Synodical Conference Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1954, Page 85

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Ev. Luth. Synodical Conference of North America, 1954 85

I that I could withstand God?” I am here to say that each year

more than 2,500 men are brought into our particular Synod by the

work of the chaplains who serve in the Army, the Navy, and the

Air Force. This is only a small portion of the countless number of

men who, by the work of the chaplains, are brought to the Chris-

tian religion each year. Who are we to withstand God when He
’ so manifestly blesses this work?

At this point I should like to insert a description of just one
kind of opportunity that beckons the chaplain on military duty.
My last assignment in the Air Force, which, by the way, I left just
two years ago, was that of Wing Chaplain at Sampson Air Force
Base, Geneva, N. Y. Sampson is a training center to which volun-
teers are sent as soon as they decide to join the Air Force. This
is where they get their basic training. Into that basic training there
has been woven a systematic program in moral training and also
a course on the fundamentals of the Christian religion. The latter
program is carried out on a voluntary basis. During the time
I served there Sampson was a base of some 25,000 men. Each week
it was possible on Wednesday evening to get over 2,000 men into
classrooms and into the chapels to hear discussions of basic Chris-
tian truths. In one month that I recall no fewer than 90 men were
baptized at this one base.

Take another situation. My first assignment in the Air Force
was with the Weather School at Chanute Field, Ill. This was back
in 1941 and 1942; and a most remarkable assignment it was. At that
time only graduate students of meteorology were admitted to the
Weather School. During my stay at Chanute Field, from May,
1941, to September, 1942, I personally instructed and confirmed 51
of these men. Where else do you have such opportunities?

People often ask: “Well, how about the general Protestant
service that has to be held on every base each Sunday?” The an-
swer is quite simple: “When a Lutheran has that service, he makes
it a Lutheran service.” He is completely free to do with this service
what he wants. If he wants to wear vestments, that’s his decision
to make. If he wants to use the confession of sins and the abso-
lution, as we have it in our Lutheran services, he has the right to
make that decision. As a result, it is just this service that provides
the greatest missionary opportunity in this year of our Lord, 1954.

To this statement on opportunity I must immediately add that
the peculiar position of our Synod on matters of worship is not
only understood in the military service, it is actually protected and
guaranteed by official regulations—to a much greater degree,
I want to add, than at the turn of the century, when the Joint
Synod of Wisconsin was represented in the Army by Chaplain
F. Eppling of Algoma, Wis. (Proc., Wis. Syn., 1898, p. 84), and to
a much greater degree also than during the years down to 1935,
in which the Wisconsin Synod had an indorsing agency for mili-
tary chaplains!

I want to read to you two paragraphs from official regulations
which, I am sure, speak for themselves. They come from an Air
Force manual called The Air Force Chaplain, which appeared in
April of this year. You will find this particular quotation on page 17
of that manual:

‘The Chaplain is morally obligated to provide for the religious

needs of the entire command. The Chaplain accomplishes
this objective through his own personal services and through

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