Religion: Padre's Hour

All British Army units in the United Kingdom now have an obligatory, weekly religious instruction period. Called the Padre's Hour, it was planned by Army chaplains at the behest of handsome, youngish Major General Frederick Arthur Montague ("Boy") Browning, commander of Britain's airborne troops, husband of Novelist Daphne du Maurier.

The Padre's Hour sometimes includes a whole company, but the ideal is the informal (they can smoke if they want), clublike meeting of a platoon, 20-25 men. Chaplains usually start with a 15-minute address on any topic they wish, then hold a 45-minute question-&-answer session. The Hour is apt to be quite as instructive for the padres as for their men. Many chaplains have been joggled by such questions as: "How can you justify the Church's ownership of slum property?" Many have been startled by posers like "Why is God always represented as male?" Some 75% of the questions are social-economic, about 15% are purely religious.

Chaplains in general feel that the Hour is raising the religious interest of the troops. They cite the fact that many men ask for baptism, confirmation, some talk about entering the ministry after the war. But by & large the men's attitude tends toward the cagey. Many of them preface their questions apologetically: "Without disrespect to the Church. . . ." Says the Ministry of Information, with bland British understatement: "There is extremely little real hostility to the Church. The commonest attitude might be accurately described as disappointment or impatience."