Washington, USA - The U.S. Air Force Academy failed to accommodate minority beliefs but there is no overt religious discrimination at the college, an Air Force report on the religious climate at the institution said on Wednesday.
The report was prompted by allegations that the academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, which produces junior officers for the U.S. Air Force, promotes evangelical Christianity and a climate of intolerance toward other religious beliefs.
"The root of this problem is not overt religious discrimination, but a failure to fully accommodate all members' needs and a lack of awareness over where the line is drawn between permissible and impermissible expression of beliefs," stated the report, headed by Air Force Lt. Gen. Roger Brady.
Brady told a Pentagon news conference that he referred seven specific cases of "questionable behavior" by people at the academy to the military chain of command for possible disciplinary action.
"General Brady found that a combination of immature behavior by peers and barriers to reasonable accommodation had made some adherents to minority beliefs feel ignored by the institution," Acting Secretary of the Air Force Michael Dominguez said in a memo accompanying the report.
A team from Yale Divinity School said in April it found evangelical Christian proselytizing commonplace at the academy, which has about 4,400 students, and cited "stridently evangelical themes" by staff. The team described a campus chaplain telling cadets they would "burn in the fires of hell" if they were not born-again Christians.
The watchdog group Americans United for Separation of Church and State released an April report detailing allegations that academy instructors proselytized in classrooms and that senior cadets harassed non-Christian junior cadets over religious beliefs.
The report found a "perception of religious intolerance" at the academy, inadequate guidance regarding religious expression and cited a need for training in the area of religious diversity and respect. It recommended developing guidance for Air Force commanders and supervisors regarding religious expression.
'DONE BETTER'
"This is a premier institution wrestling with an issue that is a matter of widespread public debate that is not unique to the Air Force or the United States Air Force Academy. There are challenges at our academy. There are things that need to be done better," Brady told reporters.
The religious bias investigation came in the aftermath of a decade of sexual assaults and harassment against female cadets at the academy that a Pentagon report last December blamed on leadership failures by top Air Force officials.
An Air Force Academy chaplain who criticized the "pervasive evangelical climate" at the college resigned from the military ahead of the release Wednesday's report.
Air Force Capt. MeLinda Morton, a Lutheran minister, had publicly complained that evangelical Christians at the academy were bent on converting young cadets. Morton had worked closely with the Yale Divinity School team.
The allegations come after the Pentagon recently dealt with another case involving reports of religious intolerance.
Lt. Gen. William Boykin, a senior Pentagon intelligence official, referred in 2003 to the struggle against Islamic extremists as a battle with Satan.
In a speech, Boykin referred to a Muslim fighter in Somalia, and said, "Well, you know what I knew, that my God was bigger than his. I knew that my God was a real God, and his was an idol."
The Pentagon inspector general concluded in August 2004 Boykin should face "appropriate corrective action." A senior Army general later said unspecified action had been taken against Boykin.
The academy said this month admissions applications from high school students fell 22.7 percent this year compared to last, but did not offer a reason.
Of the 4,400 cadets at the school, about 93 percent are Christian, 1 percent are Jewish, and less than 1 percent are Buddhists, Muslims or Hindus, according to the academy.