by Matt Barr

Air Force Academy rife with religious intolerance

I hate to spoil the ending, but the Denver Post reports:

A former Air Force Academy cadet commander did not violate the Constitution or any military policies when he e-mailed classmates 300 quotations, including 30 that either mentioned God or quoted the Bible, Air Force officials said Tuesday.

Nicholas Jurewicz, now a second lieutenant, graduated with academic, military and athletic distinction a week ago.

Before he left the academy, he sent a farewell message to 3,000 freshman, sophomore and junior cadets....

Jurewicz's e-mail was a compilation of quotes that he collected during his four years at the academy. He quoted war heroes, politicians, rock bands, authors, poets, religious figures and the Bible. Among those quoted: Mother Teresa, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi and Pink Floyd.

"The legal review determined that there was no attempt to convince any of the recipients of the intrinsic value of any one quote or quote source," academy officials said in a release. "Considering the facts of the message and the attachment in their entirety, legal experts determined that there were no law or policy violations."

The academy's legal office also determined that Jurewicz's use of e-mail to send the quotes was proper because he acted within the authority of his position as cadet wing commander.

So why is this news? Because he'd already been convicted by Big Media (and some smaller) of being a fundie theocrat brainwasher. The Colorado Springs Gazette consulted an unidentified "theology expert" who told it "the e-mail is less a reflection of the cadet’s desire to convert others than it is a signal that the encroachment of religion into official academy business is pervasive and not being dealt with effectively."

Yale "pastoral care expert" Kristen Leslie said, "Obviously, this cadet thought he was sending meaningful things to his colleagues. In the context of the larger picture of what the academy is going through, he didn’t get it." If it wasn't meaningful, then who cares?

The "doesn't get it" baton is taken up by Chaplain Capt. Melinda Morton, "an outspoken critic of the academy’s handling of religious issues": "He’s supposed to be an example for all the other cadets, and he doesn’t get it."

Capt. Morton had more to say to the Denver Post. "This this is a prime example of what we've been talking about here in terms of leadership failure. If he doesn't understand the constitutional boundaries here, to use his position to espouse religious ideology, then who does?" Indeed, who does? Now that an official inquiry has said those "boundaries" weren't breached?

More Capt. Morton: "It talks about developing yourself in terms of character. Clearly the message is, if you're going to resource your character here at the Air Force Academy, you do that with evangelical spirituality. That's precisely what we've been talking about here." Precisely! Except not.

Reporting confidently that Air Force cadet flies afoul of rules on religious messages,", the Minneapolis Star-Tribune picked up the AP's account of E-MailGate, in which a Mikey Weinstein, "a 1977 academy graduate who has sent two sons there," dug deep into the adjective arsenal. "There couldn't be a more wretchedly timed example of the total and dismal failure of the senior leaders of the academy than having the No. 1 cadet breach the most fundamental and elementary rules of the religious tolerance program." Later, Weinstein apologized to Lt. Jurewicz. Ha ha! No, he didn't.

KRDO TV in Colorado Springs reported, LOUDLY, that "AFA WING COMMANDER VIOLATES RELIGIOUS CONDUCT RULES." "SOME ARE UPSET BY THE FACT THAT THE MESSAGE CARRIED HEAVY RELIGIOUS THEMES, A CLEAR VIOLATION OF THE ACADEMY'S NEW CODE OF CONDUCT," the station SAID. "THE E-MAIL LISTS SEVERAL REFERENCES TO JESUS, INCLUDING ONE VERSE TAKEN STRAIGHT FROM THE BIBLE." Straight from the Bible!

The Post, link above, tells us that among the 300 quotes were also sayings attributed to "Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Martin Luther King Jr., Winston Churchill, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Herman Melville, Rudyard Kipling, George Bernard Shaw, Isaac Newton, many generals - including Napoleon Bonaparte, Colin Powell, Robert E. Lee, Erwin Rommel and George Patton - and others." Today the AP tells us the "e-mail also included quotes from Buddha, Confucius, poets, authors, presidents and military leaders, among others."

Religious intolerance does indeed seem to be a problem at the Air Force Academy, in that references to God, the Bible and Jesus seem to be contributing to an apoplexy epidemic. But with the likes of Capt. Morton fighting to preserve our freedom from religion, as set out in the Separation of Church and State Clause of the constitution, we can all sleep peacefully. We WANT her on that wall! We NEED her on that wall!

UPDATE: Submitted to Wizbang's Carnival of the Trackbacks.

Browse books from Amazon.com:
free+speech First+Amendment church religion