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US Army looking for a few good chaplains
Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have strained the 3,000-member Chaplain Corps, which now has 450 vacancies.
from the April 12, 2007 edition
Page 2 of 4
The command is responsible for training all branches of the Iraqi military and the civilian police. Stationed at Phoenix base in Baghdad, he travels the country from the Kurdish north, to Anbar Province in the west, and to the Persian Gulf in the south to visit troops that don't have regular contact with a chaplain. He recently received an e-mail "thank you" from a young marine he helped.
"He was having a recurring dream that he was going to die," Chaplain Jenkins recalls in a phone interview from Baghdad. "We talked about his fears, and, after some sessions, he reconnected with the faith he had had as a child. One day he came in and said he no longer had the fear and could do his job, which was a dangerous, personal-security detail for high-ranking officials. That makes it worthwhile being here."
Jenkins entered the chaplaincy while he was pastor at a North Carolina church. Some of his congregation who were in a National Guard battalion urged him to volunteer, as their unit lacked a chaplain. His church supported the step, so he joined up. Later, he went to the Reserves.
But signing up Guard and Reserve chaplains can be challenging, since serving requires pastors to be away one weekend a month. An overseas deployment could mean leaving for a year or more.
That has created tensions in some churches, Dolinger says. Pastors' jobs are not legally protected, as are those of other soldiers (the government can't tell churches what to do). So some chaplains have had to resign, while others have left churches to go on full-time active duty.
Given the growing demands, the Army's National Guard Bureau (NGB) has created a team of chaplain recruiters stationed regionally around the US. (See www.1800goguard.com/clergy.)
"For qualified individuals, there is now a $10,000 sign-on bonus," says Chaplain (Capt.) Paul Douglas of NGB's recruiting office. Seminary students who become chaplain candidates can get reimbursed up to $4,500 per year for their education expenses, if they agree to a mandatory service obligation. A student-loan repayment program pays up to $20,000 to those with existing debt when they enlist.
"We're doing the best we can to get qualified individuals and retain them," adds Chaplain Douglas, who returned last year from 16 months in Iraq, serving an infantry brigade in Baghdad and later south of the capital.
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