VA accused in Texas lawsuit of religious bias
The right-wing hyena mob is working itself up again, this time over some long-overdue common sense that, predictably, offends their smug, religious sense of entitlement.
There’s a deep strain of angry Christians in this country that simply cannot abide the notion that their religion isn’t universal and mandatory, or that religious tolerance requires not imposing public displays of, let alone mandated allegiance to, their religious beliefs in areas that properly fall within the individual’s sphere of private conscience. And the merest request that they should actually keep their religious ceremonies to themselves, still less at someone else’s funeral, is an attack on their rights, or religion in general.
This is the policy that caused the fuss. Note that it explicitly declares that families can have the flag thing read at funerals by government staff – if they request it. It also notes that it was a “gross error” in the text (referring to Isaac, Abraham, and Jacob as “gods”) that caused the complaint – obviously by a religious family. And it does not even cite religious neutrality as the reason for the directive (it cites the lack of any official definition of “the meaning of the folds of the flag”). This is what has caused the entire outrage among the shriekingly ignorant and apparently illiterate right-wing.
Department of Veterans Affairs
Date: September 27, 2007
From: Director, Office of Field Programs
Thru: Each MSN Director
To: Each Cemetery Director
Subj: The Meaning of Each Fold of an Honor Guard Funeral Flag
It has come to my attention that cemeteries may be distributing a handout entitled, “The Meaning of Each Fold of an Honor Guard Funeral Flag” and/or posting the handout in cemetery buildings. I have also learned that our volunteer honor guards may be using the handout as a script and reciting the meaning of the thirteen folds of the flag while the interment flag is folded during the committal service.
There are various versions of the script circulating by anonymous authors. Some of those scripts are religious in nature and also ascribe meaning to the individual folds put into the flag. We have recently received a complaint sent to the President of the United States that there was a gross error in the handout with reference to the 11th fold “…glorifying the Gods Abraham, Isaac and Jacob”.
There are no federal laws related to the flag that assign any special meaning to the individual folds of the flag. The National Cemetery Administration must not give meaning, or appear to give meaning to the folds of the flag by endorsing or distributing any handouts on “The Meaning of Each Fold of an Honor Guard Funeral Flag.”
Effective immediately all national cemeteries are to refrain from distributing any handouts on “The Meaning of Each Fold of an Honor Guard Funeral Flag”; remove any postings from all cemetery buildings and discontinue our VA-Sponsored Volunteer Honor Guards from using the handout as a script at a committal service during the folding of the flag.
The only time the reading of “The Meaning of Each Fold of an Honor Guard Funeral Flag” is authorized in our national cemeteries is when the next-of-kin arranges for military honors with their local VSO and requests the reading during the committal service.
Peace
