Ep. 216 - Kerstin Hedlund "Faith on the Frontlines" pt. 2
The Deconstructionists
John Williamson
4.4 • 823 Ratings
🗓️ 10 November 2025
⏱️ 33 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this episode, we continue our conversation with Army Chaplain Lieutenant Colonel Kerstin Hedlund. If you haven’t listened to Part 1 yet, we recommend starting there for context.
Kerstin has spent years serving alongside soldiers in moments of grief, trauma, transition, and deep personal struggle. Her work isn’t about offering easy answers. It’s about presence, listening, and holding space for real human complexity.
This conversation is for anyone who has wrestled with suffering, loss, or disillusionment. It’s also for those who care deeply about someone who has served.
Kerstin’s insight offers a grounded and deeply humane perspective on what it means to stay present with one another through the hardest parts of life.
Resources & Further Reading
If you’d like to explore more about topics mentioned in this episode:
- “Soul Repair: Recovering from Moral Injury After War” – Rita Nakashima Brock & Gabriella Lettini
- The Moral Injury Project – Syracuse University
- VA National Center for PTSD: https://www.ptsd.va.gov
- Military Chaplaincy Overview: https://www.goarmy.com/chaplain
Connect with Us
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- X (Twitter): @deconstructcast
- Support the show: patreon.com/deconstructionists
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome back to the Deconstructionist podcast. I'm your host John Williamson, and today we're continuing our conversation with Army Chaplain, Lieutenant Colonel Kirsten Headland. If you listen to Part |
| 0:22.0 | 1, you'll remember that Christine carries a rare perspective, someone who has served alongside |
| 0:27.0 | soldiers in places of deep stress, trauma, and sacrifice while holding space for their |
| 0:32.5 | spiritual and emotional lives. In part 2, we go even further into what it means to show up for people in their most |
| 0:39.4 | vulnerable moments. |
| 0:41.0 | This isn't a conversation about easy answers. |
| 0:43.4 | It's a conversation about presence, about listening, and about what it means to be human |
| 0:48.0 | with other humans and moments where words often fail. |
| 0:51.0 | So let's get into it with part two of my interview with Army Chaplain, |
| 0:55.4 | Kirsten Headland. |
| 1:02.4 | Talk a little bit about, obviously, you know, you served during a time of war where we were |
| 1:07.0 | in a couple different countries. What have, what has it taught you and what have you seen in regards to human resilience and meaning making through your work? |
| 1:15.6 | And a lot about human resilience and finding maybe a purpose within a purpose, whether or not one believes in the operation that he or she is engaged in. How do I find a purpose within a person? How do I love the community |
| 1:30.1 | to which I have been given for right now? And one of the things I learned, I think I really learned, |
| 1:35.5 | was that, and we all know this to some degree, but I think we forget it so much, is that things are |
| 1:39.8 | not always as they seem and as they are portrayed on the media. And so, for example, when I was |
| 1:46.6 | in Iraq during the time of withdrawal, we were finding that the base on which I was primarily |
| 1:53.9 | serving was getting mortared by some of the surrounding villagers a lot more heavily. And we had |
| 1:58.8 | really gained good relations with the local |
| 2:01.7 | community. So it's like, why are we getting mortared now more heavily as we're withdrawing? And |
| 2:07.5 | what we found out was that obviously this great influx of service members is boosting the local |
| 2:14.6 | economy. And these people who had been used to having so many people in the area for |
... |
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