{"id":46404,"date":"2022-01-13T21:57:07","date_gmt":"2022-01-14T00:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/?p=46404"},"modified":"2022-01-13T21:57:07","modified_gmt":"2022-01-14T00:57:07","slug":"col-boling-new-director-of-ang-chaplains-with-diversity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/2022\/01\/13\/col-boling-new-director-of-ang-chaplains-with-diversity\/","title":{"rendered":"Col Boling New Director of ANG Chaplains, with Diversity"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Chaplain (Col) Leah Botona Boling recently became the director of the Air National Guard Chaplain Corps, and the Air Force was quick to point out she was the \u201cfirst female, person of color<\/a>\u201d to hold that position. More important to the people she serves, of course, are her beliefs. Oddly, the chaplain\u2019s religious beliefs were rarely mentioned in the articles vaunting her elevation to the position. Speaking of what she brings to the role, she said<\/p>\n

I bring the female perspective, the mother perspective, the Filipina perspective and, most important, the Leah Botona Boling perspective.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

On one hand, the statement is notable for highlighting that every person brings their \u201cperspectives\u201d with them into every<\/em> role in which they serve. Boling doesn’t seem to support the idea that a person should leave some part of themselves at the door \u2013 read: those who think Christians shouldn\u2019t allow their beliefs to influence their leadership or politics.<\/p>\n

At the same time, note the \u201cperspective\u201d the chaplain<\/em> left out: her faith<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It shouldn\u2019t have been hard to include, as her faith tradition seems to be very \u201cinclusive\u201d. Boling is endorsed<\/a> by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship<\/a>, which left the Southern Baptist Convention many years ago because the SBC was too conservative. While the SBC believes in the autonomy of the local church, the CBF takes that freedom to a new level, essentially saying churches can believe just about whatever they want, while still saying they’re “baptists.”<\/p>\n

While Boling declined to mention her faith, in keeping with the focus on social issues, she did give some insight into her sociopolitical beliefs:<\/p>\n

Whether it\u2019s diversity of thought, gender, ethnicity, religion or even sexual orientation, diversity in leadership is important because it reflects our population and brings so many powerful experiences to the conversation. Diversity is important because it\u2019s the right thing to do.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Even without parsing it too far, that\u2019s a ridiculous statement that aligns reasonably well with current virtue signaling. For example, the idea that leadership or organizations can benefit from having people with a range of sexual behaviors<\/em> is ludicrous. Does Chaplain Boling think a polygamous person needs to be part of her staff merely \u201cbecause it\u2019s the right thing to do\u201d?<\/p>\n

To be clear, there is<\/em> value in true<\/em> diversity \u2013 the idea that everyone is not the same. People who are different can certainly bring different experiences and perspectives, and those difference in experience or perspective can contribute to the benefit of the mission. But making diversity itself<\/em> the goal doesn’t help<\/em> the mission, it undermines<\/em> the mission. A group of fighter pilots planning a strike mission might benefit from varied perspectives within their skillset, but there is no reason whatsoever<\/em> to believe they would benefit from the people within the group having a range of different skin tones. In that example, to make diversity more important than skill or merit \u2013 that is, to require the group to have different skin coloring at the expense of skill \u2013 would hurt<\/em> the mission, not help it.<\/p>\n

Contrary to the chaplain\u2019s statement, diversity for the sake of diversity<\/em> is not<\/span> the right thing to do. It\u2019s exactly the wrong<\/strong><\/em> thing to do.<\/p>\n

That said, it\u2019s admirable that she included a nod to diversity of thought and religion, as most people actually have a very limited range of \u201cdiverse\u201d things they\u2019re willing to accept. Of course, it\u2019s unclear that the institution she serves would actually support true diversity of thought or religion. After all, if a mainline Christian, Muslim, or Jew believes a woman should not be a religious leader, would the US military \u2013 and its female lead Guard chaplain \u2013 value those people for their \u201cpowerful experiences,\u201d or would they be mocked and derided as they have been in the past?<\/p>\n

Chaplain (Col) Boling may<\/em> be a well-qualified military chaplain, but you\u2019d never know it from the articles in the press that repeatedly reminded readers of the need for diversity \u2013 and her noble representation of it. That\u2019s where the government\u2019s priorities are, it seems, which makes Chaplain Boling\u2019s selection almost pitiable.<\/p>\n

After all, would you want to be remembered for your merit and capability \u2013 or your skin color and gender?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chaplain (Col) Leah Botona Boling recently became the director of the Air National Guard Chaplain Corps, and the Air Force was quick to point out she was the \u201cfirst female, person of color\u201d to hold that position. More important to the people she serves, of course, are her beliefs. Oddly, the chaplain\u2019s religious beliefs were rarely mentioned in the articles […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46405,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[134,648,6948,5284,96,3459,219,2362,442,44,39,6949,2,17,10,171,2344],"class_list":["post-46404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government-and-religion","tag-air-force","tag-air-national-guard","tag-cbf","tag-chaplain","tag-christian","tag-cooperative-baptist-fellowship","tag-dadt","tag-diversity","tag-homosexual","tag-islam","tag-jewish","tag-leah-botona-boling","tag-military","tag-religious-expression","tag-religion","tag-religious-freedom","tag-southern-baptist"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46404","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=46404"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46404\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46417,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46404\/revisions\/46417"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46405"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/christianfighterpilot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}