Chaplains Take Their Work on the Road at Tustin Base

The white motor homeparked in front of a hangar at the Marine Corps Air Station in Tustin might not look like much, but to Navy Cmdr. Robert Needham it is an answered prayer.

“We couldn’t find office space for the chaplains in the hangars,” said Needham, the group chaplain for the Tustin air station. “But by God’s providence, we found it in a vehicle lot.”

When Needham started as Marine Aircraft Group 16’s chaplain two years ago, he scoured the base’s three hangars for available office space to be near where 12 squadrons of servicemen work maintaining and operating helicopters, and training new crews.

Although servicemen can go to base headquarters for counseling from the chaplains, the distance of about a mile from the hangars makes it difficult. “With the pressure of work, sometimes the headquarters are too far,” Needham said. “Some won’t go to chaplain’s office, period. But when we are there in the hangars, they will talk to us.”

With the help of a willing squadron commander, Needham got a rusty, unattractive camper out of the Marine Corps’ special services storage area last July. The camper, which was found in a vehicle lot in El Toro, had been used previously as a military office, he says.

“It was not pretty,” Assistant Group Chaplain Gerry Goodman said. “Besides being dirty, the paint was peeling and cracking, and the engine had to be fixed.”

Undaunted, the chaplains and squadron volunteers spruced up the 25-foot hulk, painting it white, wiping off years of accumulated dust on the inside and rewiring it to add telephone lines and air conditioning for those sweltering summer days. To make sure it was indeed mobile, mechanics gave its engine a tuneup.

Chaplains began visiting the hangars in their chapel on wheels in early December. Needham says it has enabled them to be closer to the approximately 4,000 servicemen and their dependents at the base.

“I found that when I walked through the helicopter base or the work area, there seems to be more (servicemen) who are willing to talk to me,” Goodman said. “I go directly to where they work and they know I’m around.

With the stresses of frequent separations from families, so endemic to military life, and the often frequent transfers that make it difficult to set down roots, military personnel often need someone they can talk to. Two of the base’s 12 squadrons are overseas for six months at any one time. Often, even in practice drills, the squadron members can find themselves in grueling, often dangerous, situations, Goodman says.

“No Marine would ever admit that he is scared or nervous about deployment when they go to overseas duty,” Goodman said. “Instead, we talk about the problems associated with deployment such as separation or financial situations.”

‘Hardest Experience’

Chaplains also have the added duty of helping to notify families and friends about the death of a servicemen. Chaplain Robert D. Coapmano, who is based at the neighboring El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, says chaplains routinely accompany a casualty assistance call officer (CACO), the military’s representative responsible for assisting survivors.

“Going out on CACO is the single, hardest, emotionally draining experience for a chaplain,” Coapmano said. “How do you comfort the family? Sometimes there is nothing you can say. You just let them know you care.”

Tustin chaplains were unavailable for comment on the crash of a CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter, which killed all five crew members during night maneuvers near the Salton Sea several weeks ago, or on the effect the incident has had on servicemen stationed at the air base. But Coapmano says it was an incident where Marines can see their own vulnerability.

And sometimes, Coapmano says, Marines have to talk about their fears and get them off their chests.

“For many, it was sort of like driving down a freeway and seeing an accident and saying, ‘That could have been me,’ ” he said. “Marines can admit they are afraid.”

Sign of the Times

For some, the mobile office is a sign of the times, and an example of how the Marine Corps has changed its attitude toward its servicemen, and sought to become more responsive to their human needs, Chaplain Charles Hall says.

“There’s a willingness to provide people for the Marines to talk to,” Hall said. “In the past, there was just concern about the mission of the Marines . . . concern about the goals of the mission instead of the people in it and the pressures that they undergo.”

Gunnery Sgt. Bruce Stephenson, for one, likes the mobile office to be as close as possible to the hangars. The 37-year-old Stephenson recommends the members of his squadron seek out a chaplain if they need someone to talk to. In the past, he has sometimes taken time off to escort them to the chaplains’ offices at base headquarters.

“I had a kid who had trouble adjusting,” Stephenson said. “He was 19 and he didn’t show up for mess duty. He ended up smashing some windows in his car. I had to take him to the headquarters, which is a bit of a way to go when you need help. The kid could have gone U.A. (on unauthorized leave) in the length of time it took for him to get to a chaplain alone.”

The Same Problems

The chaplains are more like buddies than pastors, says Stephenson, who has been in the Marines for 17 years. A chaplain understands the servicemen more than a pastor because he experiences the same problems they do, Stephenson says.

“Whatever we go through, the chaplain goes through. When we are deployed, they are too. When we are separated from our families, they are too,” he said.

There’s a closeness between the chaplains and servicemen that is hard to pinpoint, Stephenson says while seated in the refurbished mobile office.

“When a pastor says, ‘I understand you,’ sometimes you can’t believe him because he’s never had the experiences we’ve had. But when a chaplain says, ‘I understand you,’ I feel better because he’s been in the trenches with us. When he gives me advice, I feel like it’s straight from the hip, not from a textbook.”