Onward Christian Soldiers . . . To Hypocrisy

WilliamPitt

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Wed Jan-26-11 11:58 AM
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Onward Christian Soldiers . . . To Hypocrisy

Soldiers pray during a deployment ceremony for the 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team of the Vermont National Guard in Burlington, Vermont in 2010. (Photo: Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Chad J. McNeeley / DoD)

Onward Christian Soldiers . . . To Hypocrisy
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

Wednesday 26 January 2011

Talk to Mikey Weinstein for even a few minutes, and you get the definite sense that the man must have gills. It is the only explanation for how he can say so much, so quickly, without pausing to take a breath. This should come as no surprise, as Mr. Weinstein has a great deal to say on a topic that affects us all, and threatens the constitutional fabric of the nation: a frontal assault by elements within the active military on the separation of church and state, and a crusade by those elements to transform the Armed Services into a fundamentalist Christian entity.

For Weinstein - founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) - and his family, along with the members of his organization and the service members they represent, that threat is vividly personal. Weinstein and his wife both hold licenses to carry concealed weapons, and have every reason to believe they may someday need them. The windows of their home have been shot out, dead animals have been left on their steps, and - certainly worst of all - the lives of their children have been threatened. One such threat came in the guise of a promise that Weinstein would be murdered, and his children would be bathed in his blood before they themselves were murdered.

Where are these vile threats coming from?

Christians.

Wait, that is not accurate. Let me try again.

Self-proclaimed "Christians." Fundamentalist evangelical frauds who cloak themselves in the words of Jesus and the uniform of the American military while lashing out violently against anyone who does not toe the line of their "true faith." The hypocrisy of their activities is beyond appalling, and flies in the face of the Scripture they pervert with every breath they take.

Weinstein and the MRFF have been working to call attention to a deeply ominous trend that has been spreading through the ranks of the U.S. military, one that exists at the highest levels of power: a push to turn the Armed Forces into a fundamentalist evangelical Christian army, to the exclusion of all other faiths - even mainstream Protestants and Catholics - and even more severely to the exclusion of those in the service who are atheist or agnostic. Because Weinstein has pointed out the absolute necessity of the separation of church and state, especially within the military, he and his wife have to go around strapped at all times, their children live under the threat of death, and their e-mail boxes are always filled with letters and pleas from active-duty service members - almost all of whom are practicing Christians themselves - looking for a way to escape this pervasive and corrosive phenomenon.

The rest: http://www.truth-out.org/onward-christian-soldiers-to-hypocrisy67164