Regarding your e-mail to the MRFF

Dear  (name withheld),

I am in receipt of the e-mail you sent to the Military Religious
Freedom Foundation. You wrote: “YOU ARE ONE FUCKED UP ORGANIZATION AND
I HOPE YOU AND YOUR COMMI BASTARDS GET WHATS COMING TO YOU IN TIME!
GO BACK TO NATZI GERMANY YOU SICK BASTARD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

To begin with, why don’t you take off your hood, put the sheet back on
your bed and try to pay attention for a minute or two. Are you ready
to listen now? Okay, good; here we go.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation endeavors to respond to all
incoming e-mail; however, Mr. Weinstein is not able to answer all
e-mails personally and therefore I have the good fortune to respond to
many inane e-mails such as your own. Please understand, however, that
as a result of the sheer volume of hate mail, death threats and
vandalism to the home and vehicles of MRFF Founder and President,
Mikey Weinstein (including having the windows of his home shot out
multiple times) by Fundamentalist Christian bigots such as yourself,
we are turning over all death threats and suspect correspondence to
the FBI for follow up.

Mr. Weinstein is the Founder and President of a Foundation which
represents people of all faiths and no faith at all. In fact, 96% of
our clients are Christians. Yes, you read correctly – 96% of the
MRFF’s clients are Christians! They are in fact Christians who are
discriminated against by Fundamentalist, Dominionist Christians who
don’t consider them Christian enough. Furthermore, the Military
Religious Freedom Foundation’s largest institutional sponsor is the
California Council of Churches IMPACT, which is comprised of some
5,500 Protestant congregations, 21 different Protestant denominations
and 6.5 million Protestants. However, we do represent servicemen/women
and veterans of all faiths, as well as atheists, etc. Our work is
focused on not only representing those servicemen/women and veterans
who face discrimination based on their religious beliefs, but on
working to prevent such discrimination. That is how we got involved
with the Franklin Graham case. We stand up against anyone who would
impose their religion on others within the U.S. Military and
Department of Veterans Affairs.

Of course individuals like you frequently try in vain to justify your
hateful actions by appealing to “Judeo-Christian values”. As a
religious Jew I can tell you absolutely that there is no such thing.
Jewish values have nothing in common with Fundamentalist Christian
predatory proselytizing and bigotry. Of course individuals like you
also like to harken back to the “good ol’ times” – times that featured
slavery, segregation, widespread misogyny, lynching and the Klan. And
finally, individuals like you seek to argue that this is a Christian
Nation, founded on Christian values; once again you couldn’t be more
wrong. Our Nation’s founders were men of the Enlightenment and they
didn’t want religion within a thousand yards of government. But of
course you would only know this if you bothered to read what they’d
written. Have you ever bothered to read Washington, Adams, Jefferson,
Madison, Monroe and Hamilton? I have. And I’ve read the Federalist and
Anti-Federalist Papers as well. Have you? How about the Treaty of
Tripoli?

The Treaty of Tripoli, signed at Tripoli in 1796 and both ratified by
Congress and signed into law by President Adams in 1797, makes clear
that the United States of America is NOT a Christian Nation. In fact,
Article 11 of the Treaty of Tripoli reads, “As the Government of the
United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the
Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against
the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen,—and as the said
States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any
Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext
arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of
the harmony existing between the two countries.” Also, after he signed
the treaty into law, President Adams affixed the following statement
to the document: “Now be it known, That I John Adams, President of the
United States of America, having seen and considered the said Treaty
do, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, accept, ratify,
and confirm the same, and every clause and article thereof. And to the
End that the said Treaty may be observed, and performed with good
Faith on the part of the United States, I have ordered the premises to
be made public; And I do hereby enjoin and require all persons bearing
office civil or military within the United States, and all other
citizens or inhabitants thereof, faithfully to observe and fulfill the
said Treaty and every clause and article thereof.”

None of us who work for or support the work of the MRFF in any way
hate Christians. In fact, as previously stated we represent far more
Christians than any other faith group. However, we will not tolerate
the predatory proselytizing of any group within the U.S. Military and
Department of Veterans Affairs. And we will expose religious bigotry
and hate wherever we find it.

In conclusion let me reaffirm that the Military Religious Freedom
Foundation does not support or promote in any manner any faith
whatsoever. However, we are committed to stopping the ongoing,
virulent and aggressive Fundamentalist Christian proselytizing within
the U.S. Military and Department of Veterans Affairs. It is this
subset of Christians who most endanger everyone within the ranks of
the Military and within the facilities built to provide humane medical
care for our veterans. Not long ago I had the opportunity to
personally represent three veterans (two were Catholics, one was a
Jewish agnostic) who did multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. All
three had been wounded in combat, and all three had been diagnosed
with PTSD at the time of their honorable discharges. They contacted
the Foundation because all three had been refused therapy, including
for their PTSD, by their local V.A. Medical Center because the center
concluded that the three of them were unwilling to become “born
again”. Thankfully, I was able to get this problem fixed for them;
however, it seems as though you condone this inhumane and
discriminatory practice. Is that what you call supporting our troops?

Do you honestly want the U.S. Military and Dept. of Veterans Affairs
to continue to discriminate against people based on their religion?
Don’t you see that discriminating against anyone’s religious beliefs
is fundamentally not only a violation of the United States
Constitution, but an act of evil? The more likely answer is that you
just don’t care about people other than yourself. With that said, I
will wrap this up with just one more friendly suggestion. Next time
you decide to try to overcome your deep-seated insecurity and
self-loathing by hurling profanity and insults (even if you do it
while quoting or misquoting the Christian scriptures), remember it
just makes you look and sound pathetic; in fact it exposes not only
the paucity of your intellect, but the lack of any foundation to your
argument. It exposes the reality that you are, quite simply, a fool.
So, good luck with that.

Sincerely,

Akiva David Miller
Associate Director of Development
Military Religious Freedom Foundation