Friendly Fire: Bombs from 29,000 feet

In one of my favorite lines from a Vietnam era movie, the pilots are sitting around the circle in a bar in the Philippines enjoying some of the local brew. One of them leans back and says “Nothing beats high altitude bombing, does it”. They all laugh and go back to ogling the girls in the bar. Their conversation revolves around their job: To go up above the 20,000 foot level and using precision targeting drop their entire load and head on back to relative safety. Actually, unless they had a plane malfunction, they were safe the entire time. No artillery was going to hit them up there, let alone a non-existent Viet Cong Air Force. They never once saw a single victim of their bombing attacks. They never had to face the damage they were inflicting.

Here is what this looks like in today’s church culture. People are sitting in a Bible study decrying the state of marriages today. The happily married co-leaders of the group tell story after story of wretched people they know who

Friendly Fire: Many Faces of Gossip

A reader asked me why I hadn’t dealt with gossip yet in this series on “Friendly Fire”. I just assumed everyone would know that gossip is on the ‘verboten’ list and we could deal with subtler nuances of how we hurt each other. But it occurs to me that gossip itself can have 31 flavors and some of those are just too yummy to pass by sometimes. For the record, all gossip is damaging to relationships and working functions. There are no exceptions. But gossip likes to play dress-up and here is what it looks like when it doesn’t wear the ugly badge.

1. Personal Warnings: We let people know they are in trouble, being lied to or are in any way going to be used by others because we care about them. But sometimes we use that warning as an opportunity to take a shot at someone else as well. “Do you know what so-and-so is saying about you?” If you’re a Lord of the Rings fan as I am

Friendly Fire – Introduction

After the horror of September 11 set in, professional football player, Pat Tillman, decided he wanted to make his life count for something. Apparently, playing football didn’t quite complete that equation. So he joined the United States Army and was sent as part of the force to Afghanistan. On April 22, 2004, he and his platoon were ordered to a town in the hills to secure one site. A few hours later, reports came back that Pat Tillman was killed as part of the operation. Over the next few weeks, his family heard several conflicting accounts of exactly what happened. In the midst of this, they held an emotionally charged funeral service where he posthumously received the Silver Star. A few weeks after that, they were hit with the stark reality of the events: Pat was killed by bullets from American guns. He was shot down by “friendly fire”.

His family, especially his mother and brother, got involved with what has now become a four-year ordeal to find out the complete truth. It still has not happened. Mary Tillman recounts all of this ordeal in a tribute book to Pat titled, “Boots on the Ground by Dusk”. I have not read it yet, but both interviews I heard with her make me believe it will be balanced and revealing.

What there is no mistake about is that the Army messed up big time on this one. Even Senator McCain, who helped to launch the investigation, says that this cover-up is inexcusable and involves many of the Army’s senior officers. That is the biggest tragedy of it all; that they would cover up the mistakes that were made and the real truth of what happened. He was killed by “friendly fire” – well, that happens. But what shouldn’t happen is a cover-up of this magnitude. It is not fair to his family and the other soldiers in the Army who need to learn from this.

In that spirit, I will begin today a series of articles on the subject of “Friendly Fire in the Church”. By “the church”, I don’t mean the church I help to lead or ones I have lead in the past or even churches with whom I have an ax to grind. I just mean all churches. I have counseled pastors, been one, and participated in so many grievance councils and reconciliation meetings that I could write entire books on this subject.

No one should be surprised that friendly fire happens. What we shouldn’t tolerate is the cover-up. And we have all done it; even me. Join me in the next few weeks, as we explore the types of friendly fire and gather together the ideas of myself and others (even you the readers) as to what we can do to cut down on some of these injuries.