{"id":16597,"date":"2012-03-05T02:44:26","date_gmt":"2012-03-05T05:44:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/?p=16597"},"modified":"2015-06-27T19:14:04","modified_gmt":"2015-06-27T22:14:04","slug":"chaplain-bans-quran-distribution-in-afghanistan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2012\/03\/05\/chaplain-bans-quran-distribution-in-afghanistan\/","title":{"rendered":"Chaplain Bans Quran Distribution in Afghanistan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Prominent milblogger BlackFive obtained a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blackfive.net\/.a\/6a00d8341bfadb53ef01676322f255970b-500wi\">copy of a US Army memo<\/a> from Afghanistan <a href=\"http:\/\/www.blackfive.net\/main\/2012\/02\/christian-soldiers-banned-from-the-quran-in-the-us-army-in-afghanistan.html\">restricting the distribution of Qurans<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Qurans will only be distributed to US Servicemembers who are Muslim as indicated on their identification tags&#8230;Exceptions&#8230;will be granted if the Service Member has a memorandum signed by his Commander that states the reason for obtaining a Quran provided by the chaplain.<\/p>\n<p>Qurans will not be placed in general literature distribution racks.\u00a0 They will be kept in a secure location&#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The memo is signed by US Army Chaplain (LTC) Eric Albertson, a Catholic <!--more-->priest with a long military history that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.missioncapodanno.org\/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=article&amp;id=1362:soldier-at-heart&amp;catid=34:chaplain-testimonies&amp;Itemid=70\">includes a Purple Heart<\/a>.\u00a0 He specifically notes it is relevant only to RC(E), which refers to a military regional command of Afghanistan (over which he is presumably the Command Chaplain).\u00a0\u00a0USAF Chaplain Jon Trainer commented on the article emphasizing it was not USFOR-A guidance (that is, coming from the US leadership in Afghanistan).<\/p>\n<p>While it may seem moot to some (what non-Muslim wants a Quran anyway?), it is actually not unusual for servicemembers to explore other religious beliefs &#8212; or <a href=\"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2010\/01\/27\/soldier-former-muslim-converts-to-catholicism-in-iraq\/\">even convert<\/a> (<em><a href=\"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2011\/08\/22\/us-marine-converts-to-islam-in-iraq\/\">to Islam<\/a><\/em>) &#8212; while deployed.\u00a0 Arguably, given the cultural importance of Islam in the region, members of the military might actually <em>benefit <\/em>from reading the Koran.<\/p>\n<p>Blackfive accurately notes the overrestrictive irony:\u00a0 Those same service members can get a Quran from anywhere else, just not chaplains:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Can you order one up from Barnes &amp; Noble?\u00a0 Sure.\u00a0 You just can&#8217;t get one from the chaplain.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Perennial critic of Christian religious freedom, Michael Weinstein, has predictably remained silent on this uniquely restrictive order on religious freedom.<\/p>\n<p class=\"smallfont\">Via <a href=\"http:\/\/armychaplaincy.com\/defense-department-issues-koran-hazmat-guidance\/\">ArmyChaplaincy.com<\/a> and John Hayward at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.humanevents.com\/article.php?id=49860\">HumanEvents.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Prominent milblogger BlackFive obtained a copy of a US Army memo from Afghanistan restricting the distribution of Qurans: Qurans will only be distributed to US Servicemembers who are Muslim as indicated on their identification tags&#8230;Exceptions&#8230;will be granted if the Service Member has a memorandum signed by his Commander that states the reason for obtaining a Quran provided by the chaplain. [&#8230;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[58,88,2979,54,5284,2981,44,2980,590,85,2,5218,7,17,2564,591,10,171],"class_list":["post-16597","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government-and-religion","tag-afghanistan","tag-army","tag-blackfive","tag-catholic","tag-chaplain","tag-eric-albertson","tag-islam","tag-jon-trainer","tag-koran","tag-mikey-weinstein","tag-military","tag-military-religious-freedom-foundation","tag-mrff","tag-religious-expression","tag-purple-heart","tag-quran","tag-religion","tag-religious-freedom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16597","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16597"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16597\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16597"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16597"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16597"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}