Relieving and Reliving: not all wounds bleed

Dear Friends:

Over the years, our denomination, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), has sent resolutions to individual Sessions for their consideration. In the late 1980’s the U.S. covertly funded Contras in Nicaragua. (This was when most of us first learned Oliver North’s name.) Overthrowing the left-wing government of Daniel Ortega, the U.S. supported the election of Violeta Chamorro, who immediately began to undo the land re-distribution undertaken by Ortega, but Chamorro’s party, the UNO, was accused of using torture in their round-up of Contra forces.

In the wake of the Iran-Contra affair, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) invited our congregation’s Sessions to denounce the use of torture. I presented the resolution to my Session members, who passed it unanimously with little discussion. Shortly after the vote, one of our newest members, Bob, shook his head and said, “Torture is a horrible thing. All I have to say is when it comes to war, we’re no better.”

Bob was a stocky guy who always wore his American Legion cap. I knew he had fought in Korea and had worked as a metallurgist for the US Steel Works on the east side of Chicago. Diabetes had taken a toll on his eyesight, and he had agreed to serve on Session on the condition that someone drive him home if the meeting ran after dark. As elders dismissed to their cars, I let Bob know I would drive him home after I got a few things from my office. Bob followed me into my office, collapsed in the chair opposite my desk and began to shake and sob, massive tears splashing on the floor. I sat down at my desk.

It took several minutes for Bob to gain composure and explain his reaction. It was November, shortly before Thanksgiving and the holidays. He looked at me across the desk, red eyes swollen. “Every year around this time I’m a mess. I think of all the Christmases I’ve ruined around the world.”

Right after high school, Bob had entered the Air Force. He was proud to serve. As a young guy, he had admired all the World War II veterans. Now retired from the steel mill, Bob spent most of his free time visiting WWI vets in the nursing home. Bob excelled in the military; the Air Force moved him into officers’ training, and then he was hand-selected for military intelligence.

In Korea, it was his job to torture prisoners.

“I was good at it!” Bob said blank-faced. “I mean really good, I could make you say anything I wanted you to say in a matter of minutes and not leave a mark on you.”

A slight chill went down my back as I realized he wasn’t bragging but offering a statement of fact. Bob briefly described his favored technique; years later I learned it was what we call ‘waterboarding’.

Bob then explained that he was so respected for the quality and efficiency of his military service that he was invited to remain with the Air Force following the war. He was sent to several Central and South American countries to train others in his craft. That’s where he believed his skills ruined the lives of young kids around the world.

“The point is,” said Bob, “after I was done with you, you would never be the same again. For the rest of your life, what I had done to you would mess with your mind.”

Bob continued, “When I got out of the Air Force, I wondered what I would do with my life. Before I went in I wanted to be a Methodist pastor. I was active in MYF (Methodist Youth Fellowship) and always admired pastors, but after what I had done while I was in, I figured I didn’t have a soul. So, I went to the mills. That’s why I’m so proud to be an elder; after all these years you were willing to ordain me.”

After that November evening, every Christmastime Bob and I would meet for prayer in my office. He would pour out his memories and ask God to somehow forgive him.

Several years later, when Bob was in the hospital dying, I was called in the middle of the night by the nurse from intensive care. Bob was having violent nightmares, and he was calling out my name.

When I arrived, his wife told me he was fighting the whole Korean War all over again. I went to his bedside and took his hand. He opened his eyes and told me to pray! “Pray for those poor b*st*rds…! Pray for THIS poor b*st*rd!” I did, he calmed, a few hours later he died.

I’ve thought a lot about Bob over the past few weeks. With the appointment of a new CIA director and Korea once again in the news, I’ve thought about Bob, his life, his loyalty and the lesson he wanted me to understand. When one tortures another, two victims leave the room.

Haunted by the memories, I remain,

With Love,
Jonathan Krogh
Your Pastor

 

Featured
Don't Try to Be Happy
Don't Try to Be Happy

Dear Happy(?) Campers:

Happiness is a byproduct, not a goal. I heard that quote during a podcast interview last week and it is stuck in my head. 

A little research reveals that Mahatma Gandhi may or may not have said something similar. His abbreviated quote usually reads, “Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” Except that seems to be a memeification (yes, invented word) of a longer, more verifiable Gandhi quote: “Happiness is a direction, not a place. Happiness

Leisure, A Sign of Failure?
Leisure, A Sign of Failure?

Dear Busybodies, 

Labor Day—that last gasp of summer as we slip our summer whites into storage and prepare for the seasonal responsibilities of harvest. A day for workers to set aside the drudgery of Mondays for one fleeting glimpse of how life could always be had we been born into the luxury of the leisure class. Except these days we no longer mark success as freedom from responsibility, but rather prove our worth by a flurry of perpetual busyness.

Imagine Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos lingering over one more game of croquet on the lawn while sipping lemonade. Or Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg touring aimlessly down a coastal highway, windblown with

Wishing It Were True
Wishing It Were True

Dear Seekers:

This past week I attended a required clergy continuing education program hosted by the Presbytery of Chicago. A portion of the day was devoted to helping us understand the importance of monitoring our stress. When we are under pressure, we are more likely to violate the personal boundaries of others; we become less supportive of their needs, and our tolerance for their behavior wears thin. At the same time, the presenters wanted us to appreciate how stress helps us grow, building our resilience, so they offered this illustration...

Biosphere 2 was a research project constructed in the Arizona desert in the late 1980s to determine if it was possible to create a closed ecological system which, in the future, might sustain human life on other planets. It’s a massive domed structure that replicates

The Gospel of Success
The Gospel of Success

Dear Wealthy Investors:

If you’ve missed the fact that I think a “prosperity gospel” is heresy, then we haven’t talked. Religious hucksters have been around since the beginning of time. Even the early church struggled with that brand of phony. 

In Acts 4.32, we’re told how many people sold property to place the money before the Apostles so they could distribute it to any who were in need. In Acts chapter 5, Ananias and his wife Sapphira wanted in on the action. Christians were digging deep to support the work of the early church. So Ananias and Sapphira sold a piece of property, but they held back

The Pervasive Power of Patrons
The Pervasive Power of Patrons

Dear Political Patrons:

I’m not a Chicago native, but I’ve spent nearly three times as many years as a resident of the Windy City as I had in my hometown of Omaha, and all of that time on the South Side (if one counts Hyde Park as the South Side). When I arrived in Hyde Park, Michael Bilandic was Mayor, and the fact that he was Croatian was of little consequence to my newfound awareness of Chicago politics. The Irish were kings of the South Side ever since Mayor Richard J. Daley’s mother, Lillian, announced that she wanted more for her son than being a policeman. Richard J. didn’t disappoint.

Daley (the elder) had a keen sense of optics, making sure that his base constituencies were well represented when handing out credit and meting out power. His was a carefully crafted machine in which the component parts were not

When Spiritual Misses the Religious
When Spiritual Misses the Religious

Dear Collective Clergy:

As you may gather from my sermons over the past several weeks, I’ve been thinking a lot about community, about interdependence, about sharing. Perhaps because there are few things less independent or self-sufficient than caring for someone who is ill; or perhaps because I am old enough to realize there are some things I will never accomplish in this life. Whatever the reason, I’ve been musing about how spirituality has become a personal responsibility. We’ve privatized it. We are taught that each of us is responsible for working out our own salvation, our prayer life, our meditation, our scriptural devotion, even our emotional health and faith. I’m not so sure that’s right.

Much of this started with the Reformation. The reformers denounced the special position priests held in mediating God’s presence for the people through the

A Little Love Note to a Church
A Little Love Note to a Church

Dear, Dear Friends:

Letters from the pastor are traditionally epistles of reprimand. Seeing oneself as constrained by a stiff-necked people, the pastor attempts to write the congregation into submission. Confident that the only limit to their ministerial wonderfulness is spiritual stubbornness, they dedicate their pens and preaching to browbeat the very congregation to which they are called. I sometimes wonder how church members tolerate such dismissive paternalism. There must be something irresistible in the friendships, or the choir rehearsals, or the coffee that brings people back to endure their weekly scolding. I have on occasion, submitted my congregations to such smug condescending judgmentalism, and now looking back, I am sorry. My regret arises not only from the absurdity of ‘biting the hands that feed me,’ but

Is Our Welcome Upside Down?
Is Our Welcome Upside Down?

Dear Welcoming Worshipers:

This may come as a bit of a surprise, but occasionally I muse about things other than political temperament or cultural erosion; sometimes I muse about the church—and not just its niche in society or role in public discourse. I sometimes think about how we ‘do’ church and how we ‘are’ church.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been rolling around in my head our metrics. What we count, how we measure progress, where we look for trends. Most often we consider ‘how many’, as in attendance, and ‘how much’, as in offerings or expenditures. But independent from this annual report data, I’ve been thinking about people, as in those who are not yet part of our fellowship, and I’m beginning to believe our systems of connection may be upside-down.

The centerpiece of our community in both energy and focus is our gathering

Pointless Performative Posting
Pointless Performative Posting

Dear Fatigued Faithful:

Now that the state of Louisiana has codified posting the Ten Commandments in every public school classroom, attention has been given to commandments 7 (Thou shalt not commit adultery) and 9 (Thou shalt not bear false witness) and whether or not the politicians who endorse the policy live up to these commands. Those who defend the posting of the Decalogue claim it is a bedrock document of American law, and as such a piece of history without religious prejudice. My musing over this issue, and the recent state school superintendent of Oklahoma mandating the teaching of the Bible in schools, has less to do with the documents themselves and more to do with the qualifications of those who will interpret their meaning for young minds.

Of course, the Ten Commandments is a religious document. Let’s start with #1, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.” There is nothing secular about that! Of course, moving on, the next three commandments are equally sectarian: #2 Thou shalt not make any graven image, #3 Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain and #4 Remember

Requiem For The Horde
Requiem For The Horde

Dear Bugged Ones: 

As many as 1.5 million cicadas per acre emerged a few weeks ago in our region of Illinois. With great anticipation, people dreaded the endless sound of their mating screech. It was amazing how finding a single cicada in the house and courting him outside could fill the air with so much noise. While larger than most bugs, it still seemed to emit more sound than its size could resonate. The crunching sound too—of thousands of exoskeletons littering the sidewalks—created its own fascinating cringe.  

Love them or hate them, they’re now nearly gone.

It will be 2041 when our brood emerges again. If I’m still around, I’ll be 80.