Chaplains and Role Models

EVERY agency needs them

Faith and its impacts on law enforcement are so important that there are chaplains in most law enforcement organizations. The FBI itself acknowledges this fact on its website, stating that, “Chaplains improve the overall functioning of law enforcement.” They help both criminals and law enforcement workers. Chaplains provide support and strengthen the overall wellbeing of an officer/agent. Secret Service chaplain, Reverend Mark Arbeen, the chief chaplain of the Secret Service’s DC based offices, and chaplain program manager nationwide for the Secret Service, notes that the two most common struggles he hears from law enforcement are dealing with moral injury and dealing with having to miss out on certain family milestones or events because of their jobs (M. Arbeen, personal communication, August 4, 2022). He says that the most important thing for law enforcement is to prioritize their faith and to not be afraid to ask for help. Agencies have various support systems of all sorts in nature, and they are there to help. Chaplains provide an outlet to help minimize moral incidents and difficulties; the goal of this position is to make sure that people have the spiritual fortitude to do their job. The Secret Service, as well as many other local and federal law enforcement organizations have chaplains that range from Catholic, Protestant, Liturgical Protestant, Baptist, Jewish, Muslim, Episcopalian, and even an atheist chaplain. Reverend Mark Arbeen said, “Overall, faith can help negate the negative impacts of working in law enforcement. It cannot hinder them, but every person is different. It is not how faith impacts them on a whole, but how their own personal faith can help them. Based on however their faith can help themselves, then it is my job to help them further that strength” (M. Arbeen, personal communication, August 4, 2022). 

With seeing and dealing with all the negative impacts that come with working in the job of law enforcement, it can be easy to get caught up in everything and be stuck in the belief that you cannot have both a career in law enforcement and a strong moral faith. However, Father Anthony Pinizzotto disproves that assumption. Anthony Pinizzotto is both a Catholic priest and a forensic psychologist in the FBI. He says that he relied on his faith as he processed the evil he witnessed on the job. “Whenever any of those atrocites happened, I brought it to Our Lord in the garden, where he experienced more psychological spiritual terror, I think, than any of us. Yet he got through it knowing that he had a loving God” (Pinizzotto 2020). Father Pinizzotto used his position to apply faith and reason into research to help learn more about the human nature behind both law enforcement and criminals. Father Pinizzotto serves as an amazing role model for all in the field of law enforcement. After 20 years on the job, he retired from the FBI. Today, he still does work for both the Church and in law enforcement; he serves as a priest, performs various psychological assessments, and performs and writes research studies about criminal justice and psychology (Maraist, 2020).