Jason Crouthamel is Professor of History at Grand Valley State University, USA. He is the author of An Intimate History of the Front: Masculinity, Sexuality and Ordinary German Soldiers in the First World War (2014) and The Great War and German Memory: Society, Politics and Psychological Trauma (2009). He has also co-edited, along with Peter Leese, Psychological Trauma and the Legacy of the First World War (2016) and Traumatic Memories of the Second World War and After (2016). He recently co-edited, with Julia B. Köhne and Peter Leese, Languages of Trauma: History, Memory and Media (2021).

• AcknowledgementsA Note on the TextList of AbbreviationsIntroduction1. “Gott Mit Uns”: Hegemonic Religious Ideals, Emotions and Mobilizing for War2. God and the ‘Spirit of 1914’: Religiosity of Ordinary Soldiers and Civilians at the Outbreak of the War3. Processing Trauma: Nerves, Religious Language and Coping with Violence4. “Where is God?” The Brutalization of Faith in the Front Experience5. Diagnosing Religious Beliefs: Contemporary Scientific and Popular Debates over the Spiritual-Psychological Effects of the War6. Alternative Beliefs in the Trenches: Superstitions, Gods and Monsters, and Religious Humor7. Spiritual Subjectivities: Constructing New Beliefs Out of Total WarEpilogue: Defeat, Revolution and AftermathConclusionBibliographyIndex

No serious historian who writes on religion during what George Kennan called the great seminal catastrophe of the twentieth century can afford to ignore Crouthamel’s findings.

Jason Crouthamel is Professor of History at Grand Valley State University, USA. He is the author of An Intimate History of the Front: Masculinity, Sexuality and Ordinary German Soldiers in the First World War (2014) and The Great War and German Memory: Society, Politics and Psychological Trauma (2009). He has also co-edited, along with Peter Leese, Psychological Trauma and the Legacy of the First World War (2016) and Traumatic Memories of the Second World War and After (2016). He recently co-edited, with Julia B. Köhne and Peter Leese, Languages of Trauma: History, Memory and Media (2021).

• AcknowledgementsA Note on the TextList of AbbreviationsIntroduction1. “Gott Mit Uns”: Hegemonic Religious Ideals, Emotions and Mobilizing for War2. God and the ‘Spirit of 1914’: Religiosity of Ordinary Soldiers and Civilians at the Outbreak of the War3. Processing Trauma: Nerves, Religious Language and Coping with Violence4. “Where is God?” The Brutalization of Faith in the Front Experience5. Diagnosing Religious Beliefs: Contemporary Scientific and Popular Debates over the Spiritual-Psychological Effects of the War6. Alternative Beliefs in the Trenches: Superstitions, Gods and Monsters, and Religious Humor7. Spiritual Subjectivities: Constructing New Beliefs Out of Total WarEpilogue: Defeat, Revolution and AftermathConclusionBibliographyIndex

No serious historian who writes on religion during what George Kennan called the great seminal catastrophe of the twentieth century can afford to ignore Crouthamel’s findings.

Jason Crouthamel is Professor of History at Grand Valley State University, USA. He is the author of An Intimate History of the Front: Masculinity, Sexuality and Ordinary German Soldiers in the First World War (2014) and The Great War and German Memory: Society, Politics and Psychological Trauma (2009). He has also co-edited, along with Peter Leese, Psychological Trauma and the Legacy of the First World War (2016) and Traumatic Memories of the Second World War and After (2016). He recently co-edited, with Julia B. Köhne and Peter Leese, Languages of Trauma: History, Memory and Media (2021).

• AcknowledgementsA Note on the TextList of AbbreviationsIntroduction1. “Gott Mit Uns”: Hegemonic Religious Ideals, Emotions and Mobilizing for War2. God and the ‘Spirit of 1914’: Religiosity of Ordinary Soldiers and Civilians at the Outbreak of the War3. Processing Trauma: Nerves, Religious Language and Coping with Violence4. “Where is God?” The Brutalization of Faith in the Front Experience5. Diagnosing Religious Beliefs: Contemporary Scientific and Popular Debates over the Spiritual-Psychological Effects of the War6. Alternative Beliefs in the Trenches: Superstitions, Gods and Monsters, and Religious Humor7. Spiritual Subjectivities: Constructing New Beliefs Out of Total WarEpilogue: Defeat, Revolution and AftermathConclusionBibliographyIndex

No serious historian who writes on religion during what George Kennan called the great seminal catastrophe of the twentieth century can afford to ignore Crouthamel’s findings.