{"id":22533,"date":"2023-08-10T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-08-10T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=22533"},"modified":"2023-08-11T06:42:04","modified_gmt":"2023-08-11T06:42:04","slug":"chaplains-prepare-to-mentor-counsel-force-families-at-fort-cavazos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/?p=22533","title":{"rendered":"Chaplains prepare to mentor, counsel force, families at Fort Cavazos"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n Chaplain (Maj.) Christian Groenendal shakes hands with Chaplain (Lt. Col.) Timothy Won, the Chaplain Family Life Training Center deputy director, after receiving his certificate July 28. (U.S. Army photo by Samantha Harms, Fort Cavazos Public Affairs)
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FORT CAVAZOS, Texas \u2014 <\/strong>Being in the Army was always in Chaplain (Maj.) Christian Groenendal\u2019s plan. He said he knew what his calling was since he was a child.<\/p>\n

\u201cJoining the Army was something I wanted to do, since I was a little kid,\u201d Groenendal shared. \u201cInitially, I pursued a ROTC scholarship. So, I did ROTC and in my sophomore year, I was at airborne school in ROTC and I met the airborne school chaplain.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I didn\u2019t know the Army had chaplains,\u201d he continued. \u201cAnd so, I was like, \u2018Well, what do you do?\u2019 And he says, \u2018Well, every Monday, I jump with the group to give them hope that they can do it. I lead a Bible study on Wednesday. And, I do counseling for Soldiers when they need it.\u2019 I (replied), \u2018Well you have the best job in the Army!\u2019 And he agreed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Groenendal said he always knew deep down that he had two callings in life, but hadn\u2019t realized they could coincide.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always thought that ministry would come later on in my life,\u201d he explained. \u201cI thought I\u2019d be a pastor when I was older. All the pastors that I saw were old men, and so I thought I\u2019d go take over the world in the Army and then someday become a pastor. And so that really was God; (he) kind of changed my heart, my trajectory to say, \u2018You can do both. You can be an officer and be in the Army, and you can be a chaplain and serve me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

This changed the career and life path that Groenendal had set for himself. He then began to pursue becoming a chaplain, going from undergraduate to seminary, followed by a few years at a church and then coming on active duty as a chaplain.<\/p>\n

He, along with five others, recently took a next step in their career progression, graduating as family life chaplains July 28 at the Chaplain Family Life Training Center here.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday we recognize these six chaplains who have completed a family life qualification course,\u201d Chaplain (Lt. Col.) James Covey, Chaplain Family Life Training Center director, said as he opened the ceremony. \u201cWe\u2019re very, very proud of them for a whole lot of reasons but uniquely we\u2019re proud of this class because they are the first cohort we\u2019ve ever had in which every single one of these students has already taken the National Marriage and Family Therapy exam. It\u2019s never happened before.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n Chaplain (Col.) John Manuel, School for Spiritual Counseling program director, tells a joke during his speech at the Family Life Chaplain Qualification Course Graduation Ceremony July 28. (U.S. Army photo by Samantha Harms, Fort Cavazos Public Affairs)
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The role of a family life chaplain is to provide pastoral care and counsel to help strengthen and develop Soldiers\u2019 familial and interpersonal relationships, as well as serve as mentors and counselors to other chaplains across the force.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love EBH (Embedded Behavioral Health), I personally use EBH myself,\u201d Groenendal explained. \u201cAnd so, the relationships that we have as chaplains with them is really, really strong. And I appreciate that kind of collaborative, being able to work together. I think that they appreciate that we can slow down, and kind of go longer term with Soldiers. \u2026 We can spend 12 months with a Soldier working on a particular issue.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Another thing) that\u2019s also different about us and the program we went through is all of our training is specifically focused on relationships, in marriage and family relationships and broad terms,\u201d he continued. \u201cA lot of psychotherapy is focused on an individual problem, where we specialize on couples and families that come in and how do we help them develop healthy relationships. So many people\u2019s behavior, mental health is intertwined with their relationship help.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the last 18 months, each chaplain worked to complete the rigorous graduate program at the Central Texas campus of Texas A&M University. The program traditionally takes 36 months, yet they did it in significantly less time.<\/p>\n

Each chaplain completed more than 500 hours of counseling to individuals, to married couples and to families. They also each received more than 100 hours of training in evidence-based counseling models.<\/p>\n

Additionally, each chaplain received more than 100 hours of supervision, meaning that their counseling sessions were observed and watched carefully by their supervisors. They in turn sat with the chaplains and gave them feedback.<\/p>\n

\u201cSoldiers (also) know that now in a family life chaplain, they\u2019re getting someone who has been clinically trained to be a therapist,\u201d Groenendal shared, \u201cbut also operates from a position of being okay talking about God and being okay talking about their spiritual life, whether that\u2019s the same as mine or whether it\u2019s different than mine.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ceremony was a joyful one, the culmination of 18 months of hard work.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so, today, we celebrate their accomplishments,\u201d Covey expressed. \u201cAnd we send them throughout the footprint of the Army to be channeled the blessing, as the old hymn says, so they can train other chaplains to be better pastoral counselors. We\u2019re proud of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Groenendal will serve as the U.S. Army Garrison-Fort Riley Garrison Family Life Chaplain, Fort Riley, Kansas.<\/p>\n

The biggest thing he wants Soldiers to know is that the family life chaplains are there for them and are meant to be utilized.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you go to see the family life chaplain that\u2019s on your base, \u2026 (I just want for) Soldiers just to know that they\u2019re getting highly skilled and competent therapists slash pastoral counselor that really wants to integrate both their spiritual life and their mental health,\u201d Groenendal said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s what we try to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n The six new family life chaplains pose for a photo alongside their cadre following their graduation ceremony July 28 at the Chaplain Family Life Training Center at Fort Cavazos. (U.S. Army photo by Samantha Harms, Fort Cavazos Public Affairs)
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Chaplain (Maj.) Christian Groenendal shakes hands with Chaplain (Lt. Col.) Timothy Won, the Chaplain Family Life Training Center deputy director, after receiving his certificate July 28. (U.S. Army photo by Samantha Harms, Fort Cavazos Public Affairs) (Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL FORT CAVAZOS, Texas \u2014 Being in the Army was always in Chaplain (Maj.) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22535,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22533"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22539,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22533\/revisions\/22539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adn.monetizemail.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}