{"id":2590,"date":"2009-12-18T00:30:30","date_gmt":"2009-12-18T08:30:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/?p=2590"},"modified":"2015-06-27T19:16:25","modified_gmt":"2015-06-27T22:16:25","slug":"military-religion-question-of-the-day-beliefs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2009\/12\/18\/military-religion-question-of-the-day-beliefs\/","title":{"rendered":"Military Religion Question of the Day: Beliefs"},"content":{"rendered":"

A\u00a0US Air Force Air National Guard Chaplain recently wrote what became a surprisingly controversial commentary:<\/p>\n

Although I haven’t written any books in my time, I often refer to a book that speaks to the subject of happiness. It’s called the Bible. The Bible tells us that 2,000 years ago, God sent his son Jesus into the world so that through his death on our behalf, we could have a personal relationship with him. Lest we forget, Christmas speaks of that birth and the happiness that came from that. Whether you share this belief or not, my wish for all of us is that no matter what religion you identify with, that we genuinely recognize that there is hope for happiness. It is important to remember that we are never alone, and that life eventually, and ultimately, will get better.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It was part of a commentary published by Chaplain (LtCol) Daniel Hornok<\/a> in anticipation of the upcoming holiday season, which is traditionally an emotional one for military members and their families.\u00a0 This is true of deployed servicemembers, certainly, but also for young troops who may be experiencing their first major holidays at a new base away from home.\u00a0 The Chaplain emphasized hope and the need to ‘look out for each other,’ an act that “may save a life.”<\/p>\n

While the commentary of a Utah ANG Chaplain is probably not terribly widely read (with no offense intended to the Chaplain), and the topic (hope and support during the holidays) was one that is important to the military, it still managed to attract some negative attention.\u00a0 A critic responded:<\/p>\n

An evangelical National Guard Chaplain is blatantly proselytizing, writing a commentary for the 151st Air Refueling Wing news website of the Utah ANG entitled “where do we find happiness?”, Chaplain (Lt Col) Daniel Hornock answers the question as follows:<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The critic then clipped the quote, lifting the following from the article:<\/p>\n

God sent his son Jesus into the world so that through his death on our behalf, we could have a personal relationship with him. Lest we forget, Christmas speaks of that birth and of the happiness that came from that<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Others chimed in with their agreement:<\/p>\n

Chilling how they slide personal beliefs in there as though they are supposed to be proselytizing. What are vulnerable minds to do. They use their authority to push the soldiers toward their own beliefs. We are paying them to support the troups not brainwash them. Very sneaky to apear [sic<\/em>] so open, yet the reality is there is nothing open or ethical. Where does it say in the Chaplain’s Manual to push your own personal religion?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What do you think?\u00a0 Was the Chaplain “blatantly proselytizing?”\u00a0 What if it wasn’t a Chaplain, but was instead just an ordinary soldier who published an article that included his beliefs?<\/p>\n

Finally, what do the Chaplain’s words\u2014or the critic’s\u2014say about the spiritual environment in the military?<\/p>\n

Stay tuned for more.<\/p>\n

Update<\/strong>: Read the answer to this Military Religion Question of the Day<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A\u00a0US Air Force Air National Guard Chaplain recently wrote what became a surprisingly controversial commentary: Although I haven’t written any books in my time, I often refer to a book that speaks to the subject of happiness. It’s called the Bible. The Bible tells us that 2,000 years ago, God sent his son Jesus into the world so that through […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[20,4,70,107,2,5218,7,17,10],"class_list":["post-2590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-military-regulations","tag-atheism","tag-churchandstate","tag-evangelism","tag-maaf","tag-military","tag-military-religious-freedom-foundation","tag-mrff","tag-religious-expression","tag-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2590","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=2590"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2590\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}