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Message: <br /><br /> If you are having trouble reading this email, you may view this article online at: http://www.jweekly.com/36224/full/36224/enemies-within-lawyer-at-war-with-christian-extremism-in-the-military/ <br /><br /> <b>Enemies within?: Lawyer at war with Christian extremism in the military</b> <br /> Friday, November 21, 2008 | by dan pine <br /><br /><p>While the Pentagon worries about loose nukes falling into the hands of the Taliban, Michael "Mikey" Weinstein believes there already exists a nuclear-armed American version of the Taliban: Christian fundamentalists embedded in the U.S. military.<br /><br /> He's doing everything in his power to stop them.<br /><br /> A former military lawyer and now president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, Weinstein decries what he sees as a growing influence of religious extremists infiltrating the armed services.<br /><br /> And they worry about him. Weinstein's Albuquerque home has been shot at and vandalized with anti-Semitic graffiti. He routinely receives death threats, and he keeps his family protected with attack dogs, surveillance cameras and loaded firearms. <br /><br /> "I'm not kidding when I tell you it's a war," said Weinstein, who was in San Francisco Nov. 15 to be the guest speaker at the Great American God-Out, a one-day forum built around the idea that morality can exist independent of theology.<br /><br /> "We have 737 military installations scattered around the world in 132 countries, and in every one of them we have organizations of a fundamentalist Christian version of the Taliban or al Qaida," he added.<br /><br /> Weinstein's foundation represents 10,000 enlisted personnel who have complained of harassment, intimidation and even physical assault, usually because they practice other faiths. But sometimes it's because they practice the wrong kind of Christianity.<br /><br /> "It is virulently anti-Semitic and Islamophobic, virulently homophobic and misogynistic," he said of evangelical theology. "Their promise is a 200-mile long<br /><br /> river filled with human blood [of those] slaughtered at Armageddon. They believe the U.S. Constitution is of no significant moment at all. It's a weaponized gospel of Jesus Christ."<br /><br /> Weinstein filed a class-action lawsuit against the military and the Defense Department. It alleges what he calls "a pervasive, pernicious pattern and practice of rape of religious liberties of service personnel." The case is moving through federal court and Weinstein hopes to take it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.<br /><br /> Lest anyone accuse Weinstein of being an anti-military leftist, he is a lifelong registered Republican, a third-generation graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy and a former lawyer in the Reagan administration.<br /><br /> With the chaplain corps a longtime military tradition, and with all faiths represented in the armed services, why worry about fundamentalist Christians, especially when they represent only about a third of active duty personnel?<br /><br /> Weinstein has a Humvee full of reasons. "The Officers Christian Fellowship wants officers exercising Christian principles to 'raise up a godly military,' " he said. "They call themselves ambassadors for Christ in uniform. They push their Bible studies on subordinates. They say, 'We should not allow an opposition spearheaded by Satan to oppose us.' "<br /><br /> He cites incidents of beatings and intimidation. His own sons, both Air Force Academy graduates, were called "Christ-killers" while in the service.<br /><br /> To illustrate his adversaries' disregard for the Constitution, which forbids any religious test for government office, he quotes Gen. Cecil Richardson, the Air Force deputy chief of chaplains, who told the New York Times in 2005 that the Air Force "will not proselytize, but we reserve the right to evangelize the unchurched."<br /><br /> Added a disgusted Weinstein: "There's your religious test."<br /><br /> As a proud Jew, Weinstein believes his organization shores up the wall of separation between church and state. And he urges Jews to listen to what their "Jewish" DNA tells them about this issue.<br /><br /> "We [Jews] are the miners' canary for morality," he said. "We have seen this train leave the station over and over, and that train goes to 'Slaughterville.' We end up with oceans of blood, generally beginning with Jewish blood."<br /><br /> Weinstein does not express much hope that the incoming Obama administration will do much about this problem, which has flown under the media radar. So does he believe his side can fight and win?<br /><br /> "We're like Israel," he said. "We have no choice. It's win or swim in ocean of blood. If we don't win, we're about a Tiger Woods putt away from Fundamentalist Christian States of America."</p>

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