{"podcast":{"title":"The Documentary Podcast","slug":"the-documentary-podcast-487670","podcast_index_feed_id":487670,"rss_url":"https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/p02nq0lx.rss","website_url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02nq0lx","image_url":"http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/images/ic/3000x3000/p0kxnkls.jpg","author":"BBC","episode_count":2000,"summary":"Hear the voices at the heart of global stories. Where curious minds can uncover hidden truths and make sense of the world. The best of documentary storytelling from the BBC World Service. From conflict in the Middle East to the advance of AI, to the front line of the climate emergency, we go beyond the headlines. Each week we dive into the minds of the world’s most creative people, take personal journeys into spirituality and connect people from across the globe to share how news stories are shaping their lives.","last_synced_at":"2026-07-24T10:20:39.856026+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670"},"episode":{"title":"The missionary soldier","slug":"the-missionary-soldier","published_at":"2026-06-05T00:36:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670/the-missionary-soldier","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670","url":"http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0nq718j","audio_url":"http://open.live.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/6/redir/version/2.0/mediaset/audio-nondrm-download-rss-low/proto/http/vpid/p0nq70rv.mp3","summary":"David Eubank calls himself a missionary soldier. A former US Special Forces soldier, he is now an ordained Christian Reverend and founder of the Free Burma Rangers, a humanitarian group working in some of the world’s most dangerous conflict zones. He prays before missions, runs towards gunfire, rescues the wounded, and says love is what keeps him there. But David's story is also morally complicated. He has carried dying children from battlefields. He has watched friends and colleagues die. And he has killed. Rajeev Gupta speaks to David about what it means to follow Jesus in a firefight. David reflects on his upbringing as a missionary child in Thailand, his years in the US military, and the call that took him into Burma’s long-running civil war. He describes the moments when his faith and a desire for revenge came into conflict. But how does David know he is on the right side? How does he justify taking his wife and children into war zones? And how does he keep believing in God after seeing so much suffering? This episode of The Documentary, comes to you from Heart and Soul, exploring personal approaches to spirituality from around the world.","meta_description":"David Eubank calls himself a missionary soldier. A former US Special Forces soldier, he is now an ordained Christian Reverend and founder of the Free Burm…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":1594,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-documentary-podcast-487670/episodes/the-missionary-soldier/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-documentary-podcast-487670/the-missionary-soldier.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}