Veterans thrive in yearlong pastoral education program

Iraq war veteran Perry Schmitt, 50, has learned to let go of his depression by listening to the grief of other former soldiers.

Schmitt was a chaplain in Iraq during the worst years of the insurgency. He witnessed 46 of his friends and compatriots die in his unit, the 1st Stryker Brigade's 25th Infantry. He returned to the U.S. furious and full of questions about why he returned and they didn't. But then he was introduced to the Clinical Pastoral Education residency program at Salt Lake City's Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

"I got my life back," he said Thursday in the medical center's crowded chapel, which was full of friends and family there to wish him well after graduating from the yearlong CPE program.

Schmitt and 19 other Utahns, most of whom have previously served as Army chaplains, joined the program last September to return to chaplain work and to get on with their lives.

While making his rounds at the medical center as part of the yearlong program's training, Schmitt met a man in the emergency room who had served as a medic on D-Day. The terrors he witnessed that day haunted him the rest of his life, but he never shared them with anyone, not even his wife, to spare others their horror. Still, he couldn't help thrashing in his bed every night as those visions haunted him.

A week later, again making his chaplain rounds at the hospital, Schmitt met a Korean War veteran who'd been at Heartbreak Ridge. He returned to the U.S. to become a barber, cutting the hair of other veterans. These veterans told Schmitt their stories, and in return, he told them his.

"He shared his story, and he escaped his memories and his anger," Schmitt said. Schmitt learned to do the same. His wife, who no longer recognized him after 25 years of marriage when he returned from the war a haunted man, felt like she finally had her husband again.

"Thank you for giving me my life back," he said at Thursday's graduation.

Most of the graduates will return to their families and communities with a restored sense of compassion and ability to open up, organizers said.

"It's not a program meant to get them hired here, but to let them return to their communities and better them," said Mark Allison, the program's training supervisor, who began the program two years ago to give Utah vets a place to become better listeners. Two of the program's graduates, Catherine Toronto and Jeri Lambourne, are going on to fellowships to become professional chaplains.

Toronto said she decided to turn this into a full-time job because it works. She's seen the sick and wounded rediscover spirituality by carefully listening to their grief and comforting them with God's love. She said she's seen them become whole because of it.