When “Thank-You” Hurts

It happens all the time.  Standing in a grocery check-out line, waiting at an airport terminal, walking down the street, enjoying a meal in a restaurant, most anywhere really.  Especially in this part of the country.  Fort Lewis.  McChord.  Bremerton.  The military is part of our culture.  Service men and women are our neighbors; our mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters.  Our friends.  People we know and care about and love have been getting deployed to dangerous war zones for too many years – years since President Bush declared the war was over.  People we know and care about and love have been coming back forever changed – physically and mentally and emotionally.  Or not coming back at all.  If they come home, it’s not to stay.  They get sent back again.  And again.  And again. 

And so it happens all the time.  Someone walks up to a service man or woman, extends their hand and says, “Thank you.  Thank you for your service.”  They mean well.  They are grateful for the tremendous sacrifice the military make on their behalf.  This time, we understand the toil it is taking.  This time we want to do better by our veterans.  This time we want them to know that we care; that we are grateful.  And so some walk up to the person they see in fatigues or military dress, extend their hand and say, “thanks.”  I’ve often felt bad that I’ve never thanked a service person.

Wednesday night, an army chaplain came and talked about spiritual care for the military to my cohort group.  He has been deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan 5 times.  Five times.  He has ministered to young kids blown apart by shells and missiles.  He has listened to our brave men and women weep at the loss of close comrades.  He has felt pain and compassion and anger from hearing the men and women that we have sent to do our fighting express unspeakable guilt for killing other human beings – enemy or not.  This army chaplain wept as he told us that these soldiers don’t want “thank yous”, they want forgiveness.  They need forgiveness.

We learned that our returning service men and women are wounded deep down in their souls.  We, the American people, have sent our service men and women to kill because we cannot resolve our political differences in any other way.  And as a result, these men and women harbor guilt for killing other human souls. We aren’t wired to kill.  

We are culpable.  He told us that the Church has fallen short and it made him weep.  He said that the Church too thanks and congratulates veterans but the Church doesn’t understand what has been asked of the veteran.  The Church doesn’t understand that the Veteran has lost his/her soul.  The Church doesn’t understand its’ need to reach out and minister and offer forgiveness.  The Church doesn’t understand its’ need to confess.  Scripture calls us to corporately confess the sins of our nation and to ask forgiveness.  And instead, we thank these men and women and it causes their guilt to grow deeper and injures their souls more gravely.  This army chaplain, after 5 harsh deployments, has stopped going to church.

We see the suicides, the homicides, the broken marriages, the PTSD…. we see it but we don’t understand.  To truly care for the souls of our service men and women, we need to own up to our role of sending them out to do our dirty work.  We need to ask for forgiveness.  And then we, the Church, need to offer forgiveness to these brave men and women who have given up their lives – whether physically or emotionally or mentally to do our bidding.  This will begin the healing process.  Forgiveness.  Forgiveness leads to freedom.  True freedom.

Sometimes, thank you hurts.  I didn’t know, until Wednesday, how much.  What should we say instead of thank you, we asked.  “Maybe just offer them a hug – no words,”  he suggested.