Military Moral Injury and Spiritual Care

Description

Military Moral Injury and Spiritual Care offers resources to inform and support practices of spiritual care for veterans and others affected by moral injury incurred in the context of military service. A dozen contributors, all experienced in the field, contributed to this work first published in Pastoral Psychology and now widely available. This book is published with the support of the Soul Repair Center at Brite Divinity School. Interreligious in its focus, the Center sponsors research and creates resources to inform and support religious leaders and communities of faith as they respond to veterans and their families and others affected by military moral injury. Proceeds from the book support the Center's work.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Ecumenism
• Christianity

Informations

• Publié par: Chalice Press
• Date de parution: 03 décembre 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780827223806
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 4 Mo

Extrait

MILITARY MORAL INJURY

SPIRITUAL CARE

RAMSAY / DOEHRING, eds.

“In this crucial contribution to moral injury research, the authors, diverse in traditions and experience, reveal its powerful spiritual/ religious implications—even for atheists—and offer compassionate, effective strategies for alleviating the profound human suffering that moral injury inflicts.” — Rita Nakashima Brock, coauthor ofSoul Repair: Recovering from Moral Injury After Warand Senior Vice President and Director of the Shay Moral Injury Center at Volunteers of America

“The subtitle for this comprehensive collection of essays says it all; as a resource for “Religious Leaders and Professional Caregivers,”Military Moral Injury and Spiritual Careis a vital and long-needed compendium of thoughtful, well-researched, and relevant essays on the subject of moral injury. Poignant and personal, this volume offers compelling stories revealing the complexity of returning ‘home,’ and captures the complexity of the dynamics of reentry into families, relationships, and communities. This volume is bold to speak frankly on the inevitable questions of God’s love and/or indifference, God’s omnipotence and/ or God’s impotence as the injured (service member, family member, recently returned or elderly war veteran) yearns to make sense of the morally and spiritually unfathomable. Creating a collection of articles that have to this point been available only through professional periodicals, Nancy Ramsay and Carrie Doehring have gifted the caregiving community ready and readable access to both theory and practice in this uncharted field of moral injury. They provide articles that carefully tell the stories of veterans from Korea to Afghanistan and that probe the possibilities for what pastoral care could look like for these survivors.Military Moral Injury and Spiritual Careis profound without being prescriptive, sensitive but certain in its commitment to the spiritual healing of those we as caregivers are called to serve.” — Margaret Kibben, Rear Admiral (Ret.), U.S. Navy

“Moral injury affects many service members. Leaders of congregations, healthcare chaplains, and other spiritual care providers need to develop the ability to provide care for service members who experience it, as well as their loved ones and faith communities who are also affected by it. This book is an excellent resource for this important work.” — George Fitchett, Rush University Medical Center

“This is a profound anthology on moral injury in the military. A must read for soldiers, leaders, and those dedicated to healing the wounds of war and service.” — Cynda Rushton, Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics and the School of Nursing

“Military Moral Injury and Spiritual Careis a timely theological companion to clinical engagements with moral injury. Steeped in the emerging research in moral injury and forged in close proximity to the lived experiences of veterans, these essays display the power and breadth of pastoral theology to map the moral terrain. The authors scour the depths of their religious traditions, grapple with moral ambiguities, and provide practical advice for spiritual caregivers. If you enter with hopes of finding tips for working with military service members, you exit with a full-throated exploration of moral wounding and repair in the era of America’s unending wars.” — Shelly Rambo, Boston University School of Theology

chalice press Saint Louis, Missouri

An imprint of Christian Board of Publication

The essays in this collection were originally published inPastoral Psychologyare reprinted here with permission. Copyright © and Springer Science and Business Media, LLC. All rights reserved.

Introduction copyright ©2019 by Nancy J. Ramsay and Carrie Doehring.

All rights reserved. For permission to reuse content, please contact Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], www.copyright.com.

ChalicePress.com

Print: 9780827223783 EPUB: 9780827223790 EPDF: 9780827223806

Printed in the United States of America

This book is supported in part through

Dianne Shumaker’s generosity to

the Soul Repair program

at Brite Divinity School.

Contributors

Contents

Introduction by Nancy J. Ramsay and Carrie Doehring 1 Moral Injury and Human Relationship: A Conversation by Michael Yandell 2 Military Moral Injury: An Evidence-based and Intercultural Approach to Spiritual Care by Carrie Doehring

3 Sustaining Lamentation for Military Moral Injury: Witness Poetry That Bears the Traces of Extremity by Shawn Fawson 4 Accessible Spiritual Practices to Aid in Recovery from Moral Injury by Elizabeth A. Liebert 5 Insights into Moral Injury and Soul Repair from Classical Jewish Texts by Kim S. Geringer and Nancy H. Wiener 6 Muslims in the U.S. Military: Moral Injury and Eroding Rights by Shareda Hosein 7 “Turn Now, My Vindication Is at Stake”: Military Moral Injury and Communities of Faith by Zachary Moon 8 Moral Injury as Loss and Grief with Attention to Ritual Resources for Care by Nancy J. Ramsay

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Contributors

Carrie Doehringis the Cliford Baldridge Proessor o Pastoral Care and Director o the Master o Arts in Pastoral and Spiritual Care program at Ilif School o Theology. She is ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA) and licensed as a psychologist in Colorado and Massachusetts. She is the author o three books, including The Practice o Pastoral Care: A Postmodern Approach, Revised and Expanded, and numerous articles and chapters.

Shawn Fawsonresides with her amily and works in Freeland, Washington, where her passions are in bringing the intersections o poetry and spiritual care to hospital chaplaincy. She is a PhD candidate in the University o Denver/Ilif School o Theology Joint PhD Program. Her book Giving Way  won the Utah Book Award or Poetry.

Kim S. Geringer,MSW, serves on the aculty at Hebrew Union College- Jewish Institute o Religion in New York City, where she teaches in the rabbinic, cantorial, and Doctor o Ministry programs. She is also rabbi-in- residence at the Chai Center or Jewish Lie in New Jersey.

LTCOLShareda Hosein, USA (Ret.) U.S Army, is a community Muslim Chaplain in the greater Boston Area and serves as an educator on Islam in multiple venues across the country. She served active duty and reserves or 34 years, including Kuwait in 2004 during Operation Iraqi Freedom and 6 years as a Muslim educator with Special Operations Command. She holds a MDiv rom Hartord Seminary and was the first Muslim Chaplain at Tuts University.

Elizabeth Liebert,SNJM, is Proessor o Spiritual Lie, Emerita, at San Francisco Theological Seminary/University o Redlands. She is author, coauthor, or coeditor o six books in the areas o spiritual ormation, spiritual direction, and discernment, including Way o Discernment: Spiritual Practices or Decision Making. She continues teaching at several seminaries and serves on the doctoral aculty o the Graduate Theological Union.

Zachary Moonis Assistant Proessor o Practical Theology at Chicago Theological Seminary. He is also a commissioned military chaplain. The author o two books, his most recent is Warriors between Worlds: Moral Injury and Identities in Crisis.

Nancy J. Ramsayis Director o the Soul Repair Center at Brite Divinity School, where she is Emerita Proessor o Pastoral Theology and Pastoral Care, and served as Executive Vice President and Dean rom 2005—2012. Ordained in the Presbyterian Church (USA), Ramsay is the author or editor o our books, including Pastoral Care and Counseling: Redefining the Paradigms , as well as numerous articles and chapters.

Nancy H. Wiener,is Founding Director o the Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Center or Pastoral Counseling and holds the Dr. Paul and Trudy Steinberg Chair in Human Relations at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute o Religion in New York City, where she teaches in the rabbinic, cantorial, and Doctor o Ministry programs. She recently coauthored Maps and Meaning: Levitical Models or Contemporary Care.

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Michael Yandellis a PhD candidate at Emory University. Deployed to Iraq as an enlisted soldier in 2004, Yandell now studies moral injury and war through the lenses o theology and ethics.

Introduction

War changes lives forever. This volume offers guidance for spiritual care with those whom war forever changed through wounds of conscience or soul wounds. These wounds may not be easily seen, but they take a costly toll not only on those in or near a war zone, but also on their families, and when not addressed, extend across generations. The Department of Veterans Affairs describes these wounds of conscience as “moral injury.” This term describes the consequences of “perpetrating, failing to prevent, or bearing witness to acts that transgress deeply held moral beliefs and expectations…[and may also include] bearing witness to the aftermath of violence and human carnage” (Litz et al. 2009, p.700). Moral injury is a new term for an ancient recognition that war changes us. Moral injury is also identified as one of the primary contributors to a significant increase in suicide among veterans (Kelly et al. 2019). The pain of these wounds of conscience can be intense, and while helpful care can ease the burden, “innocence lost is not innocence regained, it is innocence mourned and moral integrity reestablished” (Graham 2017, p. 78). Military Moral Injury and Spiritual Careresources to inform offers and support practices of spiritual care for persons affected by moral injury incurred in the context of military service. This book is published with the support of the Soul Repair Center at Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, Texas. Interreligious in its focus, The Center’s mission is to sponsor research and create resources to inform and support religious leaders and communities of faith as they respond to veterans and their families and others affected by military moral injury. A number of the chapters in this volume reflect research recruited and sponsored by the Center in an interreligious research “think tank” 2013–2015. Contributors to this volume write from their personal and professional location in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim traditions. Each chapter offers theologically reflective and spiritually informed care for veterans and their families as well as others such as nurses and physicians whose service in war zones has rendered them vulnerable to moral injury. These chapters are written to be of use to spiritual care

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