Department of the Army. (1964, Aug.) Department of the Army Field Manual, FM 16-5. The Chaplain. Washington, D.C.: Headquarters, Department of the Army.
This is, basically, the chaplain's field manual. I tried to find more recent ones, but this is all I could find, with the limited resources available to me. Remember, though, that I only need it for 1987-1989. I'm not sure how often they update their manuals.
Here are the chapter titles:
I. Introduction
2. Relationships of Chaplains
3. The Chaplain Program
4. The Installation of Chaplain
5. The Chaplain in Special Assignments
6. The Conus Army Chaplain
7. The Chaplain in the U.S. Army Air Defense Command
8. The Chaplain in the Combat Zone
9. The Chaplain in the Communications Zone
10. The Theater Army Chaplain
11. The U.S. Army Combat Development Command Chaplain
!2. The U.S. Army Materiel Command Chaplain
13. The USCONARC staff chaplain [It's in lower case like that]
14. THE CHIEF OF CHAPLAINS [It's in all-caps like that]
Now we're not necessarily going to cover all of these because the whole point of this exercise is to discuss issues pertinent to my life, so I'm particularly interested in trying to understand things that might relate provide useful background related to the chaplains at the Vienna mission. Some of the discussion might not directly mention them, but in the back of my mind I'm thinking about them and there are some connections being made, but maybe I'm not sure yet about something so I'm just putting feelers out.
The church state issues is something that the Vienna mission already knows not everyone would agree to, but the main churches and supporters it has don't care and it knows it, so it doesn't care about that issue too much. I'm pretty sure about that. But it's an issue, nonetheless and could be fodder for bad publicity.
Well, let's just start and see what this Field manual says.
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Chapter 1 Introduction"2. Responsibility for the Religious Program
... The chaplain is a member of the special staff and acts as adviser and consultant to the commander in all matters related to religion, morals, and morale as affected by religion in the command. The chaplain assists the commander and his staff to integrate the principles of good moral conduct and citizenship into the training program and the total life of the command (AR 600-30)."
Did you catch that? The chaplain basically helps keep the soldiers in line! He provides the moral end of things, whereas the commander would just give the old kick in the boot, right? The commander is probably not going to be as likely to have a nice little chat with someone who needs bringing in line, right? No, that's where the chaplain comes in to play. So that's a completely different role that what we've been seeing in the other articles we read. The first half of the paragraph is more like what we've been reading.
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"3. Status and Mission
... He represents religion which teaches fortitude, reverence and justice as well as kindness, sympathy, and humility." (p. 1)
You've got to be kidding me! Since when does the Army go around telling religions what they teach?! Hey, you Baptists - yeah, you - you teach fortitude, reverence.... and you, Conservative Jews, you too... C'mon, people! First of all shouldn't we double check in our holy books and/or our spiritual leaders, the Pope or whoever? Somehow I don't think the Army ranks quite up there with the Bible or the Pope.
They are supposed to be letting the denominations tell the chaplains what to teach and how to lead their flocks. And my understanding from a Christian Protestant viewpoint is that the fruit of the spirit goes more like this love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance (Gal. 5:22-23). I don't particularly care whether the Army likes it or not, that's that they are and they can't go trying to change them or replacing what values are taught just to suit their interests.
So the chaplain becomes a nanny for the Army raising up children according to the Army's image.
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Same paragraph..."The mission of the chaplain is to promote religion and morality in the Army and to minister to the spiritual and moral needs of military personnel, their dependents, and authorized civilians." (p. 1.)
Okay, to promote religion is clear, but how do they promote morality? Maybe they try to get the soldiers to drink less or offer clean entertainment or something. I guess this is okay. I can't see anything too out of the ordinary here..
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The next section is going to entail a lot of discussion and I want to break now, so we'll have to pick it up on the next post. This should be an interesting book though.