Religion: The Church in Uniform

“We were slapped by one wing of the Red drive on Chinju,” said the Rev. Carroll Chaphe. “The enemy mortars started cracking with the dawn . . . Our casualties were heavier than the medics could handle, but they kept working and I gave them a hand … A light mortar dropped in ten feet from me, and they’re still picking out the metal. When the medics repair this leg I’m going right back to those boys.”

Last week Chaplain Chaphe, a veteran of World War II fighting on the Rhine, was in blue pajamas in a Tokyo hospital. He is one of the 70-odd ministers, priests and rabbis now serving with the Army* in Korea, of whom two have already been reported missing or killed in action. Back from a five days’ inspection tour of the front, Colonel Ivan L. Bennett, Chief of Chaplains in the Far East Command, summed up the mission of the 175-year-old corps in one of the most difficult campaigns to which it has ministered.

“To the anxious mothers and wives whose sons and husbands are bearing the burden of the campaign,” said Colonel Bennett, “I want to say that all is being done that is humanly possible to be done to assure that Catholic, Protestant and Jewish chaplains are present to minister to those who are in danger and to the wounded and dying . . . Wherever men suffer and die, they have a right to expect that the church will be there. The chaplains . . . will be there.”

* With the Marines last week were 16 Navy chaplains; a dozen more are serving offshore with the Navy.