Having all the sects of Christianity broken out and then not breaking out any other religions is pretty dumb, but if they’re still tracking the wider list for things like gravestone markers, and this just impacts the dog tags as @What_Exit says, it does seem fairly minor compared to many of the other ways Hegseth is gutting the military.
I don’t think I follow the distinction between “atheist” and “nonreligious”.
Atheist vs Agnostic seems to be about an individual’s personal relationship (or lack thereof) with the idea of divinity; from the perspective of the military figuring out “which religious services and accomodations do we need to offer this individual”, the answer seems to me to be the same. Likewise, if I wanted to put down “Jewish” because I am connected to the culture and the people and would prefer talking to a rabbi than a priest and would like access to Kosher food, whether or not I personally believe in God or the story of the Exodus or whatever else doesn’t really come into play.
Is there some factor about this that I’m missing? I guess I don’t see why the army would break down “no” on the religion chart into Atheist vs Agnostic vs Cultural Jew vs Lapsed Catholic etc to begin with.
Firing competent Generals & Admirals, especially those that are of Color or Women. At least 3 dozen so far. Includes the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff & the Army Chief of Staff.
Stopping promotions of Women and Black Officers.
Eliminated anonymous complaints.
Authorized Drill sergeants to “physically interact” with recruits.
Renaming the Defense Dept the War Dept.
Conducting many very questionable military actions that have little or no precedence in US history.
I’m sure I’m forgetting a few more. All of these are much bigger issues than that 2 letter code, that honestly maybe shouldn’t exist at all.
Having spoken to military chaplains ideally that would be great but in reality that doesn’t always happen, especially in combat situations. It’s not at all uncommon for a military chaplain to have to attend not only to the needs of his co-religionists but also the needs of others to the extent he or she is able to do so. Of course, being human, how well this is done varies from one person to another.
When I started going to a local hospital system three years ago when some major health problems started I specifically stated “no religion” for the records. Somewhen along the line “Jewish” was appended to my records. I didn’t bother to kick up a fuss about it, but no one asked me if I wanted that changed, someone just did it.
At other times in my life I have encountered people for whom ridged boxes are very, very important and yes, they’d be the sort to force people to declare yes or no on religious membership.
And don’t forget the old Nuremberg Laws - any number of Germans who thought themselves Christians were suddenly declared “Jewish” by the state because of a grandparent’s faith.
Well, some members of the LDS are Republicans and they want answers. Whether they’ll get an updated list or not or just swallow the existing one remains to be seen.
They are in a tizzy about how the LDS is categorized, yet appear to not give damn about their constituents who had their religions eliminated entirely from the list.
Isn’t the issue that fundamentalist Christians in particular have always considered LDS to be outside “their” religion? In polls, a majority of fundamentalists don’t rate it a denomination although Christians generally do. I take this as another sign that Hegseth and cronies are Christian Nationalists. Having the military think their preferred religion is congruent with America would be mighty handy in a civil war.