Category: reader reactions

A reader sends the following reaction to Combat Chaplain by Israel Yost:

Dear neighbors on the other side of the globe,

I want to personally thank the University of Hawai‘i Press for publishing Combat Chaplain by Israel Yost, and to thank Monica Yost and Michael Markrich for compiling and editing such a wonderfully well-told account of very tough times.

I work as a spiritual director near Naples, Italy, where I travel many of the paths that Chaplain Yost once did as I live near Avellino. I was surprised to find that I currently conduct spiritual retreats just a few miles from where he did his hardest work in Montecalvo Irpino, Italy.

Having been in combat myself, I am humbled at the harshness of the task facing the 100th Battalion, which lacked our modern protections and tactics. This book will greatly enrich the retreats I conduct here and I will encourage others to read it. I plan to drive the path he did while recollecting some of his thoughts while treading the same, now peaceful ground. We truly stand on the spiritual shoulders of such men as Israel Yost and those who tell his story. I now reap the benefits of the peace that he sought.

My prayers of thanks to the Lord for your book. May such stories be told over and over.

Ciao, most sincerely,
Bruce Mentzer