Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-11-28
ARE LARGELY DEPENDENT ON THE COAL MA
PRAYER FOR WOMAN
LEFT BEHIND
BY "MA" SUNDAY

SnH, LORD, God or Hosts, my WIN DO
~ Done on This war-Reddened Earth
Even as It Is in the Peaceful Heavens.
Give Us Strength and Faith and Love 10
Send Our Dear ones Away With Smile
on Our Lips, and a Smile In Our Hearts.
Give Us the Vision TO Glimpse the Victory
and the Sunshine Beyond the Grim Clouds
Of war--That Victory for which They and
We May Be Called to give All That We
Hold Most Dear on This Earth. Help Us
to Keep our Service Flag Flying with
New Meaning and a New Challenge and a
New Ideal, and May Our Lives Be Fuller
for Its Flying--Not with Grief or Sadness,
but with the Thrill of an Inspiration That
Shall Know No Pause Until All Humanity
Is Freed From the Yoke of Man-Made
Tyranny"
This is the first section OF the new Lords
Prayer for the American woman who Is
waiting and working in the war-darkened
home, from which her dear one has gone
in his khaki to bear his part in the great
soul-struggle of the trenches.
In her way she is facing just as supreme
and bitter n soul-struggle in the trenches
az home. They may not be swept by the
fire cf the enemy, but they are swept by
all of the demons OF despair and heart
ache and that supreme desolation which
can come only to the hearthstone blackened
by the grim specter of war.
The women OF America are just begin
ming TO glimpse something or the burden
and trial and sacrifice into which they are
entering-that gaunt cloud from which at
times there seems no ending and which for
three long years of anguish has spread its
cold fingers about the hearts OF their sisters
across the seas They are just beginning,
from the black valley of their new bereave-
r1ent, 10 stretch out gropngly for support
and consolation and inspiration that can
not be given by human hearts or human
voices.
They are facing the first breaking down
OF readjustment in their lives and homes
which will be nationwide and fearfullv
Soul-deep before IL is completed. They are
graphing with strange problems and prob
ing strange depths, often unsuspected depths
in their hearts, which Ii needed some such
world-crisls TO bring into evidence. And
in IL all they are facing the greatest heart
ache and the most wrenchng sacrifice that
WomanhoCd can be called upon TO bear
not only the awful. ever-present fear OF
the Valley of Death for those they love
better than themselves, but the bitter, stab
hng ordeal Of waiting, always and every
where waiting, for what the tomorrow may
bring
Their dear ones may be in training
camps, or they may have already received
| the fateful order to sail. They may still
| be on American soil, or their feet may have
| already touched the soil made red by the
| iron heel Of the invader. 1t is given to the
women at home-wife or mother. or sister.
! or sWeetheart--to wait and watch with al
| ternate hope and fear; hope which will
| grow less and fear which will grow greater
| as the months go by and this nation is
| brought face to face with the first lists of
| killed. wounded and missing from the front
| II is a crisis needing not only all of the
| inherent strength of American womanhood
| that strength which has been handed
| down from the wilderness struggles of the
| Mayfower mothers-but deeper and a
| more enduring and more inspiring
| strength even than that which echoes &c
! us from the heroic pages of the past The
| lite woman at home is left alone, and per.
| haps for the first time in her life is brought
| into intimate personal contact with her God
| that God who must protect when she
| cannot have the soldier who has marched
| away with his colors,
II she IS the woman ! think she is. sh,
will emerge from her trial by fire with
new faith in herself and in humanity anC
in her God. and new boundaries and new
ideals in that life which up TO now hI
been sheltered by conventions and mad,
easy for her by the labor of others. He
service flag for God and country will meai
something more to her than a piece o
| pretty bunting for patriotic occasions, Sh
| will know II has been consecrated in tn
| lfeblood Of those who gave their live
freely that it might survive-she will know
that beneath it are the unbroken rampant
OF a civilization and brotherhood of MAJ
that has come safely through the creates
blasts aimed at it in all history.
| Yes. and she will know. too. she will hav
done her part TO hold those ramparts An
,, in that knowledge she will find he
strength and comfort for whatever may be
fall
, (Copyrght 1917. by The Bell Syndicate, Inc. J