President Obama Leaves Office Unpopular with Military

Regardless of individual opinions on particular policy decisions, President George W. Bush was very popular within the US military, largely due to the genuine and sincere care he displayed and very obviously felt for the troops he led. Even after he left office, President Bush continued to serve and visit troops in the hospital — most often without any fanfare whatsoever.

The Military Times has posted the results of a poll that indicates President Barack Obama will leave office with the majority of the US military viewing him “unfavorably” (by wide margins, in some cases). The paper Read more

The President: Politics, Morality, Religion are Inseparable

We poison our society when we remove its theological underpinnings…Those who believe must be free to speak of and act on their belief, to apply moral teaching to public questions…

Without God, there is no virtue…Without God, we’re mired in the material…Without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure.

If we ever forget that we’re one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under.

President Ronald Reagan’s Remarks at an Ecumenical Prayer Breakfast in Dallas, Texas
August 23, 1984

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, very much. And, Read more

FRC Highlights Potential Trump Religious Freedom Targets

The Family Research Council has been highlighting the “top 20 ways” Donald Trump can dramatically and quickly influence “values issues” in his first 100 days in office.

At #15, the FRC said

Address Regulations Regarding Military Service of People Identifying as Transgender

Notably, FRC simply called on the administration to “address” the regulations — they didn’t explicitly call for the issue to be reversed.

At #18, the FRC said

Strengthen DOD Religious Freedom Protection

Here, the FRC highlighted Service-specific regulations (AFI 1-1, SECNAVINST Read more

Marine Aviator Criticizes Monifa Sterling, Religious Freedom Case

Carl Forsling, a retired Marine MV-22 pilot, recently took to Task and Purpose to criticize the current Supreme Court appeal of court-martialed Marine LCpl Monifa Sterling. One part of Sterling’s case, as you’ll recall, centered on her decision to post a paraphrased Bible verse on her desk — which she was ordered to take down. Forsling opines:

Sterling worked in a customer-service job at an ID center, so people conducting their official business had to read the verse. This made effectively made something that was supposedly for her own personal inspiration into proselytization.

To quote Inigo Montoya: “You keep using that word…” How does a posting a verse from Isaiah translate into an attempt to convert other people to a religion?  In short, it doesn’t, but claiming that Read more

Jeff Sessions Criticized for same Christian Beliefs as Ronald Reagan

I do believe that we are a nation that, without God, there is no truth, and it’s all about power, ideology, advancement, agenda, not doing the public service.

The quote above by President-elect Donald Trump’s Attorney General nominee Jeff Sessions is a statement of the obvious to millions of Christians, yet is being touted as proof Sessions is unqualified for government service.

In a widely distributed piece at The Daily Beast, author Jay Michaelson cites the above under the headline “Jeff Sessions Said ‘Secularists’ Are Unfit for Government,” and questioned Sessions’ fitness for the office:

[Sessions’] comments raise questions as to which set of “truths,” religious or secular, would motivate his Justice Department’s decisions on which laws to prosecute, which liberties to protect, and which interpretations of legal and constitutional texts to adopt.

That’s moronic for two reasons.

The first is the obvious “truth” that Read more

Retired Chaplain Norris Burkes Wrong on Gen Costin, Religious Freedom

Retired US Air Force Chaplain Norris Burkes first came to the attention of this site in 2009, when the syndicated chaplain wrote a column about the burning of Afghan-language Bibles by American troops in Afghanistan (a controversy discussed here). In essence, Burkes approved, and noted:

The possession of such religious material violates something the military calls General Order No. 1.

Though he was dismissive of most input, he did finally concede that he was wrong — General Order Number One says no such thing.

Despite the admission, Burkes declined to change the article, and it can still be found on his website, with the unchanged statement that even Burkes admitted was wrong.

Chaplain Burkes recently popped up again, and for some reason he Read more

Religious Freedom Day and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, 2017

Monday, 16 January 2017 marks the annual Religious Freedom Day, as proclaimed by President Obama over the weekend:

Religious freedom is a principle based not on shared ancestry, culture, ethnicity, or faith but on a shared commitment to liberty — and it lies at the very heart of who we are as Americans…We must be unified in our commitment to protecting the freedoms of conscience and religious belief and the freedom to live our lives according to them…

Part of being American means guarding against bigotry and speaking out on behalf of others…

Religious liberty is more than a cornerstone of American life — it is a universal and inalienable right…

Religious Freedom Day marks the anniversary of the passage of the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom in 1786, originally authored by Thomas Jefferson.  It preceded the US Constitution and its similarly-themed First Amendment by several years.

President Obama’s 2017 statement was Read more

Catholic Hospital Sued for Denying Transgender Surgery

As reported by the Religion Clause:

Lambda Legal announced yesterday that it has filed a lawsuit in New Jersey federal district court against a Catholic hospital that refused, on religious grounds, to allow a surgeon to perform a hysterectomy on a transgender man as part of his gender reassignment.

This isn’t completely unrelated to the military. One unaddressed elephant in the room concerning transgenders in the military has Read more

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