STATEMENT

Published On: October 14, 2015|Categories: MRFF's Inbox|0 Comments|

Accessibility Notice

This post was created on the previous version of the MRFF website, and may not be fully accessible to users of assistive technology. If you need help accessing this content, please reach out via email.

HI — WAS READING WHERE YOU ARE ALL TRYING TO CONTROL “GOD BLESS” SIGNS ABOARD A MARINE BASE IN HAWAII.

KEEP UP YOUR EFFORTS IF YOU FEEL YOU MUST, BUT GOD WILL WEN OUT AND BEAT BACK THE GREAT SATAN THAT IS CONTROLLING YOU.
GOD BLESS YOU ALL.
(name withheld)

Dear (name withheld),
There’s a whole lot more to the Military Religious Freedom Foundation than Mikey.
We are not satanic nor are we anti-Christian. Mikey is Jewish (and prays to the same Father we do 3 times a day) and 80% of the Board, Advisory Board, volunteers and supporters (244 in total) of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) are Christians. In fact, 96% of our 42, 711 soldier clients are Christians. We fight for the rights of Christians more than any other religion.
We are a diverse set of people that come from different religions or no religious affiliation and a wide variety of backgrounds, who work harmoniously together to defend and uphold the Constitution and Supreme Court rulings.
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) does NOT act on its own but at the request of our soldiers’ and their complaints of the blatant disregard and trampling of the Constitution and the Military Code of Justice; blurring the lines between the separation of church and state. Every complaint is vetted by Mikey who was a JAG lawyer at the Air Force Academy for 10 years; worked in the West Wing under Ronald Reagan; and held positions in private practice.
Our military is secular – which includes those of other faiths or no belief system – and it must not advance one religion over another according to the Constitution, Supreme Court rulings and the Unified Code of Military Justice. Religious activities must be in the hands of the Chaplains on Chapel grounds, not in the hands of the Commander on base-wide grounds.
As defenders of the Constitution we fight for the separation of church and state.
“…but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.” (Article I, III)
 
This means that from the President to Congress to the military – no one’s job is based on their religion.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion (Establishment Clause), or prohibiting the free exercise thereof (Free Exercise Clause).”(First Amendment)
 
The Establishment Clause means that you cannot favor one religion over another even though it is in the majority. This clause respects the RIGHTS of all religions. Our military is SECULAR and there are people of other faiths that don the uniform that love this country.
The Free Exercise Clause means that our soldiers are free to exercise any religion they want or no religion at all but cannot elevate one God above others.
“Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person’s life, freedom of religion affects every individual. Religious institutions that use government power in support of themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths, or of no faith, undermine all our civil rights. Moreover, state support of an established religion tends to make the clergy unresponsive to their own people, and leads to corruption within religion itself. Erecting the “wall of separation between church and state,” therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society.” Thomas Jefferson, to the Virginia Baptists (1808) ME 16:320.
This is his second known use of the term “wall of separation,” here quoting his own use in the Danbury Baptist letter.
This wording of the original was several times upheld by the Supreme Court as an accurate description of the Establishment Clause.
Jefferson’s concept of “separation of church and state” first became a part of Establishment Clause jurisprudence in Reynolds v. U.S.98 U.S. 145 (1878). In that case, the court examined the history of religious liberty in the US, determining that while the constitution guarantees religious freedom, “The word ‘religion’ is not defined in the Constitution. We must go elsewhere, therefore, to ascertain its meaning and nowhere more appropriately, we think, than to the history of the times in the midst of which the provision was adopted.” The court found that the leaders in advocating and formulating the constitutional guarantee of religious liberty were James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. Quoting the “separation” paragraph from Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptists, the court concluded that, “coming as this does from an acknowledged leader of the advocates of the measure, it may be accepted almost as an authoritative declaration of the scope and effect of the amendment thus secured.
 
In 1878 “separation of church and state” became part of the Establishment Clause BY LAW.
The Supreme Court heard the Lemon v. Kurtzman case in 1971 and ruled in favor of the Establishment Clause.
Subsequent to this decision, the Supreme Court has applied a three-pronged test to determine whether government action comports with the Establishment Clause, known as the Lemon Test.
Government action violates the Establishment Clause unless it:
1. Has a significant secular (i.e., non-religious) purpose,
2. Does not have the primary effect of advancing or inhibiting religion, or
3. Does not foster excessive entanglement between government and religion.
Parker v. Levy:
“This Court has long recognized that the military is, by necessity, a specialized society separate from civilian society… While the members of the military are not excluded from the protection granted by the First Amendment, the different character of the military community and of the military mission requires a different application of those protections. … The fundamental necessity for obedience, and the consequent necessity for imposition of discipline, may render permissible within the military that which would be constitutionally impermissible outside it… Speech [to include religious speech] that is protected in the civil population may nonetheless undermine the effectiveness of response to command.  If it does, it is constitutionally unprotected. (Emphasis added) Parker v. Levy, 417 U.S. 733, 1974
The sign fits into all 3 and therefore it is a violation of the Establishment Clause.
All we are asking is to move the sign to chapel grounds (where it belongs) and if not, allow other signs to be placed next to it to be in compliance with the Establishment Clause.
The winners in this fight to force the base to abide by our laws are the soldiers and the American people.
GOD BLESS YOU, TOO!
Pastor Joan
MRFF Advisory Board Member

Dear (name withheld),
“Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.” -Exodus 20:7
Is there anything more vain than using your own god as a passive aggressive insult against your political opponents? In your entire religion there is only one thing that you people claim your god wrote with his own hands, and it included these words. I would expect you to have greater respect for your own god’s words than you have for some piece of garbage sign. It’s ironic that the same crowd with a fetish for stamping the “Ten Commandments” all over government property is too incompetent to remember to follow them.
Find someone else to dazzle with your arrogance and hypocrisy.
Dustin Chalker
MRFF Atheist Affairs Advisor

Hi (name withheld),

No one here is under the control of anything but their intelligence. What we honor is our country and its constitution. While it may come as a surprise to you, the law and military regulations require the government, including the military, to act in a manner consistent with the separation of church and state as laid down in U.S. law.

You see, the protection of the freedom of religious choice means that the government cannot impose or seem to suggest a preference for one belief system over another. So while you’re free to bless us, and thanks for that, a military base commander is not. Were he to do as suggested and move the sign to the chapel grounds where it belongs, no one would have a problem with it.

For you to assume that our actions represent a hatred of religion is simply incorrect. For you to ascribe our actions to the control of “The Great Satan,” as you put it, magnifies incorrect into the realm of stupidity.

Best,

Mike Farrell

(MRFF Board of Advisors)

Share This Story

Leave A Comment