Parish, the Thought. David B. Bowman
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Sunday School each week, we were informed. He spoke to us about the base operation.
When the captain concluded his welcome and remarks, he asked for questions. I raised my hand and when recognized I asked, “If a chaplain on Sunday morning from the chapel pulpit were to raise some question about what goes on at this base, how would that be handled?” The captain did not hesitate. I remember distinctly to this day what he said. Matter of factly he replied, “That chaplain would be down the road the next day.” So much for the Protestant tradition of freedom of the pulpit.
This incident confirmed in me a long–standing opinion that military chaplains, no matter how much good they do, are “kept persons.” Just as journalists in the Afghanistan conflict “imbedded” with the troops on the ground where objectivity lost its grounding, so with the military chaplains. How much better for all concerned if the clergy were able to maintain their civilian identity, operating independently as did journalists during the Vietnam conflict, when the public received objective reportage.
During my ministry in Tacoma I participated several times in silent protest demonstrations along the Burlington Northern Railroad at the entrance to the base. These protests took place as train loads of parts entered the base to build or resupply the Trident submarines of genocidal potential. In leadership, James and Shelley Douglass, founders of the Ground Zero community, whose house was situated near that entrance. A noteworthy participant at times in these protests, Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, Bishop of the Seattle diocese.
On a Sunday following the “clergy day” at the Bangor base, I used a good portion of the pulpit word time to tell of the clergy tour and of my repartee with the camp chaplain. During the discourse one of the church members rose from his pew and noisily walked out. I had conversation with him at his home in the week following. We agreed to disagree agreeably.
In his book, The Nonviolent Coming of God, James Douglass refers to a speech Seattle Archbishop gave at the University of Notre Dame, in which he said, “Our nuclear weapons are the final crucifixion of Jesus, in the extermination of the human family with whom he is one.”15
A Delegate to Synod
Representing the Washington–N. Idaho Conference, UCC, as delegate in 1977, I participated in the Tenth Annual Synod in Washington, D.C, and the Eleventh General Synod in Indianapolis, Indiana, of 1979.
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