So began the journey of faith that led Pierre early this month to a baptismal font dug into the desert at a Marine base in western Iraq.

"I figured if God had spared me this one time and spared me other times, it was time to get dedicated to him," Pierre said, shortly after he emerged from the baptismal water.

For many servicemen and women, duty in Iraq stirs intense spiritual experiences, often drawing them toward a deeper faith but sometimes challenging strongly held religious beliefs.

Pierre was the second Marine baptized at his camp that day. And at least three Marines in his 800-member battalion have felt a call to religious ministry while in Iraq — including Pierre, who plans to devote his life to a music ministry once he completes his enlistment. Pierre, a Protestant, has already composed several "praise songs," or hymns.

At Camp Fallujah, a few miles away, the Catholic chaplain performed two dozen adult confirmations or baptisms during a seven-month tour of duty.

At a nearby patrol base in a bombed-out soda-bottling plant, five roommates gather for Bible study and prayer sessions three times a week. All over Iraq, Bibles are a common sight in barracks, as are inspirational texts such as Rick Warren's "The Purpose-Driven Life."

For some Christians, standard equipment includes crosses, rosaries and prayer cards. Medals of saints, such as Christopher, patron of travelers, and Michael, the warrior archangel, are popular even among non-Catholics. Some squads and platoons regularly start patrols with a group prayer.

Though members of the U.S. armed forces are overwhelmingly Christian, military chapels are nondenominational. And servicemen and women of all faiths are finding that the war has changed their approach to religion.

Lance Cpl. Jordan Parlier, 21, of Kenosha, Wis., said that during the 2003 push into Baghdad, he began seeking religion amid the devastation of war. He found answers from a Jewish friend a few months later in Najaf. Raised as a Christian, Parlier has converted to Judaism.

Now at the massive Al Asad air base near the end of his second deployment to Iraq, Parlier has become the lay Jewish leader for his battalion. Though he has yet to have his bar mitzvah, his tours in Iraq have deepened his religious convictions, and he treasures his religious bond with other Jews.

"You kind of look within and you look for a higher authority that's going to help you get through," he said. "It almost feels like an emancipation."

Deployed in Iraq without television, nightclubs or even members of the opposite sex in many units, service members find there are far fewer distractions than at home. For those so inclined, there is plenty of time to contemplate issues of purpose in life and relations with a higher power.

"Back in the States, you have years and years to think about things, or at least you think you do," said Navy Lt. Leslie Hatton, a Marine chaplain and a minister in the Evangelical Church Alliance. "Here, they might not get older. Death and life and all the big questions are thought about at a much younger age."

For many, God's hand appears far more evident when so much is so clearly beyond the control of individual will.

Pierre's story of faith intensified by a near miss is not unusual. In Mahmoudiya, Staff Sgt. Hank Rimkus wiped his laptop computer clean of porn and reconciled with his estranged wife after a rocket hit his Humvee but did not detonate. He now wears an orange wristband inscribed, "When in Doubt, Pray."

"I got the message. I don't want him to send another one," said Rimkus, 29, a Marine reservist from Des Moines, Iowa.

In Fallujah, a rocket landed between Cpl. Dan Turner and his twin brother, both Marine reservists. It also was a dud.

"How did that happen? There was a purpose to it," said Turner, 22, of Dallas, who is now studying the Bible. "It wasn't luck. God made that rocket not explode."

But the dilemmas that can test faith also arise with a special intensity. How does a soldier reconcile a benevolent God with the violent deaths of friends and the intense suffering inflicted on the wounded? How does a person heed the call to love thy enemy when that enemy kills his friends and would eagerly behead him, too? How does a person of faith kill without regret?

Gunnery Sgt. Juan Morales, 38, of Joliet, Ill., a Marine reservist who in civilian life is an accountant and a Catholic churchgoer, has avoided church services since arriving in Iraq.

For the time being, Morales said, he deliberately walls off his religious beliefs as a potential "distraction" from his Marine duties: "If I have to pull the trigger, I don't want to hesitate."