Book Review: Memoirs from Babylon

Chaplain Jeff Bryan
Ingram 2011

Memoirs from Babylon, A Combat Chaplain’s life in Iraq’s Triangle of Death, is the story of Chaplain (Capt) Jeff Bryan’s deployment to Iraq with the 10th Mountain Division from 2006 to 2007.

The book stands as one of the better examples of the “day to day” operations of a chaplain deployed to a US military war zone, both for his perspective on the combat itself but also for the duties to which he tended. He tells repeated stories of counseling soldiers who learn of family deaths back home, scrounging a Catholic chaplain to Read more

A Chaplain’s Service to Wounded Warriors

An article at Defense.gov highlights the service of Air Force Chaplain (LtCol) Brian Bohlman, who has served at the theater hospital at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan for six months:

The chaplain gave the cross he brought from home to the young injured Marine from Florida.

The Marine had been hurt in a roadside bomb explosion and had lost the cross that was on his body armor. When the chaplain presented the cross to the young Marine, both men cried…

Read more.

ACLU Engages in Campaign for Abortion in US Military

The ACLU has enlisted the help of former servicemembers (“military heroes,” since everyone who was in the military is a “hero”) in a concerted ad campaign to get abortion funding approved in the National Defense Authorization Act for 2013.  Similar attempts have been made virtually every year and have failed.

Advocates are launching a full-court press in favor of allowing the military to fund abortions in cases of rape or incest, but some Capitol Hill insiders say past failures bode ill for the measure’s survival.

An amendment allowing abortion funding Read more

Marine Officer Invited to White House Because He is Homosexual

The US Air Force Academy football team was invited to the White House to receive the Commander in Chief’s trophy for their victory in the traditional rivalry between the military academy football teams.

US Army SFC Leroy Petry was invited to the White House to be presented the Medal of Honor.

According to US Marine Capt Matthew Phelps, he was apparently invited to the White House because he’s homosexual:  Read more

Congress to Codify Religious Rights in Funerals

Last year a Houston Veterans’ Cemetery director was accused of banning all religious references from funerals occurring at her facility (as well as using the chapel as a storage shed, among other things).  A lawsuit was filed, and settled.  The consent decree prohibited the cemetery, then run by Arleen Ocasio, and the VA from interfering with or prohibiting religious references in the ceremonies.

This year, Rep. John Culberson (R-TX) has sponsored a bill that would codify in law the ruling in that consent decree.

Problems arose in Houston when the cemetery director misinterpreted [the] law to prohibit all religious speech.  Read more

Congressmen Call Air Force Hostile to Religion Again

Updated with BrigGen Lee quote on Michael Weinstein.

Sixty-six members of Congress called on Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta to investigate the US Air Force for an environment of “hostility towards religious freedom” — the fourth time in recent months they’ve made such an accusation.

The Congressional letter (PDF) essentially said that Air Force Chief of Staff General Norton Schwartz’s September policy letter had created a “chilling effect” on religious freedom as Airmen attempted to comply with his guidance:

The decisions that have been made in reliance upon this policy go beyond what is required by the US Constitution.  The First Amendment prohibits the establishment of religion; however, the mere discussion of religion or reference to God certainly does not rise to that level.

The Congressmen said the Air Force had “capitulated” to organizations Read more

1 … 322 323 324 325 326 … 608