Revelations of secret waiting lists at VA hospitals and veterans’ struggles to get medical care have received national attention in recent weeks. This scandal, however, is just the highest-profile example of the consequences of government encroaching further into our lives. In Iron Mountain, Michigan, VA officials cloistered images of Jesus, Mary, a crucifix and altar behind a curtain to make a formerly Christian chapel more religiously “neutral.”
These Christian images were not in the public areas of the VA facility. They were contained in a chapel, specifically designed for those veterans or family members who wished to reflect or pray in the manner of their choosing. The VA itself has a “National Chaplain Center,” whose mission is to address the spiritual needs of veterans. The existence of a non-non-demoninational Christian chapel within a VA facility certainly seems a function of this mission.
Congressman Dan Beneshik, who represents Iron Mountain in Congress and, as a doctor, often treated patients at the VA facility said in a statement to Breitbart News:
In all my years as a surgeon at the IM VA facility I met with many families in the chapel. I never once asked anyone’s religion and I never heard a family member complain about the religious symbols in the chapel. They and I were only concerned about their loved ones and that is who this administration should be concerned with.
This Is an outrageous example of wrong priorities and political correctness from the Obama administration. Veterans across the country are dying and the VA is more concerned with spending time and money covering up Christian symbols in chapels. Our veterans deserve better.
A resident of Iron Mountain, Patsy Norton, recounted a conversation she had with a chaplain at the facility in a recent letter-to-the-editor:
I found Chaplain Bob Mueller, to ask what the meaning was of this change. This is what he told me.
“A couple of months ago, an order came down from Washington DC to cover all things associated with Christianity in the VA. Their solution is to cover everything in all the VA Chapels across the country.”
The old adage says, “he who pays the piper, calls the tune.” Something to keep in mind as we relinquish more of our daily lives to government.
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