Category Archives: Government and Religion

USCIRF Counsels Government on Religious Freedom

The US Commission on International Religious Freedom is a bipartisan US government panel that issues an annual report on the American government’s support of religious freedom.

This year, the report indicates that the US government is becoming less concerned with “religious freedom in its foreign policy and national security decisions,” despite evidence of religious persecution around the globe.

In particular, the USCIRF took issue with the government’s recent semantic change that replaced “religious freedom” with Read more

President Proclaims National Day of Prayer, 6 May 2010

President Obama issued the annual proclamation marking the National Day of Prayer, which will be 6 May this year.

We are blessed to live in a Nation that counts freedom of conscience and free exercise of religion among its most fundamental principles, thereby ensuring that all people of goodwill may hold and practice their beliefs according to the dictates of their consciences.  Prayer has been a sustaining way for many Americans of diverse faiths to express their most cherished beliefs, and thus we have long deemed it fitting and proper to publicly recognize the importance of prayer on this day across the Nation…

Let us pray for the safety and success of those who have left home to serve in our Armed Forces, putting their lives at risk in order to make the world a safer place.  As we remember them, let us not forget their families and the substantial sacrifices that they make every day.

It is interesting to note what is missing from the proclamation.  Read more

MRFF Sticks Its Foot in Its Mouth. Again.

Few people might realize that while the Military Religious Freedom Foundation claims some 16,000 undefined “clients,” fewer than a half dozen people actually speak for the MRFF (and even fewer speak with any regularity).  It is interesting, then, to observe Michael Weinstein’s inability to control his own message.

This site has already pointed out the self-contradiction of Chris Rodda, the MRFF research assistant who said a Chaplain’s sermon was “of course…permissible,” but it was also “part of the…problem.”  (Her statement was also in direct contradiction with Weinstein’s own words.)  In addition, the MRFF still uses the Read more

Selective Service Expands CO Status

In the first substantive act in 25 years related to the draft, the Selective Service has signed an Alternative Service Employer Network agreement with the Mennonite Voluntary Service.  The agreement entitles the MVS to be an officially recognized employer for persons making a claim for conscientious objector status; those applicants would be offered “alternative service” in a civilian support role, as opposed to a non-combat military role other COs receive.

The Army article has an interesting history of the CO status in the Read more

Weinstein Reveals Vendetta in Demanding Removal of “Cross”

Michael Weinstein is truly the gift that keeps on giving.  His latest attempt at infamy is to say that a red cross appearing on a military hospital’s emblem

violate[s] the constitutional requirement for separation of church and state and should be removed.

DoD Image

DoD Image

Apparently Weinstein has missed the long, international history of the cross in military medical use, as well as the US military’s equivalent treatment of Islam and Judaism that would allegedly “violate…separation of church and state,” pictured below.

Weinstein also objects to the emblem’s motto “pro deo et humanitate” or “for God and humanity,” despite the military’s description of the phrase as pre-dating Christianity.

The emblem in question is that of Evans Army Community Hospital at Fort Carson, near Colorado Springs.

The official Army description of the emblem Read more

Supreme Court Reverses Injunction Against Mojave Cross

The decision in Salazar v Buono directly relates to faith in the military profession, as its very basic premise has far reaching implications:

Is a cross on government land an unConstitutional endorsement of the Christian faith?

A variety of organizations reported on the Supreme Court ruling Wednesday essentially allowing the World War I memorial Mojave cross to remain standing.  The ruling reversed the appeals court decision initially declaring the cross on federal land unConstitutional, and then declaring the US Congress transfer of land to the VFW invalid due to its attempt to “avoid” the injunction.

The Supreme Court issued six separate opinions, with no single majority opinion.  The decision itself (pdf) is largely procedural, though the net effect Read more

Hasan May Face Death Penalty

Maj Nidal Malik Hasan’s attorney, John Galligan, has told the press he has received notice the military plans to present evidence of “aggravating factors” to the Article 32 hearing which will determine the judicial course of the case.  According to Galligan and others, the only reason to include such factors would be to support a capital sentence.

Hasan faces 13 counts of premeditated murder, among other charges.

Retired Chaplains Oppose DADT Repeal

The Alliance Defense Fund has previously stated its position that the “repeal” of DADT would ultimately result in untenable conflicts between the moral, religious positions of military Chaplains and the new policy.  The ADF is now publicizing a 6-page letter signed by 41 “distinguished” Chaplains opposing the policy change.

The letter says, in essence, that if homosexuals were allowed to serve openly by direct military policy, the Chaplains would be forced to choose “to obey God or to obey men.”  Chaplains would be forced to avoid preaching on certain topics, or would face Read more

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