Common Dreams reports that Veterans for Common Sense (VCS) and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) are demanding an investigation of Daniel Cooper, President George W. Bush’s undersecretary for benefits at the Department of Veterans Affairs. Cooper made an appearance in a fundraising video for the evangelical group Christian Embassy, which carries out missionary work among the Washington elite.

VCS and the MRFF are arguing that Cooper violated the First Amendment by advocating a particular religion while on the job. They also believe Cooper violated ethics rules that prohibit government officials from using their name, picture, or title for proselytizing or fundraising.

In the video, Cooper says of his Bible study,

It’s not really about carving out time, it really is a matter of saying what is important. And since that’s more important than doing the job—the job’s going to be there, whether I’m there or not.

“We’re very concerned about this because hundreds of thousands of veterans are waiting for their benefits while Cooper himself says that promoting his religion is more important than helping the veterans,” Veterans for Common Sense’s Paul Sullivan told IPS.

Sullivan’s right. Even if Cooper had made the video on his own time (which he didn’t) he’s still endorsing a particular religion from an official position of authority. Given the military’s propensity toward proselytizing (see the latest Humanist magazine, or the LA Times, “Not So Fast, Christian Soldiers”), this appears to be just the latest violation of church and state therein. Cooper needs to be letting veterans know they are his number-one priority, not that he’ll amble off to pray since the job will still be there. We as Humanists need to support groups like Veterans for Common Sense and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation that bring issues like this to light. We also need to be sure this isn’t skewed as an argument about Cooper’s right to pray, because it isn’t about that at all. He has every right to pray, just not when he is supposed to be working on the taxpayers’ dime to get veterans their benefits.