While the term moral injury (MI) was originally envisioned to address the gap between PTSD and what Vietnam veterans were experiencing after returning from the war, our understanding of the phenomenon has grown (Shay, 2014). Due to recent scholarly work in the fields of servicewomen, healthcare, social work, and many others, we now know that …
Category Archives: Chaplain Learning
A Very Important Book
In the spring of 2019, I was conducting some phone interviews as part of a ground-breaking research project. The study focused on the moral injurious experiences of women veterans, and the data was very disturbing. As someone who has worked in the U.S. military chaplain corps for many years, I realized that many chaplains did …
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Divine Inspiration and the Rocky Path
Whenever we set out to accomplish a goal, we encounter tons of problems, usually a lot more problems than we bargained for or predicted. The challenges often surprise us and it seems that the easier we think something should be, the more likely we are to experience obstacles. As the problems mount, we begin to …
Why We Need a Conference for Women Veterans and Clergy Men
As a man myself, and someone who served in the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps for 18 years, I can honestly say that I had no idea how difficult it was to serve as a woman in the military. Four years ago I began to get a clue and it was very disturbing. In 20I6, I …
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Old Memories, Fresh Wounds
For the last several months, I have been working with a partner to conduct a moral injury study for women veterans. (We are still looking for participants. If you are a female veteran and experienced something while serving that caused inner conflict or went against your moral values, consider signing up: https://chaplainconsultants.com/projects/). Although military sexual …
Why Male Clergy Need to Understand Moral Injury in Women
Introduction In the United States, most clergy are male. Approximately 95% of U.S. Army chaplains are men (U.S. Army, 2014) and only 12% of churches have a woman in the senior leadership role (Hartford Institute for Religion Research, 2006). There are many women in institutional ministry (e.g. prison and hospital chaplaincy), but for most women …
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What’s Missing in Moral Injury Research
Moral injury (MI) is a term that refers to the emotional trauma a military service member feels when his or her sense of moral rightness is violated during the course of war (Currier, Holland, Drescher, & Foy, 2015a; Currier, McCormick, & Drescher, 2015b; Nash, Carper, Mills, Au, Goldsmith, & Litz, 2013). MI addresses a gap …
Raped, Bullied, and Neglected
So far, I have only conducted a small number of interviews for the study entitled, “Moral Injury in Women Veterans: A Grounded Theory,” but some common themes are quickly emerging. The first is, that all of the women were raped by someone in a position of authority over them, like their commanders. Some were raped …
Caring Deeply about the Underserved
Sixteen years ago, I began a journey that would transform the rest of my life. In February of 2002, I entered the military chaplaincy as a member of the dominant group – a White, male, conservative Christian. In my prior service as an infantryman, I had never worked with female soldiers. I assumed, like many …