Author: Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Military chaplains
Languages : en
Pages : 20
Book Description
The Challenge of the Chaplaincy in the United States Army
Author: Enlisting Faith
Author: Ronit Y. StahlPublisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674981316
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 385
Book Description
A century ago, as the United States prepared to enter World War I, the military chaplaincy included only mainline Protestants and Catholics. Today it counts Jews, Mormons, Muslims, Christian Scientists, Buddhists, Seventh-day Adventists, Hindus, and evangelicals among its ranks. Enlisting Faith traces the uneven processes through which the military struggled with, encouraged, and regulated religious pluralism over the twentieth century. Moving from the battlefields of Europe to the jungles of Vietnam and between the forests of Civilian Conservation Corps camps and meetings in government offices, Ronit Y. Stahl reveals how the military borrowed from and battled religion. Just as the state relied on religion to sanction war and sanctify death, so too did religious groups seek recognition as American faiths. At times the state used religion to advance imperial goals. But religious citizens pushed back, challenging the state to uphold constitutional promises and moral standards. Despite the constitutional separation of church and state, the federal government authorized and managed religion in the military. The chaplaincy demonstrates how state leaders scrambled to handle the nation’s deep religious, racial, and political complexities. While officials debated which clergy could serve, what insignia they would wear, and what religions appeared on dog tags, chaplains led worship for a range of faiths, navigated questions of conscience, struggled with discrimination, and confronted untimely death. Enlisting Faith is a vivid portrayal of religious encounters, state regulation, and the trials of faith—in God and country—experienced by the millions of Americans who fought in and with the armed forces.
Change and Conflict in the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps Since 1945
Author: Anne LovelandPublisher: Univ. of Tennessee Press
ISBN: 1621900126
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 368
Book Description
Army chaplains have long played an integral part in America’s armed forces. In addition to conducting chapel activities on military installations and providing moral and spiritual support on the battlefield, they conduct memorial services for fallen soldiers, minister to survivors, offer counsel on everything from troubled marriages to military bureaucracy, and serve as families’ points of contact for wounded or deceased soldiers—all while risking the dangers of combat alongside their troops. In this thoughtful study, Anne C. Loveland examines the role of the army chaplain since World War II, revealing how the corps has evolved in the wake of cultural and religious upheaval in American society and momentous changes in U.S. strategic relations, warfare, and weaponry. From 1945 to the present, Loveland shows, army chaplains faced several crises that reshaped their roles over time. She chronicles the chaplains’ initiation of the Character Guidance program as a remedy for the soaring rate of venereal disease among soldiers in occupied Europe and Japan after World War II, as well as chaplains’ response to the challenge of increasing secularism and religious pluralism during the “culture wars” of the Vietnam Era.“Religious accommodation,” evangelism and proselytizing, public prayer, and “spiritual fitness”provoked heated controversy among chaplains as well as civilians in the ensuing decades. Then, early in the twenty-first century, chaplains themselves experienced two crisis situations: one the result of the Vietnam-era antichaplain critique, the other a consequence of increasing religious pluralism, secularization, and sectarianism within the Chaplain Corps, as well as in the army and the civilian religious community. By focusing on army chaplains’ evolving, sometimes conflict-ridden relations with military leaders and soldiers on the one hand and the civilian religious community on the other, Loveland reveals how religious trends over the past six decades have impacted the corps and, in turn, helped shape American military culture.
The United States Army Chaplaincy
Author: Professional Journal of the United States Army
Author: Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Military art and science
Languages : en
Pages : 332
Book Description
The United States Army Chaplaincy: Gushwa, R. L. The best and worst of times, 1920-1945
Author: Military Chaplains' Review
Author: Serving God and Country
Author: Lyle W. DorsettPublisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101610697
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 371
Book Description
In World War II, over 12,000 Protestant ministers, Catholic priests, and Jewish rabbis left the safety of home to join the Chaplain Corps, following the armed forces into battle across Europe, Asia, North Africa, and the high seas. They were officers who displayed uncommon courage and sacrifice. They were men of faith under fire. And they would charge straight into Hell to save the soul of a single soldier… Representing America’s three major religious traditions, thousands of volunteers from across the country enlisted as non-combatant commissioned officers to provide spiritual strength and guidance for those fighting men who never knew if they were going to survive to see another day. Armed only with Bibles, Torahs, and the tools of their holy trade, these men of God went wherever the troops went—from the bloody beaches of the Normandy Invasion to the hellish jungles of Guadalcanal and Okinawa in the Pacific. They prayed over men about to march into combat on land, sailors facing Kamikaze attacks at sea, and bomber crews who could neither retreat nor surrender in the air. And, most important and difficult of all, they guided fallen fighting men of every faith as they breathed their last, and gave up their lives in the fight against tyranny. These are the personal stories of some of the bravest and most selfless men who served with the armed forces. Many lost their lives or suffered debilitating wounds while serving as pastors to the troops. All of them battled the pain of separation from their own loved ones as they gave some of the best years of their lives to keep the military personnel spiritually awake, morally fit—and prepared to make the journey from this world to the next without fear or despair, and with the trust of the Almighty in their hearts.
Religion in Uniform
Author: Edward WaggonerPublisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1498596169
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 215
Book Description
Religion in Uniform argues powerfully that Americans must reform their military’s chaplaincy. Americans fund this public project to serve all persons in the armed forces, but the chaplaincy currently fails to do so. Waggoner shows that Americans’ support for keeping chaplain positions in the military has always rested on a mix of political, military, and religious rationales that continue to evolve. He argues political, military, and theological reasons to eradicate bias, gender discrimination and sexual violence in the chaplain corps and to stop the use of chaplains in strategic roles abroad. Acknowledging that Christian groups are providing the strongest support for the chaplaincy’s status quo, Waggoner contests the specific theological claims that underwrite their policies. He launches a new, critical and constructive discussion about US military religion for the twenty-first century.
Military Chaplains and Religious Diversity
Author: Kim Philip HansenPublisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137025166
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 220
Book Description
Based on extensive in-depth interviews with more than thirty active duty chaplains regarding their successes, failures and conflicts, the book is about the way military chaplains handle religious diversity among the enlisted they serve and within their own corps.