SCENARIO NUMBER THREE:
You are a battalion chaplain in a three-battalion brigade.
Your chaplain
supervisor is a senior major who has been passed over for lieutenant
colonel.
It appears that he is just holding on to get his 20-year
retirement.
Consequently, many things around the office and at the chapel are being left
undone. People at the chapel seem uneasy with the lack of ministry effort.
You, too, are troubled with the leadership void and lack of attention to
detail. Decide how you would deal with a chaplain who may be characterized
as "bitter" and an "abdicator." Identify the problem areas. What is your
responsibility as a team member? How would you make the situation better?
SCENARIO NUMBER FOUR:
Your battalion commander calls you into her office on Monday morning. She
is visibly upset about the content of the sermon preached the day before in
the Collective Protestant Service. The chaplain who preached the sermon is
a chaplain peer in your brigade.
You were equally uncomfortable with the
tone and content of the sermon.
What is an appropriate response on your part?
Do you let your commander
know how you feel? Do you approach the chaplain who preached the sermon?
Does your chaplain supervisor need to know about this situation? Decide how
you would deal with this problem.
SCENARIO NUMBER FIVE:
You are a battalion chaplain.
You and the brigade chaplain share a
Collective Protestant Service on post.
The brigade chaplain is creative,
gifted, and well equipped to do ministry. The two of you make an excellent
ministry team.
Consequently, the parish is growing and expanding at a
phenomenal pace.
After a year of healthy team ministry, the brigade chaplain is moved to
another assignment. Her replacement is not nearly as gifted. In fact, he
is quite threatened by what you and the former brigade chaplain have built.
He wants to make wholesale changes, and you know that the proposed changes
will effectively "kill" the life of the parish and anger most of the
parishioners.
What dynamics are at work in your relationship with the new brigade
chaplain?
What are you to do?
How important is it for you to recognize
that the new brigade chaplain may be insecure or defensive? Where do your
loyalties lie? With the parish or the new brigade chaplain? What action
should you take?
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