and question and so genuinely human as to enjoy the wit and
humor and even the frivolities of life, its Christliness lifting its
pleasures out of the mists of evil into which we have permitted the
devil to drag them, and placing them side by side with the more
serious considerations of our life work.

My observations teach me that the effort of the army to solve the
fundamental problem of the soldier's spiritual life met with a large
measure of success.

The army took millions of our boys from every walk of life. It sent
two and a quarter millions across the sea. It fed them an abundance of
plain but wholesome food. It gave them plenty of hard exercise to
convert that food into hard muscle. It demanded _attention_, so that a
keen mind directed a strong body. It provided the leisure hour with
huts where the touch of home suggested the writing of millions of home
letters which otherwise would never have been written. Concerts,
lectures, reading rooms with books and magazines and games of all
kinds were furnished to all--free. Even something _homemade_ to eat
and drink, in addition to the regular canteen supplies, which covered
practically every legitimate desire of the men, could be purchased at
reasonable cost.

Having done all this for his body and his mind, it took a broad view
of his spiritual needs, and carefully selected chaplains from the
various denominations and creeds and sent them with the boys as their
spiritual advisers. So splendidly was the choice of religious leaders
made that often on the battlefield a Protestant minister or a Jewish
rabbi would borrow a crucifix and bring the word of comfort to a dying
Catholic; or a priest would read the Bible or the Prayer Book to a
dying Jew or Protestant. On one occasion a woman canteen worker aided
a Jewish rabbi to give absolution to a Catholic boy in a Y.M.C.A. hut
when a priest could not be secured in time. In all this is there not
more than a hint for the Church of to-morrow?

These our boys, now men, have come back to become the great leaders of
our new civilization, and they will be intolerant of dogmatic
denominationalism, and well they may. The church that holds their
respect and commands their allegiance must have a world view of
Christianity and a Godlike love for the lives of all men. And the
theology of to-morrow must be as broad as the teachings of the Bible.

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