Building God's (Christian) Army
By Jane Lampman, Christian Science Monitor. Posted October 19, 2007.
Are U.S. troops being force-fed Christianity? A watchdog group thinks
so.
At Speicher base in Iraq, U.S. Army Spec. Jeremy Hall got permission
from a chaplain in
August to post fliers announcing a meeting for atheists and other
nonbelievers. When the
group gathered, Specialist Hall alleges, his Army major supervisor
disrupted the meeting and
threatened to retaliate against him, including blocking his
reenlistment in the Army.
Months earlier, Hall charges, he had been publicly berated by a staff
sergeant for not
agreeing to join in a Thanksgiving Day prayer.
On Sept. 17, the soldier and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation
(MRFF) filed suit
against Army Maj. Freddy Welborn and US Secretary of Defense Robert
Gates, charging
violations of Hall's constitutional rights, including being forced to
submit to a religious
test to qualify as a soldier.
The MRFF plans more lawsuits in coming weeks, says Michael "Mikey"
Weinstein, who founded
the military watchdog group in 2005. The aim is "to show there is a
pattern and practice of
constitutionally impermissible promotions of religious beliefs within
the Department of
Defense."
For Mr. Weinstein -- a former Air Force judge advocate and assistant
counsel in the Reagan
White House -- more is involved than isolated cases of discrimination.
He charges that
several incidents in recent years -- and more than 5,000 complaints
his group has received
from active-duty and retired military personnel -- point to a growing
willingness inside the
military to sup****t a particular brand of Christianity and to permit
improper evangelizing
in the ranks. More than 95 percent of those complaints come from other
Christians, he says.
Others agree on the need for the watchdog group, but question the
conspiratorial view and
some of its tactics. They say dealing with religious issues is a
complex matter, and the
military is trying to address them appropriately.
At the Defense Department, spokeswoman Cynthia Smith says the DOD
doesn't comment on
litigation, but "places a high value on the rights of members of the
Armed Forces to observe
the tenets of their respective religions."
Since the Revolutionary War, the armed services have tried to ensure
that soldiers can
practice their faiths, and that chaplains serve not only those of
their own sect but all who
may need pastoral care. The services have also sought to adhere to the
First Amendment
prohibition of any government "establishment of religion."
In the 1990s, for instance, the Air Force's Little Blue Book of core
values highlighted
religious tolerance, emphasizing that military professionals "must not
take it upon
themselves to change or coercively influence the religious views of
subordinates."
Weinstein insists, however, that there are improper actions at high
levels that not only
infringe on soldiers' rights but, at a very dangerous time, also send
the wrong message to
people in the Middle East that those in the US military see themselves
engaged in Christian
warfare.
For example, he says, Lt. Gen. William Boykin, who gave speeches at
churches while in
uniform that disparaged Islam and defined the war on terror in
fundamentalist, "end times"
terms, was not fired but promoted. (Speaking of a Muslim warlord he
had pursued, Lt. Gen.
Boykin said, "I knew my God was a real God and his was an idol." And
our enemies "will only
be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus.")
"There's an eschatologically obsessed version of Christianity that ...
is trying to make
American foreign and domestic policy conterminous with their biblical
worldview," Weinstein
charges. And "there's improper pressure within the military command
structure to make
members join them."
The most serious allegations from the field cannot be corroborated for
this article. A few
will be raised in the lawsuits, but some incidents have been
do***ented.
Perhaps the most visible situation -- and the one that set Weinstein
off on his mission --
involved the evangelizing of cadets on the part of some faculty and
staff at the Air Force
Academy (AFA) in Colorado Springs, Colo., which came to light in 2004.
Congress held
hearings, DOD conducted an investigation, and the head of the academy
acknowledged
significant problems. Weinstein's cadet son experienced the pressures
as a Jew.
Col. David Antoon (ret.), another alumnus of the AFA and now a 747
commercial pilot, says
his heart was broken when he took his son, Ryan, to an orientation at
the academy in the
spring of 2004. An overt evangelistic approach during part of the
orientation so upset them,
he says, that they decided his son would reject the treasured
appointment and instead go to
Ohio State University.
"My son had dreamed of doing what I had done, but it was no longer the
institution I went
to," Colonel Antoon says, his voice cracking with emotion.
The Air Force set about reaffirming basic principles in religion
guidelines, as a basis for
widespread training, but a pushback by Evangelicals later led to
Congress setting them aside
until hearings could be held. The hearings have not taken place.
In 2006, MRFF learned of a video produced by Christian Embassy, a
group that conducts Bible
studies at the Pentagon and seeks to evangelize within the armed
services. Aimed at
fundraising for the group, the video was improperly taped in the
Pentagon and involved
endorsements by Army and Air Force generals in uniform.
MRFF's public alert spurred a DOD investigation. In a re****t critical
of the senior
officers, the Inspector General said they gave the appearance of
speaking for the military.
One general defended his role by saying "Christian Embassy had become
a quasi-federal
entity."
The re****t noted that Maj. Gen. Paul Sutton participated while he
served as chief of the US
Office of Defense Cooperation in Turkey, a largely Muslim nation whose
military takes pride
in protecting the country's secular status. After a Turkish newspaper
wrote about the video
as promoting a "fundamentalist sect," General Sutton was called in and
questioned by members
of the Turkish General Staff.
"They had to give him a lesson in the separation of church and state,"
Weinstein says.
"Imagine the propaganda bonanza! And how this upset Muslims."
The DOD re****t on the video recommended "appropriate corrective
action" be taken against the
officers. According to Army spokesman Paul Boyce, "The Army has not
yet completed any
planned actions associated with the Christian Embassy review."
MRFF claims a victory in the case of the evangelical group Operation
Stand Up. Earlier this
year, OSU was preparing to send "freedom packages" to soldiers in Iraq
as part of an Army
program. Along with socks and snacks, the packages included
proselytizing materials in
English and Arabic, and the apocalyptic video game, "Left Behind:
Eternal Forces." In it,
Christians carry on warfare against people of other faiths.
After the plans were made public, the Pentagon announced in August
that the materials would
not be mailed. OSU did not respond to a request for comment.
Weinstein -- an intense, voluble attorney who prizes blunt,
no-holds-barred language -- has
struck more than one nerve with his bird-dogging. He says numerous
threats have been made on
his life. Last week, the front window of his house was shot out for
the second time. After
the lawsuit was filed, talk of "fragging" (killing) Specialist Hall
surfaced on some
military blogs. The Army is investigating.
Others sympathetic to Weinstein's concerns say some tactics undermine
his efforts, and they
question aims.
"He's uncovered some very disturbing stuff that shouldn't be going on
in the armed forces,"
says Marc Stern, a religious liberty expert at American Jewish
Congress. "But it's im****tant
that you not go too far." Mr. Stern disagrees, for instance, with
Weinstein's stance on the
Air Force guidelines, such as preventing military supervisors from
ever speaking of religion
to people under their command.
"He did a disservice to his and our cause by taking a position beyond
what the law requires,
and in fact may intrude on people's rights," Stern adds.
Several conservative Christian ministries publicly proclaim an
evangelistic aim "to
transform the nations of the world through the militaries of the
world," and they are active
at US military installations in many countries. (See
www.militaryministry.org or
militarymissionsnetwork.org.)
MRFF sees that as a harbinger of a volunteer military falling under
the sway of increasing
numbers of Christian soldiers. Others see a military leader****p, with
the exception of a few
generals here or there, well aware of its constitutional
responsibilities, but challenged by
the demands of training on these issues in a military of millions. A
group such as MRFF can
provide a crucial service, they say, if it is willing to work with the
military.
Right now, Weinstein is counting on a set of lawsuits to bring serious
issues to the fore.
The question is whether those suits will go beyond individual cases of
discrimination to
prove an unconstitutional pattern within the armed forces.
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