Guest post by NYU student delves into ongoing Christian indoctrination at Air Force Academy and more

“With God on Our Side”

The United States military must protect religious freedom from aggressive Christian proselytizing.

Mar. 13, 2024

Guest post by Sarah Mulbarger

Sarah Mulbarger is a current sophomore at NYU studying law and history

Fundamentalist Christian groups throughout the United States military are unified under the belief that they are God’s chosen army, ambassadors for Christ in uniform. The organization Officers’ Christian Fellowship discerned their military service as a spiritual commissioning. This misguided approach to military service was uncovered in the snowy white mountains of Colorado Springs, the backdrop for the United States Air Force Academy.

In 2005, investigations began into the overt evangelizing and religious discrimination found at the United States Air Force Academy. Active duty military officers/chaplains were proselytizing in the chapel about the acceptance of Jesus or eternal damnation, student groups were publicly advertising “The Passion of the Christ,” and in at least one case a teacher ordered students to pray before beginning their final examination. Outside Academy grounds, active duty military chaplains/officers were exhorting cadets to evangelize their fellow students.

In 2005, an Air Force Academy graduate and former officer who served for seven years as a military attorney, Michael “Mikey” Weinstein filed a federal lawsuit due to the overbearing proselytism of evangelical Christianity at the Academy. Weinstein explained how Christianity had become inextricably intertwined in every aspect of the academy and how non-Christians were made to feel targeted, marginalized, discriminated against, and overall unwelcome amid a hostile sectarian monoculture.

Following the lawsuit, the Air Force was pushed to make guidelines discouraging prayer at public events. However, attitudes about Christianity and hostility towards non-Christians did not change. Almost 20 years later, Christian fundamentalism continues to be uncovered at the Air Force Academy.

It is crucial that this country’s military service academies should be non-sectarian and welcoming to people of all faiths. Given their critical role in defending our constitutional government, it is only fair that the separation of church and state be particularly clear in these institutions. While these institutions provide students with opportunities for profound growth and development in leadership, the military should not rely on Christianity as a crutch for military service.

Military service members in positions of power have a unique responsibility to promote religious tolerance and pluralism. However, it is difficult to separate church and state when people in positions of power are proselytizing.

Last month - I interviewed an Air Force Academy cadet, who spoke on condition of anonymity, about her experience with a Christian professor who is an active duty military officer. The professor’s Christian beliefs blurred and in fact crossed the line between educating and evangelizing. In her comparative religious history class, the cadet explained how her professor made derogatory comments about non-Western customs, denoting these traditions as “weird” or “odd.” While not outrightly stating her religious beliefs, the professor’s full-court press advertising for Christianity was shortly to follow.

When it was time for the class to learn about Christianity, all critical distance vanished. The professor outrightly endorsed Christianity to her students, defending her religion against criticism from non-believers. She preached how Jesus is accepting and can forgive those who do not believe if they accept Him. When my source followed up with the professor after class to question her proselytizing, the professor maintained she was simply “sharing her truth” with her students and so was not at fault.

As Mikey Weinstein, who now runs the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), told me over the phone, the Air Force Academy continues to be ground zero for religious intolerance and enforcement. MRFF has over 300 current clients there among cadets, faculty, and staff.

Weinstein explained how these instances of religious influence were not simply “issues'' but instead “national security threats.” He further elaborated how “it is a pervasive and pernicious pattern and practice of out-of-control, wholly unconstitutional, religious extremism which is literally inextricably intertwined into the very fabric of the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Veterans Affairs, as well as the US Coast Guard and US Maritime Service in the Department of Transportation and all 18 National Security Agencies.”

I asked Weinstein how we can protect the religious freedom of non-Evangelical military service members. What responsibility does Congress have to protect the religious freedom of service members? What laws could be passed to prevent the spread of Christian nationalism? His answer was short yet powerful. “We really don’t need them. We already have them. They’re just being ignored.” The most recent religious security threat MRFF uncovered is a prime example of this. They are demanding an investigation of an ethics professor at Air War College who signed an overtly fundamentalist Christian Manifesto.

In August of 2023, the Department of the Air Force Policy Directive (DAFPD) issued the “Balance of Free Exercise of Religion and Establishment Clause” directing military leaders to balance the free exercise of religion with the prohibition against governmental establishment of religion. Military leaders should not let their personal expression of faith be associated with the government. Weinstein explained how this clause should enforce the separation of church and state yet is still blatantly ignored. Without the MRFF, the ethics professor’s conduct at the Air War College would likely have gone unnoticed.

While the Air Force Academy has a particular reputation for religious intolerance, students at other service academies have complained about aggressive Christian influence at both the Naval Academy and West Point. The “pentacostalgon” as MRFF dubs it, influences all aspects of the military and is not limited to a specific branch.

I write to convey the urgency national security threats of Christian fundamentalism have on the U.S. military. As the largest government employer, the Department of Defense has the responsibility to build and foster a non-sectarian environment that both protects the religious freedom of service members and allows for a strict divide between practice and proselytizing.