Posted on 05/27/2015 8:53:39 AM PDT by yoe
A United States Marine was convicted at a court-martial for refusing to remove a Bible verse on her computer – a verse of Scripture the military determined “could easily be seen as contrary to good order and discipline.”
The plight of Lance Corporal Monifa Sterling seems unbelievable – a member of the Armed Forces criminally prosecuted for displaying a slightly altered passage of Scripture from the Old Testament: “No weapon formed against me shall prosper.”
Sterling, who represented herself at trial, was convicted February 1, 2014 in a court-martial at Camp Lejune, North Carolina after she refused to obey orders from a staff sergeant to remove the Bible verses from her desk.
[snip] Berry said the supervisor cursed at Sterling and ordered her to immediately remove the verses. She refused the order. The following day, she discovered the verses had been removed and thrown in the trash.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
The evidence was irrelevant, the judge rules on evidence every single day in our courts. The Marines may grant permission or deny permission. Provide an example of something that must be allowed without permission.
I tend to agree with you. The verse itself was harmless, and maybe even appropriate. But to allow it is to force the military to have to determine which verses are appropriate, and which are not.
And there is a second point to consider. If this marine is allowed to put up Christian quotes, then a muslim marine would probably be allowed to put up muslim quotes. We sure don't want to go down that road.
Even though I disagree with the woman in this case. I do admire her for trying to stand up for her Christian beliefs.
Was the Bible verse on an email signature? If that, I can understand. People are welcome to use those on their personal email, but when you apply that to a company (or government) email address, that is now representative of the organization to which I would then side with the supervisor.
If the verse was simply as desktop background or somewhere on the computer that wasn’t effecting others then she should have been able to do what she wants. As others have said, probably more to the story.
No denying that. My question is why was this Marine supposedly singled out. My take, again, is that she was a problem child, and had deeper issues and was trying to hide behind religion.
That being said, even though this is the Marines, and what an NCO says to do, if lawful, should be followed, if said NCO allows other Marines to do what this one Marine is denied, then there is an issue. Especially something as mundane as workstation decorations.
Want to make it stick? Then ensure all workstations have no personal items on them. Problem solved.
When I was stationed at Osan Air Base, Korea, back in the late '80s/early '90s, we had several black Airmen who were wearing "Black to the Future" or "Black Power" t-shirts on base while off duty. Imagine the furor if a white person did the same. Base commander said all shirts of such type were banned on base, for all races/ethnicities. Problem went away, and no one could say "boo" about it.
So no, I don't think this issue was about religion, I do think it was about a problem child, but the Marines could have helped themselves significantly by ensuring no one had any personal items on their workstations. Period.
Remember what happened to Larkin.
The issue in the 70’s was what decorations and personal items on display in rooms, especially posters. The easy out for commanders and First Sergeants was to simply ban all posters, but the Army was giving soldiers a little control over their little piece of the Green Machine. Better solution was for commander and First Sergeant to make decisions on case by case: if the poster needed to go down, down it came. In the end, the Army has the authority and can exercise it as required.
That would be called Mr. Obama, the Sect. of Defence and his (anti-Christian) leadership at the Pentagon.
What kind of Christian chooses to work for a virulently anti-Christian government?
Christians can not work for the anti-Christ. We have “progressed” that far.
Yeah. This is not that kind of thingy
She can stand up for her Christian beliefs on her time, with certain restrictions. Then when she gets ‘out’dhe can continue
See if she does this when she works for a corporation
I’ll tell you. As a Christian being told My soul is in joepardy for not being of another denomination is unacceptable attention work, during war and trying to do my job. Unacceptable
Right. And it began before the Bamster. What was Bush’s major war cry against the islamists? “Islam is the religion of peace.” He’s a retard or a liar. Obama is pure anti-American evil.
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