Chaplaining Dignified Transfers: Public Liturgy and the Sacred Remains at ATL

Excerpted from AAR presentation to the Innovations in Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care Unit

By Donna S. Mote
University of the South

Since 1998, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL) has been the busiest airport in the world in terms of total annual passengers. The current daily average of passengers is over 300,000.

On average, the remains of one to two service members pass through ATL on Delta flights each day. The remains of active duty personnel and of personnel from previous conflicts recently identified through DNA travel with official military escorts who must be the same rank or a higher rank than the deceased. These individuals are on duty from the time they begin their journey with the remains until they sign the final paperwork and turn the remains over to the civilian funeral home that will handle the final disposition. Turned out in their dress blues or Class A uniforms, the escorts travel in aircraft cabins while the remains ride in the cargo hold under a US flag.

When the remains and their escort land at ATL, this is what happens.

I jump out of a Delta Honor Guard vehicle on the tarmac. I climb up the exterior jetway stairs from the tarmac, key in the door code, step onto the jetway, and greet the Delta gate agent working the inbound flight.

“Hey Chaplain, is there another one?”

“Yep,” I reply. “The escort should be the first one off the plane.”

“Is it just the one escort or is the family traveling with the remains, too?”

“Just the one escort, so far as we know.”

I stand at parade rest. The jet parks. The gate agent drives the jetway planeside, lines up the ramp with the door, puts the jetway in park, puts the canopy in place, gives the customary knock on the plane door, and opens it.

The flight leader motions the escort to step off the plane. I shake their hand, call them by rank and name, and express condolences for the loss of the service member whose remains they are accompanying. I ask if this is their first escort through ATL.

The escort and I descend the exterior jetway stairs. We put any carry-on gear they have in the cart that will soon hold the remains they are escorting.

I tell the escort what’s about to happen, and when the Delta ATL Honor Guard coordinator gives me the signal, the escort and I move into position on one side of a cargo belt loader. I stand shoulder to shoulder with the escort.

The Honor Guard coordinator drives the tug pulling the cart for the remains toward us. The volunteer members of the Delta Honor Guard process the US flag, the flags of all five service branches, and the POW/MIA flag toward us, coming to a halt facing us across the belt loader.

The Honor Guard leader of the detail holds the US flag and calls “Present arms.” The colors remain aloft as the other Honor Guard members slowly lower the other flags and the escort and I render a slow salute.

As we all hold the position of “present arms,” the Honor Guard members in the cargo bin manipulate the casket of the deceased as gently and respectfully as possible to start it on its way down the belt loader. The Honor Guard coordinator moves to the end of the belt loader next to the remains cart and raises his baritone voice to intone the words of this public liturgy:

“We will cherish them in our memory; we will honor them in what we say and do; we will not forget their sacrifice; and they will forever live in our hearts.” These words are the inscription on the back of the Honor Guard coin that will be placed in the hand of the escort to give to the next of kin.

The next words are what the Anglican traditions know as a series of biddings and are, in fact, a de-Christianized mashup of a prayer for the armed forces from the Book of Common Prayer and a portion of a prayer that was used when the ATL Delta Honor Guard was formed about 15 years ago:

“We pray for the safe keeping of all the men and women of our armed forces at home and abroad that they may be defended, protected, and strengthened and know they are not forgotten.”

“We pray for the escort of this dedicated warrior that they may have the strength, wisdom, and courage to perform the sacred duty that lies before them. Amen.”

The Honor Guard detail, the escort, and I continue to hold present arms until the remains are in the cart. Then the Honor Guard detail leader calls “Order arms,” and we resume the position of attention. The Honor Guard coordinator shakes the hand of the escort and expresses condolences on behalf of Delta Airlines, its employees, and the Honor Guard and invites the escort to go around to the other side of the belt loader to shake hands with the members of the flag line detail and salute the colors.

While all this is happening, sometimes passengers are watching through the windows of the just-arrived aircraft where they have stayed on board. Sometimes passengers are watching from the windows of the gatehouse. Almost always ramp employees (baggage handlers, catering staff, and so on) are observing. Some people are taking photos or videos; other people are annoyed by the wait; other people are standing respectfully with their hands over their hearts. No matter what anybody else is doing, and no matter whether anybody else is watching, we do what we do because we understand that it is our common task. And even if no one else is bearing witness to the dignified transfer of these remains, we are. This is the honor of the Honor Guard.

I wait for the escort in the position of attention next to the remains cart. After they have shaken hands with the flag line members and saluted the colors, they come and stand at attention beside me again until the Honor Guard detail has about-faced and marched away from the aircraft. When the Honor Guard detail leader calls “Fall out,” the escort and I fall out also. But I stay close beside them. And I will be with them until their onward flight.

The escort and the remains they are accompanying must have at least a two-hour layover at ATL for domestic flights and a minimum four-hour layover if arriving from abroad. In this interval, I am the companion of the companion of the deceased service member. Often this is literally the most appropriate term – com-pan-ion – as we share a hastily-consumed meal together in the Honor Guard office during their layover at ATL.

The Honor Guard office is a haven for the escort where they can come out of their jacket, put their feet up, be entertained by the Honor Guard coordinator, and be out of the public gaze for a little while. The remains of the deceased rest just outside the office in their cart in a safe, covered area. Though the office is for them, sometimes the escort will insist on standing near the remains no matter how hot or how cold the weather. If they stand by the remains, I stand with them. If they rest in the office, I hang out with them.

In the course of this sometimes hours-long proximity a safe space is held, a container is created. Usually the deceased is known personally by the escort, sometimes quite well. The exceptions are when the remains are recently identified from World War II, Korea, or Vietnam. In those cases, we share a sense of somehow being a part of history, and there is usually conversation about the honor of serving as an escort getting someone’s remains home after as many as 78 years since their deaths. If the remains are those of someone who has just died, almost always the escort is experiencing significant personal grief. This was their friend, their comrade, a member of their unit. In the case of suicides, the escort is often the person who discovered the body. They have either volunteered for this difficult duty or been asked by the family of the deceased to be the escort. As in other contexts of chaplaincy, if given time and space, people usually say what they need to say.

An hour before their outbound flight, the escort and I will go to the podium of the departure gate and get them checked in with the gate agent. Often the captain and first officer for the outbound flight will be in the gate house and, if so, the appropriate introductions are made.

The escort and I walk down the jetway of the outbound flight, descend the exterior stairs to the tarmac, verify the remains are the correct ones and, when the Honor Guard coordinator gives the signal, we take our places side by side at the belt loader. A dignified transfer is made once more as the remains are loaded onto the aircraft, but this time there’s no flag line or spoken words. We render a salute as the remains are loaded, and when they are safely aboard, we remove the escort’s carry-on gear from the remains cart and ascend the jetway stairs. Sometimes, just before we reach the jetway stairs, the escort stops, leans over to me, and says that last thing they need to say before they depart ATL, turning the tarmac into the world’s noisiest confessional. When this happens, I know that they know that I will hold what they’ve said in confidence. As we reach the top of the stairs, the passengers on the jetway waiting to board give us “ups” in line, and I introduce the escort to the flight leader. Then I put out my hand to express condolences once more and thank them for their service and sacrifice. Fairly often the escorts turn my proffered handshake into a hug, sometimes a big one. “Thanks, Chaps” or “Thanks, Padre” are among the highest compliments I’ve ever received for any ostensibly religious work anywhere. I bid “safe trip” to the crew and descend the jetway stairs once more.

In chaplaining these dignified transfers and escorting escorts in the company of the Honor Guard, I identify three primary religious roles and functions of the chaplain: first, bearing witness to the reality and presence of “the sacred remains” (Gary Laderman); second, accompanying or companioning the companion of the body; and third, creating a context of availability through visibility.

As to the first, all the Honor Guard members and some passengers and other airport and airline employees are also bearing witness whether they intend to or not. No information is available in advance as to the religious preference, if any, of the deceased or the escort. The liturgy as such is in the genre of civil and/or civic religion, yet to the escort it is generally also very personal as well as official. The role of the chaplain is not to look away, not to avoid the reality of death but to stand fast in the face of it—no matter the cause of it—and not to assume all deaths of service members carry the same moral valence for all escorts. The service of the deceased is being honored, for sure, but their death may or may not be understood by the escort (or others) as properly a part of that distinctively and almost inescapably religious category of sacrifice. That depends on how and why they died.

Regarding the second, some Honor Guard members and the Honor Guard coordinator also accompany the escort in certain ways. And these are often very chatty ways. Certainly, it’s generally a good thing for the chaplain to contribute their share of the conversation. The religious role of the chaplain in accompaniment, however, is at least two-fold. On the one hand, the chaplain must discern by reading a variety of “contextualization cues” (Charles Briggs) how to hold the space lightly and non-anxiously to create a kind of container for the escort to get what they want and need. On the other hand, the chaplain must incarnate presence by being and remaining proximate and present. Sometimes the escort has no words. And sometimes the most eloquent elegy is the one that contains no words but consists in “glances heavy with existence” (Carter Heyward). Not infrequently, standing beside the escort at various points of the process, as I hold my position steady, they actually move closer to me. The register of solidarity via proximity is often clearly operative.

And, finally, with respect to the third, the manner of being with, accompanying, companioning the escort and the availability to do so seeps into a mode of communicating non-anxious presence and easy silence or conversation to members of the Honor Guard. All of them are volunteers, and most of them are prior service members; veteran status, however, is not required for Honor Guard participation. Many of them are active in this work because it provides what they consider an honorable way to work through their own issues and grief in a concrete manner of service. It is therapeutic and cathartic for them, and they are drawn to it in ways they often do not have words to describe. A transferable dictum from military service for chaplaincy is “Visibility is accountability.” And, I would add, accountability and reliability build credibility. Turning up and turning out for escorts as the Honor Guard members do, rain or shine, hot or cold, darkness or daylight, builds credibility with them and creates an environment in which the chaplain may become chaplain to, and not just with, the Honor Guard. Prayer requests and news of life changes and challenges are offered up in the spaces in between dignified transfer ceremonies and the drives to and from various jetways all over the ramp and tarmac.

As with many legitimate functions of chaplaincy, onlookers might conclude that anybody could do what I do as Honor Guard chaplain. And, in many ways, it is true that almost anybody can greet an escort, show them around, stand beside them, talk to them, tend to their logistics, and hang out with them. Yet how those tasks are performed, how those roles are incarnated or inhabited by a chaplain so that they are intentional religious functions of bearing witness, accompanying, and creating availability is what distinguishes them from mere functions or activities and renders them efficacious practices of chaplaincy.

Rev. Donna Mote is a chaplain at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and Missioner for Engagement and Innovation for the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta.