Perspectief 2015-30

2015-30 Reluctant Prophets - The Prophetic Task of Military Chaplains 43 Reageer soldiers cannot deny or avoid them. And if they succeed in avoiding them, this will be temporarily successful only: for their conscience will confront them once again when they are a veteran and memories can no longer be repressed. Therefore, military culture must facilitate this type of Socratic questioning. To summarize the relevance of this, I’d like to ask you: can you imagine soldiers fighting a ‘just war’ or conducting just combat actions in a peace operation without them having any idea about justice, or about the military’s license to kill? Now let us consider Socrates as a military chaplain avant la lettre. What can we learn from this important source in Western culture? First of all : it is most important to pose questions, and to pose the right ones, for by asking these, one helps a soldier in his self-clarification. Secondly : the focus on self-clarification implies that the soldier himself is and will stay responsible for his own personal and professional attitudes and actions – which is a good starting point for pastoral care. Thirdly : although the posing of questions can really contribute to the formation of the conscience, it is not an easy job. It implies an intervention in current ways of framing military practice. Therefore, it takes skills and techniques in dialogue, so it requires a type of pastoral quality, in modern terms: professionalism. Fourthly , it is not without a risk to operate in this Socratic way. Even in a democracy like ancient Athens, Socrates was killed in spite of the fact that he was esteemed as a philosopher, too. He died in a way similar to a Jewish prophet 4 , refusing to escape his death penalty and by staying loyal to his inner vocation expressed in his inner voice, his so called daimonion . The Socratic attitude is a very demanding one. In sum, my question to you is: can we ourselves, can our military chaplains, live and work up to this Socratic standard? Nowadays, the early Socratic dialogues may offer an important instrument for moral education, because they are helpful in aiming at transcending self-centered ambition, for transcending a lucid self-esteem, and to go beyond narrow-minded ideas on military professionalism and corporate p ride. The 4 In western philosophy, Socrates and Jesus have been compared very often.