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This next article is:
Ellens, Jay H. (1984, Spring). Preparation for combat: emotional and spiritual. Military Chaplains' Review, 13(2), 29-39.
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"[T]he sick notion that has become common coinage in our society of late, namely, that independence is the ideal achievement of real humanness and healthy personhood, fails radically in understanding two crucial facts. First, independence is as psychopathological as depencency is in personality development... Second, the alienated individualism of American society today is a product of the strong emphasis upon radical independence as the ideal destiny of real persons. The most tragit result of that alienation is the loss of philosophical and ethical consensus in America." (p. 32)There's a lot to respond to here, and I'll try to break it apart and take the individual bits separately.
First of all, I don't think it's so new in America. I think it was part of the independent spirit that drove Americans to head out to look for new land, that drew people to leave their original countries (if they're not indigenous). Of course, there was a lot of banding together, but there was a lot of needing to be self-reliant and that sort of thing. Then, of course, the sixties came with their rebelliousness and all. But I did a study, in fact it's in my first refereed journal article where I cite that the USA rates so high on the scale for valuing independence in contrast to countries on the other end of the scale that value interdepence, like, say, Japan. There are other scales, but that's the relevant one, and that one we rate particularly way off on one end on, extremely on one end. So I don't think that something so new, really.
The other thing is that I agree that it's not necessarily ideal to be so independent, but this is one time where I hedge a bit because I don't think there's a one size fits all answer here. As far as Scripturally, the Church should be somewhat more interedependent, but I don't know that it absolutely has to be a commune, that is, interdependent to that level. Churches in America are weak in this I think, though, for the most part. There are exceptions, of course. I'm not going to go into all the Scripture passages, but all the "one another" verses are a good place to start (e.g., pray for one another, rebuke one another, kiss one another with a holy kiss, etc.)
Then to say that independence is psychopathological is wild. Where did he get that idea? I suppose there may be specific situations where that is true or not, but to make such a blanket statement is, in my view, totally uncalled for. I've lived in cultures that prefer individualism and been in situations where it was needed, but I've also lived in cultures where interdependence was the norm or situations where that was more called for. The thing is that I don't think that either independence or interdependence in and of themselves are an end all. The issue is: Who are you going to be interdependent on/with? or Who are you going to be independent from? If I'm a Christian and I say I'm going to be interdependent with people at the local bar because that's the only place I can make friends, how's that going to look? Is that a good decision? Do you see what I mean? So to say being interdependent is so great is silly, because you have to say interdependent with whom or what.
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"There are four areas in which thorough preparation of chaplains and soldiers is necessary to insure psycho-spiritual durability and pastoral effectiveness in combat. They are spiritual, theological, ethical, and psychological preparedness." (p. 33)So these are some of the areas that the military chaplains/H.R. staff at the Vienna mission might have had in their chaplain roles. Again, you must remember that when I got these articles the military chaplain ones were especially regarding those two men.
"Secondly, spiritual preparedness... His preparation should include the development of theological worldview which affords meaning to human suffering, inhumaneness, and irrationality, in a way, that neither jeopardizes the integrity of God's grace nor blames the suffering humans by assigning a cause and effect relationship between their guilt and their pain." (p. 34)
"Ethical preparedness... This sense of ethical preparedness must include the conviction that, wherever there are people in suffering and need, chaplains are under ethical imperative to serve them, even if the general does not seem altogether ethical." (p. 34)
"In all of that, of course, the professional preparation of chaplains as well as of soldiers is crucial. To maintain security, self-esteem, self-confidence, and profienciency in work or ministry under extreme conditions requires that professional skills become second nature." (p. 35)
I wonder if they had more ethics in their service in the military even than they did in their work in the Vienna mission? It sounds like it more and more as I read these articles. It's like maybe they did pick up some things from their military background but then they perverted it all when they came to the mission. Well, maybe they didn't pervert everything, but a significant amount of it.
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"Rationale
The Just War Theory is no longer as well received as it once was. Wars do not fit such neat philosophical categories as they once did.
... I hear the argument for the Just War Theory still promoted in military circles on occasion, but I doubt that anyone really sees this as an adequate source of spiritual, theological, ethical, and psychological grounding for pastors and soldiers to find or give meaning to war's brutishness and beastiality anymore.
War is always immoral, but it may be the lesser of two or more evils... Since there shall be wars and rumors of wars, what shall we do with them in godliness?
That is the pastoral question, the ultimate pastoral issue for chaplains caring for soldiers in the hell of war or potential war. That is the question with which the chaplain must struggle in peaceful times so that he will be prepared to devote his energies wholeheartedly to ministry in a just war (if there ever be such a thing) or in an unjust war, so long as there are needy men and women down in the mud, wrestling with the beastiality and inhumanity war inevitably brings." (p. 36-37)
I don't think the Just War Theory is dead yet, and we have seen that it is alive and kicking still, but the author here does have a valid point, I think, that there certainly are limits to it any more. Wherever war includes non-national terrorist groups (like war against the Taliban instead of war against a country) or where a country has and uses or might use or threatens to use biological or nuclear weapons, the Just War Theory really can't apply, because right there you're looking at breaking it. Disregard for loss of civilian casualties and structures is another issue. The U.S. if often guilty on that one, which is a major reason we don't want to join the World Court. Heaven forbid anyone would hold us accountable for any of our reckless causing of loss of civilian lives.
As to the question chaplains must answer... Well, I guess that is the penultimate question for them. I audited a college class taught by a Romanian pastor in exile and the class was on the theology of suffering. They had developed a whole theology on suffering. So I guess chaplains have to deal with that question. I would rather be on the end of things trying to avoid wars and killing. But that's our society; it's how we deal with medicine too. Instead of getting preventive medicine we instead wait till we have to have an operation. And that's when the insurance will be more likely to pay for it too.
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"ConclusionHe's talking about bringing spiritual life and values and ethics to soldier and to the battlefield when there is a war. I have the full text here, otherwise I was thinking something else. So it's a call to raise up mature Christians who will be prepared spiritually and morally if need be for the ravages of war.
Who is up to such a task? Let us leave off the old and tired rationale of Just War Theories and chaplains as rescuers, staff workers, or merely parish priests. Let us become Kingdom builders. Where beginnings have already been made, let us continue. Let us convert our soldiers to the method, motivation and meaning under which even war can be an act of constructing the spiritual and cultural edifice of God's Kingdom on earth, an act of civilization for preservation of justice, cultural idealism, spiritual decorum, and tenderness for fractured and war weary humanity." (p. 39)
I must admit that I can see the military chaplain/H.R. director of the Vienna mission doing this kind of thing. I also think he was probably a good pastor. It's hard to understand what happened to him though that he should do what he did to me, although I don't for a second believe he was in it alone. I'm not even sure he is the main person. He just happened to be the one who met with me and because he had the military connection he was suspicious as far as connections with my dad are concerned.
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That's it for tonight.
