A New Book Documents Hate Mail Sent by Christians to Military-Focused Church/State Separation Group

If you live in Los Angeles, keep an eye out for this mobile billboard around town beginning today:

That provocative billboard is part of an advertising campaign for a forthcoming book by Bonnie Weinstein, co-founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, called To the Far Right Christian Hater… You Can Be a Good Speller or a Hater, But You Can’t Be Both (Rare Bird Books, 2014). (The generous subtitle is: Official Hate Mail, Threats, and Criticism from the Archives of the Six-Time Nobel Peace Prize-Nominated Military Religious Freedom Foundation.)

It’s a compilation of hate mail that has been directed at the group and the author’s husband Mikey Weinstein over the years.

In the excerpt below, Bonnie documents the kinds of letters MRFF receives and how they affect her personally:

My name is Bonnie Weinstein, and I am married to a force of nature.

About forty years ago now, when I was sixteen, my decision to go up to the United States Air Force Academy to meet “real men” set me on a collision course with my future — one that I would never trade away, even though it so often leaves me shaking my head with disbelief and astonishment at the absolute shock of it all.

Kierkegaard has a saying: “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” While I admit that I tend to understand myself better the more I move forward in life, I have found that I understand nobody better — both forward and backward — than my darling husband. It saddens me, however, to know that, without a doubt, there is no amount of living through this maelstrom of hate and viciousness — all in the name of a benevolent God — that will ever let me come to understand the men and women who write the hideous letters presented here. This book is but a TINY sampling of the thousands we have received, with more coming in on a daily basis. I have chosen to publish this body of gutter-level trash to try and shed some light on the people they affect — myself and those closest to me.

In 2005, my husband and I started the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), and in the ensuing decade it has taken an extreme amount of intestinal fortitude to stay the course. We fight against those who, at worst, seem hell-bent on dismantling our Constitution, and at best, seem to have little idea of what they are talking about. These authors, and I use that term very loosely, seem to have never made it past a third grade intelligence level both in erudition and education. Simple people skills, which kids learn in kindergarten — such as learning to play well, getting along with people, and understanding that not everyone thinks the same way you do — have sadly eluded them altogether.

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