0105:29
2016Mass violence
Orlando, Florida
The Pulse Nightclub Shooting
Andrew Wade describes how years of relationships helped chaplains reach officers, dispatchers, families, and hospital colleagues—and keep caring after the first night.
01 / THE SERIES
Some days can strip away routine police work and force responders into a raw, fundamental confrontation with the human condition—which is precisely the domain of the chaplain.
This series returns to those moments through the voices of chaplains who were there. Each debriefing preserves what they saw, what the event demanded and what another department should know before its own darkest day.
Every account is followed by a practical field brief organized around three moments: before the call, during the response and after everyone else has gone home.
- 01Watch
A short, first-person video account.
- 02Study
The operational and human lessons.
- 03Carry
A concise brief for the next tabletop.
02 / THE ARCHIVE
Ten events. Ten witnesses.
One body of field knowledge.
0203:24
2012Mass violence
Aurora, Colorado
The Aurora Theater Shooting
The uniform can hold an officer together through the scene. The reckoning may come later.
0302:53
2017Mass violence
Las Vegas, Nevada
The Route 91 Harvest Festival Shooting
For officers trained to act, being pinned down and unable to stop the threat carried its own wound.
0405:16
2017Mass violence
Sutherland Springs, Texas
The Sutherland Springs Church Shooting
A small community became a national crime scene, and entire family systems were suddenly missing.
0501:05
2018Terrorism
Austin, Texas
The Austin Serial Bombings
For nineteen days, the scene was the whole city and the next device could be anywhere.
0610:49
2018Terrorism
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
The Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting
The injury moved through officers, families and a faith community already carrying a long history of threat.
0703:10
2018Disaster
Wilmington, North Carolina
Hurricane Florence
After the flood, C. J. Caufield met people grieving ruined homes and others troubled that theirs had survived. His account makes room for questions a chaplain cannot answer.
0805:09
1991Mass violence
Killeen, Texas
The 1991 Luby’s Shooting
A familiar dress and hair color turned an officer’s search for ammunition into a private terror.
0902:05
1972Terrorism
Munich, West Germany
The Munich Olympics Attack
Mindi Russell recalls being told to distract the athletes and avoid discussing the attack. Her later reflection asks who gets to decide whether another person has been affected.
1002:37
2001Reflection
New York / in flight
Above the World Trade Center
From thirty thousand feet, the smoke was still visible—and so was the need to name what remained worth defending.
03 / THE PRACTICE
“You don’t tell people how they were affected. You give them the room to tell you.”
Across five decades and different kinds of crisis, one lesson returns: preparation is relational. Departments need protocols. People need a trusted person who already knows how to enter the room, listen without judgment and stay after the immediate work is done.