Memorial Day Reading

As I sit at home after a long bike ride watching Taking Chance, I thought it would be great to compile a short list of some great things to read on this day when we honor those who gave their full measure of devotion to the cause of their brothers and sisters in arms.

This first one is from Faith and Leadership at Duke Divinity and contains three articles written by Chaplain Mel Baars and two by myself regarding veterans issues and dealing with tragedy in our midst. If you don't have time for them all, read Mel's as she's a much better writer than myself.

http://www.faithandleadership.com/features/articles/resources-for-memorial-day

The next is a great piece that was meant for Remembrance Day (our Veteran's Day). In England and other countries Armistice Day is a day to remember the fallen from the great wars.

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/11/armistice-day-the-forgotten-fields-of-flanders/66409/

And of course, the poem in Flanders Fields: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Flanders_Fields

Here is a reflection by a Jewish Rabbi at the dedication of a cemetery on Iwo Jima in 1945: http://chaplaincorps.navylive.dodlive.mil/2014/03/26/honoring-the-fallen-in-the-battle-of-iwo-jima-69-years-later/

I highly recommend watching President Regan's speech at the D-Day memorial in 1984: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEIqdcHbc8I

Finally, take an hour and a half and watch Taking Chance. It is a truly powerful depiction of how many people a fallen service member touches in his or her life and death.

One Year Later

This is a time of year when many people are recovering from their celebration of St Patrick last night. However, this time of year is one of reflection for me and many other Marines and Sailors who were with the Walking Dead in Hawthorne, NV.

Personally, I am grateful for not having any night vision goggles that night. If I had some I would have been down range following my Marines and would have been close enough to the blast that at a minimum I would have spent some time in the hospital. The individual with whom I ran the two previous day range events was seriously injured and I was always within arms reach of him.

I learned what secondary trauma looks and feels like. I wasn't on the hill, but I can tell you exactly what it looked like, what it smelled like and what happened in all of its tragic detail. I learned just how surreal it is to know the full story and less than 12 hours later seeing CNN leading the news talking about and making some crazy guesses about what happened.

I miss Josh, Billy, Ripp, Mason, Joshua, David and Rog. We all do. They were good men. Their families raised them right and were so gracious and loving towards us as we all grieved together at many funerals over the span of a week.

But, what I didn't expect was to find so much beauty in the midst of all that carnage. I saw bravery and heroism that we don't speak much of in peacetime and training. There are Marines and Sailors that are here who wouldn't have made it without the quick thinking of those on the scene and due to the amazing leadership and training of the Battalion Surgeon.

I saw communities pour out their hearts for their lost sons and welcome their brothers in arms as if we had grown up right alongside them. I saw people lining a highway for 50 miles to honor someone they never met, people pulling over to the side of the road just to nod to those of us in a long processional. I saw a funeral crowd for a Lance Corporal that surprised and briefly overwhelmed the staff at Arlington.

That night and the events that followed impacted me and made me a better chaplain, a better minister and a better person.

I leave you with the memorial remarks at the two memorial services; one at Bridgeport and one at Camp Lejeune.  

Shipboard Ash Wednesday

Many here may have arrived out of mere curiosity. Some have participated in this service for as long as they can remember. So why are we here on this Wednesday?

We come here in this place and time to mark ourselves in an overtly outer manner as Christians. This is the one time where we do this. Why do we mark ourselves in such a bold way when Jesus says, “beware of practicing your piety before others in order to be seen by them?” Does this practice violate what Jesus expects of us in the Sermon on the Mount?

I don’t think so, because of the motives involved in what we are doing here today. This isn’t in the same manner that the hypocrites of Jesus’ day showed off their fasting. This is only for one day, if that long, as most people will wash the ashes off at some point in the day. It will mark you as a believer in a world where believing isn’t always looked upon positively. It may mark you as odd, an outsider. It probably won’t bring you respect or fame. It may just end up getting you ridicule or weird looks.

But, it’s not to let the world know we are Christians. We are called to let the world know through our actions. It is placed on our foreheads as a reminder. We forget many things, for example that God is God and we are not. We forget we are sinners. We forget that we don’t really know what a fast is. We forget that we have tendencies that make us like the hypocrites in the Gospel passage from today. We forget that from dust we came and to dust we shall return. We need a physical mark that we feel as it is applied as our reminder.

In Jesus’ time, people would walk around in sackcloth (essentially a burlap sack) and put dust or ashes on their heads to show that they were either repenting from something or in mourning. And because they believed that sins could lead to suffering the two reasons for walking around with ashes on their bodies were very similar. They would let the world know they were turning away from something. They wanted to whole world to know their sins and pain.

But, Jesus came along and said that is not what God wanted. God wanted them to repent in a more private manner. If they are fasting they should put oil on their head and wash their face. The fast God chose is different from what humans choose when they fast. We want everyone to know we are fasting, Jesus proclaims that isn’t necessary because God already knows that you are fasting and the reason behind that fast.

So what is the fast that God chooses and what does that mean for us? God chooses a different kind of fast than we typically understand the word fast. We think it has to involve giving up something for the next 40 days. Actually, its more than 40 days because you get to break the fast every Sunday. We give up things like candy, meat, soda, caffeine, sweets, TV, facebook, etc. These things get so involved in our life that we think giving them up is so difficult that we offer that denial up to God as our fast during Lent. Others will take on extra duties and responsibilities as part of their Lenten discipline. Both of these are acceptable, but is that really what God chose as his fast?

In today’s reading, Isaiah speaks for God and describes the fast God chooses. It’s not what we might consider a fast by today’s standards and today’s culture. Isaiah asks if humbling yourself in sackcloth and ashes with your head down for the whole world to see is the fast God chooses. Because this fast only serves to make us have righteous justification for looking down on others who don’t do the same. Our fast should be lasting and mirror what God wants. That is why we mark ourselves to remember this fast.

Our fast should be one of destroying the bonds of injustice where we find them; lifting oppression anywhere we find it and setting people free. Sharing our bread with the hungry and bringing the homeless and poor into all aspects of our lives, including our homes. Clothing those who need basic articles of clothing. Isaiah says “if you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. You shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail.”

This fast is something that we can do as sailors. It’s hard to give up certain foods for 40 days while underway or working crazy hours. It’s hard to give up caffeine when coffee may be the only drink available. That kind of fast is setting you up for failure and the frustration that comes with it. It’s more like a New Year’s resolution rather than a spiritual discipline, which will change your life and mold you to be like Christ.

The fast God chooses is life changing, done in private and becomes natural. This fast lasts more than 40 days. This fast changes other people. This fast doesn’t require outward signs that you are fasting because when you participate in this fast, people can’t help but know that you are marked. These ashes remind us of this fast, the fast that God chose. The same fast that God asks you to choose today.

Remembering Guadalcanal

I’ve been out to sea for almost a month, so no real activity on the blog because not much noteworthy happens on an open ocean transit. But, sometimes an amazing opportunity presents itself.

One of the great things about this who Navy Chaplain gig is that I get to travel to some amazing places and am provided with opportunities that most pastors never consider possible. I was honored and humbled to participate in a remembrance service off the coast of Guadalcanal this past week.

The CO of the ship on which I am currently embarked received a note in his suggestion box regarding a family connection with a survivor of the Battle of Guadalcanal. The sailor briefly described how is grandfather was in the battle and the ship he was on sank in Savo Sound, commonly referred to as Iron Bottom Sound because there are 46 warships resting on the bottom following 6 months of battles. This sailor also wrote that it was a dream of his since joining the Navy to make it to that specific spot in the ocean.

On the same night the sailor placed the suggestion, he stopped me in the passageway and gave me a brief rundown of how excited he was that he may travel close to the site of his grandfather’s ship. The next morning, the CO mentioned the note and asked me if I would put together a short service in case we passed close by the wreckage of the USS LAFFEY. As luck would have it, we were not only traveling through Savo Sound to refuel in Guadalcanal, our track was close enough that we could alter course slightly and pass directly over the LAFFEY.

I worked with the sailor and developed a short remembrance service to honor all who perished in the Guadalcanal campaign. This sailor created a memorial of sorts by adding a weight to his Dixie Cup (that is the trademark white cover that enlisted sailors wear) that he could place in the water and have it rest close to the ship.

With everything set, about 40 of us gathered on the flight deck as we departed Guadalcanal and with both Guadalcanal and Savo Island in clear view we conducted a short ceremony. In addition, the sailor chose to re-enlist in the Navy in the same spot in which his grandfather survived a major naval battle and the sinking of his ship.

No matter how long I am a chaplain, I will always remember two things about this whole experience off Guadalcanal. The look on a sailor’s face when I told him that the CO wanted me to do a ceremony to honor his grandfather and fulfill a life long dream of that sailor. And, the fact that I was called upon by a ship to conduct a ceremony in some historic waters, somewhere I may never have the opportunity to set my sight upon again.

This is what being a chaplain is all about.

Sacramental Children

This weekend I had the pleasure of seeing two children participate in sacraments in ways that really show what theology means. On Friday I had the honor of baptizing a two-month old in the bell of one of my ships. This is a long Navy tradition and the baptism on Friday was the 6th in the short history of the USS Kidd. When his father handed him over to me, a complete stranger, he was upset and began to cry which is significant because every day we don't want to leave our comfort to follow Christ. The call on our lives is difficult and I think that deep down, when we baptize infants they understand what is happening in a way adults just tend to blow off. That water on their heads is shocking and causes many to cry out much like a two-month old did on Friday. I think that they also know that some people made a difficult promise on their behalf and they are none too happy about that. But something else happened on Friday. An infant accepted the water and calmed down as I walked him around to see his new family. He found a new comfort on the other side of discomfort, a lesson we could all learn from this particular child.

And this particular sacrament has meant something to a number of people as the photo below, taken by my fellow DESRON Chaplain is probably the most commented on photo I have ever posted on Facebook. It is a moment that many others have wanted to participate in from afar:

As if that wasn't a significant object lesson, on Sunday I saw something I have never seen nor imagined. The church I attended shared communion and they participate in a manner I haven't seen elsewhere in that they pass two plastic cups stacked together. The bread in the bottom cup and juice in the top cup. Well, as they were passing out the elements they missed a 4 year old girl and her father who were sitting in the pew in front of me. The first time an elder walked by the pew, the girl started to feverishly look around wondering when they were going to serve her and her father. As a second elder passed near she locked her eyes on him like tractor beams and was doing her best to will him to see her and serve them the elements. Unfortunately, he too passed the little girl and her father without skipping a beat.

Then, she burst into tears. It took me a second to realize that she was crying because they forgot to serve her communion. A four year old who was so distraught at the possibility of not partaking in communion that she was crying. How many adults view the importance of communion in such a manner that we will make a scene if we can't partake? Do we view it as something of significance rather than just a part of worship to get through quickly to get to lunch or home to watch the game? I have to admit, in that moment I felt wholly unworthy to partake. So I did what anyone should do when a four year old is schooling you in theology. I leaned forward and gave her the elements I had received. She wanted and needed it more than me. And through her I participated in one of the more memorable and truest communion meal I have ever had the privilege of partaking in.