Evening star., 1939-10-05

Son died on the cross knows what
those mothers suffered when they
kissed their children good-by and
listened to the patter of their little
feet dying away down the street
where the soldiers had marched,
heads high, heels clicking, guns
shining, the band playing, just an
hour or two before.
Mary, pity women in times of
war!
But-and 1t is to the eternal
honor OF women-no matter how
cruelty high war has cost them,
no matter how it bankrupts them
In heart and purse. when their coun-
try needed them they have always
paid their debt to the last far
thing. And they have done it with
out Whines or complaints. They have
offered up on the altar of war some
thing that required far more courage
to give than their own lives. They
have given their husbands and sons
and brothers.
1t is only in times of peace that
women are pacif1sts. When they see
their country menaced or some of
the hard-won gains of civilization
about to be trodden underfoot they
flame into righteous anger that
lights the fires in mems souls and
strengthens their arms to 60 out
and do battle for the right. And
this Is a matter of nature. For
only strong women breed strong
sons, and every hero is the child of
a heroic mother.
So far we women of the United
States are only confronting in our
thoughts the horrors with which our
sisters across the water are grap-
pling In reality. Our men still come
home to dinner every day and growl
over the roast being either too rare
or too done. Our little children
still play around our feet of an eve
ming, and gas masks are no part
OF baby's layette. We can still buy
all the food we can pay for at the
grocery, and all that we know about
war is what we read in the news
papers.
May God in His mercy keep us
thus safe and prevent the terrible
conflict that is devastating Europe
from touching us. But the woman
who does not realize that it will be
a miracle if we do not become in
volved in it is simply befooling her
self. She is stultifying herself by
believing what she wants to believe
and refusing to face the truth.
For in this day there is no space
nor distance nor isolation between
nations. We are knit together by
bonds of steel and electric wires that
we could not break if we would. Fast
steamships and airplanes and radio
have made us one vast family and
we can no longer ask: Am I nv
brother keeper? We are all brothers
and responsible for each others
conduct.
And now two great ideologies have
claShed. The one believes in freedom,
in decency of life, in worshiping God
and keeping His commandments;
the other believes in despotism, in
taking away from the people all
freedom of thought and action; it
seeks to destroy religion and all that
is spiritual in man. How long the
struggle between these two beliefs
will be or which will triumph in the
end no one may say.
Therefore, it is this crisis that we
women here at home face as well as
our sisters abroad, and we must
prepare ourselves to meet it. We
must keep ourselves calm and un-
embittered as far as this is possible
in such time of hysteria. We must
try to be just in our judgments and
to see things as clearly as we may
through the fog of rumors with
which the air is filled. We must try
to live sanely, quietly and soberly,
as BELTS those who are looking on
at the greatest tragedy the world
has ever seen and who know its
shadow is over their houses also.
Let us hope and pray that war
will pass us by. But if it comes,
may the God of Battle grant us the
courage to meet it like men and
women