“In past generations our soldiers were given Bibles. Many of them were grounded in the Christian faith. Nowadays, most of these young soldiers don’t have any idea about God, and Jesus Christ is a curse word to many of them.”

The number of people in the U.S. military who have committed suicide has increased dramatically in recent years, with the Army alone battling a suicide rate that doubled between 2005 and 2009.

At Fort Hood in Texas, officials have documented 14 confirmed suicides and six suspected suicides among soldiers so far this year, including four suspected suicides during one weekend at the end of September. Fort Hood had 11 suicides last year and 14 total in 2008.

Sara Horn, a military wife who founded a support network called Wives of Faith, said the suicides are directly related to a problem of the heart.

“When the heart has no hope, it’s very hard to see a future. This should serve only as one more wakeup call, one more plea to our local churches and believers to reach out to our military and their families,” Horn told Baptist Press. “We know the hope we have in Jesus. We have to share that hope with others.”

…Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the problem is going to get worse before it gets better as more soldiers return from war. “Things that have been pent up, or packed in, or basically suppressed or sucked up — whatever term you want to use — we’re going to start to see that as well.”

[Editor’s note: This article is incomplete. The source for this document was originally published on bpnews.net—however, the original URL is no longer available.]