Air Force Academy chaplain spoke out in NYT today -- fired!

[DeepModem Mom]

Thanks to Rose Siding for the update, following today's NYT story --


The NYT article:

Air Force Chaplain Tells of Academy Proselytizing
By LAURIE GOODSTEIN
Published: May 12, 2005

A chaplain at the Air Force Academy has described a "systemic and pervasive" problem of religious proselytizing at the academy and says a religious tolerance program she helped create to deal with the problem was watered down after it was shown to officers, including the major general who is the Air Force's chief chaplain.

The academy chaplain, Capt. MeLinda Morton, 48, spoke publicly for the first time as an Air Force task force arrived at the academy in Colorado Springs on Tuesday to investigate accusations that officers, staff members and senior cadets inappropriately used their positions to push their evangelical Christian beliefs on Air Force cadets.

The academy began developing the tolerance program, called Respecting the Spiritual Values of all People, or R.S.V.P., in response to a survey it took last year. The survey found that more than half of the cadets said they had heard derogatory religious comments or jokes at the academy.

For more than a year, the Air Force has been struggling to respond to accusations from some alumni, staff members and cadets that evangelical Christians in leadership positions at the academy were creating a discriminatory climate. Air Force officials say the task force they dispatched this week shows that they are taking the accusations seriously. The investigators are to make a preliminary report on May 23.

In an interview on Tuesday, Captain Morton, a Lutheran who has been a chaplain at the academy for two and a half years, said that the initial reception to the tolerance program helped illustrate the climate....

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/12/education/12academy.html?


The AP/WP update just posted by Rose:

Military Chaplain Says She Was Fired

By ROBERT WELLER and JON SARCHE
The Associated Press
Thursday, May 12, 2005; 5:48 PM

DENVER -- A top Air Force Academy chaplain said Thursday she was fired for speaking up about anti-Semitism and other reports of religious intolerance among cadets and staff, including allegations that evangelical Christians wield too much influence.

Capt. Melinda Morton said she was fired last week by her boss, Col. Michael Whittington, after he pressured her to deny a professor's account of a religious service for new cadets last year.

Both chaplains had been scheduled to leave the school this year, with Whittington, the academy's chief chaplain, retiring and Morton, his executive officer, scheduled for an overseas assignment. She called that an excuse to get rid of her.

"I believe I was fired and I believe the other staff would say I was fired and that was the point of doing it," she said in a telephone interview....

***

Morton said she was pressured to deny a report by Yale Divinity School professor Kristen Leslie that a chaplain told 600 cadets during basic training last year "to go back to their tents and tell their fellow cadets that those who are not born again will burn in the fires of hell."...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/12/AR2005051201214.html

[davidinalameda]

1. disgusting

I want to get out of this country!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

[candy]

4. Then why don't you? I believe in staying and fighting the

good fight. It's MY country as well as the fundies.

You certainly are free to leave.

[fooj]

2. Unbelievable!

:spank:

Peace.

[paineinthearse]

3. I'm surprised she was not tarred and feathered or burned at the stake

for herasy!