thedrifter
01-13-07, 07:41 AM
GIs are uplifted by Iraq services in Spanish
The language helps Marines discuss their feelings and seek God's assistance as they face questions of mortality, a Navy chaplain says.
By Tony Perry, Times Staff Writer
January 13, 2007
CAMP FALLOUJA, IRAQ — The Navy chaplain brought his guitar. The Marines brought their M-16s.
What they all brought to a Friday night service at the Chapel of Hope was a desire to speak Spanish while discussing Scripture and its application to life and death in a war zone.
The services were inspired by something that Navy Lt. Cmdr. Samuel Ravelo, a chaplain and Southern Baptist minister, saw a few months earlier when he arrived in Kuwait while en route to his second tour of duty in Iraq.
Ravelo, a native of the Dominican Republican, saw a sign in an Army camp mentioning a Spanish-language religious service. When no Spanish-speaking chaplain showed up, Ravelo took the task upon himself. It inspired him to hold similar services for military personnel here in the insurgent stronghold of Al Anbar Province.
Ravelo says many Marines, sailors and soldiers for whom Spanish is their first language feel more comfortable hearing the Bible discussed in Spanish and joining in the conversation in their native tongue.
In Iraq, he said, many military personnel, all attached to the Camp Pendleton-based 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, are confronting questions of mortality for the first time. Anything that helps them discuss their feelings and seek God's assistance is helpful, he added.
"Iraq is a good place to get to know God," he said. "Death is such a reality here. When we hear someone has been killed, we know it could have been us. Everyone wants to get their life straight."
The sound of war is a constant backdrop to the services. Blackhawk helicopters fly past, carrying the injured to a base hospital known as Fallouja Surgical. Trucks rumble past outside. Artillery booms in the background and sermons are punctuated with an English phrase known to all here: "Incoming, incoming!"
The Chapel of Hope is used by a variety of faiths and serves as a venue for a steady stream of memorial services. The sandstone structure is a large auditorium once used by the Iraqi military; it can seat 2,500.
Saddam Hussein used to lecture troops from the stage, and Iranian conscripts who fought on behalf of Baghdad in the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s received training here.
Now the auditorium has an altar and is decorated with banners and American flags. Bibles are plentiful.
The Friday night services are in addition to Ravelo's duties as chaplain for a Marine radio battalion. He provides an English-language service on Sundays and recently finished a two-week stint as a traveling chaplain serving far-flung Marine outposts throughout the sprawling desert.
The crowd for a recent service was small — just a handful. About a dozen servicemen usually attend the Spanish service, but Ravelo's two-week absence had broken the continuity. He was sure that attendance would pick up, though he said that even if only one Marine, sailor or soldier attends, he will consider the service worthwhile.
On this evening, Ravelo was animated, tossing in joking references to Marine life, and he employed a question-and-answer approach to foster discussion.
One example comes from a favorite sermon theme: "If You Were Accused of Being a Christian, Would There Be Enough Evidence to Convict You?"
One of the night's Bible readings came from Romans: "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Or, as it flows in Spanish: Porque la paga del pecado es muerte, mas la dádiva de Dios es vida eterna en Cristo Jesús Seńor nuestro.
It's unclear how many Spanish speakers serve in Iraq, though Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans and other Latinos are common. Latinos, 12.5% of the U.S. population, made up 11.2% of the deaths in Iraq in 2006, according to government figures.
The Marines gathered recently at the chapel all speak perfect English, but said they feel more comfortable with the language of their upbringing.
Cpl. Andres Velasquez, 22, from Long Beach, said he grew up attending Mass in Spanish. "It just feels more natural," he said. "Out here your eyes are opened to a lot of things, and it's good to be able to talk about them in Spanish."
Cpl. Jose Vasquez, 24, formerly of Long Beach and now of Atlanta, said he came to the service "to help clear my mind of some things." Assigned to the mortuary affairs unit, a day earlier he had helped prepare the bodies of three Marines killed in a sniper attack while they patrolled in Fallouja.
"It helps to speak Spanish," he said. "I don't get much opportunity where I work."
Cpl. Rodolfo Quiles, 22, was born in Puerto Rico and learned English in the Marine Corps. "I just get a different vibe from Spanish; it's hard to associate with English sometimes," he said.
The Spanish-language service also helps ease the pain of being separated from his wife and 8-month-old daughter back at Camp Pendleton.
"I can't keep them out of my mind," he said.
Ravelo, now 44, joined the Navy at age 24 and served a hitch as a seaman before leaving the service and graduating from the University of South Carolina and the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Dallas. He rejoined the Navy as a chaplain in 2000 and is in his third overseas deployment.
"As Christians, we plant seeds in English and Spanish," he said.
During his service, Ravelo crafted a military image to convey his message: He urged the Marines to think of God as they do a concrete shelter, the kind that provides safety from the mortar attacks that are common here.
The image was apt. The day after Christmas, the Chapel of Hope was struck by mortars, leaving the walls peppered.
God is your shelter, he told the Marines. "He will guide you because he is with you," Ravelo said. "He knows what's best."
tony.perry@latimes.com
Ellie
The language helps Marines discuss their feelings and seek God's assistance as they face questions of mortality, a Navy chaplain says.
By Tony Perry, Times Staff Writer
January 13, 2007
CAMP FALLOUJA, IRAQ — The Navy chaplain brought his guitar. The Marines brought their M-16s.
What they all brought to a Friday night service at the Chapel of Hope was a desire to speak Spanish while discussing Scripture and its application to life and death in a war zone.
The services were inspired by something that Navy Lt. Cmdr. Samuel Ravelo, a chaplain and Southern Baptist minister, saw a few months earlier when he arrived in Kuwait while en route to his second tour of duty in Iraq.
Ravelo, a native of the Dominican Republican, saw a sign in an Army camp mentioning a Spanish-language religious service. When no Spanish-speaking chaplain showed up, Ravelo took the task upon himself. It inspired him to hold similar services for military personnel here in the insurgent stronghold of Al Anbar Province.
Ravelo says many Marines, sailors and soldiers for whom Spanish is their first language feel more comfortable hearing the Bible discussed in Spanish and joining in the conversation in their native tongue.
In Iraq, he said, many military personnel, all attached to the Camp Pendleton-based 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, are confronting questions of mortality for the first time. Anything that helps them discuss their feelings and seek God's assistance is helpful, he added.
"Iraq is a good place to get to know God," he said. "Death is such a reality here. When we hear someone has been killed, we know it could have been us. Everyone wants to get their life straight."
The sound of war is a constant backdrop to the services. Blackhawk helicopters fly past, carrying the injured to a base hospital known as Fallouja Surgical. Trucks rumble past outside. Artillery booms in the background and sermons are punctuated with an English phrase known to all here: "Incoming, incoming!"
The Chapel of Hope is used by a variety of faiths and serves as a venue for a steady stream of memorial services. The sandstone structure is a large auditorium once used by the Iraqi military; it can seat 2,500.
Saddam Hussein used to lecture troops from the stage, and Iranian conscripts who fought on behalf of Baghdad in the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s received training here.
Now the auditorium has an altar and is decorated with banners and American flags. Bibles are plentiful.
The Friday night services are in addition to Ravelo's duties as chaplain for a Marine radio battalion. He provides an English-language service on Sundays and recently finished a two-week stint as a traveling chaplain serving far-flung Marine outposts throughout the sprawling desert.
The crowd for a recent service was small — just a handful. About a dozen servicemen usually attend the Spanish service, but Ravelo's two-week absence had broken the continuity. He was sure that attendance would pick up, though he said that even if only one Marine, sailor or soldier attends, he will consider the service worthwhile.
On this evening, Ravelo was animated, tossing in joking references to Marine life, and he employed a question-and-answer approach to foster discussion.
One example comes from a favorite sermon theme: "If You Were Accused of Being a Christian, Would There Be Enough Evidence to Convict You?"
One of the night's Bible readings came from Romans: "For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Or, as it flows in Spanish: Porque la paga del pecado es muerte, mas la dádiva de Dios es vida eterna en Cristo Jesús Seńor nuestro.
It's unclear how many Spanish speakers serve in Iraq, though Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans and other Latinos are common. Latinos, 12.5% of the U.S. population, made up 11.2% of the deaths in Iraq in 2006, according to government figures.
The Marines gathered recently at the chapel all speak perfect English, but said they feel more comfortable with the language of their upbringing.
Cpl. Andres Velasquez, 22, from Long Beach, said he grew up attending Mass in Spanish. "It just feels more natural," he said. "Out here your eyes are opened to a lot of things, and it's good to be able to talk about them in Spanish."
Cpl. Jose Vasquez, 24, formerly of Long Beach and now of Atlanta, said he came to the service "to help clear my mind of some things." Assigned to the mortuary affairs unit, a day earlier he had helped prepare the bodies of three Marines killed in a sniper attack while they patrolled in Fallouja.
"It helps to speak Spanish," he said. "I don't get much opportunity where I work."
Cpl. Rodolfo Quiles, 22, was born in Puerto Rico and learned English in the Marine Corps. "I just get a different vibe from Spanish; it's hard to associate with English sometimes," he said.
The Spanish-language service also helps ease the pain of being separated from his wife and 8-month-old daughter back at Camp Pendleton.
"I can't keep them out of my mind," he said.
Ravelo, now 44, joined the Navy at age 24 and served a hitch as a seaman before leaving the service and graduating from the University of South Carolina and the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Dallas. He rejoined the Navy as a chaplain in 2000 and is in his third overseas deployment.
"As Christians, we plant seeds in English and Spanish," he said.
During his service, Ravelo crafted a military image to convey his message: He urged the Marines to think of God as they do a concrete shelter, the kind that provides safety from the mortar attacks that are common here.
The image was apt. The day after Christmas, the Chapel of Hope was struck by mortars, leaving the walls peppered.
God is your shelter, he told the Marines. "He will guide you because he is with you," Ravelo said. "He knows what's best."
tony.perry@latimes.com
Ellie