Various laws, regulations, and processes come with religious exceptions. In order to qualify for religious exceptions, you need to follow a qualified religion.
It seems the deleted entries mainly consisted of Protestant denominations and Pagan groups. They also removed Atheist as a specific religion, and various entries like None Provided and Unknown. Many two-letter codes were changed, which may be confusing if you have groups of soldiers with a mix of old and new dog-tags.
As long as the flying spaghetti monster is still on the list, I'm fine. First they came for the Buddhists, then they came for the Abrahamics, then the Zoroastrians, but it will be a while yet before they get to me.
> The changes were iterated in a May 20, 2026, memorandum issued by the Under Secretary of War and signed by Anthony Tata, under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness of the United States, and obtained by Military.com.
FFS there is no such thing as "of war". It's still "of defense" until Congress actually passes a bill.
As for the rest of that topic... yeah. Fits the expectations one has these days when thinking about "how can the US Administration screw up the lives of anyone not fitting into the world view the average Fox News audience can squish in their brains".
It's notable that the original list with the extra 180 religions was from Trump's first term, so this is another example of the doubling down on white Christian identity politics that has come to define Trump's second term.
Also one small potentially controversial decision here that I find amusing in a narcissism of small differences kind of way, Mormons aren't considered Christian according to this list.
The choice with Mormons is technically correct. Those who use theological considerations to define Christianity generally don't accept Mormons as Christians. For example, the Catholic Church sees Mormonism a non-Christian religion, because it rejects the Nicene Creed. People who base Christianity on cultural identity are more likely to include Mormons in the definition.
It does seem to be common to make LDS not counted as Christianity, although the reason is unclear to me.
Another comment mentions that the rejection of the Nicene Creed does not seem to be the distinction.
I had thought that it is because they have the Book of Mormon, although that is unclear. Orthodox have additional books of the Bible that Catholics do not have, but are still Christian. (Although, I think the additional books that the Orthodox have are still a part of the Bible, and Book of Mormon is different.)
Something that I had heard is that it is because Mormons use a different baptism, which is not Trinitarian. However, it seems that it is Trinitarian, although this trinity is different from that of Christians (even though they still say "the Father", "the Son", and "the Holy Spirit").
Quakers (which are listed as Christian) also apparently do not use baptism (and reject other sacraments as well). Although the Religious Society of Friends is Christian, they do have differences and not all Quakers are necessarily Christian (or necessarily theists).
>> Something that I had heard is that it is because Mormons use a different baptism, which is not Trinitarian. However, it seems that it is Trinitarian, although this trinity is different from that of Christians (even though they still say "the Father", "the Son", and "the Holy Spirit").
I had not heard that so I looked it up:
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Catholic baptism:
“I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” The matter is the water poured over the head of the recipient. Traditionally, the one being baptized has water poured over them or is fully emerged in water three times.
Each candidate is presented by name to the Celebrant, or to an assisting priest or deacon, who then immerses, or pours water upon, the candidate, saying
N., I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
(Some groups do it differently, but this seems to be common.)
Mormon baptism:
73 The person who is called of God and has authority from Jesus Christ to baptize, shall go down into the water with the person who has presented himself or herself for baptism, and shall say, calling him or her by name: Having been commissioned of Jesus Christ, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
74 Then shall he immerse him or her in the water, and come forth again out of the water.
And yet Jehovah's Witnesses are denoted on the list as a Christian faith. So whatever the distinction that is being made here, it isn't simply rejection of the Nicene Creed.
one core tenant of Christianity is that Christ the Messiah obviates prophecy. No denomination of Christianity (AFAIK) considers the LDS as true Christians...except for the LDS themselves
Just to clear this up, all the various "Christian" ministries that embrace modern prophecy and prophets are, therefore, not actually Christian?
From the beginning of the Assemblies of God, prophecy has been affirmed as a spiritual gift for the Church today. Since the Day of Pentecost, the Church has functioned as a prophetic community. Any Spirit-filled believer may prophesy while discernment and judgment of prophecy belong to the full body of Christ.
And to make it clear since you didn't say it, Assemblies of God is on the list categorized as Christian while the LDS Church isn't, so this doesn't appear to be the distinction the list makers had in mind.
Ok I looked at the list. There are 31 entries, which are "no religion", "agnostic", Baha'i, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, Sikh, and 22 different varities of Christian (Baptist, Catholic, etc.). Sheesh. At least they didn't get all the way to “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912".
Religion provides certain benefits in the military. If you are say a Christian, you get assigned time to go to a (hopefully) air conditioned church and relax and recover. Even if it’s short, it can be beneficial to collect yourself in a high stress situation like basic training/boot camp.
If you elect not to go to a religious service, you typically have to keep doing whatever you are doing. Atheists or other less organized religions should be treated equally under the law. If a Christian gets a 90 minute religious service, an atheist should also get 90 minutes to do whatever they want.
You also see this reflected with something like The Satanic Temple advocating for human rights under the guise of religion.
In my opinion, religious organizations should not have any more rights or privileges than businesses.
I am curious how the variety of faith based practices could be handled…I’m super on board with providing a universal spiritual/mental health space regardless of your affiliation. That gets very weird when you start having to account for the variety of schedules and practices.
I am pretty sure I disagree on religious orgs having no more rights than a business. I think that seriously under accounts for the degree of identity that folks get from their religious affiliations and the types of activities businesses and religious groups tend to do.
A business and religious group are pretty fundamentally different…I’d have to reflect a lot longer and harder to come up with a more stable and coherent stance on that. I can definitely think of valid arguments on either side.
This was true 20 years ago (not sure about now). As an atheist/agnostic in basic training I used to try different church services to get away from the barracks on Sundays. If you didn’t you were definitely assigned some cleaning detail instead of having down time. At the time it didn’t come across as discrimination and felt more like a way to keep control. At various times when control was lax bad stuff happened, e.g. fighting, sex, awol, etc. In a new light this does seem like it has a disparate impact.
As somebody who works with data and humans, I know it's not a good idea to use the absence of information as information. Then you need confidence that the absence was on purpose, and means a specific thing. Whereas you could simply not omit the information.
It being a "list of religions" is just a semantic distraction, like saying "bald" shouldn't be on a list of hair colors.
Atheism is not a religion, and someone who is religious can also be atheist (and some religions are not theistic), although having no religion does not necessarily make you atheist either (although many atheists are not religious). (However, considering that, putting "agnostic" in there seems to be strange compared to this.)
Howveer, when knowing what should be in the list, there is the question of what the information is used for, in order to know what divisions are helpful for this purpose.
There are lots of problems with this, but taking off UU is sort of ironic and shortsighted in particular, given that the UU community is probably a good source of chaplains given the nature of the religion. You can see this in the comments.
FFS there is no such thing as "of war". It's still "of defense" until Congress actually passes a bill.
As for the rest of that topic... yeah. Fits the expectations one has these days when thinking about "how can the US Administration screw up the lives of anyone not fitting into the world view the average Fox News audience can squish in their brains".
Also one small potentially controversial decision here that I find amusing in a narcissism of small differences kind of way, Mormons aren't considered Christian according to this list.
Another comment mentions that the rejection of the Nicene Creed does not seem to be the distinction.
I had thought that it is because they have the Book of Mormon, although that is unclear. Orthodox have additional books of the Bible that Catholics do not have, but are still Christian. (Although, I think the additional books that the Orthodox have are still a part of the Bible, and Book of Mormon is different.)
Something that I had heard is that it is because Mormons use a different baptism, which is not Trinitarian. However, it seems that it is Trinitarian, although this trinity is different from that of Christians (even though they still say "the Father", "the Son", and "the Holy Spirit").
Quakers (which are listed as Christian) also apparently do not use baptism (and reject other sacraments as well). Although the Religious Society of Friends is Christian, they do have differences and not all Quakers are necessarily Christian (or necessarily theists).
So, I don't know.
I had not heard that so I looked it up:
-----------
Catholic baptism:
“I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” The matter is the water poured over the head of the recipient. Traditionally, the one being baptized has water poured over them or is fully emerged in water three times.
Source: https://ascensionpress.com/blogs/articles/the-ultimate-guide...
(Some) Protestant baptism:
Each candidate is presented by name to the Celebrant, or to an assisting priest or deacon, who then immerses, or pours water upon, the candidate, saying
N., I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Source: https://www.bcponline.org/Baptism/holybaptism.html
(Some groups do it differently, but this seems to be common.)
Mormon baptism:
73 The person who is called of God and has authority from Jesus Christ to baptize, shall go down into the water with the person who has presented himself or herself for baptism, and shall say, calling him or her by name: Having been commissioned of Jesus Christ, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
74 Then shall he immerse him or her in the water, and come forth again out of the water.
Source: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/dc-test...
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I am not an expert, but they all seem mostly the same to me?
( no vested interest here, I've got Wagyl riding shotgun on the stagecoach of my life )
The religion list doesn't mean that much. The religious respect requirements for the armed forces are codified in law; the DoD can't alter them.
(explanation: https://www.fpcmarion.org/2024/04/die-heretic/ )
There's also this: https://theonion.com/various-deities-still-sorting-through-v...
Like…leave the religion off the dog tag and that communicates enough right? What’s there to recognize?
I’m super not trying to be antagonistic. I’m trying to understand why an atheist would be upset by this.
If you elect not to go to a religious service, you typically have to keep doing whatever you are doing. Atheists or other less organized religions should be treated equally under the law. If a Christian gets a 90 minute religious service, an atheist should also get 90 minutes to do whatever they want.
You also see this reflected with something like The Satanic Temple advocating for human rights under the guise of religion.
In my opinion, religious organizations should not have any more rights or privileges than businesses.
I am curious how the variety of faith based practices could be handled…I’m super on board with providing a universal spiritual/mental health space regardless of your affiliation. That gets very weird when you start having to account for the variety of schedules and practices.
I am pretty sure I disagree on religious orgs having no more rights than a business. I think that seriously under accounts for the degree of identity that folks get from their religious affiliations and the types of activities businesses and religious groups tend to do.
A business and religious group are pretty fundamentally different…I’d have to reflect a lot longer and harder to come up with a more stable and coherent stance on that. I can definitely think of valid arguments on either side.
It being a "list of religions" is just a semantic distraction, like saying "bald" shouldn't be on a list of hair colors.
Howveer, when knowing what should be in the list, there is the question of what the information is used for, in order to know what divisions are helpful for this purpose.
That’s what was officially on my docs, the whole time while in the Air Force
Athiesm continues to not be a religion despite religious people trying to make it stick