On Religion and the Air Force

This post is also available at Blogger News Network

My Pappy, a man who hates religion with zealous fervor, sent me this article. He called me later that night to talk about it. I wasn't home because I was working late. Here's a brief of what happened:

"The U.S. Air Force Academy failed to accommodate minority beliefs but there is no overt religious discrimination at the college, an Air Force report on the religious climate at the institution said on Wednesday...The report was prompted by allegations that the prestigious academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, which produces junior officers for the Air Force, promotes evangelical Christianity and a climate of intolerance toward other religious beliefs...The team described a campus chaplain telling cadets they would "burn in the fires of hell" if they were not born-again Christians...Other issues included football coach Fisher DeBerry hanging a locker room banner saying, "I am a member of Team Jesus Christ." " (Read More)

My opinion on this is that it's unfortunate. I know why my dad sent it to me. It's another example of the blinding hatred and intolerance inherent in the most zealous of organized religions. He's incensed and he's trying to lobby me into believing that all organized religions should be abandoned. Guess which political party he's registered as ; )

I believe in the civilizing effects of faith. I believe that submitting ones self to a greater truth is the way to keep from going off the deep end of immorality. When I needed to turn my life around, I began to look hard at faith and it helped me get back on track. Be mindful here, I keep using the word the "faith," not "religion." Religion, as my Pappy and I have deliberated on it, has come to mean institutionalized religion. The Christian Church being the one most often talked about but all organized religions present the same problem. I believe in the teachings of Jesus as I've learned from a variety of secondary sources. Most people whom are profoundly religious believe in the teachings of whatever their particular holy book tells them and nothing more.

The problem with those who are indeed profoundly religious is that they become blind to alternative sources of truth. Is not the Christian God equal to Muslim God? Most Christians and Muslims would say, no. Countless millions have died in the name of striking down false religions, false Gods, and beliefs threatening to their own. Primarily it is that blind hatred between the most devout that turned my father away from religion in the first place. I myself tend not to practice an organized religion per se because I have no need for a sense of a belonging among people blind to alternative points of view.

I also don't believe in any of the leaps of faith like the virgin birth or the miracles so that would probably make me a lousy Christian.

What appears to have happened at the Air Force is not out of the ordinary. After all, thirty-seven percent of all Christians in America (which is 83% of the population) describe themselves as born-again or evangelical; that includes nearly half of all Protestants (47 percent), as well as a small share (14 percent) of Catholics. Additionally, Evangelism soars particularly among blacks, and southerners: Two-thirds of blacks describe themselves as evangelical or born-again Christians, double the share of whites who do so. And 55 percent of Christians in the South say they're born-again, compared to 21 percent in the Northeast, 26 percent in the Midwest and 31 percent in the West.

Lower-income Christians also are more apt to be evangelicals. Among those with household incomes under $35,000, 45 percent are evangelicals; among those with higher incomes this declines to 31 percent.

With the most devout coming from the most poor or uneducated amongst us, it's not all that unlikely to see Evangelicals is places where those same folks can find gainful employment, like the military. As I began with, what happened at the Air Force Academy was unfortunate but I highly doubt it was institutional.

Here's my thinking on this, in America, a land that separates Church and State, when someone decides they feel they are being discriminated against because of their religious preference, instead of being locked up, as they would in Iran, they can take the institution to court. In today's America, they'd probably win too. There's no escaping devout, Evangelical Christians in this country unless you live in the heart of most big cities. However, despite recent events, they are not running the country. Non-religious or other religious people haven't lost their rights nor will they ever. The underlying issue with this story isn't that there's this hive of religious intolerance and we need to be afraid of a modern day Torquemada running amuck through America. The issue is that when the perceived discrimination reached a fever pitch, something was done about it. To my knowledge, the victims aren't being punished. They certainly aren't being imprisoned as they would in the aforementioned Iran or even better, Saudi Arabia. Let's not loose perspective here.

You cannot let your beliefs blind you into hatred and on that my Pappy is absolutely correct. However, humans left to their own devices will become complete animals. I've seen people develop in the absence of structure; it isn't pretty. People need an anchor to something bigger than themselves in life. Not everybody can be like my dad and just principle themselves in a religious vacuum. I couldn't. I needed the teachings of Jesus as at least guide because before I was making all sorts of nutty mistakes in my life. But where we agree is that however you get to your beliefs, my way or his, you right to believe and practice freely end at the next persons right to be left the hell alone.