Chaplain: Morality and belief can’t be legislated

A command sergeant major, I worked for during my Army active-duty time in the 1980s commented how confused he was over religious and faith expression. As a military leader during his tour in Vietnam, he would have to discipline pagans if caught practicing solstice events.

As a practicing Baptist (yes, that is my faith, our history is ripe with drownings, torture and being killed for our faith in Europe), I am aware of cultural and legal acceptance of practicing a faith not in the majority. Twenty years later military chaplains then provided accommodations for a   “controlled burn” to occur during solstices.

Americans have always believed in a variety of different faiths and spiritual practices. Catholic, Wiccan, Hindu, Protestant, NONEs or no religion, Native American, Shinto and Jewish, to name a few. In the 21st century, data is gathered, documented and shared of who believes what of different spiritual/faith practices.

Pew Research’s Religious Landscape Study of 2023-24 (www.pewresearch.org) indicates that the “religiously unaffiliated” now comprise 29 percent (2007 was 16 percent) of U.S. adults compared to Christians at 62 percent.

One group of the religiously unaffiliated, the atheists, who adhere to a humanistic philosophy has been increasing. There are even atheist churches now. Another place atheists gather for spiritual development and community is in Unitarian Universalist Churches.

Paganism (think Valhalla) and witchcraft are now accepted in culture today. Satanism is another belief practice. This past holiday season, the Satanists of Minnesota had an approved plaque through the Minnesota Department of Administration (which runs the Capitol Complex buildings) on display Capitol Rotunda.

Our First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution “prevents Congress from making laws respecting an establishment of religion; prohibiting the free exercise of religion; or abridging the freedom of speech, the freedom of the press, the freedom of assembly, or the right to petition the government for redress of grievances.”

Morality and belief cannot be legislated. We live in a country where people are not legally prosecuted for their beliefs and practice in a faith or religion. Our country’s founders recognized that legislating a faith expression for all violates the human conscience of autonomy. Amen to this.

Kelley Ackerman of Pine Island Post 184 is the chaplain for The American Legion Department of Minnesota.