Elf Sternberg

Last night, I went to listen to Mikey Weinstein, head of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, an organization aligned with Americans United For Separation of Church and State. Weinstein is head plaintiff in a court case which seeks to prove that there is a pervasive and pernicious pattern of proselytising within the U.S. Military. His basic premise is that even though the Premillenialists, Dominionists, and Reconstructionists make up only 12% of the population, they make up a higher percentage of soldiers because they're encouraged to join the military where existing organizations teach them to be "soldiers for Christ" first.

Some of the examples Weinstein claimed to have documented include:

• A Lieutenant in Iraq telling his troops after one was killed by an IED that the death was the fault of "the unsaved among us," because they threaten unit cohesion
• Assignments with the highest likelihood of combat fatalities going to soldiers who refuse to fall in-line with the evangelical leadership
• A sergeant (who was later busted, and reported in the media) who was passing out "When Americans are killed they go to Heaven with Jesus, but when Iraqis are killed they go to Hell" Chick-style tracts on the streets of Baghdad
• The Air Force's official policy is that it "reserves the right to evangelize the unchurched." (Quote from the Air Force head of Chaplaincy, Sep 17, 2005 NYT "Religion" column)
• The same Chaplain gives a "voluntary" church service in which he orders those present to "get in the face of your fellow soldiers who are not here and make them bow their knees before Christ"
• The "Crusaders," an F-16 wing, operated over Iraq airspace for a year before anyone complained about their name or their flight patch: a crusader's cross, helm, and sword, with three stars they admit is for the Trinity
• A Pentagon-sponsored officer's organization with the stated purpose of "creating a military empowered by the holy spirit"

That's just what I can remember; the list of examples he had went on and on and on. It was terrifying; if even one-tenth of what he says is true, our nuclear arsenal is more or less in the hands of the people who really do believe that Jesus needs just a little more help to make it back to Earth.