I hope you will read this, but suspect many will simply keep scanning. It is a sad topic, and probably will not evoke the spirited commentary of writings on women priests, celibacy, the rights of gays, or newly discovered evidence of priestly abuse or associated cover-up. For the past several years, news accounts have noted the large number of deaths in the United States Military--not to enemy action, not even to so-called friendly fire, but to suicide. Michael O'Loughlin, who as a 20-something himself keeps us posted on what is important to his generation—through their own eyes—wrote about this topic last week. But considering the blog tallies and number of comments I am not sure how many readers simply passed over his words to read about some of the other topics that always seem to pique our interest or stimulate or our (easily evoked) righteous anger. So please let me offer a few thoughts on why this might be so—and then I will note some efforts being made in the profession of psychology to help prevent soldiers from killing themselves. I suspect many of you may disagree with my conjectures.
Sometimes I wonder if many in the church have written off the young people—and those who, being 30 or 40, are older—who serve in the military. Of course, whenever someone speaks of her or his opposition to war, a frequently-too-perfunctory statement is added, "Of course, I support the soldiers." How many parishes offer outreach or keep in mind their men and women who are serving in the military? I recall visiting one little parish in a small town years ago—there were gold stars on the ceiling, the "boys" who died in World War I. Congregants at Fordham's Rose Hill Chapel cannot fail to note the names of the Fordham alums who died in World War II. These names give even greater sobriety to the nearby Stations of the Cross. Are young soldiers today held in similar honor?
Is there denial, is there bias, is there a glossing over and sweeping-under-the-rug going on among many of the faithful about the reality of what it means to be a soldier today? Without a draft, are disadvantaged young people signing up for the military, not out of love for their country or the sake of righteousness, but for job training, temporary financial security, or a way out of a tough family or impoverished culture? Does our own view of the morality of current warfare make us deny their human suffering? Of the soldier suicides, I wonder how many are minority persons, persons from poor backgrounds, or simply those who didn't want to go or couldn't get into college, let alone a Jesuit school. One portrait of a soldier suicide from the New York Times brings this into focus:
FORT HOOD, Tex. — At 3:30 a.m. on a Saturday in August, Specialist Armando G. Aguilar Jr. found himself at the end of his short life. He was standing, drunk and weepy, in the parking lot of a Valero station outside Waco, Tex. He had jumped out of his moving pickup. There was a police officer talking to him in frantic tones. Specialist Aguilar held a pistol pointed at his head.
Specialist Armando G. Aguilar Jr. joined the Army partly to pay for music school.
This moment had been a long time coming, his family said. He had twice tried to commit suicide with pills since returning from a tough tour in Iraq a year earlier, where his job was to drive an armored vehicle to search for bombs.
Army doctors had put him on medications for depression, insomnia, nightmares and panic attacks. Specialist Aguilar was seeing an Army therapist every week. But he had been getting worse in the days before his death, his parents said, seeing shadowy figures that were not there, hallucinating that he heard loud noises outside his trailer home.
Specialist Aguilar is but one of too many soldiers—overseas and back in the United States—who have committed suicide. This month's issue of The American Psychologist is devoted to efforts by psychologists to help build resiliency in soldiers:
The last 25 years have witnessed a shift in the fields of psychology and mental health from a focus on the treatment of pathology after it arises to the development of positive skills and resources that contribute to resilience before serious problems develop (Peterson & Seligman, 2004). The Comprehensive Soldier Fitness (CSF) program in the U.S. Army represents one of the exciting applications of this approach to health and well-being. Comprehensive Soldier Fitness is understood as multidimensional, involving physical, emotional, social, familial, and spiritual domains. In this article, we examine the relevance of spiritual fitness to a comprehensive resilience program and then provide an overview of this new and innovative approach to human development in the Army. Before we turn to this discussion, however, it is important to consider the meanings of three key terms.
The meanings of the terms spirit and spirituality have evolved over the past few decades and are continuing to change (Zinnbauer, Pargament, & Scott, 1999). Though a consensus of meaning has yet to emerge, it is important to be clear about the ways in which the terms spirit and spirituality are being used in particular projects. Here, we are speaking about spirit, spirituality, and spiritual fitness in the human rather than theological sense. The spiritual fitness component of the CSF program is not based on a particular stance or position on the ontological truth or validity of philosophical, nonreligious, or religious frameworks of belief and practice. Department of Defense leaders are not in a privileged position to answer ontological questions about God's existence or the truth of religious claims. However, they can facilitate the search for truth, self-knowledge, purpose, and direction in life as group members define it. In this project, we define spirit as the essential core of the individual, the deepest part of the self, and one's evolving human essence. As Sweeney, Hannah, and Snider (2007) noted, “Human spirit is thoroughly manifested in who we are” (p. 26). But the human spirit is not synonymous with personal identity. It has a deeper dimension to it. Scholars often ascribe a number of sacred qualities to “spirit,” including ultimacy (what is true and of deepest significance), boundlessness (what is of lasting value), and transcendence (what is set apart from the ordinary) (Otto, 1917/1928; Tillich, 1952). The term spirit is also tied intimately to other higher order qualities, including purpose and meaning, enlightenment, authenticity, interconnectedness, and self-actualization. It is important to add that the human spirit is more than a set of fixed traits and characteristics; it is an animating impulse—a vital, motivating force that is directed to realizing higher order goals, dreams, and aspirations that grow out of the essential self (Sweeney et al., 2007). In this sense, the human spirit organizes people's lives and propels people forward. One military leader put it this way: “Our individual sense of who we are—our true, spiritual self—defines us. It creates our mindset, defines our values, determines our actions, and predicts our behavior” (Fairholm, cited in Snider, 2008, p. 14).
My own sense is that the people of the Church could be doing more to help individual soldiers who are or who have just recently served our country. Am I off base, out in left field, or to mix metaphors, on a different planet? I hope to hear your perceptions on this, especially if you can let us know about positive and constructive outreach efforts to help fellow Christians whose military service may have brought them to a psychological place known in the Beatitudes as being "poor in spirit."
William Van Ornum
This argument is also obnoxious in its implication that because war is evil all people serving in the military are somehow spiritually or morally lacking. Anyone who knows anyone who has actually served in combat are some of the most moral people you will likely find. Christ of course several times praised individual Romas centurians for their firm spriitual understanding.
The idea that military people are experiencing crisis of conscience for being in the military or their participating in warfare is not likely for most people. You need to try to remember that the current wars are not the first case of warefare in history. Warefare has been going on all over the earth for all times. But in all those expereince no documentation exist documenting some personal spriitual malise that would result in someone killing themselves.
This "spiritual analysis" just does explain the suicide of individuals in the military.
"An army of one" - "army strong" - these slogans focus on the heroic individualism and empowerment that attempt to reshape our nature into a type of "military superhumanism."
It is a complicated topic - one that our current culture is as at fault in as much as the military - but this deformation of human identity does lead to depression and suicide in many cases, I believe.
My answer above is that war is not unique to our age or country. No previous war identify a spriitual or moral deficit on the part of the people participating in the war that was not exist before the war was started. War does not cause military service members become evil or experience moral or spriitual deficits.
The idea that war corrupts the military personnel and lead to their taking their own life is false.
Christ represents universal love, rather than the love of tribe, so to speak, and it is his break in the cycle of violence that has disrrupted the power of cathartic acts of war and violence that allowed old structures (totalities of states) and power to survive. The mechanics of such power are exposed by Christ, so they no longer work.
Today, the only choice is either complete love or complete war - and since we have rejected the message of Christ - we will face escalating levels of violence (on a personal/psychological and global level) of complete war. (not the wars of old - but new decentralized limitless violence of terror and crime networks etc. - open source networks enable this proliferation)
Rene Girard (I keep plugging him on here ;) goes over this in his book on Clausewitz called "Battling to the End"
Perhaps this is the case in the "Old Testament," but in the actual Hebrew Bible... not so much! ;)
We must always remember that just because something is attributed to God in the Bible does mean that it is a fully accurate statement about God. As Pope Benedict reminded us just recently in his Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation VERBUM DOMINI, God did inspire the authors of scripture, but he allowed them to express the truth He had reveleaved to them in their own words, using the language and concepts they had available to them. (See #44)
Also relevant is what the pope says about the “the dark passages of the bible”:
42. In discussing the relationship between the Old and the New Testaments, the Synod also considered those passages in the Bible which, due to the violence and immorality they occasionally contain, prove obscure and dif?cult. Here it must be remembered ?rst and foremost that biblical revelation is deeply rooted in history. God’s plan is manifested progressively and it is accomplished slowly, in successive stages and despite human resistance. God chose a people and patiently worked to guide and educate them. Revelation is suited to the cultural and moral level of distant times and thus describes facts and customs, such as cheating and trickery, and acts of violence and massacre, without explicitly denouncing the immorality of such things. This can be explained by the historical context, yet it can cause the modern reader to be taken aback, especially if he or she fails to take account of the many “ dark ” deeds carried out down the centuries, and also in our own day. In the Old Testament, the preaching of the prophets vigorously challenged every kind of injustice and violence, whether collective or individual, and thus became God’s way of training his people in preparation for the Gospel. So it would be a mistake to neglect those passages of Scripture that strike us as problematic. Rather, we should be aware that the correct interpretation of these passages requires a degree of expertise, acquired through a training that interprets the texts in their historical-literary context and within the Christian perspective which has as its ultimate hermeneutical key “ the Gospel and the new commandment of Jesus Christ brought about in the paschal mystery ”.140 I encourage scholars and pastors to help all the faithful to approach these passages through an interpretation which enables their meaning to emerge in the light of the mystery of Christ.
I tell everyone, the second best decision I ever made was to join the Navy. The first, being marrying my wife and having a family. For myself and a lot of young men the military is a real growing up experience. You are part of a very active group of similar young men and expected to perform and you are exposed to some of the best men in our society. There are also some real jerks in the military but the excellent role models out number these by a large amount. By far the most impressive men I have ever met were in my relatively short time in the military and not in business, academia or other areas that I have been exposed to for much longer times. There is definitely stress as I said you are expected to perform and there are plenty of positive role models.
The Army is certainly different from the Navy but all the stories I have heard are similar in the growing up experience and stress to perform. Obviously carrying a gun and expecting to kill people is a lot more stressful than normal civilian life and my everyday life in the Navy.
Another occupation that is similar in stress also has a high rate of suicides, policemen. One thing in common between the two is that each carries a gun and has constant access to one. I heard a comment some time ago from a young person who was glad that his family did not have a gun in it. He didn't think he would be alive if it had.
Dr. van Ornum, I believe their is a concept in social psychology (from my graduate courses in it) that links a stimulus with an action in the sense that the stimulus triggers thoughts on using the stimulus that wouldn't be there if the stimulus was not present. In other words, the availability of a weapon or means of suicide may trigger thoughts in many of us that would not be there otherwise. So are there are possibly lots of people not in the military out there who would also take their life but do not have the constant stimulus or availability of the means.
400 suicides out of 1.1 million people represents about .04 percent of the military and certainly each is regrettable. The military should try to weed out those who might be susceptible to suicide. I certainly took a lot of psychological tests before I entered and during basic training. It would be interesting to see what percentage of the military thought it was a worthwhile experience and what percentage thought it was negative. For me it was extremely positive and one I always treasure. But I can see that for some it can be negative and for others just a waste of time.
These are the kinds of (mostly) young men that the Marines seek out. They are easily malleable, prone to overactive testosterone, and just the kind that will take orders no matter how futile or even stupid they may be.
Many Marines have been heroic above and beyond the call of duty and Marine history is full of their tales. Many Marines have also been turned into ant-social, blood thirsty men who cannot function adequately in a non-military society where choices have to be made.
With its large military presence, San Diego may be unique in the care and attention the citizens give to service members and their families. They are often honored at sports and entertainment events. I don't know if the diocese has any specific programs, but I believe that individual parishes, especially those in the communities having military installations, do reach out. A large number of their parishioners would be service members and families.
The local paper has a front page article today: Pentagon Battling Problem of Suicide in its Ranks" . .....The MC suicide rate had soared above all branches in 2009 and then plummetead 29 % last year. Exactly why is still unknown but Lt. Cmdr Andrew Martin, a clinical psychologistdd who is manager of the MC Suicide Prevention Program thinks it is because Marine attitudes are changing about seeking help for behavioral healthissues. Also, it is a sign of the maturation of prevention programs. Navy and Marine personnel in SD created one of the military's most innovative suicide prevention and psychological resiliency initiatives. The program embeds mental health providers within combat units and trains other front -line troops such as sergeants and chaplains to be mental health first responders. Charles Benson, MC psychiatrist said that the Operational Stress Control and Readiness Program in Afghanistan has broken down barriers to delivering mental health care and reduced the need for medication and evacuations. (San Diego Union Tribune, 2-4-11, article by Gretel C. Kovach).
That said, a very high percentage of the suicides are committed by those with little or no combat experience (I believe it is 61%). This indicates that this is not just an issue associated with the army - but that the army is a representation of the general population.
Atomization of society and the focus on human will power (i.e. Obama's call to "win the future" - or "An Army of One") are a cause of spiritual disorder and despair that affects both the military and the high rates of suicide at large.
I'm really a peacenik and I think Christianity and war are incompatible but I do know a Jesuit who served as a marine in Vietnam. Later he volunteered to be an army chaplain in Iraq - Fr. John Quinn SJ. Interestingly, it was he whp told me about peace activist John Dear SJ and Pax Christi.
This, I think, is the key: the army wants "spirit" in the utilitarian sense that it creates and maintains stable soldiers.
It does not want spirit in the sense that there is something beyond human power that may limit human action (i.e. killing of fellow humans). Despair and suicide comes from their transgression and isolation - a transgression that the army denies to exist and, if they do acknowledge it, hope only that it can be coped with in a theraputic manner rather than addressing the religious and human issues at the root.
Christ may have praised centurians, but it was not for their warlike nature - it was for their faith in Him.
The fact that the army and government resacrilizes violence - makes it a point of transcendence or heroism - is an attempt to restore the old scarificial order of princes and powers that Christ destroyed on the Cross.
The kids are not to be blamed, the system of endless war and denial of Christian revelation is.
Most certainly the bible answers yes to all three counts.
This argument that war corrupts the individual serving in the military eliminates the individual as a functioning moral agent with free will. It make war out to be an all powerful evil that an individual can not resist and therefore must be corrupted. But people do have moral sense and moral choice. The actual empirical observation is military people are perfectly moral people like any other group.
Way to much moralizing that does not make sense. Suicide in the military are not credibly shown here to be due to any spiritual or moral cause.
Yes, but there are some unique stresses in modern warfare. It is only in recent years that the military has perfected its ability to use operant and classical conditioning to help soldiers override their natural aversion to killing. (In his book "On Killing", Lt. Col. Dave Grossman chronicles how the military turned a 15% firing rate among soldiers in WWII into a nearly 99% firing rate today.) Add to this improvements in communication and travel that allow soldiers to stay much more in touch with their home lives while deployed. This adds a level of stress and makes it harder to compartmentalize their combat life from their home life. Our battlefield technology (e.g. better telescopic sights, night vision goggles, HD cameras, etc) allows soldiers to more intimately witness the damage and death they inflict. Also, a smaller percentage of our population is serving in the military and a small proportion of the population feels any direct impact of the war on their lives, so soldiers feel more alone and misunderstood when they return home.
I think it is important to keep in mind your many peers 18-22 who do not go to college and whose life path is often different than those who attend in work in colleges.
best, bvo
When they return from their tour of duty many will be physically or psychologically scarred. Many will suffer from PTSD and depression like the young man discussed in your article. I think that the church and other community organizations should hold support group meetings for those that have served our country. That way these people feel like they are not going through their problems alone and can start to cope with readjusting to civilian life. Putting someone on medicine and having them see an Army therapist once a week may not be enough when someone returns. Having a support group of peers who have been through the same thing as you would be most beneficial in reducing the military suicide rate.
I don't know if the answer lies in the field of psychology, in more spiritual outlets or a combination of both, but I hope that professionals in both of these areas feel an obligation to do what they can to support our troops. Priests, rabbis, and leaders of all faiths will hopefully make it a point to be available for these individuals in their congregations and make it known to those men and women that they are there to listen. Psychologists can continue research to find more effective programs than we currently have in place and hopefully with time we can make significant progress with this issue.