(A reflection given at a CPE graduation, December 2023). My dad was a storyteller. If you have seen the movie, “Big Fish,” the dad in that film was the spitting image of my dad. Always telling a story. One of his favorites was “The Bear Story,” by the Hoosier poet, James Whitcomb Riley. It’s written…
For a little over nine years I’ve been Assistant Director of Adventist Chaplaincy Ministries for the North American Division; that ends today. Apart from my twenty years in the Army Reserve and National Guard (two ten-year periods with a gap), this was the longest job I’ve had (a few months more than I was with…
(Prepared for SDA healthcare chaplains’ conference April 2023) The best part of my job the last nine years has been visiting chaplains, and so the worst part of the pandemic, for me, was being grounded. We had nearly two years in which we couldn’t travel. I have loved getting back out on the road, seeing…
[Updated 2021] Thirty-five years ago I raised my hand, took the oath of office, and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant, Chaplain Candidate, in the US Army Reserve. That summer, as a student in the Chaplain Officer Basic Course at Fort Monmouth, NJ, I first heard the story of the Four Chaplains: George Fox, Alexander Goode,…
[Originally posted in 2016. I wrote this when I was debating resigning. I finally did so at the end of February 2019, inspired by these examples.] You don’t often hear of military chaplains engaged in political protest or resigning in disagreement with policy. But it does happen. Charles Liteky, recipient of the Medal of Honor…
Tonight my wife and I went to a local theater that was showing Stanley Kubrick’s 1964 satire, “Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb.” It’s a hilarious film–but sobering, at the same time. Lots of people love the Bomb. They express their love whenever anyone criticizes Truman’s decision to…
Note: This reflection is a personal response to things I’ve recently read and conversations I’ve participated in. And I’ve made some revisions in response to some of the comments I’ve received. Chaplaincy is ministry. It is ministry in a specialized setting: hospital, military, college, prison, etc. But it is ministry. It is pastoral. I find…
They were talking about Buddhist chaplains when I did my Chaplain Officer Basic Course back in 1986 and 1990. The Army finally has one on active duty: CH (CPT) Somya Malasri. CH Thomas Dyer has served in the National Guard since 2009.
Pax et bonum 
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