Thursday Afternoon, October 21, 2021 |
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NAVY INSTALLATION PUTS BIBLE
ON POW/MIA TABLE — MAKES IT EVEN
MORE EGREGIOUS BY USING BIBLE THAT
MRFF GOT BANNED BY THE NAVY IN 2012!
"Besides the obvious, unconstitutional utilization of ONLY the majority faith’s scriptures (the Christian Bible) to the utter exclusion of ALL other faiths’ and non-faith traditions’ scriptures on that POW/MIA Table display, that particular Bible, the so-called “Sailor’s Bible” produced by Holman Bible Publishers, has LONG been banned by DoD and the U.S. Navy. Why, you may ask? Because Holman Bible Publishers had been blatantly violating the Trademark and Licensing regulations of DoD for years through its unauthorized and illicit usage of the U.S. Navy emblem and other branch emblems on its military Bibles."
— Mikey Weinstein to Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, California, commander Captain Roberto C. Dumlao
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MRFF OP-ED
ON DAILY KOS
Navy Installation Puts Bible on Missing Man Table — Uses Bible Banned by the Navy in 2012!
By: MRFF Senior Research Director Chris Rodda
Thursday, October 21, 2021
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Back in 2012, after receiving countless complaints about Bibles bearing the official military branch emblems showing up on PX and BX shelves across the military, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) took action, successfully getting these military Bibles, published by Holman Bible Publishers, disallowed by all four military branches. This wasn’t a difficult fight, given that Department of Defense (DoD) trademark and licensing regulations are crystal clear on the subject, unambiguously stating that official military emblems cannot be used on items promoting religion. Holman Bible Publishers changed the covers of their military Bibles from sporting official military branch emblems to a more generic design, and life went on.
In recent years, the most common complaint received by MRFF, replacing the previous most common complaint of the Holman Bibles, has been the placement of Bibles on POW/MIA table displays at military installations and VA facilities. These tables, also called "missing man" tables, are a tradition started during the Vietnam War era in which a table is set with an empty chair, acknowledging those service members who are missing in action or prisoners of war. These tables are found in military dining facilities and elsewhere on military installations, set up as permanent displays, and it is also a common practice at events such as military balls and banquets to perform a ceremony during which the table is set while a script is read explaining the symbolism of each item as it is placed on the table.
The original POW/MIA table display, as first created by a group of combat pilots during the Vietnam era, did NOT include a Bible. The practice of adding a Bible didn’t begin until over thirty years later, when a script for setting the table was published in a 1999 issue of the VFW Ladies Auxiliary magazine. A nearly identical script, also adding a Bible, was shortly thereafter adopted by the National League of POW/MIA Families, and gradually over the years the original Bible-free tradition was forgotten and the National League of POW/MIA Families version began to be mistakenly followed as the “tradition.”
Just as MRFF received a constant stream of complaints about the Holman military Bibles until 2012, we now receive a constant stream of complaints about POW/MIA tables.
Now these two issues have collided at the Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, California, where a POW/MIA table in the facility’s break room not only contains a Christian Bible, but the particular Bible displayed is the Holman “Sailor’s Bible,” one of the Holman military Bibles with the official branch emblem that MRFF got banned by the military back in 2012!
Someone must have had an old edition of this Bible from before Holman changed its design to remove the illicitly used official Navy emblem and decided to add it to the display, not only turning the table, which should honor ALL POWs and MIAs, into a divisive display of Christian privilege but doing so with a Bible that has been banned by the Navy for nearly a decade.
As one Air Force judge advocate described the Holman Bibles back when MRFF got them disallowed, the use of official military emblems on them had been “a big step towards establishing the Holman Christian Standard Bible as the official religious text of the military services of the United States.” In the same sense, the untraditional “tradition” of adding any Christian Bible to POW/MIA tables by military installations is seen by many, both Christian and non-Christian, as a symbol that Christianity is the de facto official religion of the military.
Over the last five years, MRFF has had great success in getting military bases and VA facilities to remove the Bibles from their POW/MIA tables, or to replace the Bible with a generic book to be inclusive of service members of ALL faiths (see links to examples in the below e-mail), but not all commanders and VA facility directors have been amenable to making their POW/MIA displays honor those of all faiths or no faith. In one case, at the VA Medical Center in Manchester, NH, where a group of obstinate Christian nationalists has actually bolted a large Bible down to a POW/MIA table in an unsightly plexiglass box, two of MRFF’s clients are currently in federal court fighting to get the now ludicrously displayed symbol of Christian supremacy removed.
What will happen at the Navy Operational Support Center, Alameda, California, where the issue of a Bible on a POW/MIA table has been heightened by the Bible itself being one that is banned by the Navy, is yet to be seen. MRFF founder and president Mikey Weinstein has sent the following e-mail to the installation’s commander, and is awaiting a response:
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Email from MRFF Founder and President
Mikey Weinstein to Captain Roberto C. Dumlao, Commander of Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, California, demanding that
Bible be removed from POW/MIA table
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Subject: VIOLATIONS OF LAW UNDER YOUR COMMAND! U.S. Constitutional Civil Rights & DoD/U.S. Navy Trademark and Licensing Violations at NOSC Alameda
Date: October 20, 2021 at 10:04:40 AM MDT
Captain Roberto C. Dumlao,
This notice constitutes an official demand for you, as the Commander of Naval Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, California, to IMMEDIATELY cease and desist from the current U.S. Constitutional civil rights violations and DoD/U.S. Navy Trademark and Licensing Violations under your direct command.
For the particulars of these egregious illegalities for which you are directly responsible, please see the October 18, 2021 explanatory e-mail further below from MRFF Senior Research Director Ms. Chris Rodda.
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) has received complaints from U.S. Navy personnel at your facility regarding the inclusion of a Christian Bible prominently included with the POW/MIA Table display in the break room. (See the photos sent in a follow-up e-mail to this one.)
There are dual noxious illegalities associated with NOSC Alameda’s usage of this sectarian Christian Bible in the aforementioned POW/MIA Table display as detailed below.
Besides the obvious, unconstitutional utilization of ONLY the majority faith’s scriptures (the Christian Bible) to the utter exclusion of ALL other faiths’ and non-faith traditions’ scriptures on that POW/MIA Table display, that particular Bible, the so-called “Sailor’s Bible” produced by Holman Bible Publishers, has LONG been banned by DoD and the U.S. Navy. Why, you may ask? Because Holman Bible Publishers had been blatantly violating the Trademark and Licensing regulations of DoD for years through its unauthorized and illicit usage of the U.S. Navy emblem and other branch emblems on its military Bibles. MRFF led the charge in 2012 to stop Holman Bible Publishers from further producing and selling these unlawful Bibles. (Again, see more information below on this sordid matter.)
Capt. Dumlao, perhaps it might be useful for you to understand that the U.S. Navy is a vastly diverse organization and, further, that not all sailors practice the Christian faith, just as not all POWs and MIAs were or are Christians.
Diversity is the true strength of our armed forces. Indeed, new Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, made it clear when he first assumed his position that he desired to be the lodestar for racial and religious diversity, inclusion, and equality throughout DoD.
Sadly, Capt. Dumlao, it doesn’t seem that you even remotely support the Defense Secretary’s clarion call for universal diversity in DoD.
Your prominent inclusion of ONLY the Christian Bible (and, wretchedly exacerbated by the fact that you are using one that was explicitly banned by DoD nearly a DECADE ago!), on your unit’s POW/MIA Table display not only violates the U.S. Constitution’s No Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, it also tears asunder the good order, morale, discipline, and unit cohesion of those sailors who have to see it under your command. Additionally, it viciously violates the Core Values of the United States Navy. Truly, it is an imperious act of fundamentalist Christian supremacy, exclusivity, exceptionalism, and domination.
CAPTAIN ROBERTO C. DUNMLAO, YOU ARE DIRECTED TO PERMANENTLY REMOVE THAT ILLICIT “SAILOR’S Bible” FROM YOUR POW/MIA TABLE DISPLAY IN YOUR BREAK ROOM AT NOSC ALAMEDA FORTHWITH!
Subject: POW/MIA table at Naval Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, CA
Date: October 18, 2021 at 9:01:11 AM MDT
Regarding the complaints about the Bible on the POW/MIA table at Naval Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, CA, there are two big problems with this display.
The first, of course, is that the display of a Bible by a government entity is an unacceptable and unconstitutional promotion of religion, and on this solid ground alone we have successfully gotten quite a few military bases and VA facilities to remove Bibles from their similar displays or to replace the Bible with a generic book to be inclusive of service members of ALL faiths:
The second problem in the case of this display is with the particular Bible on the table.
The Bible is a Holman “Sailor’s Bible.” This is one of the Holman military Bibles that were disallowed by the all of the military branches, including the Navy, back in 2012 for violating the DoD’s Trademark and Licensing regulations, which strictly prohibit the use of the official DoD seals on items that promote religion.
A Bible that has been disallowed by the Navy for its violation of DoD regulations should obviously not be on display anywhere on any naval base!
And, as you well know, the original POW/MIA tradition did NOT include a Bible. These table were not intended by their creators to be religious. They were meant to honor ALL service members who were POWs or MIA. The practice of adding a Bible to this previously non-religious tradition didn’t begin until 30 years after the tradition was started.
These are two article I wrote that contain the real history of the POW/MIA table:
“Bibles don't belong on POW remembrance tables”
This article was a bit sarcastic, but contains the history of the table in a bit more detail:
“Apparently, the American Legion Hates Jesus”
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Close up of banned-since-2012 Holman "Sailor's Bible" on POW/MIA table
at Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda, California
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Email of appreciation for MRFF's efforts from
US Navy Officer and MRFF Client at Navy
Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda
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"Deeply Grateful for the Support
Only MRFF Can Provide"
From: (name withheld)
Date: October 20, 2021 at 12:33:17 PM MDT
Subject: Deeply Grateful for the Support Only MRFF Can Provide
Dear Mikey,
I cannot express enough gratitude for your incredibly swift support. I’ve relied upon MRFF in the past and I am always amazed at how quickly you respond. I recently discovered a banned Holman Bible on my command’s POW table. Within 30 minutes of reporting the violation to MRFF, I received your email reply and was personally talking to you on the phone about the situation. By the next day, you worked with your Pentagon contacts, sent out multiple emails, phoned the command relentlessly, and demanded they immediately remove the contraband Bible.
What I appreciate most is your tenacity when upholding the Constitution. It was obvious that the Navy Operational Support Center (NOSC) Alameda was attempting to ignore you. I’m guessing they’ve never dealt with you in the past, and are thus unaware that Mikey doesn’t just go away. You made more progress in a single day than I ever could have alone. If I tried to fight this battle without MRFF, I undoubtedly would have made no progress against the overwhelming power of conservative thinking and military stubbornness. Such a fight would have adversely impacted my career, which is unfortunate when my only goal is to uphold the Constitution.
For how much the military talks about promoting Constitutional ideals, it is unfortunate when the military hypocritically fails its own standards. I can never thank you enough for your unstoppable passion to hold the military accountable when no one else will. You are a true American patriot, no matter how many rightwing conservatives say otherwise.
US Navy Officer and MRFF Client
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Recommended Reading from around the web: |
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SALON
Interview: Religion scholar Anthea Butler on "White Christianity" and its role in fueling fascism
By: Chauncey DeVega
Tuesday, October 19, 2021
Author of "White Evangelical Racism" explains how a specific strain of Christianity became a toxic political force.
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WORD & WAY
The War on Military Chaplains
By: Brian Kaylor & Beau Underwood
Tuesday, October 19, 2021
Word & Way combats the right-wing lie that Christian military chaplains are in danger of court-martial from the Biden administration.
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“Catholics in Support of COVID Vaccine”
From: Catholic MRFF Supporter’s E-Mail Address Withheld
Subject: Catholics in Support of COVID Vaccine
Date: October 13, 2021 at 4:03:09 PM MDT
To: Mikey Weinstein
As a Catholic, I have the greatest respect for Archbishop Broglio, his service to the church and his flock. Nothing in my views on vaccines changes that.
Over time there have been many controversies over many different vaccines. These are certainly personal opinions and decisions.
However, just as our conversation toward one another, and ability to work through disagreements has changed (unfortunately for the worse), our communication style has something in common with vaccinations; that being the general unwillingness to consider others.
Pope Francis has urged all Catholics to get vaccinated. To protect all, as an act of love. Pope Francis has called this a lifesaving and an ethical obligation. Do we not “violate the sanctity of conscience” when we do not consider the most vulnerable?
In the matter of vaccines, consider the words of the Pope Francis, and the value of considering others in all things; from vaccines to daily communications and conflict resolution.
Catholic MRFF Supporter
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“you low leftist scum”
From: (name withheld)
Subject: you low leftist scum
Date: October 20, 2021 at 4:20:04 PM MDT
To: Information Weinstein <mikey@militaryreligiousfreedom.org>
They were talking about you on the radio show today Weinstein. Just another Christian hating lowdown leftist scum. They said that you are a jew. Thanks there Captain Obvious.What else could you ever be?Anyways can’t wait until you burn in hell.We’ll be cheering on the flames from our front row seats. In heaven.
(name withheld)
To see responses from
MRFF Advisory Board Member Mike Farrell,
MRFF Board Member John Compere,
and MRFF supporter Jude:
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