GR 'Streets' (death and/or afterlife)

[jbor]

>> Sure. Christian chaplains, "working for the army", preaching about salvation
>> and redemption and sending soldiers out to their deaths. It's grotesque.
 
on 19/4/03 9:55 PM, Paul Mackin at paul.mackin at verizon.net wrote:

> We need another reality check here.
> 
> I think we can assume in our reading that Pynchon is not stupid, knows
> it's the generals who send the men out to their deaths, not the
> chaplains or belief in redemption and salvation.

Generals? In the passage? The telling detail is that Pynchon has these "army
chaplains" preaching to the soldiers *before* they go off into battle. Not
ministering to the sick and wounded, performing last rites, delivering
eulogies. Sending them off to their deaths with promises of redemption and
salvation. "It really happened." (693.14)

best

    There were men called "army chaplains." They preached
    inside some of these buildings. There were actually
    soldiers, dead now, who sat or stood, and listened.
    Holding on to what they could. Then they went out, and
    some died before they got back inside a
    garrison-church again. Clergymen, working for the
    army, stood up and talked to the men who were going to
    die about God, death, nothingness, redemption,
    salvation. It really happened. It was quite common.
                                        (GR 693)