A disturbing story in the NYT regarding the treatment of atheists in the military:

When Specialist Jeremy Hall held a meeting last July for atheists and freethinkers at Camp Speicher in Iraq, he was excited, he said, to see an officer attending.

But minutes into the talk, the officer, Maj. Freddy J. Welborn, began to berate Specialist Hall and another soldier about atheism, Specialist Hall wrote in a sworn statement. “People like you are not holding up the Constitution and are going against what the founding fathers, who were Christians, wanted for America!” Major Welborn said, according to the statement.

Major Welborn told the soldiers he might bar them from re-enlistment and bring charges against them, according to the statement.

The Major predictably denies it, but Specialist Hall has at least one confirming witness. Specialist Hall has been sent home from Iraq:

In November 2007, Specialist Hall was sent home early from Iraq after being repeatedly threatened by other soldiers. “I caution you that although your ‘legal’ issues are yours and yours alone, I have heard many people disagree with you, and this may be a cause for some of the perceived threats,” wrote Sgt. Maj. Kevin Nolan in Specialist Hall’s counseling for his departure.

Though as a practicing (in every sense of the word) Presbyterian I do not share Hall’s stance on the existence of God, I find his treatment — like the behavior previously documented at the Air Force Academy — to be appalling and contrary both to fundamental American values and to Christian ones.

Honestly I’ve always been very uncomfortable with evangelism — it strikes me as all too susceptible to human weaknesses like hubris and power-seeking and petty spite, as I believe is demonstrated in this story and in all too many instances of self-righteous “ministering.” I can’t imagine a worse combination than aggressive evangelizing and the top-down authority-driven structure of the military. Enlisted personnel are the ultimate captive audience, bound not only to sit and listen and obey but to refrain from the sort of response that aggressive unsolicited ministering merits. The attitude of some officers — that they have a free speech right to attempt to convert the soldiers under their command — represents the same confusion of public and private capacities you see in judges who say they have a free speech right to post the Ten Commandments in their courtroom or order defendants to say prayers. When interacting with their peers and those they command, officers and noncoms are not acting in their individual capacity. They are acting with the authority of the government. They have no business hectoring anyone to follow their beliefs. To do so reflects badly both on the military and on the faith.

Via.

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