The Churches and World War II

THE CHURCHES AND WORLD WAR II

Activism

Like every other institution in American life, the churches of the United States were deeply involved in World War II. Churches provided moral guidance, spiritual advice, and comfort to millions of soldiers in the battlefield and millions of families on the home front. Many members of the clergy enlisted in the military as chaplains, and churches provided Bibles and other religious items to the troops. Churches were often the location of bond rallies and scrap drives. Some clerics advised pacifism during the war and coordinated small opposition groups. Most, however, were engaged in the struggle against Germany and Japan and afterward became important agents in postwar reconstruction. Significant clergymen, such as Reinhold Niebuhr and Francis Spellman, were instrumental in framing American policy during and after the war, and churches and religious periodicals acted as shapers of public opinion throughout the period.

Toward War

The developments of the late 1930s and early 1940s that propelled the world toward war had a different impact on different churches. American Catholics were troubled and divided by events in Europe. Rome was deeply opposed to atheistic communism, and many Catholics in Europe and the United States therefore supported or remained sympathetic to the anti-Communist philosophy of fascism. This was especially the case after Francisco Franco's Fascists attacked Republican Spain in 1936. Franco's claim that he was acting for Spanish Catholicism and rescuing Spain from communism was persuasive among many American Catholics, who raised funds for the Fascist troops. Catholic labor unions and the Catholic Worker movement supported Republican Spain, but the American Catholic leadership was for the most part united behind Franco. After 1940 many in the pro-Franco leadership became advocates of isolationism, especially after the United States extended Lend-Lease aid to Russia in 1941. Catholics closely tied to the Roosevelt administration, however, backed intervention. Catholic leaders such as John A. Ryan, Edwin V. O'Hara, Joseph P. Hurley, James A. Ryan, Bernard Sheil, and New York archbishop Spellman were exceptional in their backing of the administration. Isolationism split the Catholic Worker movement, as prounion leaders followed President Franklin D. Roosevelt's lead and advocated American intervention in the war, while committed pacifists such as Dorothy Day sought to prevent American involvement. Protestant leaders were similarly divided in their sympathies. Robert Calhoun, C. C. Morrison, and Morrison's periodical Christian Century were opposed to intervention and advocated Christian pacifism. By contrast, a periodical founded in 1941, Christianity and Crisis, mobilized the talents of interventionist Protestants such as John Bennett, Henry Van Dusen, and Francis Miller to attack isolationism. Jews held the greatest unanimity of opinion. With millions of fellow Jews being persecuted by the Nazis, almost all Jewish religious leaders favored intervention.

After Pearl Harbor

As it did with American public opinion generally, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941 rallied church opinion behind American involvement in the war. Almost every church and denomination backed the war; the "army" of pacifists so often cited by isolationists dwindled to about 1 percent of draftees. Nearly eight thousand clergymen of every denomination served as chaplains during the war, and home-front churches raised money for the troops and supplied the military with Bibles, prayer books, and devotional literature. Nonetheless, American church leaders remained deeply troubled by the wholesale slaughter of humanity and were stunned by the Holocaust. They attempted to turn the calamity of war to good effect by focusing public opinion on war goals and postwar reconstruction. American Catholic bishops, in a 1943 letter, "The Essentials of a Good Peace," hoped that the war against the Nazis would put to an end racist ideologies that obscured the unity of humanity; a 1944 letter reinforced the war aims articulated in the Atlantic Charter; and in 1945 the bishops pleaded for mercy for the defeated enemies. Spellman, along with John F. O'Hara and William McCarty, helped organize the work of chaplains during the war and coordinated the activities of other humanitarian war organizations such as the War Relief and Emergency Committee and the War Relief Services. Spellman also toured various war fronts, reassuring the troops that "in serving your country and in a just cause, you are also serving God." Other Catholics were less certain about the divine mandate accompanying American troops. In 1944 Catholic theologian John C. Ford objected to the indiscriminate bombing campaigns of the air corps, and the leading Catholic journals of opinion protested the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Even Spellman had his doubts about the Allies' demand that the Axis surrender unconditionally, fearing the demand would prolong an already bloody conflict and result in a vengeful peace.

The Home Front

American religious leaders were also troubled by the war's impact on the home front. Many worried over a rise in ruthlessness and brutality that would be difficult to extinguish after the war. Many also expressed anxiety over the separation of families and feared a rise in juvenile delinquency and sexual promiscuity as a result of absentee fathers and mothers burdened by service in the defense industry. Church boards discussed methods for curbing "traffic in drink,' a rising divorce rate, and sensational reports of gambling, prostitution, and teenage gang activity. Their congregants shared these concerns, as one national poll revealed that a majority felt the war was contributing to a rise in general immorality.

War, Faith, and Nationalism

The impact of the war experience on American religion is complex and varied. Undoubtedly, the war turned many Americans toward the church as a source of solace in uncertain times; as was commonly said, "there are no atheists in foxholes." The sheer magnitude of the devastation was humbling, as were calamities such as the Holocaust. Neo-orthodox Protestant theologians especially emphasized that the eruption of war proved the inability of humanity to guide itself without divine assistance, a point they reiterated after Hiroshima. Millions, overwhelmed by the war experience, turned to their churches. Victory in the war, however, convinced many that the United States was God's chosen nation and that American piety was the key to success on the battlefield. Such an attitude led to a kind of cultural arrogance, often underscoring American intervention in foreign affairs or affirming extreme anticommunism. It also led to anxiety over the spiritual condition of American society. If the United States were God's chosen nation, widespread immorality could be a sign of the withdraw of his favor. To prevent this, close policing of the nation's morals might be necessary, and religion could well become almost compulsory. Dwight D. Eisenhower made this connection between nationalism and piety explicit in a 1946 address. "Without God there could be no American form of government, nor an American way of life," he said. "Recognition of the Supreme Being is the first—and most basic—expression of Americanism."

Source:

Robert Wuthnow, The Restructuring of American Religion: Society and Faith Since World War II (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988).