the boisi center interviews no. 66: February 9, 2012

jonathan ebel is an assistant professor of religion at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a former lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy and Navy Reserve. He spoke with Boisi Center associate director Erik Owens and undergraduate research assistant Claire Kairys before participating in a panel on the religious component of the U.S. military experience.

owens: Your book, Faith in the Fight, soldiers and the nation partake in this post-Vietnam era, which experienced looks at the religious experience of Amer- religious narrative)? a re-awakening of politically engaged ican soldiers in the First World War. conservative evangelicalism (although I ebel: What I tried to argue in the book What did you determine through your would be wary about tying that particular was that this religious awakening was not primary research? one to soldiers). I think there are other denominationally based, but was what social things that are happening, as ebel: I found out two main things. I refer to as a “re-illusionment” among indeed there were in World War I, which First of all, not surprisingly, soldiers are can account for the rise of the moral ma- complicated spiritual beings. They are jority in the Christian coalition. complicated in ways that defy denomina- tional or traditional boundaries. Through That said, the 1920s—a time of the mod- this complication, one can sort out partic- ernist, fundamentalist controversy—is a ular themes. In the particular historical really fascinating period for a historian of era [of World War I]—which has carried religion. forward into the present moment—many owens: The Great War was particularly believed that there is something noble, gruesome for Americans. Did it make authorizing, and validating about the soldiers more or less likely to find spiritu- experience of combat. However, this al dimensions in their experience? experience is also disempowering and existentially disorienting. ebel: Soldiers seemed to have entered the war with a particular understanding One thing that I did in the book was to of what it was going to be like. They ex- associate God-talk not only with theology, pected it to be characterized by weapons but also with the ways that people under- of intimacy, or hand-to-hand combat, stand how the world works around them, but instead they encountered weapons of whether that is by chance, luck or faith. the soldiery. Those who are coming back industry that were a lot more indiscrim- I am trying to see what the theological from the war are doubly invested in the inate and killed in many different ways. balance is and to examine the many ways mythologies they developed, a kind of Those were not entirely new, but the scale of talking about being powerless in the millennial efficacy of violence through at which they were encountered in World face of this industrial combat. which America can be made whole. War I was really jarring. The mythology owens: In Faith in the Fight, you talk of war to that point in America (and, to Other people have written about religious about the religious awakening that some extent, to this day as well) featured awakenings in the wake of World War II, occurred after the Great War. Was that a man with a rifle up on a horse. The particularly the birth of national televan- a unique outcome, or is that a tradition- Civil War, the Indian Wars and the Rev- gelism and Billy Graham revivals. I think al consequence (in the sense that both olutionary War all featured prominently this phenomenon is also evident in the

1 the boisi center interview: jonathan ebel in the psychological experience of the Those sorts of things get pushed out of only considered the best way to burn American soldier in the First World War. the narrative because they trouble it. things down. And so the body just sort of vanishes. One thing that I argue in the book is owens: But aren’t those flaws in the that we move too quickly to narratives of narrative validated precisely by the belief owens: The mention of McNamara disillusionment in America with regard in the purity of our mission? raises the question of who is responsible to World War I. I think that the British for the narratives of spirituality and reli- ebel: I think that that is certainly part and French experiences have exerted gion that you’re talking about. Certainly, of it, but that does not mean that there an overly strong influence on American they’re driven by efficiency: when you’re is not something important about going interpretations of World War I, such that in charge of the military, you need to get back and trying to recover those more we regard the “lost generation” and the the job done. But what are the roles of sol- morally complex realities in their focus. rhetoric of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest diers, chaplains, politicians and civilians Hemingway, Ezra Pound and E.E. Cum- in the development of this narrative over mings as though such experiences the time? norm. They are not invalid, but they do “There certainly ebel: Well, let me first say a little bit not describe what I would argue was the more about the development of this nar- experience of the overwhelming major- is an American rative. One can look at American pulpits ity: a doubling down on violence and habit of mind in in 1917, 1919 and from the 1920s through the view of war as a necessary means of the 1930s to hear ministers—liberal keeping America safe and whole. warfare: that we and conservative Protestants, liberal and owens: You write about how the meta- are the bastion conservative Catholics and Jews—talking physics of good and evil are enmeshed about the nobility of war for God and for in the theological dimension of soldiers’ of good and country. That narrative is also present in experience in war. How has that man- newspapers, in editorials, in Hollywood ifested itself in the last hundred years? are struggling and in novels. I think it’s just part of the Do all soldiers in war see themselves as warp and woof of American culture in agents of good in the world, or is this an for good in the that period, which then becomes built American phenomenon? world...that into environments. Memorial Church [at Harvard University], Soldiers Field [in ebel: That’s a great question. There Chicago] and the amazingly beautiful certainly is an American habit of mind in habit of mind cemeteries in Europe from World War I warfare: that we are the bastion of good does function and later from World War II really sanc- and are struggling for good in the world. tify the soldier and make him perhaps While it describes America, I cannot say powerfully if not more religious in death than he might that it is American specifically both be- have been in life. cause of propaganda and its existence in universally.” other cultures and nations of the world. Resistors to that narrative come from But from World War I to World War II, different corners, including traditional From what I have heard and from the in Korea and to some extent in Vietnam peace churches, pacifist social move- little that I have studied about Robert and throughout the Cold War, that habit ments like the Fellowship of Reconcilia- McNamara, I do not think that he was of mind does function powerfully if not tion and the student anti-war movement possessed by a sense of evil. He was a bu- universally within the American context in Vietnam, and sometimes from within reaucrat who was doing a job, looking at of war. the military itself. As a famous example, numbers and putting weapons in places. John Kerry is such a lightning rod for At the same time, to the extent that we Some of my research, which is in a very taking the narrative of authorization do that, we lose track of some really embryonic stage, offers a religious his- through exposure to violence and turn- troubling war realities that America tory of American weaponry. I am asking ing the myth back in on itself. There are has gotten involved with. For instance, questions like how it is that a weapon— people from other quarters—from the aligning with Stalin in World War II and such as napalm—gets developed, and pulpit, American film, media, television deliberately targeting civilians in Europe how do people think about it? Do they and novels—who write those kinds of and Japan with napalm and incendiary consider bodies? Do they consider pain? narratives, as well. weapons (which was well-documented From what I have read from scientists and confessed by Robert McNamara). at Harvard who developed napalm, they

2 the boisi center interview: jonathan ebel While I would say that we are all complic- time, and there were people who were account for Tillman beating a fellow it in the narrative’s production, we are contrasting —portrayed as teenager severely and facing charges of all also equally empowered in its decon- a truly sacrificial, truly heroic soldier— felony assault, Krakauer turns briefly to struction, although there are definitely with John Kerry, portrayed as some sort neurology, not exactly his field, citing an some dangerous ways to deconstruct it. of bastardized pro-Communist, pro-liber- underdeveloped “dorsal lateral prefrontal This is where John Kerry might be an al pseudo-veteran. cortex.” This seems like a rather elaborate interesting example; he became an ap- way around a part of Tillman’s life and In any case, it came out soon afterward pealing figure to the anti-war movement career, violence, that Krakauer would that his death wasn’t as it had been because of the fact that he’d been to war. prefer to see as incidental rather than described, and also that his politics were essential. owens: Can you say a bit about Pat not as they had been described: Tillman Tillman and how he and his family bring was anti-Bush, against the war and owens: I hope that maybe today in the this narrative to present day in an inter- an avid reader of . panel we’ll talk a bit about the religious esting way? overlay on that as well, particularly the Now at this point, the political left rushed use and abuse of Tillman among the ebel: Yes. I’d like to start by acknowl- in, wanting that part of Pat Tillman. This Christian right, the religious left and the edging just the immense tragedy at a per- is where it becomes important for us to non-religious left. sonal level for his wife, brothers and par- think about the way in which the violence ents, who have really taken an enormous was done to him; apart from his family, ebel: I’m treating this as a kind of de emotional risk by stepping out and being no one wanted to embrace the real Pat facto religious process, but there are more the public face of his service and death. Tillman. His biographer, , specific religious dimensions to it that Pat Tillman was famously the last person I think, is just as guilty as anybody and you just mentioned. to receive a football scholarship at Arizo- was not as comfortable with the violent na State University. He rose through the Pat Tillman as he really could be. For ranks, an undersized, scrappy athlete in instance, in his book, when he has to [end] the Pac 10, to be drafted by the Arizo- na Cardinals in the seventh round. He became a very successful, aggressive and exceptionally violent football player in the NFL, and after two or three years on a rookie contract he signed a $1.2 million annual contract to continue playing for the . But after September 11, Tillman, like a lot of people, felt that he wanted to do The Boisi Center for something more for the country. He had Religion and American always been sort of detached from the Public Life game of football as the meaning-mak- Boston College ing organ in his life, so he decided that 24 Quincy Road he wanted to go and do something. He Chestnut Hill, MA 02467 convinced his brother Kevin to enlist in the military and they became Army Rangers. They deployed to Iraq and then tel 617-552-1860 to , and on April 22, 2004, fax 617-552-1863 Pat was killed in Afghanistan. [email protected] His death was described immediately Visit bc.edu/boisi-resources in very standard heroic terms, which we for a complete set of the boisicenter shouldn’t be surprised about. Based on Boisi Center Interviews and that narrative, he was embraced by people audio, video, photographs, @boisi_center on the political right as a real hero. John and transcripts from our Kerry is a part of the story because he events. was a candidate for president at the same

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