Clearly, the nation’s two largest churches {Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist] do play crucial roles in the chaplaincy program. A mere 234 priests serve the 25 percent of all military personnel who are Catholics. The Southern Baptist Convention has more than 1,500 approved chaplains, more than any other faith group.<\/p>\n
America’s military leaders will have to decide if doctrinally conservative chaplains will be allowed to honor their religious vows or not, said the Rev. Russell Moore, leader of the SBC’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, in a forum last week.<\/p>\n
The current trend, Moore said, is to view chaplains as “carriers of the American civil religion, in a way that seeks to counsel and to do some religious duties but not to actually be Roman Catholics or Evangelicals or Latter-day Saints or Muslims or what have you. I think that is troubling. … I believe in religious pluralism in the public square where everyone comes as he or she is into the public square for more dialogue and not less.”<\/p>\n