The Religious Right's attempt to take over the Air Force Academy

[bobbieinok]

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_363.shtml

....

The Air Force Academy, located in Colorado Springs, is surrounded by right-wing evangelical groups, several of which maintain close relationships with the academy's faculty, staff, and cadets. These groups and the military officials who follow them have been integrating evangelical Christianity into official academy activities for at least 12 years. Over this time, they have promoted evangelical beliefs to cadets, used their religion as a tool for military training, and encouraged religious conformity on campus.

....

Also situated on the far north side of Colorado Springs is New Life Church, where it was built, in part, so it could be seen from the Air Force Academy. <1> Sporting Air Force colors, the silver and blue megachurch, along with its leader Ted Haggard, are there not just to be seen, but to aggressively recruit new members for what they believe to be a "spiritual war" of epic proportions.

Haggard, who many consider to be more influential than Dobson, meets with President Bush or his advisors every Monday and leads the nation's most powerful religious lobbying group: the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), which claims about 45,000 churches consisting of 30 million members nationwide.

Haggard's influence deserves notice because he preaches that wars, disasters, and other tragedies are opportunities for spreading evangelical Protestantism throughout the world <2> and that the end result of globalization will be a final spiritual battle between Muslims and evangelicals. "My fear," he told Jeff Sharlet of Harpers Magazine, "is that my children will grow up in an Islamic state."

For this reason (see above link) Haggard believes "spiritual war" requires a military component. He teaches a "strong ideology of the use of power, of military might, as a public service" and supports preemptive war because he believes the Bible instructs Christians to proactively abolish sinners. He told Sharlet he believes in violent warfare because "the Bible's bloody. There's a lot about blood."

One New Lifer who spoke to Sharlet thinks of Colorado Springs as a "spiritual Gettysburg" -- "a battleground between good and evil." He believes God called him to Colorado Springs and says many of the people he knows, including those working at the surrounding Air Force Bases, feel the same way. <3> "I'm a warrior for God. Colorado Springs is my training ground," he said.

The religious organizations of Colorado Springs, which literally surround the Air Force Academy, have been influencing school activities and interacting with academy officials and cadets for over a decade.

more....

[NMMNG]

1. Onward Christian Soldiers

Literally.

[JohnyCanuck]

2. I can just see Jesus right at home in a B2 cockpit

dropping some depleted uranium tipped bunker busters on the evil doers (when he is not otherwise engaged offering advice to the president of course)


"So if I understand you correctly, Jesus, I nuke Iran and then invade N. Korea? Or do I nuke N. Korea and then invade Iran? And do I do this after we spread the bird flu at anti-war protests and quarantine all the commies? "

[C_U_L8R]

3. The fundies want their own bomb wing

... nuclear of course.

Jesus told em so.

[TrogL]

4. So how pervasive is this in the officer corps?

Are my hopes of a left-wing military coup dashed?

[yurbud]

5. this hasn't had time to filter up--the pay off will be decades away

The generals at the pentagon got their spurs as junior officers in Vietnam or earlier.

[niyad]

6. our local alternative paper has had a number of articles on this

issue, including two extensive articles about officers and former officers who are fighting this BS:

http://www.csindy.com/csindy/2006-03-02/cover.html

http://www.csindy.com/csindy/2006-03-09/cover.html