Undermining The First Amendment By Creeping Christian Prostelyzation

The first amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads as follows:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

It is generally interpreted and generally agreed that the Establishment Clause in the first amendment establishes freedom of religion and also establishes that there shall be no state religion. This interpretation has stood the test of time and in fact, been upheld by the United States Supreme Court.

It seems, though, that certain segments of the American public, and certain officials (both government and military) are either not aware of this component of the Bill of Rights, or deliberately choose to ignore it. We have seen examples of this in civil life as government officials, who are first and foremost politicians always pandering to what ever special interests get them elected, enact various rules, policies and laws to intermix matters of religion in to state governance.  This country was founded by people escaping religious persecution and domination, so that its citizens could each, by his own free choice, determine what, if any religious practice he or she would subscribe to.

A great segment of our society seems to have either never learned this lesson of our history, or simply choose to ignore it in their misguided belief that their religion commands them and all other men and women to conform to their one way of life and religion.  They do not understand that no religion that forces its will, or what it believes is its God’s will on the entire human race is something that is sacred, justified or a moral imperative, but rather an unjustified, morally repugnant imposition of their personal will on another human being.  No human being has the right to do that, whether in their God’s name or any other name.

Something that the last eight years should have taught us, and something we may be falling prey to as we move forward in to a new era,  is that the active prostelyzing by any religious group delivered via the offices or channels of government is a recipe for disaster.  Ironically the “War on Terror” is a religious war, started and fomented by religious fundamentalists who would impose their beliefs, their will, upon the rest of the world, believing only in utter conformance to their particular religious and social values.  This is what we have been fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2003.  Yet our government officials, motivated by their personal desires to retain political power and office and subsequently our military officials, who take their lead or their orders from the politicians, have destroyed our credibility as the world paragon of religious and political freedom.

As told by Jason Leopold at The Public Record in his recent story titled “Military Entangled In ‘Extreme Missionary’ Christian Reality Television Show” our elected, and appointed government and military officials have permitted, in fact seemingly encourage, fundamentalist religious groups to prostelyze their particular religious values to citizens of another country that we occupy.  Does it not occur to any of our government officials that by our forcing our own religious and moral values upon Afghanis we are doing the same thing as the Taliban.  We are making the imposition of our will on other people, whether invited by those people or not, just as Al Qaeda tries to impose their values on the rest of human kind.  How incredibly stupid and short sighted it that?

In his article, Leopold relates how fundamentalist religious groups have succeeded in “embedding” themselves in to military units on station in the war zone:

The popular reality series, “Travel the Road,” aired on the Trinity Broadcasting Network and featured Will Decker and Tim Scott, two so-called “extreme” missionaries who travel the globe to “preach the Gospel to the ends of the earth and encourage the church to be active in the Great Commission.”

The other cable program green-lit by the Pentagon is “God’s Soldier,” which aired in September on the Military Channel, and was filmed at Forward Operating Base McHenry in Hawijah, Iraq. It features an Army chaplain openly promoting fundamentalist Christianity to active-duty U.S. soldiers in Iraq in violation of the U.S. Constitution…

Part of the second season of “Travel the Road” was filmed on location in Afghanistan and aired in April 2006, where Decker and Scott were embedded with the Army, and shows numerous scenes of the men accompanying U.S. Army soldiers on patrol.  The missionaries are also filmed evangelizing the local Afghans by distributing New Testaments to them in their native Darri language.

In one scene, an Army Chaplain named Capt. Brad Hanna of the Oklahoma National Guard, talks about the possibility of a “revival” in Afghanistan and says he frequently speaks to Afghans about converting to Christianity. Hanna was made a full-time support chaplain for the Oklahoma National Guard after he returned from Afghanistan.

Additionally, Decker and Scott prominently cite SSgt. Sheldon Hoyt, who was stationed in Afghanistan with the Oklahoma National Guard’s 45th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Battalion, 179th Infantry Regiment, as playing a hands-on role in helping the missionaries facilitate their proselytizing as opposed to simply being a tour guide of sorts…

Earlier this year, U.S. military personnel launched a major initiative to convert thousands of Iraqi citizens to Christianity also by distributing Bibles and other fundamentalist Christian literature translated into Arabic to Iraqi Muslims…

The distribution of the Bibles and Christian literature came at the same time that U.S. Marines guarding the entrance to the city of Fallujah handed out “witnessing coins” to Sunni Muslims entering the city that read in Arabic on one side: “Where will you spend eternity?” and “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. John 3:16″ on the other…

“God’s Soldier” was co-produced by Jerusalem Productions, a British production company whose “primary aim is to increase understanding and knowledge of the Christian religion and to promote Christian values, via the broadcast media, to as wide an audience as possible.”

Before “God’s Soldier” aired on Sept. 10, the Discovery Channel, which owns the Military Channel, advertised the program by stating that it would feature several Army Chaplains from a wide variety of denominations discussing their work in the military.

“Follow a group of U.S. Army Chaplains from different faiths on a tour of duty in Iraq as they comfort wounded and dying soldiers, reassure panicked and depressed soldiers, as well debriefing those soldiers that return from their tours of duty,” the marketing literature for “God’s Soldier” said.

Instead, “God’s Soldier,” zeroed in on one chaplain, Capt.. Charles Popov, who appears in the first scene of the program in a godlike pose looking down upon the military base and urging soldier to attend Christian Bible study. [Astute readers will note that the Popov family name is a familiar one in terms of religious fundamentalists and tent meetings. -B.F.]

“Hey this is God,” Chaplain Popov says. “Come to Bible study tonight at 1900. Purpose Driven Life. You only have 25,000 days in your life, and probably half of it’s gone.”

The author of the book, “Purpose Driven Life,” that Popov referenced is Rick Warren, the leader of a fundamentalist mega-church in Southern California. In a recent interview with Fox News pundit Sean Hannity, Warren said, “the Bible says that evil cannot be negotiated with. It has to just be stopped…. In fact, that is the legitimate role of government. The Bible says that God puts government on earth to punish evildoers. Not good-doers. Evildoers.”

For the full context of all of this, Leopold’s full article is a must read.  But don’t stop there, in a follow-up story, Leopold reports that this de facto policy of encouraging prostelyzation may continue in the new administration being sworn in on January 21.  In his story titled “Prostelyzing In the Military Likely To Continue Under Obama”, Leopold relates:

But, now that Obama has decided to keep Robert Gates on as Secretary of Defense—and he’s embraced Warren—it is virtually guaranteed that fundamentalist Christianity will continue to permeate throughout the military just as it has during George W. Bush’s eight years in office.

Despite being named in several lawsuits filed against the Pentagon for allowing military chaplains to proselytize to soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the numerous letters he has received  from civil rights organizations and government watchdog groups since he was tapped as Defense Secretary two years ago, letters demanding that he launch investigations into widespread proselytizing, Gates has failed to issue a response of any kind to these groups and has refused to take steps to address the matter. Meanwhile, soldiers continue to have fundamentalist Christianity shoved down their throats.

Of the nearly 11,000 soldiers that have lodged complaints about proselytizing with just one of the various government watchdog groups, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, reports that about 96 percent have identified themselves as Christian, however, there are numerous cases in which atheist and Jewish soldiers have said they were subjected to  Christian prayer sessions and proselytizing by chaplains despite their objections.

This is all terrifying to freedom loving, individual Americans, who rightly fear the establishment of any religion as “the state religion”.  Religion has a place in each individual’s life at a time and a place of each individual’s choosing, but it has no place being forced upon anyone.  The recent brouhaha on these pages about Rick Warren performing an invocation at the presidential inaugural maybe be viewed as a bit over reactive by some, and when it comes down to it, I can ignore that small interlude, as I have done so in similar situations for my entire life, but why should it be foisted on me in the first place during an act of state ceremony, and it does make me fear what else religious extremists might want to force upon me, will I, one day be forced to wear a religious insignia on my clothing, have all of my worldly possessions seized, have my friends and family torn away from me, and find myself marching to a gas chamber, all in service to some one’s skewed belief that their God is God and is the only God?

Sphere: Related Content

Gates tells the Pentagon to start planning the closing of Gitmo

From Jurist:

US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has ordered the Pentagon to draft a proposal for shutting down the military prison at Guantanamo Bay in preparation for a possible order from President-elect Barack Obama, a Pentagon spokesperson said Thursday. Press Secretary Geoff Morrell told reporters that Gates wants to have a plan in place in the event Obama issues an order shortly after his inauguration to close the facility. Morrell said:

[Gates] has asked his team for a proposal on how to shut it down [and] what would be required specifically to close it and move the detainees from that facility, while at the same time ensuring that we protect the American people from some very dangerous characters.

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Executive Director Anthony Romero applauded the move [press release], saying:

The fact that Defense Secretary Gates is finally taking steps to close down Guantanamo and its unconstitutional military commissions is a welcome and encouraging sign that President-elect Obama intends to fulfill his campaign pledge. This is an important first step toward turning the page on eight years of shameful policies that allowed torture and violations of domestic and international law.

Also Thursday, the ACLU, along with Amnesty International USA, Human Rights First, and Human Rights Watch (HRW) issued a letter to Obama calling on him not to create a similar detention system, should he close Guantanamo and end the military commissions system.

It can not happen soon enough for those still languishing there. Obama must end the torturing of this individuals as well as provide them with due process. Gates is stepping up to the plate on this issue and I do applaud him for that move.

Sphere: Related Content

Conspiracy Theories And The News

“There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again . . . If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.”

President Elect Barack H Obama speaking about Pakistan.  August 1, 2008, on the campaign trail

Today Secretary Of State Rice said the minds behind the attacks in India must be brought to justice. The attackers base is reported to be in Pakistan

Over the past few weeks US planes, based in Afghanistan, have flown attack missions into Pakistan.

Mr. Obama has said he will have all combat troops out of Iraq in 16 months. He repeated that this morning after publicly announcing he will keep Robert Gates on as Defense Secretary. The theories abound. Hell…I have a few myself. After all, how can a guy live in Roswell and not start thinking like a conspiracy theorist. I am surrounded by that attitude daily here.

I have heard, read and thought about these things coming together for a while. From the beginning, when I heard that Osama bin Laden had moved to Pakistan, I was sure George W Bush would invade there as well. Then I realized he couldn’t. He had been exposed to the world as a warmongering fool with a grudge against Hussein that used his military to overthrow him. After all, daddy got humiliated by Saddam a few years ago and needed to have his honor avenged.

But how long has the machine had Pakistan in its sights and to what extent did they go to insure John McBush wasn’t our Commander In Chief? How could a Bushie lead us into war with yet another country without being questioned? A fresh face with the promise of change on his lips can sell it better than the Same Ol’ Same Ol’. They couldn’t put Hillary Clinton in there now as they have different plans for her down the road.

After the attacks in India this past holiday weekend, invading Pakistan seems imminent. The pre warning by Obama before he was elected. The withdrawal of troops from Iraq to Afghanistan as promised. The rumors of bin Laden in Pakistan instead of Afghanistan. The necessity of placing another American friendly puppet government into a volitale anti western area. The proximity of Afghanistan bases to Pakistan. The sell to the American masses will be easy.

It HAS been proven to us that the invasion of Iraq was based on lies and deceit. Americans, and the rest of the world Do feel our invasion of Afghanistan had merit because al-Quaida was “based” there. An invasion of Pakistan WOULD be okayed by the world.

Because…who knows?

Maybe this time we’ll find Osama bin Laden.

Sphere: Related Content

The Defense of the Nation

It will be assured by a well-executed presidential transition plan. The country is curious about whether current Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates will be staying on after President-elect Obama takes the oath of office. It looks like there is some possibility that he will, based on these news items: Gates and Danzig? — A former Navy Secretary has praised the man whom he might eventually replace. “Obama Mulls Plan to Keep Gates at Pentagon,” from (11/11/08) CQ Politics. To quote:

President-elect Obama is strongly considering keeping Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates in that post for a limited time in the new administration, several sources close to the discussions said Tuesday.

Under the still-tentative plan, former Navy Secretary Richard Danzig would become deputy secretary and take over the job when Gates departs, perhaps after up to one year. Gates has not formally been asked to stay, sources close to the Pentagon and the transition team said. A source close to Gates said he is reluctant but willing to stay on in the short term.

The general in charge of the Missile defense program is leaving his post soon and has prepared a briefing for President-elect Obama, should he want it. Obama has not said what his final views on the subject are, though he has not ruled it out. The story, “General Warns Obama on Missile Defense,” is from the (11/12/08) CBS News. To quote the piece’s sub-head, “Head Of Missile Defense Agency Says U.S. Would Be “Severely Hurt” If Plan Is Abandoned; Russia Rejects More U.S. Proposals.” As for the Middle East war situation, “Obama faces major challenge in Afghanistan/Pakistan,” from Juan Cole’s (11/12/08) Informed Comment, is one of the very best available current background readings on the subject.

Public Diplomacy as an element of national security has been an abysmal failure under the Bush administration. Here is an example: “USC Study of Alhurra Withheld from Public; Inquiries of Network’s Operation Deepen” from (11/4/08) ProPublica. To quote:

The government board that oversees the US-funded Arabic satellite channel Alhurra has refused to make public an independent study commissioned last year to review the network’s content.

People who have read the study, which was completed in July, described it as highly critical of Alhurra, a four-year-old government broadcasting effort begun by President Bush that has cost U.S. taxpayers $500 million and has been shrouded in controversy.

Bush’s public diplomacy efforts have been widely criticized by Democrats and even within his own party and corners of his administration. It is likely that his successor will review some of the most expensive efforts such as Alhurra which was designed to promote a positive image of U.S. policies in the Muslim world.

Defense acquisition will need an enormous amount of revamping if the following two examples are any indication of how wrong-headed it has been under the Bush administration:

1. “Army Orders Pain Ray Trucks; New Report Shows ‘Potential for Death’,” is from (10/10/08) Wired: Danger Room. To quote:
   

   After years of testing, the Active Denial System — the pain ray which drives off rioters with a microwave-like beam — could finally have its day. The Army is buying five of the truck-mounted systems for $25 million. But the energy weapon may face new hurdles, before it’s shipped off to the battlefield; a new report details how the supposedly non-lethal blaster could be turned into a flesh-frying killer.

   The contract for the pain ray trucks is “expected to be awarded by year’s end,” Aviation Week notes. “A year after the contract is signed, the combination vehicle/weapons will start be fielded at the rate of one per month.”

2. “Packs of robots will hunt down uncooperative humans*” comes from (10/22/08) Short Sharp Science. To quote:
   

   The latest request from the Pentagon jars the senses. At least, it did mine. They are looking for contractors to provide a “Multi-Robot Pursuit System” that will let packs of robots “search for and detect a non-cooperative human”.

   One thing that really bugs defence chiefs is having their troops diverted from other duties to control robots. So having a pack of them controlled by one person makes logistical sense. But I’m concerned about where this technology will end up.

   Given that iRobot last year struck a deal with Taser International to mount stun weapons on its military robots, how long before we see packs of droids hunting down pesky demonstrators with paralysing weapons? Or could the packs even be lethally armed?

In conclusion, as Commander in Chief, President-elect Obama will be challenged to restore and repair the U.S. military to full effectiveness. Our professional military has not been well-served by the current Commander in Chief. You can be assured that President-elect Obama would have an entirely different “take” on the last three stories in this post than our current president would have. Though Obama is a “Techie, ” he would likely look askance at deploying pain ray trucks and pursuit robots. And because he is so bright, he would read with fascination my last story: “Scientists Identify Brain’s ‘Hate Circuit‘*” from (10/29/08) Yahoo! News. To quote:

British researchers say they’ve identified a “hate circuit” in the brain.

This hate circuit shares part of the brain associated with aggression, but is distinct from areas related to emotions such as fear, threat, and danger, said researchers Professor Semir Zeki and John Romaya, of University College London’s laboratory of neurobiology.

References on National Security from a recent Congressional Quarterly Newsletter, “Behind the Lines.”

Follow the money: A federal judge ruled last week that Treasury violated an Oregon Islamic charity’s constitutional rights by designating it a terror organization without adequate notice, The Medford Mail Tribune mentions. The international system for curtailing terrorist financing has achieved major successes but is fraying seven years after 9/11, AP has an expert report finding. As difficult as terrorists’ clandestine financing methods are to globally eradicate, “an equally vexing problem is how to shut off jihadist funding siphoned off from so-called ‘legitimate’ charities,” Homeland Security Today spotlights. Treasury announces it will teach Islamic finance to bank regulators, Congress and others, “but critics say it is opening a door to American funding of Islamic extremism,” WorldNetDaily leads.

Strategerizing: Amid the focus on the wars Obama “will inherit in Iraq and Afghanistan, a third conflict gets less attention: the shadow war against stateless networks of Islamic extremists,” the L.A. Times’ Sebastian Rotella spotlights. “In the not too distant future it will become painfully obvious that implementing Obama’s policy of retreat from Iraq [will] be a capitulation to terrorism with potentially catastrophic consequences,” Christopher Pearson contends in The Australian. “We need to deal with the terrorist threat in a completely different way… We can’t, in fighting terrorism, create more terrorists,” Madeleine Albright remarks in a Post online dialogue. The terror struggle “is also a battle of ideas. Our current strategy against terrorism has put this concept last, and the terrorist groups have put it first,” The Minnesota Daily’s “St. James’ Street” asserts.

Hat Tip Key: Regular contributors of links to leads are “betmo*” and Jon#.

(Cross-posted at The Reaction.)

My “creativity and dreaming” post today is at Making Good Mondays.

Technorati tags: news news and politics politics national security defense department bush obama robert gates pentagon

Sphere: Related Content