Several House Republicans slammed a proposal to provide secular/atheist chaplains in the military claiming it would be a mockery.
Rep. Rob Andrews (D-NJ) proposed an amendment to the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act this past Wednesday during meetings of the House Armed Services Committee that would allow humanists and other members of moral cultural groups to become members of the military’s chaplain corps. Andrews raised the issue as a means of providing services to members of the military who don’t believe in God but wanted to obtain counseling services without seeking the assistance of medical professionals.
However, several Republican members of the committee objected saying atheists cannot offer counseling services as they have no belief or would offend dying soldiers or family members. Rep. Mike Conaway (R-TX) stated:
“They don’t believe anything. I can’t imagine an atheist accompanying a notification team as they go into some family’s home to let them have the worst news of their life and this guy says, ‘You know, that’s it — your son’s just worms, I mean, worm food.'”
Rep. John Fleming (R-La.) went on to add:
“This I think would make a mockery of the chaplaincy. The last thing in the world we would want to see was a young soldier who may be dying and they’re at a field hospital and the chaplain is standing over that person saying to them, ‘If you die here, there is no hope for you in the future.'”
Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), the top Democrat on the committee, responded that:
“To say that an atheist or a humanist doesn’t believe anything is just ignorant. The response to the gentleman’s amendment makes me feel all the more the necessity of it.”
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