Page:Christian Science War Time Activities.djvu/94

 the great camp cities, scattered throughout the United States, established for the training of the army-to-be, took form in the summer and early fall of 1917, the necessity of providing for the spiritual welfare of the soldier Scientists already gathered there in considerable numbers began to press for attention.

Exclusion by the War Department of all religious and benevolent organizations excepting the Y. M. C. A. and the Knights of Columbus, a ruling later greatly modified, made the problem at first a rather difficult one. It had been hoped to erect in each camp a Christian Science building capable of accommodating good-sized groups of soldiers during their leisure hours and also of housing one or more Christian Science practitioners whose services would thus be immediately and constantly available. The ruling referred to, however, made this at least temporarily impossible and other means had to be devised.

While these were being sought, the demand from many parts of the country that something be done for the men in camp became increasingly insistent. Christian Scientists traveling in the South called attention to the fact that in many of the camp towns in that section there were few if any Scientists and that no provision was being made for the Science men in the