Does the Air Force ‘encourage atheism’ and ‘prosecute Christianity’?

[cbayer]

http://chrisstedman.religionnews.com/2014/03/24/air-force-encourage-atheism-prosecute-christianity/

Chris Stedman | Mar 24, 2014


The Freethinkers Club at the Air Force Academy tables for “Ask an Atheist Day.” Photo courtesy of Jason Torpy and Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers.

Todd Starnes of Fox News is claiming that a “double-standard at the Air Force Academy” has created an atmosphere that “encourage[s] atheism [and] prosecute[s] Christianity.”

As evidence of this supposedly anti-Christian environment—one that leads Starnes to “wonder if those in charge of the Air Force Academy believe the only good cadets are godless cadets”—he points to an Air Force Academy cadet who recently removed a Bible verse posted outside his dorm room after a formal complaint was filed.

Starnes then contrasts that incident with an “Ask an Atheist Day” event sponsored by an officially recognized cadet group, the Freethinkers Club, suggesting this demonstrates a pro-atheist Academy agenda.

In Starnes’s eyes, the fact that the Freethinkers Club’s event was advertised over email and on bulletin screens indicates that the Academy is “[encouraging] atheism.”

- See more at: http://chrisstedman.religionnews.com/2014/03/24/air-force-encourage-atheism-prosecute-christianity/#sthash.ZEEP1ajW.dpuf

[HockeyMom]

1. My daughter was told last year in Basic

that she had to attend some kind of religious service on Sundays or she would have KP duty. "You cannot sit around doing nothing while everyone else is at services". Services for athiests? Wouldn't that be discrimination against them? So my daughter told them she was Wiccan and went to those, which were held off the base.

[cbayer]

3. This is the kind of thing that the Military Religious Freedom Foundation should

be made aware of.

They are working really hard to stop that kinds of practice and have been quite effective. Telling her that she had to attend a religious service is say out of bounds, imo.

[TygrBright]

2. Wait... is this the US Air Force we're talking about?? n/t

[Vogon_Glory]

4. Say WHAT?

The last I heard, the Air Force, and the Air Force Academy had some very heavy-handed evangelists bullying not only Jews, Muslims, and various pagans, but also liturgical and mainstream-protestant Christians. Is Todd Starnes' wedgied underwear tied in double-squareknots because the bullying evangelists don't have the free rein that they used to while Buckaroo Bush was in the White House?

Sure sounds like that to me.

[cbayer]

5. That appears to be exactly the case.

Let's shed a few tears for him.

[el_bryanto]

6. That's pretty lousy. Not surprising though.

To make it clear it's lousy that they are claiming that the Airforce is persecuting Christians in an effort to push Atheists out.

Bryant

[packman]

7. Seems to me that

the Air Force Academy a few years back was in all sorts of trouble because of its pro-Christian stance, forcing cadets to attend chapel, pray, and all sorts of inappropriate religious crap going on in its dorms. This seems to be a 180 change.

From 2005 article:

An Air Force panel sent to investigate the religious climate at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs found evidence that officers and faculty members periodically used their positions to promote their Christian beliefs and failed to accommodate the religious needs of non-Christian cadets, its leader said Wednesday

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/23/politics/23academy.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

[exboyfil]

8. Freethinkers is one club of many grouped

together in the affinity/culture. The religious organizations are already sanctioned in a big way by the academy. Here is the website showing weekly services for a whole bunch of different religious organizations.


http://www.usafa.edu/hc/fc.cfm

Freethinkers wants to move to this group which includes something called the Earth Centered among the traditional religious groups.

[okasha]

9. The Earth Centered category

probably includes Traditional Native Americans, Wiccans and other pagans.