USA. Fort Hood, Texas. 2011. Family members wait to greet their loved ones returning from Iraq. There is a tradition at Fort
Hood. Before the soldiers deploy and upon their return, they are each hugged by seventy-nineyear-
old Elizabeth Laird. On their departure, she gives each soldier a copy of Psalm 91, which
reads, “You shall not fear the terror of the night nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence
that roams in darkness, nor the plague that ravages at noon. Though a thousand fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand, near you it shall not come.”