Mother Courage and Her Children

The play is set in Europe during the Thirty Years’ War, which immediately brings religious beliefs to the forefront. Mother Courage and the soldiers she sells her wares to are Protestant, and the Catholics are their enemy. As the play opens, Mother Courage proudly flies a Protestant flag from her canteen wagon, signaling her allegiance.

It becomes apparent, however, that while nearly every character is devoted to the war, few are truly devout. Even the Chaplain, the play’s central representative of organized religion, is shown to be a fair-weather Protestant at best. When the tides of war turn and the enemy advances, Mother Courage and the Chaplain pretend to be Catholics. Mother Courage replaces the wagon’s Protestant flag with a Catholic one and the Chaplain hides his clerical robes. These actions indicate that neither of them is willing to die for the cause, and that their faith is easily forgotten when their lives are at stake. Moreover, the Chaplain is far from being a pious and humble servant of his fellow humans. He frequently grumbles about not being able to preach during the war, not because he has a genuine desire to help others, but because he believes his gifts are being wasted. Mother Courage notes his hypocrisy when she expresses her frustration with both the Chaplain and Swiss Cheese: “Here you sit—one with his religion, the other with his cashbox, I don’t know which is more dangerous” (51). The play is a damning indictment of Christianity and violence done in its name.

Rather than sincerely practicing their religion, characters manipulate or skew religious doctrines to fit their agenda. For example, Eilif kills innocent civilians, insisting that he does so out of personal necessity. He shows no compunction for this act and is even praised by the Commander, who agrees Eilif’s actions are justified, quoting scripture: “Doesn’t it say in the Bible ‘Whatsoever thou doest for the least of these my children, thou doest for me?’” (38). However, in the Commander’s view, the “least” of God’s children are his hungry soldiers, rather than the defenseless peasants from whom Eilif stole. As the Chaplain points out, people are prone to place their own interests above those of others, especially during hard times. He notes that “when [the Lord] told men to love their neighbors, their bellies were full” (38). His assertion suggests that it is easy to adhere to doctrine when one’s life is easy, but that when one is faced with challenges, doing so proves more difficult.

The play emphasizes the hypocrisy of a war fought on religious grounds, showing that such a war necessarily violates the very tenets it claims to defend. Eilif steals from and murders civilians, an action that is, absurdly, lauded during wartime but punished during peacetime. Mother Courage’s anxiety about Kattrin derives from the knowledge that rape and sexual assault on women is legitimized by war—regarded as one of the “spoils” afforded the victor. There is nothing righteous about the Thirty Years’ War, the play suggests, just as there is nothing righteous about a cause that condones such violence.