Army chaplains and churches have played a significant role in commemorating Australia's war efforts, including organising the first Anzac Day services, according to a Charles Sturt University (CSU) lecturer.

Lecturer in history at St Mark's National Theological Centre in the CSU School of Theology in Canberra, Dr Michael Gladwin, recently published Captains of the Soul: a history of Australian Army Chaplains, the first historical account of Australian Army chaplains from the nineteenth century to the present.

Dr Gladwin's book uncovers how the first Anzac Day commemoration was conceived and organised by First World War Anglican chaplain David Garland in Brisbane in 1916. The Anzac Day Dawn Service was given shape and substance by veteran Anglican chaplain Arthur Ernest White during the 1920s.

"Anzac Day services, especially the Dawn Service, retain a significant Christian component in terms of their substance, hymns and liturgical shape," Dr Gladwin said.

"Chaplains are still called on regularly to give Anzac Day addresses and the demand for chaplains' involvement in Anzac Day commemorations remains particularly strong for those who serve or have served in the armed forces."

Despite their pivotal role in establishing Anzac Day services, over time many chaplains have been dismayed by sectarian divisions which impacted on commemorations.

"Catholics were banned from attending religious services on theological and canon law grounds which was only overcome in the 1960s when Roman Catholic Cardinal Norman Gilroy found a way for priests to attend," Dr Gladwin said.

To avoid divisions between Catholics and Protestants, the services were changed so that Catholics would not have to hear a religious message from a non-Catholic clergyman and prayers were also read by laymen. The price of ecumenical unity was a less obviously Christian message in the major capital cities' Anzac Day services after the 1960s.

Dr Gladwin believes the resurgence of Anzac Day in the last 30 years has seen the Anzac 'legend' or 'myth' become increasingly etched into the collective national psyche.

"The emphasis of Anzac Day is no longer on military skills but rather values of unpretentious courage, endurance, sacrifice in the midst of suffering, and mateship," Dr Gladwin said.

"Anzac Day provides universally recognised symbols and rituals to enshrine transcendent elements of Australia's historical experience making it a quasi-religion, or at least a 'civil religion'."  

Dr Gladwin has observed that many Christians, chaplains included, have seen this Anzac civil religion as both a challenge and an opportunity. On one hand, it is a quasi-religious challenge to Australia's much older Christian heritage and identity. On the other hand, it is an opportunity to locate points of cultural connection between the Anzac legend and the Christian faith, namely by explaining how the sacrifice of the Anzacs points to the greater sacrificial death of Jesus Christ.