or favor from the Man of Sorrows who was hanged upon a
cross, and found a mother-love in the vision of Mary, which came to them
when they were in fear and pain and the struggle of death. The padre
had a definite job to do in the trenches and for that reason was allowed
more liberty in the line than other chaplains. Battalion officers,
surgeons, and nurses were patient with mysterious rites which they did
not understand, but which gave comfort, as they saw, to wounded men; and
the heroism with which many of those priests worked under fire, careless
of their own lives, exalted by spiritual fervor, yet for the most part
human and humble and large-hearted and tolerant, aroused a general
admiration throughout the army. Many of the Protestant clergy were
equally devoted, but they were handicapped by having to rely more upon
providing physical comforts for the men than upon spiritual acts, such
as anointing and absolution, which were accepted without question by
Catholic soldiers.

Yet the Catholic Church, certain of its faith, and all other churches
claiming that they teach the gospel of Christ, have been challenged to
explain their attitude during the war and the relation of their teaching
to the world-tragedy, the Great Crime, which has happened. It will not
be easy for them to do so. They will have to explain how it is that
German bishops, priests, pastors, and flocks, undoubtedly sincere
in their professions of faith, deeply pious, as our soldiers saw in
Cologne, and fervent in their devotion to the sacraments on their side
of the fighting-line, as the Irish Catholics on our side, were able
to reconcile this piety with their war of aggression. The faith of the
Austrian Catholics must be explained in relation to their crimes, if
they were criminal, as we say they were, in leading the way to this
war by their ultimatum to Serbia. If Christianity has no restraining
influence upon the brutal instincts of those who profess and follow its
faith, then surely it is time the world abandoned so ineffective a
creed and turned to other laws likely to have more influence on human
relationships. That, brutally, is the argument of the thinking world
against the clergy of all nations who all claimed to be acting according
to the justice of God and the spirit of Christ. It is a powerful
argument, for the simple mind, rejecting casuistry, cuts straight to the
appalling contrast between Christian profession and Christian practice,
and says: