THE ARMY AND THE CHURCHES
By DR. W. B. SELBIE
TTHERE lies before me as I write one of the less grue- 1 some relics of the Great War. It consists of a stout volume of some four hundred and fifty pages entitled The Army and Religion, and it was the joint product of a Committee of the Churches under the chairmanship of the late Dr. Talbot, then Bishop of Winchester, and the general editorship of Dr. David Cairns, of Aberdeen. Its object was to discover and describe the attitude of the men in the army, then practically identical with the young manhood of the British Empire, to religion in general and to the Christian Churches in particular.
Immense labour went to its making. Questionnaires were sent out, and hundreds of replies were received from men of all ranks in the Army, from chaplains, nurses, doctors, Y.M.C.A. workers and others. When these had been sifted and tabulated, it was found that, in spite of differences in opinion, there was an impressive unanimity in regard to the main facts of the case. These may be briefly sum- marised as follows: (I) It was generally agreed that the great majority of the men held very loosely by organised Christianity. About ten per cent. were in vital relation to churches and another ten per cent. were nominal adherents. The remaining eighty per cent. were quite outside. These, however, in Spite of their frankly materialist outlook, had all the virtues of the good Pagan—courage, magnanimity, cheerfulness, comradeship, and the like. It was said of them that they had got religion but not Christianity, and their religion, such as it was, did not give many of them sufficient moral vigour to withstand the fleshly temptations of the rest camps and the home base.
.(2) It was generally agreed that there was crass and widespread ignorance of the real nature and meaning of the Christian religion. It was all a matter of "don'ts." A. man was a Christian if he didn't drink, or swear, or go With girls, and it was rather a dull business. At the same tune there was a great deal of superstition, belief in charms and mascots, and a thoroughly fatalist outlook. ,If a bullet bore your name, then your number was up, but until then YOU were safe. (3) Hence it was generally agreed that under the stress of war our whole educational system, both secular and religious, had been tried and found wanting. Ignorance of the Bible in particular was colossal, and that in spite of the fact that most of the men had had some sort of Bible teaching either in Sunday or day schools. At the same time there was a pathetic eagerness to learn, and one of the main recommendations of the report is, educate, educate, educate.
(4) It was generally agreed also that the men as a whole had little or no use for the Churches. They were regarded as effete institutions out of touch with real life, too much concerned with their own interests, and greatly hampered by their disunion. The official religion of the army was very unpopular and parade services were greatly disliked, though chaplains were regarded as mostly good fellows and useful up to a point.
When this report was published, it created a ripple of interest in Church circles, but quite failed to produce any practical results. Indeed, looking back upon it now we cannot but admit that it fell extremely flat. For this there were probably two main reasons. In the first place there was nothing in the report that was not already quite well- known to those in closest touch with the life of the churches. The report contained no surprises. But the main reason for the failure was war weariness and the preoccupation of the Churches, as of everyone else, with the business of recovering from the war strain and of readjusting themselves to the new conditions. The men from the army certainly did not flock into the churches when the war was over. They held rather severely aloof, and such statistics as are available show that all the Churches are now steadily declin- ing in numbers. So far their efforts to set their house in order have not been conspicuously successful.
It should be frankly recognised that the condition of things reflected in this report still exists—only more so. We are no nearer real unity among the Churches than we were in 1920. The fine resolutions and appeals of the Lambeth Conference of that year have never been imple- mented in practice. Among the Free Churches, though there has been closer co-operation in action, certain new lines of cleavage in thought have become apparent. The crisis-theology on the Continent, a very definite symptom of war neurosis, has had its repercussions in this country, and the rise of the new dogmatism, whether in its Calvin- ist or Thomist form, constitutes a fresh and serious threat to Christian unity. The tragedy is that all this, however interesting to theologians, is hopelessly irrelevant to the life and thought of the average man, who is more puzzled than ever by the disunion of the Churches, and by the theological and ecclesiastical differences on which it is based.
Once more the manhood of the nation is either in the army or doing work ancillary to the army. Once more the cry is raised, "Never again," and men are resolved not to lay down their arms until peace has been established in righteousness. This time, however, there is a clearer and more widespread recognition of the fact that such a peace can only come about through a practical application of Christian principles and values. But this must have behind it something more than a reaction against that Pagan Humanism which has now been found wanting. If its worst consequences are to be avoided and a European settlement on Christian lines is to become possible, it will be due mainly to the work and witness of the Christian Churches.
Whether, as at present constituted, they are equal to such a task may well be doubted. They are handicapped in many ways and their influence counts for little with men of the world. But they stand for a kingdom which is not of this world, and they have behind them spiritual resources which are unlimited. Whether they can bring these to bear with any effect on the present difficult and complex situation will depend largely on their willingness to stand together and to sink their differences in the wider interests of the Kingdom of God. In the coming iecon- struction their united work and witness would have great weight. But, unless they can speak with one voice, they had better keep silence altogether.
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