A Liturgy for a Worship Experience on the Issues of Moral Injury and War

A Service of Peacemaking Witness
In Celebration of Selective Conscientious Objection

Call to Worship (from the Church of the Brethren)

One: God of all Creation,

All: What do you require of us?

One: to do justice,

All: seeking peace & reconciliation, standing with the marginalized and forgotten

One: to love kindness

All: showing compassion and unconditional caring for those in need

One: to walk humbly

All: following in the steps of Jesus, lifting up not the work of our hands but the power that sustains our service.

Opening Prayer (unison) (from the Roman Catholic Church)

Jesus, rightful Advocate of peace, Elegant Champion of reconciliation, Your victories echo harmoniously. You taught me the way towards peace, My assurance of congenial oneness. Teach me to carry the torch of peace, That it may reside within my heart And radiate in my surroundings. Through the Grace of Your power, Transform the world into a Heaven. You are the only hope of humankind: You are the most gracious Peace Maker!

*Hymn" God, Whose Love is Always Stronger" BEACH SPRING
Lyrics By Carolyn Winfrey Gillette

God, whose love is always stronger Than our weakness, pride and fear,
In your world, we pray and wonder How to be more faithful here.
Hate too often grows inside us; Fear rules what the nations do.
So we pray, when wars divide us: Give us love, Lord! Make us new!

Love is patient, kind and caring, Never arrogant or rude,
Never boastful, all things bearing; Love rejoices in the truth.
When we're caught up in believing War will make the terror cease,
Show us Jesus' way of living; May our strength be in your peace.

May our faith in you be nourished; May your churches hear your call.
May our lives be filled with courage As we speak your love for all.
Now emboldened by your Spirit Who has given us new birth,
Give us love, that we may share it Till your love renews the earth!

Old Testament Reading Deuteronomy 20 :5-9

New Testament Reading Luke 22:49-51.

Faith Reflections on Peace

"In the depth of his conscience, man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but which holds him to obedience. Always summoning him to love good and avoid evil the voice of conscience can, when necessary, speak to his heart more specifically: do this, shun that. For man has in his heart a law written by God. To obey it is the very dignity of man, according to it be will be judged. Conscience is the most secret core and sanctuary of man. There he is alone with God, whose voice echoes in his depths." The Second Vatican Council.

A Reading

Has anyone built a new house and not yet dedicated it? Go home.

Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done.

How like a definition of home that sounds;

A sound roof, a safe haven, perhaps a garden,

A place for family to gather, friends to visit,

Along the banks of the Columbia, the Mississippi, the Hudson,

The Tigris or Euphrates.

Beiti, beitak, my house is your house,

Let us bring home now everyone who would rather be home

Than in a foreign land,

Everyone whose home would be blessed and a blessing,

Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it. Hebrews 13:2

Has anyone planted a vineyard and not begun to enjoy it? Go home.

Every time you drink of this cup…

Cold water from a well or spring is needed to nurture a vineyard

Just as it is to slake a dry mouth or roll done mountains like justice.

Turned soil, warm between the toes in Spring, is need to awaken the vine

Just as it is to take the seed for corn and wheat for the bread to eat with the cup.

Pruned vines, secured again after the winter to stays and guy wires require our attention,

Just like children growing up each day, elders aging not far from the hearth.

How could conscience not call us home to the vineyard, home from the warring front?

Do this in remembrance of me and of the least of these our brothers and sisters.

Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best for till now. John 2:10

Has any one become pledged to another and not married yet? Go home.

Our daughters pledged to those who would become our sons,

How do they, or we, hide our tears when the trumpet sounds?

Our sons pledged to those who would become our daughters,

How do they, or we, hide our fears when the drums roll?

Our grandchildren who would from this union come,

How will they be born or raised if the pledge is broken before tide?

The eye of the metal bird beholds an assembly,

Why would so many gather on a hillside, in a garden?

Why would they dance through the streets and in a courtyard?

Why would the fruits of the vineyard be so widely shared?

Who pulls the trigger half a world away to come between the betrothed,

And then goes home to dine, bride and bridegroom, and the fruits of marriage?

Is anyone of afraid of warfare, faint-hearted about killing others? Go home,

Faint at the sight of blood even after computer games, television, movies.

Sickened by the archive of journalists abroad in the fields of war.

Not far enough removed even in the comfort of sleep and dreams

It seems a miracle to have been the fruit of descent through so many generations of violence

Why do I shudder at loud noises, curl into a ball away from flash and blast,

Suspect disturbances of the earth and strangers on the horizon?

Lightly girls running naked down dirt roads in hysteria,

sitting with their heads buried in their knees covered, blood-splattered.

Bring them home, give them homes, protect us all from warfare.

My conscience is clear. But that does not make me innocent. I Corinthians 4:4

Who is left to construct battles, to arm for conflict, to do war?

What if no one would take command, pick up the arms, obey orders?

What if everyone went home from every side and party?

Who then would lay blame and who would be to blame for the lack of killing?

What factories would have to close, which equities would collapse?

What would the cost be to us?

They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. Isaiah 2:4

'A moral injury in war occurs when a person does things "that transgresses deeply held beliefs, witness that in others, or witness intense suffering and cruelty.' Clinical Psychology Review, December 2009

Healing Moral Injury A Lifelong Journey

By Camilo E. Mejia

Moral injury is a relatively new term, and although mental health experts and religious leaders are now investigating it and addressing it as a precursor to Post Traumatic Stress, there is still a lot that needs to be understood. According to a Clinical Psychology Review journal article, moral injury occurs when a person does things "that transgress deeply held beliefs, witness that in others, or witness intense human suffering and cruelty."

But what does that mean?

The first time I heard of moral injury was when I attended the launching of the Truth Commission on Conscience in War, in March of last year in New York City. It was one of those things I had learned in my past and remained on my memory until one day I heard the mention of it again, and the knowledge of it became fresh once more.

It was only after I became involved with the Truth Commission, some six and a half years after returning from Iraq, that I began to ask myself why the term moral injury felt so familiar. I realized that moral injury is not something I carry with me, like a backpack I can strap to my body and drop at any time, but something that shapes an important part of who I am as a human being.

In trying to articulate for myself a definition of moral injury the first thing that came to mind was Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I started thinking about how my life has changed since I came back from Iraq. The main change in my life is that I have become a very secluded person, and the reason I have withdrawn from society is that I want to avoid the fear and the anxiety I experience from interacting with the outside world.

My PTSD is not very different from that of others who have been to war, or who have experienced traumatic events. When I go to a public place, such as a bookstore, I always prefer to sit with my back to the wall, and in a place that allows me to see what's going on around me. I like to be in clear sight of all the exits. And I always identify places that could provide cover and concealment from possible attacks.

While I was in Iraq, when people in charge exercised poor judgment, others got badly hurt or killed. As a result, I developed a sense of suspicion of people in positions of authority and control. Today that suspicion applies to everyone from physicians to bus drivers, and I now prefer to drive than to be driven; to cook than to be cooked for; to walk or ride my bicycle than to ride the bus.

Going to therapy at the Miami VA hospital helped me understand that the source of my fear and apprehension was the violation of an unspoken agreement I had with the outside world. That agreement stated that bombs don't explode on the road; it said that a dead cat is just that, a dead cat, and not an improvised explosive device. The agreement said that kids don't throw grenades at people, even if they're outsiders occupying their country. It said that mortar rounds don't fall from the sky as we walk to the toilet, or to the shower, or to the mess hall to eat dinner. The agreement I had with the world was that those appointed to positions of power are supposed to protect life, not to destroy it.

PTSD appeared in my life when the world no longer was a safe place; when I realized I did not trust the roads anymore; when children became a mortal threat; when every beat of my heart pumped fear into my body, reminding me that my life was expendable and could be over at any moment; when death became real, and present, and graphic, and refused to leave my side, and forced me into isolation.

My PSTD, however, is different from my moral injury.

My moral injury is not the result of a violation of trust between the world outside and me, but of a violation of a moral agreement I had with my internal world. I violated that agreement. And the agreement was that as long as I honored and obeyed my conscience I would not be morally injured.

When I was stationed in the city of ar Ramadi, in Central Iraq, one day my platoon was ordered to respond to a political protest outside the city's main government building. After a while the protesters, who were demanding the end of the US occupation, decided to start throwing grenades at the building.

I was ordered to occupy a defensive position on the rooftop. A young man emerged from the crowd. He was holding a grenade. As he drew his arm back to throw it we all opened fire on him. Before I squeezed the trigger, I remember thinking that he was too far to hurt any of us. I still fired on him. I saw that young man, first alive, walking, breathing, and then on the ground, covered with blood, dead.

After the incident I went into a dark room by myself, I removed the magazine from my rifle, and I counted the bullets that were missing from it. I had fired eleven bullets at the young man. The reason I needed to count the rounds fired was that immediately after the incident, my mind erased all images of the moment of the killing. All I remembered, then and now, were the moments immediately before and after the young man was shot dead.

That day I knew something had forever changed inside me. I felt a hole within me that had no bottom, an infinite void that could never be replenished. For weeks after the incident my mind could not shake off the images of the young man walking, and breathing, and then down on the ground, bloody, and dead.

I once spoke with a therapist about this event. I described the incident, providing details, and explaining how I had felt and continue to feel about it. He told me that I shouldn't be so hard on myself. The young man had actually thrown a grenade that could have killed people from the crowd or, at a later time, he might have ended up killing other soldiers or civilians. I had also followed a lawful order, and I had not opened fire until I was convinced that he was indeed going to throw a grenade.

I sat that day with that therapist, and on a certain level I had to agree with him. The problem was that as I observed that young man through the sight of my rifle, when he was still alive, there was something inside me, a voice one could say, that was telling me not to squeeze the trigger. And I knew, without a shred of doubt, that I should not disobey that voice, and that if I did, there would be serious consequences to face.

It is hard for me to talk about this subject without citing the words on moral conscience given by The Second Vatican Council:

"In the depth of his conscience, man detects a law which he does not impose upon himself, but which holds him to obedience. Always summoning him to love good and avoid evil the voice of conscience can, when necessary, speak to his heart more specifically: do this, shun that. For man has in his heart a law written by God. To obey it is the very dignity of man, according to it he will be judged. Conscience is the most secret core and sanctuary of man. There he is alone with God, whose voice echoes in his depths."

Notwithstanding the male-centered language, I do uphold the concept that conscience is the most secret place where we can see the unwritten law of morality. Our integrity and our dignity as human beings are preserved to the extent that we obey that law.

When I opened fire that day I violated that law and desecrated the most sacred sanctuary of my being. As I observed that young man through the sight of my rifle, I was staring at a point of no return, the very Rubicon of my life, and I crossed it.

My moral injury is the pain I inflicted upon the very core of my being when I took something I could never give back. It is a pain that redefined my life, and that not only transformed who I was, but continues to transform me.

But I don't pity myself for living with moral injury. I believe we always have a choice to take the defining moments in life, however painful they may be, and either turn them into something positive, or let them continue to destroy the core of our moral being.

Before I deployed to the Middle East my life was quite shallow. I lived in a beautiful beach town in Miami, Florida, I attended a very expensive private university, and I didn't have to work for a living. I spent my days reading and studying at coffee shops and bookstores. I wanted to be a private practice clinical psychologist, specialized on personality disorders, and write psychological thrillers in my spare time. I viewed things through a lens that allowed me to separate the world between them and us. I felt sorry for the problems of other people, but at the end of the day those problems were still the problems of other people.

My experience in Iraq changed that.

As horrible as the experience of war was, and as painful as the memory of it continues to be, I am now a much better person than I ever was. My eyes are open and I no longer view the suffering of others as alien to my own experience. I view hunger, disease, and the brutality of war and occupation as global-scale issues, not as issues of individual nations.

I believe those of us who have lived through war have a moral obligation to educate the public about what is being done in their name. But first we must recognize the fact that we have injured our moral being and core, and that repairing that damage within ourselves will require a life-long commitment to atone for the wrongs we have committed against others.

Moral injury is painful, yes, but it has also returned a sense of humanity that had been missing from my life for longer than I can remember. I have come to believe that the transformative power of moral injury cannot be found in the pursuit of our own moral balance as an end goal, but in the journey of repairing the damage we have done onto others.

There is much to be learned about moral injury. I would never claim that my own experience and understanding could ever encompass the entire scope of it. But if there is one thing I am certain about, it is that in committing great wrongs against others, I committed great wrongs against myself as well. And with the certainty that it will take a lifetime to heal the injuries within me, I embark on this life-long journey to heal the injuries of others.

A Litany of Light for Peace (from the National Council of Churches)

LEADER: May the Peace which passes all understanding be with you!

PEOPLE: And also with you!

FIRST READER: Light is an image from scripture associated with peace, hrmony and oneness with God. When all was in the darkness God created light and called it good.

PEOPLE: Light is a symbol of God's goodness and of all that is created. Let us celebrate the light of the world.

SECOND READER: In the great story of the Exodus from Egypt the people were afraid and fearful for their lives. God gave them a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night that they might find their way to freedom and peace.

PEOPLE: We too are afraid that the nations will lose their way. O, God, give us light that we might find our way to peace.

LEADER: Let us place among us this candle. Let us light it and let it stand as a beacon calling us from darkness and warfare to light and peace.

(Here, a member of the family or group lights the candle and it is momentarily lifted up above the bearer's head and placed on the table or altar.)

LEADER: Let us pray to the God of life for Peace:

ALL: God who created light that your children might walk in light and live an abundant life, we come before you in faith and in hope that even now the nations might choose to walk in light and put aside warfare and killing. Drawn to the light of this candle we make bold to pray that you will touch the hearts and minds of world leaders afresh. May the councils of the powerful yield to your everlasting wisdom. Wherever wars and rumors of war abound may your Peace and understanding quiet all fears and animosities. May you give new and powerful gifts of courage and leadership to those who speak and work for Peace. Help us to confess that war in this time is a mark of our failing one another and contrary to your will. In these days of anxiety and preparation for war stand by us and make us strong that we might not be paralyzed by fear but rather empowered to speak on behalf of Peace, work for Peace, pray for Peace, and live in Peace each with one another. Amen

LEADER: Then let us dedicate ourselves to the ministry of Peacemaking in the name of the God who brings true Peace.

PEOPLE: Lord, make me an instrument of your Peace!

LEADER: Let us declare ourselves again in opposition to war and killing, in the name of the Lord of life.

PEOPLE: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace!

LEADER: Let us again denounce war as a final rupture of the human family and violation of God's will for our lives.

PEOPLE: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace!

LEADER: Let us seek the ways of security that hold promise for life and lasting peace rather than an expeditious exercise of military domination

PEOPLE: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace!

LEADER: Then let us go from this place when worship is concluded to bring light in darkness, hope in despair, and to sow true and lasting peace by word and deed

PEOPLE: Lord, make me an instrument of your peace!

LEADER: Peace be with you!

PEOPLE: And also with you!

ALL: Amen

*Hymn"Amazing Grace"

*Benediction (adapted form a traditional Franciscan prayer)

LEADER: May God bless you with discomfort: at easy answers, at half-truths, and superficial relationships, so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger: at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people, so that you may work for justice, freedom, and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed: for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war, so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in this world, so that you can do what others claim cannot be done. Amen.

* Those who are able, please stand.