Tom
Cornell
posted on America Magazine blog
and Independent Catholic News, London
August 27, 2012
and Independent Catholic News, London
August 27, 2012
Joshua Casteel died, August 25, in New York
City, after a long, brave and painful battle with cancer, another victim of the
war in Iraq, at age 32.
If ever there was an “all-American boy!” A photo of Josh as president of the Young
Republicans in his high school is charmingly naïve. Tall and handsome, blue-eyed and
blond-haired, of Norwegian stock, he must have looked quite at home as a cadet
at West Point Military Academy. But he
couldn’t take the mindless chauvinism, he told me. No critical thinking! “I could take orders, but I can’t give them
in an outfit like that,” he said. He
thought it only right to fulfill the commitment he made when he signed his
enlistment contract, so he asked not for release but for reassignment as a
common soldier. He was sent to language
school, in California, where he learned Arabic well enough to be assigned to
Abu Graib Prison in Baghdad as an interrogator.
He arrived there just after the prisoner abuse scandal broke in
2004. He had over one hundred
interrogation sessions with prisoners, 90% of whom, he determined, were guilty
of nothing but being Arab. General Janis
Karpinski, in charge of the prison at that time, disagreed, maybe 80%. One was 14 years old, another nine!
Joshua was brought up in a fervently
Evangelical family. But Josh’s Christian
faith began to falter. He read Cardinal
Ratzinger’s Introduction to Christianity. That not only revived but strengthened his
faith. He was received into full communion
with the Catholic Church. An admitted
jihadi prisoner challenged Josh’s commitment to the New Testament ethic of
nonviolence. The jihadi had the better
of the argument, Joshua decided. He came
to the conclusion that he was in fact a conscientious objector to war and to
military service. He applied for early
discharge as a conscientious objector. His
commanding officer recognized the sincerity and validity of his claim. Joshua was released with an honorable
discharge and returned home to study and to write plays and stories based upon
his experience.
Archbishop Joseph Fiorenza, retired, of
Galveston-Houston, arranged for Michael Griffin, theology professor at Holy
Cross College in South Bend and editor of the Catholic Peace Fellowship The Sign of Peace and me to present
Joshua to Pope Benedict in Rome, March 2007 at an outdoor Mass. The Holy Father was obviously impressed with
Josh’s story. As he was led away, Mike
Griffin told the Holy Father the purpose of our trip to Rome, to spur further
development of ministry to conscientious objectors, support and encouragement. “You mean men like him?” said the Pope,
pointing to Joshua. “Yes, Holy Father, men like him!”
Having earned an MFA at the University of Iowa,
Joshua started advanced studies at the University of Chicago when he suddenly
took sick. It was lung cancer, 4th
stage, metastasized. The disease
progressed rapidly. He was soon in
excruciating pain and dependent upon strong opioids. Treatment seemed at times hopeful. He was admitted to an experimental therapy
program at a secret location in Lower Manhattan. He responded very well. Then a sudden downturn, due to pancreatitis. In little more than a week, attended by his
mother, Joshua slipped away.
A victim
of the war? Yes, probably, but there is
no proof. Joshua believed that his
cancer was caused by living at Abu Graib near an open burn-pit operated by the
US military. All manner of refuse
including plastics was dumped into open-air pits to be incinerated. The fumes are toxic.
Let Joshua have the last word, or words he
spoke to Aaron Glantz, in a radio interview on Pacifica Radio KPFA, San
Francisco, on our trip to Rome: “We were seeking pastoral guidance from
the Holy See as to how to best address the issue in America, which at the core is an issue of
spiritual formation and catechesis, that people don’t know the history of
Catholic conscientious objectors…. And
this is where the issue of nationalism is front
and center…. In this country, Catholic Christians often don’t act as if their
Catholic identity is their primary
identity – that somehow it’s ok to closet your Christianity when the State tells you to.
That’s not the history that Christianity hails from; it’s simply not the case.”
Pray for us,
Josh, that God will grant us even a small share of your faith and courage, and
consolation to your bereft mother Kristi and sisters Naomi and Rebekah.
