Congregation, please be seated

Remove all ads!

Looking back at my sorry-arse military service, I realized that I had about a week of service in full health. A week. No wonder I was pretty fed up with the whole thing since my service consisted mainly of loitering in the barracks and getting lip from the corporals who were few years younger than me.

I actually liked the little combat training I was able to do, although I was probably the crappiest shot at the range. Ever. The light machine gun was fun.

Doing the last strip of my responsibility as a man of my country has taken me down the memory lane and this bit of reminiscing brought to my mind that whoa-hey: I was actually a spiritual leader that time! Or at least was supposed to be that for more than a few days, but there I was, supposed to take the responsibility of the spiritual well-being of the garrison on the weekdays, since the pastor was there only on week-ends.

I counted my blessings and came to the conclusion that as an enlisted military priest I had none to give. One guy was falling to pieces and he was supposed to have guard duty, so I managed to get him a week-end off, but that was it. At least I did something I was supposed to, a place where they hand you a gun doesn't mix too well with guys falling apart, and if it's the supposed preacherman's duty to get the guys the heck out of there, then that's what I might sign in for. But I was never too keen on giving a sermon on anything or to anyone.

Basically, I just wasn't cut out for that poo. Hells, I aws naive and stupid and expected some sort of religious calling to come for me out of the blue, but it never came. In religion, I saw nothing but the same petty power struggles that goes on in any given group of people. The us vs. them mentality. "If you're not with us, you're against us." The undercurrent in any ideology: that there is no common goal, only the will to power. The want to have more than someone else. That for more or less and always too much for my taste, almost all ideologies serve the purpose or are used to gain power over others...

...perhaps my problem back then was that I wasn't too good at lying. I guess I'm still not. That and the fact that I was just too tired of the whole BS. Amen.