I guess atheists are the new gays when it comes to discrimination by the US military:
An American soldier who served in Iraq has claimed he was discriminated against because he is an atheist and is suing the US defence department for violating his religious freedom.
Specialist Jeremy Hall, 23, said he was passed over for promotion because he refused to pray with other soldiers and was even assigned a full-time bodyguard because his comrades wanted to kill him. […]
Spc Hall said he was a practising Baptist when he joined the army, but lost his belief while serving two tours of duty in Iraq.
He said when he refused to pray before a Thanksgiving Day dinner, he was told to eat elsewhere. “I was told because I can’t put my personal beliefs aside and pray with troops I wouldn’t make a good leader,” he said in a television interview.
The Army apparently took the threats so seriously that they gave Spc. Hall a personal bodyguard and sent him home early from Iraq. That strikes me, as I hope it does you, as very, very alarming.
Since when did Christians in the military decide to issue fatwas against their fellow non-Christian brothers and sisters serving beside them in harm’s way merely because they refused to profess the same religious views? My reading of what Jesus taught in the New Testament didn’t include anything about threatening to kill people who don’t share your religious beliefs, or ostracizing them, or treating them as less than human. But then, this is a different military than the ones our fathers knew, and a different Christianity as well. Or has anyone forgotten that bastion of Christan fundamentalism, the US Air Force Academy, where faculty and students went public last year with their concerns about the overtly religious bias there:
(cont.)
Three faculty members from United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) in Colorado Springs, Colorado–one of whom is also a former cadet–have gone public today with their criticisms of evangelical Christian proselytizing at the USAFA. They are joined by another former cadet now serving in Iraq. One faculty member has been reassigned to the Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama.
The Air Force Academy allowed Campus Crusade for Christ to film a video promoting Christianity on the Academy’s campus in 2002, and for a long time permitted Christian organizations to openly proselytize cadets there. Four generals were shown in uniform at the Pentagon participating in a promotional video for the group “Christian Embassy.” Other military facilities have also permitted Christian organizations to conduct special programs on their bases to pressure soldiers to convert, and to promote their own brand of “muscular” Christianity which calls for killing Muslims if they won’t convert to the “true faith” of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace.
The warriors pose for the camera in a group shot – some holding their weapons in one hand and their holy book in another.
Elsewhere, a poster bears a quotation calling for the killing of enemy leaders and forcing the defeated people to convert. […]
The photo depicts Army trainees at Fort Jackson, S.C., where in addition to basic combat training recruits may also attend “God’s Basic Training,” while the poster — boasting a quotation from conservative author Ann Coulter — adorns the door of a Military Police office at Fort Riley, Kansas. […]
The group also has found at the Fort Riley exchange the Muslim-critical “Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam” on display right next to The Holy Bible. And at Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont., a new “Enabled By Christ” Christian men’s store operates at the base exchange, Weinstein said.
One would think America’s Armed Forces had been sent back in time to aid the Christian Crusaders who fought against against Islamic warriors in the Medieval era, rather than exists in the here and now of the 21st Century from the pervasive and ugly nature of Christian fundamentalism in our military which daily is being exposed as far more extensive than any of us ever imagined. Obviously, 9/11 and the Iraq war have had a great deal to do with the spread of these distinctly un-American attitudes within what is supposed to be a a strictly secular governmental organization, but I don’t think we can blame events entirely for what we are witnessing. This has been a long time coming, and bears the fruits of a military establishment that has been compromised to an extreme extent by one extreme faction of one religion which has operated to the detriment of anyone who does not share their beliefs.
That any putative Christians of the modern era find it acceptable, and even necessary, to kill members of other religions in the promotion of their faith is abhorrent and directly violates the precepts and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, the person whom they worship as the Son of God. That our military services are infested with people at all levels who profess these beliefs is frightening regarding what it may mean for the future of our republic. For one can legitimately ask the question of them: Where does your true allegiance lie — in defending the Constitution of the United States, or in promoting a vision of America that would supersede that founding document and overthrow our current form of government?
