Moral injury, the distress that can arise from experiences that violate deeply held moral beliefs and expectations, is an important concern for U.S. military veterans. In this report, the authors examine the landscape of U.S. community-based organizations that provide faith‑based or spiritually informed support for moral injury among military veterans. Drawing on a systematic scan of publicly available information and qualitative interviews with 19 representatives from 17 participating faith-based organizations (FBOs), the authors describe how these organizations conceptualize moral injury, the approaches they use to support veterans, and how their work intersects with the broader veteran-support ecosystem, including the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), religious congregations, and other religious or spiritual communities.
The study is descriptive. The authors summarize the evaluation and outcome information that organizations have published or provided, including a small number of peer-reviewed pre-post studies and organizational reports on reach and participant feedback. They did not collect data from veterans, independently verify organizational data, or evaluate program effectiveness. Additionally, because the authors describe the participating organizations rather than evaluate them, the recommendations reflect implications and considerations rather than endorsements of specific programs or models.
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