Being surrounded by death has the tendency to make a person think about religion, since most religions usually have ideas about how the soul lives on after death. Birdy doesn't think about the soul that much, but he does think about God, and how to make sense of his belief in God and the horrors he sees.
Jonesy, a preacher's son, is having the same struggle. He tries to pretend he doesn't care, but he's not fooling anybody.
Just to complicate things even more, Iraq is a predominantly Muslim country. There are plenty of citizens who are trying to live a peaceful version of Islam, but there are others who think of the Americans as godless enemies.
All these issues are shown in Sunrise Over Fallujah, but none of them have easy answers. The author simply gives his readers a lot to think about.
Questions About Religion
- Why does Jonesy keep asking Birdy about whether he's religious?
- When asked Jonesy's religion at his funeral, why does Miller call him "a blues man?"
- Why does Omar make a special effort to call the soldiers infidels?
- What shakes Birdy's faith in God by the end of the story?
Chew on This
Jonesy is more religious than he lets on to the others.
For Jonesy, blues is a religion.