No stranger to using ‘Christianity’ when sales dry up along the ol’ campaign trail, Chicago Jesus took some precious time away from the golf course to explain his legislative ‘achievements.’
Not that he ever ‘found it’, but this boy has completely lost it.
OBAMA: I Pushed ObamaCare Because Of Christ
(BuzzFeed) [...] Today at the National Prayer Breakfast he [Obama] claimed support from on high to defend two of his most controversial legislative achievements.
“And so when I talk about our financial institutions playing by the same rules as folks on Main Street, when I talk about making sure insurance companies aren’t discriminating against those who are already sick, or making sure that unscrupulous lenders aren’t taking advantage of the most vulnerable among us, I do so because I genuinely believe it will make the economy stronger for everybody. But I also do it because I know that far too many neighbors in our country have been hurt and treated unfairly over the last few years, and I believe in God’s command to ‘love thy neighbor as thyself.’”
“I know the version of that Golden Rule is found in every major religion and every set of beliefs — from Hinduism to Islam to Judaism to the writings of Plato,” Obama added.
~snip~
“I’d be remiss if I stopped there; if my values were limited to personal moments of prayer or private conversations with pastors or friends. So instead, I must try — imperfectly, but I must try — to make sure those values motivate me as one leader of this great nation.”
Obama maintained that his call for the wealthiest to give up their tax breaks, he’s doing so out of economic necessity, but also in line with biblical teachings.
“And I think to myself, if I’m willing to give something up as somebody who’s been extraordinarily blessed, and give up some of the tax breaks that I enjoy, I actually think that’s going to make economic sense. But for me as a Christian, it also coincides with Jesus’s teaching that ‘for unto whom much is given, much shall be required,’” Obama said, noting Jewish and Islamic teachings say much the same thing.
Obama also defended foreign aid from assault, noting that it not just enhances the nation’s security — but fulfills the biblical requirement to look out for those who cannot speak for themselves.
“And when I decide to stand up for foreign aid, or prevent atrocities in places like Uganda, or take on issues like human trafficking, it’s not just about strengthening alliances, or promoting democratic values, or projecting American leadership around the world, although it does all those things and it will make us safer and more secure. It’s also about the biblical call to care for the least of these — for the poor; for those at the margins of our society.
To answer the responsibility we’re given in Proverbs to ‘Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute.’”
C.S. Lewis forecasts the dangerous times we live in — Government channeling faith away from God: HERE
Obama Christ, ‘My people, you continue to have my blessing’: HERE
Obama and pals use Christianity to sell ObamaCare: HERE
Obama invokes religious theme as 2012 nears: HERE
The Barack Hussein Obama, George Soros, Jim Wallis connection: HERE
Obama removes Christian symbols at Georgetown University: HERE
American Holocaust: Obama defends the extermination of 54+ million lives: HERE
National Motto ‘Letter Of Correction’ Sent To President Obama From The Congress Of The United States: HERE
Obama honors Nobel Prize winner with a statement about himself: HERE
Obama ego meter, count the ‘I’s’: HERE
Obama, ‘I will not rest until I finish another round of golf’: HERE
Obama hits links as Japan faces nuclear meltdown: HERE
hat tip: Erik
This post – comprised of 3 sections – is in chronological order; therefore, the ‘call to action’ appears first.
Sections:
1. A Call To Liberty – Message From 1787
2. God Has No Place In Government?
3. America’s ‘Progress’ Report
Let’s begin…
1. A Call To Liberty – Message From 1787 (by Samuel Langdon)
(h/t: Patriot Freedom) Preserve your government with the utmost attention and solicitude, for it is the remarkable gift of Heaven. From year to year be careful in the choice of your representatives and all the higher powers of government.
Fix your eyes upon men of good understanding and known honesty; men of knowledge, improved by experience; men who fear God and hate covetousness; who love truth and righteousness, and sincerely wish the public welfare.
Beware of such as are cunning rather than wise; who prefer their own interest to everything; whose judgment is partial or fickle, and whom you would not willingly trust with your own private interests.
When meetings are called for the choice of your rulers, do not carelessly neglect them or give your votes with indifference … but act with serious deliberation and judgment, as in a most important matter, and let the faithful of the land serve you.
Let not men openly irreligious and immoral become your legislators; for how can you expect good laws to be made by men who have no fear of God … and who boldly trample on the authority of His commands?… If the legislative body is corrupt, you will soon have bad men for counselors, corrupt judges, unqualified justices, and officers in every department who will dishonor their stations…
Therefore be always on your guard against parties and the methods [of] unworthy men, and let distinguished merit always determine your vote. And when all places in government are filled with the best men you can find, behave yourselves as good subjects; obey the laws, [be] cheerfully subject to such taxation as the necessities of the public call for. Give tribute to whom tribute is due, custom to whom custom, fear to whom fear, and honor to whom honor [is due] as the gospel commands you.
Never give countenance to turbulent men, who wish to distinguish themselves and rise to power by forming combinations and exciting insurrections against government. For this can never be the right way to redress real grievances…
I call upon you also to support schools in all your towns, that the rising generation may not grow up in ignorance…. It is a debt you owe to your children and that God to whom they belong…
I call upon you to preserve the knowledge of God in the land and attend to the revelation written to us from Heaven.
If you neglect or renounce that religion taught and commanded in holy scriptures, think no more of freedom, peace, and happiness…
May the general government of these United States, when established appear to be the best which the nations have yet known, and be exalted by uncorrupted religion and morals. And may the everlasting gospel diffuse its Heavenly light and spread righteousness, liberty, and peace through the whole world.
Full message: HERE
Bio: (Wiki) Samuel Langdon (1723 – 1797) was a American Congregational clergyman and educator. After serving as pastor in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, he was appointed president of Harvard University in 1774. At Harvard, his ardent patriotism led him to adopt measures that were obnoxious to the Tory students [Loyalists to the King – Sad Hill], and although he endeavored to administer the government of the college with justice, his resignation was virtually compelled in 1780. In 1788, he was a delegate to the New Hampshire convention that adopted the Constitution of the United States, often led its debates, and did much to remove prejudice against the Constitution.
~snip~
2. God Has No Place In Government?
~snip~
3. America’s ‘Progress’ Report
Obama Tears Up The US Constitution
(Washington Times) The Constitution of the United States, whose adoption we celebrate every Sept. 17, clearly lists the powers of each branch of the national government. Let’s take a look at what Barack Obama, like any president, is empowered to do and see if it squares with his actions. In Article II, Section 1, he is sworn to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Section 2 names the president as commander in chief of the armed forces, grants him the power to make treaties with the advice and consent of the Senate and to appoint ambassadors, federal judges, Cabinet officials and other federal officers. Section 3 says the president “shall take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”
In his two years and nine months in office, President Obama has compiled a spectacular record of noncompliance with the Constitution. Here are just some of the ways his administration has failed to execute the laws while using raw, unauthorized power:
(Courtesy The Obama File)
The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA): On Feb. 23, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced that under Mr. Obama’s direction, the Justice Department would no longer defend DOMA, which is under attack in several federal courts. DOMA, which was passed by overwhelming majorities in Congress and signed into law by President Clinton in 1996, defines marriage for all federal purposes as the union of a man and a woman and allows states under the full-faith-and-credit clause not to be forced to recognize unions from other states that do not comport with their state marriage laws. Forty-five states have moved to strengthen their marriage laws, with 30 enacting constitutional amendments. Mr. Obama, who has played coy with the marriage issue while aggressively promoting the homosexual agenda, is violating his oath of office to appease the gay lobby.
The 15th Amendment: Under Mr. Obama, the Justice Department has effectively become a race-based enforcement unit. After New Black Panther Party members were caught on tape intimidating voters at a Philadelphia polling place in 2008, the Justice Department declined to defend the convictions and thus sent the message that baton-wielding thuggishness on Election Day is no big deal. Former Justice Department attorney J. Christian Adams, who laid out the case before the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, described the administration’s dismissal of charges as “lawless hostility toward equal enforcement of the law.”
Illegal Immigration: The Obama administration has ignored the illegal actions of “sanctuary cities” and sued the state of Arizona in July 2010 for enforcing federal law. Then, last month, the administration announced a new policy that, in effect, ends enforcement of illegal immigration, providing the illegal alien meets the requirements of the Dream Act, a bill Congress failed to pass. So, Mr. Obama is ignoring current federal law while creating rules based on a law that never passed.
“Cap and trade”: In 2010, the Senate rejected a sweeping environmental bill that would have created a massive federal carbon regulation system. Despite this, the Environmental Protection Agency announced that it would treat carbon dioxide (the air we breathe out) as a pollutant and begin cracking down on America’s businesses and power plants. The EPA has become a law unto itself. The Obama administration also has ignored a federal judge’s ruling that it acted illegally in prohibiting new drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
Obscenity laws: The Obama administration, like the George W. Bush administration before it, has ignored federal laws against selling obscene materials, prosecuting only a handful of cases. Even though the law is clear and courts routinely hand down convictions, U.S. attorneys don’t bother to enforce the law anymore, given the direction from the top. The result is that the Internet is awash in illegal obscenity and even mainstream hotels peddle obscene materials via pay TV.
The Fifth Amendment: The Constitution guarantees that no one is deprived of his or her property without “due process of law” or “just compensation.” The National Labor Relations Board’s absurd order to the Boeing Co. not to open a newly built $750-million Dreamliner facility in right-to-work South Carolina, because unions in Boeing’s home state of Washington object, violates that guarantee. Even liberal New York Times columnist Joseph Nocera commented, “Seriously, when has a government agency ever tried to dictate where a company makes its products? I can’t ever remember it happening.”
The First Amendment: The NLRB struck again this year, declaring two Catholic universities – St. Xavier University in Chicago and Manhattan College in New York – not sufficiently “religious.” If the holdings stand, the schools may see the NLRB assert jurisdiction and rope the faculty and employees into a union election.
While ignoring laws that he is obligated to enforce, Mr. Obama has added other duties that would leave America’s Founders scratching their heads. As columnist Don Feder notes, “Right out of the gate, there was his salaam to the Saudi king and his declaration in the course of a 2009 speech at Cairo University that ‘I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear.’ That’s in the Presidential-Responsibility-To-Fight-Negative-Stereotypes-Of-Islam section of the Constitution.”
More frightening is Mr. Obama’s heavy-handed seizure of the nation’s health care system and Obamacare’s unconstitutional mandate for everyone to purchase health insurance. Nowhere, not even in the much-abused commerce clause, does the Constitution give the government the right to force citizens to engage in commerce. If Obamacare is upheld, government bureaucrats can pretty much order us to do anything they want.
This list, which could be longer, should include Mr. Obama’s failure as commander in chief to lead our armed forces with honor. Can you imagine George Washington’s or Gen. George S. Patton’s response to the Obama administration’s doctoring of results of a troop survey, leaking misleading “findings” to the press, ignoring strong opposition by combat troops and ramming through a policy of homosexualizing the armed forces? This violates 235 years of tradition in the world’s finest military.
More: HERE
~snip~
Obama, ‘I’d like to work my way around Congress’: HERE
DictatorSpeak – Obama, ‘The idea of doing things on my own is very tempting’: HERE
Obama’s illegal war: HERE
Obama says, ‘There is going to be a tug-of-war within the US between those who see globalization as a threat, and those who accept it’: HERE
Obama removes Christian symbols at Georgetown University: HERE
Obama launches AttackWatch.com to kill ‘negative’ stories about Dear Leader: HERE
Obama meme: HERE
Wounded Marine, Clebe McClary, ‘too evangelical’ for USAFA prayer luncheon: HERE and HERE
‘Mikey’ Weinstein gets Franklin Graham disinvited from National Day Of Prayer: HERE
Rev. Franklin Graham banned from National Day of Prayer: HERE and HERE
Federal Judge prohibits prayer at Texas graduation – jail for those who refer to God: HERE
Oprah denies Jesus as the only way to salvation: HERE
When God punishes the human race: HERE
Destroying your hope: HERE
Weak-Kneed Christians: HERE
‘Amazing Grace’ – the global music sensation: HERE
h/t: Jim Kelly and my wife.
Just in time for X-mas.
The artist agency formerly known as ‘Campus Crusade for Christ’ is making a new name for itself. And they’re counting on X-ians across the land to embrace Orwellian newspeak on behalf of their deity formerly known as ‘God’.
No doubt the governing body of our emerging new world order appreciates [Campus Crusade For Christ's] significant contribution to the reduction of ‘unnecessary’ words that conjure up ‘distasteful images of intolerance‘ and complicate the English language.
Campus Crusade For Christ Changing Its Name To ‘Cru’
(OrlandoSentinel) After 60 years, officials announced Tuesday night that the international evangelical ministry is changing its name — to “Cru.”
“This is the right time to embrace a new name, and … this name meets our objective of achieving a greater level of effectiveness in ministry,” said Steve Douglass, the organization’s president. “This decision has been saturated with prayer. We only want what God wants for us… We believe this new name will position us to connect better with the next generation.”
Chosen from 1,600 suggestions, the name already has been used on a majority of the group’s U.S. campus ministries since the mid-1990s. Though some followers worried in online forums the name might be confused with a rowing club, the organization said change was due.
“Has the old name hurt the organization? We do believe so,” said Steve Sellers, vice president of the expansive Orlando-based organization. “The name alienation among the general population was significant.”
Sellers said there were two problems with the old name, which Campus Crusade founder Bill Bright said had been given him by a seminary professor who told him, “God gave me the name for you.”
The first is that Campus Crusade, one of the nation’s largest religious charities, long ago ceased to be a ministry exclusive to college campuses — although it still has about 70,000 student followers across the country.
“We have an athletic ministry we call ‘Athletes in Action.’ We have a family ministry we call ‘Family Life,’” Sellers said. “We have music ministries. We have ministries in 150 countries, and there are fewer than 10 of those that still use the [Campus Crusade] name.”
But the more problematic word is “crusade.” At best, some Christians say, it’s outdated. At worst, in an age of jihad, it conjures up images of violence and intolerance in general and the religiously sanctioned military Crusades of history in particular. The latter flourished in the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries.
While those connotations may be sketchy for some, the word still carries a sense of zealotry and fanaticism that’s distasteful, said Sister Ann Kendrick, a Catholic nun who helps run the Hope CommUnity Center in Apopka.
~snip~
“We’re a donor-based organization,” said Sellers, who would not say how much the name change will cost. “We strive to use our resources wisely. This is all about: How do we become more effective as we move forward?”
[Sad Hill — And the 'forward moving' rationale for removing 'Christ' would be?]
More: HERE
UPDATE (07.26.2011): Outrage Grows at ‘No God’ Cemetery
(FOX) A Texas lawmaker is calling for a congressional investigation of the Houston National Cemetery after he went undercover and determined that cemetery officials are still preventing Christian prayers at the funerals of military veterans.
“The Obama administration continues to try to prevent the word ‘God’ from being used at the funerals of our heroes,” said. Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas).
UPDATE (08.03.2011): ONE Complaint And Air Force Shuts Down 20-Year Class Because Material Contained Bible Verses
(Fox) The Air Force has suspended a course that was taught by chaplains for more than 20 years because the material included Bible passages.
The course, called “Christian Just War Theory” was taught by chaplains at Vandenberg Air Force Base and used scripture from both the Old and New Testaments to show missile launch officers that it can be moral to go to war.
But the Military Religious Freedom Foundation said the course violated the Constitutional Separation of Church and State. The organization was created to “directly battle the far-right militant radical evangelical fundamentalists” in the military.
The MRFF filed a complaint last Wednesday on behalf of 31 missile launch officers – both instructors and students.
David Smith, the spokesman for the Air Force’s Air Education and Training Command, said the main purpose of the class was to help missile launch officers understand that “what they are embarking on is very difficult and you have to have a certain amount of ethics about what you are doing to do that job.”
He said the class was suspended the same day the complaint was filed. The class is currently under review by Air Force officials who will determine whether or not to revise the material or end the class.
~snip~
‘Christ’mas returns to ‘Holiday Village’: HERE
Obama removes Christian symbols at Georgetown University: HERE
Obama Christ, ‘My people, you continue to have my blessing’: HERE
Obama gets religion to sell ObamaCare: HERE
White House and Mainstream Media kill ‘negative’ stories about Obama: HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE
Wounded Marine, Clebe McClary, ‘too evangelical’ for USAFA prayer luncheon: HERE and HERE
‘Mikey’ Weinstein gets Franklin Graham disinvited from National Day Of Prayer: HERE
Rev. Franklin Graham banned from National Day of Prayer: HERE and HERE
Federal Judge prohibits prayer at Texas graduation – jail for those who refer to God: HERE
Oprah denies Jesus as the only way to salvation: HERE
Queen of doublespeak: HERE and HERE
‘Islamophobia’ in theaters now!: HERE
The Minute Men are turning in their graves: HERE
When God punishes the human race: HERE
Destroying your hope: HERE
Weak-Kneed Christians: HERE
‘Amazing Grace’ – the global music sensation: HERE
(Showdown at Sad Hill Cemetery – The Good, The Bad and The Ugly)
This is where Sad Hill* draws the line. How about you Texas?!
(FoxNews) A federal judge has ordered a Texas school district to prohibit public prayer at a high school graduation ceremony.
Chief U.S. District Judge Fred Biery’s order against the Medina Valley Independent School District also forbids students from using specific religious words including “prayer” and “amen.”
The ruling was in response to a lawsuit filed by Christa and Danny Schultz. Their son is among those scheduled to participate in Saturday’s graduation ceremony. The judge declared that the Schultz family and their son would “suffer irreparable harm” if anyone prayed at the ceremony.
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said the school district is in the process of appealing the ruling, and his office has agreed to file a brief in their support.
“Part of this goes to the very heart of the unraveling of moral values in this country,” Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott told Fox News Radio, saying the judge wanted to turn school administrators into “speech police.”
“I’ve never seen such a restriction on speech issued by a court or the government,” Abbott told Fox News Radio. “It seems like a trampling of the First Amendment rather than protecting the First Amendment.”
Judge Biery’s ruling banned students and other speakers from using religious language in their speeches. Among the banned words or phrases are: “join in prayer,” “bow their heads,” “amen,” and “prayer.”
He also ordered the school district to remove the terms “invocation” and “benediction” from the graduation program.
“These terms shall be replaced with ‘opening remarks’ and ‘closing remarks,’” the judge’s order stated. His ruling also prohibits anyone from saying, “in [a deity’s name] we pray.”
Should a student violate the order, school district officials could find themselves in legal trouble. Judge Biery ordered that his ruling be “enforced by incarceration or other sanctions for contempt of Court if not obeyed by District official (sic) and their agents.”
The Texas attorney general called the ruling unconstitutional and a blatant attack from those who do not believe in God — “attempts by atheists and agnostics to use courts to eliminate from the public landscape any and all references to God whatsoever.”
“This is the challenge we are dealing with here,” he said. “(It’s) an ongoing attempt to purge God from the public setting while at the same time demanding from the courts an increased yielding to all things atheist and agnostic.”
~snip~
*A masterful retort from one of Sad Hill’s favorite authors Oswald Chambers:
“Some of us run away instead of standing; when there is a fresh onslaught of the wiles of the devil we lose heart instantly; and instead of standing we scuttle, and others have to stand until we are sufficiently ashamed to come back again. We have to take on the initiative in standing against panic. One strong moral man will form a nucleus around which others will gather; and spiritually, if we put on the armour of God and stand true to Him, a whole army of weak-kneed Christians will be strengthened. Remember, we have to take the initiative where we are, not where we are not.”
UPDATE (06.03.2011 – Big hat tip Rebecca on Facebook): Texas Makes A Stand – Victory!
(Fox) A federal appeals court has lifted the order banning public prayer at a Texas high school graduation Saturday.
The reversal comes on the heels of increasing criticism of a federal judge’s earlier ruling that agreed with the parents of one graduating student that religious expression during the ceremony at Medina Valley Independent School District would cause “irreparable harm” to their son.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals thought differently, reversing the judge’s ruling Friday and allowing students to say the word “amen” and invite the audience to pray during the ceremony.
“This is a complete victory for religious freedom and for Angela,” said Kelly Shackelford, president/CEO of Liberty Institute, which had represented class valedictorian Angela Hildenbrand in the appeal. “We are thrilled that she will be able to give her prayer without censorship in her valedictorian speech tomorrow night. No citizen has the right to ask the government to bind and gag the free speech of another citizen.”
~snip~
Obama removes Christian symbols at Georgetown University: HERE
Wounded Marine, Clebe McClary, ‘too evangelical’ for USAFA prayer luncheon: HERE and HERE
‘Mikey’ Weinstein gets Franklin Graham disinvited from National Day Of Prayer: HERE
Rev. Franklin Graham banned from National Day of Prayer: HERE and HERE
God couldn’t save the Queen from Obama: HERE
Obama Christ, ‘My people, you continue to have my blessing’: HERE
Obama gets religion to sell ObamaCare: HERE
Oprah denies Jesus as the only way to salvation: HERE
Destroying your hope: HERE
Weak-Kneed Christians: HERE
Dude, what’s with the name, ‘Sad Hill’? Go: HERE or HERE
h/t: Jim R (Thanks buddy!)
Close to home; added crosses. Wishing you and your family Joy this Easter – Sad Hill
No stranger to using religion as a platform to get what he wants, Obama hit last week’s National Prayer Breakfast as 2012 encroaches on his reign.
And never mind Obama’s regime banning Franklin Graham from the National Day of Prayer, or that Obama hid symbols of Christianity during his Georgetown speech and removed ‘Creator’ from his Declaration of Independence speeches, or that Obama officially ended the Bush-era National Prayer Day services held at the White House:
(Washington Examiner) President Obama inhabits a largely secular presidency, rarely blending his religious beliefs with his public duties, and spending more Sundays shooting hoops than going to church. So it was a notable shift when Obama went deeply devout for last week’s National Prayer Breakfast, telling attendees the role daily prayer plays in his life.
“When I wake in the morning, I wait on the Lord, and I ask Him to give me the strength to do right by our country and its people,” Obama said. “And when I go to bed at night, I wait on the Lord, and I ask Him to forgive me my sins, and look after my family and the American people, and make me an instrument of His will.”
A cynical interpretation would note Obama’s intensely religious rhetoric — even for a prayerful event — coincides with the unofficial start of the presidential campaign season.
At the same time, Obama talked frankly about his family’s “certain skepticism” about organized religion, and noted his father was “a nonbeliever.” Obama’s own path to religion was through the civil rights movement.
“Religion is a touchy thing and it has to be handled very carefully to not make it seem like the president is doing it for political reasons,” said Jim Pfiffner, a professor of public policy at George Mason University.
Obama gets religion to sell ObamaCare: HERE
The Barack Hussein Obama, George Soros, Jim Wallis connection: HERE
National Motto ‘Letter Of Correction’ Sent To President Obama From The Congress Of The United States: HERE
Destroying your hope: HERE
UPDATE (01.23.2011): All updates to this ‘Clebe McClary bulletin’ will be posted near the end of the article.
Thank you Free Republic, Weasel Zippers, Doug Ross @ Journal, Larwyn’s Linx and StanDeyo for pitching in!
Marine 1st Lt. Clebe McClary
Next, they’ll be trying to snuff out officers who are ‘too straight’, or ‘too white’…
(Gazette) A religious rights group is calling for the removal of the Air Force Academy’s top officer after a flap over a speaker planned for a February prayer luncheon at the school.
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) says the academy’s choice of retired Marine 1st Lt. Clebe McClary shows that superintendent Lt. Gen. Mike Gould remains tilted toward evangelical Christianity and tolerates an environment where proselytizing is accepted.
Lt. Gen. Mike Gould
“We’re done,” said academy graduate Mikey Weinstein, the foundation’s founder and a frequent foe of religious practices at the school. “Gould needs to go.”
An academy spokesman, Lt. Col. John Bryan, defended the choice of McClary and said the planned prayer gathering is optional and inclusive of a broad spectrum of religious views.
“Nobody is being forced or coerced to go to this luncheon,” Bryan said.
McClary is a wounded Vietnam veteran who overcame his disabilities and now says he’s in the “Lord’s Army.”
Bryan said he’s heard McClary speak and came away with inspiration for overcoming obstacles rather than religious philosophy.
“He’s a nationally recognized motivational speaker,” Bryan said.
McLary’s website lists testimonials from celebrities including The Rev. Billy Graham and former Denver Broncos coach Dan Reeves.
The academy first sought retired Army general and former Secretary of State Colin Powell to speak at the luncheon, but when he couldn’t make it due to schedule conflicts, McClary was picked to keynote the annual event. He’ll be paid $2,500 and airfare reimbursement.
Weinstein points to McClary’s website for evidence that the speaker is too evangelical for the academy.
“To him, USMC will always mean a U. S. Marine for Christ,” McClary’s website says.
“Such statements are not only antithetical to the clear mission of the United States Air Force Academy, they are totally anathema to the purportedly globally inclusive purpose of this National Prayer Luncheon,” Weinstein wrote in a letter to Gould and Defense Department officials.
Several groups, including the Colorado branch of the American Civil Liberties Union have written Gould in support of Weinsten’s effort.
Weinstein has battled the academy in recent months over the school’s failure to include him in a conference on the school’s religious tolerance practices and the academy’s initial failure to release results of a survey that showed concerns about prosyletizing there.
Gould hasn’t responded to Weinstein’s latest letter.
PLEASE let the United States Air Force Academy Public Affairs know what’s on your mind. Tell ‘em Sad Hill sent ya…:
Mailing Address
HQ USAFA/PA
2304 Cadet Drive Suite 3100
U.S. Air Force Academy, CO 80840-5016
Phone: 719.333.7731
Fax: 719.333.4094
Community Relations: pa.comrel@usafa.af.mil
Media Relations: media.pam@usafa.af.mil
~snip~
UPDATE #1 (01.22.2011): Hypocritical Oath taken directly off Weinstein’s site – MRFF’s Mission Statement (h/t: taxesareforever):
UPDATE #2 (01.22.2011): MRFF Letter from Weinstein to General Gould:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: BEKKI MILLER
(337) 356-8696
bekki.miller@militaryreligiousfreedom.org
(MRFF) ALBUQUERQUE – Albuquerque-based Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) has demanded that the United States Air Force Academy rescind their invitation to former Marine Lt. Clebe McClary to speak at the Academy’s upcoming National Prayer Luncheon. “Egregiously sectarian statements like [those] from former Lt. McClary blatantly exclude not only non-Christians, but also the many Christians who do not subscribe to a particularly fundamentalist view of Christianity,” said Michael “Mikey” Weinstein, President and Founder of MRFF. MRFF’s letter, linked below, closes by demanding that the Air Force Academy “immediately rescind its invitation to former Lt. McClary and choose a new speaker who can appropriately embody a message of inclusiveness for all Academy attendees.”
MRFF’s January 20th, 2011 Demand Letter to U.S. Air Force Academy Superintendent Lt. Gen. Michael C. Gould: Please see below.
-
UPDATE #3 (01.23.2011): Who is ‘Mikey‘ Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation? (h/t: Girlene): SEE HERE
CAUTION: This document contains Mikey Weinstein’s extremely violent, profanity-laced, and bigoted comments against all evangelical Christians who believe the New Testament of the Bible: HERE
(PIJN) On 21 April the Pentagon disinvited Franklin Graham to speak at their National Day of Prayer event, because Graham allegedly made previous controversial statements, by daring to criticize some Muslims who beat their wives, kill their children for suspicion of adultery, and committed mass genocide against 2 million Christians in Sudan.
But the real question is, why did the Air Force Academy invite Mikey Weinstein (whose letter to SECDEF got Graham disinvited) to speak to cadets at their National Character and Leadership Symposium in February 2010, when Mikey Weinstein has made statements far worse than Graham’s, threatening violence and swearing vulgar obscenities at all evangelical Christians, up to 38 million American people on whom he has declared war?
Continue reading: HERE
UPDATE #4 (01.23.2011): Weinstein and cronies sue Fort Carson for over emblem with cross and inscription, “For God and Humanity” (h/t: Erik and rybbr): HERE
Note: ‘It’s inscribed with “For God and Humanity” — not “For God and Americans” or “For God and Christians.” And it’s a hospital, not a combat unit.
(PajamasMedia) Persecution of Christians worldwide, particularly at the hands of Muslims, is a well-documented phenomenon despite the successful attempts by most major Western and American media organs to ignore it.
Persecution of Christians in the United States — a country where almost 80% of the population, some 240 million, is of that faith — is deemed, ipso facto, an absurdity by some and an undeniable fact by others. As a conservative yet non-fundamentalist (Lutheran) Christian, Army veteran, and former academic specializing in Islamic history, I agree that Christians are notcurrently being persecuted in this country. I do discern, nonetheless, a worrisome growing intolerance of the majority faith coupled with a kneejerk support of minority religions.
Particularly, and unsurprisingly, Islam.
This year alone, there have been four prominent attacks on Christian connections to the U.S. military:
• Charges of neo-Crusaderism against military supplier Trijicon for its gunsights inscribed with New Testament verses.
• Charges of neo-Crusaderism against an Army unit for daring to have a cross as part of its unit insignia.
• The branding as “a hate crime” the placing of a cross next to the the Air Force Academy’s neo-pagan worship site.
• The Army’s decision to disinvite prominent evangelical Franklin Graham from speaking at a Pentagon prayer service on the National Day of Prayer.
These four incidents all have one major factor in common: the involvement of Mikey Weinstein and his “Military Religious Freedom Foundation” — which was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize last fall.
Weinstein is a former member of the Air Force JAG (Judge Advocated General’s) Corps — an attorney — and a self-proclaimed secular crusader for rebuilding what he calls the military’s “obliterated wall separating church and state.”
Since Weinstein blames evangelical Protestants for allegedly breaching this wall, he directs most of his ire against them. They don’t hesitate to return fire, often citing Weinstein’s own intemperate, crass words. Weinstein gets plenty of support from the media, as is obvious from a sympathetic 2009Harper’s article with an inflammatory title: “Jesus Killed Mohammad: The Crusade for a Christian Military.” The piece quotes him at length and takes his assertions at face value.
I will leave it to Weinstein’s evangelical Protestant opponents to question his salvation status; however, his misrepresentations of history — Christian, American, and even Islamic — are certainly fair game and call into question his logic and motives. If Weinstein were simply the head of a “religious watchdog group,” working out a personal animus against Christians and Christianity in the military, we could perhaps ignore him, but his views appear to be not just influential but gaining traction among some elements of the Obama administration.
Weinstein’s favorite trope is that the American military is somehow being turned into a “Crusader” army by the nefarious Protestants within its ranks, as exemplified by the “Crusader” unit heraldry which, according to him, “continues to add more fodder to the argument that we are Crusaders. … It’s exactly what fundamentalist Muslims want.”
UPDATE #5 (01.11.2011): Air Force Academy Prayer Luncheon With Clebe McClary ‘A Go’ – Judge Sends ‘Speculative’ Mikey Weinstein’s MRFF Home: HERE
~snip~
‘Mikey’ Weinstein gets Franklin Graham disinvited from National Day Of Prayer (h/t: Girlene): HERE
Rev. Franklin Graham banned from National Day of Prayer: HERE and HERE
McClary’s Biography: HERE
McClary Silver Star Citation (h/t: Retain Mike): HERE
Team Napolitano labels returning veterans as ‘lone wolf extremists’: HERE
Weak-Kneed Christians: HERE
Hat tip: Dad/Mom
