AIRPORT CHAPLAINS VOLUNTEER TIME TO HELP THE WORLD'S TRAVEL WEARY.

Byline: Betty Barnacle The San Jose Mercury News 

Mel Dahlgren has the habit of hanging out at San Jose International Airport, approaching strangers and striking up conversations.

Security knows, but the cops haven't done a thing about it. In fact, they approve of what Dahlgren and 14 other local ministers and lay church workers are doing as the airport's first chaplains.

Dahlgren, 49, pastor of the Worldwide Church of God in San Jose and Salinas, and other chaplains volunteer in three-hour shifts to care for thousands of the world's travelers, often on their days off from their own flocks.

On duty at the airport, they might be called upon to talk someone through a fear of flying or comfort a lonely parent whose child just flew off to college. They could be the rational voice that keeps in check tempers that flare over canceled flights and lost luggage.

The Interfaith Chaplaincy Program, operating quietly since November, officially became a part of the airport at the end of February. Most travelers, and even some of the 3,000 employees at the sprawling terminals off Civic Center near Highway 101, are still unaware of the group's existence.

This might explain why Victoria Yuan, cradling 4-month-old Anthony and awaiting a flight home to Los Angeles, kept asking Dahlgren what he was doing when he greeted her.

``I never knew they had chaplains at airports,'' she finally said.

``We're still building,'' said Dwight L. Kintner, chairman of Interfaith Services Inc., a nonprofit corporation that established the chaplaincy. The founders of Interfaith Services wanted to create a ``ministry of presence'' at the airport.

Programs similar to San Jose's are operated by the International Association of Civil Aviation Chaplains in 72 airports worldwide, mostly in Europe, Kintner said. There are about 30 programs in the United States, clustered in the East; each operates differently.

At Boston's Logan International, which has the oldest chaplaincy in the nation, a sign directs passengers to an airport chapel.

Phil Orlandella, Logan spokesman, said that although the chapel just celebrated its 50th anniversary, volunteer church people aren't stationed there and must be summoned for emergencies.

At San Jose International one recent day, Dahlgren found things quiet and left those he spoke to with a smile. Such isn't always the case, according to the Rev. Vigen Galustian of the Church of the Valley in Santa Clara.

``Sometimes a chaplain is the last person they want to see,'' he said. ``When we go up to some people who are upset, they say `No. No. I can help myself.' ''

If he meets people of a different faith who are seriously troubled, Dahlgren said, he refers them to a local priest, Buddhist monk or rabbi or suggests someone at their destination who is on the association's reference list ``so they'll feel more comfortable.''

Dahlgren said he's found that people just want someone to listen to them.

``I don't want to tell them what to do, and if I see that someone's busy, I try not to monopolize or interfere,'' he said.

But he did break into the conversation of a forlorn group sitting near the boarding gates in Terminal A. Reyna Madrid, 17; her son, Manuel, 6 months; her brother, Jose Madrid, 12; and her mother, Blanca Sanchez, 32, had been driven to the airport from their home near Salinas and dropped off at 6:30 a.m. by Reyna's fiance.

They had been waiting for five hours for a mix-up with their tickets to Colorado to be resolved, Reyna said. They had paid cash at a Soledad travel agency, but the airlines had no record of their flight reservations.

Dahlgren helped Sanchez make phone calls for help and comforted the stranded family.