Tag: christian
Pete Hegseth

Hegseth Promotes Pentagon Religious Service Preaching God 'Anointed' Trump

U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, an Evangelical Christian whose religious tattoos drew scrutiny during his confirmation hearings, led a Christian prayer service in the Pentagon auditorium during official working hours on Wednesday. The event featured Secretary Hegseth's personal pastor from Tennessee, Brooks Potteiger, and included remarks describing President Donald Trump as “sovereignly appointed," according toThe New York Times.

"This morning at 9:00 AM the Office of the Secretary of Defense sent out what appears to be a building wide email to the entire Pentagon inviting everyone to a 'Christian prayer service and worship' in the Pentagon auditorium," wrote Fred Wellman, who writes "On Democracy" at Substack. Wellman is a graduate of West Point and the Harvard Kennedy School, an Army veteran of 22 years who served four combat tours, and a political consultant. "Not the chapel. The auditorium."

"This is a clear and direct violation by a Cabinet member of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and is a direct violation of military norms, traditions, and regulations by the senior official of the entire military," Wellman alleged.

"The defense secretary said that attendance at the prayer service was voluntary," the Times added, "but encouraged the uniformed military personnel and civilian employees there to tell their co-workers about it."

Politico Pentagon and national security reporter Paul McLeary noted that there was even an official government email address on the invitation, "to RSVP to this 30 minute event in the middle of a workday."

The Atlantic's Tom Nichols, a retired U.S. Naval War College professor and expert on national security, added: "The RSVP is a nice touch, so that they know who's on board."

He also weighed in more broadly:

"Not sure of the constitutionality here - not a lawyer! - but years ago, one of the War Colleges used to do this with 'voluntary' Bible study opportunities that had the same kind of roster-taking, and that went away pronto after complaints and an investigation," Nichols wrote.

Last week, the Freedom From Religion Foundation published a report stating that Pastor Potteiger is "known for promoting Christian nationalist views," and claimed that Wednesday's event "is expected to be a monthly prayer gathering. According to Potteiger, the event will include Christian preaching, proselytizing and the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer — all within one of the most powerful institutions of the U.S. government."

“This is a blatant violation of the First Amendment and its proscription of religion in government,” FFRF Co-President Annie Laurie Gaylor said in a statement. “Assuming the pastor’s boast is true, these prayer meetings would not only exclude and marginalize the significant number of nonreligious and non-Christian service members, they will send the impermissible message that Christianity is the Pentagon’s preferred faith.”

"Turning the Pentagon into a church service during duty hours isn’t just inappropriate — it’s unconstitutional," FFRF also said. "We’ve sent a letter demanding an end to this blatant breach of the First Amendment."

In January, before he was confirmed, The Guardian reported that in "a series of newly unearthed podcasts, Pete Hegseth, Donald Trump’s pick for defense secretary, appears to endorse the theocratic and authoritarian doctrine of 'sphere sovereignty', a worldview derived from the extremist beliefs of Christian reconstructionism (CR) and espoused by churches aligned with far-right Idaho pastor Douglas Wilson."

Others are also blasting the decision to hold a Christian prayer service inside the Pentagon.

"Hegseth continues to propagate christian white nationalism, while undermining the separation of church and state and the norms of civil-military relations," wrote retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, the former Director of European Affairs for the U.S. National Security Council, whose whistleblower efforts led to the first impeachment of Donald Trump.

"This is what Christian nationalism looks like: the government using its power to push religion from the top down, said Max Flugrath, Communications Director for Fair Fight Action.

In February, author Brian Kaylor, a Baptist minister with a Ph.D. in political communication, posted a video from a Pentagon town hall where Secretary Hegseth began his remarks by declaring, “All glory to God.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Hey Republicans! Would Jesus Take Away School Lunch?

Hey Republicans! Would Jesus Take Away School Lunch?

An iconic Texas band, the Austin Lounge Lizards, has a song that nails the absurd self-righteousness of Christian supremacists: "Jesus Loves Me (But He Can't Stand You)."

I think of this refrain when I behold today's right-wing proselytizers wailing that the blessed rich should not be taxed to assure that everyone has the most basic human needs. Seems very un-Jesusy to me.

One bizarre focus of their religious wrath is a wholly sensible and biblically sound national policy: subsidizing school districts to assure that every child has healthy meals to fuel their daily learning. Yes, in the Christian nationalists' book of public abominations, government feeding of children is a holy no-no. Project 2025, the Republican blueprint to impose theocratic rule over America, proclaims school meals a socialist/Marxist evil to be eradicated.

The extremists cry that if there is any free lunch "giveaway," it must be narrowly restricted to truly destitute students. But wait — publicly singling out those children would stigmatize them. Plus, how odd to hear Republicans demanding an intrusive, absurdly expensive bureaucratic process empowering government to decide who's eligible to eat!

In fact, the student lunch subsidy runs as low as 42 cents a meal, so it's far cheaper, fairer and (dare I say it?) more Christian simply to offer it to all. Indeed, the program is akin to the biblical story of Jesus providing fishes and loaves to the multitude. He imposed no income test —everyone got a fish.

Interestingly, the same lawmakers opposing 42-cent meals for kiddos today routinely and enthusiastically feed billions of our tax dollars to corporate, ethically challenged profiteers who love money above all. As I recall, Jesus couldn't stand people like that.

What Woody Guthrie Said About Inequality

Woody Guthrie's prescription for inequality in America was straightforward: "Rich folks got your money with politics. You can get it back with politics."

For Guthrie, "politics" meant more than voting, since both parties routinely cough up candidates who meekly accept the business-as-usual system of letting bosses and bankers control America's wealth and power. It's useless, he said, to expect change to come from a "choice" between Tweedledumb and Tweedledumber. Instead, common folks must organize into a progressive movement with their own bold change agenda, become their own candidates and create a politics worth voting for.

Pie in the sky? No! Periodic eruptions of progressive grassroots insurgencies have literally defined America, beginning with that big one in 1776. Indeed, we could take a lesson today from another transformative moment of democratic populism that surged over a century ago, culminating in the Omaha Platform of 1892. This was in the depths of the Gilded Age, a sordid period much like ours, characterized by both ostentatious greed and widespread poverty, domination by monopolies, rising xenophobia, institutional racism — and government that ranged from aloof to insane.

But lo — from that darkness, a new People's Party arose, created by the populist movement of farm and factory mad-as-hellers. They streamed into Omaha to hammer out the most progressive platform in U.S. history, specifically rejecting corporate supremacy and demanding direct democracy.

That platform reshaped America's political agenda, making the sweeping reforms of the Progressive Era and New Deal possible. As one senator said of the Omaha rebellion, it was the start of robber baron wealth flowing "to all the people, from whom it was originally taken." And that's what Guthrie meant by "politics."

Reprinted with permission from Creators.

Alito Reveals Christian Nationalist Bias In Secretly Taped Audio

Alito Reveals Christian Nationalist Bias In Secretly Taped Audio

Secret audio recording of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito casually and unreservedly telling a woman posing as a right-wing Catholic conservative that there are “fundamental” differences between the left and the right that “can’t be compromised,” and agreeing the nation needs to return to “godliness,” has sparked strong criticism by legal and political experts.

Justice Alito agreed with the woman, documentary filmmaker Lauren Windsor, who told him, “I don’t know that we can negotiate with the left in the way that needs to happen for the polarization to end.”

“I think that it’s a matter of, like, winning,” she added before Alito replied, “I think you’re probably right.”

Alito continued, saying, “There can be a way of working — a way of living together peacefully, but it’s difficult, you know, because there are differences on fundamental things that really can’t be compromised. They really can’t be compromised. So it’s not like you are going to split the difference.”

Many expect judges, and especially Supreme Court justices, to maintain an impartiality, including when weighing in on issues of faith and morality. The Constitution itself states justices serve for life if they remain on “good behavior.”

“The key part of the Alito tape is his concession that compromise on fundamental issues is probably impossible. A horrific quality for a judge or human being,” declared constitutional law scholar and professor of law Eric Segall.

“Sam Alito is a Christian Nationalist,” said attorney and author Andrew L. Seidel, a vice president at Americans United for Separation of Church and State. “Anyone familiar with his opinions on religious freedom and church-state separation (or who has readAmerican Crusade) has known this for some time. Then there’s his admission with the flags. Now this confession.”

Professor of law, MSNBC legal analyst, and former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance shared several concerns.

“If Justice Alito is making comments like this to a random person at a get-together, what is he saying to his close confidants? How is this impartial justice, especially when his votes/rationale on cases are considered?” she asked.

“This is a Justice who believes the correct way to determine the law is via a strict appeal to ‘history & tradition’ even though both of those things assume a legal system where Black people & women have no rights,” Vance added.

Vance also remarked, “A statistic that stuck with me about Alito’s jurisprudence is that ‘An empirical analysis of the Court’s ‘standing’ decisions…found that Alito rules in favor of conservative litigants 100% of the time & against liberal litigants in every single case.’ ”

The Atlantic’s Norman Ornstein, a political scientist and emeritus scholar, responded to remarks Justice Alito made, writing: “Utterly unethical, corrupt, a serial liar, and a radical lacking every element of judicial temperament. This monster does not belong in civil society, much less on any court, much much less on the Supreme Court.”

Some, including attorney George Conway, pointed out the difference between Justice Alito’s response to Windsor and Chief Justice John Roberts, who was asked similar questions by her.

“Pressed on whether the court has an obligation to put the country on a more ‘moral path,'” Rolling Stone reported, “Roberts turns the tables on his questioner: ‘Would you want me to be in charge of putting the nation on a more moral path?’ He argues instead: ‘That’s for people we elect. That’s not for lawyers.’ Presented with the claim that America is a ‘Christian nation’ and that the Supreme Court should be ‘guiding us in that path,’ Roberts again disagrees, citing the perspectives of ‘Jewish and Muslim friends,’ before asserting: ‘It’s not our job to do that. It’s our job to decide the cases the best we can.’ ”

“The contrast between Alito’s responses and Roberts’s speaks volumes,” Conway said. “Oh my.”

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Mike Johnson

Speaker Johnson Delivers 'Horrible' Sermon At House GOP Retreat

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has not shied away from sharing his far-right, evangelical Christian faith during his nearly eight years in Congress.

Earlier this week, Religious News Service reported members of the Congressional Forethought Caucus sent a letter to Johnson on Thursday, February 15, expressing their concerns "about Jack Hibbs — the extreme right Christian nationalist Johnson chose to lead the House's opening prayer on January 30."

Last weekend, Politico reports, the Speaker used his presentation during a Republican retreat as an opportunity to focus "on declining church membership and the nation’s shrinking religious identity, according to" two people who were in the room.

Johnson's speech "took on a surprisingly religious tone," according to the report, as, "Rather than outlining a specific plan to hold and grow the majority, these people said, Johnson effectively delivered a sermon."

Furthermore, Politico notes, "The speaker contended that when one doesn’t have God in their life, the government or 'state' will become their guide, referring back to Bible verses, both people said. They added that the approach fell flat among some in the room."

Calling Johnson's presentation "horrible," one person present told the news outlet, "I'm not in church."

They added, "I think what he was trying to do, but failed on the execution of it, was try to bring us together. The sermon was so long he couldn't bring it back to make the point."

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

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