Air Force chaplains perceive widespread discrimination in assignment, promotion, and career progress, and they do not believe the situation will improve.
"Racial, gender, and religious discrimination exists within the Chaplain Service—now more subtly than overtly," an independent survey concludes. "There is a general lack of confidence and faith in the integrity of the senior leadership."
The study comes in the wake of controversial remarks last year by Brig. Gen. Lorraine Potter, the then-deputy chief of Air Force chaplains, that "African-American chaplains are good pastors and preachers but cannot do staff work."
Potter's successor is Charles Baldwin, a Southern Baptist from Texas, who says he gives "an invitation at every chapel service." Baldwin told an Air Force diversity task force to use the report to recommend changes.
Among the respondents, 97 percent of African Americans, 80 percent of women, and 58 percent of Protestants said they "sensed or directly experienced" discrimination. "Evangelicals appear to continue to lag behind 'mainline' Protestants in promotion," the report notes.
The Air Force chief of staff, Gen. Michael Ryan, said he was "concerned about reported perceptions of race, gender, or religious affiliation discrimination or preferential treatment. We must fix the condition underlying these perceptions."
While we pray for peace, we need moral clarity about this war.
A Christian reconciliation group in Israel and Palestine warned that war would come. Now the war threatens their relevance.العربيةFrançais
Christian artists work at the intersection of music and climate change.
