O’Reilly Interview w/Mr. Weinstein

Dear MRFF,

Just wanted to comment on a statement that Mr. Weinstein made on the interview last night.
He made the claim that eighteen individuals out of hundreds on the Guantanamo Bay installation
complained about Nativity scenes on the base, and caused the displays to be moved, after pressure
from your organization, and I’m sure his count was correct.
However he also stated that among those eighteen individuals were Protestants and Catholics that wanted the displays taken down, and I must dispute that as I have never know a follower of Christianity to be appalled or outraged by a display of the Nativity during the Christmas season.
If there were actually those that believe so strongly in the separation of church and state while at the same time profess to be practicing Catholics or Protestants then our nation and the world are in far worse shape than I can even imagine.
The interview itself went downhill pretty quickly as Mr. Weinstein was more evasive on answering questions directly than White House Press Secretary Jay Carney during an Obamacare questioning session.
And though I do believe that Mr. O’Reilly is rather full of himself most of the time, he did make Mr. Weinstein look rather foolish and more like a jackboot for the A.C.L.U. than a savior of the Constitution.
I do not agree with what your organization does as I believe that there are enough secular watchdogs and government thugs prowling the streets, without another operation trying to remove God, Christianity, and religion from every nook and cranny of our Judeo/Christian founded nation, all in the name of tax-free donations and media exposure.
I’m sure you feel that your work is good and necessary, however I am curious as to what the five-year plans are for Mr. Weinstein and company, as there are only so many Nativity scenes, Ten Commandment displays, and crosses on public or government land that you can have removed.
MRFF and other operations of the same type are obsolete by design and by mission, and hopefully will cease to exist about the same time as the secular resident that currently occupies the White House.
Thank you for your time, and regards!

Sincerely,
(name withheld)

Hi (name withheld),

Mr. Weinstein is busy protecting the freedom of religion of the men and women in the miitary, so has asked me to respond to your message.

While acknowledging Mr. Weinstein’s point about the MRFF acting at the request of members of the armed forces in calling for the removal of the Nativity scenes from military mess halls, you chose to begin your dispute by asserting his statement that the individuals making the complaint, or some of them, were Protestants and Catholics was not true.

There’s a lot to work our way through here, so please bear with me. The basis for your position, apparently, is that you’ve personally never known “a follower of Christianity to be appalled or outraged by a display of the Nativity during the Christmas season.” While I have no reason to doubt your statement, I’m sure you must realize that just because you’ve never known a Christian who took such a position doesn’t mean it can’t have happened. This group of military personnel, while I’m not sure they characterized themselves as “appalled or outraged,” objected on the perfectly appropriate grounds that placing the Nativity scenes in the mess hall breached the separation of church and state by making it appear that the government, in the form of the military, was promoting a religion. They understood, as did the commander of the base when it was pointed out to him, that putting a religious display in the mess hall rather than the chapel was inappropriate. In fact, Captain Nettleton said, “The spirit of the Navy’s policy on this is, if it’s religious, it goes to the chapel.” And that’s where they went.

And, by the way, no one objects to the Nativity scene being displayed in the chapel. This hardly indicates that our nation is in bad shape; quite the reverse, I think.

You then indicate your response is based on Mr. Weinstein’s appearance on Bill O’Reilly’s show, and I agree with you that the interview “went downhill pretty quickly,” but that’s what one expects on Bill’s show, wouldn’t you say? As you note “Mr. O’Reilly is rather full of himself most of the time.” I disagree that Mr. Weinstein was evasive in his answers and was made to look foolish by Mr. O’Reilly, but it’s certainly fair that people see these things differently. I thought Bill was the one who looked foolish by calling members of our armed forces “cowards” and pretending to offer Mikey the last word only to quickly interrupt him and then cut him off.

Your comments about the ACLU and “secular watchdogs and government thugs prowling the streets” and “the secular resident that currently occupies the White House” suggest an ideological position on your part that assumes an opposing one on the part of Mr. Weinstein and the MRFF. While you’re welcome to your view, you’re as wrong in trying to put a political spin on our position as you were about the Christians who felt the Nativity scene was in the wrong place. And it’s too bad. It seems that it’s hard for some who profess to be Christians to understand that there are many Christians who fully understand that there is nothing anti-Christian about separating religion and government. Supporting freedom of thought, freedom of choice and freedom of religion or non-religion is one of the strongest threads in the fabric of our nation.

But please know, even as you have no personal knowledge of such people, the MRFF is made up of people of many faiths and no faith. And of the people of faith, over 90% are Christians, some are clergy. And just as that is so, there is no political litmus test here either. People of all political persuasions dot our ranks, and proudly so.

And in that regard, you can count on us to be here for as long as it takes to ensure the protections of the Constitution apply to everyone.

Best,

Mike Farrell