Hegseth’s religious codes mirror the CCP’s classification of religions

The Ruling Parties in the US and China use state power to regulate religion to serve Party interests

Secretary of War Defense Pete Hegseth’s changes to the military’s religious affiliation codes, on one level, suggest incompetence: listing Orthodox Judaism under “Christian-Orthodox” and Reform Judaism under “Christian-Reformed.”

And the perniciously controversial: listing the LDS Church as separate from Christian. This sent Utah Senator and Hegseth-confirmer Mike Lee into a righteous tizzy, giving himself a “Member of the Leopards Eating Mormon Faces Party shocked to find a leopard eating his Mormon face” moment.

But there is a deeper, more ideological, more ominous matter here. The Ruling Party in the U.S. is using the regulatory power of the government to classify religions in a way that shapes religion to serve the Ruling Party’s ideology. This is what we see in Communist Party-run China. And now we are seeing the same in America.

The story, first reported in military.com, is that the Pentagon reformed its religious affiliation codes for the first time since 2017, reducing the total number of faiths from 211 to 31. Soooo, why does any part of the federal government maintain a list of religions? Good question. There is a logic. Military chaplains exist for a reason: the need for servicemembers -- given the nature of their business – to have access to spiritual counseling. Chaplains serve people with a wide diversity of faiths (and non-faiths). They need to understand them. The immense bureaucracy that it is, the Pentagon creates codes to guide chaplains.

At first glance, DOD’s reason given for the change seems administratively benign: to “streamline the DoW (sic) collection of religious preferences collection for service members to enhance the delivery of targeted religious support from the Chaplaincy.” But dig a little, and we see its perniciousness.

As Sarah Posner, a chronicler of the Christian Right, explains, Hegseth’s snub of Mormonism is consistent with his personal religious agenda. She explains that Hegseth is is a devotee of “Christian nationalist Doug Wilson who has written that ‘Mormonism is not Christian’ and is ‘a false gospel,’” and concurred that there is a “‘disturbing trend’ of Mormon chaplains in the Corps.”

After Mormon politicians objected, the Pentagon posted an odd revision of the list. But it’s still highly exclusionary. No Wicca, no Unitarian Universalists, no pagan, no atheist, no shaman, etc. DOD says it’s merely trying to make things more efficient for chaplains, rather than make a government-approved list of religions. But in effect, that’s exactly what it’s doing. And this is where the China parallel comes in.

In the People’s Republic of China, there are only five religions officially recognized by the state: Buddhism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Taoism and Islam. They are organized into national associations under the control of the State Administration for Religious Affairs.

The Chinese system defines in-groups and out-groups in terms of religion. You can practice as a Catholic, as long as you obey the rules. You an in-group. But if the government considers your faith community an out-group, you are not protected. An example is the recent arrest of Pastor Ezra Jin and others of the Zion Church.

In effect, the Pentagon’s system also defines in-groups and out-groups. The government is categorizing certain “popular” religions as in-groups. They are allowed to have official resources (chaplain services) directed their way. But by cutting down the list, Hegseth is affirmatively designating some faiths as out-groups, not worthy of official acknowledgement. As in China.

I can hear my critics. They will say that the scale, scope and severity of Hegseth’s action is nothing like what the CCP is doing to religion in China. This is true. But this doesn’t mean that the Pentagon’s policy is not contributing to a weakening of religious freedom in the United States, contrary to the First Amendment and international human rights law. In my experience, the scale-scope-severity test has become a go-to weapon for conservatives to cover up or excuse domestic human rights violations.

We have to look at the religious code change in context. Secretary Hegseth has hosted Christian-based prayer services in the Pentagon auditorium with controversial speakers like Wilson. His public statements on ongoing military operation in Iran invoke Scripture. Hegseth’s push to priotitize “religious liberty” and practice in the military by executing a “top-down cultural shift, putting spiritual well-being on the same footing as physical and mental health” (emphasis mine) is seen as part of an effort to push Christian Nationalism through the military.

In turn, this is part of a larger program by the Trump Administration and its allies to use the power of the state to endorse their particular version of Christianity. Under the deceptive guise of “religious liberty,” they are actively tearing down the Constitutionally-established wall between church and state.

This is why I think the China analogy is apt. Under the Community Party’s “Sinicization of religion policy,” Chinese authorities have employed regulations to determine which religious communities are favored and disfavored, and “eradicate religious elements considered contradictory to the CCP’s political and policy agenda with ultranationalist overtones.”

That’s what Hegseth and his Ruling Party are doing too: employing regulations to determine which religious communities are favored and disfavored, and marginalize religious elements considered contradictory to the GOP’s political and policy agenda with ultranationalist overtones.

Here we see the behavioral similarity between the Communist Party and Republican Party: the use of state power to shape religion to suit its ideology and thus help cement its political control.

The reason to make these parallels is not merely academic. If we want our criticism of China’s religious freedom violations to be taken seriously, and to lead to change, we undermine our case if our own government is doing the same thing. If we want to protect religious freedom at home – in the genuine not duplicitous way – then we must hope to convince those who have advocated for the religious freedom of people in China to understand what is happening at home and to also advocate for the religious freedom of people in the United States.

P.S. If you want a good laugh, check Cosplayer-in-Chief and Manosphere Evangelist Pete Hegseth struggling to meet the military’s fitness standards.