woodguru

I found this really interesting, and there is no intent to beat up on religions at all, this involves where the military is at regarding fairly serious and fractious religious strife. When I was in the military nobody ever breathed a word about religion except to make it clear that the base chaplain was available to all. If you did not go to church or visit the base chaplain you never really heard anything about it. I had a born again room mate that lived and breathed in the lord, so I heard it but was okay with it and had long discussions with him.

I saw an article where the founder of the MRFF organization is getting death threats against he and his wife, so I started digging into what they are dealing with from a religious discrimination and abuse perspective. It is not nearly what I thought it would be in terms of who the clients are that are looking for help getting some form of religious persecution stopped.

My guess is that if you tried to guess what the bulk of the problems are you'd be as wrong as I was, I figured it would be minority sect cases like perhaps muslims and jews being harassed, or christians that are being persecuted for being christian. The stats sort of set up a base for understanding what they are dealing with.
...of a staff of over 500, 80% are categorized as practicing christians of different denomination
...95% of their client's that have a complaint are christian
...80% of the abusers involved are harder christians proselytizing or pressuring other christians

So I looked into their publication at a list of cases that they had successfully handled, they are not only interesting, but they tend to show the wisdom of the military keeping a policy of separation between the military and religion, which by the way has been destroyed by a relatively new regulation that allows religious displays and proselytizing if it is what the person believes, wh**ever that means. So now the military has a new problem they never really had before because it used to be against regulations to let it be a thing.

So here is a case, and I did some thinking about it because at first glance my reaction was so frigging what? A commander had a big framed sign and a cross in his office that said it was a religious license for fishing for men to bring into god's fold. This was making enough people uncomfortable with their commander that a dozen people, mostly christian themselves went to the base JAG saying that this was a violation of military religious regulations. The JAG informed them of the wording of the new regulation that allowed for expressions of a religious nature as long as it was what this officer believed.

The people who had filed the complaint responded by making a certificate to hang on their walls that was an arrest warrant for those displaying fishing licenses for men, they showed it to the JAG and the officer was told to remove his fishing license and other religious displays from any squadron spaces.

Here is the rundown on that case, it's interesting, and the only people who will have a problem will be those with a bias that sees this as religious persecution rather than the wisdom of the military keeping a religious free zone policy.

https://www.militaryreligiousfreedom.org/2020/11/mrff-intervention-leads-to-immediate-removal-of-christian-fishing-license/

BigMike Loc: yerington nv

Throwing the baby out with the bathwater?

Without taking into consideration young people today have been taught to be very concerned about "microaggressions", I'll be the first to admit Christians can be quite irritating and I consider myself one (you'd probably agree with the "irritating" part ).

1) The military makes rules and changes them depending on the situation.

2) In heat of battle situations proselytizing has traditionally been more welcome.

American Vet

There are no atheist in a foxhole.....

woodguru

I actually think that a blessing before a battle or skirmish is a good thing, and isn't going to offend anyone regardless of their beliefs or lack of. Subjecting people to it elsewhere in groups or one on one isn't okay.

The line being talked about here is commanding officers pressuring people, actually pressuring people who consider themselves to be christian to be more christian. And that is sort of a division we are seeing among conservatives where it comes down to the degree of devotion. It can lead to a how far will you go for your faith mentality, which the military has no use for.

woodguru

Yeah..."hey bubba, you're on good terms with the lord, can you talk to him?"

Sonny Magoo Loc: Where pot pie is boiled in a kettle

It's "the man upstairs". Come on man!

BigMike Loc: yerington nv

I've heard that my whole life.

BigMike Loc: yerington nv

I know. They can figure it out. I won't trip either way because...

...over periods of years and decades the pendulum swings one way...

...then it swings back.

11Bravo

Learned it & live it to this day. Thank you for your service. Death Before Dishonor !!

American Vet

11B “Bushmaster”!

91B here....grunt medic but ended up in Dustoff

11Bravo

Thank you again for your outstanding service & heroic effort as a 91B Dustoff, 11B's will never forget you !!

American Vet