I wrote about other subjects that month I am amazed. I wrote about the assassination of Franz Ferdinand which triggered the events leading to the outbreak of World War I in this article A Wrong Turn, a Holy Cause and Two Bullets: The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand But here is the first article that I wrote about the collapse of the Iraqi forces and reflected on all the history that we should have paid attention to in 2003 The Results of Ignoring History: The Implosion of Iraq as well as my own reflection of my time there and hope for better Inshallah Iraq (إن شاء الله) Maybe Someday things will be Better

In July I did a lot more work on Gettysburg as I got ready to take another group there in August. I reflected on Iraq, PTSD, the Declaration of Independence and in my work on Gettysburg and Civil War issues I wrote this article about some of the similarities that I see in some Tea Party ideology and that of the ante-bellum South, the Confederacy and Jim Crow. That article is here Parallels between Tea Party Ideology and the Ante-Bellum South I took another stab at the situation in Iraq in this article Iraq, ISIS and Al Qaeda: Sowing the Wind…  and this about the moral responsibility of a nation at war to those that it sends to fight its wars  “You Broke it, You Bought It” The Responsibility of a Nation at War and Broken and Unlikely to Get Better: Military Mental Health Care

In August I led another trip to Gettysburg, and I reflected on a number of subjects, but as I was struggling so much after my collapse in May I decided to write a number of new articles about PTSD, Suicide and the military mental health care system. Here are two of them No Shutting Up Until it is Fixed: Veteran and Military Mental Health Care and  Moral Injury: Betrayal, Isolation, Suicidality, & Meaninglessness; the War after the War But I also ventured into the initial police reaction in Ferguson Missouri in the article The Misuse of Force: Shock and Awe Backfires in Ferguson But one of my favorite articles to write was this one on the Gettysburg Address, something that I always find important to reflect upon Reembracing the New Birth of Freedom

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In September I made pilgrimage to Oktoberfest. However I ventured into the discussion of the new, old kind of war that we are facing again, that of religious ideology and war without mercy. That article is here Wars Without Mercy: The New Old Way of War and The Islamic State and the New, Old Nature of War

In October, of course I continued to write about Gettysburg and the Civil War, baseball and the World Series, and was inducted into my High School’s Hall of Fame, which was a great honor. But I decided to tackle some of the religious ideologues who are actively engaged in the political process and did an article about Senator Ted Cruz’s father Rafael Cruz. That is here: Rafael Cruz and the Dangerous Heresy of the Self-Annointed

In November I made my final trip for the last academic year to Gettysburg and had the honor of meeting a real hero, retired Army Colonel Walter Marm, who won the Medal of Honor for his actions at the Battle of Ia Drang, a battle made famous by the movie We Were Soldiers that reflection is here: Return from Gettysburg: Table Talk and Meeting a Hero

December was another big month, the Senate Report on the CIA torture program was released much to the chagrin of the program’s most ardent supporters including a host of “Christian” leaders. I decided to take them on in this article Conservative Christians and Torture: Wedded at the Hip

Those are just some of the highlights. I wrote about so many other things as well, and I invite you to browse the site. Like I said, all things considered I am surprised I have been so productive this year. So anyway, thank you so much for reading what I put out, for sharing it and for your wonderful comments and encouragement. So I’ll wish you well and if I don’t get anything else done later today I wish you all a happy and blessed New Year.

Peace

Padre Steve+

 

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December 20, 2014 · 19:26

I Belong Here With Those in Pain and Who Have Lost Their Faith

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Christmas Eve at COP South 2007, the Most Important Mass of My Life

“I belong with those who are in pain, and who have lost their faith, I belong here.” Father Palmer, the Chaplain in Joyeux Noel (Merry Christmas)

In the next day or two, certainly by Christmas I will again watch the film classic Joyeux Noel (Merry Christmas) which is the story of the amazing and exceptional Christmas Truce of 1914. It is a film that each time I see it that I discover something new, more powerful than the last time I viewed it. I will also be writing about Christmas from my perspective as a combat veteran and giving voice to those who serve now, as well as those who served God’s people in hellish places before me.

As a Chaplain I am drawn to the actions of the British Padre in the film, who during the truce conducts a Mass for all the soldiers, British, French and German in no-man’s land, who goes about caring for the soldiers both the living and the dead.  His actions are contrasted with his Bishop who comes to relieve him of his duties and to urge on the replacement soldiers to better kill the Germans.

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Father Palmer Tending the Wounded

As the Chaplain begins to provide the last Rites to a dying soldier the Bishop walks in, in full purple cassock frock coat and hat and the chaplain looks up and kisses his ring.

As the chaplain looks at his clerical superior there is a silence and the Bishop looks sternly at the priest and addresses him:

“You’re being sent back to your parish in Scotland. I’ve brought you your marching orders.”

Stunned the Priest replies: “I belong with those who are in pain, and who have lost their faith, I belong here.”

The Bishop then sternly lectures the Priest: “I am very disappointed you know. When you requested permission to accompany the recruits from your parish I personally vouched for you. But then when I heard what happened I prayed for you.”

The Priest humbly and respectfully yet with conviction responds to his superior: “I sincerely believe that our Lord Jesus Christ guided me in what was the most important Mass of my life. I tried to be true to his trust and carry his message to all, whoever they may be.”

The Bishop seems a bit taken aback but then blames the Chaplain for what will next happen to the Soldiers that he has served with in the trenches: “Those men who listened to you on Christmas Eve will very soon bitterly regret it; because in a few days time their regiment is to be disbanded by the order of His Majesty the King. Where will those poor boys end up on the front line now? And what will their families think?”

They are interrupted when a soldier walks in to let the Bishop know that the new soldiers are ready for his sermon. After acknowledging the messenger the Bishop continues: “They’re waiting for me to preach a sermon to those who are replacing those who went astray with you.” He gets ready to depart and continues: “May our Lord Jesus Christ guide your steps back to the straight and narrow path.”

The Priest looks at him and asks: “Is that truly the path of our Lord?”

The Bishop looks at the Priest and asks what I think is the most troubling question: “You’re not asking the right question. Think on this: are you really suitable to remain with us in the house of Our Lord?”

With that the Bishop leaves and goes on to preach. The words of the sermon are from a 1915 sermon preached by an Anglican Bishop in Westminster Abbey. They reflect the poisonous aspects of many religious leaders on all sides of the Great War, but also many religious leaders of various faiths even today, sadly I have to say Christian leaders are among the worst when it comes to inciting violence against those that they perceive as enemies of the Church, their nation or in some cases their political faction within a country.

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The Bishop Leads His “Service” 

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“Christ our Lord said, “Think not that I come to bring peace on earth. I come not to bring peace, but a sword.” The Gospel according to St. Matthew. Well, my brethren, the sword of the Lord is in your hands. You are the very defenders of civilization itself. The forces of good against the forces of evil. For this war is indeed a crusade! A holy war to save the freedom of the world. In truth I tell you: the Germans do not act like us, neither do they think like us, for they are not, like us, children of God. Are those who shell cities populated only by civilians the children of God? Are those who advanced armed hiding behind women and children the children of God? With God’s help, you must kill the Germans, good or bad, young or old. Kill every one of them so that it won’t have to be done again.”

The sermon is chilling and had it not been edited by the director would have contained the remark actually said by the real Bishop that the Germans “crucified babies on Christmas.”  Of course that was typical of the propaganda of the time and similar to things that religious leaders of all faiths use to demonize their opponents and stir up violence in the name of their God.

When the Bishop leaves the Priest finishes his ministration to the wounded while listening to the words of the Bishop who is preaching not far away in the trenches. He meditates upon his simple cross, takes it off, kisses it hand hangs it upon a tripod where a container of water hangs.

The scene is chilling for a number of reasons. First is the obvious, the actions of a religious leader to denigrate the efforts of some to bring the Gospel of Peace into the abyss of Hell of earth and then to incite others to violence dehumanizing the enemy forces. The second and possibly even more troubling is to suggest that those who do not support dehumanizing and exterminating the enemy are not suitable to remain in the house of the Lord. Since I have had people, some in person and others on social media say similar things to what the Bishop asks Palmer the scene hits close to home.

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Christmas Eve 2007 with the Bedouin 

When I left Iraq in February 2008 I felt that I was abandoning those committed to my spiritual care, but my time was up. Because of it I missed going with some of my advisors to Basra with the 1st Iraqi Division to retake that city from insurgents. It was only a bit over a month after I had celebrated what I consider to be my most important Masses of my life at COP South and COP North on December 23rd as well as Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. In fact they were really the last masses that I felt the mystery and awe of the love of God that I used to so much feel.

When I left the new incoming senior Chaplain refused to take my replacement leaving our advisors without dedicated support. He then slandered me behind my back because what I was doing was not how he would do things and because I and my relief were under someone else’s operational control. It is funny how word gets back to you when people talk behind your back. Thankfully he is now retired from the Navy and I feel for any ministers of his denomination under his “spiritual” care.  So I cannot forget those days and every time I think about them, especially around Christmas I am somewhat melancholy and why I can relate so much to Father Palmer in the movie.

It has been seven years since those Christmas Masses and they still feel like yesterday. In the intervening years my life has been different. Just a year later I was walking home from church where my wife was to sing in the choir during the Christmas vigil mass. I couldn’t handle the crowds, the noise, and I felt so far away from God. That night I walked home in the dark looking up into the sky asking God if he still was there. If there had been a bar on the way home I would have stopped by and poured myself in.

Since Iraq I have dealt with Severe and Chronic PTSD, depression, anxiety and insomnia were coupled with a two year period where due to my struggles I lost faith, was for all practical purposes an agnostic. I felt abandoned by God, but even more so and maybe more importantly by my former church and most other Chaplains. It was like being radioactive, there was and is a stigma for Chaplains that admits to PTSD and go through a faith crisis, especially from other Chaplains and Clergy.  It was just before Christmas in late 2009 that faith began to return in what I call my Christmas Miracle. But be sure, let no one tell you differently, no Soldier, Sailor, Marine or Airman who has suffered the trauma of war and admitted to PTSD does not feel the stigma that goes with it, and sadly, despite the best efforts of many there is a stigma.

Now that faith is different and I have become much more skeptical of the motivations of religious leaders, especially those that demonize and dehumanize those that do not believe like them or fully support their cause or agenda. Unfortunately there are far too many men and women who will use religion to do that, far too many.

As for me, I thought that I was in a better place a year ago. I had the floor kicked from out from under me this summer and it has been a hard fight and while I am beginning to get back to some sense of normal it is a day to day thing. I still suffer the effects of the PTSD, especially the insomnia, nightmares and the nightmares which came back with a vengeance this summer. I also still have the anxiety in crowded places and bad traffic, but working with my new therapist I am coming up with some effective coping mechanisms. As for faith, I do believe again, though at the same time I doubt. I would have to consider myself a Christian Agnostic who echoes the cry of the man who cried out to Jesus, “Lord I believe, help my unbelief!” 

Like the Priest in Joyeux Noel I know that my place is with those who are “in pain, and who have lost their faith.” For me this may no longer be on the battlefield as I will retire from the Navy out of my current billet teaching at the Joint Forces Staff College in a couple of years. However, that being said I will strive to be there for those that struggle with faith and believe, especially those who struggle because of what they saw and experienced during war and when they returned home.

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Joyeux Noel Christmas Eve

Likewise I expect that I will do my best to speak truth to those in power and those whose faithfulness is more a product of their comfort with the God that they create in their own mind rather than the Crucified God wise death on the Cross s a scandal. For many Christians the scandal of the cross is too easy to avoid by surrounding ourselves with pet theologies that appeal to our pride, prejudice and power. The kind of malevolent power represented by the bishop in Joyeux Noel. Thus I take a measure of comfort in the words of Simone Weil who said “He who has not God in himself cannot feel His absence.” 

Thus, like Paul Tillich I have come to believe that “Sometimes I think it is my mission to bring faith to the faithless, and doubt to the faithful.”  In other words to become a complete pain in the ass until the day that I die.

Praying for Peace this Christmas,

Padre Steve+

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November 28, 2014 · 23:15

Post Thanksgiving Thanksgiving:

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Dear Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Just a note tonight wish all of your a Happy Black Friday, or as it really is the day after Thanksgiving.

Yesterday we had a nice Thanksgiving dinner at home with one of our friends over as a guest. I am thankful for so much for I have been blessed. I am especially thankful for my wife Judy who despite the many opportunities I have given her to kill or divorce me has not. She has endured over 10 of the last 18 years of marriage separated from me due to my military assignments and deployments beginning in June of 1996 when as an Army Reserve Major was mobilized to support the Bosnia operation.

Since then most of our lives have been spent apart. I realized a couple of months ago that if I should be selected for Captain in the Navy Chaplain Corps that the odds would be pretty good of having to endure yet another separation. I know that no no matter how strong that she has been that our marriage could not survive another separation of two to three years. Likewise I realized that I am tired and want to go home and that if all I wanted to due was to increase my retirement pay by getting promoted and hanging for another two to three years was the price that to do so would be to jeopardize my marriage to basically hold a position from another chaplain who still wants to push themselves as hard as the office requires. I finally came to realize that I could no longer keep up the charade. I had to chose, and I now, for probably the first time in our marriage with Judy decided with her to get ready to retire from the Navy, give up the idea of trying to make Captain and to get ourselves ready to retire from the Navy and go home.

Home is important to us. I think that I can speak for many, when I say that those  who elect to spend their lives  to serving their country in the military, away from home and family; that no matter how many friends and relationships that you develop away from home, that home is home and everywhere else, as wonderful as it may be is not. Going to my induction at into the Edison High School Hall of Fame made me realize just how much I realize that Stockton is home, like it is for Judy.

My regular readers know the struggles that we have endured since I started this site a year after I returned from Iraq dealing with a complete, psychological, physical and spiritual meltdown due to the shattering experience of combat trauma and PTSD.  Likewise regular readers know just a bit of what Judy and I have been through ealing with separations necessitated by deployments and assignments. The time involved is astounding, since I was mobilized as an Army Reserve Major to support the Bosnia operation in 1996  it is about 10 of the last 18 years that we have spent apart. 

We have talked about it and are both at peace to announce that I am going to be putting in my retirement papers so I can retire from my present duty assignment at the Joint Forces Staff College in the spring of 2017 and move back to Stockton. Moving back to Stockton will reunite us with family and friends, I am looking forward to being near my brother Jeff and his family and so many friends, some of who I have know since 6th grade at Cleveland Elementary School Stockton Junior High and Edison.

There is a cost to this. By putting in retirement papers I will not be considered for promotion to Navy Captain, or for those unfamiliar with Navy ranks, the same rank as an Army, Marine or Air force Colonel. Financially it is a decent amount of money, not just for retirement but for time on active duty. But I have to live with myself. If I decided to roll the dice and actually be selected for promotion I would only be doing it for money. My heart wouldn’t be in it and in doing so if I was selected and either turned it down, or accepted the promotion just to retire in the minimum time required I would be penalizing a man or woman who if not selected because of me might lose the chance to be promoted. I have had friends do just that, and I told them when they did so that that they had hurt the Navy, and especially hurt the men and women that were not selected. Thus I cannot allow that to by the case for me. I am happy, I don’t need another promotion to prove anything.

 

Now I still have a lot to accomplish before we retire and move home. I enjoy my current assignment as a Chaplain and instructor at the Staff College and the opportunity that it has given me to move back to the academic world. As such I will begin to pursue and Educational Doctorate with  a concentration in Organizational Leadership; continue to write about leadership, military history and PTSD and continue to do what I can to advocate for veterans and active duty personnel dealing with PTSD. I also hope to get my text on Gettysburg published and continue to write after it is done.

Likewise, I am so thankful for all of the people who I call friends, people who care for me and have been there through so much. I am a very fortunate man.

As I think about Thanksgiving I remember the one that I spent in Iraq the most, serving dinner to the troops in the mess line at Ta’Qaddum Air Base after spending half of a mission to the Syrian border marooned with my assistant and body guard Nelson Lebron due to lack of air support and having to cut the mission short to get back to prepare for the next mission.

I left much of my heart and soul in Iraq and brought much of it back with me. I want to see in my lifetime a time when Iraq is a land of peace, and a place that I can return to, if nothing else to see at least some of the Iraqis that I got to know when I was the unlikely “American Imam” who cared about Iraqis as well as Americans and tried to build bridges between our peoples. I hope that I can spend time with men that I served alongside in 2007 and 2008, as well as the Iraqi merchant Marine skipper who I became a friend of in 2002, when he and his ship were detained under the United Nations oil embargo. That man told me that one day that he hoped that “when this war was over, that like the American, British and German veterans of the Second World War, that one day we could meet at a tavern and have a drink as friends.” 

That is something that I long to see in my lifetime.

Since returning from Iraq in 2008 things have not been great. But despite all that I have endured since then dealing with chronic PTSD and so many other issues I am more than thankful. I am blessed beyond belief. Today was the “holy day” known as Black Friday. I didn’t take any part in it. I was too tired.

That being said I thank all of you you for being a part of my life and I wish you all a Happy day after Thanksgiving!

Stay tuned I will be putting some new material out this weekend.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 17, 2014 · 23:25

Things that Go Bump in the Night Terrors of PTSD

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Bram Stoker wrote in Hamlet these immortal words in his novel Dracula:

“How blessed are some people, whose lives have no fears, no dreads; to whom sleep is a blessing that comes nightly, and brings nothing but sweet dreams.” 

I am getting ready to go to bed, hopefully a bit early tonight and hopefully without the terror of so many nights, but I dread to sleep. I can understand why the savior of Little Round Top, General Gouverneur Warren wrote his wife after the Civil War:

“I wish I did not dream that much. They make me sometimes dread to go to sleep. Scenes from the war, are so constantly recalled, with bitter feelings I wish to never experience again. Lies, vanity, treachery, and carnage.” 

Last night was difficult, the nightmares and night terrors were quite terrifying. Thus I almost dread bedtime tonight. Since the summer my dreams and nightmares have become much more vivid and often so terrifying that I either wake up or am woken up by Judy when she sees me becoming too physically active in them. I have when up several times either screaming or hitting the floor when I fall out of bed trying to attack something in my dream which is threatening me or Judy, or when I am fleeing a threat, usually as I hit the floor or the bookcase that doubled as my nightstand. Judy has woken me up a number of times, once when it appeared that I was shooting at someone. It must be thrilling for her. Of course Minnie our youngest Papillon decided that hanging on to mommy during such times is a good idea, while my unflappable Molly, my Papillon-Dachshund mix who helped get me through many nights after coming home from Iraq now simply looks up and goes back to sleep. Evidently she is used to me now, it is good that someone in our little household is able to not be too bothered by nightmares.

Last night I in a place where Judy and I had been trapped by enemy soldiers of some kind. I was unarmed and to allow Judy to escape up a hill I shut a gate to keep the enemy soldiers from pursuing us. As I struggled to lock the gate, I turned and saw that Judy had reached safety. I turned to join her but found that I could not get up the hill, I struggled and as I did the soldiers broke through the gate and began to shoot at me, I dove to avoid their bullets and was rudely awakened by my chin hitting the edge of the previously mentioned bookcase.

I slammed into it hard, so hard that my teeth cut my upper lip, and that my chin and jaw were swollen and in pain. I got up, walked into our master bathroom where my mouth was full of blood and my chin already swollen from the impact. Because of the hour I did not want to have Judy take me to the emergency room so I rinsed out my mouth, packed it with tissue to soak up the blood and lay back down until my normal time to wake up.

When boring came I got up, unpacked the very bloody tissue from my mouth and lips, showered and got ready for work. As I did so I noticed the damage to the bookcase, my jaw had shattered the pressed wood. I was shocked, evidently I have as hard of head as my dad accused me of as a child. I was surpassed, took a picture of he damage and went to work, where I reported what happened to my dean and went to our branch medical clinic. I spent most of the morning getting my head examined.

Though I hurt from the neck up, and was in a lot of pain nothing was broken so the doctor sent me home. The doctor said that though nothing was broken that I would be in pain for some time, and I am. He compared the impact to being in an auto accident. My neck is sore, the chin, jaw and mouth sore and I do have a pretty good headache.

When I see my new primary care doctor I will get scheduled for a sleep study.

Judy mentioned something that I didn’t think about either last night when this happened or while I was at the doctor. The fact is that had I not crushed the bookcase with my jaw I could have suffered a very severe injury, perhaps even a fractured skull.

I think that most of my current nightmares are triggered by reading about or seeing news reports about what is currently happening in Iraq where I left so much of my heart. But my dreams and nightmares are such surreal mixtures of fact, history, reality and imagination that it is sometime hard to tell where the dream ends and reality begins, or for that matter if there is much difference between the dream and reality, as Edward Allan Poe wrote:

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?”

I make no pretense of saying that I can understand or interpret them. Last night may have been triggered by the F-18s from the USS George H.W. Bush flying in to the Naval Air Station following their return from deployment not far from where I work during the day. The noise of their jet engines took me back to Iraq.  When I was in Iraq, any time that I was going west or east and waiting on flights at Al Asad Air Base in Al Anbar, the Marine and Navy F-18s based there would keep me up all hours of the day and night as I tried to sleep in the tents that transients like me stayed. Of course those tents were only a couple hundred yards from the flight line, so sleep was rare and the noise got into my head.

I honestly do hope that my new therapist and medication manager can find the right combination of therapy and medications to manage this. It would be nice to be able to sleep without waking up in terror with dreams of war and of enemies, both real and imagined trying to kill me.

I have posted the photo of the broken bookcase here just to give you an idea of how hard I hit it with my chin. It shocked the hell out of me when I saw it. Yes that is the damaged that I caused, it is about three inches in size.

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So anyway, I am going to try to get some sleep. But as Guy Sajer, the author of the classic account of brutal combat wrote: “Only happy people have nightmares, from overeating. For those who live a nightmare reality, sleep is a black hole, lost in time, like death.” Since returning from Iraq, my nights have been nightmarish. I wish that I never had to sleep, for sleep is far worse than being awake, even awake in a combat zone. Like Gouverneur Warren, my dreams sometimes, in  fact most of the time cause me to dread going to sleep.

All that being said I do not want to lose my dreams, the good, the bad or even the terrifying. The somehow are a part of me, though I certainly would wish that they would not be so vivid that I end up physically bruised and sitting in an acute care clinic. That being said, I have to agree with Joseph Heller who wrote: “I want to keep my dreams, even bad ones, because without them, I might have nothing all night long.”

With that, I wish all of us peace and pleasant dreams, even in the midst of real life nightmares.

Padre Steve+

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November 14, 2014 · 23:01

Epiphanies and Struggles at 2000

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I posted an article last night about three Union heroes of the Battle of Little Round Top in the Civil War; Colonel Strong Vincent, Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and Colonel Patrick “Paddy” O’Rorke. That was the 1999th article that I have posted here, this is number 2000.

I have wondered for weeks what I was going to write about on such an auspicious occasion, and I thought of a lot. However, recent events have brought me to an emphany based on my own experiences to be sure, but also through the study of the post Civil War life of Joshua Chamberlain and Gouverneur Warren as well as the British leader of the Arab Revolt in the First World War, T.E. Lawrence.

The frailties and struggles of these men with life after war in relation to their calling, chosen vocations and family lives have stuck a chord in me that the mere study of them as iconic military leaders had never done. Well over a century after their death of Chamberlain, the lives and words of these men have spoken to me in ways that few things, including the words of scripture and the lives of the great saints have ever done,

I am currently re-writing another article about on another Union hero of that battle, Brigadier General Gouverneur Warren. I expect that after I complete that and get some edits from my wife Judy that it should be posted Sunday or Monday.

I find it fascinating and even ironic how much I learn from the lives of these men, especially the two men who serviced to battle to both great glory and heartache.

If you are a regular reader of this site you probably have picked up how much that I relate to complex, contradictory and often troubled historical figures. My world is a world of various shades of gray. My heroes are usually flawed men, men of great brilliance and intelligence who may on some occasions rise to greatness and other times struggle in the most basic elements of life.

I have written many times and shared my struggles with faith, belief in God, acceptance, meaning and depression. These are things that honestly I did not struggle with, or that I could have imagined before I returned from Iraq. If you had told me in early 2007 that I would struggle with these things I would have told you just how wrong that you were.

I cannot do that now. Although I have been very successful in life as well as my military and academic career I often feel like a complete failure. I struggle to believe that I am not, especially in regard to my service in the Chaplain Corps, an organization that since my return from Iraq I have felt disconnected from and in some cases rejected by. Now I do have to own that as my own issue. In my more recent interactions with some senior Chaplains I have found that my perception may not be true of how I am viewed may not be true.

Alexander Dumas wrote in his literary classic The Count of Monte Cristo:

“Moral wounds have this peculiarity – they may be hidden, but they never close; always painful, always ready to bleed when touched, they remain fresh and open in the heart.”

That kind of got thrown in my face when the contractors preparing the annual Navy Chaplain Corps professional development training conference contacted me. They plan on using my story from the DOD Real Warriors website as a “discussion starter during the training event. The irony is that I told a number of people recently that I felt like the “poster child” for PTSD that no one wants to admit exists. Now it looks like I might be the poster child that everyone sees. The irony is too rich.

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I understand from a senior Chaplain who attended the validation of the project, that it was perceived in a very positive manner by the senior leaders of the Chaplain Corps present. My friend whose judgment I trust was surprised by how I perceived that I have been seen by senior leaders. Truthfully my feelings are quite negative and I admit based on how depressed that I have been that those feelings might not be correct.

I am humbled, but kind of embarrassed as you can imagine for a number of reasons, first that I could be wrong about my perception. That is the easier conundrum. The second is that though I have tried to be transparent in sharing my experience on this website as well as in person the fact is that in every case where others picked up and ran with my story, it was on their initiative, not mine. All of those events,including the Real Warriors video and story were scary, because I had to “drop my shields” so to speak and let others tell and interpret my story. Honestly if I was to become famous for anything I would prefer it to be my writing about history, ethics, and of course Gettysburg.

As I told the people for the contracting team I am happy to help in any way that I can so long as those who hear my story are inspired, or even guilted into ensuring those in the Chaplain Corps and those that we serve are cared for and do not experience the hell of what I went through when I returned from Iraq feeling so rejected, abandoned and uncared for by my peers and superiors. So even though the prospect of my story being shared among a community that I have little trust of, I am willing to allow them to use it, so long as it helps ensure that others do not experience what I did on their return from war.

My wife Judy told me that I need to stop my negative self talk, which I probably should try to do but find it hard to do. However,I guess from my clinical experience that I should know better. However, being chronically depressed for years while suffering from PTSD does skew one’s perspective on life and reality. It also can effect how they believe that they are perceived by others, usually in ways that correspond to their own beliefs.

For me I often feel as T.E. Lawrence wrote after he had left the Royal,Air Force where he had served for twelve years under an assumed name following his voluntary exit from the world stage. Lawrence wrote:

“You wonder what I am doing? Well, so do I, in truth. Days seem to dawn, suns to shine, evenings to follow, and then I sleep. What I have done, what I am doing, what I am going to do, puzzle and bewilder me. Have you ever been a leaf and fallen from your tree in autumn and been really puzzled about it? That’s the feeling.”

I do understand what Lawrence meant by this, but I understand what Judy says too. When she says tells me to stop the negative self talk, I know what she says to be true, That being said many times I have a hard time believing it or acting upon it. Of course Judy is quite correct, despite how I feel I am capable of being logical and analytical. That was something that I was always good at doing, thus in spite of myself she has me trapped.

It is somewhat fascinating to me that coming up on seven years after I left Iraq, a country that I would gladly go back to again to help my Iraqi friends that I still seem to be emotionally stuck at the place that I returned. The quote by Captain Picard that I led this article with is an excellent place to end tonight.

Honestly I just want to work my way through this, but I struggle. Since I now seem to be rambling I will close for the night.

Thank you as always for taking the time to include my writings into your life. All of our time is limited and the fact that many of you chose to spend time reading what I write means a great deal to me.

So until tomorrow,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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November 7, 2014 · 11:54

The Bond: Veteran’s Day 2014

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Honor to the soldier and sailor everywhere, who bravely bears his country’s cause. Honor, also, to the citizen who cares for his brother in the field and serves, as he best can, the same cause. Abraham Lincoln

I always become a bit more thoughtful and quite often emotional  around Veterans Day and Memorial Day.  I’ve been in the military for over 30 years now.  I enlisted in the National Guard while in college and entered Army ROTC back on August 25th 1981.  Since then it has been to quote Jerry Garcia “a long strange trip.”  During that trip I learned a lot from the veterans who I am blessed to have encountered on the way, men and women who have touched my life in truly special ways.

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My Dad: Chief Petty Officer Carl Dundas aboard the USS Hancock CVA 19 circa 1971-72

I come from a Navy family. My dad served twenty years in the Navy.  Growing up in a Navy family in the 1960s and 1970s was an adventure for me and that Navy family that surrounded us then remained part of my family’s life long after.  My mom and dad remained in contact with friends that they served with or were stationed with, and now many of them are elderly and a good number have passed away.  Even so my mom, now a widow stays in regular contact with a number of her Navy wife “sisters.”

My dad retired in 1974 as a Chief Petty Officer and did time surrounded in the South Vietnamese city of An Loc when it was surrounded by the North Vietnamese for 80 days in 1972.  He didn’t talk about it much when he came back; in fact he came back different from the war.  He probably suffered from PTSD.  All the markers were there but we had no idea about it back then, after all he was in the Navy not the Army.  I had friends whose dad’s did not return from Vietnam and saw how Vietnam veterans were treated by the country as a whole including some members of the Greatest Generation.  They were not welcomed home and were treated often with scorn, even by veterans who had fought in the “real wars” of World War II and Korea.  Instead of being depicted a Americans doing their best in a war that few supported they were demonized in the media and in the entertainment industry for many years afterwards.

My dad never made a big deal out of his service but he inspired me to pursue a career in the military by being a man of honor and integrity.

It was the early Navy family experience that shaped much of how I see the world and is why I place such great value on the contributions of veterans to our country and to me.  That was also my introduction to war; the numbers shown in the nightly news “body count” segment were flesh and blood human beings.

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My second view of war came from the Veterans of Vietnam that I served with in the National Guard and the Army.  Some of these men served as teachers and mentors.  LCDR Jim Breedlove and Senior Chief John Ness at the Edison High School Naval Junior ROTC program were the first who helped me along.  Both have passed away but I will never forget them.  Commander Breedlove was someone that I would see every time that I went home as an adult. His sudden death the week before I returned from Iraqshook me.  I have a post dedicated to them at this link.  (In Memorium: Chief John Ness and LCDR Jim Breedlove USN )

Colonel Edgar Morrison was my first battalion commander.  He was the most highly decorated member of the California National Guard at that time and had served multiple tours in Vietnam.  He encouraged me as a young specialist and officer cadet and showed a tremendous amount of care for his soldiers.  Staff Sergeant’s Buff Rambo and Mickey Yarro taught me the ropes as a forward observer and shared many of their Vietnam experiences. Buff had been a Marine dog handler on the DMZ and Mickey a Forward Observer.

The Senior NCOs that trained me while in the Army ROTC program at UCLA and Fort Lewis had a big impact. All were combat veterans that had served in Vietnam.  Sergeant First Class Harry Zilkan was my training NCO at the UCLA Army ROTC program.  He was a Special Forces Medic with 7th Group in Vietnam.  He still had part of a VC bayonet embedded in his foot.  He received my first salute as a newly commissioned Second Lieutenant as well as a Silver Dollar.  I understand that after the Army he became a fire fighter.  He had a massive heart attack on the scene of a fire and died a few years later from it.  Sergeant Major John Butler was our senior enlisted advisor at UCLA.  An infantryman he served with the 173rd Airborne in Vietnam.  Sergeant First Class Harry Ball was my drill sergeant at the ROTC pre-commissioning camp at Fort Lewis Washington in 1982.  He was a veteran of the Special Forces and Rangers and served multiple tours in Vietnam.  Though he only had me for a summer he was quite influential in my life, tearing me apart and then building me back up.  He was my version of Drill Sergeant Foley in An Officer and a Gentleman. Like Zack Mayo played by Richard Gere in the movie I can only say: Drill Sergeant “I will never forget you.”

As I progressed through my Army career I encountered others of this generation who also impacted my life. First among them was First Sergeant Jim Koenig who had been a Ranger in the Mekong Delta.  I was the First Sergeant that I would measure all others by.  Once during an ARTEP we were aggressed and all of a sudden he was back in the Delta. This man cared so much for his young soldiers in the 557th Medical Company.   He did so much for them and I’m sure that those who served with him can attest to this as well as me. Jim had a brick on his desk so that when he got pissed he could chew on it.   He was great.  He played guitar for the troops and had a song called “Jane Fonda, Jane Fonda You Communist Slut.” It was a classic.  He retired after he was selected to be a Command Sergeant Major because he valued his wife and family more than the promotion.  It hurt him to do this, but he put them first. Colonel Donald Johnson was the commander of the 68th Medical Group when I got to Germany in January 1984.  Colonel “J” as well all called him was one of the best leaders I have seen in 28 years in the military.  He knew everything about everything and his knowledge forced us all to learn and be better officers and NCOs.  On an inspection visit you could always find him dressed in coveralls and underneath a truck verifying the maintenance done on it.  He served a number of Vietnam tours.  He died of Multiple Myeloma and is buried at Arlington.  Chaplain (LTC) Rich Whaley who had served as a company commander in Vietnam on more than one occasion saved my young ass at the Army Chaplain School.  No really he saved my career at least twice, and kept me out of big trouble on both occasions. Personally I don’t know too many senior chaplains who would put themselves on the line for a junior chaplain the way that Rich did for me. He remains a friend and is the Endorsing Agent for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. As a Mormon he is one of the most “Christian” men that I have ever met.  I know some Christians who might have a hard time with that, but Rich demonstrated every trait of a Christian who loved God and his neighbor.

When I was the Installation Chaplain at Fort Indiantown Gap PA I was blessed to have some great veterans in my Chapel Parish.  Major General Frank Smoker flew 25 missions as a B-17 pilot over Germany during the height of the air war in Europe. He brought his wonderful wife Kate back from England with him and long after his active service was over he remained a vital part of the military community until his death in 2010.  Sergeant Henry Boyd was one of the 101st Airborne soldiers epitomized in Band of Brothers. He had a piece of shrapnel lodged next to his heart from the Battle of the Bulge until the day he died and was honored to conduct his funeral while stationed at Indiantown Gap. Colonel Walt Swank also served in Normandy.  Major Scotty Jenkes was an Air Force pilot in Vietnam flying close air support while Colonel Ray Hawthorne served several tours both in artillery units and as an adviser in 1972 and was with General Smoker a wonderful help to me as I applied to enter the Navy while CWO4 Charlie Kosko flew helicopters in Vietnam.  All these men made a deep impact on me and several contributed to my career in very tangible ways.

My life more recently has been impacted by others. Since coming into the Navy I have been blessed to serve with the Marines and Sailors of the 2nd Combat Engineer Battalion and Lieutenant Colonel T D Anderson, 1st Battalion 8thMarines and Lieutenant Colonel Desroches, 3rd Battalion 8th Marines and Colonel Lou Rachal and Headquarters Battalion 2nd Marine Division and Colonel, now Major General Richard Lake.   My friends of the veterans of the Battle of Hue City including General Peter Pace, Barney Barnes, Tony “Limey” Cartilage, Sergeant Major Thomas and so many others have become close over the years, especially after I did my time in Iraq. They and all the Vietnam vets, including the guys from the Vietnam Veterans of America like Ray and John who manned the beer stand behind the plate at Harbor Park all mean a lot to me.  My friends at Marine Security Forces Colonel Mike Paulovich and Sergeant Major Kim Davis mean more than almost any people in the world.  We traveled the globe together visiting our Marines.  Both of these men are heroes to me as well as friends, Colonel Paulovich was able to administer the oath of office to me when I was promoted to Commander.

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Finally there are my friends and brothers that I have served with at sea on USS HUE CITY during Operation Enduring Freedom and the advisers on the ground in Al Anbar mean more than anything to me. Perhaps the most important is my bodyguard, RP1 Nelson Lebron, who helped keep me safe and accompanied me all over the battlefield.  Nelson who has done Iraq three times, Afghanistan, Lebanon and the Balkans is a hero.  The men and women of Navy EOD who I served with from 2006-2008 have paid dearly in combating IEDs and other explosive devices used against us in Iraq and Afghanistan are heroes too.  There is no routine mission for EOD technicians.  Then there are the friends that I serve with in Navy Medicine, medical professionals who care for our Sailors, Marines, Soldiers and Airmen, family members and veterans at home and in the thick of the fighting in Afghanistan.

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There are many from my time in Navy Medicine who have meant so much to me. Chaplain Jeff Seiler, an Episcopal Priest at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth and Father Fred Elkin, a retired Navy Chaplain who served there helped keep me together during the darkest time of my life after Iraq, as did many of the physicians and nurses that I worked with there, and many of them were not Christians, but they helped and cared for me. That continued at Naval Hospital Camp LeJeune, where I served as Director of Pastoral Care. At Lejeune I was fortunate to serve with Duke Quarles, a civilian pastoral counselor and retired Navy Chaplain. Duke was a rock for me there, as was Command Master Chief Ed Marino, one of the most spiritual and kind people that I know.

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I now serve in a wonderful place, the Joint Forces Staff College. I am surrounded by great people here, from all the services of our armed forces, active duty and retired. I get to do wonderful things, and despite having gone through absolute hell dealing with the military mental health system this year, these folks have stood by me, especially Commander Lisa Rose, our staff nurse. She is a highly skilled nurse and a courageous woman. For eighteen years of her career she served always wondering if someone was going to try to persecute, prosecute or try to run her out the Navy because she is a lesbian. For years she could not take her spouse to official functions, she could not even take a chance on being seen in public by someone with her spouse, even under “don’t ask don’t tell.” She is now able to do that, but truthfully I cannot imagine what it would be like to want to serve your country, your shipmates and your God, while always knowing that anyone could end that simply because they didn’t approve. I am glad that Lisa and my other gay and lesbian friends in the military are able to openly serve.

There are others who I have served alongside who have died while in the service of the country, or after their service had ended. Some, like Staff Sergeant Ergin Osman who I served with at 3rd Battalion 8th Marines, were killed in Afghanistan, others like Commander Marsha Handley, a nurse I served with in the ICU at Portsmouth, who was one of the people who helped hold me together when I was so fragile, died of complications of chemotherapy treatment. Damage Control Specialist 2nd Class Ray Krolikowski, who I served with aboard USS Hue City died yesterday eleven years after suffering an injury that left him a quadriplegic in 2003, and some like Captain Tom Sitsch who was my last Commodore at EOD Group Two, and Father Dennis Rocheford died by their own hand after being tormented by the demons of PTSD and TBI. Both of them were real heroes. I could mention so many more, but will end there because I am getting a bit emotional.

There is a closing thought from the television mini-series Band of Brothers which kind of sums up how I feel. The American troops who have fought so long and hard are watching a German general address his troops after the German surrender. An American soldier of German-Jewish descent translates for his comrades the words spoken by the German commander, and it as if the German is speaking for each of them as well.

Men, it’s been a long war, it’s been a tough war. You’ve fought bravely, proudly for your country. You’re a special group. You’ve found in one another a bond that exists only in combat, among brothers. You’ve shared foxholes, held each other in dire moments. You’ve seen death and suffered together. I’m proud to have served with each and every one of you. You all deserve long and happy lives in peace.

So for me, I have a bond, a special bond with so many of my brothers and sisters who volunteer to serve. Today we number less than one percent of the nation, a tiny number of people in comparison to the size of our nation and the commitments that our leaders have engaged us.

Unless by some chance I am selected for Captain, I plan to retire from the Navy at the end of this assignment. As Sergeant Murtaugh (Danny Glover) said in the movie Lethal Weapon “I’m getting too old for this shit.” The military is a young person’s game, and I am now older than almost everyone on active duty, and have been in the military longer than almost everyone that I know, including many people senior in rank to me. I am a dinosaur, and sometimes a cranky one at that when it comes to dealing with the bureaucracy of the military.

I give thanks for all them men that I mention in this post, especially my dad. For the countless others that are not mentioned by name please know that I thank God for all of you too. Someone once said “A ‘Special Day’ once a year creates an excuse for neglect on the other 365 days for mothers, fathers & veterans” Please do not let that continue to happen, please do not just look at this as time off, or if you are a corporation or retailer use this day to boost your sales by acting like you care.

I do hope that people will remember the Veterans that impacted their lives this and every day. Some may have been the men and women that we served with, perhaps a parent, sibling or other relative, maybe a childhood friend, a teacher, coach or neighbor. As we pause for a moment this Friday let us honor those who gave their lives in the defense of liberty in all of the wars of our nation. They have earned it and please thank any veteran that you know in some small way this weekend.

Peace

Padre Steve+

 

 

 

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October 23, 2014 · 23:59

The Anger of Moral Injury

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“I think, when one has been angry for a very long time, one gets used to it. And it becomes comfortable like…like old leather. And finally… it becomes so familiar that one can’t remember feeling any other way.” Jean Luc Picard, Star Trek the Next Generation, The Wounded

When I returned from Iraq in 2008 I was angry, Angry at at the trinity of evil, the politicians, pundits and preachers of the political right who I had believed, followed and trusted during the previous decades. That anger diffused itself so it was  not an all the time kind of thing but it remained, while I tried to believe that I was different then them, even though I no longer agreed with them I was just as angry as the most foul talk radio host, pundit or politician.

Jesus told us to “be angry and sin not.” Truthfully I haven’t figured out how to do that, the anger I have has become a part of me, and I really don’t like it.

My anger I believe is valid because those people betrayed not just me, but so many others in the drive to an unjust, illegal and immoral war against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. A war that cost the lives of far too many Americans, not to mention our allies and the Iraqis, a war that hurt this country economically, strategically, militarily and helped build up the radicalized Islamists who had attacked us on 9-11-2001. The war was one of the most bungled, inept and disastrous moves ever launched by a political administration, despite the brave sacrifice and even battlefield successes of our troops. When I came home I found that some of the people who I had trusted in the Chaplain Corps, really didn’t care about me, just what I could do for them now, past service, sacrifice or experience be damned. I felt betrayed, that betrayal is is something that is part of what is called “moral injury.”

I was able to convince myself that even if I disagreed with them and occasionally got angry that it was not that much a part of me. But the anger remained, compounded by the very real symptoms of PTSD I always notice the comments, the lies, the and the invective spewed by these apostles of hate. I would hear them, watch them, and read what they said and the anger continued to build, and at times in absolute frustration, pain and just wanting to strike out in any way I could I occasionally launched into very angry blogs and social media posts, posts that when I read them later, or had someone point them out were embarrassing to read.

Those posts might have been justified based on how I felt, but they were not good. I am sure that I lost some friends because of them, but in some cases I still don’t feel too bad, because some of those “friends” only liked me if I agreed with them. Since I have many real friends that span the political, economic and religious spectrum, men and women that often hold radically different views than me I know that my ideology does not consume me.

What consumes me is anger at those that don’t care. those who would use me and others for their own ends and then be the first to throw us under the bus.

A couple of days ago one of those idiot, pompous and hate filled men that populate the right wing radio airwaves. a man named Michael Savage called Veterans with PTSD weak crybabies and that with such soldiers that it was no wonder ISIS was beating us. If you want to read his remarks the link is here. Coming from a man who has made his money off of those in the military, the wounded that he so savagely mocks, who has never served in uniform or put himself in harm’s way for the country does anger me.

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/10/21/michael-savages-disgusting-rant-ptsd-and-depres/201248

When I saw it, all of the anger, all of the pain, and yes, even the hatred burst forth. On a social media network I commented that I Savage deserved to be taken out and shot and made some other unseemly remarks. Was my anger okay? Yes. Was I factual about things that he was saying and doing in what I wrote? Yes. But did my outburst made me look like as much of a hateful ass as Savage. 

A friend, a fellow combat vet and senior NCO sent me a note about it. One thing that he said cut me to the bone because he was absolutely right. He was not defending Savage at all, but he said that he didn’t like to see me, a friend that he respected “spewing hate.”  When I thought about it overnight I realized that he was right and thanked him.

Now do I care that some people think I’m an ass or disagree with my positions on various issues? Not at all, in fact there are times that admittedly I try to provoke a response just to thin out the ranks of the haters. But this went beyond that. I was wishing someone dead, but as much as I may disagree with a person, as much as I may hate everything that they stand for, as much as I think my anger is justified, saying that the man “should be taken out and shot” is inexcusable. It is no different than the very things that Savage and others like him say all the time, three hours a day five days a week.

My anger at such people and their continued lies, deceit, self justification and hatred has become comfortable as comfortable as “old leather” as Jean Luc Picard so eloquently stated. The episode of Star Trek the Next Generation episode where he said it is one that always makes me think. During the episode, the transporter Chief, Chief O’Brien tells a Cardassian officer, a representative of a still distrusted recent enemy something that was reminded of when my friend mentioned me “spewing hate” at Savage.

O’Brien told the Cardassian “It’s not you I hate, Cardassian. I hate what I became because of you.” 

So I still have to work through this, but once again I think that the writers of Star Trek the Next Generation have helped enlighten me about what is going on in my life. After loyally trusting and following the politicians, pundits and preachers of the right I realize that I hate what I have become because of them.

So I’ll get ready to sign off. I only had a couple of hours of sleep last night and I have been up a long time as I flew to California today.

Until tomorrow,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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October 15, 2014 · 00:46

The Wounded: How War Changes People but Unites Them

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A couple of days ago I wrote about an encounter that I had with another officer who I had an encounter with last week. I noted that the officer in question had said that he wanted to talk with me and my own prejudices and suspicions regarding his words.

That officer came to me today, and while I cannot entirely subscribe to his theological framing of his position; I have to say that our time together was a blessing and most likely a chance for healing for both of us. The man was not sone sort of ideological or religious extremist by any sense of the imagination. His version of orthodoxy was different than mine, but like me, was a man who idealized the faith that he had in his service and superiors, and had been betrayed by them.  In his case he was betrayed by men who most people could never imagine to be unworthy of that trust.  If I had I not known the men that had betrayed him, I would not have understood what he said to me last Friday.

His comments about not being at our school to learn what we were teaching, I understood when I listened to him and what he had experienced. His faith in God, as unlearned and simple as it was to me was instrumental in saving his life. Even if I disagree with his underlying theology, I cannot abandon a man who in his life, faith and service done all that he can to honor God, his fellow human beings and his country.

Our encounter last week was one where I assumed that he was a religious ideologue, which was not the case. Yes he is a man of faith who could be considered religious even a fundamentalist, but not  a man driven by religious or political ideology. Instead, like me, he is a man wounded during his service and trying to make sense of the betrayal by people that he assumed were his brothers, men that he idealized who in the end betrayed him.

Maybe that is the most difficult issue faced by those who have returned from war but struggle with where they fit in life, their profession and in their relationships.

Pray for all of us,

Peace

Padre Steve+

 

 

 

 

 

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October 12, 2014 · 15:09

Religious Monsters

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Yesterday I wrote about an experience with a Christian who decided hat his purpose as a military officer was not to learn the craft of his trade but rather to “do the Father’s will” which in his case was to tell me that my faith and experience as a Christian suffering from PTSD was, in one word “garbage.”

To say the least I am offended, but not by God, or Jesus, or the words of Scripture, but rather a religious monster created by an aberrant and heretical brand of the Christian faith that is being sold as absolute truth by Christian Fundamentalist extremists in our country.

The problem is those that become “religious monsters” rarely realize that they are such. Instead they are the salt of the earth, simply proclaiming “the truth” and heaven help you if you don’t agree with them. Holocaust survivor and Italian philosopher Primo Levi wrote:

“Monsters exist, but they are too few in numbers to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are…the functionaries ready to believe and act without asking questions.”

Levi was right, but at the same time he was wrong. Sometimes these monsters are the same people that end up being the functionaries who are ready to believe and act without asking questions.

Sadly, there are many leaders of the political-religious movement loosely defined as the “Religious Right” in the United States who preach a “gospel” of hate and intolerance that demonizes anyone that dares to interfere with their message. Sadly this doesn’t just extend to their politics, but also to the basics of the Christian life of which many of these leaders seem ignorant.

Personally I believe that the virtue of living a good Christian life might be equated with living a good life regardless of one’s religious or secular beliefs. The call to “love God and to love your neighbor” is universal.  It has been my experience that even people that chose not to believe in God, subscribe to the principle of loving or at least respecting one’s neighbor.

I grew up from High School to adulthood in the Christian Right. I know the politics, I know the language and I know the hypocrisy and intolerance. What happened last week, something that I did not plan but was forced on me by one of these fanatical and ignorant “true believers”
 has hardened my resolve as a Christian to oppose these American “Christian” versions of the Taliban, Al Qaeda or the Islamic State at every turn.

I have to, because most people, including many moderate and progressive Christians look the other way and do not confront these monsters. People don’t want to believe that good religious people can harbor thoughts of evil, demean, or actually harm others.

But all too often that is the case and we have to call them what they are; not saints, but monsters who use their “faith” to demean, dehumanize and destroy anyone that does not agree with them, even if they are ignorant and unlearned about what they are criticizing in others.

The terrible thing is that most of these “monsters” are actually decent people who really do not understand the implications of what they are doing or the “faith” they are championing. They are basically good neighbors who want to do right and believe that they are doing so. Their leaders on the other hand often manipulate such people into believing that in thinking and even promoting evil, they are doing right.

Thus otherwise good people become unquestioning servants of the real monsters, religious and political leaders that distort the Christian faith and use it to bludgeon those that they hate in the political and judicial process.

The leaders of the Religious Right are a malignancy that will kill any authentic expression of the Christian faith if they have the chance. Their goal is no different than to what the leaders of the Islamic State aspire, but they wear better clothes and appear to be more socially respectable, if only because they are not yet allowed under American law to chop the heads off the people that they oppose. Knowing the history of Christians who controlled the state in past generations, I know that these people only await the chance to do this. It has happened all too often for any of us not to believe that it couldn’t happen again.

That my friends may sound harsh, but it is all too true. Hannah Arendt spoke of the banality of evil by which she meant the people who just went along with evil without really thinking about or understanding the consequences of their actions which they in their hearts believe are right because their religion or ideology says so. But all too often, the people who absorb and adopt these views, who become “the willing executioners” of the policies of those that promote them are just as guilty, and just as responsible for their actions as if they had thought of them on their own.

In the movie Judgement at Nuremberg Spencer Tracy playing the presiding judge made a most interesting and provocative comment. He said:

But this trial has shown that under a national crisis, ordinary – even able and extraordinary – men can delude themselves into the commission of crimes so vast and heinous that they beggar the imagination. No one who has sat through the trial can ever forget them: men sterilized because of political belief; a mockery made of friendship and faith; the murder of children. How easily it can happen. There are those in our own country too who today speak of the “protection of country” – of ‘survival’. A decision must be made in the life of every nation at the very moment when the grasp of the enemy is at its throat. Then, it seems that the only way to survive is to use the means of the enemy, to rest survival upon what is expedient – to look the other way. Well, the answer to that is ‘survival as what’? A country isn’t a rock. It’s not an extension of one’s self. It’s what it stands for. It’s what it stands for when standing for something is the most difficult! Before the people of the world, let it now be noted that here, in our decision, this is what we stand for: justice, truth, and the value of a single human being.”

I choose to stand for Justice, truth and the value of a single human being over the doctrine of those that will use faith to depreciate, devalue and dehumanize those that they feel have departed from the truth.

With that, I go back to my beer and on the game two of the National League Championship Series where I hope that my San Francisco Giants will win.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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