21 Endorsing Agencies For Military Chaplains Ask For New Conscience Protections

Yesterday, 21 Christian organizations that act as endorsing agents of U.S. military chaplains sent a joint letter (full text) to the Chief Chaplains of the three services urging adoption of "broad, clear, and strong protections for conscience" as the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is implemented.  The letter was apparently triggered by concerns after the Navy's Chief of Chaplains issued, and then suspended, a memo making base chapels available for same-sex marriages and blessing of civil unions in states where these are legal. (See prior posting.) Yesterday's joint letter reads in part:

Chaplains have a tremendous moral responsibility to insure that when they preach, teach or counsel, they do so in accordance with their conscience and in harmony with the faith group by which they are endorsed. When guidance, however, is forthcoming from senior leadership that implies protected status for those who engage in homosexual behavior and normalizes same-sex unions in base chapels, any outside observer would conclude that both homosexuality and homosexual unions officiated as marriages in base chapels are normative. This creates an environment that is increasingly hostile to the many chaplains—and the service members they serve—whose faith groups and personal consciences recognize homosexual behavior as immoral and unsafe and do not permit same-sex unions.

Alliance Defense Fund issued a press release announcing the joint letter.