FALLUJAH, Iraq -- Deployed servicemembers deal with stressful situations, such as taking fire while patrolling hostile city streets and weathering sleepless nights manning a remote camp guard post, every day in a combat zone.
It’s one man’s mission here to ensure that his unit’s troops have all the tools readily available to deal with the stress.
Instead of equipping his Marines with weapons and bullets to accomplish this, Navy Lt. Richard Ryan gives them Bibles, sings songs with them, and offers them kind words of encouragement.
The 30-year-old Hendersonville, Tenn. native serves as a chaplain for the Camp Lejeune, N.C.-based infantry unit, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment. As they perform their mission of providing security and stability for people here, Ryan puts his knowledge of ministry to use, ensuring the troops maintain a positive outlook on the front lines.
“God called me to the ministry when I was 16, the summer before my senior year,” stated Ryan, a 1996 graduate of Nashville, Tenn.’s Belmont University. “I’d always had the military on my mind, and I’d always liked being athletic and keeping active.”
Ryan kept his dreams in mind as he earned his Masters of Divinity through the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2000. From there, it was straight into military service.
“To come in as a chaplain, you have to have (completed) a 90-hour Masters degree,” Ryan said. “I came in at 26, so I came in about as young as you could be.”
However, Ryan said he did not arrive to his decision alone.
“I spent a lot of time talking to my wife (Melinda) about it, because I wanted her to be onboard with the idea,” he continued. “We’d moved to Tennessee, and were living 30 minutes away from our families.”
However, Ryan decided to leave the comforts of home behind and answer the call to serve in the Navy Chaplain Corps.
He started his military service in June 2001 and served his first three years at Pearl Harbor with a submarine squadron.
“One of the things I enjoyed about military ministry was the fact that I got to be out of the office,” Ryan added. “I never thought as a pastor that I’d ever get the chance to ride on nuclear subs.”
Ryan’s time spent working in the field would soon increase. In 2004, he traded his Navy blue for Marine Corps green when he reported for duty with 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment in August 2004.
Less than one year later, he was deployed to Iraq, where he currently performs his mission of tending to troops’ emotional and spiritual well-being.
Even though he works in a combat zone, Ryan is armed with only one weapon; faith.
“Chaplains are non-combatants and don’t carry weapons,” he explained. “It’s a matter of faith, and a matter of trusting the people whom you’re with to help look out for you.”
The military provides its chaplains with an assistant to help them and provide for their security.
According to Petty Officer 2nd Class Colin Gardape, the battalion’s religious program specialist and Ryan’s personal assistant, no chaplain has died in combat since the Vietnam War.
“I work as a bodyguard for the chaplain while on deployment,” Gardape explained. “I’m also his administrative, logistics and communications guy. I set up his schedule, type up memorandums, basically help keep him from being in front of the computer so he can be out there with the guys. I take care of the office; he takes care of the guys.”
Assisted by Gardape, Ryan travels to different bases in his unit’s operational area to speak with the troops. This is a task that keeps him busy around the clock
“I do a lot of counseling and offer worship services,” Ryan said. “Whatever I could offer spiritually that I’d normally do as a pastor, I do here. My goal is to help everyone be successful and enjoy what they’re doing.”
According to unit personnel, this ministry work keeps them optimistic and emotionally balanced as they work in this austere combat zone.
“Going to service here keeps me in a good state of mind,” stated Lance Cpl. Jason S. Crowder, a 1st radio operator working with Marines in the city. “It’s good that the chaplain comes down here to see how we’re doing. I take his messages to heart, and it keeps me positive.”
“It gives me a time for reflection,” added Lance Cpl. Ben J. Bett, the battalion’s mail clerk. “For 30 minutes a week, it’s just me and God.”
To further enable Ryan and fellow chaplains to accomplish their mission, the military empowers them with the same anonymity they would have in the civilian sector; total confidentiality.
“Whatever people say to me stays with me,” Ryan explained. “People can talk to me outside of their chain of command, and it doesn’t affect their job. I’m someone they can talk to without being afraid of what the repercussions are going to be.”
As a member of the battalion commander’s staff, Ryan also has the power to go “straight to the top.”
“I am the spiritual, ethical and moral advisor to the command,” he stated. “I have the ability to go straight to the commander and say, ‘this is what I’m hearing from the troops.’ So far, I feel like the deployment has gone really well and morale is very high in the battalion.”
Even so, Ryan still counsels troops. Much of the issues they discuss he also faces himself; missing family and home.
“This is my first deployment, and I miss my family a lot,” he stated. “I feel like I’m missing out on a lot while I’m here, like the birth of my third child.”
Despite this, Ryan still said he believes his wife performs a more difficult job back home by tending to their two kids, four-year-old Evie and two-year-old Brant.
“Sometimes I feel like this deployment is going to be tougher on my wife. She’s got the kids 24, seven.”
Despite missing his loved ones, Ryan said he is privileged to share this experience with fellow Marines and sailors.
“I’m enjoying the deployment so far … the camaraderie, how close you get to everyone, and how everyone pulls together during tough situations.”
It is with this same optimism that he looks forward to the rest of his military career.
“Right now, I plan to make this a career, unless God tells me to do something else. It seems that throughout my life, God has confirmed my calling in everything from the college I went to, to the seminary I attended, to every job I’ve ever had. God has been saying, ‘Hey, this is where I want you.’ He’s done the same thing with this, and I’m having a ball.”