Where is your church in PTSD fight

Too many times we read about what is not happening. We read about suicides going up, families falling apart afterwards and discovering all too late what they could have done to help but while we read these stories, it should come into our brains that we have not seen the last of the suffering. We don’t read about the over 12,000 a year attempted suicides never manage to put together the numbers in the military killing themselves or the attempted suicides in the ranks.

When we read about another suicide, there is usually no follow-up done by reporter after covering a suicide as if they were covering a football game. No, I take that back because most of the time they take more interest and write with more passion about sports than the suicide of one of our veterans. We don’t know what happens to the families and more than we know what happens when a veteran comes home with PTSD and the family has to decide to stay together, break apart or if they too suffer in silence. What happens when they learn too late what destroyed their family?

When the average civilian family suffers from a traumatic event, there is an army of specialist showing up, usually based in local churches, trained to respond after any kind of emergency situation. Cops on the job have chaplains to talk to and so do firefighters. Victims are usually able to find someone to talk to just as patients and their families are able to talk to hospital chaplains along with members of the clergy showing up for a visit. All in all, for average citizens, we show up because we can put ourselves in their place knowing “there but for the grace of God go I” and that the next time it could be us needing to talk to someone. How can chaplains or a pastor put themselves in the place of a veteran when they never went to war?

For me, had I not been so close to my husband in the beginning when PTSD was mild, I doubt very much I would have taken such a deep interest in working with veterans. I just wouldn’t have a clue how to understand what they went through or how to even begin to try. This is the position many of our members of the clergy find themselves in all over the country. They just don’t know how to begin to try to put themselves in the place of a tiny fraction of the population.

They are intimidated by the history of the veterans. They have no idea what it is like to risk their lives anymore than they know what it is like to have to kill someone but they do know what it is like to want to be of service to others, what it feels like to have deep compassion for others and what it is like to struggle with faith over and over again having that faith restored stronger than ever. In other words they know what it is like to have miracles happen all the time.

This is what they need to connect to. That part of their humanity that called them to serve God in the first place. They need to know that these men and women are in deeper spiritual crisis because of their devotion to taking care of others suddenly finding themselves in need of help yet find it harder than others to ask for help.

The clergy need to be involved in this and it’s a fact that has been avoided for a very long time. The word “trauma” comes from the word “wound” in Greek. The Greeks knew about this kind of wound often writing about it in lessons of human discovery as heroes struggled with what was brave inside of them and what drove them to want to act in the first place. Heroes do not just sit back and wait for someone else to step up? They race to the front of the line. Does that come just from courage? No, it came from compassion that fed their courage. If they didn’t care in the first place it wouldn’t have made any difference at all how brave they were.

This is what we have today suffering between a deep spiritual wound and redemption. If they were able to see what makes them so unique, they would know how much they do matter. So how do they know they matter if the people who are supposed to be there to help them heal their troubled souls ignore them instead?

Veterans are waiting and families are suffering for what the heads of our churches are supposed to be doing. Taking care of God’s children when they were willing to do what Christ said “No greater love has a man than this, to lay down his life for his friends” and that act alone requires a heart that can break deeper than any other.

There are parts of this country where clergy of all faiths are stepping up and doing something to help. Here’s one of them. After you read it, copy it and hand it to your spiritual leader with a message. “Veterans are waiting to know they are loved. Where are we on this?”

PTSD, STRESS, AND PRAYER
LIFE AFTER COMBAT: Civilian clergy learn the effects of deployment
By DANIEL WOOLFOLK
TIMES STAFF WRITER
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 2010

FORT DRUM — Stresses of military life extend beyond the installation gates — they can be found where soldiers pray.

Almost 60 civilian clergymen met with Fort Drum chaplains at The Commons Tuesday to discuss how to better minister to military congregants.

“The clergy want to do all they can for the soldiers and their families that are in our communities,” said Denise K. Young, executive director of the Fort Drum Regional Health Planning Organization.

She worked with Fort Drum garrison Chaplain Col. Lee Dudley to organize the event that highlighted the importance of understanding post-traumatic stress disorder, the availability of additional family resources and the stresses unique to each phase of a deployment.

The Rev. Frederick G. Garry of the First Presbyterian Church addressed the audience, telling them civilian clergy are very good at working with common problems, but should also understand military needs.

“It doesn’t always translate easily into the parish,” he said.

Personality disorders are especially difficult, said Rev. David L. Hayner, of New Life Christian Church.

“We’re lacking in being able to understand, being able to cope with and being able to reach out to soldiers with PTSD,” he said.

More than 60 percent of families in his congregation have a member in the military, an organization he is familiar with.

A combat-wounded veteran, the Rev. Mr. Hayner served as a platoon sergeant in the 10th Mountain Division’s 2nd Battalion, 14th Infantry Regiment.
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PTSD, STRESS, AND PRAYER