{"id":547071,"date":"2026-03-26T20:35:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:35:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/547071\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T20:35:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:35:16","slug":"hegseth-prays-at-pentagon-service-for-overwhelming-violence-against-enemies-us-military","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/547071\/","title":{"rendered":"Hegseth prays at Pentagon service for \u2018overwhelming violence\u2019 against enemies | US military"},"content":{"rendered":"

The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth<\/a>, prayed during a religious service at the Pentagon that there be \u201coverwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Christian worship service, held on Wednesday before military and civilian workers at the Pentagon, was Hegseth\u2019s first since the Iran war began, the Associated Press reported.<\/p>\n

Hegseth called for violence during a prayer he said originated from a military chaplain and was given to troops after Nicol\u00e1s Maduro, the president of Venezuela, was captured by the US, the AP said.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation,\u201d Hegseth said in the prayer service. \u201cGive them wisdom in every decision, endurance for the trial ahead, unbreakable unity, and overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The remarks came a day after Hegseth announced changes to the military\u2019s chaplain corps, which he said in a video message had been \u201cinfected by political correctness and secular humanism\u201d until they were \u201cwatered down\u201d to be \u201cnothing more than therapists\u201d who focused more on \u201cself-help and self-care\u201d than faith or virtue.<\/p>\n

The chaplain corps would have its religious affiliation codes reduced from about 200 different faith codes down to 31 codes, he said. The chaplains would also no longer wear their officer rank insignia on their uniforms, but instead their religious insignia. The changes were in pursuit of \u201cmaking the chaplain corps great again\u201d, he said.<\/p>\n

Hegseth instituted monthly prayer sessions at the Pentagon during his tenure, though all of the prayer meetings have been presided over by evangelicals, the AP reported.<\/p>\n

Hegseth is member of a church affiliated with the Congregation of Reformed Evangelical Churches, founded by Doug Wilson, who self-identifies as a Christian nationalist and has himself led a session<\/a> of the prayer service at the Pentagon.<\/p>\n

Hegseth\u2019s insertion of his Christian faith into his role has drawn criticism and legal complaints. Hegseth\u2019s comments on the Iran war have included religious context \u2013 he said in a TV interview that the US was \u201cfighting religious fanatics who seek a nuclear capability in order for some religious Armageddon\u201d.<\/p>\n

Military veterans previously told the Guardian<\/a> that Hegseth\u2019s use of religion in the department was causing division and could weaken the military.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re gonna see a lot of Christian nationalists join the military,\u201d Kristofer Goldsmith, an Iraq war veteran and the CEO of non-profit watchdog Task Force Butler<\/a>, told the Guardian last year. \u201cThey\u2019re not gonna perform very well, and our national security will suffer for a generation for it, because those that don\u2019t wash out will be toxic leaders.\u201d<\/p>\n

Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed lawsuits<\/a> against the defense and labor departments this week to access public records about prayer services at the departments, including invited speakers, recordings of prayers and any complaints from employees about the services. The records will help the organization understand whether the departments are staying neutral on religion and respecting workers\u2019 religious freedom, the group said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe federal government\u2019s role is to serve the public, not to proselytize,\u201d Americans United President and CEO Rachel Laser said in a statement. \u201cEven if these prayer services are presented as voluntary, there is pressure on federal employees to attend in order to appease their bosses \u2013 especially since these services occur amidst the Trump administration\u2019s campaign to punish anyone who doesn\u2019t comply with its Christian Nationalist agenda.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"IranIran says Trump \u2018negotiating with himself\u2019: what next for war? – The Latest<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, prayed during a religious service at the Pentagon that there be \u201coverwhelming violence…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":547072,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-547071","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547071","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=547071"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547071\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/547072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=547071"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=547071"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=547071"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}