{"id":13831,"date":"2011-10-27T01:08:27","date_gmt":"2011-10-27T06:08:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/?p=13831"},"modified":"2011-10-27T01:08:27","modified_gmt":"2011-10-27T06:08:27","slug":"the-courage-of-us-military-chaplains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2011\/10\/27\/the-courage-of-us-military-chaplains\/","title":{"rendered":"The Courage of US Military Chaplains"},"content":{"rendered":"

The National Catholic Register ran a piece on military chaplains entitled “Profiles in Courage: Military Chaplains<\/a>,” documenting the roles and experiences of\u00a0Catholic chaplains in the US military.\u00a0 While it noted the typical shortage, it also highlighted a surge of new volunteers:<\/p>\n

The Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA reported a sharp jump this year in the number of seminarians interested in serving as military chaplains. As the 2011-2012 academic year begins, there are 31 military-affiliated seminarians nationwide, up from three just three years ago.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The article also profiled four military chaplains.<\/p>\n

Chaplain (LtCmdr) Karl-Albert Lindblad <\/strong>noted some unique differences between the civilian priesthood and military service:<\/p>\n

“We travel a lot, we can get shot at, and we\u2019re asked to live in small spaces.”<\/p>\n

Unlike a civilian priest, a military priest lives with his congregation: “It can be both exhilarating and challenging. While you\u2019re trying to be a role model and witness Christ to them, some days they see your worst side…”<\/p>\n

Being away from home six months or more at a time can be a burden, too. Those who are forced to kill others in battle approach him with moral concerns about their actions.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The article also highlights Chaplain (Col) Robert Bruno<\/strong>, currently serving at the US Air Force Academy.\u00a0 Chaplain Bruno has served for 31 years, for a simple reason:<\/p>\n

I fell in love with the ministry.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The ministry to the military sometimes takes a unique character — which Chaplain Bruno seems to have in spades.<\/p>\n

At 96 years old, Msgr. Jerome Sommer <\/strong>may be the oldest living military chaplain to have served in World War II.<\/p>\n

Father Clement Davenport <\/strong>spent his military years serving in Korea and Vietnam.\u00a0 Though advised to return to the safer areas in the rear, he refused, because he knew where chaplains belonged:<\/p>\n

He wanted to be on the front lines with the troops.<\/p>\n

He explained, \u201cThat\u2019s how we serve as priests. It\u2019s part of our nature. We have to go where the suffering and dying is.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Nicknamed “Father Lucky” for shrapnel that passed through his uniform (but not him),<\/p>\n

Father Davenport believes in the saying \u201cThere are no atheists in foxholes.\u201d Soldiers fighting and dying were often receptive to his ministry; some wore rosaries he had given them around their necks into battle.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Military chaplains truly serve an important and irreplaceable role in the US military.<\/p>\n

Via ArmyChaplaincy.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The National Catholic Register ran a piece on military chaplains entitled “Profiles in Courage: Military Chaplains,” documenting the roles and experiences of\u00a0Catholic chaplains in the US military.\u00a0 While it noted the typical shortage, it also highlighted a surge of new volunteers: The Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA reported a sharp jump this year in the number of seminarians interested […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[88,20,54,5284,2375,2374,2373,2,1945,10,171,1274,123],"class_list":["post-13831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chaplain","tag-army","tag-atheism","tag-catholic","tag-chaplain","tag-clement-davenport","tag-jerome-sommer","tag-karl-albert-lindblad","tag-military","tag-no-atheists-in-foxholes","tag-religion","tag-religious-freedom","tag-robert-bruno","tag-world-war-ii"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13831\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}