CAF Story | Faith at Sea
Video / October 07, 2022
Transcript
(NG) How do I, after I've only met the member, maybe once or twice, being able to sit him down and tell him that his mother most likely wasn't going to make it throughout the night.
My name is Rabbi Noteh Glogauer.
I'm a captain in the Canadian Armed Forces serving as a chaplain.
Well, the most amazing part of being a chaplain is that the chaplain is the go-to person to be able to support each and every member. So, in our recent operation PROJECTION, on a ship of 260 members, I was the sole chaplain, as a one-and-one, providing support.
In the beginning, I thought: "What have I got myself into?" After the second day being at sea, as we were leaving Esquimalt hitting up the coast, when we still had WiFi, I managed to message my wife.
I told her: "Honey, I think I've made the biggest mistake of my life." But something happened after that second day. And just, you know, rolled into it.
I call it "getting your sea legs". I just felt that this was the place that I needed to be. I enjoyed it very much. And there were some very amazing experiences.
On the second day of our deployment, late at night, I got a knock on my cabin door. It was the XO and the coxswain incoming to ask for my help. Sadly, one of the members' mother had taken ill. So much so that they didn't expect that member mother to last the night.
So, there was an urgent call for us to be able to figure out: "Could we repatriate that member?" The window was really tight, and we had to act really quickly. I figured out that we could actually repatriate the member with the help of the logistics department, the helicopter detachment.
We could actually fly the member off our ship to Nanaimo. And actually, there was a small window of opportunity that we could possibly have that member get back to Halifax to be able to see his mother, or at least spend the last few moments with his mother.
It was a very emotional time. Emotional time for me as well, to be able to, you know, provide that compassion and that care, possibly a little bit of window of hope. But we wanted to present a plan that we were gonna do our very, very best to try and get that member home.
We flew the member from our ship to Nanaimo. From Nanaimo, then, to Victoria. Victoria to Edmonton; Edmonton, Halifax. And indeed, we were quite successful and the member ended up spending the last two, three hours with his mother before her passing.
He was incredibly grateful that, indeed, we were, you know, able to facilitate those last few moments for him. And for me, to be able to know that, you know, the small role that I get to play in the larger scheme, that's what the chaplain does.
Page details
- Date modified: