PTSD - God's Curse?

“Even in times of trauma, we try to maintain a sense of normality until we no longer can. That, my friends, is called surviving. Not healing. We never become whole again ... we are survivors. If you are here today... you are a survivor. But those of us who have made it thru hell and are still standing? We bare a different name: warriors.” 

-- Lori Goodwin, military veteran, author

As a follow-up to my Guest Post, The Silent Demon, I had a few more thoughts on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  I began thinking about this being God's curse on those that wage war, if there isn't some built-in mechanism that trips when our sense of morality goes a bit askew as we take life which God has seen fit to grace the world with.  My thoughts went to the followers of the Hillsboro Baptist Church who would dare to blame the deaths of our brave men and women in battle as God's curse on mankind for homosexuality.  The only positive outcome of this philosophy is that it destroys any credibility these folks at Hillsboro Baptist may have illusions of ever acquiring.  I mean, really, the ir conclusion is a non sequitur.  I could understand them, as ignorant as they are, chanting that AIDS might be a curse for homosexuality, but certainly not dying in battle.

But, they make one think, and that is never a bad thing.  Does God curse us for war?  Obviously if you're waging war for all the wrong reasons, like the seven deadly sins, one might understand God's displeasure at lessons we haven't learned, but what if we're protecting ourselves, or the weak.  What if we are protecting the peace?  Do we still pay for our actions we perform as part of God's greater plan, and not for some illusory reason thrown onto the table by some fringe Christian cult to excuse their own cowardly inadequacies?

I'd like to think this built in circuit breaker trips when we violate our own code of morality.  As when you cut yourself with a knife, if hurts like the dickens, but you learn the lesson to not cut yourself again.  Even if we don't cut ourselves, we can imagine through our experience with other pain what the cut will feel like and set a circuit breaker to trip in our heads if we ever come to a situation where we might get cut, to ensure we don't.  What if we were told to stab ourselves repeatedly with the blade?  The circuit breaker would trip, and fail.  Our sense of morality would succumb to a surge of negative energy and overload.  Sooner or later, one would expect these centers of the brain might overload and burn out.  This damage might bleed over into other mental circuits to create collateral damage of confusion, self-loathing, anger and frustration.  Left untreated, this damage might very well cause the computer to shut down or self-destruct in order to end the painful damage.

“PTSD is a whole-body tragedy, an integral human event of enormous proportions with massive repercussions.”

-- Susan Pease Banitt, psychotherapist, social worker

We order our young people to violate their circuitry.  We order them to override the moral circuit breaker we have put in place and, even if they are protecting their own, or protecting the weak and the helpless, whether the reasons are misguided or noble, we pay a price.  We are, in essence, cursed because we violate our morals and feel the full weight of guilt for doing so.  If we didn't, man would ultimately become as evil as that which he so vehemently fights against to survive.  There must be balance.  For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction?  Maybe.  I think that for every life taken there must be a life forfeit, or some payment to fit the crime.  Thou shall not kill?  But, what if it is necessary to ensure peace and security?  Maybe the punishment must fit the crime; a balance kept on some divine scale to excuse the action, yet remind us there is a price to pay for even the noblest actions that violate our code, God's code.  It is something to remind us of the horrors of war and the payment we must make for what we do in the name of peace.

What about those that come back seemingly unscathed by their actions on the battlefield?  I think it would benefit us all to assume no one comes back without scars of their time on the field.  For one to say they are fine is to admit denial of their own emotions or the emotions of others.  I think if you truly are not negatively affected emotionally by what you do, or witness, in battle, it would be to admit your own serious lack of morality, of right and wrong.  Might this lack of moral compass be seen as sociopathic?  Perhaps.

Is PTSD a curse, or just the end result of overloading our moral circuit breaker?  Is it payment for feelings and emotions we have forgotten how to understand; a penance for our inability to find forgiveness from God for doing what is required to survive against evil in our world?  Perhaps it is a way of reminding us not to get comfortable with death and destruction, with that which is required, to remind us there is a hell right here on earth, and lessons that must continually be learned if we are to, eventually, discover a lasting peace.

I am but a humble veteran.  I was military intelligence and never was retrained to see the world in black and white.  After basic training, we were trained to see all the colors in between the shades, along with the good, the bad, and the insane.  Two plus two doesn't always equal four, and expect the poorly armed rebel leader with a captured, fully armed, jet to have a pilot and fuel hidden in his backyard, despite what higher echelon intelligence might say to the contrary.  If I were a rebel leader with a jet, my number one priority would be to find me a pilot, fuel, and more bombs.  If I was his enemy, I'd want to know what target was most important for him to strike, when he got the jet airborne.  We were expected to question everything we thought we knew, and everything we were told, or the troops that were expected to see their world in black and white, would find themselves in a world red and hurt.  I can't help but bleed with them when I see an operation go horribly wrong.  I can't help but wonder what "intel puke" in planning is second guessing what he thought he knew as he sees the body count grow.

“There is no greater love than this: that a person would lay down his life for the sake of his friends.”

-- John 15:13

We must remember those that pay the ultimate price for our freedom and the freedom of others.  I, for one, will not question their motives for serving, and continuing to serve, time and again, when duty calls.  Those I have known give of themselves freely and see it as an action that must be undertaken in order to ensure peace and freedom, or to protect others.  Though we may not always agree on why we fight battles, we must give credit to those that fight the battles, as they sacrifice much for those that don't.  Let us not be selfish in thinking they do this for any but the most selfless of reasons, for there is no greater love than this.

"Dear Lord, 

Lest I continue
My complacent way
Help me to remember
Somehow out there
A man died for me today.
As long as there be war
I then must
Ask and answer
Am I worth dying for?"

-- Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962), First Lady, politician, diplomat, activist

 Editor's Note:  

Before you go getting your panties in a bunch, it is essential to understand that this is just an opinion site and, as such, can be subjected to scrutiny by anyone with a differing opinion.  It doesn't make either opinion any more right or wrong than the other.  An opinion, presented in this context, is a way of inciting others to think and, hopefully, to form opinions of their own, if they haven't already done so.

It is my fervent hope that we keep open and active minds when reading opinions and then engaging in peaceful, constructive, discussion and debate in an arena of mutual respect concerning the opinions put forth.  After over twenty years as a military intelligence analyst, planner, and briefer, I have come to believe engaging each other in this manner and in this arena is the way we will learn tolerance and respect for differing beliefs, cultures, and viewpoints.

We all fall from grace, some more often than others; it is part of being human.  God's test for us is what we do afterward, and what we learn from the experience.
  

Pastor Frank Anthony Villari

Pastor Tony is founder of the Congregation for Religious Tolerance and author/editor of the Congregation's official blog site, "The Path."