How military chaplains are finding new ways to treat vets with invisible wounds

[Arcadiasix]

War is such a constant in the American experience that most of us are all too familiar with the evolving names we have given its emotional consequences in the past century: Shell shock, battle fatigue, operational exhaustion, and most recently, post-traumatic stress disorder.

But most Americans are less familiar with a related, if distinct, affliction known as moral injury, with roots in foundational religious or spiritual beliefs violated during war. And increasingly, military chaplains are on the front lines, tending to these misunderstood wounds.

Psychiatrists have used the term since the 1990s, but the concept has only recently been the subject of serious research by clinicians, some affiliated with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2015/04/10/how-military-chaplains-are-finding-new-ways-to-treat-vets-with-invisible-wounds/?postshare=1391428951883084

[NYC_SKP]

1. Recommended, kicked for visibility.

Thank you.

[riderinthestorm]

2. Don't need chaplains to know when one is violating the Golden Rule

“Nothing will be able to restore the life I took, or fix what did,” said TCU’s Brock, channeling the mind of someone suffering from moral injury. “But if I come to accept it — this is who I am — I can build life without letting this event define me. That’s a kind of forgiveness.”

THIS however sounds like a bullshit way to circumnavigate the most simple spiritual concept in every religion.

All this article does is try to help folks justify being monstrous while still being believers.

[jwirr]

4. So we (and I use we as meaning our government) send them to war and we are then supposed to

ignore one of the biggest problems they have? Guilt.

Every child grows up knowing that to kill is wrong - regardless if it is a religious child or not. Can you imagine what it was like in any of our modern wars to get to the country we are fighting in and realize that we should not have been there in the first place. I watch my uncle from the Korean War go through this and it has happened in all the other wars as well.

When you were drafted you had no choice so you could blame the government but since Vietnam we have had choices. People go for various reasons but they believe they are going to help in some situation the government says we have to deal with. Most of them get to know some of the people, talk with them, and finally realize that there is no reason to be there. That is when the moral injury starts. Every time they have to kill someone it eats at them because the little child inside still knows that killing is wrong.

They are doing more than violating the Golden Rule. They are violating their own belief system. They at the least need to be able to forgive themselves or they are not going to be able to live with the knowledge that they are lost. That they no longer have any foundation to stand on. Why do you think so many of them are committing suicide.

As to who can help. Well I can't imagine an officer taking the time to listen and then keeping it quiet. And one thing a chaplin has been trained to do is forgiveness. They have the time and the training why not them? Forgiveness is not justification. It is the realization that you have done something very wrong and that you now have to live with it. It is the struggle to learn how to live with it.

[riderinthestorm]

5. Co-dependent enablers are noble eh? How about we examine the base structure that ennobles war?

And ask our chaplains to work backwards from that?

But of course that's out of the paradigm. Vietnam is a long time ago and this article isn't addressing that. Its addressing NOW/

[jwirr]

6. Did you read the article? The article traces this back as far as the Illiad. What I think is that it

is governments that go to war and to blame the little guy is really sad. That is something we did in Vietnam as well. What ennobles war are politicians, historians, profiteers and Hollywood. Not chaplins.

[jwirr]

9. Hell no. Of course I see that. History is one thing but seeing what it does today is easy just

listen to the rw candidates.

However, I happen to know a bit about the chaplaincy program. One of my family was a chaplin in WWII. Most of them are from the old line churches not the rwers. and they are not out there lobbying for the damned wars. They are there because often the soldiers need someone to talk to. To remind the soldiers that at least for an hour or two they are still human. To serve the soldiers who do want to continue their faith. There are Christian, Jewish and Muslim chaplins.

Unlike the rest of you I believe the real war pushers are politicians, historians, profiteers (MIC) and Hollywood (media). I will add the modern rw churches to that mix. Between their massage of hate and their idiot end times theories war is to them the only alternative. And most Christian do not believe in this shit.

I will also remind you that the rw churches do not preach forgiveness - they preach hate. They would be of no help in the problem they are now calling moral injury. Plus no one forces anyone to go to a chaplin - or at least they did not until W and company - and they should not.

Anyone who thinks that it is the churches that push war is missing the real push. About a month ago there was a post that included a list of nations that build military weapons. I took one look at it and realized that we are never going to be without war. The economy of the world would totally fall apart. Just think for a moment about what our biggest exports are - weapons. Too big to fail.

[yortsed snacilbuper]

8. Hunting People For Jesus