TITLE: Christians and the U.S. Military By gene hudgens 06/25/07 |
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Christians and the U.S. Military
Submitted by Gene Hudgens
When was the last time you stopped and really thought about your American military personnel? It is our military you know. Most of the approximately 3,000,000 members of the U.S. Armed Forces are Christians.
Are you aware that only about one percent of the U.S. population serves in U.S. Armed Forces? No other Americans sacrifice like your military personnel do to preserve and protect America. Most Americans do absolute nothing for the security of America. Do you realize that our military is an all volunteer force averaging from age 17 to 45, and that these volunteers, for the most part, come from the lower income and less educated sector of our society?
Do you really realize that only one percent of our total population is making the greatest sacrifices to insure that the other 99 percent has a safe and secure life in a free society? Because this is an all volunteer force, there are few if any family members of politicians, wealthy people, or cowards serving in the military. Why should they? They can enjoy their lives of leisure while others sacrifice and do the work for them. There is no military draft to insure that American citizens from every sector of our society do their fair share to protect America.
It is a fact that the U.S. Army Forces is the only occupation or profession in America that demands that all of its employees sign a contract agreeing to give their life for their country, to accept the possibility of loss of limbs and permanent disability in the line of duty, and to endure the hardships and separation from family. No other occupation or profession demands this. Police and fireman are expected to face dangers in their employment, but they can quit or refuse at any moment...and only lose their jobs. A military person can go to prison for refusing to follow orders.
For this reason the U.S. Armed Forces should be one of the highest paid professions in America, but instead many members endure a food stamp salary. Yes, the military pay is too little and unjust because we Christians, who are voters and the majority…allow this to exist.
The cost of the U.S. Armed Forces is about 3.7% of the U.S. GDP (Gross Domestic Product)…and politicians scream that the nation can not afford to pay veterans their earned retirement pay and their earned disability pay. The politicians send our young men and women to war, but when these men and women get injured or disabled the politicians scream about the expenses to care for them. If America had the DRAFT and some of our unsopiscated and uncaring politicians had family members in war and getting injured…they would quickly change their tune. But they don’t, so they don’t relate.
During WWII the American people and the politicians found the war costing about 38% of the GNP; yet America survived.
One scary thing about this big picture (not wanting to adequately care for our military members and veterans) is that…”a straw can break the camel’s back”. The young men and women in America may just get enough of this hostel non-sense political bull and stop volunteering for the military. Perhaps the high unemployment and poor job opportunties are a political gimic.
Presently there are about 16,000 military members with serious injuries from Iraq. Twenty percent of them have serious brain or spinal injuries that will require life-long care. The numbers are expected to double by 2010. These individuals can easily have medical bills that will run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars…perhaps even over a million in a life time. Recently an article showed an uncaring politician introducing a bill to offer wounded military members a $50,000 lump-sum cash payment in lieu of any future medical bills being paid by the government. Many of the military volunteers are from low income families and with less formal education than the politicians…and just might ignorantly grab the $50,000 with out thinking of the future. For any politician to ever try to take advantage of a wounded military person is a sin and is criminal.
Many of these politicians profess ti be Christians. Is this Christian?
A peace-time military is expensive and a war-time military is naturally more expensive. That is a fact of life. There will be medical expenses, disability expenses, and death benefits expenses. All of these expenses are bills due...and must be paid.
I sincerely pray that all Christians will realize that the survival of our nation depends on immediate action to insure that young men and women continue to volunteer to serve in our military.
All Christians need to act on this issue. Talking and quoting scriptures will not get the job done.
I urge all fellow Christians to strongly support the return of the military DRAFT, so that every citizen will be eligible to participate in the security of our nation.
I strongly urge all Christians to pressure their representatives in Congress to separate the expenses relating to active military personnel and veterans from the expenses of tanks and bombs etc. This will simplify and clarify the present confusing program-budgets and accountability. Hopefully this could eliminate the present illegal manipulation of millions and billions of tax payer’s dollars by unsopiscated politicians.
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