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According to Dr David Ritchie, historian at the University of Edinburgh, the Church of Scotland initially viewed the outbreak of World War One as a great opportunity:

鈥淭hey believed there would be a massive religious revival and that this was an opportunity for the church to re-engage with the people. But by third year of the war, it was clear that the church had not got that connection. According to one minister, 鈥榯he soldier has got religion, but not Christianity鈥�. Trench religion was not that of the church.鈥�

There were other problems too in that the army chaplain was strongly identified with the officer class 鈥� and many soldiers resented that fact that, despite the mud and mess of the trenches, they were still required to smarten up for the Sunday service.

Both the Catholic and the Presbyterian churches were big recruiters of men to the army, but a certain cynicism set in - as David explains: 鈥淐hurches were recruiting men to fight, and saying that God was on their side. But those recruits knew well that that on the other side of the lines, Lutheran pastors were saying exactly the same thing to German troops. After a while, the idea that you were fighting a just war didn鈥檛 quite have the same resonance.鈥�

David Ritchie says that by the time of the Second World War, the Church of Scotland had learned lessons: 鈥� The church was more engaged, it held entertainments, ran canteens and so on. They were there with the troops. They鈥檇 learned their lesson, but it took a long time.鈥�

Image copyright: National Library of Scotland

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