MILITARY’S ‘DON’T ASK/DON’T TELL’ REPEAL: Consequences I Warned of Coming to Pass
Congress was about to repeal the ban on sodomites in the armed forces in 2011 when I warned it of several problems that might arise from doing so. And as leaders now punish servicemen who speak the truth about sodomy those foreseen problems have become a reality. Congress should respond by reversing its disastrous decision.
I wrote a letter to the House Armed Services Committee in 2011 urging it to reconsider removing the ban on sodomites in the armed forces. I listed six specific issues that had not been addressed regarding the repeal and I implicitly warned of the consequences that would come from it. One of the issues I warned about is that chaplains would be intimidated into silence or punished if they spoke the truth about sodomy. That’s apparently now proven to be an accurate assessment.
The Navy reportedly punished Lieutenant Commander Wes Modder, a Navy Chaplain, for adhering to his Christian faith with regards to sexuality. I warned of this happening in my 2011 letter.
The briefing explicitly stated that chaplains will not be required, in the context of their religious ministry, to take actions inconsistent with their religious beliefs. And a scripted answer to a hypothetical scenario reiterated the same notion. Yet our group discussion concluded that the reality will be that if a Service member complains of hearing a chaplain speaking against homosexuality the chaplain will suffer either official or unofficial blowback. The group concluded that to avoid this, chaplains will avoid the subject of homosexuality entirely, thus achieving a de factor silencing of belief.
Most chaplains likely haven’t addressed the issue of sexual morality since 2011. But in the case of a chaplain who did, he was (as I had assessed) punished for it. On top of this, Modder likely wasn’t just punished; he allegedly was set up by a junior sodomite officer.
The lieutenant junior grade officer went on to detail concerns about Moody’s views on “same-sex relationships/marriages, homosexuality, different standards of respect for men and women, pre-marital sex and masturbation.”
Modder said the young officer had only been working with him for about a month and would constantly pepper him with questions pertaining to homosexuality. He had no idea that the officer was in fact gay – and married to another man.
Repealing the ban on sodomites in the armed forces has been a disaster. And while surrendering to disastrous policies from the Obama administration has been something Congress has consistently done, it now is time to break from this record. Congress should once more ban sodomites from serving in the armed forces even as it restores First Amendment rights to everyone, including Christians.
Image: http://militaryatheists.org/news/2013/09/humanist-society-offers-free-weddings-gender-couples/
