{"id":28189,"date":"2014-01-30T03:55:45","date_gmt":"2014-01-30T06:55:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/?p=28189"},"modified":"2016-10-01T23:43:52","modified_gmt":"2016-10-02T02:43:52","slug":"little-rock-afb-alters-wingman-day-after-mrff-complaint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2014\/01\/30\/little-rock-afb-alters-wingman-day-after-mrff-complaint\/","title":{"rendered":"Little Rock AFB Alters Wingman Day after MRFF Complaint"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>According to the Air Force Times, Little Rock AFB has <a href=\"http:\/\/www.airforcetimes.com\/article\/20140129\/NEWS\/301290020\/Little-Rock-AFB-drops-Christian-marriage-video-from-Wingman-Day\">changed one of its &#8220;Wingman Day&#8221; seminars<\/a> after Michael Weinstein&#8217;s Military Religious Freedom Foundation complained about Christian content in a chaplain-led marriage course:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Little Rock\u2019s Feb. 7 Winter Wingman Day will offer classes in four \u201cpillars\u201d \u2014 mental, social, physical and spiritual \u2014 according to a Jan. 23 release from the base. The spiritual pillar originally would have offered sessions from an evangelical Christian video series called \u201cThe Art of Marriage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Some airmen objected to the video\u2019s inclusion, and felt it favored a particular version of one faith&#8230;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>There is no doubt that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.familylife.com\/\">Family Life<\/a>&#8216;s The <a href=\"http:\/\/theartofmarriage.com\/\">Art of Marriage<\/a> is Christian, though how that translates into &#8220;a particular version of one faith&#8221; is unclear.\u00a0 Merely being <em>Christian<\/em> isn&#8217;t sufficient reason to eliminate the chaplain-led course, after all.\u00a0 At present, there isn&#8217;t public evidence the complainants even knew the <em>content<\/em> of the course.\u00a0 (In fact, if people took the time to review the course material, they might be surprised.)<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DV66dQZAdbM\" height=\"315\" width=\"560\" allowfullscreen=\"\" frameborder=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>Marriage in America could probably use <em>more<\/em> of that.<\/p>\n<p>Most who supported the move (outside of the MRFF) agreed <!--more-->that it was inappropriate to have a Christian-themed seminar as part of mandatory training.<\/p>\n<p>Except it wasn&#8217;t mandatory.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.littlerock.af.mil\/news\/story.asp?id=123377586\">same press release<\/a> the Air Force Times referred to above said<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Team Little Rock members will be able to <strong>choose the classes they would like to attend<\/strong>. Personnel are required to attend three classes plus their respective Commander&#8217;s Call&#8230;Personnel are encouraged to attend classes in areas they feel they need to strengthen.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The release lists seminars for the mental, social, and physical pillars; a multitude of other classes are also available, as the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/events\/415160711906280\/\">base&#8217;s Facebook page describes<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In other words, <em>no one<\/em> has to attend a marriage seminar <em>at all<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>But what if 25 MRFF complainants felt they <em>deserved<\/em> to have access to marriage seminars that day? Certainly, if a group of Airmen expressed a desire for a Wingman Day event that aligned with their particular needs &#8212; ie, a non-Christian based marriage event &#8212; the base should attempt to support them, provided they have the manning for multiple events and the requests are properly made.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, the same could be said for the physical pillar: Those who felt they deserved physical training on sit-ups, rather than &#8220;improving running efficiency,&#8221; are also entitled to support, right?<\/p>\n<p>In the end, &#8220;Wingman Day&#8221; was never <em>intended<\/em> for every seminar to be an all-inclusive affair &#8212; the military is resource constrained, after all. Instead, Airmen were expected to select courses from those offered for which they felt a need or a fit.\u00a0 If a particular class didn&#8217;t fit their needs, they didn&#8217;t have to go.<\/p>\n<p>While the marriage seminar was Christian-based, there is no law, policy, or regulation that makes that improper &#8212; nor has the Air Force outright declared that to be the case.\u00a0 There is nothing wrong with having a Christian-based marriage course occur during a Wingman Day event. There&#8217;s also nothing wrong with doing a &#8220;non-denominational&#8221; course, particularly when a substantial group asks for one.<\/p>\n<p>Whether the Air Force should <em>remove<\/em> a course that the base population <em>does<\/em> want &#8212; solely because of vicarious offense based on its religious content &#8212; is another question altogether.<\/p>\n<p>Let&#8217;s hope those 25 MRFF complainants fill the chapel classes. After all, that&#8217;s why they wanted to change the content of the course available to the rest of the base population, right?<\/p>\n<p>From a strictly US military\/religious freedom perspective, this &#8220;scandal&#8221; is a non-event.\u00a0 It matters little whether Little Rock offers a Family Life seminar, a homemade seminar, or none at all.\u00a0 It does, however, provide further evidence that Michael Weinstein has specifically targeted the religious liberty of <em>Christianity<\/em> in the military, no matter how remote the nexus might be.\u00a0 He targeted the marriage seminar not because of any objectionable content, but because it was <em>Christian <\/em>&#8212; or not the right <em>kind<\/em> of &#8220;Christian&#8221; that receives the MRFF stamp of approval.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, because of the way the &#8220;scandal&#8221; was handled, it also risks adding a log to the fire of perception that the US military is <a href=\"http:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2013\/10\/09\/michael-weinstein-interprets-religious-regulations-for-air-force\/\">&#8216;under the influence&#8217; of Weinstein<\/a> in his vendetta against Christians.\u00a0 Lost in the conversation are those Little Rock Airmen who may now perceive their faith has been stigmatized in their unit.<\/p>\n<p>Little Rock was admittedly placed in an awkward position. No matter how they responded, Weinstein ensured there would be only one &#8220;winner&#8221;: Mikey Weinstein.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: xx-small;\">Also at the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AirForceTimes\/posts\/685655508123630?stream_ref=10\">Air Force Times<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.stripes.com\/news\/air-force-drops-evangelical-marriage-video-from-mandatory-wellness-course-1.264951\">Stars and Stripes<\/a>, and later at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.arkansasmatters.com\/story\/d\/story\/lrafb-gives-insight-on-religious-marriage-course-c\/20963\/QSFJ7rppQkKVk_vRjy21SQ\">the local news<\/a>.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"fb-like\" data-layout=\"standard\" data-action=\"like\" data-size=\"small\" data-show-faces=\"true\" data-share=\"true\"><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: xx-small;\"><strong>ADVERTISEMENT<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script><!-- blogpost --><ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-format=\"auto\" data-ad-slot=\"2728423835\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-6450825356098669\"><\/ins><script>\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});<\/script><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to the Air Force Times, Little Rock AFB has changed one of its &#8220;Wingman Day&#8221; seminars after Michael Weinstein&#8217;s Military Religious Freedom Foundation complained about Christian content in a chaplain-led marriage course: Little Rock\u2019s Feb. 7 Winter Wingman Day will offer classes in four \u201cpillars\u201d \u2014 mental, social, physical and spiritual \u2014 according to a Jan. 23 release from [&#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":[4605,5284,96,4604,4603,85,2,5218,7,10,171,3882],"class_list":["post-28189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government-and-religion","tag-art-of-marriage","tag-chaplain","tag-christian","tag-family-life","tag-little-rock-afb","tag-mikey-weinstein","tag-military","tag-military-religious-freedom-foundation","tag-mrff","tag-religion","tag-religious-freedom","tag-wingman"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28189","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=28189"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28189\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}