Some Air Force members keep God as their co-pilot.
Some do not.
One airman says being an atheist at the Air Force Academy made him feel “like less of a person” than other cadets and officers.
The second lieutenant filed a complaint with the Air Force Inspector General’s Office a week before his June graduation documenting four years of discrimination against nonbelievers and non-Christians.
The complaint outlined a culture “systematically biased against any cadet that does not overtly espouse Christianity.”
Academy officials said they can’t comment on a filing at Air Force headquarters.
The Air Force issued a statement saying it “takes all allegations seriously and thoroughly reviews the merits of each case. In this case, the complaint was reviewed and the individual referred to the appropriate agency for assistance.”
The officer, now based in the eastern United States, said he’s waiting to hear the outcome. His name is being withheld at his request to protect his family from harassment and embarrassment and the officer from reprisal.
His formal complaint is among a swirl of allegations that the academy discriminates against non-Christians.
In response to a faculty and staff survey in February and complaints received since then, the academy started a training program Nov. 2.
After allegations became public last week, the academy began speeding up the task of sensitizing cadets to other faiths and nonfaiths.
In a notice issued Friday, Lt. Col. Chaplain James E. Ludwikoski, deputy senior chaplain, said the academy wants to form roughly 15 teams to make 144 presentations to cadets.
“As directed by the superintendent (Lt. Gen. John Rosa Jr.),” the notice said, “the timing for the religious diversity plan . . . has been moved up. Education of all 4,100 cadets will happen between Thanksgiving and Christmas.”
Training was among the suggestions in the second lieutenant’s complaint submitted in May.
The officer told The Gazette he followed the chain of command but was discouraged.
When he turned to the academy’s Military Equal Opportunity officer, “He told me that he was Christian and per his beliefs, he does not like to see anyone stray from Christianity. He told me that as a Christian, he had a duty to explain it to me,” the complaint said.
“I was very offended by this, given that his reaction was precisely what my complaint was based on — the perceived duty of Christians trying to ‘bring me back’” during work hours.
The officer said he brought up the issue as a freshman when forced to march in “heathen flight” for not attending church. The complaint also alleges:
c Commandant Brig. Gen. Johnny Weida advised cadets to be accountable “first to your God.” The academy and the Air Force say Weida meant cadets should place God, country, the Air Force and the academy above their teammates.
c The officer was denied an off-base pass to attend Freethinkers of Colorado Springs meetings, although Christian cadets were given passes to attend off-base church services. The cadet also was denied permission to form an on-base freethinkers group because it wasn’t “faithbased.”
c Weida conjured a yell based on a Christian parable of two men who built houses on rock and sand, the house on rock, symbolizing Jesus Christ, being the stronger one.
Weida would yell, “Air power,” to which cadets were told to respond, “Rock, sir.”
Weida told a group of cadets the routine would prompt other cadets to ask about its meaning, “which would open an opportunity for the Christian cadets to discuss their faith with other cadets,” the complaint said.
Such complaints aren’t new to Mark Silverstein, the American Civil Liberties Union legal director in Colorado.
He’s received a half-dozen calls in recent years from cadets and staffers who say the academy advocates Christianity. Silverstein said they describe “exactly what the Constitution forbids — government establishment of religion.”