Column: I was desperate, and the best time to pray is when you’re desperate

I recollect only once attending chapel services during my three years of active duty in the U.S. Army.

One time.

I didn’t need it. That was my excuse.

God and I were on relatively good terms, or so I thought. After basic training, however, this G.I. got cocky. Prideful, even. I didn’t need a “crutch.”

I raised my right hand on Feb. 14, 1964 at the Los Angeles Induction Center. As we walked from the building to buses that would take us to Union Station, several elderly gentlemen from Gideons International handed out pocketsize New Testaments, free of charge.

Aware that I’d reached a seminal moment in my life, I wisely accepted one. More than 100 of us boarded an overnight train for Salinas and a short bus trip to Fort Ord in Monterey County.

I read a few passages nightly — in King James English — before lights out. I was homesick most of my two-and-half months of basic training, and drew sustenance from the Good Book.

Easter fell on March 29 that year, and I was officially beginning my fifth week of training. Because it was Easter, we had the day off but were restricted to the “company area.” No passes.

More than 200 out of my company of 300 elected to attend a Protestant or Catholic worship service on Easter morning. We knew that guys left in the barracks would likely be conscripted for cleanup details.

We marched three miles from the training area to the chapel. The only memory I have of that service is sitting rigidly at attention in a pew, engulfed in Army Green. We numbered in the hundreds.

I don’t recall a word of that Easter message, save one: “Resurrection.”

But I could barely define the term at that stage of my life. It clattered around my brain like sleet on a Korean Quonset hut.

That was the first — and last — church service of my Army career.

Approximately one year later I was a corporal stationed at Fort Benning, Ga. That was years before the advent of social media, and I called home — collect — every other Saturday night.

I decided to forgo protocol one Tuesday night and called home anyway. My dad answered. Dad never answered the phone.

“Hey, what’s up where’s Mom?” I queried.

“Well,” came dad’s somber reply, “she’s at Hoag Hospital. She’s having surgery tomorrow.”

“What?” I was stunned. “And you didn’t tell me?”

“Your mom didn’t want you to worry. We were going to tell you Saturday after it was over and she was home.”

“What kind of surgery?” I yelped.

“Dr. Barnett found a lump in her breast.”

Moments later I put the receiver down and hustled four blocks to the post chapel. It was 10 p.m. Eastern time and the door was shut, but I pushed it open.

I entered the sanctuary for the first time. On a post of 40,000 soldiers, it was dark and completely empty. It would just be God and me.

I knelt at the altar and prayed earnestly for mom for more than 30 minutes.

I felt self-conscious and scared. Mom was just 41. Too young, I thought, for breast cancer. I made promises to God that night that I didn’t keep. But I was desperate, and the best time to pray is when you’re desperate.

Mom came through the surgery with no sign of cancer, and I was deeply relieved.

Two months later, Uncle Sam shipped me across the Pacific to South Korea. I was stationed there for 18 months and never darkened the doorway of a church.

Promises forgotten.

But that’s not entirely true. I entered a chapel once to attend a lecture by renowned author Pearl S. Buck. Miss Buck delivered a delightful lecture but that wasn’t what I required. I desperately sought — without realizing it — an awakening of my soul.

But it would be a dozen years before I’d get around to getting serious with God. Had I taken time to reflect earlier maybe I’d have come to faith earlier … and saved myself a truckload pain.

But that’s water under the bridge.

JIM CARNETT, who lives in Costa Mesa, worked for Orange Coast College for 37 years.