[Vision2020] Soldiers Allege Punishment Over Christian Concert

Mon Aug 30 15:32:12 PDT 2010

Courtesy of the Army Times at:

http://www.ArmyTimes.com

Soldiers allege punishment over Christian concert 

Army officials launch inquiry

The Army is investigating alle-gations that soldiers were pres-sured to
attend a Christian con-cert - and punished when they refused.

Pvt. Anthony Smith says he was one of 80 soldiers in Advanced Individual
Training at Fort Eustis, Va., who were punished for opting not to attend a
Christian rock con-cert on post. The soldiers were confined to their
barracks, ordered to clean and were barred from using cell phones and other
elec-tronics, according to Smith and another soldier who has asked to remain
anonymous.

The Army is conducting an investigation into the incident, ordered by Lt.
Gen. John E. "Jack" Sterling, Training and Doctrine Command chief of staff,
TRADOC spokesman Harvey Perritt said. Perritt and a Fort Eustis spokesman
declined to offer details while the investigation continues.

Col. Thomas Collins, an Army spokesman at the Pentagon, said the military
should not impose religious views on soldiers.

"It's not a problem to hold a Christian rock concert on an Army post; it's a
problem if soldiers who didn't want to attend were com-pelled to attend or
feel punished for not attending," he said. "That is not consistent with Army
poli-cy." Smith said he believes his spiri-tual life should remain private.

"The religion thing being shoved down my throat is really something that
doesn't work for me," said Smith, now in Arizona with the 640th Aviation
Support Battalion. "As far as what I believe, I believe there's some-thing
out there, but it's a really personal thing with me. If I have a
relationship with God or that entity, it is not anybody's busi-ness, ever."
BarlowGirl, the Christian rock-ers who played at Eustis as part of a
Commanding General's Spiritu-al Fitness Concert Series, describe themselves
on their website as "tender-hearted, beautiful young women who aren't afraid
to take an aggressive, almost warrior-like stance when it comes to spreading
the gospel and serving God." The Military Religious Freedom Foundation is
readying a federal lawsuit, according to its founder, Mikey Weinstein. He
blasted the commander who originated the concerts as a "walking neon sign of
Defense Department-sanctioned, ignominious fundamentalist Christian
supremacy and excep-tionalism." On the evening of May 13, Smith was with A
Company, 1st Battalion, 222nd Aviation Regi-ment, which was in training at
the Army Aviation Logistics School. The student leader and the duty
noncommissioned officer, a first sergeant, assembled the company in
formation and marched it to the mess hall for dinner. After dinner, the unit
was marched to the parking lot just outside the concert venue.

"As soon as they told us we were marching to chow because we were going to
this concert togeth-er, people started to f---ing freak out, people started
to get angry," Smith said. "There were several Muslims in the company, and
peo-ple started getting upset right away." Smith said A Company appeared to
be the only group entering the concert as a unit.

Outside the venue, the troops were asked to split into two groups, those
attending and those who would not. Smith and the oth-ers who opted out were
marched to the barracks, where they were placed on "lockdown," their
activi-ties were restricted until the con-cert ended.

"Anybody in the military will tell you that lockdown is a form of
punishment," Smith said. "When we don't want to go to this concert and we're
not allowed to use our laptops or our cell phones or music, we're not
allowed to be sit-ting in our beds - that's a form of punishment." Smith and
eight other soldiers attempted to file a complaint with a succession of
Equal Opportunity officials in their chain of com-mand.

Smith said as he went through the ranks, each official tried to dis-suade
him from filing a formal complaint, and all but one of the soldiers who
first complained with him backed off.

Smith said he spoke with the company commander, who told him he took
responsibility for directing the first sergeant to send the unit to the
concert.

Smith and the other soldier, who asked not to be identified, said they would
be willing to join the planned federal lawsuit. Neither said they want to
see soldiers pun-ished; Smith said he wants sol-diers to "know and
understand" why he and the other soldiers were wronged.

"I want to help other people; I don't think that anyone should have to feel
this," Smith said. "I think that somebody should look into these spiritual
fitness events because I'm pretty sure all of them are Christian. I
guarantee I can't go to an Army base and see a Mus-lim rock concert
described as spir-itual fitness." Both soldiers said the incident has
changed their view of the Army and the country. The soldier speaking
anonymously about the incident said he fears people who are irreligious by
choice are no longer tolerated.

"We have mob rule, where it is purely Christian in every direc-tion," he
said. "For someone like me, you feel surrounded." Brig. Gen. Brian R. Layer,
who was the commanding general of the Army Transportation School at Fort
Eustis during the May inci-dent, inherited the spiritual fit-ness concert
series from Maj. Gen. James E. Chambers. A professed born-again Christian,
Chambers went on to Fort Lee, Va., and in April became director for
logistics at Central Command, MacDill Air Force Base, Fla.

As head of Army Combined Arms Support Command at Fort Lee, Chambers
duplicated the series, telling a post newspaper in 2008, "The idea is not to
be a pro-ponent for any one religion ... It's to have a mix of different
perform-ers with different backgrounds." Between 2007 and 2009, the Army
paid $125,000 to a booking agency for Christian performers for events at
Fort Lee and Fort Eustis, according to USAspend <http://USAspend-ing.gov>
-ing.gov, a searchable database of federal spending. The contractor was
Indiana-based Street Level Artist Agency.

Several performers who were publicized in the post newspaper and played at
Eustis in recent months all advertised themselves as conveying a Christian
message: Mark Schultz, Josh Wilson, the Micah Watson Band, Brandishing
Steel, True Liberty, Alathea, Phil Keaggy, SonicFlood and Barlow-Girl.

Lauren Barlow, a band member, said in her Twitter feed Aug. 21 that the band
"knew nothing at all about soldiers being forced to go to our show." A
federal lawsuit by Military Religious Freedom Foundation would be the third
in a series it has undertaken against the Army over the last few years. The
two prior lawsuits, which took aim at alleged proselytizing by members of
the armed forces, were dismissed.

In January, a federal judge in Kansas dismissed Spc. Dustin Chalker and the
foundation's law-suit against the Defense Depart-ment, ruling Chalker failed
to exhaust all available remedies before filing suit.

Chalker claimed his rights were violated when he was compelled to attend
military events at Fort Riley, Kan., where prayers were made without regard
to his status as an atheist.

Also in 2008, a voluntary dis-missal was filed in a federal law-suit in
which Spc. Jeremy Hall alleged he was harassed and dis-criminated against
because he is an atheist.

------------------

The Christian rock band BarlowGirl was performing in concert at Fort Eustis,
Va., when some soldiers protested that they were punished for deciding not
to attend.

ChristianBand_BarlowGirl.jpg

In my twenty years of Army service I had never experienced anything even
remotely similar to this allegation.

But then I retired back in 1989, long before enlistment criteria was
tragically weakened.

Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen

Moscow, Idaho

"Patriotism is not a short and frenzied outburst of emotion but the tranquil
and steady dedication of a lifetime."

-- Adlai E. Stevenson, Jr.

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