Cadets For Christ Solicits Letters to the Air Force Academy to Use as Ammo

[Joanne98]

This is the most recent development in an outrageous story that has been developing over the better part of this year, so, for those who need to be brought up to speed, here's what's going on in as small of a nutshell as I can put it:
There's a fundamentalist ministry operating at the Air Force Academy called Cadets For Christ. This ministry is part of the "shepherding" movement, using cult-like tactics by which the cadets recruited by ministry leaders Don and Anna Warrick are separated from their families and anything else that might interfere with their brainwashing. In the shepherding movement, the female is the "sheep" and the male is the "shepherd," and a woman's sole purpose in life is to be a good wife and mother, subordinating herself to her male shepherd.

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) has been contacted by a number of parents of Academy cadets who have fallen prey to the Warricks' ministry, and one of these families has been brave enough to go public with their story.

Peter and Jean Baas, the parents of 2010 Academy graduate Lauren Baas, are now completely estranged from their daughter. Why? Because the Baas family is Catholic, and therefore, according to the Warricks, unsaved. While at the Academy, Lauren Baas, who entered the Academy with dreams of becoming an Air Force pilot, was prepared for what can only be described as an arranged marriage by the Warricks, and is now engaged to her shepherd. A woman, of course, is destined by God to be a good wife and mother and serve her shepherd, not be an Air Force pilot and serve her country.

http://www.talk2action.org/story/2010/12/23/94258/335/Front_Page/Cadets_For_Christ_Solicits_Letters_to_the_Air_Force_Academy_to_Use_as_Ammo

[PassingFair]

1. Baas?

Would be funny if these fundies weren't so influential.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

2. The Air Farce Academy has been a cesspool of

christian bigotry and insanity for years. The last new commander promised to clean it up, but even he claimed it would take more than 6 years. 6 YEARS?

[mudplanet]

9. Actually, it sounds like a reasoned plan, but I don't have faith he'll do it

And as the Air Force has the keys to something along the line of 4000 nuclear weapons, it scares me.

[Foolacious]

3. I sent this email to USAFA

I sent it to USAFA Superintendent Lt. Gen. Mike Gould ([e-mail]), USAFA head chaplain Col. Robert Bruno ([e-mail]), and Chaplain Lt. Col. Dan Brantingham ([e-mail]), as suggested at the Talk2Action website.

Gentlemen:

When parents send their children off to the United States Air Force Academy, they send them with pride and with expectations that their children will learn, grow, and serve their country with honor. It's a new world for these young men and women, and they find themselves facing new situations and stresses. This is inevitable, and it's how things must be if they are to mature. But during this time of transition -- particularly in the first year -- these cadets are vulnerable to outside influences, as are all people at that age.

I believe it is appropriate for USAFA to support its young charges in making this transition into adulthood. And as a federally-funded (to a large degree) facility, it is reasonable for USAFA to provide facilities and clergy so that students can engage in their normal religious activities, but not to encourage, endorse, or be seen to be endorsing any particular faith or set of religious customs, nor any faith at all. It is therefore NOT appropriate for USAFA to provide ready access to students by Cadets for Christ or any other proselytizing religious organization. These students' religious beliefs are a private matter. Their parents have a stake and a say in those beliefs; USAFA does not, whether directly, or by facilitating or condoning the activities of Cadets for Christ and other like organizations.

Please protect these kids in your care. At the very least, do not be -- nor permit yourselves to be seen as -- a conduit for the recruitment of cadets into organizations that most parents would consider to be cults.

Respectfully --

[FreakinDJ]

5. I hope you cc: the Commander in Chief

[BlueMTexpat]

4. Sects like Cadets for Christ are truly frightening.

They pose an immediate threat to American life and prosperity.
Not only that, but they are actually in the US and their actions are not only condoned, but encouraged, as can be seen in the Baas case.

[Lint Head]

6. Killers for Christ.

Hey, I know Christ would just love him some Air Force jet fighter cannon killing.

[starroute]

7. A ministry that tells Academy graduates to leave the military?

Given how much this country invests in educating each of these students, how could the Air Force Academy dream of giving house room to a ministry whose purpose is convincing female graduates not to serve? How is this even legal?

http://www.ask.com/wiki/United_States_military_academies#Duty_commitments

Students at four Service academies (not including Merchant Marine Academy) incur a minimum five year active duty commitment and if in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps or Coast Guard have an additional three year reserve commitment.

[yurbud]

11. that is nuts, but there probably is a rationale for it that is internally coherent, like the ban on

gays.

I think the ban on gays survived for as long as it did for two reasons:

1. to make conservative Catholics and Evangelicals feel a natural sympathy and kinship with the military.

2. to maintain the stigma on homosexuality so it can still be used to blackmail and control closeted gays in positions of power or to extract information.

[yurbud]

8. it's part of an effort to make our military a partisan enforcer for the right like it is in the

Third World.

You can't go Pinochet until you've got an officer corps that will follow the Pinochet order.

[mudplanet]

10. Exactly