The Combat Chaplain

Chaplain Rarely was a combat chaplain, which is not at all like those sissy garrison chaplains. He had deployed to combat a few times in the same job, and he was a guy the men could all relate to. This was not because he had an open ear to complaints. On the contrary, no one visited the chaplain with complaints, unless they were willing to spend two minutes listening to his gripes for every one minute of their own. He was not a particularly inspiring speaker, but only because his messages had the odd tendency to leave his flock slightly more depressed than they were before hearing them. If one was in a chipper mood, one usually left his sermons in a manner resembling one who had just gone to see a sarcastic standup comedian who dabbles too much in politics and religion.
No, men didn't relate to Chaplain Rarely because he was uplifting and spoke words of hope. They liked him because he made religion seem like something a normal person could do. He had no problems with smoking as long as the cigars were properly humidified and the smokers shared one with him. He loved beer, as long as it was German and someone else was buying. He wasn't the type of pastor who played the guitar for the children's lesson, but one would be hard pressed to beat him in a video game involving a guitar shaped controller. A modern-day Friar Tuck, which is what LT ox called him, Chaplain Rarely was an apathetically cynical German-American Lutheran. Very little could phase him, and even less could excite him. He referred to the increasingly popular contemporary protestant services as "happy clappy" and conducted them as infrequently as possible. It was difficult to attract people to liturgical worship, but that was never a great concern for Rarely.
"People will come if they want to come," he reasoned. Excusing his inability to get much attendance at his Bible studies and services, he said, "The Army has made it very clear to me that I'm not allowed to proselytize, which is somewhat like telling the Hebrews to make bricks without straw." Hence, he resorted to hanging up disturbing pictures in the chow tents as a means of recruitment. One such photo showed a puppy with a pistol to its head with a caption reading, "If you don't come to Bible study, I'll shoot this dog. His life is in your hands." Unfortunately, with the severe overpopulation of stray dogs in Abu Dahbu, two of the company commanders saw this as an opportunity to mitigate the rabid dog threat by ordering their soldiers not to attend any Bible studies for the remainder of the deployment.
"Oh well," the chaplain thought after another empty chapel Sunday. "I guess I'll just have to polish off all this communion wine."