A writer for the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) has published a startling blog entry that, if true, should be a major story on the government’s indoctrination of flawed historical and constitutional accounts in training foreign military personnel. The article below discussed material used in International Military Student Officer (IMSO) program run by the Defense Security Cooperation Agency. It is run by the military but is under the supervision and direction of the Secretary of State. The author from MRFF, Chris Rodda, quotes from the material used in the training and it is pretty shocking.
The program trains military personnel on American government and values. The material includes the following passage:
Just as importantly, the church has a still-important role to play in the formulation of national values, ethics, and morals. Beginning with the liberal court of Franklin Roosevelt, the supreme court has divested American law from our religious cultural heritage. The justices have more pronouncedly than ever based their interpretations of law on the written verbiage of the us Constitution and increasingly less on the intentions of the founding fathers. The bible has become less and less an authority for the adjudication of complex legal issues.
This trend has led to the complete disestablishment of church and state. American secondary schools, which were originally intended to provide religious education, have evolved to produce responsible citizens. The ethics and morals of citizenship, however, must be taught in a complete void of American religious heritage. Since the 1960’s, American law has forbade organized prayer in public schools. As late as 1992, such common and traditional rites as non-denominational benedictions at graduations have been banned. Issues arise over the portrayal of christmas nativity scenes at or on public land. And even such long-standing verbiage on us coins — in God we trust — has come under attack.
Still, the values parents pass on to their children are, for the most part, those of our traditional, judeo-christian heritage. Without the benefit of public education, parents must rely on Sunday schools or their own tutoring to impart moral values. With this disestablishment of the church to the community level and with the shear vast diversity of the various sects and churches in this nation, one must wonder how we, as Americans, can claim any moral standards whatsoever. The answer lies in a greater ecumenical movement in to bring the majority of religions, sects, and denominations together on our basic values. For this reason, issues which are not given a second thought in nations possessing a religious homogeneity or majority, become major causes in the United States. The right to have abortions and civil rights for homosexuals are cases which immediately come to mind. Until reconciliation of traditional values occurs among the majority of churches, the debates will remain long and heated.
That passage is breathtaking in its biased and highly distorted view of both the law and history of free exercise in the United States. Putting aside the fanciful statement that the courts have divested our religious cultural heritage, I am not entirely sure what is meant by the statement that this change was caused “by their interpretations of law on the written verbiage of the us Constitution and increasingly less on the intentions of the founding fathers.” Most critics of separation of Church and State argue for a highly textualist reading of the First Amendment. The passage quickly descends into a diatribe. The complaint over the “complete disestablishment of church and state” is ironic since we have a prohibition on the establishment of religion. That would seem a good thing. The material goes further to complain about how “American secondary schools, which were originally intended to provide religious education, have evolved to produce responsible citizens. The ethics and morals of citizenship, however, must be taught in a complete void of American religious heritage.” That is the line that made me question the authenticity of this material. I cannot imagine any reasonable, educated official approving such language for inclusion in published material for the program — let alone writing such material. It reads like a bad parody of the movement against separation.
I would love to see links to the original material. I do not question the veracity of the author. Rather, this is so unsettling, the complete record should be made public to allow a broader discussion of how such material could ever have found its way into educational material for foreign military.
Source: Free Thought as first seen on Reddit.
Whether this is happening, there is quite the disturbing trend on religion being mixed with our military and their mercenaries. Jeremy Scahill writes about this as recently as May 2011.
Here is a segment from Democracy Now, May 2009: “The military is denying it allows its soldiers to proselytize to Afghans, following the release of footage showing US soldiers in Afghanistan discussing how to distribute Bibles translated into Pashto and Dari. We speak to Air Force veteran and former Reagan administration counsel Mikey Weinstein, founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, and journalist Jeff Sharlet, author of a Harper’s Magazine article on “The Crusade for a Christian Military.”
The dangerous mixture of church, state and heavily armed forces is happening now.
If Marx was right about religion being the opiate of the masses, this is surely a sign of a drug abuse problem.
Moar’s thought is reasonable: the passage is simply unbelievable, so let’s not believe it, at least not yet.
Well said Mespo!
Thanks AY. I figured it wasn’t a recent devised overlapping agency! Yikes.
“I do not question the veracity of the author.”
I do. I just came off deployment in September. I’ve never seen anything like what the author is describing, and I’ve been doing this since 2003.
This would not surprise me at all. There have been reports and videos of officers instructing soldiers on how they are involved in a crusade. What little information we can get on JSOC shows a group of people who may very well be christian end timers. The Family is a secretive group in the upper echelons of this and other nations, which definitely preaches end times christianity. In short, truly insane people are running things here and abroad.
I believe mespo’s quote is completely descriptive of what is happening in our society at this time.
1. never allow the public to cool off (permanent state of war);
2. never admit a fault or wrong (speaks for itself);
3. never concede that there may be some good in your enemy (hatred of tea baggers and Republicans by Democrats, hatred of Democrats or communists by Republicans–each group unable to concede their may be any humanity in the other);
4. never leave room for alternatives (austerity and more austerity);
5. never accept blame (speak for itself);
6. concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong (this has become more sophisticated). The population has been divided by careful focus grouping and an enemy created which appeals to each segment of that population–ie: Teabaggers for Obama supporters, communists for Republicans etc;
7. people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it (speaks for itself to almost every aspect of how we are taught to believe and obey and facilitate unjust authorities in the nation)
Frankly, I was really disturbed to hear that. That officer should have been court-martialed since it is a violation of the UCMJ. Do you know the base and when? That should be reported to MRFF.
This is simply an outgrowth of the Cold War in which the US supported right wing dictatorships and saw them as good and pro-American. So this is not too surprising since there is a big element within the military that disdains democracy. One only has to remember the problems FDR had with the military during WWII and the GOP.
I personally experienced this when I returned from Turkey and went to a lecture in Hartford, CT. It was about the Greek military dictatorship that had just staged their coup. I had the misfortune to take leave in Athens just a few days after. They had just lifted the curfew and during which the Greek military had killed about 5 airmen who were out during curfew. So needless to say, I and my fellow GIs were alert and apprehesive on a number of fronts. I got to talk with a number of Greeks who spoke English, and they were ALL against the coup and not very happy with the US and its support for the dictatorship.
The speaker was a retired US Army Col who was being a paid shill for the dictatorship and his presentation was standard Cold War rhetoric. One of his statements chilled me to the bone. He said that the Greek military had to suspend democracy to preserve it! I was astounded that no person in the audience objected to this formula.
While there are many in the military who take their oath seriously, there is a growing number who refuse to acknowledge the supremacy of our Constitutiion over their religious beliefs. It is time to conduct a purge of such officers and men and get them out of the US military.
My oldest decided to join the Army out of High School. He was rather shocked at what he found. One of the chaplains gave a sermon about how the end times were upon us because Bill and Hillary Clinton (Then in the White House) were the Anti-Christ.
this actually doesnt surprise me, there is a large Christian contingent of military officers across all branches of service.
Rather sobering to think the military elite in this country may be gunning for the second coming.
“American secondary schools, which were originally intended to provide religious education.” What the? Um. Noooooo. SOURCE! Yep, JT, a whole lot of wrong in this scary salad.
Blouise:
“This may be one of those times when the real enemy is within.”
*******************
“It is scarcely possible that the eyes of contemporaries should discover in the public felicity the latent causes of decay and corruption. This long peace, and the uniform government of the Romans, introduced a slow and secret poison into the vitals of the empire. The minds of men were gradually reduced to the same level, the fire of genius was extinguished, and even the military spirit evaporated.”
(…)
“The influence of the clergy, in an age of superstition, might be usefully employed to assert the rights of mankind; but so intimate is the connection between the throne and the altar, that the banner of the church has very seldom been seen on the side of the people. A martial nobility and stubborn commons, possessed of arms, tenacious of property, and collected into constitutional assemblies, form the only balance capable of preserving a free constitution against enterprises of an aspiring prince.”
~ Sir Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1788)
From the fall of the Roman Empire until today, that’s always the case.
Oh Canada….
“..one must wonder how we, as Americans, can claim any moral standards whatsoever.”
Indeed. A country that tortures, wages aggressive and illegal wars, imprisons on an industrial scale, murders its own citizens, engages in illegal domestic spying, suspends habeas corpus, and immunizes the rich and powerful from the consequences of law-breaking is hardly in any position to lecture or advise any other country on moral standards.
The tortured twisting of the reality versus the “intentions” of the founding fathers hinted at in these couple sentences ” …based their interpretations of law on the written verbiage of the us (U S) Constitution and increasingly less on the intentions of the founding fathers. The bible has become less and less an authority for the adjudication of complex legal issues.” is frightening.
Indeed, this entire presentation needs to be thoroughly researched and sourced and responsibility for this dangerous material be assigned to the “original” authors and those who approved their rants.
This may be one of those times when the real enemy is within.
And people wonder why I am encouraging my kids to emigrate. My country has gone mad & it will be a very long time, if ever, before it gets well.
raff,
It came after the lend lease….I think it came about during JFK reign but was started by DDE….I may be wrong…but 1960 or 1961….
What the hell is the Defense Security Cooperation Agency?
mespo,
I think you’ve hit the nail on the hail….and I think this might lead to why we did not directly kill Gaddafi…There is more in the Psychological Profile that if read in context of today’s leaders we might be more afraid than ever….
“His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.”
~The OSS commenting of Hitler’s Psychological Profile