Wreaths

From: (name withheld)
Date: December 12, 2021 at 8:09:50 PM MST
To:[email protected]
Subject:Wreaths

You know, just when you think that we’ve reached an end of people looking for things to be upset about, a group like yours raises the bar.So suddenly after over 30 years NOW these wreaths are a problem? Then you pile on the hyperbole of how this is a desecration and an insult to our honored dead, come on!Americans have been doing this with little to no problems. The families of these fallen service men and woman haven’t raised  a stink but you and your devine group of misfits know better than anyone else! The people just aren’t as enlightened as you neophytes are so you will save them from their poor, ignorant minds, their souls will be saved, by you of course since the THOUSANDS of the workers and the fallen families themselves are just so evil! Please, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart, shut the fuck up, stop trying to fix a problem that only exists in your minds and craw back into whatever cesspool you’ve crawled out of. We do not need or want your self serving “help”!Merry Christmas 

(name withheld)

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Response from MRFF Board Member John Compere

On Dec 12, 2021, at 8:40 PM, John Compere wrote:
Your clueless condemnation reflects only on yourself & reveals only your insolent ignorance.
For your information, some families of deceased military veterans do not want a religious organization to which they do not belong or adhere profiting, promoting its religion version & marketing itself by presumptuously putting its religious wreaths on the graves of their deceased loved ones without permission. Those families consider it uninvited & unwanted intrusions on the personal burial sites of their deceased family members.
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation represents, when requested, the religious freedom rights of those families to object & prevent what they believe to be thoughtless trespasses on their family graves. We do so because we respect their wishes & the religious group responsible for laying the religious wreaths does not. To become informed, see militaryreligiousfreedom.org.

Brigadier General John Compere, US Army (Retired)Disabled American Veteran (Vietnam Era)Board Member, Military Religious Freedom Foundation (composed of 85% Christians)

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Response from MRFF Advisory Board Member James Currie

Dear (name withheld),

I have been asked by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation to respond to your recent email. I would like to say that your message to the MRFF was reasonable, thoughtful, and made a really good point. But, that would be a total misrepresentation of what you wrote. You apparently do not have any understanding of the First Amendment to the Constitution, a document that everyone who ever served in the military has sworn to support and defend. In case you do not recall—or maybe you have never read the Constitution—the First Amendment reads as follows:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Please read that first sentence of the amendment. Are you a scholar of the Constitution? What do you think it means? Well, here’s what President Thomas Jefferson, someone who actually knew all of the men involved in composing the First Amendment, wrote about it in 1802:

“I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people [that is, the First Amendment] which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.”

What this means is that our government has to remain neutral when it comes to religion. It can’t favor one religion over another, and it cannot allow a private group to take it upon itself to decorate veterans’ graves with symbols of any particular religion. You seem perfectly satisfied with a Christian symbol being placed on a veteran’s grave, but what if it were some other religion’s symbol? Suppose a Muslim group or a Hindu group were to decide to go among the tombstones in your local VA cemetery and place the icons of their religion on the graves there. Would that meet with your approval? I suspect that it would not, and MRFF believes that a Muslim or Hindu group has no more business doing such than does a group that is placing a Christian symbol on the graves. And, please don’t tell me that the Christmas wreath is non-sectarian. For at least 200 years the wreath has been a symbol of Christianity, recognized as such the world over. I could go on, but that’s probably enough. MRFF exists to protect the religious freedom of all veterans, including those who are no longer able to speak for themselves. That’s what this is all about.

Col. James T. Currie, USA (Ret.)

Board of Advisors, Military Religious Freedom Foundation

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Response from MRFF Advisory Board Member Mike Farrell

On Dec 13, 2021, at 9:37 PM, Mike wrote:
(name withheld),
You might take your own advice about shutting up.
Or as an alternative, wake up. There is a legal premise in this country declaring that there shall be a separation between the church and the state. There is also a group of Christians who believe deeply that America is and must be a Christian country and do everything they can to make their belief a fact, despite the constitution and decades of legal understanding holding that America is a secular nation in which everyone has the right to believe as she or he chooses.

Those particular Christian folks make their intentions known in various ways, one of which is to ignore the beliefs of those who are not Christians and sometimes to try to snowball them by acting as if they don’t matter or don’t exist.

It is the purpose of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation to protect the separation of church and state, which is under attack by religious zealots. It is further endangered by the casual attitude of many citizens who don’t think much about the freedom of religion because they’ve either taken their faith for granted, don’t see a problem or just don’t much care.

Christmas wreaths celebrate Christmas, which is a Christian holiday. It’s lovely that people want to share their joy about Christmas by decorating the gravesites of veterans, but just as Christian families might not appreciate having their loved one’s gravesite adorned with a Jewish symbol on a Jewish holiday or a Muslim symbol during a special period for followers of Islam, such decorations should be done thoughtfully and ,more important, respectfully.
We have no problem with these wreaths being placed on veteran’s graves if their families welcome them and approve. But it is the responsibility of the organization laying the wreaths to do the necessary research that will allow them to do so appropriately and respectfully. To casually presume that every family welcomes a Christmas wreath on the grave of their loved one is insulting to the many non-Christian American families whose loved one fought for this country and everything it stands for, including the right to believe or not believe as one chooses.
Mike Farrell (MRFF Board of Advisors)

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On Mon, Dec 13, 2021 at 10:30 PM (name withheld) wrote:

You are operating under the false assumption that the wreath people are those “certain type of Christians” when in reality it is overwhelmingly people just trying to do something good. I am not a Christian, I am Wiccan, but if someone put a wreath on my grave or that of my family, I would accept it in the manner it was intended and not get my panties all tied up. You should try it!!

(name withheld)

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Response from MRFF Advisory Board Member Mike Farrell

On Dec 15, 2021, at 9:43 PM, Mike wrote:
To repeat,

We have no problem with these wreaths being placed on veteran’s graves if their families welcome them and approve. But it is the responsibility of the organization laying the wreaths to do the necessary research that will allow them to do so appropriately and respectfully. To casually presume that every family welcomes a Christmas wreath on the grave of their loved one is insulting to the many non-Christian American families whose loved one fought for this country and everything it stands for, including the right to believe or not believe as one chooses.
Whether the people behind this are “that certain type of Christian” or not, what they aredoing is presumptuous, insensitive and dangerously insulting to those of other beliefs,.
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/12/6/2067841/-So-called-non-profit-claims-its-Xmas-wreaths-aren-t-Xmas-wreaths-but-sells-them-as-Xmas-wreaths

Mike Farrell (MRFF Board of Advisors)

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