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…
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
From Faith and the Law [formatting original]:
On March 14, 1778, George Washington, then Commander in Chief of the Continental Army, approved the sentencing of LT Enslin on attempted sodomy of another soldier. General Washington called it an infamous crime Read more
The US Supreme Court denied certiorari in Mount Soledad Memorial Association v. Trunk, which lets stand a 9th Circuit ruling that the cross was unconstitutional. While some have claimed this was a victory for church/state separation, the ruling was actually more nuanced — and not focused on Constitutionality at all: Read more
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
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
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
Tomorrow the Pentagon will host the US military’s first-ever “gay pride” celebration.
The event will include speakers who will address the “value of gay service.”
The official poster was “proudly” distributed to a homosexual advocacy site by Lt Col Todd Breasseale of Public Affairs.
The military apparently had to be very careful in its wording of the event, because the “T” in LGBT, transgenders, are still prohibited from active duty military service, though it seems transgender civilians will be part of the “pride.”
Retired Chaplain (COL) Ron Crews of the Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty condemned the celebration and noted the interesting timing of the original announcement, coming just a day after the Pentagon publicized the fact it would no longer permit its service symbols to be used on military themed Bibles.
Presumably, in a spirit of equality, next month the US military will Read more