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The next quote is still from Chapter 4, "The Installation Chaplain," but now is from Section III, "The Operating Program."68. "Programing and Budgeting"
"a. General
(1) The chaplain program operates within the framework of the army program system (AR 1-11-FY, AR11-45, AR 11-46, AR 37-1). The post or installation is normally the unit for which program goals are established....
(2) The chaplain activity is further subdivided into the following activity accounts: religious serves; religious education; pastoral activities; and character instruction." (p. 22-23)
(1) goes on to describe where the installation chaplain falls in the usual accounts, under "Operation and Maintenance Facilities," along with "the special services activities" and "the command information activities."
I was primarily just focusing on (2) as to the breakdown, at least fiscally, of the chaplain's duties. So, fiscally at least, it looks like they have 3 chaplain/denominational/items and 1 Army item. Of course, you'd want to see the fiscal breakdown of it too - how much money was allocated to each. It's nice that they have three and one, but they could still have a very lop-sided budget in the Army's favor. We don't know this, though, one way or the other, so we have to withhold a judgement here and just say that it's interesting or even just potentially interesting.
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On to Chapter 5 "The Chaplain in Special Assignments," Section I. "Personnel Center."
"74. The Reception Center (AR 612-10)
A reception center is a place where newly inducted personnel and recruits are examined, classified, equipped, immunized, and assigned. The reception center is often the first contact which men coming directly from civilian life have with the Army. Normally, an inductee will not remain in the reception center longer than three or four days. The chaplain's program at a reception center usually includes...
a. Orientation and Interview...
b. Religious Services...
c. Counseling. Sometime, [sic] men passing through a reception center have problems attendant upon their separation from home. The chaplain will be on the lookout for such men and go out of his way to furnish gidance. The chaplain will make it clear that they are welcome to come to him and will counsel them as best he can in the short time he has with them concerning the ultimate adjustment of their situation.
d. Pastoral Care of Cadre..." (p. 27; the words not italicized here were italicized in the original)
I included the titles of all four major areas of responsibility just so you'd have an idea of the scope of what the chaplain did there. (I don't know if this is still accurate for now, but I'm just interested in the lated 1980s anyway.)
This really is a great text, the counseling part in particular, because it comes very close to what I was dealing with in Vienna. So this homesickness (which is basicly what the chaplain was supposed to look for, right?) starts to nudge in the direction of culture shock, and if the reception center is in Germany (where the U.S. had a lot of bases during the Cold War) then you maybe could even call it culture shock. So it's very possible that the chaplain/H.R. director (and his assistant, also a reserve chaplain) had served in this capacity as a chaplain or if not in this capacity exactly maybe in one similar to it. I think I might be getting warm here.
The thing is that in the Army they can use more or less coercion to get someone to change - it's maybe a case of "killing me softly" where those qualities that are unsatisfactory to the Army have to go, and the chaplain is part of the conspiracy to get this done, although the unsuspecting newbie might naively instinctively trust him, falling for his honey-sweet trap. But no matter how you look at it, the chaplain is still part of the establishment and still supports the same kinds of qualities the rest of the establishment does.
That's rather an overly mean view of the chaplain for this text, but the other texts we've looked at do show the chaplain doing all these character guidance instruction for the Army.
Here, the new recruit is actually trapped because he did sign the papers to commit him to a term of so many years, however many he signed up for. So the chaplain is helping him make it over the first hump if he's having a problem.
But if the Vienna mission chaplains thought they could use this kind of thing on me they were way off base because I didn't want to return home at all. I wasn't homesick by a long shot. This was so off base for me. I did not feel a separation from home. In fact even as a child I don't remember having a problem going to camp and being homesick. And I'd been in Europe already twice before for five months or more not that long prior and never felt anything like what paragraph c. describes. So if the Vienna mission chaplains looked at me as they did as these Personnel Center entrants they made a big mistake. And in making that mistake they lost me for good.
But the thing is that if they did have experience with that kind of thing, how could they make that big of a mistake with me? How could they get it so wrong? Or did they do it on purpose? So either they really messed up and they didn't know what they were doing, as in they made a horribly bad professional error, or they did it on purpose - they knew they were wrong, that I didn't have culture shock, but that's what they told me. But why would they make all those arrangements and do what they did?
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Section IV. "The Training Center"89. "Training Responsibilities"
...
"c. Character guidance is prescribed for all basic trainees. The chaplain should be well prepared and present his material effectively. The chaplain's instruction in character guidance should be a high point in the training program." (p. 33)
One of the main problems, if not THE main problem, I had with the mission in Vienna was how it looked to me like it was using the world's ways or tools. Well, in the military chaplaincy you have a situation where they are unequally yoked, and I think discussion comes up about this in some of the articles later, if I remember correctly. So the chaplains themselves also struggle with it, but nevertheless they have to live with it one way or another because that's the nature of their work. And it appears that the Vienna mission brought in people with that kind of background too and just maybe a few bad apples spoiled the bunch, and maybe there were some on the Board too.
So, really, when it comes down to it, the Vienna mission had to surreptitiously teach things that military chaplains had the luxury, if you will, of being able to teach openly. But these were not things that were denominational, but rather Army-instigated. Only in the Vienna mission, the Army wasn't required to instigate these kinds of things. They just voluntarily mandated them all on their own: character guidance for the sake of mission security. Only they might not come out and say that in so many words.
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We're done with this chapter, so I'll end here.