PREFACE

A few words about the background, scope, methodology, and organization of this study will assist the reader.

The writer of this paper was a chaplain in the Florida National Guard for three and one-half years while a pastor in St. Petersburg, Florida, and for the last fourteen years has been serving as a chaplain on active duty with the United States Army. As an ordained minister with ecclesiastical endorsement of the Southern Baptist Convention he has been very much aware of the traditional doctrinal teaching of Baptists regarding religious liberty and the separation of church and state. He is, therefore, personally concerned with the issues involved in this study and is anxious to clarify his own thinking and, hopefully, to contribute to a better understanding of these issues within his own denomination and other denominations which hold similar beliefs on church and state.

This study originated neither as a defense of the military chaplaincy, nor as a challenge to it, but simply as an honest inquiry into a question of consistency between doctrinal teaching and practical action. It is so easy to say one thing and practice another. The question is: are Baptists inconsistent in the matter of the military chaplaincy? If Baptists are inconsistent we should change either our professed doctrine or our actual conduct—or both. If we are consistent we should be able to present a clear rationale for our doctrine and our practice. And if there is, in fact, excessive entanglement between church and state in the present system of military chaplaincy, it cannot but weaken the effectiveness of the chaplains' spiritual ministry to the military personnel. In any case, these problems must be faced and dealt with openly and honestly.

The scope of this study includes input from history, theology, ethics, and practical Christian ministry. From these fields are selected those pertinent items which concern the Baptist interpretation and applications of "religious liberty", "church and state", "war and peace", "freedom and authority", and Christian ethical doctrines as they relate to the military chaplaincy. The reader will see as he pursues the study that these topics had special relevance and were required to be addressed in detail to achieve the object in view.

The writer would like to acknowledge with deep gratitude valuable assistance afforded him by the staff of San Francisco Theological Seminary Library, Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary Liberty, the Graduate Theological Union Library, Moody Memorial Library of Baylor University, the J.M. Dawson Research Center of Baylor University, and the Santa Rosa-Sonoma Country, California Library. Many persons from the following agencies were most cooperative and helpful: the U.S. Army Chaplain Board, the U.S. Army Chaplain School, The Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs, the General Commission on Chaplains, the Southern Baptist Convention Chaplains Commission, and the Southern Baptist Convention Christian Life Commission.